My MAC F&F Order!

Remember that MAC 25% off sale? Well, my order arrived today! Look at all the fun stuff I got:



I got a couple of lipsticks, a blush, a mascara, another 239 brush, and a whole bunch of eyeshadows! (Can you tell eyeshadow is my favorite?) I'm excited because I got a good mix of both neutrals as well as bold colors. I'm most excited to try out Steamy (the bluish one) and Sumptious Olive. If I come up with any good looks with my new purchases, I'll post them here.

SYTYCD: Thoughts on Top 16

This is for you Alisa!

I thought tonight's performance was definitely a step up from last week's dudfest where I struggled to pick any favorites. If you follow me on Twitter, you already know that I am not a fan of Toni Basil as a SYTYCD judge. She rambles on and on and none of her commentary is interesting or entertaining. I miss Adam Shankman, however, he won't be back to SYTYCD until the finale per his tweets.

Anyway, out of the 8 performances, here are my top 3 favorites:

1) Phillip and Jeannine - Broadway by Tyce Diorio

I am always a fan of the Broadway routines and this one was super cute. Nigel was somewhat harsh with Phillip, but come on! He leaped (leapt?) a 6ft couch *and* ripped his pants on national TV!

(Audio disabled - let me know if you have a better link)


2) Randi and Evan - Contemporary by Mia Michaels

The butt dance... very slinky and smooth and sensual... different and fun! And I have to say, Randi is really growing on me - she's really fun to watch.



3) Janette and Brandon - Hip Hop by Dave Scott

This was a toughie... I also liked the Rumba but ultimately Brandon won me over with his hip hop skills! You would never have known that was not his traditional background.



Honorable Mentions:

• Melissa and Ade - Rumba by Tony Meredith
  I also liked them because I love the Destiny's Child version of Emotion, heehee
  
• Kayla and Kupono - Viennese Waltz by Jean Marc Generaux
  Side note: I love Jean Marc, he always cracks me up in rehearsal footage
  
• Caitlin and Jason - Paso Doble by Jean Marc Genereaux
  I was surprised Jason got the harsher critiques as I didn't feel Caitlin danced it as "sharp" as he did

So that means my bottom two are:

• Karla and Jonathan - Hip Hop by Dave Scott
  
• Auska and Vitolia - Jazz by Mandy Moore

My guess is that Jonathan will go home for the guys but it's a toss up between Karla and Auska for the girl.

What did you guys think about the show?

This cat just kills me!

OK, kind of random... but this cat just cracks me up! He/she is so playful *and* chubby, a great combination, haha.



Whenever I see this, I laugh out loud:


See more of Maru's adventures here.

Heehee - Pranks on Twitter

Saw this on Ashton Kutcher's twitter...


the best prank ever - Watch more Funny Videos

I was literally laughing out loud when watching this, but part of me was thinking... geesh, these guys are kinda creepy! Luckily, they only pranked men. If that was me, I would have been crying for my life!

Anyway, are you on Twitter? If so, follow me!



(FYI - I have to approve all requests first.)

MAC Friends & Family Online Sale ends today!

Today is the last day of the MAC Friends and Family sale - 25% off everything, online only, with the exception of the Viva Glam products.

Offer code is SAVE25 with free shipping of orders of $60 or more.

Not surprisingly, I went a little crazy with this sale, despite the fact that I definitely do NOT need any more of this stuff. But I can't resist a good sale!!! Ah well...

This info is a little late, but if you were thinking about getting some stuff, here are some suggestions below. These are some of my favorite neutral shades that should go with anyone's coloring.

Audrey's MAC Picks

Eyeshadows:











These were actually the first MAC eyeshadows I bought and I often see these on other people's "must have" lists. I typically wear Shroom & Satin Taupe together and Ricepaper & Woodwinked together but you can always mix them up. And if you want it more dramatic or more of an evening look, I'd add some Carbon in the outer corner. You could also use Carbon with a liner brush to line your eyes instead of eyeliner.

I also prefer buying pans vs pots - pots on the left, pans on the right.



