Beautymint.com Essential Cleanser & Ultimate Replenishing Serum Review

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . November 9, 2011 . 9:04PM

A few weeks ago, here on blueshelled.com, I mentioned a site called beautymint.com. They were doing a really neat campaign to help fight breast cancer that was appealing to me because all you had to do was sign-up for their newly launched site in the month of October and you would add to their donation total for their campaign. As a part of this, Beautymint.com asked if I wouldn’t mind trying some of their products and writing an honest review for my readers. I generally don’t mind doing this as long as companies don’t mind that I am going to be completely and totally honest and they might not like what I have to say. Beautymint.com was up for the challenge and sent me two of their products: Essential Cleanser and Ultimate Replenishing Serum.

One of the neat things about the site is that they have a customized beauty plan for each person. You go on the site and before you can look at the products (which could be a pro or a con, depending on how quickly you’d like to view the products), you take a personalized skin test to determine which products would best fit you. I am a 3*6*3, which means that 2 different systems would work for me.

I tried the products over the course of a week and my verdict is that these are not for me. These may be for me over the summer, when my skin tends to be more oily, however, right now, with the weather cooling down, they dried my skin out even in my oily t-zone. My skin had extra redness after these products and a week after using them, I’m still dealing with the fallout.

Here is where I give you my disclaimer: I have super sensitive skin and I think that these products would work best for a person with normal to oily skin and no dryness or itching issues. I’m not a dermatologist, rather, I’m just someone that tried them and had a reaction. I also did NOT use the entire 4-part system that was recommended for my skin, so this may have contributed to the reaction I had to the products.

As such, I can’t say that I will be using these products for myself, but I can see that for those struggling with balancing an oily face, these might be a holy grail product. They are fairly inexpensive in that you can get the entire 4-piece set for $39.99 (so roughly $10 a piece) and they are only a little smaller than most department store sets. I did like the scent and the texture was nice. I didn’t have to use much, but I did feel like I would run out fairly quickly. Overall, if you are still searching for your perfect cleanser set, it’s worth a try, but if you’ve found something you like, you may not want to move in on this set.

Note: I received free products to keep in order to review them. I received no other compensation for my review and all opinions are my own.

Earring Review and giveaway

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . October 13, 2010 . 8:11PM

Every now and then a company will send me something and say “Please give my product an honest review.” I remind them that all of my reviews are honest and they might not like what I say. So far, no one has pulled out of their offer because of it. I received an email in August from the people at Diamondearrings.org asking me to review their earrings and letting me know they’d throw in a pair for me to give to a lucky reader if I’d like as well. I have super sensitive ears so my first response to them was “Well, sure, but I have to let you know that my ears hate even the most expensive of earrings so if they aren’t good quality, the review won’t be good.” I’m serious about that. I have what must be a nickel-allergy or something because, though earrings look great on me, my ears get irritated, puffy and red after I’ve worn them all day.

It could actually be post-traumatic stress from when I got my ears pierced. I only vaguely remember this. I was young. My mom could verify the age, but I’d guess I was 6 or 7 years old and I’d wanted them pierced for a while. Luckily for both of us, my mom’s best friend at the time was a beautician and she could do it for me. All went well until she pierced the first ear. Commence extreme wailing, gnashing of teeth and a refusal for her to do the second ear.

I wasn’t playing. There was to be no holding still for a second ear. I was doomed to go through life with only one ear pierced. One ear pierced with a fake gold stud and sapphire. I was going to look like someone from the boy-band Colour Me Badd. My mother wasn’t having it. She had to get creative. There was a happy meal in my future if I’d only consent to the ear piercing afterward.

I’m assuming I was bought because I have a hole in each ear. Actually, I have 2 holes in each ear as I got bold when I was around 14 or so. Regardless, I do believe the upset caused by that first encounter has given me a condition I call “angry ears.” It doesn’t let me wear earrings easily and I feared this review was going to be a nasty one.

It almost never happened. I never heard anything from the company and never saw anything in the mail. I deleted the emails and assumed that they decided against someone who was not a sure bet. I was wrong. My post office had held a package addressed to me for over a month because they “wanted to make sure it was me.”

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I’ve always been me. I’m glad the post office figured it out.

