December Favourites!

The following are products which were my favorites in December  There are a mixture of products had i have been using for a long time and can't live without, and also products which I've newly discovered and needed to rave about!

*Hair*

I have a new favorite product for December and i can see it becoming a product that i wont be able to live without. This is the American Cream hair conditioner from Lush Cosmetics.

I cannot stop raving about this product to anyone who will listen. It smells like strawberries and cream! As its a Lush product it contains little preservatives, meaning it is good for your hair. It contains fresh strawberries, organic oranges and vanilla pod infusion. You can still smell the lovely scent of the conditioner two days after washing your hair. I got the 250g bottle for around €10.95 and it is lasting me ages. I will definitely repurchase this product again, and again

*Skin*

For skin care i have 3 favorites. First is Angels on Bare Skin cleanser from Lush Cosmetics. I have been using Angels on Bare Skin for almost 2 months now and i don't see myself using another cleanser, unless i get bored which happens a lot. It is perfect for my skin. I have combination skin so its hard to find a cleanser to work for both oily and dry skin, but Angels is made for that purpose. It suits all skin types which makes it Lush Cosmetics number 1 bestseller in cleansers.  

It has ground almonds for a light exfoliation, and lavender oil which helps to balance out redness in the skin. With this product you take a pinch and mix it hot water to create a paste. At €7.95 it is so worth it! You definitely get your moneys worth.

Next up and keeping with the Lush theme, is their Toner called Tea Tree Water. Now i have had bad experiences with toners before which really put me off buying them. I found them to be too harsh on my skin causing my skin to burn and flake, even with heavy moisturising afterwards. So for years i just put ice cold water on my skin to try and close up pores. Since working in Lush i was told about their toners and how they didn't contain any alcohol. I decided to try the Tea Tree Water. It is not just a December favorite, its an all year round favorite!! 

It comes in this bottle with a handy spray pump. You can either spritz the toner onto your face or onto a cotton pad. I prefer spraying it onto my face then wiping off with a cotton pad. It contains grapefruit water which cuts through any remaining oil, and tea tree itself, which is a great antiseptic the help prevent spots.

The final skin care favorite i chose is yet another reoccurring fav and that's the L'oreal Men Expert hydra energetic moisturiser with flash bronzer. It have a review of this product already on my blog so i'm not going to go into much detail about it now. I chose this as a December favorite is because we don't get much sun here in December and nobody likes to look pasty. I use this before i'm going for a night out or if i go somewhere important. It gives you a healthy glow rather than looking completely tangoed.

*Fragrance*

So i decided to put an aftershave into my favorites since i recently bought one and 3 weeks later its almost used up. It is the David Beckham "pour homme" aftershave. I know it isn't a new fragrance but im not very experimental with aftershaves so this is something new to me. Its a nice warm but sweet smell, very manly. Like some perfumes nowadays are unisex, you would completely know its a mans aftershave. I got it in Boots for half price for €20. What a bargain! I'm hoping it is still on sale so i can buy more.

*Shaving*

So from a recent post you might guess what i'm going to say as my December favorite. It's the Dermalogica shaving kit. Definitely a new favorite of my mine. I also wont go into too much detail with this because i have a recent post up of this. It has everything in it you need for a shave. Top Christmas gift too.

*December Necessity* 

For my December necessity i kept it simple. Since December is cold and wintery, my lips are getting chapped, cracked and sore. To prevent this from happening i bought the Vaseline Lip Therapy lip balm. For a small lip balm it really worked. I chose the cocoa butter one. Cocoa Butter is very moisturising for the skin so it prevents any cracks forming in the lips

So that was my December Favorites, i hoped you liked it and found it helpful. Any questions just leave a comment, email me or tweet me @Paul_Bray . Thanks

New Years Eve Outfit Of The Day (Night)

It's my blurry outfit of the day! Props to my sister heather for taking it and props to Bianca for featuring in the pic!

Jumper: it's from Spain, (courtesy of my friend Kate) a company called Blanco. It's a knitted burgundy coloured jumper.

Jeans: skinnies with turn ups from topman. My go-to jeans

Shoes: nice thick-soled mock vanz shoes, burgundy colour from penneys/primark.

Accessories: a brassy chain with royal charms from river island

Hope everyone has a nice new years :)

P.S. Sorry about the pic quality i need a proper camera badly

Product Review: The Dermalogica Shaving Kit set

In this post i will be reviewing a shaving kit by the company Dermalogica. I have terrible trouble with shaving and i have gone days/weeks without shaving just to avoid the pain of it, but after using Dermalogica i am now  not afraid to shave anymore! I got this kit as a Christmas present off a close family friend, so i don't know exactly where it was bought and for how much, but i do know it is available from certain Irish websites such as http://www.kudosbeauty.ie/ . Some salons might stock Dermalogica too, so it would be worth while checking it out. Dermalogica is all about, you getting to know your skin and how to treat it properly. With shaving it aims to reduce ingrown hairs, redness after shaving, and cuts/nicks.

With this shaving kit you get 4 products. A daily cleansing scrub, a pre-shave guard, a soothing shaving cream and a post-shave balm. These 4 products are all you need because they cover all things you need to have a comfortable shave.

First off you get the Daily cleansing scrub in a 44 ml/FL OZ tube. I wouldn't recommend using it daily because you will run out of it fast, so i use my normal cleanser everyday i'm not shaving. Even though its only a small little tube it works amazingly! The cream has a slightly course texture from the silica beads in it to give  exfoliation, and a good exfoliation at that too! It gets rid of excess oils and dead cells. The cleansing scrub also help lift the hairs so they are raised the make for a closer, easier shave which reduces ingrown hairs. You simply use like another other facial cleanser by rinsing it off with warm water before you move onto the next step. I found this to be one of the best cleanser i have ever used as you get such a good deep clean from it.

