Perfume Haul!

On my way back from Japan, I was perusing the aisles of the airport shopping mall and found some things that I really liked! Having bought so much makeup already in department stores and small Japanese boutiques, I wasn't really looking for more makeup. However, I found three perfumes that I really loved and have been wanting to try.

Ralph Lauren Polo for Women #2 is one that I've been wanting to buy for a while. I first tried it out about a year ago and have loved it ever since. I was debating between getting this one and #1 but when I found the Ralph by Ralph Lauren perfume I decided on the one that I bought because Ralph and #1 smelled somewhat similar to me. Both have a very fresh fruity scent while #2 is much sweeter.

I also bought Fame by Lady Gaga. I fell in love with the packaging on sight and was really intrigued by the black fluid in the bottle. While the scent is not one I would have expected from Gaga (it's surprisingly subdued), I love it! It's fruity and sweet and fades into a really comfortable scent on my skin after a few hours. I haven't opened my box yet but I did try it at the airport. I can't wait to open my box!

The last perfume that I bought is Jo Malone's new fragrance, Blackberry and Bay. This smells so yummy, I can't get enough of it! My mom pre-ordered this for me a couple weeks ago and it arrived yesterday, so I haven't used it yet either. Still, I've sampled it at the store and it is incredible. Such a great fall scent!

Reviews to come soon, guys! Hope you're all doing well :)

Dot by Marc Jacobs

Being familiar with my love of perfume, my friend gifted me this new fragrance by Marc Jacobs on my birthday in August. The only other perfume I'd tried from the line was the Daisy Eau So Fresh one, which I absolutely love, but I've always adored the packaging of his perfumes. I initially thought that this perfume was inspired by ladybugs, especially given the packaging, but supposedly it was inspired by Jacobs' love  of polka dots.

The top notes of this perfume are red berries, dragon fruit, and sweet honeysuckle, followed by jasmine, coconut water, and orange blossom. It's rounded out with base notes of vanilla, driftwood, and a sensual musk. On me this scent tends towards the fruity and sweet notes, and I don't really get much of the floral even after this has been on my skin for a few hours. I love that, though, because floral scents are not usually my cup of tea but floral/sweet ones are right up my alley. The thing that I love most about the fragrance is that it lasts ages on me. Usually my problem with perfumes is that none of them stay on my skin for very long so I have to bring around a sample size to touch it up throughout the day, but with this one I don't have to.

I'm also in love with the packaging. It's not for everyone and I can understand that, but to me it's fun and girly. It can be a little bulky and it's definitely not portable, but I don't usually bring perfumes around with me when I travel, and if I do they're sample sizes, so that doesn't matter much to me. It looks pretty on my shelf and that's all I need to know!

Have you tried Dot? What do you think about it?

Sigma Sigmax Brushes

I'll admit, I had never heard of Sigma brushes until I started watching YouTube videos two-three years ago. Growing up in a city like Hong Kong, most of the brands I had been exposed to were high end and very expensive, so the idea of affordable brushes was almost inconceivable to me. Dramatic, I know, but it's true. When I started watching YouTube I heard everyone raving about these Sigma brushes so I decided to look them up and have been wanting to try them ever since. 

A few months ago I finally bit the bullet and ordered two brushes from their then-new Sigmax line of brushes which are made with synthetic bristles and are supposed to be used especially with cream products. First of all I have to say that I was very pleased with their service - they offer shipping worldwide so I didn't have to go through multiple channels of family friends to get them here. I remember there was also a problem with my order that necessitated talking to one of the Sigma employees and the woman I spoke to was very friendly and informative. After all that was sorted out, my brushes arrived surprisingly quickly considering the international shipping, so I'm very happy with their customer service.

The first brush I ordered was the F86 Tapered Kabuki brush which I thought would be nice to use with cream highlighters. When it came, though, I saw how big it really was and realized it wouldn't work for highlighters. I found that this works pretty well with liquid and cream foundations. The tapered brush really allows you to work the foundation in around your nose and under your eyes, though it was a little awkward to get used to at first since I wanted to use it like a buffing brush and couldn't, really. I did try this with a cream blush and bronzer and I have to admit that its best used with foundation, as it can cause your blush and bronzer to apply a little streakily and is more difficult to blend that than foundation. 

The second brush I ordered was the P82 Precision Round brush which I wanted to use with my concealer and I have to say I absolutely love this brush for applying my concealer! It honestly makes it so easy to apply and blend, and because it's so small it really allows you to be precise with your concealer application. It can be a little hard to use for undereye concealers but I still found it okay. I did try this with a cream highlighter and I really liked to use it for that purpose as well, especially if you have a smaller face and thin cheekbones. This is really nice for sparingly applying foundation as well if you don't need as much coverage over your entire face. 

