Crave & Covet #4: The Too Faced Edition

My original plan had been to get this up long before my actual birthday, so that, y'know, any parental figures looking to get me a gift but feeling relatively stumped would have some guidance. Like a snail, however, I failed. My birthday has come and gone just like that -- but is that any reason to abandon a wishlist? Hell no!

Too Faced is a brand that I adore looking at, so it only felt appropriate that a number of its items would make their way onto a Crave & Covet post.

So what exactly does my heart desire? Which items makes my bank account shriek in horror?

The Little Black Book of Bronzers || This looks like a really great way to try out the massive number of Too Faced bronzers out there, even if the packaging does seem like it could become a little iffy over time.

Melted Long-Wearing Lipstick || I wasn't really too drawn in by these when I first found out about them, but since then Too Faced has come out with a number of shades that make my heart sing to look at! Which shades especially? Why, the pink and red ones! Melted Marshmallow, Melted Candy, Melted Strawberry, Melted Jelly Donut, Melted Velvet... Heck, sometimes I feel like even Melted Villain would look good.

Melted Metal Lipstick || A little different in formulation, these lipsticks all look really nice, and I don't think there isn't a shade that I wouldn't try out.

Semi-Sweet Chocolate Bar Eyeshadow Palette || This made its Crave & Covet debut here, but here it is, making a return -- especially as I haven't got it yet! It's definitely on my priority hit list, especially after I had a bit of a swatch with the shadows in-store at Kit Cosmetics recently. Love them!

Natural Matte Eyeshadow Collection || I know, I know -- I have a thousand and one eye shadow palettes, but I actually think that this would make a fantastic staple to my collection. I've heard that the quality is especially good, and its size means that it would also be fantastic for travelling.

Sugar Pop Eyeshadow Collection || Deliciously colourful colours, most of which have been said to be quite reliable in terms of quality. Why the hell not? It's a wishlist, my friends, an excessive number of eye shadow palettes is a must.

Candlelight Glow Highlighting Powder Duo || I've been trying to increase my highlighting techniques of late (see also: I've been bothered enough to highlight lately), and this looks like it'd be a really fun, versatile product to play about with!

Soul Mates Blushing Bronzer - "Ross and Rachel" || As a Friends fan and a lover of Ross & Rachel, there's no way this wouldn't make it onto here! I don't think that the blush component would be of much use, because it's just so small, but the bronzer actually seems like a great colour to have to depart from my usual.

Hangover Replenishing Face Primer || I've heard this primer be hailed as one of the all-time greats, and I'm eager to get my hands on it, especially as I'm just about to run out of my Hourglass primer! I don't drink, but my skin certainly has the ability to look like it's gone to Mordor and back, so it'd be fantastic to see what this is like.

This has been quite the fun Crave & Covet list to lust over, and I really hope to be able to add these items to my makeup collection, one piece at a time.

Do you have any of them in yours? Which of these catches your eye the most? Let me know in the comments below!

Shae xo

You're It! The Summer Tag

Hello, people of the internet!

I was tagged by the absolutely gorgeous Emma of Peace Love Vintage to complete The Summer Tag quite recently -- and everybody knows that I love tag posts! Of course, being in Australia, we've just hit winter (and, to the apparent surprise of many, it does get really cold), so I had originally planned to tweak the questions to make them about my current season.

Rarotonga, Cook Islands. Photo by me.

I then read the questions and thought, 'Do I really need to change these?' I decided I didn't. After all, why not warm myself with a remembrance of days that were much hotter?

Without further ado, here are Emma's questions!

1. What's your favourite thing about summer?

So here's the thing. I hate the Australian summer -- and I love hating it. I complain about the hot weather every year, without fail, and I never actually realised how much I enjoyed doing so until we had the coldest summer I can ever recall. The summer of 2014/2015 was an utter disappointment. We had perhaps a week or two of blisteringly hot weather, and the rest of the time... It was cold and/or rainy. I was heartbroken.

