After a relatively busy week of essay writing, exam preparation stress and minimal sleep, I had somehow convinced myself that during last weekend and the early days of this week I didn’t have to run around like a chicken with its head chopped off and make serious headway on the assignments with steady and continuous deadlines that were looming. It was a mistake, it was only by the grace of the finest caffeine, my disturbing ability to work under the worse conditions optimally and my ability to perform while being very sleep deprived. I survived, which is the important thing – and I didn’t screw anything up royally. Oh, the joys of university student life. Things haven’t slowed down that much but it has gotten to the point that I’m ecstatic that I don’t have any assignments due in the next week and that I have some time to breathe as I conquer my mountain of readings and get on that essay writing train…

1. Oh, Coffee, how I love thee… We may or may not have plans to elope, but more seriously I don’t know how I would survive without the potent kind of the divine beverage.
2. Essie Cashmere Matte Collection’s Comfy in Cashmere … My nail polish obsession has continued and this has been my latest object of fixation. It’s one of those gorgeous greige colours with a matte finish – as the name would suggest – and the most gorgeous blue iridescent lean running throughout. I can understand why people are so divided on the polishes in this collection though, – while they are interesting neutrals that have nice pigmentation and interesting hues, they don’t last long on the nails especially without being top coated and they can kind of dry ridiculously fast – but I love this one regardless.
3. Keeping up with the daily sunscreen … Even though I don’t love wearing sunscreen every day because of the hassle and how finicky my skin is with the stuff, I’ve been keeping up with going for it on the daily and since switching to Differin and going a little heavy on it, using any sort of chemical product (i.e. the Clinique Superdefense) has been out of the question, I’ve gone back to the Avene High Protection Mineral Cream as a moisturizing step in my routine and its been working like a charm, even though it takes some time to blend it and to set to neutralize the pinky white-ish cast.
4. A New Top-Coat Lemming… I’m one of those people with nail chipping issues so a good top coat is a requirement and at the moment I own zero that can be described as good and have a still functional and usable texture. Over the last few days (somewhat out of frustration), I’ve put some research in and I’ve come to the conclusion that the CND Vinylux Weekly Top Coat needs to come into my life. I don’t even care that it’s not the fastest drying top coat if it keeps polish on as long as people say it does!
5. Another Drugstore Dash … I’m not going to even apologize for my foray into the local drugstore after class last week, fueled by my desire to buy things and forget about the 2737 things that I was stressed about and joined by my partner in crime – at least I kept it at three items and two of them I’m really pleased with and the other is just fine. First up the OPI ’50 Shades of Grey’ Nail Polish in Cement The Deal has the most amazing formula ever and is far more interesting than it appears as a dullish grey cream, second, I was more than pleased to pick up the Garnier Curl Construct Creation Mousse for a mere few dollars on sale and I’m equally pleased to say that it has been a much more impressive one than the last few that I’ve tried – actually working and neither drying out my hair or leaving that weird residue. On the final note, I like the Maybelline ‘Rebel Nudes’ Lipstick in 700 Barely Bloomed just fine but I made an error with my shade choice, as it’s just another peachy nude that seems to look very similar to a number of lipsticks that I own and love – in the bullet, it appears much more peachy and pastel-y and because of this, I wished I had gone for one of the more corally shades!
6. My first Paula’s Choice order… Just a tad over a week ago, I bit the bullet and ordered a few things from Paula’s Choice for the first time and this product (the Paula’s Choice Resist Daily Smoothing Treatment) was one of those things and I would have it now if there wasn’t this stupid mix-up that happened with shipping with our bad weather conditions. Regardless, I’m pretty excited to receive my products (and plethora of samples) and should have it early in the week.

Any thoughts on the last few weeks?

Maggie, x.