Soap & Glory Sexy Mother Pucker!

Hello!! Today I will be looking at the Soap & Glory Sexy Mother Pucker lip gloss in 'Half Naked'. Ha! Gota love the cheeky names Soap & Glory comes up with! They retail at £10 a pop so fairly pricey for a non over the counter cosmetic. You can get them in Boots but I've also seen them on Amazon too (although they seem to retail higher online).

Colour
To me the colour is the perfect nude. It looks brown from the packaging (which is why I got it) but if I had to pin the colour down I'd say it's more of a mahogany with slightly pink undertones. It's not the kind of colour that's going to make you stand out but for an everyday look I love this. I do think its versatile enough to compliment most skin tones.

Plumps your lips?

Now, having lacked in the voluptuous lips department, I was very excited about this product because it claims to plump up your lips. In fact, the product claims it can plump them up to 10 x in volume! How mammoth would that be!

1 - 2 minutes from application I started to get really tingly lips as if there were little vibrations happening pushing my lips out. When I looked in the mirror I was in 2 minds about it. I wasn't sure if they did genuinely seem bigger or if it was just the fact the lips were just coated. Either way they did seem seem slightly bigger (definitely not 10 x bigger though!).

The top picture shows my lips without the gloss and the bottom two are with the gloss (pictured with and without camera flash), so you can judge for yourself whether you think it actually worked.

Texture/Consistency
If I am honest the consistency of this is a little stiff which could be because it's got quite a thick texture. It's also very sticky so you may have to remove a few fly away strands sticking to your lips!

Smell
Strangely like sweet popcorn!

Lasting Power

30 minutes - the gloss starts to set and the stickiness dies down.
1 hour - the product loses it's thickness and definitely feels more natural on the lips.
2 hours - I can still just feel it on my lips. The gloss hasn't dried them out at all and my lips feel fairly smooth.

 Overall lasting power is about 2 - 3 hours.

Have you tried the Soap & Glory Sexy Mother Pucker range? What was your experience with it? Do you recommend other Soap & Glory cosmetics? Thanks for reading!

Interview Wear!

Hello!! So I recently went for an interview and I wanted to share with you two outfits I put together. I wanted a smart but trendy look so I raided my wardrobe (and went Next sale shopping!) to put together these looks.

Outfit 1

Black diamond embroidered skirt -  Next  £14 (half price)
Pale pink top -  ASOS - £22 (old but managed to find the link here )

I thought this outfit captured the smart but trendy look.
The top has frills on the sleeve and neckline which added some fun to the outfit.

The skirt has little diamond embroidery (2nd pic on right) which I thought added an extra element to what would have been a fairly plain skirt. The material is polyester and overall it's really comfortable to wear which was great for my long train journey to my interview!

Outfit 2

Grey dress with purple strips - Next - £20 (half price)

I don't think you can really go wrong with a grey dress for smart wear. The length is interview appropriate and it has this faint purple stripe design (see below) which I think transforms this standard grey dress to being quite stylish! Teamed with a blazer and this smart look would be completed.

Unfortunately, the material ( polyester and viscose) creases quite easily so I didn't think it would be good for my long train journey which is why I choose outfit 1!


Thanks for reading. Comment below on what you would wear for an interview/day in the office?

Carmex..My lip saviour!

Hello!!

Today I thought I would do a little review on what has become my summer lip saviour, the Carmex Moisturising Lip Balm. I bought this in Tesco's for a purse friendly £1.50! I'll be honest and say this smells a lot like medicine and has a cool numbing effect on the lips. I wasn't a fan of this so I literally just chucked it in my draw and it never saw the light of day for around 3 months!

Recently, my lips became uncommonly dry for me and I started to get flakes appearing along the edges (maybe it's the hot weather?). I rigorously put my Maybelline Baby Lips on to keep my lips moist but they just did not get rid of the dryness, neither did my Nivea Milk and Honey chapstick (which normally works wonders).

I pulled out the Carmex to see if it could solve my problems, and it has really saved my dry lips! The cool numbing effect it no longer a problem in the scorching summer heat! Looking at it closely, it's got a thick consistency which I think has helped get rid of the dryness and is so moisturising! The fact that it's in tube also means that it is so easy to just whack out and apply to lips in a hurry.


I will definitely be using this more during the summer and will probably invest in different flavours to solve the smell issue (which I just cannot love!).

What are your favourite summer lip balms? Comment below!

Kleenex Shine Absorbing Sheets!

Hello!!

I am very excited about this product as I get really oily skin throughout the day. I bought mine for £1.50 off Amazon but I think you can also find them in Tesco's. Essentially, these are just little paper thin sheets which you just dab onto the oily parts of your face. Once your done, the oil gets absorbed onto the sheets and hey presto your face looks less oily!

