Swatch: Essence Blush up! - Heat Wave

Happy Friday! Boy did I find a treat! The new Essence products are slowly making their way to our stores, and I got this lovely thing: Blush up!, shade 10 Heat Wave. It's a gradient powder blush, and the product has a matte-finish, no trace of glitter or sparkle in it (like some other essence blushes might have). The texture is smooth and glides on, and it's easy to blend. The pigmentation is sensational, and you only need a light dab on the brush. I payed 32 kn for this, and it's just gorgeous, I'm in love. Swatches below, I took photos with different lighting so you guys can see it properly. I'm so happy with this product.

What a fabulous product! Great ratio of price and quality and cuteness. The packaging is really sturdy - this baby can handle travel, and even impact. What Essence says about this product: ''colour-flow… the latest hair and fashion trend is finally reaching make-up, too! essence is bringing a cool and unique blush with a color gradient to the beauty stores. the silky, semi-translucent texture with subtle coverage gives your cheeks a gorgeous, fresh look.''

Packaging: 10/10 

Texture: 10/10 

Pigmentation: 10/10 (well, it's a translucent blush, but you don't want a blush to have the pigmentation of a theater-used eyeshadow, right?)

I got this at my local DM store. Now, I found it in one store, but I see not all dm stores have the new products out yet. I guess by the end of the weekend they'll all be stocked up. To read more about which store has this product out (in Zagreb), and what I think of the new essence products, follow me on Twitter. Now tell me, is this on your shopping list? What other essence products are you dying for?

Sparkle Over Sponge

This was supposed to be a gradient, but what the hell happened? I know now what my mistake was, but I didn't want to let this look go to waste, so I threw some sparkle over it (because that's what you do, apparently, ha ha). Anyway, the black shade is Maybelline's 23 Dark Chocolate (no wonder this horrible watery polish is discontinued), the grey is Catrice 610 ASHley, and on the tips She's 121/115. The sparkle is Smart Girls Get More no. 138 (I think this was LE somewhere around Christmas). The red sparkle on the thumb is another old Maybelline, 54 Cherry Sweet (slowest drying polish EVER). So that's that, next gradient I know what to do (hopefully) so I don't need to 'fix' it afterwards.

I didn't really enjoy this look, even though the Smart Girls sparkle-polish is stunning. What do you think?

A little bit of sparkle goes a long way

Hey girls! So in my last post I spoke about how I wasnt too crazy about the last 'Smart girls get more' polish I tried out - well I got this new one and I'm back in love with them. At first I wore this look without the sparkle - see this photo:

..but then I looked at it and thought it needed something more...so I did this simple gradient effect with the glittery polish and I loved it. The polishes used are: Maybelline mini Colorama -no.96, Party Blue (on the ring finger, I havent used Maybelline polishes for a while, but I have to take them out again, this color looked great!), Max Factor no.37 Prussian Blue - I think I'll be wearing this during the winter, I love wearing the darker colors during the cold weather....and the last one 'Smart girls get more', no. 40 - smart girls polishes are a bit watery which makes them PERFECT for gradient manicures...I have to get more of their sparkly ones....they look great layered over other colors... ;)

Anyway, hope you all are having a great time, I'll leave you with a few more pictures and I'll see you in the next post! ;)

Gradient Blue Sea

Hello lovely people! If you dont love gradient manicures, then you've never tried one out...they're so much fun and your nails look so wicked! This look was inspired by the sea and the waves...it was such a fun summer look..I wish I could have one more month of summer! Polishes used: the darkest color - Max Factor Max Effect Mini Nail Polish No.37 'Prussian Blue' (great great color, it's such a lovely dark blue), then Deborah Milano Pret A Porter No.29 'Blue Paradise', and the white on the tips - dm No.115 (since they redesigned the bottles some time ago, I have been in love with their polishes, I'm a sucker for great bottles!)

See you in the next post! ;)

Inspiration From The Internet

So some time ago I saw a post that just blew my mind: it was by a blogger called 'Sweet Sugar', I'll link it here. Anyway, after seeing it I got so inspired I decided to try and re-create it. Well it turned out NOT to look much like the original...the colors I used are bolder, but I absolutely LOVED this look. It was a lot of work - first achieving the gradient effect, then stamping the flowers on...but I had a lot of fun creating this! :)

The colors used are: Deborah no.19 (I got almost the entire Deborah pret-a-porter previous collection because they were on sale for less than 1 euro a bottle - how awesome! & these are amazing quality polishes for the price), then an Essence orange (sorry dont know the name, it was before the new bottle design) and then Catrice 'Bloody Mary To Go'. Before this look I had only tried this gradient effect once, so I was surprised at how great it looked. As for the stamping plates, I only have Essence stamping plates and they're amazing for me - great price for a lot of fun designs. This one with the Hibiscus flower that I used I havent seen in store lately. I have it since last year so I'm not sure if it's still in store - Hibiscus is my favorite flower so I had to have it...

Summer is almost over, so I'm afraid I wont be able to get away with such bold colors anymore, so it's time to set my mind to Autumn! ;) Also, since I'm new here in Blog-Land, dont know if it's OK to say you tried to re-do someone else's look, hopefully miss Sweet Sugar doesnt mind, I frikkin' LOVE her! ;) Until next time, love, Jelena

The Golden-Black Gradient

So this was supposed to be a gradient glitter-effect on a black nail polish (though I'm not very sure the pictures do it justice). The black used here is Revlon no.999 Blackest Black - and, even though this is the third time I'm using this nail polish I only now noticed it isnt quite all black. Inside there are small blue particles - not blue glitter, just some sort of reflecting particles - personally I've only been able to see them when the nail polish is still wet, but once it would dry out, you cant really see it. It is a quite strong black, but my main problem with this polish is its tendency to create small bubbles of air...I actually painted it once, and when I notice the sheer volume of bubbles, decided to re-do it...and what do you know - bubbles again!!! I hate when that happens! Aaaargh!

As for the glittery golden polish, I used Essence no.67 - Make It Golden - the only reason I really did pick this up is because they were on sale (because Essence is changing the packaging of the bottles). After painting it on my nails I absolutely fell in love with it - inside there are three different kinds of glitter - two larger glitter pieces, and a very fine glittery dust which just took my breath away. I cant believe I never noticed this polish before! Anyway, the new Essence products are now in store and I have to say I'm not excited at all - I really dont like the new packaging :(

This manicure lasted me a very long time (quite surprising) and it looked amazing in real life (pictures didnt quite capture it). So in the future I plan on doing more glittery-gradient creations.

Until next time, love, Jelena. <3