first impressions

Smashbox Superstars Limited Edition Gift Set First Impressions

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This wasn’t going to be my original post for today, but as it says this set is limited edition and it seems to be out of stock online already I wanted to put this up so you might be able to find it in a Boots near you. This is a sort of first impressions or look at what’s inside the Smashbox Superstars Box that’s on sale in Boots for £30 and has £88.50 worth of products in it. I have to admit I was sceptical about whether it was truly worth that much but I’ve put the links to each of them individually and it does add up.

Smashbox is one of those brands that seems expensive, or more expensive than I’d often spend on the products I’ve been interested in trying from them. However, they seem to get such good reviews they were one of the brands I put on my to try list this year so when I saw this set I had to get it. It’s supposed to contain some of their best selling products, with a Cover Shot Eyeshadow Palette in Ablaze, Light Photo Finish Primer, Photo Finish Primer Water, SuperFan Mascara and their Contour Shadow Brush. I do have a weakness for brushes and have wanted to try one of theirs for a while but £20 for one brush was a bit out of what I spend on them, maybe this one will convert me.

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First Impressions: Candy Coat Hard Candy Builder Gel

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I have never used a building gel before but I’ve been interested in them for a while as I have two nails that always break so being able to build these up rather than cutting the rest short is something I’ve wanted to try. Maybe it’s just me but they always seemed a bit intimidating with dipping a brush into a pot and not knowing which brands to try, but when I ordered some things from Candy Coat a while ago I saw they have a builder gel in a bottle like a normal gel nail varnish and got one.

The Candy Coat builder gel range is called Hard Candy, I love the theme they have, and comes in a 8ml bottle with a brush like their standard gel nail varnishes. They have a range of colours and I picked B005 because it looked like a nice natural nail colour and could be a good base for all my colours or work on its own for a more natural look. The Hard Candy builder gels cost £15 each which is a pretty standard price for nor lack gel nail varnishes so it seems a good price to me for this.

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Lush Halloween and Christmas 2018 Haul

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I tend not to buy much Lush any more, ten years ago everything I had was by them, but I always get dragged back in at Halloween and Christmas. This year I’ve not gone over the top, for me anyway, but I do like to try new products that sound nice to me to know if I’m going to try and get them in the sale. I got three of the Halloween products and quiet a few of the new Christmas products so I thought I’d put them all in one post.

This is pretty much a first impressions post, though I have used a couple of them before if they aren’t new this year I can’t say that they’re definitely the same as in past years even if they smell like it.

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The Body Shop Haul: Some New Products and Christmas Gift Sets

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It feels so early but a lot of stores are releasing their Christmas products. As I was planning on trying a few of the Body Shop’s new products I saw these two sets and wanted to give the new Christmas scents a try. This year they’re releasing a range of products in Berry Bon Bon (mixed berry sweets), Peppermint Candy Cane (sweet mint) and Vanilla Marshmallow (sweet vanilla, which didn’t appeal to me) and these sacks looked like they’d give a nice range of product types to try as well as meaning I now have some great travel sized products. I was quite good and resisted the advent calendars, for now anyway. I really want the £45 one but I would probably end up with too many advent calendars and no money if I got all the ones I want this year!

Some of the other products I chose are ones I’ve either wanted to try for a while or have just found out about and couldn’t resist. I’ve sort of fallen in and out of love with the Body Shop products over the years as they can be a bit of a single note scent and them being owned by L’Oreal, but their ginger shampoo is amazing and I’m always drawn in by the Christmas scents so I wanted to try them early this year rather than leaving it to the sales and missing out because I don’t know what they smell like.

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Primark Haul: Harry Potter, Friends and Disney

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Having spent more time than I probably should watching YouTube videos on the Primark goodies available and checking out their Instagram I went on a trip to a local Primark. I hadn’t been to the Peterborough one before and was hoping they’d have a larger home section than the one I normally go to, which it did slightly but still not the best. I think I may have missed most of the sale items but there were some of the new Friends, Harry Potter and Disney bits there.

There were definitely a lot of the latest clothes ranges around but I was good and tried to avoid most of them, I love the mustard and all the fluffy things around this year so I have a feeling there will be an Autumn/Winter Primark clothes haul coming up soon. I didn’t get everything I planned but probably half of my list was crossed off and there’s a mix of Disney, Harry Potter and Friends. I do love all the officially licensed products they’ve been coming out with, especially all the home ranges.

