Welcome back! And welcome if you are new here xoxo
Remember my Natural Beauties series? I have a great addition to the awesome ladies mix – please step forward Natasha from The Clear Skin Essentials. I follow her for a decade, ever since she was making raw food videos. A lot has happened since, she now lives in another part of the world, Bali, and is happily married with two beautiful children. We share green beauty love, she uses all natural products and is very knowledgeable about skin. I am so happy to present the interview with her!
Love Lula Beauty Box June 2019Love Lula Beauty Box July 2019
Umm, I apologise in advance, this post is gonna be a bit different from my usual Love Lula Beauty Box posts where I would not only list ingredients but also my opinions of everything, as well as previous month boxes. Reason being is that I have too many plates to spin at the moment, work/life balance isn’t really in my favour right now, and as a result my health suffered. That’s the story in a nutshell, normal service resuming in August 🙂 Not wanting to disappoint my readers, I am still doing a post, but shorter version of it.
Worth 48£ this box had two products from NATOrigin – Mascara and Eyeliner, both black (£15.95+£7.95). Mascara was too natural looking for my short lashes, so I gave it away, but the pencil is in use. Next we had AyumiIntensive Hair Conditioning Treatment (£8.99 – 150ml) which I like, I am impressed with a lot of Ayumi products I have tried to far, see this post here. FoM London featured Anti-Pollution Hydra Plump Serum (sample size) which is ultra-light, absorbs quickly and is fragrance free. Madara’s Weightless Sun Milk SPF20 sachet sample was a final addition that month.
Worth whopping 101£!!! Yes really – no kidding. Really worth subscribing, don’t you think so? The box featured Dafna’s Personal Skincare Summer Heroes Set in a nice cotton pouch – I will make sure to take this on my holidays (first in four years, overtired me can’t wait!) to test. Next was Madara is their Plum Plum Lip Perfection Balm (15ml – £10) – I like it, seems super moisturising with a delicious fruity scent. Next we got Kathleen Natural Refreshing & Lightening Cleansing Lotion (150ml – £29.50 – I am yet to try this, so let me come back to you on this. I have been impressed with what I have tried from this brand so far though. Next we got 10ml of Skin Alchemist’s Apothecary Sesenne Facial Elixir (10ml – £30), which has 26 skin loving oils in it. What a box, right?
So, all in all it was a great box, I say well done Love Lula! I believe this time UK box and the international box were the same (sometimes they substitute other products for the ones they can’t send internationally, like nail polishes, perfumes, etc..) Where else you would get that good of a value at the budget price you pay for? Exactly! What I like about Love Lula box is that you are guaranteed to get at least two or three full size products each month, the sample sizes are almost always deluxe samples, like travel sizes. In nearly two years I am getting this box, I’ve seen sample sachets less than five times, I swear. Are you interested yet? Check out here. Want to see what was in previous boxes as well as plenty of reviews on all kinds of products from Love Lula? See this FB album All Things Love Lula here.
Love Lula Beauty Box
Please like and share my posts on social media, it really helps to get the green beauty word out – and you will forever have my gratitude!
That’s all my lovelies, thanks for reading! See You here next Tuesday if not sooner. Please allow me some time to rest, get my health together and I will come back to you with reviews/ thoughts on all of these products xo
Lots of Love,
Renata.
Enjoy my content? A tip into my PayPal Tip Jar - will get You my eternal gratitude and more awesome green beauty reviews Your way! I weed out all the greenwashing products so You won't have to.
Green Life In Dublin, green beauty and lifestyle blog
Welcome back! And welcome if you are new here xoxo
Clean Beauty Tag
How are all of you, I hope you are well?
Today I will do a bit of a different post, a Clean Beauty tag one. I was watching Andie’s The Green Queen Clean Beauty Tag video (here) and it turns out the tag was created by the Conscious Bee (see her video here) whom I just discovered in a series of serendipitous moments. Loving what I saw, I self tagged into it, because that’s how I roll 🙂 Both ladies did Youtube videos, Get Ready With Me style, but since I am a blogger, not a Youtuber, I will improvise a bit – I will answer questions first and will link to some of the make up post after, pretending I was sort of doing make up all along. There are quite a few I’ve done lately, what can I say, I have rediscovered my love for make up 🙂
See my Natural Beauty interview with adorable Andie here and let’s get into the tag, shall we?
