Lips: MAC's Lipstick in "Pure Heroine" (LE) [MAC x Lorde 2014]

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Hi everyone. Today is the second to last day before my vacation starts, and while I'm excited, a plethora of things also makes me feel uneasy and stressed. I've been working a lot of hours and that plus my daily exercising has led to daily headaches, so I've been totally out of it. This post could have been written weeks ago, as the product I'm reviewing made it to my doorstep the first Friday of June. By the way, happy June everyone, and happy summer soon, too. We're in the year's gem month, which is already more than halfway over. (I'm biased; it's my birthday month.)

I saw Temptalia's review of this product in my Facebook feed before I even knew what collection it was from. I don't know or care about Lorde. The color, however, instantly caught my attention. I feel proud (and poor) to say that I love trying out all kinds of colors: purples, oranges, mattes, frosts, pastels, deep/rich tones, cool tones, warm tones - oh,  you get the point. I love being able to mold my appearance so that I can trick people into thinking I'm a certain kind of person, with a certain kind of style. I don't want anyone to know who I am - or maybe a human ditto* is exactly who I am.

*Pokemon reference. 

In any case, it turns out that "Pure Heroine" is one of the two items making up the tiny MAC x Lorde 2014 collection, which is apparently only available on MAC's website and in a very, very select few stores - I believe one or two of the three (is it three?) are located here in the disgusting city of New York. In saying that, I feel partially guilty for claiming my own from the online stock that people everywhere else have to fight through. Not that there was much fighting for this one. In fact, it's still in-stock on MAC's website at the time of this post.

So, let me refrain from making this introduction any longer and let's get to the review already.

Lips: MAC's Lipstick in "True Love's Kiss" (LE) [Maleficent 2014]

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Hello! I actually started another post on Wednesday that should've gone up by now, but I never got to finishing it and then this past Friday happened. I ended up with "True Love's Kiss," the limited edition lipstick from MAC's Maleficent 2014 collection.

When I saw what this collection would consist of - and the fact that its only lipstick, "True Love's Kiss," would be a shade of red - I completely ignored it. It released the first week of May, I think - I can't even remember right now. The point is, it's been out for a while, and you can probably still find it in stores because...well...those that don't have reds don't wear them, and those that do have reds likely have a shade of red close enough to "True Love's Kiss" already.

I own four red lipsticks, two of which are samples and two of which I purchased on my own (both of those are from Revlon - one of which was one of my first reviews here). Then I have the orange-reds, pink-reds, and purple-reds, that are much easier reds to wear because they're mixed with those other colors. But red-red, I have no problem turning away from. That is why I totally ignored this collection all of May.

But this past Friday, my mom and I went to see the new movie, Maleficent, that this collection was inspired by, and the movie was awesome in my opinion. In fact, I would watch it again right now if I could. Then there was the fact that Angelina Jolie's red lipstick was gorgeous in the movie. I thought it would be pretty neat to own a lipstick that not only was in the shade of the movie's main character's lipstick, but was from a collection inspired by the movie as well. So yesterday my mom and I went to a Macy's that still had "True Love's Kiss" in stock and each got our own.

I wanted to get this post up as soon as possible, since we're in June already.

Lips: MAC's Lipstick in "Toying Around" (LE) [Playland 2014]

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I was going to just call it a night and save my review of "Toying Around" for tomorrow, but no. I'm going to plow through to the end, while I still know what I'm doing (lol!).

Some colors are winners. It's as simple as that. From the moment you put them on, you know that they're winners. You know you'll get a lot of use out of them, that they're what you've been looking for - that they make you feel totally confident whenever you wear them.

"Toying Around" is one such color.

I knew I wanted it from the start, and as much as my list changed between January and April, it was the only color from my initial list that stood put. I did take a risk in buying it - I love a lipstick that's a perfect balance between pink and orange, but most inevitably fall too pink, or too orange. You can see examples of such lipsticks in my comparison post here, where I compare "Toying Around" to an example of each.

That's not to say that "Toying Around" is perfect, because it's not. If you view it next to the other pinker colors in the collection - as I have swatched in my master post here - you'll see that it's more orange than pink. But still - there's just something, something about it...

