Biz Time

We are having a heat wave at the moment here (where I live it's been 37°C) , also it' been quite hot for most of June, so I put my Fantasy and Euphoria away for a while and reached for more summer type scents. My favourites this month were:

Essence Like a First Day in Spring - A very refreshing and sweet scent. As the name suggests, it is a more spring/summer type of fragrance. In the first minutes the strongest note is tangerine and orange mixed with a bit of pineapple, so very fruity and an Escadaish type of fragrance. Later I get a bit of rose and musk, but it's still quite fruity. Staying power is quite poor, I on me less than an hour.

Yves Rocher Mango - Passion fruit - Another Escadaish - cocktail type of scent, so very fruity and sweet. Doesn't last long, though.

Yves Rocher Noix de Coco Malaysian Coconut - It's exactly what it says it is, a straight up coconut scent. Great for summer and it lasts very long on the skin.

It's been all about corals for me (for the most time at least). I've already written a post about my selection of lipsticks for this summer, but these four really stood out the most. At the beginning of the month I mostly wore Manhattan Soft Mat lip cream in 53M. Other most worn lippies were Essence Coralize Me!, Shiseido Glowing Matte PK 224 and in the last week Maybelline Popstick in Tropical Pink (btw a really moisturising lippie).

I bought Dove Deeply Nourishing shower gel just because I wanted to try out something new and I really like it. It's thicker than your run-of-the-mill shower gel, also it smells really nice. I'll keep repurchasing. 

I love the scent of lavender and Weleda Lavendel Entsoannungsöl has one of the most amazing lavender scents. It just smells like a lavender field. Plus it's great for my dry skin and hair.   

Palmer's Cocoa Butter Formula Swivel Stick is the best chapstick I've found. It's not exactly a chapstick, the size of it is more comparable to a glue stick, so you do look a bit weird when you're applying it on the lips. It's more of a multi purpose product, so for everywhere you have very dry skin. Highly recommended.

I received quite a few samples of Eucerin Aquaporin Active Light moisturizer and eye cream. While I find the eye cream a bit too rich (it takes a long time to sink, I don't really like it when a product sits on my skin), the moisturiser is fantastic. It leaves your skin really moisturised and feeling great also it takes seconds to sink in. I like it a lot and I might even purchase a full size (similar product is Vichy Aqualia Thermal serum, but Eucerin's is about half the price).

Orofluido has recently added another product to their line and as I adore Orofluido hair oil I had to try it out. It's called Orofluido Sahara and it's a dry oil that protects your hair against sun, wind and dryness. It has UV filters which is great for protecting your hair against the damaging sun. As I said it's a dry oil, so it's very light and doesn't make my hair greasy. If you ever used dry oils you know what it's like, you can spray a lot of product in your hair and it won't be wet like with spray conditioners. It's smells amazing, identical as the oil, so oriental amber and vanilla. I use it daily to protect my hair from drying out because of the strong sun. It leaves my hair very shiny and smelling amazing. Like it a lot.

So here are my May favourites. As always coloured text is a link to the original review.

In the past few months I've been mostly concentrating on my perfecting my skin and leaving out from my routine most of the other make up items. My favourite foundation still remains my beloved Bourjois Healthy Mix serum. I've raved so much about it already and usually I get a lot of compliments about how perfect my skin looks when I wear it. But mostly I wore skin79's BB cream because of the spf and it too makes my skin look pretty perfect. On my cheeks I wore Magic Lumi by L'Oreal (one of the best highlighters ever) and Dream Touch blush by Maybelline in either Peach or Berry. I recently purchased the shade Berry when I was in France, so swatches will follow (an old review of the shade Peach can be found here click). Still my absolute favourite concealer is Instant Anti-Age The Eraser Eye by Maybelline.

For my eye make up I kept it really simple with just some mascara and a fleshtone eyeliner by Max Factor. Maybelline Colossal Volum' Express in waterproof is my latest mascara and it compares very well to my favourite HR Lash Queen, just that Volum' Express does not perform that well when it comes to the claim of being waterproof. But the volume it gives is impressive, at least on my lashes (I always wear waterproof mascara as it holds the curl better).

On my lips I only wore some lipbalm. My favourite is Palmer's Cocoa Butter Formula Swivel Stick (the packaging is quite a chunky thing, it looks like you putting on glue but it moisturises so well), other favourites are Rosal in Milk and Honey, Labello in Rose and for a pop of colour Fruity Shine in Guava again by Labello. 

Thanks for reading!

Essence is probably the most affordable make-up brand available in Slovenia. They have a nice range of products in general and quite a few trend edition collections per year. Now, I obviously haven't tried all of their products, but here are my favourites so far. I only chose products that are available right now, so no TE (apart from nail polishes) or discontinued items. Coloured text are links to the original review and swatches.

I'm not a massive fan of lipglosses. I just don't like the look of them on me, especially the ones that are super shiny and glittery, but these are probably my favourite glosses. For a very affordable price you get a fantastic  gloss that is not too sticky, nicely pigmented (especially darker shades) and smells really lovely (kinda sweet-fruity). The shade range is fantastic, in my opinion, with two lovely nude shade and a really nice coral. I like to blot 03 Candy Bar and wear it more as a kind of a stain, I just find it suits me better than applying it straight from the tube. The wand is kinda odd, but it doesn't make the application any harder.

