Maybelline Eyestudio Quads - Review

Hello my lovely bloggies! I've been out of commission for quite a few days! I got sick after my trip to Los Angeles. Had a nasty cold all the way from thursday Feb 18th up until right now as I type. What else has been going on? I have a freaking STYE on my right eyelid!! I haven't worn any eye makeup since last friday!! It's been 5 days *sigh* I miss wearing eyeliner, I feel so naked without it. This stye was pretty painful but thankfully, it went down after a couple of days of meticulous cleansing. Since I haven't really been wearing makeup and can't put any on to show you.. Someone came to visit me the weekend after I went to L.A. to make my surprise visit.. I guess i'll do a random update and review.

yes, this is my face without makeup on. scary, yea? check out that stye!

Anyway. Those who know me know that I also hit up the spa and get a mani/pedi before I go on a trip. Yes, even before I go on a weekend trip to Los Angeles, I get my nails did. A girl has got to make sure she looks properly presentable, mmmmmkay? So before trekked down to El Lay for Valentine's Day I got my nails did!

I used Zoya's "Stephanie" on my nails and OPI's Absolutely Alice from the Alice in Wonderland special collection for my toesies. 

Zoya's Stephanie - very feminine and classy I love it.

 

OPI Absolutely Alice - it's a straight party on my toes

I told Melissa "I'm all business on top, but party on the bottom!"

Maybelline Eyestudio Quad - Give Me Gold

 I was inspired by Holly to try this quad out. She had managed to get this before it arrived in the U.S. Now that it's here... I decided to check it out since Walgreen's had a 40% off thing going on with drugstore brand cosmetics. Normally, I don't use neutral tones or browns but I have been using them lately (before the stye). When I was younger I didn't know how to apply them so I felt like I looked like I had a black eye. Anyways!

The color pay off seems great when you swatch these, but it's a lie :[  I always use Urban Decay Primer Potion on my lids (I have greasy lids) and that usually makes drugstore brand eye shadows last a lot longer. Although I have primer on my lids, the shadows don't last very long. They are also very very easily blendable so you can lose color definition. I also seem to have a problem with constant fall out whenever I use this. I think that it is not pressed well enough. However, I got it for 40% off so I guess this warrants a B- rating. I won't be using it as main eye shadow anymore but I really like the gold so i'll keep it to use as accentuating shadows. 

In Los Angeles, I was browsing through the various shops inside Little Tokyo before dinner. I stumbled upon a dollar store where they sold tons and tons of NYX! I was ecstatic since we don't have any place that sells these in San Francisco. However...All the things I wanted from NYX seemed to escape me. I only remembered that I wanted to try the jumbo eyeshadow pencil in black bean since a lot of YouTube gurus seem to have it.

Very pigmented, color pay off is great but - it creases on my lids despite wearing UDPP. *sigh* not happy with it. I probably won't be using this anymore and will most likely be giving it away. I still want to try their blushes and eye shadows though.

The one thing I picked up recently that I am happy with is this:

 

Neutragena 3 in 1 eye concealer in "light"

• concealer
• eye cream
• spf 20

This Neutragena eye concealer is a concealer for those of you who didn't realize that (ahem, Jocelyn). It gives me exceptionally great coverage under my eyes (I genetically have dark circles. You can see it in my stye picture posted earlier) with only needing to use a teensy little dab. It lasts all day and does not dry out or look cakey. I still wear my usual Shiseido eye cream underneath this but I got tired of using my NARS  concealer because it looks cakey and dried out at the end of the day.  (below) I also got too lazy to apply it with a freaking brush every single morning. I just use my ring finger with the Neutragena concealer :)

There is also a whopping 50% price difference. The Neutragena eye concealer is about $10 and the NARS concealer is $22 =X
If you want to make a switch, I recommend giving the Neutragena brand a try. Besides, you can't go wrong! You can always return/exchange drugstore cosmetics - don't ever forget that!

Friday we did hot pot or "da been lo" as we say in Cantonese at my friend Jocelyn's house.

We had a buttload of food! Seaweed salad, salted seaweed stems, marinated cuttlefish, dried anchovies, squid salad, taro vermicelli knots (my fave), fried tofu pods, spinach, cabbage, shitake & button mushrooms, fish paste, beef rib eye, sliced pork butt, and cod roe stuffed fish eggs. I made various dipping sauces also including a very spicy one w/ lots of Thai chilis that set my mouth on fire. We were all VERY STUFFED.
Saturday I drove down to Santa Cruz for the 29th Annual Clam Chowder Festival. It was pretty fun! It was $8 for a tasting kit: 5 tickets (redeemable at 5 vendors of your choice) 1 biodegradable spoon, paper cup, napkin, and a people's choice ballot. There were 76 different vendors. We each bought a tasting kit and decided to be greedy and share our 10 tickets. No pictures from that day, I forgot! Sorry! Drove us back to San Francisco to have dinner at Boboquivari's. I love their bone in filet mignon. Bad camera phone pic, sorry! It's dark in there, hahaha.

me: how's the twice baked potato? him: good, but it would be better with bacon me: *melt*

EVERYTHING IS BETTER WITH BACON OKAY!?

Sunday was very chill. Just eating , people watching in the rain and relaxing at mi casa.

"So Good" Authentic Belgian Waffle Truck :]

French Onion soup @ Chez Maman

Basic burger + bacon and brie. Frites w/ aioli @ Chez Maman, my absolute favorite burger in the world

Blue Bottle Vietnamese coffee ice cream @ Humphry Slocombe

P.S. I stole these iphone pictures from his Facebook. Just a lil disclaimer for when he sees this, hahahaha.

Just re-did my nails because I got bored.

Zoya "Savita" from the matte collection. This stuff takes a long time to dry. I've had to re-do my pinky nail twice -_-