My Mac Glitter and Ice Collection Haul

Every year Mac ropes me in with their mineralize eyeshadows, so of course once again I have given into the temptation and purchased half their holiday collection. Do you want to see what I got? Here it is!

Packaged in shiny silver outer boxes (which are fingerprint magnets) and white plastic compacts and tubes.I think it's pretty nice, certainly makes a change from the usual Mac packaging. I ended up buying all the mineralize eyeshadows, both beauty powders, three lipsticks, two dazzleglasses and all 3 paint pots. I have close-ups of everything below, plus swatches of the eyeshadows, so keep reading.

Just want to mention, Winterized mineralize eyeshadow was super hard to find as it's been showing as sold out/out of stock on every website and none of the counters I tried had received it (same thing happened with Rare Exotic mattene last month actually), but I managed to order it from Mac mail order directly. It's very pretty, so I'm glad I tracked it down.

I also bought a few sets from Ice Parade and Dazzlephere! collections, but I didn't include them in here. I bought all 3 crush metal pigment sets, the mineralize brush set and also Rocking Iced Delights Nail & Lip Bag which contains Kanga Rouge lipstick that is absolutely beautiful. I also picked up Hot Gossip lipstick which is included in one of the exclusive face kits and Trax eyeshadow which is included in the Sultry Snowglobe eyeshadow palette, both of them are permanent. Phew! I'm all Mac-ed out.

Did you pick up anything from Mac's holiday offerings? Let me know in the comments!

See more pictures and swatches of the mineralize eyeshadows after the jump!

My Mac Semi-Precious Haul - Part 2 and Fashion Flower Haul

I went to check out the Semi Precious collection in person today, fully expecting to get sucked in by the lipsticks and Cremesheen glasses and walked away with just Unsurpassable mineralize eyeshadow (the one Debenhams couldn't send me). Yep, this is my rather measly part 2 of my haul. :)

It's a pretty eyeshadow though and I'm happy to now have the full set (see my haul part 1 here). And for this not to be such a boring post, I've decided to include my Fashion Flower haul as well. That's not a big one either. I originally ordered Summer Shower lipstick, Alpha Girl beauty powder, Now In Season and Fashion Flower lipgelees, and today I also picked up Budding Beauty lipgelee. I love the lipgelees, they are wonderfully sparkly (except Budding Beauty which is the least shimmery of the 3). Summer Shower lipstick is very unique as it's green/blue, but it's suprisingly wearable as it mainly just gives a sheen and not sull coverage. I have not swatched Alpha Girl because it's got such pretty flower detail, but I will get around to doing it soon.

So this is it for me for this month, so no more Mac haul posts. I will aim to swatch the Semi-Precious face products this weekend, plus I do have plenty other exciting thigs to show you too, so stay tuned!

See more pictures and swatches after the jump!

New Cid Cosmetics i-glow powder in Coral Crush and i-gloss in Coral Candy

Thanks to Charlotte at Lipglossiping telling us about the new Coral Crush i-glow shimmer powder and Coral Candy i-gloss from New Cid Cosmetics, I had to order them both as they are so pretty. I already owned two of the i-glow shimmer powders (Sirocco and Ice Pop - reviews to follow later) and an i-gloss and really liked them, so was quite happy to place an order online without seeing them in person. Unfortunately there's no New Cid Cosmetics counter near me (I think the closest is in Selfridges in London), so if I wanted them, I didn't really have a choice anyway. Well, I could've waited until I next go to London, but I am very impatient, so that was never going to happen!

I got my order last week and I can tell you it was love at first sight with the shimmer powder. The gloss is very nice too, but the powder, oh my...!

It is quite simply one of the prettiest powders I have ever seen. It's pinky coral with cool pink and gold veining, well not so much veining, as they are thicker than veins, more like patches. Very similar to Mac Mineralize Skinfinishes and Laura Geller Blush 'n' Brighten blushes, I think both are 9 g, so is this. Coral Crush is pretty frosty, so it's not for those wanting something without shimmer, but it isn't glittery and it is very smooth, fine powder. The compact also has a mirror inside it, something that's missing from the Mac MSFs. It's more expensive at £23.50 though.

The lipgloss isn't shimmery at all, it's also non-sticky, but it is quite sheer and the colour isn't quite the same on my lips as it is in the tube. It comes with one of those light up wands (there are two small light bulb in the handle that come on when you unscrew it) and has a mirror on the side of the tube. It's quite funky, but I personally don't like the light as it's a very cold blue light, so the gloss looks very different when I'm applying it. I gues it's cool when you're clubbing and want to reapply your gloss in the dark. :) I don't do that anymore. The gloss retails at £15.50 which also puts it in a higher price bracket from Mac.

See some more pictures and swatches of the powder and lipgloss.

L'Occitane Peony Make Up Collection Haul

I told you about L'Occitane's upcoming make up collection here and now I'm happy to report that the collection has arrived in the UK. I have a L'Occitane in my town, so when I walked past it today I spotted the stand with all the pretty make up, and couldn't resist to check it out. They didn't have everything including the duo eyeshadows due to the recent travel disruption, but they should have the missing things tomorrow, so I will go back and check. I came away with the pretty illuminating powder, a blush, two lipglosses, the cheek and lip stain and the shimmering beauty powder (which I didn't know about until now). They're all packaged it beautiful flowery paper bags that remind me of the packaging of flower bulbs, and the powders are in cardboard boxes just like Paul & Joe powders. The lipglosses have paper/card on the outside of the top of the wand but plastic on the inside. They all look really pretty. The Beauty Powder is absolutely huge (40 g), it's for the body, but will last forever anyway, it comes with a huge fluffy puff and is housed in a tin rather than cardboard. I tested the lipsticks, but they are too sheer for my liking and the two lighter lipglosses weren't very interesting to me, but might suit others more who like sheerer colours. There's also a lipbalm that is a very light pink colour which I also didn't get. They were missing a blush (no. 03), so need to check that, they also didn't have the bronzing powder, but I probably won't want that. Below are some photos of what I did get and some swatches too. Couldn't really swatch the illuminating powder as it's very light and doesn't really show up other than a sheer glow. Tried to show you how gorgeous the shimmery beauty powder is, but the camera just couldn't capture its beauty. You need to check it out in person! ;) Oh and there's also a new perfume called Peony which smells absolutely gorgeous, but as I'm on a perfume no-buy until I use up at least 3 of my existing perfumes (honestly, I have at least 30!), I sadly have to give it a miss right now.

The collection is also available online on http://www.loccitane.co.uk/ and you get free delivery on orders over £59.

See photos of products and swatches...

Illuminating powder

Blush shade 02

Blush swatch

Lipglosses no. 03 and 04 and lip and cheek tint

Lipgloss and lip and cheek tint swatches (same order)

Huge powder puff for the Beauty Powder

Beauty Powder

Beauty Powder swatch