The basics for this are my usual things: Everyday Minerals semi-matte foundation in Medium, and Everyday Minerals eyebrow powder in Auburn. I also used a little bit of Everyday Minerals blush in Memphis Rose and Catrice Ultimate Shine lipstick in Corallicious Pink.

On the eyes, I used the pinkish brown shimmer from the Sleek Storm palette as a base for the crease, and a Gosh eyeshadow stick in Love That Violet as a base for the lid. I then applied Cranberry from the Sleek Sparkle palette all over the lid, and a bit of Galactic from that same palettein the outer V and blended up into the crease. I also added a little bit of the pink/gold duochrome from the Sleek Original palette in the inner corner of the lid. On the lower lash line, I made a very thin line with my Urban Decay 24/7 liner pencil in Perversion and smudged that out with a little bit of black eyeshadow. Finally, I added a very thin black line on the upper lash line as well, using my Sleek Dip-It eyeliner, and used my YSL Shocking mascara to finish the look.

I'm still not a huge fan of the colour, but at least by going all out and using hot (almost neon) pink, it doesn't look like I've just been crying, as with pretty much any other pink eyeshadow I've ever tried. What do you think?

Sorry, spoilers. Let's start at the beginning, shall we? This is the Cristalliste shampoo for long and fine hair, by Kérastase. It is supposed to give you free-flowing, lightweight hair, according to the package. When I looked at the ingredient list, I noticed it didn't contain any SLS or SLES, which are fairly harsh cleaners that can leave your scalp or hair feeling dry, so that's nice.

I wash my hair every day, and normally use a shampoo first followed by a conditioner, whenever I do so. However, I didn't have the accompanying conditioner that goes with this shampoo (I'm assuming there is one, anyway :P) and I didn't want to ruin the results by using my own cheap drugstore conditioner after using this, so I tested it in a couple different ways on consecutive days. The first time, I just used this shampoo, without using any conditioner afterwards. My hair was a fair bit lighter and more voluminous once it dried, but it was also quite fluffy and static-y. So, the next day, I used this shampoo, still without any conditioner while in the shower, but then I applied a little bit of leave-in conditioner to the lengths once it was towel-dry. This reduced the dry fluffiness, but already diminished the added volume as well.

On the third day, I just used my normal conditioner (Andrelon Volume & Care) after washing my hair with this shampoo. This time, my hair looked and behaved (in terms of lightness) pretty much exactly the same as if I'd used my own shampoo. Finally, on the fourth day, I used this shampoo to wash out a coconut oil hair mask (I should maybe do a post on that some time...), without using any conditioner afterwards, which is what I normally do when using that hair treatment as well. Um. This was a minor disaster; my hair looked super greasy as soon as it dried after a nice fresh wash! Now, the coconut mask is obviously very oily, but my other shampoos never have any trouble washing it all out; this one clearly couldn't manage the task. I suppose it might have something to do with the lack of SLS?

I find it a bit hard to give a definitive judgement about this shampoo, since I'm assuming the line does have its own conditioner that you would normally use with this. If said conditioner is capable of smoothing down the hair while maintaining the light airyness, then this product line does have some benefits, since I don't remember ever using a shampoo before that managed to give my (normally very sleek and straight) hair this much extra volume. However, as much as I liked the extra volume, without any conditioner this shampoo is simply unusable for me, as it makes my hair way too dry and frizzy -- and when using my own conditioner, the added volume is pretty much gone instantly, meaning I might just as well have used my own shampoo, which is about six times as cheap. In that case, I'm not seeing any revolutionary improvements, basically making this another no-buy for me.

I was going to do some kind of elaborate FotD for Queen's Day -- and blog about it, of course. Then I realised Q-day 2012 took place just two days before my exams, so I would probably be spending most of my day inside, studying, rather than outside, partying. :P Suddenly, there did not seem to be that much need for a big fancy eye look, but I still wanted to do something vaguely Queen's Day-inspired. So, here's what I came up with:

This is the orange/copper colour from the Sleek Original palette in the crease, with the bold blue colour from the same palette on the lid. I blended the two together at the edge of the crease and added a black line along the lower lash line using the black colour from the Original palette and a pencil brush. I used my Sleek Dip-It liner on the upper lash line, and my YSL Shocking mascara to finish the look.

