Clarins Radiance-Plus Golden Glow Booster

If I had to chose one skincare product that made a huge difference in my complexion the last few weeks it would be the Clarins Radiance-Plus Golden Glow Booster! My love for this little gem is infinite. Just three little drops mixed with your moisturizer of choice, mine being the Clinique Dramatically Different Moisturizing Gel, gives you a healthy glow and minimizes the appearance of pores, blemishes and hyper pigmentation.

Rather than actually tanning your face it provides a lovely and healthy glow like when you just get out of the sun on a hot summer day. Also the product is very buildable, even on pale skin like mine. It doesn't look orange and it doesn't look fake! I use two drops of it about every other day to maintain the results I like and it never fails to impress me.

Hair Routine #1: Going Blonde

Over the past weeks I've been dying my hair blonder and blonder, as I was just bored with my medium to dark brown hair that I have had pretty much all my life. Instead of going to the hairdresser, I actually decided to do my own hair with package dye despite all the negative experiences I read online.

For me, this actually worked pretty well. I dyed it multiple times (three to be exact) and it took me about a month and a lot of purple shampoo to get the shade I actually wanted. The shade my hair currently is, is in between an honey and ashy blonde and I absolutely love it. I started with lightening my hair two or three shades, this made my hair lighter (but still brown). Then I used a peroxide spray, the John Frieda Sheer Blonde Go Blonder Lightening Spray, two times to lighten it even more.

Then I decided to opt for a 9 out of 10 shade of blonde hair dye by Garnier which made my hair quite blonde without any orange tones. The only problem was that when I cut my hair short, and shaved the sides of my head, the brown came through within days. I decided to dye it again, three days ago to be honest, and got a warm honey blonde shade from L'Oréal Paris.

Of course my hair turned a bit more orange than I wanted now and then, not 'carrot orange' but just a bit more orange toned blonde. I used the Provoke Touch of Silver treatment shampoo twice a week for about 15 to 20 minutes each time, and the La Riche Directions White Toner as conditioner when I used the purple shampoo. This gets rid of the warmer tones right away.

And that's about it! I absolutely adore my hair right know because the colour suites me so much more than the brown did in my opinion. Did you dye you hair recently?

Just a last quick note, if you have very dark and long hair I recommend to go to a professional salon and get it done. Most people dying their hair blonde at home turn orange and your hair does get really damaged. Things that have worked out good for me might now work as well for you. 

The Dewy May Base

Last month's April base was about covering up those scars that come along with breakouts. However, due of some amazing products (that I'll show very soon) it's a little less about coverage this month! Summer is on its way and we need our sun kissed faces to be enhanced rather than to be hidden, and this is how.

We'll start of with a well known primer around the world, the L'Oréal Revitalift Magic Blur. You might say this is a bit of a cult product as its spoken about by almost every beauty blogger on the web and YouTube! I do like this primer but tend to wear only a little of it as too much primer breaks me out. Don't worry, almost every primer breaks me out so this might just work for you.

Even though I love my Clinique Age Defense BB Cream, this one stole my heart the past couple of weeks! I'm not entirely sure in which countries you can buy this yet, but if you can, make sure to check it out. The Max Factor CC Cream is a skin loving foundation that gives great (read: full) coverage on the areas you need it to, but is very sheer on the rest of the face. Also the colour range is exceptionally good for a drugstore offering, I wear shade 50 called Natural.

Last but definitely not least are the brows. This little pencil from the beloved brand Chanel is amazing. I use this on an everyday base without it ever failing to amaze me. It's such a good colour match for my blonde hair as most pencils come in only two shades which usually are both too dark for me. Also the brush does an amazing job and getting your eyebrows in shape without even filling them in.

I'm currently not using any setting or mattifying powder. The primer makes sure my base stays in place while the finish of the CC Cream gives a healthy and dewy glow.

Are you familiair with any of these products?

An Amazing Origins Duo

I think we all know Origins. There have been hypes about almost all of their products and I personally love the whole feel and concept of the brand. Last year I bought an amazing moisture duo, the Origins GinZing Energy Boosting Moisturizer, a lightweight oil-free gel formula, and the Dr. Andrew Weil for Origins Night Health Bedtime Face Cream, a think and rich restoring and repairing night cream.

I finished the Origins Ginzing Moisturizer in a few weeks and ran out of the latter just a month ago, just before I bought the Clinique moisturizers I talked about earlier, so I thought it was about time to do a little review on both.

Starting with the affordable one (€25), the Origins Ginzing Energy Boosting Moisturizer, which I will call 'moisturizer' from now on. This is summer in a bottle. The scent, the ingredients, the formula. It all screams summer. It's so lightweight, yet moisturizes perfectly. The citrus scent wakes you up instantly, even on those rough mornings. It's a cappuccino for your face. Yes, I love it as you can tell, and I might just buy this again next month.

The night cream on the other hand is not lightweight at all. It's one of those rich thick creams you can only dream of. I used to apply this in the evening feeling so happy knowing my skin would look like new the next morning, no matter what I did. I used this for the first time on my 18th birthday, and drinks usually break me out overnight. I had quite a few drinks and expected the worst. I woke up with only one pimple, that's about nine less than I expected. Also, my skin looked anything but red. The camomille in here calms down your skin instantly. Sad thing is, this little wonder has a bit of a heavy price tag (€75,-), so you might want to try a sample first.

