Clinique Lid Pops (Review & Swatches)

Clinique Lid Pops

Clinique has got a good thing going on with their gorgeously embossed powder “Pop” line! When the blushes came out a few years ago, everyone was in total awe. I mean, how could you not fall in love with the beautiful clear acrylic containers alongside the beautifully embossed daisy imprint? I mean, the whole thing is basically a makeup lover’s dream!

Clinique Lid Pops
Clinique Lid Pops

More recently, they’ve extended that line up with their Lid Pop eyeshadows (and really, who didn’t see that one coming??). These eyeshadows contain as absolutely astounding 6 grams (well, almost! They have 5.95 grams each.) of product. When you compare them to a normal eyeshadow pan which usually contains about 1.3-1.5g, you realize just how much product you’re actually getting in one of these!

Clinique Lid Pops
Clinique Lid Pops

Clinique describes these eyeshadows as “a modern wash of silky, long-wearing eye shadow”. I do feel they pack more colour punch than a “sheer wash”, but there is some variety in intensity between all four shades I tried.

Clinique Lid Pop in Willow Pop
Clinique Lid Pop in Willow Pop

Easily the most unique shade out of the whole bunch, Willow Pop, is a gorgeous burnt gold with some kind of green shading in there. I really don’t think I have any other colour like it in my entire makeup collection!

Clinique Lid Pop in Cream Pop
Clinique Lid Pop in Cream Pop

Although this is called Cream Pop, there is a soft hint of orange to the shadow.  Maybe a bit champagne?

Clinique Lid Pop in Petal Pop
Clinique Lid Pop in Petal Pop

Petal Pop is the soft pink of the lot. It’s predominantly a baby pink, but it does have soft gold reflects in it.

Clinique Lid Pop in Grape Pop
Clinique Lid Pop in Grape Pop

The last shade I have is Grape Pop, a beautiful purple that fits the “colourful, but not too colourful” eyeshadow look that most people are looking for!

Wearing Willow and Cream
Wearing Willow and Cream

In the shot above, I’m wearing Willow Pop all over the lid with Cream Pop in the inner corner. Willow Pop is seriously such a unique shade. I love how it looks green, gold and bronze on my lid! Cream Pop was a lovely accent colour to the whole look and I applied it to the inner corner of my eye.

Wearing Petal and Grape
Wearing Petal and Grape

Above, I’m wearing Petal Pop all over the lid with Grape Pop through the outer corner and crease. I was able to build Grape Pop up, but it wasn’t as dark as I expected it to be right off the bat.

Final Thoughts

The Clinique Lid Pops breathe a breath of fresh air into Clinique‘s lineup of eyeshadows. They’re the perfect complement to the Cheek Pops and I’m so glad they decided to keep going with the “Pop” idea. The eyeshadows are soft to the touch and easy to work with, although some may need more building up than others. You will find that the daisy pattern will start to wear off pretty quickly once you start dipping into the pans regularly. Of the four I tried, Willow Pop was easily my favourite just because it’s so unlike anything else I’ve ever owned.

Although the eyeshadow price tag is a bit up there in price point, pound for pound, these are infinitely cheaper just because you’re getting so much product in each compact. (This is less important for makeup obsessors since we’re unlikely to go through a full eyeshadow any time soon, but rather this is a great point of interest for people who don’t tend to wear a ton of eyeshadow and instead stick to the basics – this eyeshadow, if used daily, will last you an INCREDIBLY long time!). My recommendation? Get a few shades you know you’ll love!

The Clinique Lid Pops can be purchased on sephora.ca for $22 CAD each or on sephora.com for $17 USD each.

The products featured in this post were sent to me for consideration.

VIDEO: essence Spring/Summer 2016 + Giveaway

essence Spring/Summer 2016 Product Giveaway!

I’m giving away a prize pack full of brand new products from essence’s Spring and Summer lineup! Full product listing can be seen here.

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Giveaway Rules

  • This giveaway is open internationally!
  • This giveaway starts on April 5, 2016 and runs for two weeks.
  • Please be aware that all entries will be double checked to ensure fairness.
  • One winner will win an essence Prize Pack(See the full product details here – there’s a lot in there!)
  • The winner will have 48 hours to respond to my e-mail. If they fail to respond within that time frame, I will pick another prize winner. (And so on.)
  • “Giveaway accounts” will not be considered for this prize. (If you want to know what I mean by that, please click here.)

a Rafflecopter giveaway

What I Bought This Month – March 2016 Haul

A quick haul this month! Amazingly, I’ve been doing pretty well with sticking to my low buy! (Actually had a few moments in the past few months where I felt totally inundated by makeup so that definitely helped to curb my spending!)

