More Favorite Drugstore Beauty

I don’t even want to experience the more expensive end of the spectrum when it comes to beauty products. I hear people express their deep love for $30 eyeshadows and $25 lipsticks and $40 mascaras, and I believe them! I’m sure those products are fantastic, and worth all of the (many!!) pennies they cost.

But as long as I don’t know what I’m missing, as long as I carry on with my lowly drugstore makeup collection, I’ll just be happy with my inexpensive product collection and never know the difference.

(See some of my other drugstore favorites in THIS post.)

1. L’Oreal Pop Balm in Fiery Red: I love the idea of wearing a classic, timeless red lipstick, but every time I try one, I feel like it’s too bold for me. I’m baby stepping toward a red lip with this lip balm, which is called ‘fiery red’ but isn’t really all that ‘fiery,’ in my opinion. It’s a nice, classic red, but very sheer and lightweight and not-scary. One day I’ll work up to a strong red lip . . . unless Forrest shames me out of it.

2. Detangling Brush: I’ve heard so much praise for the Tangle Teezer that I bought one for my sister for Christmas (she suffers from chronically tangled hair), then bought a knockoff version for myself for $4 at Ross recently (I could have sworn it was made by Bed Head, but I can’t find it anywhere online, so maybe I’m wrong!). They really are amazing at getting tangles out of wet or dry hair without any tugging or pulling, and I lose so much less hair when I use it compared with a wide-toothed comb or brush. I’m going to guess that if you have daughters who protest having their hair brushed, this would be a great item to make mornings easier.

3. John Frieda Repairing Oil Elixir: In my last drugstore favorites post, I sang the praises of a different John Frieda oil elixir. I liked that one a lot, but when it ran out I picked up this one, and I like it even better. It’s more lightweight than the previous product, and I think it smells better and gives more shine. I use 1-2 pumps on damp hair, another 1-2 pumps after blow-drying, and occasionally another half pump after straightening or curling. This is probably way more than Mr. Frieda intended anyone to use at any one time, but I love the stuff.

4. Revlon Colorstay Eyeliner Pencil: 9 times out of 10, when a makeup product runs out, I try a different brand in an endless search for the best product. But I’ve re-purchased this same eyeliner 4 or 5 times in a row now without feeling any need to continue searching for a better one. It goes on smoothly with great, deep pigment, and stays put all day. I buy it in Black Brown.

5. Carmex Lip Balm: At any given time, day or night, I can almost guarantee you I’m wearing a big thick layer of Carmex on my lips. I’ve bought and used it faithfully for years, and unless I’m going out and opting for a little color, I rarely put anything else on. I love the tingle when I first apply it, and I think it has the perfect amount of moisture, slickness, and shine. I wear it over bare lips, or put a layer on over lipstick for a little extra shine. I always have at least 2 or 3 tubes stashed around my house and in my purse. My favorite is the original flavor that comes in the tube.

6. Glamoflauge Heavy Duty Concealer: I’ve seen this touted as one of the most hardcore concealers you can get at the drugstore, and supposedly it’s even serious enough to cover tattoos. I don’t know about that (I don’t have any tattoos to test it on), but I really, really like it. It goes on nicely, blends well, and handles my under-eye circles and around-the-nose redness. I think it’s a bit pricey for a drugstore product (about $12), but I’ve had my tube for at least a year and it’s still 2/3rds full (a little bit of this concealer goes a long, long way). It also comes with a little concealer pencil, which I have never used.

What are some of your favorite drugstore beauty products? I keep a running list of items I want to try, so I’d love to hear your favorites!

My Everyday Makeup Routine

This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone. #AllDayLook #CollectiveBias

I am definitely feeling the irony in posting about makeup. I have never claimed to be any sort of beauty expert . . . quite the opposite, in fact. But I sort of enjoy reading about what products others like, and what their go-to makeup routine is—especially if they are not a huge makeup expert. I mean, if I head to your blog and see 5,000 tutorials on all sorts of fancy knock-your-socks off makeup looks, I’ll probably just be intimidated and click away and watch videos of kittens on youtube instead. 

