Tag: avon

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Beauty

Nail Polish: AVON Speed Dry+ in rebel rose.

avon rebel rose

I have a love/ hate relationship with AVON polishes, and this one is not an exception.

First of all, the colour is amazeballz. This is exactly the shade of hot pink/ fuchsia/ whatever that I love. It’s cool toned and therefore looks great against my skin.

The brush of this one is okay. The formula is great, application wise. If you’re in a hurry, even one layer is enough, although it’s a little bit see-through. It goes on smoothly, and requires minimal clean-up. Also, it dries in seconds.

However.

It chips in seconds as well.

OK, well maybe seconds is a slight exaggeration, but there hasn’t been a case where this polish would hold longer than 24 hours on my nails. Usually it’s far, far less.

Nevertheless, I have since then bought a couple other shades in this range, because you can’t beat that drying time. You just can’t. I’d recommend it for that alone.

AVON Speed Dry+ in rebel rose is a discontinued product, but I’m sure it can still crop up on the likes of Ebay. You can still find the range in AVON catalogues I believe. Give it a go next time you’re on the market for a new polish (which is any time, if you’re like me).

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Beauty

AVON Nailwear Pro+ in midnight green.

Avon Nailwear Pro+ in Midnight Green is a shimmery type of forest green colour that I quite enjoyed. I’m a sucker for certain green polishes, and this one falls exactly into that category, even though most of the time I prefer the absence of any kind of shimmer or glitter on my nails.

It goes on relatively smoothly and dries quickly. I love the brush, it’s wide. It easily takes two strokes to cover the entire nail.

The colour is rich, and I think that even one coat of this would’ve been enough. However, there was something a bit off with the formula of this one. It felt too thick, but when I tried removing the excess from the brush, it didn’t go on smoothly at all. So a second coat was in order.

Another thing with Avon polishes is that they’re not long lasting at all. Their Speed Dry series is notorious in that department. Nailwear Pro+ are better, but only a bit. I applied this polish yesterday evening, and took these photos about 22 hours later. It’s not as evident in there, but it’s become quite thin and rough around the edges. As I’m typing this, a little over 30 hours after application and one round of dishwashing later, it’s quite chipped on at least three fingers. Not a tragedy by all means, and maybe even suitable for a grocery run, but no longer looking *dundundunnn* polished.

This particular shade was discontinued, I believe; but I doubt I would’ve repurchased it, even though I’m absolutely in love with the colour.

I’m curious: what’s your experience with Avon polishes? Do they hold well? Is it just me?

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Beauty

FOTD #3: Matte Skin, Grape Lips.

fotd 3

One of these days I’m going to find a flattering selfie angle, and actually share photos of the result. For now, lookie how I arrange them products on lined paper, eh. Eh, eh?!

Face:

  • Foundation – Oriflame Matte Control Foundation
  • Face Powder – IsaDora Perfect Loose Powder
  • Concealer – Bourjois 123 PERFECT CC EYE CREAM

A discontinued version of the Oriflame Matte foundation. I swear, Oriflame‘s been rebranding like there’s no tomorrow. It’s an OK foundation with medium coverage, but I’m just not sure. When it comes out of the tube, it’s a bit on the yellow/ grey side, which makes me all giddy inside. Yes, I said grey, and yes, giddy. But when you apply it and it oxidises a bit, it a) becomes about a tone darker than in the tube; b) loses all the yellowness and greyness and goes pink. And I do not need pink undertones in my face makeup, nuh uh.

Why am I suddenly accenting about every other word with italics?

Moving on.

The concealer I used for undereye only. I wish it were a lighter shade. It’s an OK concealer, but I don’t think I’d be repurchasing it.

