Mentally Spending...

 

So these products are what I’ll be itching to spend my June paycheck on! They are pretty much all high end, pricey products so I will probably only purchase two or three realistically, a girl can dream though ey!

 

Nars Laguna Bronzer - £26: I’ve heard everyone rave about this from Tanya Burr to my best friends so I really want to try it out for myself, apparently this makes for the perfect contouring product!

Chanel Chance - £74: This is a such an expensive fragrance and I’m not sure when or if I’ll end up getting it but it’s definitely on my wishlist. A friend at work wears it all the time and I love it on her, it’s a really fresh scent and different to what I normally go for in a perfume.

Liz Earle Hot Cloth Cleanser - £14.75: I’m always on the lookout for new ways to treat my skin and to remove makeup. This has had really positive reviews so I’m excited to try it out. No7 at Boots do a great dupe apparently so I might try that one out too!

Bumble & Bumble Surf Spray - £20.50: I’m not sure if my hair actually needs this as my hair is naturally curly but hopefully it will tame it into soft beach waves!          

Mac Vegas Volt - £14: I saw this lippy used by Alix at icovetthee.com and it looked amazing on her so I’ve pined for it ever since!

Chanel Vitalumiere Foundation - £34: Chanel is one of the best brands on the market and the same goes for their foundations, I’ve been dying to get my hands on one for a while to see if they really are worth the hype and money!

Mac 168 Contour Brush - £26: I’ve been after this brush for a while, but the price keeps putting me off, I am a student afterall!

Nars Tropic Eyeshadow - £18: I saw this whilst online browsing a few weeks ago and just fell in love with the colour, it’s gorgeous, a bit daring for me though I must say!

Urban Decay Naked 2 Palette - £36: My sister has this palette already so typically I’ve been getting my fair usage out of hers, but I think it’s time I got my own!

What products are you after this month?

Bourjois Cream Blush Review!

 

These new cream blushes from Bourjois have been on the shelves for roughly a month or so now and after a few weeks of usage, I’ve concluded that they are indeed an asset to this humble brand.  They are dinky little tubs of creamy cheek goodness, cute and compact, just how we like it. There have only been four colours released so far and I ended up choosing shades 04 – Sweet Cherry and 02 – Healthy Glow.

 

Basically these are super creamy blushes that go on with ease and are fairly pigmented meaning that you only need to apply the slightest amount. They are blendable and once you have the product built up to your needs, they really do give that noticeable touch to the whole face. My favourite from the two has to be the shade 02 in Healthy Glow. I genuinely thought this one would be chucked to the bottom of my stash after a couple of uses but I’ve had it on near enough every day! It is a gorgeous peachy coral that includes a very slight shimmer and it just screams summer. I love it! I bought shade 04 in Sweet Cherry because it’s a deepened pink shade and I love these sorts of shades, however it has kind of been cast aside due to the coral number stepping on its toes! The 04 holds much more of a matte finish, which suits the pink/brown hues in my opinion. These deep tones are my favourite shades of blush but I think Sweet Cherry will be more suited to when I’m on a night out in comparison to the day where the 02 comes in handy, enabling me to look a little more vibrant and a little less walking corpse. I apply these with my fingers, I have yet to even try a brush yet as they work so well and so quickly with my mere fingertips! They have a great airy and light consistency to them and feature that distinct Bourjois scent that I love on their products.  Overall they make for a great spring/summer budget buy.

Saving Your Skin...

This time of year is usually when I begin hammering the sunbeds, all in aid of achieving that bronzed body and complexion in time for my summer holiday. I would always feel slightly guilty about using them but it would never put me off, as I justified it by telling myself, “I don’t use them all year round” and “it’s only the same as sitting under the sun”, true but the UV rays of a sunbed are actually way more intense than that of the sun, upto ten times more so in some cases! So I’ve decided to ditch them and start looking after my skin the way I should.

Luckily I’m really lazy and going to the sunbed shop is actually a massive chore for me so that is one factor that’s encouraged me to bin the beds, but probably the most important one is how they might affect me in the future. I’m well aware that they dramatically increase the chances of skin cancer, and that is something that I no longer want to risk. One of my best friends has gone through so much with her Dad who’s currently fighting cancer and I just think, why would I want to purposely increase my chances when there is a possibility I could have children of my own one day, I would never want to have to put my family through all that when I could have simply avoided it in my younger years. It just isn’t worth it!

Another reason is that although we can’t deny sunbeds do make us look good, all sunkissed and that, it’s only short term. Within practically a week that tan has faded! Looking after my skin now will hopefully prevent premature aging and when I’m 50 I hope that I’ll be able to see the results of taking good care of my skin as a teen. I sometimes serve customers at work who are clearly heavy sunbed users, and although they may only be between 20-30 years old, you can see that the damage has been done. They may be bronzed but it doesn’t look good – they looked aged.

