Santa approved: The Venus XL eyeshadow palette by Lime Crime.

For Lime Crime's bigger-sized palette in their best-selling Venus range, they've gone for the "ultimate grunge palette" and have chosen a "renaissance remix" theme, using romantic and feminine colours used in period artwork 0their shade selection.

I'm being a bit different in this review, by saying straight away that I love it the most out of every new-to-me cosmetic product I've tried this year, so think that it would make a stunning gift. I got it as soon as it launched on the Lime Crime website way back in March (or was it in late February?), so have been using it enough for a valid viewpoint. So if you are looking for a good gift idea for a makeup lover, then read on...

EOTD: the Jaclyn Hill palette, by Morphe...

When I watched the Jaclyn Hill palette reveal video that she made for this palette last year, she mentioned that she'd made one of the shades [Diva] as a perfect Christmas shadow, which is something which has stuck with me.

I was ill between last september and this January [including a week in the ICU], so never got to go anywhere or experiment with makeup for months, and so didn't get around to trying the 'perfect Christmas shade' during the festive lead-up last year.

But one year later,  I've remembered that I wanted to make a point of finally trying it out over the festive period...

Is this the one that we want? [reviewing The Emily Edit: The Wants eyeshadow palette, by Revolution]

 “I wanted this palette to inspire but could also allow you to stay in your comfort zone. I wanted the perfect balance of light, medium and really rich dark shades. I want the colours to be buildable, so you can reach that level of intensity that you want. You can create countless looks and endless creativity.” - Emily Noel

Here's the second half of popular YouTuber EmilyNoel83's collaboration with cosmetic brand Revolution. Like with The Needs eye & face palette I reviewed last month, I bought The Wants on release day & started using it as soon as it arrived, but wanted to wait before reviewing it because I wanted to make sure the 'wow' factor of using a product with the name of someone I've been watching for 11 years had worn off, and then I thought I'd keep on waiting til December to see if it was good enough to recommend putting onto peoples gift-lists.

The verdict is in...

EOTD: Soph x, by Revolution Beauty...

When I reached for my Soph x palette to use the Festive Flame shade in my previous post, I saw another two Christmassy shades, so thought I'd use them in today's post...

I wanted to showcase this palette again as I think Soph x is a nice palette for people who want to experiment with colour and want to expand their palette collection without breaking the bank - I think it'd make a nice stocking stuffer for those people and for YouTube fans, so as it's December I wanted to share.

EOTD: Soph x, by Revolution Beauty.

Like with the palette in my last EOTD post, since I'd not used this one in a while I thought that planning a post around it would motivate me to use it again. Plus as we're now in December, I wanted to use something that is affordable and easily accessible, for people looking for gift ideas.

As an added bonus, I recalled that this palette has a season-appropriately named shade in, so this look practically did itself...