Category: female vanities

Its still the last few days before the summer sale ends and I wanted to take advantage of this to buy some presents for my family. I was wondering what to get till I walked past a Carpisa shop. Its a clean-design looking shop but warm and inviting. And when you enter a Carpisa shop, you cant help to notice their green turtle mascot.

Looking around, I instantly knew that this would be lovely presents for my mum and my sister. While there are a few unfashionable looking things, mostly are a plentiful of stylish, wearable bags. But the prices were affordable, with many of them costing about 25 euro and above. And with the sale going on, all of the items were 50% off.

While as much as sometimes I doubt the genuinity of some “made in Italy” goods, Carpisa looks legit as there are so many branches and sold in many large shopping areas. Moreover the brand has been around for about 10 years so its reputable.

After much peering, and contemplating,I finally decided on a couple of bags and I think I’ll just show them here.

For myself, I chose this simple but elegant beige handbag with tan trimmings with a matching wallet to replace my old and fraying one. I like this design as it looked wearable enough for work but is still looks casual. And its roomy enough to put all my portable necessities. All I need now is a nice pair of tan shoes and I’ll have matching everything.

Because of the sale, I got both the wallet and bag at under 22 euro! There is also a pink as well as a green version of this bag. I think I would have liked the green one better I think. Too bad its sold out.

For my sister, I chose this fierce looking gold bag with faux snake trimmings. It looks stylish. If she doesn’t like it, I’ll take it back.

And for my mum, I chose this luxurious cream coloured leather bag which looks perfect for going to events. I think she’d love it. If she doesn’t, I’ll take it back too 😛

But I’m not going to post the prices for these two bags as they are going to be presents. Even though they are both individually more expensive than my bag, the last thing I would like, is that my sister and mum start to fight with things like “I am more special! My bag is more expensive than yours!“

Its the sale season!

Here in Italy, there are two big sales mainly in January and the other in July. And since last Saturday, I’ve noticed loads of shops, mainly those selling clothes, shoes, bags and accessories being on sale, with big 50 percent off banners all over. Of course, that made me feel very excited!

With many of my summer clothes still in Singapore, this was a good excuse to buy moar pretty stuff, after all 😀

Hence, I went to one of my favourite clothes shoppe, Mango and scoured around for some wearable stuff and I saw a couple of outfits that I love. Like these :

I love the white cotton print dress. Its so comfortable and yet it makes me feel so pretty and girly. Pair it with a pair of heels and oooh laa laa, instant glam. I don’t think you could see it from the picture, but it has lovely lace details around it.

The green outfit is very wearable too. Its very comfortable as its made of a cotton blend. And because its stretchy, I don’t feel lumpy in this. It might look simple, but with the right accessories, its easy to look glamorous with this one too.

Unfortunately, in my opinion, the price doesn’t seem very sale-y. Even with the discount, it costs about 60 euro in total. Freaking heck. I’m just a housewife with no income. So this sale, doesn’t feel like a sale to me. But I do like my outfits anyway.

Anyway, I’m adding this picture of the dress I got from last year’s sale with me and Sweska. This was supposed to be an ala Marilyn Monroe shot. But it looks more like Sweska is doing something naughty instead 😛

Its been a while since I’ve done a female vanities post, so today I’d thought that I’d share with you my Everyday Mineral Brushes collection.

Here it is! Isn’t it a beauty?

I’ve pretty much everything except for the new dome blush brush which came out just a few months after I’ve placed my last order.

I love my brushes. I’ve been using Everyday Minerals for close to two years and no complains from me so far! EDM is a cosmetics brand which uses mineral make-up. Previously the company offered free sample kits and I’m happy that through it, I’ve found a good colour match for my skin.

It was a long toss up between the EDM brush sets or the brushes from Sigma Makeup (which claims to have brushes as good as Mac Cosmetics) but eventually I chose EDM on account of its price. 12 items and above gets a 45% discount. So it makes more sense to do a collective spree with friends and have it cheaper.

The company promotes itself as eco and animal friendly. Its brushes itself are said to be made from synthetic cruelty-free fibres and bamboo handles which is recyclable. But one of the things that makes EDM brushes very memorable to me is how extremely soft the brushes are.

Face brushes

Here are probably one of the most popular brushes in Everyday Minerals. On the left is the kabuki brush and on the right, the flat top brush.

