British beauty haul

Everytime I get the chance to visit England, I will never let go the chance to sweep beauty stuffs from major high street shops, department shops and Primark. England I could say is a makeup heaven for me (I have not been to America, I bet it would be paradise over there and I will go crazy) with a wide selection of beauty brands.
This time I burnt a hole in my wallet and made a huge purchase.

I mainly got items from brands that isn't available at where I am now such as Barry M, Soap and Glory, Real Techniques, just to name a few.

First, I am gonna start with the palettes.

I got 5 palettes from the high street. It is a record for me, getting 5 palettes in a go.
There's so many beautiful palettes from various brands in the high street, I wanted to get more but since I do not have as much cash with me, I restricted myself to these five palettes.

I heart Makeup Go! Palette . This palette is inspired by Tarte Showstopper Clay Palette.
I actually like the concept of the Tarte Showstopper Clay Palette where everything is compacted into a palette. It is convenient and travel friendly, but at the same time I do not to fork out money to get the Tarte Showstopper Clay Palette. When I knew Makeup Revolution sister company came up with a Go! Palette, I knew it was my mission to hunt it down when I visit the UK.

The palette came with the most gorgeous shades of roses for the eyeshadows. They are so up my alley.
As a lover of highlighters, I like that the highlighter came in the largest pan because you know, I am never stingy with the highlighter on my face.

Collection Little Mix All About The Eyes Palette.
The packaging of this palette is a cardboard, it is not my favourite type of packaging because it seem flimsy. The packaging already looks battered up through the transiting.

The palette comes with 6 beautiful shades of neutrals. Great for daytime casual look and nighttime smoky look. It is a very versatile palette.

The Makeup Revolution Iconic 3 Palette.
This palette is inspired by the infamous Urban Decay Naked 3 Palette. I love the Naked 3 Palette so, I wanted to get this palette to make it my travel palette to substitute my Naked 3 since Naked 3 is pretty pricey, I do not want to carry it everywhere and risking it shattering and breaking apart. Imagine the heartache.
This was the last palette available at the Superdrug I visited. I was considered to be pretty lucky.

The shades are gorgeous, they look somewhat identical to the Naked 3 Palette.

Sleek i-Divine Palette.
I finally got a Sleek palette for myself. I regretted not getting one the last time I visited the UK and I swore to myself the next time I visit UK, I had to get it and I finally got it.
I am so excited.

The packaging is a matte black. It is not the NARS type of matte black that will attract all sorts of dust. It is very sleek like its brand name. This is not a pun.

The palette comes with 12 shades. There's enough of variety of light, dark, matte and shimmery shades to do create a variety of looks for different occasions.

BarryM Natural Glow Palette 2.
I wanted the Natural Glow Palette which came with a blusher but unfortunately it was out of stock, so I had to settled with with the Natural Glow 2 Palette.

This palette is a primer and 6 neutral shades.

The next batch is powders, foundations, blushers, the other stuffs.

Rimmel Wake Me Up Foundation.
This foundation is not available in Russia;s Rimmel counters. I have heard many good reviews about this foundation. Me myself, I have good experiences with Rimmel's foundation and I love my Rimmel True Match Foundation.
When I was in London, Boots was having a 2 for 10 pounds offer on Rimmel products. I picked up two of the Wake Me Up Foundations.

Boots was having a 3 for 2 for all Soap and Glory products.
I have heard many great reviews regarding Soap & Glory's One Heck of A Blot Powder from many beauty youtubers from the UK.
I picked up two of this powder incase I so happened so run out before I manage to set foot back to the UK.

The packaging is cute and retro.

The powder has a really cute engraving. This powder comes with a sponge.

The third item I got from Soap & Glory is the Glow All Out Luminizing Radiance Face Powder.

The packaging is a cardboard with a retro print on the front.

In the pan, the powder looks too pink for the face but when applied it appeared as a subtle champagne pink.

Sleek Blush by 3 in Pink Lemonade.

I have great experience with Sleek's blushes. I picked up 3 from my last UK trip and I love all of them. They are so great in texture, pigmentation and longevity and the great part, you don't need to burn your wallet to get hold of them.
It is just unfortunate that Sleek isn't available in my country. So, everytime I visit the UK, I need to pick up something from Sleek.

Instead of getting the single blushers, this time I got the palette because after doing the math, the blush palette is much more bang for the buck and I already had four of the single blushers from Sleek. I do think that is a fair amount of Sleek blushers.

Pink Lemonade has two powder blushers and a cream blush in the palette.
The shades are different tones of pink. You have a bright light pink, bubblegum pink and a surprise - a pinkish copper tone.

The other blush I got is I heart Makeup Blushing Hearts Triple Baked Blusher.

From the packaging, I guess you know where this blusher got its inspiration from.

