A Makeup & Beauty Blog – Lipglossiping

I’m a foundation floozy.  A total sucker too ‘cos I can never resist a new release that promises me the skin of an angel.

I’m currently trialling one that’s almost ticking all the right boxes for me (review coming v. soon!) but in putting this particular product through its paces, it’s made me realise just how demanding my requirements are for the perfect base.

Holy Grail foundation, dude… wherefore art thou?

Infact, not only are my requirements kinda demanding… I’m not sure they’re wholly realistic.  A bit like the images used to sell us the foundations then?  Touche.

My Holy Grail foundation, let’s break it down…

1. Thou shalt give medium coverage

I don’t want heavy coverage from a foundation, I want *even* coverage… it needs to give enough oomph to subdue the redness, dampen down the blotchiness and remove all traces of motley bits.  So, I want a mask… but like an invisible one ok?  Or someone else’s face.

2. Thou shalt not stick to my eyebrows

I have an eyebrow/foundation issue.  Yes, I know the simplest answer would be to keep my foundation the hell away from my eyebrows.  But I like to apply my base in about 15 seconds flat with minimal fuss.  Infact, in an ideal world… I’d like my base to apply itself.  Some foundations spot my eyebrows from a mile away and make a direct beeline so that when I look in the mirror, my face is bare and my eyebrows? Skin coloured.

3. Thou shalt not make me matte

I don’t do matte very well.  I have dry/combo skin… my nose gets oily by lunchtime but I’m ok with that (hello powder), I’m not ok with looking like I’ve been dug up.  Matte makes me look…. lifeless.  I want the glow (not the chip pan glow) but the “oooh la la” satin glow ok?

4. Thou shalt not squat in my pores

I have cheek pores that you could fall into and never escape from.  Some foundations make them appear smoothed over… some foundations install neon signage around each one to ensure they’re visible from the International Space Station.

5. Thou shalt glide on with fingers/brush/sponge/elbows if necessary

I can’t be doing with finickity foundations.  I want my Holy Grail foundation to apply happily with whatever utensil I have at hand.  I already have too many bases that look amazing only when applied with a coral reef sea sponge dampened with virgin water from iceberg B-15A on a Tuesday afternoon.

6. Under no circumstance shalt thou oxidise in my presence

Nothing worse than applying a perfect shade only to discover you’ve been oompah loompah’ed by tea time and your colleagues left wondering if their transition lenses are playing up.

Oh.. and finally?

If you don’t last longer than a chocolate button caught in Leila’s line of sight then it doesn’t matter how good you are at all the other stuff.  You fail.

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What are your foundation pet peeves?  Have you found your Holy Grail base?

…but damn I can make a decent Hob Nob.

And now that I’ve blown my own trumpet so voraciously, it’s time to admit that these aren’t made from any recipe plucked from my brain.

These are what are known as Twinks Hob Nobs.  Twinks is a poster on MoneySavingExpert who one day, innocently unleashed her Hob Nob recipe on the world.  You can read her post and the resulting thread here.

The absolute trick to these is to not overcook them.  Take them out from the oven when they’re *just* golden and looking barely cooked.  They’ll be soft but will harden as they cool.  I usually half the original recipe and get around 15 chunky biscuits.  I turn into a total Gannet around these biccies so halving the quantity saves me from myself (sometimes).

4oz Self Raising Flour (113g)
4oz Sugar (113g)
4oz Porridge Oats (113g)
4oz Margarine/Butter (113g)
1/2 tbsp Golden Syrup
1/2 tbsp Hot Water
1/4 tsp Bicarbonate of Soda

Mix the flour, oats and sugar together in a bowl.  Melt the marg/butter, syrup and water in a pan.  Stir in the bicarbonate of soda and add it to dry mix.

Mix well and mould/press into smallish balls (ping pong size!) which you then put on a greased tray and flatten slightly with a fork.  Put in the oven at 170 degrees C for 12/13 mins… and leave to cool on the tray.  The aim is to get them golden in the oven and not brown.

Do give them a go if you get a minute, they taste 100x better than shop bought Hob Nobs, there’s barely any washing up and they’re done and dusted in under 30 minutes!

