Absolutely loving ... Wella High Hair 'Leave it Long'

Once upon a time, I chucked a mini sample of a hair product, along with other bits and bobs, in a parcel to my lovely American friend, Ashleigh. Ashleigh and I met on youtube. She is incredibly talented in makeup, make easy to follow make up tutorials on YouTube and puts my writing to shame on her blog. Coming back to this sample, little that I knew, when sending her this sample that she was going to be going obsessed with it, and become restless until she gets her hands on a full size product.

Here’s what she had to say about it:





Hey guys!  It’s Ashleigh (otherwise known as AdmiralKathryn on both twitter and YouTube!)…and as BestBrushForward here on Blogspot!

I’m so excited to be invited by one of my dear friends Liloo to do a guest post in her petit jardin and about a product that she inadvertently hooked me on.

I had been sent a package of goodies from Liloo (we had been trading and sending back and forth for a while at this point) and as a bonus she had tucked in the cutest little sample of a hair product that I had never heard of!

What is this product? Get on with it! Enough rambling!!!!  I can hear you all now! Haha.  The product I’m talking about is Wella Professional High Hair Leave It Long Cream.





Now here’s my luck – it’s a product I’ve never been able to find since receiving it.  This would be because...it's not available in the US.  So with it not being available here, I’ve had to do a lot of digging around to find any information about this cream as the sample size doesn’t really have any information of the product on it…here’s what I’ve found:

Wella High Hair Leave It Long is a weightless, natural control cream especially for longer hair.  This lightweight cream creates a beautiful, smooth groomed look with moveable, light hold and a non sticky feel. Hair is soft, natural looking and flowing even the day after washing. Enriched with pro-vitamin B5 and UV filters it also works to fortify and protect hair.

This cream is a dream for my hair!  It is extremely lightweight (feels almost watery when I emulsify it in my palms) and I scrunch it into my damp hair to activate my curls.  Due to the lightweight hold, they stay all day and I don’t need to use any extra hairspray (BONUS! as a little backstory, I absolutely despise most styling products – mostly due to my history with theater and performing)

I have medium length, thin (but ample) hair that frizzes at the slightest notice and it’s very picky about what goes into it – this cream leaves it soft and silky with a natural bounce and here’s my favorite part – the next day it’s not disgusting so I don’t have to wash my hair every day!  I mist with a little water to take some of the flyaways down and let it go!




(this photo is of my hair 2nd day with the Wella cream – you can see that it still looks nice and fresh and not like second day hair normally can look with my particular hair type...which is scary if you're not aware haha.)

I like that it has pro-vitamin B5 in it, which means that it doesn’t leave hair crispy (B5 is an ingredient that you may be familiar with in your mascaras nowadays…it can be on the ingredients list as Panthenol and it’s a conditioner – no crunchy hair and no crunchy lashes!) and it helps to repair damage leaving your hair shiny and manageable. (If you're a science nerd like myself, here's the link to the wikipedia article about Panthenol)  Having the UV filters are also a plus because the sun won’t bleach out your color…so I love it for it’s protective nature as well.

Do any of you UK readers use this product?  What do you think of it?!  What is your favorite product for your hair (and if you tell us, tell us your hair type too!)

Bisous!
Ashleigh



Product:  Wella High Hair Leave It Long Cream, 100ml
Availability:  Amazon.co.uk is where I finally found it
Price: £6.00

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Lusting over Spring Offerings from Gosh

Gosh Cosmetics has decided to celebrate Spring with a bang and has released lots of funky new products. A new foundation primer (now cream instead of a yukkygreasy gel) a cute brow kit, lip marker pens, mono eyeshadows, limited editi0ns nail polishes, and last but not least a range of long lasting eyeliners. As if this was not good news enough, Gosh is on 3 for 2 at the moment, so there could not be a better time to pop down to your local Superdrug and sample/get some Gosh.


I am personally on a forced 'stop buying everything that you see' ban at moment and until further notice but that doesn't mean I can't lust and blog about it, right?

Feast your eyes on these new limited edition nail polishes. I absolutely love the design on the bottle and the colours of course. If money was not so tight at the moment, I would have definitely indulged and got home with 'groovy grey'. Misty Mauve is good idea, but I am wondering if it's just your average lilac, and if it's too clean and not greyish enough to tempt me. All these are priced at £4.99. They also released a matte top coat (Matt 604 - non photographed) but my Superdrug had none of them in stock.  


 

I wanted to show you quick swatches of the brand new mono shadows Gosh has released here. The colours seem to be a bit more pigmented than your average trio from Gosh but I am not too blown away. From what I gathered these shades just have boring numbers for names (from 001 to 008). My favourites are the lime green (001) the golden brown (003) and the golden peach (007)







And last but not least, and my favourite from all the gosh new releases, these new "Super long wear long lasting eyeliners" priced at £5.99. They feel a bit runny on application, but once they're on, they're on and they don't budge. The colours are great despite once again, very unimaginative names and the applicator nib makes the application like an easy walk in the park .

