Elle Canada Beauty Box – Spring 2014

Recently in the mail I got the best surprise.

I don’t subscribe to any beauty boxes (thinking about Ipsy though) so I’m not really used to surprises in the mail. I had no idea, but my mom had signed up for the Elle Canada Beauty Box. She had actually already opened it and when she found out there was nothing she really wanted, she gave it to me. πŸ™‚ Thanks momma.

Here is what’s inside!

A little booklet filled with style ideas.

Very beauty box-esque booklet with all the products listed

Can always use some more white strips. πŸ™‚

Coupons. Meh. It was free I guess haha.

Full size mascara! It’s funny, one of the best things in the box, and I’m probably not gonna use it. My lashes make it extremely hard to use mascara (waterproof or not), so I think I’ll give it to my friend.  

Shave gel with Olay. This one I’ve already tried and it’s pretty good. All shave gels seem the same to me though…

Little baby samples of Pantene.
I hope they have more these free boxes, cause they are the cutest things! πŸ™‚
Hope you’re having a great day!

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Drugstore Delights: Wet n Wild Mega Last Lip Colour- Swatches + Review

While I was at Wal-Mart with a friend recently, she recommended I try out these Wet n Wild lipsticks. I was hesitant, but the price was VERY appealing at around $3, so I thought I would try some out.

Overview:

Amazing matte lipsticks with a price that can’t be beat.

Price:

Each one cost around $3 CAD at Wal-mart

Rating:

9.5 / 10

Would I Buy Again?

YES! I’m going to be looking for more colours to add to my collection.

Rambling Review

I cannot rave about these lipsticks enough. I should have been tipped off by the practically empty display and the recommendation from my friend, but I had to try to believe it. And boy, now I believe!

I purchased 3 colours:

910D – Red Velvet

     

905D – Smokin’ Hot Pink

      
904B – Rose-bud
     
The colour I’ve been wearing the most has been Rose-bud. The lipsticks go on matte with HUGE pigmentation. That’s the thing that surprised me the most. This is definitely not a glossy balm and shows up true to colour. 
Here are some swatches:
These swatches were done with one swipe, which I can’t believe. Some things I did note were that they were a bit drying, but nothing more than other matte lip products I’ve tried. Actually I would say these were less drying than others! Another thing I noticed was that after wearing for an entire day, they started to bleed a bit. Nothing that a touch up couldn’t fix, but I might have to invest in a lip pencil.
Anyways, I can’t rave about these enough and hope to get some more soon! 

Thanks for reading!

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Confessions of a Cake Face

Is it sad that while this was happening, I was thinking of blogging it? Probably.

So today at work we had a end of term event for all the interns leaving for the semester (I’m staying though, so for me it was an afternoon of free food. The best kind of food). Mostly for work I don’t do full makeup or anything just cause I’m so dang lazy. Today though I did full face makeup (brows, highlighter, the works). 

Half way through the event as I’m sipping on my free Ginger Ale (did I mention I love free stuff?), my friend looks over at my face and says “Um, I think you have something on your face.” As I look at her with a puzzled look, two other people in the conversation look over with a slightly disgusted look. “Yeah, it looks like an orange streak on your face”. “Wow must be your makeup”. I didn’t even know what to say. One person actually said “It looks like you put it there”. Wow, nice.

What could I have said? Nothing much to make me feel any less embarrassed. All I could do is partially laugh it off as I scrubbed at my face with my hand. It’s funny, cause as I was scrubbing I was thinking “They must be seeing things, I deff checked my makeup just recently!”. #denial

As the title of my blog states, I’m Not a Beauty Guru, but I’m trying and learning!

Moral of the story, don’t let a streaky face get you down. You go Glen Coco.

Have a lovely long weekend everyone!

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#NailsOfTheDay: Gumdrop Sparkles

Hello there!

Hope you’re having a great day!

Just wanted to share my nails of the day!
I remember getting this nail polish from someone and thinking. Hmm! Not sure if I’ll ever use this! It seems so loud and pink and such. After applying it though, I fell in love! Textured nail polish is quite popular right now, so I feel very chic. In a Barbie-pink sort of way.

The texture is called Gumdrop, but I think it’s pretty much the same style as sand. I love the sparkles in it, and can’t stop touching my nails!

Hope you’re having a great day! πŸ™‚

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Empties: My First Ever Empties

As mentioned in earlier posts, I would consider myself pretty new to makeup and beauty. A miracle has happened recently though. I noticed that I’ve started to use up products.

