[ ♡ ] Rediscovery – Korean samples plus extras

Posted: December 13, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: look of the day, Makeup | Tags: , , , , | Leave a comment

I’ve been cleaning out my vanity lately because I keep buying new things so I have to find place for them and I’ve rediscovered a few things I forgot about for a while, mostly samples.

Whenever you buy cosmetics from Korean stores/places you usually get tons of little samples and I’ve just been collecting them and finally I pulled these out and decided to test them out. I now have a little spot on my vanity where I keep samples that I need to test out. So here are the first set that’s on my vanity.

From Etude I found a few things:

This is an spf sunscreen. Haven’t used it yet but I will soon.

These are etude as well. The circle packet is a bb cream and the two on the right are lip and face tints.

I used these already.

Next I tried this apple body wash from Etude:

I like this little package but I don’t like the smell of this product. Instead of a country apple type smell, you get a sour apple smell. I just don’t like it and will probably not use it again.

Then I have this caudelie sample I still haven’t used.

Then I found my elf shimmery whip. This was in my first ever elf order years ago and I don’t even know if its still good but I’ll still give it a go. I’ve recently discovered a new love for cream/gel highlighters so I’m excited to put this to the test.

And then I found this little coastal scents eye pigment sample and tried it out as well.

It’s a pinky shade and I don’t love it but mostly because I just don’t like dealing with loose powders in general.

Ok so here is the look I did using the bb cream, tints and eye pigment:


The bbcream is too light for my skin as all bbcreams are so I probably will not use that again. It also is a sheer cover which I don’t like but it does give you a dewy glow without looking oily. The tint is ok, sort of sheer but the color is nice. Again, pigments look good but are too messy for me to deal with so I probably will not use the pigment again.

I’ll let you know how I feel about the other samples that I didn’t use yet when I do use them so stay tuned!

♡ PaNhia

[ ♡ ] Review – LA blushes

Posted: June 16, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Makeup, reviews | Tags: , , , , , | Leave a comment

So I have all these new products that I’ve posted up but haven’t swatched or tried on and I thought I’d do some swatch posts. I also need to pull out a box for items to try and keep it on my vanity so they won’t go to waste.

First I’m going to swatch and review the blushes I got. I only got two in LA, one randomly and one I planned on getting. I got a light orange from Illamasqua in Lover and a purple one from the Faceshop’s lovely line.

I actually went looking for the Illamasqua blush because like I’ve said previously, my Sephora doesn’t carry that line. And I don’t want to pay $25 for a blush and not like it. So I did some research and found a sephora in LA that carried the line and so I picked up a blush. I originally wanted excite which looks just like lover but much brighter and more orange. But I swatched them and thought excite was too bright for me so I went for lover instead. The faceshop one I just picked up because I’ve been on a purple blush hunt lately.

Here are the swatches on my arm first without flash then with flash.

The illamasqua blush picture turned out more orange than it actually looks. It’s still a orange blush but more on the coral side with pinks in it. It’s matte, no shimmer and has good staying power. I like it but I wanted more of a muted orange and lighter orange. This one is still darker than I’d like. I paid $25 + tax for this one.

The faceshop blush is actually pretty light and looks close to the pictured shot. Its not purple on the cheek but it does have that purple sheen/undertone. It looks closer to a highlighter than a blush but I actually really like it as a blush with some pink on the cheek hollow where you usually apply bronzer for definition. It works sort of like a doll look. I never thought I’d like super light cheeks but it looks really cute. It doesn’t have good staying power though so I’d say set it and reapply. This one was around $9.

Overall I’m happy with my purchases. Its given me more blushes to add to my collection and given me a chance to try a new brand. I’m now on the look out for a light, muted orange blush and a raspberry purple blush.

♡ PaNhia

[ ♡ ] Recent Purchases & cosmetic reviews – 03/23/11

Posted: March 23, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: reviews | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave a comment

I did a little shopping the other day and decided I would do some lip swatches. First, some quickies from Walmart and Kmart.


• I’ve been struggling with tweezers lately because I now have three that I use for different purposes. One I use is a thicker tweezer for placing my false lashes and then I have a Revlon with a small tip for brow plucking and finally a tiny one for really close tweezing. The other day I went to my sisters and used her tweezers and I really liked them so I went to kmart and got one that was similar. It’s a medium-small size but its got a really sharp pointed tip and works really well for plucking. This baby has eliminated two of my tweezers so I’m pretty happy! It also comes with an extra one that I don’t use.
• I got facial exfoliating sponges to scrub away dead skin cells
• I also got a Neutrogena makeup removing cleanser because I ran out of my clean & clear one and they no longer make it. I just prefer a cleanser to remove makeup because I’ve found that wipes don’t remove all my makeup and I’d rather not have clogged pores
• I also got a new eco-tools loofah for my gym bag
• And then I got a sally hanson top coat clear polish for work

I also stopped by Ulta to use my coupon and got 4 nyx lip products. First, two jumple pencils that look pretty similar. They look pinky peach and light orangey.



Here is what it looks like on the skin:

On, though, they’re actually quite light and frosty looking.

I will be returning these two because I won’t be using them.

I also got two lip liners that I love! One is a called nude pink and it’s a light rosey pink color. The other is called pinky and it’s a hot pink color.

Here are some quick swatches of the following three lipliners I’ve recently purchased from NYX

Frist, nude pink:

^I love this color!
Next, dolly pink:

^here it looks crazy but its actually a really cute light purple pink color.
Finally, Pinky:

^I love it!

I also bought a lipstick during spring break by MAC called Pink Nouveau. I actually went in to buy morange but it was just looking funky on my lips that day so I got this instead.

