Sunday 29 December 2013

The Glamour Beauty Edit.

Hellooo lovelies!!
I hope everyone had a brilliant Christmas, ate a little too much turkey, drunk a little too much alcohol and fell over a few too many times - I know I certainly did, in front of a club full of people. SMOOTH.
But anyway, enough about me! I hope Santa was good to everyone and everyone got exactly what they wished for :)

Today's post is about a lovely little beauty box that was on offer at Latest in Beauty! It's currently sold out but if you clicky on my linky HERE you can be entered into a competition to get your mitts on one of these little darlings! The box originally retailed at £14.95 and delivery was £3.95!



So, I hear you ask - WHAT'S IN THE BOX???
I shall show you..

1. Balance Me Daily Care Radiance Face Oil - RRP £15.00
2. Maybelline Baby Lips Balm Repair - RRP £2.99
3. Eyeko Lash Curler - RRP £12.00
4. Philip Kingsley 'One More Day' Dry Shampoo - RRP £5.95
5. Toni & Guy Glamour Firm Hold Hairspray - RRP £2.19
6. Benefit 'They're Real' mascara - RRP £9.00
7. HD Brows Eye and Brow Palette 'Foxy' - RRP - £19.96
So as you can seeeeee there is a LOT in the box, you pay £18.90 and receive 7 products that are worth approximately worth £67!! That's a saving of of nearly 50 quid!! The majority of the products are full size, and those that aren't give you the chance to try something out you would never think of purchasing!

The Balance Me Daily Care Radiance Face Oil is gorgeous!! It's designed to replenish the skin with ingredients to boost and balance your skin! It's particularly effective on oily skin, as oil on oil helps to balance the skins natural oils out! I've noticed it made such a difference to my skin, because since I've moved into my new student house I've suffered from a really oily T zone and it's helped so much! Also the smell is beautiful! It's got chamomile in, and it really helps me sleep if I use it last thing at night, it conks me straight out! I've been so impressed by this product I'm definitely gonna try some more Balance Me products in the future!

The Maybelline Baby Lips have been such a hyped up beauty product over the last few months on Youtube, blogs, instagram, you can't avoid them! I'm glad I got one in this box and was able to try it out because every time I went to Superdrug they were sold out! I'm not going to lie to you, I don't think they're amazing, I much prefer my eos balm to the baby lips, but if you want something easy to carry around with you to avoid chapped lips in the winter it works perfectly.. It's ultimately a pretty looking chapstick! Maybe if I had got a flavoured one I would have been more intrigued or impressed :)

I am one of those people that constantly forgets to curl their lashes, I always forget about it until I'm half way through applying my mascara and at that point it's too late! This Eyeko Lash Curler is super pretty with its limited edition blue velvet handles, it catches my eye on my dresser and now I actually remember to curl my lashes! It makes such a difference and this one is such good quality it really helps my lashes become a lot more curly and noticeable! It comes with 3 silicone pads for the curler, all which last for 3 months! It means for £12 you get 9 months of pretty eyelashes, to a lash freak like me that's a bargain!

Philip Kingsley is some kind of hair product God, however for me with my very short hair I tend not to pay much attention to new hair products on the market. However dry shampoo is my BEST FRIEND. I am a lazy person, I hate washing my hair - even though there is so little of it, so I love being able to reach for a can and getting another day out of it! I also think Dry Shampoo is so good at adding volume to a style for a night out - guarantee it'll help you're hairstyle last all night!! This Philip Kingsley one is brilliant, which is to be expected for the slightly hefty £5.95 price tag! That's like 3 HUGE cans of Batiste when they're on offer! But the price really shows in the quality of the product! Not one I'd repurchase myself but it's lovelyyyy when you get it in these beauty boxes - a treat to my little short-haired head!!

As anyone else with short hair knows, hairspray is essential to ever holding any style! Toni & Guy are another haircare brand I tend to pass buy as I stick to VO5, Got2be and Elnett for my hairsprays! This hairspray gives a good hold without making your hair feel sticky or really stiff! But I'm more in love with my current brands so I don't think I would rebuy this one either! It's nothing against Toni & Guy or Philip Kingsley - it's just once you get used to products that work for your hair and the way you style it you tend to stick with them! 