As you can tell I loved both products a lot, and because of them I actually bought a lot of other Origins product which I will feature on my blog in the future.

Currently Loving #1

As I'm a sucker for beauty related products I try a lot of both low- and high-end brands, but sometimes I find myself reaching for the same products over and over again. That's why I thought it would be nice to do a favourites post (besides the monthly ones) every once in a while.

The first product is the one I probably adore the most right know, this little gem called Clarins Radiance-Plus Golden Glow Booster is a product I tend to use every other day, if not everyday. When I bought it and tried it for the first time I didn't like it at all, just because I didn't think it was doing something (read: giving me a gorgeous tan). It was only a week or two ago when I actually found out what it should be doing, and boy do I love it now. Three drops of this stuff mixed with your daily moisturizer gives you a sun kissed glow rather than tan in just an hour which even shows through your makeup. My skin looks more radiant and my complexion looks more even. I absolutely love it.

Next up is my beloved Chanel Crayon Sourcils Sculpting Eyebrow Pencil, I can't really tell you if it's any better than Benefit's or Anastasia's, because I've never tried those. But boy do I love this pencil. The shades appealed to me at first, because these were a little lighter than the average brow product. I recently went blonde, or more like blondish, and my almost black eyebrow product didn't fit me anymore. Besides the perfect shade (I have #30), the product just looks so natural and lovely, and the brush works very well too. I really like it and will probably buy it again.

L'Oreal Paris recently launched a new line called #TXT, and I really like their #TXT07 Volume Texturizing Spray. I feel like the product is a mixture of dry shampoo and volume powder, without making your hair look too dry. I use it almost everyday and this has to be my third bottle of the stuff. It gives so much volume and texture to the hair, especially when you've just washed it! If you're looking for a lovely but cheap texturizing spray this is for you!

The French skincare brand La Roche-Posay has a lot of loyal followers when it comes to their Effeclar Duo. This is a serum that prevents acne on long term base. It won't clear up overnight, neither will it in two. I actually didn't notice any difference when I used it for a few weeks, so I stopped. Probably one of the biggest mistakes I made that month, my breakouts got worse and so did my acne. This is the kind of product you've missed your entire life if you suffer from severe acne or any form of acne prone skin, just give it some time!

Last but not least is the Max Factor CC Cream, a lightweight product with amazing coverage. The only thing I dislike about it is the smell, because it does has a strong scent to it. However, when I'm at home or head to the store for some groceries this is my go to product. Applied in just seconds with a natural finish, what can you ask more for in early spring?

A Little Lush Haul

Sometimes you just have to go into Lush and buy something. I had that this the other day. Besides my love-hate relationship with their products, most just don't work for me, I do like the brand and the whole concept of it. And if a product does work for me, it works incredibly well! 

My one and probably only holy grail product is from Lush, it's the Tea Tree Toner Water (I will do a full review on this in the next few days). So when I ran out of it I went straight to Lush to get a new bottle, I got a small one because they didn't have a big one in stock, so expect another little Lush haul in about two to three weeks...

Anyway, I picked up a face and body mask, a spot treatment and the toner I just talked about. My skin is going through a bit of a blemish period, I break out almost every week and tend to wake up with spots every single day. The products that normally work for me didn't help this time, so I got a new face mask and spot treatment to calm everything down. Along with the toner my face should be clear in no time! Or at least I hope so.

I did try the face mask once already, and I'm pleasantly surprised by it. It feels very refreshing and calming rather than purifying, which is a good alternative to most of my face masks. Also, this one is great for in the mornings as it dries up in a few minutes!

I will let you know some more details about all products in the coming weeks!

Two Clinique Products for Dehydrated Skin

From time to time my skin gets quite dehydrated, especially during the seasonal changes. To get my drier than usual skin ready for the sheer and dewy spring bases I picked up two Clinique products that caught my eye.

The first one is a small version of the Clinique Moisture Surge Extended Thirst Relief. This gel based creme seemed to have everything I needed, a good amount of moisture without looking greasy. I love gel based products during the warmer months of the year because they sink in so quickly and look lovely throughout the day.

I took it with me to Barcelona, Spain to try it before buying the actual full size version, and I used it everywhere. On the plain, in the morning, evening and sometimes even when we went to the hotel to touch ourselves up a little. When I was about to buy the actual full size of the product, because I loved it, my eyes fell on a big yellow bottle.

And then I thought, why didn't I think of that one before! I read and even heard so many raves about how amazing the Clinique DDML (short for Dramatically Different Moisturizing Lotion/Gel) is and should have tried that one in the first place. As the bottle is a lot bigger I decided to just buy it, and I don't regret a single thing!

Don't get me wrong, both products hydrate extremely well, but I just prefer the big yellow bottle for some reason. I have to admit you need a little more product to make it work, but as you get more of it anyway I don't really think that's a bad thing. I use around three full pumps of it in my routine.