Avon has a lot of holiday offerings this season, and I was able to try their Expert Mega Palette and ’tis the season lip balm in Sugar Cookie. Keep reading after the break for my full review!
First Impressions
First of all, I love the packaging of the Sugar Cookie lip balm – it’s totally festive and adorable! It also smells really good, although not exactly the way I remember sugar cookies smelling – it’s more “cookie” and not enough sugar, but that’s great because it means it isn’t overly sweet.
When I opened the Expert Mega Palette, I was amazed at the sheer number of shadows, lipgloss and blush shades. This palette contains every color you could possibly need for your holiday makeup, and I was excited to try it out. It even comes with its own makeup brushes, although I prefer to use my own.
First Use
I tried the Sugar Cookie lip balm right away, and enjoyed the sweet scent. It doesn’t taste like a sugar cookie – or anything, really. I liked how it didn’t leave a waxy feel on my lips like other balms can do. I used this as a moisturizer before putting on lip color and it worked nicely for that purpose. I can also see this being a great go-to lip balm for the holiday season, or whenever your lips need a little pick me up.
For Thanksgiving, I wanted to play up my eyes – the Mega Palette was the perfect way to do that! This palette includes 36 shadows, 36 glosses and six makeup blushes in a wide variety of colors to suit any skin tone. I wanted to do a contemporary version of the smokey eye look for the holiday, so I used three different blue shades included in the palette. The shadows were nicely pigmented, and I didn’t experience any fallout like other powder shadows can cause. Plus, the shadows glided on effortlessly with my shadow brushes, and when I used a primer beforehand I was pleased with the staying power.
I also wanted to use the lip gloss and blush included with the palette. I layered two different lip gloss shades over a regular lipstick and was impressed with how vibrant they looked – it was perfect! Instead of using the blush as an actual blush, though, I used the lightest pink shade as a highlighter. It’s the perfect pale shimmery pink for this purpose, and people were complimenting me on how “radiant” I looked all night.
Overall
I’ve used these shadows without a primer since then, and I can’t say I’d recommend it. Definitely use a shadow primer, and your eyes will pop and stay crease-free and gorgeous throughout the day/night. The lip gloss lasts about as long as you’d expect lip gloss to last for, but the color payoff is worth the short wear time. The blush shades are great to use as a highlighter/illuminator or as regular blush, and last for a decent amount of time.
Overall, I really enjoyed this lip balm and palette from Avon. The lip balm has a great holiday scent, while the palette can create an endless variety of looks. I think this palette would also be a great gift idea for the makeup junkie in your life, or as an introduction to makeup for a teenager. The palette retails for $29.99, an EXCELLENT value, and the lip balm retails for $0.99. You can purchase both via Avon.com.
