MAC describes Fluidlines as:
Ultra-smooth, Fluidline’s gel formula provides the precision of a liquid liner with a silkier, softer finish. Goes on “foolproof” with a brush in an easy dip-and-stroke action. Long-wearing. Smudge-proof. Lines up in a rich array of colours and finishes. Brush sold separately.

MAC Dark Diversion Fluidline
Description: Blackened plum. (LE: Stylishly Yours)

MAC Blacktrack Fluidline
Description: Solid flat black. (Permanent)

Swatching procedure: My skintone is a MAC NW20 (maybe a bit lighter due to it being winter). All photos taken under “natural light” bulbs, which mimic natural daylight.

Dark Diversion was an impulse buy, but I think I can get some use out of it… if I remember I own it. I hardly ever use my other two Fluidlines I own (Blacktrack and Sweet Sage). Blacktrack is really intense, but works AWESOME on the waterline, despite adhering to contacts and dryness that I’ve mentioned before.

MAC Dangerous Cuvée Paint Pot
Description: Frosted cool grey. (LE: Cham Pale)

MAC I Get No Kick Eye Kohl
Description: Metallic nude (LE: Cham Pale)

MAC Retrospeck Eyeshadow
Description: Beached blonde (Lustre, Permanent)

MAC NC15/NW20 Chromagraphic Pencil
Description: A highly pigmented wood-clenched pencil with a firm lead and silky soft application. Use for outlining, defining and drawing. (PRO, Permanent)

Swatching procedure: My skintone is a MAC NW20 (maybe a bit lighter due to it being winter). Retrospeck is applied over Painterly paint pot, so results may be different if applied on bare skin. All photos taken under “natural light” bulbs, which mimic natural daylight.

I Get No Kick currently sold out on MAC’s website, and I can see why! I think it’ll be the perfect eye kohl for brightening and highlighting my eyes (besides my usual NC15/NW20 pencil that I use on my waterline). Tomorrow I might use Dangerous Cuvée for both work and then my NYE look. Very excited to play around with these new products! ‘Bout damn time I got some new MAC

Retrospeck I use as a highlight color often. For being a lustre finish, it doesn’t get too messy on my face.

To my horror the box was half opened and crushed in… wtf? Luckily everything was in there and nothing was broken (mostly due to what I ordered, no pressed powder products). Still made me sad to see the sorry shape the box was in

I immediately jumped to try to the skin corrector and concealer.

MAC Studio Finish Skin Corrector in Pure Orange is helpful for concealing blue under eye areas (along with blue/black tattoos, or so I’ve read). This is a problem that plagues me, and my concealer just wasn’t cutting it so I decided to give this a whirl. I stuck the pan in a depotted 4-pan eyeshadow palette. The product is very creamy, and just the tiniest dab is all I needed. When I first applied of course it was neon orange, but it blended in easily with a MAC 194 concealer brush. The blue tinge was reduced considerably.

I have always used the discontinued MAC Studio Touch-Up Stick Concealer, but as of late I have found it difficult to work with… dry and scratchy. (Which totally could be due to the age of the product, I’ve had it for over 3 years.) So I threw the MAC Studio Sculpt Concealer in NW20 in my order as well. I applied it over the Skin Corrector. This product is deliciously creamy and easy to apply and blend in. It combined with the skin corrector definitely brightened up and improved my under eye area!! Now only time will tell how long the product holds up, and if I’ll look like a mess in a few hours or not.