I’ve thought for a while that maybe it would be fun to post my own daily makeup routine. This definitely will not be fancy—I own precisely 2 upscale department store makeup items, and if I’m being honest, I’m not entirely convinced they were worth the extra money. I love drugstore beauty products, and I like to spend somewhere in the 5-10 minute range doing my hair and makeup for the day. I mean, really. I’m at home with a 3-year old and an infant 99% of the time. I don’t have loads of time to spend getting ready in the morning, but I still want to look put together and prepared for the day. I’ve noticed my day always goes better when I spend a little time getting prettied up in the morning, so I need a routine that’s quick to power through in the morning, and lasts all day without needing any extra attention or touchups later on.

I’ve used some of these Neutrogena products in the past, but I also tried a few new-to-me ones specifically for this post, and obviously, you saw the disclosure at the top—this is a sponsored post, so I’m using all Neutrogena products today, instead of my typical mash-up of beauty brands. This is indeed my normal day-to-day makeup routine, and although some of these products are not in my usual line-up and were new ones for me to try, I promise, I’ll share my real thoughts and opinions on them. Deal? Deal.

Let’s go.

 

Pregnancy did good things for me in the complexion department (and I thank my lucky stars that this was the case, because I know it could have just as easily wreaked havoc on my face). I have never dealt with terribly bad acne, but up until my pregnancy with Forrest, I would always, without fail, have at least a few zits here and there at any given time. That cleared up awesomely while I was pregnant, and my skin has stayed reasonably decent ever since (hallelujah!). All this background is to lead into my beauty routine step 1: moisturizer and foundation. I don’t feel like I need (or want!) very heavy-duty coverage, so I like to kill two birds with one stone here by mixing my moisturizer and foundation together in my palms for a really smooth, really lightweight coverage. Everyone’s been in love with those BB creams for such a long time, and although I’ve never found one I really like, I guess this is sort of my homemade version. I generally pump out 2-3 pumps of moisturizer into my palm (I’m using Neutrogena Oil-Free Moisture with SPF 15, which goes on remarkably lightly, and I liked it quite a lot). Then I pour out roughly that same amount, if not slightly less, of foundation on top of it (I’m using Healthy Skin Liquid Makeup Broad Spectrum SPF 20 in Natural Ivory, and I love how lightweight it feels).

I rub my palms together to mix the two, then work it in all over my face, starting with my nose and working my way out across my cheeks, up onto my forehead, and across my chin. If I have any extra on my hands after getting the coverage I want across my face, I’ll apply whatever’s left under my jaw and down my neck. Combining the moisturizer and foundation maybe speeds things up by the teeniest factor, but I mainly do it because it glides on so smoothly and makes my skin look very even and fresh and dewy. I’ve never liked the matte, powdered look, and I love that my skin looks so fresh and healthy when I use moisturizer and foundation together and apply them at the same time.

Next up, I use a little blush, and I am not including a photo of this step because I looked like an enormous doofus in every shot. I can only take so much embarrassment on this blog, you know. If I’m feeling extra ambitious on any given day, I’ll toss on some eyeshadow, but most of the time, I skip it and just use eyeliner instead. I have actually been unhappy with my eyeliner for months now, but I haven’t found a replacement yet, so I was excited to try the Neutrogena Nourishing Eyeliner. I love how smoothly it glides on, and the chocolate brown is a really nice color—it’s deep enough to make an impact without being too harsh, and it’s very smudgeable (this is both a pro and a con—it smudges nicely when you want it to, but also smudges off quite a bit as the day goes on). I like to pencil it right into my upper lash line, getting as close to the lashes as I can, then I go over the line again, thickening it towards the outer edges. I try to keep things more subtle along my bottom lashes—I work the eyeliner into the lash line, then run my finger back over it to make sure it’s soft and subtle and not a sharp, harsh line.