Then I would just buy a palette to store the pans and I find that easier to manage and tote around. Plus it's more economical. A pot eyeshadow is $14.50 and a pan eyeshadow is $11. A x4 palette is $3.50, so a pot eyeshadow is the same price of a pan e/s + the x4 palette and you'd still have room for three more pan eyeshadows. If you think you'll be collecting more, there's also a x15 palette.

Lip stuff:

Bare slimshine lipstick


Love Nectar lustreglass (like a lip gloss)


I'd also recommend the Viva Glam V lipstick but that is not included in the sale, but still worth checking out.

Brushes:

These are my two favorite eyeshadow brushes.

The MAC 239 brush is a flat shader brush and is really great for packing on color on the lids. Because it's thin, you can also use the edge to line your eyes with shadow.



The 217 is more of a fluffy brush and is good for putting color in the crease or the corner and just blending out the color for a softer look. You can use it with either creams or powders so I have one just for eyeshadows and one that I use to blend out my concealer.



OK, those are my main recommendations for now... do you guys have your own favorites? Please share!

The Return of So You Think You Can Dance

YAY! I'm so happy that So You Think You Can Dance is back on the air. I always look forward to the end of American Idol for this reason alone, haha.

The Top 20 had their first performance show last night... loved it! So great to see all those familiar faces again. Plus Adam Shankman is one of my favorite guest judges.

Here are my favorite performances of the night:

Jeanine & Philip: Ne-Yo / Tabitha and Napoleon piece
I *love* Tabitha and Napoleon's choreography... this had a similar feel to their "No Air" and "Bleeding Love" routines, hip hop with a storyline. It was awesome to see Phillip in his element in a choreographed piece and he and Jeanine both did such a great job. The choreography seemed so intricate!




Caitlin & Jason: Bollywood / Jai Ho
Nice to see they brought Bollywood back this season. I can't imagine them ever going wrong with this style since the costumes alone are always so gorgeous. Great piece!




Ashley & Kupono: Crash Test Dummy / Wade Robson piece
Sometimes Wade Robson routines are hit or miss for me but I really liked this one. Their movements were so fluid and you really believed they were crash test dummies!




Melissa & Ade: Right Here Waiting / Mandy Moore piece
This one is really beautiful and romantic.



All in all, it was a great show. It will be interesting to see which ones get the boot tonight. I'll guess Paris and Tony for now.

And how crazy was it that Louis Van Amstel is now choreographing for the show? I'm used to seeing SYTYCD alums on DWTS but not vice versa. I'll be honest, he was one of my least favorite professionals on that show, but I liked what he brought to the show tonight. I know everyone was raving about that final samba number. It was good, definitely, but not one that I wanted to watch again.

Which ones were your favorite? Who do you think will get voted off tonight?

Loving The Cosmetics Company Store...

If you've been following my blog, you'll know that my interest in make-up started with watching YouTube make-up videos (tutorials, reviews, hauls, etc). That's pretty much where I learn everything (for good and for bad) and one of my favorite discoveries through YouTube is this wonderful place called The Cosmetics Company Store. (I'd link a website, but they don't appear to have one.)



This is a chain located at various shopping outlets. (You can find all their locations here.) I guess they primarily sell the Estee Lauder line which includes not only Estee Lauder but their other brands like Clinique, Prescriptives, Bobbi Brown, and my personal favorite - MAC!!!

The beauty of this place is that not only do they sell discounted makeup but they all sell discontinued products as well. And since MAC has so many collections that include limited edition products, you can really score at these stores. They also sell some of their permanent products. I typically only purchase the MAC stuff and from what I can tell, they are usually priced at about a 30% discount (awesome, right?).

Below is picture of a portion of the MAC display at the CCS in Maryland. This is just a small portion - they also had a whole wall rack of their skin, eye, and cheek products. But check out all those palettes on the bottom shelf - those are from past collections that aren't available at stores today.



The offerings vary from store to store. The one near me doesn't really have too much compared to the ones I went to in Las Vegas and Maryland.

