Another category I love is comedy - check It's Grace (graciehinabox). In order to satiate our common love for the funny bone, my guy took us to Second City on Saturday for a Valentine's Date before we hopped on the train to Two Brother's Roundhouse in Aurora to meet my family for the brewery's Reggae Festival.
Given that the weather was still crap and our date was relatively casual, I went for a low key, semi smokey eye, and a relatively casual outfit.
Here's how the afternoon went down:
I've been using the Burt's Bees Soap Bark & Chamomile Deep Cleansing Cream for about a month and LOVE it. In fact, this is the first time I've had a spot since I started using it and, honestly, it's saved my skin from a winter of dry ugliness. I usually start massaging it on my skin sans water, then hold a warm washcloth over my face twice wile massaging the cream in, followed by a cool splash of water.
Since I had a hot date, I followed it up with the Glam Glow Youthmud mask. This is a bit pricey, but WHOAH baby - does it make a difference. It definitely makes your skin glow while clearing your pores and helping create a more even texture after just a few uses. The $20 pot from Sephora will give you about 8-10 uses, depending on how thickly you apply it.
I followed this up with a good scrub with the Lush Sweet Lips scrub - a castor oil based scrub that sloughs off the dead skin and chapped skin, leaving your lips baby soft.
I then followed up with a layer of the Ole Henriksen Sheer Transformation and, once that dried, topped it off with the their Truth Creme - Advanced Hydration, leaving my skin perfectly primed for makeup.
For a base, I slathered on a bit of the Sugar lip treatment by Fresh, then moved on to use my favorite BB cream, the Dr. Jart Black Label Detox Beauty Balm. I typically apply it with my fingers or a smaller foundation brush like the one pictured, from Ulta.
I use the Tarte Maracuja Creaseless Concealer to cover my spot, as well as to conceal the redness around my nose and to help erase my under eye circles.
I then used the NYC Smoothing Skin Bronzer as a contour. it's a bit orangey, but I'm so pale right now that using a richer bronzer would look ridiculous. If you are just getting started with contouring, you should definitely check out SineadyCady's tutorial on TheMakeupChair. She's a genius!
After contouring, I like to highlight the tops of my cheekbones, above my eyebrows, my cupid's bow, and down the center of my nose using the YSL Touch Éclat. I splurged on this about a year and a half ago - so I definitely would say it's worth it, given that you only need a dab on the back of your hand to dot strategically. This is a great step that helps give your face definition and glow, especially if you'll be in a dark space like the Second City theater or a dim bar.
Blush and eyebrows are the final steps of my base. I LOVE Tarte's Amazonian Clay 12-hour blush. Love. Going for a sweeter, more "Valentinesy" look, I used Charisma. My eyebrow kit is kind of beat up and ghetto, but I got it because the darker color in the pair is a perfect match for my own brow color (NYX Brunette). For eyebrows, I'll typically just fill in the sparser bits - nothing too heavy or defined - as my eyebrows are rather close to my lids and heavier brows tends to look too bold.
In preparation for eyes, I used the Urban Decay Primer Potion and then lightened my under eye area with a blend of the Bare Minerals foundation in Fairly Light and the lighter shade in this ancient Too Faced shadow duo called "Teddy". I just dust my eye area very lightly - a trick I learned from CutiePieMarzia - to really brighten the eye area.
If you are looking to create a smoky eye, the Urban Decay Naked Palette(s) are a perfect place to start. With a great range of matte and shimmery shades, you can easily blend out a signature look. I used the "Naked" shade as a base, then blended in my favorite MAC shade (which I have had for eons - these shadows just don't quit), Woodwinked into the outer corners and crease. I then finished the look by darkening the crease with the Bare Minerals shadow in Queen Tiffany, a bronzey taupe. Under my lower lash line, I dotted MAC's Satin Taupe, a cult favorite and another shadow I'm starting to wonder if I'll ever hit pan on.
While I didn't want to go for a winged look, I did define my upper lash line with Urban Decay's 24/7 liner duo in Demolition (similar here).
Going for casual, yet nice, I wore a floral blouse by Charlie Jade (TJ Maxx), my trusty Muubaa Lyra jacket, JBrand jeans, and my new Coach boots - which are amazing. Because it was Valentine's Day, I brought my raspberry Minkoff MAC Mini - the perfect casual evening hold-all.
