My Top 5 Black Eyeliners

     I think this was the first ever makeup product that I used when I got into makeup in my teens. This used to be the only thing I would wear and slowly started realizing that there are other products out there which began to gradually enter my kit. People always ask me how do I manage to do my eyeliner well and my standard answer is practice! Well I have been using it since I was a teenager and have enough years of experience under my belt :P  I dont even know how many brands and tubes of products that I have gone through since I started using this. Well today I want to share with you my current top 5 black liners mostly which I have encountered in the last 2-3 years and now they make it to my favorites list. Most of them are easily available in India and the other 2 are international brands which are fairly easy to procure as well. So in no particular order lets take a quick look...

Maybelline Rebel Bouquet REB05 Lipstick

     Maybelline recently launched their Rebel Bouquet collection (known as Rebel Bloom in the US) which is their Spring-Summer collection made up of "bold" pastel colors. The collection in India includes 6 lipsticks and 9 nail paints. They have included some face and eye makeup products too but these 2 categories are the main focus of it. I was sent over some products from the range to try out and I will be reviewing the REB05 lipstick for you here first. Btw they have launched some really interesting nail paints in this collection under the Color Show Go Graffiti umbrella for just Rs. 145/-.

Maybelline The Colossal Liner

Maybelline The Colossal Liner in Black, Price - Rs. 425/-

     Maybelline has bought in a lot of new products in this past year, their recent launch being the Rebel Bouquet collection, and some of them have not only been very affordable but have just nailed it in the performance department. Recently they made some new additions to their very popular Colossal family. Today I will be reviewing the Colossal Liner in Black which is a felt tip liner pen. I really like this type of format as it makes the application process a whole lot easier and gives you more control on the kind of thickness that you want for your liner. 

Maybelline Valentine's Day Kit - Rs. 999/-

Ho gayee hai mohabbat tumse

Aaein palkon mein khaab banke

Reh gaye sar-aankhon par

Bade hain ahsaan humpe

Dil ne kiya jab asar

Oh, Mil gayee hai amanat tumse

Ho gayee hai mohabbat tumse

- Aslam & Shibani

     This is one of my favorite songs back when I was sixteen! Brings back such wonderful memories - the hopes, the wishes, the butterflies-in-my-stomach, the anticipation, the doubts...the entire naivety and expectations that Valentine's would bring in. Waiting to confess to the one we liked, hearing other people confessing to you and who can forget getting chased by people one had no interest in and being ignored by the ones who had ours. Lol! What a beautiful roller coaster those days were. Though at that time a lot of them felt so embarrassing and end-of-the-world types but I would love to relive them once again any time. The best part would be getting those cards and gifts...remember how they would be hidden in your desk by your "secret admirer" (read the creepy weirdo in the other section :P ). Ah! beautiful memories...

Maybelline Baby Lips Electro Pop

     Maybelline is back with another variant to their very popular Baby Lips line with a promise of vibrant neon shades. They have launched 4 variants to it with flavors like lemon, orange, watermelon and strawberry. Out of these 3 provide a sheer shade to the lips and one is transparent. The PR of the company was kind enough to send me 2 variants to try out - Oh Orange and Pink Shock (Watermelon flavor). It has been quite sometime since I have done a product review so please bear with me. I don't want to do them the way I doing em ie in the systematic break down method but will just go with the flow of it so that I can get into the mode again. 

      I was feeling extremely low since the last few days for no reason whatsoever. Nothing was wrong yet everything was...I was literally "under the weather"! My melancholic mood made me dislike everything around and was sapping what little energy I have. But enough was enough and I had to just pull out of this slump! I don't like to mope about feeling "victimized"...in fact I despise it and people who have that attitude. There is nothing in this world that cant be dealt with or turned around... I remember one of my college professors saying that when we ladies feel good we dress up...and when we feel bad we should dress up even more so that it helps us come out of the funk and feel good about ourselves. Wiser words were never spoken :D

I got stars in my eyes, 

and the whole world rose up to meet me, 

with the vision like a child. 

Yeah I got stars in my eyes, 

and the whole world was spinning slowly, 

‘cause they can’t keep up with me, me and my mind. 

