Learning to Contour

I have been trying to perfect the art of contouring my face and really checking out many of the You tube gurus to learn just that !

I found some videos very helpful and thought to link them up here so all of you can have a look minus the search, if you have some little tricks dont forget to tell me ! The last video is really informative !!

Some pointers from me :

1.It is about the brush !!! It actually does matter a lot and you need a brush like the MAC 168 or 109 or a brush that has a tapering end(angled brush)

2.For highlight using fan brush helps for nice sheer placement.

3. Matte for oily T zone or pore problems and Cream blushes and highlight work best for normal to dry skin.

Here are the videos to check out!

Hope you enjoyed and learnt from these videos !

The Bun but Messier, Sexier and Easier

The bun is Hollywood’s go to hairstyle and it has been re invented into so many Avatars that we see it in the runway too

High, low, side or centre. However its worn, this season the celebrities are proving the only way is up!

This video tells you how to rock this with the help of a single accessory, the style maker ! and also shows you 4 styles to wear it in ! You can do this even without the style maker but it sure does add some oomph. I love it so much and with spring coming it is the perfect time to get it !

Had to share this, hope you are inspired.

How to get that Perfect red lips

Red Lips are always a fool-proof way to get glam ! Here are some ideas to fool-proof your Red Lips.

1. It is not all the Same Red !

Rule of thumb to choose your red:

Warm Tones looks better on orangey reds! Like the MAC Chilli.

Cool Tones should use Bluish Reds like the MAC Ruby Woo.

2. Prep Your Lips

Make sure your lips are well scrubbed and moisturized before you put bold shades. Also priming your lips with a little foundation will help with those little lines.

3. The Technique

Use a Liner or even Better a Lip stain like Jose Maran Lip stain to get a perfect border.

For a perfect Matt look using a lip brush is the way to go

4. Finishing touches

Use a clear gloss for an almost matt look or a dewy lip look. Or make it even better with some lip gloss with red hues.

5. Make it better

Add some gold lipstick/gloss/glitter on the center on your lips to add more oopmh.

Use a clear glitter glue and add some red glitter all over the lips.

Lip Scrub, Body Shop Born Lippy, YSL Lip Stick, Mac Sheer Lipgloss, Pauls Lipgloss, Nars Gold Lipstick, YSL golden Lip Gloss, Pop Lipstain.

The Perfect Blow Dry

Getting the perfect blow out from a salon is time-consuming enough, so attempting it at home can be even more tedious. So here are some pointers for a lasting and sleek blow out.

Things You will Need:

1. A detangler or hair mist

2. Volumising Mouse/spray or gel (modify according to your hair type)

3. A Paddle Brush or Round Brush

4. A blow dryer with a Nozzle and a diffuser

5. Hair Clips

6. Hair protectant serum or spray

7. Shine spray or setting spray.

Step 1.

After your shower, spritz your hair with the serum or spray and lightly rough dry your hair in warm setting for a few minutes. PS: I like to air dry it for as long 5 or 10 minutes while I put on moisturizer or anything else, less heat is always good.

Step 2.

When your hair is still damp but not wet use the styling mousse. Chose as per your hair type. I have thin hair so I go for a volumising mousse or Bumble and Bumble Thickening spray. Thick hair can use wax or pomade but otherwise use lighter products.

Step 3.

Divide hair into sections and clip it away. I like to do the front sections of the hair first as it tends to dry out faster. Use a round brush and hold the hair straight,the key to get a frizz free blow out is to point the nozzle of the dryer downwards. If you want a more wavy look, you could use the diffuser instead of a nozzle. Rotate the brush underneath the ends as you dry — this will leave them looking smooth, not brittle. The more you pull with your brush as you dry, the longer your blowout will last.

Repeat for the remaining sections of hair starting from the bottom.

If you like to add a slight curl or wave at the ends of your hair, use the round brush to curl hair into the shape and angle of your choice and dry each part until thoroughly dry.

Set with a finishing spray or shine spray !

Some Important Tips:

Fringe Finesse:

For an unruly fringe not sitting correctly due to a cowlick, blow dry fringe in the opposite direction. This will give root lift and settle the cowlick and allow hair to be more settled when placed back in its normal position.

Beat the Frizz:

To avoid frizzy hair always blow dry down and never up. By blow-drying down you will smooth all the cuticles the one way avoiding fuzz.

Detangle First:

Use a wide tooth comb and comb it through first before you start actually drying your hair. Directly using the brush on wet hair can pull and break hair too.

Keep the Dryer on Warm settings:

Drying hair on warm setting and drying will cause less damage in the long run than in hot setting. When you are almost done drying a section switch to cold setting and this will freeze the style.

Hope you enjoyed the post ! What are your tricks to a lasting blow out ?

