My Favorite Makeup Brushes

It's no secret that I like to splurge every once in a while on beauty products. I'm becoming more and more conscious about money and spending but if I have once weakness, it's makeup. My full time gig is in the beauty industry and when you spend your days marketing all kinds of makeup, you can't help but lust after it yourself. There's certainly some higher end products that are worth the price tags. But I realized that all the makeup brushes I love are pretty affordable. I'm pretty basic with my everyday routine so I don't really need anything special or high end. The brushes I use do just the trick and are affordable (in fact, one of them is only a buck!).

My favorite brushes, from left to right:

1. elf Contouring Brush

2. real Techniques Powder Brush
 3. Sigma Medium Angled Shading E70

4. Real Techniques Blush Brush
 5. Real Techniques Expert Face Brush
6. elf Eyeshadrow Brush (yes guys this one is only a dollar!)

7. Sigma Tapered Blending E40

I was going to go into more detail about each one but then I realized I'm going to end up saying the same thing about all of them. These are all great basic brushes that are good quality for the price you pay for them. They're great if you're just starting your makeup collection or want a good brush without having to spend 50 bucks. Beauty doesn't always have to cost an arm and a leg...well cause most of use don't have any extra limbs to spare (don't you just love that saying?).

How To Shop Amazon.com

I will literally buy anything on Amazon (well almost anything). From food (non-perishables of course) to makeup to furniture, I've bought it there. I’m huge on internet shopping, especially living in a big city. Why lug a big box of toilet paper around when you can get it shipped straight to your door at a great price? Amazon may seem like a difficult-to-shop website with a mish-mash of random products but here are some of my tips on finding what you want at a great price:

1.       Amazon Prime  - Amazon offers a great service called Prime. For a subscription fee of $79 a year, items that are sold by Amazon can be shipped to you within 2 business days, with no shipping minimum. You also get access to select movies, videos, and Kindle books. I know this may seem unnecessary to some but I’ve been a member for two years and really do value the speed of shipping. It cuts down on a lot of trips to the store to pick up things you forgot on your last trip.

2.       Subscribe & Save – Many items on Amazon are eligible for Subscribe & Save, which means you can receive 5% off if you sign up to receive an item on a regular basis (for instance, you can sign up to receive a bottle of dishwashing soap every 2 months). You can decide on the quantity and the frequency. You can literally just set it and forget it (which can be dangerous too but you can always cancel your next shipment if you don’t need it). Also, if you have 5 items shipping to you in a given month, you’ll receive 15% off instead of 5%.

3.       Marketplace – Thousands of people and businesses sell on Amazon marketplace so you’ll most likely find what you’re looking for, no matter how random it is. This also makes pricing very competitive. If Amazon doesn’t sell it themselves, you’ll find a marketplace seller that has it 99% of time. A lot of these sellers are small businesses trying to get into the .com space so it’s nice to give them business as well.

4.       Customer Service – I’ve heard some negative things on Amazon’s customer service and I can’t really understand why. For the most part, they provide quick and efficient service. They have live chat available, which can connect you to someone almost instantly. If you prefer to speak with someone, you can request to have someone call you (and  they actually do!). I’ve had issues to packaging and delivery in the past and they’re always resolved  and replaced it without a fuss.

5.       Know what you want or figure it somewhere else – Once of Amazon’s pitfalls is it’s tough to navigate site. It’s not the most consumer intuitive and I end up have to do a search for it instead. They’re product description are also lacking – sometimes there’s just not enough info or it’s incorrect all together. While brick-and-mortar stocks hate this and I’m am guilty of it, try to figure out exactly want you want either in another store or on another website. Match up the product numbers or UPCs. Then comparison price shop on Amazon. 

Now I know what people say…Amazon is the Walmart of the internet. I can’t say I disagree so I say this all with a grain of salt. Try not to forget the mom and pop stores.

*This is not a sponsorded post. I just really like to shop on Amazon.

TGIF | Week In Review

Oh yes I do like to exercise...occasionally...when I'm not tired...or hungry....or sleepy. Yea, nevermind.

This week was a hot one in New York. We're currently in the middle of a heatwave and temperatures have reached 100. Personally, I hate New York in the summertime. Hot, humid, and lots of people. It's gross, particularly rush hour on the subway - think armpits in your face gross. 

