Returning Faves

I went into The Body Shop yesterday and to my surprise, some of my old faves are back!!! For a limited time only, the Body Shop is bringing back some of their original products from the 80's. Let me highlight my top 4:

Passion Fruit Cleansing Gel. I've talked about this one up before because as I kid I loved this stuff. It's gentle and smells great. I don't use it as an everyday cleanser because my oily skin needs acne fighting ingredients every now and then. This is more along the lines of a "special occasion" shower gel. A few years ago I found this product in London and stocked up. Is it bad to still be using products after 4 years? It doesn't seem to have affected the way this gel works and the scent is still fresh.

One product I had forgotten about until I unleashed the scent again was the Green Apple Shower Gel. This stuff is genius! It's a little on the fruity side for those that try to steer clear of these kind of scents, but it's their loss. It's got more of a zest fragrance than an overwhelming sweetness, and I love how strong it is. Obviously it goes without saying that if you get the right scent than the Body Shop shower gels are the da bomb. See: Strawberry shower gel.

This last product is a little controversial for me. Banana Shampoo and Conditioner. The scent is a very pleasing banana, but I've just found that it's a basic shampoo that sometimes has left my wavy hair limp on occasion. Which is ok! Because every now and then I need that scent life to perk up my shower plus it does leave my hair feeling soft. Does anyone else do this? I sometimes buy products knowing full well that overall it's just standard, but some aspects of the product makes it worthwhile for me. In this case, it's the scent and the softness factor. Which let's just all agree - the Body Shop does scents well. I think these products are more about nostalgia for everyone and when I use these they remind me of being 10 and getting beauty products for the first time.

Re: Molton Brown and B&BW Kitchen Herb

Ok, so I have to say that the Molton Brown Re-charge Black Pepper bodywash is one of my all-time faves. I know it's heavily-scented (sort of in the incense, patchouli family), so it's probably not a product that should be used daily. But really, nothing makes me feel more autumn-fresh than washing with this shower gel and putting on a nice oversized neutral-toned sweater. If I remember correctly, Lindsey said she used this before she goes out for the evening. I use it on Saturdays, sitting around my apartment in big sweaters. Good for both occasions, I think.

Also, Kitchen Herb? Really????? I hated this stuff. Give me Kitchen Lemon or Kitchen Spice any day over this handsoap. I had it in my kitchen in college once and I dreaded washing my hands with it (hence, it seemed to be the never-ending dispenser). I usually like fresh, herb-y scented things, but for some reason I had a real aversion to this handsoap.

What are your thoughts on the Bath & Body Works moisturizer handsoap? I discovered that it's not bad. Since I probably wash my hands more than the average person, it helps to keep them moisturized during the harsh winter months.

What's on your sink now?

We have: Method French Lavender (my roommate's purchase)

Spring Finds

Temperatures here this weekend were:

Besides washing my car, I took the time to return my last Christmas gift. It was some Sapphire/ Amethyst/Moonbeam shower gel from Bath & Body Works. I mean a nice gift, but I just will never use it and I'd rather take a look at some new products. I hadn't been there lately - but did you know Valentine's Day is coming up? Look out rose/candlelight shower gel displays! I knew I wanted something from the C.O. Bigelow line because I like the packaging and it will look good in my bathroom. I like their Mentha line, but I thought I'd think "outside of the box" and get a new scent. I'm usually a Rosemary Mint/Lavender person, but nothing really caught my attention from that area. Instead, I went with the Lime & Coriander Body Cleanser. What a great scent! I love it! It's going to be great for when spring actually gets here.

Another thing about it - and I don't know if I'm just weird about these things, but I like how it smells with my body lotion. Right now I'm using St. Ives Collagen Elastin because it's a subtle scent and moisturizes well. I've had bad experiences in the past where a shower gel and a body lotion smell great separately but when they mix - sick! The #1 culprit lotion for me was always the Olay Quench Body Lotion. Something about it just always made a good shower gel smell awful. But I can safely safe the Lime & Coriander does not present this problem.

