Fabulous Over Forty – Where Beauty Is Ageless

Recently I showed a color palette for a Soft and Natural look.   It seemed to be a popular blend of makeup and I’ve been asked several times to do a drugstore version.    So I went to my local Ulta and did some bargain comparisons.    Here’s the great part – Ulta has most of these brands on sale this week at 40% off!

First up, the foundation in place of the Chanel one.   I like L’Oreal Ture Match.   It’s creamy, has nice texture and easy application.  Plus I like how it looks on the skin and it has several shades to choose from.

In place of the Dior Bronzing powder, I like this Physicians Formula Magic Mosaic.   This particular shade is Warm Beige.    I love the gradual shading of this palette and the colors will warm up the face beautifully.

Eye Shadow #25 from Giorgio Armani has been replaced by L’Oreal’s singular eye shadow in #405 Taffeta.   This is a taupe with rose shade that matches very closely to the Armani Beauty shade.

Don’t worry – I don’t mean to share the blue shadow with you!  No, it’s the color next to it.   Revlon’s eye shadow 010 Polished Bronze replaced the Giorgio Armani #27 taupe/light bronze shadow.

Using the left shade color on L’Oreal’s HIP #818 Saucy eye shadow duo, it matches the Giorgio Armani Bronze shadow #20.

The Maybelline single eye shadow in #30 Champagne Fizz is a dead ringer for Giorgio Armani eye shadow #2.

For lips, I love this Revlon Colorburst collection.   Shade # 025 Blush is a great match to the Giorgio Armani lipstick in #30.  

For the eye shadow gel liner, I suggest Sonia Kashuk gel eyeliner in the brown shade.   At this point, I couldn’t find a budget replacement for NARS Orgasm Illuminator, but I’ll keep on searching! 

Not all the textures on the eye shadows will be the same as the Giorgio Armani ones – some may have shimmer in the budget choices when they are matte in Armani and vice versa, but the colors are very similar to one another.

Enter to win one of the following mascaras:
Lancome Hypnose Drama (1)
L’Oreal Telescopic Explosion (3)
Rimmel Glam’Eyes Lash Flirt (1)
Rimmel Sexy Curves (1)

Contest ends on Sunday, October 4th at 11:50 p.m. EST.  

Day four of the mascara review week is L’Oreal’s latest  to their extensive mascara line, Telescopic Explosion.  It is one of the most unusual brushes around, except for a really expensive version from another line.    It looks like a Flail, rather scary to put by your eyes, but trust me it’s not – Mel Gibson in Braveheart is not going to pop out of the tube and attack you.

The concept of this unusual brush is to get every angle of the brush to touch your lashes.   That concept makes sense, as how many times do you take a long brush and turn it length-wise to get into the corner lashes, or even the bottom lashes.   It’s just that it feels a little odd at first because never have I tried a brush that was shaped like this.

So, how does it actually perform?  Well, once you get used to the brush (it only takes a day to get the groove) it really does get every single lash – even those teeny tiny corner lashes.

I didn’t get a huge amount of volume, but it definitely enhanced the length and got every single tiny lash.   I especially like how it defined my lower lashes.  Again there was no clumping or flaking, and it’s not drying on my lashes either.  Check out Total Beauty’s reveiw board to see what others think.

This retails for $10.59, and at the end of my mascara review week, I’ll have a contest to give away 3 tubes of this mascara!

I’d love to hear what you think about the mascaras so far – please leave your thoughts in comments.

If you know me, you know that I always say if you want to buy cosmetics at the drugstore great, but your foundation purchases are best left to the department stores.    Not that there aren’t good foundations made for drugstores, but because finding a match can be nearly impossible.

Enter L’Oreal’s True Match foundation.   They have this color chart on a clear plastic sheet that you can put up to your face to match your skin tone to their foundation shade recommendation.  And the best part?  If it’s used properly, it actually works!   What do I mean by “used properly”?   Well, the best place always is to test your foundation is in natural light and it may be a bit difficult to do that in drugstore (or department store) lighting.  It’s always best to ask an honest opinion if you can’t take the chart in natural light.

They also have a great chart on their website to find a match.  If you’ve purchased a department store brand in the past and want to find your L’Oreal match, you can enter your department store brand/shade and they give you the match.  It actually works – I put in my Bobbi Brown shade of foundation and it came up with the right True Match shade.   There isn’t a large selection of department shades to choose from on the crossover, but some of the major brands are listed.

Now, onto how does it look?   Honestly, I was completely shocked!   This foundation is so incredibly smooth and silky.  I applied it in the morning and when I checked in the mirror at lunch time, it still looked great.  When I looked in the mirror when I got home from work 12 hours later, it had mostly worn off like nearly all foundations do.   But there was no separation, no blotchiness, just a beautiful medium to medium/full coverage foundation.

If you are considering purchasing and want to hear what others think of this foundation, check out the objective reviews listed at Total Beauty.  Their reviews are from bloggers and consumers alike, so you’ll get everyone’s honest opinion.

I’m going to a beauty conference in a few weeks and can’t wait to go and then come back with all kinds of fantastic beauty information to pass on to you.   One of the companies that I am meeting with is L’Oreal and they want to answer all your questions about home hair coloring.    So in order for your questions to be answered, I need to have you send me your questions no later than Sunday night – yes this coming Sunday – the 23rd.   I’ll then be able to send you your answers when I return!

So either leave your questions in the “Comments” section or you can email me directly at kari@faboverforty.com

In the last few years the latest and greatest thing that seemed to have hit the mascara market are the primers that they’ve been creating in conjunction with mascara.   L’Oreal is no exception to this rule.   I recently started using one of these primers in hopes that they would make my lashes appear thicker and they seem to work.

This L’Oreal Double Extend (the name is just too long to write the whole dang thing) mascara has both the primer and the mascara built into one tube, which is great for convenience sake.  I know probably about 80% of you, or more, want longer lashes.   Can’t blame you – if mine were short, I’d want something to lengthen them too.   Mine are not full, so I want volume.

This mascara is wonderful if you want length.   Just look at the comparisons of my eyes.   The one on the right has the mascara on and the other does not.  SHOCKING! I did not want to put any other makeup on my eyes, as to keep the comparisons pure.    It makes a DRAMATIC difference by showing off all the length my lashes have to offer.   It even picks up the tiny lashes and gives them some definition as well.

So if you need length, I highly recommend this mascara.   Volume, not so much – but it also doesn’t claim that it will give you volume, only length.   The photo of my eyes is with one coat of primer and 2 coats of mascara.   This mascara is a fiber type mascara.   What does that mean?  Well, it coats the lashes like a tube that surrounds each lash.   For me personally, this type of mascara comes off too easily.   It’s not flakes of mascara that are left on my face after a few hours, but “tubes” of mascara that look like the lashes themselves have fallen off onto my face.

Click here to see what others are saying about this mascara.