Eyes:

  • Eyeshadow Primer – Artdeco pure minerals Mineral Eyeshadow Base Sensitive
  • Inglot AMC Shine 49
  • Oriflame The ONE Colour Impact Cream Eye Shadow Petroleum Shine 30748
  • Oriflame The One Colour Match Eye Shadow Duo in Brown 30970
  • Avon Hollywood quad
  • Mascara – Oriflame HyperStretch Mascara
  • Oriflame Eyelash Curlers

Inglot was used all over the lid. It’s one of my favourite eye shadows ever. The Colour Impact Cream Eye Shadow is beginning to dry around the edges a little bit, I need to use it more often. It doesn’t last particularly long on the lid, so that limits my ability to wear it, especially since it’s such a deep shade of green. The brown duo doesn’t last long as well, but it’s a pretty neutral shade, so I wear it more often. I used the lightest colour in the Avon Hollywood quad in the inner corners of my eyes.

In all honesty, the colours looked much better together in my head. It worked, but it wasn’t exactly what I was going for.

Brows:

  • Relouis pencil
  • Avon Hollywood quad

Now that I used the lightest shade in the quad for the brow bone (not like I haven’t before, but you know), I keep thinking that the matte brown might work for brows themselves. I’m one of those lucky people who don’t need a lot of filling in or drawing, but it’s still good to give a few strokes here and there just to even things out, especially if you’ve got a full face of makeup going on.

Lips:

  • Oriflame Lip Impact Deep Berry 26573

This is the discontinued version of the Oriflame lip crayons. They have since then released the new ones that you don’t have to sharpen (yay), but I’m not sure what they’ve done to the formula. I’m going to try one soon and report on that.

I was going to do a separate post for each and every crayon I own, because I just love lip crayons like I used to love the damn Crayolas when I was a kid. This is a deep grape colour that’s perfect for autumn.

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Beauty

#100empties: a Mascara, a Toner, and Two Creams.

b v camomile face toner

Bielita B&V Camomile Face Toner

Bielita is a Belorussian brand.

This is one of the toners that you forget about under the slew of other similar products, but would come back to once you stumble upon a reminder of some sorts. It worked fine. It didn’t dry my skin, yet left me with a fresh feeling. Didn’t break me out like a lot of other face toners do. The scent is neutral. For its price I say it’s a good product. Will probably repurchase once I run out of my current one.

maybelline falsies mascara volum express flare

Maybelline the Falsies Volum’ Express Flared Mascara

I liked the brush, especially the side that you use to create the ‘flare’, but the mascara was so-so. It wouldn’t last on my eyes for more than 6 hours (actually a common problem with Maybelline mascaras), and when it was new, it was too wet, but then when it dried a bit, it quickly became too crumbly. The volume it gave was great, but everything else just outweighs this positive side.

Read other mascara reviews and notes here.

barkhatnie ruchki

Barkhatnye Ruchki Nourishing Hand Cream

With shea butter, avocado oil, and provitamin B-5. A good quickly absorbing hand cream. Requires frequent reapplication – but then again, I’ve never met a hand cream that doesn’t require a reapplication after hand washing.

I would probably repurchase this one again as this is a quality product with a merciful price tag, but the scent — which is pleasant — just brings too many memories, so I might pass.

avon anew eye cream

AVON Anew Vitale Eye Gel Cream

I ended up using this one as a hand cream. My eyes would sting ten seconds after the application. It felt smoothing and looked like it evened out the skin colour under your eyes, but it’s not so much what it did as how it’s made. It’s just the texture of the product. This Avon eye cream has some kind of a shimmer/ micro-glitter in it that you can’t really see when it’s applied. So it acts like a light diffuser and brightens the area a little bit, but the effect is not long-lasting. It was relatively nourishing though, as it made my hands feel less dry, but I can’t recommend it for the eye area.

4 (+7) down; 89 to go.

Read all other posts in the #100empties challenge here.

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Beauty

Products I’ve Used Up: AVON, Dove, Oriflame, etc.

products i've used up

AVON Naturals Hair Care Essential Balance Mango & Ginger 2-in-1 Shampoo and Conditioner

Can I just say… Tone it down, brands. All y’all name your products in a way that’s not at all Twitter-friendly.

