Late to the Party

The Look Fantastic monthly beauty box is £15.00 per month (free P+P) - Subscribe HERE When I heard that this was going to be the second special edition box of the year, I was really hoping that I'd be more excited about this box than I was by the previous two. This edit is called 'Into the Blue' and this month you can expect seven items (it's usually six) which promise to rejuvenate, illuminate, hydrate and refresh us all.     Box Design Score: 3.5/5 It certainly is a very refreshing looking box. Not sure this is a keeper for me though.   With the usual accompanying free copy of Elle Magazine and the Beauty Box booklet. I do really like the opulence of the navy tissue paper and the gold writing.   Excitement Score: 5/5 Yess! Loving the look of everything in here at first reveal.        * Elemis - Superfood Facial Wash Excitement Score: 5/5 I think Elemis has to be one of my favourite skincare brands - I...

If you're an Instagram user then it will have been nigh on impossible for you not to have noticed all the drama surrounding Deciem CEO Brandon Truaxe's bizarre Instagram posts. It all seemed to kick off quite quickly ( I won't go into it too much here) with him posting, at first, passive posts where everything was 'peaceful and loving' and quickly degenerated into pretty hateful comments directed at other users who questioned his behaviour. He even started to highlight certain comments he'd made on his Instagram stories, where he seemed quite pleased with his snarky, and sometimes downright abusive replies to certain comments. It was uncomfortable viewing from the off - but then it became so bad that for me personally, I could no longer try and turn a blind eye to the way he made the whole Deciem brand feel pretty toxic. I'm guessing I tried to ignore it for a while as I was a great fan of most Deciem products - particularly those from The Ordinary br...

I had such a difficult week with my foundation last week! Even the Erborian BB crème au Ginseng left me feeling quite greasy - so it went from one level to another with the scaly cake-iness of The Ordinary Colours foundation to the overly slippy Erborian! Which I couldn't quite work out as the Erborian felt quite matte when applied but didn't take long to make me look shiny and oily. Here's hoping this week's foundation choice is more successful!   * Primer - Pixi by Petra Flawless & Poreless Primer * Foundation - L'Oreal True Match * Undereye Concealer (not pictured) - Inglot - This has got to be used up this week. I'm getting bored now! * Powder - TonyMoly Cat's Wink * Highlighter - E.L.F - Baked highlighter in 'Moonlight Pearls' * Bronzer - E.L.F - Sunk Kissed Glow Bronzer - I actually didn't reach for this at all last week so I'm keeping it in for this week. * Blusher - Hourglass - Ambient Lighting Blush in ...

Phew! A mega month of empties!   Just two new skincare products bought this month - I needed to replace the Bielenda Dr Medica Capillaries Serum and also my The Ordinary Advanced Retinoid 2% ran out so I replaced it with the Ishtar Skinlights 1% Bioactive Retinol Serum. Any other additions from my stash came from Beauty Boxes.   Skincare Empties     WR - Will Repurchase/Have Repurchased MR - May Repurchase in the Future WNR - Would Not Repurchase   * Etude House - Baking Powder Cleansing Cream WNR * Holika Holika - Honey Acerola Sleeping Mask - (De-Cluttered) WNR * Skin Food - Watermelon Mask WNR * Omorovicza - Deep Cleansing Mask WNR * Ole Henriksen - Sheer Transformation Facial Crème MR * The Ordinary - High Adherence Silicone Primer WNR * Ziaja - Marigold Toner MR * Ole Henriksen - African Red Tea Foaming Cleanser MR * Jurlique - Activating Water Essence MR * Clarins - Gentle Eye Makeup Remover WNR * Cl...

Here are the items I've chosen to try and use up this month:   * The Ordinary - Glycolic Acid 7% Toning Solution The 7% strength of this was always just a little too much for me and I've favoured other 5% strength glycolic toners. I've found that I can use this on my body also, so it will probably get used up in this way.   * Cosrx - Advanced 96 Snail Mucin Essence I didn't manage to finish this off last month, so it remains in the project.   * Nuxe - Rieve de Miel Lip Balm This has a lovely scent but it's extremely rich. I started off using this as a lip sleeping mask, but I would wake up feeling greasy-lipped! It's taking forever to get through this small pot as is it so rich.   * The Ordinary - Hyaluronic Acid Another item that was in last month's selection that I didn't manage to finish off.   * TonyMoly Apple Tox Peeling Cream Initially bought as part of a fruity packaged set, I don't mind this product as a peelin...

My skin has been in great shape recently and is looking quite clear but for some reason it's not been looking so good when using foundations with any degree of coverage - it seems to be caking on my nose and sinking into my pores making them look worse (maybe I'm drier than I think at the moment?). But whatever the reason, I'm gravitating towards lighter coverage and have been favouring my Erborian CC Cream as the only base. This week I picked up some Erborian BB Crème Au Ginseng, so have introduced that into the weekly makeup bag as my initial choice of The Ordinary Colours foundation is looking terrible on me this week! This is also the week when I start cycling through my eye shadow palettes again - and my first choice is the Obsession Makeup bespoke palette.    * Primer - A'Pieu - Start-Up Pore Primer - I have several sachet samples of this primer to use up. Although this feels very silicone-heavy, it doesn't seem to clog up my pores. And because of th...

I actually started this project at the beginning of May, where I pulled out six skincare items that I don't use regularly and aim to use them up within the month. I'm allowing myself to de-clutter them if they're really not working for me as I don't believe that you always have to see it out till the bitter end, even if I would prefer to finish rather than throw.   So here's what I chose to use up in May:   * Skin Food - Watermelon Mask I bought this because I just love the fresh smell of watermelon. But what I didn't bank on was just how quickly that gorgeous scent could turn sickly sweet when sitting on your skin for ten minutes! This is a wash-off mask with a thick, gel-like consistency. It's meant for soothing your skin, but to be honest, it didn't really do too much so I had put this mask aside with a preference for others.   * Holika Holika - Honey Acerola Sleeping Pack This is one of the first sleeping packs I bought so without...