Magical Things: LUSH Cosmetics

My sister and I have started this tradition where every time we go on vacation to somewhere really cool we have to see if there's a LUSH store in the area and go to it and spend obscene amounts of money. I've visited LUSHes in Canada, Hawaii, and all over the eastern seaboard. I'm pretty sure I've also visited LUSHes in Europe and the Caribbean, but I'm not totally positive and I would hate to lie to you. But seriously, it's becoming a problem for us.

I could wax poetic about LUSH for hours. Seriously. But the short and short of it is that their products smell amazing, work wonders for various skin, face and hair problems, and are overall great quality products in a pretty reasonable price range. I absolutely love that the brand makes a point to make all their products all-natural and many organic and vegan. Plus, not only is the brand cruelty-free, but they actively work to eradicate animal testing from the cosmetics industry with their Fighting Animal Testing campaign. They're an all-around great brand creating innovative products and formulas with ingredients of excellent quality.

I've had this love affair with LUSH for a number of years, but I'm continually discovering new products and trying new things that LUSH has to offer. I had a number of those experiences recently when I purchased LUSH's new Beach Box, pictured below (it's in French because I bought it in the Montreal store).

Not only was the packaging totally adorable (the empty space was stuffed with rainbow packing peanuts and there were interesting facts about the environment printed all over the box) but it came packed with five travel-size products, all themed for the beach. Almost all of the products were new to me, and included two of LUSH's all-time best-selling products - Dream Cream body lotion and Ocean Salt face and body scrub. The other three products were Seanik solid shampoo, Sea Vegetable soap (one of my favorites) and Sea Spray hair mist. In the same trip, I bought the Miranda bar soap, which I had never tried before but smelled completely amazing, like all the best things about summer. I can't wait to crack that baby open. 

Photo via lushusa.com

But now for the beach box. I absolutely love Sea Vegetable, I've been through two whole bars of that soap which is a LOT for me, as I usually prefer liquid body wash. The lime and lavender scent is amazing and the sea salt and seaweed really softens the skin in a great way. But I was really impressed by the products I'd never tried before. I can see why Dream Cream is such a big seller - LUSH's number one seller in fact - the lotion makes my skin feel ridiculously soft and smells awesome. Plus, it's almond oil-free, which is great for me because I'm allergic to tree nuts (last time I tried Charity Pot, my hands broke out in hives. Yuck.). 

Photo via lushusa.com

The Sea Spray was actually not one of my favorites, although it did add a beautiful sheen to my hair that most salt sprays do not, I found the scent to be far too strong for me. The Ocean Salt scrub is amazing, I can't believe I've never bought it before, it made my legs incredibly soft and smooth after just one use. However, I would not use it on my face as it seemed too rough for delicate face skin (but not as rough as their solid sugar scrubs, which I've also used before).

Photo via lushusa.com

But my favorite part of the box is most definitely the solid shampoo. This is one of those LUSH things that I always thought was super weird and I had no idea how it worked and never tried it because I thought it would be a waste of money. I WAS SO, SO VERY WRONG. This stuff is incredible. You rub it down your wet hair three times, suds it up, and that's it! It saves space, it saves time, and I'm pretty sure if you crunched the numbers it would save you money. I've used this every day since I first tried it. It smells amazing, it works into a great lather, and leaves my hair feeling really clean. So many shampoos now are either so gentle/moisturizing that they don't make your hair feel clean, and this left my hair feeling light and bouncy but not dried out. My hair has also been incredibly soft since I started using Seanik, so clearly this is doing a lot of things right. Sorry liquid shampoo, but I may never come back. This is just too, too great.

As for my all-time favorite LUSH products, I'm just going to list them. There are too many: 

• Butterball bath bomb - it's like taking a bath in cocoa butter. Truly amazing, and your skin will probably never be that soft again
• Sexy Peel soap - because the name is cheeky and it smells awesome
• Honey, I Washed the Kids soap - it smells incredible and makes skin super soft
• Marilyn hair mask - specially built for blondes, it's lightening, softening and shine-inducing. My hair literally felt like silk when I was finished. Plus, it smells lemony and delicious.
• Tea Tree Water toner - makes your face feel seriously clean, and tingles, which is always fun
• Cupcake fresh face mask - An acne/oily skin mask that smells like chocolate? It's like they read my mind!
• Honey Trap lip balm - incredibly moisturizing and smoothing, plus tastes like vanilla and honey and is non-sticky. Can someone say makeout sesh?
• A Million Kisses lip tint - SO RED!!! Who knew that natural ingredients could make such a richly red pigment?
• Lip Service - a truly deep treatment for dry, chapped lips. Smells like lemon and works 1,000 times better if you let it soften in your pocket for about an hour before using.
• Gorilla Perfume in 25:43 - one of my favorite perfumes, it's spicy and sexy but also playfully citrusy
• Sugar Babe body scrub - I guess this has been discontinued, but this scrub was super effective. There was not a single bit of dead skin left on my legs once I was through with them. This would be great in the summer for pre-self tanner prep.

