Taking a Chance

In general, hair grows about 1/2 inch each month so I wanted to speed that process up. I was looking for a product that would give my hair an extra growth boost. I was in The Vitamin Shoppe and I came across the Enegizer Hair Follicle Stimulator. I had seen the product before but it looked a little shady so I never even picked it up. It was the last bottle, it looked dusty and it was on the bottom shelf. I mean if this product was great wouldn't it have reached top shelf status? Anyway, one day I saw that a new shipment had come in and I was feeling a bit adventurous so I picked it up and read the label only to discover that it contains some pretty good ingredients. Jojoba oil, rosemary, chamomile, wheat protein and other natural ingredients. I was however slightly disturbed at seeing methylparaben adn propylparaben only because those were the two ingredients that looked unhealthy to me, probably because Carol's Daughter and other companies so eagerly bost that their products are paraben free.
I purchased the product but I later did some checking online and it seems that researchers are trying to determine if there is a link between parabens and some forms of cancer...scary right especially since so many hair products have parabens. Also the parabens were at the very bottom of this list, but I can tell you know that I can't see myself picking this product up again just because of the parabens.
My bottle is almost done and what do I have to show for it, a bushel of blossoming new growth, a fuller mane, or glossy strong strands? Well I feel like when i used it, my hair was a little softer and it certainly didn't make my hair feel hard or unmanageable so that was a plus. I do have a great deal of new growth but that is probably because my last tough up was roughly 8 weeks ago. Despite what the many online proponents of this product have to say, I don't see an extraordinary difference with my hair despite. I am officially doing all I can to kick all parabens to the curb.
At least it only cost me $9.99
Have you ever tried a product that received rave reviews yet you received less than fabulous results?

Shoe Shopping Saturday

"I'm sorry we don't have this shoe in your size". That is all I kept hearing on Saturday while I was shoe shopping. Nine West came to the rescue and offered the two shoes pictured above in my size. There were countless other shoes at Nine West that I wanted but my size was not available. When they did have a shoe that I wanted in my size, something was crazy with the fit, tight in the front and flopping off in the back. NW did offer a sale on certain items so I took advantage and got the black and white sling backs for $39.99. The brown embossed sandals are new and cost $89.00. I love heels and these purchases just whet my appetite for more shoe shopping.
Which shoe stores help to satisfy your shoe cravings? Do you buy shoes online, if so where?

My introduction

Saturday was a beautiful day in NYC so I ended up going on a shoe run. It is that time of year when you just have to buy shoes. No seriously you just have to.... Anyway as I was strolling along I passed a Mac store so I just had to enter. Antithesis got me all excited when I saw her post on the Mac Neo sci-fi line, but I didn't remember while I was in the store that this line will come out in May. As I entered the store women were waiting to have their faces painted, while others were getting all dolled up in their favorite Mac shades. An associate quickly came to my aid and I told her that I was looking for the Mac Neo sci-fi line. She contorted her face in such a way that it was clear she had not heard of the line, so she asked an associate and he was equally confused. I have to say in that moment I felt completely in the know, like I had informed these Mac employees of products they didnt even know about. (Turns out I was jumping the gun by about a month..lol) The gentleman informed me that he thought I was talking about the N line then he ushered me over to a nearly empty container with two nude lipsticks. I wasn't impressed thanked him for his help and continued browsing the store with the female employee. I told her I wanted the darkest brown lip liner available and she quickly blurted out Chestnut ($12.50). It is beautiful and just the shade that I wanted. She tried to get me into some light shades but I was drawn to the darker products.
I also purchased plushglass in "Wet wild Wonderful", "oversexed (which looks like a dark purple)" and lipglass in Viva Glam V (it is listed as a neutral pink with perl but it looks like a shimery nude color ($17.50 each) . The picture on the right is a shot with all of the shades on my forearm from left to right (the chestnut lip liner, the Viva glam 5, wet wild wonderful, and oversexed (which looks red but it isn't) feel free to click on the picture for a larger view).

I love all of my Mac purchases, the plushglasses are shiny, long lasting, not very sticky (a level 2.5 on the sticky meter), they have a great scent and they apply smoothly with just the right amount of color. The plushglass is supposed to plump up your lips but I don't need that so I almost didnt make the purchase until the sales associate told me that it doesn't work..lol However, your lips will tingle. The lip glass is long lasting and really shiny so I love it also.

In fact earlier today I didnt feel like I had any gloss on my lips so I went to reapply, and the color was still there and it was shiny. I would certainly purchase Mac products again so look out for reviews in the future.

What is your favorite Mac product?

Happy Macing.....

