Historically Accurate: 1950s Makeup Tutorial

Love "macshadowcombos" on Youtube, and especially her historically accurate series. The 50s? My kind of decade. I want to look like this every day of my life.

XoxoX

How to Look Your Best in Photos with Alexa Losey // I love makeup.

It's that time of year for family reunions in the park, and selfies at the beach. Liked this video from Alexa Losey and 'I love makeup.' Hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

XoxoX

5 Days of Work Looks | Makeup Geek

I am going to try each and every one of these looks. So good, I had to share.

XoxoX

5 STEPS TO FLAWLESS EYES | Makeup For Beginners

A great little primer for beginners. A beautiful eye look in five simple steps.

Thanks for watching!
xoxox

6 Uses for a Fan Brush (FACE)

Have you found MacShadowCombos on Youtube yet? She is an artist, and full of info. Check her out!

Perfect Bottom Liner | Minute Masterclass with Olga Kay // I love makeup.

Love this quick tutorial on under-eye liner. And funny to. ;)

Summer Colors Makeup Tutorial! - Great for Hooded Lids!

Jordan Liberty, the man is pure golf. Love this look, and especially because it's great for hooded eyes. Just gorgeous! xoxox

Back-to-School Nail Look

This look was so simple, and really fun to do.

Step One: Apply a white base coat. Any shade of white will do.

Step Two: Use a blue striper or nail art marker and on your thumb draw lines up and down. On the next finger draw blue lines going horizontally across the nail, and continue to switch which direction the blue stripes go.

Step Three: Use a yellow or green striper and draw overlapping and intersecting lines across the blue, as seen in the picture.

You don't want the lines to be exactly perfect. The waviness lends the look to a summery textile look.

You can vary the look by changing the spacing between the stripes. Narrow gaps will give it a more colored and dynamic feel. The wider and looser stripes like I've done are more summery and laid back.

I'd love see what you come up with, if you recreate this look please tag me on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook or Google plus with hashtag #summerstripes.

Thanks for your time, and I hope the rest of your summer is warm, fun and fabulous!

XoxoX

Tip Tuesday: Complimentary Colors to Make Your Eyes Pop

Remember that opposite colors on the color wheel tend to cancel each other out. But ...if you place them side by side, they do something extraordinary. They make each other stand out. 

It's a simple concept, but a crucial one when you're choosing the most flattering eyeshadow colors for your look. 

Some inspiration:

For blue eyes: Since orange is the opposite color of blue, anything with orange in it will make blue eyes stand out more. It doesn't have to be a bright pumpkin color — it just has to have orange-hued undertones like gold, apricot, or peach.

For green eyes: Red is the opposite color of green. I wouldn't recommend you slap on any cherry red-colored eyeshadow to your lids. But your green eyes pop if you use colors that have red undertones, like deep plums and wine.

For brown eyes: Brown is a neutral color, so any color will work well. The most standout colors are blue and purple.

I hope you learned something useful. Thank you for your time, and stay beYOUtiful!

- Becky xoxox

Tip Tuesday: Changing Your Eye Shape Using Makeup

Just like we use highlights and shadows to contour the face, we can also use the same principle to alter our eye shape. Whether you have hooded lids, or narrow-set eyes, you can use your knowledge of light and shadow to enhance their beauty.

If you want definition: Sweep a light bronzer or transition shade through the crease. Your crease is just beneath your brow bone but above your lid. This technique is great for mature skin, to give the eye more definition. 

If you have narrow-set eyes: To elongate your eye width, apply a black liner to the outer half of both your upper and lower lash lines, connecting at the outer corner. Focus your darker colored shadows on the outer third of your lids to draw the eye outward from the nose.

If you have hooded eyes: Use what you know about highlights and shadows to lift your eye. Apply highlighter below your crease, from the inner to outer lid. Then blend a transition shadow on the area that you want to push back. You'll need to manually blend in a faux-crease on the upper area of your eye, above the lid but beneath the brow. Make sure to blend the edges starting from the highlight on the lid to the shadow in your faux-crease and back up to the highlight beneath the brow. This same technique works for women of Asian decent who often don't have a pronounced crease.

