Influenster I Do VoxBox

See what I received in my Influenster I Do Voxbox.

Would you like free stuff too then check out how to join Influenster here.

Walmart Beauty Box Summer Edition

It's a new season so that means a new Walmart Beauty Box. See what I received this time.

What products would you like to see a review on?

Review: Refresh Eye Serum

I was lucky enough to win this eye serum in a contest. See if it really works.

What is your favorite eye serum or eye cream?

Review: Laura Geller Baked Body Frosting

I was recently sent this Laura Geller Baked Body Frosting. It is a bronzer that can be used all over your body.

What is your favorite bronzer?

Reveiw: Burt's Bees Shampoo & Conditioner

Ever want to try out Burt's Bees shampoo and conditioner? See what I thought.

Have you tried this before? What is your favorite shampoo and conditioner?

Best Eye Drops - Rohto

It’s getting to be allergy season and I am noticing that more and more often I am reaching for my eye drops. My favorite ones are from Rohto and are in Cool.

Picture from here

These eye drops relieve redness and dryness fast. They also give your eyes a nice cool feeling. The cooling sensation can be overwhelming for some people so I would not recommend using them if you have super sensitive eyes. I personally love them and have never had an issue but I also use the weakest ones. There are two stronger ones that give you an even more powerful cooling sensation, Ice and Arctic. If you decide to try them I would start with Cool and then work your way up?

How do you combat seasonal allergies?

Empties Ep. 10 May 2015

Here are some of my current empties and mini reviews of each product.

What are some of your favorite products right now?

May Hidden Gem: TheBelleAdventures

This month's Hidden Gem is Zerina of TheBelleAdventures. I met Zerina through a Facebook group and love her content. Her videos have a style of their own and are fun to watch.

 

 

 

 

When did you start your Youtube channel and why?

I started uploading videos to my channel the first week of November 2013. I've always wanted to make beauty videos ever since I discovered the beauty community on YouTube around 2008. It was just something I didn't have time or equipment for until I finished college and found myself with so much free time on my hands. I figured I'd finally take the leap and start my YouTube journey. 

 

What is the main focus of your channel?

I mostly do makeup tutorials because those are the videos I enjoy watching the most. I'm in no way a professional, but I've realized having a channel is such a great way to track your skill growth, and I believe I've come a long way since I began recording. Other than that, I enjoy filming DIY videos as well. I haven't had a chance to do as many fashion videos as I would like, but hopefully that will change with the warmer weather. I've been thinking about starting a series on my channel and I'm almost done planning it, so I'm really excited for that!

What or who inspires you and why?

I get inspired by people in the community the most. From big gurus, to smaller channels. A lot of people might think running a beauty channel is superficial, but I see them as a vessel for empowering women all over the world. There's nothing wrong in being passionate about this form of art - but I especially respect those who emphasize the importance of loving yourself in your bare skin and feeling as confident then as you do with a glammed out full face of makeup. That's a message that I would also like my channel to portray, which is why I make a point of starting every tutorial with a bare face that I love, imperfections and all. Smaller channels inspire me in the way they keep going and uploading content even though it's so hard to get your channel out there and reach a wide audience. 

 

What has helped your channel grow the most?

Probably the relationships I've formed with other content creators. I love supporting other people and most often those people reciprocate. Joining Facebook groups geared towards beauty channels has also been a major helping factor. Other than that, I'd like to think the videos themselves are a big deciding factor whether or not someone will subscribe.

What would you like people to know about you?

 

I use to be a very outgoing person but over the years I've grown more timid and I have cynical sense of humor. Some people who don't understand this about me might see me as off-putting. I know many prefer watching content creators who are bubbly and loud, but that's just not how I am and I'd rather be myself than pretend to be something I am clearly not - that would be counterproductive and exhausting.

Where you can find her:
Youtube
Blog
Facebook
Instagram
Twitter
Tumblr

See last months Hidden Gem.

Review: Daiso Oxygen Face Mask

A review on the Daiso Oxygen Mask. It is $1.50 for two treatments which makes it a great bargain. See what I think about it and check out my face full of oxygen bubbles!

What's your favorite skincare product from Daiso?

Dove Antiperspirant Spray

I have been using Dove products all of my life. My favorite products are their beauty bars and their deodorant. When Dove comes out with a new product I always have to try it.

Pic from here

I have always used stick deodorants, which covers your underarm odor. Antiperspirants are different because they prevent you from sweating. Thus, there is no smell to cover up and it prevents the underarms of your shirts from being stained. 

