Saturday Shopping Haul + Reviews

Saturday I was getting stir-crazy,

So I took the bus and went out shopping!

This was probably a bad idea, but I had gotten my hands on some more money and was just itching to spend it.  (Yikes!)  Normally the buses scare me, not because I have anything against them but just because I’m paranoid of getting left somewhere.  (Which, coincidentally, almost happened at Walmart.)

Still, I ended up journeying to Westwood Mall and Walmart, and even though I didn’t buy much at the mall, there were a lot of things I really liked!  Spring is rearing its head full-force in stores, and I’m really looking forward to the collections and patterns coming out this year.  🙂  I’ve never really been much for seasonal shopping, but I might have to stretch a bit this spring/summer.

In case anyone doesn’t know, coral and orange are going to be big colors, flats are in, and if you HAVE to wear heels?  Big chunky ones are best.

In addition to clothes that were making my heart flutter, I found out that Younkers (spelling??) sells Fossil bags!  They didn’t have the cosmetic bag I wanted, tragically, but knowing that they sell stuff there is just SO EXCITING.  There was a gorgeous $78 purse, but that one I couldn’t even BEGIN to justify, ignoring how much I’ve spent on makeup lately.  xD

BUT!  I thought I would do a small ‘haul’ blog for what I bought on that trip, and some reviews for some of the products.  Let’s get to it, ’cause I don’t want this to be forever-long!  (I always feel bad when that happens.)

And so, without further ado, my Hard Candy Haul! (Products from Hard Candy found only in Walmart stores and at walmart.com)

I got….

• OPI Nail Polish in I Think In Pink – $2.25 (On super sale– 75% off!)
• Hard Candy Sheer Envy Tinted Moisturizer with SPF15 in Fair $8
• Hard Candy Hide & Glow Duo Cheek Tint in In Love $6
• Hard Candy Molten Metal Eyeliner Pencil in 24k $6
• Hard Candy Lash Tinsel Glitter Mascara in Spellbound $6
• Hard Candy Lip Tattoo Lip Gloss in Sangria $6

As you can see, I definitely tried to spread myself out and test a lot of different areas!  Now, I haven’t tried everything, so I’ll only be doing reviews here for the items I have used a few times and feel I have a proper opinion for.  (Again, these are MY opinions– you’re free to have your own as well!)

Just as a note of interest, apparently Hard Candy is a pretty legit brand– they used to be really high-end makeup, right up there with Urban Decay and sold at Sephora, which is really weird.  Unfortunately their company came under some financial troubles and made a deal with Walmart, so now they’re sold exclusively there!  It’s pretty weird to imagine a company that used to sell at Sephora now available at Walmart– when you’ve browsed Sephora, $6-8 is SUPER cheap.

So first up will be the only NOT Hard Candy product, which oddly enough, I think was probably my favorite acquisition of the day.

OPI Nail Polish in I Think In Pink

OPI polish is one of the larger brands in nail polish, but oddly enough I’ve never owned any of them! Which was sad when I thought about it.  So there I was in Westwood mall, all these expensive things I couldn’t afford (or at least wouldn’t put that much money down for on one item), when outside Regis Salon they were having a super 75% off sale!

The colors they had out were some sort of deep wine-red, a light pink with some shimmer, and a baby candy pink.  Another sort of odd thing, I don’t own any pink nail polish, and only recently (since starting this blog) have I owned a red.  SO I decided to go with the nice matte baby candy pink. 🙂  It’s such a pretty color!  And the cheap thing wasn’t half bad– normally $8, $2.25 is practically a steal.

That’s actually a GREAT picture, and fairly accurate, though I think mine looks a TAD more coral in real life.  (Sorry for the continued lack of pictures of me! ;<)  Isn’t it a gorgeous color?  I’m actually really happy with this as a first pink polish, and as soon as I got back I painted ALL my nails– my fingers and my toes.  ❤  It made me feel really springy, which I have just been needing so bad!

As far as technical sides, what can I say?  The color goes on pretty patchy on the first coat, but becomes beautiful on the second.  The drying time isn’t too awful, pretty much the norm as far as I can tell, but unlike my other polishes it seems to be a bit more chip-resistant.  I do a lot of things with my hands, and only today is there a noticeable chip in one of my nails. (Again, painted Saturday.)

(Don’t forget to use a coat of clear polish before painting your nails, or they’ll turn yellow!)

I’m not entirely sure if OPI is worth the usual $8, unless you find a color you can’t locate absolutely ANYWHERE else.  That said, look out for sales. 🙂  I’m actually really sad I didn’t pick up the other 2 while I had the chance!

 

Hard Candy Lash Tinsel Glitter Mascara

This was an impulse buy, like most of the things I got from the Hard Candy section, mostly because I was just looking for some fun new stuff to add to my collection.  I wanted to get the white glitter, but that was the one they were out of.  (As a matter of fact, they were out of the shade I wanted in pretty much everything!)  Instead I got Spellbound, which is actually black glitter– weird, I know.

The tube is pretty standard– round, chunky, cute twirly design and plenty of sparkle visible from the tube.  The wand is extremely skinny, the skinniest I’ve seen thus far, and it doesn’t have any sort of special shape to really get it into the lashes– I’ve decided it might work better going over already-mascara’d lashes, but I haven’t tested that yet.  (Definitely not over Maybelline Great Lash!)

The one I got is the one on the left, Spellbound.

Now these are pretty much by their nature gimmicky mascaras, and not really intended to replace heavy-duty every day mascara– you don’t get the color, at least not from the one I have.  It doesn’t do anything special for your lashes, either, except put glitter on them… Which could be good or bad, depending.  A gold for example might be really cute in a Christmas look, say, or maybe the silver one I originally wanted.