Honestly, this has to be one of the simplest looks I've posted in the history of this blog, haha. The only thing "special" about this look is that I normally probably wouldn't have thought to use these colours together, and it did actually turn out kind of nice. But, yeah... that was my quick & dirty Queen's day look. :P Hope you enjoyed :)

You'll need the following:

• one banana
• about two large handfuls of spinach (fresh, uncooked leaves)
• 1-3 teaspoons of honey

Start by adding a large handful of spinach to your blender, and add enough water to make sure it will blend down nice and smooth.

Blend, add the other half of the spinach (and some more water, if necessary), and blend again.

Finally, add the banana (peeled and broken into a couple of chunks), as well as honey to taste, and blend again until you have a nice smooth drink. It will look bright green, like this, but it will actually taste of banana and honey, with just a hint of an earthy/spinachy note.

This makes one serving, which contains (assuming you used about 2tsp honey) 2g protein, 29g carbs, 0.3g fat, and 3g fibre, for a total of 133 kcal. Try this as an alternative for your mid-morning latte -- you may find that it gives you the same energy boost without the post-caffeine crash :)

This is my eye without any make-up on.

Here's my eye with my usual €3 Etos mascara, without any other eye make-up.

And here's the €30 YSL mascara, on its own as well.

The Etos mascara in a typical "everyday" eye look...

...and the YSL mascara in the same look.

Okay, so be honest... if I'd told you all of these pictures were the same mascara, instead of two different ones, you'd probably have believed me, right?

You can't really tell from this pictures, especially since I didn't get the angle exactly the same on each day, but the YSL mascara lengthens my lashes slightly more than the Etos one. They both show a notable increase compared to my bare lashes, but if, say, my lashes look 50% longer than normal with the Etos mascara, then they look 60% longer with the YSL one. So, it does a good job there, but no amazing improvements compared to cheap drugstore mascara. If we compare volume/thickness rather than length, I actually feel the Etos mascara gives me more of that than the YSL one, though the added volume does come at cost of clumping my lashes together a bit more as well.

Really, I'm only seeing two main benefits of this mascara: one, it does a really good job of separating the lashes. Two, some (cheap) mascaras leave a faint black smudge under the eyes after several hours of wear, especially if you've been sweating or something, and I didn't notice that with the YSL mascara. Other than that, it does what it is supposed to do: give your lashes some extra length and volume and paint them black. But it doesn't, in my opinion, do a better job there than other mascaras, even though it does come at ten times the price. I'm actually glad I got to try this out for "free" like this, because now I know I'll probably never be buying this for myself.

The Chocomania body butter is one of those truly solid body butters rather than being a thick liquid, which melts upon application so you can actually spread it out. I do feel it's even more hydrating than my Anatomicals body butter, but this comes at the cost of not completely being absorbed into the skin. Even if I apply it as sparsely as possible, it leaves behind a slight sticky/greasy film on my skin for most of the day. The smell is... okayish, I guess. It's a bit too much "chemically flavoured chocolate candy" instead of an actual natural chocolate scent, for my taste.

But the #1 drawback of the Chocomania butter is actually the taste. Now, before you go all "dude! that's why you're not supposed to eat it!" on me, let me explain... If I apply this in the morning, my hands (when touching my lips or something) and even any food that I hold/eat tastes awful. Even if I wash my hands multiple times over the course of the day, the taste remains for the better part of it. It's like a super harsh chemical kind of flavour, as if I'd just doused my hands in rubbing alcohol or acetone or something prior to eating. It's so annoying I've actually taken to only applying this body butter right before I go to bed, because then at least the taste is gone from my skin after a whole night plus morning shower. I definitely won't be buying that one again. I guess that may also -- subconsciously -- be part of the reason why I never bothered to review this on the blog. On the one hand, it's one of the most hydrating butters/lotions I've ever used, but on the other, there's so many drawbacks!

So, that all being said, let's move on to this body butter! This is the one from my Glossybox, made by a brand called H₂O+ that I have to admit I'd never heard of until now. The hydrating base is mostly made of coconut and palm seed oil plus shea butter, and the active/repairing ingredients are green tea, wakame and aloe vera, among others. The first thing I noticed upon squirting this out of its little sample tube was that it's very thick. It's not a solid butter (obviously, since it comes in a tube), but it's definitely thicker than your average body lotion, as you'd expect a body butter to be. Because it felt so thick and rich, I was worried that it would leave a greasy/sticky residue behind like the Chocomania body butter. Fortunately, there weren't any problems there. I applied this quite generously -- I could've made the little tube last for about 1.5 applications if I'd used it sparsely, but not a full second one, so that seemed a bit silly and I ended up using the whole thing in one go -- and it still got absorbed fully in about two minutes. It left my skin feeling very soft and smooth all day.

