I don’t know if you’ll remember but I said I wanted to recreate this outfit that Emma Stone wore this year. I knew we were going to have a really laid back day, so I wanted my outfit to be nice but super laid back as well.

I wore this Gap Fitted Boyfriend Shirt in White with Gap Legging Jeans (mine have zips at the ankle) and Toms.

I also wore my Madewell Drifter sunglasses and for my hair I pulled it up in a low messy bun and swept my blunt bangs to the side. I actually really liked them this way and haven’t stopped wearing them that way since. My earrings are my Kate Spade Small Square Studs in Silver

On my face I wore: Nars Sheer Glow Foundation in Siberia, Nars Radiant Creamy Concealer in Vanilla, Nars Blush in Deep Throat, Lancome Eyeshadow in Metallic Taupe, Urban Decay 24/7 Glide On Eye Pencil in Bourbon, Benefit Watts Up Highlighter, Benefit They’re Real Mascara, YSL Volupte Sheer Candy in #9 Cool Guava and Makeup Forever HD setting powder.

I was completely in love with this outfit. It was absolutely perfect for the day, and I managed (with the help of an apron) to keep my white shirt white during meal times which is an amazing feat for me because I’m insanely klutzy.

Howl thinks he’s a Vampire now and wants to know why he doesn’t sparkle! I keep telling him only Faeries sparkle.

I’ll be doing a post on what my husband and son got me for my birthday very very soon so be on the look out for that.

As any other skincare junkie might know, there is always a list of things to try. My list keeps getting longer and longer. Sometimes I wonder what I’m going to do if I find that magic combination of products that clears up my skin. There’s so many products out there to try. I currently have a wishlist of products that I need to tick off my to try list.

1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10

I bought the Kiehls Rare Earth Cleanser and Toner a while ago. Originally I had gone in to get the Rare Earth Mask but they didn’t have it, and since I needed a Cleanser and Toner I just went for these. I still haven’t bought the mask, but I really want to.

I don’t think I’ve had a rave review about a cleanser in a very long time. Not since Liz Earle broke my heart. But I really like this cleanser. It’s a cream cleanser, which means it doesn’t foam at all. Which I like. I’m not actually a fan of foaming cleansers, I much prefer cream, balm, or milk cleansers. This one has bits of Amazonian Clay in it that help soak up the oil, keep it at bay and provide a bit of exfoliation. But unlike other products that claim to have gentle exfoliation this one really doesn’t tear at your skin or rip open acne blemishes unless you scrub too hard. It sort of reminds me of that Dermalogica Powder exfoliant, which I have added to this on occasion to give it some extra oomph.  I absolutely adore this cleanser, and while it took me a while to figure out how much to use, you really only need the tiniest bit, I will be repurchasing this when it runs out. I keep forgetting how much I love Kiehls products until I repurchase one.

How I Use It: This is either the first or second step in my routine. I use it every morning first thing, followed by another cleanser and the rest of my routine, and if I’m not wearing makeup I use it first at night, followed by the same morning routine, but if I’ve worn makeup that day then I take my makeup off first then follow with my morning routine. I apply it to slightly damp skin, and then take it off with a Hot cloth.

I’m gonna have to give this toner the same love that I’m giving the cleanser in this line. If you have oily skin even if you use nothing else, use this before your moisturizer. I’ve used it with another toner before, I’ve used it on it’s own. With the Rare Earth Deep Pore Cleanser, with Origins products,  with a heavy moisturizer, and with a light oil free one. In a box, with some socks, this toner is better than green eggs and ham. Instead of feeling oily all day, my skin feels like it properly absorbs my moisturizer and is clean and fresh. It’s probably my favorite toner I’ve ever used.

How I Use It: I mentioned above this varies. Sometimes I use it with another toner or other products, but it’s always the last toner I use if I’m using other toners with it. I shake the bottle really well, poor a bit in my hand and pat all over my face. A little goes a long way, and I find I use less of this product applying it this way, rather than with a cotton pad.

All in all I highly recommend both of these products if you have oily skin.

I had a couple requests for a Tutorial on how I did my hair in this post, so here it is!

First you’ll need: A Hair Tie (I’m using one from Emi-Jay), 2 bobby pins, and not pictured Hair Spray. Personally I use Aveda’s Air Control:

Starting with your hair down:

Seperate out a section at the front which will have your bangs if you have any:

Then brush up into a ponytail:

And tie it off with your hair tie:

then start twisting up your bangs:

You’ll be placing the bobby pins in two places right before you get to the end of your bangs:

And then again at the end of the length of hair you’ve twisted:

And this is how it should look:

This really is super simple, after it’s all done just spray with a light hold hairspray and smooth any flyaways you may have. You might have to do the twist a few times to get it just how you want it, but it’s so quick and easy that after awhile you’ll have it perfect on the first (or second) try.

