Review | MUA undressed palette

 
Welcome back,

For my birthday I recieved this gorgeous MUA undressed palette from Lex.

I've used it a few times and I thought I'd let you know what I thought. simple.

So let's start with the look of the product. The style is simple and slimline. I really like the black and clear design and for it's price (£4.00), it looks very nice. The only thing that would have made the look of this better would to either make it all black or to have a metal case or both. What is good about it is that because it's see-through you know which palette you're grabbing in a hurry. 

This palette has a good range of matte and sparkly colours it also comes with a double ended sponge applicator. I don't really like to use a sponge applicator but it's nice that it included in the pack and at times this can be good for packing on colour.

Here are the swatches from all the colours in the palette. I think the colour payoff is really nice and they glide on well. I really like the pigmentation in the matte shades and I like that the glitter isn't too chunky.

Here's a close up of the brush it comes with although it's just a soft pad one of the good things about it is that it's quite long wilhich means you have a bit more control over what you want it to do. 

I love that this palette has all the names on the back. I've had palettes before where the names have only been printed on the cardboard sleeve and once that's disposed up you need to consult google images. 

Over all I really like this palette, I think it's an excellent dupe for the naked palette and I fully recommend it! 

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I hope you liked reading this for more reviews, make-up and lifestyle the you can find me on Instagram, Twitter and YouTube all @lulabellemua

Lots of love 

Lucy 

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Lush Valentines range!

Hi guys,

Yesterday the new valentines range was launched at Lush so I thought it would be lovely to show you all the gorgeous things and tell you a little bit about them. 

First off a returning favourite. Unicorn horn. This year it's a little pinker and doesn't have stars on but in my opinion it's all the  better for it! This is has a gorgeous lustre, the bath looks so shimmery and inviting when you use it. There's loads of French lavender, ylang ylang and Tunisian neroli oil in it to really relax and uplift you all ready for Valentine's Day! 

Now for a brand new addition to the Valentine's line up. Lover lamp. Based on Oxford street original, lava lamp this releases fair trade organic cocoa butter hearts laced with glitter to make a very pale, pretty pink bath dotted with heart shaped confetti. This has mood boosting Brazilian orange oil and vanilla to leave your skin fresh and soft.

Now onto lip care, Valentine's Day is the perfect time to polish up that pout. 

The kiss lip scrub is back! This sweet and salty scrub is chock full of nourishing cocoa butter and sweet almond oil with a little manderin oil to make it fruity. The best things about this is that 1, this year it's vegan and 2, it has lots of tiny little edible hearts so it looks super cute. 

Also back this year is the matching gloss. The kiss lip gloss is enriched with Shea and Illipe butters to soften the lips. Kalahari melon oil, full of essential fatty acids and lots of agave for slip and shine. 

This year Lush have reworked a modern classic. Prince Charming shower gel has become a shower cream. This means it has loads of added cocoa butter to moisturise your skin as you're showering. Prince Charming also has marshmallow root decoction and pomegranate juice. Which will help soften and protect the skin whilst brightening it. 

They're painting the roses red, not pink or green nor aquamarine! 

Roses all the way is one of the loveliest rose soap I've smelt in a long time. It's jam packed with Turkish rose oil to produce a fresh yet blousey floral scent. I also love that these are individual soaps. It'll look as gorgeous in your bathroom as it does on the fun green base instore! 

This year there are two knot wraps available for your loved ones. Love birds of Africa is back, a lovely scarf depicting love birds under a new moon, and a fun frog prince designed by an amazing charity called Arthouse Meath (www.arthousemeath.com). 

"Showcasing talents and skills of adults living with severe epilepsy, learning and physical difficulties. 100% of sales revenue goes back into the project". 

It's stolen my heart and that frog can kiss me anytime! 

Last but not least, some gifts! 

There are 5 gifts for Valentine . 

First off is 'in your dreams' this is lovely little gift that has two bath products in. A unicorn horn and an old classic Tisty Tosty. 

'?' Is a shower box with roses all the way and a 100g bottle of Prince Charming. 

'Two hearts' is a three bomb box. Tisty Tosty, sex bomb and lover lamp. Great for the person in your life who loves a long soak! 

'Love and kisses' is a big sexy shower hat box. Jammed full of everything you need to get ready before your date and everything you'll need after! This box has Yuzu and cocoa shower cream 100g, Prince Charming shower cream 100g, love and light hand cream, oral pleasure toothy tabs, serendipity soap, passion fruit lip balm, rub rub rub shower scrub and tender is the night massage bar. 

Now for probably my favourite box. 'Lots of love' a box that looks like an old fashioned box of chocolates with gold deco detailing and six amazing bath products to share (or not!). This set includes lover lamp bath bomb, a French kiss bubble bar, rose jam bubbleroon, Tisty Tosty bath bomb, sex bomb bath bomb and a unicorn horn bubble bar. 

 

My top picks are Prince Charming, unicorn horn and the kiss sugar scrub! Let me know yours!

Also there are some special things coming to the kitchen soon so keep a close eye on that! 

I hope you've liked reading this, if you did then ad me to your reading list, or, find me on you tube, Twitter and Instagram all under LulabelleMUA. 