Only thing I don’t like about it is that it looks like the Painterly Paint Pot. I think I’ll have to write a big “C” on it so I know it’s my concealer

At last, more foundation! Oh how I’ve missed it, especially since it’s my sunscreen since my skin gets rather finicky about moisturizers/skinscreens. As you can see, I don’t use the foam applicator it comes with. I yank that sucker out, and I shoved the temporary sponge up in the lid. I’ll see if this helps when I accidentally tip over the container. I love this foundation, but I really wish MAC offered a better container for it

I am very pleased I got 1.5 years of use out of my first foundation. Of course I wasn’t using it daily, but even with daily use, that’s still like a year or so! Definitely not bad

And the rest of my goodies, which are backups for existing products that are soon to run out, or will in a few months. Since I don’t live anywhere near a MAC store (100 miles to the nearest), just counters which won’t accept my Pro Card, I decided I’d just order up some replacement stuff. I figure if I don’t open it it’ll stay fresh just fine

I should do a comparison picture of a brand new Clear Brow Set, and my existing tube! My existing tube is light brown from all the shadow the wand has picked up. Quite amusing, at least to me.

And those are my new goodies Time to update the collection list!

Ohhhh… moisturizers. I never even owned one until last year! Definitely not my thing, but since I live in a really dry climate, it’s been a necessary product. My usual moisturizer is MAC Studio Moisture Fix with SPF, but it began struggling to keep up with dryness this winter. Wanting to stick with MAC, I decided to give Studio Moisture Cream a try.

Initial worries: My skin is weird. It gets pissed off if I use new products on it, usually in the form of breakouts. And who wants that?! But my cheeks and area between my eyebrows are so dry this time of year, I had to make a switch…

So how has my skin been doing? Well, I have gotten some breakouts. Therefore, I’ve been trying to use this product only on the dry areas, and leaving it off of the areas where I get breakouts (forehead, chin mostly). This seemed to help a lot. But then I started tanning again (sorry, can’t do the pale thing…) and I slathered this product all over my face, and I got about 5 breakouts… forehead and upper lip. Yuck! However, I am not sure if it’s due to Studio Moisture Cream, or because I used my Studio Moisture Fix before tanning because it has sunscreen in it… maybe my skin just doesn’t like two different products being used?

On the dry areas it does wonders! No more peeling showing up in a few hours after use! So Studio Moisture Cream does what it’s suppose to on dry areas!

The product itself is pretty dreamy. Doesn’t take much to get the job done! I purchased it in mid-December, and I’m still just using what was stuck to the inner lid. It doesn’t apply heavy, but I “feel” it on my face more than the Studio Moisture Fix. Biggest downside is the lack of sun protection in it. Even though my foundation has SPF, I don’t always use foundation.

So overall… definitely this will be my winter moisturizer. I will be switching back to Studio Moisture Fix once winter is over. The product does what I ask it to, and I can’t really fault it for causing some breakouts because I knew going in that my skin responds funky to new products.

Now, I’m not the biggest fan of makeup being applied to myself… I’ve only had mine done at MAC about 3 times, and only one of those times were my eyes. So of course I was nervous, being the makeup freak that I am.

The look was very neutral, but simple enough for day… because let’s face it… purple smokey eyes, regardless of how much I swear by them, are not appropriate for most “professional” environments.

I snapped a few pics when I got home. I can’t remember all the product names, so there will be a few missing details…

Face

Eyes

Ooo, the dreaded full face! Usually I use concealer and some sort of brow product… so excuse the dark eye circles and messy brows!

I have a feeling the Eyesicles is going to start creasing on me… I actually own this product and it always creased as a base or by itself.

I’m liking the lip glosses, they make my lips feel soft. The foundation also gave good coverage, though seems a bit pale… I think this is only because my MAC foundation is now too dark for me since I haven’t gotten any sun in the past few months, so I’m not use to the correct foundation shade being used, oops.

Mary Kay is actually how I got into makeup… I use to only use black eyeliner and mascara until an old friend became a MK consultant. Then I got into eyeshadows and it snowballed from there. I actually have one of the “old school” MK palettes filled with shadows. I stopped using it soon after I got into MAC products. I keep meaning to pull it out and do some looks just for fun one of these days.

