I love...Mango and Papaya Body Butter

Long term readers of this blog would know that I love scented products. It's pathetic - anything that promises to smell nice can suck me in like nobody's business.

When I returned from Cambodia I found this on my desk - a present from Mum! It turned out to be extra special because the scent reminds me exactly of all the incredible fruit drinks and beautiful smells I remember from Cambodia.

Anyway, back to the body butter. When I use a body butter I want something that is quite thick and heavy duty but doesn't leave too much residue on the skin. I dislike products that don't sink in as I find it rubbing off on my clothes and failing to moisturise my skin effectively.

Sadly, this isn't a great love of mine. I find that the texture is quite nice, easy to apply, however it leaves a film on the skin. If I apply this before bed, when I wake up in the morning and shower it comes off all slippery as it has remained on the surface of my skin all night and not soaked in one bit.

I don't need to use all that much product to rub it evenly over my skin, but as I mentioned it is a bit of a waste of time because it simply sits there, doing nothing much at all.

Perhaps I am being a little too harsh after having used Body Butters from The Body Shop, but this is just plain useless in comparison.

Ignoring the product itself, I will say that the packaging is quite lovely. It comes in a little pot covered in love hearts and orange colours to accompany the mango and papaya aspects of the product. I like the approach the brand 'I love....' takes with all their products, although their brand name is such a pain!

Basically, all this is good for is the beautiful fragrance that reminds me so much of Cambodia - the sole reason that I continue to use this product. As for its moisturising properties, it is pretty useless and it also sits on top of the skin and doesn't sink in. I couldn't find how much this costs, but from memory their products aren't super cheap.

I wish I could give this a better score, but for now it gets 3/10.

Face of Australia Mineral Therapy Bronzing Pearls

You know how sometimes you get overwhelmed with products and end up shoving something away only to discover it about a year later? Yep, that is what happened with the Face of Australia Mineral Therapy Bronzing Pearls I was given.

Bronzer isn't really a product I tend to reach for regularly and I certainly feel more confident in applying blush and highlighter. I do however give it a shot every now and again and I think that when applied well it can look absolutely stunning and make the biggest difference!

This bronzer from Face of Australia comes in the form of 'bronzing pearls' certainly unlike the bronzers I am used to.

Formulated with natural minerals, bring a fresh glow of warmth to your skin with the Face of Australia Bronzing pearls. Oil free, fragrance free, talc free, no animal testing. 

For a start, I am not really a fan of the packaging. It is so very chunky and as always, the brush supplied is not particularly effective. I would much prefer a more compact product without the brush included (especially at a cheaper price, although this is hardly what I would call expensive).

The pearls themselves are incredibly sparkly. Very pretty looking things but they are as glittery and shimmery as they could possibly get, and to me that is quite a strange property for a bronzer. I really didn't know how to wear this because in my experience, matte bronzer is the way to go (especially for contouring) and even slightly shimmery bronzers can be applied tastefully but this was just so full on that I hadn't a clue where you would put it!

Despite this, I still attempted to use these as I would a normal bronzer, sweeping it gently across the places I felt could do with a bit of colour and brightening.

The results were okay, but I really felt a bit strange with the level of shimmer present. Everyone likes glowing skin but there is a fine line between glowing and garish and I think this product just crosses it. It was passable when the lighting I was in wasn't terribly bright but when it caught the sunlight I just looked stupid.

But I wasn't ready to give up yet. Surely I could use this product somehow. So I decided to use it as eyeshadow.

Everyone loves a shimmery brown/bronze eyeshadow shade! After having tried it as an eyeshadow I can safely say that is how I much prefer to use it and that though it may be a bit of a failure as a bronzer in my opinion, it kind of works as an eyeshadow.

There were two ways I discovered that this could be applied - with a brush as normal or directly rubbing the pearl onto the skin for a more intense shade. Both ways worked well however it was difficult to apply the shade neatly when holding the pearl and rubbing it on the skin (and it made a little bit of a mess too).

I found that on the eyes this wasn't too long lasting - certainly nothing like any of my other eyeshadows. My main problem, however, was that the glitter seemed to fall underneath the eyes (and there is nothing pretty about that!). I guess this is to be expected as this isn't designed to be an eyeshadow, but it's a little frustrating because it is just so useless as a bronzer.

