All The Things I Can't Live Without...

...Or I think it is... I didn't keep the box, so I kinda forgot the name of the colour. But it's the 2nd box on the left in the pic below. :)

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Ha ha, like I would let my hair off with just a hair cut. Nope, if I'm gonna revamp my hair, it's gonna be the whole package! Anyways, just so you see, the ugly roots... D:

That is, like, nearly 3 months of growth. And it's icky!!!

So I got my almost-pro mom to touch up my roots with the dye; I swear she's so good at this after doing it twice. This time I didn't leave the dye on as long as I normally would (30 mins vs 45 - 60 mins), cos I didn't want my hair to lighten any further. I just wanted the roots to be covered and the brassiness in my hair to done away with.

Here's the result:

(btw, these pics are all taken under strong room lighting)

The back, ahh I love the colour~

And the top! Ma, look! No more roots~

Aaaannndd a few more feel-good camwhore shots. :)

I went out that day with my friend to have some pancake goodness at "Strictly Pancakes" -> food porn coming up.

Banana and rum sauce pancakes with vanilla ice cream, yumz~

Potato and leek pancakes with a side of mushrooms, double yumz~~

And here's the two of us together!

My eye makeup for that day was a simple smokey eye, a usual for me.

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The very next day, I went out for a school project meeting and I took some pics of my hair in the glaring sunlight from my bedroom window.

Yep, that's how it looks under natural (but bright) sunlight. And my LOTD, which was my even-more-usual winged eyeliner:

Ha ha ha, pic spam much??? But thanks for viewing this post, take care people~

Ha ha ha, I changed my hairstyle again (after 6 months of having Taemin's mushroom head)! Don't know if you guys noticed in the Sakura-themed LOTD, that my hair is shorter. :)

Anyway, let's cut to the chase! I'm gonna show you the before pics, when my hair was long, shapeless and unkempt.

(Eeee, this pic is kinda creepy; looks like there's two of me glaring at each other. @__@)

I kinda got more and more irritated with the shapelessness of my hair and my fringe which keeps poking into my eyes (ARGH!), so I decided to go pay my hair stylist a visit~ And here's the pic spam of the results.

The left side of my head:

And the right side of my head:

Ha ha, funky sei!!

The back:

And how I look from the front:

My hair is asymmetrical, and it was my crazy idea brought to life (and in a nice way too) by my stylist. I went on ranting to him how boring my hair was and how I wanted one side to be longer, and the other side shorter. And he literally gave that to me, lol! I was quite taken aback at first by the blunt cut on my right, but after looking at it for a few days, it's not too bad! It's so funky, ha ha!

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Anyway, my LOTD that lasted through the shampooing (water splashing around my face and eyes):

Thanks for reading this post, I've still a quite a few posts on backlog, gonna try clearing them this weekend! Cheers, everyone~

Warning: Pic spam post! :D

I was inspired to do this look after watching Michelle Phan's newly uploaded makeup video yesterday night.

She created this look to celebrate Japan's upcoming spring in April and the beauty of the soon-to-be blooming sakura flowers. Aside from it looking all girly and pretty, it struck a chord on my heartstrings as she specially dedicated it to the disaster-stricken Japan (no pun intended) and is going to donate $1000 to the Red Cross if she hits 1 million views.

Please just pop over, spare her 5 minutes of your time, and watch this beautiful makeup video. It'd be great if she could hit a million views on it soon! Anyway, besides that, I really love this look, as it's one of her prettier and more workable looks. I love the backdrop of the sakura tree, I love the song that was playing (Mika Nakashima's "Sakurairo Maukoro", a classic), and I love the nuance behind this vid.

If only Japan could spare some time, you know with all the nuclear radiation trouble and tsunami survivors and all, to admire spring and their very own sakura flowers. Which, I hope are still able to bloom splendidly despite the 2 giant disasters. I think it'll give the people of Japan great encouragement if the flowers still bloomed despite how bleak their future may seem.

So anyway, here's my take on the look:

Close-up of the eye makeup:

Okay, granted I didn't have the best products with me because I left half of my makeup stash at my dorm, so I made do with whatever I had. There's no good gold e/s here (in fact, I don't have any good gold e/s ;__;) so you can't really see the gold, but it's there, transiting between the white and pink.

Full-face pics:

Products used

Eyes: 1) UDPP   2) L'oreal Timeless Green Quad (white highlight shade)   3) e.l.f. Studio Blush in "Fuchsia Fusion" for the pink   4) e.l.f. Studio Shimmer palette, as a cream base to make the colours pop   5) Daiso e/s palettes, for the gold transition shade and the dark purple for contouring at the outer V   6) Silkygirl Funky Eyeliner in Purple   7) Silkygirl Lash Prism in Purple   8) Sasatinnie Shocking Volume Mascara (still goddamn clumpy)   9) Stage Pencil Camouflage in "Creme Brulee"

Face: 1) Bourjois Healthy Mix Foundation   2) Random reddish-pink blush (grabbed it from my mom :D)   3) Daiso palette, used the white highlighter shade to highlight my nose and cheekbones

Lips: Nyx Mega Shine Lipgloss in "Candy Shop"

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More pic spam, har har har!!!

And some candid shots...

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I want to leave this as a final note to this post:

And salute to the brave workers still trying their best to prevent any further nuclear disaster!