As for my steps to protecting and saving my skin, I decided that investing in a facial suncream would be a good idea. I bought the Bioderma Photoderm AKN Mat - Matifying Fluid in SPF30, the fact that it is a matte fluid enticed me as there is nothing worse than suncream that turns your face into a big white sticky mess (…eh?).  It goes on easily and blends in quickly and it doesn’t leave your face feeling greasy. I use this when I’m having a none foundation or no makeup day as even when the sun isn’t out (which is usually the case in Britain) you are still exposed to the harsh elements in the atmosphere and sunscreen protects against those. Of course many foundations on the market these days have contained SPF so I don’t tend to use this when I have foundation on, as the moisturiser I’m currently using also contains SPF (Estee Lauder DayWear Advanced Multi-Protection Anti-Oxidant Crème SPF 15). I’ve also been using an eye crème to help prevent against wrinkly eyes when I’m older! I got a sample bottle of Estee Lauders Advanced Night Repair Synchronized Eye Recovery Complex when I bought their foundation, and I’ve been applying this round my eyes AM and PM, so far I haven’t seen a drastic change in my dark circles, which it claims to get rid of as well as other things but in the long run it should reduce my chances of saggy baggy eyes when I’m over the hill!

 

 

Now I’m not saying that I’ll be cooped up in the shade when I’m on my Jolly’s, but I WILL be applying suncream generously and NOT frazzling my poor skin cells away! And as for sunbeds, I’m embracing being a Pale Gail more than ever!

What are your thoughts on tanning? Were you ever a sunbed junkie like me?

Estee Lauder Advanced Night Repair Eye Recovery LINK
Estee Lauder DayWear Crème LINK
Bioderma Photoderm Matifying Fluid LINK

Estee Lauder Double Wear Review!

 

Estee Lauders Double Wear is a foundation that I’ve heard so much about and so I recently got pampered at the EL counter and purchased it for myself. It’s a foundation that I held with high expectations, and I would say that it’s done a fairly good job at meeting them.

My first thoughts about Double Wear is how lightweight I find it on my face, I hate those foundations that feel as if they are weighing you down whilst making you want to get home and get a good cleanse on, but I can happily wear this all day without reaching for a face wipe. What I also love is that is keeps all my oils at bay! I can wear this for 8 hours at work and still manage to avoid an oily t-zone, which is a miracle in itself. Double Wear actually claims to stay put for 15 hours, which I haven’t actually put to the test yet. But for the 10-12 hours I have trailed over the past two weeks, I’ll have to give it to the guys at EL, it does last. One night I was even contemplating letting my foundation do a full force, round the clock job as when I got home from work my foundation looked so good I didn’t want to take it off and reapply it again for my night out! But I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I digress however… what I’m trying to say is that I’ve found foundations on my skin can end up patchy and oily by the end of the day but Double Wear keeps that even, covered finish we all sought after.

Once on the skin this foundation gives a semi-matte finish but I haven’t found it to be drying which is what I usually find when it comes to matte/semi-matte foundations. The downsides to this foundation are that it claims to be medium to high coverage, but I personally would say it was leaning more towards the medium and I don’t find it to be quite enough for me. This foundation is buildable though and although it may look like I am having a five minute fight with a foundation brush each morning, I do eventually manage to hide away my ever returning spots and blemishes. A big turn off concerning this foundation is its very absurd way of draining you of life in pictures – especially with flash! I read somewhere before purchasing that it tends to create a white cast on camera and I didn’t think much of it, but it’s true, so for nights out this one definitely will no longer be making an appearance!

All in all I hoped this would be the foundation of all foundations, don’t get me wrong I do like the stuff and will continue to wear it, but it didn’t wow me like I expected, but for being at work and long days out when you need to be reassured that your foundation isn’t going to let you down, this is the one.

Cheap Cheap Cheap!

So I’d thought I’d tell you about this little site I’ve found (with thanks to one of my best friends, bethloux) called cheapsmells.com. It’s basically a site that sells off makeup, skincare and perfume at super cheap and affordable prices, or at least slightly discounted! It’s brilliant if you’re not looking for anything in particular and just fancy treating yourself. The only downside to this site is that the products it sells usually aren’t the most current, they are usually old or discontinued items that they sell off in bulk, so each week differs in the range of stock they do or don’t have on the site. I wouldn’t let this put you off however as what’s great is that it has loads of well-known brands such as Clinique, Estee Lauder, Urban Decay and so on, so pretty much anyone can find themselves a bargain!  I bought a few bits a couple of weeks back and got it all for the price of £36.82!

