Rambling on about books, baking and beauty…
November’s Nailbox has arrived, bringing with it a hint of Christmas in its red, green and glitter.
Also in the box, Elegant Touch stick on tips, a file, and a great little booklet of festive patterns for your nails.
And the colour coordinated candy cane is a nice touch. I’ve got a few Christmas dos to attend and now festive nail designs!
ramblingmads
I love beauty products, make up, skincare, you name it, but I also love animals, I’m mum to five rats, and animal testing horrifies me. The comestic industry really doesn’t need to test shampoo on rabbits or mascara on mice.
The Vegan Kind‘s three monthly beauty boxes contain products that demonstrate this fact wholeheartedly. None of these items have been tested on animals and all are suitable for use by humans.
The box contains six items for £18.95, is delivered every three months and this box has donated 20p for every box sold to The Dr Hadwen Trust – the UK’s leading non-animal medical research lab.
Inside the box;
Human+Kind Hand Elbow and Foot Cream 500ml (RRP £6) this rich and pleasant scented multi use cream contains cocoa butter and avocado oil to deliver lasting hydration.
Spectrum Collections Concealer and Eyeshadow Brush (RRP £4.99) I am a sucker for a nice brush and love the soft electric blue bristles on this baby. Shaped for applying colour to your lids or concealer to that pesky dark shadow. I might have to use my exclusive discount code to treat myself to a few more.
Cocoyou Coconut Oil 200ml (RRP £5.99) coconut oil is everywhere this year, in baking, stir fries, slathered on skin and hair, used in teeth cleaning (oil pulling). This tub is perfect for your beauty routine, coat your face at night, smooth through the ends of your hair and use it to sort out your cuticles.
Emani Vegan Cosmetics Soulmate Lipshine 7ml (RRP £11) this pink gloss goes on clear with a slight sheen of shine.
Vegan Button Mirror – soon to be available from the TVK website, this little pocket mirror is rather sweet with it’s bunny logo.
Green People’s Vegan & Organic Intensive Repair Shampoo 30ml trial size. Strengthens and repairs dry, damaged or weak hair. Excellent for the upcoming party season when too much hairspray and too many late nights stress your hair out. There’s also 20% off for subscribers.
ramblingmads
This month MLB managed to get delivered in plenty of time! Hooray.
It’s also a tin for treats as opposed to a box, rather sweetly decorated too.
Inside are baking themed goodies, including jar labels and a cute apron, as well as some beauty treats. They’ve teamed up with food blogger Mimi Thorisson.
The beauty items are mostly skincare;
* Dr Pierre Ricaud Neck & Decolletage Lifting Cream – this little pot of cream plumps and perks skin cells.
* Yves Rocher Sensual Fragrance – a rather warm and sexy scent in a tiny bottle of perfume.
* My Little Beauty Sweet Hand Cream – marshmallowy sweetness in a rich and soothing cream.
ramblingmads
This month Birchbox has joined forces with accessories brand Skinny Dip London. Confusingly there are no items from Skinny Dip in the box, you could however add a phone cover from their range for an extra £4. The boxes feature a shell print design from Skinny Dip.
Inside there’s six beauty products from a variety of brands. Let’s take a look inside.
Ren Wake Wonderful Night-Time Facial – this works while you sleep, leaving you with plumped up, radiant skin in the morning. I’ll be giving this a go to relieve tired winter skin.
Lord & Berry Silhouette Neutral Lip Liner – I’m not really a lip liner kinda girl, I don’t really wear lipstick, but this doesn’t need matching to your lipstick of choice as it’s translucent.
Cowshed Cow Pat Hand Cream – I loved the Cowshed body lotions that I’ve tried and winter means hand cream becomes more essential than ever. This one contains grapefruit and coriander essential oils, and smells quite pleasant.
Number 4 Lumiere d’Hiver Super Comb Prep & Protect – like a hair oil, you spritz this on towel dried hair, comb through and style. Strengthen and repair tired hair while detangling and taming flyaways. Not sure it’ll come between me and my argan oil though.
Delarom Crème Acquaconfort – with almond and apricot oils, vitamin E this facial cream nourishes and soothes dehydrated skin and perks it up.
L.Erickson Grab & Go Ponytail Holder – metal free hair tie, designed to avoid getting tangled in your hair.
ramblingmads
The second gold and shiny beauty box from Look Fantastic was delivered this morning. A text from Royal Mail let me know it had arrived (I didn’t know RM did that, I do now).
