Posts Tagged ‘moisturiser’

Showtime, Aromatherapy Synergy!

May 28th, 2010
linden leaves

Memories Soap and Lotion set

Let me make up for radio silence on my part by offering up a chance to win some lovely prizes, thanks to the always-generous Linden Leaves.  We’ve got gift sets of the Aromatherapy Synergy range up for grabs:

Four unique fragrances compile the Aromatherapy Synergy range using natural blends and each with their own characteristics:
Memories – a blend of rose, geranium and ylang ylang; in love again- a sensual blend of neroli, vanilla and sandalwood, pick me up – a rejuvenating blend of mandarin, petitgrain, rosemary and lavender and absolute dreams – a mellow blend of lavender, sandalwood, cedarwood and orange.
Each set contains a body lotion which is easily absorbed and formulated with sweet almond oil for pure hydration, and keeps skin feeling soft and nourished. A gentle vegetable soap enriched with certified organic rosehip and avocado oils, each variant has its own unique scented blends and is packaged in a beautifully artworked soap box.
Enter the competition today to be in the draw to win one of four beautiful Linden Leaves Aromatherapy Synergy soap and lotion sets. We’ve got one in each scent, so because it’ll be hard for you to choose which one you want, we’ll make the competition part real easy. Just leave us a comment telling us which fragrance you want, by Wednesday June 10. That way, you’ll get your prize in time for my birthday, which, for your information is June 17, and you can think of me when you smell yourself. Awesome.

Karen Murrell moisturisers

December 22nd, 2009

Remember when we shared our first impressions of Karen Murrell’s beautiful range of natural skin care? Well I’ve had a bit of time using the Face Moisturiser, and the manly-man I live with used the Men’s Face Cream.

The three things I look for in a moisturiser are: texture on application; compatibility with makeup; and how it leaves my skin feeling. This moisturiser ticks all these boxes. It feels very fresh and smooth to apply, doesn’t cake or feel greasy. It was fine under make-up. And feels like it soaks straight into skin and leaves it soft and fresh feeling.

The fragrance may not be to everyone’s liking as it is quite unusual, with grape seed and frankincense. But I liked it a lot.

And the downside is it’s not spf labelled so unknown sun protection. This isn’t a big deal for me because I have a very good facial sunblock, and my foundation is quite high spf. And sometimes the sun protecting ingredients compromise the other benefits of products. But I know some of you will demand an spf label, which is fair enough.

The men’s face cream was apparently great too. Men do have different skin to women – they produce more collagen so fewer fine lines, but usually shave a lot so need moisture to counter dry skin from shaving. This product purports to calm skin after shaving. My partner has very sensitive skin, and he had no problems or flare ups using this product.

As well as being environmentally sound products and packaging, the Karen Murrell moisturisers are great moisturisers. Such a treat to use.

Quick review: Elements Body Lotion

February 12th, 2009

You know, it would take a pretty harsh person to criticise a product that’s made directly to fund the Cancer Society (as opposed to the “oh, we’ll donate half a cent from every bottle” type promotion), but as it turns out, I am that person.

What is life without a little luxury?

We all deserve some pampering and if we can help others at the same time, it feels even better. That’s the philosophy behind the Cancer Society’s new range of skincare.

Made from gentle ingredients and infused with natural extracts to soften and beautify, elements is the skin care range that really cares. Treat yourself to elements and know that your purchase is contributing funds to the valuable work of the Cancer Society.

Okay, so that sounds fair enough. I purchased a 500ml bottle of Ginger & Green Tea body lotion from Farmers for $10, thinking that I liked the smell, and that it was a new and interesting product. Turns out I don’t really like the smell that much, but of course that’s very subjective. What I think is more objective is that this lotion isn’t very thick at all (in fact, it kind of slops all over the room when I pump it out), and it doesn’t make me feel very moistened, and it definitely doesn’t last. Their body butter might be better, but if you want a big bottle of value that actually gets the job done, might I suggest Oatmeal and Shea Butter lotion from St. Ives that you can get for around $7 in a (good) supermarket or the Warehouse, and you can donate the $3 to your favourite charity instead?

(I’d offer up this body lotion as a dud trade, but I think it might come in handy for the impromptu foot-massage parties that pop up much more often than you might suspect!)

My, that’s Delicious!

October 21st, 2008

delicious
Recently we were contacted by a New Zealand company named Delicious, asking us if we wanted to try their products. To be honest, neither Amy nor I had ever heard of them before, but we’re always keen to try new things – especially if they’re New Zealand-made and inspired by a bubble in a glass of champagne (that’s where all of our best ideas come from too!), so our reply was a resounding “yes please!”

A couple of days later I got a bulging packet in the mail, crammed full of pink delicious goodness. They’re described as “divinely decadent and sensual”, and the exfoliator, shower gel, hand & foot balm and moisturiser products even smell pink, and I mean that in a good way. It makes a nice change for me, as I normally buy products that have one specific scent (and to be honest, that’s normally just coconut), but these are more perfumey. When my flatmate Smoo tried the hand & foot balm, he said it was probably a bit too girly-smelling for him to get away with (although he liked the way it felt), so we made jokes about how it could be useful in giving yourself a stranger, but my sister’s boyfriend Bambi said the scent was fine for him and his mother and grandmother are the lovely ladies from Herbatint, so we think he is more credible as a judge of beauty products. Both of them however, might prefer Delicious Aqua products, which apparently are “fresh, clean and unisex”.