- Goodluck

     From the title you can see that I have been bitten by the "Sherlock" bug ("Ive been Sherlocked" for the Sher fans :D). Ahh! I can watch it for hours....and am counting the minutes before it graces us with its fourth season. Benedict Cumberbatch is the stuff dreams are made of! Honestly I have it so bad for him that when I see a cookie my brain registers it as "Cumbercookie" :D :P Lol! Imagine that. Any-hoo....I could keep going on and on about it and bore you to tears or run out of space or both...with great willpower Im diverting my attention.....Uhn......What was that?.......Give me one second......Ok Im don.....Sigh! 

     So I tried my hand with water decals for the first time....Water decals are like those tattoos that you find with chewing gum and candies and what not that transfer onto your skin by applying water. These follow the basic concept except that you need to dip the paper with the decal on it in water and then place it on the nail. Sounds easy yes? Fool proof? Child's play? One would think....But OMFG!!! This is such a pain :P No I can assure you I have all my marbles with me....I counted....and double checked :P You go in and try something with an "adult" frame of mind....how quickly they beat you and have you wailing like a kid! Ok enough with the melodrama :D 

     Hey there my sweet! It has been awhile since I last did a NOTD. Long story...I was too lazy to go for a badly needed manicure and in that process my nails ended up breaking. So I had to wait it out for them to acquire a decent length again. But now I'm back, manicured and all :D, with some basic dotting art that I tried out. Turned out ok...if it would have been a tad neater it would have been da bomb! I got the dotting tool and neon beads from Born Pretty. You can use the code SKT10 and get yourself 10% off. 

     A simple nail art this time but I love the pastel color combo. I have used a textured nail paint from Barry M called Atlantic Road of which I have put 2 coats on all my fingers and Maybelline Color Show in Coral Craze of which I have put on 1 coat on 2 fingers. I was expecting the texture of the Barry M show through the Maybelline coat and it didn't disappoint. Topped it off with dots of the same blue ( I don't know why I have gotten so fixated to the dots-on-the-side design). 

     Honestly I feel like I have come a long way from getting part of the stamp design on my nails to proper full fledged ones that I'm doing right now. I'm no pro at this nail art business but I'm glad that I am improving. I bought myself some stamping plates from MoYou after I saw Awungshi talking about them on her blog :) These are way different from the regular Konad ones that you can find. I love the intricacy in design that they have on offer. So many different themes to choose from. Using the addictive Maybelline Color Show nail paints in Denim Dash and Bold Gold along with MoYou professional plate no. 08 I created this design. 

     Hello my sweets! I didn't do the September Favorites earlier as I had an odd 1 or 2 products that made it to my list that month. Felt weird to do a post for that kind of number. So here I am with the combined favorites of 2 months but unfortunately only 5 items made it to my list and one of them is a beauty subscription box :) A nice mix of products again this time around so without further ado lets do a quick recap as to why they made the list...

     Nail stamping has been my must-accomplish-no-matter-how-much-I-suck task. Seeing so many people create such beautiful designs with something seemingly so simple was always quite fascinating. Thinking that it was child's play I got myself a Konad kit last year sometime. Very merrily I set out with the bits and pieces which in this case were the stamper, the image plate, the scraper and the paints included in the kit, and tried my hand at "stamping". But whats this? I managed to get part of the image on the stamper but somehow completely failed to transfer it on the nail?!?

     Back with another review of the Maybellline Color Show launch and this time it is the color Wine & Dine. Everyone is in love with these nail paints and you will find the whole blogsphere raving about them. The price of Rs. 75/- makes them oh-so-delectable and they have a very good staying power. People are just so happy with the different finishes in it and some have even found great ones for stamping. If you still don't own one yet you are seriously missing out :)

     When Maybelline announced the launch of Color Show nail paints it created such a frenzy in the atmosphere. They were launching 40 shades in different textures priced at a mere Rs. 75/- From mattes to metallic and from shimmers to bold neon, this launch has something from everyone. It has gained such a huge popularity in such a short time that some shades are going out of stock on the counters. Imagine that! I don't think I have heard of something like that happening with another brand apart from MAC limited edition collection. 

     Hello me chicas! Been a while since I penned some words down. I tell ya once you stop it takes a bit of a push to get back on track. But I missed it and missed you. So it feels great to be doing something so familiar again. Lord I'm behaving as if I went on pilgrimage or something :P Any-hoo! I'm back and that is all that matters baby ;)