Thailand haul

Hi everyone! I just got back from Thailand abut a week ago and I have done a little bit of shopping in Bangkok and Chiang Mai. I thought I'd share my beauty haul with you all, so let's go :)

Beauty haul

I wasn't quite sure which drugstores I'd ran into in Thailand, but seems like Boots is very popular there, so I just had to explore the store!

First thing I ran into were these blotting sheets. I've been using the Clean&Clear blotting sheets for years now, but I'm always on the look out for cheaper versions. These are the Aiko and the Gatsby blotting sheets.
I've heard the Gatsby are just as good as the C&C ones, so we'll see whether they can match the more expensives ones. The Aiko I just got because they were cheap :D

Gatby & Aiko blotting sheets

Next up are the cleansing strips by Biore. If you haven't heard of them yet, they're black nose strips which you stick to your nose to get rid of the blackheads on the nose. I think they're one of the better nose strips on the market for now.

Biore nose strips

You all know by now that I'm a lip junkie, so I jut had to check out their lippies. I ran into a Baby Lips Belgium hasn't released, which is the mango pie fragrance.

Maybelline Baby Lips. mango pie

Right next to it was the Maybelline Color Bloom lip balm, and since I've never heard about that I just had to grab it as well to give it a try.

Maybelline Color Bloom

Honestly I don't wear much blush, but everytime I see a pretty color on the shelves, I just can't restrain myself and I have to have it. This powder blush is a matte peachy color.

Revlon blush: Perfectly Peach

I got really excited when I saw this lying on the shelves: the Soap&Glory Hand Food. I've heard so many good things about this hand cream. There's a very sweet scent to it and reminds me of Dior's perfume.

Soap&Glory: Hand Food

My last item I got at Boots is the Cetaphil moisturiser. It's supposed to be a lightweight moisturiser with SPF. And after hearing so many people rave about this product, I just had to give this a go as well.

Cetaphil moisturizer

My next stop to do beauty shopping was 7/11. It's a little supermarket that sells pretty much everything: from food to beauty, they have it all.

I used products by the brand Ponds before and although I'm not their biggest fan, I really wanted to try out some of their facial products.
The pure white was very gentle on the skin and I quite liked it.

Pond's Pure White Deep Cleansing Brightening Facial Foam

Because I liked the product mentioned above, I wanted to get myself another Pond's product. Since I like mattifying products, I couldn't keep my eyes off of this facial foam, because of the words mineral clay. I used to experiment with clay before, but the results didn't turn out as I wanted them to be. We'll see what this can do to my face.

Pond's Oil Control Skin Mattifying Facial Foam

As I had a day off (no activities planned) I decided to had a pamper session and do my nails. I went and got a polish remover by the brand Joy Us. I can't ay it's the best polish remover ever. but it did the job...after a while :)

Joy Us nail polish remover

As I was in a hot country, I bought a deodorant. It's funny to see that the deodorants we have in Europe are the same in Asia, only Asians added the words 'extra whitening' to their products. Yes. Asians still like to be as pale as ever. It's all about their status after all...

Nivea Extra Whitening Anti-Perspirant

After hearing so any raving about this product, I just couldn't be left behind. This is a daily scrub to remove blackheads. It's a white creamy texture with yellow micro beeds in it.

Neutrogena Deep Clean Blackhead Eliminating Daily Scrub

On my last day I found out I had some 7/11 stamps left. 1 stamp equals 1 Baht, and since I had 31 stamps left over, I decided to use them up before leaving Thailand. I got 2 Clean&Clear miniature sizes of their Essentials line.

Clean&Clear Esentials: Foaming Facial Wash - Oil Control Toner

I also got a polish by Revlon, which I got at a very big drugstore. I don't really remembered the name, but most big brands were very cheap. Frankly, I don't have high hope for this polish but we'll see.

Revlon Nail Enamel: 220 Provoke

If you had noticed, I only bought products which are all or Western or Eastern, everything except Thai. Well, I accidentally bumped into Oriental Princess. This is a little boutique which has only beauty items that is as Thai as can be. I've heard about this store, and as it is affordable, it's not super cheap as in most drugstores. I got the Acnemise, an oil free moisturising gel.