Either way, it made for a very happy bathtime for me to be able to layer the fragrance upon myself, and then upon my clean sheets. I used the shower gel as bubble bath, and it wasn’t a big bubbler (they do make a bubble bath though which is undoubtedly better), but it made for a nice soak anyway, perhaps due to its manuka and olive extracts. I really enjoyed the exfotliator with apricot seeds – it was soft but I still felt like I was getting a good scrubbing. The moisturiser comes in a pretty pump bottle which is really handy, but my favourite product was the hand &; foot balm. It’s a really intense moisturiser with grapeseed and shea butter, and your hands feel so soft after using it it’s not unlike a much more expensive four-part treatment – but in one easy application. The balm went missing mysteriously before I could pass the products on to Amy to try, but as I am a good person I have brought it to her tonight to try. My verdict on Delicious? I’m really glad to know about it, the range is perfect for when you want to feel really girly, and the balm is going on my list of products to carry all the time.

There’s a list of stockists on their website, but for the rest of the month they’re offering free shipping and a free gift, so you don’t even need to get up from your computer to get yourself some tastiness. Or perhaps there might even be a giveaway from us tomorrow – if you’re really lucky…

Your homework for this weekend

June 13th, 2008

1. Get yourself a copy of the latest Bust magazine featuring my role model Amy Sedaris on the cover jumping out of a cake, or some other very good form of reading material.
2. Put clean sheets on your bed, preferably 100% cotton, 400 thread count or so.
3. Run yourself a nice hot bath and make sure you put some luxurious products in it (or even just some milk powder, almond oil and a drop of your favourite smelly). Before you get in, apply a nice face mask. Have a jolly good long soak.
4. Scrub your feet with a brush, some pumice, some foot scrub or a combination of all of the above.
5. When you’ve dried off, and removed the mask, slather yourself all over in some glorious thick body butter. I cannot say enough good things about Skinfood’s body butter – they’re a New Zealand company, most of their ingredients aren’t all chemically, it’s rich and lovely, it’s cheap and easy at around $14 a tub in most supermarkets, and if you want further proof of its awesomeness, every time I apply it, my cat licks my hands for ages. So that has to be a good thing, right?
6. Get into your nice clean sheets. Feel blissed out. Perfection!

Pretty Pretty Pretty Prettifying Party Part I.

April 28th, 2008

Amy and I really like the idea of getting a bunch of girls together to do all kinds of girlifying things, and so we put our idea into action this past Saturday. Our lovely friend Shirley played host to us and four other girls, so we could drink bubbly mixed with ginger wine, watch Breakfast at Tiffany’sMolly Ringwald movies and partial episodes of Pride and Prejudice, and most importantly, try out some products and techniques on each other.

Kirsten and I self-identified as having problems with blackheads, so we started out our facial routine with a good steam. This is super easy to do – simply fill a bowl with boiling water and hold your head above it for five minutes or more, covered up with a towel. This is where we recommend investing in some straws for your champagne glasses so that you can stay hydrated while you steam. If you happen to have a blocked nose while you do this, feel free to add a little peppermint oil or vicks vapour rub to the water to clear out your sinuses while you’re at it. After five or ten minutes or however long you can stand the steam, you should come out dripping, but feeling slightly detoxified. In sort-of scientific terms, your pores are now open and ready to receive some product-loving.

We instructed all the attendees to bring along some girlie products to share, so we had a wide range of options when it came to putting on face masques, including the masques from our earlier trial. As well as providing us with a venue and stunning pizzas, Shirley offered us a choice of mud from both Egypt and Rotovegas. Brave Kowhai went with the former, but after laughing at how hard she had to wash to get it off, I stayed national. The Rotorua mud came in a hugeass tub and was only $23.50. The Egyptian mud would be in the thousands of dollars price range, cos you’d need to buy a ticket over there to get it.

Wallowing in Egyptian Mud wallowing in rotovegas mud 

We both enjoyed the tightening sensation as the mud dried, and mine came off pretty easily with some warm water, although I did have to clean up Shirley’s sink afterwards. My skin felt super soft and smooth, but I still wanted some moisturiser. Luckily, Kowhai had come to the party with some Nude Moisturiser she’d purchased at the fabulous store of Wanda Harland for around $30. To be honest, I thought the cream was a little bit too rich for me for my face, and I’m not a huge fan of lavender scent, but Kowhai obviously likes it, and that’s a good enough recommendation!

We did some lip plumping that Amy will be blogging about soon, and then we moved on to our hands. Heather had a set of Mary Kay Satin Hands to share with us. Now, you might think that a four step process (rub on emollient, then a scrub, then cleansing gel, then wash it off, then apply a moisturiser) sounds ridiculous, but oh my lordy, your hands feel like they are made out of angels afterwards. Honestly, wow, just wow. It’s like giving yourself a stranger. And if you’re applying it at a party, we really recommend that you and your friends give each other a little handrub afterwards too, using a little extra moisturiser. You’ll feel good, they’ll feel good, and all the boys watching on webcam waiting for panties and pillow fights will get a quick thrill too.

We had more products to try out, but the lure of more pizza and more Molly proved to be a little too strong, but I will hand the computer over to Amy now so she can describe what she did to Kirsten’s hair as part of the girlification.

beforeafter 

Well Jo, with modern technology, girlification is made easy. I merely twirled Kirsten’s pretty locks around my Remington Teflon Curling wand* and voila! (By ‘voila’ i really mean an hour of combing, pinning, heating and holding.) Without any hairspray at hand, i left Kirsten’s new ringlets hanging. With a bit of spray i might have gently brushed through the ringlets to create a Veronica Lake do. aaah well, some other time perhaps. *Disclaimer: i’m actually a little disappointed with this curler, and hankering for a new one. So i do not recommend this product.

Yay! It was a fantastic night all around, we had lots and lots of fun, tried some lovely things, and just generally had some fabulous girl-time. We intend on having lots more of these events, so we think you should become friends of ours, and then we’ll invite you along, and everyone will have a great pretty time!