Inside the pretty box, beneath the layer of tissue paper lies this month’s selection of beauty goodies.
There’s more variety in this box than there was in the skincare fest last time.
There’s a festive bent to the box this month, with Look Fantastic’s pick of a Ruby Red mineral lipstick from Bellapierre. The perfect shade for the season.
Also in the box – Korres Guava Shower Gel – vitamin enriched, lightly scented, creamy-foam gel.
Ole Henriksen Empower Foaming Milk Cleanser – travel sized, this cleanser promises to protect against free radicals with the power of Arctic cloudberries, which is packed with vitamins. All I can say is that it smells inoffensive and left my skin soft.
Dr PawPaw Tinted Ultimate Red Balm – a limited edition balm that can be used for lips, cheeks and touch ups. Containing pawpaw extract, olive oil and aloe vera.
Ren V-Cense Youth Vitality Day Cream – a moisturiser that hydrates, smoothes and boosts skin energy and elasticity.
Kebelo Enriching Masque – designed for naturally dry hair, this contains argan oil and a host of happy hair ingredients that mimic natural hair oils and nourish your hair to keep it shiny and healthy.
ramblingmads
I’m getting a little fed up with LMB, for the past few months as they’ve revamped their site, the same products have loitered in the boutique with the occasional swap over. Making it rather pointless.
This month I’ve picked four items for my monthly 60 credits, one of which I’ve had pretty much every month.
There’s also the addition of the brand new LMB magazine The Journal.
This month there were a lot of products from Cailyn, an eye make up brand. I don’t really do anything to my brows (curse of being blonde, do too much and they disappear) so I picked a couple of their gel eye shadow pencils in Champagne and Mauve.
They are also featuring a selection of Lanolips balms. While I wasn’t very keen on the high lanolin content as it can unsettle my skin, the thought of a strong protective balm in this horrid weather overcame that – plus it’s banana flavour!
Finally a familiar item – Monuspa Rosewood Reviving Mist.
I hope next month they refresh the entire stock in the boutique.
ramblingmads
This latest collaboration between LiB and The British Beauty Blogger is rumoured to be their last so it’s not unreasonable to expect something great. For £16.95 (with free P&P for a limited time) you get 12 products, some you might be more familiar with than others, half of which are full size.
There’s something for almost every part of your body, from your hair, to your lips, to those dry little bits!
BareMinerals Marvellous Moxie Lipstick in Raise the Bar (£17.99) – a dinky mini lipstick to pop in your handbag in a pinky red, that I quite like and I’m not really a lipstick fan.
Beauty Kitchen Love Me Wonderbalm £2.99) – cocoa butter with a sweet cinnamon scent for your lips, dry patches (elbows!) and all in a handy tin, perfect for the oncoming grotty weather. There’s also a special 40% discount for Beauty Kitchen.
Crabtree & Evelyn Le Source Hand Therapy (£9) full size moisture packed hand cream with a fresh, clean scent. 20% off in store or online with the voucher code given.
Maybelline Dr Rescue SOS Nail Balm (£3.99) another pocket sized product, this nail and cuticle stick should help keep my nails happy.
Shay & Blue Framboise Noire Fragrance (£5) I’m really fussy about fragrance, but I like this one rather a lot. A warm, berry scented perfume suited rather well to these darkening days.
Nuxe Prodigieux Eye Cream (£18.50) this is a brand I have been seeing everywhere, and I rather like the face masks I’ve already tried. I don’t use an eye cream so this will be getting a trial. Plus 15% off online.
Erborian CC Cream (£17.00) I’m rather wedded to my Clinique CC cream but I’ve read a few reviews of this Korean brand so I might just give it a whirl. 15% discount online.
L’Occitane Almond Oil Shower Gel (£3) it’s no secret that this French brand and I have a love affair. I’ve tried this oil before, a little goes a long way and the same goes for the shower gel. Free full-size shower gel when you spend £35 on their website.
L’Oreal Paris Telescopic Carbon Black Mascara (£10.99) – regular readers will know I am not very impressed with how many mascaras turn up in beauty boxes, I only have 2 eyes and 2 sets of lashes!
Soap & Glory The Righteous Butter Mini (£2.50) I love S&G, and the Righteous Butter and I are old friends. It smells amazing and leaves my skin soft for hours.
