Clarins Lotus Face Treatment Oil: My Oily Skin Saviour!

Hi everyone! Just going to start of my apologizing for the lack of posts over the last few days, Thursday was my 21st and since then I've not been on my computer much at all. Thursday I had a meal with my family, Friday-Saturday I was at a Spa with my mum and sister (bliss!) and Saturday had a big night out with friends which I'm still paying for! Enough about that and on to one of my favourite finds I have ever come across, the Clarins Lotus Face Treatment Oil!

I will start off by saying if you're anything like me, I was so skeptical and scared at the thought of putting oil on my oily skin. Surely it would just make me oilier? The answer is a definite no. First off, I love the smell of the product. It's sort of a light herbal scent and bare in mind I'm never usually a fan of herbal. I also like the little perpet which makes for giving you the perfect amount to spread all over your face at night. Like I said before, I didn't expect much at all to come of this other than to become more oily but I was completely wrong!

I would now never be without this! I've tried everything to fix my oily t-zone from cleansers, to masks, to foundations and all have either done nothing or helped me stay oil free for an extra hour. The first couple of days I used this my skin felt soft and brightened in the morning, all the oil had sunk in over night and my skin looked healthy. I thought to myself great, I spent all this money just to get the same effect I can already get from other products in my collection. However a week on, the difference is incredible. Oil production on my face has gone down massively, to the point i'm only touching up my powder once throughout the day instead of every couple of hours. On top of this, my foundation goes on far nicer and my pores are visibly reduced (something I don't say about many products at all!).

You start off using the product alone after cleansing and toning overnight, then you move on to mixing it with whatever moisturizer you usually use at night which I am about to do. If you don't have combination/oily skin, there is also a dry skin formula which I've heard is great too.

If you're nervous about putting oil on oily skin don't be, it's helped balance my skin out and stop oil production all throughout the day and done wonders for my skin. This is now a skincare staple in my routine and I will never be without it!

Have you tried this? What's your oily skin saviour? 

Rimmel Match Perfection Concealer

Today I thought I'd share with you the first of my reviews on my recent beauty buys the Rimmel Match Perfection Concealer. Until I saw this on a blog a little while ago I'd really heard nothing about this concealer but had heard a lot about the foundation. I've never tried the foundation itself as from what I hear it's better on more normal/dry skintypes and I tend to go for matter bases to help with my oilier nose which is vastly becoming the bane of my life!

I'll start off by saying this is most definitely a rave review from me. I've tried so so many concealers and this is definitely an all time favourite. I'd say in terms of shade it's a pretty neural colour, neither too pink nor too yellow which should please a variety of people. I wear the shade 'Ivory' which is the lightest shade and one major disappointment with this shade as I see with most drugstore concealers is there are only three shades, not ideal!

The consistency is pretty light which is key for me. I have some mild milia under my eyes so anything that isn't too heavy works a lot better for my skin. The concealers I buy are always for the purpose of using under the eye so I can't comment on how this fairs on covering on other areas of the skin but this is fantastic as an undereye concealer! It lightens and brightens, the main thing I look for in my concealers, whilst offering a good coverage with a natural finish and blends beautifully into my skin without going at all cakey, something I found begun to happen with my Collection concealers and the Maybelline Lumi Touch. 

The applicator is a little like the Lumi Touch and the Collection Illuminating Touch in the straw like end which with those you twist to get product out but with this you squeeze it. I like these type of applicators as I find them far easier to get the right amount of product and more hygienic too.

Before with no makeup

After with concealer and foundation

You may be able to tell that I have lines under my eyes but I can confirm that this isn't a fault in the concealer setting into lines, my eyes always have creases there with and without makeup (lucky me at the grand old age of almost 21!). Honestly I will repurchase this again and again as the only thing I've found that is on par with it is the Origins concealer (£16) and this is £5.99!

Have you tried this? What's your favourite undereye concealer?

Recent Beauty Purchases

Hi everyone! Been a bit bad lately with my 21st coming up and bought myself a few beauty bits that have been on my wishlist for a while. It started with Beauty Bay, then went onto Ebay and purchased some products unavailable in the UK and finally, a few things from Boots. So, onto the haul! :)

www.beautybay.co.uk

Urban Decay All Nighter Setting Spray - I've seen a lot of mixed reviews on this but I've wanted to try it for ages! I get a very oily T-Zone so i'm willing to try anything that may help it.

Urban Decay Primer Potion - My MAC Paint Pots aren't working on my oilier eyelids anymore annoyingly and I remember this primer being really good when I've used it before. I was torn between this and the Too Faced Shadow Insurance but as this one is £3 for the same amount I thought I'd go for this one.