If you have small eyes: Apply a nude-colored eyeliner to your lower water line, which will help make eyes look more open. Then use a black pencil liner along your entire upper and lower lash lines, connecting the lines at the outer corner. The key is to blend the liner with shadow, sweeping outward away from the nose. Wherever you place the darkness is where the eye will go. By smudging the eyeliner, you give the allusion that your eyes are larger in scale.

For fuller looking lashes: Apply a black pencil to your upper water line. This lengthens the eye and it also sharpens the appearance of the eye, giving more fullness to the natural lash line without seeing the hard edge of a liner.

I hope you learned something useful. Thank you for your time, and stay beYOUtiful!

- Becky xoxox

Tip Tuesday: Tips for Contouring

Applying your makeup is no different than applying paints to a canvas. Contouring is the art of highlighting and shading, whether it's on a cheek or on muslin. 

Anything that is lighter than the skin tone will make an area more prominent, anything darker will make that area recede.

Use contouring to add dimension to your face and to accentuate your positives. 

If you have a round face and want to make it look more oval: Apply a bronzer a shade or two darker than your skin tone in a "3" shape alongside your face: on your temples, the hollow of your cheeks, and under your jaw line.  

If you have a prominent forehead: Shade around the outer edge of your forehead along your hairline to minimize the area with bronzer.  

If you have a flat or wide nose: Shade alongside the bridge of your nose on either side, starting from your inner brows. Then highlight right on the center of your nose. Be sure to blend well to avoid a painted-on look.

If your cheeks are sagging: Apply a highlighter just above your cheekbone all the way to your temple. Use a blush directly on the cheekbone, then use a bronzer in the hollow of the cheek, underneath your bone.

And if you really want to make your contouring stand out: Use a sparkly highlighter, which will reflect the most light. 

And remember: When applying a bronzer, always use one with a matte finish, which will absorb light and create a stark contrast. See my post on contouring powders vs. bronzing powders for more suggestions.

I hope you learned something useful. Thank you for your time, and stay beYOUtiful!

- Becky xoxox

Tip Tuesday: Use The Color Wheel to Hide Blemishes

The key to applying your best makeup look is being able to identify your undertones and knowing how to manipulate the color wheel to get rid of unwanted color.

Opposite colors cancel each other out, so green-pigmented concealer or primers cover redness, and orange-hued concealer removes blue tones from the skin. 

Be warned: If you use a beige concealer, it'll only make those areas look muddy.

I hope you learned something useful. Thank you for your time and stay beYOUtiful!

- Becky xoxox

Tip Tuesday: Mix Primer With Your Cream Foundation

You can wear a cream foundation straight out of the bottle for an opaque, full coverage look. Or ...you can make your foundation more translucent by mixing it with some primer.

This is the best way to retain the foundation's coverage without looking caked on. Plus, you get to reap the long-lasting durability that cream foundation has over liquids and powders. This also helps the makeup blend seamlessly with the first layer of primer on your skin.

Want to know more about cream foundations?

Everyone can use cream foundation. Those of us with oily skin, however, should use a damp sponge to apply it. 

Most foundations have oil in their formula to give the coverage blend-ability. Using the sponge will pick up the pigment, but not the oil in the foundation. You'll still get great coverage, but not the shine.

For dry or combination skin types, use your foundation brush and buff the foundation onto the skin, concentrating on the center of your face, which is typically where your skin has the most discoloration. The further you get from the center, the less coverage you want, to maintain a more natural, less mask-like look.

I hope you learned something useful. Thank you for your time, and stay beYOUtiful!

- Becky xoxox

Tip Tuesday: Invest in the Best Tools for Success (Then Learn How to Use Them)

There is a magic trifecta in applying good makeup. Tools and product quality are equally as important as the makeup application skills you have. For example, if you are using mediocre brushes, mediocre products, and have average skill ...just by improving the quality of your brushes and using more richly pigmented products, the application will immediately be better, even without improving your technique. 

