First day back in the store!

Well, we (my husband and I) finally re-opened my store, Smokey Crystal.

There is still a lot more stock to get loaded into the space, but we were proud to be able to have the doors open.  With that excitement I was up and at it early and took care of a full face makeup to carry me through the day:

I was so excited to have a nice makeup on I forgot to get dressed before I took the picture...lol.  However I was wearing a burgundy shirt with black trim so I thought I would go out on a limb since the blue eyeshadow went so well and show that anyone can wear any color if done tastefully.  I am wearing a pink/red palette in today's look.

The large circle you see on the eyeshadow are the colors I used on the lid.  The small circle below that is what I used as a shadow and the small circle is what I used to color in my eyebrows.  I forgot to show my E.L.F. blush, but I have shown it in previous posts.  After applying, I was ready to face the day and it was a good day!

Thank goodness we have Monday off because I have had little sleep.  I am off here to try and get some rest.

Happy holiday's to all!!

Thanksgiving time!!

Time for fun, time for turkey, time to be grateful for all you have.  With that being said, why do so many choose the day of or the day after to lose their mind over a good deal?!?  Forget the whole pilgrim thing, Thanksgiving has morphed into a day where FAMILY comes together and good, bad, or indifferent, spend the evening trying to show each other how happy they are to be together and alive.  It isn't about the Xbox that goes on sale at midnight or the 40" TV you can get for $200 at 6am.  With that being said, we stoked up the turkey, had family together and enjoyed a good meal.  I hope you did too.  If you didn't have family to spend the day with, there are events going on all over the country where you can get together with others and enjoy a free or reduced meal and just be grateful that you are in a country where you can do such a thing.
With that being said, I had company coming over.  After making some killer deviled eggs while my husband cooked a fantastic turkey:

 

I got myself together to be presentable. I never use blue, I am afraid of looking like Mimi from the Drew  Carey Show:

 

I have avoided the color for years.  When I was a child I used to get accused of wearing blue or purple eyeshadow because my thin eyelids would let the veins show through.  I thought it was kind of cool until I was sent home from school and my parents called for it.  Then they had to prove I wasn't wearing makeup.  After that I developed an aversion to blue eyeshadow.  But this was a day to be thankful about what you have so I thought why not.  I gave it a try and I think it turned out nice!

 

 

 

As you can see I used a light blue highlight, medium purple blue for the eyelid, a light-medium blue for the top lid and a smoky blue for the shadow.  I lined my eyelashes with a deep-dark blue with a light sparkle in it.  Some mascara, blush, and nude lipstick and I was good to go.  Dinner turned out great, I felt wonderful, and after accidentally falling asleep with makeup on, it was still in place the next day!

Here is what I used:

The circled part of the palette are the colors I used.

 

Happy holidays!! 

 

New day, new makeup

This was the last full face makeup I did.  I will show some of my quick makeup soon as life has gotten a little bit more busy.  I finally got an image of the products I used for this post.  I hope you all like it.

With this look I used shades of brown for my eyes and brows.  I thought it would be nice to offer a 
 

close-up of what everything looks like and below you can see the foundation, powder, lip stain, mascara, and eyeshadow palette I used.



This multi color palette really is great for a ton of different looks!
Sorry this one is quick, but I have to work in the morning.
Bright blessings all!

A little halloween fun...

I'm back once again, this time to show the fun I had for Halloween.  The more I am working with makeup again, the more fun I am having and the more I am feeling like myself.  I may have to broaden my descriptions into cleaners though as Vaseline has been my only saving grace so far considering the excessive dry skin and water proof mascara.  The nice thing is that the Vaseline has been softening my skin and cleaning my face...even though I have to double up with soap sometimes.  That is another story for another day.  On to the fun! 

I had an opportunity to go visit a friend.  I wasn't feeling well, my back was really giving me trouble, but I couldn't resist going out for a little fun.  I decided if I was going to go out on Halloween for fun, I was going to "dress up" some.  I ended up with a fun gothic look that many seem to have liked.

I like to smile, but apparently the straight face fits the gothic look...lol.  Anyway, I had fun with purples in this look.

I know, scary close-up huh ;) Anyway, going in close, you can see how I pulled the makeup to my temples.  Once again I used eyeliner and eyeshadow for the lips.  All the makeup used in this picture is the same as the previous.  The necklace is fun, it is technically (although flipped in this photo) a take on the skull and crossbones.  Lovingly and humanly crafted from raccoon bone by my friend over at Poking Dead Things.  I believe it added a nice touch to the overall outfit.

