When Revlon's Nearly Naked liquid foundation, $9.99, in 120 Vanilla showed up on my desk, I was worried it was going to be a repeat of all those times I walked around with an Oompa Loompa face after using a drugstore foundation. It looks too dark in the bottle, but blends into a beautiful, pale shade that's a bit on the warm side. They also offer a pale shade, Ivory. I'm skeptical of shade names that are so on-the-nose (being too pale for a shade called "Siberia" tends to make you suspicious), but this shade was only faintly pink and predominately, well, ivory -- making it a good choice for fair-skinned women with pink undertones.

If you're like me, you probably have a whole arsenal of tried-and-failed foundations that just aren't quite right. But sometimes the formula and coverage is perfect and you keep hoping that maybe, someday during the summer, you'll tan just enough to be able to wear it. Until that happens, instead of letting those foundations sit sadly on a shelf, mix up your own custom blend to fit your pale skin now.

Illamasqua's Skin Tint comes in a glorified white-out shade (seriously, it is snow white) that you can mix with a too-dark foundation to bring the shade down. If you want something a little dewier, Lush Feeling Younger Skin Tint, $18.95, increases the paleness of the foundation and adds a touch of glow. Designed to be a highlighter, it also adds a nice glow when blended onto cheekbones and under your brows.

Simple advisory board member and celebrity makeup artist Gita Bass also recommends mixing in a few drops of a color corrector if your foundation is the wrong undertone. She says the most common case is foundation looking too pink, so look for a yellow or gold color corrector to balance it out. Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics' Airbrush Foundation comes in five color correcting shades: olive, blue, red, yellow and black. They look like something you would finger paint with, but adding a few drops can make a world of difference in a foundation that is too pink or yellow.

Whenever you mix up your own concoction, always do so in direct sunlight because this is the truest light, says Bass. If you're mixing in your bathroom, the color could be affected by warm or cool lighting — so a shade that looks perfect in your bathroom will look bonkers in daylight, says Bass.

All this mixing and matching may seem like a lot of extra work, but once you figure out the proportions it only adds seconds to your morning routine. I did this for an entire week and was never annoyed — just thrilled to finally have a use for the bottles of foundation fails lining my bathroom drawer.

Image via @kohgendo