All in all, this was a pretty disappointing product. I am especially saddened by it because I absolutely love Face of Australia as a brand and usually they can do no wrong! This costs $14.95.

Unfortunately I have to give this 3/10.

Real Techniques Core Collection and Stippling Brush & my thoughts on iHerb

Everyone knows about Real Techniques brushes. I don't think I have ever seen one negative review about any of them. Naturally I had to get my hands on them, but I wasn't willing to pay full price for them in Priceline as they cost $67.98. So, I went to iHerb and picked up the same ones for $21.38 (there was a sale on the brushes at the time and I had a discount code too). Pretty good deal in my opinion.

I wasn't really sure what I wanted to get as there seemed to be so many to choose from, but in the end I decided to get the Core Collection set as it seemed like a versatile little set of brushes that could be used to create an entire face look. I also picked up the stippling brush because I was getting fed up with applying cream blushes with my fingers and thought it might be handy to try out a stippling brush.

I selected the cheapest postage, the Global Priority Mail by DHL for a flat rate of $4. The average delivery time was listed as 13 days but it took 15 to get to me. Though I did run out of patience towards the end there, I am really impressed that I was able to get postage so cheap without any difficulties with lost or damaged parcels.

When they first arrived they were even better than I had expected. I was impressed with their sturdy handles, soft bristles and densely packed hairs, however the stippling brush didn't seem to be too great as it seemed to contain very few bristles and I feared it would be too flimsy to be of any use. All the brushes were synthetic and were lighter in colour on the top.

I didn't really take much notice of their intended purposes, rather allocating them according to my needs and what I wanted to get out of each of the brushes.

Buffing Brush - 9/10
"Ideal for full coverage application of powder and mineral foundation"
I use this to apply any liquid bases that have a medium to high coverage. I find that this method, in comparison to using my fingers, uses up considerably more product but the finish is absolutely flawless and almost leaves my skin looking airbrushed. Funnily enough, I don't love this look for everyday as it can be a little too fake, but when I'm having a particularly bad skin day or I am going somewhere special I use this brush.

Detailer Brush - 2/10
"Precision cut to effortlessly concealer problem areas; or use with lipstick for long-lasting shape and definition"
I'm not into this brush. It just seems like a bit of a waste of space to me as it is almost too tiny to do anything with. I do use a brush for concealer but it is a lot bigger and flatter than this one and to be honest seems to work a lot better too. Until I find a use for this it is just going to sit around collecting dust.

Pointed Foundation Brush - 3/10
"Use with liquid foundation to build custom coverage"
I feel like the only blogger to have ever criticised the Real Techniques brushes, but the shape and design of what is supposed to be a foundation brush is just ridiculous. It is way, way too small to be used for foundation (it would take years to apply a full face of it with this tool!) and it is too pointed for my liking. I was considering using it for concealer under my eyes but the bristles are so scratchy that it just didn't work out. Not impressed with this one...

Contour Brush - 9/10
"Delicately applies highlighter to contour or create sheer, soft-focus finish"
I use this to apply both bronzer and highlighter, though it is best suited to highlighter as it is quite small and compact. I love this rounded little brush - it is dense, soft and a perfect shape to fit in the hollows of your cheeks or on the tops of your cheekbones. It's wonderful! The only improvement I could make is the slightest bit bigger.

Stippling Brush - 9/10
"Is the trade secret for creating airbrushed, high definition results with all types of makeup"
I haven't used this brush for anything other than cream blush yet, but I LOVE it. Though my initial concerns of it not being dense enough and too flimsy are true to an extent, it works magically to disperse the colour evenly across my cheeks giving me the most natural, even looking flush of colour. All my forgotten cream blushes have been rediscovered!

I am so pleased that I picked these brushes up. I haven't had them for long and therefore can make no judgement on their lasting power, whether they shed or how they respond to being washed but they are such good quality (except for the pointed foundation brush!). Even though two out of five I was not happy with, the three that I do love I love so much and it was absolutely worth every cent!

If you were like me and are not too keen on the prices for these brushes, jump on to iHerb and pick up a couple because they are so worth it. You can use the discount code JTJ998 for up to $10 off too!

Do you own any Real Techniques brushes? Do you have any other ways I could use them?

