Weekly Lost in Makeupland post

No way, I can't seem to do this post when I mean to, so I guess I'll keep on trying to post this on Sundays and just be happy if I get it done before Tuesday.

This week's post won't be too long, I promise!

Delayed Packages from December

They keep arriving! At least two more packages shipped back then have arrived to the buyers :).

Next week, as promised, I will contact all the buyers whom I don't know if they have received their packages to check if they have received them, in case they didn't, we'll talk a solution.

Craziness grooowing

I'm very happy yet a bit overwhelmed by how my sales have increased lately. I know it's nothing compared with other companies, but it's far more than I expected and I'm adjusting to it. These days I've exceeded my turnaround time, which I'm not happy about, but that should be solved tomorrow morning since I've been working nonstop lately.
This week I'm going to buy another, bigger grinder to make my products (I managed to break my lovely little one T_T ) in order to:
1. Make bigger batches. I don't want to make very big batches because I find it's harder to do quality control the bigger it is, BUT, the ones I make are too small now and I find myself "wasting" a lot of time making a small batch after another. Better grinder means I can make more quantity and faster, whily still having time to do quality control, I find it's more productive.
2. Be very ahead of work. When I opened my shop at the end of October, I usually made the eyeshadows after the order was placed. I stopped doing that at December, when the shop started to start walking, step by step. I want to be ready for rushes and just about ANYTHING that may happen. I want to be able to ship your orders as soon as possible.


With that accomplished, I'd have the time to work on all the new stuff I've been developing and planning. I've been working in blushes, more eyeshadows and planned out a couple of collections that can't be released at the momment due to lack of time and preparation for their release.

I love shopping indie!

Yay!!! Yesterday I received my The Morbid The Merrier Valentine perfume order, my last Haus of Gloi order and a package from the lovely Sakura full of Sugarpill samples and stickers and goodies <3 I'll try to take pictures of everything (plus last week's stuff) to show you. I'm very impressed and happy with everything, even though I'm upset that in both my TMTM and HoG orders, various perfumes leaked and it kind of ruined the lovely labels.


I swear I couldn't SQUEEEE louder when I opened (that is, ripped open the envelope like crazy) my The Morbid The Merrier order. This is what I saw. Aren't you squeeing too? The care put on the packaging, image and feel of the brand is impressive. I LOVE it.

I'd love to read some new blogs, learn about interesting youtube videos, books, online comics, whatever to entertain myself when I disconnect from work. I'm kinda bored at what I've been watching on YT lately, I'm almost out of tv shows I like and only my fave blogs interest me nowadays. I need some new stuff and I'm sure you have great suggestions!!

International shipping Chrsitmas delays

This has been my first Christmas as an Etsy seller so this has caught me quite by surprise.

During the whole December month and all of this current month, I've been (still am) quite upset because of the EXTREME delay in orders shipped from Dec 11 to 27. I hope they start showing up eventually because I don't want anyone to think I never shipped their packages. The problem has been only with US customers, nothing went wrong when shipping to any other country.

I knew two packages I shipped on Dec 11 were held on by Spanish customs until Dec 30, because it was shipped as Urgent (wait, I'll laught) International mail and it was registered. I know nothing about the rest of the packages shipped during these dates.

A couple of days ago I found this useful information on Etsy about these delays and realized I'm not the only seller in this delicate situation. Apparently it's happened only with people shipping stuff to the US, not shipping from there.

So please, if you're expecting a package from me that was shipped during December, PLEASE be patient. I'm really sorry that postal services are taking so long and that you've been so unlucky that you have to wait.

Shipping usually takes around a week to arrive to the US and this has been a special and unfortunate one time thing. I will take action if any package is lost and never ends up showing, don't worry about that, but please allow your packages some more time to arrive, I'll just ask that of you.

I've learned though, and next year, Christmas gifts will be shipped on November only and if I ship anything during December it will go by registered mail so it can be tracked at least. I don't like it because that will mean increasing shipping costs for buyers, but it's the only way to be able to stay calm and know what's going on.

Thank you all for your patience!!

Have you had shipping problems during Christmas? I'd love to hear your experiences!

I promise I'm back! Some thinking and love for all of you :)

Hi everyone!

