Hello everyone! As promised, today I have the second part of my birthday haul for you (here's the first part, in case you missed it). There will be a third part coming sometime in May, which will be a clothing haul. However, right now I don't have a lot of time to set up a photo shoot with my friend like last time, so it will have to wait until uni is giving us some more time off, hopefully you can understand. Nevertheless, today's post is all about makeup and beauty related things I recently bought for my birthday. Although there's a lot of different brands featured in this post, I only shopped in two stores: Kiko and Maquillalia (a Spanish online store). I hope you enjoy this and don't hesitate to send me any questions or feedback!
Starting with Kiko, since it's where I bought less things, I got my hands on two lipsticks and a nail polish. Both the second lipstick and the nail polish were firsts for me, and the first lipstick is an old favourite line of mine, from which I decided to buy a new shade, perfect for spring.
So, for the lipsticks, I got the Smart Lipstick in the shade 903, which is a lovely pink shade that's just perfect for the warmer days. I also got my hands on Kiko's Velvet Mat Satin Lipstick in the shade 604, which is a very bold bright orange shade. If you follow me on Instagram, then you know I picked up the wrong shade for this lipstick, even though I swatched the right one in the store (me and my ditsy brain, sigh). Even though this shade is a lot brighter than the one I swatched (shade 605, in case you're wondering, which is a lot darker, closer to a red shade, even), I still managed to make good use out of this, so I don't regret buying it one bit!
Finally from Kiko, I also bought one of their nail lacquers, in the shade 503. Although I never bought any of these before, I was really impressed! I got this one on sale for only 1€, but they usually retail at 2,90€, which is honestly a fair price I'd pay for this little gem. It's incredibly long lasting, it stays looking glossy all week long and the colour payoff is out of this world. I'd definitely run to the store and buy some of these to try out if I were you!
Moving onto Maquillalia, it was the first time I ever ordered from that store, but I was very pleasantly surprised at how much variety they had. Plus, the shipping costs were a lot lower, since they're "right next door" to Portugal, and they took less than 36 hours to deliver this, which is mind blowing.
I bought the Essence Eyebrow Designer Pencil in the shade Brown, which I've been dying to get but never found on sale at any physical stores here in Lisbon. I also got the Catrice Made To Stay Inside Eye Highlighter Pen in the shade In The Mood For Nude, which seems like a good dupe for the Rimmel Scandaleyes. Hopefully it will do the trick, since the Scandaleyes is sadly not for sale here in Portugal, at least in the nude shade.
I finally got my hands on Batiste's Dry Shampoo, which I've been wanting for months now. At first I wanted to buy it through Asos, but they didn't ship it to Portugal. Maquillalia was a lifesaver when it came to this little gem that I can't wait to try out!
They also had Wet N Wild on the website, and I had heard such good things about this brand, that I had to buy some things, especially since they were on sale. I bought the Mega Last Lipstick in the shade Cherry Bomb, which is a gorgeous dark vampy red that would have been perfect for the colder days (thankfully, the weather is a bit iffy here in Portugal at the moment, so we still get some gloomy days every once in a while, where this baby will surely make an appearance). I also bought the Wild Shine Nail Colour in the shade Sunny Side Up. The lipstick was only 2,99€ and the nail polish was only 0,98, by the way, since they were both on sale. A bargain, right?
Finally, I bought some goodies from Makeup Revolution, a brand I've been longing to try out every since the whole blogging community started praising it a couple of months ago.
The Amazing Lengths Mascara in the shade Black Brown was more of an impulse buy, really, since it was on sale for only 98 cents. Plus, I really did need a softer mascara, and brown always helps make your lashes stand out without making it obvious that you're wearing mascara. I have yet to try this, but I hope it works as great as it looks!
I also couldn't resist buying one of their eyeshadow palettes, since they're all everyone seems to be raving about on the internet. I was stuck between the Flawless Matte and this one, the Beyond Flawless, but after reading a post from Magpie Jasmine comparing the two, I realised this was the right one for me. It has a lot of gorgeous, neutral shades to choose from, a couple of them matte but most of them are either shimmers or satins, to be honest, which is what I usually wear on an everyday basis.
As you can clearly tell by the amount of pictures I took, I am more than a little obsessed over this palette and you can bet I will be using it every single day until I pan out. In fact, this palette is so pretty, it just makes me want to buy every single one Makeup Revolution has to offer (which I might end up doing anyways as the year progresses).
Finally, Maquillalia was kind enough to not only send me a little pack of candy (which is empty in the picture because I ate it all before I got the chance to actually take the picture, oops) and also a little sample, all for free!
The sample is for a shower soap by a brand I never heard of, Ziaja. Since it's quite small, I ended up offering it to my mother as a second, belated, Mother's Day gift, which she gladly accepted. If she ends up liking it, I might even buy it later, since this brand is available on the website.
Overall, I'm extremely happy with all I got and I'm also really pleased with Maquillalia (I think I even prefer it to Asos, if we're being 100% honest). I'll definitely review quite a few of these products in the future, and if you have a favourite, don't hesitate to tell me in the comments!
