Corvus Cosmetics First Impression - The Year 3000 Swatches and Review

Welcome back everyone!  I hope you had a great Thanksgiving and a safe Black Friday.  I have an exciting first impression today.  It's a new company called Corvus Cosmetics that has an Etsy storefront for now.  They opened recently and introduced themselves on the indie subreddit.  The first collection is inspired by Futurama and features nine shadows.  If you buy the whole set, a free eyeshadow is included.  Each color is inspired by a character on the show and the full sized jars have a label art with the character's face.  I opted to buy samples since I can never finish a full size (although I was really tempted because of the labels!).  Since they are new, the TAT is very quick and I received my order within the week.  

Look at this sweet card!  So generous, right?  ALL GLORY TO THE HYPNOTOAD.  O_O

Each full sized jar comes individually shrink-wrapped.

The sample sizes are said to be 1/4 tsp, but look how insanely generous this is?!

Notoriously Morbid November 2014 Vanishing Cabinet - Dead Love Swatches and Review

Hi everyone!  As I'm eagerly waiting for the clock to count down to midnight, I'll share my Notoriously Morbid November Vanishing Cabinet with you.  This month's theme is called "DEAD love", based off the Sookie Stackhouse novels and True Blood.  Instead of the regular four mini shadows that are included in each month, NM gave us five this time!  There's one shadow inspired by the main girl, Sookie, and the other four are her various suitors.  The packaging was also super cute this month, featuring a small black coffin and two shadows inside.  It's worth mentioning that the two shadows inside are Sookie and probably her most famous love interest, Eric.  I thought that was an adorable touch and shows how much NM cares about packaging.

The special guest this month is Glamour Doll Eyes and they made a shadow just for this collection.  Another free NM sample was included as a sneak peek for next month's VC.  I have no idea what it is yet, so I'm excited for the reveal.

If you guys haven't noticed, my product pictures might look a bit different and that's because I finally got a DSLR!  My product pictures will be taken with the DSLR now and I tried doing the same with swatch photos but it wouldn't focus for some reason.  Therefore, swatch pictures are still taken with my regular (still really great) point-and-shoot until I figure out how to focus on my DSLR.  Another change is that I've started doing half my swatches over ELF Glitter Primer because I have started using that in my almost-daily routine, so here's how these shadows look like over a sticky base!

Pictures taken under daylight bulb and swatched over ELF Glitter Primer (upper half) and ELF Essential Primer (bottom half)

Mittens for Michael

Mittens for Michael:  beautiful purple with gold sparkles.  The gold sparkles are very obvious and that's what's giving off the sheen you see in the swatch photo.  I'll be looking forward to receiving this next month because it's absolutely wonderful!

Ipsy November 2014 - Girl Meets Glitter

Hey everyone!  I have the November Ipsy bag for you guys today :)  The theme is Girl Meets Glitter, but I only had about two glittery things in my bag - including the bag.  My bag had pretty silver glitter all over it, but came with a tear on the other side.  After contacting Ipsy, they're sending me out a replacement with no hassle at all.  Their customer service is pretty great!

Aromaleigh Cosmetics Holiday 2014 Sol Invictus Collection - Swatches and Review

Welcome back, everyone!  I'm so excited to bring you Aromaleigh's newest collection - Sol Invictus!  This is their collection for holiday 2014 and was inspired by the Roman holiday Saturnalia.  For those of you who are interested in learning more about the holiday and the meanings of each color, feel free to read them here.  After being excited by all the sneak peeks they were posting on their Facebook, I was contacted by Aromaleigh's representative and asked if I was interested in swatching this collection before it was officially released.  (Note:  It is released now, which you can buy from the link I posted above).  Of course I said yes!  I had such great experiences with their past collections, especially the Halloween 2014 Diavoli collection.  A sample set was shipped to me soon after and I received it within the week.  

The owner, Kristin, also included two free samples from their Mythical Monsters collection that I was eyeing so that was a great treat as well!  The day I decided to photograph these was a day I actually had natural light, which was another plus because my lamp was being weird.  However, my swatches couldn't focus on the beautiful sparkles as well as I would have hoped, but you can definitely catch a glimpse of them towards the bottom, where my camera gets a little out of focus.

Without further ado, here are swatches!

