If you love mascara, you may want to check out additional offers for free mascara samples.

1. Massage Vaseline into your cuticles once a week. This helps feed the new nail and encourages nail growth. A great time to do this is right before bedtime.

2. Buff your nails! This also helps your nails to grow because it improves circulation. It also helps keep the nail bed smooth. Just don’t go overboard..! Buffing too much can weaken the nail.

3. Stick to one direction when filing your nails. Filing in a back and forth manner places stress on the structure of your nail plate and will actually cause nail breakage down the road. Always carefully file in one direction.

photo credit: Jacklyn DL

4. To get a few extra applications out of your favorite nail polish, try adding a tiny bit of nail polish remover to the bottle. Make sure the polish and remover are mixed well before applying. You won’t want to try this until that bottle of nail color is almost ready to throw out.

5. Instead of shaking your bottle of nail polish to even out the color, gently roll it back and forth across a table or in the palm of your hand. This prevents air bubbles from forming inside the bottle - and prevents them from ending up on your nails. You want your nail polish to go on smoothly.

6. When it comes to application, you should always apply the following: a base coat, two coats of color and a final top coat. The base coat protects your nail and helps the polish to last longer. It also prevents your nail from yellowing. Two coats ensures even coverage and the top coat adds shine and helps your manicure or pedicure to last as long as possible.

7. Finally, you should always let your nails dry for about an hour before wearing shoes. The polish may be dry to the touch after just 5 minutes or so, but make sure to only wear sandals or flip flops for the first hour to prevent marks and scuffs in your new polish.

Sometimes it doesn’t take more than a little something for the lips and a little something for the lashes to dazzle the masses; this is the idea behind MAC’s new collection Double Dazzle set to release April 30th, 2009. With the tag team of lips and lashes in full force, really, what more do you need.
There is nothing like the sun coming out that makes me want to keep my makeup looking clean and simple. When you are sporting the sun-kissed skin, you really don’t need a lot more than a little lipgloss and a little lash lengthening to bring out your best features. I think the most frustrating thing about this collection is just how many choices of lipgloss there are. At first glance, I’m excited about at least half of the eighteen options!

I have always thought that if you do nothing else to enhance your eyes, you should at least take care of your lashes. Your lashes are the frames for your beautiful peepers so you want them to stand out. This collection offers mascara in two different colors, brown and black. By applying mascara, you help lengthen your lashes and give them a full look which will highlight your eyes. I have actually never tried MAC’s mascara Dazzle Lash, but I think this might be the time to try it. You can see all of the options for mascara and the Dazzleglass lipglosses below. Good luck making a decision on just one - I haven’t been able to do it.

Dazzleglass

• Baby Sparks - Pale pink with violet pearl
• Bare Necessity - Caramel apricot with red and gold pearl
• Date Night - Deep plum with blue and gold pearl
• Extra Amps - Sheer bright blue pink with blue and pink pearl
• Funtablulous - Purple with violet pearl
• Get Rich Quick - Warm yellow brown
• Girl’s Delight - Sheer mid-tone tan with gold pearl
• Goldyrocks - Sheer soft yellow with pink and gold pearl
• Like Venus - Clean light bubble gum pink with red pearl
• Love Alert - Raspberry red with red pearl
• Money Honey - Mid-tone rosy mauve with red pearl
• Moth to Flame - Sheer neutral beige with violet pearl
• Rags to Riches - Plummy pink with teal and red pearl
• Smile - Light coral with pink and gold pearl
• Steppin’ Out - Clean yellow pink with red pearl
• Stop! Look! - Sheer violet mauve with blue and pink pearl
• Sugarrimmed - Milky pale pink with red, teal and white pearl
• Utterly Posh - Mid-tone orange with pink and gold pearl

Dazzle Lash
• Black - Dazzle Black
• Star - Brunette Brown

Spring is in the air with MAC’s new collection, A Rose Romance, set to release April 23rd, 2009. If I didn’t have spring fever before, I do now. Seeing what this collection has to offer makes me want to put on my favorite sun dress and flip flops and have some fun with the colors and products included in this collection. There is a little bit of everything from eye colors and lipsticks, to nail polish and perfumes; where do I begin? With my favorites of course!
I am in love with the eye shadow Crème de Violet. It is a vibrant and rich purple with a hew of pink. I think this color will look good with any eye color, but I think it has the potential to really make blue eyes pop. I can’t decide which lipstick color I like the best because they all look so beautiful. I am slightly leaning towards the color A Rose Romance mainly because I love a soft pink lip in the spring time.

