Empties – July 2019

Hi there! Today’s post is about all the products I emptied last month. I’m not doing a big intro, but let me say that I finished quite a few products. Please have a look! 🙂

1-4 Ted Baker Toiletries (travel sizes) – whilst I’m grateful to have received a Ted Baker toiletries gift set from a friend, I would not purchase these products for myself.

5 Imperial Leather Polynesian Spa Passion Flower & Almond Milk Spa Escape Shower Cream – a nice enough shower gel. But I won’t repurchase it because it’s nothing special. This is a shared empty because my husband used this shower gel too.

6 Sukin Anti-Pollution Oil Balancing + Charcoal Facial Masque – this is a great face mask. I’d love to repurchase it!

7 The Crème Shop Depuffing + Anti-Imflammatory Rose Oil Overnight Gel Mask – I enjoyed this product a lot. I might repurchase it (I say might because there are so many other night creams I want to try first…)

8 Nivea Free Time Shower Cream – I liked this shower cream a lot, and I would like to buy it again!

9 Radox Eastern Spirit Shower Gel – this is a nice shower gel. I’d buy it again, but I haven’t seen it in a while. I guess it was discontinued… This one’s a shared empty – my husband used and enjoyed this shower gel too!

10 Superdrug Refreshing Foaming Facial Wash For Normal Skin – this is an OK face wash. It’s been discontinued, but I wouldn’t repurchase it anyway.

11 Rimmel Lycra Pro 436 White Bright – good enough as a base coat, but I wouldn’t repurchase this polish.

12 MUA Lipstick Shade 11 – this is one of the best natural-yet-not-nude lipsticks out there. It’s a true “my lips but better” shade for me. With the help of a lip brush I was able to get every last bit of product out of the bullet! I have a backup, and I will review this lippie shortly. 😊

13 Yves Rocher Nourishing Lip Balm Framboise – I enjoyed this lip balm a lot. Since YR ceased trading in the UK, I don’t think I’ll (be able to) buy this one again.

14 Max Factor Pan Stik 25 Fair – my holy grail foundation!

15 Anovia Healthy Shine Bamboo & Lotus Conditioner – this is an average conditioner that I won’t repurchase.

16 Carex Original Shower Gel – I’ll review this one shortly! This is another shared empty.

17 Palmolive Welcome To Madagascar Forest – another amazing shower gel from Palmolive. This one’s definitely worth buying again. By the way, this one’s another shared empty.

I’ve also used a few single-use face masks. I never keep the empty sachets, but you can read my latest face mask reviews if you click here. All in all, I’m happy with the stuff I emptied this month. Whilst more than half the products I emptied were small items, I’m glad to have finished those, and I’m thrilled (!) that I managed to say goodbye to a few more shower gels (the Radox and Carex ones took ages to finish even though my husband helped). What have you emptied recently? Feel free to comment, and thanks for stopping by!

Mrs Strawberry Blonde

100% Vegan & Cruelty-Free – Sukin Anti-Pollution Oil Balancing + Charcoal Facial Masque

Hi there! Today’s post is about Sukin‘s Anti Pollution Oil Balancing + Charcoal Facial Masque. This face mask contains bamboo charcoal, moringa extract, willowherb, aloe vera, rooibos tea, as well as quince, bilberry and pomegranate extracts, and coconut, avocado and rosehip oils.

It promises to absorb toxins for a deep cleanse, to revitalise and refresh skin, and to tighten pores and reduce shine for a balanced complexion.

This mask is eays to use – apply it your face, leave it on for 15 minutes, then wash it off. I’ve used this mask for a few times now, and here’s what I think. 🙂

I think Sukin did an amazing job with this mask. I didn’t expect much because I couldn’t “feel” the mask doing its magic. However, when I washed my face, I was seriously impressed! My skin looked and felt super clean without being dry, my skin tone looked more even, and my pores were much smaller. I get this effect every time I use this mask, and I can definitely see myself picking up another tub once this one’s finished.

I would recommend this face mask to everyone who wants clearer skin. Since this mask works well for my very dry and moody skin, I would also recommend this mask to people with similar skin types.

Sukin‘s Anti Pollution Oil Balancing + Charcoal Facial Masque is available as 100ml. I paid £5.99 (TK Maxx).

Mrs Strawberry Blonde

100% Vegan & Cruelty-Free – Sukin Purifying Facial Masque

Hi there! Today’s post is about Sukin’s Purifying Facial Masque. This mask for all skin types contains cleansing kaolin clay, as well as soothing aloe vera and hydrating rose hip oil.

The instructions are quite simple – apply the mask, let it dry and leave it on for 15 minutes, then rinse it off… and you’re done! 🙂

So how’s the mask? I think that this mask is quite alright. It doesn’t give me any visible results, but it makes my skin feel clean and soft. So yes, I’m satisfied that this face mask works!

However, I don’t love the fragrance – the mask smells like marzipan. If you like marzipan, you’ll love the mask, but the fragrance is just way too sweet for my taste.

All in all, I’m happy to continue to use the mask on a weekly basis. Sukin’s Purifying Facial Masque is vegan, cruelty-free and carbon-neutral. I paid £7.97 (well, I spent 797 store points).

