Category Archives: Beauty

Traveling With Arbonne

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Arbonne

Arbonne samples were provided for testing.

With all the traveling I did last month, I feel like I was packing bags constantly! I have a special bag just for my toiletries, and I like to pack smaller, travel-size items whenever possible in order to save space. So when some mini testers of Arbonne skin care products arrived, it was great timing since I was about to hit the road!

This set featured samples from the RE9 Advanced skin care line, and included the following:

Smoothing Facial Cleanser
Regenerating Toner
Intensive Renewal Serum
Corrective Eye Cream
Restorative Day Creme Broad Spectrum SPF 20 Sunscreen
Extra Moisture Restorative Day Creme Broad Spectrum SPF 20 Sunscreen
Night Repair Creme

All of these products are meant to be used twice daily, with the day creams applied in the morning after the other products, with the night cream used, obviously, before bed. The samples were enough to last roughly 4-5 days, so I took them on my trip up to Washington, which was very convenient. I enjoyed the texture and scent of the products – the eye cream tingled a little when I put it on, so I was concerned that my sensitive skin might have a reaction, but I had absolutely no problems. I loved that the day creams both had SPF, since that’s really important to me; you can either use just one or both, and I usually put on both. ETA: I was mistaken, you’re only meant to use one or the other day creams, not both at the same time. What is unique to me about this set is how many moisturizing products you layer on – I figure that just putting on that many different creams has got to help keep my skin moisturized, haha! I didn’t feel like my face was greasy or heavy, however. I liked this set and I’d happily use it again; it’s more steps than I usually do in my skin care routine, but it doesn’t take too much extra time.

If you’re curious to read the clinical results for this product, click here. The trial consisted of 163 participants using the products over 4 weeks, and was run by International Research Services Inc., which is a private clinical research company. I wasn’t able to locate the full clinical research papers or names of the people who conducted the trial, which I’d really love to read. I can’t say that I looked any younger after using the product, but my skin did feel moisturized.

Frownies Immune Screen Review

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Immune Screen

Complimentary tube of sunscreen provided for review.

I’ve been a fan of Frownies products for a while now. So when I heard that they had a new sunscreen on the market, I knew I had to check it out. Sunscreen is really important to me, especially during the summer when I have to be really careful in order to avoid sunburns.

Frownies Immune Screen comes in a 4oz bottle and is designed for use on the face and neck/chest. I’ve never used a sunscreen quite like this before – it has the consistency and color of a clay mask out of the tube, but goes on clear and can be worn by itself or underneath foundation. I’ve tried it both ways – if you wear it alone, you could tell you have a product on if you look really closely, but it doesn’t make you look super greasy. I would totally feel comfortable wearing this alone, although these days I pretty much always put on foundation or powder while doing my makeup because I have such dark circles under my eyes.

I really like this sunscreen – it smooths on like a moisturizer but dries quickly, so your fingers will drag on the skin if you don’t mix it over your face fairly rapidly. It also has a pleasant scent reminiscent of their other moisturizers – it doesn’t smell like a regular sunblock to me. Immune Screen has an SPF of 15, so this would be absolutely perfect for year-round use, since my preference is to wear sunscreen on my face even during cloudy weather. For bright summer days, I’d want to go higher in SPF or my face would probably burn.

Frownies Immune Screen retails for $39.97 and is available on Frownies.com.

Beauty Gurus: I Need Your Help!

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This post contains Amazon Associates links.

OK beauty bloggers, I am calling on your collective knowledge: I am in need of a recommendation for a good eye primer! I have a terrible time with my eye makeup smearing. My routine usually consists of an eyeshadow base with a heavy lining of black eyeliner on the top lid – I usually use Almay 16 Hour Eyeliner, but I’ve tried all kinds of pencils, cream eyeliners applied with a brush, liquid, and so on – and it always, always, always smears on the crease of my eyelid no matter what I do.

This will melt off in 5 minutes...

I know there must be a better way of doing things, since I’ll see women at parties at midnight whose makeup looks pristine – meanwhile, I’ll look smeared and disheveled by 1 PM because of my eye makeup melting off. I’ve tried the SEPHORA COLLECTION Eye Primer Pot, but it doesn’t help; I’ve tried it alone, and also tried it with powder on top like Kandee Johnson recommended; no dice. I’m seeing mixed reviews on this so I don’t know if the primer just isn’t that effective, or if I’m doing something wrong.

So tell me: How do you keep your makeup from melting off? Which eye primers do you use? Do you have any tricks I haven’t tried?

Skin Tight Lotion Review

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Skin Tight

Thanks to Skin Energizer for providing samples for review purposes. This article is a recounting of my personal experience using this product – I am not a doctor (As I’m sure you can tell!) and this article is not intended to prevent or treat any condition.

I have really dry skin, so I go through a lot of lotion. I have to keep lotion on my hands all day, or they get very dry and parched, which is unpleasant; I also like to use overall body lotion, although I tend to forget to put it on. Recently, I received samples of Skin Tight Body Firming Lotion from SkinEnergizer.com, and it couldn’t have come at a better time, as I had just run out of my usual hand lotion.

Skin Tight comes in a long, tapered bottle that holds 8 ounces of lotion. It has a creamy, moisturizing consistency with a pleasant scent that is not overpowering. It works pretty well on my dry hands and makes a lovely all-over lotion as well. If you look around my house right now, you’ll notice a few bottles of this dotted around – one in the bathroom to use after the shower and one by my desk where I work, as I have to re-apply hand lotion throughout the day. The instructions recommend applying to targeted areas twice a day, but I’ve been putting it mostly on my hands.

As for the firming aspect, I don’t know – really, any areas of my body that need to be firmer are that way because they need more time at the gym to tone up, so that’s really not something a lotion can help with. Personally, I don’t believe any lotion can eliminate double chin. However, just as a stand-alone lotion, Skin Tight is moisturizing and smells good, so overall I’ve really been enjoying it.