If you are a fan of the Gosh extreme art liner already, you'll definitely want to try those and you’ll probably like these better, precisely because of the great pointy nib, rather than the brush of the art liners.  (Man, how bad was the English of that sentence, I hope you understand what I mean) x






Some selected swatches for you:
From left to right: the green, turquoise, brown and grey, photographed in natural daylight.






I could have seen myself going home with these four amazing shades but if I had to pick just one, it would have been the turquoise, which a is a lovely mix of turquoise and hints of copper running through it. Here you see it in mid afternoon light, in the shade, without flash.





Any of these new products from Gosh tempt you? I am very curious to try the new cream face primer. I really really disliked their existing primer, it felt so greasy!


Where to buy: Superdrug
How much: eyeliner £5.99, nail polish £4.99, eyeshadow:?

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“Become an Aussie Angel” Competition: “Put a spring in your Spring”

I am super excited to introduce you to a fun competition sponsored by Aussie Haircare.
The prize: Becoming an Aussie Angel

 
Aussie is scouring the luscious lengths of the United Kingdom (and Ireland) in search for their next Aussie Angels. What's an Aussie Angel? It's your girl-next-door blogger who gets to try the latest Aussie Haircare producs when they are launched and is happy to share their Aussie Products experiences with their audience.

In addition, Aussie Angels have the chance to  participate in fun activities and events to know more about the brand, how to use the products and tips and tricks to raise your hair confidence and feel fabulous. Last but not least you get to mingle with lots of bloggers and make friends. Pretty amazing really!

What's the competition? What do I need to do?


1. You need to be an active blogger, and resident of the United Kingdom & Ireland.
2. Put your thinking cap on and answer the following question (in the form of a blogpost):

“Put a spring in your spring! Tell us:
How would you lighten up your life?
#AussieLight”

  

3.  Answer the question in the form of a blog-post on your own blog.
4. Tweet the link of your blog to @yummyhair (so Aussie know where to find it!)


Important Information


- Winners will be chosen by the Uncover Aussie team based on the most creative response that reflects the Aussie spirit. This means videos, pictures, stories or even songs can be their blog post entry – just as long as you answer the question.
- The competition closes on Sunday 20th March 2011, 23.59 GMT
- Full rules, terms and conditions can be found here or at http://bit.ly/aussielush


Further Information


- Aussie Official Website: http://www.aussiehair.com/
- Aussie Angels Website: http://www.uncoveraussie.co.uk/
- Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/yummyhair
- Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/AussieHair

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My first love

When little girls dreamt of being air hostesses, fashion designer or vets, my wildest dream when I was younger was to become fluent in English. My first love before anything else was the English language and even before being learning it officially in school, I had already asked people around me to teach me words. Exposure to the English language being obviously being very limited being born and living in France, I used to give myself extra homework and make up my own lists of vocabulary to learn because I thought 3 hours of English at school was not enough. All foreign films would be dubbed in French but the very rare times they would be shown in original version, i would embrace the opportunity with both hands and watch the film with a pen and paper to write down words and expressions which caught my attention.



At bath time, I would look out for bottle of shampoos and shower gels, with the list of ingredients translated in English and would read them out. When I came to live to England, my little habits carried on, but this time, I would read out loud stuff in the bath to practise my spoken English. One thing led to another, I ended up knowing by heart the ingredients and mode of use of Aussie Shampoo and Conditioner, the “Luscious Long” 'flavour' and the “Miracle Moist”. Not only I loved washing my hair with those shampoos but I really developed a soft spot for those in particular as the whole English of it was so different from anything I'd 'studied' in the bath before: humorous, light hearted and very friendly, yet not as 'childish' as Innocent Smoothies or as slightly adult orientated as Herbal Essences hair care range
So when Aussie Shampoos contacted me, after they've seen my very young blog to invite me to become an Aussie Angel, I was just over the moon.
'Would you like to be An Aussie Angel?” They asked me.
"Hell yeah”, I replied. “I am sooooo into your shampoos, I could recite the whole description of a bottle, on the spot”, I added.

What does it mean in practice to be an Aussie Angel: Well, I'm not quite sure as this is all new but from what I gather, I am part of a little network of beauty bloggers and I get invited to Aussie Bloggers' events when there are some.

One of my first 'assignments' was to choose which tribe I wanted to be in, as in choosing which shampoo I liked the best. Tough to choose at first between The Miracle Moist and the Luscious Long, but then the answer struck me as being obvious and I thought 'my hair had gone a long way for me, so it's normal to repay it' :) I told you I knew it by heart! So this my badge :)


Makeup being a hobby of mine, I wanted to create a look for the occasion and dedicate it to the lovely team at Aussie. Thank you for inviting me, and for my welcome pack.
I am super stoked!



What did I learn from doing this makeup? Well, always shave your armpits, ‘cos you never know... ;)

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