CLEAN BEAUTY TAG:
1. When did u switch to green beauty and why?
That was around a decade ago, after accidentally discovering Janey Lee Grace’s book Imperfectly Natural Woman – I was looking for some light read for the weekend and that book changed my life! Many years later I managed to get Natural Beauty interview with Janey Lee Grace, see that post here. Funny story with that book, I had to buy it not one, not two, but four times, because after reading it I started lending the book to everyone around me and I didn’t get it back a couple of times. So I had to buy it for myself again and again, and it was the exact same book I did my very first Instagram giveaway with 🙂 Before that I was naively assuming that all the products on the shelves go through rigorous testing for safety and ingredients aren’t harmful for humans in any way shape or form- oh boy, how wrong I was! I was sick to my stomach to find out how many harmful ingredients are in our skincare (formaldehyde in babies products for God’s sake, don’t get me started on this!!) and I started switching out my products there and then. But the trouble was, clean beauty products were soooo hard to find back then – most people (millennials) will have a hard time believing this, but there were NO online shops back then, so I was having the hardest time switching my products. Yes, you read that right, no Detox Markets, no Love Lula or anything. In fact, I can credit Janey Lee Grace for my blog too – I was having the worst time finding not only my best natural products, but any natural products around me at all, so I remember thinking to myself “this is nuts, what if someone is going through the same transformation and does not know where to start or where to go, I better blog about this to let people know”. So that’s how my blog started, out of desire to help out fellow green beauty sisters – and that’s still a driving force behind my blog to this day! I was here before it became popular and way before PR and marketing was happening. Up until two years or so ago I was purchasing all the products myself, so if that doesn’t prove I am not in it for the money, then I don’t know what will. Fortunately the green beauty scene exploded since – and that makes me very happy! I kind of made it my mission to help all the ladies (and gents) to switch to natural and organic products. Clean beauty world has an answer to any conventional product out there, and it is a proven fact the products work – and they work even better! Just check my post on more than 20 natural dupes for Nars Orgasm here for example – I worked really hard on that post 🙂
2. Do you remember your first green makeup product? Did it work well for you?
Yes I do – it was a Dr Hauschka mascara and for then-unemployed me it cost me eye wateringly amount of money, I remember wincing when parting with my cash – and to make matters worse, it didn’t do anything apart from making my lashes black and it started crumbling in the first week. I remember thinking “oh no, what if all the natural products are so expensive and work so bad?”. Fortunately I was able to find a Holy Grail product in every single category since, you can see them here. I sifted through a ton of products to find good ones that work amazingly well. And they are at all price points too – you don’t need to spend a ton of money in every single category. I choose to splurge on skincare (I am five minutes to forty after all, I kind of need to) and am quite happy to save on body care for example. No money? No problem, use coconut oil as your body moisturizer! Make up? I have it at all price points starting from just 2.50€ going to up to 50€ for a palette. I think that is quite reasonable, no?
3. Have you noticed a change in your skin/overall health since the switch?
Yes! My skin was a disaster before the switch – dry, super sensitive, reactive to every single product I have tried and more and more adult acne as the time went by – and amazingly I never attributed my skin’s conditions are caused directly by the products I was using. I guess I was blindly falling for the “I am worth it” marketing hype – oh the naivety of me! Insert face palm emoji here 🙂 I see history repeating itself with my elder daughter, who’s is convinced she needs certain ingredients and products for her skin to look good. She buys her own products (oftentimes conventional, resistance to parents, sigh) but she reacts to them more often than not, so I am strategically suggesting natural alternatives and am doing a happy little dance every time she does not reject something. I have to say she and I started on the wrong foot with all things natural – I gave her my own DIY deodorant and it burned her pits – turns out she is allergic to baking soda! not only in deodorants but in toothpastes and dry shampoos, everything 🙁 She rejected all natural products for a couple of years since then, and I can’t say I blame her. Slowly but surely she is coming to our side, but we have a long way to go. I do not push her in any way shape or form, I am not one of those green beauty bullies with scare mongering tactics, you might notice that in a way I blog too – I simply let people know about amazing natural stuff and let people think and choose for themselves.