As you could see, these brushes are very dense. These are necessary so that it will be able to pick up the loose mineral powder and be ready to be distributed on your face. As already mentioned, these brushes are very soft. Kind of like rubbing a bunny on your face.

While most would prefer the long handled kabuki brush, I find myself reaching the flat top brush instead. Its more straightforward for me when applying my base powder. Because of its flat top, I could buffer it and my face would be done in a few minutes. In comparison to the kabuki brush, because of how soft it is, application takes a longer time.

Next in the face brush segments are the angled blush brush, the foundation brush and the concealer brush

I don’t usually use the foundation and the concealer brush that much, and I usually skip that part.

But I love my blush brush. Because of its shape, it’s fantastic to use it as a regular blush brush or turn the handle as a highlighter. At this point of time, the angle blush brush is discontinued and is replaced by the new dome blush brush. I’m not sure why its replaced though, as I don’t see anything wrong with it.

And now lets see the eye brushes.

Eye Brushes

Here are the Eye Kabuki Junior and the Eye Kabuki. If you notice that the logos are different, the reason is that the brushes with the round logo are from the late 2008 batch while the rectangle logo are from the late 2009 batch.

Initially, EDM released the Eye Kabuki brush as an all over eye-shadow brush. But as you can see, it’s really huge. Bigger than the size of my finger, so it’s not very practical for me. But it can be used as a concealer brush and it works great for the under-eye part.

While junior on the other hand, actually does a great job for smudging. Works great for the creation of smoky eyes looks.

And below are the rest of the eye brushes – The everyday eye-shadow brush, the eye blending brush, the everyday eye smudge brush, the dome blending eye brush and the angled brow and liner brush.

Truth be told, I don’t use all of these brushes all that much in the end as I’m more into neutral eye looks. But so far, I think it does a fair job when it comes to application mineral eye make up.

Just do be careful when using these brushes on regular eye-shadow, especially bright colours as there is a big chance that it will stain these brushes. And because EDM brushes all have their tips dyed white, it makes it VERY visible. But don’t worry too much if it does happen as some stains are inevitable. Just keep deep cleaning it with baby shampoo as regularly used.

If anyone asked me, which are the most basic brushes that I would get from Everyday Minerals, I think I would pick these since I use them more regularly compared to the others :

Angled Blush Brush for blush application Flat top brush for base powder application, Eye Kabuki Jr for smudging, Everyday Eyeshadow brush for all over eye-shadow application and the Dome Blending Eyebrush as a highligher.

To end, I’ll put up a nice picture of me with rainbow eye-shadow using mineral mekap.

You like?

Cart and I were in Monte Verde last Saturday, visiting our friend Lynn when I chanced upon a new clothes shop. It was the opening day, seeing the wreaths of flowers outside of the shop.

Being curious, I dragged Cart in with me into the shop to have a look see. There were a couple of people in there already, looking at the clothes and squealing out, “Che carina! How cute!”

I looked around, checking out the clothes. Because the style of the clothes and the make, looked so much like items made in China. And for the price sold, I would rather buy it from Singapore or straight from Shanghai or Hong Kong itself.

Examining closer at the label of one of the outfits, I was very surprised at what I saw.

“Made in Italy”Huh? Are you sure?

In my opinion, Italians have their own sense of style. I see that they mostly wear solid colours, their outfits were simple but classic and usually decorated with bold accessories like boots or belts and accessories. With the exception of perhaps the style of Roberto Cavalli, but everyone knows that he is an eccentric.

The outfit in the shop front of me on the other hand, looked like it was imported from China instead which I’ve nothing against and wouldn’t mind wearing it myself. But shouldn’t a made in Italy item, at least look like it was made in Italy?

Italians have always prided themselves as having beautiful, well crafted and quality items that would justify the higher costs compared to their counterparts.

Thus seeing the label, forgive my dramatics, but it seems a quite a mockery to me.

I don’t want to pay money for something which claims to be something it is not.

Coincidentally not too long ago, I was watching this program on ‘Current._’ about an expose on luxury Italian brand names. These labels actually had uncompleted items, such as sleeves and parts of bags and shoes being made and imported from China. These items are then completed in Italy, like adding a bow to the shoes, and assembling the bag and clothes together and European laws deemed it was fit to have the Made in Italy label.

To top it off, there are several luxury brands, where to save money, used illegal immigrants, pay them low wages without benefits, to make these goods, all in the name of making profits.

That seems so wrong to me and makes me wary about labels.

