My Skincare Routine

I'm not going to lie to you. I've been lucky to have relatively nice skin. I went through a time in my late teens where I had little bumps all over my forehead and cheeks, I went to a dermatologist and he told me that I was drying my skin out with too many products that contained acne treatments. That's when I streamlined and started using a gentle cleanser. My skin cleared up after a couple months and I've never gone back. The only problems I have now are an occasional pimple. 

My skin is combination, so much so that I have dry patches right next to oily patches. Let me tell you, it's real cute. It's also really sensitive and gets irritated easily.

I start out by removing my makeup. I do this every night before I shower or wash my face. These Neutrogena wipes are my personal favorites, the generic brand works too but they tend to irritate my dumb sensitive skin.

After my makeup is off I cleanse my face.This is the best cleanser I've ever used. It's the Burt's Bee's Soap Bark and Chamomile Deep Cleansing Cream. It's especially good in the winter when my skin is dry because it's a thick cream that is moisturizing but not greasy and leaves my skin clean. It has a pretty strong sent that's really natural. I personally love it. It seems to have a bit of menthol in it because it makes your face tingle a little bit, but it wakes me up in the morning so I'm not complaining.

About three times a week I exfoliate to get rid of all the dead skin. I alternate and use any of the St. Ives Apricot scrubs depending on my mood. This is the Blemish Control one. They're all great and extremely cheap!

This is my day moisturizer and it's just what the title says. It's the Simple Replenishing Rich Moisturizer. It has no scent and is perfect for my dry and sensitive winter skin. I'll buy this until they stop selling it.

As you can tell I love the Burt's Bee's line. This is the Burt's Bee's Sensitive Night Cream. It also has no scent (are you sensing a pattern?) and it's incredibly moisturizing. It's my perfect night cream.

And here are all the products! They're all relatively cheap, under 15 dollars, and are all available at drug stores.

Brace yourself. This is my face with no makeup. I felt like I should show you my bare skin since this is what the whole routine leads to for me. 

Thanks so much for reading! I'll be back soon. Leave me comments if you have any suggestions for what kind of post I should write next!

Drugstore Hair Care All-Stars

So I have long hair, and a lot of it. If you know me at all then you know my hair is kind of my pride and joy. The problem is, having long hair means breakage, especially on the ends. This breakage is even worse when I'm up at school using water that is so hard you can practically smell the iron. Enter my new best friend, the L'Oreal Paris Advanced Haircare Total Repair 5 Restoring line. Wow, that's a mouth full.

I bought this whole line on a whim. I was in Target and I was out of shampoo and conditioner, this was on a pretty new display, so I gravitated towards it like a moth to a flame  Obviously I was intrigued by the claims of repairing damage, reducing frizz, and overall making my hair perfect. Let me tell you, I've never been happier with a hair care purchase in my life.

I know that sounds dramatic but these products are fantastic. I have tried almost every smoothing and moisturizing shampoo from the drugstore and they all leave my hair dry or greasy. This shampoo/conditioner combo cleans my hair well but still leaves it incredibly soft. The conditioner reduces frizz and leaves my hair moisturized but not greasy in the least bit. Overall they are a great duo that I can see myself repurchasing in the near future.

The third item in this trio of awesome is the Multi-Restorative Dry Oil. I grabbed this simply because I've heard so much about hair oils but I'm far too cheap to buy pure Argan oil so I figured I would just give this one a shot. I'm sure there are better, more expensive oils that do more for your hair but this one does smooth out frizz and soften the ends of my hair. All in all it's a very nice product.

I give this whole line an A+. I never thought I could get this nice of a shampoo/conditioner from the drug store. I highly recommend these to anyone, especially if you have long or thick hair.

I hope everyone had a nice week! I know mine was pretty long and busy so I'm glad to be home with plenty of time to sleep and rest up. Have a good weekend everyone, I'll be posting more hopefully next week!

Favorite Winter Lip Products

Hi my name is Kylie and I'm addicted to lip products.

Given this information I decided to share with you guys my favorite lip products for the winter. As we all know, the cold can be brutal on your lips. My best advice is to keep piling on a good lip balm whenever you think of it, it's the only way to avoid the cracked and dry lips that are cute on no one.

With that being said, here are all my favorite lip products that I can't seem to stop reaching for in the winter months.

MAC lipsticks are some of my favorites. On the left is "Russian Red" and on the right is "Rebel". Russian Red is a blue toned dark red matte lipstick which goes great with just about any complexion in my opinion. Rebel is a plum purple color with red undertones that is gorgeous applied as a stain and as a full lipstick. Both are rich in color and are gorgeous, however they can both be a bit drying so definitely use lip balm before applying.

