You see how that rhymes? Cool, no?

*is chuffed with self*
What? My titles rarely have catchy names. :P

So I purchased from both Jenni's and Ann's blog sales (like, within a day of each other) and the items came on like the same day. It was well cool. I felt like a beast.
I think Jenni's is still going on, so do check it out. She had 58 polishes up for grabs, so I'm pretty sure there's something for everyone. Prices are very reasonable!

Look at the gorgeous polishes!

Essie "Bermuda Shorts", American Apparel "Hunter" and "Passport Blue".

Thanks sooo much Jenni, much appreciated :)

I also got two NYX Jumbo Pencils (Milk and Black Bean) from Ann's sale.


Thanks Ann! Again, appreciate it lots :)

And yes, I am wearing Essie "Bermuda Shorts" in that picture. Couldn't wait :P I've had it as a full manicure for two days now, it's glorious. Glorious. Wonderous. Magnificent. Insert superlative of choice, ad nauseum. It's so good I want to track down the rest of this collection.

Await swatches. *salute*

If you've got a minute, would you mind popping over here and giving me a quick vote? The contest ends on the 20th! :) Which is like, today. So if you could get a last minute vote in, I'd be really grateful!

What gems have you picked up from blog sales?

Some of you guys might remember this post, in which I reviewed BeautyUK's Metallic Eye Sparks and claimed it was the full range. Well, the replacements for my broken sparks arrived not too long ago (kindly sent by the lovely people at BeautyUK, who were very VERY generous - you'll see in a little while!) and I realised that there was actually a sixth colour in the range, a bronze shade.

*sits with egg on face*

...yeah. Naturally, I had to reswatch all of them and add the bronze one into the collection! Otherwise, it'd feel lonely. Below I've got some words from my original review.
I really have to purchase some more BeautyUK products past the nail polishes and the eye pencils. I've got my eye on their bright eyeshadow palette.

I love this bronze shade, it's a great highlighter on black girls like myself and looks way less harsh than white near the eye. BeautyUK seem to think of everyone with their products, which is nice.

These are easy to sharpen with the correct sharpener. I’ve sharpened the silver since it’s last outing. It now works well but the formulation is a lot softer than the other four colours – it’s easy to apply too much. Shame, because it looks really good on the eyelid.

*Scheduled Post*


At least, it's the complete range according to the website, which is kinda sparse. There are a few more colours of the Metallic Eye Pencils instore (Khaki and Brown, anyone?) than are shown on the website. It might be the same for these, too.

Anyway, I picked these up with my £5 off voucher (the 3 for 2 on No7 Cosmetics is ending on Tuesday the 29th, by the way - just a heads up) and I really like them. Though the colour range is a little dull, they do go the distance and the smudger on the end is a quaint touch.
I like the fact that these are gold. It makes the packaging feel luxe, solid in your hand.

I'm not seeing a huge amount of difference between Blue-Grey and Brown, here. On my hand they look rather similar. Perhaps it would be different for someone with lighter skin?
The plastic surround is cute, though I do prefer the bog standard wooden pencil type eyeliners. Those seem to be getting rarer these days, no idea why. Consumer preference, I guess?
The black applied a little too softly for my tastes. In fact, as I was picking it up, I accidentally dropped it (from a very, very low height) onto the rug, and a smudge of black was left on the rug. Which is cream. Nice one, Lena! :P I think it was because it was slightly warm, though, as the next time I used it it was a lot harder. The other two pencils were on the harder side of soft, not creamy, but depositing good colour. The smudger on the end allows for an easy smoky eye, if you're that way inclined.

These held up really well to the water test, I was impressed!

All in all, I do quite like these. They're student friendly once you've got one of the No7 vouchers in your hand - at full price, they cost £7.75. I'm not sure if I would pay full price for these...the colour range is too limited, for me.

So creamy! Wonder what my teachers would think if I submitted my coursework written in gold eye pencil...

I purchased these during their £5 off voucher promotion thing that they do at least four times a year. One wonders how they make any money but whatever.



Above and below are "Blackest". When I saw the name in store, I thought it was going to be a plain, jet black eyeliner, but it actually has noticable glitter in it, which would make this unsuitable for the waterline. I find Blackest in particular intensely creamy, perhaps even more so than Zero (Urban Decay). It makes for a really intense, black line, but not particularly precise. I imagine that these would require refrigeration before one attempted to sharpen them, they're that soft.