Pictures taken in daylight and swatched over ELF Essential Primer (click to enlarge)

Oscilla

Oscilla:  sparkly peach with red, silver, and blue sparkles

Notoriously Morbid Halloween 2014 Grisly Grimoires - Swatches and Review

Hey everyone, since it's Halloween, here's a double dose of Notoriously Morbid!  I was actually hoping to get this a little earlier so I wouldn't have to rush to get this out, but I understand how swamped the NM team is, especially since they had to get all 100 boxes out by this week.  I actually bought this awhile ago as a pre-order and actual TAT started on Oct. 10th, so it took twelve business days to ship (well within the TAT, unfortunately, I was one of the last ones shipped).  Thankfully, I was determined to get this review out by tonight, so I swatched like hell as soon as I got home from work :P

For this years Halloween, the NM team decided to do a set inspired by various spellbooks, aptly named "Grisly Grimoires".  It comes with six full sized eyeshadows, one mini blush, one Coffin Kisser, and a handmade charm.  There was also a sneak peek of the Black Friday set included in the box which I will swatch later.  NM's Halloween sets are special to me because it's the first thing I EVER got from them, and was what made me a diehard fan.  For this box to be handmade like last years', really shows that it's still the same amazing company no matter how huge its grown.

In my pre-order, I also got two samples of the Divination Blushes and the Gift With Purchase (GWP) was a mini of the October CoTM.

This was very sweet and I totally understand how overwhelming all this was!  It just made me kick my lazy butt into gear tonight.

Notoriously Morbid October 2014 Vanishing Cabinet - Us and the Dead Swatches and Review

Okay, so I promised myself I'd get this review out before Halloween - guess what day it is today?  Halloween.  Yeah, I goofed, so hopefully today's double post will make up for that!  I have Notoriously Morbid's monthly Vanishing Cabinet and this month is called "Us and the Dead", inspired by The Walking Dead.  I was so surprised to open up my envelope and see this cute little zombie tote!

Included were two monster themed candies which I thought were really cool.  I devoured the gummy zombie in seconds; it also made my fiancee buy a pack of gummy eyeballs haha!  

Ten Three Labs Howl O'Ween Collection - First Impression

Hey everyone, I have an exciting review for you today!  This is my first impression on the newly opened shop - Ten Three Labs!  A user on /r/IMAM had been talking about opening her company and finally did it :)  A huge belated congratulations to you, Cara!  Even though I already have a crap ton of makeup, I decided to scope out the shop and hopefully support a fellow redditor.  So far, the shop carries eyeshadow, salve sticks (lip balms), smudge sticks (tinted lip balms), and perfume oils.  I decided to get the limited Howl O'Ween collection in full size because she had a beautiful wolf on the label (yes, I am that shallow).  The collection consists of three shadows and one perfume.  I decided to pick up a Smudge Stick in All Vamp Everything and a perfume sample in Exorcists of Malignant Devils as well.  

My order came a few days later and it was wonderfully packaged.  Check it out below!

Everything came in the decorative bag above and was sealed with a sticker.  The perfume were all put into a cute potato-sack bag.  What I thought was wonderful was that she included sifters for the three full sized shadows as well!  I rarely use sifters, but I love that she was thoughtful enough to include it.  She included one free shadow sample, perfume sample, a bag of flower seeds, and a cute fortune fish!  I love both the flower seeds and fortune fish because it's not something you see all the time, plus I loved playing with those fortune fish as a child so I'll treasure this one.  

The contents of my order were packed securely as well.  All of my eyeshadow jars and Smudge Stick were shrink wrapped to prevent leakage.  Another great note is that my jars were packed COMPLETELY full, which was surprising and much appreciated.

Unfortunately, my order had some problems.  The perfume sample had no label on it, so I had no idea which one I got.  My Smudge Stick was also overfilled a lot and cracking, so I had no idea how to use it without breaking it off.  I messaged Cara on the subreddit and replied within an hour.  She apologized and offered me a refund or a replacement Smudge Stick.  I accepted a replacement since I really wanted to use the color.  I also asked about the perfume and described the scent to her (as best as I could do since I'm extremely new to perfume) and she was able to answer me with the horrible description I gave haha.  She sent out my replacement in the same day and I got it a few days later.  Along with the replacement stick, I also got the label for the perfume, a salve stick, and two other free shadows!  Top-notch customer service and interacting with her was great.