Blogmas Day 3: Gift Ideas

~ stashy ~ 39 Comments

This isn’t just any ol’ gift ideas post – I’ll focus on gift ideas for the beauty addict – because that’s what I know best! 😛  There are 2 schools of thought on gift giving for beauty items: buy practical things that you know the person uses up and would want a replenishment.  Or, buy things which perhaps are a little frivolous and the person might not buy for herself.  I don’t see any issues with either of those strategies, you can even give a mix from each categories – so here are my gift ideas divided into: Sensible and Sensational. 😉

I’m not a fan of pre-packaged gift sets – I think it’s more thoughtful to pick items and package them together yourself.  I’m going to keep the gift ideas capped to below $100 so it’s realistic!

Sensible

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Shiseido Facial Cotton x6 ($11 each = $66)
I’d be pleased as punch if I received enough Shisedo cotton for an entire year!

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Blogmas Day 2: Ugly Christmas sweaters

~ stashy ~ 42 Comments

It’s a fun one for Day 2 of Blogmas!  Let’s talk about ugly Christmas sweaters. 😀

These are real sweaters spotted at Sears:
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They were just mixed amongst the regular ladies’ wear – I’m honestly not sure if they were being ironic or these are sincere Christmas sweaters. 😆

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Blogmas Day 1: Red & Green

~ stashy ~ 42 Comments

Today I’m excited to announce the launch of my first ever BLOGMAS!  Ingrid of Curly.Spring.Blossom came up with this idea and asked if I’d be interested! So, Ingrid, Kaily of Hello Kaily, Sharon of Sharon Beauty Prime and myself (we’re calling ourselves the Babes in Blogland) will be posting 25 consecutive days for the holiday season.  Our Blogmas will be primarily focused beauty topics with a Christmas spin.  Every Tuesday, Thursday and Friday all 4 of us will be posting about the same topic, so be sure to check out each of our take on the topic du jour! 😀

Our topic today is RED & GREEN stuff (or Red & Green sh!t as the classy Kaily called it). I’m interpreting this topic as a showcase of red and green makeup items from my stash.
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It would have been a bit of a cop-out to just feature nail polishes so I did make an effort to include actual makeup stuff. 😛

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Trash Stash: November 2015

~ stashy ~ 39 Comments

With last month’s epic Trash Stash, this month yielded a much smaller amount of empties.
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I’m most proud of finishing up that little pot of Laura Mercier powder!

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Optimum Points Redemption Extravaganza!

~ stashy ~ 55 Comments

Since everyone is posting their Black Friday loot, I thought I’d post my Optimum Points Spend Your Points loot!  I did go into Shoppers Drug Mart (SDM) armed with a shopping list, let’s see how well I did sticking to the plan:
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Firstly, I ended up redeeming for $300 worth of products instead of $200. I had accumulated more points since hitting the top tier a little while back. And since I’ve been positively deprived of new beauty products all year long (too dramatic?) that I went all out and depleted my Optimum Points balance. It was worth it! 😀

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Fall into Autumn Tag

~ stashy ~ 18 Comments

I was tagged by Joy of StyledWithJoy to do this one and since Fall is quickly slipping away from us, I figured I’d hurry up and answer this, pronto!  Thanks Joy for tagging me on this one, I can always count on you! 🙂

Rules:
1. Include the blog links of the tag creators (Lilian and Denise).
2. Thank the last person who tagged you and link their blogs in your post.
3. Be thoughtful and creative when you answer these questions.
4. After answering the questions, pass the tag onto at least five more bloggers to spread the autumn joy!

The Questions:

1. What is your go-to fall color?
Grey. I just LOVE all shades of grey. I will wear head to toe grey – charcoal pants with a dove coloured top!  I don’t have grey shoes – what’s up with that.