OPI Nail Lacquer in Goldeneye - I saw this on someone's blog a while ago and absolutely fell in love with the shade. In the bottle it doesn't look like my kind of polish but swatches I've seen tell me otherwise!

Essie Butler Please - Although I'm not the biggest fan of Essie's formula this shade is undeniably beautiful. I actually really wanted Topshop's AWOL polish but they've annoyingly stopped doing it and this was the most similar shade I could find

www.ebay.co.uk

Kleancolor Polishes - I saw the shade Twinkly Love on Lily's blog and fell in love. I took up the offer of six (I got two of the Twinkly Love shade, far right) and also purchased Blind Date (small multi-coloured stars), Firework (copper with multi coloured glitter chunks), Take A Hint (lilac with iridescent glitter) and Aurora (pink with iridescent stars and glitter). I got them from here and I'd highly recommend the seller.

Revlon Colorburst Lipgloss in Papaya - I probably don't need to rave about these anymore since my post on how much I love them. This shade is unavailable in the UK but it's just a gorgeous corally shade that will be perfect for summer.

Maybelline Babylips in Pink Punch and Cherry Me - I've wanted these for ages and despite hearing rumours of them coming to the UK at some point, I couldn't wait! So far I adore them, they leave a pretty tint and work really well for moisturizing my lips too.

Shu Uemura Eyelash Curlers - My eyelash curlers completely broke last week and I completely gave into the hype and purchased these. To be honest, I've only used them once but so far I'm not overly impressed. They do the job, but no better than my normal cheaper ones and I find they're a weirdish shape, but we'll see!

Boots

17 Miracle Matte Powder - The hunt continues for the dream way to stop my T-Zone from being oily! I've heard Mel say she loves this and after being left disappointed by the Rimmel Stay Matte I'm hoping for good things from this powder!

Rimmel Match Perfection - I'm on the hunt for a really good drugstore brightening concealer and saw this on a blog (cannot for the life of me remember which!) how someone with great taste in makeup loves this so thought I'd give it a go!

Toni & Guy Advanced Detox - If you read my latest post you'll know I'd never be without this! I won't say much more than it's amazing and you should try it.

Have you tried any of these products?

A Haircare Favourite: Toni & Guy Detox Shampoo

Hi everyone! So I thought I'd steer away from makeup and nails today to talk to you about one of my HG products, Toni & Guy Detox Shampoo. I have to be honest here and say I'm not that fussy about haircare, as long as it leaves my hair relatively soft, shiny and detangled I'm happy, meaning that a lot of the products in my routine are totally interchangable. 

Toni and Guy Cleanse Shampoo for Advanced Detox £5.99 for 250ml

I picked this up from Boots for the first time a few months ago, completely on a whim. I'd never read a review on it or heard of it prior to purchasing and still haven't now. However, I'd seen and tried products of its kind from more expensive brands, namely the Phyto Detox shampoo. The idea is that once a week, you use this as your shampoo to get rid of any excess product build up on your scalp to leave your hair feeling squeaky clean. Although the Phyto offering did do this, it also cost £10.50 which for me, is a lot to spend on a haircare item. It also smelt VERY strongly like cleaning product which was a little off putting to say the least! So when I spotted this one whilst T&G products were on offer and I didn't more conditioner, I thought why not give it a go?

Three bottles later, it is safe to say this is one of the best impulsive purchases I've ever made, I love it! It does everything the more expensive versions do amazingly, I actually think it leaves my hair feeling even nicer than the Phyto. It also smells beautiful, the normal hair salon smell you love to find in a product. I'd really urge more people to try this before buying any of the more expensive brands' offerings, I really couldn't see myself without it! It leaves you hair feeling so clean and so soft and best of all, far cheaper. 

The Phyto Detox Shampoo works out at £21.00 for 250ml.
Bumble & Bumble Sunday Shampoo is £15.50 for 250ml
Toni & Guy Detox Shampoo is £5.99 for 250ml 

You can find it on the Boots website here, and it's currently 3 for 2 :)

My Valentine's Day Inspired Nails

I'm not a massive fan of Valentine's Day myself but I do like to get in the spirit of holidays slightly and this is often done through nail art! I've done these nails before and just think they look so cute, i'm really terrible at anything too fiddly so if you're like me and like easy to do but nice looking nails then look no further!

So like I mentioned before, I don't have the most steady hand hense the slight wobbly heart here and there! However, even if you're the same as me, they are so easy to do! For this nail art, I used Essie's Fiji which as you may have guessed from my post on overhyped beauty products I'm not in love with due to the formula but the colour is beautiful after the required effort, Topshop Helter Skelter which is like MAC Impassioned in a polish and dotting tools which my housemates got me from Ebay!