It's a really nice concealer for the price. I find the coverage sufficient enough for dark circles and even some minor spots. It is actually quite pigmented for a drugstore concealer. It has a doe foot applicator, which honestly I like a lot as it makes the application really easy. Also it blends really nicely. The only problem is that it comes in only two shades (10 Natural Beige and 20 Soft Beige) and both run very light. I own both, 10 is suited for very pale skins (Healty mix 51) and has yellow undertones, while 20 is just a tad darker (Healthy mix 52) and has pinker undertones. 20 suits me perfectly now that I'm self tanning.

This is a new product, I think it became a part of their standard range just about a month or two ago. It's basically a liquid highlighter that you can use by itself, or under/mixed with foundation. I like that the shine is actually quite subtle, there are no massive shimmer particles in it, so the glow it gives is really pretty. I tend to use it on my cheeks under blusher and then add my Jemma Kidd highlighter just on the tops of the cheekbones. The packaging is nice, with a pump, but it's a bit hard to squeeze just a small amount of product (it's quickly too much). You get 20 ml of product for 3-4€. There is also a peachier version available.

These are my absolute favourite cream eyeshadows and I've raved loads about them (here is another review and comparison to Catrice cream eyeshadows). They apply and blend nicely, don't crease and last really long on the lids. 

I bought this eyeliner just a couple of weeks ago and I'm already impressed. Before I used Mac's gel eyeliner and this one performs just as good. It lasted the entire day without smudging or fading, which is very impressive, especially since it costs about 1/5 of the price of Mac's and honestly I see no difference between the two.

Again probably my favourite nail polishes. They have a nice colour range, they apply nicely and last really long without chipping especially if I use a good top coat. Fantastic quality for the price. My favourite is You Belong to Me, which is a dupe for Essie's Mint Candy Apple. 

From TE's my favourites are BBC Pink Heat (a coral red shade, very pigmented, it needs only one coat) and from one of more recent TE's 04 Bright Alert! (a bright coral pink, needs 3 coats).

So these are my favourites so far. Hope this was useful. Thanks for reading!

I've been skipping foundation (my trusted Healthy Mix serum) this month and just applied some concealer and Mac's MFS where needed. My current concealer of choice is Stay All Day by Essence (an old review and swatches here). It's a really nice concealer, especially for the price. The coverage is nice, it even covers some smaller spots. I really like that it has a doe foot applicator, it just makes the application that much faster and simpler.

I then applied My Base illuminating make-up base which is a new product by Essence (I'll post swatches and a more detailed review in the next post). It gives a nice subtle glow to the cheeks without looking too shimmery.

I finished my skin with Mac's MSF natural, which I got after reading Summers rave here (She's such a great blogger and such a nice girl. She always manages to brighten my day with her sweet comments. I also ordered Skin79 BB cream almost 3 weeks ago because of her recommendation, but it still hasn't arrived. This shipping from Korea has been taking really long, I'm a getting bit worried :/). Initially, I didn't get along well with this powder. It was just so hard to work with, none of the brushes could pick up any product, I was just really disappointed. But now that I'm through the harder layer of product, it's finally working for me. I find that the best brush for applying it is the E.l.f. powder brush as it blends the product nicely into the skin.

I've already raved enough about Dermalogica's gentle cream exfoliant (review here). I've also been loving Mineral lipstick in the shade Runway Pink by E.l.f., which is one of my all-time favourite lip colours.

I exclusively wore only two nail polishes: Mint Candy Apple (a gorgeous pastel mint green colour) by Essie and my newest polish from a TE by Essence called 04 Bright Alert. Although, the latter looks really bright pink-coral in the bottle, the formula is actually quite sheer and needs at least three layers to get the full on brightness of colour. Thanks to Seche Vite, even three layers of nail polish are dry within minutes.  

Orofluido is again in my favourites. The scent is divine and it makes my hair look so polished and shiny. Plus this bottle is lasting me ages, because you really need only a little amount. I completely forgot to put my Alverde hair oil in the picture (review here). A truly fantastic product (mine is currently in Ljubljana, and I use Orofluido when I'm at home), I've been using it literally everyday when I'm in Ljubljana. Because it's quite light, it doesn't weigh down the hair. It just makes it look shiny and gives moisture to my dry ends. Plus it's silicone free, so an amazing product for the price.

I've been enjoying Katy Perry's Purr more and more. I wasn't much of a fan the first couple of weeks when I bought it. But now I love it, it just grew on me. A great spring scent and the bottle is so cute. Review can be found here. 

Thanks for reading!

I really miss Summer, so to make me feel a bit more summery I started self-tanning again and my favourite self tanner is the St. Tropez mousse. Using it again reminded me how much I like it. It gives a really natural colour and isn't streaky (I use a mitt). It does has a bit of a typical self tanner scent, but it's not that strong that it would bother me.    

I am just in love with the L'Oreal Infailible eyeshadow in the shade 21 Sahara Treasure. It's just the perfect everyday shade for me and I love pairing it with 24 Bronze Goddess just along the lash line and some Vanilla pigment by Mac in the inner corners (seriously the perfect inner corner highlighter). It's my favourite eyeshadow combination so far. FTW.

My go to cheek combination this month has been the Estee Lauder Bronze Goddess Soft Mat bronzer paired with my favourite highlighter Ice Gold by Jemma Kidd.

I haven't worn much of any lipstick, I right now I prefer just some chapstick, but when I did I wore Rose Petal by Natural Collection. It's become my go to lip colour, it looks great in combination with everything. Still among my favourites is the Bourjois Healthy Mix serum which is my HG foundation.

My latest discovery is the Weleda Lavender oil, which I only have the sample version, but I will definitely purchase the full size product. I love lavender scented products and this one has one of the most authentic lavender scents. I love oils because I use them both for body and hair. 

Thanks for reading!