As you can see there's a pretty big difference in the size of these two brushes which is why you can't really use them interchangeably, you need to have distinct purposes for each brush. The bristles of both these brushes are very soft, much more so than I initially expected, though they are very densely packed which is why they're made to use with cream products rather than powder products. Another thing I really liked about these brushes is that they were really easy to clean, whether with my MAC Brush Cleanser or with baby shampoo. They take a while to try though if you deep clean them since they are so dense, but as long as you leave them overnight it should be fine. 

Overall I was really happy with my Sigmax experience and would definitely repurchase brushes from this line, though because I have oily skin I prefer to use powder products and don't need to buy the whole range. 

Have you tried the Sigmax brushes? What did you think of them? 

September 2012 Favorites!

bareMinerals Prime Time Eyelid Primer

Make Up For Ever HD Primer

MAC Briar Rose Beauty Powder (limited edition - sorry guys!)

EOS Lemon Drop Lip Balm

The Body Shop Brow and Lash Gel

Tarana Tarantino Broken Doll Eye Dream Highlight Hyperliner

Clinique Shy Honey Almost Lipstick

Bath and Body Works Moonlight Path Eau de Toilette

Some of the products here are quite old, such as the BBW Moonlight Path and the brow gel from TBS. Rest assured, they haven't gone bad and are still working as well as ever. I love Moonlight Path for fall/winter because it's one of the few muskier scents that I really enjoy, especially because it's quite light which makes it perfect for day or night. I used to hate the brow gel from the Body Shop because I thought it didn't really help to keep my brows in place at all but I realized at the beginning of the month that that was because I wasn't using it right (whoops). 

I love the Tarana Tarantino liner for my lower waterline because it really helps to open up my eyes and as a high school junior I need all the help I can get to look more awake! The Clinique lipstick is really more like a tinted lip balm, it has less color than the Revlon Lip Butters but is more moisturizing and wears really comfortably. When I'm not wearing that I've been just using my EOS lip balm, an old favorite of mine, to keep my lips hydrated as we move into the colder months. 

I bought the Prime Time eyelid primer a few months ago when bareMinerals first opened a counter here in Hong Kong and I didn't really use it much until last month, but since then I've loved it! It goes on colorless and feels very smooth and velvety on my lids in addition to keeping my shadows in place all day. I don't think it helps as much as other primers in the way of making the shadows pop, though. I've been using my HD primer recently as it gets colder because it gives my skin a little boost of hydration which is much needed in the fall/winter months. I've photographed just a small sample bottle I got when I purchased my Aqua Rouges (reviewed here). Finally, my Briar Rose beauty powder is one of my favorite blushers for fall because it's a bit of a deeper rose color but isn't too dark for my skin tone, so it's a great transition color into the cooler months. 

What were some of your favorite products in September?

September 2012 Empties

I've decided to make this type of post a regular monthly feature on my blog. So every month, in addition to my favorite products of the month, I'll also show you guys what I've used up as a way for you guys to know that I really do use my makeup and also for my own personal record.

I used up more products than I expected to during the month of September, which was a really pleasant surprise for me. I feel like I buy so much, my products just kind of accumulate and then it becomes difficult for me to use things up. This month, however, I managed to use up:

Philip B Scent of Sante Fe Balancing Shampoo

LUSH Yummy Yummy Yummy Shower Cream Wash

Dr. Wu AcneCur Pore Refining Serum with Evermat

Moroccanoil Moisture Repair Shampoo

Neutrogena Makeup Remover Cleansing Towelettes

Jill Stuart Sugar Lip Scrub

Agnes b. Volum'Up Curl Mascara

Crazylibellule and the Poppies Vanilla Fruit Sorbet & Shanghaijava Ananas Imperial Perfume Sticks

The reason I was able to use up two shampoos is that I've been using them in conjunction with one another for a while. I use them alternatively, the Moroccanoil shampoo helps my hair feel less dry and I think also prevents it from getting split ends, especially when used with the accompanying conditioner from the same line. The Philip B shampoo gives my hair a lot of volume, on the other hand, and flat hair does not suit me, so this really helps me maintain volume without having to use like twenty products on my hair. 

As for the serum, I don't think it really did much for me. I did notice my pores were less noticeable after using it but it didn't do much to help my acne. I suppose it helped fade some of the hyperpigmentation, actually, but since I break out so much the hyperpigmentation isn't as much of an issue for me right now because more pimples pop up in their space. The LUSH body wash was used up extremely quickly because I feel like I needed so much to wash my entire body, so I kind of regret buying this. I've loved the Neutrogena towelettes for a while, I first tried them over the summer when I was at summer school and they were a much more convenient option than using my cleansing oil. 