Oriental Princes: Acnemise

On my last day we had some time to spare at the airport. Amd what do you do to kill time at an airport? That's right, you go duty free shopping :)

The first thing I picked up was an eyeliner by NARS. I've heard so many good things about this, and since my eyes are quite tricky to please, I splurged on a high end eyeliner to check whether it's worth the hype.

NARS Larger Than Life Long Wear Eyeline: Via Veneto

Second thing I got is another eyeliner, but this time it's a cheaper alternative. This should supposedly stay on for 16 hours, so I just had to put this one up to the test.

Revlon ColorStay Eyeliner: Charcoal

When I was already planning on leaving for my gate, I saw this in the corner of my eye and I was sold immediately. This is a travel exclusive little box containing 5 Baby Lips (jumping up and down).

Maybelline Baby Lips

And last but not least, I knew I would make a loss should I change my Bahts back into Euro's, so (and this may sound dumb), but I tried to use up all of my Thai money. When I saw this on the shelf, I've been hesitating to get it but I decided to pamper myself :) This is the V&R set: perfume, body lotion and shower gel. Although it's not much cheaper as in stores, unfortunately most stores are out of this set. (Yes, i was a valid excuse for me to get it)

Victor&Rolf Flowerbomb

This was my Thailand haul. I was hoping I would get much more, but I'm quite pleased with the end results after all. If you want me to do a review on any of these products, let me know in the comment bar below :) Lah gorn!

Hits & misses Jan-Jun 2013

Well hello there everyone and welcome back to my blog.

Today I'd like to share my hits & misses of the former month. I recall putting up a favorites of the month post last year for June 2012. I can't believe it's already been a year since I posted my favorites. Talked about consistency...woopsie!

Anyway, last month there were products I liked, but there were products I didn't like as well, so I decided to put a blog post on my hits&misses.

Let's cut the chit chat and jump right into it, shall we?

Hits

This month my lips have been dry as ever! It even dried out to the point that my corners started to crack which hurt like heck whenever I tried to open my mouth. I decided to put some Nivea lip butter on the lips so my lips could suck up all the moisture. It's not completely healed yet, but I'm getting there... As the name doesn't gives it away already, the formula is like butter, it's very creamy lip balm. Plus, it tastes so good, haha!

 

Nivea lip butter - vanilla & macadamia

Recently I caved in and bought some Embyolisse products. I'm still on the fence about the lait-crème on which I'll do a review soon, but I have been liking the hydra-mat emulsion.
It's a gel for normal and mixed skin which leaves the skin soft and matte.
It supposedly to leave the skin matte because it contains a natural derivative of corn starch which will absorb excess sebum and will reduce the shininess on your face. The apricot oil will tone and boost the skin and it contains the antioxidant vitamin E as well.

I've been liking it so far, although it doesn't keep my face matte ALL day long. I'm one happy chappy for this product keeping me matte for half the day!

Embyrolisse hydra-mat émulsion

If you've read my last year's favorites, you know by now I've been using the Clarisonic for almost a year now, and yes, I'm still a huge fan of this tool. It takes the dead skin cells off for me to look fab, hahaha! And I still like to combine my Clarisonic with my Bioré Acne gentle care oil control facial foam.

I've been treating my skin with love, but no product can keep those hormonal breakouts away. Here's when the Vichy Normaderm comes in, on which I've already done a review.
This baby dries out the imperfection so you can swing by life zit free, hahaha!

Vichy NormaDerm

Next to skin care products I do have a make up item to mention as well. I don't often think a product is wow-this-knocks-my-socks-off-like-nothing! But, I'd like to take the time to praise the one who made the Jealousness waterproof gel eyeliner (my review on it can be found here). This is the only eyeliner that will stay put on my waterline. As soon as you've put this into your waterline, it will not budge or whatsoever.

You probably know by now I have very oily eyelids and this causes for any eye product to give me panda eyes as the day goes by. Luckily this Jealousness eyepencil does NOT go anywhere unless you've want differently :)

I got mine in BK (black), but there are 6 other shades as well. And don't worry, one swipe of this eyepencil and you'll have a very pigmented waterline already.

