Hey guys! First, I just wanted to say thank you SO MUCH for all of your advice and well-wishes since last time. My symptoms have finally stopped and I am now just trying to get my energy back to 100%. At least I am well enough to eat Thanksgiving dinner. Yay! Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Now, I know a lot of you probably don't read all of my comments but an Anonymous commenter posted this link asking if it was my myspace: "faker Mina's Myspace"

Obviously my name is NOT Mina, I am not a 21-year old Vietnamese-mix who is 5'11"!!! Not to mention, if it were me, why would I crop off my own watermarks? Looks like I'm going to have to be more careful with the watermarking. Sorry about this guys, but I really am against stealing of identities. If you have a myspace, report those pics as being unauthorized use. :( And "Mina" since you are obviously a reader of this site, please remove pics you have up that aren't yours. It's not nice to steal. Thank you to the Anonymous tipper who let me know about this.

Anyway, getting back to business, I've bought a few products recently that I wanted to share. First, on a trip to Marshalls I happened upon a few high-end products including the Anastasia Brows in Bloom palette and a Lancome Juicy Tubes Smoothie lipgloss.


You can still find the brow set at Sephora.com here selling for $28, but the one I bought was marked down at customer service to $8 since the brush was missing. I have tons of brushes anyway, so I was super, super excited. I must say, I love this product. It comes with a gold highlighter, a creamy wax to keep hairs in place, and two brow shades. I got the palette in Brunette which is perfect for Asians.



The Juicy Tubes smoothie is a bit more opaque than the traditional juicy tubes, but has the same consistency. The color I bought was called "Energizing Melon" which is a hot ruby pink with a bit of gold tinge to it.





You can see in the swatch how the iridescence changes the color in different lights. I love it! I can't at all wear orangey lips, but this is definitely a flattering color on me. I'm sure I'll use it for a look soon. I think I'm just falling in love with hot pink lip glosses. :P

Oh, and before anyone asks, the nail polish I'm wearing is NYX in Wild that I got from my last NYX haul. I love the color of this medium purple-fuscia. In certain lights there is a slight hint of blue iridescence too. The tips are a Sephora by OPI color my friend had. It was a very dark wine color but I'm not sure of the name.



Hope you guys are having a great holiday season! I'm off to get ready for my big family (and I mean I have a HUGE extended family) Thanksgiving feast. :)

Sorry to say it, but I've been sick as a dog lately. I know I mentioned it in my last post but it honestly only went downhill since then. I've only been able to sleep through the night for the first time last night since about a week and a half ago. I got a nasty fever and cough that I'd been fighting for a while but then I got a stomach virus on top of that which is all sorts of NO FUN. I've missed so much work, and the worst thing is being sick at home alone! But at least my hubby comes home in the evening and my parents live close by. Don't know what I'd do without them.

Since I've had the need to limit my computer time (and tv and any screens that zap away precious energy), I did find time yesterday to do my nails. I apologize for the wrinkly hands, but all that frequent handwashing is just not doing them so well lately. For the insane amount of Gatorade and herbal tea I've been drinking it astounds me how dry my skin has been.




Anyway, it's nothing too complicated. Just a basic french with a stripe of silver glitter under the white, rainbow glitter on the upper half of each nail, jewels on the ring fingers, and a clear topcoat.

Something about pretty nails just makes me feel better. When the rest of you feels less than beautiful, at least there is something pretty that you can easily look at right at your fingertips! hmm...

When I pop in next I will be checking comments, so please give me your best remedies for sickness recovery and also maybe some nail looks I should try. I saw some wicked ones on that soompi nail thread that are amazing. I wish I could get those crazy Japanese 3D gel nails with all the bows and embellishments on them! Who's with me?!

I've been sick lately so I'm not going to go into a full tutorial, but I just wanted to share a FOTD (from before I was sick) using my new NYX shadow in Hot Orange that I got from my recent haul.

I've always been very hesitant to try orange anything because of my yellow skintone, but I was pleasantly surprised with this color. It's a little out of my comfort zone to have bought but thank goodness for my love of trying new things! I absolutely love it. It looks more of a brighter neutral... like browns or coppers with a pop. Not to mention, the color is highly pigmented and has the perfect amount of gold pearl to it.




Since I had a strong shimmery eye, I went with a simple and clean-look for the rest of the face. Sunlight concealer from Everyday Minerals under eyes and on the tops of cheeks, pink blush, and nude gloss.

Ok, I'm off to bed early with my heating pad and "Nineteen Eighty-Four" by George Orwell.

I did a photoshoot for a car calendar (not trashy~!) a few weeks ago and got to pose with a very sexy red '01 Corvette. Trust me, it's not my normal thing but it was way more fun than I thought it would be! Lots of pretty cars, pretty ladies, and the weather was nice. :) To match, I did a purple smokey makeup look that was rather dramatic, but still very feminine at the same time. Very va va voom with big false lashes and curled hair. I love dressing up and this was no exception!

The makeup was basically my purple smokey look but a bit more exaggerated and with these huge Smashbox falsies. I think they were so heavy it gave me sleepy-looking eyes. No wait, I mean sultry. ;)




Main tools:
Urban Decay Primer Potion
Smashbox Lashes
NYX black, purple, and opal shadows
MAC fluidline in blacktrack
MAC 3D lipglass
Everyday Minerals blush in Apple


And here are some behind-the-scenes pics from the shoot:


"I'm smiling big because I'm pretending that it's mine"


"When I point here everyone start singing Prince"


"Ze hair! Ze does what ze wants!"


"What's going on here?" :P



Special thanks to Amanda Ford for her sweet energy and photography, and Norman Mah for his sexy, sexy cars and these photos. :)

If anyone wants a calendar (with very gorgeous girls posing for the other months included of course) let me know and I will find out about the price and info of when they will come out. And I gotta post my obligatory question: What is your dream car?

Hello everyone! I hope those of you who dressed up for Halloween had a blast last night. One of the few years where Halloween actually landed on a decent day of the week!

For the bruised eye, I basically stuck to using the 77 color palette because there are so many colors to choose from. I started with a burgundy color, then purple, yellow, green, and charcoal. I think the trick to doing this type of realistic makeup is to use matte shadows, not shimmer. Shimmer reflects light and looks too fake. If you can get a good burgundy, mustard yellow, and deep purple you can make it look pretty cool. I added MAC fluidline to that eye to blend into the dark shadows and a touch more shadow on top to blend the eyeliner in. The mascara I had on that side was what I had remaining from the day, which I left on. I added a lip stain to my lips and a bit of gloss.

And this is what I came up with:




It was a decent job for using just powder eyeshadows instead of any cream makeup, but UDPP works wonders as always. Here's a few more photos of my costume and silliness. FYI, the center of the belt was a spinner. It was so excellent! I got it from the boy's toy section at Target.

I'm so tough



That's right, I like to dance!


I WILL BUST YOU UP!


Tell me about your Halloween costumes and what you did to celebrate! I want to know what shenanigans you crazy people got into. ;)