kilig to the bones

all i can think of is

i'll never have to buy makeup ever again!

that's an exaggeration, of course, but not a bad approximation. :) i would love to share this loot with my mom, my sister, and some close friends. god, isn't it amazing? many thanks to GlamaDazzle for sponsoring this giveaway!

contest alert: konadlicious giveaway!

when i was a little girl, we lived in a condo that had a salon on the first floor. naturally, my mom was a regular customer and i would accompany her while she got her beauty fix for the week. what fascinated me most about this strange, adult beautification process was the nail painting. mother must have had at least 4 different shades of red nail polish (her favorite, even today) but the parlor's collection had every color of the rainbow, plus all the variations in between! for a little girl who loved collecting coloring books, i figured it was girly adult heaven.

since i studied in a convent school that emphasized simplicity, i didn't get to paint my nails until the summer before high school. i would put on my very first polish, a bottle of pretty blue glitters, on friday night then take them off again before school started on monday. it soon became a tiring routine so i mostly stuck to perfectly shaped long nails, buffed into perfection with the buffer from The Body Shop.

these days, i prefer short nails painted either black or dark red. i haven't gotten the chance to try this nail art thing (mostly because i never sit still long enough for my nails to dry properly) but i'd love to get my hands on these:

want it, too? go over to Kond-licious for details on how to enter! :)

quoting myself

 Love gets up at 5am to cook your perri-perri chicken baon, drives through the horrendous morning traffic to take you to makati, then waits for you to finish your appointments at 2pm. Yes, folks: love waits. Usually in a Starbucks with free parking.

a moment of weakness

i would very much consider selling my eternal soul in exchange for a lifetime supply of this.

contest alert: earth's 3rd blogversary and birthday giveaway

gah. i have several posts in my backlog because my camera (aka, my bf's phone) is being repaired. :( in the meantime, would you be interested in any of these prizes?

umm, there's A LOT (and counting!) to choose from but all i superdesperatelyreally want is the Neutrogena Fine Fairness collection of which Earth is an ambassador (sorry, but Ambassador Manalo insists that ambassadress is not a word!)

i'd been in the market for a good, decently-priced moisturizer since my skin started drying out like crazy in the cold december weather and Earth's post convinced me that the Fine Fairness Brightening UV Moisture was IT. so, i've been hunting it down ever since but it's always out of stock. T_T

i hope to god i win this contest because that damn moisturizer has eluded me like a CIA agent. see the contest details here.

contest alert: holiday giveaways!

here's to gift-giving beyond the holidays :D

Funny Face Beauty's holiday giveaway

the first thing that caught my eye was Audrey Hepburn. both C and i are fans, and i'd always particularly liked this photo of hers. then my attention wandered over to the Urban Decay Naked palette, which would be perfect for my novice skills and preference for more neutral colors. see the other goodies and contest details over at Funny Face Beauty's blog.

Beautyburg's New Year's giveaway

umm, wow. nail polishes galore! i particularly want the ones from China Glaze and the bright blue one on the lower left corner. i was just thinking of where i could find a nice metallic blue polish, and here it is! there's an awful lot of polish though, so i'd probably share this with some other folks. and, can i just say: i love that the entry form is via Google Docs! see the full list of nail goodies and submit your entry here.

Rinz's Valentine giveaway

for every holiday, there is a giveaway. Rinz really gave a lot of thought into this loot bag--all you'll need after is a hot dress and an equally hot date! ;) it would be extra cool if i win this because the contest ends on my birthday, hehe. see the details here.

tribute

i'm not really big on making new year resolutions and to-do lists seem more compelling, anyway. so far, mine includes getting myself a better moisturizer with spf (the weather's been so chilly that my skin's flaking like crazy) and updating/upgrading my wardrobe. there are more pressing and "serious" items on the list but let's keep the mood light, shall we? :)

2010 witnessed my first foray into the beauty world, as i stared and stared and finally bid for the much-adored Ecotools 5-brush set on ebay. i don't remember why i wanted them so badly, given that i was a cosmetic ignoramus at that point. i was only beginning to read Kikay Exchange, which i stumbled upon somehow and Jill's posts encouraged me to think of makeup as wearable art instead of the annoying goop my mom would make me wear for school presentations.

i soon found myself with a lovely set of brushes, some mineral makeup samples and a ton of Xteeener videos from youtube. many months later, i became an avid follower of several beauty blogs, the proud if somewhat still clueless owner of some basic makeup products, and the sort of girl who couldn't leave her apartment with a completely bare face. thankfully, those art classes in school paid off enough to merit compliments from the boyfriend. :) BUT. i'm not a makeup addict. yet. that may change when i can afford to buy more stuff, hehe!

just wanted to say "thank you" to the beauty bloggers who have taken the pains to explain the difference between a corrector and a concealer, give detailed instructions (complete with step by step photos and diagrams!) for makeup looks, and especially for braving product testing, despite the risk of breakouts and other unpleasantries that we readers no longer have to worry about (as long as we read their reviews first, hehe)

salute! Jill, Nikki, Phoebe, Khymm, Shen, Lizz, Liz, Earth and Bea :)

ps. would really appreciate it if you could follow me! :)

(i follow some international blogs, too, but the local ones are really the blogs i first started reading)