Review: MUA Shimmer Kisses bronzer and blusher

I bought both of these products in my recent MUA haul. I love the idea of multi coloured blushes and bronzers where you swirl the colours together, or can use the colours individually - like the Benefit Hervana and Sugarbomb blushes I own. I don't think I could ever own enough blushes, and while I've never used a bronzer and liked the look I've gotten before, I thought this would be a nice subtle one that I could get right.

First of all, these smell really weird. Kind of a mix between the cheap paint I used to use as a child and chalk. These definitely smell like their price tag (£3, which is about $4.50 here). They're also incredibly chalky, creating a lot of powder when you use your brush on them. I also found they aren't very pigmented, and don't really leave any colour on my cheeks, so at first I was really disappointed with these and thought they would be useless.
But, these are incredible as highlighters! They have just the right amount of shimmer to go over any blush to give it a bit more glow, and the lighter shades in particular are fantastic. I've been using the bronzer daily now by itself to give my cheeks a lovely glow, and using the lighter shade as a highlighter on the top of my cheek bone and under my eyebrows. These can be hard to blend, especially if you're putting them over a cream foundation, so it's definitely best to go in with a light hand so you don't end up with a big patch of shimmer on your face. Even though these aren't what I expected, I'm really happy about the bronzer as I didn't own a powder highlight before this. I haven't really had the chance to use the blush much yet, as I've been using the bronzer every day!


Blusher

blusher swatched clockwise from top left in sunlight

blusher swatched together (l) and blended (r)

bronzer

bronzer clockwise from top left in sunlight

bronzer swatched together (l) and blended (r)

bronzer applied to cheeks

This photo shows how powdery this actually is. This is the result of using a brush on it once for the swatch above. It got powder over the table and there was heaps of powder still over the top of the bronzer.

I'm also giving away a Shimmer Kisses Bronzer in my giveaway! Click here to enter!

Have you tried the shimmer kisses range before? What's your favourite powder highlighter?