a Little Lush Haul

About a week ago, I was browsing Lush and noticed a section labeled Fond Farewells. Curious, I clicked on the section and discovered that Lush was discontinuing their Retro line! Retro is a section of specialty products only available online. Horrified at this, I immediately went to my wishlist to purchase the few items I'd saved.

Smitten is described as a marzipan scented hand cream. I was expecting Smitten to be a rich and thick cream, but when smoothing some onto my hand I discovered it was a thin lotion. However my hand did feel very moisturized. The smell of the product in the tub wasn't very pleasant, but the scent that lingered on my hand was a very nice sweet almond smell. I can't wait to see how well I like this product!

I also purchased Gumback Express, a 'shower smoothie' with ground almonds, honey, and banana. It smells so tasty, like banana pudding! Its very liquidy and scrubby. I'm very excited to take a shower to try it out!

I've never tried any bar soap from Lush before, so I figured Banana Moon would be a great place to start! The soap doesn't smell like bananas at all, and the bar is very soft. After this photo I cut the bar very easily into chunks so I can make the soap last longer. Hopefully I'll enjoy to smell the more I get used to it!

I cant wait to further review these products after I've used them more!

Are there any Retro products you love, or want to try before they're gone?

Empties 001

I don't know about you, but I love reading and watching empties posts, whether they're shared on a blog, instagram, or YouTube. I'm nosy when it comes to what products others are using so it's just perfect for the busybody in me. For myself, there is just something so satisfying about finishing a product. The most honest reviews also come from talking about your empty products; if you used it up, you definitely will be able to say something about it rather than use it once or twice and review.

Today I bring forth some empties I have been hoarding for quite awhile. Lets begin with some hair products shall we?

The Macadamia Deep Repair Masque is my holy grail high end hair mask. Not only is this about to be raved about by me, but it has been raved about from the beauty community for a couple years now. I usually purchase this when Target has a buy one get one special, or on Salon Savings. As much as I love this product, I do not think I could play full price for something that will wash down the drain! The mask is so thick and nourishing, I can see the little swirls of oil in the creme. You only need a little bit, and because I use it only once a week, one tub lasts me about two or three months. This was probably my second or third tub of the product, and I will most likely be buying it once again after I finish the couple of deep conditioners I'm trying out at this moment.

After finishing the above hair mask, I wanted to try something new, something cheaper. Lo and behold the L'Oreal Advanced Haircare Power Moisture Moisture Rush Mask that was on clearance at Target for $4 instead of the $6.99 it usually retails for! It smelled very lovely, but the texture bothered me; it was quite thin for a deep conditioner, like just using my normal everyday conditioner. I did finish it and unless I couldn't find another cheap mask to buy and this just happened to be on sale again, I wont repurchase. I didn't really notice a difference in my hair at all.

Quite an array of dry shampoos I have here! I go through about one can a month, and I love to try new ones! I don't believe I have found my holy grail yet, but I do know with how fast I go through them, I will only be paying drugstore prices!

Batiste Cool and Crisp Fresh  dry shampoo was the first dry shampoo I ever tried. I found it at TJ Maxx for $4. I had heard that your only suppose to wash your hair a couple times a week. I usually washed every other day. But after dyeing my hair to my natural hair color, it was very dry and washing it all the time definitely wasn't helping so I gave dry shampoo a try. I like to spray the shampoo on before I go to bed to work more thoroughly, and when I used this, in the morning there was still a little bit of a white cast on my roots that I had to rub away. I may repurchase though I'm still trying to test all of the drugstore ones out!

Catwalk by TIGI Session Series dry shampoo was a higher end product I found at TJ Maxx. I'm not sure what I paid for on it, but I didn't like it very much. It made my hair feel kind of strange... I know it was a texture spray as well as shampoo but it was a little more texture than I liked. I wont be repurchasing.

The Dove Refresh + Care dry shampoo has been my favorite so far. The smell, the fresh feeling is gave my scalp, and the minimal amount of white powder to blend in.... I'm going to keep trying new dry shampoos but this is at the top of my list!  This shampoo also lasted a lot longer than the previous two at holding out for about a month and a half.

Herbal Essences Naked Volume  dry shampoo was disappointing. It smelled so lovely and I loved how my hair felt after spraying my roots...but after maybe 3 used the aerosol stopped working and sprayed liquid all over my head much to my dismay! I'm not sure if I just bought a bad bottle or what but when you shake the can you can tell its barely half way empty. Definitely won't be buying this again.

Youth Code Texture Perfecter  serum is a permanent staple in my morning skincare routine. This has to be my third bottle and of course I've already gone out and repurchase it! The serum is very light and smells quite pleasant, the fluid sinks into my skin with ease and my face feels nice and supple after. I love this product and I'm usually lucky enough to get it when its on sale, as it is a little on the pricey side for drugstore. 

Another staple to my skincare routine, Cliniue's Dramatically Different Moisturizing Lotion +. This is my holy grail facial moisturizer, used both morning and night. The lotion absorbs instantly, and if I need some extra moisture I just use an extra half pump of this wonderful product and I'm good to go. I always buy the largest bottle they offer, and it lasts a good six to eight months.

