I won an amazing giveaway!

Hi everyone! I won a giveaway from the beautiful Yasumi from Worship at the House of Blues. She has an amazing and super gorgeous blog, I highly recommend a visit!

The prize is Shu Uemura's Abracadabra Fantasy Peace and Harmony Mini Brush Set.

The super cute card from Yasumi.

You don't know how happy I am to have won this giveaway. It's the first giveaway that I have won. I really liked this brush set when I saw it in Shu Uemura, but couldn't afford it! The outer packaging is a triangular shaped pink box.





The pouch is so pretty! I love the shiny pale pink/lilac colour, and unique shape.

Adorable heart and diamond zip tags.

Here's what is looks like inside the case. There is a zip compartment to out little bits and bobs in. The brushes are protected by a layer of fabric.

The set includes 4 brushes; a lip brush, shader brush, tapered blending brush, and powder/blush brush.

Each brush has a pretty bright pink handle. The brushes are of great quality, and the bristles feel silky soft to the touch.

Thanks again Yasumi for the amazing gift!

Happy Chinese New Year & Quick CNY Inspired FOTD

Happy Chinese New Year Everyone!! Hope you all have a very wonderful and auspicous year ahead!

This year, it's the year of the Rabbit. In Asia (or Chinatown), you can see lots of cute little rabbit decorations for sale. Not to mention adorable Chinese New Year cards with little bunnies, like this one my husband's grandma sent us.




In the spirit of Chinese New Year, I have decorated Ollivander, our little Olive tree with little chinese lanterns.

My family (but not me!) will be in Sarawak, Malaysia for Chinese New Year this year as there will be a huge reunion on my father's side. I'm not attending as I just came back from there. Somehow, I didn't find out about the reunion until a few weeks ago... I feel a bit left out of the loop!

Anyway, my family will be in my hometown of Miri to celebrate CNY with my Dad's side of the family, then Kuching to celebrate with my mum's family. I haven't been back to Miri in about 5 years, so it'll be nice to see what it's like nowadays. It was a quiet little beach town ~20 years ago when I used to live there, but it was a bustling city the last time I went!

I've done a quick FOTD to go with this post. I used my YSL Pur Couture red lipstick stained on my lips using my fingers, to create a more subtle cherry colour.

One of my New Year's Resolutions was to completely forego foundation this year (not sure how long this will last). Foundation tends to irritate my skin a lot and I feel I'm more suited to tinted moisturisers or light BB creams. Better yet is to not wear any base as then my skin will be irritant free. My previous FOTD was made before the New Year, so I've not quite violated my resolution yet!

For this FOTD, I'm using Shu Uemura's Instant Glow Skin Perfecting Cream instead of foundation. It gives skin a nice radiant look, however, I found it did irritate my skin a little bit.

Products Used:

Face
Shu Uemura Stage Performer Instant Glow Immediate Radiance Skin Perfecting Cream
MAC Blush in Peaches

Eyes
Dior Earth Reflection
Bobbi Brown Gel Liner in Black
Max Factor False Lash Effect Mascara

Lips
YSL rouge Pur Couture in 01

Please excuse my very messy hair. Sadly it was kind of deliberate. I was trying a messy, just got out of bed look, but realised it did not go well with my type of fringe. So I ended up looking like a deranged witch.

One of my favourite blushers is Mac Peaches. It gives skin a nice peachy colour, while imparting a subtle glow. It makes me a little healthier looking. I'll be reaching for this blush more in the Summer.

It's tradition to wear red on CNY. I'm just wearing a simple red T-shirt in this FOTD as I realised I don't own many red clothes. I could have worn a cheongsam for the pics, but they are in very un-CNY colours of either white, blue or black.

Anticipation of Spring 2011 Collections

Hi everyone, here are some photos to get you excited for upcoming Spring 2011 beauty collections, while it's cold and dreary outside for most of us. Sorry for the lack of info, I just wanted to do a quick round-up on things which have caught my eye. Spring collections have always been my favourite as they are so vibrant and pretty.

Paul and Joe:

Parasol Spring 2011 Collection

image curtesy of Kiss and Makeup

YSL :

The colours look so pretty and fresh! The range includes a highlighting powder called Pink Celebration, and 8 new Rouge Pur Couture Lipsticks.

One of my favourite brands, Guerlain:

I like the look of: Ecrin 6 Couleurs Eyeshadow Palette Rue de Rivoli

and Blush G de Guerlain

Givenchy:

The star product of this collection will be the Photo Perfection Light Evanescent Fluid Foundation SPF10 with foam applicator and radiance formula

This Blush Gelee caught my attention as I love blushes in its many forms

Lancome:

Ultra Lavande Collection by Aaron De May.

I'm not fond of lavander coloured makeup, but this collection has some beautiful looking pieces, including this La Rose butterfly Blush

Ballerine Color Fever Gloss Natural Origin, Lancome Le Vernis and LA Base Dewy Glow Smoothing Radiance Enhancer (which I am VERY interested in the sound of).

Shu Uemura:

Inspired by butterfly's wings and tropical jungle sunsets.

Morphollium Blue Palette, Sunset Gold Palette, Shine Mystic Eye Colors, and Peacock Partial Eyelash

From all the the above collections, I'll be interested in investigating the; YSL Pink Celebration Highlighter, Givenchy foundation and Lancome LA Base Dewy Glow. How about you?

Shu Uemura Abracadabra Fantasy Aya Takano mini haul

Shu Uemura's Holiday Collection 2010 has finally reached the UK. It's called Abracadabra Fantasy, and all the products look super cute and pretty! Aya Takano is a Japanese artist who draws inspiration from science fiction and Japanese manga.

The main attractions of this collection are the adorable palettes shown below.

The Shu Uemura website also includes a little guide on how to achieve the makeup looks of the 2 girls featured in their promotional poster.




From this adorable collection, I bought the Reindeer Kiss Palette xxxx as well as the Miracle Cherry Blush Tint.




The packaging of the Reindeer Kiss Palette is gorgeous. The palette is encased in thick, chunky, good quality plastic.

This is the side view of the case. The plastic is pink on the bottom layer, and clear on the top.



What's in the palette:




The palette contains 3 eyeshadows, one eye liner, one highlighter, one blush and two double-ended brushes.




Here are swatches of the eyeshadows. There are two icy blue colours and one silver shimmer.



Below is a swatch of the chocolate brown eyeliner and the cream/gold shimmery highlighter.

I especially love the palette's blush. It's a cool tone bright pink. I like this palette so much, I bought an additional one as a gift for my sister.

I couldn't resist getting this Miracle Cherry Blush Tint. It's inspired by the blush on the cheeks,elbows, and legs of Aya Takano's cute and sexy characters.

The tint is housed in a small pink squeezy tube.

The tint is in the form of a watery gel, and the colour itself is a strong pinky-red.

Once blended out however, the colour becomes a lot more subtle resulting in a pink tint to the cheeks with a tiny hint of peach.

I'll now leave you with a piece of artwork from Aya Takano!