Cargo in Boots

I am fond of the Cargo blush, even though I only ever had one and my husband hated the colour passionately (The Big Easy blush, kind of glow-in-the-dark on me).

There was a time when you could only get Cargo at selected large Sainsburys around the country. In Central London you could get it from the Gloucester Road Sainsburys, and you could only choose from a limited range of Cargo products. Now an even more limited range of Cargo products are available right in Boots, namely the Lash Activator they're advertising in Grazia, and this 7 in 7 kit that gives you 7 Cargo products (individual products not sold in Boots, but possibly available in a Cargo-carrying Sainsburys some distance away) and it's £35.



Contents:
Cargo OneBase foundation in 02 (Light medium) - the 7 in 7 kits available in American Sephora comes in three different kits with different colours, but I think Boots has a different kit with only has the Light medium foundation.
Essential palette in warm neutral - each strip is labelled with where you should apply it.
LashActivator
BeachBlush
Black eye pencil
Lipliner in a 'neutral rose'
Lipgloss with 'Timestrip' in a 'shimmering dusty rose'. Timestrip is a little window in the lipgloss cap that turns red. When it's totally red it's time for you to throw out your gloss. Apparently this lasts nine months.

The kit contains the traditional default neutral colours in kits. Good for Christmas. Possibly excellent for Christmas, since everything's full-size and you could technically separate the items and repackage them for different people.

The Timestrip lipgloss is kind of gimmicky (like many things in Cargo: blu-ray, Timestrip, plantlove), but it's things like it that make me feel all old school and frugal, and only have two or three lipglosses at a time, and throw them out every year in an organised way. The downside to the Timestrip gloss would be the guilt you feel when tossing out a relatively new, not inexpensive gloss when you know you've got years of gloss in your kit. Giant Juicy Tubes and tubs of tinted lip conditioner.

This article says to keep lipstick only a year, and cream blush even less.

Maybe it's time they started making smaller (and proportionately cheaper) tubes of lipgloss and lipstick, and especially mascara. Tubes one person could actually use up. I like those small gwp mascaras from Estee Lauder or whatever because I change mascara every three months, which is apparently what you should do. My current favourite mascara is Benefit Bad Gal Lash, and I sure as hell won't buy a full size every three months.

It's great though. It's great. I like the big bristly brush

Alternatively, I (and you) could pare down our more perishable/non-powder cosmetics to the most basic, bearing in mind that most colours could be mixed. And we don't really need 10 shades of pinky-peach lipstick in our collection.

Sleek Original palette and cheapness

Sleek is a line of cosmetics for women of colour (it has a great range of foundation shades) and you can find it in Superdrug. They've got a few palettes out, there's a Storm palette that I might just get because of the wonderful neutrals, and there was a neon Acid palette out that was sold out really quicklyI think they've got a new one out but I haven't seen it in shops yet. From DvoraDivine's swatches it looks like it has some similar colours to the original palette. I have that one and today I've used some colours from it. I've read a lot of good reviews about this palette and I concur that it's amazing for £4.99. Depending on how posh you are that's about how much dinner costs.




I flipped the swatch pictures around to line up with the colours in the palette. The colours are pretty and pigmented though a few colours look the same on me: the second and third on the bottom row, and the fifth (bottom row) reminds me of MAC retrospeck in that it looked like gold glitter on me. When applied sheerly the third pink looks yellow on me when I use it on my lid, I have to apply more than one layer for the pink to show up and I really prefer sheerer eye makeup. It also looks like the copper colour doesn't really show up on me but it actually does show up copper and metallicky in real life, I'm just a similar colour to copper, but a bit less shiny and orange.

No I didn't use a primer, I don't have a primer. It's generally not a problem with me since the eyeshadows I have show up well without a primer, or with just a light-coloured base shadow, including these, so I'm pretty much cool with not using a primer. Maybe I'll get one in time, like when I get a proper job with some proper taxable disposable income, but I'm pretty sure lots of women don't use eyeshadow primers and use lipstick on their cheeks and all I say they're just fine the way they are. I also have a philosophy with more expensive eyeshadows (read: more expensive than, say, Rimmel - MAC is pretty much the top end of what I'm willing to spend): if I'm spending that much on a bit of makeup it'd better work well without extra effort and expense.

I heard that if you put concealer on your lid it also works, but I'm kind of paranoid about doing that often. I don't think concealer was formulated to go on your eyelids. I've got a white shimmery Miss Sporty cream eyeshadow though which I sometimes use and works pretty well for sticking eyeshadows. That's like £1.95. Bonus.

Another thing is that I personally feel that all the colours are quite glittery except the black which they had the good sense to make matte.



Sure it looks pretty but I'd apply just one of the colours on top of a more subdued base for more everyday makeup, if only because I'm just that bit more boring than your average Superdrug shopper. That said, this is a great I don't find the colours chalky and I'm especially fond of the purple, it's a great purple. I haven't got any mid-greens like the one in this palette either, which will come in useful. but I'm going to use this as a going-out palette since it has a huge mirror and all the different colours together and it's all shiny and glittery and pretty and most importantly fits in my handbag. I don't know how small your hand bag is though, some women have the very tiny wristlet-handbags that won't fit a chihuahua in.

What I used today:

Eyes:
Sleek eyeshadow palette bottom row: colours 1, 3, 5.
Rimmel twisty eyeliner.
L'oreal mascara with the little ball instead of a wand. This mascara, I'd like it better if it had a better, less wet formula. I like rolling the little ball around but the mascara clumps a bit, and is a bit wet.

Face:
Boots Natural Collection foundation in Walnut. This is the darkest colour in the Boots Natural Collection and it ain't really that dark - I use Bobbi Brown stick foundation in honey so it's probably equivalent to that except it's less yellow and sheerer, obviously. It's a shame there aren't more colours because it's only £1.95 and doesn't break me out. Sometimes I have terrible-looking skin but I don't want to use a massive heavy stick foundation. That's for special events like weddings and celebrations - things involving distant relatives and photography.
Superdrug MeMeMe Pussycat lip & cheek tint (Benetint knock-off).
MAC studiofinish concealer in NW35.

Lips:
C.O. Bigelow lip balm.
MAC Sandy B lipstick.

short skincare post

Status: knackered.

My skin is particularly terrible right now and I noticed little lines under my eyes - I haven't been moisturising my undereye area and have generally gotten careless about my skin since about September when my new course started. So I've got two new things: a night cream and an eye cream.



The Boots Botanics 'Eye and Lip Correction Serum' promises results in 4 weeks on the tube. It ain't exactly cheap at £8.80 and has all sorts of things including horse chestnut. I have faith in the Botanics products in general but I'm doing a pharmacognosy course and am probably biased in favour of Things With Plants. I'll be testing this over 4 weeks and I'll review it at the end.

The other thing I got is the Superdrug Vitamin E night cream because I thought I should start using one, and vit E will apparently reduce acne scars and stop lines forming, and I'm running out of money and it's less than three quid. I was going to get their Vit E oil but the top ingredient's mineral oil so I decided not to in case it broke me out further. I was thinking of making my own vit C serum but then realised I didn't have ascorbic acid or glycerin or anything else. I might get some vit C tablets and make a mask though. Or if I have some money at the end of the month I might get The Body Shop's vit C mask (it's got a fancier name) because it peels off, and that's fun.

Vit C Tablet Mask Recipe

Materials:
vit C tablets (a small box in Superdrug is about 90p or something)
warm water

Methods:
Smush together and put on your face until dry
Wash off or wipe with a cotton pad/cloth/etc.