August Empties

Can you believe there are only 4 months left until Christmas?! We have just hit Spring here in Australia and I cannot wait for more sunny days to come. August was a good month in terms of empties as I managed to get through quite a bit of products.

Maui Moisture Shine + Awapuhi Hair Shampoo
This shampoo has a lovely refreshing fruity smell containing aloe juice as one of it’s first ingredients (as opposed to water which is usually listed first in most shampoos) and infused with coconut water. Designed for dull hair, this shampoo is designed to hydrate and detangle whilst Awapuhi extract adds vibrant shine to your hair.
My hair does feel light and fresh using this but I feel like it makes my hair oily relatively quickly compared to other shampoos I’ve tried. I can usually get away with not washing my hair until late day three / day four, but with this, I felt the need to urgently shower by day three. I just hate oily, gritty hair. Although I liked the smell of this, I think I’ll give it a pass.

Innisfree Canola Honey Lip Balm Intensive Moisture
If you haven’t already guessed, I love Innisfree products so it’s no surprise that this is probably my third tube of this lip balm. Innisfree do have several different lip balms in their range and I find this one to be the most moisturising of them all – probably because the formula is more intense than the others as the name implies. This is in canola honey scent so it does have quite a sweet honey smell to it, but nothing overpowering. It comes in a 3.5g tube so it’s very convenient to pop into your handbag, keep one by your bedside, pretty much everywhere really. You can bet I have back ups of this too and will be repurchasing once I run out.

Innisfree Green Tea Seed Cream
This is the second or third tub of this that I’ve gone through. I purchased this a while back so they’ve changed the packaging a few times since – I’ve linked in the subtitle to the latest packaging on their website. As the name suggests, this contains green tea which is full of goodness and provides great hydration to your skin. There is a slight scent to it but again nothing overpowering if scents are a concern to you. I didn’t find this irritating on my skin at all, in fact, green tea is one of the ranges that Innisfree has that works well for my skin. The consistency is on the thicker side to help provide that hydration, but if you prefer something lighter, you can opt for their lotion version as well.

Kose Sekkisei UV Gel
Kose is a well known Japanese drugstore brand that I fell in love with after being introduced to it by my mother-in-law. Hard to find in stores here in Australia but they are readily available at every drugstore (or pharmacy as it’s called here in Australia) in Japan.
Despite the word gel in the product name, this has more of a moisturiser consistency as opposed to clear gel that I’m used to seeing in western brands. I find this to be incredibly moisturising and not greasy at all which makes it perfect to use in the morning underneath my makeup. It contains SPF50+ PA++++ to protect the skin from UV rays. I am aware that different countries produce sunscreen products in accordance to their own standards so an SPF50+ for Japan may not necessarily be SPF50+ equivalent for Australia as the sun damage can vary depending on where you are in the world. That’s just something to bear in mind when you’re buying sunscreen and where they’re made. For light days or if I’m at home, I’ll use this (yes, you should use sunscreen everyday even if you’re indoors as UV can still come through the windows, reflect off surfaces etc). For hot Australia summer days, I’ll actually switch up my sunscreen and opt to use one from the Cancer Council for example for that peace of mind as I know it’s been formulated for the Australian sun.
Overall, I did love this product and would repurchase again.

Soap and Glory Smoothie Star Body Butter
The next two products have got to be my favourites out of this month’s empties. So these next two products came in a three pack gift set given to me for Christmas one year and I’ve only gotten around to using and finishing it up now. I’ve used up two so far and have one more to go.
This is my first time trying anything from this brand and oh my word! Let me tell you, this stuff smells so goooood!! Like amazing, delicious, I-want-to-eat-this good! This one is infused with pistachio, almond, sweet vanilla, shea butter, cocoa, coconut oil, so just from this list you can tell, is going to be amazing. It’s incredibly hydrating and feels luxurious on the skin. It is a lightly whipped formula so it’s not too thick feeling.
I love that for something that smells and feels so good, is so affordable too. I am definitely getting another one of these down the track.

Soap and Glory The Righteous Butter Body Butter
This is the second of the three body butters in the gift pack and again, this one did not disappoint. This has more of a perfumed smell to it as opposed to the smoothie star which smelt more like food to me, if that makes sense. This one too also smells absolutely amazing. I’m not sure if they’ve changed the formula or not but the one I have has shea butter, coconut oil and cocoa butter listed in their ingredients. According to Mecca’s website, the fragrance notes to this is bergamot, mandarin, rose, peach, musk, patchouli and amber. Regardless, I would definitely want to use this again as it’s another winning product for me. Unlike the smoothie, the texture of this is more of a body moisturiser and not a whipped formula to help hydrate and nourish your skin.

I definitely found some new loves this month that I’m so glad I stumbled on. I’d love to hear what products you’ve used that’s got you excited.

Until next time xo