For real, the only good thing about summer are the following: ice cream, air conditioning, the cricket and the clothes being dry in ten minutes.

2. Do you have a favourite summer drink?

I'd say iced tea. It's a drink that I'll have all year round, but there's nothing like a nice cold glass of iced tea when the sun's coming down so hard that eggs cook in their shells on the walk home from the supermarket.

3. Is there a special place you like to visit each summer?

When I was younger, it used to be my grandparents' house. I would go and stay there for two weeks every summer and I loved it. Now I just enjoy being at home.

4. What's your favourite makeup look for summer?

I love anything that means I can use colour. Reds, pinks, oranges, yellow... Hell, I'll take the whole Skittles rainbow and put it on my face if I can! I might switch out foundation for a BB cream, but yeah, otherwise it's all about colour.

5. Dresses or skirts?

I was all about short skirts when I was younger, but I've put on a stack of weight in recent years (it must be said!), so I go for dresses now. I have one long maxi dress that I bought last year that was a smashing staple for me, otherwise I go for dresses that allow room in the hips.

6. Festivals or vacations?

I say holidays, all the way. I'm not really a festival kind of girl.

7. What's your signature summer hairstyle?

I don't know that I really have one! I think I'm more prone to using heat to style it, because I'm on holiday and I have more time. I really got into basic, Level 1-style braiding last summer.

8. What's your signature summer scent?

Some light and floral. My favourite is Gwen Stefani's G in the Sea, but my bottle is practically empty, so I wore a lot of Intimately Beckham instead.

9. Favourite music for summer?

It's whatever I'm listening to at the time -- I've had summers where I've listened to upbeat tracks (especially if I'm alone -- my laptop volume gets cranked up loud!) and I've had summers where I've listened to artists who are more morose. Last summer I think I leaned towards morose. A lot of Florence + The Machine got played.

10. Pool or beach?

I'm not a huge fan of either if there's the option of staying indoors, but I might go with a pool because you kind of know where you stand with them. You know there aren't any nasty hidden creatures, you don't have to worry about your things getting nicked or there being sand everywhere... That being said, however, I've kind of wanted to visit a beach the last few summers, if just to remind myself why I avoid them.

11. BBQ or seafood?

A BBQ, man, hands down! Nothing beats the smell of a summer barbecue, especially when you've got family over and everybody's laughing and chatting, and the little ones are arguing about who gets to sit next to whom.

Rarotonga, Cook Islands. Photo by me.

That's it for me, but I'd love to nominate the following to also complete this tag!

1. Danielle || Confessions of a Beauty School Dropout
2. Charlotte || Vanity Fairest
3. Carmen || Paint, Powder and Polish

If you're not on this list but want to complete the tag anyway, do so and link me to your post -- I'd love to read it!

Shae xo

Product Review: L'Oreal Paris Collection Exclusive Nudes

The limited edition celebrity nude lipsticks from L'Oreal Paris were a highly coveted collection that seemed to empty out as soon as it came in. It's been around for a while, and although it's somewhat hard to locate, it's still out there if you're willing to go around and try a variety of Pricelines and Big Ws -- they are around, but with newer limited edition collections on the release, they might be stashed in a little corner somewhere.

The idea behind it is great: that every woman can have a flattering nude lipstick based around their skin tone. Australia's version of the collection saw L'Oreal Paris team up with five celebrity spokeswomen -- some countries feature a sixth -- to create a stunning line-up of nude lipsticks. Despite the idea that it's not meant to be a one-lady-suits-all, I was determined to get my paws on all of them, and figure out a way to make them work.

Let's take a closer look!

L to R: Frieda's Nude, Doutzen's Nude, Julianne's Nude

L to R: Julianne's Nude, Eva's Nude

L to R: Eva's Nude, JLo's Nude

In sleek, matte black packaging, the Collection Exclusive Nudes really adds a sophisticated feel to your lipstick collection; it reminds me a little of the kind of lipsticks I would see in my mother's collection when I was young -- quite grown up! The Colour Riche logo is on top of the slanted lid, making them easily identifiable, the front is adorned with the signature of each shade's appropriate celebrity in a yellowy gold, and the bullet itself is embossed with the brand name.

