The Beauty Buffs - Royal Blue

Bought Myself/Gift/Nothing To Disclose

Hello everyone! Welcome back to another episode of The Beauty Buffs!! .. Okay, why I called it an episode I have no idea, I thought it was funny. *bah dum tss*

This weeks theme is Royal Blue and I figured that since the last TBB post I did nail polish, I thought I would do makeup this week! SO, I had gone out in search of a nice royal blue eye shadow and found the Maybelline Expert Wear quad in Electric Blue. I guess, it is new? I don't know, I've never seen them before and it was $2 off I think so I decided I would get it. I'm going too tell you now, don't waste your time, It's not that great. The pigmentation is lacking. WELL, low and behold AFTER I bought it, I remembered I had Sugarpill's Heartbreaker palette in it, which has Velocity. A gorgeous matte royal blue. BAM, have my eyeshadow. *dances*

I decided too use the blue in the Maybelline quad as well as Velocity, and I used a mixture of colors from the Crown Cosmetics Smokey Eye Palette. 

The three shadows with the arrows pointing too the are the ones I used. I didn't use them in any particular order, except tap my brush into each a couple of times.  I added that into the crease and blended out. BUT wait! There's more. I also used Sugarpill Velocity in the crease. I used it as the original outline of the crease then I blended a bit on the top of the crease to give it a little something extra,. 

On the lid I applied lightly the Royal Blue from the Maybelline Electric Blues palette. I should have added some of Velocity on top, but what is done is done.

On the lower lashline I mixed the royal blue and the black shadow and smudged it across.

You are probably asking yourself WHY so many pictures and WHY pictures of both eyes. WELL my dears, I did both eyes different. On my left eye I didn't wing the liner and I didn't bring the shadow up as high as I did on the other eye. You can't tell particularly but the liner on my right eye *below* is winged out and I brought the shadows higher up towards the brow bone. 

Products Used:

Sugarpill - Velocity

Maybelline - Electric Blue Palette (black and blue)

Crown Cosmetics - Smokey Eye Palette (colors shown above)

Urban Decay - Zephyr (innter corner)

Milani Extreme Eye Tech Eyeliner

Urban Decay Primer Potion

MiA BelleZZA Creme Liner in Brown - Waterline & Tightline

Ellis Faas Mascara

I really love how this came out! I've been itching too show everyone the look since I completed it a couple of nights ago! 

Here's the finished look with the whole face! ... I don't know why I said it that way but I did. A lot of people say don't wear blue on blue, brown on brown or green on green. I say, do what you want, it is your makeup and it's YOUR face. Makeup is an expression of art, don't let others dull your shine!

The purpose of this is too give you some more blue options. I understand the 3/4 makeup choice are high end, but you try too find GOOD affordable royal blue shadows. :P I got lucky I found the Maybelline one, and the palette itself isn't that great, 

Essie nail polish / Seche nail care, $16 / Maybelline eye makeup / NARS Cosmetics matte eye makeup, $30 / Eyeshadow, $26 / Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics matte makeup

Don't forget too check out the other ladies in the linkup and leave comments on their posts!

An InLinkz Link-up

Top Coat Throwdown

Heya loves!

Before I get into the purpose of this blog post, I just want to restate a few things from my earlier post. I did switch blogging platforms because it was becoming an issue with people only being able to subscribe VIA email. So I eliminated that (kind) and switched to Blogger from Wordpress. So unfortunately yes, you will have to re-subscribe (if you were previously) but you can do so through GFC (Google Friend Connect) or once again VIA email. I do want to point out, that for an upcoming giveaway or two, GFC will be part of it and what not :)


ANYWAYS, so what we are here about today!

I was just going to have this be a NOTD (Nail of the Day) post then I remembered I told a few people I was going to do a comparing blog post of these two top coats... or at least a review of one of them. I figured I would compare them, since they are the two that I currently am switching between. Maybe down the road a little bit I will do comparisons of the 3 I have, heck maybe I will even have a few more baha. Anyhoobles.

The two polishes that I used were both from Essie. The lilac-grey color is Miss Fancy Pants and the glittery parts is Stroke of Brilliance from their Luxeffects line.
 My basecoat is the Sally Hansen Continuous Growth Treatment (being discontinued scoops this bad boy up ASAP it's amazing..also.. it's not pictured below)

For my Top coats I used Out The Door and ORLY HI Shine.
Out The Door can be purchased at CVS and Sally Beauty Supply, I'm not sure where else. CVS is where I found mine.
HI Shine .. well that is a different story, I found mine at TJ Maxx, but I've never seen it before and apparently neither have a few nail bloggers I talk too.. I got this for $4.99 at TJ Maxx.

Out The Door claims to be Americas #1 Super Fast Drying top coat. I do agree with that, it does dry extremely quickly. However, don't expect to be able to walk out the door, especially if you didn't wait for your nail polish to fully dry (without realizing it..this happened to me)
You get a pretty nice amount of shine out of this top coat. On my pink and ring finger I used two coats and on my middle and index fingers I used 1 coat.. Just to show. You do get more shine if you use two coats of it. However, two coats is not necessary, especially if you are not using a top coat eater (like glitter) this glitter topcoat I used isn't a TCE (top coat eater) thankfully, but I still did 1 and two coats just to show. This is an absolutely lovely top coat. This also claims to be "long-wearing" and will not yellow... I've never had a top coat "yellow" on me, I didn't even know it could happen... As for long wearing, for me, it is long wearing. I can't say days and days because I have shoddy nails and nothing lasts days and days on me. No matter how much prepping or anything. It is just the nature of my nails I guess. HOWEVER this one does last longer than other ones I have tried so yay on that!

ORLY's HI-Shine is new to me..well kind of, I've had it for a few weeks, but new to me as in I've never seen it before. In the bottle this has a blue tinge to it, but comes out clear when used. The brush for this, in my opinion leaves something to be desired. Don't get me wrong, I like the brush itself, but not the way it is cut. It is cut in a really wonky manor that if you don't check to see if your nail polish if fully dry, it can tug and pull it.. it happened to me on this manicure actually...on my pinkie to be exact. I really do like the bottle of this, I'm not sure what it is, but it just reminds me of being slightly vintage-y.. it's a me thing okay? This handle of this, has the typical rubbery ORLY handle, which I actually quite like. I do find that between the two of these, Hi-Shine is more "shiny" or glossy if that is what you prefer. Particularly, it does make the nails looks sleep and finished, even when they are painted a little shoddy.. ( I did my nails in half darkness..no shame) It also makes them look even.. thankfully. On my left hand, I'm not sure you can see it in thee pictures, you can tell the polish was uneven.. where as on my right hand (this top coat) it looks even and just.. dare I say perfect? .. Well not really perfect, but you get my point? As for HI-Shine, I think that there are top coats out there that can give you a more shiny effect, however this one is pretty shiny.

Between the two top coats, it is hard to say which one I like better. I actually quite like both of them honestly. It really boils down to what nail polish I use on my nails per which one comes out looking better. Does that make any kind of sense? I've had times where the Hi-Shine was out shined by the Out The Door and vice versa.


Here is an example of what I mean by one out shining the other. On the left (pinkie/ring) is Out The Door on the right is HI-Shine. (middle/index)

Oh! All pictures were taking as the sun was halfway up in the sky.. aka morning light :)

Have you tried either of these top coats? Which is YOUR favorite Topcoat? I am ALWAYS on the lookout for a new one! xx