Lips: MAC's Lipstick in "Happy-Go-Lucky" (LE) [Playland 2014]

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Review #3! We're almost there! "Happy-Go-Lucky" is the lipstick I was curious about after hearing it being compared to "Candy Yum Yum," which I own but have such a hard time using due to the streaky, drying application. You can see a comparison of the two here.

When I tried "Happy-Go-Lucky" at my MAC counter, the ease with which it applied convinced me to purchase it. It's definitely the most fun color of the four Playland lipsticks I purchased, in my opinion.

If you want to see "Happy-Go-Lucky" beside other lipsticks in this collection, check out my master post here. With that being said, let's move on to the review.

Lips: MAC's Lipstick in "Sweet Experience" (LE) [Playland 2014]

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When MAC's Playland collection first launched, I only planned on purchasing two of the collection's lipsticks, and "Sweet Experience" was one of them. I wanted to own a pale pink in a more opaque formula, compared to my other pale pink from MAC, "Rose Lily." "Sweet Experience" was perfect.

Also, for anyone that's ever been curious about "Saint Germain," an amplified cream lipstick from MAC's permanent line, but just knew in their hearts that it would look awful, give a warm welcome to "Sweet Experience."

Before we get into the review, just know that you can click here if you want to view my master post for Playland, where you can see "Sweet Experience" beside the other three colors I own from this collection.

Lips: MAC's Lipstick in "Red Balloon" (LE) [Playland 2014]

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Here we go! The first lipstick I'll be reviewing from MAC's Playland collection is "Red Balloon" - the one that seemed to be the less stellar option of all the colors available. I initially wanted this lipstick, then I decided not to get it, and then I saw more pictures of it and ultimately bought it. It's the darkest of the four amplified lipsticks in this collection, and perhaps the easiest to wear everyday.

If you want to see "Red Balloon" beside its fellow Playland lipsticks, you can check out the master post I created for this collection here. If you want to see a comparison post, click here. Otherwise, let's get to the review.

MAC's April 2014 Collection: Playland

LEFT TO RIGHT: MAC Playland lipsticks in:
Red Balloon, Sweet Experience, Happy-Go-Lucky, and Toying Around.

Hello, hello! As of yesterday, I finally have all four of the lipsticks I purchased from one of MAC's April 2014 collections, Playland. I already did a separate post with quick swatches and comparisons, which you can find here, but today I'll be doing a master post with all four of the lipsticks side by side, swatches, and full-face pictures - much like what I did for MAC's February collection, A Fantasy of Flowers.

As with that post, this post is meant solely to allow you to see the products I purchased beside each other, so you can see what differences exist within the collection. Playland featured permanent and limited edition products, including eye, cheek, and lip products. In terms of lipsticks, there are six limited edition colors, of which two are in the frost finish - "Playland" and "Head in the Clouds" - and the remaining four are in the amplified finish - "Red Balloon," "Sweet Experience," "Happy-Go-Lucky," and "Toying Around." I purchased all four of the amplified finish lipsticks, which I'll be sharing with you today.

This post is not a review of the products. Once reviews are up for each product, I will link them at the post's end. 

Lips: MAC's Lipstick in "Nearly Nude" (Amplified) (LE) [Nudes & Metallics 2013]

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Hello! I want to start off by apologizing that I've been reviewing mostly MAC lipsticks for the past few beauty reviews. It wasn't intentional; I've simply been using my MAC lipsticks frequently and wanted to get reviews up for them while they're at the top of my use list.

While this lipstick is one that was part of a collection last year (so, as it is limited edition, I have no idea what the availability of it is at this point), I wanted to review it (a) because I really like this color, (b) I often look at my reviews as a kind of archive of the products that I've owned and tried, and (c) I'm waiting with great anticipation for the upcoming April collection, Playland, whose lipsticks are a majority in the amplified finish, like this one.

I remember that I found this lipstick on MAC's website by chance. I was just getting interested in nude lipsticks and I wanted to try another lipstick in their amplified finish. When I saw a set of nude lipsticks released under a collection called Nudes & Metallics, settling on "Nearly Nude" was easy.