If you really want to apply your makeup like a pro, do what the professionals do: Use the best brushes you can afford for application.

Here are the eight basic brushes you need:

1. Foundation brush

2. Concealer brush

3. Fluffy powder brush

4. Blush brush

5. Small blending brush

6. Flat eyeshadow brush

7. Precision angle brush

8. Lip brush

Once you have your tools, learn the correct way to use them. 

Where you hold a brush on the handle affects your control. The closer your fingers are to the ferrule (the silver section beneath the brush head), the more pressure you put on the brush head and the more opaque your application is going to be.  

As a rule - if you want to apply color evenly, place your fingers on the center of the brush handle. 

One last tip: You can easily turn a fluffy brush into a flat, angled brush by squeezing the bristles on your brush and flattening them.

I hope you learned something new. Thank you for your time and stay beYoutiful!

- Becky xoxox

Winter Makeup Trends in 3 Looks

While fall was all gold accents, plum lips and winged eyeliner... winter is going to be something more fabulous. I've put together a few snapshots of what sort of seasonal looks we'll see everywhere in the very near future. After all, Christmas is almost a month away and winter is as good as here!

Look #1 - Metallics and Illuminating Powders

We see LipstickOnYourPillow has kept the plum lips of fall and paired it with bright metallics on the eyelid, and a shimmer on the cheek. Bright metallics has been the thing to do recently, and every winter we see the same trend. It's also no coincidence that we're coming into winter and the Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powders are flying off the shelves. The average lady probably won't rock quite as dewy of a look as LoYP did above, but that lit-from-within glow makes everyone look sexy.

Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powders

Look #2 - Super Natural

I think the next trend this winter will be a super natural look. Full brows, minimal blush or bronzer where the blush usually goes, and a frosty nude lip (paired with illuminating powders or highlighters). We all lament the passing of summer, and even in the throws of frigid winter I think we'll see a lot of no-makeup or super-natural makeup looks around.

Look #3 - Vibrant & Quirky

Come the holidays, every woman with an inner diva has to rock a red lip. I'll be looking for more orange/red-toned red lips instead of the cooler berry-toned or deep plummy looks of fall. I think we'll see a lot of color blocking with reds and blues or silvers on the face and not much between. It's fun, it's festive and it's unexpected. What more could a beauty ask for?

I hope everyone out there has a bright and beautiful holiday season. Thank you for your time, and stay beYOUtiful! 

- Becky xoxox

LoTD: Bronze & Cocoa Bear

Today I was looking for something warm and wearable. I came up with a bronze lid and a warm brown transition with burgandy accents in the outer corner and the crease. On the bottom lid I used the warm brown and for the highlights in the middle of the lid, the inner corner and under the brow I used a very light golden shimmer. I threw on a pair of KISS false lashes in 03. My foundation was the Guerlain Lingerie de Peu and I used Pixi's bronzer in suntouched as a blush. The lips were just a nude gloss. Very beautiful and wearable look. 

LoTD: Cranberry Craze 11-14-13

So this is sort of an experiment for me. I decided to use my DSLR that I use for portrait photography to do today's look-of-the-day pictures. Normally I'd want to use a POS camera because selfies with a 6-pound DSLR are complicated. So really, this was an experiment. I've been wearing this makeup look for 8 hours, so it's not exactly fresh. Some of the blending details have lose their oomph. Having said that -- yay for non-webcam-generated images! 

For those interested in the look - I have L'Oreal's Infallible in Glistening Garnet on the lid. I have MUG in Bitten on the inner and outer corners. My transition color is a cool plum color by ELF that I depotted ages ago and have no idea what it's called. I blended the edges with MUG Peaches and Cream. Under my bottom lashes I dusted some MUG Cupcake and blended it in. I used Scandaleyes by Rimmel in black along the top and bottom waterline and have Cover Girl Lash Blast Mascara on. For the lips I'm wearing Cover Girl's Smoochie in #textme.

So fall, so beautiful. 

