Sephora Lip Service Lip Deluxe Sampler and Essie Mint Candy Apple

When I went to return the Stila Smudge pot set the other day, this set caught my eye in its place. It's a gift set of 8 lip products from various brands retailing for $38. 3 of the 8 items are full sized items too..so it's a pretty good deal. It contains DuWop Private red (deluxe sample size), Smashbox Lip Enhancing gloss in Sheer (clear gloss, maybe 2/3 size), Sephora Nano Lip Liner in Beau Bordeaux, NARS Velvet MAtte Lip Pencil in Roman Holiday (Full Size), Korres Guava lipstick in Wine Red (Full Size), Cargo PlantLove Botanical Lipstick in Muir Woods (Full Size) Tarte Vitamin Infused lipstick in Hatha (sample), and Laura Mercier Lip Color Creme in Pink Champagne (sample)Flash
No Flash
Swatches (L-->R): Du Wop Private Red: supposed to be a color changing lipstick. I don't really notice any real color change. It's a pretty red..unfortunately I don't feel like I love it...or hate it... it's got a good texture, is nondrying, and smells like Smarties candy.
Sephora Beau Bordeaux Nano Lip Liner: Reddish Brown. It looks kind of mauvey in the swatch picture, but I don't see any of that on my skin
NARS Velvet Matte Lip Pencil in Roman Holiday: Kind of a silvery pink. It looks like Pepto Bismo against my lips and skintone, but it'd probably look lovely on a lighter girl. It has an odd scent I can't quite place, but nothing too strong or lasting
Korres Guava Lipstick in Wine Red: Cute Pink-Red. Very good texture and moisturizing. I like this color best in the set and think it could be flattering for a wide set of skin tones.
Cargo Plant Love Lipstick in Muir woods- Sheer Mauvey Pink with an emphasis on sheer. Has a somewhat mild waxy scent. I find this color somewhat drying.
Tarte lipstick in Hatha-A nice pink with copper shimmer. It's a really cute color and decent formula.
Laura Mercier Lip Colour Creme in Pink Champagne- Mauvey Pink...a cute neutraly color and very work appropriate. Has a nice emolient feel to it too.
I was messing around with Private Red earlier..so I cropped out a lip swatch of it. It's not quite this warm RL:
Overall the set's really nice and would make a great gift for someone. Personally, I feel like the colors are a bit off with my skintone..but then again my skin tone's made another change and I'm now really warm, so I have to go through my stash and figure out what will work on me again.

Today's NOTD is from Essie's holiday collection. Mint Candy Apple. I found the formula a bit streaky..though thinning it helped a bit. # coats gave a smooth, opaque result:

Cargo Eyeshadow book--Wet/Dry Eyeliner Palette

The last palette included in the Eyeshadow book was the Wet/Dry Eyelining palette, which retails for $32. This palette was probably the only disappointment in the book as the colors don't quite apply all that smoothly wet and are somewhat unimpressive to me dry. You can use these as eyeshadows as well, but they're a bit chalky, so I'm not sure any of these will see much use, if any. I swatched each color wet (left) then dry (right) for comparison.

Cargo eyeshadow book- Cargo quads

The second part of this 3 part series is Cargo's color quads. There are a total of 8 quads and each of these retails for $28 and can be found at Sephora. I took pictures and swatched these in indoor natural lighting (though a window) so there may be some variability in the lighting.

London: Overall, this quad isn't something I'd normally buy, though it's nice for me to have as part of this palette nonetheless. This quad contains a dark, matte brown similar to the "outer corner" shade in the warm neutral palette. This shade is a touch greyer than the one in the warm neutral palette on my hand, but on my lids, they're very similar. Next is a slightly frosty yellow beige shade; of the 4 shades in this quad, this one has the softest texture. The purple in this quad is the chalkiest in this quad and is a warm, slightly reddish purple on my skin. If not used carefully, this color comes off bruisey, and it is very easy to give yourself a 'bleack eye' look with this shade. The final shade in this quad is a shimmery brown with olive tones.