Recent Visit to Duane Reade

So tonight I was just kind of sitting in my apartment watching some TV. The sky was overcast and I created a nice little mood with the lighting, but after a while I jumped up and felt the need to just buy something. Ideally when I'm in this mood, I have a Target available and a pal to share in this type of adventure, but tonight I just sort of had to make do with the situation at hand and I ambled down the street to my nearest Duane Reade. The CVS on Lex is probably a little bigger/nicer but I just wasn't going to walk up the hill to get there. So this is what I purchased:

Caress Tahitian Renewal body wash. After giving up on my search for PTR botanical buffing beads body wash, I decided there just has to be another summer shower gel out there that I could actually get my hands on. Now, I've purchased this body wash as a travel size for when I went on vacation somewhere in the south, and I originally thought I wasn't going to go bigger than that, but I went ahead and decided to make the commitment to the whole 12 fl. ounces anyway. The thing is, I'm using a coral-colored poof right now, and I just have this thing that the shower gel has to mesh with the poof color. I mean, I just couldn't use Dove's Cucumber & Green Tea with a purple poof, for example. Also, after doing a little research, I found out this shower gel was given out on the Tyra Banks Show! Wow! Since Tyra and I are in agreement on most things in life, how could I go wrong here? All in all, I'm happy with this purchase but it wasn't anything new and exciting.

So ironically, for my new and exciting purchase, I went for Johnson's Vanilla Oatmeal body lotion. Two scents that couldn't be further from the idea of excitement. BUT, it was New! and it stood out from the rest of the baby lotions with its more natural tones. I just thought it might be a nice light scent for after the shower that wouldn't compete with my perfumes. But looking back on this purchase, I'm feeling a little bit of buyer's remorse, only because this seems like such a fall/winter scent. Maybe I'll save it, we'll see. One thing I would like to add here, it's really annoying how you can't smell any of the baby products in the store since they always have that safety seal. So if you want to purchase anything baby-related, you have to just take a leap of faith. I've always wondered why it was OK for adult bath products to go unsealed while baby products are blocked from the world until after purchase. I suppose some things will never change, even if it is a mild source of frustration.

Strawberry-frosted Pop Tarts. I like cherry-frosted better. But I always pick cherry over strawberry for everything anyway so no surprise there. DR just didn't have them, so I went with these. This will be an exciting new addition to my breakfast routine this week, so I'm looking forward to it. I don't think there's much else I need to say. We've all had them, and I'm pretty sure we all like them.

Dial Daily Care Antibacterial Hand Soap with Aloe. So it's my turn to get the soap for our community bathroom, well, sort of. The weird thing is, everyone in my apartment has purchased their own hand soap. So we have 3 at our sink right now. I mean, I guess it's nice to have the backup option, but it's also just kinda funny/ridiculous. So for my personal contribution I went for the Aloe version. I bought the Melon-scented last time because I thought I remembered liking it at one point, but I was wrong. It wasn't great. So since I've been washing my hands a lot more often as of late (due to the humidity and the stickiness of the city in the summer), I had to go with something soothing/moisturizing. The scent is very boring, like a hand soap you would find in your aunt's powder room, but it will get the job done. In a soft and soothing way.

And lastly, I purchased Betty Crocker Warm Delights Fudgy Chocolate Chip Cookie because I wanted a snack for HGTV's Design Star finale. I haven't even watched any of the shows this season, but I figured I would watch the finale and then catch a marathon of the rest of the season sometime this week. But anyways, I introduced these to Susan last year and it was a big hit! It's basically like having a serving size of fresh warm cake. In NY, it seems that they only sell limited kinds, so I can't get my absolute favorite - Cinnamon Swirl Cake. But since I was feeling burned out on ice cream, I think this will be a nice change of pace for an evening snack.

Summer Buffin'...Had Me A Blast

While we're talking Peter Thomas Roth here, I wanted to express how much I enjoy the Botanical Buffing Beads body wash (the blue one). This is the perfect summer shower gel, because it just has a nice light scent that leaves you feeling clean and refreshed. Perfect after a day in the gravel pits or the streets of NY. The scent is kind of like an old Vavoom! shampoo I used to use that was discontinued, so it fills that void nicely. Scent-wise, I think it has the same general effect as if you use a Lever 2000 or an Irish spring bar, but it's little less masculine. And, it has little buffing beads! Fun!

I went to two Sephora's in the past week and could not find this kind outside of the mini PTR tester-kit. I asked an incompetent employee if they had it and she pointed me to the actual scrub. After I explained to her that this wasn't it, she guessed that it was discontinued. I don't think so, it's still on their website. I will have to do a little more detective work here. But to sum it all up, this is a great summer s-gel. I guarantee it will make your shower experience very refreshing!

Summer Mocktails

I was looking for a gift a few weeks ago and came across this set of Korres Summer Cocktail Shower Gels. The set includes Ginger Cosmopolitan, Melon Mojito, and Vanilla Daiquiri. I enjoy the Korres line, but I have to say the only one that smelled great was the Melon Mojito. Granted I didn't buy it and haven't used it, but I will say that the overall idea appealed to me for new summer gels.