May you be Blessed!

Hello Readers,

December has been a really trying and busy month for me. On the good side, my husband and I celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary and we went on a short holiday to Bangkok to celebrate. Its been a wonderful 10 years, with its ups and downs but more ups than downs I must assure you!

I also came home from the holiday being sick and staying sick for weeks after - it started off with sore eyes and the flu and the flu all over again!

I took time off in preparation for Christmas and only just managed to recover to bake cookies and cakes to be enjoyed by family on Christmas day. It was a curious Christmas for us in certain parts of the city - at around 6.30pm that evening, we were plunged in darkness! A call to TNB (our power suppliers) confirmed that there was a major problem at a substation nearby. So when anyone in Malaysia says "major problem" you sorta know that it is indeed major! The power was only restored at around midnight! It was a hot and humid Christmas evening indeed.

I am looking forward to the new year, dear readers, only because this blog has been a great adventure to me and it has forced me to really think about the products I use - hence the lack of posts everyday. I simply cannot bring myself to write about a product and give my views on it unless I have tried it and I can see some results or have good before and afters to show you.

I thank you for your patience and support - to Pugnes who was my only reader for the longest time and to my fellow bloggers, Vivawoman whose quest to share with us the benefits of using natural products is wonderful to ParisB who inspired me to write.

I hope that you will continue to have faith in me as I continue this journey.

I wish you all a New Year full of Blessings........

Hada Labo - Super Hyaluronic Acid Moisturizing liquid

I happened to be in Jusco Wangsa Maju yesterday evening and thought I would pop by Guardian Pharmacy to check out if they carry the much raved about Hada Labo Super Hyaluronic Acid Moisturizing liquid. To my surprise, they did and a small stand was set up right at the front of Guardian so you cannot miss it. I found a bottle and looked around to see if there were a few hundred women ready to pounce on the same item too because I had read that these little gems were sold out in many other places! I purchased a bottle of this and had thoughts of being greedy and buying another bottle just in case……but changed my mind. At RM 40.90, this is a very reasonably priced item and if it can do what it claims, then we have got a winner on our hands!

Hada Labo Super Hyaluronic Acid Moisturizing promises to provide hydration and nourishment to the skin and the payoff is radiant and crystal clear skin. Now how many hands would go up at the promise of RADIANT and crystal CLEAR skin? I know mine will in a heartbeat.

In my teens and well into my 20’s, I had a face full of pimples and had to battle scars which were unsightly. My skin improved in my 30’s and I have a clear face with no scars now which I love. I do remember telling myself when I was younger that one day if my face became clear I would wear no makeup to show off my skin! This was because I always used to hide under thick foundations to cover up the scars and hated it! I am happy to say that I pretty much kept my promise and I do use much less now and am not afraid to leave the house with clean skin and a slick of lipgloss.

Back to Hada Labo, the function of Super Hyaluronic Acid is the ability to retain moisture and do it better than plain Hyaluronic Acid and the claim is that one gram of Hyaluronic Acid can hold up to 6 litres of water. This results in more moisture retained in the epidermis or skin thus making it soft and supple.

I used it last night before going bed and the SA said to put four drops in the palm of your hand, rub to spread it and then pat on your face. For me the four drops were too much and I ended up patting the liquid on my neck and finished it off by patting the excess on the backs of my hands. This morning I tried using three drops and that was just ideal. I am unable to comment on the claims just yet but once I have used the product for a few weeks, I will present my findings.

ELF Plumping Lip Glaze

These are two ELF products from a haul several months back. I purchased two colors of the Plumping Lip Glaze namely Ruby Kiss and Mocha Ice. It comes with the lip color on one side and the clear lip plumper on the other side. This has a doe foot applicator which can be a nuisance once you get to the last bit of the product and find that you cannot extract it. It really frustrates me when this happens as I hate to waste at least 4 or five applications worth of product.

