Mixing it up; lip creams

In the eternal struggle for the perfect nude lip, I have purchased countless lipsticks, lipliners and creams, both high end and drugstore.

One that I had to share with you all was the Collection Work The Colour (as they are now called) "Cream Puffs". God, these are such an underrated product! Much like the NYX Matte Lip Creams, these are four creamy, buildable lip colours that you can find in Superdrug and Boots. They stay on ages too! At £2.99 each, I'm not complaining...

B-T Powder Puff and Angel Delight

I LOVE mixing these; and to achieve the perfect nude lips I use Powder Puff and Angel Delight . Together they make the most beautiful browny nude it makes me want to cry. Sometimes I'll add a little of Cotton Candy to add a hint of pink. Or I'll add Angel Delight and Cotton Candy for a dark pink nude. Or Powder Puff instead of Angel Delight. Confused? Same. Basically, mixing these creams creates endless lip colours, when you all need to buy two or three products. Fairy Cake, the fourth colour is a strong coral that I don't reach for much, but is nice when mixed with Powder Puff.

You do need to apply a balm, or even better a lip primer, before you use these as they aren't the most forgiving when it comes to chapped lips. I won't knock off points for that though because with ANY lip product you should exfoliate and moisturise before using.

(not my image) L-R Cotton Candy, Powder Puff, Fairy Cake and Angel Delight

Nahlabee xoxo

Makeup Revolution Blush Sticks: Review

Makeup Revolution kind of just popped out of nowhere, didn't it? Priding themselves as a company who make good quality products, but don't cost the earth, there was a MUA (another budget beauty brand) feel to the brand, but that certainly wasn't true!

Browsing the website, you can tell these products are for makeup lovers and are not cheap drugstore lip glosses and glitters (shout out Miss Sporty). There are a lot of interesting products like eye brow gels and blush palettes, but the one product that immediately took my attention were the Blush Sticks.

(not my image)

When I saw them I was instantly reminded of the Nars Multiples, and the Artist of Makeup (by Zukreat) Contour Sticks. I haven't ever tried the Nars Multiples but I did own an AOM contour stick. Sadly, it was a too dark for my skin and I only used it once (on my wedding day, risky I know). So I was on the hunt for something to replace it.

 I chose the shade Matte Malibu as it was the only brown shade, and Matte Rush to use as a highlight. There are "matte" versions of all four of the colours, as well as more sheer versions. At £5 each, I was expecting good sturdy packaging and a relatively good product. Packaging was good - usual thing. The texture of the product is extremely impressive, its very creamy and bendable, and has pretty good colour pay off. 

I don't love Matte Malibu; I like it but don't love it, as it runs a little too orangey for my liking.  I know it isn't intended to be a contour shade, so I can't really can't complain. That being said, it is SUPER pigmented, and you certainly can get away with it. Use a light hand and go over with a grey/brown powder such as Benefit's Hoola. Given that I am an NC42, it works pretty well. There's so much product that I doubt I'll ever need to repurchase again.

Makeup Revolution's Matte Malibu Blush Stick applied with one stroke (right) and built up (left)

Matte Rush isn't anything to right home about. Its okay. Not bad, not great either. As it is pretty light in colour, it doesn't show up well on my NC42 skin, so I have switched it on Mimi's NW25 skin instead. It's easy to cake this on, so you have to be careful otherwise you'll defeat the whole dewy ness. Incidentally, whilst they didn't deliver on this product  Makeup Revolution hit the ball out of the park with their Radiant Light powders, which I would strongly recommend! (review coming soon).

Makeup Revolution's Matte Rush Blush Stick, applied one stroke (right), and built up (left). Swatched on NW25 skin,

All in all, an interesting product. I prefer cream contours, and whilst I didn't really get on with Matte Rush, Matte Malibu is a nice contouring product! Though the brand in sold in Superdrug, they only stock these online.


Thats all for now folks!

Nahlabee xoxo

Accutane part 3? Yeah I think its that time

Hey Everyone!

I hope you are all well!

I thought its about time for another accutane update? Last time I posted about my accutane experience was a little over a month ago and I went from 40mg, to 60mg, and now I am on 80mg!!!




Okay so I feel like I need to show you my face currently so you can understand my pain.

These are my cheeks...

They are super spotty and sore, itchy and getting on my nerves. They actually make me want to cry. I hate leaving the house because I honestly feel like people will just see me and think I am diseased. I guess I am :'(

So yeah I'm 2 months and a week into Accutane, and so far all I see are spots spots spots. And they are actually driving me crazy, when I say they are sore, I'm not kidding I feel like my spots have gotten worse than ever, like I've had spots for about 4/5 years now constantly never left for a day, but I have never had this many spots? And even if I had this many, they were never this sore, these are actually painful and the skin is so dry that I just want to itch it all day long.