Frankly, this is by far the best eyeliner I've ever used. For those who would like to give this baby a try, check out this website to get a hold of this eyeliner (Disclaimer: I'm not being sponsored for doing this blog post. All opinions are my own.)

Jealousness waterproof gel eyeliner - BK (black)

As I'm going from the top down, let's talk about nails :)
I've been ob-sessed with pastel colours recently. I still like to wear bold colours, but for some reason I always go back to my pastels.

Recently I've been rocking Diorlisse by Dior like crazy. It's a beautiful pastel pink colour which looks classy and put together, and will match with pretty much every outfit you wear.

And if I'm feeling like going crazy, I'll go pastel purple with Essie's Go Ginza! ;) It's a gorgeous lila that give your nails that hint of colour but still doens't look overdone.

As for my last hit of the month, let me just take a minute (and spray on some more, haha!). I'm talking about the Victor&Rolf's perfume called Flowerbomb.

Victor&Rolf - Flowerbomb

I accidentally picked up this bottle, smelled, sprayed and fell in love.

I never heard about this perfume before when I reached for this perfume bottle. As soon as I sprayed it, a magic of scents spread all over me and made me fall head over heels with this perfume.

As I suck at describing scents I looked it up and apparently it contains the following:
Notes: Sambac Jasmine, Centifolia Rose, Cattleya Orchid, Ballerina Freesia, Patchouli.
Style: Oriental. Gourmand. Floral.

It starts off quite sweet and dries down to a sweet, slightly vanillic dessert of amber and patchouli. The name Flowerbomb is suite misleading, as I don't smell a strong flower scent. Be assured that you don't have to like flowers to likes this perfume. If you're a lover of slightly sweet perfumes, this will be right up your alley.

Since every up has its down:

• quite expensive
• unfortunately the scent doesn't last very long on you

Nevertheless, this won't stop me from loving this perfume. Flowerbomb is the BOMB!

 

Misses

I have some dark spots on my face and when I saw these products I was too weak to pass it off. They're Garnier products which will treat dark spots, yeah right...

Garnier Dark Spot Corrector Daily Illuminating Moisturizer - Garnier Anti-Dark Spot Renovator Night

I'm not going to say that I expected immediate results, but these products just didn't do ANYTHING for my skin. The left one left my skin quite oily and the right product was just some gel I put on my skin before going to sleep. No no no, I won't be using these anymore.


Let's stick to the face and talk about another moisturizer. Yes, I did experiment quite a bit with moisturizers. I like to bring up the Clinique Dramatically Different Moisturizing Gel on which I've already done a review.

I've heard so many people raving about this product. People who have combination to oily skin. I know by now that most gels work better for oily skins, but this was a bit too harsh for my skin.

Whenever putting this on, it moisturized my cheek area, but it dried out my chin area after 5 minutes. This forced me to put another layer of this gel or to put another moisturizer on the drier sides of the face.

I'm aware that some people use 2 different moisturizers for their face, but I like to use just one.

Besides, this gel had a rather chemically smell to it when applying. Luckily this disappears after the gel has soaked into your skin.

I'm not a fan of this Clinique product and has actually left me quite disappointed.

Clinique Dramatically Different Moisturizing Gel

A few years ago I used the pore strips from Bioré. Apparently they changed their packaging, but I like to stick to products I know that work (normally...). I've been using the nose strips a few times and I'm not sure whether my little box is a bad one, but it just ... sucks! The date says it hasn't expired yet, so I'm hoping that mine is just a fault box.

Every time I use this, the white serum keeps sticking to my nose and when pulling the strip from my nose, the strip doesn't come off as one. The sticky side stays on my nose causing me to wash it off instead of tearing it off. It just didn't work at all. I can't do anything to help the product to come off more easily, because the strip is just too weak to be torn off.

A very big disappointment after being ecstatic for years about this product.

Bioré Pore pack

Last but not least, let's talk make up!
Who doesn't know CoverGirl? They're known for their Lashblasts and their red lipstick that Taylor raves so much about (for money, but still).

When I saw this eyeliner, I just had to pick it up, because who knows this is another great CG product. Well, it's not.

