But I am NOT the One Who Took a Bite Out of That LipSmacker

Now y’all. I am no expert when it comes to cosmetics. It’s been a dream of mine since my daughter was born to go get a REAL make-over done by a REAL make-up artist and waltz home with a pink and black brown bag full of $450 worth of products that would transform me from my little ol’ down-home, country-fried self into someone glamorous and sophisticated and stunning.

But I think any of you who know me at all are thinking the exact same thing I’m thinking right now, which is why I don’t pursue the above dream (well this and the fact that if I spent $450 on stuff to put on my face, my husband’s head would split open and 539 rabid monkeys in funky doorman outfits and tasseled fezzes would fly out, grasp me in their feet-fingers, and drag me back to the witch’s castle never to be heard from again). 

You’re thinking it’d take a whole lot more than a bag of pricey make-up to un-country-fry me, and you’re right, because the closest thing I’m ever going to get to glamorous is making it through an entire day without appearing before other human beings sporting an eye-booger the size of my pinky-knuckle or a wad of spinach between my two front teeth.

And even those days are rare days, indeed.

So when it comes to make-up, I’m better suited and more in my own element in the drugstore aisle, hunkered down over one of those dang plastic racks that you take your Bonnie Bell ® LipSmacker out of and it automatically advances the next one up REALLYQUICKLY and then you discover that THIS Bonnie Bell ® LipSmacker has a big BITE taken out of it (that Dr. Pepper flavored one is amazingly true-to-flavor) and so then you try to put that one back and it WON’T. GET. IN. THE. STUPID. RACK, but you want to get the next one (the one sans bite) so you stuff the bitten one up on top and grab the second one and then run away real fast before the whole thing’s jammed up good.

Yeah. That was me.  I’m the one that did that.  Hello, nice to meet you.

And I generally look about THAT good, too. But I may someday elevate myself to a higher level because now I know CARMINDY. And she’s teaching me a thing or two about make-up, slowly, over the course of what, three or four years now and forty-leven episodes of What NOT to Wear. And CARMINDY says I need a shimmery pink shadow to apply just below my eyebrow and in the inside corner of my eye, in order to give me a fresh, young look.

I’m all about the fresh and the young, CARMINDY. Lay it on me, girl. I’d just been trying to accomplish this CARMINDY-inspired look with the lightest shade in whatever Covergirl ® or Revlon ® multi-pack of shadows I happened to be smearing on when I wanted to look extra pretty (normally I just use eyeliner and mascara and put a little blush or bronzer on my eyelids and go).

What? Yes I’M GETTING TO THE PRODUCT UP FOR REVIEW. Just be patient – I do not know how to make a point without giving you all the background information I can piece together with my feeble old brain.

So. But the lightest shade in those multi-packs was usually a SUEDE or a MATTE (hooty toot toot), and CARMINDY specifically says it’s got to be SHIMMERING, so about two weeks ago I plunked down my $10 for a little criminally teeny plastic vial of L’Oreal Bare Naturale Eye Shadow in Bare Rose. It’s pink, it’s shimmery, and it’s a loose powder vs. a cake one, which, I felt, would meet with CARMINDY’S approval.

I do not like the packaging of this shadow. Take a look at the photo. That brush you see there is attached to the lid, sorta like the paste brush was attached to the lid of the Elmer’s ® School Paste you used when you were in kindergarten. And that causes a little problem. You see the clear plastic cap on top, and how the brush doesn’t touch the top of that cap on the inside? Well, it CAN’T touch the top of that cap.

Which doesn’t SOUND like a big deal, but when you’re dealing with a loose powder, you need to be able to tap your brush on something to shake off the excess. And the cap’s the only place to do that unless you try to tap it on the rim of the criminally-small little pot, but that just makes a mess because, and here’s my next complaint about the packaging, the brush is HEE-YUGE. For an eyeshadow brush. That also hopes to be compatible with this little dime-bucket of shadow.

Not only is it unwieldy vs. its companion vessel, unless you have COW EYES with appropriately sized COW LIDS, this brush is not the tool to create a nice thin line along the bottom of your brow or a tiny little dot of a smudge in the inside corner. This brush would work, say, on the Statue of Liberty’s eyes, were she to be looking something a little shimmery and sexy a la CARMINDY’S suggestions. But for a real woman, it’s big. And to get off the excess shadow, you are on your own, lady.

But the product itself is nice. I use my OWN brow-highlighting shadow brush, with which I just stroke a nice light layer under my eyebrow, and then a small little dusting in that inner corner, making sure I don’t get any into my actual eye because the only thing worse than a big old eye booger is a big old shimmering eye booger, don’tcha know?

I like the loose powder – it seems to go on smoother and more easily than a cake shadow, and it’s controllable and blends well when I want to blend it with the shade I’m using in the crease of my lid. (Oh, don’t I sound like I know what I’m doing? Isn’t it wonderful?) I like the color I’ve chosen quite a bit alongside the rosy neutrals of the rest of my make-up palette (just tossing around cosmetic jargon like I’m Max Factor himself, I am).

The shadow stays put for an evening out and sits well on the top of my skin rather than sinking and settling into my pores and creases like some of the pearly shadows I’ve used in the past. For the price, you get a piddlin’ little amount, but the good news is you don’t need to use that much if you have your own decent brush. (If you used their brush, you’d get about two good applications and be up Shimmerless Creek before you knew it.) So I may well get my $10 worth out of this one yet, and hopefully by the time I’ve used it all up, they’ll have redesigned the vial, the cap and the brush so it’s easier to use.

Like the product, a little puzzled and irritated by the packaging. Try it out if you want a bit of shimmer, but bring your own brush to the party or you’re going to be disappointed.

Fine print:  The word "booger" does not exist in TypePad’s spellcheck.  How on earth can a mother be expected to discuss her life and the important happenings therein without being able to use the word "booger?"  Mama bloggers, unite.