Bodycare Empties

I told you I had so many empties forming a pile in my bedroom! I really wanted to squeeze them in one post but obviously that would be impossible! Shower gels, body butters and a deodorant for this week’s empties!

Review: Collection Lasting Perfection Concealer

This is a product that has got so much hype around it that another review almost seems redundant. However, I felt the need to write my own just because it is a holy grail product for me.

Christmassy Home Bits [Picture Heavy]

Today I thought I’d give you a sneak peek of my home and share with you my Christmas decorations and how I transformed my house to look festive. Since it's the time for decorating I thought you might get some ideas. You didn’t think I’d leave you without a Christmassy post, did you? I really like the way it turned out but I would like to add some more, however I don’t think my fiancée is as enthusiastic as I am about the festive season so probably I’m not!

November Favourites 2013

And we’ve come to this time of the month again when everyone is raving about their favourite products of the month. Personally, I’m longing for this time every month because they are my favourite youtube videos to watch and blog posts to read because I always find treasures that instantly go on my wishlist. This has been an almost makeup free month for me because of some breakouts I was dealing with and the fact that my skin was dried up due to acne medication and caused eczema on my eyelids. So, it’s mainly skincare but I include some products that I used when I indeed put makeup on. And there you go, my Favourite Beauty Products for November 2013 (and Christmas is round the corner yayyyyyy!).

Review: Make Up For Ever Aqua Smoky Lash

Time for another review you guys! This time for my beloved MUFE mascara! I’ve kind of given away my feelings about it from the very beginning, haven’t I? Keep reading to find out if this mascara suits your needs.

Sweater Weather Tag

This tag has been going around for a while now. The questions vary between candles, lipsticks, nail polish, tea… So how could I resist?

Baking Post: Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls

Over the last few months I have become really good at baking. It was always something that I was interested and pretty good at but since I moved and have a lot more space for it I have been practicing a lot.

Haircare Empties

After the skincare come the haircare empties. I think this pile made it definite for me that I won’t be sticking with a specific brand in the future. Keep reading to find out which products are worth your €€€ and which are not!

Back with Skincare Empties

I know I’ve been MIA for way too long.. I have no excuse, I just didn’t feel motivated and moving house as well as everyday life has got into me. I haven’t been absent from the beauty community though nor seized from picking up products that need to be reviewed. This time I feel pretty determined to keep it up, let’s see!

Taking the Acne train for my new journey

I know that it has been months since I posted but there’s a lot going on in my life since then. You can’t imagine how much I appreciate all of you following this blog and I’ve been stressing out a lot over it just because I wanted to share so much and reform the layout of the blog to look much better and professional. However, it has been impossible for me to stay at home and take pictures and write posts because I have a full time job which requires a good deal of travelling resulting to a great deal of stress especially during March, April and May.

So, I decided to spicy it up a bit doing a post with updates of what has been going on in my life and write about a topic that has been troubling me lately and not a loaded with photos one that you or brands will appreciate much more.

Point being, I have been dealing with acne for the past 3 months. You might have realised from previous posts that I am an acne winner and have been left with scars, blackheads, acne prone and oily skin. But it has come back. And it’s stressful and makes me feel miserable. That’s why I wanted to share it with you. Mainly because many of you might have been going through the same and this post could have a slight chance of helping someone.

I’ve had acne since I was 9 and that was the age that I got my period. I patiently waited until I was 16 just seeing my acne expanding to my chest and back having tried all the mild therapies, until I was prescribed ‘accutane’ treatment which cleared up my face. I was super happy and only got the occasional spots those days of the month. My face was totally normal and the drugstore skincare just made my face glowing. Especially when I went on the pill, purely for birth control reasons, my face even switched from oily to normal/combination. I had almost forgotten about any skincare and the only thing I did was wash my face day and night! That’s the way it’s supposed to be right?

Three months ago I decided to stop the pill because it was giving me high cholesterol and that’s when it all started. My face started to sparsely break out with spots and within a week it was completely covered in white heads which made it rough to the touch. I tried effaclar duo (there’s a full review for it here) only to witness it getting worse. Since I only trust dermatologists and not aesthiticians I thought I’d pay a visit. The first one suggested I go on Accutane again but with a milder approach, just getting a pill every week or so. For the record, Accutane comes with a list of tremendous side effects. Apart from the aesthetic result which is dry and flaky skin, it should not be taken by women who are pregnant or even thinking about it due to birth defects that it can cause. It may also result to fertility problems in the long term. That being said and given that I am a 26 year old woman who is engaged and dreams of having a kid someday, I don’t think that it would be a smart thing to take the chance to go on a treatment that would clear my face but possibly f* up my life. Next dermatologist reassured me that the problem is hormonal and resulted from stopping the pill (tell me something I don’t know) and suggested a treatment with a Ducray cleanser, a Frezyderm non-comodogenic lotion mixed with an antibiotic, a spot treatment that contains benzoyl peroxide 2.5% and oral treatment with antibiotics for 3 weeks. I religiously stuck to that only pairing it with an oil free non-comodogenic moisturiser before applying make-up. That worked wonders, my face started clearing up and I was up in the sky thinking it wasn’t that bad, just a side effect of the pill. Until the oral treatment came to an end because you can’t take antibiotics for life. Then everything came back like I’ve never tried to erase it. Third dermatologist, and I had to travel to my hometown for that (!), gave me a treatment with adapene (known in the Greek pharmacies as ‘adaferin’) which I am currently on. On first impression it’s hell. I’ve been using it for about a week now and my face has seen better days. It is flakey, it’s breaking out with cystic acne and it’s very dry, itchy and red even at the eye area where I don’t use the gel; as a bonus I have very chapped lips as well! Obviously I can’t use any sort of make-up because we all know well that foundation on non-moisturised face looks even worse. The only thing I use, and I sort of have to, is an spf cream, because you can get dermatitis if you go out in the sun without any while on this treatment. Even when I apply moisturiser my face is burning for about 3 minutes. However, it was exactly like that when I was on ‘accutane’ which is the only thing that’s helped so far, so maybe that’s the way it should be in order to heal.