Dove claims it lasts up to 48 hours, does not leave a residue, and will moisturize your underarm. 

Pros:

~It does not leave a residue.

~ It dries very quickly

~ It smells great. (I have Beauty Finish)

~ It keeps my underarms as moisturized as my Dove deodorant stick 

Cons:

~It does not last 48 hours. I found that it does work really well for 24 hours but after about 36 hours it starts to fade. This may be based on your activity level.

I’ve seen it in the drugstore for about $7 which seems a bit expensive to me. It is new so I believe the price will go down a little and there are coupons for it right now. 

I give it 5/5 stars. I definitely love this product and will be repurchasing it.

1K Subscribers Q & A

To celebrate hitting 1,000 (1K) subscribers I decided to do a Q & A. 

Thank you so much for all of your support over the years. I really appreciate each and everyone of you.

April Hidden Gem: A1nettie

I met Annette through mutual friends on Youtube. She has a great knack at obtaining free stuff and I love her unboxings.

When did you start your Youtube channel and why?

I Initially Started in 2010 on another channel just to do reviews on things. BzzAgent was failry new to me and I thought why not share my views on products on videos too. That was my main reason for starting my channel was to share my thoughts on products.

What is the main focus of your channel? 

Mostly reviews now. I love beauty and always wanted to go there, but freebies, couponing, hauls, unboxings and reviews are my main things I publish. 

 

What or who inspires you and why?

My kids inspire me to be good and be kind. The world has so many positive things in it and if you just stop to look it can inspire you to want to do good for others. My job inspires me to want to help others more and be patient. Kindness is a must and compassion is a must, without it we would never have understanding. When I see others helping one another, I want to do it too.

What has helped your channel grow the most?

I think maintaining communication and being friendly to all. Also sharing to different groups at times helps to. It seems to be just content that if you are interested in you will subscribe. 

What would you like people to know about you?

I do this as a hobby and love it. It has taken away from my family at times and have had to put reality in check. I have a family to care and provide for and they are my number one priority, but Youtube is my secret obsession along with my love for anything beauty related. I enjoy interacting with my on line family and friends which is the main reason I love it so much. I have chatted with people all over the world and it's amazing. This is the modern 

day pen pal! Let's keep in touch!

Social Media Links

Youtube
Blog
Twitter
Instagram
Facebook

Walmart Beauty Box Spring Edition

Check out what products I received in my Walmart Beauty Box Spring Edition and only for $5! This is a quarterly subscription service offered by Walmart and you can sign up using this link. (It's not an affiliate link.

See what was in my Winter Box

Top 5 Spring Lipsticks

Sorry, I am a little sick but I really wanted to be part of this fun collaboration for Spring. I was doing a little makeup Spring cleaning and thought that I would share my Top 5 Spring Lipsticks. 

What is your favorite lipstick this Spring?

Rediscovered Favorite #1: Too Faced Palette

In the beauty world we are always looking for the latest and greatest products to try. Often great products are forgotten about until one day when we see them in the back of our drawer. Then we remember how much we loved that product and fall in love with it all over again. That rediscovered loved product is what this new series is all about.

My first rediscovered favorite is the Natural Eye palette by Too Faced. I bought this palette a couple of years ago and used the heck out of it. 

I even did a tutorial using it. (Check it out here.)

There are 4 out of the 9 colors that I am absolutely obsessed with: Heaven, Silk teddy, Push-up, and Honey Pot. They are all very soft and shimmery. All the eye shadows are super pigmented.

My favorite one is Push-up as you can see by the indentation. It is perfect as an all over color and as a crease color.

I don’t use Velvet Revolver, Expresso, Erotica, and Cocoa Puff  because they are just too dark for me.

I don’t use Nude Beach very often because the glitter is super chunky and it can irritate my eyes.

What is your rediscovered favorite product this month?

Ulta 21 Days of Beauty Picks

Ulta is doing their 21 Days of Beauty sale again and I thought I would share with you which items I would purchase. I wish I could purchase them all but I don't have unlimited amounts of cash. =( 

Here is my wishlist. There are links to each item to see pictures and full descriptions. (Not affiliate links)

~March 16 - Stila Smudge Stick WaterProof Eyeliner (Buy one, get one free)

~March 24 - Mally Perfect Prep Under Eye Brightener ($22)

~March 27 - Strivectin Age-Fighting Discovery Kit ($20)

~March 29 - Lorac Chamgane Dreams Eye Shadow Palette ($15)

~April 1 - Too Faced Sweethearts Perfect Flush Blush ($15)

~April 4 - Smashbox Original Photo Finish Foundation Primer ($18)

 What do you want to purchase?