Essence Stay All Day Long Lasting Eyeshadows - Copy Right and Glammy Goes To

Dear Essence Stay All Day Long Lasting Eyeshadows,

Always one to jump on the bandwagon at the very last second, I picked you up in Priceline when you were on sale for half price due to the fact that you are soon to be discontinued. Though I appreciated the discount at the time, I appreciate it even more now after having gotten to know you and discover that you really aren't anything at all like your cousin Eye Souffle in Pas Des Copper (the most beautiful cream shadow in the world). In fact, initially I was devastated that you were going to be discontinued  but this was prior to having worn you on my eyelids you see, and I have since changed my mind and consider it to be a blessing to us all.

Do you really think you can rightfully call yourself cream shadows? Really? I don't know if all your siblings are like yourself, but from what you have shown me you are not at all like a cream but rather a solid block of shiny rock. Maybe you are just old and past your use by date, but honestly, I struggled to even get a swatch out of you let alone actually wear you on my eyelids. Not impressed, not impressed.

When I did carve a somewhat dangerous looking lump out and furiously slap it across my eyelids I found that unless I dragged you painfully back and forth, you did not transfer what could be a beautiful pigmented but rather rolled up in a ball and refused to cooperate. I didn't let you win, of course, and forced you to work, but you were resistant and in the end you won, flaking all over the place and dispersing colour unevenly across my eyelids, making me look ridiculous.

I will, however, grant you one thing - you did last all day, in fact after kicking and screaming during application, you finally settled down and rested on my eyelids, only to hang on tight and refuse to come off when required. I must say, I wasn't at all impressed with your inability to cooperate and I certainly shall not be working with you anytime in the near future.

I don't want to sound too bitter, after all you do look quite presentable in your packaging. I like the fact that you come in a lovely little tub with a raised dome shaped lid. I even like the design you display on top and the way in which you change colour according to the shade that you are. Your shade names are alright, nothing special but not too hopeless.

I know that you call yourselves residents of the great land Essence, but I really don't see it. In my experience Essence products, whilst affordable like yourselves, are of a high quality in beautiful shades and textures. You really do not belong and you are a disappointment.

I am willing to grant you the benefit of the doubt and suggest that perhaps you were just the runt of the litter - that your fellow Stay all day long lasting eyeshadows were of a better quality than you and that you are just old and over it, but you really were hopeless.

I give you 3/10.

Yours sincerely,

Critical Beauty Blogger
YouReview

Mini Lancome Juicy Tubes

The word lipgloss has always, always, always meant 'Lancome Juicy tubes' to me, basically since I was born. I don't know why that is, especially because I never owned one - perhaps the first lipgloss I ever heard about or came across was a Juicy Tube - but even now, since my knowledge of lipgloss has expanded, that is still what the word lipgloss means to me.

You can imagine then, how excited I was to receive these three mini Lancome Juicy Tubes as part of Dawn's giveaway prize from 'See it, love it, swatch it.' Unfortunately they don't appear to have names, so I shall describe them to you. I did look the shades up on the website and guessed what they might be so please correct me if I am wrong.

1- Bright red with golden red shimmer dispersed throughout (Couldn't find a match but it looks most like Bolole)
2 - Pale pink with golden/slightly orange toned shimmer throughout, pearly finish (I think it is Dreamsicle)
3 - Bright medium pink with silver/blue toned shimmer throughout (I think it is Miracle)

First up is the packaging. To be honest, considering that Lancome is supposed to be a pretty respectable kind of brand, the packaging isn't all that impressive. It's nice and all but hardly anything to rave about. As is the case with every lipgloss, I struggle to get along with this squeezy tube type packaging, much preferring a doe foot applicator, but that's just personal preference.

As mentioned before, each of these glosses are jam packed with glitter - I'm talking to a crazy extent. For someone who isn't all that keen on the idea of blue glitter coated lips, this doesn't work all that well with me. I've tried to talk myself into loving the disco-ball feel of these glosses, but it's just not happening. Maybe if I was 5 years old I might be a little less apprehensive. Might.

So that little (uh, quite large actually) hurdle was a challenge to get over, but once having moved past that I got to the formula. Oh dear. I'm sorry Lancome Juicy Tubes, I really wanted to like you I really really did, but you didn't make it easy for me. Why must you be so sticky, thick and glitter filled?