First of all, I'd like to apologize for not updating my blog for so long. I've been neglecting it in order of getting other things done and due to life in general.

Christmas has been very busy, Lost in Makeupland is a baby that's trying to stand up on it's own and starting to walk step by little step. I really, REALLY, want to thank you all for keeping up with me, trusting my company and products and giving them a try.

I also want to apologize to all the people who ordered from me by the end of December because I had a long gap where it took me far too long to proccess or ship their orders. I fell sick at the start of January with a horrible cold, which resulted in me not going out of home to ship anything and absolutely and for OBVIOUS hygiene reasons not  going anywhere near products until I got well. No way for me getting near micas and bases while I was constantly coughing, sneezing and wiping my nose every momment. I hope everybody understands it and that it's not a big hassle for you.

A very important thing I want to do is thank all the people who's asked me questions, to those who've bought from me, especially for those of you who have come back after your first purchases. To all the people who's reviewed me (both on blogs and people who convo me telling me what they like about my products and how was their experience with them). Also thanks for those of you who follow my blog, Twitter and Facebook page.

I especially want to thank all the people who's ordered from me during Christmas and are still waiting for their orders to arrive. Thanks for your patience. Apparently, this Christmas have been very problematic for sellers outside the US. I'm going to write a full post about it, because doing some research, I've found out that I'm not the only one who's sent packages that are not arriving. I think it's a very serious matter and believe it deserves a post of it's own. If you ordered between Dec 11 and 27, don't panic just yet!

I'm so happy with the way things are going for my company, that I can't complain. Lost in Makeupland has been open for two months and a half and I've made more than 50 sales already, which I think it's great.

It's quite a bit overwhelming in the way that I'm changing my work schedule to adapt myself to the growing of the shop. I'm still deep into that, so I'm working slower at the momment and hope things go faster starting this new week. My current turnaround time is 2-5 days.

I'll be catching up with you guys in blog stuff during this next week, but I'll leave a little list of some of the topics I'm going to cover soon here:

-I've made a couple of giveaways.
-Upcoming products (a deep look into my Face powders, Alice's Chains collection which is being reformulated)
-I'm using transparent jars for eyeshadows instead of shiny black lids.
-Looks by you.
-Part 2 of the How I test my products post.
-The wonders of Pixie Epoxy (thanks Sakura for sending me some!)
-I've bought stuff from some lovely indie companies and will tell you what I think of everything.
-Looks by me.

Christmas Day Look

Here in Algeciras, the 24th is a bit different than anywhere else in Spain. Young people reunite in the morning (since 12:00 or so) and drink, have fun with friends, drink some more and spend the afternoon inside a huge crowd until the sun goes down.

I didn't feel like drinking, so I just took a beer there and went for a couple of hours in the afternoon to meet friends. Since it was going to be really crowded I went with some comfortable clothes and pretty basic makeup. I didn't apply a base or concealer at all to let my skin rest for the night. I just applied a bit of a Deliplus powder base and MUFE HD powder to my skin. No blush at all since my hair was freshly dyed and dye would end on my cheeks anyway later. I kept my eyes simple too.

I used my Sleek Acid palette for the look, using the matte purple and a bit of neon pink in my inner corner blended very well with the purple and a bit of the white from that palette under my crease blending down the purple and pink and on my inner corner. As a highlight I applied a bit of Faerie to the rest of my lid up to my eyebrows.

At 20:00 I went back home to take a quick shower and change my clothes and also changed my makeup. I did a look inspired on this GORGEOUS look by Phyrra. I was in a real hurry and couldn't take pictures of it though, but will redo it and take pictures then since I loved the result.

PRODUCTS USED:

EYES:
Too Faced Shadow Insurance
Sleek Acid palette's matte Purple
Sleek Acid palette's neon Pink
Sleek Acid palette's matte white
Lost in Makeupland Faerie highlighter
Deliplus black eyeliner pen
Coastal Scents (same generic one sell anywhere) gel liner in Deep Plum (waterline and lower line)
Too Faced Lash Injection mascara

FACE:
Deliplus compact powder foundation
Make Up Forever HD powder

LIPS:
Vaseline
Nyx Round Lipstick in B52

What did you do for Christmas? Did you do any different looks than usual? Did you get any presents?

New week...