I will do a separate post later letting you know what I actually ended up getting.

Review: Daiso Charcoal Proe Strips

I recently picked up these charcoal pore strips from Daiso for only $1.50! You asked for a review so here it is. 

Let me know if you want me to compare them to the Biore ones.

March Hidden Gem- BeautyByAndriana

This month's Hidden Gem is BeautyByAndriana. 

I came across Andriana's channel about a year ago and fell in love with her videos. Her eye makeup is always flawless and her reviews very informative. Now, let's get to know her a little better.

1) When did you start your YouTube channel and why?

I started my YouTube channel on February 25th, 2013 (my 2 year anniversary just passed!). I decided to finally start a channel because I was obsessed with the online beauty community. I loved talking about makeup products and creating new, exciting looks, so I thought making a YouTube channel would be perfect!

2) What is the main focus of your channel?

My main focus is makeup. This means that my videos can range from tutorials to first impressions to reviews...you name it! And of course, I occasionally post a tag or haul when I feel like it.

3) What and who inspires you and why?

Let's see...I'm going to stick with YouTube and say Marlena from MakeupGeekTV. As many of you may know, she started off making beauty videos on YouTube and then came out with her own makeup company. I want to do the same thing, so to see how successful she has gotten from it, inspires me to work 10x harder than I already am.

4) What has helped your channel grow the most?

I would say that interacting with my viewers has helped my channel a lot. People really like to know when you find them important and that's one of my biggest goals on my channel. I really want to create a friendship with each of my viewers and I want them to know that they can come to me for any of their beauty questions. 

5) What would you like people to know about you?

Hmm...this one is tough. There's only so much people see from watching a 5 minute video of me. I'm going to cheat and write two things. First off, I'm an extremely shy person, but once I warm up to you, I get extremely comfortable and act very funny/quirky. To go along with that, I am also a very loyal person. I will go through hell and back to help anyone close to me. I'm that one person who you can count on for anything you need help with!

Where you can find Andriana

YouTube

Beauty Blog

Instagram

Twitter

Facebook

Pinterest

See who the Hidden Gem was last month.

Influenster XO Voxbox

I lucked out and received another box from Influenster!

 

What products would you like to see a review on?

Join Influenster using my friend code. (You'll be accepted faster.)

Mascara Showdown!

 I have been trying a lot of new mascaras over the last several months and I thought that I would give you little reviews of each one in one place (I know this has been a long time coming).

Loreal Butterfly

This mascara was okay. I could not do more than one coat without it starting to clump. It did make my lashes look very dramatic though. 

It’s not something I would recommend for an everyday look because it did not last very long. I found it was perfect for a night on the town.

Covergirl LashBlast Fusion

This has been my everyday go to mascara. I have loved almost every version of the Lashblast line but I think this one is my favorite. One coat gives my lashes a very natural look. Two coats makes them stand out a little.

If you are looking for a dramatic difference I would not recommend this mascara. This is more for giving your lashes a little boost.

Rimmel Retro 

I love Rimmel but I really do not like their mascaras. I have tried at least three different ones now and have had very similar experiences with all three. They clump like crazy! They do lengthen and fill out your lashes but in a spidery way. This mascara also flakes really bad for me. After only about an hour I will have little black flakes on my cheek. 

I don’t like to waste products and just throw them away so I figured out a way to make this mascara work for me. I would do one coat of the Rimmel mascara and one coat of the CoverGirl mascara. It seemed to get rid of most of the spideryness at least.

Benefit BadGal Lash

This is my new favorite mascara! To see why check out this video. 

Have you tried any of these mascaras? What did you think of them? What is your favorite mascara?

Review: Aussie 3 Minute Miracle Moist

I have used the Aussie 3 Minute Miracle before but realized that I have never done a review on it.

I give it 5/5 stars and would definitely recommend it. To see why watch the video below.

Do you like Aussie products? What's your favorite?

Daiso Haul

Recently, I went to Daiso (a Japanese version of a dollar store where everything is a $1.50) and I picked up some beauty and planner items. 

What items would you like me to do reviews on?

See what items I have picked up in the past here and what I thought of some of them here.

Glamglow Review

This was a gift (see what else I got here) from my friend Cheryl (check out her channel here). Everyone raves about these face masks but they retail for about $69 for 7 oz! The sample I received is 0.5 oz and I got about 3 uses out of it. 

