Retail Therapy - Clicks Haul

Yesterday was one of those days that I just needed to escape for a little while and what better (and cheaper) way to do that than to indulge in some retail therapy. I had literally completely run out of shampoo and my conditioner bottle was being shamefully manhandled in what was becoming a futile attempt at extracting the last little drips. I'd say that's as good a reason as any for that retail holiday, isn't it?

So off to Clicks I went...

... and then this happened. Not particularly splurge-worthy in the greater scheme of things, but considering I went in for 2 things and came out with 9...

The reason I went to the shop, like I said, was for shampoo and conditioner. I wanted to try the Toni & Guy range, but the Clicks I visited didn't stock the it so I just bought whatever was on special. I don't have loyalty to any brand or haircare line, and there are a one or two brands that I will avoid because I haven't had success with their products in the past. So for the most part, I just buy what's on special, which in this case was Schwartzkopf Gliss Hair Repair With Liquid Keratin.

R42.35 each (Promotional price) 250ml shampoo and conditioner at Clicks

As far as first impressions go, I think you can make a decision as to whether you will use a shampoo or conditioner again after the first try. It either works or it doesn't. I used both the shampoo and conditioner last night and I was immediately taken with the scent. I'm not very good at describing scents so forgive me if I'm vague/totally off the mark with this description. I'd say it's fruity, floral and perfumey, I didn't find it at all to be offensive and the scent lingered until maybe late this morning. Bear in mind though that I didn't rinse the conditioner out of my hair, I usually leave it in until my next shower. It didn't do anything WOW to my hair, but didn't make it onto my never-to-be-bought-again list. It didn't weigh my hair down, my hair had bounce, maybe not as much shine as the previous shampoo and conditioner that I used, but I'll give this a decent go before giving a proper review.

I usually use a mask instead of a conditioner, and because I don't heat style my hair, I'll use one that will provide some sort of control for my frizzy, curly locks. I bought the Schwartzkopf Gliss Satin Smooth Anti-Frizz Mask for shits and giggles really. No rhyme or reason. I tend to go for products for dry/damaged/unruly hair and choosing this one made sense.

R79.95 200ml at Clicks (normal price, I think)

 I haven't tried it yet but you'll be sure to hear from me soon. I'll link that review to this post as soon as it's available.

Next not on my list was the Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Top Coat. 

R79.95 @ Clicks

 I was looking for the Mirror/Mega/Diamond Shine Top Coat, but they didn't have it in stock, so Insta-Dri it is.

I've successfully used up or gotten rid of almost all of my mascaras and the one that I'm currently using is on it's last legs. I've never used Maybelline mascaras before so I thought I'd give The Rocket Volum' Express a go because I've heard only good things about it. Or I may have heard bad things too, but I couldn't remember them, so I may have just bought a dud. I'll let you know... I usually get free samples of mascara in my Clinique Bonus Time freebies and buy one or two to take me through to the next Bonus Time, so this purchase was necessary.

R124.95 @ Clicks

Giant, spiky brush usually means vavavoom lashes.

Maybelline Baby Lips, you either love them or hate them and I kinda like them enough to have tried more. It's basically a lip balm, some are tinted, some have SPF and are supposed to be very hydrating, moisturising and long lasting. I bought the Cherry Me variant a while ago and it's found a permanent home in my car. It provides a decent amount of hydration which is essential for our dry winters and just a hint of colour and shine. Long lasting...? Maybe not so much but my lips were not drier than before as some lip balms can do, but that wasn't a deal-breaker for me. I wanted to go for one that didn't have any colour payoff so that my boys could use it too.

R24.99 on the shelf, R19.95 at the till. Nice surprise! @ Clicks

Intense Care with SPF 20

Hydrate

Garnier has released a BB Cream Eye Roll-On following the success of the normal BB Creams. It's basically a BB Cream in a roller ball tube and is available in light and medium. 

It claims to have 5 benefits for the eye area:

1) Hides dark circles.

2) Reduces the appearance of bags.

3) Fine lines appear less visible.

4) Illuminates

5) Hydrates

The rollerball applicator is intended to reduce the need for rubbing the delicate eye area.

First of all, can we talk about the ridiculous amount of packaging on this product?

Is it really necessary for a box as big as that? The actual product is the size of a lipstick... How about a vacuum seal?

Cool-to-the-skin rollerball applicator.

R69.95 exclusively available at Clicks.

