Homemade Holiday Face Masks | Blogmas Day 11

My skin tends to go a little haywire in the winter months, so masks have become an essential part of my skincare routine. Face masks have an array of advantages, from brightening dull skin, exfoliating, soothing irritated skin amongst other benefits, and nothing is better than a mask made from fresh ingredients found right in your kitchen. Today I have 4 tried and true homemade face masks for you to try out this winter! And the best part is each one literally takes minutes to make.

1. Pumpkin Oatmeal Mask

2 tbsp. raw pumpkin

1 tbsp. rolled oats

1 tbsp. honey

Pumpkin is amazing for your skin. It contains vitamins A and D which can help to soften, soothe and brighten skin. Add in the astringent properties of honey and the exfoliating potential of the oatmeal and you have a good mask to help irritated dull skin when mixed together.

2. Ginger and Honey Mask

2 tbsp. Ginger Juice (throw ginger root and water in blender, strain)

1 tbsp. Honey

Ginger is awesome to treat acne scars because of the natural anti-inflammatory elements it contains. Mixed with the honey, and you have an excellent mask for acne clearing. Simply apply the mask, wait 20 minutes and gently wash off. *Fresh Ginger can also be used to dab on acne spots as a spot remover.

3. Cocoa Coffee Mask

1 tbsp. unsweetened cocoa

1 tbsp. ground coffee beans

1 1/2 tbsp. almond oil (or any carrier oil)

Coffee is known to reduce inflammation and redness and as an exfoliator, it gently removes dead skin and gives life to a dull complexion. Cocoa is a good source of antioxidants and it also contains sulfur, which is great for fighting acne. Simply mix together to make a paste, apply to face an after about 20 minutes gently wash off of your face.

4. Sweet Potato Ginger Mask

3 tbsp. mashed sweet potato (cooked)

2 tsp. grated fresh ginger

1 tbsp. honey

1 tbsp. milk/almond milk/ soy milk

Before you toss those sweet potatoes in your casserole, save a little for this mask! Sweet potatoes are known for their anti-inflammatory and anti-aging properties and mixed with the honey and ginger it becomes a mask that'll leave your skin seriously smooth and brighter. Just blend all ingredients until smooth, apply to face for about 30 minutes and gently scrub off.

I hope you find these facial mask ideas helpful! Let me know if you try any and what your thoughts are!

xoxo

LivforLashes

**images from Google**

Follow me on Twitter! @LivforLashes

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Email: liv_2008@icloud.com

Hooded Eyes | Tips and Tricks | Blogmas Day 2

If you have hooded eyes, you have probably figured out that some makeup looks just don't work on you. I myself have hooded eyes and it took a lot of trial and error to find makeup looks that not only flatter my eyes, but looks that do not accentuate my hooded lids or make my eyes look weighed down. I've compiled a little list of tips and tricks for hooded kids, so I hope you find these helpful. 

1. Brows

Eyebrows not only frame your face, but they can also open up the eyes. Shaping your brows with an arch can really give the appearance of a lifted lid, easing some of the heavy look of a hooded eyelid. Brows that are shaped without a prominent arch, or straight in the bottom can really make a hooded lid look even more hooded. 

2. Blending in the crease. 

With hooded lids, shadows that are blended directly into the crease can often times become hidden by the hood when your eyes are opened. Avoid this by blending your crease shades and transition shades right above the creased hood. Do this by blending while your eyes are open, so you can see exactly where you are placing the eyeshadow. 

3. Defining the crease

Adding a deeper shade to the crease can quickly look messy on hooded lids. Instead of blending your deeper shades directly into the crease, try swirling them on to the outer third of your eyelid and slightly above the outer crease. Blend in a rounded shape. This will help give the appearance of more rounded and wider eyes, instead of weighing the hooded kid down with dark eyeshadows. 

4. Shimmer on the lid

With hooded eyes, most eyeshadows placed in the lid transfer to the crease once you open your eyes. So if you want a little shimmer on your lid, try applying it to just the inner half of your lid or so, avoiding the bulk of the hood. With hooded lids, shimmer shadows that have bled to the hood can reflect light onto that hood, accentuating your hooded eyes making them appear smaller. 

5. Brow bone highlight

The same concept goes for highlighting the brow bone. A shimmery shadow applied to the brow brings attention to the hood, making it look heavy. Using a matte shade avoids this, thus not directing attention to the hood. 

6. Winged liner

Anyone with hooded eyelids who have tried winged liner may know how hard it is. You can have the most perfect line while your eye is closed but once you open it, the hood either cuts through your wing, or completely changes the shape of your liner. Help avoid this by drawing the outer half of your liner thicker, cutting directly into the hood and drawing your wing over it. It may look a little heavy while your eyes are closed, but it really helps give you a perfect wing once you open them. 

