Massive Shopping Haul Post #1: Makeup, Books, Jewellery, Candles, Skincare!

Soooo I feel like lately all I update with is hauls, but with starting a new job tomorrow (eek!) I realized I desperately needed some new work attire. Besides, who doesn’t love to see shopping sprees?! I know I do.

So this past weekend I headed to Toronto and raided all the stores I normally don’t get to experience. I REALLY tried to stay away from focusing on my usual favs (LuluLemon, Forever 21, Sephora, Victoria Secret etc.) and more on the quality work clothing stores (Banana Republic, Tristan, etc.)

So for this post I will start off with all the accessories/fun little things I got and do another for the clothing!

Chapters

A Life in Men by Gina Frangello
Already halfway through this book and really, really enjoying it. Hope to do a review afterwards!

And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini
Loved The Kite Runner by this author so I am excited to try this one out!

LUSH

Skin Drink (face moisturizer) and DreamWash (body wash)

LUSH was out of Celestial, my regular face moisturizer, and since I am hardly near a LUSH store ever I had to get something. The lady working recommended Skin Drink was my next bet. Interested to see how it compares.

Bath and Body Works

Now that I am back living at home, I’ve unfortunately had to ease up on my candle obsession since my mom hates them…..buuuut, with her going on vacation soon, I figured I’ve got some time to put them to use! Smelling like a pina colada, I love how this scent fills the room!

Sephora
So I tried to stay clear since I JUST did an online Sephora haul (which can be found here) I couldn’t resist. Toronto is 3.5 hours away from me sooo I gotta take advantage while I can right?! Right.

Anastasia Beverly Hills Brow Pencil in Medium Brown

After trying the Go Brow Kit, I couldn’t deny that this pencil works some pretty get magic on my brows. Therefore, after regretting not getting it in my online order, I knew it was my chance to grab it in stores.

NARS Deep Throat Blush

My original excuse for going in store was to return NARS Amour. It just wasn’t my colour, and no matter how light of hand I used I felt like I looked like permanently embarrassed all day long every time. But after seeing deep throat and practically swatching my whole arm with it, I had to have it. Fingers crossed this one works out better!

H&M

Hard to tell from the picture, but this necklace came with all the letters of the alphabet….so you can choose whatever you use it for! It is only one per letter…therefore my name, Heather, doesn’t work. Thats okay though! I like using just my initials, and I love the fact I can change it up whenever I want.

I think this necklace will look wonderful with a rounded neckline or high neckline. I’ve worn it once and it definitely is a stand out piece. I love it!

Forever 21

I think this is a unique necklace as well, that will go with a lot of things.

This ring was $1.80. ‘Nuff Said.

Stay tuned for my clothing haul! 🙂

June Favourites!

July is here/happy Canada Day!! Time to celebrate a great country by wearing our colours and drinking our national drink — a beer. But first,  a look back on the month of June and some of the products who really stood out as favs for me!

Revlon Colorstay Concealer 
Blends like a dream and perfectly hides those dark circles underneath the eyes. Does exactly what it sets out to do — conceals what I want, and looks 100% natural. Wore this pretty much every single day since I got it!

Origins Mask
My skin has been getting pretty bad lately now that I am off birth control — so this Charcoal Mask has been an absolute life saver. I notice such a difference immediately after use, I know it is really getting the dirt from beneath my skin and helping my stupid blemishes and blackheads disappear!

Coconut Milk Conditioner
Got this near the beginning of the month, and I am officially obsessed. I love trying out new conditioner so it is rare that I repeat — I am for sure repeat buying this. My hair feels so hydrated and healthy — and not to mention smells amazing — after I use this.

MAC Cleanse Off Oil
In the past couple of weeks I’ve re-found love in really taking my time and doing a full face of makeup a lot of the time, so the MAC Cleanse Off Oil just makes my life so easy. I love how it literally makes EVERYTHING come off within two seconds of rubbing it in, and that it turns into lather once you wash it off. Love!

B2B Mousse
I used this when going camping, jump out of the lake and simply scrunch this through your hair and — bam! Voluminous curls and no frizz! And frizz is a huge problem for me. Definitely my go-to mousse from now on!

Bite Beauty #6 Gloss
After getting Bite Beauty’s Deconstructed Rose set, I am venturing between a variety of glosses for different occasions, however #6 cannot go unnoticed, seeming to have found a permanent pocket position in my purse. Smelling sweet and looking great, #6 is a tad darker pink than my natural lip colour, which is perfect  for the natural makeup look I often sport.

Essie Go Gingza
Receiving this for my birthday at the beginning of the month, I’ve pretty much had this colour on either my toes or fingers the whole time since. A light purple, this colour is so flattering and pretty with a tan, and of course Essie polishes always go on smoothly and have great lasting power.