The lipsticks vary in opacity. Some will seem rather sheer at first, but can be built up somewhat to show more colours. Some don't seem to build in colour on me no matter how thick I try to layer it, and others don't really need any layering at all.

L'Oreal Paris Collection Exclusive Nudes - swatches

Frieda's Nude (Mauve Tint) || The first of the collection that I ever bought. I was actually quite concerned that it would look terrible but I actually find that it matches my lip colour really, really well! Winter or summer, I find that it works all year round.


Wearing Frieda's Nude

Doutzen's Nude (Hint of Pink) || This can sometimes be a bit of a miss for me -- it's the sheerest of all the shades, and has a tendency to look like a milky white pink. It's better suited to my skin in the colder months, when my skin looks as pale as Jon Snow's.


Wearing Doutzen's Nude

Julianne's Nude (Rosewood Beige) || As a lover of pink lipsticks and Julianne Moore, I was after this one the most. It's a beautiful natural pink that suits my MAC NW20 skin tone all year around, come rain or shine. What's great about this particular shade is that you can either keep it sheer or build it up for a fuller pink lip.


Wearing Julianne's Nude

Eva's Nude (Peach Skin) || I was very curious about this, because based on everything I'd read, it was meant to be the shade that suited my skin tone best. For a peachy nude, it does really look quite nice, being natural without washing out my skin. It's probably best that I keep it for the summer months, however, as warm-toned lipsticks tend to make my skin look more orange in the winter.


Wearing Eva's Nude

JLo's Nude (Greige Glow) || I have no idea what 'greige' is, but this lipstick is generally a miss for my skin type. It's similar in colour to Eva's Nude, but it does make my skin look washed out and flat unless it's a blisteringly hot day outside -- in which case it looks sizzingly good. How or why it happens that way, I don't know.


Wearing JLo's Nude

Overall, this collection wasn't one that you needed to race out and buy every shade from. It's a great way to start a nude lipstick collection, especially if your idea of nude is one of those terrible shades of beige that blends your lips so well with your skin that you may as well not have any lips at all. Wear time varies generally between two and three hours, depending on the shade you're wearing, how much you apply and whether or not you eat -- but then the greatest thing about a nude lip is that you can eat and not worry about a ring of colour! The consistency of all the lipsticks were nice and creamy -- I didn't need to worry too much if my lips were on the drier side, as it didn't highlight any patches.

The collection is not as widely available as it once was, but it is still out there -- I was in my local Big W recently and saw three of the shades tucked away near the regular Colour Riche lipsticks!

Padawan Product Rating: B+

Did you get your paws on any of the shades in this collection? Which looks like your favourite?

Shae xo

Where HAVE you been?!

It's been about six weeks since my last blog post -- a brand new record that I personally never hope to reach again. My previous record was two weeks, and while I knew that an absence was inevitable, I had hoped to have a nice backlog of posts to make that absence less noticeable.

No such luck!

As though being slammed with assignments wasn't enough, I was suddenly told that I had been assigned a placement... with one business day's notice. It was as inconvenient as that time the English soldiers snatching Claire just as she's finally gotten to Craigh na Dun (sorry, what do you mean you don't watch Outlander? If you're not faint of heart, get on it!)

Either way, that's where I've been the past month. Posting could've been possible, but it wasn't probably, as I had to relocate and internet was a precious, precious commodity that I couldn't afford to waste. (First world problems, am I right?)

One thing is for certain: I've had an absolute blast!

My mentor was absolutely fantastic, I was surrounded by a great team, and, best of all, I made some absolutely fantastic friends.

Elly + Jess + Shae

So there's no need to be like this anymore:

It's going to be a challenge to get back into a routine of balanced work and play, but I'm really gunning to make it work.

Shae xo