Here are the fun MAC products that I got in the Las Vegas CCS:

• Sweet & Nice Tendertone (Limited Edition, came out in June 2008)
  
  
  
• Love Nectar Lipglass (Permanent)
  
  
  
• Dipdown Fluidline (Permanent)
  
  
  
• Fafi Eyes 1 Quad (Limited Edition, came out in February 2008)
  

I was excited to get this quad because all the colors are pretty plus I've been meaning to buy Vanilla as a standalone eye shadow anyway. Here are all the colors included:

Top Row (L-R)
- Pink Venus: Washed pink (lustre)
- Vanilla: Soft pale-peachy-ivory flecked with shimmer (velvet)
Bottom Row (L-R)
- Hey: Neutral tan with white pearl (veluxe pearl)
- Howzat: Deep grey with silver sparkle (satin)

I couldn't wait to try it out so here's a look I did using all the colors.



I wore Hey on the inner third of the lid, Pink Venus on the remainder of the lid. Howzat in the outer V and Vanilla as the highlight color under the browbone.

I later went to a CCS in Maryland and bought a couple of eye shadow brushes that are part of the permanent collection. I totally do not need them but I have some weird addiction with collecting MAC brushes. That's why I absolutely love these discounts!

Next time you're outlet shopping, make sure to look for The Cosmetics Company Store!

New Moon Trailer / Best Kiss Award - Discuss!!!

Finally! I don't know about you, but I was dying to check out the trailer for New Moon. I never watch the MTV Movie Awards but since this was the year of Twilight, of course I had to tune in.

I got a good laugh out of the Andy Samberg spoof but here's the real thing...

THE TWILIGHT SAGA: NEW MOON trailer in HD



Thoughts below...


...


...


...


...


OK, first thought: AH! I WANT MORE!!! Beyond that... I liked it. I didn't love it, but I liked it. Given they just finished production last week, this was more of a teaser trailer, right? Like when you compare it with Twilight's official trailer, you really got an overall feel for that film. I still don't know what to expect with Chris Weitz's direction.

Maybe part of me doesn't like change. I kind of missed the indie/eerie feel of Catherine Hardwicke's version. New Moon looks a little more "commercial" and maybe is missing some of the coolness factor? (if that even makes sense)

Other random thoughts:

• Is it just me or did they intentionally make Bella a lot darker than the Cullens compared to the first film?
  
• Loved that we got to see an Edward/Bella smooch, but the way she raised her eyebrow in asking for it set off my "cheese" alarm (and I adore Edward/Bella smooches!)
  
• I miss the Cullen Oregon home from Twilight! I don't like this new setting (see? I'm not comfortable with change). It just feels stuffier to me. Plus the clip seems to be missing the Cullen family chemistry that we got in the first film
  
• Liked the special effects with the Jasper attacking / Edward defending / Bella flying scene (poor Jasper - they just can't give him a decent hairdo, can they?)
  
• I hope they're saving the really emotional heart-wrenching bits of the breakup forest scene, because the ones they showed weren't that painful
  
• Oooh, Laurent... very creepy!
  
• Nice gratuitous half naked shot of Jacob which seems to be out of sequence of the scene showing Jacob running to save Bella (i.e. they just shoved that scene in there to get Team Jacob all hot and bothered. I still firmly remain with Team Edward. For now.)
  
• I loved how they showed the transformation of Jacob into a wolf but... um... didn't the wolf look kind of cute and cuddly? Or is that just me?

I wish they could have used their footage from last week for the trailer... but I guess that would spoil the big ending. Oh well, we can just savor this for now...



OK, on to the MTV movie awards... on a side note, who thought that Eminem/Bruno bit was staged? Looked pretty real to me. I find them both annoying so whatevs.

Anyway, in addition to the New Moon trailer, I also was anxious to see the Best Kiss award because hello - of course Robsten had that in the bag! I actually thought they would just accept the award and run off stage but I loved that they actually planned a funny bit. Don't know if the video will work since I know MTV is notorious for taking their content off YouTube so I posted some pics as well. It was basically a cute fake out.







By the way, I love when Kristen Stewart combines dresses with sneakers. I think it's cute on her and it reminds me of last year's Vanity Fair shoot. I also think its cute that she dropped her award, heehee.

Let me know what you thought of the trailer and/or the Movie Awards!

