i didn't know about hourglass until recently. i read a lot of beauty blogs since i've given birth to my daughter, or a little bit before that since i have lots of time to kill, so.. many bloggers that i read mentioned hourglass. several of them. so i became curious.. especially about their ambient lighting powder. i believe the lighting powders are the breakthrough product that make hourglass famous. the founder claimed that the powder infused with active ingredients to create unbelievably surreal skin. while traditional powder mattifies skin and sometimes make you look dull, this lighting powder won't. it will catch lighting in wherever you are and somehow conceal the imperfection on your face and make you look radiant. sounds too good to be true, eh?

well.. many bloggers claim that the product works, that it will make your face not dull at all, glowing but not too shiny. right lighting in perfect place. like highlighter but a subtle one. not too shimmery, just like powder but more than usual powder. though it's supposed to work as powder, they have several variations in tones and highlighting effects. since they are so popular, they recently release a trio of highlighting powder for last year holiday season. which i hope i can get my hands on it, but i can't since it's too expensive.

their other products that i also interested in are their blushes. they look like usual compact powder blush, but with abstract picture on them. i don't know if the abstract pattern give color impact as blush. mostly i only saw hand or arm swatch, but i once saw what it will look like on face and it's pretty. very subtle in color and just look like the person is flushing.

recently they release bronzer to their collection. the pattern on the bronzer is same as the blush one. and they only have two types, one suitable for light skin, and the other one for darker skin. well, i only hope that someone will give me one of these as present or someday i'll be able to purchase it myself, before they're out of my reach.

(+) innovative products, good reviews
(-) expensive

i have no idea about e.l.f. and i don't remember how i stumbled upon e.l.f. all i know, i was browsing about their products, and i'm glad that it's also cruelty free and very affordable. it has 3 price groups. the essential is $1 range, the studio has $3 and $5 range. so far, the only thing that attracts me from the essential line is the eyelid primer. and yes, i bought it, and i like it, though it dries quicker. or is it me who don't use it so often? oh well...

other products that i'm attracted to are their brushes, blushes, bronzer, lip liner and the lip scrub. the famous brush from the studio line is the powder brush, which i later bought it. actually i want to buy another brush, but i don't know which one to buy. i'm eyeing on the stipple brush or the angled blush brush.. but since i've had blush brushes and my foundation brush which all still in pristine condition, i decided to put that thought on hold. and that also applied to the blushes too, since i decided to buy nyx instead of elf. though i have 2 shades in my list, the candid coral and twinkled pink.

okay.. now move on to the bronzer. elf has 3 different type of bronzers, warm, gold and cool. i didn't know what to expect in a bronzer but i was looking for a bronzer that can be used to contour, but i didn't searched intensive enough, so i made a bad choice. i choose the gold one since i found out that it's the most subtle one, and since i'm quite fair, i'm afraid that dark bronzer will make me look silly. but turned out, it's so subtle that it barely showed on me. plus it's too shimmery for contouring. oh well.. if i'm lazy enough to put on blush on or i was going for bold lip, i just use this bronzer to warm my face. but i won't buy it again for bronzing or contouring.

and lip liner.. they have their matte lip cream which serves as lip liner, and it's quite popular since some of the shades are similar to some popular lipstick. but, they also have a universal lip liner. it's clear and waxy, so it also helps helping to keep the lipstick in place. since i don't have many bright lipsticks, i don't want the usual lip liner, and just bought the universal one instead. as for the lip scrub, i decided to buy it since i hate scrubbing my lips with my bare finger. and i don't want harsh scrub since i don't know what to expect from lip scrub. but this lip scrub got good reviews, so i decided to try it. well, i still don't know how to make it scrubbing my lips before chapping a bit of the top of the scrub, but i think chopping a bit every time i use it is easy. if you have other ideas to use it, please tell me. as for the effectiveness, i might say it is effective.. but scrubbing it to hard will bleed your lips.

sometimes i want to buy more from this brand, but lately since i'm more into lipsticks, somehow elf lipsticks don't attract me so i'm not interested anymore in this brand. but i do look on their website every now and then since they often have marvelous promotion deal. if you're new to makeup world and don't want to spend fortune but want to have a good experience, then elf is a good way to start.

to round it all up..
(+) cruelty free, budget-friendly, often have sales (big one.. 50% or more), great selection of brushes, you get what you paid for and don't make you broke.
(-) no worldwide shipping so it's hard to get, especially here in indonesia.