I chose the darker of the two shades. I hope it won't be too light but for the eye area you do generally go a bit lighter. I use the dark shade in the facial BB cream.

And last but not least... anti-perspirant. 

R43.95 @ Clicks

I used Mitchum gel anti-perspirant for years and one day my body plain and simple rejected it. It just didn't work. So I jumped between Dove and Garnier a-p roll-ons but thought I'd give the Mitchum Invisible Solid a try. It claims 48 hour protection, as did the gel variety which I haven't put to the test because I'd take a shower at least once in 48 hours. But if the situation ever arises then at least I'll know I'm covered. I know that there are people who are anti-anti-perspirant, I am not one of them despite being aware of the effects of long-term use. I choose my battles. With dry underarms.

More indepth reviews to follow.

Take care.

When the fight for equality with men eludes me.

Scenario: RANDOM woman is shopping for last minute birthday party goodies for her son and phones her husband from the queue in a shop.

Wife: Baby, please check in the 5lt ice-cream tub in the plastics cupboard if there are still candles and how many there are. There's a whole bunch of loose plastic knives, forks, spoons and straws in that box and there might be some candles in there as well. I don't want to have to buy candles if there are enough.

Husband: OK, just hold on.

Husband disappears for a second. Lots of scuffling going on in the background.

Husband: Baby, there's only batteries and light bulbs in the box.

Wife: Baby are you looking in the drawer or in the cupboard.

Husband (annoyed): In the drawer, Baby! There's 3 2lt ice-cream tubs in the drawer and I don't see any candles here.

WHY DO WE FIGHT FOR EQUALITY WITH MEN?

(Image from here)

Nails... 1 year later

So my last post was almost a year ago. I can either do a post every 12 months, or I can try to give this blog some serious loving. I've been thinking in blog for the past few weeks now. You know, like when you start on Facebook and start thinking in status updates. Come on, you know what I'm talking about!

Although 10 months has passed since the last entry, much has changed, and some things are still the same. My obsession with nail polish has waned slightly, or maybe the obsession has become a habit and I've learnt to manage it better. Or maybe I just don't feel bad about buying new colours anymore. One thing that has changed is that I'm not into Essie anymore. I have a few colours now and I have to say, I think I'm wasting my money.

Let me elaborate, and someone please tell me how flawed my thinking is because there must be a scientific explanation refuting my reasoning. One of the things that I look for in nail polish is the staying power and Essie has not proven to be one with much staying power. Now, when this whole obsession started, I used to paint my nails EVERY SINGLE DAY. I soon saw the downside to doing this when my normally healthy, strong nails were splitting and tearing all over the place. No treatment or base coat was going to help the situation so I needed to give my nails a break and leave them NAKED for a few weeks. Apparently your nails need to breathe and nail polish, even with base coat, suffocates the nail which results in normally healthy nails becoming very sad indeed.

Anyway, after my nail polish down-time, which was about a month, I started my manicures again. And because I didn't have my daily ritual anymore, I found it to be a bit tedious getting back into it, so I'd change up the colour every couple of days. This is when I discovered that Essie really isn't an option anymore. For the first time, well, not the first time, but after a long time I've had to leave a nail polish on for a few days, and the Essie wasn't standing up to the R20 and R30 nail polishes from the barrels at Dischem. It would chip after just one day. Now I've used it with and without base and top coats, but I've done so with the other polishes as well. I showed my husband on more than one occasion how flawlessly a R30 polish looked after almost a week, chip free! Base and top coats can make any manicure look amazing, but the true test is how it wears without these. And staining... even Essie stains, depending on the colour. 

I'm not keen on spending tons of dosh on, well, anything really, so Essie is the only more expensive nail range that I've bought so far. And like I said, unless my nails fall off, which it hasn't (so far), I'm good with brands like: LA Girl, Catrice, M.O.D., Passion from Dischem and Essence, Tip Top Nails from Clicks. My justification is also that, if it doesn't work I won't feel bad to chuck it coz it didn't cost the week's milk.

I was at Dischem 3 times this week and I think the first time I came out with 2 polishes, one from M.O.D. and one from Passion. These are brands that you'll only find in the huge barrels in the beauty department when they have their beauty fairs. The colours are vibrant and only cost between R17 and R20. I just applied the M.O.D. polish in 101, which is a gorgeous, bright blue-based pink with the finest silver shimmer, opaque in one coat! It's a beautiful colour for dark-skinned hands, like mine. Sometimes bright pinks, especially, can look odd on darker complexions.

