Wednesday, April 23, 2014

Review: My First Body Shop Purchases!!!!

I cashed in on the Buy 2 Get 2 sale + Free Shipping thingy on their website and the products arrived within a week!! I'm super excited to try them, they're the first items I've gotten from The Body Shop.
The packaging! I love packaging worms and I liked that they took so much care in making sure my products won't be damaged. Props to you TBS!

I got 4 things: Blue Corn 3-in-1 Deep Cleansing Mask, Tea Tree Skin Clearing Toner, Tea Tree Blemish Fade Night Lotion, and the Tea Tree Skin Clearing Facial Wash.


I tried all of them tonight as a test run. In the shower, I considered that trying a whole new skin regimen isn't smart–if my skin improves, I can't isolate which one product caused the change and I'd have to repurchase every item. To establish cause and effect, I'd have to test each product separately for a while and measure any changes, and then I'd have to test pairings of products to determine which products are the ones actually causing improvement. And then I thought fuck too much stats for one day and I went and used all of them.
First Impressions:
  1. Tea Tree Skin Clearing Facial Wash: 
    1. It smelled ... like tea tree oil, and felt so much thicker than a normal cleanser, and didn't bubble up into a lather. 
    2. It felt minty, but not unbearably minty that my eyes hurt. 
    3. After I got out of the shower my skin felt 10x cleaner than usual, and I have no idea how! It just felt baby soft and like all the dirt there had gotten drawn out.
  2. Then I used the Blue Corn Mask, which, WARNING, smells reaaally strong. I'm fine with strong chemical scents (as in it doesn't bother me), so I didn't mind. 
    1. For the first 5 minutes, the mask burned :/ like pretty intensely. I was wondering if I should take it off after 5 minutes instead of 10-15 like suggested, but right after, it calmed down and didn't hurt anymore. Weird. 
    2. It's also supposed to be exfoliating, because when you take it off, you're supposed to go in circles to utilize the little sand bits. I'm not a big fan of it though because it felt like the St. Ives apricot scrub, and those are too rough for your skin.
  3. Tea Tree Toner:
    1. Felt ehhh about this. I'm not sure about the mattifying effects since it's nighttime, so I'll try it out in the morning. 
    2. Smelled like tea tree oil as well, although not as strongly.
    3. Felt minty, but unlike tea tree oil, the mintiness didn't hurt my eyes
    4. Removed the rest of the dirt on my neck/lower face area! The cotton pad showed up a little beige after I used this.
  4. Tea Tree Lotion:
    1. I expected this to be so much bigger. Hell, I expected all this to be bigger. It was like facial products for elfs.
    2. It's been feeling minty for a while nowww
    3. Since it's so small, I had to just dab onto my dark spots. Updates will come after a week or two!
Overall experience included a lot of mintiness, disappointment in how small they are (they're pretty costly for their size), and super soft skin.

Edit: bonus of me in the mask because yknow

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Saturday, April 19, 2014

Ipsy Bag: April 2014

Ayyyye I got my second ipsy bag!

I had a bit of trouble getting this one because although I changed my address before the 5th of March, they still sent the package to my old address. I missed out on the feeling of finding a package in my mailbox :c o well, I'm pleased with the contents.

An overview of the whole bag. I forgot to take a picture of the actual April makeup bag, but it's pretty basic. I'm not impressed by the makeup bag designs so far.

Onto the items!


1) Kiss lashes in Shy

I have small eyes, so lashes that aren't natural-looking really looks weird on me. These are perfect ;; they're long and light and perfectly curled. So happy.

Approx. retail price: $4


I just tried it on this morning, and I think it did help with mattifying. As for filling in pores, it didn't do much for my skin. Plus the texture feels oily, so I felt strange putting it on my face. I'm not the biggest fan of this, but let's see about the anti-acne benefits.

Approx. retail price: $19 (hell yea)




The pigmentation is amazing!! I love that it's shiny, but not glittery because the shiny bits are super small. As for the color, I'm not a huge fan because it looks too yellow. The pigmentation/shine makes up for it though.

Approx. retail price: $4






Really interesting container. You untwist the bottom out, then pull out the brush from the top and insert it back in upside down, and you can hold it like a full brush.

The color is pretty nice, but a little light for me. I thought it'd be a slightly coral/pink tint but it ended up being frosting pink. For a tinted lip balm, the color's pretty opaque though. (sorry for the scratches on the lip balm, I was excited to try!)

Approx. retail price: $19



I'm so happy about getting a UD item in this bag !!!!!!!
I wore this on a warm night to Berkeley, and when I came home 5 hours later, the only smudges on my eye were from my Maybelline mascara. I wish I had the money for UD liners regularly hahaa

Approx. retail price: $20 (I'm pretty sure I got the mini though?)

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Review: Sonia Kashuk Satin Luxe Lip Color (Currant)

First review post!

The other day I found a Sonia Kashuk lipstick on clearance at Target for maybe $4. Helluva deal.

Snazzy, yea? I've been trying to get darker lipsticks lately (I'm stuck on fall season colors) and this seemed perfect.

I really like the packaging, and how the color on the outside is the same as the lip color. Other brands just have a sticker with the color name on it, and usually the shades don't match up at all.

The actual lipstick part of it has the Sonia Kashuk initials on it!! I don't know why, but this made me super happy even though it disappears after a few applications.


My lips/skin looks super gross, I apologize.

Color: The lighting doesn't show it but the color's pretty dark, and stays true to its shade name (currant). Usually, colors don't show up on me because I have pretty dark, yellowy skin, but this actually showed up really well!! It's not a dark maroon or a bright red. I think it's a really good color for someone who's used to wearing lighter shades but wants to transition into darker shades.

Staying power: I wore this to a business conference, and the color stayed on 100% for the first 4 hours. Afterwards, it got lighter and lighter, but I'm still impressed.

I recommended this to all my friends because the shade sits perfectly between a normal red and dark wine red.

overall: this lipstick is bae
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This blog is intended to be a personal documentation of my life.

I'll be posting a lot of what I buy, what I see, where I visit, my late night thoughts, etc! 
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