Whoops, Renata, get back to the question, will you? Yes, my skin balanced itself in a month when I switched to natural products and the acne never came back – amazing or what?
4. Is there anything you wish was different about the green beauty space?
Yes, a few things come to mind. Price points for one (a whole topic on it’s own, for another time maybe, there are few things worth their price point, but not all) limited shade ranges when it comes to make up; scare mongering tactics needs to go, as well as greenwashing.
5. What is the nr 1 ingredient you avoid in cosmetics?
Fragrance, parabens, bismuth oxychloride, phenoxyethanol – although the latter is increasingly hard to avoid, it is everywhere!
6. What are your favorite 3 make up products you discovered thus far?
Well, if we are talking about make up only, my first love would be Peachy Keen by Inika – it is a natural and more gorgeous version of Nars Orgasm, even though it does not look like much in most of online shop photos. Trust me, it will get you all heart eyed once you will get it and put it on. Very concentrated, so the jar will last you for years, I promise! Nars Orgasm was the last product I switched, but having found Peachy Keen, I haven’t looked back.
Next would be my trusty workhorse for many many years, a product used and appreciated daily; I have stuck with it going through branding and packaging changes – please step forward Hynt Beauty Duet Perfecting Concealer! By far the most full coverage concealer in the green beauty or not green beauty and it is something I keep coming back to no matter how many other products I have tried. I have not one but two reviews of it on my old blog (see here and here) so I won’t be going into too many details here. So well worth the money, I have my last jar for well over the year and I am yet to hit pan or see a change in the formula (as in going bad) when my newer concealers are starting to smell a bit off after six months. I can’t praise it enough, really. Just one teeny tiny thing, dear Hynt Beauty, if you are reading this, please introduce a shade in between of Light and Medium – those two shades need to have a love child, pronto! You have introduced a shade in between for the darker shades, now please do so for the lighter ones too, pretty please? As you can guess, I happen to be in between the shades and would love to be able to buy just one jar instead of two at a time. The formula is very impressive, so that’s why I keep buying two shades, but I have heard many and many ladies say the same thing. Once again, Hynt Beauty, pretty please?
Do you guys know how hard this question is?? I have to say both moisturizers and Antioxidant Booster by Bella Aura Skincare (review) – I can’t live without them!
*Update on why I no longer stand by this brand, even though I still think their products are fantastic here, scroll down to the very end.
8. What brands do you really want to try but still haven’t?
My wishlist is probably two miles long, haha! The first brands that come to mind are Okoko Cosmetiques, Lovinah, Osea, Live Botanicals, Blue Beautifly, De Mamiel, Odacite, Mayia Chia, Aether Beauty, Laurel, Antonym, Amly – do I need to go on? 🙂
9. What type of product do you buy the most of?
Toothpaste, rinse, body wash (mostly soap, Black African soap preferably). Body Oils. Shampoo. From beauty products, mascara. Same like a regular person, really.
10. Do you like trying new skincare products or do you keep a certain routine?
A bit of both really. My uber sensitive and dermatitis prone skin does not allow me much room for wriggle, I am most likely to react to any product, even to the ones everyone is raving about. Having found my perfect skincare in Bella Aura, I kind of don’t want to test or try anything else, plus having put my skin through a marathon (and burning it more than once!) for the sake of judging in the green beauty awards (see more on my IG), I don’t really want to try anything else for the time being. But still there comes a product from time to time that calls my name organically and I get that magical experience – I am talking about May Lindstrom Blue Cocoon as an example, see more in my recent Favourites post here.
11. If you could only buy from one brand, which one would you choose? Pick one for makeup and one for skincare.
Skincare, easy – Bella Aura! Make up, it would have to be between Inika (amazing blushes and mascara) and Hynt Beauty (concealer and lipstick Holy Grails), but W3LL People are also very high up there – oh, what to do??
