Super-Cool

Sometimes I buy things before I need them. Perhaps it’s some sort of shopping ESP, but every once in awhile I zero in on something, and feel like I need to buy it, even though I don't have a specific reason. Then, a few days or weeks later, it's exactly what I need.

Complimentary

I celebrated my birthday this month. I always enjoy a new beginning, but this year my birthday carried a bit more weight. It wasn’t a particularly special/scary number or anything; It’s last year’s fault, I think. Last year was sort of the beginning of the end, because last year was the year the warranty ran out on my face.

Everlasting Like

I know I told you guys I was never going to buy another kind of lip gloss after I found YSL’s Glossy Stain, but…

Eye Think Eye Like It

The final installment of unofficial Neutrogena week is my review of their Nourishing Eyeliner. As I mentioned earlier in the week, all this Neutrogena stuff was sent to me by BzzAgent.com, free of charge, with the hope that I would share my honest opinion with you. As if they could stop me!

Balms Away!

I got a full-size sample of Neutrogena Revitalizing Lip Balm as part of the Neutrogena Bzz Kit (from BzzAgent.com) I mentioned on Monday. It’s available in six different shades, of which they sent me three. I chose “Sunny Berry” which was the darkest of the group, and passed the rest on to two lucky friends. Sorry, Other Friends!

The Sunny Berry color is nice. It’s actually similar to my favorite Clinique Chubby Stickshade, Super Strawberry, which, for the record, does not taste like strawberry. I am a grown-up. Sunny Berry is a bit more opaque and not quite as quenchy. (Not a “real” word, but a real feeling.)

The shape of the balm, a narrow oval tube, is a little funny. I guess it’s mostly because I’m not used to it? Still, it’s like one direction is too fat and the other is too skinny. This would be better in the thin kind of lipstick tube that has an angled top. (Says me, very specifically.) I also don’t like that the branding is a rectangular sticker glued to the side. Declassé! What’s UP Neutrogena? Unless their real packaging wasn’t finished so they sent out mock-ups? The sticker part has been photoshopped out of all the promo shots, so maybe. I want printing right on the package if you’re trying to sell me an $8.99 lip balm. This ain’t Chapstick.

On a brighter note, it has SPF 20, which is always awesome. And thanks to its "ion2complex" it’s supposed to make your lips look “softer, rosier, fuller and more defined” after one week of use. I did not notice any long-term effects, but it certainly looks that way while you’re wearing it, which is kind of good enough.

One thing you may or may not care about is that this has petrolatum in it, and it is in no way an “all-natural” product. Though, products that promise to make long-term improvements seldom are.

Overall, it’s a nice tinted-balm for a natural look if you don’t care about using natural products. I prefer a bit more shine, but if you like your natural look to be more natural-looking, this is a good one to try.

Tuuuurn Arouuuund, Briiiiight Eyyyyyes...

I recently received a very generous sampling of cosmetics from Neutrogena via BzzAgent.com. (Anyone can be a BzzAgent and get freebies! You should totally do it.) I’ll review all three this week, because it’s always nice to know about good stuff you can get at the drugstore, and it’s even nicer if you didn’t have to spend money on it to find out if it’s good or not.

May Birchbox

Birchbox is early this month! AND it’s a special Gossip Girl Birchbox. I actually don’t know anything about Gossip Girl, but sometimes they film in my neighborhood and I have to cross the street.

Other than that, I only know what I have picked up from the occasional magazine mention or ad. Here is what I have gathered: They are a bunch of either extraordinarily mature teenagers, or early-twenty-somethings, that were born rich and live in NYC. You could describe each character with one or more of these words: bitch, snob, backstabber, douchebag, jackass, frenemy, and/or “sensitive.” Many of them are very attractive, yet some are unattractive in their supposed attractiveness. Oh, and one of the actresses is Blake Lively and there is something about her character and headbands. I think. Was she in that movie about traveling pants? I didn’t see that either, but I wish it was about time-traveling pants.

Is that in any way accurate? This should be an interesting Birch Box!



Algenist Firming & Lifting Cream
“Looking your age is so overrated” says the card. No it’s not? That doesn’t make any sense! No one ever says “It’s really, like, super-great to look your actual age.” That’s not a thing. Unless it’s a thing on the show? Gossip Girl Birch Box, you’re already confuuuuusinnnng meeeeee!

Dior Diorshow Extase
This promises tons of volume and length, plus ceremides to fortify your lashes. This is relevant to my interests! One point awarded to Gossip Girl Birchbox.

Dior Miss Dior Eau de Parfum
You know how I feel about perfume samples, but this one actually smells nice. Very girly, but I think I can probably still get away with it. This month’s tiny atomizer has been spared the trashcan.

Kerastase Age Premium Bain Substantif
This shampoo is meant to fortify hair against damage, since it has UV filters and hyaluronic acid. It sounds pretty good, but they describe it as “action packed” which makes me think the Scrubbing Bubbles are in there. (Sooo not French!)

Kerastase Age Premium Masque Substantif
Deep conditioning treatment to match the shampoo, though without the claim of being “action packed.”

Notecard
This thing is a total waste of paper. I’m never going to send someone a notecard that has the same quality as those annoying BRCs that fall out of magazines. And I am definitely, definitely not going to buy a set of 12 of them for $10. Seriously?! Good luck with that.

There is also a Gossip Girl trivia card, which, hahahhahahaha. Oh, it’s a contest/sweepstakes! “What is the significant piece of jewelry that Bart gives to Chuck?” Hmm. An anklet, I bet. Either that, or trucknutz. (Which would have to be some sort of a trick question.) I should enter; I’d totally win.

So here is the thing about this Birchbox. It’s based on a show about young people, but all the stuff is for… oldness. I guess the Miss Dior and the Diorshow mascara are youthful, but the other stuff is definitely for people who are losing their youth. I am wondering now if Birchbox knows my age and made a special box for me. (This is actually quite possible, though not made specifically for ME, but for my demographic.) I mean, I do think these are good samples to send me, I just don’t get the Gossip Girl tie in. Are they obsessed with anti-aging products? Are these products supposed to make us look more Gossip Girl-y? But wait, don’t they all look old for the age they are supposed to be on the show? The card says something about a black tie ball, but… I don’t get it! It is a pretty good Birchbox though.

Gelishious 2: I Try DIY

A few months ago, friend/reader Aline wrote a guest post about doing your own gel manicure. It was great, and her nails looked fantastic, but I kind of figured I would never do it myself. It seemed like a lot of work, I didn’t want to store the lamp, and I didn’t need gels frequently enough to deal with all that. But…

Spring Cleaning

I’ve been working on my spring cleaning, which includes cleaning out, cleaning up, reorganizing, and repairing, for a few weeks now. My husband doesn’t understand why it needs to get done, and if it really needs to get done, why we can’t just pay someone to do it.

We All Scream For Sunscreen

 

If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it eleventy times: The only safe tan is a fake tan. We all need to wear sunscreen, pretty much all the time. It’s important to find something you like, and if you have yet to find products that work for you, Sephora will let you try 17 of them for $30. And they’ll throw in a reusable train case! It’s kind of an amazing deal. (They value it at $193.) Even better, 100% of the net proceeds will benefit the Skin Cancer Foundation.