I also looked at the Basic Minerals kits...which felt somehow comforting. They have the step by step application description like Beverly's good advice a couple of days ago. But, while the paint by numbers aspect is nice, I fear the one-size fits all colors would not do for my super pale complexion.

I'll be honest that the Bare Minerals never worked with my skin tones. If you want to play with mineral makeup in sheeeeeeeeeeer but effective powders, try Aromaleigh. Massive numbers of colors and samples are $1 a piece (actually foundations might be $2, shadows are $1) so you can try, try, try. And if you just order samples, there is no shipping charge at all. I adore them. And it's really the first time I've had makeup that works on my skin without fuss.

eta to add link and spell the company correctly.

Also, bonny, you might want to try a dryer lipstick than a sheer gloss. Maybe a lipliner pencil to help the color stay where it's put, and then fill in with regular lipstick? I fail so hard at lipstick. I cleared mine out before we moved, and I just counted last week and I have twelve. Two of which I can wear alone, and there may be a half-shade difference between them. The rest are reds and shimmery pinks and beiges that I can't wear alone--too bright or too pale. So I combine them...to make the same peachy taupey beige as the two I do wear alone. I am wed to this shade of lip color.

Oh good call on christening with booze and not laundry, meara. And good luck finding a fast, good locksmith. H changed our locks himself, but it's a much older house. We just bought and installed new locks.

Cass, I ordered a bunch of samples, which cost less than the lipstick I now need to return.

I had such high hopes for it, but it did not last. It ended up looking like a lip liner, missing from the middle of the lip. Much like my old gran used to look. Sigh.

Beverly, I'm feeling your frustration. I fail so hard at lipstick! I've been attempting the actual lipstick, vs. gloss but it just doesn't stay, nor have I found a color that works. Either too orange, to pink or just not right.

What I really need is someone with no financial stake to say, "Here, use this, it looks great on you."

I am wed to this shade of lip color.

Preach it. I stopped buying alternate colors. I have a liner and I have a lipstick (and a sheerer version of the same lipstick by the same company that was a limited time thing and I only have three spares) and that is what I wear. Sometimes I buy glosses and stuff. I don't know why. I wear MAC's Del Rio. This is my way.

Cass, I ordered a bunch of samples, which cost less than the lipstick I now need to return.

Whee! Honestly, I really like them and I don't have any guilt about trying a lot of things before I find one I like enough to buy full-size because I am paying for the samples. It's perfect for my "try before I buy" brain.

What I really need is someone with no financial stake to say, "Here, use this, it looks great on you."

For this, we have samples. And Buffistas.

I wear Clinique's Black Honey gloss and colours that look a lot like that. Also a dark brown, and a red I mix myself.

I've wished there's a pink I could wear, but I'm a high yella black woman. I don't think I can pull off pink lips, ever.

But I thought that about bright red--it took me mixing a very bright red with a touch of dark brown to make it workable.

Maybe I could beige up a pink.

The only lipstuff which works on me is Revlon Colorstay. You brush it on, then add a topcoat. looks good, stays almost all day. I use the sheer, as I don't like to look painted up. Best of all, Bonny, it's cheap and you can buy it at most drugstores, so you can try a few colors to find the one which works for you. [link]

Lipstick just doesn't stay on, the moisturizer felt odd and didn't make enough of a difference to seem worth it and the concealer didn't actually conceal. I fear that it will require me to either go with the less than natural look or give it up.

Try mixing some of the Aromaleigh with your regular moisturizer. Works like a charm and just sort of glosses over flaws. I'm lazy, and that's about the extent I'm willing to do these days. Also, anything else breaks me out.

In the summer, I use the Neutrogena Sensitive Skin 60+ SPF Sunblock Lotion mixed with some of my Aromaleigh, and it's perfect.

Lip-wise I'm partial to a pink Covergirl outlast lipstain and then lipgloss (generally one of several MACs) that I keep reapplying.

It looks like my long-held dream for a light-in-color-but-dense-in-pigment pink my have been answered by Lady Gaga. I don't know for sure yet, however, because every time I go in they are out of it :(

Everyone else gave me sheer shiny things or the wrong color. Gaga, it appears, has my back.

Try mixing some of the Aromaleigh with your regular moisturizer. Works like a charm and just sort of glosses over flaws. I'm lazy, and that's about the extent I'm willing to do these days. Also, anything else breaks me out.

This sounds like a great solution. I use Olay, because it is the only moisturizer I've found that doesn't break me out or feel greasy. It never occurred to me to add color. I'm on it!

Scrappy, I actually have one of the Colorstay's. It's too pink, so I should try other colors. And, once the gloss wears off, the color dries and flakes.

The problem is that my lips are super thin, and the lower one shows...how can I explain this...a bit of the slick inner lip above the regular lip tissue. Does that make sense? So the color sticks to the outer lip but not to the slick part...which makes me two-toned about an hour after application. It's maddening.