As you can see, I have an addiction, but it's one that benefits both me and the makeup world. LUSH is beauty with a conscience and a mission to make the world prettier, naturally. I'm in love with LUSH, and I expect a long, long love affair with this brand.

Necessary Beauty Tools: Sharpeners

If for any reason you don't know this, I'm a total beauty junkie. I used to do the same old same old "what I'm wearing" and "how-to" posts that everyone does, but clearly this new blog is not about that. I made this blog to help me expand my horizons and write about something other than beauty, but there are some things I feel very strongly about that if prompted, I will share with you. Today I was prompted, so here we are.

I read so many reviews online and on Sephora because I do like to do a lot of research before I buy beauty products. If you know me you may be incredulous considering the volume of product I own, but I have cut my inventory by almost half and have become much more judicious in my spending (gasp!). So now research is a thing for me. One of the products I choose to invest in is eyeliner. I use this product every single day and having a good-quality liner makes a huge difference in the look you achieve (and maintain) when you go about your day. And on that note, there are many cosmetic products these days that come in pencil form, and this is where this article comes about.

In my research, I consistently find that many people are switching to retractable pencils, whether it's a lip pencil, eye liner pencil, eyeshadow pencil or so on because they can't find a good sharpener. Personally, I am a huge believer in traditional pencils. My look would not be complete without either my Urban Decay 24/7 liner in Zero or my MAC Powerpoint Eye Pencil in Engraved. I'm pretty sure at least 80% of the eye and lip liners I own are traditional pencil style, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

I too struggled with finding a good sharpener at a decent price. I tried the cheap sharpeners from the drugstore, the high end sharpeners I could use in my place of business and I've tried sharpeners at Sephora and I've finally found one I'm extremely happy with. I present to you: Urban Decay's Grind House.

Photo via sephora.com

Of course a brand that's famous for it's liners would make the best sharpener that (not a lot) of money can buy! I've found over and over again that the Grind House sharpens my pencils to a point with no rough edges or unevenness. It gives me a uniform sharpen all the way around even when I've broken a pencil and start from the bottom. There is little to no chipping in the actual pencil and removing it from the sharpener is easy and doesn't leave rough edges.

This sharpener is also great for its features. It's a double-barreled sharpener with a small hole for standard-sized eye and lip liners and a larger hole for standard-sized jumbo lip and eye pencils. There is a relatively standard size amongst brands now, and a variety of pencils fit into the Grind House. The Grind House also comes with a built-in scraper, which you should utilize after every use to make sure there's no left-over pencil, which can cause problems with future sharpenings. It comes apart for easy cleaning, but when you put it back together it stays together until you take it apart again. Be aware though, I've found that the scraper tends to fall out, so you may want to just take it out and keep it somewhere separate from the sharpener itself. The Grind House recently underwent a design change but I can safely say that the new sharpener is just as good as the old one. At $10.00, this is truly a rather small investment that will pay off big time for your makeup bag, and you can buy it at Sephora or Ulta.

For best results, I've found this technique to be the best.
1. Insert pencil into appropriate side of the sharpener.
2. Sharpen to desired point.
3. Apply light pressure as you gradually pull the pencil out while continuing to slowly rotate. This will assure you don't end up with any sharp edges or dents in your pencil.
4. Once the pencil has been removed, empty contents and clean sharpener with attached scraper. If you feel the need, wet a Q-tip in makeup remover and fully remove remaining pencil from sharpener blades.

I really cannot say enough good things about this sharpener. Don't ever give up a pencil you love because you can't find a sharpener that does it justice. The Grind House will not let you down, and at its reasonable price point I highly recommend picking one up. If you've had sharpener issues in the past or you just really love liners, give this sharpener a try - it won't disappoint!