After the marathon two weeks ago, Cart and I were in this mall called the Parco Leonardo and we stumbled upon a shop full of women. Naturally, being curious, I went to explore inside And I realised that I was in a make-up shop. I was so excited like a kid in a candy store.

In any case, the shop was called Kiko cosmetics. Like Pupa cosmetics, this is another Italian brand. Kiko is popular for its affordable cosmetics range.

Kiko, in honestly is a strange name to me because the first thing when I think about Kiko is a little sea creature from Neopets.

I wanted to purchase the hot pink couture eye shadow palette from the ‘Posh Couture collection’.

Isn’t this look totally darling? I love the gold and black eyeshadow look going on here.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t find it anywhere! A quick check with the clerk, revealed that the collection was was over. Turned out that the posh couture collection was out for fall/winter 2009 and since it’s spring now, it was all gone.

Instead, there were currently the ‘Electric town collection’ going on. So I was contemplating on getting the Ropopongi Green eyeshadow palette instead as a replacement. But swatching it, the colours didn’t look very vibrant on my skin. It could probably be more colourful when applied wet or used with eyeshadow primer but I just wasn’t convinced.

Nevertheless I got for myself a couple of the other items in my list. First off, is the nail polishes.

What I liked about Kiko is that, there is a wide range of variety in the colours that they had – up to 105 variations. Compared to the more traditional pinks and reds, Kiko had unusual colours, practically every shade of the rainbow.

So I got for myself the base in pastel pink and the unusual shades of Cerulean blue and Spring Green nail polish as well as the more classic Vermillion Red shade.

Application wise though, the polishes were rather runny and I needed at least two coats before the nail polish would look decent. But the worst part is, it took ages to dry! Even after 10 minutes after applying, I find myself having the nail polish smudging.

I’m not sure that I’d purchase more which is a pity because of the range of unusual colours.

The only thing I liked from the nail range is the polish remover. Your fingers smells like vanilla after using it.

The next item that I got for myself is the limited edition ‘Red emotion satin lipstick’ in Sensual Red.

I really like this lipstick. It is very bright, bold and eye catching among all my other pink lipsticks. Wearing it, it felt rather comfortable and moisturizing despite of how matte it looked like on my lips. Moreover for 6.90 euro, I think that it was a very good buy and actually cheaper than most drug-store brands.

Its quite coincidental that Kiko came out with the red emotion line because it was most certainly awesome in my recreation of the 40’s look. What do you think?

If you’re wondering how I did my bangs, I used this tutorial. Takes a bit of practise in rolling though.

And you could put it up your back hair in a pony tail or style your hair any way you want to. Pretty cool huh?

Anyway, I find Kiko cosmetics pretty fun to use. I love the red emotion lipstick a lot. And while the nail polishes could do with a bit of improvement, kiko on the overall is good place to check out on account of the affordable prices.

4 nail polishes, a polish remover and a lipstick for 27 euro. I don’t know of anywhere else in Italy where you could get cosmetics at this prices. At the moment, I’m not sure if Kiko will be expanding outside of Italy though.

Check out my other reviews of Italian cosmetics

• Review of Pupa Cosmetics

I had my eye on the Remington Sleek and Curl flat iron for a long time since early December last year. I think it was the cover that did it for me. There were women with 6 various different hairstyles that I was hypnotised and stared at the box for like 10 minutes, examining every corners of the box till Cart dragged me away.

Anyway, I did a quick research online for review, and seeing how every user loved it, I finally decided to get it. Unfortunately, by the time that we went there next, it was no where to be seen!

So back in January, while I was in another mall, I noticed the last set of Sleek & Curl hair hot iron and I quickly pounced on it before anyone else could get it.

This is what was in the box.

The flat iron, and a book manual, and a dvd that shows you the different ways on how to style your hair. It was actually very interesting watching the stylist do all those hairstyles on the model. Although I’m not sure if I had the deftness and dexterity to do them all.

Just on thing to note about the flat iron is that it uses this European pin. I can’t plug it directly to the Italian power source. But all we had to do was to get the correct attachment plug for it and it works just fine. I bet that it’ll be fine for travelling too as long as there is the right attachment.

It takes about 30 seconds to heat up.

Though the maximum temperature of the flat iron is 230 degrees C, I haven’t really experimented it at that heat. By right, I shouldn’t really worry since the flat iron is supposed to be made of ceramic, tourmaline and coated with teflon so its not supposed to be damaging for hair.

