I'm a Lush {Lush Cosmetics Review}

Hello beauties!

I have shared before my love for the natural and handmade Lush Cosmetics. All of their products are so fresh and I think they smell really great. I am in no way sponsored by this company, just sharing with readers what I love! Lush uses natural ingredients, like fruit, veggies, essential oils, etc. They don't test on animals and don't use animal fats in the making of their products, so most of their products are vegan friendly. 

Their stores have a great vibe to them. Their workers seem to genuinely love their job and they will let you test or sample any of the products. Also, they are all very helpful and honest. They will tell you what they like and are not so crazy about, and they will tell you how best to use a product or what to use according to your skin. I've never had a negative experience in one or their stores. 

I have a few products that I like from this company. I will tell you ...they are not priced like your run-of-the-mill drug store products. I am cheap when it comes to beauty products because I'm such a beauty product junkie. Lush is always a splurge for me because I only get the chance to go about twice a year, and I won't allow myself to buy online because I would NEVER have any money! :) And unfortunately, they are few and far between, especially in the U.S. of A. 

But if you're rich {unlike me} and you find a product on the site that you love but don't have a store close by, you can sign up for auto reFresh, where they will send you the product every three months, or five months, or whatever duration of time you think it will take for you to use up the product. 

Bath Bombs - These are a one time use "bomb" that you throw in the tub once you fill it up. They all have a different fragrance. I love to drop these in the bath and watch them fizz up. The thing I dislike about this product is...it's a one time use product, so there'e no stretching the dollars here. They're about $5 a piece, on average. 

This is the Twilight bath bomb, great for a relaxing bath before bed. {$6.25}

Bubble Bars - This is my absolute favorite lush product. They are more expensive than the bath bombs, BUT I can get several uses from these bad boys. You can break off little {or big!} pieces and hold them in your hand as you run the bath water over it. This will make a bubbly bath with a heavenly smell! My favorites are The Comforter {$10.95}, Rose Jam {$6.25}, and Yuzu & Cocoa {$6.25}. Yuzu & Cocoa is a really cool scent, it's like an orange-chocolate scent which is kind of fun and different. 

The Comforter Bar. I can REALLY make this last a while. {$10.95}

Happy Hippy Shower Gel - This is a great shower gel. It smells AMAZING! The citrus smell in a morning shower is invigorating and is a great way to wake up. This is a Lush product that I keep buying over and over again. 

{$9.95-$28.95}

These next two products are ones that I have already reviewed in previous blogs, so I'm just adding the link to that article. 

Godiva Solid Shampoo - Now that I'm no longer using this product on a day-to-day basis, I can be a bit more objective. I would use this for a trip or camping, or something of the like. I much prefer a liquid shampoo to a solid for every day use. This is still a fab product, smells great, I hold onto my previous review, but just something for you to know now that it has been a while since I've used it as my one and only shampoo. 

No Drought Dry Shampoo

Caca Rouge Mama Hair Henna - This one is a tricky one. This is a henna hair dye bar. It literally comes to you like a bar of soap. It's a great alternative if you're sick and tired of all the crazy chemicals going into your hair when you color it. Brian got this for me once and I really loved the color it gave my hair...BUT...it is really difficult to use. You have to grate it, then mix it with water to make it like a muddy paste. My mom and I worked for hours and could never get the consistency right. The color came out fine, but I don't think it worked as well as it could have. My advice for this product is find someone who has done it before OR talk to one of the workers in the store who has used it and get some tips before you try it. 

{$25.95}

Fresh Farmacy Cleanser - This is a face wash that comes in a bar. It's got a fresh scent to it and it is infused with calamine, to calm troubled skin like mine. It also doesn't dry out my skin. Its cleanses without stripping my skin of it's hydration. 

{$9.95}

Eau Roma Water Toner - I'll be honest, I haven't used this product in a while. The acne medication i'm on doesn't really require that I need or use toner. But I love the rose scent and when I was using it, it worked really well. Light, airy, and a great scent. 

{$9.95-$21.95}

Honey Trap Lip Balm - This lip balm is fantastic. It smells great because it has honey in it {which is obvious from the title} and makes your lips super smooth. Personal preference, I dislike chap sticks and lip balms where I have to use my finger. DIVA ALERT! :)

 {$7.25}

Ambrosia Shaving Cream - In case you've never read any of my blogs, ever, I have really sensitive skin. For the past five years or so, when I shave my underarms in the summer, I break out into insane, red, itchy, painful bumps. It's awful. So when I find a product that works, and doesn't make that happen, even on the hottest, stickiest South Georgia summer day, I will sing it's praises wherever I can. Enter Ambrosia. It is light and creamy, so you'll be a little jarred if you normally use a shave gel. But this is lovely. As with all Lush products, it smells wonderful and it works. The bottle also suggests that you can use it as a Nair-type product but I have yet to try that. I just use this on my underarms. I have used it on my legs before and it worked, but my legs are not as sensitive as my underarms. 

