ASOS, Feel Unique & eBay Beauty Haul

Okay, we all know I've got a shopping problem, that was established a longgg time ago, and yes I am looking into rehab for exessive shoppers.. or maybe just confiscation of the bank card.

 

In this post are the little beauty bits and bobs that I have picked up in recent weeks and this was originally intended to be an 'online beauty haul' post ..until I accidentally stepped foot inside Superdrug too.

oops!

 

 

ASOS

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How amazing are these super bright neon orange make-up brushes from ASOS? I absolutely love them! They were so inexpensive too; the set of 5 brushes originally cost £10.00 but I bought mine whilst there was a 20% discount code going around and got mine for £8.00 with free postage. The handles are quite short, making them easy to work with and the bristles are soo soft - plus, you'll never lose them in your make-up bag when they're this bright! The set includes: a powder brush, a lip brush, a shading brush, an angled brush and a blending brush.

 

 

Feel Unique

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I moan lots about my She Said Beauty Box subscription but there is no denying that it has introduced me to some amazing products that I otherwise would never have tried! In November's box there was a sample size of Redken's new Smooth Lock shampoo and conditioner duo which I didn't think much of at the time of use.. but 6 days after washing when my hair was still perfectly styled, smooth, frizz free and minimal traces of greasy roots (nice, I know), I was very impressed. I could not stop running my fingers through my hair, amazed at how soft my dry and damaged ends were so I just knew that I had to purchase the full sized bottles. They're not cheap at about £11 a bottle so I never would have taken the plunge if I hadn't tried out a sample of them first. Available on Feel Unique at the moment is a gift set version of the duo with the full sized bottles available as a pair for just £17.00 saving you a huge 15% as RRP of the pair is £25.25.

 

 

SuperDrug

 

Ermmmm.. did somebody say '3 for 2'? Such an irresistable offer! I picked up the Rimmel Precious Stones nail varnish in 'Diamond Dust' because I already have the red one (Ruby Crush) and love it to pieces but on all swatches that I have seen this silver version looks much nicer so I thought that I would give this a try too as you can never have too many nail varnishes.

 

Another thing that you can never have too many of is lipsticks! I picked up this very bright pink shade from Rimmel's Kate Moss range in shade 20 as it is an apparant dupe for Mac's 'Girl About Town' at a fraction of the price - and look how well it matches my nail varnish! (See picture below)

 

My third, and technically free product was MUA's 'undressed' eyeshadow palette, which, as the name suggests is a dupe for Urban Decay's 'Naked' palette - why spend £36 when you can spend £4?? MUAs shadows are amazing quality, super pigmented and long lasting, and I was looking to extend my collection of their singles so just thought why not pick up a palette with 12 shades in instead.

 

 

 

 

eBay

 

I found a seller on eBay who I'm sure will gain a lot of business from me in the future: hairproductsonline_ltd and their stock is like a hair care and bargain lover's dream! I'd been eyeing up this Macadamia Infused Hair Brush on Beauty Bay (link) for literally months but was reluctant to spend £16.75 on just another brush when I already have so many ..so when I saw it being sold on eBay for £15.99 but with a 10ml bottle of the oil treatment too then I was sold and clicked purchase right away (link). Browsing this seller's stock I also noticed that they sold bottles of the Osmo Berber Oil Hair Treatment in various sizes. On Feel Unique this Osmo Berber oil costs £5.90 for 10ml but I found it for £3.20 on eBay (link) - if I can save £2.70 on something then I will; every little helps.

[Full reviews coming soon]
 

Last but not least.. I fell for the Bioderma hype and bought the make up remover solution in the 250ml bottle! You can shop around for it on eBay but I found it for the cheapest price that I saw and it was £7.49 plus £2.79 postage costs totalling £10.28 (link) which is quite an expensive total for something which is essentially a bottle of glorified water that can take your make up at the end of the day, but I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. I've been using this daily for nearly 2 weeks now and my views on are just a bit 'meh', it's okay but not worth the hassle of buying from overseas or the price tag.
 

 

 

 

 

 

I know I should be shopping for Christmas presents instead of bankrupting myself on superficial treats but all of these were just irresistable!

 

Have you ever tried and loved anything that I've bought here?

 ♥

 

 

Clinique Bonus Time & Beauty Haul

 

Ummm.. I went shopping. Again. SOMEBODY RESTRAIN ME.