High End Hype

I watched this woman on the Tyra show and she mentioned that she will only buy make up from high end lines and that she would never use drugstore makeup. They made her go through a series of tests to see if she could even tell the difference between the high end and the low end product. You better believe that 9 times out of 10 this woman was able to sniff out the cheap products. To some extent I know where this woman is coming from, there are just some instances in which the quality of a cheaper product is just not as good as it's more expensive rival. I remember as a kid being able to detect when cheaper orange juice made its way into the house, but I digress..lol.

I went into a store this week in search of a product I had never tried, I did not have anything specific in mind I was just open to any and everything. The beauty consultant marched me over to the Givenchy line of makeup. Givenchy is not the cheapest brand on the block so I expected to be blown away over the products. I was drawn to this glitter lip gloss (shown above), it is the Givenchy Pop Gloss Crystal ( the color swatch for glitter orange, the color I purchased, is shown on the right side of the screen). The color doesn’t really show up at all so it basically looks clear. The Pop Gloss Crystal has castor oil but it also includes ingredients that are used to remove dead cells and stimulate new cells. I should also mention that this product is supposed to be non sticky. My only concern was that the crystals in the product would irritate my lips, the tiny little sparkles almost prevented me from buying the lip gloss. The beauty consultant said "OH NO, you won’t feel the sparkles at all it just glides on". I said oh great, as she applied some from the tester tube and rubbed her lips together. I admired the high shine and the way the sparkles seemed to reflect the light beautifully.
Truth

One thing that I can say is that this is a long lasting high shine lip gloss. However you better not even think of pressing your lips together unless you want to come up with a bloody lip from all those sharp edged sparkles. I have used lip glosses with sparkles before and they don’t all make your lips feel scratchy but this one does. I will not be buying this slightly sticky $23.50 cell regenerating lip gloss again. The only reason this is not in the skip it files is because the high shine is adorable, and after wearing it for a while those dangerous sparkles become a bit more subdued.
Do you think you can tell the difference between high end and low end products?
Which high end product did not live up to your expectations?

Product Watch

When Spring arrives don't you always start to think about the colors that you would like to wear during that season? Nothing has been on my mind more than the color that I will be wearing on my nails. I have been in search of this limited edition Dior Long- Wearing nail polish in the color Poison which is a dark blue (pictured below). I already have a blue nail polish but it is so dark that it basically looks black which is not what I want. This Dior polish appears to be the perfect shade, I have scoured countless Sephoras but to no avail. This polish is only sold at Sephora so I am beginning to think I just wont be able to get it...sigh. I even went online to the Sephora site and the product is temporarily out of stock. While I may not get my product, which items are on you itching to get this Spring?

I worked for my results

I buy products because I want them to do something for me, so I hate it when they make me do most of the work. Everyone wants smooth gorgeous feet so when I thought I had found a cream that could satisfy all of my foot related desires I was overjoyed. Soul Owner by Philosophy is an exfoliating foot cream that has both glycolic and salicylic acids. At one time or another both of those acids have done quite the little tap dance number on my face so I was certain that they would join forces and take down any rough patches on my feet.
Since Soul Owner is referred to as an exfoliating foot cream I was expecting salt grains or exfoliating beads, but I got nothing except a thick lotion like substance. So I rubbed and rubbed and rubbed the lotion in and it just looked like I coated my feet in petroleum. My feet did look shiny but that is about it. The directions never mention that you need to wash the product off, so I kept it on my feet and then I tried to find the slightest improvement. After assessing my feet shininess (check), rough patches (check), not a single rough patch was removed or smoothed out. Finally I took a tissue and decided to rub this product off of my feet and only then did I see the tiniest skin flakes being removed. It was almost hard to see the skin that it did remove. This product is so not worth my time, so you can just "SKIP IT".
I blogged earlier about the Ped Egg and it is great but I just wanted to try something new.
You can purchase an exfoliating foot cream that will not make any difference in the appearance of your feet unless you scrub and scrub and scrub your skin off yourself for a mere $14.00.
How do you keep your feet in the best condition possible? Any special products you would like to recommend?

Disappointed

As a kid I had this doll, I don't remember the name of it but you would put cold water on the doll's face and makeup would appear, use hot water and the makeup was removed. I wonder if the makers of Mirror Shine nail polish also liked this doll, because they have clearly developed a nail polish that is based on this concept. I painted my nails and they looked pretty good, the next morning I took a shower and voila the nail polish was gone. I was so upset because I then had to find remover to get this mess off of my hands. This polish is supposed to have this metallic sheen but it ends up looking a bit dull. I can say that the color "Foil" (it is the color of aluminum foil) that one actually does have a nice metallic sheen but who cares if you can barely wash your hands.
I haven't done this in a while but this product was made for the "SKIP IT" files.
You will pay about $2.99 for nail polish that can perform a disappearing act.

What do you do with the products that disappoint you?