As you may (or may not if you are new to Lost in Makeupland), every week starts with a Lifestyle collection release and a new weekly offer.

Supply problems seem to have vanished already and I'm going back to being fully productive! Today was quite productive actually since I released 3 blush shades.

Monday will be the release of Mustard, a greenish gold, almost metallic and quite flattering. Here is a little swatch of it.

On to the weekly sale... there's one going until December 25th that you'll already know about if you follow me on Twitter ;) AND there's another one that starts this week. If your order is over $15 (shipping not included), you can choose 5 eyeshadow, highlighter or blush samples for free. Not bad, isn't it? 

This week I want to get more swatching done, show you upcoming eyeshadows I'm working on, do a few EOTDs (any look you'd like to see? Is there any eyeshadow combo you want me to try? I'm open to suggestions!).

I also want to share with you some of the products I use frequently and highlight others I'm dying to try but haven't bought yet.

Dealing with making the Facebook page is driving me crazy, I've spent the whole day trying to make something nice for it and it was a total failure. I hope I figure out during this week a way to make it work. Trying to find a template to add offers, highlight new products and more stuff there has been fruitless.

I also have a few emails to send, some research to do, to do home stuff, bleach and dye my hair, setting up the reviews page, get ready to party HARD on the 24th, keep going to the gym every day of the week and so many things that I feel dizzy just by thinking about them.

Blogging regularly is quite an effort to me, but I think I'm getting used to it slowly :)

How was last week for you? Is this incoming week going to be stressful for you too?

The Weekly LiM offers and releases post... a bit late

Hi everyone!

I should have written this on Sunday, but if you throw together the fact that I'm lazy, that my netbook was formated on Sunday and I hate writing using it with a passion and that I've been quite busy (did I say I'm lazy?) well, I've kind of neglected the blog.

I'm very surprised that I get many visits everyday, I hope you people like the content and find it interesting/useful or at least entertaining. Is there anything you would like me to add to the blog? Any topic you want me to talk about, looks you want to see, tutorials... whatever. I'm open to ideas so if you give me one I'll give it a try.

This week has been very prolific at Lost in Makeupland. There have been quite a few releases. Let's take a look at them!

-This week's Lifestyle release was Sugar-coated, a gorgeous bright light blue. Here's a pic of me wearing it on my lid with Party on the outer corner. In this look I also used Glow (the highlight you see on the rest of my lid) and Snow in the inner corner and just under my eyebrow.

-Glow. Another highlighter. I really like it. It's a lovely sheer golden toned highlighter, great for achieving a natural glow on your skin. It was swatched with no primer.

 

-Individual full sizes and samples of the Rock my Look collection. FINALLY!! I also swatched the whole collection as liners and added it to the listings. What do you think?

About this weekly offer... you get a full size eyeshadow of your choice from the Rock my Look or the Lifestyle collections with every order over $10 (shipping not included). Not a bad deal!!

I would also like to apologize to a couple of customers who are getting their orders these days in big baggies instead of the small ones I use. There have been delays in every supplies orders I've made early in the month and I ran out of sample baggies. I just received a large order of them so it won't happen again. These customers have also received more product than usual to make up for it.

On a last note, if you have done any looks using my products and would like me to feature them both on the blog and on a Facebook page I'm working on (I've said it more than once, I'm computer challenged LOL) email them to me at lostinmakeupland @ gmail . com

I'm going to add a little page on the top (next to About, Contact, etc) where I'll be posting pictures you people send me. I'll add another one where I'll list all the reviews on my products so you can check what other people has experienced with them. If you have written a review about Lost in Makeupland or have stumbled upon one on the net, send me the link so I can post a link to it here too.

UPS!! It ended up being a rather large post lol.

December comes with a great sale!! :)

December is a hard month, there's so much to buy and wallets are certainly not healthy!

SOOO... Here it is!

Buy one full size eyeshadow and get one for free!! That means you get two eyeshadows for $5.99! Include the name of the shadow you want for free after you make your purchase or convo me about it.

Also, Buy 2 eyeshadow samples and you'll get one for free!! It works the same as the BOGO, include the name of the shadow you want for free after you make your purchase or convo me about it.

IS THAT ALL??? NO!!

I've also lowered shipping charges during December, since I know post goes slower I'll make up for it that way.

See anything you like?