The Sephora website describes it as a:

10 minute mud mask for men and women. It says it leaves the skin noticeably radiant and glowing. It works with the body’s natural moisturizing collagen to provide gentle resurfacing exfoliation and helps to leave skin smoother, brighter, and softer. While providing youthful appearance and absorbs impurities without removing natural oils.

You use it like any other mud mask. You apply it on a clean face, let it sit for 10 minutes (until it is dry), and wash it off.

Cons:

~ This is a very messy mud mask. It has little flakes of stuff that get everywhere, and don’t really stick to your face. 

~ Also, this is a tingle mask and boy does it tingle! I love masks like this but even I almost couldn’t handle it.

~ The mask claims to not be drying but I found that I had to immediately moisturize my face or it would feel like it was going to crack. 

~The price! It is so expensive!

Pros:

~ It did a great job of cleaning out my pores and exfoliating my skin.

~ The more used it the more I got use to the tingly feeling.

~ After a couple of uses people began complimenting me on how good my skin looked.

I give the Glamglow Tingle Mask 3.5/5 stars because it is a great product if you can afford it and handle the tingle.

Have you tried the Glamglow Tingle Mask or any other Glamglow products? What did you think?

Review: First Aid Beauty Cleanser

Check out my review of the First Aid Beauty Cleanser. 

What other First Aid Beauty products would you recommend?

February Hidden Gem - WiMomMandy

This month’s Hidden Gem is WiMomMandy (Wisconsin Mom Mandy). I have been watching her for a couple of years now and love her content. She does fun reviews and unboxings. She is a mom and her adorable daughter can be seen running around in the background. 

She also started a Sampled Out project this year where she is attempting to get rid of all her samples from her subscription boxes. She posts mini reviews of each product on her Instagram

so you can follow her on her journey. 

Now let’s let Mandy tell us about herself.

When did you start your Youtube channel and why?
My YouTube channel will be 3 years old this summer! I can't believe it's been that long already! My channel started as a beauty subscription unboxing channel. I knew next to nothing about makeup and didn't really wear it much when i was younger.  After I had my first child I realized I was in my 30's and wanted to start taking better care of my skin and start wearing more makeup.  

What is the main focus of your channel?

My channel was centered on a novice starting later in life and trying new things.  Now that I've been amassing a collection over the last three years I'm focusing on using what I love,  getting rid of the things that I don't love, and deciding which products work best for me and I want to continue purchasing in the future.  I'm weeding the duds out of my collection and getting my monies worth of what i have! 

What or who inspires you and why?

Superfreaky1ru is one of the first channels I really loved and it showed me that you don't have to be young, skinny, and look like a model to have an opinion that matters  I love watching smaller channels! I have met so many amazing women from all over the country through YouTube and I wish I could meet so many of them! 

What has helped your channel grow the most? 
I think that although the videos that get the most views for me are unboxings (I think) most people stick around for my honesty. 

What would you like people to know about you?

I would love people to know that I'm a busy mom of 2 that works full time.  I don't edit my videos,  and I don't upload a lot, simply because I don't have much time.  YouTube is a super fun hobby,  but that's all it is to me.  I'm not on a quest to get a certain number of subscribers.  I don't advertise my giveaways, I would rather have 10 people who actually watched the video enter instead of 500 people who only are subbed to try and win stuff.  I appreciate every person who has joined me over the last three years and although I don't always respond to every comment i read all of them and try to answer specific questions.  If you are interested in joining me you can find me on all social media as wimommandy.  

New for 2015:

#SampledOut on Instagram and YouTube.  My goal is to use all samples,  deluxe samples, and minis I have in my collection before 2016. I give a mini review of each item I finish our get rid of on instagram and have monthly wrap up videos on everyone's progress.  I would say there are somewhere between 30 and 50 participants so far and anyone is welcome to join at any time. I'm also participating in Amber F's pan that palette 2015 challenge.  I post monthly update videos of my progress trying to use an entire palette of eyeshadow.  Also coming in the fall: subscription box showdown flashback! Three years ago I subbed to Ipsy,  Birchbox,  and Sample Society for 3 months and compared each service.  I figured out the sample values of each item and compared the services by their bottom line and your monetary return.  In the fall I will revisit this challenge and see how they stack up now and if the samples have really gotten worse (which is a complaint I hear ALL the time but suspect is just a bad case of rose colored glasses)

Where you can find Mandy:

Youtube
Twitter

Instagram
Blog
Pinterest
Facebook


See last month's Hidden Gem