GIVEAWAY ~ Win A Too Faced Smokey Eye Palette!

I wanted to do this for a while now, and I couldn't wait any longer! I planned to include more prizes and have more than 1 winner but, due to some reasons, I decided to move the other prizes to another giveaway.

Prize ~ Too Faced Smokey Eye Palette with a sample of Shadow Insurance (eyeshadow primer). One person will WIN it.

I'm using Rafflecopter for the first time, so I'm hoping it'll help me run this contest smoothly. 

To enter, just fill up the form below. First 3 are mandatory for your other entries to be considered valid.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Mandatory Rules:

• Follow IVC via GFC or be an email Subscriber
• Like IVC Facebook Page
• Leave a comment below this post ~ Tell me the 6 colors that would be in your ideal eye shadow palette.

*Contest is open worldwide.

*Closes on 05/05/2012 at 12.01 am EST.

*More photos of the palette HERE

Thank you for reading IVC everyone & Good Luck! =)

♥ Cynthia Z *.*

Basic Eyeshadow Blending Tutorial & Tips

I have been meaning to do this post for a long long time! I did do one last year in September (!!!), but I did not like the photos & the lighting & my brows looked so untidy....let's just say I wasted a few hours & a pictorial.

When I say "What is blending?" I can't help saying it like Channel [V] VJ ~ Lola Kutty:

"Whaaht ees theese blanding?", with a hand gesture to go with it.

The reason I'm doing this tut is because I feel silly writing in my tutorials: "Blend well/ blend the edges" I always imagine someone reading my blog thinking- "Yes woman, blend, but howww???" I would be thinking the same if I didn't already know. Like in cooking, you can't just say "Cut the tomatoes julienne" without explaining how to do it. I don't really know what 'julienne' means, I learned the word from Monica Gellar. You remember her job interview with the creepy perv? "Are they, uh,  firm?..... I like it dirty" - about tomatoes & lettuce.

The main aim of eye shadow blending: To blur out the prominent edges so you don't really know where the color begins and ends. In most cases, the goal is to make it look like a gradient. Blended eyeshadows look more natural, especially when bold colors are used- a vibrant blue eyeshadow looks less trampy when blended well. With good blending, you can make 10 colors look like 3-4 colors.

I use only 2 blending techniques: 

Blending Technique 1: Windshield Wiper Motion- Place your blending brush on the line, and starting from outer corner of your lid, move the blending brush in a windshield wiper motion. Left-right-left-right......moving with the curve of your eyeshadow. This won't be hard to do if you have a deep defined crease. Most times, this technique is not enough, so you do the next technique in-between or after, whichever way you are comfortable with.....

Blending Technique 2: Swirling Circular Motion- In this, you make little circular swirls quickly. Start from outer corner and work your way inwards. This blending technique works well especially if you're applying one color on inner half of lid & another on the outer half, and you want to blur the prominent line in the middle where the two colors meet.

My Pink Too Faced Handbag Brush Kit & How To Create Your Own {DIY}

You know how doctors carry their stethoscopes everywhere? We makeup artists/enthusiasts also feel we need to carry make-up brushes with us everywhere. Yes yes, I know, we're not the same & make-up brushes don't save lives, I'm just saying that we feel incomplete without our "tools". Okay, maybe I should have compared us to plumbers instead of doctors. Talking about plumbers, can you believe they killed off Mike in Desperate Housewives??!!! 

Anyways, let's talk about happier things .... Too Faced Essential 3 Piece Brush Set. OMG I'm loving it so much!

One: It's PINK! *squeals*

Two: It's light & perfect for my handbag!

Three: The brushes are made of teddy bear hair. Tip of the cuteness! 

Four: It holds 3 essential brushes. I could live on them. 

I love Too Faced. So princessy & vintage-looking.

This kit is for $39.00 = Rs.2000. Bought it from apothica.com. I got it shipped to Shop & Ship, coz it worked out cheaper, since shipping within US is free. I told you about S&S here

Too Faced Shadow Brushes Essential 3 Piece Set

Look ~ The Other Side Of Me

"I knew that I had come face to face with someone whose mere personality was so fascinating that, if I allowed it to do so, it would absorb my whole nature, my whole soul, my very art itself." ~ Oscar Wilde.

Happy Easter! Meet My Nail Polish Painted Easter Egg....

Happy Easter, everyone! I know I'm late.

So this is my broken nail polish painted egg. I thought I'd turn something utterly useless into "art" before I throw it in the garbage.

Nail Polishes used:

• Inglot Nail Enamel #721 (Worn here)

• Bourjois 1 Seconde Nail Enamel #17

• Colorbar Nail Lacquer White

• Flower is from an old bra (LOL). I'd planned to paint a bow & decorate it further, until the moment it broke.

