Summer 2014 Favorites.

 Long time no see my lovelies, I hope you all had an amazing summer! In August I took a long break from blogging mostly because half of the month I was away on vacation, at the beautiful Naxos island, which is amazingly beautiful and dreamy. But it was time to get back into blogging again, and since summer is not completely over yet in Greece, I thought it was a great opportunity to show you all the beauty products I used the most in the summertime.

 Sunsilk Sensational Curls Leave-In Cream

In my opinion this is the best curl cream out there, hands down! I have naturally wavy/curly thin hair, I've tried many curling creams in my life, from salon and drugstore brands but this one is the best I've found for my hairtype. It defines them so well without feeling sticky or weight down my hair, and you cannot beat the price, it costs only 2.5 euros.

Garnier Fructis Surf Hair Paste
I've always had a love-hate relantionship with styling products, I've tried so many, from mousses to hair gels and sea salt sprays to try and make my curls look more defined and last for more than a few hours, and none of them could do what this God sent product can do! It creates the most beautiful and texturized curls I've ever seen, especially if I use it with the Sunsilk leave-in cream! I only use a small amount of this paste on really wet hair, if I use a lot my hair's sticky as hell. If you have thin/frizzy curly hair and sea salt sprays do not work on your hair you should definitely try this one, trust me.

Clinique Take The Day Off Cleansing Balm
OK I should be honest with you, but when I first bought this cleansing balm I hated it, I was trying to use it as a one step cleanser whenever my skin was feeling more dry but that didn't work. I decided to give it a second chance now that my skin is oily again and I completely love it, but I always use a seperate cleansing gel afterwards. It saved my skin from all the sunscreen that I was using this summer, I've never felt my skin more clean than when I started using this balm, it does an amazing job at removing heavy make up and waterproof sunscreens.

Sephora "Sol De Rio" Bronzing Powder
Bronzer of my choice for this summer was this amazing limited edition one from Sephora, it's very subtle nothing too much,completely matte and perfect for everyday use. You can see a swatch here.

Revlon Nearly Naked Powder
I was very much into powders this summer, sometimes I was just using some concealer and a powder on my face. In my stash I found this one from Revlon which I purchased last year when I visited London, it's a tone darken than my skintone but now that I'm a bit tanned it matches me perfectly. And as you can see I've used a lot of it because I hit pan only after two months of using it. 

Mac Peaches Blush
This is the only blush that I've seen using for two months now, it's the perfect true matte peach blush for the summer. If you have warm skintone you have to try it!

Mac Prep and Prime Highlighter in Bright Forecast
I love use highlighting pens as undereye concealer when the weather is hot, even though they doesn't cover as well as a regular concealer. This one has a peach shade that neutralizes my dark brown undereye circles, it makes me look more awake and fresh, and that's more than enought for me.

Essence Get Big Lashes Waterproof Mascara
I was blown away by this mascara, I never thought that such a cheap mascara would give to my lashes so much curl and length. You can see my full review on it here.

NYX Butter Gloss in Apple Strudel
I love using peachy glosses at summer, and this one was just perfect because it's super glossy and doesn't have any shimmers in it. It looks amazing over any peachy and coral lipstick but I loved using it on it's own for a fresh everyday look.

Mac Flamingo Lipstick
I have so many peachy lipsticks, but this summer Flamingo was my number one choice. It's more of a neon coral pink, and it looked amazing even when I wasn't wearing anything else on my face. You can see a swatch here.

L'oreal Color Riche "Lemon Meringue" Nail Polish
I never thought I'd say that a pastel nail polish was my top shade for the summer but it's true! I always go for reds and corals but this one changed my mind! It's not the traditional opaque white nail polish, it has a light yellow-lemonish tint into it that makes it special. Also it looks amazing on toes when you're tanned.



So these were all the beauty products that I loved the most this summer. Have you tried any of those?
What were your favourite products for the summer? Let me know!

What's In My Travel Makeup Bag - Summer Edition.