The lip scrub wasn't very effective, the sugar granules were very large but dissolved really quickly, so the scrub didn't really have time to do anything for me. The mascara was a sample I received with my purchases of Agnes b. items (which I have reviewed) and I'm glad I didn't buy the full size because it was really clumpy on me, but I used it up anyway so it wouldn't be wasted. The perfume sticks are ones I've had for a while and finally used up this month! While I like the conveniency of these sticks (they're so portable and easy to use for touching up) I don't like the way they apply because I feel like they leave a sticky residue and don't last that long on me because they rub off. They smelled really yummy and I got so many compliments when I wore them, but I wish they were in a different type of packaging because I didn't really enjoy them in stick form. 

Those are all the products I used up during the month of September! Have you done a similar post to this? If so, leave the link below! If not, I'd still love to hear in a comment what you've used up this month!

Take a Bite: New York Grill (Tokyo)

Given my supreme love of food and basically anything edible, I thought this Take a Bite series would be a nice one to feature on my blog. For my first feature (sorry for having so many photos!) I decided to talk about the New York Grill, which is a restaurant in the Park Hyatt Tokyo. It's pretty pricey though, so I would save this one for special occasions when you really want to go all out for your meal.

The food is absolutely incredible and they're known for their amazing selection of steaks. The one I ordered is the Yonezawa Sirloin steak which is very thin and has a higher fat content than most steaks but I think personally it's really delicious and has a lot of flavor. My brother ordered the Omi Tenderloin which he also really enjoyed as it doesn't have much fat and is a very thick piece of meat. My mom doesn't take beef so she ordered something else, and luckily this restaurant also offers an extensive selection of seafood and other grilled meats. It's also common to order a few side dishes to share with the whole table. I highly recommend the duck fat french fries because they're a much classier take on what might otherwise be a fast food meal. The mashed potatoes were also really creamy and had a lot of flavor, and they go really well with the steaks.

Dessert is also such a treat, my mom and I ordered the chocolate pudding to share and it was so delicious and rich. Servings here are quite large so I recommend sharing dishes with the people at your table as it makes it much easier to finish the food and doesn't waste money. The service here is great, I felt like all of the employees really knew the menu well and could recommend good dishes based on your preference. The chef is also very willing to come out and talk to you about the food, so I felt really welcomed and assured that I would enjoy my food.

What are some of your favorite restaurants?

Make Up For Ever Aqua Rouge

Make Up For Ever recently added the Aqua Rouge line of liquid lipsticks to their well-loved waterproof makeup line, and the other day I picked up two colors to test out. I'm a huge fan of their Aqua Cream eyeshadows and their Aqua Liners, so this purchase was pretty much a no brainer for me.

I loved the packaging from the get go, it's very classy but simple at the same time. It's functional as well which is what I look for the most in products. On one end there's a liquid lipstick and on the other there's a clear gloss. The lipstick end has a medium sized doefoot applicator while the lip gloss has a brush applicator. Personally I'm not a fan of the brush applicator on the gloss end since it's a bit hard, especially when it's new, and it will scratch off some of the lipstick if you apply it before the lipstick has dried and set. The gloss itself, however, is very shiny and nonsticky, which I love, though it's not very long lasting. I don't really mind though because I bought the product mainly for the lipstick, not the gloss.

As you can see it's very pigmented, just one swipe and your lips will be totally coated in color. I love the two colors I picked because they're so appropriate for the upcoming seasons, though because I did pick darker colors I can't speak to the pigmentation of the Aqua Rouge line as a whole. These two colors, however, are absolutely fantastic. They're so long lasting and feel very comfortable on the lips. Though they're not hydrating, I don't find them drying either, and the lip gloss on the other end helps to keep the lips from feeling dehydrated and uncomfortable. They're shiny at first but dry down to a semi-matte finish, unless you add the gloss on top.

Adding the gloss helps the color to look more smooth and prevent it from seeming like it's sinking into your lip lines. Even after the gloss wears off though the color will still be there and it will stay for a very long time. When I was testing these out they lasted through most of the day, including a meal! These swatches on my hand also took a long time to come off, even though I was scrubbing at my hand with soap and water. Even though these are a bit more pricey I say that they're definitely worth it for the color and for the wear time. I haven't tried too many other liquid lipsticks besides the Yves Saint Laurent one, though I do have the Guerlain ones set aside to be reviewed at a later date, but I think that fans of the YSL Rouge Pur Couture lip products will really enjoy these (for a cheaper price).

What do you think of the MUFE Aqua Rouges? Were you a fan? What other liquid lipsticks do you like?