Friday, January 16, 2015

Frest Start - Ipsy Unboxing January 2015

 Flippity Ippity Ipsy.

I will be honest. My enjoyment with the service is kind of - not waning? - but it's not as exponential as it was before. November gave me an amazing bag, and December's was rather decent but I don't know. Even with getting nice products I have grown stale with the blogging aspect. That's really half of the excitement; the review. I had a partial post typed up for December in addition to filming myself opening it. Watching the video it was not something that exciting. Like I used a webcam and my lighting was the bad sun-already-went-down kind.

Plus, the butter lip balm I got was quickly stolen from my purse by a pair of jerk-brothers and annihilated. Though I got the boring nude color, I actually really liked it. Dallas I'm assuming was the instigator, because he is truly the nosy one. That is despite Nightshade sporting a less cute sheltie nose, and instead a long and thin collie muzzle.

Maybe I'll finish the post for december, but it was hard to get arsed about it. Even though all the products I got were indeed pretty awesome. In fact except for the hair styling produc (and of course that cute balm..) t, I have been regularly using everything. That's kind of a definition of a great bag.

So like the theme of the bag denotes, this is a fresh start. It's time to get excited about the arbitrary blogging again. Lord knows that if a lot of my favorite bloggers are starting to poof on the internet, at least I can continue.

Let's start backwards from normal. The bag. It's blue on one side and a somewhat whitish cream (or is it just my lighting?). The zipper is salmon which is very cute in terms of color theory. It's a strange material, textured woven plastic or something. This bag is just fine. It's innocuous and the zipper works, unlike my December bag.


LashFood

Phyto-Medic Eyelash Enhancer


 0.5 ml/3 ml
one month trial supply adjusted to $13.33
Buy the full four month supply here for $80

This is actually a fairly valuable sample, because the full size is a grotesque $80. It is roughly a one month sample, so hey in a month I can share what I thought. According to the envelope it came in, upwards 85% of people had results of length and 100% of people thought their lashes were fuller and denser. This is all based on independent studies, hosted by JB Cosmetics group I'm assuming. Probably no objectivity. Also that is after four months. Perhaps this sample does not have enough juice to push into that. Either way I am anxious to do this test because what could it hurt?

This product was pointless and would only give psuedo results. It was like a sugar pill. 

Probelle

Into the Blue Nail Lacquer

full size available here for $6

After nearly a year of Ipsy I finally received a nail polish! Great timing with all sarcasm intended, as I just started a job that prohibits nail polish. It's fine for today because I need not go in to work until Tuesday and here it is friday. I can wear this gorgeous bugger for the weekend. What an absolutely lovely shade of blue, which knocks on the door of my exact favorite hue. It's an amazing cream color and reminds me of my husband's eyes, so I'm pretty thrilled.

This has been on my toes and on my nails when I had consecutive days off. I love it and it's decent in two coats. Thin in formula, it really does best with three. 
Two coats. And pretty Dallas. 
Three coats and Nightshade. With a toy he is in progress of ruining. It shortly went in the garbage. 

Elizabeth Mott

All Over Shadow Brush

full size available here for $9.99

Nicely contained packaging and an eye-catching design. The brush is dense and super soft. If I were not wearing gobs of blue and black eyeshadow, I would go upstairs and test the brush. I am sure this will work quite nicely, even as a regular fluffy brush. With this I am pleased.

I have no additional comments. It works fine as a blending brush. 

Pacifica

Natural Mineral Coconut Eyeshadow in Ethereal

Sample adjusted to $3.50
Shop Pacifica's eyeshadow here

Fugging this stuff again. By far the worst eyeshadow I had ever used came to us in May's Ipsy in that god awful duo. The colors refused to apply to my lids and barely swatched. My chintsy plastic case broke immediately.

It's very hard to find their products online. I found a larger palette with the darker color, Treasure in it, but without a size listed. I have no idea where to adjust the price on this one, so I will default the price to $3.50. That is the price of a similarly sized eyeshadow pot in their four pan eyeshadow palette that was $14.

This though is housed in it's own pretty little blue box, patterned to flow directly with the Pacifica design on their palette. I receieved the lighter of the two which is a small disappointment because I need another bronze like a hole in the head (translation. I still need another bronze because bronze). So far the comments on the product page are much more welcoming than what we had last year with Pacifica eyeshadow. 

It does actually work beautiful and has made many a neutral work-eye sparkle. 

Malin + Goetz

Mojito Lip Balm

0.20 oz/0.35 oz
Sample adjusted to $8.40
full size available here for $12

This is a repeat, and somewhat defies the fresh start theme. So far we have had a number of repeat products throughout this bag. Same song and dance samples are getting smaller and the varieties getting fewer.

This item is not particularly thrilling. I have been making my own lip balm for two years and I have loved how moisturizing that has been. It's based on a Burt's Bee knock-off recipe and I've honed it over every batch and it's a nice heavy lip balm that will stay with you for hours and absolutely superior when using before bed time. Still it's winter and my lips have been feeling the weather.

I have never tried a mojito. I cannot judge the flavor as a comparison, but it has little flavor. Slight mint. I kind of hate the Carmex type application tube, but it's worth it if it's an amazing product that can conquer winter lip stings. It feels like a really gel-heavy lip gloss, and may be a tad too sticky. Of course I am going to use this whole thing up, but I am not like dropping my pants over it. I just hope that the balm improves upon my lips winter weathering. The balm does feel soothing and will be nice overall.

I lost it recently, but it has been a luxury for my lips. 

Bag Value.

Out of the ten dollars invested on January first, I reaped products with a retail value of $41.22.

I would like to start something of a recap. Such as in February, I would like to add how i felt about January's bag. Kind of like my preface in the beginning of this post referencing to my (unposted) December bag. Let's see if i remember to do that.