7. Waterline

Using a flesh tones or white eyeliner in the water line helps open the eyes up more, making them appear more awake and wider. With hooded eyes, this is especially helpful. When you use a black liner in the waterline, it closes off the eye making it appear smaller, so not you have a hood on top weighing down the upper lid, and black liner on the bottom closing off the bottom. 

8. Mascara and lashes

A good tip for hooded eyes is to use either a waterproof or long wearing mascara, like Benefit They're Real! Mascara. Throughout the day, the oils on your kids and the hood of your lid can cause the mascara to streak into the hood. For falsies, try to stick to styles that flair out on the ends. Even the daintiest lashes can overwhelm hooded eyes, effectively blocking any effort you put into your lid makeup, the a flared style helps give your makeup look a little glam with the lashes, but also still showcases the hard work you put into your makeup look. 

Hooded eyes are a pain, but with the right tips, you can really learn to work with them. While they'll probably frustrate me to no end, I've finally balky learned not to hate them and to embrace my hooded eyes. While I know I'll never be able to rock a perfect cut crease, or have that amazing graphic winged liner, I know that my eyes give me character. 

I hope you found these tips and tricks helpful! Rock your hooded lids and let me know some of your favorite tricks for hooded eyes!

xoxo

LivforLashes

Follow me on Twitter! @LivforLashes

Find me on Instagram @livforlashes

Email: liv_2008@icloud.com

Affordable Dupes for High-End Favorites!

The Internet is full of dupe lists of our favorite makeup products, and thanks to Temptalia, you can find a dupe for almost anything. Well, I wanted to share a little list of some of my own personal favorite products and some affordable options as alternatives to their high end counterparts. 

1. Revlon Colorstay ($8.99) vs. Este Lauder Doublewear ($38)

Both of these foundations boast a full coverage and both are long wearing. The Revlon foundation is slightly less coverage with a not quite as matte finish, but for a fraction of the cost, it's super comparable to Doublewear. 

2. L'oreal True Match Lumi Powder Glow Illuminator in Neutral  ($11.99) vs. MAC Mineralize Skinfinish in Lightscapade ($32)

When the four powders in the L'oreal neutral highlighter are swirled together, it creates a glow almost exactly it like Lightscapade. It is slightly less fine milled, and takes a little more blending, but the outcome is identical. 

3. Essence Metallic Effect Eyeshadow in Sandy Says Hello ($2.99) vs. Stila Kitten single eyeshadow ($18)

Kitten is my all time favorite eyeshadow, so when I found SSH by Essence, I immediately snagged a few up. Kitten is slightly more glittery, and SSH slightly more beige, but on the lid and blended out, they both give a gorgeous champagne shimmer.

 

4. Elf Blush in Gotta Glow ($3) vs. Sephora MicroSmooth Baked Illuminizer in Star Dust ($14)

Both of these are great products for that light golden highlight. The Elf one is a little more powdery, but a little extra blending helps that. Plus these are both great dupes for NARS Albatross!

5. Revlon blush in Mauvelous ($8.49) vs. Kat Von D Everlasting Face Shaper Blush in Truth ($25)

These blushes are seriously identical on the skin. The KVD one is slightly creamier and more pigmented, but for a drugstore blush, this Revlon one is a good pick. 

6. L'oreal Magic Lumi Light Infusing Primer ($9.79) vs. MAC Strobe Cream ($33)

Both of these lotions give your face a luminous glow underneath foundation. The L'oreal one feels slightly thicker with more of a silver glow while Strobe Cream is a little more pink, but these are pretty darn good matches for each other. 

7. Elf Mineral Infused Face Primer ($6) vs. Bare Minerals Prime Time ($24) vs. Smashbox Photo Finish Primer ($36)

These three are literally identical. They are all a slippery silicone base that helps fill pores and smooth out your foundation. They glide on smooth and dry fast too. The elf one feels slightly thicker, but I kind of prefer that. 

8. Elf Contouring Blush & Bronzing Powder in St. Lucia ($6) vs. NARS Orgasm blush ($30) and Laguna Bronzer ($39)

While the Elf duo is a lower quality than the NARS Powders, it's a great alternative for only a few bucks. The elf blush is a little chunkier with bigger shimmer particles, but with a few extra swipes of your brush, it gives that same peachy golden glow as Orgasm. Laguna is slightly lighter than the Elf bronzer, but again, once blended out, the bronzers are identical on the skin.

 

9. Real Techniques Miracle Complexion Sponge ($5.99) vs. Beauty Blender ($20)

If you can't quite bring yourself to spend $20 on a makeup sponge, the Real Techniques sponge is an awesome alternative. I even prefer it to my Beauty Blenders. Both are a super dense but smooth sponge that applies foundation and blends concealer flawlessly. I like how the Real Techniques one has that flat side though, making it a little more versatile for using different products than the Beauty Blender. 

What are some of your favorite dupes? I would love to hear and find some newer alternatives to other products. I hope you found this post helpful and let me know if you enjoyed it! 

