Get Ready With Me (Make Up Routine)

Welcome to my first beauty post! I was inspired this morning to share with you all my routine for my daily makeup. I have been addicted to several YouTube "beauty gurus" and love watching their tutorials and hauls, etc. My favorite is probably Emily Eddington's Beauty Broadcast. Check out her Emily Awards for 2012. So much fun!

While I do not consider myself to be any type of guru, I have really enjoyed learning how to really do my makeup and it actually look nice. I have included advice from more experienced make up users than me to round out this post. Also, I don't always have time to go all out like I did today. On busier days I might do a more basic look, or if Eli is awake, Mr. Grabby Hands sometimes cuts the routine short. But if I have time, this is the routine I've been doing lately.

First I start with foundation. I am currently blending two foundations together--Loreal True Match Lumi and Mary Kay TimeWise Luminous Wear Foundation.

True Match is shade N 1-2, Mary Kay is Ivory 6

The True Match gives my skin a dewy-er look than I like. The Mary Kay has a nicer finish in my opinion so I blend the two on the back of my hand so I don't waste the Loreal. Maybe I am using too much product, but it takes a lot of blending to get these foundations looking natural. But once I blend with a bunch (with fingers or a brush) it looks great.

I set that with some Cover Girl pressed powder. Not my fave at all (kind of cakey looking) but I have it so I use it. Probably won't re-purchase.

Then I use my Physicians Formula blush/bronzer combo. I have used the bronzer to try to contour but it doesn't do much for me. But the blush...wowzers. I love it. Such a pretty bright pink. They make this blush by itself but its like 11 or 12 dollars. Ouch. Maybe it'll go on my Christmas list.

Here's a photo with just foundation, powder, and blush (and morning hair :)

Sorry for the phone quality. 

This picture makes my face look a way different color than my neck. It's not that bad in person :)

Next were eyes!

I started with Mary Kay eye primer all over the lid. Just pat it in (preferably with the ring finger).

Then I used my Wet 'n' Wild eye shdaow trio in Comfort Zone. Such a beautiful trio. I dropped mine, which is why it looks like this. But it still works. Now I am nobody to be giving make up application advice to the masses yet, so here's a video tutorial on creating a basic smokey eye. Emily uses a very similarly colored palette to create her look, and this is the tutorial I followed (almost entirely) to create today's look.

By the way, here are the brushes I used today. This is the brush set from Mary Kay (plus a Sonia Kashuk brush). 

Here's my face with foundation, powder, blush, and eyeshadow.

Next was lining the eyes. 

From top to bottom: Eyeshadow trio, Maybelline Eyestudio Gel Liner in Charcoal, Jordana FabuLiner liquid liner, Mary Kay liner (used only as a tool), and my eyeliner/eyebrow brush from brush set.

Okay, here's where it can get complicated and I usually skip some of these steps if I'm going for a hurry-up-and-finish look. But stay with me.

1. Line the upper lash line with liquid liner. I LOVE this Jordana liner which I showed in my recent haul. It has a felt tip and is easy to apply. It has nice staying power, is a nice dark black, and is $1.99 at Walgreens!

2. Use the stiff liner brush end of the eyeliner/eyebrow brush and tight line the lower lashes with the darkest eyeshadow color. Then line the lower lashes using the medium taupe/gray color just below that (this is explained in Emily's video above).

3. Line the water line with the Maybelline gel liner. You can do upper, lower, or both, I did both today. I used the Mary Kay liner to dip into the gel liner and apply. This is what I meant when I said I used the  Mary Kay liner as a tool. The Maybelline gel liner comes with a brush but I don't like it as much as using another pencil liner. Gets the job done faster.

*Note: The only change I made from Emily's smokey eye tutorial is tight lining the lower lashes rather than going right under the lashes like most people do (and like she does in the video). Dark shadow under my lashes tends to give my eyes a droopy look, so I like to keep the liner (whether it's a pencil liner or eyeshadow used as liner) as close to the eye as possible. I mentioned I used the medium shade as a traditional liner, under the tight lined color. Medium colors don't seem to give me the droopy effect. Now you know more about my eyeballs than you ever wanted.

Here's the look after lining

Now for my favorite part: Mascara!!

I used the Maybelline MegaPlush on my upper lashes. I really like this mascara, it gives lots of volume with minimal clumping and leaves the lashes very soft. The lash lengthening mascara I used on my bottom lashes since I just want a basic coat of mascara on those lashes, rather than a volumizing mascara, which tends to smudge on my lower lashes. I also used a little brow gel too. 

Mary Kay Brow Gel (clear). I promise this is not a public service announcement for Mary Kay. I just have a lot of it from when I used to sell it

Mary Kay Nourishine Plus Lip Gloss in Pink Sateen

I finished off the look with some lip gloss. I like this particular one because it's a nude-y pink. It has the faintest amount of silver sparkle/glitter. But you have to look close to see it. I'm leaning more toward glossy rather than obviously sparkly lips lately, so this works great.

Here's the finished look with my hair done. (Again, coloring looks weird. Blame the phone).

I hope you enjoyed this post. Leave comments on your favorite products you use right now or any advice you have for me.

Thanks for reading!

*Side note: this is not a sponsored post. Just my opinion on products. Ain't getting nothing in return for it :)