Thank you for your time, and stay beYOUtiful!
- Becky xoxox

Bronzer vs. Contouring Powder to Contour

Contouring is an art form, and I see tutorials on how to do it by everyone. What everyone agrees on is that your contour powder needs to be a matte powder, not a shimmery one. After all, shadows are meant to fade into the background, not pop. And a shimmer innately pops to the forefront of the face.

What's not agreed upon is what type of powder to use to contour.

I'm new to the rodeo and admit that I had no idea there was a wrong and right type of powder to use to contour. Every single Youtube beauty guru that I watch just uses their plain old bronzer to contour their face.

And then I watched a video by Jordan Liberty. If you don't know who he is, just google his name. Jordan does incredible faces, and he's the top of the MUA game.

In the video he mentioned his pet peeve - people using bronzer to contour. It was revelatory for me. I had to know more. This is what I've learned through my research:

If you look at your face in a mirror in natural light, all the natural shadows will have a more grey/ashy look to them. Shadows are naturally cooler in tone. 

Many a bronzer has an orange undertone to it, so aren’t good for contouring. Bronzer is used for warming up the face. That's it. Why contour with a warmer-toned powder? There's nothing natural about a warm shadow.

The best contouring shades have a greyish or ashy undertone to them. Some examples of good contouring powders would be NYX Blush in Taupe, particularly for fair-to-medium skins. MAC's Eyeshadow in Omega would work also. Physician's Formula has a bronzer with cooler undertones. Ulta's eyeshadow in Sable is a completely matte, gray-toned brown which is just the right contrast for fair skin – it looks very natural, while still giving those awesome editorial-esque cheekbones. Ulta also carries a few other matte browns in the same grey-family if you think you need something darker.

Nyx blush in taupe is a popular contouring powder.

There are non-powder products to use for contouring as well. Some things to remember: If you’re going to use a foundation to contour, not only does it need to be a few shades darker than your skintone, it still needs to be the correct undertone — the same as yours.

You can also use creams to contour. Illamasqua Cream Pigment in Hollow seems like it’d be a good contour shade. Ben Nye also has a contouring palette.

Whatever product you choose,  I think it's interesting to know the best way to enhance your beauty. And when the people who do it for a living - uber successfully - show us how it's done? Then that's the way I'll be doing it. ;)

Thank you for your time, and stay beYOUtiful!

- Becky xoxox

First Ever Successful Winged Eyeliner

I wish I had my camera. Seriously. Grrr. I've done winged eyes with eye shadow before, but this was my first successful felt-tip liquid eyeliner winged look. And in person? It looks beautiful! The eyeshadow is a maroon color (Bitten, from MUG), there's a deep plum color at the outer corner and Vanilla Bean (by MUG) on the lids. I used a touch of Mary Lou-Manizer by the Balm to highlight the inner corners of my eyes, just under my brows and at the center of my lids. Really very beautiful in person, especially with the winged eyeliner.

Not a huge big deal for anyone else. But for me? It's an awesome day when I finally FINALLY get the winged look without it going all crazy. This took practice. I'm giggly and giddy. :)

Thanks for your time!-Becky xoxox

Cut Crease: How To

I recently learned about a new eye-lining technique called Cut Creasing. I'm sure most of you heard about this years ago, but I was thrilled to find a fun new technique to add to my repetoire. I simply LOVE this look. There are a couple of blog tutorials I found particularly useful when learning how to do this. I won't bother with my own how-to tutorial because these blogs have really excellent graphics and images on how to do this. They included:

Preen.Me's Beginner Crash Course on Cut Creasing

BataLash Beauty's Easiest Cut Crease Ever Tutorial

Makeup Geek's Cut Crease Kitty Cat Look Tutorial

And a Few Youtube Videos:

 

And last but not least, pictures of my own very first attempt at doing this. It wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. I was going for a wearable day look so my colors are light browns, and golds. I used my Lorac Pro Palette for this look. I swear I'm going to get my P&S camera fixed ASAP. I had to use my webcam for these shots, and I hate even posting them. But I'm so excited that I had to share. I wish the photos were more true to life. The color is more bold, more obvious and very beautiful in real life.