 

Choose-Day Tuesday: Benefit vs. Laura Mercier Highlighter

Today’s battle is faught between two highlighters which I got as a part of two different value sets to give them a good try before deciding to buy the full size products. Though miniature in size, they both pack a mean punch in what they set out to do — provide the face with a radiant, healthy glow.

First up, is the ultrasmooth, silky sexy powdered highlighter that will outlast any competitor — it’s the Laura Mercier Matte Radiance Baked Powder Compact!
ADDRESS: Laura Mercier Matte Radiance Baked Power Compact (Shade: Highlighter 01)
$42.00 0.26 oz

ASSESS: Cashing in my 500 point perk for a Laura Mercier set, this little baby was a stand out right away. It is perfect for a night on the town, a day at work, or even for a no makeup natural look giving off a healthy warm glow. Super blendable, this product can be built up from just a hint of sheer to  an intense bold look — your call.

I also love this product because it has its benefits for the skin as well, including Vitamin E to protect the skin from free radicals, to jojoba oil to moisturize the skin, which is always a plus for my forever issues with dryness.

Next up is the competitor that will luminize your life, it is the Benefit’s Girl Meets Pearl highlighter!
ADDRESS: Benefit’s Girl Meets Pearl Highlighter
$36.00 0.4oz

ASSESS: Described as a soft, golden pink, liquid-pearl highlighter, this stuff light-reflects wonderfully and smells of wonderful raspberry goodness. I also love that this product has benefits for the skin, with moisturizing sesame seed oil and chamomile and almond seed extract to improve firmness. I will always opt for a product that looks great, while at the same time improving your skin.

While it is definitely important to use this sparingly (if you overload it looks like a hot frosty mess) I think this looks great for a night out when you really want your skin to appear vibrant and dewy.

VERDICT: I use both of these highlighters, however I definitely use the Laura Mercier one more. It looks so much more natural and absolutely stunning each time, no matter if I use a light or heavy hand. It is a powder but somehow does not feel dusty, and lasts all day long. The Benefit one is also great, with it’s own skin benefits and provides a great light-reflecting glow, however it can look too frosty at times and is a bit much for me for every day wear.

Laura Mercier is the winner!

Sephora Haul!

Four very wonderful S’s have made my long weekend — Sunshine, Swimming, Sangria aaaand Sephora! After a beautiful cottage weekend away, I arrived home today to another beautiful sight, my Sephora order.

I was super excited about this order, anxiously waiting every single day since I ordered it for it to come.

Hourglass Ambient Lighting Palette
I have been eyeing the Hourglass palette since it came out, so I decided to just bite the money-bullet and get it. I’m a bit annoyed because I heard others received the Hourglass primer with it, which I was excited to try, but oh well. Will be doing a review soon!

Lash Stash To Go Set

Not even gonna lie, the whole reason I HAD to put an order in (pretty sure I am headed to a Sephora next weekend ha!) was because I was worried this may not still be there and I absolutely had to have it. What an amazing deal. Will do a review for sure soon!

Origins Check and Balances Face Wash

My skin has made it’s way more to the combo side as of late, and after loving another Origins product I decided to test this baby out. After trying once, I think this is headed towards a positive review, fingers crossed!

Sephora Look Smart Travel Eye Brush Set

This was smaller than I anticipated, but I am really excited to try this out.

Sephora (Make Up For Ever) Birthday Set

Actually was pretty shocked over how much I love this lipstick. It is a great colour, and I just think it is the cutest tiniest lipstick!

Holy Grail Hump Day — Revlon Colorstay Concealer

For me, a Holy Grail status is a hard one to achieve. I don’t take that title lightly. A Holy Grail product isn’t something I just like, it’s a product I know I can depend on time after time. That I will continue to repurchase because it exceeds expectations and gets the job done every single time.

Therefore, it’s pretty shocking for me that after less than a month, the Revlon Colorstay concealer has already achieved Holy Grail status for me! I got this product completely on a whim, my Laura Mercier Secret Camouflage is going quicker than I want and was hoping to find something for a cheaper price that could do the trick.

(03 Light Medium blended)

Well this does the trick alright. Super blendable, this product comes on creamy and blends in effortlessly. I personally love these tub and stick applicators, it makes it easy to get the product in the exact areas you desire. 03 Light Medium is the perfect shade for me.

Coverage is great, it is buildable, so depending on the coverage you want you can get. However, I feel it comes on pretty thick anyway…a little goes a long way. I use this for the under eye dark bags and it hides them perfectly, with no cakey look whatsoever. It isn’t a highlighter in any way, but a straight up concealer. It does the exact job it has set out to do, and I couldn’t ask for anything more!

Choose Day Tuesday: LUSH Turkish Delight vs. Dream Cream

Today’s battle goes to two of Lush’s most hydrating shower smoothies — Dreamwash and Turkish Delight!