Too Faced Peanut Butter & Jelly palette ($36 USD)
Too Faced Peanut Butter & Jelly palette ($36 USD)

The standout product this past month had to be the Too Faced Peanut Butter & Jelly palette. I was all kinds of stupid excited for this palette because I was madly in love with the Peanut Butter shade from the Semi-Sweet Chocolate Bar palette and I love that they expanded on that idea to make an entirely new product!

Too Faced Peanut Butter & Jelly palette ($36 USD)
Too Faced Peanut Butter & Jelly palette ($36 USD)

The warm shades in this palette, combined with the purples, really just make this palette for me. This is everything I could’ve hope for in a PB&J palette and I’m very seriously considering picking up a backup because it’s limited edition! (Sadly, the PB&J palette is only available in the USA via Ulta. I was lucky enough to have Shawna of Spill the Beauty order it and have it delivered to her US address!)

I have a Challenge Week coming up on Friday for this palette, but until then, you can check out my YouTube tutorial using it as well!

Too Faced Chocolate Melted Metallics (free - swap)
Too Faced Chocolate Melted Metallics (free – gift)

More Too Faced! I hadn’t purchased the Chocolate Melted Metallics because the Metallics have just never really been my thing (even in my recent review, I was pretty upfront about that), but I somehow ended up with all of the shades anyway! Katherine of The Green Bows, was super sweet and gave me two of the shades since she said she wasn’t inclined to wear brown shades anyway, the third shade I managed to snag in my gift bag at the Toronto Too Faced VIB Rouge event that Laura (of Lipstick and Laura) took me to. Talk about lucky!

Charlotte Tilbury Wonder Glow (free - gift)
Charlotte Tilbury Wonder Glow (free – gift)

This next one was also an unexpected gift from Katherine! She said she already had one of the Charlotte Tilbury‘s Wonder Glow and offered me a brand new unopened bottle of it. WOW! Charlotte Tilbury packaging kills me every. single. time.

NYX Micro Brow in Taupe ($10.99 CAD)
NYX Micro Brow in Taupe ($10.99 CAD)

The last item of the month is really just a replacement item since I’m close to finishing up my currently being used NYX Micro Brow in Taupe. NYX is now available in Shoppers Drug Mart, so I grabbed it when it was on sale. I’ve been overly lazy with my brows lately and while I prefer using a promade on them, this pencil is just soooo much faster for whacking on my eyebrows in the morning!

That’s it for this month! April should be… interesting, to say the least. I’m eagerly looking forward to IMATS New York as well as finally getting my hands on the Too Faced Sweet Peach palette!

EDIT:

Too Faced Sweet Peach palette

I got me that glorious Sweet Peach palette!

Too Faced - Sweet Peach ($59 CAD)
Too Faced – Sweet Peach ($59 CAD)

I’ve barely even touched it, but dang is it ever pretty!

Swatch Sunday: Too Faced Sweet Peach

Too Faced Sweet Peach palette

The hype for the Too Faced Sweet Peach palette has been absolutely unreal!

Too Faced Sweet Peach palette
Too Faced Sweet Peach palette

This launch hasn’t been as smooth as I think they had hoped for (this has been the craziest Too Faced launch to date) as I have never seen the demand so high for one of their palettes! The TooFaced.com site sold out FAST and indicated they wouldn’t restock. Then Ulta sold out. Then Sephora sold out and had rolling restocks. Canada got it the day after the US online release and at something like 3 am… then it sold out by 6 am. Anyway, you get the idea… there’s a LOT of people after this palette! I was personally going to wait till it went in stores, but I started panicking over the idea of not getting my hands on it (hyyyyype) that I ended up ordering it during one of the restocks on the Canadian site!

Too Faced Sweet Peach palette
Too Faced Sweet Peach palette

Although it is peach-centric, there’s a lot of purple shades in here which held round it out! And yes, it really does smell like peaches – but more like the gummy candy kind. Mmmmmm!

