LittleMissYaya: Lips

Lip Service

The magazines and websites are ablaze with lip colors that are trending this season. The truth of the matter is that anything bright is on par with the trends. The standout colors shouldn't be too surprising, as they always peek their heads out as soon as the sun comes out to play for real. Case in point: orange and pink. A newcomer to the popular table is the lilac and purple lipstick. Let's blame it on the gals who take the stage in costumes your mother would never advise you wear. As far as the red - well that one never goes out of style. A bright red lip is a bad-mamajama all year, come rain sleet or snow (and unlike the postal service, it doesn't take days off).

I love the orange trend the most because a lot of the times it comes off as a red depending on what shade you get it in, and how you wear it, and it makes your teeth look brighter than your toothpaste ever could. Though I have favorite lipsticks for all of the shades, the hands down winner is the selection of colors by Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics with their Lip Tars. The best thing with them is that you can even mix them to customize your own color.

p.s. I had to add a celebrity example in a variety of skin tones because I don't want to hear anyone say the color doesn't look good on their skin. Retire that mindset!

Which color tickles your fancy the most?

More Yves Saint Laurent...

Armour Lip Gloss

Tell me when you have a single day of not needing a lip gloss. No go ahead, tell me... I'll wait. If there are in fact days that I can't make it for long without my lip gloss, ipod, or cell phone - I feel naked without these! How sad!

If my bag doesn't have lip products, my money inevitably gets spent on something new. Most of the time it's on a cheap filler product and other times on a great newbie. The case with this Armour Beauty lipgloss was neither. I was at The Makeup Show (and going to the show, you can surely expect to spend money before you leave) and met the folks behind the company. They had a quaint setup for the product, and the packaging is pretty smooth too. I invested in a single gloss and promised to do a thorough review.

The first major win for me was the packaging. I love a good packaged product y'all. If you're a regular reader on MOJ, you will know this to be a fact. Great packaging is the way into my wallet and heart!

Want to know more about the brand? Check out the info from their 'About' page:

p.s. I'm still figuring out the coding for this darn setup, so instead of having a 'continue reading' link, please click on the post title to read the rest! If you know the answer to my dilemma, I'd love to hear it!

OCC Lip Tars

After our quick introduction at my first Makeup Show, Obessive Compulsive Cosmetics hit the ranks of favorite products faster than any other brand ever has. The main reason for this is their innovative and extensive color selection in their lip tar and loose pigments for eyes. But many brands have large color selection for eyes, lips? Not so much.

As previously mentioned, the lip tars are not necessarily a gloss, nor a stain, their a happy mixture in between. They come in small packaging but half a squeeze lasts forever. When I wore this color to Mercedes Benz Fashion Week, it lasted through far more shows than I expect and granted me a compliment from a makeup artist (when I actually thought I ate the color away!).

My two new colors (and appropriately my two new favorites, although - Anime will forever remain #1) are Uber, and Katricia.

Tart Kisses

Upon my last visit to Sephora, I saw what I was looking for plenty of visits prior. The Tarte Natural Lip Stains have arrived. After I saw these babies in People Style Watch, I was so excited I could have ran up and down the street and told everyone about it a la The British are coming!

Are you guys familiar with Tarte Cosmetics? The ecofriendly cosmetics line rocks my socks with the quality of products they continue to put out. There is not a single stinkin' season that they spare me and my wallet of any wants or needs (and there are plenty of both). Truthfully? The guys and gals behind Tarte can sell me a lemon of a car (that'd be a very poorly working car) and I'd buy it in a jiffy. The honest truth? They'd never do such a thing! They stand behind their products and I'm happy to as well.

The colors look like this:

Some tech talk from the site:

"What it is:

A natural lip stain that is clinically proven to increase lips' moisture content by 6000%.

What it does:

After 10 years the wait is finally over. These much-anticipated natural lip stains are an extension to the best-selling and award-winning cheek stains. Just like the iconic cheek stains, each emotive, peppermint-infused shade smoothly glides on lips for a natural flush that will stay all day. So say goodbye to reapplying your lip color throughout the day and say hello to a gorgeous pop of color and hydration that lasts.