The scent is a little odd initally. I have no idea how to describe it, but I'm sure it has something to do with that green tea and seaweed in there. However, that fades as soon as it's absorbed, and then you're left with a nice fresh, very slightly flowery scent that lasts for the remainder of the day. Oh, and there are no weird taste issues here. Having become slightly paranoid after the strange Chocomania experience, I even touched my fingers directly to the tongue briefly before washing my hands, but it's completely neutral.

So, would I buy this again? Well... probably not. It does hydrate a bit better than my Anatomicals body butter; probably on the same level as my Chocomania butter, but without all the drawbacks that that one has. However, it's also three times more expensive as the Anatomicals butter and still twice as expensive as the Chocomania one, and I'm not seeing any revolutionary improvements to justify that price difference. Besides the price, though, I cannot think of a single negative thing to say about this body butter. So, as long as you don't mind paying €20/$21 for a body butter, this would definitely be a very nice pick. (Fun fact: I looked up this product on H₂O+'s own website, and among the 38 people who reviewed it there, it's rated a solid 5.0 out of 5 possible stars.)

I used Everyday Minerals foundation powder in Medium, Catrice lipstick in Like My High Heels, and Everyday Minerals eyebrow powder in Auburn.

On the eyes, I started by applying my Urban Decay 24/7 eyeliner pencil in Perversion to the lower lashline, and then blending that out with some black eyeshadow and a pencil brush. I also drew a line right into the crease and blended that out with the black shadow as well; so there was a black smokey base in the innermost part of the crease (not going as high up as in these finished pictures). Finally I also applied the liner to my upper and lower waterlines.

Next, I took a blending brush and the darkest grey shimmer from the Sleek Graphite palette, and blended that into the crease, going about halfway up to the brow bone. On the part of the crease closest to the nose I used the second-to-darkest shade, and extended it all the way on to the corner where the crease meets the nose and inner corner of the eye. I applied the purple shimmer from the same palette to the eyelid. On the inner 1/3 or so of the lid, I added a little of the lightest grey shimmer on top, and applied this colour in the inner corner of the eye as well. To finish the look, I added some Sleek Dip-It black eyeliner and my usual Etos Xtra Volume black mascara.

• about 6 to 8oz fruits of choice
• about 1/2 cup water, milk, or juice of choice
• 2 tbsp of chia seeds

Add your fruit to a blender. I'm using about 2.5oz each of raspberries, blueberries and blackberries. I bought these frozen and allowed them to thaw in the fridge over the course of the day, which caused them to release some of their juices. This is no problem at all, just pour those right in there as well.

Next, give them a good blend. At this point in the blending process, you may have more of a chunky, thick paste than an actual smoothie, especially if you're using a $25 blender like I am. :P

So, add some water, milk or fresh fruit juice to help, and blend some more. (I'm using milk.)

Transfer the smoothie mixture to a bowl and stir in your chia seeds. Place this in the fridge overnight. The tiny seeds will soak up quite a bit of the moisture in your mix and release a sticky gel. This makes the smoothie coagulate into a (thin) jelly-pudding like substance.

The finished product, come the next morning. You may have to experiment a bit with the exact amounts of liquid and chia to get a proper pudding consistency, but it should at any rate be thick enough to eat with a spoon rather than drinking.

Here's one from a different morning. This one has raspberries, mango, milk and chia. So, how do these puddings hold up, nutrition-wise? The nutritional value for the first one (3 kinds of berries + milk) comes out to this: 13g protein, 34g carbs, 14.8g fat and 18.8g fibre, for a total of 310 kcal. About half of the fat are omega-3 and omega-6 essential fatty acids, and that amount of fibre is over half your recommended daily intake, right there at breakfast. As a consequence, this simple, light pudding will probably keep you full for most of the morning, especially if you drink plenty of water to go with it.