12. What do you love about makeup? What about skincare?
I love that make up lets me create the best version of myself – isn’t that amazing how much more confident you feel when you look great? Skincare is my everyday treat to myself, my “me time”, my self care. What’s not to love, am I right or am I right?
13. Name your favorite thing about the Green Beauty community?
The support! I am so so grateful to green beauty community for welcoming me with open arms. Up until then I was kind of not belonging or should I say not feeling welcome anywhere really, and this is where I feel at home and feeling like I am contributing to a great cause. Andie’s comment about other women struck a chord with me, all the backstabbing in my life came from other women, even close friends, so I was kind of floating around in life not feeling that love, support, girl or sister power, up until I discovered the green beauty community. Huge thanks each and every one of you!
(ps. catty behaviour still happens in the green beauty world, this is an industry like any other industry. Fact of life)
Now that all of the questions are answered, let’s pretend I was doing make up at the same time 🙂 I will link three of my last make up posts, so check out the one which look you like the most – I didn’t mention any make up in my recent Favourites post, but any product from those posts below is still a strong favourite to date. Or skip them all together. Your call. Thanks for reading anyway!
Green Life In Dublin, green beauty and lifestyle blog
Enjoy my content? A tip into my PayPal Tip Jar - will get You my eternal gratitude and more awesome green beauty reviews Your way! I weed out all the greenwashing products so You won't have to.
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Natural Products in TK Maxx
Today I am coming at you with a short post on what you can find in the beauty section in your local TK Maxx, or TJ Maxx for my US green beauty sisters. This has been my secret weapon for years, and I I hope more of you will discover this great place to shop and save a bit of money too. This is especially great for people like me, when you have no Wholefoods or Detox Market or any place indeed where you can get anything your heart desires under one roof in your city. A good few stores are now jumping on the natural beauty bandwagon, but when you actually look into the selection, it is oftentimes very expensive or just plain greenwashing brands and products. So what’s a gal to do? Apart from going online, check out TK Maxx! Continue reading “Natural Products in TK Maxx”
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Love Lula products – Weleda Hair Tonic, Tabitha James Kraan Dry Shampoo, Nature’s Wish Joy
How are all of you, I hope you are well? Now that the weather is getting warmer by day, I hope everybody feels alright? If you follow me for some time, you might know I am one lucky duck also known as a part of Love Lula* Accredited Bloggers, and each month we have an opportunity to choose products we want to review.
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How to stop your concealer from creasing
Today is the day I will spill one of my beauty secrets – I will reveal how you can stop your concealer from creasing. It is a common complaint I hear in the green beauty world – as natural concealers lack the silicones that are in conventional products – and the silicones are exactly the thing that makes the conventional concealers glide so smoothly and also fill in all the crevices, aka fine lines, to give the appearance of smooth perfect skin (but remember, it is only that – an appearance, while it hurts your skin in the long run!)
We won’t go into all those nasty ingredients that are lurking in the conventional concealers and foundations, that’s another post in it’s own, for another time. Since the natural counterparts don’t have those silicones I’d just mentioned, they perform a bit differently, and this is one of those learning curves you will have to get used to it once you will go au naturale 🙂
Don’t worry, the switch is so worth the extra effort – natural concealers are full of natural ingredients that are good for the skin, like coconut oil, aloe, nurturing oils and butters, depending on the formulation. So you will get not only pigment, but skin care benefits from them as well, as I don’t know how about you, but I can rest at night knowing I am doing my skin no harm, only goodness. Having said all that, oftentimes the complaint is that they are creasing – and this is where I am coming to help!
