My Beauty Buying Mistakes

With only two weeks left in my Project X Pan, I've really been thinking about how I've ended up with so many products.  I've analyzed and come up with some explanations for my buying mistakes.


#1: I love this color
So I buy five of the exact same shade of shimmery taupe eyeshadow from five different brands, even though there is no discernible difference between any of them.  Or three of the same shade of matte coral blush... I could go on.


#2: I love this line
I try one shade of shadow and it's pigmented, soft and lovely.  The second one is a hit too.  Then I end up buying every shade of shadow they sell even though I know I will rarely, if ever wear that emerald or cobalt eyeshadow from Wet N Wild.


#3: I want to experiment
I want to branch out and try some different colors of eyeliner so I buy five different shades of blue eyeliner and only end up liking one of them.  Now I'm stuck with four duds.


#4: I have to settle
I do my research extensively.  I pick out the product I want, the shade I want and I go shopping with a well thought out and prepared list of the specific items I want.  Then they are sold out of all of them.  Or my store doesn't carry that item.  But I got so excited about having that product and I'm so disappointed that the store is sold out of it that I end up buying a similar item that I know nothing about and have heard nothing about and it ends up sucking eggs.


#5: Lack of knowledge
I do my research.  I go online and read reviews, product descriptions and ingredients labels and pick out what I think is the perfect hair product.  I get it home and turns out that my hair didn't need an anti-frizz serum, but rather a leave in conditioner to fight my frizz.  And I just don't know what product I should be buying because I don't know that much about hair types or products.


#6: Impulse Buys
I have to stop at the grocery store and pick up milk and it's been a crummy day at work and I'm tired and grumpy and then I see that beautiful new pink lipstick just staring at me.  I smile as I get out to the car and put it on.  I drive home, put the milk away, look in the mirror and OH MY GOSH it looks like I'm four and I've been playing in mommy's makeup bag!  What was I thinking?  Frosty hot pink is not your look, woman!


#7: Forgot to Save the Receipt
I picked up a lipstick while at the grocery store and forgot to save the receipt... it was only two items, after all.  Then I realize that the lipstick I now hate was $8.00 that could have been spent on that old lipstick that I used up and loved.


#8: Deceptive Store Lighting
I swear in the lighting at Target it looked like it had a golden undertone but I get it home to find out it looks like a completely different color in natural light... in a bad way.


#9: I'm Almost Out
I've used an anti-frizz cream until it seems to be nearly gone so I purchase a new brand.  Then I find that I like the new brand better and I never finish the first cream I had.  Or even better, I'm almost out of this mousse I love but I want to try something new so I go with a different product, hate it, and end up buying the old reliable product without ever making a dent in the faulty product.


#10: It's My Holy Grail
I've wasted hundreds of dollars on setting powders that I hate and I now have a drawer of ten powders that have been used three times.  The eleventh purchase is a winner - a Holy Grail makeup item - and since every Holy Grail I have gets discontinued a month later, I decide to stock up when it goes on sale.  Suddenly I have twenty of the same powder and even though it's great, I'm starting to get a little bored with it.


I could probably go on like this for enough pages to fill a book but these were the top ten mistakes I make when buying beauty products.  It's felt really good to use up so many items over the last two months but I'm looking forward to trying out (a few) new products!  I hope that maybe this post will help you to self-analyze your shopping habits as well and perhaps avoid some of my mistakes!