The polish is also very opaque, probably one of the least sheer polishes I own. I did end up doing two coats because it intensified the colour just a tad bit more compared to one, but you could definitely get away with just a single coat.

The colour is just amazing, and perfect for summer if you ask me. It is a very bright, almost neon pink with cool undertones, kind of like a fuchsia colour. It dries slightly less glossy than most polishes I own, which I'm assuming is because of that neon-ness (true neon polishes actually tend to dry completely matte). It does dry very fast, by the way. I applied my second coat immediately after the first, without letting that one dry first, and the whole thing was still dry to the touch in under 5 minutes, and completely hardened out in about 15 to 20. Oh, and that's without a quick-dry top coat.

You can't really tell in the other pictures, but there's actually very very fine pink and purple shimmer particles in this polish! It is just a shimmer, not actual glitter, so I expect it won't give any problems come removal time. It gives the already bright colour that little bit of extra vibrancy. All in all, a very cool colour! :)

I received my first box today, and the first thing I have to address is the super cute packaging. It's not just a shipping box with some items thrown in; the products come in a sturdy light pink cardboard box, wrapped in black satiny paper tied with ribbons. It really does feel like unwrapping a gift :D

After unwrapping it, this is what I found. Pretty neat! There's a full size Essie nail polish, in an awesome bright fuchsia pink colour. I didn't actually own any Essie polishes yet, and I didn't have this kind of colour in my stash yet either, so I'm quite happy with that! This polish has an RRP of € 9.99.

The other four products are samples. There's an Yves Saint Laurent mascara, type Volume Effet Faux Cils Shocking. I'm excited to try this because I've never used such a high-end mascara before. I think the most expensive mascara I've ever owned was a mid-range L'Oreal one that went for about €15, and on a daily basis I actually use a low-budget store's home brand mascara that's like €2.99. So I'm curious to see whether this will really make any difference! The full product retails for €30.48, and this is a sample of about 1/3 that size.

Next up is a shampoo by Kérastase, which is a brand I'd never heard of until now. I suppose this makes sense since, according to the bottle, it's only sold through hairdressers and salons, and my last visit to a hairdresser was about six years ago. (Yeah, no, I'm not even kidding. I occasionally trim the ends a little in my own bathroom, and other than that I've just been letting my hair grow out for the last several years. :P) Anyway, this shampoo is intended for long, fine hair, and is supposed to make it nicely light and airy while still having a lot of shine. Let's see what that will do to my super straight and sleek hair. ;) This normally retails for €16.50, and the sample is 1/3 the size of the full product.

The little tube holds a body butter by H2O+ called Spa Sea Salt Hydrating Body Butter. This is the only product in the box that I would truly consider a sample instead of a "mini/travel size" or something like that, since it only contains 15ml of product (1/16 of the full size tube), which, given that you apply it all over your body, will probably only last once. Still, it'll be nice to try it out. The full product has an RRP of € 20.70.

Finally, there's the product that surprised me the most when I unwrapped the contents of the box -- Revitalash Advanced Eyelash Serum. I read a few reviews of this stuff a year ago or so; if you apply it to your lash line daily, you're supposed to get very long and full lashes naturally (i.e. before applying any mascara or whatever) within a couple of weeks. I was actually kind of curious to try it back then, until I saw the price: a single mascara-sized tube (only 3ml of product) sets you back €99.95. So, I was quite excited to find a whole 1ml sized sample tube of this in my box! I suspect that should be sufficient to test it out for a month or so, long enough to see whether it actually makes any difference. Pretty cool! :)

So, all in all the products in my box have a value of about €55, not bad considering the €12.50 I paid. ;) Also, the fun part is obviously getting to try out a bunch of products you otherwise would never have used -- like how I'd never even heard of Kérastase or H20+ before. I should note that the contents of the boxes vary per person. Judging from the other posts on April's box I've seen around the web, I'm guessing everyone got the YSL mascara and the shampoo, as well as an Essie polish, though everyone seems to have received a different colour of that. Each box appears to contain a different type of H2O+ skincare product as well. And then whereas I got the cool Revitalash sample as my fifth product, some others just got a small perfume sample? I dunno if that has anything to do with this being my first box and them wanting to have me extra satisfied, but I'm definitely happier with my pick ;)

Reviews on these products will obviously be coming up as soon as I've had a chance to try them :D