Summer always seems to be a time to refresh my personal care routine. I usually end up getting a haircut right at the beginning of summer, I take more care to paint my toenails (no one sees them in the winter, after all), and I change up my makeup routine to be a little lighter and fresher. Don't you love the seasonal changes? I read once, (I'm pretty sure it was in one of C.S. Lewis's books) that God perhaps made the seasons because we as humans need a certain level of sameness and routine, but also expected change, as with the seasons. The cycling of the seasons allows us a chance to reminisce about years past, but also keeps things fresh - something we would be missing in a seasonless world.
With that in mind, I just thought I'd share a few of my summery beauty favorites, just for fun. If you need a little refresh in your routine, maybe give one of these products or suggestions a try!
Makeup Picks
Everyone says that you should go a little lighter and fresher with summer makeup, and I concur. I especially change up the eyeshadow palettes I use in the summer to include less color and more neutrals, but I have to say that the palettes below are some of my favorites for any time of the year too!
Huda Beauty Nude Eyeshadow Palette
This is my favorite palette for the summer - I've used it so much that I might need to purchase another one. Since I'm very fair, I need palettes with really pale shades mixed in, and the light pallet in this collection has those light shades I need. The mattes are nice, and I really love just a dab of the shimmery shade in the middle of my eyelid - it brightens up everything and adds a little sparkle. They also have a medium and rich palette that look lovely for deeper skin tones.
Colourpop Wild Nothing Palette
This palette has a desert motif, and I love it for summer. Several of the matte shades have pinpoint sparkles in them, which make them feel a little special but still really neutral. For fancier days, the shimmers really add a wow factor. And I'm sure your eye will be drawn to that green - let me assure you, it's a very neutral green, if you can believe it, and I love the way it looks on.
Going Coconuts Palette
This is my go-to for all the time - all of the colors in this palette just work. And that shimmer shade in the middle is more sheer than it looks, and the perfect neutral shimmer to brighten your eyes.
It Cosmetics CC Cream
I unfortunately, have a lot of sun damage to my skin from when I was pregnant (melasma), and I haven't found another foundation that covers it so well while still looking natural. The finish of this foundation actually looks like my real skin. I have a hard time finding makeup that matches my pale skin, and the lightest shade of this foundation is unfortunately a smidge darker than my natural skin tone, but it blends out really well and looks about right with a little translucent powder on top. And it's such a good product that I can put up with a slight shade mismatch. Tip: Sign up for the newsletter on the website and wait for their (really good) sales.
NYX Bare With Me Skin Veil
I grabbed this product to try, and if you want really light coverage, I think this is a good one. If I have a day where I don't want to look so made up, but I still want to minimize my melasma, this is a nice one - you can still see spots/freckles through it, but it has a blurring effect. I'd use this for beach or pool days, etc.
Makeup Revolution Highlight Reloaded
My usual highlight product was out of stock the last time I was at Ulta, so I decided to try this one instead and ended up really liking it. If you are a little shy of using highlighter (I'm not, the shinier the better), this is a really subtle and pretty highlighter. I think even a tiny bit of highlighter just makes everything look so pretty and glow-y, and this one looks really natural.
Bath And Body Works Mentha Lip Gloss
Do you remember when these minty lip glosses were so popular? I was probably in high school when they came out. I rediscovered them this spring, and remembered that I still really like them.
Fashion/Beauty Channels
I hop around to different beauty channels occasionally when I want to play with my makeup, and I always appreciate Gines videos. Her looks are always so elegant, and her neutral looks are some of the prettiest I've found. (Link is to her tutorial playlist.)
I always have to include Emily Noelle, because I first learned how to play around with different eye looks from her. Her tutorials are really doable, and I feel like she explains more thoroughly than other tutorials I watched, and she also uses more affordable makeup in a lot of her videos (link above is to her tutorial playlist).
I don't really watch many fashion channels because they typically make me want to buy stuff, but the one I make an exception for is Shea Whitney. What I love about her channel most is the way she gives tips on ways to make your clothes look just a little better. Her videos about what styles are going in and out of fashion are also interesting to me, but she tells her thoughts in a way that is not dogmatic. I think her style is really classic, which is also helpful to me since I've been working toward buying pieces that will work for me for a while (not just for the next year or two).
Other Recommendations
Loreal Sublime Bronze Tanning Mousse
A few years back I won a free self-tanning mousse that I really liked, but it wass too expensive for me to want to buy myself. I set out to find a dupe, and this one is pretty close. This is a self-tanning mouse, which I think goes on much more evenly than a lotion. I do maybe one application a week, just to give my skin a tiny bit of color, and I think it looks really natural. I don't know how it would work in you want to look really tan, but for my purposes it's perfect. My one negative is that it leaves my skin just a tad tacky for up to an hour after I apply it, which is annoying. After it dries I usually put on my old pajamas for a minute and that seems to get rid of the tacky feeling.
Kiss Petite Nails
I discovered these nails last summer when I wanted to look just a little more put together for a special event. My nails are naturally fairly thin and small, and difficult to grow longer, so when I wear fake nails that are too long they feel really weird to me. I've also found a lot of fake nail kits have a lot of sizes that I can't use because they are too wide. These ones are made for smaller nails (which I need), and are also quite short. When I wear them they add a bit of glam to my fingers, but without leaving me feeling like I can't function. (How do people with really long nails even open a pop can? I just don't know.). If you have normal size nails but also dislike long fake nails, these "real short" nails are also good!
Expressie Quick Dry in "All Things"
This is just a summery color to me, and the Expressie nail polish dries quicker than the original Essie polish!
Those are my summer favorites for this year! Do you change up any of your products for the summer?
The Huda palette is gorgeous!
Have you tried Red Aspen nails? I don't generally like fake nails but I'd been wanting to find something between manicures which add up (although gel manicures last a while so they can be worth it) and doing it at home which chips after two days. Red Aspen is so good and so affordable. I stopped using fake nails long ago because my hair always got caught between my real nail and the fake, but that never happened with Red Aspen. They fit so snuggly to my real nail. They can also be filed around the entire nail so it's easy to get a good fit. #notaninfluencer
I know nothing about makeup but I really love the Mentha Lip Gloss!
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