Benefit do these cutesy little versions of They're Real for magazines, beauty boxes and freebies with other purchases and I know they're valued at £9, however you can't buy them!! You can only buy the full version which is 8.5g and retails at £19.50! I cannot lie, this is a holy grail product to me! I can't just live with the mascara on it's on but it's part of my mascara holy grail trio! I use it first to separate my lashes, as the wand has such small individual bristles it separates them so well! I then have a coat of Rimmel Lash Accelerator Endless Mascara and then finish it off with Lancomes Custom Drama mascara.. As Jay-Z would say, HOLY GRAIL. But anyhooo, anyone who hasn't tried this mascara yet, I advise that you do.. You probably will hate it at first, but stick with it, eventually you'll NEED it in that makeup bag of yours. ;-)

Finally, the real reason I bought the beauty box.. The HD Brows Eye and Brow palette... This is amazing! I have ditched my Benefit Browzing's (for now anyway) as this is such a handy palette, perfect for a good dark brow and also can be used for a great smokey eye.. It's handbag friendly and easily carried!! The colours can be seen below from left to right - 'Nude' (the really light yellow shade), 'Carbon', 'Warm Brown' and 'Dark Brown'.. You have to mix the shades slightly to make sure you get a good shade on your brows just to make sure you don't go full scouse brow or end up looking like you dyed your eyebrows! But it's brilliant none the less! The colours are so matte and so easy to blend in, quick and simple!! It's cheaper than Benefit's version and I think it has more uses as I've really gone off the gel in Browzings! I much prefer a powder for my brows now, gels tend to melt!


Have you ever purchased a Latest in Beauty collection box such as this one?
What did you think - do you think they're good value for money?
Let me know!
Have a great New Years whatever you's are upto and I shall speak to you in 2014 *eek*!!

xxx

















Saturday 21 December 2013

No chocolate in the duty free..

There might not be any chocolate in the duty free, but in Terminal 1 at Manchester Airport I can fully confirm that there is a MAC counter..

I will admit I have issues in regards to shopping, but I was flying home to go back to my old job in the hospital as a domestic assistant and I needed some form of motivation!! 



I re-purchased my holy grail powder "Mineralize Skinfinish Natural'; but I got shade Medium this time! I felt Light Plus was just a little too light for me, and I generally like to use bronzer to give my gave some colour so I just thought I'd get the shade up! 

I also grabbed a lip liner in Cherry, a beautiful deep red, it'll go perfectly with Riri Woo and my new e.l.f lipstick I searched in my last post! The thing I love about Lip liners is that it can be completely two different looks, alone or with a lipstick or gloss!! Double the value ;-)


The lip liner was £10 and the powder £18.30! 

I have a post on a lovely new beauty box coming up and it'll be up by the end of the week!! 

If I'm not back before then, I hope everyone has a super super Christmas and I hope Santa brings everyone everyyyything that they want!!
Merryyyy Christmassss!!

Xxxx

Monday 16 December 2013

ELF Haul!

Another day, another haul! This is from a few weeks ago but I have been super busy so here it issss!
ELF Cosmetics usually do a yearly 50% discount code when you subscribe to their mailing list (I really advise it - there's so many types of discounts available ALL the time it can really make a difference to your shopping basket total!)

This is just a quick post of what I bought, a few swatches and where to find things on the website!


Lipstick in 'Gypsy' and 'Fearless'
Blush in 'Merry Berry'
Long Wear Lip Pencil in 'Bitter'
Tone Correcting Concealer in 'Light Beige'
Studio Cream Blush in 'Seductress'

Swatches L- R - Gypsy, Fearless, Bitter, Seductress & Merry Berry
I also bought a travel sized mirror for all those on the go beauty fixes!

This order was £32.85 in total, and with the 50% off code it brought it down to £19.37.. That's a lot of makeup for less than £20! Especially when all the products are so highly pigmented and good quality.. The Flawless Finish Foundation is one of my favourite 'drugstore' foundations there is!!

Do you like ordering from ELF? What do you think of the products they sell?
Leave me a comment and let me knowwww :) 

Rachel xx 


Thursday 12 December 2013

MAC Haul!


Bonjourrrr neighborinos!
I know it's been a while, I've been workinggg a lot and had enough uni work that you could probably climb it!

A fortnight ago, Selfridges had their Christmas event that offers 20% off the majority of everything they sell & 10% off all beauty products... I used my cunning plan of buying things that I wanted for Christmas before Christmas so I got to use the discount.. Sneaky ;-)

The main thing I wanted to buy was Ugg boots, I've had my eye on mini black Uggs for ageees! My tan classic short uggs are 4 years old now and they've had better days! These were excluded from the 20% off day, but they were 25% off instead both in Selfridges and Kurt Geiger.. I made the plunge and bought them, £130 to £97.50 - which I was extremely happy about!! 


After my Uggs I found myself in the MAC section.. And I'm not gonna lie, I had such a splurging session!
Everything was 10% off which for beauty products is brilliant!

Here's a few pictures of what I bought!! 

Select Cover-up Concealer - NC20
Studio Fix Fluid SPF 15 - NC20




















Retro Matte Finish Lipstick - Relentlessy Red
Satin Finish Lipstick - Faux



















217 Blending Brush
All together this should have cost me £84.50, but with the 10% discount it came to £76.05.. I know this is steep but I'm gonna be getting money for Christmas so I will pay myself back :)

Have you got any of these products?? What do you think of them? 
Leave me a comment and let me know :)
Rachel xx