No flash

flash

And then I also wanted to do a quick swatch of my new favorite lipstick from the Faceshop in 217, a super cute orange shade

And finally, I wanted to show you all my new concealer from the Faceshop. It’s a solid concealer in the darkest color they had, which still is pretty light. I’ve used it every day since I bought it two weeks ago but it broke one day 😦

I didn’t push it too far out or anything, it just fell out when I opened it. It still works though, I just shove it back in there and open it carefully.

Previously, I used liquid concealer under my eyes but I like this much better because it doesn’t drip and move and I don’t have to wait for it to dry before moving onto more eye makeup.

And here is the eye comparison. On the left is with concealer and on the right is without.

As you can see I definitely look more refreshed with concealer. I don’t have super dark eyes but they are slightly darker than my skin tone. If I don’t wear anything at all, I always at least wear concealer under my eyes.

That’s all for now. Look forward to a post of more swatches from my faceshop purchases.

♡ PaNhia

[ ♡ ] Recent Purchases 3/14/2010 – Korean cosmetics & kawaii japanese

Posted: March 15, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Daily Outing | Tags: , , , , , | 3 Comments

I’ve done a little shopping on my trip and actually did quite a bit of damage at the faceshop. First though, are my finds from the Kawaii store. I got two gift box sets that I already put together to display. They’re about $2.50 – $2.99 each.


I also got this cute two tierd bento! Its huge!

I found some tab stickers that I love. I got some from LA last year but I was only able to find the blue ones. These are different colored sheets!

And last but not least I got this cute little container that I will use to store earrings and necklaces for when I travel again. Its really cool. There’s compartment part on top with lots of little squares for earrings and then you can lift it up to put bigger things on bottom.

Next are items I got from the faceshop & h-mart. First is a collective faceshop shot:

Here is a closer look at samples. It was funny, the sales lady took a look at my hair and concluded it was damaged so she gave me a sample for damaged hair.

Now onto the good stuff! I bought a gel liner set in black because I’m currently running on just a small pot of stila paint pot in black and anticipate running out soon. Its actually pretty big and comes with a mini brush that I will probably not use.



I also got three lipsticks from three different lines. The middle one is from an older line and was 40% off!



^ I got a baby pink, a muavey purple, and an orange. I’m most excited about the orange!

I also got three four liners, 3 lip liners and 1 brow pencil liner. These three are from the same line but the bottom one is the brow pencil. The lip liners are in a light brown color for nudes and a light pink color.

Here is a picture of the other lip liner which is an orange.

I also got a retractable lipbrush:

I also got an impulse mud mask for the nose:

Along with that, I got a concealer stick in the darkest color they had. I haven’t used solid concealers in a while so I don’t know how I’ll like it.

And last but not least I got face sponges and a 4 packs of facial cotton wipes (I gave two to my sister.)

Along with cosmetics I purchased several sets of utensils because I love long Korean spoons and thin chopsticks.

I also got this cute little pencil box that I was going to use for carrying my brushes but then I bought something else when I came home that rendered this box useless. Its stil cute though and I’ll probably find some other use for it.

Also included in this post are my recent target purchases:

I got a box of tissue, two cosmetic bags (because I couldn’t decide,) a foam coloring kit, Elf gel liner in purple and a new contact case.

In the end I chose this bag for my cosmetics because it had the most space and did the most with what I like to carry. I used to just carry a small set of cosmetics in my purse for touch ups but now I carry most o f my basic makeup with me because I go to the gym a lot and shower there so I needed a case that will carry a lot of makeup and the fact that it has a section for brushes just makes it that much better.

And that concludes my recent purchases!

♡ PaNhia

[ ♡ ] Goodies from Korea – Etude, Holika Holika, Missha, Skinfood

Posted: January 12, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , | 1 Comment

My friends arrived from their Korea trip a few days ago bringing back a goodie bag for me. Before they left, I gave them a thorough list of what I wanted complete with brand, name, description, Korean price, US price, where they can find it and a picture of the products (LOL, I know.) Choua did a very good job of finding everything for me. Here are some shots of what I got:

The goods arrived in a Holika Holika Bag but I transferred them to this aerie bag after giving some of the stuff to my sisters.

The receipts. I love the smell of a fresh Korean cosmetic receipt 🙂

2 packs of face masks from Holika Holika. There’s 5 in each pack so I have 10 total. Each set was only 5000 won which is about $4. I’m excited to try these out.

Some stickers with a funny little note 🙂

My most anticipated item: Etudes O2 white toners. I actually got 3 but gave one to my sister. I bought this when I went to Korea two years ago and really fell in love with it but didn’t want to pay the US price for it. It’s about $20 not including shipping and handling if you order it online but it was only 13000 Won in Korea which is like $10.50 US dollars so I just saved over $30 on three.

Here is what it looks like. My old one is on the right and the new one is on the left. I like the old bottle better.

I also got a gel liner from Skinfood in brown. I got this in brown because a regular brown color like this wasn’t included in the smudge pot stila set.


The other item I was really excited to get, Missha Oil wipes. I got these because they’re super cheap compared to the clean & clear ones. The Clean&Clear oil wipes are about $5 for a pack of 50 wipes. Each of these are 2200 won and I got 10 packs. That’s about $1.75 a piece which is a great deal! They’re more expensive than they were before though. When I bought them two years ago, they were only 500 won (40 cents.) It’s ok though because overall it’s still a better deal.


I also got two cute planners!

And finally some samples. Some are not pictured because I gave them away. Samples are my favorite part of Korean shopping.

Getting all these things just make me want to shop in Korea! I’m so excited to start planning my trip!

♡ PaNhia