Scrubs -Unlisted Brand - Sand (real, from a beach)
lilymoon 11/22/2010 6:35:00 AM
So glad to see the above review! I, too, have used sand (mixed with either olive or grapeseed oil and a small amount of glycerin) to create a highly effective facial exfoliant scrub. It also works great on the body and especially the feet. Many of you are probably in shock: "WHAT?!! She used SAND on her face?!! Is she CRAZY?!!" That's exactly the reaction the skin care product companies WANT you to have. YOUR MONEY is what keeps them afloat. Everyone needs to wise up. Don't believe the hype or propaganda that skin care product manufacturers espouse, claiming sand or ground nut or seed shells or anything with an 'irregular shape' shouldn't be used to exfoliate the skin-- it's a load of crap designed to make you buy their products (anyone who's used manual exfoliants formulated with expensive, synthetic, 'regularly shaped' perfectly spherical beads knows they do a piss-poor job at exfoliating). The skin care product manufacturer's don't want us to know how cheap, simple and easy some of these products are to make and use ourselves. You MUST slightly irritate/damage/scratch/scrape the skin surface IN ORDER to remove the uppermost dead skin/cell layer. There's no way around it. ALL effective manual exfoliants--even loofahs, brushes or nubby washcloths--do the same thing, and it doesn't matter becausethe damage is only superficial and temporary- the new skin grows back UNDAMAGED and replaces the skin that was superficially "damaged". BTW, don't you find it soooooo ironic that these same companies that warn so strongly against using sand, nut/seed shells, etc. to manually exfoliate (since they can "damage" the skin) then turn around, create and market chemical exfoliants (aha and bha peel products) which they ADMIT are damaging to the skin, in fact insisting (correctly) that the damaging and healing process is the ONLY way to get rid of old, dull skin cells and renew/regenerate new/fresh/younger-looking skin . Furthermore, everyone knows that the strong chemical peels that women pay big money for to salon/spas or dermatologists are ALL CLEARLY temporarily damaging. FYI, you can easily and cheaply make your own VERY EFFECTIVE exfoliant peels that are just as good as the ones offered by salon/spas (tantamount to a light chemical peel) using naturally-occuring alpha-hydroxy acids via sour milk (lactic acid); raw puree or juice of: papaya, pumpkin, pineapple, or figs. So, choose to EITHER manually exfoliate daily OR chemically exfoliate periodically, OR perform a combination of both in moderation--just don't OVERDO it.
2 out of 2 people found this review helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No
Gels/Soaps -Unlisted Brand - Beautea White Darjeeling Tea Calming Foaming Bath
lilymoon 9/22/2010 8:18:00 AM
Sublime! This is the absolute best bath / shower gel I have EVER had the pleasure of using in my life. Scent is sufficiently strong but not overpowering (it is all-natural and not synthetic), and all the ingredients are very high-quality, all-natural and organic. Skin feels pampered, caressed and moisturized. This company also makes other gels with variations on the tea theme (including a green tea gel which is equally divine). The matching-scent fragrance sprays are marketed as room sprays but the ingredients, again, are all-natural and organic, and i use them both as skin sprays/perfumes and get loads of compliments every time I do!
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No
Styling Products -Redken - 15 Spray Starch Heat Memory Styler
lilymoon 9/1/2010 10:33:00 AM
Excellent product for those with "hair of the damned" like mine: thin, fine, with a smattering of indiscriminately scattered cowlicks for extra punishment! Gives hair thickness, hold, and substance and helps to straighten areas that need it. Who cares if its a bit sticky and a bit dulling--when you have "hair of the damned" you have to sacrifice smooth, shiny, silky hair (our hair is already too smooth, too shiny, and too silky to begin with) in order to make it seem like you even have any hair at all. I don't know why they started marketing this as an ironing spray---it works that way, yes, but it also works just as well (at least for me) simply sprayed on wet or damp hair and air-dried, or sprayed on wet or damp hair and blow-dried. Love it!!!
6 out of 6 people found this review helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No
Treatments -Nuxe - Creme Merveillance Visible Expression Lines Cream (for Normal to Dry Skin)
lilymoon 9/1/2010 10:13:00 AM
I received this as a sample given to me by an SA and I wish I had never tried it. I have not had a single pimple in years but after just ONE time of applying this product to my clean face and neck (and changing nothing else in my routine), within 2 days I have developed three pimples on my forehead, two around my mouth, one on my chin, and one HUGE, red, nearly cyst-like pimple on my neck, which I am having to wear a scarf all the time to keep covered as it is unsightly. I do not have sensitive skin and I am not acne-prone, so I was very shocked and disappointed to have this happen.
4 out of 5 people found this review helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No
Treatments -Unlisted Brand - RevaleSkin Night Cream
lilymoon 3/27/2008 3:26:00 PM
BEWARE, consumers! SaraLee2, your ingredient list posted for this product, and the ingredient list I found on at least 3 sites selling this product, including www.revaleskin-direct.com, are markedly different. Your list shows 1% coffeeberry as the first ingredient. The ingredient lists I found for this product (posted below) contain NO coffeeberry whatsoever; what they contain -- way on down the list, I might add, is coffee SEED extract. The amazing antioxidant properties are supposed to be in the coffeeberry (the fruit/berry portion), NOT in the seed or bean. No percentage is given in the ingredient list, and the first ingredient is water. By U.S. law, ingredients must be listed in the order of highest concentration to lowest concentration. So even if there were coffeeberry in this product (which there apparently isn't), listing 1% coffeeberry as the first ingredient would be illegal due to the fact that there is far more water (and 'cones, etc.) than there are any coffee-based derivatives. It's also misleading/false advertsiing to claim a product contains coffeeberry (the antioxidant-rich fruit), when what it actally contains is coffee seed extract (from the bean, not the fruit). Interestingly, the official website for the product, revaleskin.com, makes no mention of the ingredients list for any of the products. It merely gives links to other sites and locations that sell the products. The reason the coffeeberry (the BERRY, not the seed/bean) is receiving so much immediate attention is that supposedly the fruit is highly perishable and has been impossible keep in a non-perishable state once harvested, until a chemist discovered/invented a way to keep the fruit and its antioxidant properties intact long enough for the beneficial active antioxidants to be integrated into ingestable and topical products. The unroasted seed/bean neither contains these nor is it highly perishable like the fruit. Surely I'm not the first person to notice this discrepency in the ingredients list. Wonder what's up with that? Water (Aqua), Glycerin, C12-15 Alkyl Benzoate, Cyclomethicone, Cetyl Ricinoleate, Cetearyl Glucoside, Pentylene Glycol, Hydrogenated Polydecene, Coffee Arabica (Coffee) Seed Extract, Dimethicone, Ceresin, Glyceryl Stearate, PEG-100 Stearate, Sodium PCA, Urea, Trehalose, Sodium Hyaluronate, Tocopheryl Acetate, Glycosphigolipids, Phospholipids, Cholesterol, Panthenol, Polyisobutene, Caprylic/Capric Triglyceride, Citrus Grandis (Grapefruit) Fruit Extract, Silica, Alumina, Steareth-20, Steareth-2, Triethanolamine, Polyacrylate-13, Magnesium Aluminum Silicate, Xanthan Gum, Polysorbate 20, Polyquaternium-51, Disodium EDTA, Phenoxyetehanol, Ethylhexyglycerin, Methylparaben, Propylparaben, CI 77891, CI 42090, CI 42053, CI 19140.
16 out of 17 people found this review helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No