what about you guys? do you have great experience with elf? please do share...

my elf collection

this will be the first series that i write besides reviews. i will write about new brands that i found out, not necessarily new brand in real world, but new to me, and products from that brand that i like. i might have purchased items from them or intend to buy in the future.

the first brand that i will discuss is nyx. i know nyx since i bought their lipgloss palette. but i didn't like it, so i forgot about it for a while. but then, when i was more into this beauty world, i found that nyx is a decent brand. no cruelty with decent price.. and when i found out about their round lipstick, and then soft matte lip cream with huge range of colors, i'm hooked. you know i'm a big fan of colors. so imagine when i decided to buy a whole lot of round lipsticks. i spent hours browsing about reviews and swatches. but then i read that many people complained about how shipment will ruin the lipstick, sometimes it will melt and sometimes it will be broken. and the durability is quite low since it's very creamy and tends to melt easily in hot weather. oh, i live in tropical country when heat and humid are here to stay everyday. so i decided not to plunge into big haul.

next i found out about their soft matte lip cream. i haven't tried any matte lipstick yet, so i was in doubt for quite some time before deciding to buy two shades.. antwerp and sao paulo. antwerp is the best seller colors, and i find out no wonder it becomes best seller. it is suitable to any skintone. while sao paulo on the other hand, quite bold for me, but still wearable. but since sao paulo is quite bold, it makes me stop there.. i don't have the courage to try the red ones, like amsterdam.. since it will be much bolder. maybe i will try another paler shade like milan or istanbul and other shades similar to antwerp like ibiza or cannes. who knows?

then i need lip balms. we were going to have winter holiday and i have to pack a lip balm with me. but i also don't want to look too pale, but i don't think i have enough time to put on makeup since my son is coming along, so i decided color lip balm is a good choice. and after searching, i decided to buy nyx lip balms in panna cotta and parfait. though they aren't as moisturizing as my previous body shop's vit e lip balm, but they're okay..

and lately, i've been eyeing on their butter gloss. i searched day and night about their shades.. but still it is a very long list. so i stop there and wait. and then there are intense butter glosses. oh my.. i have my eye on tres leches, napoleon and one more shade, i forgot the name. oh.. i wonder when i will have the chance to use it? oh well.. they're on my list for now.. and speaking of lipsticks, they have butter lipsticks and high voltage lipsticks which i haven't known a lot for now. i can't risk myself wanting another lipstick right now.. hahaha..

aside from lips products, i've been attracted to their blushes and eyeliners. though i would like to try their stick and cream blushes, but i decided to try the powder blush instead since i have pretty oily skin. and their powder blushes are like the round lipsticks.. it has huge colors range. and deciding which one to buy is hard. but i decided to try pinched (many said it's nars' orgasm dupe) and lately i've tried mocha also. i have apricot or coral dream in my list to try next.

as for the eyeliner, i have no luck with revlon's before, so i have scratched liquid liner from my list. i was looking for retractable pencil eyeliner, but i found out that nyx has felt tip eyeliner and i fell in love with it. now i use their dual timer eyeliner, which has felt tip on one side and kohl pencil on the other end. i'm happy with it, and i will continue my purchase in the future.

okay.. to round it up..
(+) cruelty free, budget friendly, huge range of shades (especially their lipsticks, lipglosses, blushes), great pigmentation
(-) inconsistency in shades : when i browsed to check the shade, it looked completely different from one person to the other, i mean really different.. even on the same skin tone. even the real product look different. i know, it might be lighting and all, but it's so inconsistent compared to other brand. but fyi, i face the problems when browsing for round lipsticks and the powder blushes. the other products don't share the same problem. the other inconsistency is their formulation. most of the round lipsticks tend to melt easily. some of the powder blushes are more powdery than the other. the other inconsistency is their packaging. i've read somewhere that many people are asking how to differentiate the real nyx products apart from the counterfeit, but there's no conclusion about it. me myself, i have two nyx lip balms that have different packaging.. but i guess both are genuine. perhaps nyx will help shed the light to this problem.

if you love nyx, tell me what products do you like? if you haven't known it, search about it now.. try some of their products and i assure you, you will hooked with this brand.

my nyx collection so far

the toner sachet

left: the sample sachet right: ths product on my hand