Mascara is consistently my trouble product when makeup shopping—my eyelashes are a pretty okay length, but they are as straight as straight can be (to the point where they actually point slightly downward, and I have to hold them up and out of the way on my eyelids in order to apply eyeliner and mascara on my lower lid). Finding a mascara that won’t weigh them down and undo my attempts to curl them has been a lifelong struggle (woe is me, my life is hard). After curling my lashes, I tried out Neutrogena’s Healthy Volume Mascara, a product I’ve used in the past but was eager to try again. It goes on wonderfully and smoothly (no clumps whatsoever), and is one of the most natural-looking mascaras I think I’ve ever used. It is probably too heavy for my wimpy, straight lashes, and I couldn’t convince them to stay curled with it. If curling wasn’t an issue for me, I think I would have found a new favorite mascara—the search continues (I am more than open to suggestions!).

One of my silliest beauty complaints is my lip color. They are exceedingly pale, to the point where they are hardly even a different shade than my regular non-lip skin color. A petty complaint, I know. So I like to slap a little color on them, and I have really loved using Neutrogena’s MoistureSmooth Color Stick. It goes on so smoothly, and feels moist and glossy without being overly slick or wet (a lip product pet peeve of mine). The color I’m wearing here is Watermelon, and next time I’m at Target, I’ll be picking up Berry as well—I had a hard time deciding between the two, and when I got home and used it and realized how much I liked it, I immediately regretted choosing just one color instead of grabbing both.

And that’s it! From start to finish, this little routine takes me about 5-ish minutes, and I like feeling like I’m pulled together without looking too made up. If I call it a natural look, that makes it sound like I’m keeping things minimal as a stylistic choice and not because I don’t know how to do anything fancier, right?

I’d love to hear some of your favorite drugstore products—is there anything you find yourself coming back to again and again?

If you’d like to try any of the Neutrogena products I used here, make sure to take advantage of this special offer at Target!

Also, perhaps you would like to know that Target and Neutrogena have teamed up to bring a Target Beauty Concierge event at select Target stores around the country this month! Event begins August 24th.  Limited quantities available. Check with your local Target store for Beauty Concierge day and times.

Favorite Low Maintenance (Drugstore) Beauty Products

Far be it from me to claim to be an expert of any kind in the makeup/hair/beauty departments. It is not an exaggeration of even the slightest degree to tell you that I know how to do one and only one makeup look. My sister Bekah is quite the makeup expert (her talents never cease), and she taught me how to do my makeup . . . so I do the same exact face she taught me to do, almost every day. Whether I’m headed to Walmart or my own wedding, my makeup will be almost exactly the same. This speaks less to its versatility than to my own lack of makeup talent.

But, despite my lack of appreciable skill or knowledge or expertise, who doesn’t enjoy sauntering down the beauty aisles and trying out a few new products? So, bearing in mind that I a) don’t know a ton about makeup, b) dislike spending money on beauty products, c) don’t know a ton about makeup (have I made that abundantly clear yet?), and d) am willing to spend no more than 5-10 minutes on my daily makeup, max, here are a few beauty products I love and can certainly recommend. (For the record, I have no affiliation with any of these companies--they don’t know who I am or that I’m posting this, and these are really my honest-to-goodness thoughts on them. But there are some affiliate links in here, which means that if you click and decide to buy, I get a teensy itty bitty portion of the sale price [the cost to you doesn’t change].)

1. Monistat Chafing Relief Powder Gel. Many moons ago, I admitted on the blog—to much shock and horror—that I put this stuff on my face. Maybe that sounds gross, but here’s the thing: it makes your skin unbelievably velvety soft and smooth, and any makeup you apply over it goes on like butter and looks 10 times better. If you can first get past the awkwardness of handing the pimply teenaged checkout boy a tube of Monistat, then get past the eeky weirdness of putting Monistat on your face, you will be so, so happy.