So now I gotta figure out what to spend my $25 on… There’s a travel roll up bag that is pretty nifty, but would I ever use it? Same goes for any makeup, as I’m already on MAC overload… I’m going to see if my mom sees anything she likes. It’s hard!

On other news… yesterday I did a blue look, and when I was going to get my camera, clumsy me knocked 3 of my 15-pan palettes off of the counter, and they hit the tile floor. My “highlights” one made it out fine, only some of the pans fell out because the magnets aren’t strong. In my “blue” palette Parrot shattered I ended up re-pressing it, and it turned out well for being my first time (I never did get a chance to do my pigments, and now I can’t find the empty pans I bought). My “silvers/black” palette got beat all to hell… half of Smoke & Diamonds just disintegrated into dust so I couldn’t scoop any of it back up for re-pressing. Half of Beauty Marked chipped off, so I did a quick “rubbing alcohol and finger” re-press, which I also had to do to Nehru. Not pretty looking at all… I use to hate looking at people’s palette pictures and all the shadows looking like battle ravaged warriors, but now I understand how it happens… gave me a heart attack though, and made a mess on the floor. Now I remember why I put the palettes in the sink!

Long story short, I never got pictures of the blue look, so I’ll have to repeat it. *sigh*

Well, that was my adventure for today… I’ll be searching for what to spend my $25 on!

What are Cream Colour Bases? MAC’s description is:
Versatile and multi-purpose, Cream Colour Base can be applied directly to bare skin, or layered over foundation, moisturizer, or powder. Smooth and easy to apply with a brush, sponge, or fingers-colour effects range from a light veil to highly dramatic, depending on method of application. Cream Colour Base is fragrance-free. (The following shades are not recommended for use in lip area: Black, Dusk and Fawntastic. The following shades are not recommended for use in the eye area: Fabulush, Improper Copper, Premeditated and Virgin Isle.)

MAC Pearl Cream Colour Base
Description: Soft pale gold with icy shimmer (Frost)

MAC Plumed Violet Cream Colour Base
Description: Pro, Discontinued?

MAC Premeditated Cream Colour Base
Description: A deep, bright vivid blue red (Discontinued?)

Swatching procedure: My skin tone is roughly a MAC NW20 (maybe NW15 since any tan is fading). Photos are taken in my bathroom under “Natural Light” bubs which mimic natural daylight.

I did these swatches today because tomorrow I am mailing out Pearl to a new owner. I could never get Pearl to work… it would make my eyelids really greasy and everything would crease… even if I put it over a paint pot. I didn’t have a use for it, so I posted it up for swap. I am getting Cakeshop shadestick in return. I haven’t ever used a shadestick, but figured it could be something neat to try. At the very worse it ends up sitting around like my Pearl CCB has been doing,

I have done a few pretty purple looks with Plumed Violet applied as a base. I have never used Premeditated, only swatched it 2 or 3 times. I have Flammable paint, so I don’t really need a red eye base (yeah yeah, they say not to use it on eyes… I’m a risk taker!). So Premeditated also sits around. Maybe some day I’ll find a use…

I ordered:

MAC 15-pan palettes are DVD-sized, and fit the rack perfectly. It’s designed to store things vertically, but I prefer my palettes to remain horizontal, so I had to buy some “grippers” to put on the side as the ones on it were for the vertical orientation. The acrylic is think and sturdy, definitely blowing my old flimsy DVD-turned-palette-display out of the water.

The desktop organize is perfect for all my liners, mascaras, brow products, etc. I bought some small stones for the bottom so everything would stick upright in it. Like the DVD rack, it is good quality and sturdy. It also fits perfectly on top of the DVD rack!

Before tax and shipping my order was about $18 total! I think that is totally reasonable for quality storage items. The Container Store was doing a 20% off sale deal.

Now for pictures of how I stash the stash!

