This has been one of those weeks that requires limited elaboration so I’ll try to spare you my usual meaningless lengthy blabber. I’m pretty much in the same kind of zone as any other University student, stressed to the maximum with more work to do than she can handle. On top of this, I haven’t really been sleeping (at all) due to the stress of this and to be honest, I haven’t really been going for anything elaborate beauty-wise, as you can probably imagine. To be honest this has been one of those weeks when it’s a struggle to pull myself out of bed in the mornings.

After trying the much talked about Revlon Nearly Naked Foundation ($11-12 CDN) last week and using it on the daily since, I’m pleased to report that’s a foolproof slap er on kind of foundation that successfully masks the dreaded sleep-deprived and stressed face with minimal effort – and when you have about three minutes before running out the door, it can be applied with the fingers somewhat attractively in maybe thirty seconds. Score.

 

 

Generally speaking, I am a magazine fanatic and there’s always one that I’m subscribed to at any given time and at the moment it’s Elle Canada, which I subscribed to on a whim and I’ve been particularly impressed with the newly released March 2014 issue. While remaining on the affordable end of style/beauty magazines, it has interesting style and beauty content while still containing interesting and relevant nicely written articles as well. It can be difficult. It’s one of those rare magazines that seems to be written for those who have graduated from high school but do not quite have their lives sorted out yet for the next twenty-or-so years. This month featured a pull-out Spring/Summer 2014 Beauty Trend Report and as one would expect, I was all over it – I’m not a person who necessarily chooses makeup and other beauty products based on trends but I do like to see some inspiration, especially on dreary days like these. I particularly enjoyed the article titled “The Hits” that detailed ten spring fashion essentials.

 

 

Over the last few weeks, I’ve noted that I have been running dangerously low on mascara – not a hyperbole – and after dropping into Walmart last week and seeing this on for eight or so dollars I picked up the L’Oreal Voluminous Million Lashes Excess Mascara ($9-10 CDN) and I’m really loving it (even though it is not dried out yet!) thus far. I tried the original Voluminous Million Lashes years ago which I liked for big lashes but found rather difficult to remove. I like that it’s not a particularly wet formula so with the synthetic brush you can achieve perfect separation with buildable volume and length without the potential of clumping. This one is also foolproof on the lower lashes, even without taking some of the excess off of the wand. However, it’s not difficult like waterproof mascara to remove but it is more difficult than most mascaras (such as my long-love The Falsies). But I note I naturally have long curled lashes that are much too wimpy for my taste so I don’t need a mascara to perform miracles per se….

 

 

A few weeks back I was enticed into picking up some products at The Body Shop and along with the body milk I picked up the Aloe Protective Restoring Masque ($22 CDN) – however it’s on sale on the site at the moment for $13.20 if you’re interested – in all honesty because I was feeling nostalgic wanting to try a product back from the line I used back in the day and for ages I’ve been wanting to venture into the overnight moisturizing masques but I’ve been non-committal. I’ve been using this a few times a week for the past few weeks and let me tell you, I could tell the difference right away – and that is not something I can say about a lot of skincare products. The tub is completely unhygienic and would be completely inefficient if it contained high concentrations of active ingredients but it is extremely economical, containing 100 mLs of the goo-like substance. It smells unenticing but I could not be more thrilled as it has not been fragranced-to-the-nth-degree as per usual at these natural sorts of stores (I might possibly be making reference to Lush here) but it’s not awful, but rather smells slightly medicinal like the gentlest unfragranced products. It has the texture of goo and is ultra-concentrated with moisture that stays in the skin after it has drunk it up. For the first half hour or so, the mask feels kind of tacky and gooey on the skin (due to its first ingredient aloe vera, I would hypothesize) but then the skin ‘drinks it up’. In the morning, I consecutively woke up dewy-looking and luminous skin that was quite soothed. It really helps to take down redness and irritation (particularly from breakouts I’ve noticed) and keeps the skin plump and hydrated even after it is washed off. And makeup sits so much nicer on the skin the next day, I’ve found.

 

Ummm, in terms  of post and video obsessions there’s one clear standout in my book: The Drugstore Beauty Chat with Lilly Pebbles on Anna’s channel (Vivianna Does Makeup). I always love their “beauty chat” videos as they are entertaining to watch, amusing yet helpful at the same time. I love the laid-back style of them and I’m constantly cracking up while watching one and this one was no different. There were some great additions to my wishlist as a result of watching but I couldn’t be happier. I just loooooove when these two get together and make these.

There are no words.

How was your week and what have you been loving?

Maggie, x.