Lots of love

Lucy

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Let's Talk: Christmas in retail VS Vlogmas

Hi Guys,

So It's been a little while since I posted and today I just wanted to chat about why that was. 

My last post was on the 17th December, it seems so long ago even though it was just over 2 weeks. This year I set myself a pretty tough task. To most it would seem simple enough but as I've discovered it turned out to be really hard.
 Vlogmas, that amazing time of year on Youtube where you get to watch your favourite youtubers get ready for Christmas. We watch them get their tree, decorate the house, go to parties and spend time with their families. I love Christmas and for me Vlogmas is a really fun thing to watch. At least 5 of the channels I subscribe to take part in it and this year I decided I wanted to be a part of it. 

So here's a few things I learnt. 

1. The pressure to generate content is massive.

I felt like if I wasn't doing anything particularly interesting then I had to make myself for the sake of the vlog. I then felt guilty if I couldn't make that happen. despite the fact I only have about 20 subscribers. 

2. Editing takes up a lot of time.

More than you think! Sometimes I just didn't have time and sometimes I would be up until 2am sorting it out. This is not ideal when you have a full time job.

3. Finding friends who are up for constant vlogging is hard.

I have about 4 friends who are cool with vlogging. Others only will if they have a full face of make-up, fair enough. Chris does not want to be in any vlogs of videos. I completely respect that but it does make it harder to vlog when he's around. He doesn't want to (and quite rightly) play second fiddle to the vlog. Around 90% of Christmas things involve Chris. I don't want him to feel pressured to join in. 

4. Panicking about storage and battery constantly.

This was a HUGE problem this year! I actually haven't up loaded the last few videos because I cannot get them from my files without windows crashing. It's incredibly frustrating. My laptop isn't really powerful enough to run premier and that crashes too. My Google drive, ipad and iphone filled up completely. 

 

 

5. Not living in the moment

Sometimes when I'm editing something I realise that someone might have said something really funny and I missed it due to vlogging. I'm sure the camera becomes second nature after a while but I was so desperate for content that I missed the important things about spending Christmas with my friends. 

These all seem pretty negative but there were some really amazing positive points too.

1. Video Diary

I'll always have this Christmas to watch and see what I was doing in 2015. 2015 hasn't really been as awesome as I'd have liked it to have been so seeing those fun days will show me it wasn't all bad.

2. Building my confidence with Vlogging

It's amazing how fast you don't give a fig about talking to your phone/camera in public when you're vlogging. Compared to Vlogmas, the odd vlog now and then won't seem so scary.

3. Learning how to edit, quickly.

This was amazing practice for video editing. I found that by the end I was pretty quick at it. It also forced me to use techniques that were new to me.

4. The new found respect for daily vloggers

It's hard to dedicate that much of your life to something if you're not getting paid for it. I enjoy it and it's not about money for me but unless it is your lively hood then, hell, you deserve my respect!

5. Pushing yourself to do more. 

As much as I didn't want to force content. I ending up saying yes to more things that I would have done previously. Going for drinks more than once on the market. impromptu trips to Winchester or Fun baking vlogs made me really happy. 

My number 1 problem I had whilst doing vlogmas was that I work. I work in retail.
 Retail at Christmas is hands down one of the hardest professions at this time of year. It goes hand in hand with the hospitality trade.
 It's there to make your Christmas easy and special. At Christmas we extend our opening hours- chances are that I'm at work at least 9 hours of any given day. This means that vlogs end up being 3-4 minutes long when really I'd like them to be 10-12. I can't and don't have anything to vlog about on those days. I get up- I vlog, I do my make-up- I vlog. I come home and talk for two minutes- I end the vlog. I wake up and do it all again.

Christmas in retail is insane. Thousands of customers ask you a million questions, we have to help them as much as possible. We have Christmas temps to train in any quiet periods or if that's taken care of we clean and stock up. Quiet periods become a luxury. We have a queue before we open the doors and people hammering on the glass after we're closed. deliveries go from being £1k to £8k. 
All summer you long for it to be busy and Christmas. as soon as it arrives you look forward to having space to sit in the stock/staff room ,sweating with the air con on eating melting ice lollies. As I've said in vlogs, I love my job. Boy, is it hard though, people have no idea. We smile, we serve. We go home and collapse, not wanting our burning feet to touch the ground before we have to get up again at 7am. 

One of the things I love about retail is at the end of it I go home knowing that people got a gorgeous gift for someone they love and cherish. Maybe they'll remember our service and visit during the year. 

Back to Vlogmas, I'm going to do it next year but here's 3 things I'll do differently. 

1. Change daily to weekly.

This will make my life sooo much easier! It means people will get a decent length vlog to watch and means I'll only have to spend 2 hours editing- not 8. Vlogmas like Christmas should be about quality not quantity.

2. Prepare everything the week before.

This means getting my royalty free music into place and my intro done and dusted so all I have to do is plonk it in. Sorting out my thumbnail would be a good plan also. Next year is about making it easier on me. 

3. Chill out and enjoy it! 

Go with the flow and ease up on the pressure. If these vlogs are for me (which they are) then I should stop acting like I have thousands of subscribers. Just have fun!

I hope you all had an amazing Christmas and New Year!

If you enjoyed reading this, If you want to see more then come visit me over at Twitter, Instagram, Youtube or Bloglovin'. 

Lucy 

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