Urban Decay Loose Pigment Eyeshadow – Shag: £3.95

Urban Decay Deluxe Eyeshadow – Scratch: £7.97

Clinique Bottom Lash Mascara – Black: £11.00 (Current RRP Price)

Clinique Quickliner for Eyes – Moss: £10.95

Essie Nail Polish Full Size – Orange it’s Obvious: £2.95

 

It’s definitely worth checking out as there are some great skincare products and perfumes on there too! I bought 100ml of Paul Smith Rose Eau de Parfume a few weeks ago which I LOVE for only £23.95, which retails in the likes of Boots and Debenhams for roughly £55! Again their perfume range doesn’t feature the most current fragrances, they mainly stock older scents and those questionable celebrity smells but it’s definitely worth a snoop around!

What’s also great is that they offer free delivery too! It takes between 4-8 days to arrive so if you’re desperate for your goodies I would cough up the £2-£3 extra for the faster service! The delivery took exactly 8 days and I wasn’t too impressed with the speed of service BUT cheapsmells emailed me yesterday apologising for the wait and has given me a code for 10% off my next order! Friendly huh!

 Let me know what you think and if you found anything worth ordering!

 

XX

They're Real! Apparently...

They’re Real! from Benefit is a highly rated mascara pretty much all over the show, but personally, I don’t find it lives up to expectations. I had been “do I? don’t I?” over this product for so long but during my trip to NYC I took a walk into every American girls haven, Sephora and came across the baby sized must have! So for only $10 I took the chance! And I’m quite glad I didn’t splurge on the full size to be honest. For a start I hate these types of applicators, they never do anything for my lashes so the same goes for They’re Real. I was seriously expecting it to make my eyes look big and wide and span all my lashes out to give the false lash effect that the product suggests but it neither emphasises nor lengthens in my opinion. And as for the formula, I find it way too watery, I like mascaras to be less…liquidy if you will? It just doesn’t work well for me and as for its removal, it’s a bugger.

Overall I’m not a fan and can’t say I’ll be repurchasing, but it seems to me that this is just one of them products that you either love or hate!

XX

Say Hello to Paul & Joe

Ok so for ages I’ve been after new makeup bags and not quite found anything that’s up to what I want…until now. Luckily I stumbled across the French brand Paul & Joe whilst trawling the t’interweb and hey presto! I’ve found my babies. They came at a price however, as being a student you have to be choosey with what you do and don’t purchase! But I gave into temptation and coughed up £20.50 for the yellow cat cosmetic pouch and £26.00 for green floral binder makeup bag. Initially I was only meant to be treating myself to the one but I simply couldn’t decide, damn you Selfridges. The main reason why I love these so much is because of the many pockets and pouches they have within them, so if you’re like me and like everything to have its designated place then they make life that little bit easier, as everyone feels better knowing their mac lipsticks are sitting comfortably upright and together…don’t they? There’s even space to fit your brushes so that they don’t get squashed or damaged, now that’s thoughtful.

The only issue I had with these is that my expectations of how big they were going to be were totally off scale, silly me hadn’t read the dimensions before purchasing so I expected the yellow pouch especially to be much bigger than it actually was. I can’t find a ruler at present otherwise I’d tell you it’s actual size but all in all it isn’t very big… but saying that, it does manage to fit all that I want it to fit and I would say that it is perfect travelling buddy, either in your hand luggage or suitcase.

The makeup binder is probably my favourite, it’s like a book! That stores makeup! Amazing huh! I love the fact that you can remove the pouches, making this also a great travelling must have! It’s got brush holders too, but they could be used for anything, mascara, lipgloss, eyeliner? And of course I think the pattern is so pretty, my favourite pattern of the two by far.

 

 

I’m not sure if I think these two are quite worth the £46.50 I handed over (did I really pay that much?!) especially considering the size but I’m definitely going to get my use out of them! Paul & Joe do have such pretty products and I’m definitely going to be trying out more of what’s in their makeup range, although I do hope it’s worth their price tags!

XX
 

GlamShine Stain Splash!

 

 

I know these lippy’s have been out for some time now but I’ve not stopped wearing them since their purchase! They are the GlamShine Stain Splash’s by L’oreal and I think they’re fantastic. The shades I have are in Lolita and Princess, and Princess has definitely been worth its £7.99 price tag (bought on 3 for 2 at Boots!). The colour is almost a red but has a distinct tinge of orange to it and it is SO flattering. I’ve always been scared of red’s on the lips but this has well and truly busted that fear! Lolita on the otherhand was more of a disappointment, the colour appears to be a nude pink in the bottle but on the lips it is more of a sheer pinky red, so I would definitely recommend testing colours out before you buy! To get the desired colour you do have to apply between 2-3 coats as the formula is quite watery and light but this is what I love about them. They don’t feel heavy or gunky and they smell so good! Oh and I nearly forgot to mention, they stay on, nope these bad boys don’t move and you can eat/drink do whatever and you still don’t have to reapply! All hail L’oreal!

 

 

 

Lolita

 

 

Princess

 

 

Thanks for reading!

XX