£15 High Street Challenge | June

It's that time of the month again, time for the June instalment of my £15 High Street Challenge! If you're not familiar with this blog series, you can read my other posts here to see what I've bought.

I started this series because when I looked back at my 2014 blog posts, nearly all of them were PR samples, and that made me uncomfortable.  My reviews are always 100% honest as I'm sure you know, but I didn't spend any money buying things I wanted to try, so I decided to spend £15 every month on 3 different things, and then review them for you :)

This month Boots.com had an offer on L'Oreal products, it was the traditional 3 for 2 (gotta love that!). I'd been eyeing up the True Match foundation (£9.99) for a while, I know that Em from My Pale Skin blog uses this a lot mixed with the Bourjois Healthy Mix foundation for good coverage, so I thought I'd give it a whirl.  Despite picking the lightest yellow-toned shade, it's still too dark for me, so not exactly a 'true match'.  Hopefully as my skim warms up in colour slightly over the summer (I tend not to let my skin get much sun as I'm so pale I just burn) this will become a better match.

Also, in a recent Fleur de Force video I saw her talking about the new L'Oreal Infallible mega glosses (£6.99), so I thought this would be a great option too - I don't tend to wear much lipgloss anymore as it drives me nuts the way my hair is magnetised to it (same as everyone else!), and to be honest, I don't wear much lipstick either, but I still wanted to give it a try.

Lastly, I needed and wanted a new kohl eyeliner, so I picked the black Infallible one (£5.19) to give it a go - I love that it has a little sharpener in the lid, a smudge stick (not that I use these) and it's retractable.

All together my purchase came to £16.98 (excluding P&P), so £1.98 over budget, but that's not bad going considering what I've bought :)

I actually have a first impressions video of the True Match foundation coming very soon, so keep your eyes peeled for that (subscribe here so you don't miss it!).

What do you think of this month's picks?

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£15 High Street Challenge | April

It's that time again for my next instalment of my £15 high street challenge! I was planning on upping the budget to £20 this month, since I needed to return £5 of goods from last months' haul - but what with e.l.f closing down in the UK I'm not confident it'd all work out, get to them and get my money back, so I'm just going to keep hold of it - maybe I'll sell it in a blog sale? :)

This month my haul was from Boots.com - they had a 3 for 2 offer on where you get the cheapest item for free which is how I was able to get 3 decent products for my £15.  If you're not familiar with why I started this challenge, it was because when looking back at my 2014 posts, I realised nearly all of them were PR samples.  I wanted to bring items I've bought myself back to the blog, but since I'm on maternity pay I needed to keep the budget down (hence the £15).  My goal is to find 3 pieces of makeup on the high street for about £15 each month.  If you want to see my previous months' challenges, just have a look here.

After seeing a lot of people talking about the new L'Oreal Infallible foundations, I thought I'd give them a go - I love reviewing foundation (that and mascara are my favourite to review).  I've also had my eyes on the Maybelline Coloursensational Elixir for a long time and decided to pick one of these.

If you're one of the many people who requested an Essence haul for one of these, don't worry - I've taken what I earned from my mummy blog last month (only a little bit) and put it towards a decent-sized Essence haul too which will be on here in the next few days, as well as individual reviews.

Here's what I picked up:

L'Oreal Infallialbe 24hr Matte foundation in 10 Porcelin - £6.99

I'm a big fan of matte foundations but I do struggle to find one that really works for me - my Makeup Forever HD foundation is the closest I've found (it's seriously amazing!).  Since this arrived on Saturday, I have worn it once (yesterday) and well, I'm not sure how I feel about it just yet.  Obviously this is just a first impression, but it did highlight dry skin, I wouldn't say it was very good coverage - it classes itself as heavy but I'd say it's much lighter than that.  It also didn't set that well (something I often find with L'Oreal foundations).  But, 6+ hours after applying it, a little creasing aside, it looked pretty decent.  It's not a patch on my Bourjois Radiance Reveal Healthy Mix foundation, I think this one makes me look older, but I'll give it a few more go's and see what it's like.

L'Oreal Infallible 24h Foundation in Vanilla - £9.99

My biggest mistake here was picking the 2nd lightest shade, it's too dark, I should have gone with Porcelin (the same as the matte foundation) as that is the closest.  That aside, I will still give it a go and see what it's like, it'll just have to be on days when I don't leave the house :P  Maybe these are more contenders for blog sale stuff?  I'll be back with a full review of all of these over the coming weeks.

Maybelline Coloursensational Elixir in 710 Rose Redefined - £6.99

For ages now I've seen people talk about these, some love them, some not so much.  For me this was more of a 'this will look pretty with my other lipsticks' purchase - I love the packaging and I didn't realise that the colour you see there is plastic, I thought it was the actual product, but sadly it's not. Ah well! We'll see how I get on with this - what do you think of the Elixirs?

Overall it came to £16.98 (not including delivery) as I had one of the £6.99 items for free. Not bad really - but did I pick well!?

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L'Oreal Ever Pure

A few weeks ago I popped into Superdrug in search of the L'Oreal Ever Pure shampoo & conditioner. I'd been using the TRESemme shine shampoo & conditioner for a while and found it was making my hair really greasy due to the amount of silicone in it :(

What attracted me to these was the fact they have no sulphates, and I'm pretty sure I've heard popular YouTubers talking about these.  They were on offer at the time with a bit of money off, so I picked up the intensive conditioner treatment too.

Overall I've really enjoyed using these, I've found them to leave my hair soft and not weighed down. However, if you use them regularly, like a lot of shampoos & conditioners you'll find that your hair gets used to it and the effect wears off.  I've found this is best used about once a week, alternating it with other products.  

