Stila at TJ Maxx!? A rant/review.

You see that brush right there? That adorable brush with the cute as a button floral handle? I bought that at TJ Maxx for around three dollars. When I saw it I thought "woah what is a Stila brush doing at TJ Maxx, and for three dollars!?" So I bought it. It's actually a quite nice brush except today I noticed something...

Yeah that's right "Stella"

I'm almost ashamed to say how long I've had this and thought that I was using a genuine Stila brush but it's been a little over three months because I bought it right before school started. Even after I bought it I checked online to see if Stila was still selling these particular brushes because they were so cute and I wanted to buy a full set of these, but nothing popped up. Please don't mock me for making this mistake because at the time I wasn't very familiar with Stila, I just knew that they had cute packaging so you can see how I was easily fooled.

The good

Front view 

The Fibers seem to be natural since they're not as "slick" or shiny as synthetic brushes, but it's really soft considering all the other natural hair brushes I've gotten have been slightly scratchy. (If anyone has the Elf Essentials blending brush it feels like that only maybe a hair softer)

I'd say it's good for traveling in your makeup bag because it's only six inches which is fairly small and it'll fit into most make up bags. For a size comparison here it is next to an elf blush and a Sephora Lipstick tube.

Please ignore my oddly shaped head and instead look at the glow in my cheeks

It does a really good job of putting on blush and giving you a nice natural glow

The bad

woah look at all that shedding

I was giving all my brushes a quick clean when I notice that this brush in particular was shedding the most, even my $1 elf brushes did not shed. Sadly I threw away the hairs so the little pile of hairs you're looking at right now is from the second cleaning I did just so i could take a picture of the shedding. On a normal basis though, there is no shedding, which is why I was surprised that it shed so much when I cleaned it.

The little hairs wanted to pop up and say hello

The Brush also looks like it was poorly cut or trimmed or whatever they do to make all the hairs even or angled because since I got it there have been two to three hairs that stick up above the rest of the hairs and it's really annoying but not exactly a deal breaker.

Overall

The brush is actually really good despite being "Stella" and not Stila; it's soft, small, and does a fairly good job of putting on blush and buffing it out, plus it was less than $3 and it's really cute, but sadly it does shed when you clean it and can come with some imperfections which actually isn't too bad. If I had a chance to buy more of these I defiantly would.

Mini Haul?

I'm not exactly sure at what point a haul stops being a mini haul and becomes a full sized one, but since this is my first actual haul I'll just call it mini (plus it makes me feel better about spending)

For the past few days I had been feeling down in the dumps due to a weird quarter life crisis (Worrying about the future and trying to find permanence) so my solution to this was to go on a spree, with my best friend Ani I visited: Ulta, Target, and Rite Aid searching for makeup to make me feel better

The first thing I sought out was the EcoTools Fresh & Flawless 5 Piece Complexion Brush Set , but it wasn't there so I had to settle on the six piece day to night clutch set ($16.99) which overall ended up being a better deal since I wanted eye brushes anyways. I wish I could tell you that these all work fantastic and that if you want moderately priced eye brushes that work fantastic you should seek these out, but due to the fact that my father has absolutely NO SCISSORS in his home I can't even get the box open. What I can tell you from squishing my fat little fingers through the open space of the plastic cover and felling what little I could of the brushes is WOAH these brushes are super soft. That's basically all I can say though.

The last two things I was able to pick up were the Essence Long Lasting eye pencil In Black Fever ($2.49) and the NYX Auto Eyebrow Pencil  in Dark brown ($4.99).

