Playing Beauty Salon

Well over a year ago, I signed up for Birchbox, which is box of beauty/hair/skincare/makeup products that gets delivered to my door each month. You fill out a profile in your online account, and they select about five trial sized, non-drugstore brand (read: nice stuff) items to send you each month. It costs a whopping $10, which is great, but the thing I like best about it is the exposure I get to various new products without having to shop! In fact, I don't even need to think. I just get to open the mail and play!

Initially, this month's box was a bit of a disappointment. The first thing I opened was a European hand and body lotion, which smelled so strongly of perfume that I nearly gagged. It promptly got tossed in the trash! Then I noticed this eyeliner, which looked nearly full sized (bonus!) but it was a bright green. Hmmmm, I thought... Not really my style. The other items ranged from some hair repair oil, to a cucumber face wash (that smelled FANTASTIC and felt great, but the sample was a one time use deal) to a skin and lip ointment creme. Skin ointment?! What the heck? (It's actually come in quite handy and I'll be the first to say that my initial impression of it was wrong)

Inika eyeliner in Green Lagoon

After the eyeliner sat on my vanity for several weeks, I decided I needed to try it and either keep it or toss it. It IS certified organic, so you know it had my name written all over it. It was just... So... GREEN. Bright green. Almost a blue-green. I mean, look at how green that is, right?! I have dark hazel eyes made up of grey, green and brown, so I usually enjoy green to bring that color out in them... But this looked a little "Jersey Shore" for my taste. "Oh well, let the beauty salon game begin!" I thought.

Can I quickly note that I decided to play beauty salon shortly before I headed over to the Texas DMV to get my license updated with my married last name? Down here they take a new photo for every I.D. issued, so... That was a dumb risk to take!

Anyhow, I paired the "Green Lagoon" color of Inika eyeliner with some Mary Kay shadows (they have the BEST colors!), inner-eye illuminator, and black mascara. Drum roll, please...!!! (While I might regret this decision after publishing this post, no photoshop or filters were used to edit these shots so that you can see the color true-to-shade on my skin tone. Do beauty bloggers edit their photos?! I dunno; thus the very few beauty/product review posts from me!)

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I took this SUPER close up so that you can see the eyeliner doesn't apply anywhere near as obnoxiously bright as it looks in the stick! I used a deep brown shadow liner on my upper lid and used the Inika eyeliner on my lower lid. Paired with a deep, earthy green shadow in my crease and a taupey-brown shadow in the outer corners of my eyes, I think the "Green Lagoon" actually makes my eyes pop nicely.

If you click the link for the eyeliner, you'll see that Inika offers a number of colors of this product. So, if you have blue, brown, green, or a different shade of hazel than my eyes, you'll be able to find something to make your eyes pop too! It comes with a sharpener in the lid, and I always appreciate clever packaging.

The "complete" look that emerged from playing beauty salon: Mary Kay eye shadows, highlighter and lip gloss; Smashbox blush; Clinique foundation and concealer; L'Oreal mascara. Too bad my new driver's license picture isn't this flattering...