Happy New Years!

Today is the last day of 2012..it's gone by so fast. In terms of my personal life, I've made some many new friends, gotten good grades and have just generally made a ton of memories and had a lot of fun!

For 2013, I really, really hope to continue blogging and to also interact with a lot of you. I don't really talk to you, yes you, the person reading this. I don't talk to you guys and that's one of my new years resolutions.

Also, I have a ton of projects and weekly/monthly reads that I'm hoping to introduce to you and I hope you really like it!

Here's a small sneakpeek (there's so much more but I don't want to give it away!)

You guys are going to love that ^.

And I want to share some of my resolutions with you too.

 1. Chat with all my friends from Pastel Mints.

I love blogging, I really really do. It's so much fun reading your comments and sharing my life with you guys. I'm thinking of setting up some giveaways or something so that we all can interact more!

 2. Start making weekly/monthly reads.

As I mentioned above, I'm going to be starting some more "fixed-in-place" posts.

 3. Take cleaner pictures.

Well, I already failed at this one but it's not 2013 yet so there's my excuse!

4. Start setting up a blogging schedule using Astrid.

I really need to stay on top of things so I am going to be using Astrid to help.
( And no, I am not getting sponsored to mention them.)

5. Blog at least once a week.

This is going to be super tricky because it's hard for me to blog often but I'm going to try to queue things.

What are your New Year resolutions?

xx Rachel

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone! It's finally here, I know I've waited like forever for this one day. I'm so excited to go and eat and enjoy tonight with my extended family. Merry Christmas to all of you guys too, it was really fun to write Countdown To Christmas and I know I didn't finish but it's just been getting really hard to find time to do all these things. Stay tuned though, the New Year is coming up and I have tons of resolutions that I'm hoping to keep.

xx Rachel.

CTC: Quick Last Minute Christmas Gifts

There's only 6 more days left! Anyways, today I'm writing about some last minute gifts you can get someone or some small gifts if you have a tight budget.

Hot Chocolate Mixes:

 I find these hot chocolate mixes so cute, They come in little packs and you tear them open, pour it into the cup, add water and your toppings on and you'er good to go! They have a lot of unique flavours, I picked up 2 packets from Hallmark for $1.50 each.

 Gum Packets: 

I mainly use these gifts as stocking stuffers or I put it with another gift to add a little something extra! These were from Walmart and they came in a pack of 4 for $3.

I got Peppermint flavour, perfect for Christmas!

Shower Gels: 

  The next items I got were shower gels and they came in a pack of 7 for $8. These were from Winners and Winners is kind of like a Target but it's Canadian.

 I really love the scent Snow Flurries.

Mini Hand Sanitizers:

 I absolutely love these adorable hand santizers from Bath & Bodyworks. They have a ton of unique scents and the pictures on the Christmas ones are absolutely adorable.  I got these 2 in a 3 for $5 sale. The third one is also Jolly Gingerbread.

 Candles:

 The last thing I got was this Ambered Spice & Vanilla candle from Winners. I wish you guys could smell this, it makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside, I love it! The illustrations on the side are also very cute.  This was $6 and it's a soywax candle.You can also buy this online here.

adorable little winter hats. 

I hope you found this helpful! Leave a comment below!

xx

CTC: Gift Guide * Girl Edition!*

This year, I decided to do a Countdown to Christmas thing for the last 7 days until Christmas. I'm crazy excited and I'm making a gift guide on what to buy girls for Christmas!


For the girly girl: 

(image via The Make And Beauty Blog)

This would be me. :$ For the girly girl, you could get them any makeup palette or a brush set. A gift card to Sephora or a clothing store would also work if you really had no options. Naked Basics by Urban Decay would be a really nice product to give someone.

For the sporty girl:

(location unknown.)

 For this type of girl, I would get them some sweatpants or hoodies from Pink: Victoria's Secret. Anybody can use sweats and hoodies but for a sporty girl, I'm sure they would get a lot of use out of this.

For the shopaholic: 

A giftcard to one of her favorite stores would be perfect, there's no tax and there's no going wrong with this gift!


For just about anyone:
If you're really stuck on ideas, you could get somebody some creams or hand-santizers from Bath & Bodyworks. I would also recommend giving chocolate.

Lovely Links * Is Back! *

Hi guys! As I said in one of my last posts, I feel so bad for not posting but I also feel really bad for not doing any Lovely Links post. It's been a while, I feel kind of rusty while writing this but I'm really determined to make it work!

Morning Routine For School

For the past few days, I have been absolutely obsessed with watching people's morning routines. Don't worry, I'm not a stalker, I just like to see how their morning routine compares with mine and how I could make my routine better!

(via)

I'm in love with this cardboard washing machine, it's so cute.This tutorial teaches you how to make it!

(Pimp Your Notebooks via nassae)

An adorable DIY that shows you how to personalize your notebooks with pens and paper! I think I'm going to go buy some new journals just so I can do this DIY.

( via offbeatandinspired)

This DIY recipe for peppermint mocha soap sounds absolutely delicious!