The reason for this post, apart from the obvious that I had to take it all out in the public in order to feel some sort of relief, is that it might actually be of help to one or some of you. It’s kind of a confidence booster to someone out there who is as self-conscious as I am about their skin issues. I won’t deny that I had bad days. I recently went to one of my school classmate’s wedding and I was dreading the fact that my classmates that hadn’t seen me for years were going to see me still dealing with acne after all those years. I was a laughing stock back at my school days and kind of isolated; imagine what they will think and say now. Acne is a disease for teenagers and for adults, mainly because of the psychological damage that it causes. You are constantly thinking about it and check in the mirror every now and then to see whether any miracle has happened. You occasionally touch your face to check whether those annoying bumps have vanished. You wake up in the morning and touch your face before you check in the mirror to see if it feels softer to the touch than last night. It’s a constant battle with your inner self to find the strength to go to work bare faced and let everyone see the ‘real’ you with no make-up on. Well, you can clearly see that I totally know what you are going through. The key is to be patient and it takes trial and error until you find the treatment that suits you because what suits me will not necessarily be your cure. Whatever the doctors say, do not risk to damage your health to get and even complexion and a nice looking skin. Most importantly, do not damage your soul thinking about what others will think about you. Because after all, that’s what we’re left with at the end of the day, isn’t it? Enjoy life and good luck!

P.S. I will definitely try to review all those acne treatments one by one but it takes time you know! <3

Georgina x x x   

Effaclar Duo

Unless you’ve been living under a rock lately, you would have definitely heard of La Roche Posay’s skincare range all around the blogoshere. One of their most raved about products is Effaclar Duo, a skincare product for oily/combination skin. I’ve read reviews everywhere and very famous beauty gurus, like Tanya Burr and Ruth from AModelRecommends, talking about how this moisturizer has changed their skin and everyday skincare routine.

50 Random Facts About Me

I’ve been obsessed with 50 random facts videos on youtube lately; seriously obsessed! I don’t only want to know the youtubers I’m subscribed to better but I watch any person’s video just because of the tag. Today I thought I would share some random facts about me with you, in the process of getting to know each other…!

January & February Favourites 2013

Happy Spring everyone! It's high time for my monthly favourites. Since I hadn't shared my January favourites with you I'm doing a combo of those two months. I could name it 'winter favourites' to be honest, but let's narrow it down to that!

The 22 something tag

You would have well noticed that I’ve been missing for a while. I will not even try to get into it just because it will be typical excuses about workaholism all over again! So I’ve been tagged by Kleoniki to do a tag. It’s about things that I can’t live without and it’s called ‘the 22 tag’. First of all, I’d like to thank her for flattering me believing I’m actually 22! I will moderate it to suit my age though, no worries. I will not list them in any particular order just because I can’t decide which I need the most in order to survive!

Greek Beauty Bloggers Event

I’ve been meaning to write this post for absolute ages! If you follow me on twitter or instagram you will know that I’ve been travelling a lot and I’ve been super busy with work, so that’s my excuse! This post is about the Greek Beauty Bloggers Event that took place in Thessaloniki in December. It was so nice to be able to put a face to each blog I’ve been reading so far and I had the chance to chat with so many of them and exchange ideas about the most recent trends on make up! The goodie bag was a wonderful surprise because we got stuff from L’oreal, Inglot, Beauty Store and Oxette/Loisir.

I Hit Pan Vol. I

This is my first attempt of doing that kind of post. For those of you who are not familiar with the concept, you basically save the empty packaging of products that you’ve finished up and review them after you’ve actually used the product!

MUA Lip Spree

It was like a month ago or so that MUA reached 35k likes on facebook and launched a 35% discount. To be honest, I couldn’t recall having heard of that brand before but with those prices who can resist? After placing the order I was organizing my nail polishes to come across a beautiful red with MUA written on it! So I had used that brand before (oh those good times in the UK that I could find a 1£ nail varnish at the drugstore) and I was very satisfied with it. That definitely filled me with excitement while waiting for Mr Postman!

A weird eyelash tool

I haven’t tried a lot of lash curlers and the one I’ve got is ancient! I bought it ages ago from Body Shop and I didn’t feel the need to use it before I was properly into make-up. I didn’t even know how to and I used to curl my lashes whenever I came across it in my make-up bag and always after applying mascara. A crime, I know, but thanks to all of you I’ve made progress!

The battle of Avon Mascaras

I’m all into mascaras lately it appears! Well, the thing is that I literally have got to go on project pan with them because I buy them one after the other and they never run out but just dry out and I feel so miserable afterwards! I’ve actually bought the Smoky Lash by MUFE and haven’t even opened the tube yet because it says that it expires after 6 months! Sooo I’ve been doing some shopping off the Avon brochure and here there are; three mascaras.

New Year's Giveaway Winner

It’s time to announce the giveaway winner! I just wanted to tell you that I really appreciate the support and I’m kind of sad because I really enjoyed reading your comments and learning stuff about you. It was fun commenting as well, generally the interaction during the holidays, you know! In this giveaway we reached 1873 entries and this is beyond awesome!

New Year's Resolutions

Happy New Year everybody!2012 is over and we are welcoming 2013 along with all the surprises and new experiences that it has to offer! Plus the trouble that we have every single year to get used to writing 2013 instead of 2012 when we are writing the date somewhere! Please tell me you get that too!