How I Clean My Make Up Brushes

Hi Everyone. Today I thought I'd share with you how I clean my make up brushes. I don't do anything special with them and in all honesty I am down right lazy when it comes to brush cleaning! Only doing it every so often when I finally remember! It's pretty disgusting and shameful I know. I'm sorry!

All I use to clean my brushes is a cheap baby shampoo and a sponge.

To be precise I use this Wilkinson's own baby shampoo and a cheap Wilkinsons bath sponge. In total they probably cost less than £2 to buy. So you really don't need buckets of money to keep your brushes clean and hygienic! This is what I do every month or so to get my brushes nice and clean. I know I should really do it once a week but like I said I'm lazy :| -

Step 1 - 

I run the brush under luke warm water. Not hot! Trying to only wet the bristles so I don't remove any of the glue holding the brush together which could potentially ruin the whole thing.

Step 2 - 

Wet the sponge and apply a blob of shampoo on to it. Swirl the brush in it and rinse, continuing to do so until the water runs clear, and all make up is removed.

Step 4 - 

Finally I re shape my brushes and lie them flat on a towel to dry over night. If I need my brushes in a hurry. Eg, I'm going on a night out and decide hours before leaving the house, I need to clean my brushes. I will clean them as normal and set them out on a window sill where the sunlight can dry them! Which probably isn't good for my brushes and isn't always possible. So I need some kind of spot cleaning product to help me out in times like these and to also keep my brushes cleaner and more hygenic! If you use a spot cleaner please let me know which one you use so I can take a look at them. I'm thinking of buying the MAC Brush Cleanser so please give me your opinions on that.

For reference the majority of my brushes are Real Techniques, which I absolutely adore!! I also have a brush roll of around 24 brushes from when I did Beauty Therapy at college, these are the pinky/purple handled ones. I only ever use them when I am desperate, because they really are pretty rubbish! Hence why there's only 4 of them here. And that little black brush is the brush that came with my Maybelline Gel Eyeliner! I love it. I'd love to know your favourite brushes, because I am looking to buy some new ones.

I hope you enjoyed this post and some of you may have a better idea of how to clean your brushes now.

Much Love Gemma xo.

Tag: Would You Rather? Beauty Edition

Hi Beauties, if you follow me on Twitter you will probably know I have been trying and failing to get back into blogging recently, but for some reason I just can not seem to string sentences together. So instead of stressing myself out even more I thought I would take a break and do this tag that's been doing the rounds on several Beauty blogs recently. So you eventually have something to read from me.

Would you rather lose all of your mascaras, eyeliners, lipsticks, and lipglosses or lose all of your palettes and eyeshadows?

I don't have too many eyeshadows and only have the one palette so I would have to say those. I'm not too adventurous with eyeshadow, its either a full on dark smokey eye or barely anything at all for me. So losing them wouldn't be too horrendous! I'd hate to lose the others though! Except from the lipgloss I very rarely wear it!

Would you rather chop off all your hair or never be able to cut it again?

Chop it all off, it'll grow back eventually! And I could try out short hair styles that I am too scared to have now. Never cutting it again would result in horrible scraggly hair! Not nice.

Would you rather have a coral cheek or a pink cheek?

Pink, coral scares me for some reason. I feel like I'd look orange!

If you had £1000 to spend, Would you rather buy clothes or makeup?

I'd love to say £500 on each, but I'd have to go with clothes shoes and accessories because I don't have that much, my make up collection however is rather large! 

Would you rather apply lipstick as eyeliner, or eyeliner as lipstick?

Eww, neither. I really don't know. There are no eyeliners I'd wear on my lips! And lipsticks would be awful on the eyes! However a black lipstick would work, so Lipstick as Eyeliner as long as its black.

Would you rather only shop at MAC or Sephora?

Here in the UK we don't have Sephora so I'd have to say MAC.

Would you rather only use one eyeshadow color or one lip color for the rest of your life?

Eyeshadow, like I said I'm not too adventurous with eyeshadow but I'm obsessed with lipstick and always like to change the colour I wear, so I couldn't deal with only having one!