After the cleanser you then use the pre-shave guard. Its 28.3g/1 Oz. It comes in a hard plastic cylinder tube with a twistable end to retract the product when done. Even though this is a small sized product, i can see it lasting me a long while as the product easily glides onto the skin. It has a nice menthol scent to it and leaves the skin nice and soothed before you start shaving. I can definitely see myself using this even with a normal quick shave.

Next in the shaving kit is the soothing shaving cream. It comes in a easy to use squeezable tube 74ml/2.5 FL OZ.  Unlike most shaving creams this does not foam up. It lathers up with water. I find this to be better because it gives you a closer shave. It has aloe vera and panthenol which are soothing and help to aid the skins post-shave recovery process. As well as giving you a close shave it moisturises your skin leaving no dry patches.

Lastly you in the pack you get a post-shave balm 10ml/0.33 FL OZ. Like all other post-shaving balms it reduces any irritation and redness. Since the three products before it did such a great job i didn't have any redness or irritation. It has a nice citrus scent to it which will give you that zing that will awaken your skin.

I think Dermalogica is a godsend for men with sensitive skin. I would recommend it a million times over. In this kit you get all you need to have a nice close, comfortable shave. I definitely give this product 10/10.

Any questions about this product you can email me pauliebray@gmail.com or visit the Dermalogica website http://www.dermalogica.com/us/

Product Review: BIG Shampoo by Lush

When is comes to my hair i always want to try out new and different products. So working in Lush Cosmetics i came across this shampoo in the hair care section. This is BIG shampoo. What makes it 'different' you are probably wondering, well its consistency that makes it so unusual. Unlike other shampoos that are creamy and liquid, BIG shampoo is a slightly coarse, translucent paste, that is semi-runny.

From the picture you can clearly see the sea salt. BIG shampoo contains coarse sea salt, coconut, and fresh lemons and limes to give hair such a perfect shine. Sea salt also helps to give hair volume, hence the name BIG. It has a scent of neroli and oranges, giving it that fresh smell to go with that fresh feel.

When using BIG you take a small scoop of the product out of the pot into your hands, you massage it into wet hair and it lathers up. What i did find with this products was that it didn't lather up properly the first time. So what i did was add more product then more water, and then it lathered up greatly. From the 330g pot you will get a lot of usage out of it.

Overall, i would give BIG Shampoo an 8/10. It is perfect for people with flat and grease-prone hair. It lost two marks for its difficulty with lathering.

Any questions on this product i will be happy to answer.

Thanks (:

I'm baaaaackkkkkk!!! *update*

Helloooooo,

So the last time i blogged was around September time. I thought i could balance college and doing a blog, i couldn't. :( 

As im in Cork almost full time more opportunities may arise! ;)

Also i recently got a job with the very nice company that is Lush Cosmetics, so be expecting a lot of product reviews from there.

And this time i promise i wont leave ye!

Product Review: L' Oreal Men Expert Hydra Energetic with Flash Bronzer

Tanning for men, seems like a bit of a taboo right? I am the same! I wouldn't go to the shop and buy a bottle of Sally Hanson, no way! So when i saw that L'Oreal Men Expert brought out a moisturiser with a flash bronzer i was skeptical at first but after much "humming" and "hawing" i was willing to give it a go. I'm naturally pale, and with living in Ireland i'm pretty much going to stay pale for the rest of my life, so why not try look a bit.... alive?





The product comes in a 50ml hard plastic pump-dispensing bottle as seen in this picture. The style of the bottle is very eye catching but stays true to the look for the Hydra Energetic range with is orange, black and silver colours.

The bottle comes with a safety lock which is so handy because you could easily hit off the pump of the bottle and destroy yourself in the product. You twist the top of the bottle to unlock it, once that you use the pump and put it onto your hands. The directions say only you 2 pumps (or if you want a more intense look, use 2 more) but if it's just a healthy glow you're looking for then 2 pumps will suffice. It comes out in a dark translucent gel as seen in the picture. What i do is i rub it between my hands and then all over my face quickly (if you don't do it  quickly it will dry into your hands.) The flash bronzer dries into the skin quickly and leaves no traces at all!

Ok so this a picture of me before i put the flash bronzer on, and im pretty pale and  washed out looking

And this is with one application (2 pumps) of the Hydra Energetic with flash bronzer. As you can there is a slight difference, mostly that my skin doesn't look so washed out like in the first picture.

This is with two applications (4 pumps) for the more "intense" look. My skin colour went noticeably darker, giving me a slight tan.






I would totally recommend this product to every man! For the little bottle it comes in, it lasts a really long while. I've been using it on and off for the last 5 months and im not even half way through it yet. Also it smells like the rest of the Hydra Energetic range, giving off that manly aftershave smell.

*Tip* Apply to the neck area also or else you'll have a big noticeable colour difference between your face and neck

Outfit Of The Day

So this is my first Outfit Of The Day blog post, hence i look all dazed. As i was in Cork City today i said i might as well get dressed up. I'll start off with my cardy. I got this cardigan in River Island on sale a few weeks ago. It's a burgundy colour and has buttons starting just below mid-length of cardigan so you can have it open or closed. I would recommend wearing it open like in the pic as when it is buttoned up it makes you look all frumpy and gives you no shape. Under this I wore a black Topman t-shirt with a plunging neckline. I love plunging necklines as they really extenuate broad shoulders, making them look broader, and for €5 how bad?. I then matched these up with a pair of grey skinny jeans from River Island. The grey and black compliment each other well and i tucked the ends into my boots. The boots are brown leather lace up boots with zips on the side. I got these in a store called The Josef Store in Cork on sale.

If anyone has any questions or this post just ask, or any suggestions for future posts also.