Movie Review: Night at the Museum - Battle of the Smithsonian

OK,now I have all that shirtless Rob mayhem out of my system (sort of), I can get back to blogging about other stuff... movie review time!

Last night, my sister and I saw Night at the Museum - Battle of the Smithsonian. It was cute and certainly had its funny moments but it ultimately reminded me of what I thought about the first one. Which is that it basically has a funny "schtick" (museum exhibits coming to life) but beyond that... there's not much of a plot that I really cared about. It kind of felt like an episode of Saturday Night Live... where you had some funny bits and some not-so-funny bits and I kind of got antsy just waiting for the whole thing to be over.

The whole gang from New York's Museum of Natural History is back but get transferred to the Smithsonian in DC. Now this was a part I actually enjoyed as I just got back from a weekend trip to DC where I had visited two of the Smithsonian museums myself. I wish I had seen this movie before I went because I probably would have made a bigger effort to see more of the museums while I was there. (Side note: Did you know admission to all the Smithsonian museums is free??? Love it!!!)

We got to see a bunch of new characters from the Smithsonian exhibits so it was fun to see so many new familiar faces. Besides the prominent actors like Hank Azaria, Amy Adams, and Christopher Guest there were a bunch of fun cameos. If you're an NBC fan, you'll really enjoy this movie. Off the top of my head, I spotted Kelly, Darryl, and Andy from The Office, Toofer from 30 Rock, and Bill Nader from SNL. My sister spotted a clever cameo of the Jonas brothers.

This movie is definitely targeted to kid humor but I think adults will find it funny, too. Parts of it anyway. I had to laugh at a lot of the moments just because they were so silly and ridiculous. One example - two monkeys being directed by an Einstein bobblehead to slap around one of Al Capone's men.

I guess I'd recommend... even though there were times I almost fell asleep. There is enough funny moments to make it worth it. OK, sorry, for not giving the most glowing review - haha.

But here's the trailer - you can decide for yourself. There are definitely some funny moments not spoiled in this.

Shirtless in Italy...

GAH!!! November cannot come soon enough!!!! Check out the rest of the hawtness here.



UPDATE: Even better pics here!

UPDATE #2: Until November, this will do...

King LeBron

Dude... even a sports-illiterate chick like me knew last night's Cavs-Magic game 2 was an amazing one.

With *one* second left on the clock, Magic was leading 95-93. Keep in mind, Magic already won game 1. And that Cleveland had swept its series with both the Detroit Pistons and the Atlanta Hawks prior to facing Orlando.

And then this happens...

AMAZING!!! Would have loved to have been at the Q last night.


(If I messed up any of the above, let me know. I blog TV and make-up, not sports, haha!)

Guest Blogging on Makeup and Beauty Blog!

One of my favorite beauty websites is Makeup and Beauty Blog. The blog author, Karen (a very cool chick), is currently vacationing in Hawaii (jealous!) so she graciously allowed me to do a guest post on her blog while she soaks up the sun.

Check out my post here!

Cute Casting in The Ghosts of Girlfriends Past

Just saw The Ghosts of Girlfriends Past. Quick review - it's cute! I'd recommend... Maybe more of a rental but if you're in the mood for a chick flick, this one won't disappoint. I'll be honest, the #1 reason I wanted to see this is Jennifer Garner and she was as adorable as always. Matthew McConaughey was entertaining as well but he's just doing his same old "player" schtick. There are lots of other familiar faces in this movie as well - Michael Douglas was especially funny as the "original" playa!

As you probably can figure out, this is yet another take on "A Christmas Carol" and it has its cute moments.

During the "past" moments, we got to see younger versions of both Jennifer's and Matthew's characters. I thought the teenage version of Jennifer looked familiar - a quick check on imdb.com confirmed that they used the same actress that played young Jennifer Garner / Jenna Rink in "13 Going on 30". Isn't that so cute?

The *Real* New Moon Poster - thoughts?

Ok... so apparently, this is the official movie poster for New Moon.


Obviously, this is borrowed from spunk-ransom.com.