Brand Of The Month ~ Bourjois

You know I love Bourjois. My good friend even jokes about my obsession with it. I think I've said "It's a brand that rarely disappoints me" before? Okay, maybe I'm making that up, coz déjà vu happens to me a lot! That feeling that I'd already done/said stuff before happens so frequently, it freaks me out sometimes (like MPD does). Anyways, I am putting Bourjois in the spotlight as:

'Brand Of The Month' 

Simply because I'm loving so many products from the brand these days. Below are some of them:

Bourjois Effet Smoky Eyeliner Pencils in Sparkling Mocha & Sparkling Emerald. Price- Rs.385 each

Sparkling Mocha, Sparkling Emerald (Aren't they gorgeous?!!) If you aren't familiar with these- they are soft pencils which can be smudged easily. I've done a review a long time back here

'It's The Time To Disco' Nails

I don't know what came over me after midnight last night. I went into my room & started painting my nails like a possessed person. In about 20 mins, I was done & had fabulous nails to look at (instead of the chipped 11-day-old tangerine). If you think they look nice in these pics, I must tell you they look better in person. I want to wear glitter top coats all the time now! Hope you'll like =)

Colorbar Velvet Matte Lipstick Obsessed Orange ~ LOVE!

It may seem like I'm obsessed with orange lately. Yes.I.Am! I'm actually on a hopeless search for lingerie in this particular orange- something girly & lacy, with bows, two-piece, not swimwear. When I find those, then I'll start searching for orange suede/lace platform heels to match, she dreams some more.

Oh look how beautiful Colorbar Obsessed Orange Velvet Matte Lipstick looks up there! It exudes confidence. It makes me think of Mischa Barton, I don't know why. This head.

Matching orange bottom. A reader told me it's all lipstick in there! She actually pulled it apart out of curiosity hahaha... =D

Berry Nice

I clicked these pics in February, and almost didn't want to post them. Because I hate that reddish shades don't show up as they are in photos, and also because they're not very good nail polish swatches (I can almost hear myself apologizing to myself for expecting too much from myself.)

This is one of the pricey OPI-inspired Colorbar Pro Nail Lacquers named Berry Nice. Ergo Therefore, it's a berry shade. 

Torlen Professional Soft Touch Fuschia Hair Straightener ~ It's PINK!

This is for all you girls who've been asking me about hair straighteners. I've got a pretty good one that's available in India and.....and... it's PINK! =)

Torlen Soft Touch Fuschia Hair Straightener was a tool that caught my fancy backstage at Lakmé Fashion Week, because I've a-l-w-a-y-s wanted a pink hair iron. So.... I asked a kind lady from Lakmé Studio to help me get it, and she did. I was over the moon when I got it before leaving Mumbai!

Temperature control, ON & OFF button. I usually keep it at 150°C

MAC Genuine Treasure Paint Pot........

.......is a genuine treasure. No, ......is a treasure. Yes, they both sound dumb. Thank goodness I didn't put them in the title, phew.

Oh-My-Bows! This one puts the Posh in MAC Posh Paradise. If you like glitter on your eyes, but can't be bothered about the tedious methods - with Vaseline & clear lip gloss & Duraline, then MAC Genuine Treasure is the answer!

About MAC Paint Pot:

A highly pigmented eye colour that goes on creamy but dries to an intense, vibrant finish. Long-wearing, colourfast. Creates seamless coverage without weight or caking. Blends smoothly over the lids. Cream-based, can be mixed with M·A·C shadows and liners.

Colorbar Velvet Matte Lipstick Thrilling Pink Review, Swatches, Look

I like that Colorbar has nice names for all their lipsticks, but 'Thrilling Pink' would have suited a hot pink shade more, don't you think so? I would have named this color 'Pink Cloud'. Ooh... naming lipsticks, now that's thrilling!

I've already written a review on these lippies here , and my opinion on them is still the same. Colorbar Thrilling Pink lipstick is a pretty & wearable neutral pink shade. It was so hard to capture the true color of it on camera- it kept coming out too warm than it really is. There's nothing I hate more than inexact swatches (in this area of life). The color up there is almost exact.

Colorbar Thrilling Pink ~ The matching bottoms are still the cutest parts of these lipsticks

L’Oreal Paris-Femina Women Awards 2012

The L’Oreal Paris-Femina Women Awards 2012, in association with Rasvihar, commemorated the most outstanding Indian women achievers this year. Aishwairya Rai, Sonam Kapoor, Priyanka Chopra and other leading celebrities graced this gliterrati studded ceremony, held at the ITC Grand Central on 22nd March, 2012 . In the first year of the awards 19 extraordinary women from diverse fields such as art, music, education, cinema amongst others were honoured.

Hosted by Diana Hayden and Ash Chandler, the evening was brimming with laughter, the audience was entertained by spectacular performances by singers Sona Mahapatra, Usha Uthup, singer-dancer Shiamak Davar and his troupe, who added to the exuberance of the evening.