Though they look so pigmented and different from one another in the tube, on the lips you can barely even tell the difference, they just all look exactly the same.

I hate to say it but I have to give these 3 out of 10.

What a shame. But you know what? I am still so glad that I own these iconic tubes of blue based glitter because if I didn't, I wouldn't be a real beauty blogger!

Honestly, I am glad I was so lucky to win these because now I know what Juicy tubes are actually like, and despite not getting on all that well with them, they still represent the word 'lipgloss' in my mind and I sure as hell won't be getting rid of them any time soon.

Have you tried any Lancome Juicy Tubes and did you have better luck?

Rimmel Eyeshadow Quad - Sun Safari

I have really been getting into my neutral eyeshadows lately, and I think it was my Essence Eye souffle in Pas Des Copper that started it all off. I have been using that with various other beautiful brown or taupe shadows to create some gorgeous looks. When I saw this Rimmel Eyeshadow quad in Chemist Warehouse the other day on sale for five dollars, it seemed only reasonable that I pick it up. 

It's in the shade Sun Safari and contains four absolutely gorgeous colours, totally my types of shadow. Unfortunately, this quad makes two bad eyeshadow reviews in a row. The last eyeshadow I reviewed was the Model Co. trio, which like this Rimmel quad, had great shades but just did not impress. Poor pigmentation, chalky shades and lack of staying power has once again caused problems. Perhaps I should refrain from purchasing cheap eyeshadows in the future (although the Model Co. trio sells for $39!) but brands like Essence give me hope that a dollar or two can give you quality shadows. I have always had wonderful luck with cheap makeup in the past (oh the products I have managed to get on sale!) but I'm starting to think my luck has come to an end. Do I really have to resort to spending millions on makeup?!

It's clear in my swatches that these shadows are not pigmented. Even on my finger tips (where shadows usually show up so well after direct swatching) it's unclear as to the difference between each. It's so disappointing because, as I have already mentioned, these shades could create such a brilliant look if only they translated onto the eyelid well.They come up as glitter with a lot of fallout. In the picture of my eyelid, I am wearing all four of the shades and the only one you can see is my inner corner highlight. That shadow is the best out of the four, being the least chalky and most pigmented.

The staying power is very poor. Most shadows stay on my lids all day, even without a primer, but these last a couple of hours maximum. It's difficult to tell though because you can barely seem them on the eyes even moments after application.

The texture of these shadows isn't particularly good. They are chalky and a little gritty due to the small amounts of glitter that are present in three out of the four shades. The fallout is ridiculous, and even after cleaning it up once having initially applied the shadow, throughout the day more fallout made its way across my cheeks and under eyes.

As I always do, I gave this a chance in the hope that maybe using different application methods may give it an opportunity to prove itself. I used brushes, my fingers and the sponge applicator that it came with to apply the shadow and none of the methods allowed me to get a nice look. The sponge applicator gave the best colour pay-off but was awkward to use and didn't allow for blending or accuracy. My fingers were useless, getting glitter everywhere but not actually showing any colour, and brushes were the easiest to use but were useless in getting colours to show. In summary, no application methods were affective because, simply put, the eyeshadows are awful.

Yes, yet again I have stumbled across what appears to be an amazing set of eyeshadows only to find that looks are deceiving. I'm crossing my fingers that it won't be three bad reviews in a row, but I am keeping my eyes out for some nice neutrals to pick up.

I give this quad 3 out of 10.

Model Co Eyeshadow in Bronzed Goddess

I picked up a magazine a week or two ago when I was in need of some mindless reading (don't get me wrong, I am the first person to admit I have a slight - or maybe not so slight - love for magazines, but they are hardly great medical textbooks, are they?!) and it came with a Model Co eyeshadow trio. I wasn't aware of this when I bought it as it came in a 'lucky dip' type thing and it was hidden by foil, and I ended up with the eyeshadow in the shade 'Bronzed Goddess.' At first sight I was in love with the colours but really not expecting anything. After all, it was a freebie in a magazine, how good could it really be? It claimed to be worth $39, but we all know these claims are a load of rubbish, right?

Wrong. When I got home I looked it up on the internet. I like to research my makeup and since I had never come across this brand before I figured it might be a potential brand for the future. Believe it or not, it does sell for $39! I checked out all the possible shades and I am overjoyed to say that the shade I got is my absolute favourite. Score!