I use to use a Caboodles traincase, but being semi-lazy and having a growing collection, that really did not work out. I would never put stuff back in it, and then I started to have too much stuff to fit into it. I still use it for traveling, and for storing old makeup (like my ancient Mary Kay stuff) while at home. So I graduated to a shelf on the wall, which I stacked all my palettes on. Then I saw people using DVD racks and found a rather flimsy wire one at Walmart. I was constantly worried about it getting knocked over, and I saw people on specktra.net using Container Store stuff, so I decided to check them out. The rest is history as they say!

That’s my counter top! That is all my MAC/makeup, besides my Hello Kitty tote bags (the free ones given out with purchases at the release) that hang on the wall that has empties and random packaging in it, and my brush roll (empty) that is on a shelf. It seems like I don’t have very much at all since it fits in such a small space!

The desktop organizer and the products! And my glasses, haha.

On top of my stack of drawers I keep my MAC Wipes, foundation, moisturizer, and Fix+.

Drawer #1 – Face products including MSFs, powder, blush.

Drawer #2 – Pigments

Drawer #3 – Mineralize eyeshadows and depotted Hello Kitty palettes

Drawer #4 – Paint pots, paint, Fluidlines, Cream Colour Bases, eyeshadows waiting to be depotted, etc.

Drawer #5 – Lip products

Drawer #6 – Make Up For Ever eyeshadows, Too Faced eyeshadows, sharpeners, other random crap.

Then besides all this on the counter is my brush cleaner, Prep+Prime, and liquid foundation. My brushes are (hopefully temporarily) in a cup, which I often place on a shelf to keep my cat from running away with them. I really really REALLY want the pro brush belt, but they were out of stock when I went to the pro store If they don’t seem to be coming in stock in the next month or so I might get another desktop organized from the Container Store and put my brushes in that. I do have the MAC brush roll, but it’s too small to store my stuff.

And that’s pretty much how I store all of my makeup!

On another note, I think USPS lost my empty pans that I had ordered They’ve been “out for delivery” for 4 days now, which is NOT a good sign. I plan on calling the post office on Monday and trying to get things straightened out. I’m so sad, as I was really looking forward to pressing my pigments this weekend.

Description: This is a set of 9 Urban Decay 24/7 Glide-On Eye Pencils. 4 of the colors are exclusive to this set.

• Zero (zealous black)
• Oil Slick (black sparkle)
• Corrupt (brown sparkle)
• Eldorado (gold)
• Graffiti (bright medium green with silver sparkle)
• Binge (navy)
• Ransom (bright iridescent purple)
• Rockstar (darkest eggplant)
• Stash (dark green/gold)

Swatching procedure: My skin tone is roughly a MAC NW20. Swatches were done on bare skin (no base).

Photos are taken in my bathroom which has “Natural Light” bulbs to mimic natural daylight. No flash is used.

I just picked this set up at Sephora today, so I thought I’d say a few quick words about it as well. First off, I LOVE the 24/7 pencils! The formula is so soft and creamy – no tugging on the lids here! For about 30 seconds the product remains blendable, and then dries down to a waterproof formula. And holy crap, they’re waterproof! I swatched several shades on my arm at Sephora, and their makeup remover would not remove them and I had to use alcohol (side note: MAC Wipes DO remove these liners easily, I’ve never had difficulty removing them at home). As much as I love my MAC products and prefer to buy MAC, I definitely give Urban Decay the upper hand on eye pencil formulation and color choice!

I originally went for this set for Graffiti and Eldorado. I have Zero and Stash already, which I got in another 24/7 set last year (seems that Zero is included in nearly all the sets). However, I am loving Oil Slick, Corrupt, and Binge as well! Oh, and Rockstar… hell, they’re all great!

My only gripe so far is the size. I thought my 0.8g sized 24/7 pencils were small… these in this set are 0.5g and TINY. I can see how they can be difficult to hold and use, but I think I’ll be able to adjust. Even though they’re tiny, I think they’ll all last me a decent while, or so I hope! I heard that Eldorado will be released to the full size collection in the spring, which is good to hear because I am really loving it’s rich gold color.  I hope the other 3 (Oil Slick, Corrupt, and Binge) also join the full size collection.