Fruitilyscious Nails

Here are some of my favorite Holiday Nail Inspirations ( I found so many it was hard to decide on any one !!!)

My top Xmas Nail Art

Source: nail design info.com

Top Winter Nail Art

Source: nailsmag.com

Party Nail Arts !

So What do you think of these ? I love them all and wish I could be so creative as these nail art maestro’s !! Dont let that stop you from trying them out and let me know ! share your styles too !!

I was going through Beautylish and found some real fun and fruity nail ideas that I had to share. It is cool and quirky not something all of us would like to pull off ! Check them out too !!

Source: Beautylish

Beautify Me

The holidays are here its time to bump up on the glow! Here are some of my favorite tricks to get that just before your big event.

1. My Most favorite Honey:

It barely takes a minute to rub some honey onto your face and neck, let it dry and wash it off to glowing skin. Continue with your make up routine in 10 minutes, and notice that your make up will look more flawless!

2. Yogurt and Tomato Juice:

This is a mask for dry skin with pigmentation or scars. Mix 1 teaspoon of yogurt with a little tomato juice and keep it on till it dries, wash off pat dry for smooth skin (and redness that is reduced). The skin is prepped well to keep your make up to look great. This mask can be used daily for maximum results.

3. Gram Flour and Yogurt Cleanser:

Cleanse your face with a mix of gram flour and yogurt, leave it on and wash off in 5 minutes. Gram flour cleanses from deep within while the yogurt keeps your skin moisturized. You could even add a drop of honey into it for a great glow.

Try these just before your guest arrive or before you are ready to hit the town!

Let me know what you think of these !

 

The Goodness of Turmeric

Turmeric has natural anti-bacterial and anti- septic properties that has been traditionally used in various parts of the world (India, Middle East etc) for medicinal as well as skin treatments. Being a natural liver de-toxifier it is no surprise that turmeric helps the skin as well, Of it’s many uses for the skin the main are:

1. Sooth and calm Acne

2. Help with pigmentation, Acne Scars and Age Spots.

3.It also helps suntanned skin return to its normal shade faster.

4. Continued use is said to help reduce abnormal facial hair growth!

5. Lends a glow and softens the skin

How to use it

You can apply turmeric topically on your skin or ingest it (or do both!). There are many ways to use turmeric on your skin. What I love the most is :

1) 15-minute mask with Honey, Mix turmeric powder with honey and make a thick paste. Leave it on for 15 minutes and wash off. The turmeric will sanitize your face and together with the honey give you a quick pick me up!

2) 15-minute mask with Lemon Juice, Mix turmeric powder with cucumber juice (for eye area) and  lemon juice (for acne affected areas) to make a paste. Apply to the affected area. Leave on for fifteen minutes. Rinse off. With daily use, skin pigmentation will even out.

4) Mask with Mint leaves/Orange Peel and Yogurt: Mix turmeric powder with ground orange peel or mint leaves and then add some yogurt and make a smooth paste, apply this to the scars or the whole face and let it dry, rinse off and repeat regularly ! surely you will notice some changes! ( Mint leaves are said to have great affect on Acne scars)

3) Mask or cream (with natural oils). If you have dry skin with acne or pigmentation you could opt for a turmeric infused oil mask:

Just add some turmeric powder to a natural oil of your choice in a small bottle (use a clear or see-through bottle so you can see when the mixture separates in the next step). Shake well. The oil will immediately turn an orange or a deep yellow and will look ‘cloudy’. Leave this bottle to stand overnight. The next day, the turmeric powder would have settled at the bottom and you’ll get a beautiful, clear orange oil at the top for your use.

Take a small amount of this turmeric-infused oil and rub it into your skin or face thoroughly. Leave on for at least 30 minutes (longer if you feel comfortable) and wash off.

Natural or Herbal solutions often work better than most products and are side effect free, though they do take consistent efforts over a period of time!

Caution:

Turmeric stains so make sure you have gloves on while doing the mixing to avoid stains on fingers and nails !

Also be sure to use only a pinch of turmeric or else it is difficult to wash off ! I agree that is inconvenient but worth it in the end!

Clip it on Hair !

Growing out your hair and tired of having the remains of a hair style you used to have? As thankful as you are for all that baby hair sometimes you wish you could do a little more than just a pony tail with lot of bobby pins to secure the little fly away’s? I would say keep at it and don’t give up if longer hair is what you really want ! But in the meanwhile ever thought of Clip On hair extensions? I am not talking about weaves or cold fusion or anything that is too drastic, just simple clip on’s that can lift your hair on those vacations where you want that perfect pictures.

I stumbled upon the world of Hair extensions and I quickly reached the conclusion that the permanent methods of extensions are expensive and potentially damaging. Did not want to take the risk of weaving, cold or heat fusion ! So I decided to give Clip-On Hair Extensions a try! And I am glad I did.

