eyebrow Archives - Curiously Carmen

Anastasia Beverly Hills Tinted Brow Gel

December 7, 2016

This product is one of those where I can’t believe I haven’t blogged about it yet! I’ve been using and repurchased the Anastasia Beverly Hills tinted brow gel for over two years now.

Anastasia Beverly Hills is definitely one of the top products, if not THE product, the beauty world absolutely SWEARS by.

For this post, I will be focusing on their brow gel! I have the shade chocolate.

What it says (Taken from Sephora):

For those with thin, sparse brows, this unique, botanical formula gives the appearance of fuller, thicker brows.
The combination of cream and gel effortlessly defines and fills in the look of brows while controlling and shaping without flaking or fading.

Application: The application process is pretty standard. The product comes in a sturdy tube and your typical brow brush.

You can use the brush to apply a more rounded, curved shape or you can make it more angled and sharp. But,the brush also causes some slight problems as I’ll mention below.

Wear: On top of the great colour and beautiful, full shape, this brow gel is very long lasting. It does not smudge and will easily survive a 12+ hour day without retouches. With that said, it is also easy to remove with makeup remover.
Here is a picture of my eyebrows without the brow gel. Although I do like my eyebrows without filling them in, I like to enhance them and make them look even better.
Here are my eyebrows after! As you can tell, there is a big difference. My brows are thicker and fuller now.

First, I make sure the brush is completely straight and parallel to my brow. When your brush is slightly slanted, your brows will arch too soon. That is something you do not want because that is how you get rounded rainbow/sperm brows and those ain’t cute.

As you can see from the pic below, the brush is slightly rounded instead of straight & skinny, making it harder for a precise look and easier for sperm brows.

I would prefer a thinner brush because this brow gel is only good if you want thick and full brows. It is hard to achieve a thin brow shape with this because of how big the brush is.

Then, I like to extend the shape of my eyebrows a bit past my natural hairs, because I think my face is quite round and having shorter brows make it look even rounder.

While extending, this part can sometimes be tricky depending on how much product is on the brush. Much like nail polish, sometimes there is too much product on the tip of the brow brush and the colour becomes uneven.

In this case, I will take my brow pencil and fill in the uneven parts and it’s all good.

Makes your brows look AMAZING!
Does an AMAZING job at filling in your brows, and giving them definition
Long lasting
Does not flake or fade

Brush is thicker than most spoolie brushes, which means you can only create thicker brow looks and it’s hard to be precise
Can be tricky if you have too little/too much product on the brush, leading to uneven colour

Overall, the pros outweigh the cons. Once I run out of this, I don’t think I will repurchase only because I want to try the other ABH products, mainly the dip brow or the brow wiz! I’ve repurchased this once already =P

The dip brow and brow wiz are their most popular items, and they seem to solve the problem with the brow gel, which is that it can only create thick brow looks.

Yay!

E.L.F. Studio Eyebrow Kit

July 3, 2014

Since my last beauty post, I have promised a drugstore product because I realize I haven’t done much of those. The elf studio eyebrow kit is my favourite eyebrow tool and brow makeup to use. I love how it is super easy to apply, how long lasting it is, and how natural the colour looks on me. I’ve been using this kit for the past eight months everyday, and just recently ran out.

Unfortunately, I live in Canada where we do not sell elf products in drugstores, so I usually stock up when I visit the US (US Targets or Wal-Marts sell them for cheap!) or ask my friend to kindly order them online for me!

Simple packaging of the product. The packaging is very sturdy, I’ve dropped it a few times on tile floor but it did not shatter. The left side is the pigmented wax, which kind of gives off a gel-like texture. The lighter shade on the right is the powder, which sets the eyebrow colour. For me personally, I never used the right side since it was too light on my skin. I only used the pigmented wax.
It comes with a small angle and eyeshadow brush, along with a mirror. For $5, this is a really good deal and you get a lot more than what you pay for. The angle brush helps you to colour in your eyebrows with more precision. I normally just use the angle brush from this kit. I know that some people are a bit nervous to use a brush and stick with eyebrow pencils, but to be honest, the application process is tremendously easy.
Yep… as I mentioned earlier, I just recently finished my first kit. Looks a bit gross, eh? Oh well. I am pretty surprised that it lasted me this long since I use this every single day.

Anyways, since I use this eyebrow kit daily, I’ll just attach a few random photos from the past few months when wearing this. I think that the shade is suitable for my skin and like that it’s not too harsh of a colour, what do you think?
Random picture #1: This picture taken from my Face Shop mini haul post!
Another random picture from last month…Yes I know my hair is a mess, it was very windy that day in my city and we were by the water 🙂 Also, say hi to Polka the cat again!
Taken in Disneyland back in January 🙂

I hope you enjoyed the post, thanks for reading! Comments make my day, and I would really appreciate your support! 🙂
-Carmen

April Beauty Favourites

May 9, 2014

This is my first time doing one of these monthly favourites! I’ve seen them on YouTube a lot, plus some fashion/beauty/lifestyle blogs that I follow. Since I don’t have photoshop on my computer, nor am I good at it, I had to come up with a way to create a collage by other means.

After pondering the internet and trying out various photo apps, I have finally created my first one! I know it’s not perfect, so please bear with me here. It’s been awhile since I’ve done a beauty related post, yet alone a mini haul, so I’m quite excited to try this out! These are in no particular order!

1. Dove Go Fresh deodorant, pomegranate and lemon verbana scent. I am in love with the smell of this deodorant. I like how it has a strong scent, making you smell lovely the whole day. When I want to freshen up after I shower, I apply this deodorant and feel refreshed.

2. The Body Shop – Mango body whip. I love all the body lotion products from The Body Shop (not body butter). The mango one has a lovely, subtle mango scent. It moisturizes very well. I love how it’s very light weight so you don’t feel sticky or heavy after applying this lotion.

3. ELF eyebrow kit. I bought this online back in November, and have been using this everyday for the past few months, so of course it is going on my favourites list! I love the colour/shade of the eyebrow kit, which matches my hair and skintone perfectly. The colour is very soft and not harsh, which I like because I don’t want strong, harsh eyebrows (that’s just my own preference). It’s also long lasting, and the small angle brush that comes with the kit makes it very easy to apply this to your eyebrows- pretty foulproof! Occasionally, I will double this up as a eyeliner for my lower lashes since I don’t like pencil eyeliner.

4. LUSH Grease lightning spot treatment. I received a sample of this, and I am already hooked after 2 days of usage. It is made up of all natural ingredients which fight acne scars, kills dirty bacteria on your skin, and prevents/kills pimples. I had two ugly pimples pop up last week, and after applying this spot treatment, I have noticed that they have diminished dramatically. I love how all the ingredients in this are natural as well.

5. Chanel – Chance Eau Tendre. This perfume has a soft, flowery and romantic scent to it which I love. Whenever I spray it on myself, I instantly feel very calm since the scent is very light and relaxing. I also feel a lot prettier when wearing this, so it definitely gives me a boost of confidence when I feel like I look like crap. I’ve gotten many compliments whenever I wear this perfume, which is a plus!

6. Maybelline mineral powder foundation. I bought this back in high school years back, but didn’t really have a good experience with it and ended up throwing it out. My friend recently gave me hers since it wasn’t the right shade for her, and I decided to give it another try. After wearing this as my setting powder, I noticed that my skin looked a lot brighter, smoother, and more translucent with a hint of shimmer. I realized that the problem was the crappy brush that came with it. I used my own brush and the finish looked a lot better.

Well there you have it, some of my current beauty favourites! What are some of yours?

-Carmen