Back to the makeup tomorrow!  What have you been cooking up this week?

~ If you click READ ALL (next to LATEST POSTS) you will be directed to a second ‘home page’ which will display all posts in the old-style scrolling layout.  You can update your bookmarks and access this page by default if you prefer.  Alternatively, you can subscribe to Lipglossiping.com through a reader or by email and view the site as RSS formats it.

Please note: “Featured Posts – READ ALL” displays only the ‘featured’ posts in the old-skool layout.

~ We have tweaked the colours and the labels (most obviously from red to blue) which will hopefully inject some of the previous site’s colour scheme into the template and increase familiarity.

I hope these changes are considered an improvement.

I know I’m not alone in scouring the net for images of beauty to inspire me.

I love nothing more than coming across a visual that makes me stop dead in my tracks and just… absorb.  A recent one that spoke to my makeup-loving heart was one of Givenchy‘s Spring campaign images.

The eyes, the lips… the pink, the orange… even the wispy hair… just perfect!

Another of my favourites and instantly recognisable.  Sonya Kukainis embodies the natural, polished beauty that BECCA Cosmetics sums up for me.

My personal favourite from the Illamasqua campaigns (and there are a lot of beautiful images to choose from!) is this one from the most recent Spring/Summer Toxic Nature collection.  It’s frivolous, powerful and total eye-candy in one crazy package.

And finally, a classic from 2008 and Shu Uemura‘s Tokyo Lash Bar… I remember being quite awestruck at practically all the lash images released around that time from the brand.  Amazing!

Do you have some favourites?  Would any of the above make your list?

Hello ladies,

I really appreciate ALL feedback on the new site, both good and bad because I recognise that a). you’ve taken the time to leave it and b). you’ve (mostly) broken the bad bits to me gently!  Thank you x

I want to address a couple of things and I’ll try not to ramble too much…

Ads

There are actually LESS ads on the site now than before the redesign.  Previously, the homepage contained an ad below each post, 1 in the sidebar and the leaderboard ad under the header.  Now the homepage contains the leaderboard ABOVE the header (I wanted to separate it further from the content) and 1 in the sidebar.  The in-post ones now only display inside the ‘actual’ posts.

I wanted to clarify that one so you don’t think the redesign was some cynical money-making opportunity!

Personalisation

I like to think that the site personality comes more from the content than the boxes that surround it but all I can really tell you is that I’ve injected SO much thought into choosing clear fonts, contrasting labels, a ‘snazzy’ header that actually represents my obsession and trying to increase interactivity with you guys in the form of linkbacks to you (if relevant) through comment listings etc.

What I’m getting at is that I didn’t just pick a generic corporate style template and click ‘activate’.  I picked a basic layout design, then ripped it to shreds and started again.  It’s got personality by the bucketload, I can’t help it if I’m a bit boring! 😉

I wanted you to have access to as many posts at a single glance as possible.  This was the trade off between the original scrolling design and how it looks now.  To be completely honest, I struggled like hell with this one.  Do I give you all an extra click or more content at a glance?  The thing that swung it for me was being told that doing it this way *should* reduce site load time.  With my previous design, it was having to load anything up to 20 fullsize images with every load, this way… it caches the thumbnails after the first load and that’s it.  Having said that, I’m aware that my site load time has been shit for about three days now and I’m just about ready to move hosts again.

Professionalism

I’m not sure if it’s considered a bad thing to have a professional looking blog.  I can’t quite tell from your comments.  But my personal feeling on this is that when I dedicate a minimum of 3/4 hours on this labour of love each day… hell yeah I want it to look as “professional” as possible!

Busyness and Background

Yes, there’s more content in a smaller area (on the homepage)… hopefully, there is enough spacing, labelling and separation for things to be quite straightforward once the dust settles and you get used to looking to different parts of the page to achieve/view different things.  I’m going to give that some time to “settle in” before considering any changes incase the busyness view is influenced by the fact that it’s all very new and unfamiliar.

