Makeup is fun. With makeup I can make myself look like anything I want. I can glam myself up, or play out a more natural look. I can turn myself into a sex kitten, or an innocent girl next door.

But it has taken years and years of trial and error to know what looks good on my face and what makes me look like Mimi from the Drew Carey Show. Looking back I’ve had some pretty disastrous makeup moments that I have comprised into my top 5 makeup regrets.

1. Sweat + black eyeliner = scary raccoon eyes. Now I love me some black eyeliner, especially when I’m putting on a cute little dress and going out to a club, but there are certain places where it’s probably not a good idea to pile on the black and, unfortunately, I’ve learned this the hard way.

One night my friends and I dressed ourselves up to go out dancing and I had put on a ton of dark eyeshadow and eyeliner. The dance floor was completely packed and after about half an hour we were all sweaty and gross. My friend and I went to the bathroom to cool down and when I looked in the mirror, I found that the makeup I had so meticulously applied was now all over my face! Seriously, it looked as if I had rubbed a huge piece of charcoal all around my eye and down my cheeks. My black eyeshadow had literally melted from me sweating and was now sitting in clumps on my eyelids. Needless to say I had to scrub it all off before anyone (besides all those people I saw pre-bathroom trip) saw my disaster of a face.

2. White eye shadow is for vampires, not people. When I was in middle school, the latest makeup trend was wearing white eyeshadow…and just white eyeshadow. For some reason my little awkward pre-teen mind thought that walking around looking like a corpse with all that white around my eyes was actually a good idea. And what made this look even worse is that I am naturally very pale, so I was basically applying white on white to create a sexy pastiness on my face. Luckily, I ditched this makeup trend when I entered high school, but I still can’t help but shudder when I see pictures of my middle school self looking like the freakin’ dead.

3. Always get the right bronzer for your skin tone or you will look like an Oompa-Loompa. We’ve all seen those girls; the ones whose faces look a bright orange color while their neck remains considerably paler. Or maybe their orange necks even match their orange faces, but you can tell the tan is fake because you can literally see all the bronzer particles on their face. As attractive as this sounds, I have been one of those girls.

As I’ve mentioned before, I am a very pale gal who will try just about anything to get a little color on me. I’ve done the tanning beds, but I’m afraid of skin cancer. I’ve tried the gradual tanner lotions, but I don’t see that noticeable of results. Bronzer – with its instant tanning abilities – became my go-to product. And boy did I go to it. A lot.

4. Bright eyeliner with bright lips is a huge no-no.

I have always liked experimenting with different makeup looks. Some of these looks work (I look cute with brown eyeshadow on) and some don’t (I look bad with neon pink eyeliner and bright pink lip gloss). On the plus side, I have used the latter makeup look only once, which was definitely one time too many.

My roommate is the type of girl who can pull off crazy makeup. A few months back, she had just bought pink eyeliner from Sephora and had neatly lined the top lids of her eyes keeping the rest of her face fresh of makeup. I too tried this eyeliner and slathered on a coat of lip gloss before leaving with the rest of my friends. As it turns out, the pink eyeliner spread along my lids until it looked like thick neon eyeshadow blazing out from above my eyes and,what I thought had been clear lip gloss turned out to be an obnoxious colored pink. My friends would not stop making fun of me for the whole night and when we arrived at the restaurant I proceeded to rush to the bathroom to wipe off the eyeliner goo. Never again will I pair neon anything to bright lips (matching eyeshadow and lipstick is never a good idea either), unless I’m actually going for the clown look.

5. Blue glitter eyeshadow makes me look like a tranny. Blue glitter eyeshadow is pretty self explanatory on why it would be on my list of regrets. This makeup regret was something I did in my middle school and early high school years for god only knows what reason. My friends and I would pack on the blue eyeshadow and sprinkle our lids with glitter before heading out to the movie theater. As ridiculous as this sounds, we thought we looked hot. Now that I look back, I realized that we looked like a herd of trannies.

Do you ladies have any makeup regrets?

Last Saturday in Manhattan, I saw every costume imaginable. Swarms of bees, a duo from the Great Gatsby, a Pharaoh, Cat Woman, Sponge Bob, even a seriously drunk Teletubby. Everyone came out to play.But the best costume of the night went to the super skinny hipster boy standing right near my L train exit on Bedford. He was about as authentic as an Amy Winehouse imposter can be: short shorts, ratty white tank, beehive and thick black eyeliner. He was unmistakable replica. And it probably only cost him the price of a black wig.

If you’re broke or lazy or broke AND lazy (like me!) Halloween is more of an inconvenience than it is a good time. So instead of being Debbie Downer (hey, costume idea!) by not dressing up, here are some cheap ideas that are easy to put together on the fly.

Like say tonight… or tomorrow.

Easy DIY Ideas:

Amy Winehouse

Miss South Carolina

Drunk David Hasselhoff (get drunk…eat a burger…done!)

Oscar de la Hoya in drag

Print out Masks:

Obama, Brit Brit, Putin, Fred Thompson, Ron Paul and Ahmadinejad

Larry Craig

Star Wars

A Pug or a kitten

A slew of masks from Forbes

If I didn’t have to dress up for work, I would totally be a Blythe doll! So adorable!