I always love trying new, innovative, make-your-life-easier beauty devices and products. Here are a few from Neutrogena, Color Me, Makeup Eraser, Sally Hansen and more that caught my attention. Full reviews below!
My latest beauty innovation discoveries
Breaking Down the Big Lips Trend and my Favorite Plumper
Well friends, if there’s one trend that seems to be growing, it’s the want for big lips! While I’ve never done a lip injection, the temptation is real (and I have decent lips!), so I get it. I have however tried a million different lip plumpers and the below are my favorite. In fact, I like to use the Fillerina all day everyday, then do a regimen of lip balm, Juvalip Lip Plumper Device, followed by Grande Lips Hydrating Lip Plumper for an instant plump lips. I also like to have Skyn Iceland Plumping Lip Gels on hand for special occasions when I need a smooth lip as a base. I explain more below!
Revlon X Gwen Stefani Choose Love Campaign
This Valentine’s Day, I got the incredible opportunity to spend it with Gwen Stefani and Revlon in celebration of their new CHOOSE LOVE campaign. (Fitting for a Valentine’s Day event right?). Gwen is Revlon’s newest global brand ambassador and will be starring in their empowering new campaign #ChooseLove.
As if she needs any introduction… Gwen is a three-time Grammy Award winning singer, songwriter, fashion designer and entrepreneur and is well known for her bold and trendsetting looks. She’s been inspiring me since I was a teenager and still to this day. She is my most long standing girl crush of all time — and is it just me or does she just get better looking with age? Goals people! One of her first roles as brand ambassador includes starring in a global multimedia Revlon campaign called CHOOSE LOVE, a campaign geared towards choosing and celebrating love throughout the world.
If you have oily skin, read this!
I have always had skin that was on the oilier side (especially in my T-zone) and am constantly on the hunt for the best products to keep my skin feeling clean and my make up in place. There is nothing worse than checking yourself out in the mirror halfway through the day to see most of your make up has slid off, especially in the warmer weather. Here are some of current go tos!
Life updates, Blogger advice and this retro Lafayette 148 outfit
Happy last day of February everyone! This year is flying by and I for one am ready for a vacation. It has been the most exciting few months of filming and magazine collaborations which I can not wait to share with all of you! Between Health Magazine announcing my campaign with Olay (we have another surprise coming soon!), Redbook featuring my charity and I got to announce my partnership with Vanity Fair, February will be hard to beat. However, March brings some awesome projects with Glamour, New Beauty and Amazon which I dying to see! I started my site 9 years ago because I worked for the best beauty and skincare brands and it felt like no one was leveraging experts or sharing product formulations and information in the way it’s so readily available now! And the fact that this industry (not just in beauty but fashion and travel too) continues to surprise me and push my creativity, it is never a dull moment. What I did with Olay was groundbreaking. I’ve never known a blogger or really any identifiable person go through clinicals to have their skin checked during product testing. It’s always just an anonymous clinical statistic and some number of a percentage of women that saw changes. I’ll have more to unveil on that soon! I think the best part of working non-stop this new year was after months of being excited but so exhausted from early call times and the hours I spent researching, testing and reading before going on camera is now I get to sit back and see all of these projects come to life. Every collaboration has been so different and I’m so inspired how much magazines are embracing bloggers, these past few months I have been inspired and challenged in ways I didn’t even know were possible.
Outfit details:
Sunday Somewhere Isabella Sunglasses
Lafayette 148 Visionary Plaid Silk Blouse, Lacquered Lambskin Skirt, Elise Coat (similar)
Kenneth Cole Booties (similar)
Balley vintage bag
Maybelline New Baby Lips Color Balm Crayon, Vivid Mattes and Lip Liners
Maybelline has three new mega launches that we are so excited about! The first is their newest addition to their fabulous Baby Lips line called the Baby Lips Color Balm Crayon ($6.99), their first oil balm that delivers intense moisture along with intense color. It’s like a lipstick and balm put together! I love applying it, and these have literally been my go-to! The bright and pigmented balms are available in 8 collectible shades that melt seamlessly onto your lips. Swatches below!
Ole Henriksen Gets a New Look (And Collection!)
Today, Ole Henriksen reveals his new look and as part of the relaunch has added a new Balance Collection, designed to control oil and refine pores without stripping skin. In addition to this completely new collection designed to care for oily skin, each product has been repackaged to reflect Ole’s Scandinavian heritage and has reorganized from 10 collections to 4, clear and color-coded product lines based on skincare concerns to it’s easy to shop.
The collections are as follows:
- The Truth Collection – brighting, anti-aging and all day hydration (orange packaging)
- The Transform Collection – evens skin tone and texture (blue packaging)
- The Nurture Collection – intensely hydrates and nourishes dry and sensitive skin (purple packaging)
- The Balance Collections – Ole’s new collection that controls oil and refines pores without stripping skin (green packaging).
Going for the Rose Gold with Kevin Murphy
I’m so obsessed with Kevin Murphy!!!!! I’ve admired his products for so long but getting the opportunity to spend the afternoon with him took my admiration to the next level. What an absolutely delightful person, who completely lived up to his hype. After months of struggling with my hair color — I loved being blonde but the colorists I was working with a few months back kept giving me weird highlights at the root and the intense black root to blonde highlight was not working for me at all. Expecting full well to walk into my color appointment with Kevin and ask for an ombre or some way of fixing the disaster that was my hair, he alongside his amazing Director of Color, Kate Reid had something else in mind: rose gold.
So in an unexpected turn of events, I got rose gold hair, with these beautiful highlights that gave my color and hair so much dimension. I am obsessed! Kevin Murphy has such unique colors and vision, and this was the perfect tone for me. I love how they worked with me to create a custom color that worked for my skintone. Kevin Murphy also launched 5 new products for spring, four of which are available now with another launching in April. See below for details!
By Terry Spring 2017 Techno Aura Collection
I’m really feeling cream highlighters at the moment. Whether it be to create a glowing, radiant complexion or do an obnoxious strobe of light in my cheekbone, I’m all in. I was recently at Space.NK for the launch of their exclusive By Terry limited edition Techno Aura collection. Featuring the Glow-Expert Duo Stick in 3 shades, 2 limited edition Gloss Terrybly Shine (aka lip glosses), and an exclusive new Eye Designer Palette Parti-Pris in No3 Techno Aura, it’s a memorable collection with the Glow-Expert Duo Sticks being my highlight (pun intended).
Me time, yogurt and Aveeno
Having grandparents that were born in Greece, the benefits of yogurt are not lost on me. In my family though the do it all fixer wasn’t Windex, but in fact yogurt. Growing up I had really sensitive skin and was allergic to red dyes. Every now and then I would get flare ups and yogurt would always calm it down. It helped relieve the insatiable itch and dry skin. Yogurt is filled with nourishing and healing nutrients as well as lactic acid, which is a popular AHA that helps dissolve dead skin and tighten pores, and often see it in DIY face mask and skincare recipes.
Aveeno, known for their Active Naturals ingredients which harness the power and calming properties of oatmeal has blended this with the nourishing ingredients found in yogurt to launch the new Aveeno Daily Moisturizing Body Yogurt ($7.99) and Aveeno Daily Moisturizing Yogurt Body Wash ($7.49). Available in two delicious scents, Apricot & Honey and Vanilla & Oat the Body Yogurts and Wash feature their new ACTIVBIND Complex. This makes up the body yogurt formula, which maintains all day contact with skin for long-lasting moisture and contains essential vitamins, lactose, proteins, lactic acid and lipids found in yogurt.