But I’ll stick with 180 degrees for the moment. It’s hot enough for me. After all, that’s almost twice the heat needed to boil water!

Anyway, this is my hair in all its natural glory one day after shampooing.

It’s naturally wavy, shaggy and thick.

Truth be told, I’m not all that good with hair styling. But I’m keen to try different hairstyles. Especially now, its so easy to access tutorials from youtube and blogs.

There was one time that I was so excited to try making victory rolls, so on impulse, I bought for myself, a pair of curling iron. I don’t remember which brand it was though, but it was so challenging to use that I hardly touched it after one use and it pretty much broke down by itself.

What a waste of money.

Fortunately, this time round with my flat iron, my first time was fantastic and it was surprisingly so easy to use.

I’m not sure why I’m doing a Mariah Carey hand gesture here but you take a small segment of your hair. Put it as close to the roots, squeeze and slowly pull it down.

One of the thing that initially put me off flat iron is because of the tangles I get from using them. I tried my little sis’s flat iron but it was so tangle-o-rama. And my hair felt so dry afterwards. It worked fine for her though. Maybe its because of our different hair textures.

But the teflon works here since its actually very smooth and I don’t get that draggy and tangly feeling.

For the back of the head, it would be easier to pin with a hair clasp. And you repeat the steps till every bit of hair is straightened.

Tada! Straight hair!

And if you want to curl your hair, you take the small segment of hair again, put it close to the scalp, squeeze the flat iron and turn it in and drag it down slowly.

Be careful with your fingers though, its quite hot!

I’m not sure if you could see it in the picture, but there are guide lines which is supposed to guide you in controlling the type of your curls.

Yes, my curls look very messy. I’m still quite new at this, but for a newbie, my curls look pretty impressive, yes? 🙂

Anyway, tadah! Curly hair! I like! Abit of hair spray and it’ll stay sexeh for the entire day.

Hopefully my skills get better in time but I’m quite liking my toy for now. I’m glad I bought it 🙂

To me, make-up cleanser is a very important step at the end of the day. As much as I’d love to look immaculate 24/7, using make-up for an extended amount of time is really bad for the skin, regardless of what brand or how expensive it is.

Quite by chance, reading a review by beauty blogger,Tea Noir made me so intrigued that I wanted one of my own. I couldn’t find it in Rome so I had to wait till I was back in Singapore to get my paws on one.

Ladies and Gentlemen, this is the Biore Cleansing Oil :

Wait … what? Oil to clean your face?

If you could get over how greasy it is, oils from coconuts and olives actually make good cleansers. It’s not supposed to cause acne since acne is a result of dead skin, hormones and bacteria. Not convinced? Try smearing some cosmetics on your hand and dab a little bit of olive oil and see what happens.

Thank goodness we have formulated cleansing oils that doesn’t feel so greasy.

I’ve been using this cleansing oil since January and I’m liking it so far. Firstly its quite affordable at about $10 SGD and its quite easy to use.

So here I am with my regular make-up on :

And then you squeeze out the cleansing oil in the palm of your hand. I usually need just one pump, you can pump out more but I’m trying to be frugal since I cant find this in Rome.

The oil is transparent, smells nice and fruity.

And then massage it gently all over your face and you’ll see that in no time at all, every bit of make-up gets dissolved.

Be it blusher, waterproof eye-liner, lipstick.

But be extra gentle with the eye area as I’ve read from a number of other reviews that the oil sting their eyes. I didn’t encounter the same issue personally though so I think it could be a new formulation.

And then rinse off the oil with water and admire how nice and clean your face is … Oops! Now you can see my blemishes!

The interesting thing is that after using the cleansing oil, my face feels dry. Which is weird since oil isn’t supposed to make your face dry.

So at this point of time, I’d slap on some moisturiser or if its time for bed, I’d follow up with the rest of my facial care – Cleanser, Toner, Eye Cream and Moisturiser and then dream of pimple and wrinkle free skin.

Have you used the Biore Cleansing Oil before? What do you think of it?

In all honesty, I was a little grossed out looking at pictures of myself in December. It was entire my fault, not watching what I was eating and consuming food like Pandoro almost every day and then making it worse by stuffing my face with loads of comfort food when I was back in Singapore.

My weight reached almost 70kg. Definitely not good.

This is a picture of me and Jules in December. I keep looking at my arms, thinking about how succulent they were.

The problem probably began last year.

