Beauty Review: Make Up Academy Cover & Conceal Concealer......

Makeup Academy Cover & Conceal Concealer- £1.50 Each

What has been established a lot here on VE is the fact that I bloody love MUA Cosmetics! 

So much so, that I tend to buy their products in bulk (two or three of each) just in case I can never get my hands on some of my favs for quiet awhile. Well ladies & gents I tell you this, one of my beloved products has been completely sold out for nearly a month & I am beyond distraught! 

The item in question is of course The Conceal & Brighten Kit in Porcelain Beige which I cannot rave about & love enough. To begin with I thought that because my two local stores that stock it usual are quiet tiny, that perhaps they hadn't got their order through yet so carried on waiting & checking every day. Two weeks past & I was literally scrapping the pan & corners, I started to check the Superdrug in Brighton- no luck. Then Crawley- the same, then Horsham- nope! I started to worry & have been checking online & every single day I'm on my lunch break in Brighton to see if they have had new stock of it in- BUT NOTHING!!!! This scrapping of corners lasted for close to a month & still there was no sign of them restocking it anytime soon, so I was forced to go & find an alternative for my beloved palette. Of course I didn't want to part with an uber amount of cash because if I didn't like the formula or the colour match was way off I would just beat myself up about how it was a waste of money & because I am such a MUA fan, I stuck with them & gave another product a whirl!

I brought all three colour shades on offer- Fair, Natural & Almond, all of which are shades you would expect in a concealer palette. The formula of them is quiet light & thin, which did concern me to begin with as I thought the coverage would be terrible but if you work in layers (two looks great) it's easily buildable and does not look cakey. I use the sponge applicator that it comes with to apply the product underneath my eyes & on any spots or redness & then using my ring finger, I lightly blend the product into the skin finishing off with my Real Techniques Expert Face Brush to take off any excess & buff it in. The colour I was the most excited to try was Almond- its the more peachier toned out of the three which is perfect for concealing dark circles under the eyes. Again I am blown away- they are cheap & cheerful, great coverage, easily buildable, no cakey-ness, look natural & feel lovely on the skin. Although I am still in love with my beloved palette, I think I may have a Summer romance with these babies- you never know it may turn into a marriage (fingers crossed these don't disappear too!). 

Have you tried these concealers? Does anyone know the mystery surrounding the Conceal & Brighten Kits?

Much Love,

Elle

xoxo 

♥

Summer Reads......

L-R: 'The Fault in Our Stars' By John Green, 'Before We Met' By Lucie Whitehouse & 'The Goldfinch' By Donna Tartt.

Unlike Adam & quiet a lot of people I know, I am a huge book worm. 

I could spend hours wafting around the boook cladded aisles of Waterstones, weaving in & out of Fiction to Non-Fiction, Fashion To Cookery, Travel to Home Decor absorbing the titles in front of me. The scent alone makes me want to set up home for the day in a bookshop, a mix between new books with the lingering smell of freshly made coffee (maybe this is how they get us to buy so many books in one trip!!?). Also unlike many people who live in the twenty first century, I have to have a physical copy of a book- none of this ebook crap. No. I need to feel the book, physically turn the pages, smell the newness & crispness of each page & read. I'm sorry but that is reading!

Every Summer since I can remember I have a little ritual- I have to read an insane amount of books. I know what most of you are thinking- 'I'm crazy!', but I'm a fast reader, it keeps my brain ticking & I simply love it. Now this was all fairly easy when I had a whole six weeks off school for holidays (I think one year I read close to twenty!) but know I can only get two weeks off work during the summer it has become more of a challenge! This year especially as I am using my two weeks off to move house. So I ventured into WH Smiths this weekend with the intention of buying a wedding card for my cousin, which instead ended in me leaving Smiths with three books & no card! Yep I am a prize fool but I am an excited fool because I cannot wait to get stuck into these (what looks to be)corkers of books. 

The Fault in Our Stars By John Green: Last year I picked it up & put it down. Did I really want to cry into the pool in France about a teenager who has cancer? Not really my idea of fun, but this year I simply had to read it purely because I feel like it could be a life changing book (& I don't want to see the film fyi) & when Time Magazine calls it 'Dam near genius' you have to read it.

Before We Met By Lucie Whitehouse: This was a wild card buy I must admit. I am hugely into the Thriller genre of books & whilst reading the blurbs on a number of different books, this one drew me in the most. Marketed as a cross between Gillian Flynn's brilliant 'Gone Girl' & SJ Watson's 'Before I Go To Sleep' its a marriage thriller of a newly married women who waits for her husbands flight to arrive from The US to London Heathrow, but he never turns up & then she finds her bank account has been emptied. Very excited to start reading this but I have a feeling it won't be as good as Flynn or Coben's thrillers that I love. 

The Goldfinch By Donna Hartt: Its a Pulitzer Prize winner. That's why I got it. Well, that's one of the reasons I picked it up- like Gone Girl last year, this year social media has been a blaze as to how good 'The Goldfinch' is. Many have compared it to a modern day The Great Expectation which I'm not sure how I will get on with it as I'm not a huge fan of that book, but nevertheless I shall give it a whirl & see how it goes!

What are your Summer read recommendations?

Much Love,

Elle

xoxo

♥