Onto the review of the earrings from Diamondearrings.org. If you look at the site, the premise looks simple. You mention them on your blog, twitter, facebook, somewhere online, pay a cheapie fee for shipping and they send you some earrings that look like diamonds, but aren’t. Why bother? Because eventually they won’t do this anymore and they are going to rely on word of mouth for advertising and all those posts add up to some serious advertising.

Here’s why I think it’s going to work: The earrings are good. I was really pleasantly surprised. In the box, they looked a little bigger than what I’d normally wear. I’m a small earrings kind of girl and I require a clean look at all times. They wore really nicely, gave me a little bit of bling and I can wear them all day without experiencing ear fatigue or “angry ears.” I’m used to taking my earrings out and rubbing my ears for about 10 minutes. This was incredibly pleasant for me.

So, here’s what is going to happen. You are going to go look at the site and decide you want your own pair and enter my freebie giveaway to try to win a pair and avoid paying shipping or you’ll just try the deal on your own. One way or another, the earrings were really nice and a great surprise to me. Thanks again to the company for a new pair of classy, everyday earrings. I appreciate them greatly.

If you want to try your chances on my giveaway, here’s what you can do:

1) Visit DiamondEarrings.org and tell me what you think about the idea in a comment here.

For an additional entry each:

2) Stumble them on Stumble Upon

3) Twitter about them or this contest.

4) Facebook about them or this contest.

5) Write about them or this contest in your blog.

Things to know:
**Comments posted after the deadline (October 20, 2010 at 5pm CST) won’t be included in the drawing.
**If you win, you must email me your mailing address within a week of the drawing end in order to receive your prize. If you do not, I will re-draw for the prize. I am not responsible if you do not receive your prize. If it gets lost, etc., I’ll feel really bad, but I can’t replace it.
**I will be using a randomizer to choose the winner of the giveaway. As long as your entries fit the criteria, you are eligible.

Product Review: Personal Microderm

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . July 29, 2010 . 4:02PM

Have I mentioned lately how much my sponsor, SkincareRx.com, rocks? They send me cool stuff to mess around with and then I get to tell you what I think about it. Otherwise, let’s face it, my need for new gadgets would go unfulfilled. They sent me, a Personal Microderm so I could let you know if these things really work or not. I had to promise that I would be truthful and not just say “yes, I like this” which actually makes me like them all the more because I’m a girl who is all about the honesty and it would have made me really uncomfortable to accept an item to review if I couldn’t be honest about it.

I’ve mentioned before that freebies are the way to my heart. However, when I received the box with my Personal Microderm in it, I was very concerned. See, in some ways, I’m like a man. The first thing I saw was a DVD that said I must watch the instructional video before using my Personal Microderm.

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Luckily for them, it was only 6 1/2 minutes long or I may have had to send it back. I really am just that impatient. The kicker that got me to watch is that this is a complex tool that looks like a face dremmel and it’s going to be rubbing and sucking my face. I should probably learn how to use it.

Fine. I decided to watch the video. It wasn’t bad. The perky show-offs actually worked for me and it’s pretty easy to learn how to use the Personal Microderm. I have really sensitive skin, so I use the little blue discs on my face and the big ones on the other skin on my body. I don’t let it suck for long periods of time and keep the skin taunt or my face will blister and I’ll look like The Thing from The Fantastic Four. Got it.

I opened the rest of the items and got to work. I plugged in the Personal Microderm and got it set up. It was only with slight trepidation that I set it to whirring and stuck it on my skin and…

Oh! WOAH! OH MY JELLY BEANS! WHAT THE SNICKERS BAR IS GOING ON HERE?

There was no pain but it felt like someone was trying to give me a hickey on my face. OOOOOH, ok. Too much time spent on one area. Move on more quickly. I did it on my entire face and the time spent? Less than 4 minutes.

My face glowed for a good 6 days after using the Personal Microderm. People noticed it and I didn’t need my makeup. I consider this a very, very good thing. It evened out the redness in my face. And the best part is that I only have to replace the discs every 2-3 months. For $15, this is a great deal after the initial investment. My skin is beyond super sensitive and I’ve seen no ill effects from using Personal Microderm, though everyone’s skin is different.

Thank you Skincarerx.com for an impressive showing and the opportunity to review such an awesome product!