FOTD: New Years Eve

Happy new years everybody! I had a great new years eve spent with my closest friends and had fun doing a glam makeup look for the occasion. Here are the products I used to achieve this blue smokey eye and nude lip;

• Benefit Porefessional primer
• Mac Skin Refined Zone
• Estee Lauder Double Wear in 2n1 Desert Beige
• Mac Prolong wear concealer in Nc15
• Nyx Studio finishing powder
• Lorac Behind the Scenes eye primer
• Lorac Pro 2 Palette
• Nyx Frosted Ocean shadow
• Nars Shadow duo in China Seas
• Estee Lauder Sumptuous Bold Volume mascara
• Illamasqua blush in Dulcet
• Mac Mineralised Skin Finish in Soft and Gentle
• Elf Studio Lip Liner in natural
• Mac lipstick in Myth
• Glam by Manicare Madonna lashes

I had a blonde moment and left my trusty favourite $1 liquid liner and Hoola bronzer out of the photo! But thats all the products I used to achieve this dramatic look for new years eve. I hope you are all enjoying the new year so far and thank you so much for stopping by my blog!

Monique xx

2015 Christmas Beauty Haul

I had so much fun sharing the beauty goodies I recieved last Christmas so I decided to do it again this year! I feel so fortunate to receive any presents and the last thing I want is for this post to come off as selfish or bragging, so with that being said lets get into the goodies!

About a week before Christmas my besties and I exchanged Christmas gifts, and I excitedly received the Stila Eternal Love liquid lipstick trio which contains a red, dark nude and plum, Mac Lipliner in Brick and Illamasqua blush in Dulcet. All I can say is my best friends know me too well and I have been using all the products like crazy. My sister gifted me the Chi Chi Spices palette, it has wonderful pigmentation and all the colours are beautiful- I have been getting good use out of that too! And Lastly for lip products my partner gifted me the Jefree Star Liquid Lipstick in Redrum. It's such a beautiful red that I wore Christmas day, the formula is fantastic too. 

I joined in two games of Santa Grab over the festive season and funnily enough I received Lush for both, but I'm not complaining! The Butterfly set contains a Ro's Argan oil body conditioner and a Sultana of soap both of which I can not wait to try. I also received a Magic wand which smells so sweet and delicious, unfortunately I don't have a bath but I'll save this one for a night away! 

Now I may or may not have picked out my gifts from the boyf this Christmas but when you reallllly want something it's hard not too! Black Opium by ysl has been on my wish list for so long and when the Christmas gift sets came out I was so excited. The 30ml set came with a free travel sized ysl eyeliner and mascara, the box is too beautiful to throw out too. Another item which has been high on my wish list for quite some time is the Glam glow Youth Mud. I finally got to test it out Christmas day and loved the way it made my skin felt, I can't wait to test it out some more. And being the lash addict I am I was so glad to find the Glam eyes two pack of Gwen lashes in my stocking, they're so full and pretty!

My Mum picked out a beautiful Akin Body moisturiser and hand cream for me this year, turns out she purchased them for my sister and I during the Priceline skincare goody bag sale, so she split up the extra products between us for Christmas which was so nice of her. I received the Australis One night tan, Modelco tan exfoliating wipes, Physiogel daily moisture therapy cream, Swisse Micellar water, original chapstick and the Nip and Fab exfoliation pads, so many new goodies to try! 

And last but certainly not least, I entered Hailey's amazing Christmas giveaway this year and to my surprise I won the Too Faced Le Grand Chateau! The packaging is too die for, and it contains three palettes and a travel size Better than sex mascara, I seriously jumped around the room like a loony person when I found out. Hailey's blog rocks so if you haven't already checked it out you need to asap!

That's all the amazing beauty goodies I received for Christmas this year! I feel like it would also be possible to do a haul post on all the cat items I received this year, I received that many! But I won't become that much of a crazy cat lady and stick to beauty. I hope you all had a really lovely Christmas!

Monique xx

November Empties

December is here! This year seemed to go by so quickly and I can't believe we're so close to Christmas! I wish I had used up more products this year as my beauty stash continues to grow and I'm sure I will be fortunate to receive some goodies for Christmas and my birthday early January, but I still got through a good chunk of products in november and here they are;

1 & 2. Normal Skin Face wipes/Gentle Cleansing Wipes: I'm always testing out inexpensive makeup wipes and I couldn't notice a difference between these two. They removed my makeup nicely, struggled a bit with mascara but overall they did the job.

3. Hydraluron Moisture Boosting Sheet Mask: My skin feels refreshed after using these masks although I wouldn't say they are 'moisture boosting' for my skin, I think these would work better on dry skin types.

4. Nivea Stay Clear Toner: I actually really enjoyed using this toner before putting on my makeup just to cleanse the skin and remove any excess oils/dirt. Now that I've used it up I keep going to use it only to realise I'm out, time to pick up another bottle!

5. Nivea All In 1 Face Scrub: Ignored the 3 in 1 aspect and just used this product as a face scrub. I quite enjoyed it as it had a cooling effect on my skin, as you can see I cut the tube in half to get all the product out so It must've been decent!

6. Mitchum Powder Fresh Roll On Deodorant: Holy grail deodorant, so good for the hotter months and never fails to keep me smelling fresh.

7. Random Ass body Scrub: Random, didn't work well, bleh.

8. Stella Honeyed Milk Candle: I used up my first ever candle! Yay! I received this last Christmas and it had a subtle sweet smell, I enjoyed burning it in the bathroom.

9. Clear Scalp and Hair Shampoo: A pretty average shampoo, It did foam up nicely and clean my hair as you would expect.

10. Schwarzkopf Blonde Toner: I have gone through so many bottles of this stuff that surely it must be boring to see in my empties posts by now, its works great so I'll continue to repurchase.

11. Cedel Dry Shampoo: This doesn't really compare to Batiste, sorry.

12. Lash Control Clear Gel: This served me well for my brows for quite some time so It was definitely time to throw out.

13. Urban Decay Primer Potion: Another product that was due to hit the bin, a great everyday eyeshadow primer.

14. Glo Minerals Pressed Powder Foundation: This was such a great mineral foundation, being pressed it was super easy to apply and It provided a really nice coverage. I would spot conceal and then apply this all over the face daily for work.

15. Too Faced Shadow Insurance & Powder Sample: The shadow insurance is a great eye primer very similar in formula to the urban decay primer potion. It was strange using the powder sample but it was pretty average and unfortunately too dark for my skin tone, I have another one that I plan to use after fake tanning. 

Thats it for my november empties! I hope you're having a great December so far and thank you for stopping by.

Monique xx