(Pencil liner- Top, Eyebrow Pencil- Bottom)

I've never bought anything from Essence before but due to the raving of Emily Noel on youtube I wanted to try their cream liner, sadly just like my brush set it was not there, fortunately though I saw the pencil liner and decided to take a chance because my goodness this is one of the creamiest pencil liners I've tried, since it's super creamy it would be great to use in a smokey eye. As for the NYX Eyebrow Pencil... It's the polar opposite of the Essence liner, it feels fairly dry and hard; are they supposed to be that way? Anyways I wasn't too impressed with the pencil especially it's supposed to be "Dark" brown, but looks more like an ashy brown, I'm afraid it'll make my brows look weird especially since my eyebrows are so dark they're almost black. 

Next we headed over to Target where Ani and I proceeded to go into a frenzy at the Elf shelf. I bought:

• Blush In Mellow Mauve ($3)
• Eyebrow Kit in Medium (they didn't have dark so I settled) ($3)
• "Mechanical Eyelash Curler" ($1)
• Eyelid Primer ($1)
• "Shine Eraser" (oil blotting papers) ($1)
• Blending Eye Brush ($1)
• Eye Primer and Liner Sealer ($3)

Honestly when I came home I thought I bought like five brushes, but it turns out my inner cheapo was trying to spoil my fun and only allowed me one, and in general I thought I bought more elf products than I actually did, weird how that happens. Despite being one of the essential brushes which tend to be less soft than the Studio line the Blending Brush was incredibly soft. 

I can't really give any quick thoughts on anything besides the brush right now because I don't really have time to play with the stuff, and even the blush which would be the easiest to swatch does not want to come out of it's packaging and I don't feel like fighting it anymore at 12 am, and even if I got it out the lighting in my room currently sucks. I did use the blotting sheets, and they do remove oil from your face, I would provide a photo with the evidence, but you don't need to see that.

(I might have gone a little crazy on the glade)

According to Target it is no longer Autumn and we should throw out all of our Fall decor and replace it with Christmas stuff! Luckily for me though this means that all of Glade's Fall scents are on clearance. I might have gone a little crazy because this Fall they came out with a Salted Caramel scent that smells ten times better than any of the Christmas/Winter scents they've put out. I think I got scared that I would never be able to buy any of these fresheners again so I ended up buying refills to products I don't even own like the scented oil plugins, and the automatic spray. Oh well... I'll buy them eventually.

Out of pressure to be quick and pick a moisturizer I ended up going with Olay Complete all day moisturizer with sunscreen (the one in the yellow box), but it was only after getting home I realized that I did not want it. I already have a similar Olay moisturizer at home and honestly I hate it; It gives my skin a weird slightly slick feeling that doesn't completely go away until I put powder on. I have no doubt that this one will be exactly the same but with SPF 15 (not very impressive)

look at that beauty

One of my favorite things that I got from target was the Boots No7 Beautiful skin Eye make up remover (7.99), I originally planned on buying the cheapest eye makeup remover target had *cough* up and up *cough* but a boots saleswoman asked me what I was looking for and then handed me that beautiful bottle in the front. To be honest I only ended up buying it because the packaging was so pretty and the two different colored liquids reminded me of those soap dispensers that had the same thing in them but they would have little duckies floating around, when the sales woman handed me the bottle I wanted it to buy it, plus I couldn't put it back right in front of her and say "Oh sorry I'm too cheap."

Finally we come to my Rite Aid purchases, which happen to be the most disappointing purchases of my haul. I bought The Smooth Skin Bronzing Face powder in Sunny ($2.69) and the HD Color Trio in Late Night Latte.

I had such high hopes for the bronzer because Emily Noel kept recommending it on Beauty Broadcast, but sadly when I got home and took off the packaging it was already broken, the little thing that keeps it shut is chipped so the compact can't close. If that were the only problem I wouldn't complain but when I swatched this on the LIGHTEST part of my arm I could not even see the bronzer so sadly this bronzer is going back.

I can't really say anything bad about the eye shadow trio since I haven't tried it yet, but I'm still going to return it because I accidentally took the wrong shade oops! I have nothing against the colors, but they look too dark for me.

Did any of you guys go shopping this weekend? What did you buy and did you like it?