Time for a game of What If!

What if…you found a palette that satisfied both your appetite for stylish accessories and your appetite for makeup?

And what if said palette were available now, at this very moment (depending on your time zone), and the powder eyeshadows and blushes within it not only helped you get your pretty on, but they also improved your skin?

Blarney! you say? Nope, ’tis not science fiction. Tarte believes that such a thing exists, and it was last seen escaping from the Amazon!

Wait — that’s not right. It’s just called Amazon Escape, as in the Tarte Amazon Escape Amazonian Clay Eye & Cheek Palette, and for $44 it pledges to beautify your eyes and cheeks while improving your skin.

The secret sauce in this palette parolee? A skin-loving trifecta of Amazonian clay (to nourish skin, reduce oil and improve texture), vitamin E (which acts as an anti-inflammatory emollient and protects against damage by free radicals), and soothing mineral pigments shown to soften skin.

Just as important as all that…it’s cute!

And it’s on shelves now.

I have to admit, the packaging is what first caught my attention, but the colors and claimed skin benefits also make a compelling case, not that I can detect any results after testing it for a week.

Based on the colors, at least, I think it definitely deserves more time. The six powder shadows and two blushes in the kit are downright gorgeous!

Swatches from the left: Blushes in Free and Exposed; Eyeshadows in Tame, Rare, Rope, Camo, Canopy and Tribal
(read more…)

Things I encountered this afternoon…

1. A piece of chocolate cake.

Portion control is lame

2. A pinkish coral blush that smells like a mixed berry smoothie (more on this in a minute!).

3. Jeremy Renner doing push-ups in my living room… He texted this morning to ask if he could come over on my lunch break (“Hey, girl, I’m in Novato!”).

Alright, so maybe that third thing didn’t happen. Truth is, Jeremy and I went makeup shopping at Sephora this afternoon…

Okay, okay, I’ll stop!

But seriously, I can’t wait to see Jeremy in the new Bourne movie. Maybe I’ll wear Tarte’s new Cheek Stain in Loving ($30) to the show.

If I do, one thing’s for sure — I know my cheeks will smell good, LOL!
(read more…)

Rrrrow! Tarte hopes we’ll heed the call of the wild, jungle cats and kittens, and prance over to Sephora and Ulta stores to peruse the new fall 2012 collection (available now in stores and online).

Here’s a quick look at the eye palettes and some of the other pieces from the collection…

Amazon Escape: Amazonian Clay Eye and Cheek Palette ($44)

Available exclusively at Sephora

Call of the Wild Amazonian Clay 8-Shadow Collector’s Palette ($36)

Available exclusively at Ulta

(read more…)

This morning, while Janet rocked, “What have you done for me lately?” I sang something similar while applying the products in Tarte’s latest makeup kit.

What Has Your Makeup Done For You Lately? — that’s a good question, and it’s also the name of the $49 six-piece kit (a QVC exclusive).

Listening to Janet, I came this close to teasing my hair and slipping into something with shoulder pads, but then I came to my senses, thankfully, because real life ’80′s fashion wasn’t always as cool as a John Hughes film…

For this look, I’m wearing all of the products in the kit except for the Maracuja Oil, and I’m also wearing Tarte’s Amazonian Clay 12-Hour Blush in Peaceful on my cheeks, because the kit doesn’t come with a blush.

(read more…)

Every time I say the name of Tarte’s new $49 QVC exclusive kit, “What Has Your Makeup Done For You Lately?” (a $160 value) I think of this old-school Janet Jackson jam…

I find it really funny that I can’t remember the last name of that boy I dated for three months in my freshman year in college (Mike something-or-other? I want to say Mendoza?), but I can recite the lyrics from Janet’s video word for word!

“What’s up, girl?”

“He stood me up again.”

“Again?!”

“Um-hmm.”

“Well, what’s up with this guy? Do you really like him that much?”

“Yes, honey, I love him. He is fine. He does a lot of nice things for me.”

“I know he used to do nice stuff for you, but what has he done for you lately?”

Don’t even get me started on the choreography.

But I digress…

Tarte’s latest makeup kit, a QVC exclusive (QVC and QVC.com) on July 13, features six pieces, most of them new.

For $49, or about 70 percent off the regular price of all of the products purchased separately, you get one LipSurgence Lip Shine in Smitten (a glossy pink), the new Pure Maracuja Oil Rollerball, the new Retoucher Flawless Finish Bamboo Foundation Brush, the new Maracuja Miracle 12-HR Foundation with Broad Spectrum SPF 15 (choose from one of five shades in Fair, Light, Medium, Tan and Deep), the new modernEYES Waterproof Creaseless Shadow/Liner in Plumberry/Plum Brown, and a re-promoted Amazonian Clay Smart Mascara.

Oh — and as a bonus, you also get a sample jar of Tarte’s new Maracuja C-Brighter Eye Treatment, a cream designed to conceal dark circles immediately and diminish the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles over time.

(read more…)