In the left corner we have it’s competitor’s worst nightmare, but our body’s dream….it’s Dreamwash!

ADDRESS: LUSH Dreamwash
$22.95 250g

ASSESS: Being a massive fan of Lush’s Dream Cream, I decided to use it’s partner in crime for the shower. Made with rich, smoothing calamine, aloe vera, lavender, rose, tea tree and chamomile, this shower smoothie is made for those suffering from eczema, psoriasis, skin irritation and sunburns. The calamine even helps with bug bites!

While I can’t say I’ve noticed any difference whatsoever in bug bites or sunburns (though I wasn’t trying to use it for that) I can say it has provided great moisture for my eczema prone skin and complements it’s dual cream like the dream it claims to be! Very creamy like most of their shower smoothies, the scent is a hard one to describe, but I can tell you if you are in the market for a fragrance body wash, this is not it.

While it lathers just fine, I don’t feel like it leaves me feeling super duper clean — I use a different soap for the areas I really scrub. However, if you have areas of dryness this is definitely the product to use for those areas.

In the right corner we have the shower smoothie that leaves you feeling absolutely delightful! It’s…Turkish Delight!

ADDRESS: LUSH Turkish Delight
$34.95 200g

ASSESS: Also well-known for hydrating dry skin, Turkish Delight is also a creamy texture made of the likes of aphrodisiac jasmine and Turkish rose, smoothing almond oil, moisturizing cocoa butter and neroli. Rose scented, LUSH instructs to leave lathered on the skin for a minute before rinsing, to ensure touchably soft and fragranct skin.

While made for any skin type, this shower smoothie complements dry skin well. Unlike its competitor, it is made for those with sensitive skin, yet provides a beautiful scent along with it that does not irritate.

While I found it a bit difficult to lather, leading to me using more product per use than I would like, I love the scent of this product a lot, leaving my body rose scented but not overpowering. Most importantly, I am left with extremely hydrated skin!

VERDICT: When sitting side by side, it’s a pretty difficult choice. Therefore, stats come into play. Dream Cream has 250g where Turkish Delight prodives 200g. Dream Cream is $22.95, where as Turkish Delight is a whopping $34.95.

I found both products to generally do the exact same thing, however I even found Turkish Delight harder to lather, forcing me to use more product than Dream Cream. Turkish Delight definitely had a better scent, but if that is all it does better it simply is not worth it for me. Unless I saw Turkish Delight do absolute wonders for my skin, that was going to be the only time I spent that much on the product, and since Dream Cream did basically the same thing, they are the winner of this battle!

Drugstore Haul!

So I’ve gathered up some stuff that I’ve got over the past couple of weeks to show you guys, most of which I’ve tried and some I have not, but can give you my opinions on what I think of them so far!

Real Techniques Travel Kit

This kit consists of the Multi Task brush, the Domed Shadow brush, and the Foundation brush. Definitely understand why people love this brand’s brushes! These are the first I have tried, and the Multi Task brush has become my favourite brush ever. Will be buying others from this brand!

OGX Nourishing Coconut Milk Conditioner

Will 100% be listed in my favourites for June. My hair feels so smooth and silky, hydrated and healthy, and smells AMAZING after I use this!

Got2b Double Curling Power Curling Mousse

Haven’t tried this yet, but in the summer I absolutely love beachy curls that are effortless. The last thing I want to do on a hot day is sweat underneath a blow dryer for 500 hours (okay, a tad exaggeration but that’s what it feels like, am I right?) so I am super excited to get out of the shower, run this product through my hair, scrunch and go! I’ll let you know how this stuff holds soon enough.

NYX Pore Filler

You can get a hold of this stuff at Target, a little pricier for drug store ($11.99 when I got it) but I really do believe it is an amazing dupe for Benefit’s Porefessional, which we all know is amazing. It minimizes the look of pores and feels so smooth, the porcelain doll-like finish they claim is not far off at all from how I feel!

Revlon Manicure Essentials

I haven’t opened this yet, but a friend got it for me for my birthday so I am super excited to try! The kit consists of:
-Dual-ended Cuticle Trimmer
-Nail Clip with curved blade
-Compact Emeryl File
-Buffer
-Carrying case

She also got me a few other filers and a whole load of amazing nail polishes….I have amazing friends! 🙂

Revlon Colorstay Concealer

LOVE this concealer.

Nail Polishes

So as mentioned above, my awesome friend got me tonnes of great nail polishes for my birthday, so I decided to show my favourites and then the ones that I liked the least.

My absolute favourite of the bunch goes to Essie Go Ginza, a beautiful pale purple. The other favourites were Essie Romper Room (a baby pink), Sally Hansen’s Extreme Wear Mint Sorbet (title describes it perfectly), and Sally Hansen’s Breezy Blue (a wonderful baby blue).

