Saturday 16 April 2016

Spring Brights - Cruelty Free Eye Make-Up

Even though it looks as if the weather hasn't got the memo, it is technically spring. I almost always wear a neutral eye so I really wanted to try something different. When it comes to our looks, in many ways my sister and I are chalk and cheese. In fact, other than our shared dark, curly hair, we hardly resemble each other at all. I thought I'd abuse this difference by trying out a bright spring eye makeup look on us both, to show how the same makeup can look different in different complexions/eye colours.


All the colours in this look I have taken from the elf Brights palette. We both did our base, brows, lips, and cheeks with our own products. Already, even with our eyes shut, you can see how different this makeup looks on our different complexions. 


I used the shimmering orange colour (3rd down, 3rd in) for the inner 3/4 of the lid and the shimmering mint (3rd up, 3rd in) for the outer 1/4. In the very outer corner and the crease I blended the teal (3rd row down, 2nd in) to create a little dimension.

 
This eyes open picture really shows how the green elements of the look complement my sister's baby blues. You can only see the hint of teal over her lid but it makes her eyes really pop!


I think the orange looks a lot darker on my lid than on my sisters. I have a lot of orange in my skin tone, so the orange is emphasised on the lid.


We had a lot of fun with this look - it's certainly not everyday but I think it would be lovely for a warm spring afternoon party! Let me know if you try it out!

Tuesday 5 April 2016

March Wrap-Up

March was quite the month for me - one I'll remember for the rest of my life. I'll get into the watery-eyed 'holiday of a lifetime' stuff after I've had a look back at the books I read in March!

Books



The first book I read was The Martian by Andy Weir. I watched the film at the end of February and loved it, so I thought I'd give the book a go too. It was just as hilarious as the film and I'd really recommend it!

The next book I finished was Modern Romance: An Investigation by Aziz Ansari. I love Aziz, both his stand up and as Tom in Parks and Rec and I picked this up after Leena (I think) talked about it in a video. This book is non-fiction and my poor friends had to put up with me reading them interesting facts the whole time! I really enjoyed this book and though it was an incredibly interesting examination of modern culture and heterosexual romance within that.

The third book I finished in March was a re-read of We Were Liars by E. Lockhart. The first time I read this was two summers ago whilst on holiday in Austria and I've been dying to re-read it ever since. It was almost as enjoyable the second time around (knowing the twist made it somewhat less of a thrill but I still appreciated the writing).


The final book I read this month was Very Good Lives, a transcript of JK Rowlings address to Harvard graduates. It's very short, about 70 pages, but beautifully illustrated and very inspiring.

Films

The flights to and from South Africa were 10 hours, so I watched a lot of films! I watched The Program (excellent) and Burnt (surprisingly good), but my favourite was Steve Jobs. I wasn't sure if I was going to enjoy it but I loved it! It's almost all in real time which made it completely compelling and both Kate Winslet and Michael Fassbender were excellent.

South Africa

As I've mentioned, the majority of March was taken up with my trip to South Africa. I went with two of my very best friends and I can't even begin to express how difficult it is going from spending every moment with people you love for three weeks in a beautiful country to coming back to cold England and work. I miss everything about the trip and it has taken me a very long time to readjust to normal life. I'm going to write a full post about SA in a couple of weeks when it doesn't make me so sad, but suffice to say I really recommend going!