Confessions of a beauty newbie

My name is Deirdre, and I'm a beauty newbie.  You may have seen some of my celeb gossip and TV/movie news for the site before, but beauty? Well, that's not exactly my forte. Yet.

The lovely editor Andrea here at Beaut.ie has kindly allowed me to share my naivety for your amusement. Please feel free to give some tips to help this beauty newbie in all things beauty and cosmetic-related, as I really am useless.

• I am genuinely afraid of eyelash curlers

What if I pull all my eyelashes out? For that matter, if I use mascara too much, will my eyelashes crumple up and fall out? I need to know the truth…

• I recently used toner for the first time

My friend offered me some, and I smiled like I looked like I knew what I was doing and proceeded to pat my face with the mysterious liquid. It is magical. It feels a bit tingly but then my makeup went on so smoothly, and it did not make my skin at all flaky (I have some dry patches on my face).

• Something else new I did, I plucked above my eyebrow line

I read somewhere that you aren’t meant to pluck above the eyebrow line. So, I didn’t, for years. I pluck my own eyebrows because when I got a beautician to do it once, she did them too thin and I didn’t want to look in a mirror for ages afterwards because my own face was freaking me out. But I recently abandoned this myth of leaving above the brow line alone (or is it a myth?) and it has given me a more defined shape of eyebrow, so I’m feeling pretty happy about that discovery.

• Liquid liner is both my best friend and my worst enemy

As a teenager, I used an eyeliner pencil and lined under my eye, but someone told me that was a mistake because it makes my eyes look smaller. Then liquid liner arrived, and my life changed. But I am useless with it. Really, truly useless. The smudges, oh the smudges… But I love it, so I found a compromise by buying a super thin liquid liner which causes minimal smudging (Bourjois Paris was my go-to here).

• I know I should be using a foundation brush, but I use a contouring sponge

Oh, the shame of it all! I’m just so worried I’ll mess it all up. Also, old habits die hard.

• I also don’t know how to contour

My sixteen-year-old sister can but, I can’t, and I’ll never admit that to her (though she probably knows), and it looks so nice when people do it! Although some people go a bit too far, I think, and make their faces look all pointy.

I’ve just been informed that you’re meant to put on toner after taking off make-up, not before putting it on – now I’m even more confused.