I wanted to show you how effective it is, so I took some before and after pics.

Before - I don't know if you can see but I had a lot of oil build up on my forehead, along my nose and above the cheekbones.

After - Again don't know if the camera can really capture this but after dabbing along my face it looked more matte (there was no shine) and the oil had disappeared.

The only negatives is that whilst dabbing the product took a bit of my blush off so it probably won't help keep your makeup fully in place. I do love the small packaging as its easy to carry around but because it's so small if you happen to taken too many sheets out, it's really difficult to put them back in the box. Finally, it seems more orientated towards women. The sheets are purple and the non blotting side has flowers which kinda reminds me of a design you'd find on a Always sanitary pad. So yeah, the design doesn't seem very man friendly!

Hope you enjoyed this post. How do you deal with oily skin? Have you tried the Kleenex shine absorbing sheets?

Clinique Cheek Pop

In today's post I will be looking at the Clinique Cheek Pop blush in the shade 'Ginger Pop'. They retail at £16.50 which considering your only getting 3.5g is quite pricey.

The colour at first looks kinda like a red/dark pink but on application it comes out lighter and you get more of a coral shade. I wasn't too blown away when I first tried it as the blush is actually quite transparent so you don't get a whoosh of colour straight away.  However when you build it up it gets a lot more vibrant and appears quite glossy on the cheeks. Personally, I love it!

As I am going to show you how it looks on application I thought it would be interesting to explore the different ways to wear blush. Normally, I smile and apply to the apples of my cheek (isn't that how everyone does it?). I was surprised when the lady at the Clinique counter told me I'm doing it wrong! It got me thinking so I looked up the different ways to apply blush and thought I would share some with you.

Apples of the Cheek technique 

This is what I would normally do which is just applying the blush to the apples of my cheek when smiling (left pic). I think this can look quite pretty but the problem with this technique is that when you stop smiling the blush goes downwards (see right) and your face doesn't have that flushed look anymore.


Shadow Blush
I wasn't sure what to call this but I saw it being described on From Head to Toe's youtube channel. You basically apply most of the blush to underneath your temples to create a shadow effect and then gradually apply a fainter amount along your cheek bones. On me it came out like this. I think it's definitely a more edgier look to the apples of cheek technique.

On the Cheek Bone
The final look I got from gossmakeupartists youtube channel who described applying the blush along the cheekbone (not to be confused with the apples of your cheek).  He basically said you place a finger where the top of your ear is and apply blush along that bone towards your nose. I quite like this look and on me it came out like this.

Thank you for reading.

Do let me know any tips or techniques you have for applying blush or whether you have tried the Clinique Cheek Pops?!

Tools of the trade - the essential tweezers!

I think every girl probably has a pair of tweezers in their makeup bag so I wanted to do a mini review on the two tweezers I own. One is the pricier Revlon Diamond Collection tweezers which I got at Superdrugs for £4.99 (it was actually half price!) and the other is a 99p pair I got a Body Care.

For the Revlon pair I admit I was attracted to the appearance of the tweezers and thought for a slightly higher price than they would be really good. Wrong! The diamond studs, as you may have guessed, make is slightly uncomfortable against your fingers. The tip of the tweezers are very sharp, which might make you think great, they'll do the job! Wrong again, their so sharp that they don't grip the hair from the root, they end up cutting the hair half way so that you still have tiny hairs left. Unfortunately, it's just one bad purchase.

Now the Bodycare pair for the rather purse friendly 99p is actually quite good! It's lightweight and the tips have that slanted shape which I think helps lead to better application. It's also got these little groves along the inner side of the tips and on the outer middle section which help to give you that better grip. I do struggle a little to get the extra tiny hairs with this though. I know it looks a little worn down in the pic but I've had these for over 4 years and they still do a great job!

What is your staple brand of tweezers?

Clairol Nice 'n' Easy hair dye!!

Hello Lovely Readers!!

So every few months I dye my hair. I'm 23 but I'll admit to you I get a few greys! Perhaps it's genetic or just plain stress? I picked up two of these boxes on a 2 for £8 deal at Asda in the colour 'dark blonde'.

I have naturally black hair so my aim is to get a dark brown type of colour. I'm not a fan of bleaching so that is why I opted for a lighter shade instead of a black or dark brown.

My mum recommends this brand saying that the foam application makes it, well literally,  'nice n easy' (excuse the pun!) to apply. It comes with your usual bits and pieces. I've labelled a pic of them below.

This is what the foam looks like once you mixed the colour blend formula with the colour activating cream.  Whats great about using foam dye is that it makes less mess and your less likely to have dye dripping every where! Also, it looks very cool all fizzed up!

