Happy new year, lovely ladies! I hope you took some time off to chill out or go wild over the Christmas break - whatever floats your boat. I had a very busy December, trying to get everything done before my last-minute trip to Sri Lanka, so I still owe you a couple of posts that were supposed to go up in 2016. Today we'll take a look at Sleek MakeUP's Rockstars Collection that includes two eyeshadow palettes, two lipsticks and two strobing souffles, all of which I was lucky enough to have been trying out during the holiday season. 

The i-Lust eyeshadow palettes both include six shimmery, almost glittery shades. 'Diamonds in the Rough', my favourite of the two, is perfect for that Greek goddess kind of look, with four powder and two cream eyeshadows that can also easily be used as highlighters. When applied, the pigmentation is subtler than expected and I did notice some glitter fallout as well, but they are super silky, blend beautifully, and are just lovely to wear all over the lid or in the inner corners. I'll definitely be digging this palette out again once summer rolls around. The bronzy shades are right up my alley! 

If the first palette is perfect for the lovers of neutrals, the second one, 'Hidden Gems', is all about the colours. The shades, which are all powder, range from deep green and purple to blue and red, in addition to the festive classics - silver and gold. I have to admit, I normally find it really hard to pull off the majority of similar tones, but these turned out to be surprisingly wearable when I actually applied them to my eyelids. The fact that they blend out easily helps a great deal at toning them down and using them as accent colours in combination with neutral shades or black, for a fun smokey eye. 

And now the best part of the collection if you ask me - Lip VIP metallic lipsticks. I wasn't sure if I was going to like them, because I'd never gone for a metallic finish before, but I love them! The purple iridescent glitters add an interesting twist to your look, yet are still subtle enough to not freak out the general public.
'Scandalous' is the perfect ruby red, while 'Superstar' is a dark purple. One thing I'm head over heels with is the shape, which doesn't only look super cool, but also makes the application a dream! When it comes to darker shades, it's hard to apply them precisely without the help of a lip liner, unless you have amazingly defined lips naturally, but with these, lipliner is not essential. Not at all.
The formula doesn't disappoint either. It's a bit hard to describe it, though. Upon the application, it feels matte, but just the right amount of matte, if you know that I mean. It doesn't drag, but it also doesn't slide around like creamier lipsticks tend to do. However, once applied, it feels a lot more moisturizing and creamy. It's a bit shiny and doesn't settle, which is the reason why I can't say it's particularly long-lasting, as it does rub off while drinking or having a meal. 

Do you love glitter? If your answer is yes, go grab the Strobing Souffles. 'Pink Opal' will float your boat on condition your skin's fair, with a slightly cooler undertone, while 'Smoky Quartz' is designed for the warmer skintones out there. These whipped cream highlighters have a very unique consistency. Souffle really probably is the best way to describe them, as they're neither liquidy nor what we know as creamy.
They blend out easily, but do have a considerate amount of pigment, so you really need just a tiny bit of the product. As mentioned, it's all about the glitters when it comes to these two. They are quite in your face and for me personally, a bit over the top for highlighting the cheekbones, the nose and the cupid's bow, but I did find another use for them. I wear them on my eyelids instead! The effect is gorgeous. You can easily use them to transform your everyday neutral matte look into a fun, party one by just applying the product on top. 

If you would like to see some of these products in action, check out this 'Get Ready with Me/First Impressions' video I filmed back in December. Sleek has really caught my attention with some of their products I've been trying out recently and I can't wait to tell you more about the rest of them in the next few weeks. I found some proper gems amongst them! 

It's no secret that Essence is one of my all time favourite drugstore brands. I've been using their products for ages and have tried plenty of them, so I hought I would share the selection of my top 5 with you today. I'm really glad that the brand was launched in the UK as well recently, as I can't imagine my life on the island without some of their gems. Find out which in the video below! 

Today I'll be reviewing a product that was sent to me about a month ago from StrawberryNET.com, as a present for joining their blogger collaboration program. I have never shopped on this website before and I've also never heard of this particular product, but I'm a big fan of highlighting my face, so the Ultraflesh Shinebox Highlight & Shimmer Collection definitely sparked my interest. 

The kit contains five highlighting products that are stored in a pretty awesome looking palette. I do like how sturdy the packaging is, because the products seem very protected from possible 'kissing the ground' situations, but I have to say that I find it way too bulky. This is something I would never take on travels with me, beause I couldn't fit it in any of my normal sized make-up bags. 

The first product you can see when you open up the palette, is a very lovely powder highlighter. I actually thought this would be my least favourite product from this kit, but it turned out to be my favourite one. Having said that, I would never use it as a face highlighter or an all over enhancer, as they call it, because it is far too orange. I prefer using it only on my brow bones, when I'm doing a bronzy kind of eye make-up look, or in the inner corners. The product is very soft, buttery and quite pigmented, so it works perfectly for that.

In the second compartment, there are two cream highlighters. One of the shades is gold, and the other one gravitates towards pink champagne. I myself prefer the second one, because I find it more pigmented and wearable. You can pretty much put it anywhere - on the top of your cheekbones, on the cupid's bow, under your brows, in the inner corners... You get the idea. But I can't say the same for the gold one, because it almost looks a little bit patchy once you put it on your skin. It just lacks the sheen and has too many chunky glitters in my opinion. Well, both of the shades are on the glittery side to be completely honest, so I'm not sure if I'll be getting a lot of use out of these. I'm afraid I would look like a glitterball if the sun hit my face. 

Lastly, there are also two shimmery eyeliners, a white and a pink champagne one. These were the prodcts I was most excited about once I swatched them, but the excitement unfortunatelly disappeared as soon as I started putting them on my eyes. I just don't see how I could make these products work. Technically, they would be great for the waterline, because they would brigten up your eyes in an instant, but my eyes started stinging really bad as soon as the eyeliners touched my waterline, so I can't be wearing them there. I've never experienced anything like that before. Should I be concirned about the ingredients? Anyway, I also tried to put them on top of another eyeliner on my waterline, but they just moved the one below and made it look ugly. And they still stung my eyes. But there I was, trying to find a way to make these products work. Another idea that I got was to use them as eyeliners on my upper lid, but that didn't work out either, as they are too thick for creating any precise lines. So yeah, that is when I gave up, haha. Any ideas how I would use these? I guess I could make them work for highlighting my brow bones and inner corners, but I prefer using powder products there, so... meh. 

How are you feeling about these highlighters? Would you get the palette yourself? 

Every make-up enthusiast in the world knows about the famous Benefit's highlighter called 'High Beam'. It's one of the most hyped up beauty products, and everyone seems to love it. I've always wanted to try it, but the price - it costs about 20 € + shipping since it's not sold in my country - has always put me off. 

A few months ago, I luckily saw a post comparing the Benefit High Beam to a much cheaper and supposedly exactly the same highligher - Technic's High Lights. I of course had to order it right away, and I am so glad I did. I'm in love with this product. Putting it on my brow bones, my cheek bones, on the top of my nose and on my cupid's bow makes such a difference to my face. It really gives you the prettiest glow.

Here you can see the swatch of the product and how it looks like when it's blended. Such a gorgeous light pink shimmer, right?! By the way, I bought the product here for about 4 €. You only need a teeny tiny amount of it, so the 13 ml bottle should last you ages. Literally. 

I tried to show you how the product works on my face with these before and after photos, but I think I've failed, haha. I was in a hurry and didn't check if photos turned out ok... If you look carefully, you can kind of see the highlighter on one of my cheeks and on one of my brow bones (right photo). Ahh, taking photos of myself is such a pain. It's really difficult when you don't see the screen.