Aeria Skin Even Tone Brightening Sheet Mask

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​Aeria skin is an entirely new brand on my beauty radar, but boy am I grateful I discovered them, because they're honestly one of the most luxurious face masks I have ever used. These Even Tone Brightening sheet masks were sent to me to review, which was really exciting for me in itself as no other brand have ever been in touch asking for me to review any of their products before! Whilst I'm in no way interested in beauty blogging to blag free stuff, the fact that a brand noticed a small town new blogger like me out of all of the other wonderful bloggers out there and thought that my opinion might matter enough to ask for a review blows my mind. It was a small but motivating step on my blogging journey that has made me feel as though slowly, I'm moving in the right direction and getting my name out there!

I want to start off by talking about one of the biggest selling points about this mask for me, the packaging. There was so many little things that just made it feel so special, like a lot of love and thought had went into making it. It had a beautiful delicate, watercolour style design on the front of the box and on each sachet of mask, and the sachets themselves even managed to make your usual run of the mill tear open sachets look and feel as though they were made from a smooth satin. The overall coral hue of the packaging is stunning, and did I mention you can reuse the packaging as a jewellery box when you're finished with it?! Because yes, basically, you can. The box all five masks are packaged in contains a drawer that you can pull out with a beautiful gold ribbon to use when you're done storing your masks in there. If you wanted to buy more than one type of mask then you could also start to stack them. What's not to love??

In the past I have mostly opted for mud masks, so I was a bit apprehensive about trying a fabric mask, especially after having used a couple in the past that were quite simply uncomfortable, tingly and poorly cut to size. This mask however was a whole different ball game, and I was really pleasantly surprised. Made from 100% natural organic cotton from India, this mask was fairly thick and had a real 'quality' feeling when getting it out of the pack, like no expense had been spared. At the same time, it was thin enough to adhere well to my face due to being saturated in a good amount of serum - which is also free from parabens, synthetic dyes, sulfates, alcohol, gluten and fragrance.

One thing I was particularly impressed with was the way the mask had been manufactured. The slits on the mask were expertly placed so that you can adjust it to best fit the contours of the face, and I had no problem with smoothing it down and into place in no time at all. Usually I find that if you try to pull a fabric mask over the nose it pulls the rest of the mask away from the bridge of the nose and the cheeks, but with slits in the mask along the bridge of the nose and a separate, freestanding section of mask for the nose, I had no trouble with this at all.

The only thing I was relatively indifferent to with this mask was that it was fragrance free, but I think more people would probably prefer this than not. I personally tend to enjoy the scents you get with different masks, but it was a small price to pay for the difference in results compared to other brands of mask, and it's good to know that you're not putting anything unnatural on your face.

An aspect I did like about using a fabric mask is that you don't have to wash anything off of your face after using it, as I find it's a bit of a shame to feel as though you're washing all of that goodness straight down the drain. You simply massage the remaining serum from the fabric into your face and go, sort of like having a built in moisturiser!

I have tried a huge range of different face masks in my time, from self heating ones to mud masks and peel offs. The main reason I tend to use them is for the 'me time', and the idea that you're doing something good for your skin. But honestly, I can't recall a single occasion where I have noticed a difference in my skin afterwards. I expected this to be quite similar to be fair, nothing more than a gimmick even, but I noticed such a difference in my skin afterwards that even my boyfriend pointed out that my skin looked really even! My reaction was pretty much 'no way have you just said that, that's exactly what it says it's supposed to do on the box!'.I genuinely just couldn't believe that he had picked up on the difference in my skin, let alone something so accurate and specific. Clearly I haven't been giving him enough credit! Truly, you need to try it for yourself to believe it. It really did make my skin clearer and tighter feeling and the results kept on coming in the hours and days after using it too.

Aeria Skin Even Tone Brightening sheet masks retail at $25 for five masks here. Their website has recently made international shipping available to the UK, but sometimes also have stock on Amazon.

Please know that although being sent this product for review purposes, all views and opinions expressed in this post are entirely my own.

Neal's Yard Deliciously Ella Facial Wash

For such a fan of all things beauty, skincare is the one area I don't tend to bother too much with. I'm not the worst at looking after my skin, I've always worn a moisturiser with an SPF since my early teens, and I always, always take my makeup off at night (I heard that if you don't it can age your face by up to 8 days a time!).

Aside from the odd face mask, I just don't particularly 'enjoy' looking after my skin or having a big elaborate skincare routine, mainly because I've never found any skincare products that really do what they say enough for me to want to keep at it. But, I received this face wash this year from my partner for Christmas, and I love it so much that I've been toying with buying a full skincare range from Neal's Yard. I know! I was really surprised by how much I liked it, because in my opinion face wash tends to be a duller part of a skincare routine. Well not this one. This stuff makes me want to actually take the time to cleanse properly cleanse whenever I can rather than my usual splash of water or makeup remover.

This is the first Neal's Yard product I have tried, but I'm definitely sold. Hats off to my boyfriend for choosing this too, he said he wanted to buy me something that I would like but wouldn't spend the money on myself over other beauty products. He's quite right of course, before trying this I never would have spent £16 on a face wash. I have to say though, I happily would after trying this.