Too Faced Sweet Peach Swatches

Too Faced - White Peach
Too Faced – White Peach
Too Faced - Nectar
Too Faced – Nectar
Too Faced - Peaches 'n Cream
Too Faced – Peaches ‘n Cream
Too Faced - Luscious
Too Faced – Luscious
Too Faced - Cobbler
Too Faced – Cobbler
Too Faced - Georgia
Too Faced – Georgia
Too Faced - Just Peachy
Too Faced – Just Peachy
Too Faced - Candied Peach
Too Faced – Candied Peach
Too Faced - Caramelized
Too Faced – Caramelized
Too Faced - Bless Her Heart
Too Faced – Bless Her Heart
Too Faced - Bellini
Too Faced – Bellini
Too Faced - Puree
Too Faced – Puree
Too Faced - Tempting
Too Faced – Tempting
Too Faced - Peach Pit
Too Faced – Peach Pit
Too Faced - Summer Yum
Too Faced – Summer Yum
Too Faced - Charmed, I'm Sure
Too Faced – Charmed, I’m Sure
Too Faced - Delectable
Too Faced – Delectable
Too Faced - Talk Derby To Me
Too Faced – Talk Derby To Me

The Too Faced Sweet Peach palette is limited edition, so get it while you can! It will be available in stores shortly (I believe April 7th for Ulta and April 15th for Sephora). Otherwise, snatch it online when you see it come back: it’s $59 CAD at sephora.ca or $49 USD on sephora.com. (And it’s back in stock now!)

Skincare Saturday: Aveeno Fresh Essentials

Aveeno Fresh Essentials

Falling in love with Aveeno products comes very naturally to me. I’ve been using them since I was 19 years old and there really hasn’t been much in the line that I haven’t loved. That a damn good track record for a brand I’ve been using for 14 years!

Aveeno‘s Fresh Essentials (Smart Essentials in the US!) line breathed some life into the brand that’s had fairly standard oatmeal and green packaging for several years now. The Fresh Essentials line has beautiful orange and yellow packaging on their usual oatmeal coloured bottles. But, the difference between this line and their staple line is that the Fresh Essentials boasts southernwood as a natural antioxidant which is used in products to help fortify your skin’s moisture barrier (in Googling it, I also found that southernwood is related to wormwood and has been used to ward off insects long ago!).

Aveeno Fresh Essentials - Daily Exfoliating Scrub
Aveeno Fresh Essentials – Daily Exfoliating Scrub

I’m always a little nervous about products labelled as a “daily exfoliator” because I really don’t want to be rubbing off the top layer of my skin every single day (or at least that’s how it feels to me!). However, the Daily Exfoliating Scrub is very, VERY gentle. The little scrubby parts are incredibly small. Not to the point where you can’t feel them doing their job, because you definitely can, but small enough so that it doesn’t feel like you’re using a harsh abrasive on your skin. It also contains natural luffa and coconut pulp to help remove dirt and makeup from your pores. I love using this in the morning because the scent perks me up in the shower!

Aveeno Fresh Essentials - Daily Nourishing Moisturizer
Aveeno Fresh Essentials – Daily Nourishing Moisturizer

The Daily Nourishing Moisturizer is your average oil-free daily moisturizer (shocking! lol). As with all of my other Aveeno moisturizers, I love the texture, feel and scent of the product. I also especially love the pump that this bottle comes with, although be aware that it does pump out an awful lot of product. I really only need about half a pump to cover my entire face and neck. My only gripe with this, and I don’t know how it’ll actually be since it’s not the summer yet, but I struggle a little bit with moisturizers that have sunscreen in them getting into my eyes on days when I’m playing soccer outside in the heat. I’ve had this issue with other Aveeno moisturizers in the past, so I’m curious to see how this will work for me throughout the summer. That’s a fairly small gripe though because I really do love how gentle and hydrating this feels on my skin!

Aveeno Fresh Essentials - Hydrating Night Cream
Aveeno Fresh Essentials – Hydrating Night Cream

The Hydrating Night Cream is, as expected, the thickest formula out of the two moisturizers. It’s an oil-free cream that’s intended to be used at night so that your skin can replenish the natural moisture barrier while you sleep. (I’ve had this kind of use pointed at me before at skincare seminars… that your skin’s resistance goes down at night while you’re sleeping, so it’s easier for the product to sink in and do its job.) Although I’m not a consistent night time moisturizer, on days when I’ve felt especially dry, I’ve applied this before bed and let it sink in while I watch Netflix. It doesn’t sink in immediately because it’s quite rich, but it’s also not going to be gumming up your face several hours either.

Final Thoughts

As a newbie to the Fresh Essentials line by Aveeno, I’m sold. I may actually start using this line instead of my usual product from their regular range because I prefer the scent on these a little bit more. (For those concerned about scent, I don’t find it intrusive just kind of… peacefully there.) I’m really happy that a brand I’ve loved for so long continues to make amazing products I inevitably end up loving. It’s comforting, you know? 🙂

The Aveeno Fresh/Smart Essentials line can be purchased on ulta.com ranging from $7.99 to 16.99 USD.

The products featured in this post were send to me for review.