Japan, strive on!!! Gambatte kudasai!!! All our prayers are with you. Thanks for viewing~

Ok, so here's the review! A short one I promise, cos I don't think you guys wanna hear me rant on and on (and I don't have much time).

I bought the DHC Eyelash Tonic from Gmarket back in early Jan for S$14.90. It's super cheap compared to its retail price in Watsons, so I was a bit apprehensive at its authenticity. Oh btw, I used a coupon with a S$1 discount, so it was going at S$15.90 initially. The seller was based in SG so I got the product SUPER fast; like, in 3 days after payment verification. o___o

How it arrived and the back of the packaging with the ingredients and stuff. "Made in Japan" and the expiry date, which follows the current batch of DHC eyelash tonic selling in Watsons. So far so good on the authenticity, I guess.

The point that attracted me to DHC's serum is that it doesn't contain alcohol. I mean, with Aloe Vera Juice being the 3rd ingredient, it's gotta be good right? At least none of the nasties being in the top 5 ingredients or something. I know L'oreal's serum contains alcohol, that's why I didn't want to use it.

The pamphlet included.

The sight: As you have already seen, it's a golden-coloured transparent liquid contained in an explicably small vial (6.5 mL). It looks a lot like oil and I reasoned the Aloe Vera juice played a part in giving it its yellow hue. Though I suspect that it will stay clear as long as you use it on clean lashes, that wasn't what happened to me. It got cloudy after a while, but also that's because I didn't clean my lashes thoroughly sometimes. No eye infections though.

The texture: Definitely not oil-like at all. It's got this slight jello consistancy; it's 3/4 liquid, and 1/4 jelly. It's kinda wet when you apply it on your lashes, so don't put on too much so you'll look like you're crying or something.

The scent: When I first opened it, I didn't detect any noticeable smell. However, after being opened for a few days, it started to smell like...olive oil. Ha ha, serious! I mean, I love the scent of olive oil so I don't mind, but it may smell queer to some people. Could it be because of the aloe vera inside? Does aloe vera even smell like olives?

The brush: It uses the conventional kind of mascara brush. I've been doing good using it, though I've stabbed myself in the eye a couple of times with it. No biggie, my eyeballs are tough. I feel that the brush allows me to comb the tonic through my lashes easier than, say, the spatula-like thing of L'oreal lash serum.

Did it work: Personally, I felt it worked. Like I said, results vary from individual to individual, but for me, yeah. I definitely saw my lower lashes growing. Presently, they're the length of what my top lashes used to be. That's kinda long for lower lashes, but they didn't grow much in quantity. I still have few (but now long) lower lashes.

Case in point for the top lashes (be afraid of my giant eye!):

Though my top lashes didn't extend as much as my lower lashes, I noticed them becoming curlier at the tips (see the end of my lashes, the curly tips!) and becoming thicker. There was some growth in length, but just slightly visible.

What is more impressive was that the tonic managed to coax lashes to grow out of places where they normally didn't grow. See those red circles? That's above my usual top lash growth border, and I could see a few hairs springing out. Awesome!

For 2 months of constant application of the tonic, I think the results are not bad. I started out being skeptical and expecting nothing at all (cos these kind of things seldom work for me), but I'm pleasantly surprised after all that.

Would I buy it again? I'm currently trying this out:

The Canmake Lash Care Essence. It's got a weird wand...

Anyway, I'm seeing how this goes, but if it doesn't do as well as DHC's, I definitely won't mind re-purchasing the Eyelash Tonic again!

Hopefully after another 2 months, I'll do a write-up on the Canmake one, whether it passed or failed. Thanks for reading this review, cheers!

So does it work?

Ha ha, see it for yourself! It's gonna be a long and picture-dense post.

Anyway, thanks to Zaleha (aizutto) for replying to my poll, and here's the answer to it!

Yeah, I tried to be un-bias about it, that's why I asked you guys without revealing anything first. Seems like Zaleha saw a difference, as slight as it is.

9 weeks back, I bought a tube of the DHC Eyelash Tonic off Gmarket and I've been religiously using it twice a day.

I mean, I was skeptical but since I'm gonna do it, might as well do it right. The following pictures are the physical evidence on what it did for my eyelashes. Even though it might seem slight, I do feel that it worked on my lashes. I'll be doing a description review in Part 2, cos I don't wanna cramp too many things into 1 post.

(Please click on the pics to get the larger version if these are too small for you to see the difference)

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Ha ha, do judge for yourself after viewing these pics, if the tonic is truly useful or not. I know it varies from individual to individual, and personally, I feel my lashes tend to not respond to these kind of treatments well. My friend just used eye cream (to moisturize the delicate eye area) and her lashes grew so much; on the other hand, when I tried that, nothing happened at all.

But after looking at these pictures and feeling my lashes myself, I do see my lashes being slightly longer, slightly curlier at the tips and somewhat thicker and stronger.

Then (week 0):

And now (week 9):

So what do you guys think?? Did it work? How about those who have tried the tonic, did it work well for you??

Part 2 will be up shortly, since it's my 1 week holiday! Yay to long hours of sleep and rejuvenation!

Ha ha, a quick poll, just out of curiosity~ :)

Which picture, above or below, has got better eyelashes? Or do both of them look the same to you??

What about this one? The left or right picture, or both the same??

Ha ha, I'll reveal the answer next weekend (when my 1 week break comes along and I finally have time for myself, phew!). For now, just give me your un-bias vote! *wink*