Although I like how it portrays the Edward-Bella-Jacob triangle, I'm not crazy about it. As I mentioned to my sister, it looks like the cover of some cheesy high school romance novel! To which my sister responded, ummm... isn't that what it is?

OK, fine. But c'mon, this definitely doesn't bring on the excitement like that super awesome fan-made poster. Rawr!!!

Grading the two...

Summit poster: B-
Fan-made poster: A

What do you guys think?

P.S. I never watch the MTV Movie Awards but I am totally tuning in this year to see the Twilight kids and see the first New Moon clips!!! I think it airs on May 31st.

Another Youtube inspired look...

So I decided to try a new look that I caught in a Youtube makeup tutorial since I had most of the colors used. Here's the tutorial:



And here's my take on it. Mine is a little more toned down since I was just looking for a more daytime wearable look. For example, I normally don't wear any shadow or liner on my lower lashline during the day (mostly because I'm lazy - haha).





I really like this look! Normally, I wear shimmery/frosty eye shadows on my lid and this look is mostly matte. It's subtle but pretty. I also really like using Texture (described as peachy-brown with light shimmer) as a crease color because it gives it a really natural look. Overall, all the colors are relatively neutral so I think this would work well as an every day look.

Here's everything I used...

FACE
bareMinerals SPF 15 Foundation in Medium Beige
MAC Stark Naked Blush (instead of Gentle)

EYES
MAC Yogurt e/s (instead of Rose Blanc)
MAC Shale e/s
MAC Texture e/s
MAC Sketch e/s
Bobbi Brown Black Ink Gel eyeliner
MAC Carbon e/s (on top of eyeliner)
MAC Cork e/s (brows)
Maybelline Full & Soft mascara

LIPS
NYX Thalia lipstick
MAC Love Nectar Lustreglass

The Cullen Boys

I saw this on NessasaryMakeup... totally cracks me up!

Your Guide to Everything MAC Make-up

Photo from Temptalia.com

One of my favorite beauty sites, Temptalia, just compiled an awesome collection of info on anything you could possibly want to know about MAC make-up.

Check out Your Guide to Everything MAC Make-up!

Find out things like:

• MAC Cosmetics 101
  
• Must Have MAC glosses, eyeshadows, face products, etc
  
• Swatches of products
  
• Info on upcoming collections

Good site to bookmark!

I love Jim and Pam

Finally got the chance to catch the season finale of The Office (catch it below if you missed it as well).

Loved the episode! I always enjoy the ones where they throw in all the extra crazy characters. This time we got to see the return of Charles, Holly, and my personal fave - David Wallace. I don't know why - but I always get the warm and fuzzies whenever he makes a guest appearance. Actually, I do know why. I once read online that he had given up acting to pursue a career in finance as a stock broker. Casting remembered him and convinced him to return to acting to play the role of David Wallace. He still works full time as a stock broker and just does The Office as a side job which I think is so cool! Plus he's the one "straight" guy on the show so it's funny to see him interact with this zoo of characters. (Even though he makes some really questionable decisions... like confiding in Michael which branch was going to be closed? Come on, David!)

And I have to say, the new receptionist Erin is really growing on me!

I was happy to see that once again we were given a super sweet Jim and Pam moment. Those two are so great together! If you haven't seen it, I won't spoil it... but it happens in the very end of the episode. I love how there was no sound when they were communicating with each other but you still felt all the emotions that they were conveying!

Real Housewives of NYC - Over already?!

Tonight was the season finale of Season 2 of Real Housewives of New York City. So sad... I think they are my favorite cast.

Jill and Bethenny are definitely my favorites, but I will miss the rest of the crazy gang. I mean, seriously, where else will you see "straight" men proudly display fashion like this below?



Even better in action:



Luckily, Bravo still has the reunion special (which is *always* good TV) and goes straight into the Real Housewives of New Jersey. Have you seen the commercials? It seems very Soprano-esque.

EW's Mandi Bierly strikes again!

This time my favorite EW columnist breaks down RPattz's recent interview with Moviefone.

Robert Pattinson on nudity, his future career, and not knowing what day the 'Twilight' DVD was released (?!)

She's funny. I also personally enjoy self-deprecating humor from celebrities... it's refreshing!