 Hello everybody! How's everyone doing? Tomorrow I'm leaving for my summer vacation (Naxos here I come!!), so it was a chance for me to show you what make up products I'm bringing with me on this trip! Just a note: I keep the makeup brushes that I'm bringing with me in a seperate makeup bag so I'm not going to show them in this post.

Garnier BB Cream in Light for oily skins

For when my skin is in a good day and I just want bit of coverage on my face. 

Benefit Hello Flawless Oxygen WOW foundation

A great foundation for night looks for more coverage, but still looking natural and dewy.

Revlon Nearly Naked Powder

A lightweight powder that provides a medium coverage, is a bit darker than my skintone so I'm going to use it when I'm more tanned.

Mac Prep and Prime Highlighter in Bright Forecast

The brightening concealer I use for under my eyes, it has a thin consistency, and that makes it perfect for the hot summer weather. 

Mac Studio Finish concealer

I wasn't planning to bring this one with me, but lately I've been breaking out like crazy.

Seventeen #03 Cafe Au Lait Matte Blush

I decided not to bring one of my bronzers with me but instead bring my HG matte brown blush that can easily be used as a bronzer. 

Seventeen #02 Hazelnut Pearl Blush

A newly addition to my blush family. At beautiful bronzed-beige shade with shimmers, I'm not going to bring a seperate highlighter with me, I'm just going to use this one.

Mac Peaches Blush

I just could not leave for vacation and not bring a peachy blush with me........I just can't! Peaches is THE one for me when it comes to peachy cheeks. 

Too Faced Natural Eye Palette

If you're reading my blog long enough you'd propably already know how much I love this eye palette, I could just live with this one alone in my makeup collection and use it everyday!

Urban Decay Primer Potion

Hot and humid weather means that nothing stays on my lids for more than 20 minutes, so an eye primer is a must have.

Seventeen The Stylist mascara

This is new to my collection,  I just started trying this out, I'm not so sure how I feel about it yet. It doesn't give much volume or length, it's just an OK mascara.

Mac Lingering Brow Pencil

One of my HG brow pencils, the shade matches exactly the shade of my brows, it contains wax which is great because it's going to stay on, even on the very humid days!

Mac Flamingo Lipstick

A gorgeous neon coral pink shade with glossy finish, is there anything better for a summer makeup look? I don't think so!

Seventeen Matte Lisptick #24

A brand new addition to my lipstick family, I really love this one for day looks. It's a light peachy shade with a bit of pink and beige, and it's also matte.

NYX  Butter Gloss in Apple Strudel

A beautiful super glossy light coral pink lipgloss with no shimmers. I think everyone should have this in their summer makeup bag.

Essence Lipliner in 09 Nude Coral

The perfect lipliner for all of my coral and peachy lipsticks.

Korres Mango Lip Butter

A coral lip balm is a must have, the perfect lip product when I'm super lazy to apply lipstick or lipgloss.

Maybelline BabyLips SPF20

A lipbalm with SPF is a must when you're going for summer vacation, especially if you're going to the beach or the pool.

 * Makeup bag - Forever21

Well I think I packed a bit too much this time, I'm propably going to use only half of these, but I always like to be prepaired. Do you over-pack like me?

Mac Haul.

 Hello my lovelies! I hope you're all having a great summer so far. As I mentioned in my previous haul post, I would do one more haul post in July because it was my birthday month and I bought a few make up goodies from Mac that I wanted to share with you guys!

  I'll start off with the two things that I didn's actually buy but I got them with the Back 2 Mac program, if you're not familiar with the B2M program it's very simple, you can return 6 empty Mac containers to a Mac store and you can get a free eyeshadow, well in Greece you can only exchange them for an eyeshadow but I'm pretty sure in other countries you can also exchange them for a lipstick. I had 12 empties so I got 2 eyeshadows, I got Amber Lights (the left one) and Woodwinked (the right one). Amber Lights is a shimmery bronzed gold shade and Woodwinked is more of a frost light bronze.