Would you rather wear winter clothes in summer or summer clothes in winter?

Once again, I haven't got a clue. Erm winter clothes in summer. I hate being cold. And I suppose I could cut up clothes in summer to make them more bearable!

Would you rather dark nails or bright nails all year round?

Why are all these questions so tricky?! I'd probably say dark because they would go with more outfits! Although I would hate to give up all my bright polishes! I just don't know!!

Would you rather give up your favorite lip product or your favorite eye product?

Eye product. I have spent far more money on high end lip products so I'd hate to waste the money by giving them up!

Would you rather only be able to wear your hair in a pony tail or a messy bun?

Ponytail you can do different things with a ponytail, whereas a messy bun can only be a messy bun!

Would your rather never being able to paint your nails again or never use lipgloss?

Never use lipgloss, I hardly ever wear it right now so it probably wouldn't make a difference to me.

Would you rather shave your eyebrows and have none at all? or sharpie them in everyday?

Sharpie them in. Eyebrows make your face, I'd look horrific without any so I'd somehow try and get a sharpie to work!

Would you rather live without makeup or nail polish?
Nail polish, I know I love the stuff but I don't leave the house without make up very often plus I can't wear nail polish at work so I'd have to get rid of that and stick with make up.

If you haven't done this tag already you should. Although the questions are really difficult it is fun to try to answer them. Make sure to let me know where I can read yours if you do it :)

I'll hopefully be back to normal blogging sometime soon, hoping my laptop will be sorted ASAP. Please bare with me though and thank you for being so patient.

Much Love Gemma xo.

MUA Undress Me Too Eyeshadow Palette

Hi Girls, once again my apologies for not posting anything for such a long time! I still haven't got a new laptop charger so can only get on my laptop when I can get hold of my brothers charger!

Today I'm going to show you the ever so popular MUA Undress Me Too Palette. That I picked up sometime last month.

This palette is famous for being an amazing dupe for the Naked 2 palette from Urban Decay, having never owned a UD palette I was really excited to try out this much cheaper alternative. After looking in Superdrug countless amounts of times and not coming across it I gave up hope of ever finding this beauty in town. Then one day I found the whole Undress Me collection tucked away on the side of one of the aisles! WHY have you done this Superdrug?! Instead of putting the collection with the rest of the MUA  make up its hidden away! I just do not understand it. Anyway enough whinging and on to the actual product! I was over the moon to eventually get my hands on this product and couldn't wait to try it out (not before I had took pictures of course! brownie points for being a good beauty blogger for once :P I resisted using this for days so I could get you guys some nice clean pictures!) I haven't got any swatches but here are some pictures to give you an idea of the shades.

(naked, devotion, tranquil, exposed)

 (shy, fiery, reveal, wink)

(lavish, dreamy, obsessed, corrupt)

In all honesty I haven't used every single shadow in the palette, but the ones I have used I am really impressed with. The pigmentation is exceptional for a £4 palette, if you do the maths that comes to just over 33p per shadow, amazing huh?! The staying power is also really good, weather I use these for during the day or a night out I never have to re apply and that's without using a primer! So I imagine with one they will be even better. The palette has a mix of both matte and shimmer shades, which is perfect for me because I love to use both finishes depending on my mood and the make up look I am wanting to achieve. I believe this is the first MUA palette that has named shadows, which I really like, there's nothing worse than trying to explain a product to someone when said product doesn't have a name! The shades I reach for most within in this palette are - Naked and Lavish for a soft matte smokey eye for a neutral day time look, and Fiery, Obsessed and Corrupt for a more dark smokey eye for a night out, I have also used Devotion in the inner corners of my eyes for a lovely pop of golden highlight. If I ever get the confidence and camera skills to show you any of my make up looks I will definitely use this to paint you a better picture of this amazing product. But for the time being a hope this post has given you a nice insight into this much loved product. If you haven't got it already and have £4 going spare, I strongly suggest you go and pick it up. It really is brilliant value for money! Weather it's as good as Urban Decay Naked 2, I obviously can't comment but it's a fabulous palette all the same!

Much Love Gemma xo.