Christmas is coming!

So we have 6 sleeps to go till Christmas and I am really looking forward to pushing my make-up looks into holiday glam. I am planning on wearing glittery and bright eyes with coloured eyebrows to work over the next week - I'll ease into it but my colleagues can expect me to go OTT on Thursday.

Here is what I rocked to our office Christmas party in 2014 (#throwbacksaturday) and just because he is the most darling cat in the world, our cat, Arkasha:

Christmas/Holiday Make-up and a cat. #throwbacksaturday

Excuse my smug smile in this picture but I felt like a Xmas fairy that day. This look was created using my Kryolan Aquacolour (cruelty-free) for my eyebrows and some amazing eyelashes that my best friend bought for me in the UK. 

I'll keep you updated on my Christmas looks over the next week on Instagram. Any ideas on how I can wear Christmas/Holiday make-up to work?

Eye primer #Fail

Not all eye primers were created equal and as much as I adore eyeshadow primers and preach their gospel (see my post on that here), today I learned that wearing the wrong kind of eyeshadow primer, can be just as bad as wearing no primer.

If you are in the market for an eye primer (or if you don't use an eyeshadow primer), you should try the Palladio eyeshadow primer (cruelty-free) or Smashbox's 24hr Photo Finish shadow primer. The eye primers that I would not recommend include Catrice's eyeshadow base (cruelty-free) and the Essence "I love stage" eyeshadow base (cruelty-free).

As an early Christmas gift, my mom-in-law and husband spoiled me with not one, but all three of the Urban Decay Naked palettes. Every time I open one of them, my heart skips a beat and I have been wearing it almost daily since. But I have been pairing it with my Palladio eyeshadow primer.

This morning my eye fell on my mostly untouched Catrice and Essence shadow bases and so I decided to prime my eyelids with these instead. With the Catrice on my left eye and the Essence on my right (because how else do you compare two primers with each other?), I did some kickass eyeshadow blending with my Naked 2 palette and left the house at 06h30 feeling like I'm wearing a little bit too much yet great eye make-up.

The make-up was a disaster by 11h00.

I normally wear my eye make-up for 14 to 16 hours a day before I take it off and with my Palladio primer, it often looks just as vibrant as it did after application. Today I took my make-up off by 16h00 because it was painful to see my expensive eyeshadow on my eye bags and the caking of pigment in my crease and eye wrinkles.

Maybe it is a compatibility issue so I'll try these primers again on a stay-at-home day with my (really nice) eyeshadows from the same brands and see how they hold up but for now I am going to avoid scarring the public with my creasy, baggy, fallout eyes by using the magic that I know works.

While the disaster of day was my eye make-up, I feel like I've made a great decision in buying the Lipidol Face Cleansing Oil though. It quickly erased my make-up fail from my face and mind and I might be in love.

Which eye primer, base or cream are you a convert of?