The background… I know that my site is associated with a white background.  2 years ago, the site really stood out by being so minimalist in the beauty-blogging community but now, I feel that the overall look has become quite generic.  I’ll never be one for teacups, garlands and textured backgrounds and want something different again.  If I’ve achieved that (even if you’re not sure about it!) then hand on heart, on a personal level – that makes me happy.

However, I’ve always been the one to point out that black backgrounds are less user-friendly for reading text (which is why I’ve retained a white background for the content!)  I think this is another aspect of the redesign that I’ll look at again in a few weeks.

Overall

Ok, I can tell I’m starting to ramble so will leave it there.  The new site is my baby and like every proud Mum I want to show it off and I want you all to think it’s not a cabbage patch doll.  BUT sometimes, babies take a while to grow into their features.  I hope you give mine a little bit of time to develop, it’s your views I care about most of all and I am listening.

Welcome to the new look Lipglossiping.com – I had a mini heart attack when I flicked over to the new design.  Properly too, my fingers tingled as I got flashbacks from Christmas!

Thankfully, everything still seems to be in place with no major casualties (apart from my blogroll which I’ll update next week).

I do hope you like it and I’m sure it will take a bit of getting used to… it’s a completely new navigation system but you should get enough of an idea from the front page as to whether or not the featured posts hold any interest for you before clicking through to read them in full.

Plus, you get the tabs over on the right to browse through some of my most popular posts, play russian roulette with a random pick and see who’s commenting on what!

Other features include tags and categories that are much clearer to read and easier to access whatever it might be that you’re looking for!

And let’s not forget the most important feature of all.  The chick up there… there, in the header!  She applies her lipstick when you hover over her! *dies*

*deep breath* go on, let me have it… do you hate it?

You may have noticed that things are looking a bit wonky around here.  Ad placements a bit skewed, links appearing and disappearing?  Well, that’s because Mr. L is working tirelessly on a site redesign and I’m hoping to go live with it later in the week!

I’m a little bit excited (understatement) because I’ve wanted the site to be more navigable for a long time.  There’s so many posts now and a lot of them never see the light of day thanks to a rubbish category nav system.  Hopefully, this will soon be improved, though if you’re like me, it might take some getting used to.

I hate it when websites change, I’m used to clicking on certain buttons to achieve certain things and when I get the rug pulled from under me, I’m not a happy bunny.  I hope you like the changes and get used to them quickly!

Also, I’m attempting a FAQ page… and this is where you come in.  Do you have any burning questions? About the site? Blogging?  Would it be useful to know things like my shade matches in foundation?

Anyway, if you have a question – I’d love for you to take a minute to pop it in the form below and hit send, it’s all completely anonymous (which I’ll probably regret!)

Thank you, I appreciate it (unless you just took the opportunity to mean ;))

When the new site goes live, please let me know if you notice any problems or bugs and I’ll get my whip out.

Brand loyalty is a funny old thing.  Personally, I don’t think I’m brand loyal so much as product-loyal but I can definitely name a couple of brands that seem to attract super-fans.

Liz Earle is the one that always initially springs to mind.  Their supporters go crazy for the brand, the products, the shows… infact, both the brands that I had in mind when considering this post present on QVC.  Coincidence?

When I went to the Isle of Wight last year to attend Liz Earle’s 15th Anniversary Event… it opened my eyes.  I didn’t realise that us women could be so passionate about a brand.  Beauty in general?  Yes.  But a single brand?  A company?  A business?  I was left bemused by the (literally hordes of) women doing their utmost to maintain a sense of middle-class decorum while simultaneously clambering to get close to ANYONE at the event who looked like they were representing the brand.  It was the politest scrum I’ve ever been in!

Of course, it helps that at the head of this company… is Liz Earle.  Instantly likable on screen, she always appears effortlessly chic, calm and collected.  When she opens her mouth, she’s eloquent, charismatic… engaging and most of all, appears interested in what others have to say.  Yes, I’ll admit – I’m under her spell too.  Infact, I won’t name names… but I was in the company of a perfectly intelligent blogger (kinda) who’s words as we left the room in which we’d been introduced to Liz went something along the lines of… “OMG… I want a mummy Liz.  Do you think I can get her to adopt me?”  Of course, it was said in jest… and incited a riotous giggle amongst a group of women who are old enough to know better but it showed the Liz effect in full force!

