Lost Your Makeup? Try These Top Drugstore Products

Beauty Thought Leader: Elise Marquam-Jahns

You board an airline for a two-hour flight. But when you get to the baggage carousel, your bag is nowhere to be found.

You have your carry-on, fortunately. So you have some clothes to change into. But you’d put all your makeup in the checked bag and now it’s gone. So you have to start from scratch and replace all your makeup.

Makeup Shopping List:

In today’s article and video, I’ll create a makeup shopping list for you of great drugstore products that I’d totally recommend. That can help you look like the absolute best version of you. 

“Having brows that frame our eyes and draw attention to them can make a huge difference in how we look.”

First, let’s focus on eyebrows. Many of us experience some pretty major changes with our eyebrows. The brow hair may become sparser. We may have white and grey brow hairs popping up or we may start to see fewer and fewer brow hairs in the tails of our eyebrows.

In other words, our brows start to become more and more invisible. Having brows that frame our eyes and draw attention to them can make a huge difference in how we look. So brow products are essential for most of us. Elf’s Instant Lift Brow pencil does a great job of filling in brows and the price tag is pretty unbelievable at $4.00. It’s a creamy smudge-proof formula that glides on very easily. It also has a spoolie brush on the other end which helps get rid of excess product so the brows look very natural. Moreover, it comes in five shades. 

Grey Eyebrow Pencil:

The taupe shade often works for those of us with grey brow hairs. But if you’re looking specifically for a grey eyebrow pencil, the NYX Micro brow pencil is a great choice. It comes in 12 colors—including grey. And costs $11.00. But I want to also mention another brand that I’ve recently discovered. That is specifically for those of us with grey hair and brows.

It’s called Eye Embrace. This company has seven different shades of grey in both their eyebrow powder and their pencils. So if it’s been challenging for you to find just the right shade of grey brow color, you’ll definitely want to check out this brand. It is a little more expensive than drugstore brands. But if you’ve had trouble finding a great grey brow shade match, the products from this company might really be life savers.  

And if you need a drugstore product that adds volume to your brows, I’d add Elf’s Wow Brow to your shopping list. It has built in fibers that create the look of fuller brows. And this last brow product works perfectly for those who want to tame wiry brow hairs. Or who want to cover white and grey brow hairs. Very few eyebrow products do a good job of covering white and grey brow hairs, but this one is really exceptional. It’s Maybelline’s Brow Fast Sculpt.

Different Types Of Eyeshadow Looks:

Next, let’s talk eyeshadow. And since we all have different prefer different types of eyeshadow looks, I’m going to list several different eyeshadow palette options that meet different needs. First, if you like very small neutral eyeshadow palettes, Elf’s “I Love You a Latte” Bite Size eyeshadow palette is a perfect choice. It has four all matte colors which look great no matter what your eye color is. But if you like some shimmer, Elf also has you covered because they have 9 other Bite Size Eyeshadow quads—all of which have some shimmer or metallic shades.  

“As far as eyeliner goes, all of these eyeshadow palettes have color options that will work beautifully as eyeliner.”

If you like matte shadow, but want more neutral color options, Colourpop’s “Gone Matte” palette would be right up your alley. It contains 30 smooth, buttery all matte shades in a range of warm to cool toned nudes and neutrals, peaches, beiges, taupes, pinks mauves and greys. 

If you’re looking for far more color variety, Colourpop’s “Fade Into Hue” palette might be what you want to add to your shopping list. 

As far as eyeliner goes, all of these eyeshadow palettes have color options that will work beautifully as eyeliner.

For mascara my top drugstore choice is L’Oreal’s Lash Paradise. It’s a lengthening, volumizing, fragrance free mascara that’s smudge resistant and clump resistant and costs $11.99.  

Glow With Medium Coverage:

The Foundation I’d recommend depends on your skin type, how much coverage you want and the type of finish you prefer. For those of you who want some glow with medium coverage and have dry to combination skin, I highly recommend L’Oreal’s Age Perfect Serum Foundation. That’s what I’m wearing in the accompanying video. And for a little more coverage, I’ve mixed it with Catrice’s True Skin Foundation.  

If you want sheer coverage with a bit of a sheen Maybelline’s Super Stay 24 Hour Skin Tint is a good choice. And a great overall drugstore foundation with medium coverage that’s especially good for combination and oily skin is L’Oreal’s Tru Match Super Blendable Foundation that creates a natural finish.  

My concealer recommendation is Elf’s Hydrating Camo Concealer if you have dry to combination skin. The shade “Light Peach” or “Medium Peach” works great as a corrector. If you have oily skin, go with the regular Camo Concealer.  

For contour or bronzer, definitely add Makeup Revolution’s Cream Bronzer to your list. I have the shades “Light” and “Medium” which I often combine.  

My Favorite Top Drugstore Products:

Unfortunately my favorite recommended drugstore blush has been discontinued (or it’s being reformulated because it’s no longer on the company’s website). It was Flower Beauty’s Blush Bomb which is a wonderful gel formula. But in its place, I have two products I’m recommending that tie for this position. One is Elf’s regular putty blush which comes in 8 shades or their Luminous putty blush which comes in 6 colors. And the other blush is Wet and Wild’s Megaglow Blush Stick which comes in 6 shades. In the video I’ll apply Elf’s Luminous Putty blush on one side and the Wet and Wild Megaglow blush in “Dusty Pink” on the other side. 

“My lip liner recommendation is a hands down favorite since it prevents lipstick from bleeding.”

My highlighter choice is a very long time favorite from Wet and Wild: it’s their Megaglow Liquid Highlight which comes in 5 shades. I have “Halo, Goodbye.” But if you prefer a more subtle highlight, definitely go with their stick highlight which comes in 4 shades. I love the shade “When the Nude Strikes.” In the video I’ve applied the liquid highlight on one side and the stick highlight on the other so you can see the difference.  

Lip Liner Recommendation:

My lip liner recommendation is a hands down favorite since it prevents lipstick from bleeding. It’s L’Oreal’s Age Perfect lip liner which is available in 8 shades. In addition, my lipstick choice is from Milani. My recommendation is their Color Statement Lipstick which comes in 20 shades and in the video I combine two of them: “Pink Frost” and “Violet Volt.” My lip gloss of choice for you would be from Sephora’s brand which is called their Glossed Lip Gloss which comes in 23 shades. The wide variety of shades is one of my top reasons for recommending this gloss. Plus, it also comes in shimmer varieties. In the video I’ll apply the shade “Wild” which is a pink violet.  

And last but not least is powder which I’ll apply in my T-Zone.  It’s from Maybelline and it’s their Lasting Fix Banana Loose Powder.  

So these are the products I’d put on your “definitely buy” list if you had to start all over purchasing new drugstore makeup products. They are all top notch products that won’t let you down.  

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