Wednesday 31 October 2012

Watsons Sale Y'all!!

Today is the Watsons Members Preview sale!! At selected Watsons outlets from 12 to 11pm~ I always take a lot of damage at these sales...and today was no exception =_=

AFC Collagen Box set + Konjac Sponge,
Assorted makeup from Heroine Make, BrowLash and Maybelline

I doubt anyone has never been to one of these but there's basically huge discounts on a large range of products, I'm talking up to 50% with extra bonuses for Watsons members. Not a Watsons member? Pop by if you're a DBS credit/debit holder, you're legit too! =D

Happy Halloween~

Have a beautiful Halloween~
 I love this photo, if you look at it for awhile, the darkness starts to eat into my face a little..

Monday 29 October 2012

No more oil clogs! - Laneige Light Balancing Emulsion for Oily/Combination skin

If you have read my 'More About..' page up there *points*, you will know that I have a problem with teeny little oil plugs along my jawline. Apparently, my skin is having trouble balancing the oil inside with the lack of hydration on the surface so once I solve the hydration problem, I should be, quite literally, in the clear~

I'd played around with several other moisurisers/hydrating lotions from Bioessence, HadaLabo, Kanebo, L'oreal...etc but everything seemed to want to make little oil huts on my face!! The clogging stayed despite excruciating extraction sessions at the beauty salon T_T UNTIL:

Approx S$34 from Singapore Changi Airport Duty Free

YES! Finally! Something that worked for me! T_T

Saturday 27 October 2012

KATE Mineral BB Gel Cream - Is it a gel or cream?

You're no stranger to BB Creams by now but I think this is a fairly recent addition in Singapore...just launched in May 2012~ I was really drawn to the idea of a BB Gel =)


S$25.50 from Watsons

This discovery comes after I've been using my Kanebo White C BB cream faithfully for almost a year which is really good too but when I noticed the almost S$10 difference (Kate is a makeup sub-brand under Kanebo btw), I had to try it!

Thursday 25 October 2012

Detox in a Box - is the AFC Cho Beauty for real?

Ah yes. The dreaded ambush of ninja kilos..I know the feeling so well~~~~ *anguished look*

As mentioned some posts back, I've put on some weight recently and so invested in a few of the ever popular short-cut dieting products. Today, I'll discuss one of the more popular methods of slimming: Detox programmes. The product in particular is AFC's Cho Beauty - Inner Cleanse System which boasts 5 patents and the provision of 101 billion FK-23 + Bifidus Bacteria (aka good bacteria that aids in smoother, more efficient digestion):

 
 
Now, AFC is one of my preferred beauty supplement brands which is why I picked it. 'Cho Beauty' loosely translates into 'Super Beauty' and, if you've been to drugstores in Tokyo, is one of the gajillions of slimming products available in the land of the rising sun. Purchased from (where else) Watsons on sale for S$66.90 (U.P S$74.90) per box of 30 sachets, I'm now 2 weeks into the intensive detox programe.
 
While I do not believe that any manufactured products will magically help one shed 20 kilos in, say,  2 months, I DO believe in jumpstarting your system for a more effective diet.
 

Wednesday 24 October 2012

Biore - Get Powdery Perfect on Muggy Days!

For frequent visitors to Japan or Japan-holics, this is probably nothing new. In the summer months, a variety of cooling sheets, powder sheets, blotting papers..etc will pop up in drugstores and department stores all over Japan. Biore's Powder Sheets are quite new in Singapore though~



Extremely popular in Japan (of course other Japanese brands will have similar offerings), the powder sheets retail for S$3 for a 10 sheet pack at the local Watsons but are currently on offer at about S$2.50. Looks like your regular wet wipes right? Well, not quite~

Sale Time!!!

Hitting the Shiseido sale later~ Can't wait!! =D~~~
For those fuzzy about this, you might wanna hit:

Shiseido Singapore Office
Orchard Building 1 Grange Rd
#12-01

The Shiseido Fall/Winter Sale offers brands under the Shiseido label like ettusais, Maquillage, Majolica Majorca and Cle de Peau Beaute~ It's just for today and tomorrow (24th & 25th Oct), 10 - 8pm!

See you there~ =)

Thanks to Arissa for the heads-up!! (^_^)/ \(^_^)

Monday 22 October 2012

Nothingness to Somethingness with BrowLash EX Volume Lash Fiber!

I know falsies have by now taken the world by storm (=_= not the best news for people like me who have toes for fingers, can't get them falsies on without struggling for a good half hour at least) but I still love my mascaras and this particular one from BrowLash (although not a new product) is fast becoming one of my favourites~


 

Retailing for S$24.90 at Watsons, it's not too overpriced from it's original 1,575yen pricetag, making it that much easier to pick off the shelves ^_^  The BrowLash range has been a permanent fixture on the Watsons shelves but buried among all the other Japanese drugstore brands, it might blend into the surroundings abit too well.

The same range includes a Lash Sculpture Long Separate mascara (130% more length!) that I wasn't too inclined to try as it uses a comb type brush...  But anyhoo, this is one of the mascaras with no testers available so I hope this review will come in useful to some readers. Shall we then?

Sunday 21 October 2012

Mini Haul Alert!

I've been doing a spot of shopping recently and these are some of my beauty drawer newbies!! I'm particularly excited to start on the Nuxe cleansers but I've just started on my new Shiseido Perfect Milk so I'll just have to hold my horses~


Whee!!! (*^o^*)


Friday 19 October 2012

Kiwi Quicky?