Ruby Kiss

Mocha Ice

I bought this out of interest of the claim that it can plump up my lips and leave them feeling moisturized at the same time as I am all for lip products that moisturize especially. I don’t know about you ladies out there but for some reason, by lunchtime, my lipstick tends to do a disappearing act and I look all washed out without any color on my lips. What really works for me is Revlon’s Colorstay Mineral Lipglaze – of which I have a strong bond to. These are the only products I have discovered do far that stay on my lips and leave them feeling moisturized. As for plump lips, well I have been blessed with full lips - a little too full in my opinion but I am grateful so I cannot complain. Hence, I thought, it would be good to see if indeed the claim that it would plump my lips holds true.

This is what the eyeslipsface website claims that the Lip Glaze would do:-

Forget costly Collagen injections, or those painfully stinging glosses, stimulate your senses to a refreshed full perfect pout with e.l.f. Plumping Lip Glaze! e.l.f. proudly presents a revolutionary lip plumper, infusing natural ingredients that awaken your senses for fresh, volume enhanced, and moisturized lips. This dual sided Plumping Lip Glaze has a tinted color for a subtle plump or a clear gloss that power plumps your lips, use together and instantly feel the lip enlarging effects!

I love both the colors that I chose and as you can see, I have also included a swatch of the clear gloss next to the color Mocha Ice.

Both colors actually work for my skin tone. Don’t be alarmed at how red Ruby Kiss is, it actually applies rather sheer. Mocha Ice is also as rich as it looks in the swatch. I do use this on its own without the clear gloss, but because it is sheer, I sometimes like to layer it over another color. When applied to the middle of the lower lip, it gives a nice highlight to the pout.

Both the lip color and the clear gloss have a very strong scent which is rather medicinal and not appealing at all. You will feel a little ‘tightening’ on your lips for a minute or so after application but there was no significant plumping of my lips. I will say that I did not notice much difference perhaps because my lips are already full. Also, the lip plumping effects did not seem to last beyond the first few minutes when you feel the tightening sensation.


No one noticed anything different about my lips and it was not as earth shattering as I had expected. Perhaps if your lips are on the thinner side, you might be able to see a slight difference.


For now, I ignore the clear gloss and use the two colors on days that I want a slight hint of a color on my lips and nothing too strong. The only thing that keeps me from reaching for this again and again is the awful medicinal smell. Hopefully this reaches the ears of the people at eyelipsface and they will do something about it.

Birthday Nails!

This is a design I did for my precious daughter who celebrated her 8th birthday on the 23rd. She had asked me to do her nails for her birthday and I wanted her to have something sweet on her special day. Besides, school is now out in this part of the world so it is good that she gets to enjoy looking at her nails for a while.

My little girl simply adores the color blue...so most of what we buy her usually has some blue in it. Hence I chose this bright and cheery blue color from Etude House.

As you can see in this picture below, she is posing with a little doggie soft toy which she calls "Vanilla". Vanilla has been with her since she was a few months old and my little girl usually has him cuddled in her arms when she goes to sleep every night.

I'm sure you are wondering why, dear reader, we call him Vanilla.....well, when my husband first brought him home, my daughter was only a few months old and could not talk yet, so we decided that he needed a name and came up with Vanilla because of his slightly milky color.

He is such a cutie. However, if you see, my daughter has her hands on the top of Vanilla's head in the photo's - this is because there is a big hole there! This was unfortunately caused by her younger sister poking a pencil through his head one day!!

The design that I chose for this Konad was a cute little bow ( see plate M71 below) done using the Konad Special nail polish in white. She initially decided on the design of the girls head on the left but it was a little too big to fit on to her wee nails.

Do you like this design dear readers?

Christmassy Nails!

Christmas is but a few short weeks away and already I am excited! The children have dragged out and dusted off last years Christmas CD's and the songs are really adding to the festive feel around our home.

So, dear readers, I decided to do a Konad with a Christmas theme.