(image via splashofsomething)

I love this tutorial for making your own bows, you could really personalize the paper with this!

Badger Balm/ Burt's Bee's Review + Updates

It's been a while...again.

I'm terribly sorry guys and I'm going to stop making promises to stuff that I might not be able to complete. I do have some lame excuse though as to why I have not been posting for the last week. My wifi/internet/whatever it's called has not been working so I haven't been able to post or check my emails/ Facebook. 

Yes.

I know that was a terrible excuse but I'm back, I'm ready and I will be posting at least once a week from now on. I'll be trying my hardest to post 3 times a week but that might just not be possible so we'll see!

Moving onto the post..

In the winter/ fall, hands get dry and they begin to look wrinkly and gross but nails also do too. They don't get wrinkly and gross but cuticles do begin to peel and that hurts. These are 2 of my favorite nail moisturizers.

Badger Balm ( For Sensitive Dry Skin)

 

Badger Balm is unscented and it is so organic, the ingredients are very natural. Basically, there's Extra Virgin Olive Oil, some beeswax and nothing else. I love that fact that they put " and nothing else" on there! 

You can use Badger Balm pretty much anywhere on your body but I found that this really helps the nails and the lips the most.

I bought this a month ago and so far I have only dug a little hole in it. It cost only about $8 and you can pretty much use this for about 2 years.

Burt's Bees Lemon Butter Cuticle Cream

I think I have raved about this product a couple of times already.

This Lemon Cuticle Cream is designed especially for the nails/ cuticles but you can use this on other parts of the body. The ingredients are fairly simple and pretty organic as the rest of teh Burt's Bee's brand is. It comes in a little tin pot like how lip balm comes in and I love the packaging, I find it so cute for some reason!

I bought this about half a year ago and this is the condition it's in right now, I've almost used up about half of it but once December really hits me, I'll probably use it alot more often.

One of the things I love about this cream is the scent. It has a really light lemony scent that smells absolutely delicious. The smell is sweet but not overpowering like some body mists are.

Leave a comment below and tell me how you think these two products are!

Maybelline NY : Great Lash ( Lots Of Lashes)

Note: I am super sorry that this post didn't post on Wednesday as it should have, I set the queue up wrong and none of my scheduled posts, posted. 

Today I'm reviewing Maybelline NY :Great Lash ( Lots Of Lashes Washable) in Brownish Black. 

This was the first piece of makeup that I bought a few years ago and it has been one of my favorite mascara's ever since. I actually repurchased this a while  ago and I'm almost done with it. 

I know alot of people didn't like the first Great Lash but this is a newer version. This is the " Lots Of Lashes " one and I don't think they changed their formula but they changed their brush and apparently, that made a huge difference.

This brush is a heart shaped or tear drop shaped brush. I actually broke off some of the bristles by rubbing too hard so some of the bristles on mine are missing. For the most part, this brush really works, I use the smaller part of the brush to cover my inner lashes.

The packaging basically came like this, except the brush was pink but now it's covered with mascara. There was also a green cap on the mascara tube.

*These are my lashes with mascara on* 

I love this product and I give it 4 hearts out of 5.

♥♥♥♥

What's your opinion on these Great Lash products? 

Baby Lips : Cherry Me Review

I'm reviewing Baby Lips : Cherry Me by Maybelline NY. This lip tint came out a pretty long time ago but I absolutely love this product and I want to share it with you!

So basically, this is my second tube of Cherry Me, I repurchased  this 2 weeks ago and as you can see, I've used up quite a bit of it.

Cherry Me is a tinted lip balm that claims to moisture and change your lips in 4 weeks. I really love this color, it's not as red as it appears unless you apply like 3 coats of it. Baby Lips also has 20 SPF. It smells like cherries and it comes in really cute packaging. I love the font they used!

 
Cherry Me is sold at most drugstores for $4 and they have a good selection of different flavors as well. Click here for more info! 

What do you guys think about Baby Lips? is it something you would use?

xx

New York Color : Custom Compact : Brown Eyes

Today is the first of 7 beauty reviews that I will be doing for this week! Let's get started!

Today I'm reviewing the New York Color Custom Compact for Brown Eyes. I found it at Walmart for $4.99 so it's a good deal. This compact comes with 4 colors ( 1 highlight, 1 lid and 2 creases.) a primer,a illuminator and a 2 ended sponge brush.

I know my case is a little bit messy but I've been using it for a while now, so it is used.

These are the colors in this compact, my favorite is the dark bronzy crease color. I find it so pretty. The primer in this compact is pretty good but I've never used the illuminator in this.

( swatches without primer) 

I took some swatches on a tissue so you could see the colors more clearly. My skin color throws some of the colors off. The highlight color is more of a beige skin color while the lid color is a very neutral brown.

( close up on the 2 sided sponge brush.)

Pros: 

• the eyeshadows are pigmented enough that you don't need primer
• you get 4 shades, a primer and a illumintor for a low price
• portable
• one of the best affordable neutral palettes.

Cons: 

• There are none. 

Leave a comment or your opinion below on this product!

 *I am not being paid in any sort of way to write this post, all opinions are mine.*