The intensive conditioner treatment is great, for the price it really compares to high end masks like the macadamia one (but the macadamia one is better, but much more expensive).  These are only £5.99 each (currently on offer for £3.99), the intense mask is £6.99, so slightly more expensive but in my opinion it's worth it.

If you're looking for an affordable mask, I'd really recommend the L'Oreal EverPure, it's thick, creamy and rich, and leaves your hair feeling lovely.  The shampoo & conditioner are good too, I just wouldn't use them every day otherwise you won't feel the benefit of them quite so much :)  Oh, and I nearly forgot to mention, the conditioner has a minty scent, how bizarre!

This months Biggest-Pixi3 advertiser is the lovely Ash from A Beauty Moment

 

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Foundation review: L'Oreal nude magique eau de teint

The L'Oreal Nude Magique Eau de Teint has been heralded to being a super light and 'invisible' foundation.  L'Oreal themselves describe it as feather light and fresh as water with a second skin effect.

On the left is the L'Oreal nude magique foundation, and on the right completely nude skin.

Coverage is ok, fairly light.  I completely agree with their claim about it being light, you'll barely feel it on your skin.  It has a really light watery consistency too, not thick like a lot of foundations.

It's better than the Lumi magique foundation I tried, didn't like that at all as it didn't set on my skin, whereas this certainly does.

What didn't work for me is how it accentuated my dry skin - in fact, I didn't know I actually had any until I put this foundation on :/  It picked it up around my nose, and around my lower cheeks/mouth area.  It did blend in really nicely, but even the shade porcelain I had was still too dark for me.

The finished makeup.  I did add my Dior BB eye cream and set it with the Japonesque setting powder as well.

I really like the packaging with the purple lid, and the fact it's in a cute little frosted small bottle I love too.  It's a shame it doesn't have a pump lid though, but I'm not sure how well that'd work with such a watery foundation.

The foundation lasts pretty well throughout the day, but as it starts off quite light, it doesn't last as well as heavier foundations or even my Dior BB cream.  All in all I wasn't a big fan of this, it's certainly not the worst foundation I've tried, but I don't like how it drew attention to dry skin I didn't know I had, especially as my skin issue is oily skin, not dry skin.

This months Bigest-Pixi3 advertiser is the lovely Amy from Srslylou

 

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My lip product collection

Hey guys!  Ok a couple of things about this post, it's my lip product collection (excluding lip balms), now, I haven't listed every item because there's too many too list.  Similarly I haven't swatched them all either :p  What I will be doing over the coming weeks is lots of posts on Top 5 (lipsticks, glosses, glitter glosses, reds, pinks etc etc) but I just wanted to start that series off by showing you the collection I'll be making my picks from :)  So without further ado here's the collection :)

There were a few I missed out which I found afterwards, but not many :) So over the coming weeks, be prepared to see lots of posts featuring these items :)  I'm also making a pledge to myself, a pledge to wear a lip product from this collection every day :)  Clearly judging by the size of the collection, I love lip products and need to make better use of them :)

You'll notice I've got quite a mix of products, from MUA to Chanel - when it comes to lip products, I'm not loyal anywhere, if it's good and I like it that's all that matters.  When it comes to skincare it's a little different, things need to be a little better, the ingredients need to be right etc - that doesn't necessarily mean it needs to be expensive, just good quality :)

I might do a Project Lip Pan - so using 5 lip products lots and not allowing myself to buy any more until they're gone :)  Food for thought :)

Pixi3 out

xXx

Loreal Lumi Magique

Hey guys, hope you're all having a fab day!?  This is a review I've been meaning to post for a while now, I'll tell ye' the storey :)  So, cast your minds back to when I ended my project 10 pan, it ended the day I finished my Double Wear, I went to the shops at lunch time, bought some face cleansing wipes and the L'oreal Lumi Magique foundation (something new to try).  Went back to my desk, took the old stuff off, and put the new stuff on, BOOM!  I wore it a couple more times after that, before coming to this conclusion - see below under the pics!

I love this pic, the rose etc :D  Although that is pretty much where my love of this ends!

My Thoughts

So, 'Flawless skin as if lit from within' you are not!  I have made a little list actually, of things this foundation is not...

• Does not set, at all, even with setting powder
• Does not give me 'flawless skin as is lit from within'
• Very light coverage, hence no flawless-ness
• Not cheap (over £10)

Now, I don't like doing really negative posts, I feel like I'm being a big meany head, but I really didn't like it.  Maybe it's my skin type, I don't know, but I do know that it really irritated me that it didn't set. I could touch my skin at any point during the day and it would feel like I'd just that second put it on, it would then come off on my finger, leaving a patch of skin without foundation.  I used different types of setting powders to see if that made a difference, I tried Chanel, Bare Minerals and Elf - none made any difference.  So, impressed I am not.  There is one thing I really liked about it though, the rose gold lid :) It's a nice bottle and doesn't feel cheap, but if that's where all my £10.99 went, I'd rather have a cheap bottle and a decent foundation inside thank you.

Have you tried this at all?  What did you think?

Pixi3 out

xXx

Loreal Glam Bronze Trio

Hey everyone, so back a little while ago, I purchased a couple of bits from Loreal, and when you spent over a certain amount they gave you a goody bag, and this was in it :)  I was super excited initially as at that time, I didn't own a bronzer - here's the pics :)

I was happy and disappointed with this when I got it.  I wanted a 'proper' (matte) bronzer so when I realised this was shimmery I was like 'booooo' because I wanted to contour and you can't really do that with a shimmery bronzer.  However, when you move on from that and use it as a blusher combined with the very pretty highlight it's actually really lovely.  They're pretty colours, very soft as well so you need to be gentle with your brush on it, otherwise you'll pick up too much product.

Have you used this before?  What did you think?  Make the same mistake as me?  :)

Pixi3 out

xXx