Herbal Essences Dry Shampoo

Happy Hump Day everyone!

Only a few more days until a romantic weekend is upon us.........unless you're me and M and you're off to a Harry Potter party in place of doing anything romantic for Valentine's Day. We're too cool!

I don't know about you but dry shampoo is a big part of my life, I use it a few times a week to save me from washing my hair all the time. That way I save time and effort as well as keeping my hair looking bouncy and smelling sweet. I'm a big Batiste fan - the original is usually the best.....but after my mum bought me these Herbal Essences one for Christmas could they be replacing it?

My mum picked up the Uplifting Volume which has a Citrus fragrance and also an original Dry Shampoo with a Natural Tapioca scent.
Both me and my mum have a bit of a thing for scents - we love citrus scents and plain scents. Anything unnatural and strong is totally out of the question and I can't be going near it!

The packaging promises a 1st Day Clean feel by utilising a formula containing natural tapioca.

It works exactly as any other dry shampoo, you spray it in and work it into your roots. I like to leave it on as long as possible and if you want my number one tip.....spray it on before bed and wake up with fully revitalised hair, It works a treat and requires no brushing or the dreaded 'grey halo' effect where no amount of brushing can save you. Now that my hair is back to its natural brown/black colour this is something I am permanently scared of!

The citrus fragrance for this is perfect, it's light and not overpowering at all and I really like it. 

The natural tapioca is also a really light scent and to be honest, I find both of these better than Batiste.

These are both really great and based on this alone I would repurchase as having my hair smell like these would be awesome!

It's also great that there are no parabens or colourants - any products with less chemicals in is a winner in my books though i wonder if something else has replaced them.

The texture of this is a little weird. I feel like it does absorb a lot of oil from my hair, and therefore works well as a dry shampoo - performing the task it was designed to do. However unlike Batiste this feels like a hairspray with absorbent particles in it and so sometimes I feel like it coats my hair in unnecessary extra product and weighs it down rather than giving it 'uplifting volume'.

Overall I'm seriously impressed that Herbal Essences have created absolutely great smelling dry shampoos and I would buy them again for this alone. However when it comes to performing the task it was designed to do I feel like the extra product can end up weighing the hair down and making it look worse than it did already.

It's really a 50/50 on this one and I'd probably suggest using these if you're a gym goer like myself and can't be washing your hair every day - this product is perfect for you with a stronger scent to mask any sweat and it does absorb oil.

However for other days I would stick with Batiste where I just need the crown of my hair to look a bit less greasy to get me through another day.

Both have their place but for different reasons.

Have you tried the Herbal Essences Dry Shampoos? Which scent do you recommend?

In future when I've used these up I'm going to try out the Aussie and the CoLab dry shampoos and compare them also - dry shampoo is such a vital thing in my life for looking good that its way more than an essential now!
Are you hooked on dry shampoo for its' time saving abilities?? Do you have any other brands that you would suggest?

L xxx

Lauren's Way Dream Rollers

Evening All

I'm feeling great this evening after a great workout. I love the feeling after a good workout. After I've done spin tomorrow I expect I'll be complaining!

A few weeks ago I went to the launch of the new Lauren's Way Darker than Dark Glam tan launch, you can read reviews on it here (I'm currently sat with it on ready for a night out for L's birthday on Saturday!)

I already own the Lauren's way rollers but have never got around to reviewing them. L is a big fan of them and when we go on nights out I quite often take mine to hers for her to use as we are getting ready. You can see the result of them being in L's hair from this old post.

When I saw the dream rollers in the goodie bags I was so pleased as I only got the set of 8 when I originally purchased them and needed more.

You can see from the picture below the one on the top right is an old roller. These are over 20 months old and still in great condition and the foam is still bouncy.

Dream rollers are squishy so they can be comfortably slept in. I'm not going to lie and say you can't feel them in your head because you can! I find if you sleep on your back or stomach you'll be fine. If you sleep on your side I'd recommend putting your hand between head and pillow to initially squish the rollers and then remove your hand. 

Once you get used to the fact you have an extra pillow around your head and find a comfy position they are fine to sleep in. I didn't wake up through the night and even though I'm a fidget they stay in perfectly well and don't need grips in (when I only had 8 I used grips as the rollers had more hair on them and in L's hair I use grips)

When I only had 8 rollers I bought the boots version as they were cheaper thinking they'd be just as good. They aren't don't consider the cheaper alternative as they don't compare. The boots version the foam hasn't held up as well, are slightly smaller, don't grip the hair as well but the hair they do grip they seem to rip out (I'm sure you can see all the hair around the red one! I always felt bad getting these out of L's hair and tugging at her hair!)

Rollers in all ready to sleep. I put them into clean dry hair and just slept!

