The Frilly Panda

After spending a few years venturing into the world of indie cosmetic companies and simply falling in love with loose shadows, my best friend and I decided we should try to make some ourselves. At first it was just something fun to do in our down time (she's a graphic design student and I am a stay at home mom/seamstress designer) but it quickly turned into a project. We realized how much fun we were having and the ideas just kept coming and now we have a notebook full of ideas for future collections.

We wanted to focus on a huge love of ours for the first one, Harry Potter. So we developed a 24pc Harry Potter based collection; we will eventually expand on it (we already have but shhhh). We wanted it to be cohesive enough to wear any of the shades together but diverse enough to cover all bases (haha see what I did there?). The only things the current collection is missing is pink and orange. But don't worry, those are definitely coming :). For these swatches I will not divulge the shade names as we haven't finalized all of them, but will refer to them as a number from their house (ie. Hufflepuff 1, 2, etc). I am no photographer so these photos don't cover the complete awesomeness that these shadows offer, but we will be offering samples for test runs soon.

Gryffindor

Slytherin

Hufflepuff


Ravenclaw


So that is what we have so far. let us know what you think of them! Oh, also if the name we are running with sucks horribly haha, Transfiguration Cosmetics.

It's been a week since I posted about maybe having a giveaway and no one said anything about it. I think I will do some but I will start with something small first ans them move up to the bigger items.
I have a range of samples (packed by me), samples in baggies from the company, and full sizes of the following companies:
Lime Crime
Beauty From The Earth
Sugarpill
Mon Ennui
Geek Chic Cosmetics
Julep
Revlon
E.L.F.
I also may have time to make some small bags to put them into.

So let me know what company samples you would like to see first and I will get the rafflecopter set up to start by the end of the month.

I may or may not have a few things stashed away for a giveaway or two but I want to know if there is interest for it or not. I know I don't have a lot of readers to begin with and I have seen large blogs have giveaways and have no one enter until a day or two before the deadline because the writer has posted literally everywhere on the net reminding people to do so.
Prizes range from full size cosmetics, cosmetic samples (that I have jarred myself), cosmetic sample baggies straight from the companies, hair bows, tote bags, etc. There's lots of stuff hiding in my gift box :).

I have been slowly collecting some Revlon lip butters and Maybelline colour whispers since they were released and now that I have a decent collection I figured it was a good time to swatch them.
First of all I really like the texture and pigmentation of these lippies. They are super lightweight and feel like lip balm but have super buildable colour. Very nice for a light swipe of tint or a richer look without the weight or dryness of a lipstick.

Left to right they are Raspberry Pie, Tutti Frutti, Peach Parfait, Candy Apple, Berry Smoothie, Sweet Tart

Each swatch is swiped 3 times so you can see just how some are more pigmented than others. Another thing is some of them have a slight shimmer while others are more of a creme finish.
My personal favourite is Berry Smoothie - it is almost just a richer shimmery version of my natural lip colour so it pretty much lives in my purse. That being said, some of these I haven't even tried on my lips yet as our weather has been crap and just started getting nice. So hopefully I'll be able yo wear all the colours soon and swatch them on my lips for you all.

Next up are the Maybelline Color Whispers
Left to right they are Pin Up Peach, Coral Ambition, Who Wore It Red-er, Made It Mauve, A Plum Prospect.

And just for fun here's the Maybelline Vivid in Shocking Coral.

As some of you well know, I am dipping my toes in cosplay. I have made some cosplay outfits for clients before but I have always been given either specific instructions to change parts or creative lisence to change or add anything I wanted. I am now making a costume 95% accurate for myself and it's proving to be interesting. It is just as fun to make, I am just finding spots where I would change bits to suit my personal tastes and it is difficult to decide whether to make it accurate and take the risk of not wanting to wear each element separately afterwards or make it the way I like it and have it not accurate enough for recognition. Even worse (?) is I am entering it into the costume contest at CCEE so it does have to be accurate enough.
That and I am using this as a kind of trial for a fabric I need to use for a clients order next month. I don't like this fabric. It looks great but is such a pain in the ass to work with. It is sticky, it stretches, the top rips off when something rubs against it too hard. This particular vinyl sucks. Thank god I am done the part of the costume with it; I just have some hand stitching to do on it now.
To clarify, I am making the Chromaggia outfit Blind Mag wears in Repo! The Genetic Opera. The corset is done aside from the feathers and a clasp I need to add to the bust. I made it about an inch and a half taller than it really should be because the busk I used was slightly too long and if I made it straight like hers is it would cut into the bottom of my boobs and make them a really weird shape. So I made it taller to cradle them similar to a balconet bra. My next obstacle is trying to figure out how to build the top of the dress to conceal my nursing bra as well as help support it as the dress has to be strapless. And they don't make strapless nursing bras. Well if they do, I don't have one. I'll probably just build some bone channels into the dress for a fully supported top half. I won't be able to wash the dress aside from hand washing anyways because of the feathers on it so it doesn't really matter if there's steel in it.

I also finished some Emperor robes and a tunic for my son and I may say it is super cute. Once I am done my outfit then I have to make a tunic and robes for my husband as well. His are going to be pretty fun as they aren't cannon, the character is an expanded universe one but very important to the regular story.

I have, as most everybody does, a go-to neutral face that goes with absolutely everything. I decided to finally photograph it (sadly not overly well) and show it off.

Eyes:
BFTE - Kiss and Tell
Mon Ennui - Trinket
Mon Ennui - Drink Me

Lips:
Lime Crime - Red Velvet
OCC - Super NSFW

I change out the lip color depending on what I'm wearing to a bricky brown red or plumy color or a nice pink but the red is my bolder normal choice.

Yes that is Backyardigans on the tv in the background - I have kids and that is an awesome show. I kind of wish I could download the soundtracks and put them on my iPod. Don't judge me.

I just sent in my first entry for a make-up contest based on album covers and I quite like it even if it is a bit simpler than the other entries. I used Malice Mizers album Merveilles as my cover inspiration and I did a mostly wearable look for it. I say mostly wearable as I left my right eye with the base colors as a totally wearable day or night look and took the left eye a bit further by bringing in a wider shape and some details - still wearable but just a little out of the norm. My only sad face thing is that I didn't apply the brown shade dark enough but on the same note I didn't want to look like I had a big ass bruise around my eye.