My top is from H&M and if you’re wondering what’s on my face, I’m wearing: Nars Sheer Glow in Siberia, Nars Concealer in Vanilla, Benetint, Lancome Taupe Eyeshadow, Makeup Forever Setting Powder (just where I used the concealer) and Nyx Soft Matte Lip Cream in Amsterdam

If you try out this hairstyle tweet me a picture, I’d love to see it!

I’m running out of my Liz Earle Cleanse and Polish, and I don’t know if my skin has changed or if their formula has changed, but it didn’t work for my skin this time around. So I picked up the Kiehl’s Rare Earth Cleanser. I bought this cleanser because it seems that my skin has been absolutely out of control oily lately. I’ve only used it for 2 days now but it seems to be helping.

Then because I actually am completely out of my Liz Earle Toner I also picked up the Rare Earth Toner, which I kinda really love because it separates and has powder or something in the bottom, and then you shake it up to use it.

I also ran out of my Fresh mask and wanted to pick up the Kiehls Rare Earth Pore Cleansing Mask but they were out of stock so I ended up with a bunch of samples. Only one of those is Kiehls, the others are Kate Sommerville, Clarins and Dr. Dennis Gross.

Then after I checked out I noticed that they had some new Emi-Jay hairties so I grabbed a couple packs for myself, and I grabbed the same ones to give to Sarahbelle. These seriously are my all time favorite hairties, and even though I keep loosing them, and they’re kinda expensive I will always repurchase these. I can pretty much guarantee that I will include a pack of these in my future 100 followers giveaway (hey, I can dream right?)

I know I said I was going to stick with Liz Earle, but I really do think they reformulated or something because my face actually seemed to get a bit worse. I had some left from the last time I bought it, and my skin started to clear up. When I started the new bottle I didn’t change anything or add in any new skincare that I hadn’t been using before and my face started getting worse. I’m actually really heartbroken about it, because I had such good results the first time around and I honestly thought it was going to be my holy grail. But I guess it’s back to the drawing board. Everytime I say ” OMG I love this forever” it either gets reformulated or my skin begins to hate it.

I love the product, it smells nice and feels amazing on the skin. I works wonderfully to take my makeup off and I almost don’t feel like I need to double cleanse afterwards. I don’t use this daily, only when I’ve worn makeup. It’s priced really well considering you get 150 ml for $32.

I was using this in the morning and then using it at night after I took off my makeup with my Liz Earle Cleanse and polish. But I thought it was breaking me out because of the Shea Butter in it, so I started using it only to take my makeup off, which is how I was using the Caudalie Cleansing Milk anyway.

I think the ClearCalm 3 Clarifying Cleanser would have been a better fit for my skin, but even still I really like this cleanser. Plus the packaging is really cool. You actually “use it up”. The packaging is a balloon or something like that and it shrinks up as you use up the product. It makes me feel like I’m going to get all of the product out.

Final Verdict: This is a nice cleanser, and I fully recommend it to someone with sensitive, non acne prone skin. I really like it, but it’s just not for my skin type.

At the end of one of my many shopping trips to Sephora I spotted the Korres Greek Yogurt Lactic Acid Sleeping Facial as one of the 100 pt perks and decided that I should try it, so I picked up two.

I haven’t even made it through my first one yet entirely because you don’t need very much of this at all. This is sort of a treatment and moisturizer all in one and I both love and hate it, but I think I might need to use it differently and that might fix the hate it part. But I’ll get to that at the end.

Whenever I use this the next morning my skin is glowing and bright looking, like I’m well rested. However it seriously makes the acne I have angry, and I usually get a few more blemishes popping up in the areas that I usually break out. I’m not entirely sure why that is. I don’t know if I just haven’t used this enough so my skin isn’t used to it yet, or if I should be using the Wild Rose version of this product, which is what I suspect since I’ve used the moisturizer version of that before and found it to be absolutely lovely. The blemishes don’t usually stick around for longer than a day or two though so it isn’t that bad.

I think I might be using it wrong because I put it on after my regular moisturizer and I think I should either be using it before or instead of.

Final Verdict? I like this product, I might purchase the full size once I finally manage to get my skin under control.