On a non-weather related note, I signed up for Elance this week, a website where you can find freelance jobs instantly. I've applied to a few jobs and have heard back from one, which I think is pretty good considering I just started. I'm thinking about writing a review on this site once I play around with it a little more, will keep you posted!

As for this weekend, I don't have much planned (except for errands) and will play it by ear. I foresee a lot of staying at home and chilling with the good ol' AC time. 

And lastly, for my July goals, it's been a hit or miss. I've actually been pretty good about eating in and I think I'm going to hit my goal of doing that 3 times this week. As for working out, that has been a huge miss. Haven't done a single thing this week. I find it so hard to motivate myself. How do you guys do it!? I also haven't signed up yet for driving lessons either but I will do it next week whens it's not to hot (I blame everything on the weather).

Here is a recap of my posts this week in case you missed it:
1. Things I Would Tell My College Self
2. Unboxing My Birchbox | July '13
3. Living More...With Less

Happy Friday, stay cool and have a great weekend!

Things I Would Tell My College Self

They say college is the best four years of your life. I can't say whether I can agree or not just yet, I'm sure I have many more great life experiences to come. But my college years were definitely some of the most important in my life. I grew up, met amazing people, and started figuring out what I wanted to do with my life. But at the same time, if I had to do it all over again, I would do some things differently. I'm not one to regret but there are definitely things I wish I knew during my college years to help me make better decisions. Here are a few:

1.  Take classes that have nothing to do with what you intend to major in or what your interests are- I was very generic with the classes I choose to take to fulfill my basic requirements...english literature, statistics, intro to chemistry, etc. Pick things you normally wouldn't. It's one of your only chances to explore.Who knows, you might just find a new interest or even your career path.
2. Study Abroad - I had considered going aboard for a semester but in the end, I didn't because I was too scared to be so far away from home. But I should have. When you're in the so-called 'real world', it's hard to take months off just to travel and explore.
3. Roommate with a stranger - For the two years that I lived on campus, my roommate was someone that I knew from high school. We had known each other for years so we didn't have any awkward new roommate phase to go through... we were already comfortable. But it was a missed opportunity for me to meet someone new, someone with a completely different story than myself. Roommate with someone you don't know if you have the opportunity to.Yes, it might not turn out to be the perfect situation but on the other hand, you could meet someone really awesome.
4. Figure out what you enjoy and then figure out how you can make a career out of it - I always followed the path that I thought I should follow - major in something I can make money in. I ended up with a business degree. I don't regret it but do I think it's what I want to spend the rest of my life doing? No. Figure out what you really enjoy doing and then figure out how you can make a career out of it. Money isn't everything. Do what you love and you'll love what you do.
5. Have fun - Some people wish that they took college more seriously. I'm the opposite. I was a little too serious and spent too many long nights in the library. It was worth it but I could've spent a little more time living a little. Go out, party, have fun (responsibly of course). You'll have the rest of your life to work. 

These are things I wish I did or knew. So if you're heading to college this fall, take some time to think about what you want out of the next four years. Work hard at it but don't forgot to take some time to have fun along the way. Four years go by faster than you might think.

Unboxing My Birchbox | July '13

I've been a Birchbox subscriber for almost two years now and I really do look forward to it every month. My July Birchbox came last week and unfortunately, this is another underwhelming box. Maybe I need to tweak my profile a bit but I use to love the boxes I got. I like receiving more makeup samples but lately, I've been been getting mostly skincare and haircare (Birchbox, I don't need another body cream sample!). Well at least that's better than a perfume sample, right? Sigh.

As you can see nothing too exciting- a face cream, a 'prep & protect' for hair, a few packets of body cream, and a sample of the girl meets pearl luminizer from Benefit. I usually love makeup by Benefit but I'm not a fan of luminizers in general- I'll still give this a shot though. And they also threw in a couple bobby pins this month. Cute but I miss those chocolate samples of boxes past!

So not a great month for me this time. One bone to pick with Birchbox though, my boxes seem to come later and later in the month. I use to get my box the first week but now, it's been arriving the second week at the earliest. What's up with that, Birchbox?