Tahiti is probably my 2nd favorite quad in this palette. It's a nice collection of cute, bright summery colors. It contains a light yellow-green, a green, a teal, and a blue. The yellow-green color is the softest texture-wise in this quad and also has the most shimmer. The texture and shimmer on the other 3 are all around the same level.


Bermuda contains another yellow-green shade, that's more muted than the one in Tahiti, a satiny, neutral brown, a bronzy brown shade, and a orangey copper shade. The texture of this quad is nice, and none of the shades are chalky

I actually loved Shanghai less than I expected I would, considering that it contains my favorite type of e/s color: taupe. This quad contais a frosty white, a shimmery beigey peach, a pink with gold sparkle, and a taupe that pulls purple on my skin. Of the 8 quads in my palette, this one has the softest texture

I accidently deleted the picture of Toronto that I was originally going to use, so when I retook this picture, the sun was close to setting, so the lighting for the picture of the quad itself is very cool toned. Nevertheless, Totonto is a collection of blue-greys and a chalky sparkly black shade. Of the 8 quads, I find that Toronto has the worst texture, with the sparkly black being the chalkiest and the shade to the left of it being the softest.

Baja is a quad that contains 2 bronzes, a peach and a frosty pink shade. On my lids, I can't particularly tell the difference between the two bronzes, but I have small lids. The difference is decently clear in the swatch photo though.


Barcelona is my favorite Cargo quad, with two purples, a blue, and a cool toned green.

I was quite ready to love Vienna, but the bronze in this quad is definitely very very warm. PAst that shade, it also contains a shimmery. warm beige, a darker, peachy beigh, and a shimmery blue with slight grey tones.

Cargo Eyeshadow book --Cargo Essential Eye Palettes

A few months ago, I was lucky enough to score an enormous palette off ebay containing the majority of Cargo's eyeshadow quads. I finally got around to swatching it this week so I decided to share the swatches with you guys. The palette itself is an enormous monstrousity measuring 12.25"x 12.25" and is made of cardboard that flips open like a book. There aren't any magnets or anything holding the palette shut. It's a bit unweildly and hard to store, but it was a great value, and contains a ton of colors I wouldn't have thought to buy otherwise (despite loving now). In fact, out of all of Cargo's quads, the only one I ever thought to buy was the cool neutral essential eye palette in Cool neutral.


Here's a ruler comparison of the palette:Here's the palette opened up in warmish indoor lighting without flash:
Here's another pic of the palette open, but with flash. This palette's so big and my room's lighting is so crappy that it was difficult to take really clear pics of the sucker.I'm going to split up the swatches into groups because there were over 30 pics in this swatch set overall, which I think is a bit large for 1 post. I'm also splitting it up because both my laptop and netbook are out of commission, so I have no way of uploading new pics for a while. Pics were taken in cool natural indoor lighting for the most part.

The swatches for this palette may look a bit dry and chalky looking, but I assure you that it isn't an issue so much with the eyeshadows as it was with how dry my skin was when I started swatching. The rest of the photos should be fine after this one. The Warm neutral quad contains a light matte beige, a slightly darker, warmer matte beige, a slightly satiny, warm, light brown, and a darker somewhat satiny darker brown. The first two shades pretty much dissapear on my lids since I'm around NC35 or so right now.
The cool neutral palette is my favorite of the 3 it contains a lightly shimmery beige, a fawn color, a matte taupe, and a darker slightly taupey grey. The crease shade in the giant palette pulls a lot more purple than the original though for some reason. Either way though, it's quite nice.

In this palette the Dark neutral palette is probably the softest texture wise out of the three. IT contains a warm, shimmery beige, a shimmery bronzy gold, a warm brown, and a matte dark brown. It's basically a warm neutral palette for nedium skintones.