Which brings me to a company that actually is doing better. I tweeted a few weeks ago that I was mad my Sephora never had samples of the Ren Glycol Lactic Radiance Renewal Mask, because since I have sensitive skin I wanted to try it before I bought it. Last week Ren’s Twitter contacted me and said if I emailed them my address they’d be more than happy to send me a sample. I can’t tell you how happy that made me. I’ve seen them mention sending people samples before, for those that legitimately ask about a product. But still I was surprised when not only did they reply to me a week later, they replied with an apology for taking so long, and an offer to send me a sample.

I mean really that’s just good business right there. So many companies would have ignored my complaint or if they replied they would have told me to go ahead and buy it because they’re sure I’d love it. But instead Ren took the time to send my a sample at their cost, with no guarantee that I would either purchase it full size, or that I would review it on my blog. I doubt they even knew I had I blog. Plus they gave it cute packaging.

And the best bit? I will be buying the mask because I absolutely adore it. I used it the night I got it, and it was lovely. It looked and felt a bit like marmalade out of the packaging, but it smoothed on the skin very nicely. It felt lovely for the 10 minutes I had it on my skin, and only tingled a little bit in a pleasant way. It washed off easy and it left my skin glowing, and feeling amazing. Since I’ve only used it once and that was last night I can’t tell how it’s going to affect my acne, but so far so good. Bonus, it smelled amazing, like pumpkin butter, which being completely in love with fall, I am also in love with all things pumpkin.

With one simple sample, Ren has earned themselves a loyal customer. I’ve already ordered their Hudra Calm Gentle Cleansing Milk to use after my Liz Earle Cleanse and Polish, because I double cleanse and I finally completely ran out of my Caudalie Gentle Cleanser.

To me this showed that Ren knows they have a quality product and their willing to put their money where their mouth is, so to speak. I couldn’t be more happy with this company and my sample. I can’t wait to add this mask to my skincare routine.

Similar to the Mario Badescu Drying Lotion it has pink goo on the bottom and a clear liquid on top. To apply it to your face you dip a q-tip straight down and then dot it on your acne. I use this every night provided my face isn’t feeling to sensitive. It’s not drying but it does sting a bit if the blemish is new or open. I put this on all my blemishes until they go away completely.  As much as I hate to show this photo, here’s what it looks like once applied.

That’s a lot of pink right? Most of those are mostly healed up, but now you can see that I’m not kidding when I say I have severe hormonal acne. Also please excuse the bags under my eyes, it’s partially the angle and partially that this photo was taken at 1 am the day before I went to the pride festival. I had just finished the DIY floral crown I recently posted.

This, among other things I’ve recently added to my routine, is really helping, it used to be much worse than it looks now. While this isn’t an instant cure, there really isn’t anything for acne that actually is.

I ordered the July Essentials kit and got the Cleanse and Polish Hot Cloth Cleanser, Instant Skin Boost Tonic, Skin Repair Light Moisturizer which is for oily/combination skin, and 2 pure muslin cloths.

It also came with this Energizing Hip and Thigh Gel as your complimentary gift for ordering the Essentials kit. It claims to leave the skin feeling softer, firmer and more toned, and despite it’s name
is meant to be used on your arms, legs and stomach. I’m a bit curious, and as it was free I’m willing to give it a go, and probably a review.

Bonus with every order they sneak in a trial size, I got the Cleanse and Polish that came with a mini  Muslin Cloth

How cute is their packaging by the way? I love when companies take the extra time to make their wrapping pretty. The could have just thrown it in some bubble wrap or packing peanuts. but no they actually took the time to tissue paper it all up and make it look more like a present rather than just something I ordered. It was so pretty I almost didn’t want to unwrap it.

You may notice I didn’t order a mask or any treatments. Well I have a plan, you see I tend to get bored of my routine, I usually like to try new things when I run out. But I’ve learned that I can’t be doing that anymore, and that I need to keep the core of my skincare routine the same, so to speak. But I’ve also noticed that switching masks doesn’t irritate my skin, so long as it’s gentle and is for my skin type. Same goes for Serums and things like that.  And there’s my plan so to speak, to keep from getting bored of my routine, I’m going to be trying new masks and treatments, while keeping the core of my routine the same. I’m actually really excited about this.

That’s not to say I wouldn’t try any new skincare items if I was given them. Liz Earle isn’t perfect, I did still get the odd cyst here and there while I was using it. Which is why I ended up switching in the first place, I had gone to try the Murad mask and saw they had the mask in a beginners kit for the same price as the mask on it’s own. Well you saw how that worked out, and how the mask fared when compared to the Caudalìe Purifying Mask. So if you think there might be something better out there for me, then let me know either in the comments below, or send me an email which can be found on my PR page or check out my contact me page.