When MAC has so many different fun products to offer, my eyes are not always immediately drawn to the nail polish colors, but I really like the nail color with this collection. It’s called Love and Friendship and it is a creamy lavender. I think it is such a feminine color and I can’t wait to try it.

The one thing in the collection I am not sure about is the gel blush. It sounds interesting, but I am just not sold on the idea of a blush that is a gel. I suspect it will stay on a little longer than a powder would, but I think the bold red color might be a little much for me. I do trust MAC though so I am always open to trying new things. Another new thing I might try in this collection is the perfume. If it makes me long for spring as much as the colors of the collection do, I am sold. I have listed the complete collection below, but if we learn of any updates, we’ll be sure to let you know.

Eyeshadow

• Creme de Violet - Pink-violet with gold pearl (Frost) (Permanent)
• Et Tu, Bouquet - (LE)
• Of Summer - (LE)
• Shadowy Lady - Blackened plum (Matte) (Permanent)
• Silver Thorn - (LE)

Pigment
• Circa Plum - Frosty mid-tone lavender (Frost) (Repromote from Colour Forms) (LE)
• Mutiny - Sky Blue with gold pearlized pigments (Frost) (Repromote from Naughty Nauticals) (LE)

Lipstick
• A Rose Romance - (LE)
• Odyssey - Spiked-up plum (Frost) (Permanent)
• Way To Love - (LE)

Lipglass
• Magnetique - (Repromote from Belle Azure and Holiday Minis ‘09) (LE)
• Steal My Heart - (LE)
• Virgin Kiss - (LE)

See Thru Lip Colour
• Loving Touch - (LE)
• Secret Crush - (LE)
• Tender Tryst - (LE)

Gel Blush
• Just a Pinch - (LE)

Beauty Powder
• Blush of Youth - (LE)
• Summer Rose - (LE)

Nail Lacquer
• Love & Friendship - (LE)

Splashproof Lash
Blacksplash - Black

Other

Fix+ Rose - An aqua-spritz of vitamin and minerals, infused with a calm-the-skin blend of green tea, chamomile, cucumber, topped off with the fresh, natural, energizing scent of Sugi. Adds radiance, finishes makeup (LE)

Creations: DejaRose - A striking bouquet of lush Bulgarian, Turkish and Tea Red Roses, ruffled with dewy watery and luminous green nuances. Velvety petals of exotic Orchid, Lily, Jasmine and Peony are teased with a hint of crimson Red Raspberry and the gentle texture of Pink Pepper. The interplay of light and dark woods, weathered Teak contrasting with Patchouli, adds to the intensity, while hypnotic Incense vapors and Amber Crystals lend a sense of intrigue and allure to this sensuous creation. A thoroughly modern “retro-scent”: Dejarose. (Repromote from DejaRose) (LE)

MAC’s new Color Ready Collection is set to release on April 2, 2009. It offers a little old and a little new. Word on the street is that the majority of the lipstick, eyeshadow, liner, and brows are all re-promotes. But don’t tune out just yet, this collection still has some new and, what I think, are very exciting products.

This collection is introducing the Prep+ Prime products which include a line filler, skin refiner, and finishing powder. The Prep + Prime, as its name implies, helps prep and prime your face for the best possible makeup application. The liner goes on invisible, but it keeps your actual liner bold and in place for hours to come.

The skin refiner and finishing powder both also go on transparent, but help with the overall finish of your makeup. Allegedly, the skin refiner reduces pores and makes any wrinkles less noticeable. The finishing powder again helps to hold all of your makeup in place to keep you looking fresh all day long. I am especially intrigued by the Prep + Prime Skin Refined Zone. If it does what it claims to do, I think I’ll be a customer for life.

While not everyone is overly excited about the re-promotes, I will say that the eye shadow color Bitter is simply spectacular. The golden green especially looks fantastic on people with any kind of green in their eyes. If you haven’t bought these colors before, they are definitely worth taking a closer look at. For you to be able to do so, we’ve listed the entire collection.

Lipstick
• Impassioned - Amped-up fuchsia
• Show Orchid - Vivid hot pink

Eyeshadow
• Bitter - Vivid bright golden green flecked with shimmer
• White Frost - Vivid bright white with icy shimmer

Penultimate Eye Liner
• Rapid Black - True Black

Eye Brows
• Stud - Deep rich blackened brown

Primers
• Prep + Prime Line Filler
• Prep + Prime Skin Refined Zone
• Prep + Prime Transparent Finishing Powder

Brushes
• 129SH - All-purpose for blush or face powder. This brush is particularly great for applying blushes. Brush has soft fibers which form a full, rounded shape.