After the post on nail varnish last week – and after going through my old make-up collection to find supplies to accompany a friend’s (absolutely terrifying) Halloween costume for a party next week, I realised I’ve got quite a lot of make-up left over from back in the day when I wore it regularly and extensively.

Despite knowing that you should throw eye make-up away after a few months to prevent contamination, I didn’t ever actually do it so now have a number of old, but mostly full, tubes of mascara; a heap of pots of powder eye-shadow (singles and multiples); a pick-up-sticks worthy amount of eye and lip liner pencils; lipsticks of every hue (except the bright red we needed for the aforementioned Halloween costume); some bronzer balls from when I thought, incorrectly, I should rock the “bronze look”; and, some random cream things that I think were supposed to be used as eye make-up or blusher, or possibly both (an impulse buy for sure).

So any suggestions on what I can do with this stash? They’ve all been used in part so couldn’t go to a charity shop or the like – so any ideas for new uses?

(Original photo by val-j)

…And moving on from old paint, what about old nail varnish?

From the days when I actually used it, I’ve got quite a few half-bottles left over in all sorts of colours. Some of them have separated but recongeal with a quick shake, but I’ve only painted my nails once this year and can’t see myself doing it again in a hurry (for both aesthetic reasons and for the sake of my nails) so they’re pretty much redundant.

So what can I do with all the leftover nail polish? And what about the bottles with their little brushes – any reuses for those?

(Photo by tijmen)