Before you ask, my favourite two concealers are Hynt Beauty Duet Perfecting Concealer & Ere Perez Arnica one. I have reviewed both on my old blog, you will find reviews linked at the end of this post if you want to see more information on them. In my concealer I am looking for the full coverage first and foremost – I don’t get the point of sheer coverage concealers, if I apply the product and can still see my capillaries and dark circles, what’s the point of it, right? I have been a fan of Hynt Beauty Duet Perfecting concealer (available from Glow Organic Brighton in UK) for a good number of years now, ever since it went through branding change and several packaging changes. Remember Christopher Drummond liquid concealer in a pump bottle? Yes, that’s what I am talking about. Nowadays is it not creamy liquid but rather balmy, and it comes in a glass pot that you swirl your finger in to apply. Still great coverage, and I still regard it as my nr1 – as you can imagine, I have tried a few in my days, but I always go back to this no matter what. Is wasn’t when I first started using it. Anyways, my shade is somewhere in between of light and medium, and as medium is getting too dark by the day (l am getting paler by the day) I need to get another pot in light very soon. Hynt Beauty is an amazing brand with wonderful ethos – and I keep meaning to get more of their products to try and review for you guys. Everything is really natural, and intentionally so, because Meryl, the founder of the brand is a breast cancer survivor – and that’s how the brand was born. Whoops, getting a bit sidetracked here. Can you tell I love to talk? Especially when it comes to all things green beauty?
Side note – please let me know your favourite natural full coverage concealers, so I could check them out!
Now, let’ s get to my actual trick of trade, shall we? There are three steps to it, and it is all really simple, I promise you that! You know I am all about simple and effective, right?
How to stop your concealer from creasing
step 1
Moisturise your under eye area really well.
This stop is not negotiable for me, as a lady on the wrong side of 30s, this is something I never ever forget. It is best if you gave it a few minutes to sink in, especially if you are using under eye oils or balms. I recommend this step even if you are gorgeous peachy skinned twenty something. (if you are gorgeous twenty something and reading this, more power to you, the earlier you start taking care of your skin, the better).
step 2
Don’t over apply! Another major mistake most people make, and I too have been guilty of it in the past. Yes, it is tempting to blob it on, especially if you have a lot to cover – and trust me, I get it, I too have been guilty of burning my candle from both ends or not drinking enough water (drink enough water and trust me, you will see the difference!). I have extremely dark circles that are hereditary, and no amount of green smoothies/ exercise /sleep or products can cure, and I have acres of it, real estate! Yes, I know I am a lucky gal. So a concealer is a must for me – seriously, if you saw me sans any make up on, the first thing you would ask if I am sick or tired. No, and no, just my life story. So, yeah, less is more when it comes to the concealer – apply a very thin layer and step back to see yourself in a mirror, it really helps to see yourself a step back and not in one of those zoomed in mirrors. More often than not, you will find that one layer is enough. If you can’t see any concealer, go ahead and bin that product, green beauty world has better products, I promise you! If you really need that second layer, promise me you will be VERY light handed with it. You can set or bake your concealer or not, your choice.
step 3
OK, now we are mid day, you are working or running around and you catch yourself in a mirror, and shock horror, you notice that concealer is all creased, the under eye are looks all dry and all this is making ten years older than you are. Fear not, I have just a tip for you – and you can thank me later. I would suggest that you carry a miniature eye cream or oil with you. All you need to do is to gently pat a teeny tiny drop of oil or eye cream over the concealer and TA DA, you are looking perfect again! I carry either my beloved Bella Aura eye cream, which is wonderful and sinks in in seconds, not disturbing my make up; or some lightweight face oil (serum) decanted into teeny tiny cutesy 2ml roller bottle you see in the photo. That all there is to it, told you it will be simple! Not only you will fix your make up mishap, but you will give your skin a hydration boost, which it will appreciate. (and thank you if it could talk). By the way, I have found that using face mists doesn’t work in this case, while it might work for the whole face, I found it either moves my concealer or makes my mascara run, which is so not a good luck! So be a pro and cover your eyes when misting.
That’s all for now, thanks for reading!
If you want to read more of my tricks, see here. . For Ere Perez concealer review see this post, for Hynt Beauty Duet Perfecting Concealer review, see here.
Lots of Love,
Renata.
Green Life In Dublin green beauty blog
Enjoy my content? A tip into my PayPal Tip Jar - will get You my eternal gratitude and more awesome green beauty reviews Your way! I weed out all the greenwashing products so You won't have to.