I've posted a before and after pic, so if like me, you have dark hair, you can see whether this brand and shade will work for you.

Before - You can slightly see the brown from where I dyed it before and where my natural black roots are coming through.

After - I took two pics outside and inside so you can get a good idea of how it looks in different lights (although there was little sunlight outside). As you can there is no bold colour change but in the sunlight the dye has actually made my hair look a lot browner and I'm fairly pleased. The conditioner the dye comes with is also fab and leaves your hair soft and shiny!!



Thanks for reading! What hair dye's would you recommend?

Benefit World Famous Neutrals 'Easiest Nudes Ever' Kit

This is a product I bought a few months ago when ASOS were doing a 20% off special code. They normally retail for £23.50 so I got it for £18.80 plus free delivery. Some fairly good bargains to be had on ASOS for makeup!

Now, I bought this because it's a bit of a beginners guide to using neutral eyeshadows. The box comes with little 'how to' instructions for two different looks. From the below pic you can see they also include pictures so it's quite easy to follow.



It comes with six eye shadows with the most creative names that will certainly make you smile!





The cream shadows are in the shades:

R.S.V.P - A very light shimmery pink
No Pressure - Kind of a fawn colour

The powder shadows are in the shades:

Call My Bluff - A creamy beige
Thanks A Latte - A metallic brown
Pinky Swear - A very light baby pink
Quick Look Busy  - A very dark brown

As you can see from the swatches they are all very pigmented.

I should also add the cream shadows do come in a smaller tub that the ones you can buy seperately (their roughly the same size as a 2p coin and 3.2g in weight). Overall, I would say the cream shadows are very long lasting but after 7 hours the powder ones seem to fade away. 


I'm a bit of a novice when it comes to creating these defined smokey looks but here is my attempt at what the kit describes as the 'playtime' look.









Thanks for reading!! Let me know if you have have tried any of the World Famous Neutrals kits and what are your thoughts on them!

Introducing Nanshy!

So, I was on the hunt for some good brushes and a lot of online reviews seemed to point towards Nanshy. Curious, I ordered their Large Shader Brush and the Blending Eyeshadow Brush. 

At first glance, I really love the sturdy thick pearly white handles which adds that extra ease of control when applying makeup. The bristles are velvety soft (yes - I said velvety!) so they cause no discomfort when applying to the delicate eye area. They also wash well and don't lose any hairs although one or two do go out of place.

Now, I'm very impressed with the Large Shader Brush. It's dome shaped and fairly large but not as large as the Ecotools Large Shader brush. It holds the eye shadow very well and just glides across your eye lids very smoothly.

 The Blending Eyeshadow Brush has more of a flared out shape and does a great job at blending. I also think it can be used for other purposes as I've used it as a crease brush too and it works perfectly.

My only gripe with the product would have to be the packaging. Now I agree it's the brush that matters but the really unattractive plastic it comes in just doesn't do these stunning brushes any justice. I've taken a pic of it if your interested.

I thoroughly recommend these brushes!! Both of these retail individually at £5.95 on Amazon so fairly purse friendly. You can also get the full 13 piece brush set for £34.95. I would definitely say these brushes rival the Real Techniques ones and I don't think you'd regret investing in them!

Have you tried Nanshy Brushes? Whats your favourite makeup brush brand?

Mini MAC Haul

So, last month I purchased my first ever MAC products. I got the MAC Pro Longwear Paint Pot in the shade Groundwork (pictured left) which costs a steep £15.50 and the Prep and Prime Eye Primer in Medium Dark which was around the £12.50 mark (pictured right).

Groundwork at first glance looks like it will be a lovely deep brown shade. In actual fact when applied to the lid it comes out like a taupe colour with hints of pink/lilac (see swatch on the right below). I actually like it as its quite a delicate shade that's subtle enough for daytime use.

The Medium Dark Primer is meant to be the darkest shade MAC caters for. Personally, I think it's a bit light for being described as medium dark (see swatch on the left) but it blends very well to match your skin tone.

Now, I decided to test the longevity of these products. I have taken pictures throughout the day to show you how well the makeup stays on.

On my right side I have applied the MAC Prep and Prime Eye Primer with Groundwork on top and on the left I have only applied Groundwork.

Here are my results:

10.30 am -
All freshly done

3.30 pm -
 Both still in place!

6.30 pm -
 Makeup is mostly in place but there is a slight bit of creasing at the inner corners of the eye.

Overall the longevity of this product seems to be good although there is slight creasing after 8 hours. I didn't notice that the primer made much difference to be honest although I suppose the right eye I applied primer to looks marginally better. 

What do you think about MAC Paint Pots? Or do you have any dupes you would recommend?

Thanks for reading!!

 On a side note I am actually on the hunt for a good lip liner, can anyone recommend one?