Being newly married meant that Cart and I wanted to share everything together. And that includes food. When cooking, Cart liked to measure and serve the food portions equally. I’m pretty sure that other couples would empathise.

And have you ever seen Italian food portions? It’s huge!

This pizza is a portion for one person. In the beginning of the year, I could only manage eating half of it. Slowly as the months went by, I found to my horror and fascination that I could finish it all by myself.

While in Singapore, I’d be exercising regularly, doing yoga and aerobics, taking advantage of the affordable fees from community and sports centre. You could go for weekly session for about $50 Singapore dollars for 3 months. I loved the facilities and the instructors are mostly fantastic.

The prices of exercise sessions in Rome on the other hand, is much costlier. The most affordable one that we could find was about 54 euro per month and the place looked rather dated and I didn’t fancy some of the instructor’s methods.

So slowly, after going there for a few months, I started to slack and eventually stopped going. Probably not a wise thing to do. I kept telling myself that I’d supplement by going for daily jogs. But that never happened. And the weight kept going up.

Finally in the beginning of the year, I couldn’t stand it anymore, and I told myself that I better do something about this weight gain.

I would like to reaffirm that I do not believe in quick fixes like diet pills, weight loss spas, detoxification programs and I’ll never ever endorse them. You might see temporary weight loss but then gain it all back some weeks or even days later. Its a waste of time and money in the end.

Coincidentally YesPecan was recommending an exercise regime called the 30 day Shred by Jillian Micheals. I gave it a try.

The first few days was a challenge for me. While lifting my weights in front of me and doing leg stretches at the same time, I felt so wobbly! And I was so sore the next day. Every step I took, I felt my muscles complain.

Regardless, I carried on. At first, there was no weight loss but eventually, it was really nice to see the numbers go down 😀

It was not a dramatic weight loss. But I’m realistic. I’m happy just to lose slow and steady at 0.5kg every 2 weeks and not gain them back. As for food intake, I still eat practically everything I feel like but I moderate myself to stop when I feel full instead of trying to finish everything on my plate.

But what gives me the most motivation is seeing the physical results itself. This is me after finishing my 30 day shred.

I still have a long way to go, but I feel so psyched that I am started to see a little definition in my abs. And as tired as I feel, seeing this inspires me to continue to have a more toned body.

Please feel free to join me! If I can do it, I am sure that you can do it too! Come on and lets motivate each other to lose weight together!

If you liked this post, you might enjoy :

• I survive the Amore Women’s Day out
• I feel good!
• I am fat
• Yoga makes me feel sexeh

I’ve always liked mekap. Colours fascinates me. To me, make up is like art where the canvas was the skin.

But I have never really been that great at putting on cosmetics. Moreoever, growing up, rarely I felt pretty. I admired my good friend Juli, who was naturally talented in mekap. We were supposed to set up a make over venture together. But now that I’ve migrated to Italy …

Nevertheless, thanks to mekap gurus on youtube totally making me jonesing for mekap, I bought enough mekap to last me for 10 years. It’s just too bad that cosmetics expires in way less than half that.

Interestingly enough, I met with make up artist, Andy Lee, during a Revlon event last year. I told him that I wasn’t good with eye make up. But he was really nice and advised me not to give up and just practise more. That gave me a little bit more confidence to experiment with colours.

While back in Singapore, I’d just slap on my mekap and scoot out of the house. Now I’ve got quite a bit of free time to practise.

Of course the first few times, it doesn’t look all that great. I’m not a patient person and I almost smashed the freaking liquid eyeliner.

But little by little, I think I’m getting better. Nowadays, I really enjoy playing with my colours and I feel very proud of myself when I see that I am starting to get a hang of it.

I did a rainbow eyeshadow look last year, after following this tutorial on youtube. It looked so pretty on her. But it just didn’t look quite right on me. I never knew how to blend properly and for a newbie to try to put on 6 different eyeshadow on an eyelid was surely asking for a disaster.

But just for fun, I tried out another tutorial. And this is how it turned out. Woohoo!

Andy Lee said that I should not put colours under my eyes but heck I’m really loving this! I’d go out with this even. Granted that its not perfect and I still have lots to learn and practise, it does look quite cherful.

This gives me the drive to want to take up a course on cosmetics. Would be a bit tough for someone who is not fluent in Italian though.

If you liked this post, you might also enjoy :

• A stupid commercial
• No more mekap for me
• How to be pretty