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Boots Summer Haul

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I didn’t realise until this week that hot weather can mess with the internet too! Ours has been playing up so this post was meant to go out on Wednesday but wouldn’t upload in over five hours! I’m crossing my fingers the cooler weather means it’ll work now.

Anyway, I think I’ve been pretty good when it comes to buying makeup recently, I haven’t bought too much and I’ve actually got rid of quite a few things. Next month’s things I used in August is going to have so many things I’ve decluttered in it. I may have ended up getting a bit more than I originally planned in this Boots haul but there’s quite a few essentials in there so I don’t feel too bad. Of course when I get more sun cream the sun disappears, though I think I forgot to photograph it it’s still sitting unopened from the beginning of the week.

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Happy Place Cosmetics July Box

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I’ve been a bit quiet recently, I’ve had an unplanned busy last few weeks and I was too drained to do anything last week and had to take a week off to recover. I’m back now, I’ll probably do a proper update on what I’ve been up to later in the week, and I had to do a first impressions type post on the Happy Place Cosmetics July Box that got here last week.
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I realised recently I haven’t bought anything from Happy Place Cosmetics for a while, I love their bath products but since they’ve become more popular I always seem to miss out on the restocks and everything I want is gone! I don’t know if it’s a recent thing but they do a monthly box, either sold individually or in a set of three, and I managed to get a July box before they sold out. These boxes come with full size or sample sizes and the products inside can be already on the site or exclusives to the boxes so you never really know what you’ll get.

In my box I got four full sized products, or I think they’re full sized but I’m not sure on the bath bomb, and each of them added up comes to more than the £30 price tag of the box. The July box has a face scrub a bath and shower whip (though I’m pretty sure it’s a sugar scrub I got), a lip balm and a bath bomb so there’s a good range of different products in there and it’d be a great way to try the company out.

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Candy Coat Haul and First Impressions

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I’ve had my eye on some of the products from Candy Coat, a company who make gel nail varnishes and accessories and have just launched a beauty line, for a while. They have such a range of colours and finishes and the pastel colours in particular really caught my eye. They do kits which save money with the amount of nail varnishes in them and they include a base and top coat so you have everything (even the lamp if you pick that option) to start out and try the company. They also claim to last from three to ten weeks so I’m hoping these will last well and won’t peel off like some of the others I’ve tried.

As I got a bit overwhelmed with the different colours, there are so many to choose from, I decided to go for one of the kits. The Beginner Kit costs £60 for ten nail varnishes including the base and top coats and is a great value box to get started. I also picked one of the Hard Candy Builder Gels, these cost £15 so they’re more expensive but they can be used to extend your nails or build up your nails for added depth and nail art. I’ve always wanted to try one and as I was doing an order anyway I decided to get one to try.

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DIY Beauty: Cocoa Face Mask

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DIY-beauty-home-made-cocoa-face-mask-1.jpgI’ve always been interested in trying some DIY beauty products but have never got round to it, either because I didn’t have the right ingredients when it came to making them or I didn’t know what ones to try. Last weekend we had a couple of avocados that needed using up so I tried a face mask and a hair mask.

There are so many face masks out there I didn’t know which to try but I found a chocolate face mask that seemed like it’d work for what I want and we had all the ingredients in the cupboards, it seemed an obvious choice for a first attempt. This recipe is from the Marie Claire website, you can find it here along with five other easy face masks so if this doesn’t seem right for your skin type there are others to choose from instead.

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Marks and Spencer’s Summer Beauty Box

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I did have another post planned but as the Marks and Spencer’s Summer Beauty Box arrived in the post today I couldn’t wait to do a post on the products in it. Similar to their beauty advent calendar these boxes have a much higher value than this price, this one is around £135 of products they say on the site, but you have to spend £40 in Marks and Spencer’s to get it for the discounted price of £15. Since I wanted curtains from there anyway I just added this to the basket as it’s such a bargain and there are a few products in here I was planning on getting anyway.

There’s quite a good range of different products in the box. Some are full sized and others are travel sized or deluxe samples but they cover the spectrum of beauty pretty well. There’s a couple of makeup bits with mascara and liquid lipstick, some summer products like after sun and SPF lip balms and quite a few hair and body products. It’s actually pretty evenly spread out and a great way to try some of these brands as the full sized products of some would cost more than the box and any that aren’t full sized are still a decent sample size.

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