Hi! How's your week so far? ^_^ I'm having a busy week running errands all over town, which translate into breaking into a sweat abit more than I'd like. Hope yours is going nice and slow~~

Today I bring to you a product I've been using on and off for about 6 months. It's from Lovemore, a Taiwanese brand popular for their wide range of masks. I picked up the New Zealand Kiwi Acnes All-Out Set for S$24.90 at Watsons out of curiousity and because once again, my blackheads were calling for attention.

 

Thursday 18 October 2012

Tanaka Facial Massage - Beauty at your Fingertips

If you recall, I mentioned the lymphatic facial massage as part of the Asian Skincare Routine in a previous post. Well, here's the promised elaboration~~~

I use the Tanaka routine by Japanese skincare expert Tanaka Yukuko that's really fast and easy~ The idea is that a facial massage focusing on lymph nodes after removing your sheet mask, or with your favourite essential oil or cream, will help absorbency of the remaining essence as well as improve your circulation and help skin cell renewal by encouraging detoxification. However, OVERcirculation is not a good idea for oily or acne-prone skin types as it agitates the oil glands...so you might want to avoid this step if your skin belongs to that category.

The following videos off Youtube will show you how~

Video 1 - in Japanese, demo plus a little Q&A from the guests




Video 2 - in English, full length tutorial split into 4 parts. This is only Part 2, which is the one that shows the DIY technique (starts at the 1:45 point in the video).



If anything, this massage is definately relaxing at the end of the day and puts you in the right state of mind for bed. I haven't been doing this long enough to see drastic slimming results but I can confidently say that my cheeks are less puffy and my cheekbones are slightly more defined that before! This was previously just a suspicion of mine until a colleague asked if I was using shading powder on my cheeks =D


I mentioned this massage to a number of friends and colleagues and was surprised that nobody had heard of it. If you've tried this before, how did it work on you? =D

Tuesday 16 October 2012

The Asian Skincare Routine

I got confused awhile back about my skincare product sequence after purchasing an emulsion from Laneige. Emulsion? It was my first product with that term and it threw me off a little. It looks like a moisturiser, feels like a moisturiser, description seems to be that of a moisturiser...but is it a moisturiser?

My search to define this product's place in my routine led to checking out the whole skincare routine according to Asia. And by Asia I'm leaning towards Japan 'cos let's face it, Japanese women seem to age ridiculously well...I have colleagues in their 40s who could pass for early 30s!

Sunday 14 October 2012

First OOTD~

I was in town over the weekend to pick out some new comics for the shelf =D Yes, I'm one of those girls who scour the comic bookshelves at the local Kinokuniya. I'm recently rediscovering the horror genre in Japanese comics, especially those by Junji Ito. His illustration style of uncompromising grossness appeals to the horror geek in me~ But I digress...

Every now and then, I like to sketch out different coordinates for the items in my wardrobe...and every now and then, I refer to the sketches for a lineup of what I have. Believe it or not, I have a designated notebook for such sketches.



Thursday 11 October 2012

A Little Spot of Kiehl's Midnight Magic!

I'm sure most people know of the Kiehl's Midnight Recovery range by now. Well, I was in Europe a couple of weeks ago and wandered into the Kiehl's store out of curiosity. Between the Midnight Recovery Concentrate and the Midnight Recovery Eye, I picked the latter as I've been plagued by a puffy lower left eye for some time. At 28 euros, it was really quite affordable! ^_^

First, a look at my puffy eye! =_= See it? Fugly I know.



Monday 8 October 2012

Lipbalm Lovin'

I'm not sure how popular lip balms are....non-pigmented lip balms that is. But I find them very useful for overnight flights or quick fixes on a non-made up face. Oh and also for the occasional dry fingertips!

For the record, I've tried Vaseline (which is still alright for an overnight lip mask), Mentholatum Men's Cool Aqua, Mentholatum Deep Moist and that other really popular brand with the yellow and red logo...umm...oh yes Carmex. Yep, didn't work, still have scales for lips. I even picked up a lip scrub from Suisse Programme but that seemed to make my smackers look rougher!

At a suggestion from a girlfriend that I try something with a more organic formula, I picked up the Mentholatum Organic Certified Lipbalm! (S$7.90 at Watsons~)



You've probably realised by now that I'm quite drawn to Mentholatum. Well, can't be helped 'cos it A) is a Japanese brand (made in china though) and B) has a REALLY wide range of lipcare products~

Friday 5 October 2012

Out Black Spot! Out!

I think the ever-present blackheads on our noses are a neverending bother. You squeeze them out, they come back. You pull them screaming out with pore strips, they come back. So every time there's a product promising to rid me of these little dinky spots, my nose can't help but wiggle a little in anticipation =D

After using the pore strips on and off for a number of years, I noticed the Naruko Tea Tree Oil Out T-Zone Blackhead Remover at Watson's for the fairly low price of S$15.



Tuesday 2 October 2012

I'm the new kid!

Hi there! And welcome to the inaugural, obligatory self introduction post of the Cotton Ball Crusade ^_^ This post comes a month past my 30th birthday (yay?) and is my first attempt at public blogging after almost a year's hiatus on my personal blog~

In the past couple of years, I've become more enthusiastic about my skincare and beauty products. Natural aging aside, I went off the pill about 6mths ago and realised then that the I've been living a lie as far as my skin was concerned! oh THE HORROR~~ (>_<) From pimple-free and easygoing, my skin is now slightly oily yet dehydrated with the occasional gawdawful breakout zit and sebum problem... Let's not talk about the blossoming pigmentation and fine lines. So as I continue wading through the sea of beauty products out there in search of my HG product lineup, I trust the occasional peek into my wardrobe won't hurt. =)

Now, I'm not the most tech-savvy of persons so I do ask for your patience while I figure out how everything works around here =P In the meantime, I'll keep things basic and try my darndest to distract you with pictures and babble!

Check back soon! =D