{$9.95 - $19.95}

Tender is the Night Massage Bar - I prefer to call this a lotion bar because it's less creepy. But this is a bar version of lotion. This bar smells great to me and is gentle on my troubled skin. I also recommend you splurge for the tin. If it melts, and it will, the tin keeps it contained. Melting is the one thing I dislike about this product. But it's SO pretty! :)

{$11.95}

So there you have it. I'm a lush. I'm willing to admit that. It's my little splurge, whenever I visit a town that has a store. I hope that if you try any of these products, you will love them as much as I do. Lush has recently opened spas in Philly and NYC so you can bet your bum that if I ever visit either of those cities, I'll be saving my pennies for a Lush Spa splurge. 

Have a quaint and quiet little weekend everyone! 

Postcrossing!

Though my summer vacation is over for now, as an employee of the public school system, it could be argued that my summer vacation really lasts until August 1. But since I'm working a part time job, I'm only counting the moments where I am actually gone from my house as a vacation. I am really enjoying my part time job right now. It's not killer money, but it is a little extra in my pocket. And, not to brag, I'm pretty decent at it. Certainly not interested in doing sales for the rest of my life, but it is flexible, allowing me to take work off whenever I want to travel, and I can transfer to another store when I move this fall. I'm really excited about this aspect, because I will already have a job when I arrive in Kansas, to tide me over until I find a more stable and permanent job. 

This summer, I am traveling to the beach, and to Kansas. But there are many places I want to go that I simply cannot afford to fly there. Europe entices me more and more every time I think about it. I hope we are stationed there at some point. 

My way of getting my fix, without having to buy a pricey airline ticket is postcards. Call me old fashioned, but snail mail just makes me so excited! I love opening the mailbox and seeing something in there for me. I am a member of a site called Postcrossing. It's so much fun. Basically, you sign up to send postcards all over the world. For each postcard you send, you will get one in return. I have received postcards from some amazing places: Belarus, China, Finland...just to name a few! This site is totally free, and the only price you pay is obtaining postcards, and their postage. It's also a really fun way to learn about the world beyond our back porch. I would say the hardest part is finding postcards. I suppose no one really uses them anymore so they are becoming increasingly difficult to find. 

If my classroom kids were a little bit older, I think this would be a really awesome project to have them join the site and send postcards to people around the world! 

Here are some of the cards I've received. 

So if you decide to join........

HAPPY POSTCROSSING! 

This post was in no way sponsored or encouraged by the Postcrossing website. I just love the site and wanted to share it with my readers. 

Three Trips in Ten Days

The past ten days has been complete bedlam for me. Let's recap:

June 26 & 27, I was in Florida with our church's middle school choir and hand bell choir, where we spent one whole day at Typhoon Lagoon and the next day, singing and ringing at nursing homes, before heading back to Georgia. 

Typhoon Lagoon was such a cool water park, and it gave me a self-appointed badge. With my visit to Typhoon Lagoon, I have now been to every Disney World park in the Orlando area. My next area to conquer is Disney Land, in California! 

I really enjoyed the Mid-High choir tour. To begin with, I usually spend my days with four and five year olds, so it was fun to get to hang out with an older bunch. What impressed me the most was that after we were finished with our performances, the kids would immediately go out into the audience and speak with the nursing home residents who came to see us perform. I can tell you that in Middle School, I would have NEVER been in a group who I knew performed in nursing homes. I would have never been comfortable enough to go out and visit with the residents. You probably would have found me with my nose in the corner, like an ostrich with it's head buried in the sand. 

But not this group. They went out and really showed the love and grace of Christ to these nursing home residents. For some of these people, this may be the first they've seen of young people in quite some time, and it made their day. So many of them commented on what our performances meant to them and how glad they were to have us. 

It's amazing, all of the things I've done in churches throughout my entire life-youth group, bible study, passion plays, church choir, mission trips, the list could go on. But this trip made a huge impact on me because I was so impressed by these courageous and loving middle schoolers. I had a great time and I really learned a lot from them. 

Right after returning from Mid-high choir tour, I packed my bags and headed for Tybee. We lived on Tybee Island for six years, and I really find it to be the place my heart calls home. When I drive across the causeway and the marsh air fills my lungs, I have to keep myself from tearing up because of the sheer joy my heart feels to be back where I belong. 

Shortly after my arrival, I got right back on the road. My fiance's grandfather passed away, so I drove to Cottonwood, Alabama for the funeral. 

My future sister-in-law, on her Facebook, said that she never really understood when people said "it was a beautiful funeral" until Pa's service. And I couldn't agree more with her. It was a full military funeral, complete with a gun salute, flag folding, and the playing of Taps, during which there wasn't a dry eye to be found. There was even a group of bikers who came to escort the funeral procession. I was honored to be a part of it, and very proud to see my handsome man honor his grandfather by wearing his dress blues and being a pallbearer. I'm always  proud of him, but that was really a tear jerker moment for me because I knew how much it meant to him and his family.

My handsome Airman 

My fiance, and my future sisters-in-law

So now, I'm back at the beach and enjoying the days before I have to go back home and get started on the long days of my summer job. But I cannot complain! It's extra money and it's pretty rare to be able to find one job these days, much less two! I'm looking forward to the summer, not just all the fun things and family trips we have planned but also just the feel of summer days. 

What are you most excited about this summer? 

Tell me in the comments below or in the Facebook/Twitter post!