Below are the colors that I chose for this nail design. You can also see the Konad stamping set that I have used. My first stamping set is the smaller stamper and plastic scraper. I much prefer this one which I purchased at InQBox at One U.

I like this set because I am able to grip the stamper better and there are two ends one large and one smaller, (the green end which is hard to see in this picture) which I use to stamp on my little pinky. As I mentioned in previous posts, my first few attempts at stamping designs were awful because my stamper refused to pick up the design. I now know that you should always use a fine file to file your stamper before you begin your very first stamping - this works like a dream as the finely buffed rubber surface picks up the design well.

All the colors I used including the Etude House clear coat.

Here are the details of the colors that were involved in this Konad:-

Etude House - No. 40 - (A sheer pink with subtle glittery goodness in it!) I used 2 coats of this.

Elianto - No. 40 (what a coincidence that both are No.40!) - Grape Wine.

Etude House - Clear Nail Top Coat - No. 05

Not really good for Konads as they smudge the design - I do have the Special Konad clear nail varnish but chose to use this one instead.....bummer!

Etude House - Mini French - Gold
This was used to add accents - altho' my legendary crap skills at photo taking did not capture the golden goodness on my nails well.

The M63 image plate was used to create this design.

There is no close up of this nail because in my excitement to capture this on film before my little girls smudged them, I forgot to clean up my nails and they look so bad!

Kiehl's "Berry 1851" Lip Gloss

I purchased this Lip Gloss last Christmas! So its been sitting in my stash for almost a year, not getting as much love as it should!

This lip gloss is called Berry 1851 and it is quite lovely to wear as it is not sticky and gives a natural look to my lips.

I don't know why I have not used this as much - I guess I am too lazy to use a lip brush to apply this! The gloss comes out of an angled top and dispenses the amount you need depending on how much pressure you use while pressing the tube.

There is a smell to this gloss which I quite like but am unable to put a finger on exactly what it smells like though! If any of you out there reading this has an idea, please let me know!

The color is a creamy reddish pink shade and is not as sheer as you would expect a gloss to be which is great for me because I do not like sheer lip glosses worn on its own. You see, my top lip is slightly darker than my bottom lip and anything that is too sheer will show the color difference.

As you can see from the swatch of this Gloss, there is a little oily bit at the bottom from not using it for quite a while. However, the fragrance has not changed and a good shake mixed the formula up to its former glory.

I like this for days when I want to have a little pop of color on my lips or for when my eye make-up is strong.

KOTW - Konad of the Week!

Please say hello to my Konad of the Week!


For this Konad I started out with a clear coat of polish and added a French Tip.

I saw a really good tip via youtube on using sticky tape (cellophane tape or cellotape) to do the french tip instead of the special french tip stickers that are commonly used. I was quite interested to know whether this would really work because the last time I used the french tip stickers, it left a sticky film on my painted nails and I had to take off the polish and start over!


This is how this NOTW was done. I painted a clear coat of polish on my nails and waited 10 minutes for it to dry well. I then snipped up 10 small pieces of cellotape. Once my nails were really dry, I stuck the tape carefully across to do a straight french tip. I then painted on Sally Hansens white French Tip color twice and waited for that to dry well before I took off the cellotape. I then carefully peeled off the cellotape and voila, perfect french tips without leaving a sticky film on my nails!


I then stamped a design from M71 to the tips using the Dark Maroon Special Nail Polish

This design that you see on the M71 is the one that I used on my tips. Below is a close-up of my nail.

After about 3 days, I got a little tired of the design and added this from the M57. Again, I used cellotape to achieve this design! I taped off the tips and stamped the design to the rest of my nail. As you can see on my middle finger, I did not really do a good job of stamping the design, I was a little tired that evening...

If you are doing a french tip, why not try using cellotape instead of french nail stickers?

I hope you enjoyed viewing my little Konad adventure!