2. Revlon Colorstay Foundation. I have trouble with foundation. I want something that feels very light and smooth, but still has good coverage, all in a good color to blend with my pale skin. This one fits the bill for me. Here’s how I mix up the magic: squeeze a smallish dot (like, the size of a little pea?) of the Monistat gel onto the back of my hand; pour a slightly larger amount of foundation over it; mix the two together and spackle it on. Goes on beautifully smooth and looks nice all day. Boom.

3. e.l.f. Baked Highlighter. I dust a little over my cheekbones, right under my eyebrows, and in the inner corner of my eyes. Makes me look a little less like a brain-dead zombie in the mornings. I like.

4. Ulta Precision Liquid Eyeliner. Bekah’s been trying to talk me into trying liquid liner for years. I’ve been scared of trying liquid liner for even more years. But I finally got tired enough of my pencil liner smudging all over the place and pulling a disappearing act after mere hours, so I picked this up and gave it a go. I really love it. The tip is sort of stiff and marker-ish, so it’s not as difficult to apply as I expected, and it really does last all the live-long day.

5. Ulta Color Coat Cream Eyeshadow. I got this in Rose Gold at the recommendation of a super helpful and not-terrifying Ulta employee, and I love it. It’s a gorgeous color with a really pretty gold shimmer, and it doesn’t crease like I assumed a cream eye shadow would.

6. Cover Girl Super Thick Lash Mascara. I have pathetic eyelashes, plus most mascaras end up smudging really badly under my eyes. This is the first mascara I’ve tried that’s made them look considerably less pathetic, plus it doesn’t smudge at all.

7. Cetaphil Cleanser and Moisturizing Cream. These are all I ever want from a cleanser and moisturizer. My skin has gotten notably smoother and softer since using these consistently, and the cream is the best thing I’ve ever used on Forrest’s eczema, too (even better than the prescription products we’ve tried). Cannot recommend them enough.

8. Frizz Ease Nourishing Oil Elixir. Once upon a time, I emptied my piggy bank to buy fancy pants Moroccan Oil. Yes, it is as wonderful as you have heard. But when it ran out, I thought I’d see if a drugstore brand could compare. This Frizz Ease oil isn’t quite as good, but definitely comparable, and at a fraction of the price, being almost as good is good enough for me.

I would loooooove love love to hear your favorite beauty products. Please do share :-)

Dare to Try: Makeup Ramblings

Thanks to L'Oreal for sponsoring my post about my favorite beauty looks, tips and tricks! Check out Makeup.com for beauty advice from the experts.

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There's a good reason this isn't a fashion or beauty blog. I'm kind of lacking in both departments--my attempts at stylish, unique outfits usually get me a, "Really? That's what you're wearing?" from my husband, and I don't have much wisdom to offer when it comes to hair or makeup. I stick to what I know, and what I know is old lady crafts. I'm 80 on the inside.

But I've gotten stuck in a bit of a beauty rut lately. After my little nugget was born and my full-time job became the paycheck-free, stay-at-home, nurturing type, I kind of stopped putting in much effort. When you know you're not going to leave the house, or your only venture out is to the post office where Jeff the Hippie Postman certainly won't care what you look like, you stop trying. My daily makeup routine pre-baby wasn't very intense, but it was downgraded even more after Forrest came along.

(I was going to say something about how awkward it is to try and get a picture of yourself in the bathroom mirror that doesn't make you look like a total doofus, but I believe that picture does all the talking.)

That's my daily makeup routine. Fancy, right? Tinted moisturizer (I just mix a face lotion [with SPF, of course!] 50/50 with some cheap foundation), mascara, and shimmery eyeshadow (for under the eyebrows, and a little dot in the inside corner of the eyes). When I really want to get wild, I might add eyeliner! Or blush! I know, I know, I'm out of control. It's a simple, no-frills makeup routine, and it gets the job done for a day at home, or for running errands. People don't turn away, gasping in horror and covering their childrens' eyes when they see me, so I figure I'm doing okay.

Seen this? It feels appropriate. 