My shopping addict hardly ever involves clothes and never really has; I have too basic of a fashion sense to ever have an obsession with buying new clothes, but what I do get carried away with is buying myself new products and cosmetics ..hence the appropriate blog name of 'Cosmetic Crave'. Unfortunately for my bank balance and my ever failing will power I do need to walk through the town centre of Preston to get to and from university and my house, and last Wednesday afternoon when I had some free time I managed to stray from my usual direct 'head down - don't even look in the windows' route home to a more 'Oooh Debenhams, ooo Lush, ooo Boots, ooo The Body Shop' route home instead!!

 

In my defence, all purchases are justified because I got lot's of things for free. Yep, free things make spending lots perfectly alright. Clinique are currently running their 'Bonus Time' which I only found out about because of my friend - I didn't receive any promotional e-mails, etc about this like I am usually bombarded with, Boots are running a '3 for 2' offer, and I had a voucher on the bottom of receipt for The Body Shop of '£10 off when spending £25' ..all of these offers I had available to me definitely warrented a little shopping spree.

It took me a very long time to get text onto my picture and I ended up distorting the quality too (editing novice!) - What do people normally use to edit text onto an image and keep the quality?

Here is what I picked up from Clinique @ Debenhams with my sights set on a free gift bag. The contents of the gift bag total £90 and it is received on purchase of two items with one being skincare or when spending over £45 on make-up alone. I treated myself to their 'Even Better' foundation not that long ago and loved it to death so repurchased. Even Better is a high coverage foundation for all skin types and costs £23 for 30ml which is reasonable priced for the exceptional quality. To qualify for the free gift I needed for spend another £22 on make-up or get a skin care product and after much consultation with a sales assistant I ended up with a £17 bottle of toner from their anti-blemish solutions range which I am looking forward to trying out. Spending £40 on two items and receiving 7 good quality high end items for free seems reasonable to me, especially as the foundation is something I would have bought regardless if the 'Bonus Time' offer was on or not.

I just know that with a dispenser like this I'll spill this everywhere!

The free gift is made up of: 1) a make-up bag, 2) 50ml Liquid Facial Mild Soap from the three step range, 3) 50ml Take The Day Off make-up remover solution, 4) 7ml All About Eyes eye cream, 5) 3.5ml High Impact mascara, 6) Chubby Stick in 04 Mega Melon, 7) Blush Powder in 07 Sunset Glow. Have you been and taken advantage of this offer yet?

 

Next I went to Boots to take advantage of their '3 for 2' offer on all make-up, beauty and hair products at the moment. I knew that I wanted the Core Collection of the Real Techniques brushes and also wanted the Stippling Brush too but unfortunately it wasn't stocked in my local Boots. The Core Collection cost £21.99 and without the Stippling Brush available I was at a bit of a loss of what else to get! In the end I got another Rimmel Lasting Finish lipstick as I think they're amazing and they cost less than a fiver. I got it in a classic bright red shade (164 Tantrum). My third product and the freebie of the bunch was one of Rimmel's newly released products: Scandaleyes Waterproof Kohl Eyeliner in 005 Nude (normally £3.99).

 



 

Finnnaaallllyyyyyy.. Sorry this post is so long! I'll keep it brief with what I got from The Body Shop but I love making a healthy saving when shopping - this should have totalled £26 but I paid £9.40 - Kerching! I had a voucher on the bottom of a previous receipt '£10 off when spending £25' so that knocked the total down to £16 straight away, and then I have a 'Love Your Body' Card which gives you 10% off everything you buy, giving me a £1.60 discount ontop of that and the LYB also gives you a gift of £5 off one transaction during your birthday month (it isn't actually this month but the silly lady wrote '10' instead of '11' when I told her November so I had to claim it this month instead), so that took it down to £9.40 - Wow. When all I really wanted was the Mango Body Mist which costs £7.50 alone it was worth spending an extra £1.90 for a bundle of extra stuff.

 

Camomile Gentle Eye Make-Up Remover £3.00 | Cocoa Butter Hand & Body Lotion £3.00 | Mango Body Mist £7.50 | Cucumber Freshening Water (Toner) £2.00 | Mango Lip Butter £4.00 | Papaya Body Butter £13.00 £6.50.

 

 Ten points to the first person who can spot the difference between the two pictures below!

Well done if you spotted it. The difference was one contains a Witch BB Cream and the other doesn't. If it helps I didn't actually buy this I won it in a giveaway and postie dropped it off while I was in the middle of snapping away so I threw that in the picture too.