This gorgeous little baby is the NARS Velvet Matte Lipstick in "Damned". It functions as a lip liner and lipstick and is incredibly long lasting. It can be a little drying but again, just apply some lip balm beforehand. The color is a dark fuchsia-magenta that is absolutely gorgeous and it is incredibly easy to apply. The only flaw is that you have to sharpen it, therefore you lose product. Still, it's one of my all time favorites lipsticks.

This is the Tarte LipSurgence Matte Lip Tint in "Fiery". It's a great moisturizing option for a red lip in the winter. It's similar in tone to Russian Red without being quite as opaque or drying. It lasts quite a long time on the lips and has a bit of a shine at the beginning that wears away the longer it is on.

Next is the Revlon Just Bitten Kissable Lip Stain in "Honey". When I first got this it was the summer and I had a bit of a tan. (well, as tan as I can be seeing as I'm Casper the friendly ghost) Now that I've paled out it looks ten times better. It's a very natural brownish pink color that is quite moisturizing. It has a bit of a shine and is perfect for a neutral winter look.

 These two are a recent love of mine. They are the Revlon Lip Butters in "Red Velvet" (left) and "Raspberry Pie" (right). Just like the balm stain I didn't originally like these but I kept finding myself reaching for them. They're the perfect lip product for when you want some color but don't want the drying affect of a lipstick. They aren't as moisturizing as a regular lip balm but they're definitely better than a matte lipstick or any other tinted lip balm I've tried.

Here are all of them swatched! They're in the same order as this post; from left to right, "Russian Red", "Rebel", "Damned", "Fiery", "Honey", "Red Velvet", and "Raspberry Pie".

Happy Friday everyone! So far today I've drank coffee and seen my academic advisor. I'm set to graduate on time in 2014 with both my degrees so it's celebration time! (my celebration includes eating candy and watching "Charmed" by the way).

Have a great weekend! Thanks for reading and I'll talk to you soon!

Face of the Day #1

So it's my first actual beauty post! Yahoo!
I was thinking about an easy first post to write in order to ease myself into this whole blogging thing. I decided on one of my own personal favorite posts to read, a simple face of the day. Here it goes!

I started my day at 6am so I had to go for a simple look. I started out with my basic face routine, which I can cover in another post, (it basically consists of slapping on some concealer and a little powder) and then kept it quite simple.

Here are all the products all laid out. (pardon my "rustic" dorm window sill. I was trying to catch the natural light. It was only 4:30, winter in the midwest is awful).

On my eyes I wore MAC's Paint Pot in "Painterly" as my base, then added a little bit of Naked from the Naked Palette (by Urban Decay) in the crease and outer corner. I used Virgin as an inner corner and brow highlight. (this palette is a god send by the way).

 For my cheeks I used Tarte Amazonian Clay blush in "Natural Beauty" just for some color. As you can tell my skin is so pale it's nearly transparent so this looks nice in small amounts, especially with a red lip.

       
Speaking of red lips, here's one of my favorites, MAC's Russian Red. The matte formula can be a little drying, just exfoliate and slap on a little lip balm before and you're golden.

 

And an awkward selfie to show you the finished look!

I know it's super simple but it's been my go to look this past month so I figured it warranted a post. 

If you live anywhere near the midwest hope you're staying warm, temperatures were below -10 degrees today in Michigan. I seriously thought my eyes were going to freeze open.

I'm now off to stop procrastinating and do my homework. College never rests. I hope your week has started off well, talk to you all soon!

Intro!

Well hello there, and welcome to my little awkward makeup blog. I guess we should start out with the basics. My name is Kylie, I’m a 20 year old college student in the great state of Michigan. I buy too many blushes and don’t adhere to rules of lipstick usage. Aka, I wear dark red lipstick on a daily basis. You may be wondering why I would want to start a beauty blog. The answer is that I’ve been obsessed with all things makeup and beauty since I watched a lollipop26 video on accident on Youtube a few years back. By the way Laura, if you ever by some miracle read this, you need to make videos again. Anyway, I’ve been watching beauty videos and reading beauty blogs religiously ever since. My own collection of various beauty items has grown and about a year ago I felt a pressing need to start a blog. I finally got the courage up to have a real go at it, so here we are. I'm not sure what direction exactly I'm going to take this blog but I'm sure there will be plenty of face of the days, beauty hauls, and reviews on various items (probably mainly lipsticks and blushes because let's be honest I'm obsessed). If you really read this whole thing, then I love you, and I hope you continue reading this blog.

Sorry I have to keep this short, It's only a few weeks into the new semester and I'm already behind on the pile of reading I have to do this Spring. I hope you're having a wonderful Monday!