I suppose that the phenomena could be attributed directly to the products.  If you find the solution to a skincare problem that’s plagued you for years within your Cleanse & Polish, your interest in everything the brand releases is going to be piqued.  And in all honesty, as superficial as we’re told all this beauty nonsense is… it runs deep for many of us.

Infact, as I write that last paragraph, I’m beginning to feel a little shame-faced and hypocritical.  I may not be evangelical about Cleanse & Polish (I don’t get the hype) but there is a certain product that I will forever hold in the highest regard and as such, it’s had a knock-on effect to the rest of this particular Antipodean brand.  My fangirl self even gets annoyed when I hear of other people not loving their products as much as I do!  Common sense?  Where did you disappear to?!

In analysing my own feelings for this brand, I can stem my cheerleading from the moment one of their products worked wonders on an issue that was troubling me in a way that did go deeper than the superficial.  In solving the physical issue it also removed a weight from my shoulders.

Oh dear… I’ve just thought of another brand that encourages my inner rah-rah girl.  Sigh, there goes my delusions of being even just a tiny bit cool.

Perhaps, before scoffing at what I perceive as other people’s foibles… I should remind myself that we all have a fangirl inside of us just waiting for that miracle product to bring her out, pom-poms flailing.

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Which brands do you think attract super-fans?  Do YOU have the potential to be a fangirl?

God, I’m tired.

It’s 2.47am and I got home from London half an hour ago. I can’t write my Mother’s Day Gift Guide part 3, I need to focus properly to hone in on the tastiest of gifts and my brain is failing me.  I’ll be back tomorrow with something a little more coherent.

I’m very pleased that it’s Friday and I’m hugely delighted that the sun hasn’t disappeared yet (in the UK).  By the time you’re reading this, it’ll probably be raining or snowing or something.

I’m back in London on Sunday with the fam for The Vitality Show.  I can’t wait to attend!  I last visited back in 2007 and had an amazing time.  It was a really friendly-feeling show with some real ‘niche’ exhibitors.  I hope it lives up to my memories.  I may have stalked Rosemary Conley last time (going “OMG look, it’s Rosemary Conley!”)… but only for a couple of circuits of the show floor, nothing too criminal.

Before I collapse, I’ll just leave you with this snippet that managed to completely pass me by…

Apparently, it was National No Makeup Day yesterday.  *makes big W sign*.  I bought 3 lipsticks.

Did you wear make up yesterday?

It’s been a while since I just sat down to write a post with no idea in advance of what I want it to say.  I love the feeling of emptying my mind onto a blank page, so hopefully no one will mind a bit of personal bloggage at the expense of beauty banter just this once.

I got my baking groove on early this morning and made another pudding…

I’ve never had Lemon Drizzle Cake before and I complately bastardized the recipe for it because I didn’t have any fresh lemons OR self-raising flour OR caster sugar…

Yes, I know.  Tinned Rhubarb, Jif Lemon… what next?  Slovenly.  Do I care?  No, because it tastes amaze and has melt-in-the-mouth lemon-y drizzly bits stuck to the bottom.

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2 eggs
175g granulated sugar
150g soft butter
2tsp lemon flavouring/extract
3tbsp lemon juice (out of a bottle!)
125ml milk
175g plain flour
1 1/2tsp baking powder
1/2tsp salt

Whisk the eggs, butter and sugar in a bowl (I zapped it in the microwave for 30secs to get the butter to melt – sue me). Add both the lemon flavouring and juice before giving the mixture another whisk to combine. GENTLY mix in the flour, baking powder and salt. Add the milk a little at a time until you get quite a runny mix. Pour into greased cake tin of choice! (I used a silicone cake ring/mould).

Bake in a pre-heated oven (170°c) for 40/45 minutes. When it’s cooked, remove from the oven but not the pan. Now for the drizzle icing…

150g icing sugar
50ml lemon juice (bottle again!)