The other thing about these brands is that they don't indicate what the formulation is, and I've bought 2 really bold colours that turned out to be matte, which I'm not too crazy about. I love the look, but the feel is chalkboardy which I feel on my tooth nerves and I hate it. But that problem can easily be solved with a glossy top coat.

Oh, and I haven't done gelish again. A friend of mine is a qualified nail technician and she offered to do my nails once it was restored to it's healthy selves, but I never took her up on the offer. I'm not too keen on having to go to someone to maintain my nails. I'm just not that kind of girl...

Pics will be up tomorrow...

Gelish nails

A few weeks ago I was suckered into getting a gelish manicure. Well actually, I'm a sucker for a good deal, so I was just being myself when I took up the offer at Dischem (where I get my treatments - coz every 5th treatment of the same kind is free... see!) for a gelish mani with free gelish pedi. I didn't even know how much it cost until I got to the till. (R195 for a mani btw).

Anywho, gelish is a gel nail polish that gets applied in many stages and each stage has to be cured. It takes quite a long time, but the results are well worth the time spent. Once the last stage is cured, your nails are set, no drying time, and it lasts for up to 3 weeks. It doesn't smudge, doesn't chip, stays put until you take it off or it grows out with your nail. If it's not properly done, it will start peeling away, which will be very annoying.

Mine took 2 hours to apply: fingers and toes. You'd better make sure you like your therapist coz that's a long time to be spending with someone one-on-one. The colour range is not very extensive and the colours are safely standard. The colours I chose were a pretty pink (Light Elegant 01327) on my fingers and a sparkly deeper pink (High Voltage 01402) on my toes. See here for colour swatches.

I won't get into the process, there's a video you can watch to see what application entails.

Once the last coat is cured, you can put socks and shoes on or scratch around in the depths of your handbag for those elusive keys and it won't do a thing to your manicure. If you're the type of person who wants to have colour on your nails, but can't be bothered because it needs frequent maintenance, this is definitely for you. It really lasts! What is also awesome about gelish is that you can apply other nail polishes over the gel and remove it with normal nail polish remover and it won't affect your manicure.

The proper way to remove the gel is to soak a swab (cotton wool ball, pad, swab) in acetone, wrap your nail with the cotton wool, wrap foil over the cotton wool and let it dissolve for ten minutes. After 10 minutes, whatever is not on the cotton wool after you've taken it off your nails, you can scrape away with an orange stick or with your nail, and your nails are good for another application.

I don't think I'll do it again because I like to change my nail colour if not every day, then at least every second day. I really liked the end result of the mani, but I started to get fidgetty around the fourth day and started picking at the polish because I can't stand to have the same colour on for too long. I managed to hold out for a week and a bit, but then I just started peeling it off. NOT THE RECOMMENDED REMOVAL METHOD!!! Layers of your nail comes off with the polish which you then have to buff away to smooth out again. Needless to say this is very damaging for your nails and could result in infection!

When the stain grows out (I don't use a base coat with my normal nail polish - not good either, I know) and if I can stand some length on my nails, I might consider getting a french gel mani, especially because you can apply other colours onto it. I still highly recommend it though, it just doesn't suit my short attention span.

If you've tried it, let me know what you think about it.

Ramblings of a lunatic.

I can post blogs every day, all day, if I only have my laptop with me or I can talk into a dictaphone that will automatically post to the blog. I'm not a routine person, so committing time to post a blog everyday will bore me to death, even though I have so much that I'd like to post.

The only reason I'm doing this now is because I have an assignment due on Monday, I have a netball game on this afternoon, I need to get stuff off to the bank, lectures on Friday for 3 modules (for whch I've done no work), Sunday's a get together with some friends and I've volunteered to make a salad and dessert, Monday night's report evening at my son's school and I'm thinking of making muffins for the class parents... The long and the short of it is that I'm overwhelmed by my current workload, so naturally I'll procrastinate, stress out, distract myself, stress more, eat outside of my eating plan, stress more... it's a vicious cycle.

I changed the title of this post from "Gelish Nails", coz that is what I decided I want to blog about today, and I will, in a post on gelish nail polish, but what was supposed to be an introduction turned into rambling a post long... For more on my take on gelish nail polish, click through to the post here.