Follow me on Twitter! @LivforLashes

Find me on Instagram @livforlashes

Email: liv_2008@icloud.com

Color Theory | Interpreting the Color Wheel for Makeup Application

Total first world problem here, but sometimes the most frustrating thing is trying to figure out which lipstick to pair with your eyeshadow, or which blush looks best with a certain lipstick. It sounds pretty stupid, but this is a pretty common issue we come across when applying makeup. A good tool to keep in mind when doing makeup is an understanding of the color wheel and how it works when pairing shades and tones. 

I was always big in to art and painting so I have a pretty decent understanding of colors and mixing them, but it never really came to mind to use the same concepts for my makeup until the past couple of years. Once I did though, I swear my makeup skills got better. I was more daring with color without the fear of looking like a clown. This post is all about color theory and how to understand the color wheel, and applying that knowledge to your makeup application. I've wanted to write about it for a while, since before I started my blog actually, but I wasn't sure how to word it. But after a long, long (slightly intoxicated) conversation about the color wheel with my sister during a paint night at a local bar, I knew I wanted to write it now. This post may be slighty boring, but I'm going to try to break it down so it isn't too confusing, so I hope you find this helpful!

Understanding Color

The first things to know about the color wheel, is to first understand colors. Hue is the most purest form of color. These are your primary (red, blue, yellow) and secondary (green, purple, orange) colors, and the colors you get when you mix them. Looking at your color wheel, they are the outermost colors on the wheel. So an example of this is red. There are tons of shades and tones of red, but the base for all of them is the hue of red. 

Shade is the hue, with black mixed in. So take red and add black, and you have a darker shade of red. Simple so far right? 

Tints are the lighter variation of a hue, by adding white. So white mixed with red gives you lighter tints of red.

Mixing grey with a hue is then called a tone. Tones aren't as dark as shades, but still a muted, dusty version of the hue.

 

So a little recap so far:

Hue- purest form of color

Shade- mix in black

Tint- mix in white

Tone- mix in grey 

The next thing to understand is complementary and contrasting colors. These are the colors at complete opposite sides of the wheel. They create a strong contrast with each other and make each other really pop. So an example of complementary colors are red and green. They are also good at sort of canceling each other out. Understanding complimentary colors will be especially helpful for concealing. You would use a green concealer to mute out a red color on your face, like an acne scar, or an orange/salmon concealer to hide dark purple/blue under eye circles. *quick tip: blending red and green cream products will give you brown, which you can then add yellow and white to make custom foundations. 

Analogous colors are those that are right next to each other on the wheel. So figure red, orange and yellow are close to each other on the wheel, they blend well together and look appealing in makeup looks. Think an ombré look: the colors are usually variant shades/tints of colors that are neighbors on a color wheel. 

Combining Colors

Now we all know there are a million combinations of colors to use for your makeup depending on what you like and the look you're going for. I don't like to call them rules but I definitely think that there are some guidelines to use for pairing colors in makeup to really make it complimentary and seamless. There are a few combinations that are especially ideal for makeup. 

The most basic color combination is a monochromatic combo. This is sometimes the most subtle or boring combination, but it's flattering on everyone and can easily be beautiful. Mono means one, so for a monochromatic look, you choose one hue, and use various shades, tints and tones of that hue. So maybe I wanted a monochromatic look using purple, I'd chose a variation of purple tones and shades for my entire look, like maybe dark violet lips paired with a softer purple, like lilac. 

Next is probably the easiest to do, if you want a little more color and spice to your look.  Remember when we talked about analogous colors? Well an analogous combination is the same concept of choosing colors next to each other on the wheel and creating a makeup look with them. It's flattering and they colors blend well without clashing. Say I chose blue, green, and yellow. These are next to one another on the wheel, so I don't have to worry about them clashing with each other or competing with one another. This is an especially pretty combination to use as a gradient for eyeshadow.

The third common color combo is a Triadic combination. Tri means three, so this is choosing three hues for your look. The thing about Triadic looks is you pick those three colors by looking at your color wheel, and imagining an equilateral triangle on the wheel. The three colors on the "points" of the color wheel are the colors you could use. For example, orange, yellow-green and blue would be a Triadic color combination. This look is more bright and packs a punch, but the colors still look well together. 

Now I again want to reiterate that these are by no means rules that you have to follow with your makeup, but it is helpful to remember the color wheel and how colors work with each other when doing makeup, especially if you are working on clients with different skin tones and hair/eye colors. Understanding color theory will help you get the most impactful and flattering makeup look. 

Well This was a long one, but I hope you found this post helpful! It can be confusing but you can google the color theory and find tons of other posts and tutorials to help you better understand it. It's a really awesome concept that not only works for makeup but something useful for everyday life like decorating and choosing an outfit. And it really does help on those days when you have a killer makeup look but don't know what lipstick or blush to wear :)

Until next time guys...

xoxo

LivforLashes

Follow me on Twitter! @LivforLashes

Find me on Instagram @livforlashes

Email: liv_2008@icloud.com