What it is formulated WITHOUT:

- Parabens - Sulfates

- Synthetic Fragrances - Synthetic Dyes

- Petro-Chemicals - Phthalates

- GMOs - Triclosan

What else you need to know:

The old meets the new with the infusion of our high-performance natural LipSurgence™ technology which is clinically proven to increase moisture content by an astonishing 6000%. This proprietary blend effectively increases skin's water content for a 'plumped up' appearance leaving lips defined, smoothed, and hydrated. The result is naturally fuller, healthier lips without any irritation or stinging. Like the cheek stains, each shade of these natural lip stains will leave a natural hint of tint that will last throughout the day. These shades are great to wear alone or pair with your favorite tarte lipgloss. This product is free from gluten, animal testing, formaldehyde donors, oil, talc, MEA/ DEA/ TEA."

Now... the only problem is that I cannot find any store that is fully stocked with these babies. I swear I will be turning into a Tarte junkie, sleeping outside of a Sephora waiting for a new shipment to arrive.

From the reviews I read on the wide web, a lot of people are fond of the product (did I mention they smell great?), but take up with the title of 'lip stain.' After coming in contact with these, I have to say they are not strictly a lip stain. The fact that they moisturize, and by doing that, add a bit of gloss makes me want to call this a hybrid of a tinted lip balm and a stain.

My swatches come courtesy of the testers on the counters of Sephora, and I will be reporting back as soon as I have a few of these babies in my lip product family.

Anything from Tarte getting you excited?

EOS - Evolution of Smooth

I have been hearing about EOS lip balm for a while now. The cute packaging, the roundness. Everyone had something to say about it, but I felt a little left out. Not anymore!

After a quick trip to Walgreens, I found a holiday three pack of the buggers still on sale by the counter. The three pack was meant for the winter holidays, but worked for February just fine.

The pack that I purchased had two mint flavors (peppermint and sweetmint - a lot like the Orbit gum!) and a sweet flavor (honeysuckle honeydew - which my mom stole from me). I think the trio I purchased may have had an error as it said that I'd get a summer fruit flavor, but oh well!

back packaging

There are so many things that I liked about these even before use.

First - the rubberized packaging. Think of a rubber grip cover for your phone. It feels like that but is in a cute round shape.

Second, I already mentioned it - how cute is this miniature roundbottom? If you are a sucker for cute packaging, you won't get far saying no to this.

Also, I am very much a fan of packaging that screws in instead of just popping off. After numerous a handbag accident where a cosmetic item has decapped itself and then proceeded to soil the contents of my bag, I can really appreciate packaging that requires opposable thumbs to open it.

But then of course, we had to open the product for the real review to begin.

All cuteness aside, I was looking for some soft results.

Anatomicals - Crack is Wack

After reading past reviews of mine, you would probably come to the correct conclusion that I put more thought into the product than just the product itself. Even if a product is effective, if nothing makes you pick it up from the counter at your nearest store, or from your nearest e-tailer, nobody gets anywhere. The company doesn't get the money they rightfully deserve for a great product, and you miss out on the product experience of having something so perfect for you land in your hand. So companies hire Public Relations and Advertising teams. And Yaya? She tries to pay attention to those efforts as well.

So where does Anatomicals fit in this equation? Well. Let's inspect. Start first with the website here. The page lets you choose if you want to be introduced to the company here or just go straight into a purchasing cloud nine here. Want to know more? Of course you would. The page flashes images and keywords on them. Cheeky. Pimpish. Urban. Lush. Defiant. Punky. Alluring. Etc. Catchy. The company is described to simply trying to make your life better, and says if you are not interested, to click over (won't tell you where, it ruins the surprise!).

Now we stand with a definite opinion about the company. Not sold yet? That's okay. They gave you enough to ponder about. Love it? I knew you would. Enter stage 2. The quirky and loveable product descriptions usually done with white font on bright color block backgrounds. This is for more than just the random 'let's read the label' moment. This makes you read. A bit like the Vitamin Water tidbits they have (on the Dragonfruit one they promise no real dragons were hurt in the making of the drink). You read the clever title and the description.