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Prize: Rinse Beauty Bar Manicure

~ stashy ~ 24 Comments

I visited RINSE Beauty Bar this past Wednesday for a Paradise Manicure, which was the prize I won from Cat of MyLipstickAddition! 😀 I took the day off to meet up with a friend for lunch and decided to get some pampering too.
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It was quiet and relaxing since it was just Julie (the lovely and friendly nail technician) and myself at the salon during my visit.  As Cat mentioned on her post about her experience at RINSE, this salon features natural beauty products – even all of their nail polishes are 5-free, cruelty free and vegan.  I really appreciate the fact that everything they used not only looked good, it was good for me as well. 🙂

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Tokyo Milk Wisdom No 26 perfume

~ stashy ~ 26 Comments

Happy Black Friday!  I may or may not be out trying to nab a deal on winter boots. I haven’t decided if I’ll brave the crowds.  I might just order online. 😛

Today I’m reviewing Tokyo Milk Wisdom No 26 perfume.  I’ve heard a lot about Tokyo Milk fragrances – how niche and unique they are; the official name of the company is Tokyo Milk Parfumarie Curiosite, for heaven’s sake.  But, I feel like it’s a very carefully manufactured brand image, not as indie or novel as they’d like us to think.
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I bought the eau de parfum of Wisdom No 26 purely by chance: last year at around this time in November I was killing time in a little gifty shop – you know the kind, lots of trinkets adorned with whatever is the latest trend – be it owls, foxes, pandas; necklaces with lightning bolt / mushroom / wishbone pendants, and a section of cutely packaged hand creams and perfumes at greatly marked-up prices.  They were having a 50% off sale on select fragrances, and Wisdom No 26 was among the offering.  I snagged this for only $13.50.  I initially bought it as a back-up present – just in case someone gave me a Christmas present who I wasn’t expecting to receive a gift from, I’d have something to give them back (do you do this – keep spares?)  But in the end, it wasn’t needed and the perfume sat in my stash unopened.  So I decided to open it and keep it for myself! 😉

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Black Friday 2015: No-Buy edition

~ stashy ~ 30 Comments

Happy Thanksgiving to my American friends! I hope you get stuffed full of turkey and pumpkin pie! 😀  Then rest up for Black Friday tomorrow! 😉

So it seems like everyone but me will be going out Black Friday shopping this year. *pout*  Alas, Black Friday in Canada is less of an event compared to the US anyway.  Our Thanksgiving was 6 weeks ago, but we participate in this American Thanksgiving tradition, whereby we have a random day of special sales on a Friday at the end of November.  It’s a regular work day for us; our stores don’t open as early, and our sales aren’t as insane as in the US.
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But, I have seen a bigger push from retailers to promote Black Friday here in the past few years. The last 3 years I made an effort and went looking for deals on Black Friday.   In 2013, I actually took the day off and went shopping!  Since I’m not participating in Black Friday (cosmetics-wise) this year, it got me thinking, did I even like the stuff I bought on Black Fridays past?  It’s not a good deal if I don’t even use the stuff.  Let’s have a look.

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One month till Christmas!

~ stashy ~ 22 Comments

Tick tock, it’s officially only one month till Christmas. 30 more days to finish (or start?) shopping.  I’m pleased to say that I’ve actually started my Christmas shopping!  I went to William-Sonoma when they had a 20% off Friends & Family event and bought a few things, one of which was this:
Williams-Sonoma Salty Nut Mix
The rest I can’t say because some people read this blog. 😉

I also mailed out my first Christmas card earlier this week – I don’t have many to mail out, thank goodness.  I have an idea about what I’m getting for pretty much everyone on my list – so it’ll just be a matter of buying the items.

And a bit off topic, but look what I just saw:
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Image courtesy of smartcanucks.ca
The long awaited Spend Your Points Event at Shoppers Drug Mart! Granted, it’s not the Super Spend Your Points Event but it’s better than nothing.  On Saturday only, 95,000 Optimum Points will be worth $200 instead of $170, and 50,000 points is worth $100 instead of $85. I’ll be redeeming for $200 worth of beauty products on Saturday. 😛

What about you, have you started to shop?  I guess with Black Friday coming up, it’ll be the official start of Christmas shopping frenzy. 😀