You got it. The TooFaced Sweetheart Perfect Flush Blush.
The design is pretty much the same, equally girly and cute but less elaborate compared to the Too Faced.

Isn't the blush so cute. The shade is "Blushing Hearts"

It is a dupe for the TooFaced Perfect Flush Blush in Something About Berry.

Tanya Burr's lipgloss.

I saw a small display of these lipglosses at the corner of Superdrug and I purchased it solely because I do adore Tanya Burr.

This shade is 'Picnic in the Park'. It is a warm pink shade.

I got two items from Real Techniques. Have been wanting these brushes eversince watching many beauty youtubers raving about how great the brushes are.
Got the expert face brush and also the miracle complexion sponge.
I want to see how does the miracle complexion sponge compares to the beauty blender.

This is my most luxury beauty splurge of the trip.
The Charlotte Tilbury Luxury Palette.

The packaging is simple yet feels and look luxurious.

Look at the shades, aren't they so luxurious and gorgeous.
This is the Charlotte Tilbury Luxury Palette in Golden Goddess.
At first, I wanted the Dolce Vita Palette because I see everyone and their mom raving about this palette but sadly it is out of stock. After swatching all the palettes out, I find that I like the Golden Goddess better because the tones are cooler compared to the Dolce Vita Palette which is pretty warm. I do not suit warm tones as well as cooler tones.
I do hope to get more Charlotte Tilbury items the next time I visit the UK.

EDIT : I realize it is the Dolce Vita Palette. Now I have no idea how I got it since it is out of stock and the sales assistant asked me to get another shade.

The last batch of items are items I got from Primark.

Primark Lip Crayon.
It does not have a shade name stated anywhere but it is a nice pinky nude shade.

Primark P.S. Love Lipstick
These lipsticks were on offer, so instead being their usual price at a pound, they were on sale for 80p each.

As usual, they do not seem to have a shade name.
I got a rosewood-brown shade and a bright warm pink shade.

Blush stick.
This is a baby pink shade.
The blush stick is shaped like a lipstick, really slim and dainty.
With the packaging, It can be easily confused with a lipstick. I thought it was a lipstick before I really took a look at the label.

The last item I got is a Cream Blush.
The cream blush does look really nice for such an affordable price, I just had to pick it up. Actually I picked it up at the last Primark that I visited in this trip, which is in Manchester.
Strangely I do not recall seeing it in the Primarks in Oxford Street and Edinburgh.

It is a medium pink shade.

This is the end of my huge UK haul.
Also, if you are interested, click over here to see my previous UK haul.

FOTD : Wedding Reception

I had a to attend wedding reception the other way and I want to share what I had use to create this look.

Face:
Banila Co. Prime Primer in Hydrating Shimmer
Tarte Amazonian Clay 12-hours Full Coverage Foundation
Maybelline Age Rewind Concealer
MAC Mineralized Skin Finish Natural
Tarte Tarteist Pro Glow Highlight & Contour Palette
Urban Decay Naked Flushed in Native
MUFE Mist & Fix

Eyes :
ELF Mineral Eye Primer
Etude House Sweet Recipe Chocolate Eyes
Etude House Look at my Eyes Cafe in BR402
Colourpop Super Shock Shadow in I Heart This
Dolly Wink Liquid Eyeliner in Black
Maybelline The Magnum Mascara
Maybelline Volum' Express Cat Eyes Mascara
Ebay False Eyelashes in #217

Lips :
Velvet Vanity in Slamberry

It is my first time using the Tarte tarteist Pro Glow Highlight & Contour Palette. So far so good. I know people don't the packaging because the cream contour product is not protected by any lid and kick up from the highlight side often end up in the cream contour which is annoying and you can't blow away or clean the kick up when it settles in the cream. You will end up having shimmers in your cream contour which defeats its purpose.
There's one highlight shade from this palette which I like. It is Strobe.

It has been quite some time since I used the Tarte foundation. Almost forgot its existence.
It's a good foundation but not in the lines of my top foundations.

Velvet Vanity has pretty good formula for liquid lipstick. It is lightweight and non drying but it starts to crumble and wear off once in contact with food. Slamberry is a rose pink with slight brown undertones on me. This shade is their bestseller.
Libra Baby is my favourite shade from them and I am actually really sad they discontinued it. 

Travel Diary : Italy : Day 1, Rome

We started out Italy trip in Rome. Then from Rome we will head our journey all the way north.

During my stay in Rome, I did very typical things tourist will do when visit Rome such as visiting the Colosseum, Roman Forum and eating gelato!

Got my Roma Pass.
It includes 2 free museum/archeological site visits and free transporation.
Since we will be in Rome for 3 days and doing much visiting, it is more economical for us to pick up the pass.

