Ipsy - August 2014

My Ipsy bag came yesterday and I unboxed it on my Makeup Miscellaneous YouTube Channel.  I'm not going to lie, this month was kind of a disappointment for me .  However, I still decided to keep Ipsy over Beauty Box 5 because if I average out previous months I have enjoyed Ipsy more.  Here's hoping next month is better though or Ipsy might be on the chopping block.  This month's theme was Beauty schooled.

I peeked in my Glam Room as usual, and I think knowing what others got made it an even worse month.  I think Ipsy needs to pare down the variety in their bags, especially since their Ipsy Match survey program doesn't seem to work all that well.

The first item I got was outside my bag in a separate cardboard sleeve and it was the Urban Decay Perversion Mascara.  Black mascara has got to be the most frequently sent out beauty subscription item, but fortunately the fact that this was an Urban Decay product (and a newly released one at that) made it a little easier to take.  I'll definitely give this one a shot and see how it works for my lashes.  The sample sized tube is .10 oz making it worth $5.50

Next up was an Absolute You're the Balm Lip Balm in Grape which is from Nicka K New York.  This highlights what I said above about bag variations because some of the other subscribers received tube style all natural organic lip balms that I would have been happy to try out.  The balm I received is a pot style (not my favorite) that's grape flavored and includes ingredients of petroleum, and aspartame.  It also has flecks of glitter, which is not something I want in my lip balm.  It does feel like it will probably be moisturizing, but I doubt I'll get much use out of it.  This sized lip balm is usually sold in a two pack with their green apple flavor for $5.99 which makes this single balm worth approximately $2.99.

The third item I received was a sample tube of the Dr. Brandt Pores No More Pore Refining Primer.  I am excited to try this out as mattifying primers usually work well for me.  It also has a slight tint to it that reminds me of the Benefit Porefessional, though I've only ever tried a teensy sample of that so I can't really say how the two compare to each other.  The swatch blended out quite smoothly, so I will definitely be adding this under my foundation for a while to see how it works out.  The sample is .25 oz and worth $11.25.

Also included in my bag was a very small Coastal Scents Forever Blush Duo sample.  The sample didn't have the colors listed anywhere but fortunately Ipsy's product page was able to tell me the shades are Fresh (the peachy shade) and Elegant (the pink shade).  These blushes seem very smooth and pigmented when swatched with my finger but the sample size is too small to get a blush brush in.  These blushes are currently on sale for $3.98 and Ipsy included a 25% off code of 'blush25off' for Coastalscents.com, so despite my disappointment with the sample size I do think I'll pick up a couple of their Forever Blushes to try because I was planning on ordering the original Revealed Eye Shadow Palette soon anyway.  Since the blushes have a full retail price of $7.95 I guess this 2.5 gram sample has a value of $1.99, which seems high, but I at least want to be consistent in the way I calculate the bag value

Finally I received a sample size Lord & Berry Silk Kajal Kohl Eye Pencil in #1001 Black.  This is tiny, like the size of my pinky tiny.  I know it's not a cheap liner at $16 for the full size but it still just seems underwhelming to get such a tiny sample.  Pencil liners aren't my favorite but this did glide on quite smoothly when swatched so I'll give it a try.  The sample is .02 oz but I cannot find the size of the full sized liner listed anywhere so it's difficult to know the exact value of the sample size.  I held it up to a few other pencil liners I have and it's about 1/3 of an average liner length so I'll give it a value estimate of $4.

The bag itself is quite cute this month, though was difficult to photograph because it kept wanting to roll over and hide the zipper.  It's a pencil case style design to go with their Beauty Schooled theme, and while it isn't exactly the best shape for my purse I'll be able to use it for travel and storage.

Overall probably my least favorite month so far with Ipsy.  I'm going to stick with them for now since I've enjoyed my past bags, hopefully September will be an improvement.  I did get an overall value of $25.73, so it exceeded my $10 subscription price, but still the lowest month for Ipsy since I've joined.  If you'd like to subscribe to Ipsy I'd love it if you did so using my referral link here.  Ipsy is $10 a month or $110 for an annual subscription and you receive 4-5 deluxe sample or full size beauty products each month.  My video unboxing is up on the YouTube channel and also embedded below.

Fourth of July Manicure

While I love painting my nails I'm not a nail art person.  Adding the occasional accent nail with glitter is about as advanced as I get.  However I've been seeing a lot of cute nail art lately so I decided to give it a go for the Fourth of July tomorrow.  I'm terrible at free hand drawing so I made it easier on myself by purchasing some nail striping tape to use as a guide.

The colors I used were Wet n' Wild Fast Dry 'Saved by the Blue', Essie's 'Blanc', and the Nicka K 'Ripe Apple' that I just got in my June Beauty Box 5.

I started by painting all my nails with a base coat of Essie's Grow Stronger, then two coats of Saved by the Blue on my thumbs and two coats of Blanc on the rest of my fingers.  I added a top coat of Seche Vite (first time trying this top coat) to my thumbs since initially I wasn't planning on doing anything more to them, but didn't top coat the white nails.  After this I let my nails dry completely for a couple of hours.

In order to speed up the process I tried out Sally Hansen's Dry & Go Drops on the white nails (which is why my fingers look a bit oily in some of the pictures) but I'm not sure if it did much.  Since I was striping over the white I didn't worry about the nails being perfect, which is good because Essie's Blanc is a fairly thin, streaky white.  If I was using it as a full mani I may have even added a 3rd coat.  If you're planning on buying a white I would recommend something different, I've heard good things about both China Glaze's 'White Out' and Sally Hansen's 'White On'.

