I feel like despite and even because of  the fact that 2020 is a hornet's nest - a murder hornet's nest? - of messed up, a lot of us are feeling extra proud to be Canadian this Canada Day. No, it isn't because we're perfect or don't have huge, overwhelming problems like the rest of the world - we do! But I feel like, as Canadian's, many of us have really come together through all of the eruptions surrounding the pandemic and the long-overdue mainstream acknowledgment of privilege and systemic inequality and that gives me hope. No, we aren't perfect and we as a country have a to acknowledge and deal with some pretty profound issues, but I still feel incredibly proud to be Canadian this Canada Day because I feel confident that we as a people have come together to face the issues that we've been hit with this year.

Hey guys! It's our last week of June's Nail Art Roulette for #CBBxManiMonday and this week my pairing was a Black & White/Nude colour story and a Minimalist theme. Considering I have a tendency to take a more everything-but-the-kitchen-sink kind of approach to my nails, this was outside of my comfort zone but I found that I really loved the results within the parameters of keeping it monochrome and simple. Also... I always forget just how much I love a dotticure!

I have to be really honest here... I've actually been meaning to review the Biore UV Aqua Rich Watery Essence SPF 50 PA++++ for almost a year now. Last summer, when my cousin's wife's parents were coming to visit Canada from Japan, they were kind enough to bring me a tube of this sunscreen that I had been DYING to try for ages but had yet to pull the trigger on. 

The reason that I really wanted to get my hands on this is pretty simple - it's one of the most talked about and widely lovely Japanese sunscreens that I'd seen and I really, really wanted to try a Japanese sunscreen. Why, you ask? Well, it's pretty simple. Here in Canada, as well as the US, our options for chemical filters are limited and, in my opinion, pretty outdated. Because sunscreen is treated like an OTC drug rather than a cosmetic, it has much stricter regulation and it really isn't easy to get new filters approved. For me, finding a chemical sunscreen option here in Canada is pretty difficult because the more common filters tend to cause irritation and break outs in my skin, so I tend to just stick to mineral sunscreens. Mineral sunscreens, though they do offer broad spectrum protection without irritation, can be tricky formulawise as well and can be an absolute nightmare for people of colour due to their strong white cast. Seriously, sunscreen is a bit of a minefield for me, which is why there aren't a lot that really stick in my collection. 

Like I said, I've been using this for nearly a year now (almost exactly, actually) so I've definitely put it rigorously to the test and am ready to give my review. Keep reading for more!

Of all of the pairings that I ended up with for this month's #CBBxManiMonday nail art roulette type of theme, I really did think when I landed on "Neon" and "Gradient" that it would be super easy... and it turned out that I struggled with this one quite a lot and actually tried a few different things that just didn't work at all, but in the end I'm super happy with what came out of it. Granted, it's not at all what I thought I was going to end up with when I started, but a lot of times that's what happens when I'm doing nail art, so I'm hardly surprised. 

Nail art has really been brain soothing self care for me recently - which is why you're seeing so much nail art content on the blog at the moment - and I really was inspired to try things out while I was doing my swatches of the Essie Spring 2020 Collection*. I really wasn't sure how this mani was going to turn out at the outset and if the two polishes I used would make for a good gradient (not all polishes really work out as gradients), but I'm pretty smitten with what I turned out. 

Honestly, I like to think that I'm beyond getting excited about packaging and branding and design the way that I used to, but as soon as I had the VDL Expert Color Lip Cube Marble Glow* in my hand, I was smitten. Available from Avon as a part of their partnership with the brands under THEFACESHOP umbrella, this lip balm absolutely wins the award for the prettiest looking lip balm I've ever tried by a mile and I've been testing the formula for a while to see if it lives up to what I had hoped.

For this month's #CBBxManiMonday Nail Art Roulette, we knew that we absolutely had to include Rainbow as one of our colour stories because we all love to celebrate Pride every year with nail art. I got SUPER lucky with my random number generator and landed on Texture as my theme, which we decided would refer to texture in terms of glitter, flakies or anything that would give an interesting... well, texture to the look, and I knew exactly what I wanted to do. (Although, to be honest, I probably would have made something very similar to this mani with a few of the possible pairings that could have come up....) Anyway, I put together this glittery Sharpie rainbow base, added some negative space heart stamping, and am completely in love with the look!

Keep reading for a closer look!

In light of everything that's happening in the world right now, I've really been reflecting on the things that I, as a person of pretty profound privilege, can do to be a better ally, and one of those things is to use this platform more thoughtfully to showcase BIPOC owned beauty brands that are seriously getting it done. With that in mind, I realized that, though I've used their polishes in nail art on the blog before, I've never talked extensively about just how much I love Dimension Nails. With an incredible polish formula and a really amazing ethos and brand identity, they are absolutely a brand worth looking at and one that I absolutely need to collect more polishes from. 

Admittedly, I tend to use my beauty sponges until they're basically falling apart from being jabbed with my fingernails and washed to within and inch of their lives, but they are definitely tools that need to be replaced with more frequency than others. Recently, I did a bit of a sponge cleanout and I knew I wanted to get some new ones and when I saw the elf Total Face Sponge Duo at my local Superstore, I decided I might as well give them a go and see how they fared. Even though I haven't actually been wearing much makeup for the past couple of months, I've been reaching for these sponges every time I have, and I'm ready to let you guys know how they worked out for me. 

Hey guys! I have to admit, I was initially a little bit stumped with this week's Nail Art Roulette pairing of "Pink" as my colour story and "Packaging Inspired" as my colour story. Packaging inspired nail art has never been particularly easy for me, it's just not something I tend to take much inspiration from, so I really wasn't sure what I was going to do - I don't even have a lot of products in my collection that have pink packaging. And then one night I was washing my face with the Pixi Rose Cream Cleanser and the lightbulb hit and I just sort of went from there.