In a saucepan over a low heat, slowly add the lemon juice to the icing sugar and mix well to remove lumps! Don’t let the mixture boil!

Fully prick the exposed part of the cake with a skewer and dripfeed the icing down the holes. When you get bored of that, sling the rest of it all over. Leae the cake to cool completely before turning out and slicing.

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All in all, it’s been a busy few weeks:

I’ve been…

hanging with the Royals (kinda) strengthening old friendships and making new ones diving headfirst into books again lusting after high-end foundations enjoying far too much Mexican food reigniting a love for Apple Martinis rediscovering an old favourite blush joining a gym doing a laugh-snort with nerves when I met Helen Ambrosen and Simon Constantine taking L swimming starting the long-neglected blog re-design gaining acceptance that some people are just bad eggs getting paid to blog for the first time (not here!) gaining 1/2 a pound but losing a weight from my shoulders munching on collagen!

Talking of which… my collagen “beauty meal” catered to an acquired taste (and one that I unfortunately don’t posess!)  However, I can’t deny that it was not only one of the most interesting meals to pass my lips but also the prettiest!

Thank you Cosmetic Candy for inviting me to be your +1 at Gilgamesh!

|| Wheatgrass and Avocado shot ||

|| Collagen Inside Out Dumping ||

|| Bento Box of Chargrilled Salmon & Black Sushi Rice ||

|| Beauty Bucket of Poached Chicken ||

|| Goji Berry Sorbet & Sugarless Milk Ice ||

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So, that’s me!  What have you been getting up to?

I mean… in terms of priority.  What products do you think are worth splurging more cash on?

For me… I’ve always said that I’m happy to spend more on quality foundations and whilst this is true, I can’t say that it’s done me any good.  I realised just the other day that out of ALL my foundations, the one I reach for most days is my Bourjois Healthy Mix Foundation in #51 Light Vanilla.  That’s not to say it’s perfect… it’s not.  It lasts about as long as me on a ‘no spend’, i.e. about 5 hours but it does give me a great natural finish with a nice amount of coverage.

How about what I begrudge paying good money for?

Hmmm… a few years ago, I would have said blusher – simply because I never used it.  But that’s not the case anymore… so I’ll have to go with haircare.  My recent experiences with brands like Pantene and The Body Shop (hello Banana Shampoo!) have made me less willing to lay down more than £10 on anything barnet-related on a regular basis.  OK, I still get tempted by hair ‘treatments’ but on frequently repurchased items?  I just can’t always justify the splurge.

Tell me, where do you spend and where do you save?

Cheap Smells has always been an oasis for bargain discoveries… I highly recommend a browse when you get that late night urge to spend a few coppers.  It makes me feel like I’ve gotten more bang for my buck and stops me from overspending.  I don’t have a problem, I don’t have a problem… really.

BUT…

In the past, their shipping system has infuriated me.  It went something like this…

Spend £1.50 with us and we’ll only charge you 99p for postage. (woohoo!)
Spend £9.50 with us and we’ll charge you £3.15 for postage. (err…)

Probably one of my biggest turn offs for shopping online is that sliding scale of postal charges… or just high postage charges in general.

Well, I was flippin’ pleased to notice that Cheap Smells now offers free standard postage on ANY order.  Not only that, but I checked… they haven’t increased their prices as a result (well, not on the items I would notice anyway – Creaseless Creams, Stila odds and ends).

I think that this is what one might call, a good executive decision!  While I’m here… will you indulge me in a little enabling?

1. Benefit Creaseless Cream Shadow/Liner in Sippin’ ‘n’ Dippin’ – £6.90
2. Elizabeth Arden Hydra Gentle Cream Cleanser (Dry/Sensitive Skin) 150ml – £7.90
3. Urban Decay Brow Box – £7.45
4. Burts Bees Lip Shimmer – From £2.49
5. Bvlgari Jasmin Noir Eau de Toilette Spray (100ml) – £33.00
6. Urban Decay Lipstick – £4.85

What’s your ‘cut-off’ for OTT postage charges online?  Name and shame the worst offenders!