I was in need of a true matte peachy blush, 6 years ago I used to have Mac Peaches but when I hit pan I never repurchased it. I was searching for a cheaper dupe but since I couldn't find one I decided to repurchase it. It's a very beautiful orangey-peachy shade, completely matte that goes with every make up look. If you have warm skintone you should definitely get it!

Speaking of peachy shades, when I went into the Mac store I was determined to get a coral lipstick, and I was sure I was going to get Costa Chic but I when I saw Flamingo I completely changed my mind! Not that I don't want Costa Chic as well but Flamingo is a unique coral shade that I haven't try before. It's almost a neon coral pink with no shimmers, and it looks amazing if you have a tan.

Last but not least I got a new concealer/highlighter because I run out of my Sephora Smoothing and Brightening Concealer, I got the Mac Prep and Prime Highlighter in Bright Forecast which is almost identical, the only difference is that the Sephora one is a bit more peachy, the Mac one is not as salmon toned but it's more brightening for sure! I love using that type of pen/concealer/highlighters for my undereye circles, I know they're not supposed to be used alone but I think they work just fine on their own. I have really dark circles, I don't find that they cover as much as other, more high coverage concealers, but somehow they manage to cover and bighten the darkness just fine. If you have dark under eye circles, especially brown ones, you should try one of these pens, you'd be surprised!

Here are some pictures with swatches of all the things that I got:

Amber Lights left, Woodwinked right

L-R: Bright Forecast, Flamingo, Peaches

I don't usually go to Mac, not as much I used to when I was younger, but this summer as you can see I did a small damage, some of them were essentials and some others were not , but hey it was my birthday, I was allowed to splurge a bit! Tell me have you tried any of these products? I want to know!

Essence Get Big Lashes Volume Boost Waterproof Mascara Review.

 Hello my lovelies, how is your summer going so far? I hope you're all having a great time! I know I haven't done a post in a while and to be honest I don't have any excuse besides that I've been very lazy and I'm out of ideas for posts, but I hope I'll get through that phase really soon! For now I have a review for you about a mascara that really surprised me by how good it is, and by how cheap it it! Also it's waterproof which makes it perfect for the summertime.

 Brush/Formula

 I really like the simple blue packaging with the fun print on top, it makes it very appropriate for the summer. Now about the brush, let's just say that this mascara has a very boring/typical/old school but very huge brush which somehow works wonders! I would prefer if the bristles weren't that stiff, when I use a mascara I like to brush my lashes many times for more definition, but with this one I cannot do that. Don't get me wrong, it defines my lashes, it just doesn't define them as much as I would want to. The formula is a bit dry but that is something that I was expecting anyway, I find it reasonable for a waterproof mascara to have a dry formula. I haven't notice any smudging from the heat which is good but I haven't tested it yet with water to see if it's 100% waterproof.

 Application
I always find waterproof mascaras to hold a really good curl on my lashes and this one is no exception, actually it's way better than others that I've tried in the past. Even though it says "volume boost" I didn't see much volume on my lashes but it did an amazing job at lengthening them, I don't think I've ever seen my lashes that long, I can easily compare it to my HG Sephora Lash Plumper mascara.

Price
This mascara is ridiculously cheap, it costs only 2.7 euros! In Greece you can find it pretty much at any Hondos Center store.


Pros
-It adds length to the lashes and it holds curl for hours.

- It doesn't smudge, even on high temperatures.

-It's ridiculously cheap.


Cons
-It has a huge and stiff brush which makes it difficult to really define the lashes.

-It doesn't add any volume to the lashes.



Rating: 9/10
To be honest I never thought that I would even like this mascara, and that's because I've tried the regular Get Big Lashes,  the one in the purple tube, and I completely hated it! So I thought that I would hate this one too, maybe even more because it's waterproof and I don't get along with waterproof mascaras, but I was so wrong. Overall it's an amazing everyday mascara, yes it would be even better if it added a bit more volume to the lashes and had a better brush but the length that it gives and the amazing curl it holds for such a low price, it's definitely a winner!



Have you tried the Essence Get Big Lashes mascara? Did you like it?
I really want to know your opinion.