The set was $36, which comes down to $4 per pencil. Not terrible! Definitely a good way to sample shades, or to save money. Full size 24/7 pencils are $17 a piece and very large, so if someone isn’t a heavy liner user, I see this as a great way to get some great liners for occasional use, and not have to spend a lot of money on full size products.

Got my Sephora gift on my birthday!

I must say, this was nicer than last year’s, which was a body wash I couldn’t use due to an ingredient allergy.

Gift box included 3 of Sephora Brand Super Shimmer Lip Gloss in Bronzed Beauty, Rosy Glow, and Precious Pink. They’re really nice mini tubes. My first impression is that it is a rather thick formula and has a smell that I can’t quite put my finger on. It kind of reminded me a “play makeup” that is sold to little girls for dress up. !? Because I was still sick I haven’t really used them or seen what they looked like worn.

I still like the gift, as it feels like I got so much more than a tiny bottle of lotion or body wash like previous years! And hey, who can’t find a reason to like free stuff, right? If anything, they will be nice to toss in my purse.

While at the mall on my birthday, I had the chance to check out MAC’s Magic, Mirth, and Mischief holiday collection which was released that day. I am not one for gifty type sets, so most of it does not interest me… HOWEVER… mineralize eyeshadows!!! <3 I have my eye on Blue Sorcery, Devil-May-Care, and It’s A Miracle. I’ve seen some swatches, and they’re gorgeous. I love the payoff of MES, I just think I don’t go for them because they don’t fit in normal palettes (I am such a palette freak).

Last piece of news… my MAC Pro application got accepted!!!!!! I called and checked on my birthday and received the good news. And my credit card has been charged, so now it’s just waiting time for the card to show up. I’ve been on a MAC buying freeze until I had my card, so I can’t wait! I am planning on a trip to MAC Pro in NYC as I need several pro products that I can’t get locally. I applied as a photographer, so my discount is 30% versus the 40% that makeup artists get.

I’ve never been a blush person, I’ll admit that! So I only have 4 “cheek” products, but that’s fine for me because I actually use them.

I really really really like the Mineralize Skinfinishes that I have! I love how they can be sheer or heavy, depending on how they’re applied. My two are from the BBR collection. I originally got Redhead back when the collection was first released last January. A few weeks ago I picked up Blonde at a CCO because I wanted something more pinkish.

Prism I picked up in June ‘07 at a counter in New Orleans (funny how I remember stuff like this, but not what I ate yesterday! Haha). It’s a pinkish-brown matte. Tahitian Sand is from the Hello Kitty collection and I picked it up at a CCO this past summer. I feel like I really have to jam the brush into the product to get any on it. Can I admit that I mostly got it because the compact is adorable?!

Now for pictures!

MAC Mineralize Skinfinish – Blonde

MAC Mineralize Skinfinish – Redhead

MAC Powder Blush – Prism

MAC Beauty Powder – Tahitian Sand

***

Buzz about Holiday/Early 2010 collections are out and about on the forums. I am REALLY looking forward to “Warm and Cozy” which comes out on December 26th. The four eyeshadows sound gorgeous!

* Chamomile Creamy – pale yellow (Satin) (Limited Edition)
* Modelette – Mid-tone warm camel (Satin) (Limited Edition) (Repromote)
* Milled Cider – Dark warm brown (Satin) (Limited Edition)
* Embark – Deep rich brown-black (Matte) (Permanent)

There’s also two MSFs coming out

* Comfort – Golden bronze (Limited Edition)
* By Candlelight – Golden pink (Limited Edition)

I’ll have to wait to see pictures in person before I fully decide on the MSFs, but as for the shadows I’m hopeful that I will get all four!