But here's the part that has started to get sad over the past few months: I've started to feel more comfortable without makeup than with it. Having makeup on felt wrong and weird. (There are even numerous pictures of me here on my blog completely makeup-free. Go ahead, it can be like a scavenger hunt.) Maybe that's a big leap for womankind or something, but I remember, a long time ago, putting on special makeup for a night out, or a party, or even just to give myself a little boost, and it felt great. I felt just a little prettier, more confident, and more motivated when I'd put in some effort, but I seem to have lost that ability since Forrest was born. When makeup ran out, I didn't replace it. I forgot how to apply it in a way that didn't make me look like a 4-year old who got her hands on mom's makeup bag. I couldn't figure out which color eyeshadows to try, or how to find foundation that matched. So I just stuck with my basic, boring routine every single day. Party look? Date night? Family picture day? See above nearly-naked face. I started to feel as bland and boring as my makeup routine.

It was time for a change. I want to be able to dress up for a special occasion, or just feel pretty and proud of my appearance even on a day I don't leave the house. I recruited my little sister, Bekah, who is incredibly talented with makeup, to take me shopping and give a girl a hand. She tried to talk me into buying the fancy department store makeup, but as you'll see, my frugality won out and we headed to Walgreens instead. She helped me pick out good colors for my skin and eyes, and taught me how to apply it.

And you know what? It's actually really fun. I still wear my basic, nearly-naked makeup routine most days, but it feels so good to put on my fancypants makeup every now and then, and leave the house thinking, "You know what? I look pretty great today. Good for me," instead of thinking, "I hope no one looks in my direction." Jeff and I went out on a date (not Hippie Postman Jeff; Husband Jeff) a few days ago, and I loved being able to put on nice makeup and feel date-appropriate for a change.

(Aaaaaaaaaaall right, I thought I could let these pictures happen without a running commentary, but I can't, I just can't. Taking pictures of yourself is the worst! Usually Jeff takes pictures for me, but for such a close-up, makeup-based shot, I couldn't have him do it. It felt weird. And I have discovered a few unfortunate truths: I look stupid smiling with my mouth open. I look stupid smiling with my mouth closed. I look stupid not smiling. I look stupid looking into the camera, away from the camera, making a serious face, making a silly face, etc. ad nauseum. I swear, I'm not fishing for reassuring comments here, I just can't post these "oooooh, aren't I glamorous?" pictures without saying that it sucked, I feel super uncomfortable posting them, and my "sexy face" picture up there makes me feel completely ridiculous. I dislike blogs that post never-ending pictures of the writer making sexy/pouty/kissy faces in their mirror, and I don't want this post to look like it belongs on that blog. There. Sidebar over.)

My favorite makeup item that we bought to add to my meager collection is the L'oreal Colour Riche lipstick in Gilded Pink--I've always shied away from lipstick in the past (it seems to always look so harsh and fake on me), but this is the perfect color. It's soft and natural-looking, with a bit of a gold undertone . . . very beautiful.

Bekah taught me a few helpful little tips and tricks that I thought should be passed along to other reluctant beauty queens:

- It's okay to put on more eye makeup. A lot more, actually. The day after our little lesson, I showed her the makeup I had attempted myself, and was feeling all proud of it. Her comment was, "There's barely anything there! When you feel like you've put on a lot of eyeshadow, put on a little more. It always looks like less than you think."

- Dabbing a little oil or vaseline onto your cheeks after you've finished your makeup helps keep it look dewy and fresh and real--it gets rid of that matte, powdery look and keeps it more natural.

- Best primer to use for your face after you've moisturized and before you put on foundation? Monistat Chafing Relief Powder Gel. Seriously. It's incredible--it smooths out lines and blemishes and helps keep your makeup intact all day. You just have to get past the awkwardness of buying Monistat.

Well, there you have it friends: what may just be my first and last ever beauty post. Unless this whole me-feeling-pretty thing sticks around. Time will tell.

What's your makeup routine like? Have any tips or tricks to share with me?

I was selected for this sponsorship by the Clever Girls Collective. Click here to learn more about Makeup.com or become a Facebook fan by clicking here.