The Colosseum.
Sadly it is under restoration at one side of the building and you can kinda see the construction thingy (I forgot what it is called) at the left side.

A sneak peak inside the Colosseum

After visiting the Colosseum, we took a stroll opposite to the Roman Forum.

It just amazes me to see how people of the ancient times without the help machinery and technology could build such a magnificent town.
And some these structures still stand majestic till this very day.

It is really big , you could spend hours and hours strolling in this ancient city.

It was a rainy night at Fotana di Trevi. So, there was not too big of a crowd. If not I guess one could not expect to get too close to the fountain without squeezing your way through.

Honestly, the fountain is much smaller than expected. It looks way more majestic in pictures I have seen.

It is Gelato time!
This is a small family owned gelato shop called Valentino near Trevi Foundation.

I swear the gelato of this gelateria is out of this world. Every flavour so smooth and rich.
The owner is very friendly too.

My favourite was the Ferrero Rocher flavour. It taste richly of Ferrero Rocher. Who doesn't love the world's famous chocolate snack in gelato form. 

a random post on tips on saving money

First things first, I am going to say that I am not the best at managing my own financial status and I am a spendaholic.

Why am I doing this post then? 

As I get older, I do have more responsibilities and commitments and I can't go around spending money as freely like during my college years. Those days, we know some people do do this. When we are out of cash, we could just give a phone call and super dad or mum will come to the rescue and pump in cash into our accounts. 

When you are around a quarter age, it is really embarrassing to be out of cash by almost the end of month and going out borrowing money from family or friends. It just shows how irresponsible you are as an adult. How are you able to manage your own life if you can't manage your own finances. 

I have been trying to curb my spending habits and trying to save money over the years. There are some moments that I fail miserably but there are also successful moments. 

What has actually saved me from being a broke by the end of the month or being drowned by debt, 

are : 

- never to use a credit card unless it is really necessary. 

- make sure there is a certain amount of cash in my bank account. 

So, here I am, sharing my tips on saving money and not be a total broke by the end of the month. 

The most important thing that you really need to do and know is differentiating between WANT and NEED. 

Every day there are releases in the market may it be clothing, jewelry, makeup, electronics etc.
Especially in this time and day, with the availability of online shopping and aggressive marketing strategy. It is hard to not get caught into it.

Before coming to the point of purchasing, you have to think whether you really need this item, how will it affect your everday life without having this item. Will this item be a great help to you?
Will you ever use it?

Buying items you WANT just for the sake of owning it, high chance is, you are probably going to forget about it after awhile and dumping it aside once the the "feeling of satisfaction" of owning it has gone. Which means, you end up wasting money.

So before purchasing something, remember to put aside a minute or two to think whether you really need this item. You might stop yourself from purchasing a "useless" purchase and save money.

I realized a big difference in my savings when I started this method. That is to create two bank accounts. Create one account for normal daily spending use and one for savings.
Every month once you get your salary or allowance. Immediately transfer out the amount you aim to save per month (Let's say 1/4 of your allowance or salary.) into the saving account.
Don't do it at the mid or end of month because we know there won't be any money left.
Also, a reminder, if possible, have no credit card or debit card for that account. Minimal access to it is ideal.

Online shopping is the devil.
It's so easy to put things into cart and click the purchase button. I realize that it is so much easier to purchase something when doing online shopping rather than physically shopping in shops.
Things just look so much nicer online, with all the attractive pictorials and perfect swatches.

Try going to the shops to see the actual product first instead of purchasing it online straight.
Swatch it and test it out and see if you really like it.
The risk of buying online is that you don't know the actual texture, colour and even how the product actually looks. There's going to be some chance you will be disappointed or you don't like the product enough when it comes in the mail.
If it is not available in shops, try to search for detailed reviews and swatches before purchasing.

Also, never ever practice impulse retail therapy. Don't shop online when you are sad or stress just thinking it is going to wash your sadness and stressful feeling away.
You will start buying things that you would never expect to buy or buying items you had put off buying.

Try to not follow instagram shops.
I used to follow many instagram shops and my feed would be filled with preorder post. Trust me, it is really tempting to place orders and want everything seeing all these post all over my instagram. In the end, I will place orders because I can't hold back my temptation.
If you follow many instashops, slowly delete them off your follow list one by one. If you don't see it, you won't want it. If you really want it, you will search for it.

I know food is an essential but I do not see the point of eating out everyday. There is where your money go without realizing. On that premium salad or expensive cold brew coffee. It's okay to go out and eat maybe once or twice a week but it should not be a daily habit.
Try to pack lunch to classes or work. You can also pack your own coffee in a thermos.
It will save a lot money on the long run and also it is much healthier.
Don't make time as an excuse, you can always prep meal during the weekends or spend a little more time at night to make yourself next day's meal.

Here are my few tips on saving.