 

I hope this shows you that you do not have to be afraid of color nor do you have to stop having fun at a certain age.  Life is too short to keep coloring in the lines.  It's time to reach out and have a little fun.

Have a wonderful day!

First makeup play, evening look.

Hi all, well here is what I look like pretty much on a normal day:

It's hard to show the dry skin, but it is there between my eyebrows and down the sides of my nose.  Regardless I decided to begin playing and see what I could do that may be fun for Halloween.  Here is what I came up with:

Now I haven't had dark lipstick since high school when I wore a grape color for awhile but this ended up being a lot of fun and I actually ended up wearing this for a gathering I went to.  None of the makeup came off.  The lipstick is really just eyeliner and eye shadow and it stayed all night!  The darker shade on my eyes I did drag out a bit, I may not do that all the time as it seems to accent the width of the rest of my face.  Here is another couple shots I did with my camera and played with them on Pizap.com.

The before was before I played with my hair :)

• I have on Revlon Colorstay Makeup for normal/dry skin in Ivory.  Since my summer tan isn't completely gone it did kind of wash me out a bit but I was okay with that. 
• The powder is the Revlon Colorstay Powder in light/medium. 
• I never used eyeliner on my eyes, but I did on my lips.  I used N.Y.C. black eyeliner to outline and start coloring in my lips, then used a silver frost thick stick I picked up from the dollar store. 
• From there I used an application brush and brushed on some of the dark green eyeshadow I accented my eyes with onto my lips.  It held strong and worked amazing! 
• The eyeshadows I used came from a holiday eyeshadow set that was bought at Meijer (sorry, I there is no name on it).  I will get a photo of the color palate in here later.  Anyway, I used 4 of the green colors for my eyes, the black eyeshadow to line my eyes and a brown eyeshadow to fill in my eyebrows some.
• The blush is E.L.F. in blushing rose (I believe that's the color name).

I forgot to add mascara but the look worked for the night and everyone seemed to like the change on me.  I hope you like it too :)

My next post will show what I actually ended up doing for Halloween :)  Have a wonderful day everyone, bright blessings!

An introduction to my journey to rediscover the love of makeup.

Hello, this is me.  A wonderful friend took this fantastic picture of me a couple years ago and I love it.  I've often looked at it though and thought to myself...it could have been better.  This has embarked me on my current journey to reclaim some of the joy of youth.

MAKEUP

You see, I didn't always depend on my glasses for facial accenting.

 

 

I used to make sure my makeup, jewelry, and clothing were together

Right: forgive the deterioration of the photo it was an old picture from the 80's specifically my 12th b-day.

 Left: me on my 30th birthday!

This is what can happen when we let the life of parenthood, work, and life take priority over self-care.  So in the past month I have begun to regain the joy I once had in applying makeup. 

 

You see, back in high school I was one of the makeup artists for the drama department.  I had plans to go on to college and become a professional movie makeup artist.  Life happened and I now have a couple different degrees, my own business, and a beautiful family.

 

Rediscovering my passion for makeup also meant an intensive product study (which I'm still doing).  Finding the right makeup wasn't as easy as before.  Foundation has gone from 10 choices to over 50, there is every color lipstick under the sun and I won't even get started on eyeliner or powder.  The other BIG factor was that I am not in my 20's anymore. 

 

 

I turned 43 this year and my body has made sure to let me know.  I see small wrinkles around my eyes and mouth now.  My eyelids are not quite as high as they once were.  The glow in my face and plumpness of my cheeks seems to have lessened.  The biggest surprise is how dry my skin is now!

 

This is where this blog comes in.  I have used a few products over the last year some with success....others...well...we won't go there.  As I move forward in this journey from October 2015 and forward though, I am going to take you with me.  Show you some of the things that have worked for me and some that haven't.

 

I am not going to spend a fortune unless that is the best product out there, but I will test many products along the way and I will let you know how it works.  I will also let you know the names of the products I am using (if there are names available).

 

NOTE: I will only change foundations & face powder when either:

A) I run out

B) I tan

C) It breaks

D) I'm gifted something to test

 

With that being said, I am open to product testing too if companies see this and want to get on board.

 

So let's get this going, grab your brushes and let the fun begin!!