 

If you see me posting any more beauty buys between now and the end of November no matter what you must never, ever read my blog again in protest of my silly ways because I DO NOT need anything else for a long time. When my boyfriend saw my tweet about how much I'd just spent he actually text me and told me I needed to take it all back or I won't be able to afford food for the rest of the year.. but thankfully for me cosmetics can't be returned in this country due to hygiene rules.. Sooo looks like I'm keeping it all! Tehe.

 

And don't forget that I am currently running a celebratory 200 followers GIVEAWAY that ends at the end of this month.

Enter now if you haven't already!

CLICK HERE FOR YOUR CHANCE TO WIN

♥

Getting Sucked In By '3 for 2' Offers!

Aaah I am such a bad shopper! I am one of those super gullible people who walks into a shop and only wants and needs just one item, but spots a big shiny '3 for 2' sign and suddenly has to make a 30 minute decision on which three products I neeeed to have. Hannah, just pick up the one you wanted a walk away! They're not doing you any favours, they're not saving you money, they're making you spend more than you originally intended to. 

The two shops that yesterday I fell victim to this '3 for 2' trap in were Boots and The Body Shop. I went into Boots looking for Soap & Glory's 'Scrub Your Nose In It' because I'd heard good things about it and was in need of a new exfoliater for my face. The packaging of Soap & Glory is to die for and this scrub claims to 'help refine large pores and prevent blemishes, leaving skin looking brighter and more radiant'. Sounds fab and I can't wait to use it. So I could have just walked to the till with this in my hand, spent £7.50 and then walked out of the shop. But noooo, I had to spot a miniature 'Hand Food' infront of me, and the part of me that melts whenever I see anything mini thought 'you need that mini Hand Food in your life'. However, the '3 for 2' sign pointed out that miniatures and sachets were not included in this deal. So what did I do? ..Picked up the full size bottle of Hand Food! Logic? No. Then I needed a 3rd item to complete the deal but there was quite limited stock in this branch of Boots and I'm pretty stocked up for body lotions and washes at the moment so it was a difficult decision choosing this 3rd product. In the end I chose a second bottle of Hand Food, which doesn't make sense because I only wanted the Hand Food in the first place because the miniature tube was cute!

So, I walked away with 2 'Hand Foods' and 1 'Scrub Your Nose In It' for £12.50, instead of just one 'Scrub Your Nose In It' for £7.50. Not the end of the world of course, but a little bit unnecessary.

Unfortunately, I was a sucker for the very same trap just 5 minutes later when I walked a few doors down to The Body Shop. I wasn't going to fall for it again but the I was the only customer in so got the sales assistant's full attention and she was extremely persuasive. I'm forever falling for the 'Oh I use this and it's really great' line that they always seem to use. The one thing that I was after was the 'Tea Tree Pore Minimiser' (£7.50 for 30ml) as my teeny sample of Benefit's The Pore-fessional is coming to an end and the price tag is a bit too high for me to be purchasing the full size and I have heard that this Tea Tree Pore Minimiser is quite a similar product, and it's also targeted for blemished skin which is a bonus for me and my pesky spots. This was it, this was all that I wanted, I was SO close to walking away and paying, but then the lovely sales assistant starting asking me about my skin type and suggesting all these products that would suit me and my oily skin - damn her for making them sound so amazing! She tipped me over edge into buying the Seaweed Mattifying Day Cream (£9.00 for 50ml) which has actually caught my eye a few times in the past, but she told me all about how it's great at keeping her oil at bay underneath foundation so I went for it. And then here I am again, standing with 2 products in my hands knowing that I can have a 3rd one for free and the decision is always so hard! I was swaying between the Vitamin C Skin Reviver (£13.00 for 30ml) or the Tea Tree Blemish Fade Night Lotion (£8.00 for 30ml) and as my skin is especially blemished at the moment I opted for the Tea Tree product.

Ah, how did this happen to me! This would have totalled £24.50 but I saved £7.50 because of the '3 for 2' offer (isn't it funny that the one thing I wanted was actually the one I got free), and I also have a 'Love Your Body' Card which saved me 10% too, so in total I saved £9.20 (not bad) and the total came to £15.30. (She also threw a 1ml sample of Tea Tree Oil and a voucher for £10 off my next purchase when I spend more than £25). So, I ended up paying double what I intended to but I got quite a good bargain and some lovely new products that I can't wait to try, fingers crossed that they work and make a difference to my skin!

Tell me I'm not the only one who gets needlessly sucked in like this?!

♥