CoverGirl Perfect Point Plus eye pencil - 205 charcoal

I hoped this would be a dupe for my Benefit BADgal liner waterproof eye pencil, but unfortunately this smudged after wearing it for 2 minutes! No lie: I put it on my waterline, put the eye pencil in my bag, checked my phone for messages, looked into the mirror and saw a panda looking right back at me!

Luckily Taylor Swift isn't promoting this eye pencil, unless she's a panda look lover :)


These were my hits and misses for the first half of this year. What are your favorite products and what products do you really dislike and wouldn't recommend to anyone?

Favorites of the month: June 2012

Hi there! It's that time of the month again! No, I'm not talking about PMS, it's monthly favorites...YAAAAY!! So, let's jump right into it, shall we? :)

As some of you may know I bought a Clarisonic a while back, and I decided to try it out before I wanted to review it. Well...I tried and fell in love :)

Clarisonic - sensitive brush

I've been using it every other day, other days I may do a light scrub or just go over with it with some toner, about which I'll talk more in just a second. I've been using the Philosophy Purity Cleanser or the Bioré Acne Gentle Care - Oil control facial foam.

Philosophy Purity Cleanser

                                                                   





The Philosophy is a bit more drying to my skin, but since I do want to use up the entire bottle, I'll moisturize my skin immediately after towel drying my face.

Bioré Acne Gentle Care Oil Control Facial Foam

As Bioré's name says so, it's a foam. It's not as drying as the Purity cleanser. I definitely will be repurchasing this one as soon as I'm out of cleansers.









I use the brush for sensitive skin and I have to say, I finally understand what the fuss in the beauty world was about the Clarisonic! My skin has gotten a natural glow to it, without being oily and my impurities have significantly disappeared. I'm really loving it, parapapapa!

I've been using my Biotherm toner for a very long time, and I had to switch up toners because I think my skin got used to it. And since acne was popping up on occasions I couldn't afford to have them, I started using a Clinique' toner.

Clinique anti-blemish solutions toner

Most people use the 3 step skin care line, but since I'm not most people I just wanted to try out this clarifying lotion. If you look at the bottle you see there's a powder at the bottom, which is acne medication. You just shake up the bottle so the powder can disperse in the liquid and I just a put a little bit on a cotton ball and go over my face with it.

I always learned that it's better to use a serum before putting on your moisturizer. Well, since my skin has been so good to me, I wanted to pamper my skin as well. I tried the Estee Lauder Idealist Skin Refinisher serum.

Estee Lauder Idealist Skin Refinisher serum

After using this, I barely notice dry spots on my face. Take that combination skin!

Summer's up (yes, Belgium has summers as well!) and my skin gets quite dry during warm temperatures. *enters Garnier moisturising gel* :)

Garnier gel-cream

It's a very moisturizing gel-cream for the body for those with dry-sensitive skin. It says it contains L-Bifidus** (which is inspired on pro biotica in most yoghurts to keep your skin moisturized) and peach extract. It has a slights peach scent to it, but it's not an overpowering scent that will bother those who don't like scented goodies. I prefer gels to lotions because those just make my skin glows like I've put shimmer all over body. Gels just work better for me and I'm really loving this product.


I've been a huge fan of the Shu Uemura pro concealer for years, but since they're discontinued, I had to start looking for a replacer (not a dupe, because I'm afraid I'll never find something as good as my SU pro concealer).

Maybelline Pure Mineral Concealer: shade 1

I bought Maybelline Pure mineral concealer when I was back in Hong Kong, and I finally gave it a try. Since my skin has been approving, I need less concealer and the Maybelline covers up just fine actually. When I do need a little bit more coverage, I'll go back to my Shu Uemura, but Maybelline's liquid concealer is not doing a bad job at all.
Perhaps that this will be my go to concealer from now on. Maybe it's Maybelline?

A monthly favorite ain't a favorite without mentioning my nail polishes :)
I've really been digging my Essie Tart Deco.

Essie Tart Deco

It's a bright coral, slightly orangy, and I just love this baby! It's bright enough to give my outfits a pop of color, but it's not too bright that screams heeeeeeeeeeey, look at me! :D

Well beauties, this is it for this month. Stay tuned for more make up loving!