Elf Cosmetics Haul

November 23, 2015

Elf Cosmetics Haul

You know what’s amazing? When you’re really excited about a package, but have no idea where it is or when it will arrive and then all of a sudden the mailman rings your doorbell! That’s what happened to me last Friday. I placed an order on Elf Cosmetic’s website for their Veterans Day sale. They’re already a very affordable brand, but everything on their site was 50% off and I had a whole list of things I wanted to get. Of course, with a brand being so cheap products can be hit or miss but it won’t hurt since it didn’t cost much. With the big sale, they had many orders and things seemed to be a little hectic. Since they are a bigger company, they handled it better than others but it can still be frustrating to customers. I actually received my tracking number within two days, but the USPS website said it couldn’t be found even on the day I physically received the package. But that’s typical USPS tracking for ya.

I ordered a total of 18 items, but only received 17. I did see markings on the order sheet that was in the box and contacted their customer service. They informed me that they were sold out of that particular product and refunded my card. One thing that’s important to pay attention to when shopping online is shipping charges. Elf (Eyes Lips Face) offers free shipping on orders of $35 or more. After the 50% off, my total was $34 plus $4.95 for shipping. Honestly that’s not bad when other companies charge around $8. But I wanted free shipping and with such a great sale, I added another item which actually lowered my total from $38.95 to $35.50. So pay attention to that because it may be cheaper to add another item, and who wouldn’t want that?!

We’ll start with brushes first. This is the Smudge Eye Sponge from their original $1 professional line. The only smudge sponges I have are attached to eyeliners and I wanted a separate one for convenience. On days where I don’t want to do a lot of makeup for a couple of errands, it’s easy to get away with just smudging out some eyeliner around the lashes for an effortless look.

Moving on to a new product within their $3 studio line, this is just called the Blending Brush. It’s a lot smaller in height compared to a typical brush, but is so incredibly soft! It has a different type of bristles compared to their other brushes and I wish they would start making all of their brushes like this because it feels so luxurious. I think it’s going to be one of those brushes that has many different uses and I can’t wait to figure them all out!

These two are standard to the rest of the brushes in the studio line and made with taklon bristles. They’re soft too, just not as soft as the other one. The brush on the left is the Complexion Brush and the one on the right is the Blush Brush. Because of its small size, I think the blush brush is going to be better for highlighting and the complexion brush may be great for multiple uses all over the face.

Moving on to face products, I got a backup of one of my holy grail items. The High Definition Powder in Sheer. I can’t even think of how many of these I have gone through. I’ll go in more details about it in a haul update post, but it is a miracle worker! I also wanted to try it in the Corrective Yellow shade, but that’s the one they were sold out of. The smaller one is the High Definition Undereye Setting Powder in Sheer. I’m interested to see what the difference is between the two, but I already think the packaging looks a lot better on the smaller one.

I picked up two of the HD Lifting Concealers which I’ve never tried before. I got one in the Adjusting shade (green) and one in the Brightening shade (yellow). I’m interested to see how these work underneath foundation, but the packaging feels nice and they weren’t very heavy when I swatched them. I’ve heard good things about the Acne Fighting Foundation and decided to try it in the shade Buff. It looks pretty dark on the back of my arm, so hopefully I can make it work.

For eyes, the first three things I got were a Long-Lasting Lustrous Eyeshadow in Soiree (left), a Smudge Pot in Pearls of Wisdom (middle), and a Baked Eyeshadow in Moonlight Serenade (right). While I wasn’t super impressed with the pigmentation immediately with the last two, the texture of Soiree blew me away! I’ve never touched a ColourPop eyeshadow, but this is what I imagine it feels like. It’s described as a whipped gel texture and I think that explains it perfectly. I just wish they would’ve had a bigger color selection.

I’ve never heard anybody talk about the Eye Transformer palette, so I decided to try it because why not. When I swatched it, I think I might have figured out why it’s not mentioned very often. It comes with four different pearlescent shades that you can put on top of other shadows to transform the way they look. But, as it’s obvious in the picture, they aren’t very pigmented and don’t swatch very well. So I’ll have to see how it applies over shadow before I can make a final opinion.

What I was most excited about was this palette they released not too long ago with some other ones. Because I’m in love with matte eyeshadows, the Mad for Matte palette had my name written all over it! There’s ten different shades that all feel so buttery smooth. The first two didn’t seem to show up very well, but I like those for blending. This will probably get used almost every day!

The last three things I got were the Eyebrow Stencil Kit, On the Spot Blot Mattifying Blotting Papers, and the Hydrating Under Eye Primer. The blotting papers stood out to me, not only because I love when they have powder on them but because it comes with a handy sponge for ease. I’m excited to see if the under eye primer really works, I’ve used eyeshadow primer for the same reason before but it wasn’t my favorite.

I’m really excited about all of the things that I got and will be posting an update on how these products perform within the month. I want to make sure I give everything a fair testing on multiple occasions. I would definitely recommend keeping an eye on their website for when they have a sale like this again and picking up some goodies.

~Mani Monday~

Since Thanksgiving is this week, I decided to wear Sinful Colors Energetic Red. I think everyone knows by now that they’re my favorite nail polish brand, so of course I’m going to choose one of theirs on such a busy week. This color’s interesting because it can pick up certain undertones in different lighting. For example, when I bought this it looked more orange and when I got it home it looked red. What a perfect bright color shade for this time of year. And for those of you who barely have time for nail polish, this is a shade that you can get away with just doing one coat if needed.