When swatched, I found that each of the shades were definitely my kind of colour. The lightest colour was a little bit chalky and came out in glittery chunks, but I figured I would probably be able to work with that. The pink colour looked lovely and the brown seemed to be very pigmented. They were a little glittery but I figured that would be okay.

The real decider was when I tried to apply the shadow to my eye. The pink barely showed up, in fact, all that showed up was huge chunks of silver glitter. The lighter colour was awful in texture. It applied in glittery chunks, unevenly with a heck of a lot of fallout. As for the brown, well that was just a mess. What seemed like a pigmented shadow, like the others, had more glitter than colour. It wouldn't blend and just crumbled.

I gave it a second chance, but this time used the sponge applicator it came with to apply it rather than my own eyeshadow brush. Admittedly, it did go on much nicer but I really struggled to create a nice look without a brush. The brown would not blend at all, so that looked awful. Of course, the sparkle was still unbelievable which is a big problem for me.

It also creased pretty quickly, then rubbed off in no time at all. After reading several online reviews it appears as though other people have actually liked it. I know that the magazine was trying to get rid of unwanted stock, hence why they had a random two prizes per magazine. I am wondering whether the shadow I received was a bit old, had suffered unfavourable temperatures and had been bashed and battered around a little too much for its own good. Whatever the case, I am not particularly impressed.

My favourite part is probably the packaging. The packaging is really lovely, with an inbuilt mirror and sleek black covering. It comes with one of those sponge applicators, but I prefer to use my own brush. It's nice and heavy and feels sturdy.

Did I like these eyeshadows? No, not at all. Waaaayyyyy too much glitter, poor quality in that it crumbles and has so much fallout and the pigmentation and blendability (ooh, new word!) of the shadows vary significantly from one to another. Would I spent $39 for it? Absolutely no way whatsoever.

I give this 3 out of 10, although I am going to give it the benefit of the doubt and say that maybe it is just old and had been bashed about too much for its own good.

Savvy brush set

This is a very long review so I have made the key brush names in bold and underlined, so should you just want to know about one of the brushes, you don't have to search through the whole, incredibly long review!

As I mentioned in my Savvy haul post , I recently bought a set of six Savvy brushes for $3! Yes, fifty cents for a brush, I think that is a pretty good deal, even if the brushes are useless. Thankfully, they're not.They came in a little case which I use to store them.
I haven't tried them all that much, but I have been using them where possible in order to post this review as quickly as possible. I myself am not really that good with brushes and at first wasn't entirely sure what each of the brushes were for. With a little bit of research and asking around, I soon understood how to use each of the brushes. Embarrassing? Yeah, but you won't tell anyone, will you?

The first of the brushes that I used was the foundation brush. This was partly because I had used another foundation brush before and therefore knew what to expect with this one. It is (or should I say was) the softest brush I have ever come across. I spent about five minutes just brushing it across my face with no product on it, it was just that amazing. Eventually I forced myself to actually use it, and I applied my foundation. It was a little streaky and uneven, but with a little time spent blending it all worked out to be perfectly fine. I used the same foundation that I do everyday (my Innoxa liquid foundation) but found that with the brush my skin looked even more flawless and had a higher level of coverage. I personally would only use the brush to apply my foundation at night or on special occasions because I feel that it made it more obvious that I was wearing foundation, it looked less natural and more 'airbrushed', I suppose. I personally find that I have to wash my foundation brushes every time I use them, so I washed it and left it to dry. It didn't recover very well. No longer is it so lovely and soft. Sure, it's soft and beautiful but not amazing like it was before. The bristles kind of clump together as well which is awfully disappointing. It still works very well and feels lovely, but I guess I am disappointed that it didn't return to its former self after washing.

On the end of the foundation brush was a concealer brush. The concealer I currently use (which is not amazing for covering blemishes but wonderful for under eye circles) has a little sponge applicator which I use to dab the concealer onto my skin, and then I usually pat it in with my fingers. Well, I shall never ever go back to doing it like that, this brush is amazing. I have never used a concealer brush before so I cannot compare it to anything, but I love this brush. It is absolutely wonderful. The only problem is that I have to wash the brush every time I use it. Because I am lazy (and it seems to take forever to dry!) I avoid using it as much as possible. Oh how I love this brush!