Since I’ve started buying makeup about four or so years ago, I’ve noticed that I really haven’t used up any products. Thinking about it now, it seems kind of gross but meh. Old makeup I’ve thrown out, but this is the first time I have gotten the full use out of a product.

Anyways, I definitely won’t have enough products to do a monthly empties, but I thought that I would start to do them whenever I happen to have enough to validate a post. πŸ™‚

So here are some recent empties:

1. Maybelline Dream Fresh BB Cream in Light-Medium

I would definitely repurchase this product. For the price, I really really loved it. I think it gave decent coverage and I was able to wear it without moisturizer. It was a really big time saver when I was in a pinch.

2. Smashbox High Definition Concealer in Light

I really liked this product too. This was actually the very first product I purchased from Sephora. As it was my first higher end makeup product, I have no regrets. It was a pretty reasonable price for a Sephora product and it gave decent coverage. I feel that my current Make Up For Ever concealer is a bit nicer, but considering the price difference, that’s to be expected.

3. Ole Henriksen Truth to Go Wipes

I received this product from one of the $12 Black Friday Deals and really enjoyed it. The scent is not too strong compared to other Ole Henriksen products and it made my skin feel really soft and nice after using them. I liked these so much I ended up buying the full size from Sephora which can be seen here!

4. John Frieda Frizz-ease Original Serum

This is a product that I’ve been using for a couple of years. I usually take my showers at night, and I noticed when I put it in and sleep with it in, it leaves my hair with nice waves in the morning. To tell you the truth I don’t think this supremely helps with my frizzy hair, but when I don’t use I notice my hair is out of control!

And that’s it for now! Thanks for reading!

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Review: Nair Candy Apple Sugar Wax

Hello there!

Here with a review!

First off, I just wanted to say thank you to ChickAdvisor, as they sent this to me to review as part of their Product Review Club. (And a double thanks for extending the deadline for me. Hair removal is the last thing you’re thinking about when you’re in bed with the flu).

If you’d like to learn more about the Product Review Club (I highly recommend it), check out ChickAdvisor here.

On with the review.

Overview:

Time consuming but very effective way to remove hair.

Price:

This was given to be by the ChickAdvisor Product Review Club, I’m not too sure what the retail price is.

Rating:

6.5 / 10

Would I Buy Again?

I’m on the fence about it. I’m going to keep on trying it out until I perfect my technique! πŸ™‚

Rambling Review

This is the first time I have tried using hot wax in spatula and tub form. I purchased a Veet electric hot wax product which wasn’t all that great, so I wasn’t sure what to expect from this one. Just a bit of background, I usually shave my legs but wax my underarms using cold wax strips.

The kit comes with a little tongue depressor stick, re-usable fabric sheets, instructions, and the tub of wax. Something I really liked was that the sheets are re-usable, you just need a bit of water to remove the wax from them.

The wax was super easy to heat up, you just pop it in the microwave for 30 seconds. It warmed up evenly and at the perfect temperature. The smell is quite pleasant (candy apple, yum) and the consistency was great. Now I was ready to go. I started with my legs and then I moved onto my underarms.

The first thing I noticed was it was a little awkward to get the right amount of wax on my legs. When I ripped off the sheets, there was still a bit of wax left over.

My fingers were getting sticky and making sure I didn’t mess up the wax everywhere on my carpet (bad idea doing it in my carpeted room probably…) was a bit of a challenge.

What I noticed though was that my legs and underarms ended up really really smooth. I’m very happy with the results and I can guess that this would last longer than shaving (they claim it lasts up to 4 weeks).

After finishing, I was sorta sticky all over. I was not planning to take a shower, so I had to run a towel under water to remove the wax. The good thing was it was very easy to remove. Other cold wax products I have dealt with have been a hassle to get the excess wax off. One thing I did notice is that it turned my fingers red after washing the fabric strips off!

It’s not super stained, but definitely noticeable.

My tips for using hot wax:

  • Make sure you have ample time on your hands. I would consider this a much lengthier process than shaving
  • Do this right before you are planning to take a shower. Clean up will be so much easier. (They recommend you don’t use this within an hour of taking a shower because your skin may be still a little wet, making the wax less effective)
  • Maybe wear gloves so your hands don’t get stained like mine
  • Use the wooden stick to put on a thin layer of wax. I think I sabotaged myself by using big globs when I could have done enough with just a thin layer.