As someone who doesn't get very much sleep on a day to day basis, my under eye area is always dark and puffy. To remedy that, I purchased the Hard Candy Eye'm Tired De-Puffer. At only $5 it was not only a steal, but felt cooling and helped with the puffiness of my eyes. I'm currently trying another depuffer but this is on my list to repurchase.

I love using toner! The refreshing feeling it brings and removing the last little bits of dirt... I especially love to use alcohol free toner so my skin doesn't dry out anymore than it does naturally. I used up a bottle of The Body Shop's Seaweed Clarifying Toner that I purchased when they had some kind of sale going on. I didn't really notice a difference in my skin while using this, and the smell annoyed me a little bit. All and all, I doubt I will ever repurchase.

The Neutrogena Alcohol Free toner  is my holy grail drug store toner. I've gone through at least three or four bottles in a row before deciding to try something different. The liquid is just so refreshing, and my skin feels clean and not tight. The floral scent was a little off putting at first but once I became used to it, it wasn't so bothering any more. I one hundred percent recommend!

I love pencil liners, so of course I'm always trying out new ones. This eyeliner was okay, I ended up keeping it in my travel makeup bag. Revlon Colorstay Eyeliner was a nice twist up pencil (my favorite type. I feel like I get more bang for my buck instead of having to sharpen the product away...) It didn't leave an impression on me. It wasn't bad, it wasn't the best. I've tried cheaper liners that were a lot better. Will not be repurchasing.

I have a love hate relationship with mascara. I wear glasses, so I need a mascara that's more focused on volume rather than length. So annoying when your lashes scrape against your lenses! I've received many samples of the Benefit's They're Real! and finally just went and purchased the full size. One of my holy grail high end mascaras. I will always repurchase and accept samples with no hesitation!

Another Benefit product I sampled was the Stay Don't Stray eye primer. I wasn't a huge fan of this, it creased my shadows after only two or three hours, and I didn't care for the color it gave my eyelids. It was like using a concealer for an eye shadow primer.

Maybellines The Falsie's Black Drama mascara wasn't very impressive to me either. A lot of bloggers and Youtubers rave on and on about this mascara, but I suppose I'm just not very lucky when it comes to Maybelline mascara's, I'm never in love with any I try. The wand was nice, but the formula was very very wet and bound my lashes together.

I did find my holy grail drugstore mascara! I had never tried a Revlon mascara before, but when I saw this in stores, the packaging and name caught my eye. When using this mascara I fell hard instantly. It separates my lashes, adds volume, and just a tiny bit of length. No clumping or flaking! Removing the product at night is so easy as well! Revlon's Lash Potion mascara is always going to be a repurchase for me. I'm not sure if its the brush, formula, or both but it is just fantastic!


Whew! That was quite the stash! Hopefully my next empties will not be as extensive. Maybe once a month to every other month I will share them with you all!

What is one product you will always repurchase no matter what?

Disappointing Products 001

To begin my new venture in blogging, I wanted to talk about some disappointing products. We've all purchased or sampled products because we want to try them right? And sometimes those products just do not meet our expectations. I do try to finish a product even if I don't care for it, but these were five makeup items I just couldn't stand to finish and threw them into the little Sephora bag I use to store my empty products.

To begin we shall start off with some mascara, a product I've noticed I've found more trashes than treasures. The Rimmel Glam'eyes was originally purchased because I was looking into finding a holy grail drugstore mascara. The packaging drew me in almost instantly, with the quilted black cap and pink chrome lettering. The outside unfortunately did not match the inside. The wand is very long, thin, and bendy. It is a plastic applicator, and a very thin formula. It was very difficult to sweep through my lashes, and what product I did manage to get on, made the lashes sort of bind together. I couldn't even stand to use it more than twice before giving up.

Something else from Rimmel, the Scandaleyes Shadow Paints are a  product a lot of you tubers and bloggers alike brag about being amazing. I'm always up for a good cream shadow, so when I spotted these at Target, I picked up manganese purple to play with. When first applied the color is true and bold. The problem arises when you go to blend it out; the color completely disappears. I applied four or five layers of color before some color paid off, and after continuously rubbing the product to blend, it began to flake off. Definitely a no go for me.

I was still on my hunt for a holy grail drugstore mascara and discovered this bummer that a lot of folks also raved about, The L'Oreal Voluminous Butterfly was claimed to give amazing volume thanks to the wing shaped applicator. I did try to finish this, but after about a week of struggling to rake the brush through my lashes and keeping the curl, I gave up. I liked the concept of this product but unfortunately it fell short.

I received the Be a Bombshell Lash Out Mascara in an ipsy bag. I didn't even bother to bring this mascara to my eyes! It smelled of burning plastic! Definitely not something I want near my face! An instant toss into the trash pile.

The Benefit's Watts Up! highlighter was a little sample I received for my birthday one year from Sephora. At first I really enjoyed it, I even planned to purchase the full size. But my mind was quickly changed when I realized it was a little to over powering for me. I don't wear face makeup, so I was only using the highlighter on my brow bone and inner corners of my eyes. While it is a very nice color, its just so metallic it over powered my eye looks. I'm sure if I liked to wear face makeup it would look much better and not so concentrated, but regrettably it didn't work for me.

Fortunately those are all of the products I've been disappointed in for the past couple months, and thankfully they were all drugstore or samples so my wallet wasn't aching to badly!

What is one product you were so excited to try, but then it fell short?