The next brush is the blush brush, at least, I think that is what it is meant to be used for. You see, I always used a rounded brush for blush, and this one is a lot flatter than I was used to. I looked online for a blush brush and came to the conclusion that it is just personal preference. Some people like round, some like flat, some like big, some like small, it just depends. Anyway, this blush brush holds a good amount of product. I find that I gently dab the brush on my blush and then blow the excess away, which gives me the perfect amount to apply. It leaves a flawless finish which is quite impressive. I will continue to use this brush for blush.

On the other side of the blush brush is the bronzer/contouring brush. This is the brush I was most looking forward to as I actually don't have an angled brush like this one. What I really liked about this was that it wasn't coloured. This allowed me to see how much product I had applied to the brush which was in fact, incredibly useful to know. It prevented me from brushing the product on my face only to find that I looked like some terrible fake tan job. It was angled just enough to allow it to be the perfect shape to apply product into the contours of my face. I really, really love this brush.

Next we have the eyeshadow brush which I use to apply shadow over the lid. It is a little too big for my liking, but I personally like really small eyeshadow brushes. It is lovely and soft and doesn't irritate the eye area whatsoever, I just find that the application can be a little messy because it is a little too big. I do quite like this brush as the quality and feel of it is very good, but I still prefer some of my smaller eyeshadow brushes. This brush looks very similar to the eyeshadow brush that Ecotools has.

Last and definitely least is the angled eyeshadow brush. This was the brush that I really wasn't impressed with at all. For a brush that is supposed to be used on the eyes, it is the roughest, more coarse brush of the lot. It irritates my eyes so much and I find the the bristles are too spiky. The angle is a bit pathetic to be honest. Once again it looks very similar to the brush Ecotools has, but I haven't used the Ecotools one. I expect that it would be a lot better than this one!

Overall there were some good and bad things about these brushes. Of course, the price was wonderful, and I would buy them even if they weren't on special. I didn't like how there was a brush on each end though, because it meant I wasn't able to stand them up in a container like I do with all my brushes. That annoyed me a lot, actually. None of the brushes shed at all which I was really impressed about considering it is such a cheap brand. I would pay full price for this brush set. I'm not sure exactly how much they cost full price, but I know it is relatively cheap. As for paying three dollars, I am so glad I found this little beauty!

Foundation brush - 7
Concealer brush - 10
Blush brush - 8
Bronzer/Contouring brush - 8
Eyeshadow brush - 6 (it's a very good brush but too big for my personal preference)
Angled Eyeshadow brush - 3

If I have made a mistake with any of these brushes (ie. used it for the wrong thing!) please let me know. It may change my opinion completely!

Maybelline Colour Sensational Pearl Lipsticks

Whilst Christmas shopping the other day, I came across some Maybelline lipstick samples. Being the lip product lover that I am, I snapped them up!

The colours that I got were Pearly Pink and Coral Gleam. Pearly pink, as the name suggests, is a light pink colour that has a pearly sheen to it. I personally found that it was much too frosty for me. I wouldn't buy this colour for myself because it just made me look like a corpse. Coral Gleam was much better. It was a lot less frosty and contained more colour than sparkle. I thought it was going to be too orange in colour, however I found it to be quite easy to wear.



Coral Gleam



 On the left is Coral Gleam. The colour in real life is slightly different - a little more orange coloured, but still completely wearable. Below is Pearly Pink and it actually looks quite nice in the picture. It was a lot more shimmery and white in colour in real life, of course resulting in me looking rather washed out. It wasn't too awful but I definititely would not purchase the Pearly pink lipstick.

 

Pearly Pink

I looked up the lipsticks on the Maybelline website to see the different shades. It is funny because these two colours are the exact colours that I would generally choose, however this time Pearly Pink didn't work out.

I really quite liked the texture and feel of these lipsticks - they were smooth and creamy, although I did find Pearly Pink to contain a couple of gritty bits. I'm not sure whether this was because it came in a tiny sample though.

I'm not sure that this lipstick range would be anything that I would check out. I already have a pearly/frosty kind of lipstick and I don't wear it all that often.

I would give Pearly Pink 3 out of 10, and Coral Gleam 6 out of 10.



L - Pearly Pink, Coral Gleam