This facial wash is one of two products from the Neal's Yard range called 'Deliciously Ella' in collaboration with British food blogger Ella Woodward - author of a number of books about how to eat more natural food to help you look and feel your best. She describes this range as 'nourishing skin food for a radiant glow'.

As soon as I saw the packaging for this product I knew straight away I was going to love it. The design on the box alone is absolutely beautiful, with the cutest little hand sketched depictions of the ingredients that are inside the product. The bottle itself is made of glass, which I think makes a nice change from the usual plastic tubes or bottles face wash come in that I think can often seem a bit cheap. The bottle also gives off the most wonderful deep blue glow, which I'm hoping I have captured somewhat in these photos. It's an absolute beauty to behold, something that makes you proud to have it displayed on your bathroom shelf, and I'm so glad that a lot of the other products from the Neal's Yard range come packaged like this. Not only is it so pretty that you will feel the need to use it every time you look at it, but it comes with a pump style top, so it literally could not be easier to dispense the right amount of product compared to more fiddly styles of packaging like plastic caps.

The consistency of the product itself is quite runny, which I have no problems with at all. It is a clear, gel like liquid that foams up on contact with damp skin. Whenever I use this I find myself massaging it in for far longer than necessary because it just feels and smells so nice, but it's worth bearing in mind that a little really does go a long way, and at 100ml per bottle I can see this lasting me a long time. Aside from the beautiful packaging, the smell is absolutely beautiful. So natural, and it smells just like essential oils rather than a fake synthetic type scent. I suppose that is to be expected though with an organic product! I was also impressed by how you can really smell every single product listed on the front of the packaging, which is really quite rare! I would say however that the strongest scent is the rose, followed by the cucumber and then a hint of lime which makes it smells quite fresh and citrusy. The overall scent isn't at all overpowering though, just an absolute delight on the senses.

After using this my skin feels so fresh and clean, like any of the days grime has simply vanished. It makes my skin feel taught and even manages to give me a bit of a glow, which I don't often say lightly. It doesn't make my skin feel tight or uncomfortable though, which I find some foaming cleansers can do. Overall I was really, really impressed with this. The Deliciously Ella moisturiser that goes with this is definitely next on my wish list!

You can find this product for £16 here.

Grounded Mango Edible Lip Scrub

I want to start off by describing the scent of this lip scrub. I think it's quite difficult to describe a scent, especially when this scrub isn't as one dimensional as simply smelling like mangoes. I can't put my finger on exactly what the smell reminds me of, but it definitely smells a bit like a Solero ice lolly, which I think is a wonderful surprise. It's very sweet, but considering it is made from mostly Castor sugar that is to be expected! If anyone wants to share with me what they think this product smells like in the comments then please do, as it smells like something from my childhood that I can't quite put my finger on and I would love to see if you had any ideas!

This scrub is edible (in the sense that you can lick it off of your lips, not spoon it into your tea), and has a very pleasant taste when licked off of the lips. It tastes how it smells, if that's something you can imagine! Very sugary and with a tropical like taste that doesn't seem artificial. If you don't like the thought of licking it off however you can remove the remaining granules with some tissue or wash it away, but I personally don't find that I would use enough at a time to justify going and washing it off - especially when it's been made to be edible and tastes like a fresh mango!

To use, I used about a finger tips worth of this product and buffed it in circular motions on to my lips for a minute or two to remove any dry or flaky skin. I don't really have much of an issue with dry lips, so it was hard to tell how effective this was as my lips were fairly soft before and after. I did however use this to remove the stubborn residue/staining from darker lipsticks and lip stains that are typically hard to remove completely, and this worked an absolute treat! It even got rid of that awful 'lining' of lipstick that some lipsticks can leave on the inside of the lips after a few hours (does anyone else know what I mean!?), which is usually really difficult to remove. I can imagine it would be equally effective at removing stubborn skin, seeing as it did such a good job of removing lipstick staining etc. My lips definitely felt more moisturised afterwards too.

Afterwards, I applied some of the Grounded Chocolate Orange Lip Balm (which deserves a post on its own to be honest... it smells JUST like a real Terry's chocolate orange) to moisturise after all that scrubbing. Although described on the Grounded website as having a rougher texture than other lips scrubs, I actually found that it had quite a fine texture which is easy to scoop up and work with. I loved how crumbly it was in the pot too, I found it really aesthetically pleasing for some reason! In terms of texture, I have only ever used one lip scrub before, the bubblegum flavoured one from Lush, and that was much coarser and quite rough - not to mention more expensive. I think that considering how much more delicate the skin on the lips is compared to the rest of the face, it is much better that this scrub is finer and therefore a bit more gentle. It also contains vitamins, minerals, antioxidants and extra virgin coconut oil, which is known to be quite the little miracle worker in the beauty world. Plus it's free from parabens and other nasties!

Overall I was really impressed with this product. A little goes a long way and I can see this pot lasting me a long time. It smells, tastes and feels lovely to scrub with and combined with a lip balm gives you the perfect base for lipstick - especially ones that usually show up any little imperfections!

You can buy the Grounded Mango Edible Lip Scrub here for only £4.95