But every-time I touch my face, I get told off by Nahlabee. I know it makes it worse but its become a habit of mine, I touch my face without noticing.

I think it was how I used to check for new spots? and now it's just something I always do.

Anyway other than my super sore horrible spots, lets talk about other side effects...

So far I haven't had any or much headache, I get the few headaches here and there if I haven't had much water but that is expected.

Okay well the next thing is my eyes, they're so watery, all day long drip drip drip water down my face. I thought dry eyes meant they wouldn't water? but that clearly isn't the case, lately I've tried using hayfever eye drops which have helped a little, because the moisturising eye drops didn't seem to do much. So maybe it is hayfever? I don't even know anymore.

My nose, yet it doesn't actually bleed,  like a nose bleed, but it constantly has blood inside. Never have I ever wiped my nose and it was free from blood since being on accutane, and sometimes (sorry this is nasty) the boogers are so hard and bloody that they're actually really painful.

My lips, are constantly dry and peeling off, no matter how much I moisturise them, its never enough right now the edges are very rough and burn every time I open my mouth. Very horrible!!!!! Wearing lipstick isn't even an option.

What else could I mention, my scalp is super dry and flaky, and my head is the oilest part of my whole body. I don't really have oily skin, but my hair would get greasy the next day after a wash, so I used to wash my hair every other day if not everyday if I actually wanted to look nice. But my hair can go 3/4 days now without being greasy which is great, except for the fact that my scalp is actually dry and flaky!!!

I have patchy dry skin all over my body, especially my shoulders and my arms. I had a little rash on my hands but with extra moisturising it cleared up.

My face is very dry, no matter how much I moisturise its never enough, wearing make up is very hard and takes a long time trying to blend in the foundation to make it look like I'm not diseased and have weird patchy dryness on my face, or un-blended foundation because apparently dry skin means the foundation just doesn't want to be on your face? And the bumps on my face are just impossible to cover as it is, takes me ages of dabbing of foundation buildup to cover them out. It's actually really hard!

And I think I have saved the best till last, achy bones? Yeah in my last post I said I hadn't felt it yet. Well now I have! My knees and my ankles are the worst. Walking is painful. Even sitting hurts sometimes. Getting up from sitting down = pain. Walking down stairs? yeah takes me a long time. But the weird thing is I feel that exercising helps? I don't feel achy during exercising which I find weird, but after wards its not that much more achy. But the aches are defiantly here, I thought it was bearable aches that wouldn't really affect me, but they are quite bad :(

So to sum up how I feel about accutane right now, all I've seen is the bad side of accutane, all the symptoms but my spots haven't cleared up? I know Nahlabee said how much she loved accutane and what it did for her skin, I'm still waiting to find that love.

Alright my sweetpeas,until next time

Lots of love

Mimi xx

Ogx Hair Oils: Review

Ogx Hair Oils: Review

Hey guys! Sorry it's been a while since I've blogged...but I promise to be more up to date!

Thinning hair. Dry hair. Hair that breaks when you brush it. All the above? *raises hands*.

Due to some awesome African genes, I have naturally dry, coarse hair.  Dry hair, plus wearing a hijab for endless hours a day, alhamdulillah, has left me with thinning hair. About a year ago, a decided to take action. That's where hair oil came in...

As much as I know and believe that oiling your hair makes a difference, I just didn't have the time. My granny, bless her, has always tried to encourage me to oil my hair with coconut oil, and good old Amla oil. Whilst both do provide results, the effort of oiling my hair was just too much for me to handle. I hated how the oil would seep onto my pillows, and once, in Chemistry, when the guy next to  me asked "Whats that smell?" I had to wash my hair with shampoo three times to get it out. Safe to say, I was done with the traditional Pakistani method. 

So, I decided to try something new. I saw these in Boots once day, and I haven't looked back since! I've really noticed a difference since using these and my hair feels a lot thicker and shinier. What I love most about these oils is how weightless they are. They don't weigh your hair down like traditional oils, but still deliver results. 

After washing my hair, I apply a few pumps of oil, concentrating on the tips of my hair so I don't get greasy roots (yuck!). I use the Biotin oil, as well as either the Shea Butter oil, or the Coconut Oil. After working it through my tips I blow dry the oil into my hair. I don't know if its just my amateur impression but it blow drying my hair with the oil in seems to add to the luxurious feel. Its almost like a hot oil treatment only quicker and easier.

All in all, I can't say enough good things about these hair oils. My hair is thicker, stronger and a lot healthier than before.

You can find these OGX Hair oils at Boots and Superdrug.    

Nahlabee xoxo