Welcome back! And welcome if you are new here xoxo
Love Lula Beauty Box December 2018
I do realize I am way late with this post, I assure you I had my best intentions to post it on time last December, but time got away from me juggling all the normal work-family-life-blogging duties coupled with intense testing slash judging for The Beauty Shortlist Awards 2019 and Holiday preparations. So I posted this post on my IG page here and promised You to come back a month later, not only with my first impressions, but with a more well rounded review. Here I am, ready to give my two cents on all the products and the box in overall. Ready to get started? I am so ready.
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2018 Best Natural & Organic Products
So it is that time of the year, wonderful time of the year, my favourite time of the year – Green Beauty Yearly Favourites time of the year. If Green Life In Dublin Green Beauty Awards existed, these would be it! So let’s get started, shall we? We all know I love to talk and to review good products, so majority of them will have reviews either on their own, or as part of Favourites posts – so be sure to hit that search box either here or in my previous blog with 400+ posts here. Just a reminder, my skin is dry, uber sensitive and dermatitis prone. Hair is thin, but lots of it, with a sensitive scalp to boot. Lucky girl, I know 🙂
(Full disclosure, some, but not all, of the links are affiliate links, and I thank You for using them - they are at no extra cost to you as a consumer. All products mentioned here are tested thoroughly by me, and truly my Holy Grail products - I would never recommend anything that isn't my true favourite. Some of the products date back for years and haven't left my Yearly Favourites for well, years! I also want to point out that Google collects data while you browse my blog, but I think we all know that at this point.
Alteya Certified Organic Nourishing Rose Otto Face Serum
All amazing for different reasons, but I LOVE them equally. Mahalo has a review here, all others are still waiting their turn. After being a face oil fiend for years and years, I had to give them up due to developing dermatitis (which hates oils) but I still add them for winter, when my skin isn’t coping very well on it’s own in the harsh elements.
WATER/ ALOE BASED SERUM
Earthwise Beauty Nap In The Meadow
Alteya Organics Rose Otto Regenerating Concentrate
OIL BASED SERUM
see facial oils
Healing BALM
Mahalo Rare Indigo
May Lindstrom Blue Cocoon
Please let me explain why I chose these balms that are both uber expensive – it is purely because I need all the healing help I can get with my dermatitis, which sometimes flares up for no apparent reason, and blue tansy, which is present in both products, seems to be the magic that heals my skin. It is my face after all! While Mahalo Rare Indigo is a firm fave for the last three years (just check my 2017 & 2016 Favourites posts), I wanted to change things up a bit this year and purchased Blue Cocoon, which seems to be equally impressive. Pricy as they are, both jars last a year, which makes me justify the price point for them. I see more blue balms popping here and there, so I intend to try more of them out.
W3LL People Bio Tint Multi Action Moisturiser SPF30
Kimberly Sayer is what I used for the last four years or so, but it might be overthrown by the next two, which are newer discoveries, but oh-so-impressive. I’ll talk about them soon. W3LL People, if you are reading this, come back to EU! I’ll campaign to make it happen if I’ll need to!
I hope this was in any way interesting and/or helpful to you, and if it leads to at least one person finding a good product, then my work is done. Please be on the lookout for the reviews of many of these products, and let me know your favourites as well, so I could check them out!
Enjoy my content? A tip into my PayPal Tip Jar - will get You my eternal gratitude and more awesome green beauty reviews Your way! I weed out all the greenwashing products so You won't have to.
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Today I thought to share all posts from 2018, all 70 of them in one place – purely for your convenience! Some of you might now I blog for years, some of you won’t, so I thought to round up all the reviews in one convenient place – shall we get started?
![Love Lula Beauty Box June & July 2019 [AD]](https://www.greenlifeindublin.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/ll-June-19-1200x1200.jpg)
![Love Lula Blogger Picks February 2019 – Weleda, Tabitha James Kraan, Nature’s Wish [AD]](https://www.greenlifeindublin.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/ll-feb-19-1200x1200.jpg)