Magical Things: Water, Meet Straw

Just for your reference, in my personal dictionary “magical things” are things that you would call awesome, or revolutionary. I made a realization about myself today, but first I need to give you some backstory. I used to hate drinking water. Like REALLY hated it and avoided it if at all possible. A couple of years ago I discovered MIO, which was great for a while, but I rapidly got sick of the ridiculously sweet, fake-tasting flavors they provided. When Dasani and Crystal Light released their versions of MIO it was a total relief as they taste much better, but I stopped drinking them out of pure laziness after a while.

Recently, however, I decided that my healthy choice for the year would be to start drinking my recommended dose of water every. single. day. So I, the girl who hates water, was on a mission to drink it. Like, a lot of it. My friend recommended the Drink Right app to me to help me with my goal. Drink Right is an amazing app that uses your gender, age, weight and height to calculate the perfect amount of water for you to consume in a day. It then gives you a picture of a beaker with your recommended amount and the minimum you should drink each day, then gives you amount-size water droplets to drag into and fill up the beaker as you drink. The app notifies you when you’re supposed to drink water and how much you should drink at that specific time. You drink the water, record it, and reach your goal. Easy, right? Wrong. Using the app itself is easy, but my recommended dose of water is 54 ounces per day. That’s a LOT of water. If you think about a traditional Nalgene bottle (not the skinny new sissy ones, one of the BIG old ones) it’s about one and 2/3 of those. It’s a lot of water, and like I said, I don’t enjoy water.

So this was my predicament. I decided I was just going to suck it up and drink the water. So I dug out my old Nalgene, which came with the ounce measurements on the side so I would know exactly how much I was drinking, and decided that would be my vessel for water consumption. It was going pretty well, and I was reaching my goal at least half of the week and if I didn’t reach it I got close to it. But I really, really was not enjoying it. To me, the water tasted funny, it got warm way too fast, and I was constantly running to the bathroom because I’m not used to consuming so much liquid. I also had problems drinking right when the app told me to, frequently missed my morning dose and would have to play catch-up later.

My Nalgene was a big part of the problem. It’s not insulated, and because it’s old it smells pretty funky which translates into a strange flavor in the water. It also is not optimized for drinking out of, and I’d frequently pour a bunch of water down my shirt. I was frustrated, and I found relief when I took a recent trip to Montreal and decided to shirk my water-drinking responsibilities for the week. I came back and I actually did feel kind of crappy, and I was getting frequent headaches so I decided I should really try to keep it up with the water. But today, I decided my Nalgene needed to be washed, so I used my cold cup instead. I figured half was 8 ounces, which is usually the standard dose, so I’d be okay with measuring. What I found when I got to work was actually shocking. I immediately began drinking water, and it tasted good! No funky flavor, and the cold cup actually kept the water cold. It was amazing. But I think the biggest deal for me was that having the straw actually made me want to drink more. I don’t know what it is, but straws just make liquids more fun, and by 5 PM I had almost completed my goal for the day. I will never go back to my Nalgene after this and I can safely say my cold cup is my new best friend.

Now if you’re like me I can’t promise this is going to make drinking water easier for you, but it really worked for me. Try adding some of the liquid flavor add-ins or try a fun and colorful cup that makes it look pleasant. Filter your water before you drink it to get rid of icky flavors and impurities, or buy large jugs of distilled water (I don’t recommend this because it’s a waste of plastic, but whatever works). Try making it social – do Drink Right with your friends. You can share on Facebook and Twitter when you join and when you reach your goal for the day, so your friends can see your progress and congratulate you on it. It’s great for your body, great for your health, and it’s especially great during the summer when it’s easy to become dehydrated.  Good luck with your water-drinking, I’ve hoped my experience can help you on your quest to stay hydrated!

Happy Fourth of July!

Happy Independence Day! In celebration of the 4th, I've curated my favorite patriotic beauty shots and product picks from my "Amurrica" Pinterest board. You can check out the rest of the board (which has some fabulously patriotic fashion inspo) here. Enjoy!

So glam, love this retro beauty shot from Vogue

Remember MAC's Bronzing collection from last summer? This Red Racer lipstick was too perfect.

Julep's America the Beautiful polish - last year's version of patriotic glitter, this year they have a new rendition called "Fireworks"

Stars and stripes are perfectly matched with a loose, blonde braid.

The most patriotic pretty hair accessory, like, ever!

 And finally for a little nail art inspo!

Perfect flag manicure. Love it!

Love this tribal take on the flag manicure. It's too fun and goes perfectly with all the festival fashion floating around this summer!

I also love this video from the Today Show on all-American beauty brands. From Josie Maran to Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics, they give you the down-low on these fabulous, Made in the USA beauty brands! Check it out here, and I hope you've had a fun and festive Fourth!