Ironically, the reason why she got me a bunch of nail polish was because I was also complimenting her manicure, which was often sporting the next two colours brand of SinfulColours. While I love the shade Easy Going that is shown above, I find it takes a super long time to dry and is a little bit runny. The next shade of Cinderella is quite glittery, when I often opt for a one tone colour.

 

 

Hump Day Holy Grail: Origins Charcoal Mask

Today’s Holy Grail was decided moments ago — after Origins Clear Improvement Active Charcoal Mask left my face feeling so revitalized and clean.

This is the type of mask you can actually see a dramatic result even after one use. From the first try to now, every time I have used Origin’s Charcoal Mask I have felt a world of difference — unclogging my pores, and leaving my face feeling so fresh, without stripping it of natural oils. I have dealt with super dry skin all my life, but after coming off the pill I have gotten a bit oiler and more breakouts than ever before — may even have to start calling myself combo skin from here on out. Origins did not dry out the dry patches, and really helped with my breakouts.

I’m also SO relieved I am so happy with this product, since its competitors who claim to do the same things triple in price!! I hear only amazing things about Glamglow, but just could not justify spending a week’s groceries on it.

For  the price of $28.00 for 3.4 oz to get a huge help in ridding blackheads, huge help in ridding breakouts, leaving my skin feeling fresh and clean and not drying at all…yep, I am sold.

Miffed Monday — Eyeko London Skinny Liquid Eyeliner

It’s that time of the week again! The time to discuss a product in which I tried with excitement — and left me truly miffed with it’s results. This weeks culprit goes to the one and only Eyeko London Skinny Liquid Eyeliner in black. 

Thankfully, I got this liner in part of a value set from Sephora, otherwise I’d be pretty peeved I travelled all the way home with no option of returning this awful excuse of a “precision, accentuating black liquid eyeliner.” I feel duped. After getting the Draw the Line value set, Eyeko was one of the most anticipated items, using it first from the set. 

You see, a brand dedicated to liners and mascaras led me to believe I was about to experience something marvellous — and instead it was something quite the opposite. Upon my VERY FIRST try of this liner, I didn’t even finish the second eye before it was completely dried out. That’s it. Trying now, I get the faint leftovers of what was supposedly once there. Thinking I just picked out the unlucky lottery ticket, I checked reviews online — only to find out I am not alone! 

“Two liners dried out within the first week of purchase.”

“I was really disappointed. […] As others have noted, the formula is dry and the pen tip is uncomfortable. What’s worse, it is impossible to put this eyeliner on over eyeshadow.”

“While testing the mini Skinny, I noticed (like everyone else) how quickly it dries out… so quickly that it’s almost impossible to line both eyes properly before you have to give up and try again tomorrow.”

 “Didnt even get the chance to use this product because when I finally opened the box it was already dried out!”

“Dried out soon after I used it, like 2 days after! Not worth the money at all.”

…And all these comments are from the very first page of the Sephora comments. How can such a seemingly respected eyeliner brand have such a basic formula problem? I see many comments also stating to try to run it under water and it works much better, so I will be trying that….but for $20.00 a pop, you shouldn’t have to be doing stuff like that from the very first try. I’ll stick with my Stila!

Bite Beauty’s Deconstructed Rose Library Set Review — Post #4

Next up for review in the Bite Beauty’s Deconstructed Rose set are glosses Three, Five and Eight.

This is the last three to review from the set! If you’d like to check out my thoughts on the other 9 glosses they can be found in these posts:
Glosses Two, Nine and Eleven Review
Glosses Four, Seven and Ten Review
Glosses One Six and Twelve Review

Gloss Three

I was a bit hesitant to try this gloss at first, since it is not exactly a colour I normally veer towards, but I have found myself enjoying this. However, I’ll admit I enjoy it because it comes on rather translucent….so if you are in this for the actual shade — which Bite Beauty describes as a pale peach — don’t get your hopes up. Which is rather surprising since the rest of the set has been pretty great for colour payoff.
Gloss Five

My favourite gloss from the set! The most flattering shade on my olive (now quite tanned since I’ve been to Cuba) skin tone. Described as the light mauve shade, this gloss gives the perfect amount of shine and colour  that wears for hours and leaves my lips feeling soft and sexy. It adds that subtle hint of colour, adding a pinkness without being overbearing. I am obsessed with this shade!

Gloss Eight

Gloss Eight has great staying power and along with the majority of the set, awesome colour payoff. A bright red, this gloss is so similar to shades Nine and Ten, it is near impossible to tell the difference. Therefore, as great as this can be for a night on the town when you really want a standout gloss, I would have preferred a different shade for more veracity.

An overall review of this set will be up soon!