The black, however, doesn’t really do much for me.  You can hardly see the glitter unless you REALLY look– it mostly just sits like clumps on my lashes, and since it has glitter I often find my upper lashes catching on my lower ones when I blink.

Staying power is decent I suppose– and, as far as I could tell, I don’t think I ended up with glitter in my eye, which is always a consideration when dealing with anything that has glitter in it.  Still, this isn’t really a great buy– but I might like to try a different color in the future, once I see how well it layers over already-applied mascara.

As you can see this is also not the color I got (although it does look like a very pretty teal, doesn’t it?)  I just wanted you to see what the brush looks like for this mascara.  Very, VERY thin… it’s the weirdest thing.  Cute bottle design, though.

Hard Candy Lip Tattoo

Lip Stain and Breath Freshening Gloss

Yes, that’s really the tagline– breath-freshening gloss.  I’ll grant right now that it definitely has a nice, refreshing minty smell, but I doubt highly that it’s going to do more for my breath than, say, a tasty piece of gum, or brushing my teeth.

Anyway!  This is a double-sided gloss– one side for the stain, one side for the gloss, as you’ll see when I post the picture.  I got the color Sangria, which is actually a very pretty color.  A little darker than anything I’ve gotten previously, but I sort of like that.  I wish I could describe it…  A shimmery sort of deep berry color?  Well, I’ll see if I can find a swatch.

Unfortunately there were apparently very few pictures of these products– I just got a disturbing amount of actual Lip Tattoo pictures, yick.  It looks a lot more red in this picture, but at least you can see what the packaging looks like.

I had high hopes for this, and it sort of let me down.  The color is so pretty on my lips, it has decent lasting power (nothing special mind but not bad), and the smell I absolutely ADORE, although some people might find it strong if you’re not a fan of really fruity scents.  No, it’s not so much any of that as it is application.

This is, hands down, the wateriest lip gloss I have ever met.  The lip stain side is VERY watery, which makes application a hassle.  You have to put it on in coats, letting each one dry to build up the color.  Even then, you tend to end up with a LOT of color at the back of your lip and along your lip line, and not very much on the lip itself.  I like the gloss, which is probably the saving grace of this purchase– if nothing else I have a fairly nice, minty-smelling clear gloss to put over lipstick or something.

If you decide to buy this, also be wary when opening it– since both the gloss and the stain are so fluid, if you tip them they WILL spill out and make a giant mess.

Hard Candy Hide & Glow Cheek

Duo Cheek Tint in In Love

This is pretty much exactly what it sounds like– a two-sided cheek tint.  In Love has two different colors– one which is more of a blushy pink, the other a darker almost brown-plum, but neither is exceptionally dark.  These are tints, not blushes, so it’s a creamy stick that you rub along your cheek and then blend into your skin– at least that’s the idea, anyway.

Sadly this was another bust, at least in my eyes.  (I had a lot of those, which was just really disappointing overall.)  In the packaging the colors look pretty, and I was almost afraid that they would be too dark, but that was NOT the case at all.  I had to smear a lot of product on my cheek to get any of the color, and it was almost impossible to layer or build up… Mostly because of the texture.

I have seen a lot of reviews for cream blushes, tints, etc, and I don’t think I have seen ANYTHING quite so greasy.  That’s what it felt like– rubbing grease onto my cheeks. It never dried, and I could feel it on my face after application.  Plus a couple of swipes, and the color all but vanished– leaving me with my pale yellow greasy cheeks.  I think this product definitely frustrated me the most, to be honest, because there’s just NOTHING I can think of to do with this.

In Love is the one to the far left.

Now like I’ve said, take my opinion with a grain of salt and acknowledgment that it IS just that– my opinion.  As impossible as it was for me to believe, I HAVE read a couple reviews where people liked these, so it’s totally up to the person using them.  If you can get the right, natural-looking amount of color with just a few swipes and don’t notice the texture, hey, go for it.  It will, however, never be MY favorite product.

 

SO!

That’s it for reviews. 🙂  I haven’t gotten a chance to try out the tinted moisturizer yet, though I hope it works better than the rest of the stuff I got!  I still enjoy using their Sheer Envy primer, though, so hopefully they’re similar.  I’m hesitant to really start using a full-coverage foundation though, simply because I dislike the cakey makeup look and associate Foundation with Stage Makeup– anyone in acting will tell you what I mean. xD

I also haven’t gotten to try the eye pencil, but the gold/copper color is really SO pretty, I can’t imagine not like that product.  🙂  So some pieces salvaged out of the trip, though I really wish I had saved most of my $33.  But that’s what happens sometimes when you try new things, and you readers can take something away from my experience!

Now I’ve already taken a ton of time, so I’ll just say later, and thanks for reading!

Sweatpants Girl, Awaaaayyyy~!

OH YEAH.

And a shout-out to the writer of Left in the Dust (http://tsudehtnitfel.blogspot.com/), a blog about learning to be left-handed. Sorry I didn’t catch your name– you may not have noticed, but I was a little shell-shocked at being recognized. xD;

Anyway, this girl came up to me today (technically yesterday), sits down, and tells me how much she likes my blog.  A living breathing fan that ISN’T from my class!  She’s from the other Nonfiction class, but still, I was very pleased, even if she couldn’t tell through my blustering.  Having people come up to me for things like that isn’t anything I’m used to, but I’m glad that you did, you. 🙂

Thanks again, and if you see me around, feel free to wave– I’ll try to act less clueless this time, promise!