All in all, I’m excited to try this again. I think with practice and timing, this could be a very good alternative to shaving.

Thanks for reading!

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Haul: Higher End Products From Sephora

Hello hello!

I hope you are enjoying your day!

I thought I would share some things I bought from Sephora recently!
(Note, when I say recently, I mean a couple of weeks ago! I’ve had the chance to try out some of the products and should be putting up some reviews soon!)

1. NARS Pure Radiant Tinted Moisturizer in Alaska

 

I went into Sephora looking for a tinted moisturizer for the winter. Since I’ve started working, I wanted to start using something a little lower maintenance than the Revlon Photoready. I thought a tinted moisturizer would be best for this. I was looking at this NARS one, and also the infamous Laura Mercier tinted moisturizer. I asked the girl at Sephora her opinion and this is what she gave me. Her rational was that you can layer this a lot easier than the Laura Mercier one.

2. Make Up For Ever Full Cover Concealer in 7

I actually went into Sephora looking to buy the NARS Creamy Concealer as I’ve heard good things about it. The girl at Sephora told me it probably wasn’t the best choice as it should be used for under the eye instead of zits (what I was planning to use it for). Instead she recommended this one. So far I’m loving it. I thought the colour would be way too dark, but it fits really nicely!

3. Ole Henriksen Truth to Go Wipes

Finally, this product I was debating for a while. I received a 12-pack of these wipes in one of the Ole Henriksen Black Friday deals and ended up loving them. I love the serum-y feeling of these makeup wipes, and I enjoyed the fresh orange scent. The only thing that was holding me back of course was the price. These are definitely a bit pricier than other makeup wipes I’ve used, but I decided to bite the bullet. So far I’m happy, but I’m planning to look for another drugstore brand once these run out.

I know in other blogger’s eyes this haul would be considered relatively small, but this is probably the most I’ve spent at Sephora ever! Anyways, enjoy your week and thanks for reading!

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Haul: Shopper Drug Mart 20x Points

Hello!

Wow it’s been a while since I was able to put up a blog post. I’ve been pretty busy with school, work, and everything else to write posts, but I’ve had them in mind for a while. I have about three posts in the waiting, so here we go.

Shoppers Drug Mart (a drugstore in Canada) has a rewards program called Optimum where you earn points for every dollar spent in store and then redeem for discounts. Occasionally (actually like, every week) they have special point promotions such as the ever popular 20 x the points where they multiply your points earned in a transaction by 20.

Usually these points promotions are the times that I end up purchasing my hauls, just to build up my points. πŸ™‚ So here’s a haul of some stuff that I bought during one of these promotions.

1. Olay Fresh Effects: Bead Me Up! Exfoliating Cleanser

I bought this on a whim. I needed a new exfoliator, and I thought I would try this out. I looked up reviews on this after I bought it, and I’ve read mixed things. First impression is that it has a very strong scent, but I hope it will work out okay.

2. L’Oreal Elnett Hairspray – Unscented

With my TRESemme hairspray running low (and getting really tacky and sticky) I decided to try this one. Ingrid, my favourite YouTube beauty guru has recommended this one along with a friend, so I thought I would try it out.

3. John Frieda Frizz-Ease Hair Serum

I actually picked up two of these. This is a funny product as it’s one that doesn’t make my hair look amazing, but when I stop using it, my hair goes nuts. C’est la vie I suppose. I think they are repackaging this product, so it was on a really good deal.

4. CoverGirl Jumbo Gloss Balm in 240 and 216

216

240

This type of lip product has been hot on the market since summer: glossy balm lipsticks in a thick tube. I thought I would try these Cover Girl ones, just to see if the hype is real. πŸ™‚ The colour 240 is coming up a lot more orange on camera than I expected.

And there it is! A short but satisfying haul. :3 Until next time!

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#NailsOfTheDay: Missing the Holidays

Hello!

So I decided to add a new section to my blog called #NailsOfTheDay. I honestly don’t paint my nails every day, but I thought it sounded better than #NailsOfTwoWeeks…

For the first #NailsOfTheDay I have holiday-esque nail colours.

It looks so Christmas-y, but I love the wine with gold accent.

The polishes are:
China Glaze – Seduce Me
Nicole by OPI – The Next CEO

Until next time. πŸ™‚

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