This is "Purple". On my hand, it looks fine, but I find it just looks like blah once on my eyelid. It would make for a softer look than black, so appropriate for school makeup looks as it's less obvious than jet black liner.



This has hints of glitter too, but it's a lot smaller than the glitter contained within "Blackest" and it's predominately red, pink and green. The glitter in "Blackest" is mostly silver, with some flashes of red and green.



One thing I'm really happy about is that once you've given these liners a minute or so to dry down, they refuse. to. budge. No more finding half your eyeliner in your tear duct by lunchtime, no more smudges etc. They're pretty much bulletproof. I've been rubbing the swatch on my hand constantly and it's not moving. Nice.



I dig these liners, even at the full price of £7.75. I personally think that they're worth the money!

 Since it's basically the beginning of the year, I'll keep these short.

Fyrinnae's Pixie Epoxy

I love this product. It makes eyeshadow a lot more vibrant and last for a lot longer. I can't see it running out any time soon, you get a really decent amount of product for the price. Great product.

Urban Decay 24/7 Eyeliner in "Zero"

I ration my use of this, because it's so soft it's easy to use too much, but it really does stay on until you want to take it off. It's seriously black and doesn't tug or anything along the lash line.

Seche Restore

A life saver for those grim, seized up polishes. Seriously pricey though. I was lucky to get it for a Christmas present, but you don't need to use a lot of product so again this should last me a long, long time. I use a couple of drops at most for the average bottle.

eBay Nail Art Brushes

This was one of the best finds so far! A cheap set of nail art brushes that don't fall apart the moment you take them out of the packet and that do the job properly. What more could you ask for?

I switched it up slightly this time around as I didn't have any products I really /adored/. So. Above is the Palmer's Cocoa Butter cream, which I'll probably repurchase as it's quite good.
 Random eye/lip liner pencil I got off my mum. It's not very black and barely hangs around on my eyes past lunchtime :(
 MUA eyeshadow in Shade 13. Technically, this broke and I haven't actually /finished/ it, so I'll keep using it until I buy a new one. Don't ask me how it broke because I don't know. I took it out of my makeup box one day and there it was in all it's destroyed beauty. Ah well, it was only a pound.
This finished pretty quickly - there doesn't seem to be much product in the tube. For some reason it stung when I put it on my upper lip? Don't know what that was about. I don't think I'll repurchase, anyway. I have my eye on those little orby thingies that the American blogosphere is going crazy over :P

Any disappointments this past month for you guys? Any unexpectedly good products?

dislcaimer: This is too late to be real life.


So these four items are the ones that I either reached for the most often or enjoyed loads when using them.

Number One - Sally Hansen's Insta-Dri Anti Chip Top Coat (red bottle). I don't actually think this does anything, chip wise, but you have no idea how good it is not to have to wait around for your nails to dry before you know, moving. Godsend. GODSEND. I've got through almost half the bottle already *guilty*. Plus it makes your varnish look nice and shiny!

Number Two - random generic glitter topcoat that is packed. full. of. glitter. It's so good for when you've been wearing a manicure for a while and you want to switch it up a bit. I love it over dark colours, the glitter looks like stars.

Number Three - MUA Eyeshadow Shade 13. It's a lovely, gorgeous dark purple and it's so easy to use/soft/awesome. Only I have no idea what I did to it but a couple of nights ago I took it out of it's box to find it pretty much destroyed! So I'm using what I can of it for now but next time that I'm in town I'll have to get a new one. I don't mind too much as it's only a pound, though.

Number Four - last but definately not least, Primark's Eye Kohl. This was a pound, and came in a bag with another orange coloured pencil and a sharpener. It's so soft and dreamy and opaque and....yes. Nice one Primark, nice one.

So those were my four favourite things for August. What about you guys? Let us know ;)

This is the last part of my Primark abuse. These are a hell of a lot better than I expected them to be.

The packaging is a tad American Apparel-esque. I like the fact that it comes with a sharpener, though. You get two pencils for a pound and there are lots of colours. I didn't see a plain black one but if they had one, I'd take it easily.
Gotta love the pigmentation on these babies. This was one swipe on a seriously hot summer's day, yet they showed ZERO signs of melting, unlike the Poundland ones. They're just the right amount of soft as to not hurt your eyelid but they are easy to sharpen and don't melt into nothing at the slightest sign of heat. I haven't tested wear yet but these took a bit of effor to get off my hand so I'm hoping it'll be good. All in all, another great buy from Primark!