I bought this product for its scent alone. Previously I had a shea butter and apricot one from the same series, and it smelt so good, I never wanted to do anything but wash my hair over and over again so I could just bathe in the scent. That’s saying a lot, because washing hair is one of my least favourite beauty procedures. This scent doesn’t disappoint either, but somewhere in the middle it became tiring. Not sure why I buy these ten-gallon packages, because commitment to one particular scent or formula is totes not my thing when it comes to bath products.

Shampoo-wise, it’s a good product, but didn’t match my scalp and hair exactly. It’s a hard thing to do, though, so I hold no grudge against it. It’s a 2-in-1, and if you’ve got short hair, or maybe even well-behaved mid-length hair, then I dare say the 2-in-1 will work, at least occasionally. Everyone else would need to use a conditioner with it.

Maybe I will repurchase it, but in a smaller size.

P.S. How many convincing words can one fit unto one label? Natural, science, technology, essential, care, balance… It’s either natural or tech, tho, but whatever.

Dove Hair Therapy Nutritive Solutions Daily Moisture Shampoo

I love Dove hair gels, deodorants, and body lotions — in fact, I’m going to do dedicated posts about each of these things soon enough — but their shampoos are horrible for me. The scent is harsh. The product foams up a whole lot. It’s not ‘moisturising’ in the slightest, rather, it stripped my poor scalp off of all oils, sending it into an overdrive each time, leaving me with greasy roots in something like 12 hours. The formula is thick and feels soft during the application, but it was very harsh afterwards. This is one of the worst shampoos I’ve tried in a long while. Will not repurchase, will not recommend.

Eveline Lip Gloss

This thing is old. It’s so old, I can’t even tell you the colour and the correct product name. I bought it on a sale long, long time ago, used it as long as it was usable, and then I just kinda forgot to discard it. It had a lovely vanilla-ish scent, and it was one of the less stickier glosses. They have since then discontinued this particular product, I think.

Oriflame All-Over Makeup Remover

(FYI, that’s not a piece of gum holding it. It’s an unfortunate bunch of sticky tack.)

Needed a make-up remover, and this was on some epic offer. I was a little hesitant, because the previous variation of Oriflame makeup remover (green rectangular bottles) was not good. It wasn’t particularly offensive, it just… didn’t remove much. This one is a certain upgrade of the formula, but if you need a heavy-duty remover, then this is still not your guy. I want to check out their waterproof makeup remover, see if it’s any better. Will probably repurchase if on offer.

Oriflame Volare Perfume

Very rose-scented, a little too much for me. The bottle was redesigned, however, and I’m going to buy that thing just for the bottle alone, because it’s in a shape of a crystal rose, and who doesn’t want a crystal rose on their vanity?! No one, that’s who.

Chistaya Liniya 48 hr Phyto-Deodorant in Calendula

Rather on the wet side, and a little bit harsh smelling, but overall I was pleased with it. What I loved most perhaps was the packaging. It is upside-down. How brilliant is that?! No weird balancing acts required to use up all of the product. I wish it were in a bit of a less… cone-like shape, though, because at times I found it hard to grip. Might try other scents, but I think calendula is the lightest of them all.

Pur-Lisse face cream sample

This came with my Lip Monthly bag. I hesitated using it at first, because it’s for normal to dry skin, and I’m as oily skinned as they come. However, this was a very nice cream. It moisturised well enough and didn’t leave any greasy residue. It smelt pretty much like nothing — an odd trace of non-offensive dust, maybe?.. Don’t know how to describe it. Anyway, these non-smells are a huge plus in my book, and I rather more prefer them to any kind of artificial or natural fragrance. No irritation, no break-outs, no rough patches. I cannot say this was an ideal match for my skin, though.