Mrs Strawberry Blonde

100% Vegan & Cruelty-Free – Sukin Moisture Restoring Night Cream

Hi there! Today’s post is about Sukin’s Moisture Restoring Night Cream. I’ve been using this night cream since late May, so the review is actually overdue! Before we get to the review, let me tell you a little about the brand.

Sukin is an Australian company. They specialise in “skin care that doesn’t cost the earth”. Their products are carbon-neutral, vegan and cruelty-free. In addition, Sukin products don’t contain SLS, SLES, synthetic fragrances, animal derivatives, harsh detergents, propylene glycol, artificial colours, triethanolamine, mineral oils, EDTA or parabens. Now onto the review! 🙂

Sukin’s Moisture Restoring Night Cream is quite rich. It feels good on my skin and it moisturises very well. At the moment I don’t have any dry patches on my face which is something I don’t get to experience often – although equal credit goes to Superdrug’s hyaluronic acid face mist.

However, it isn’t the most suitable face cream for people with problem skin. I’ve noticed that this cream seems to clog up my pores a little. Because of this I’m using this cream in conjuction with a clarifying serum or with a glycolic overnight peel – with great results!

All in all, I think this night cream is really good, and I would recommend it. However, because of all the natural ingredients in this cream, I would recommend you do a patch test before you use the cream on your face. Sukin recommends patch testing before use as well. I think that’s reasonable!

So whilst I like this cream, I’m not 100% happy. This cream has a shelf life of only six months – that’s because it doesn’t contain any synthetic preservatives. However, the face cream jar is huge and 120ml is a lot of product! I’ve been using this cream rather liberally on my face and neck, and I’m using this face cream on my husband’s face as well. However, after 10 weeks of daily use, the cream is nowhere near half-empty. I think it would be best if Sukin reduced the size of the product – to make sure people manage to finish it before it goes off.

I found Sukin’s Moisture Restoring Night Cream at TK Maxx where I paid £8 for it. Boots sells a number of Sukin products as well!

Have you tried this face cream or any other Sukin product? Feel free to comment. And thanks for reading! 🙂

PS: A special thanks to Jodi who got me interested in Sukin products.

Mrs Strawberry Blonde

Haul! New Products – Primark, Poundworld, Poundland, Boots, Wilko, Home Bargains, M&S

Hi there! I’ve done a little shopping this month. I haven’t gone nuts, I promise. But I picked up quite a few bargains. So let me show you what I bought!

I bought 4 PS… Facial Cleansing Sponge duo packs. That’s 8 sponges for £4. The reason I stocked up is because I’ve been using one of these sponges for a few weeks now – and I love it! I also bought 2 more PS… Konjac Sponges. That’s £3 for 2 konjac sponges.

It appears that Superdrug has given up on selling reasonably priced konjac sponges which is their loss, really. They also discontinued a few other fantastic products, so I haven’t done much Superdrug shopping lately. So yeah, it really is their loss! Anyhoo, those PS… sponges are from Primark!

I don’t think I’ve ever left my local Poundworld store empty-handed. Poundworld and Bargain Buys (which is part of the Poundworld family) have awesome nail products. I bought a cute Nails Inc. glitter topper (RRP £13), a Revlon Base Coat (RRP £6.49) and a J Lo exclusive collection L’Oréal polish (RRP £4.99). I paid £1 per polish – that’s £3 in total for these 3 polishes.

I picked up 4 new Montagne Jeunesse masks – Relaxing Spa Mud Mask, Candyfloss Scrub, Sea Splash Peel Off and Blueberry Blast Mud Masque. These masks seem to be exclusive to Primark, and they were 90p each. This adds up to £3.60 for 4 face masks.

Sukin’s Purifying Facial Masque is normally £11.95 at Boots. Thanks to a Save 1/3 offer it was £7.97. However, I didn’t spend any money, I paid with points!

I picked up 3 more Montagne Jeunesse face masks (they’re £1 each at Boots). However, these were on a 3 for 2 promotion, so I paid £2 (I paid with points for these products as well!) for these 3 face masks. I also went to Poundland where I found this Imperial Leather Foamy Banana shower cream – I paid £1 for it.

I bought these 10 Essence Colour Boost nail polishes – these are supposed to be one-coaters, so I bought them all to find out if they stamp on a black base. Well, if they stamp, they’re the cheapest quality stamping polishes out there (£1.80 each). If they don’t stamp, they don’t.

I got myself 2 more Essence Out Of Space Stories nail polishes (£2 each) and 4 Essence Glamaxy top coats (£2 each). Why 4? This is a flakie topper! All in all, I paid £30 for these 16 Essence nail polishes.

When I went to Home Bargains the other day I picked up 3 promising products. Creightons Charcoal Deep Cleansing Scrub and Creightons Charcoal Detoxifying Clay Mask were 79p each, I believe (sorry, I lost the receipt). I also picked up a strawberry-flavoured kids’ toothpaste. Yes, I bought it because of the Twilight Sparkle image!

Then I went to a different Primark store where I picked up a My Little Pony Lip Balm duo for £1.50, a My Little Pony Body Mist (100ml) for £2, and another Montagne Jeunesse Sunburst Sauna mask. On the way back home I swung by Marks & Spencer – and I bought a 100ml Monotheme Il Libro Degli Agrumi Pompelmo fragrance for £22.

Have you tried any of these products? Have you done any shopping recently? Feel free to get in touch. And thanks for stopping by!

Mrs Strawberry Blonde