The result the next morning! Hello huge hair. This was after just pulling the rollers out and no moving the hair around. The rollers give such root boost and also add a lush curl. If you have long hair they would give a gorgeous curl! Apologies for the dark photos on the last two but it was late at night and early morning and my room has crap lighting!

Hair all styled out! I love the subtle wave and the messy look it gives to my long bob. This is the result of them being put in my natural hair (which is a curly frizzy mess!)

If I have straight hair I like to add the rollers in for an hour when I'm getting ready and showing etc as I love how it just adds soft volume and curls my ends under!

I'm so glad I've now got the full set it's much easier! I'm sure L will be wanting these for Saturday too!

Have you tried dream rollers? They are great to sleep in but you still get great results from popping them in for an hour!

Love M

xxx

Bourjois Volumizer Mascara

Hello!

Happy Sunday to you all, hopefully you are not feeling too hungover...which I'm assuming me and m probably will be!
We were out last night and planned on going to a few 'dirtier' places and who knows how the night would have turned out!

This week we have a review for you on the Bourjois Ultra Black Volumizer Mascara.
M had this sent to her and I picked it up in another Boots deals...so of course we decided to do a joint post.

This mascara is one I've never seen before, its a double wand effect.
This baffled me and I swiftly took it apart to see if it had two compartments and how it works.

The top brush (No.1) is lightly loaded for defined volume.

No.2 is a fully loaded brush with up to 11x more volume with a guaranteed no clumps claim....promising.

What actually happens is when you use No.1 the brush is fed through a smaller tube and therefore more mascara is removed from the brush for a lighter look. For No.2 the brush is more fully loaded and therefore increases the effects on the lashes.

The brush for No.1 is shown below, its a pretty standard mascara brush and to be honest I didn't have high hopes for it. It's got a tapered end which I quite like and isn't loaded with too much mascara:

My photos were taken on my phone so they're a bit poor, but you can get the general idea from them.

Below is one coat of the No.1:



I was really surprised, I instantly loved it. My lashes were more defined and lovely and feathery. They barely looked like they had any product on them at all and looked so natural, it's the perfect work mascara!

No.2 can be seen below, this is the fully loaded brush for 11x more volume:

You can see above the brush has a lot more product loaded onto it and so would expect this to clump the lashes as it is a ridiculous amount!

However you can see how it looks on my lashes below:



A lot more product, more definition, more volume but no clumps!

I'm actually a little bit amazed at the effects and how little clumps there are. This has been a great surprise for me and I'd even buy it again.

It retails somewhere around £10.99....if the Boots website would actually load I'd be able to give a definitive answer but unfortunately it won't...again.

L xxx

When I first tried this mascara I wasn't convinced. I loved step 1 for a first coat but found step 2 just clumped my lashes so it ended up sat in my make up bag for a while.

After L picked it up I was reminded of it. I tried it out again and ended up loving it. I think it was one of those mascaras that gets better after it's been open for a bit.

Step 1 perfectly separates and lengthens the lashes the internal structure removes most of the product from the wand so anyone that's a fan of natural lashes will love this. step 2 adds volume to the lashes. I've found other mascaras like this I've tried just didn't work but after giving this one a second chance I love it.

It lashes all day without flaking and doesn't transfer to under eye concealer which I keep find happens lately.

Have you tired this mascara? How have you found 2 step ones?

Love M

xxx

   

Review: Revlon PhotoReady 3D Volume Mascara

Before Christmas I picked up this Revlon mascara in a 3 for 2 deal as I needed something as my third and free item.

I was needing a mascara at the time and had no idea that Revlon did a PhotoReady one and as I love lots of other things in the range I snapped it up. 

Obviously I picked this up in black as always and looked forward to trying it out.

There was a tester as usual to see the brush but I was pleased to see that the mascara itself was sealed, as I hate the possibility that someone else has touched it and played around with it getting bacteria all over it before I've even seen it!

I love the sleek packaging as always, the black and silver is adopted by many brands but I still think it has it's place.

I like simple and this fits my specifications!

The brush is more of a plastic comb and for me, separates through every lash and brushes them out so they look soft and fluffy as well as longer and with more volume.

This was really easy to use and I didn't needed to leave it for a bit to dry out as it was too wet, which happens often with mascaras.

So here's the results:

(ignore the concealer not rubbed in under my eyes!)

You can clearly see the mascara coats every lash and separates them all.

They felt quite soft and fluffy considering they were coated all over.

They definitely made my lashes look longer and thicker.

I'd love it if this had made my eyelashes curl as it would have been perfect but unfortunately it didn't.

I'd buy this again as part of a 3 for 2 deal that Boots often have on Revlon, but at £10.99 I felt this was a bit steep considering it didn't do anything much more than others at lower prices.

What do you think of this mascara? Have you used any other Revlon mascaras?

I was on my last mascara a few weeks ago and now I've suddenly got 4....oops!

L xxx