After painting on three layers of Fiji and letting it fully dry, I then took some of the Topshop polish and dabbed it onto a piece of paper. From that amount, I then dipped the dotting tool into the product and drew on two lines diagonally opposite eachother to create a heart shape. You can do them either to face you or away from you, but I chose to do them so they would face other people for this! Then all there's is to do is add a top coat and you're good to go :)

Hope this was helpful for any amateurs like me and have a lovely day Thursday whatever you're doing!

Overhyped Beauty Products That Didn't Work For Me

I need to start this post by saying that all these products are just my opinion of what didn't work for me so please don't completely take my word for it or get offended if you see a product you love in here as the chances are, you will! I wanted to do a post about products I wasn't mad about purely because I find them an interesting read and I think they can sometimes be just as helpful as positive reviews. A lot of these are loved by a lot of people but for some reason or another they either disappointed me or just did nothing for me. With that long intro out the way, here are my thoughts!

1) Nars Orgasm Blush - Now, anyone that reads my blog knows I absolutely love NARS products, especially their blushers. I think this is why I was left so disappointed by this shade. I was expecting the most incredible blush when on me it was way way too shimmery and glitterball. I much prefer Deep Throat as I find it way more flattering on me.

2) Origins GinZing Eye Cream - Another product from one of my favourite brands. For me, this eye cream just didn't do anything. My Eye Doctor from Origins does a brilliant job of soothing my eye area and brightening whereas with this one, I saw no brightening effect. It's a nice eye cream, just disappointing as it didn't do what it was designed to do on me!

3) Essie Polishes - I can already tell people definitely won't like this one! I cannot fault Essie on having some amazing colours and I do own a few of them purely because of this. But I find these so disappointing in formula. On my nails they chip after one or two days wear and the majority I've tried have been really streaky which is such a shame.

4) Revlon Colorstay Foundation - This has no lasting power on the oily areas of my face at all. It really disappointed me because all I hear are rave reviews of how long this lasts and on my normal areas it really does, but no longer than any of my other foundations which do this and stay on the oilier places. Also hated the paint smell but would have been able to get over that if it had worked for me!

5) Caudelie Beauty Elixir - Another product that did nothing for my skin. It actually made me skin pretty red and I didn't find it brightened or soothed at all.

6) Nuxe Reve De Miel - I must be the only person who didn't like this lip balm! I found it way way too thick, it left a gross film on my lips (I woke up with so much of that lip gunk, ergh) and wasn't comfortable to wear at all. It didn't even moisturize my lips no matter how I applied it. Much prefer my Korres Lip Butters for moisturization.

7) Rimmel Stay Matte - This was just okay for me. Didn't really control oil enough to be a cult product for me, it did an okay job but it just didn't blow me away. However, on other skin types I've seen this look flawless.

8) Urban Decay Eyeshadows - This isn't the Naked Palette in particular or even everything about Urban Decay eyeshadows. I love love love some of the shades they bring out and their matte ones are faultless. But I cannot deal with all the fallout the shimmery shades bring which is why I'm selling mine in my blogsale! I'm very much a 'in a rush' kind of makeup person so don't have the time to sit with a tissue under my eye to stop having a glittery face unfortunately, but again, the shades are incredible if you have the time to work with them a bit!

9) MAC Lipglasses - Any formulation of MAC lipglosses I find sticky, thick and gloopy. Would not recommend anyone get these are you can get incredible quality lipglosses for cheaper. Their eyeshadows, blushes and lipsticks are far better quality for your money!

10) Alpha H Liquid Gold (not pictured) - Another product I didn't see any results with. To be fair to it, I just believe it was far too strong for my sensitive skin and made it red and sting a lot so may be one for tougher skin I think!

I'd love to hear what products don't work for you or if you've experienced anything similar than me with any of them!

NOTD: Revlon Plum Seduction

Revlon Plum Seduction £7.99

I figured I hadn't done a nail post in a while and after wearing this colour the last few days I decided now would be the perfect time to review Revlon's Plum Seduction. I haven't had this colour too long after purchasing it on a whim a couple of weeks ago but I absolutely adore it!

To me, this is a great transitional colour from Winter to Spring, a mid-toned purple pink that is perfect for brightening up an outfit without being too in your face. As always with Revlon I find application to be super easy and opaque - this one only taking two coats. It lasted around four days on my nails which is great for me because I try to change my nail polish about twice a week to stop myself getting bored. The finish was also nice and glossy and I'd highly recommend it for any time of year :)

What's your favourite Revlon or transitional nail colour?

Also running my giveaway for reaching 100 followers, one in two chances to win a MAC lipstick of your choice! Click here for the link!