(Picture from here)

Cliffy's in hospital

Our Dalmatian was not well yesterday. Well, more than not well. We suspect he was poisoned, which happens this time of the year, a precursor to affimative shopping. We took him to the vet and they couldn't find any blood parasites (tick bite fever ruled out) so they're going with poisoning. The vet said that because we left it for longer than 24 hours, that he might not recover from it and we have to face the chance of him not coming home. We couldn't tell the boys that and they kept asking when Cliffy was coming home. I just don't have the heart to tell them what the worst case scenario could be. We'll just pray that he makes a recovery and that he'll come home in the next few days.

Fingers crossed that he comes home.

Sunday night / Monday morning

So, that was the weekend. And a long weekend - NOGAL!

Mommies don't have long weekends, or holidays for that matter. Especially when daddies go on roadtrips and camp out with their friends to a live concert in the bundus. Not that I'm complaining... I've seen UB40 twice already and he doesn't get out with his friends (work APPARENTLY doesn't count as getting out, he says) and I enjoy not having him around for a day or 2. The house stays tidier when he's not around, which is strange coz I always thought it was the 4 and 6yr old who were responsible for the constant state of unrest. This is a very recent and shocking discovery.

So he's home and snoring next to me: comforting and annoying at the same time. Thank God I don't PMS coz I might have been widowed by now. There are a few women sitting in jails in the US coz they just got gatvol of their husbands' snoring. I'm totally sucking this out of my thumb, but it sounds credible, right? Anything is possible in the USofA!

I don't know why I'm awake at this ungodly hour of 12:18am. The only way I usually keep my eyes open at this time of the night is with Red Bull cans. The boys wake up too damn early for me to even contemplate sleeping in, so it's generally a good idea to get some decent shut-eye from 11pm coz you've gotta sleep with one eye open from 5am onwards when they start their day. I really hope they keep up this early morning routine when they start school. We're usually late getting to preschool, but that's because it's not real school. Next year will be a totally different story. Summer's ok coz it's impossible to sleep past 6 o'clock anyway, but winter. Oh how I hate winter! This is going to a trying time for me. The true test of motherhood!

I'm just rambling on about absolute rubbish now. Let me share some pics that has made my weekend enjoyable...

Meet my new obsession...

Her name is Sharryy and she's available from www.stevemadden.com.

I don't know if she's available in South Africa yet, but I will be visiting the Sandton City store tomorrow morning to see if she's there and what the damage to hubby's budget is going to be.

Sharryy has a younger, naughtier sister...

Vippper, also at www.stevemadden.com.

I don't know so much about this one, I may just bring her home too. It's more winter than summer, don't you think? I prefer more open shoes in summer, like...

Julia is available from www.plum.com.es.



I think she's gorgeous, just the right height, open enough for summer, closed enough to make your foot feel secure. Good thing I didn't see her at Bulhafi when I picked up my Courtneys on Saturday coz I may have brought her home too. Wait, why's that a good thing...?

I need to get more flats. I buy all these heels and can never wear them coz I don't have a life to go with the shoes. They're usually reserved for date nights, which will only happen from February again when my brother's back. Or maybe we can take advantage of the mother-in-law when she comes up in Jan. MMmmmm.

The cheaper obsession, nails... I took off the blue and glitter on my fingers and replaced it with matt white (not my favourite finish, it looks like Tipp-Ex) with a blue, frosty looking glitter polish. Very chic. It takes the edge of start white nails.

Tomorrow, Sandton City for The Smurfs (I'm a Smurf freak and I'm using the kids as an excuse to get a picture with Smurfette, Clumsy and Pappa Smurf) and a pop in to Steve Madden, and if the kids will allow it, a pop in to Zara. I also need to track down a Christmas tree coz the real live one we had last year is real dead now. Hubby wants to get a plastic tree, I'm thinking real live indigenous tree that can be planted on the 12th day of Christmas. 2 birds... I bought Christmas tree decorations at Woolies last year for 50% off in the week before Christmas. I'm hoping I'll have the same luck this year and add to the collection. I also want to start a tradition of buying one exquisite/funky/different tree ornament and have the kids each make one every year. We've not done this previously, the tree was a first last year coz we always said that we'd decorate the tree outside that looks like a Christmas tree, but never did.

Ok, I've hit writers block. I'll add on to this if I remember in the waking hours of today. Otherwise I'll just add another title. I've been wanting to write about my attraction to certain types of people and discovering why I have the attraction. The person I'm thinking of right now is Johnny Clegg. Yes, I see you raising your eyebrows, but it will all become clearer when my head is clearer and I put finger to keyboard in the daylight hours.