Ren Evercalm Gentle Cleansing Milk (£2.75) this is supposed to be a soothing way to remove your make up, we’ll see how my super sensitive skin takes to it. I could do with a make up remover that my skin loves. 20% off online.
KMS California MoistRepair Shampoo (£4.50) and Conditioner (£5.00) my boyfriend has already stolen these, he’s run out of both! Free full size repair crème when buying shampoo or conditioner.
Crown Brush Pro Studio Contour Brush (£9.99) so I’m a bit of a novice when it comes to all this contouring business, still just trying my best to look vaguely human but this brush is so soft I might just have to give it a go. 15% off online.
Collection Speedy Blush Sticks in Tickled Pink & Cheeky (£3.99) at first look, this is really, really pink, but when swatched it’s more of a peachy tone. £1 off at boots.co.uk.
So, a box full of fab products, offers and treats for your skin. Really impressed with this box, that barely closes, it’s so full!
ramblingmads
Another month, another addition to my nail polish obsession.
This month’s box features three wintery shades of polish from Rommel, Essie and Nails Inc. I can definitely see some funky nail art with these three shades.
Also in the box is Nicole by Opi Drying Drops – which is a new product to me. According to the blurb you add a drop or two after applying your colour and top coat to speed up the drying process.
Lastly, there’s a pair of nail scissors from Elegant Touch. I prefer filing my nails to cutting them, and I can’t use them anyway, being a leftie (I have special ones for emergencies from Anything Left-Handed) but for anyone else these might come in useful.
Overall a great little treat for nail polish nuts like me. A great way to get more polish for less than if I went and bought them separately (£15 for the box including P&P).
ramblingmads
Another month, another delivery delay from My Little Box. They insist there’s no problems, but Facebook is full of disgruntled customers. If you’re one of them and don’t want any spoilers, look away now.
This month’s box has been created in partnership with Pinterest, the online scrapbook. To be honest I don’t really know what’s so creative about the contents of this box.
Inside is a selection of beauty products and lifestyle items, along with the fold-out My Little World magazine and illustrated card.
The beauty products come in their usual dinky drawstring cloth bag (really good for keeping your beauty products tidy when travelling)
This month’s selection are;
Left: Un Songe d’Or beauty oil from Aimy, full size, worth £29.
Centre: Talika’s Photo-Hydra Day, full size, worth £43.50
Right: Crème de Minuit, My Little Beauty, full size, worth £15
I’m not really a fan of beauty oils, but a friend of mine loves them, so I shall be passing this one on. I’ve tried the Talika cream in another box and it does what it says, hydrates the skin, something my skin needs as the cold weather sets in. The Crème de Minuit is a night cream, which I might try out, although I’m pretty happy with my current nightly skincare routine.
The lifestyle items this month are a little lacking, and I can’t quite see how they fit with the theme of the box.
Wire-wrap beads, MLB, £16 – little plastic beads which wrap round things like headphone wires, which would be fine if I was a teenager still, but I don’t really think they quite work for the twenty and thirty something women who subscribe to the box.
Canvas tote bag, MLB, £15 – this might not be the most ‘creative’ item but as the new 5p charge has come in for plastic bags, it will be useful. It folds up quite small, so you can pop in your handbag when you head to the shops.
Overall, not the greatest box and not really worth the wait for it. It’s nice to have full size products but a bit of variety would have been nice, and I think if you’re going to have a theme then you really need to make sure the items fit the theme.
Are you a MLB subscriber? What did you think of this month’s box?
ramblingmads
Glossybox has really upped their game in the last few months, their boxes are all full size products, making it a total bargain.
Inside this month’s box –
Nicka K Airbrush Blending Sponge – I’ve heard a lot about these magic blending sponge, which claim to create a flawless look with any liquid make up product.
Talika Photo-Hydra Dry – hydrating moisturiser from French brand Talika, claims to leave your complexion hydrated and primed.
Lanolips Golden Ointment Dry Skin Salve – lanolin, Manuka honey and vitamin E combined to tackle super dry skin, just a shame I’m allergic to lanolin.
So Susan Haute Light Highlighting Pencil – blend over brow or cheek bones to boost radiance or along the inner rim of your eyes to make the whites pop.
Jelly Pong Pong Fairy Lashes Curl Mascara – cruelty-free with a unique brush to boost the curl in your lashes with dramatic volume and definition.
A nice selection, with the obligatory mascara, perfect for some skin TLC and added glow in the coming cold weather.
ramblingmads
ramblingmads 