 Many people agree that these are the easiest to use with minimum damage. There are plenty of styles you can create by using variety of clip on’s. For starters I suggest determining the purpose of using a Clip-on.

1. To add volume to your Hair
Look for color, length and texture closest to your own hair. I prefer Italian or Indian Remy Natural Hair. They are fine and merge well into your own hair adding volume. Look for Hair kits that offer different width of clips.You can control the level of drama you want by choosing different lengths or layers of the hair or even ask your stylist to highlight the clip on’s to give you the benefits of highlights without the chemicals.

2. To add length and or waves
If you are ready to experiment you can get Wavy extension pieces and add it strategically to your own hair to create fullness and waves without damaging your own hair, Or opt to curl the  straight hair clip on and add it to your own ! You can color, curl, straighten, wash and condition the natural hair you buy.

3. Bangs and fringes:
Want some drama for an up d hairstyle? Get Pre-designed fringes/bangs and add it to your hair style for instant charm.

You can do anything You want with it

They are fun and really lets you be creative with your appearance. What I love is that I can go from straight to wavy with minimum damage to my own hair. Also, clip-on hair extensions are so easy and require minimum attention from you ! Depending on how often you use it, you can wash and condition it using products you use on your own hair. Don’t need to worry about using the Styling Irons on it either ! Just make sure you comb it using a wide tooth-comb and detangle it after use ! After heavy use of Hair sprays it is advisable to cleanse it the next day.

Have a look at the one I bought here.

A word of caution, Clip on Hair extensions are not meant for daily use or to replace a wig if you use one, it mainly for use like a styling aid. Keeping that in mind will help to ensure you own hair is damage free always.

GoodBye Cellulite

Dimples look good only on a few and on the right places ! Nobody wants dimpled legs or arms or butt. The winter makes us lethargic and no exercise could mean cellulite when we are ready for spring ( and being thin does not exclude you)   No ways !

Best ways to beat Cellulite?

1. Exercise

2. Exfoliate and use that loofah or body brush/ massagers on affected areas

3. Moisturize well very often

4. Use an anti Cellulite cream or gel

5. Drink up on water

I have done some research on cellulite creams and have found 2 products good to use from a price point and based on the ingredients.

 I just ordered 2 tubes of Revitol Anti Cellulite Cream and began using it for some troubled areas ! Revitol has caffeine and Retin A in its ingredients which are key to helping cell turnover and banish fat cells. They promise to help diminish uneven dimpled cellulite in 60 days ! Initial reaction to using the cream was a tingling and overall tightening feeling of the skin. I like the ingredients in this product the best and at USD 40,it is more affordable than other products in the market.  I intend to use it as advised twice a day and give you a more precise feedback then! Get a great deal here!!

Nivea Cellulite Cream:

It is much more affordable at USD 12 and so more usable on a long-term basis! It claims to visibly reduce on regular use in 4 weeks. The main ingredients are Lotus Extracts and L- Carnitine. It is available in gel and cream mode. I intend to try it if Revitol does not work for me.

What are your tried and tested ways to beat cellulite ?

Hair Essentials

Growing out your hair can be such a tedious task requiring more share of patience than you can possibly have to offer ! and as happy as you are about longer hair, baby hairs that just wont sit in any hairstyle is such a bother ! To keep a semblance of normality, I have taken to spraying my hair with a finishing spray from Bumble and Bumble Hair spray which keeps the baby hair from going all over.

Contrary to what I used to do before I also have the need to blow dry maybe once a week (like your saturday’s) . My hair right now in neither long nor short, kind of in between stage ! So cutting off styling totally is not an option ! As much as I am complaining about all this I am sure that I want to keep at it for at least another 10 months !

Since my task is not to just grow hair but also get them a little thicker, I decided to give some extra attention and modify my hair regime keeping in mind the styling I am doing ! After a lot of reading and talking, I decided to rotate my hair oils with new dose of herbals and essentials to my existing regime. Herbal and essential oils can help a lot, and doing this once a week should help !

These are my picks of essentials I would try to use

Lavender oil: It is said to be the number one essential that fights hair loss and promotes better health of the hair follicles.

Rosemary oil : Soothes the scalp, prevents dandruff or flakes and nurtures the hair follicles.

Eucalyptus oil: Helps with the Hair elasticity and makes hair stronger preventing breakage.

Basil oil: Helps increase blood circulation to the follicles, stimulates them and promotes Hair growth.

If you are interested in using this, then this is the recipe I follow:

Mix equal halves of all the essential with a proportionate half of a base oil (olive or almond). Mix well and store in a dark glass bottle. 

Use once a week (alternating with your hair mask or oils)

I like to explore and try new things once I am convinced it is good ! I encourage you to research and modify the mix of essentials with others based on your hair type ! I hope you try this and let me know !

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