CUTE - Beauty Shopping App

A few weeks back I was reading a beauty blog when I saw a really interesting review of an app called Cute!  Now I don't know about the rest of you but I have a huge soft spot for my beauty and cosmetics products.  I can never have too many eye shadows, always on the search for the perfect mascara and simply must try out all the new gadgets to see if they live up to their claims!

The downside to this addiction for me has always been the cost, cosmetics are in general very expensive!  You can imagine my excitement when I saw the products on the app were really reasonable, in fact if I am honest they were so cheap it had me a little concerned about the quality or them even arriving.

THE APP

When you open the app you are met with a page of items, starting with the hourly deals.  The links at the top of the page allow you to press down on them and then drag left or right to change the category  of products that you are viewing.  

The products have a nice clear photo image of them, the option to save them and the option to add to your cart.  

If you see something you are interested in and want to find out more information than is available on the home page, you simply click on the image of the product and it opens the product information for you.

I chose this really cute eyeshadow palette to have a closer look at, the product is on sale for $5 rather than $9 at the moment so even better value.  You can see that on the photo it shows us there there is a link telling us there are more photos of the product.  These are actually a mixture of photos by the seller and customers.  I really like this because you can see the products that others have received not just some staged photos from the seller.  

To access these simply click on the link, this will open the  images into the middle of the page then swipe left to scroll through them.     

        

You can see the reviews for the product under the details about the the item.  To see them all you can simply click on the number of reviews in the red print brackets or click on the red link saying review all.  This will show you what everyone is saying about the item.  

If you are just window shopping there is a handy favourites list, you can access this by clicking the heart on the bottom of the item view that is next to the share button. 

The items that you save move into folders on your account and can easily be accessed by going into your personal account.  To do this you need to navigate to the menu on the top left corner of the screen.  This is located under the three white lines.  When you click on it the below menu will open. 

As you can see the account is logged in as me, if I wanted to view my saved items I would click on my name and it shows me the items I have bought and saved.  

From here you can access your shopping cart, notifications of where the items you bought are, previous order history etc.  All are very easy to navigate.  When you have a notification a small number appears on the notifications button.  

An interesting feature of the app that I like is that when you have saved items in your folders and they go on sale for less they send you a notification to let you know.  I really like this feature as you can save things you fancy for gifts and leave them there to see if they go on sale.  

All items have different shipping times and some are fairly long, I think this one of the downsides to the app, however the shopping is very reasonable for all items, which I think is a fair trade off for the slow delivery. 

I have had several orders so far and not been disappointed at all, everything has arrived within the timescales. The items have been stunning with the exception of one item that said 1 pack of nose strips so I expected a packet of several but it was a single nose strip.  However it was only $1 so I let it slide and guess it did say 1 pack lol.  

I have bought a wide variety of items, some make up brushes, a makeup brush cleaner, a stunning silver ring, scarfs, face wash, nose pore strips and more.  I would rate every item as a 5* in quality!  I am beyond in love with the ring I bought and a watch as a gift for a friend.  

I give the app a 10 out of 10!  I have no complaints at all, in fact I have done half my Christmas shopping on it <3  

I am yet to need to put in a complaint for a refund on anything so I am not sure what their refund service is like.  

Emotional yoyo!

Living with illness that fluctuates on a daily basis can be tough, I can't plan anything because I never know how I am going to wake up.  

I am on one hand extremely grateful that there are days that I can feel slightly more like my former self before I got ill, days where I can manage to do a few things.  

When these days come I am elated, I seem to forget I am ill and push myself to my limits.  I start thinking maybe I am going to be well again longer term and start mentally planning and hoping.  Theoptimist  in me is forever hopeful that I can improve enough to at least get part time work!

Then bam comes the payment for the good day! The pain, the foggy head, the headaches, the lack of energy and the tears! Because I have been reminded that I am ill, that for every good day I have I have to pay if I do too much! 

Why do I do it is the question I ask myself! It's like the euphoria at feeling well enough to achieve things drives me on forgetting the payment.  

Then I ask myself will I do it again? Or will I ever learn? 

I think I will always do the same because I don't think the optimist in me will ever stop hoping and pushing! 

You see even as I lie here with the tears on my cheeks from the pain, hating myself for doing too much for getting to here, I am also planning all the things I need and want to do tomorrow! And I know if my body will let me I will do them no matter that I know what the payment will be because!  if I don't I would not enjoy the good days as much and frankly if I have to pay I might as well pay for a good reason! 

Makeup Brush Cleaner - Brush Egg!

Just recently I came upon an app for my Iphone called Cute, it sells lots of really different products that I have not seen available here in the UK stores.

Recently I have been doing a lot of face painting with greasepaints, they work really well for painting and last really well on the skin, however when it comes to cleaning them off my brushes I have been having a complete nightmare!

The greasepaint's are not water based so do not just rinse off, you need to use a soap based product and really scrub the bristles to remove the paint.

When flicking through Cute the other day I was drawn to a cute device called a Brush Egg, it looked a little basic however had some really good reviews and was only a $1 so I thought why not try it out. 

The device has arrived today so excited I thought I would have a quick go and see if it really works!  

As you can see from the image above my brush was pretty dirty, the greasepaint was fairly thickly on the bristles and in desperate need of a clean.  

The product actually is around the size of a medium hens egg and looks like one that has been cut down the middle, it's made of thick rubber and came packaged in a small clear bag.  

On the flat side of the egg there are two different selections of bristles, one looks a little like a draining board and the other a brush bristle.  

The back of the egg once opened has the name embossed in a pretty font across the bottom of the egg.

On the very bottom there is a hollow area, I assume this is a finger hole, the product actually comes with no instructions so it is all down to guess work!  

The bristle area of the egg is fairly soft to the touch and gave way when I pressed on it but gave enough resistance that it would allow some resistance on the makeup brush bristles.  

To use I took my brush egg and squirted some face wash onto the bristles, I have found my face washes are the best products to remove the facepaints because they are already designed to help remove stubborn waterproof makeup.   

Next I ran the Brush Egg under the water to get some lather and proceeded to simply run my brush back and forward over the bristles.  

Immediately the facewash got to work and started breaking up the greasepaint, the movement of rubbing the brush over the ridges helped spread the face wash onto all the bristles and within seconds my brush was looking spotless. I added a small amount of wash to the small bristle section of the Brush Egg to make sure I had got everything removed from the brush then simply ran both under the tap.

The egg came clean with just a small amount of water and the brush was spotless!  

I have to say I am extremely impressed, normally these brushes take me a few minutes each to clean and I usually end up with face paint spattered all over the sink and all over my hands.  

Non of this happened, the paint dripped evenly down the ridges and into the stream of water, there was no spatter and my hands were completely clean and it took around 40 seconds to fully clean from start to finish! 

I can not believe something so simple worked so well!  

For me this is a 10 out of 10! I can not believe I have managed this long without one in my beauty bag!  

Now where are the rest of my brushes :-)