General beauty advent calendar discussion and swap thread

[AprilLady]

Like many others, I’m looking forward to starting my Beauty Advent Calendars on Tuesday. With no M&S calendar or thread this year, I thought it might be fun to have a general beauty advent calendar discussion and swap thread. I would love to hear everyone’s thoughts about the calendar they are opening, whatever it is.

I suggest though we comment only on content from current or previous days, so as not to spoil the surprise for those opening one day at a time.

@bigdecisionstomake it's really good I'm really pleased with it so far. I usually get the M&S AC which as we know they didn't do this year. So I bought the No 7 one instead then at the last minute the JL one as well. Both of which I'm happy with so far.
No idea which one I'll get next year. I'll have to see what's in them. The less hair products the better though.

bigdecisionstomake & 2LittleSpeckledFrogs yes, ASOS has been amazing so far, very impressed..

ohwhatamiserableyear feels lovely on and smells good too!

I'm going to look 18yrs old by Jan 1st

I’m going to look 18yrs old by Jan 1st

I’d be happy to look 38! Doing my best too with all the lotions and potions in my calendars.

In stark contrast to F&M, I think I have also managed to buy the least good value advent calendar. As a kind of jokey family calendar, I bought the Friends themed Central Perks calendar from Debenhams. Fortunately paid £10 and not the ridiculous £25 RRP. It is truly dismal - doors contain eg. single pencils, tiny erasers, or individual stickers with the obvious quotes on them. It’s worked as fun for the family simply because it is so bad. Degusta next year, for sure.

April your post has reminded me that Debenhams did a very poor one a few years ago and someone had a very funny thread about it. One of the items was a funnel.

I’m a liar, it was HoF

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/mumsnet_classics/3102388-Sharing-the-Shitness-HOF-Advent-Calendar-SPOILERS

I remember the House of Fraser Beauty Advent thread
The items were truly abysmal

@beautyboxaddict, that thread is hilarious.

Not sure who the Friends calendar is aimed at. It’s the sort of tat that you might find in a 4 year old’s party bag, but with a theme that is aimed at older teens

Today is a face mask, eye cream and green tea. All good but I definitely don't need anymore eye cream.

Just opened the Lumene advent calendar Ochon and although I love eye cream I'm not so sure about eye gel ( I need more of a polyfilla for my wrinkles). However I've tried it and it's actually very refreshing on my puffy eyes.

Oh dear Amazon. Elf Blushing Brown lipstick. Definitely not for me. If anyone would like this pm me your address and I'll pop it in the post.

HB's offering is a lovely rosemary and rosehip oil though so all is not lost today.

Liberty, Cult Beauty and Space NK.

Very pleased with today's H&B, it smells lovely.

@Snowplop - looking at the photo, it looks like a lovely peachy colour that would suit loads of different colourings so I Googled it. It's really brown on the swatches and would, I reckon, be quite difficult to wear.

Big full size products from both calendars today. F&M is the Christian Breton Liftox Face Serum. It’s supposed to be a wonder cure for wrinkles. Hmmm. Last year’s eye serum did nothing noticeable for me.

N-a-P is a generous 50ml Ormovicza cleansing mask though, which looks great.

Lovely smelling face oil from H&B and a tube of Haribo Tangfastics from Degustabox. A great start to the week!
I really would recommend Degustabox- it's a lovely mix of products and all full size so great for sharing. It really is fricking HUGE though!

@MiaN, looks like an interesting haul. Is the Sol de Janeiro product actually a self-tan product?

Fellow Amazon-ers, what colour lipstick did you get today? I got ‘blushing brown’ which I’m not going to open as there’s no way it’ll suit me. One for the swap pile!

It’s ‘e.l.f’ brand if anyone is interested

@AprilLady it's glow oil, not self tanner. I imagine using little bit on shoulders while having outdoor dinner in Spain while on holiday! It's not something I would purchase myself

Love that marula oil and will use it

I have never used nail and cuticle serum pen, looking forward trying it

Speaking of crap advent calendars, does anyone remember the furore around the Zoella one? Was about £50 (give or take) and had stuff like a single paper clip in it!

@Snowplop and @GaryTheDemon U got the Elf brown lipstick too...v odd colour choice and a shame as the brand is quite nice. I've tried it today just to see. 1 coat was kind of OK, it's quite a pinky brown. 2 coats and I look fully goth.

@MiaN Great to see the Cult Beauty, Space NK and Liberty products, I've been stalking the other threads (all in the name of research for next year of course!) so this will save me a job today

@GaryTheDemon - also one of the youtbers sold advent that was packed with used items form her reveal videos! I think this must have been the biggest fail and yet brands like bodyshop continue to support her!

Living Proof Full Shampoo from Fenwicks today. I have fine straight hair so this should theoretically be perfect for me

@GaryTheDemon @2LittleSpeckledFrogs I'm not trying the lipstick! I've googled like @OchonAgusOchonO did and have seen what it looks like. It doesn't even suit the beautiful models and bloggers in the image search result!