After my nails were dry I added 5 stripes of nail striping tape to each white nail, making sure it was firmly pressed on so polish didn't seep under the tape.

I painted Ripe Apple on one nail at a time, immediately removing the striping tape after I finished applying the red polish to each nail.  Even more so than with the white, a thicker, opaque red is important here because I'm not sure how well having to apply two coats on top of the striping tape would work.

Once I finished the red stripes on my nails I added a top coat of Seche Vite.  I did this a little to quickly on some nails so you can see some streaking, especially on my pinky nail.  At the last minute I decided to add some white dots to my thumbnails with a dotting tool I'd picked up a while back and never used.  A toothpick would probably work just as well.  After the dots dried I added a second coat of Seche Vite to my thumbs.  I really liked how this mani turned out, and while the striping tape is a bit time consuming I found it easy to use for my nail art challenged self.  Have a Safe and Happy 4th of July!

*Disclosure: This post contains Amazon Affiliate Links*

Beauty Box 5 - June 2014

June is my second month receiving Beauty Box 5.  I received my first month free and  I wasn't blown away by it I decided to give it a try for another month.  While it's not nearly as good of a value for the cost as my Ipsy subscription I do like how consistent they are with shipping.  When you sign up for a BB5 subscription they say you'll receive a tracking email by the 8th of the month and for both months so far that I've been a subscriber I have received my e-mail by the 8th and the box has already been several days into the shipping process.  That said, they do ship DHL to USPS so it still took until today for me to receive my box.

As I said last month Beauty Box 5 only releases one spoiler a month so the rest of the box is a surprise.  This months spoiler was a full sized Nicka K New York nail polish in either a Lavender or Ripe Apple. I got the color Ripe Apple (the strange thing is that I can't find the name of the polish anywhere on the bottle, I just know it from the spoiler), which is nice but not very summery to me so I probably won't be wearing it soon.  I did swatch it onto a nail swatch stick though and the formula seems decent, it is a pretty red creme polish with what seems to be very slight blue undertones.  Nicka K is also a formaldehyde free polish.  The value of this polish is $4.99.

The second item in my box was a 2 oz sample bottle of Vita Bath body wash in Wild Red Cherry.  Vita Bath body washes are free of propylene glycol, mineral oils, and silicone.  I've tried a little foil packet sample of their Dreamy Pink Frosting scented bodywash and liked it so I'm expecting that this will be a similar formula.  There is definitely a strong cherry scent to this bodywash and it's a great size for travel.  The value of this sample is $1.33.

Next I received a foil packet sample of Organix Coconut Water shampoo and conditioner.  Organix is sulfate free and I currently use and love their Tea Tree and Mint shampoo and conditioner, so I'm happy to try another product in their line.  However, I am pretty disappointed in the size of the sample, they're quite small foil packets like the ones that companies frequently send out for free.  I'll only get one use out of these packets which makes it difficult to tell if it's something I like enough to repurchase.  I would have preferred receiving a little one or two ounce bottle, even if it meant just getting either the shampoo or the conditioner instead of both.  The foil packet size made this extremely difficult to value so I'm going to go with $1 (the full 13 oz size bottles retail for $7.99).

 Fourth was a sample sized tube of Glam Natural mascara.  This is mascara is listed as gluten-free, paraben-free, hypoallergenic, and vegan, which is great because I love trying more natural products.  The wand looked practically empty when I pulled it out, but there was some mascara on it when I swiped it on my hand, it just seems to be a very light formula.  This might work okay for me as I have long, dark lashes on my own so for daytime I don't like heavy mascaras.  The full .25 oz size of this is $28 but there is no size listed on the sample tube.  It doesn't look to be even quite half of full to me, so I'm going to estimate 1/3 of the full size and give it a value of $9.33.

Finally in my box I received 4 foil packet samples of the Elsor Introductory Collection Calming Kit, which is a paraben free skincare line.  From the description card it looks like there was supposed to be a foil packet for each of the 4 products, Soothing Refiner & Cleanser, Replenishing Scrub, Comforting Mask, and Soothing Cream.  However, I received 2 Soothing Cream packets and no Soothing Refiner & Cleanser.  I'll try these out but again it's small foil packets that I'll only get one use out of each, so aside from the cream which I'll be able to try twice it will be hard to tell if these are actually worth a purchase.  They are also quite expensive in full size, ranging from $28 to $65.  Again foil packets are difficult to value so I'll give these a $4 estimate, $1 for each packet.  This may seem cheap but there is very little product in each packet.

Overall this wasn't a very exciting box for me, I'll try everything but the number of foil packets was disappointing because these are so similar to samples I get quite a few of for free.  I've come to a total estimated value of $20.65, which is more than the $12 I paid but several of the values were just guesses.  I'm going to give them one more month to see if the third times a charm, but unless it's a lot better than this month I'll be cancelling after that.  One nice thing this month is that they sent out little cards in the box with a new subscriber discount code to share.  If you'd like to try Beauty Box 5 just use the code FREE614 to get your first box free (it will sign you up for a monthly subscription so you'll need to remember to cancel if you don't want to continue receiving it after your free box).  This code will also work for $12 off a quarterly or annual subscription if you want to use it that way, which would bring an annual sub all the way down to $7.25/month.  If you would like to sign up I also have a referral link here, you'll still be able to enter the free box code at checkout.