Mia's Review: My Beauty Empties

Recently during my blog-hopping times, I've came across a number of these 'monthly empties' posts, which are something like a 'monthly favourites' tag made popular by beauty vloggers on youtube. And I thought to myself, why not do a simple and short review on all my empties instead of just showing readers what I've emptied out for the month? :) 

First up, my shampoo and conditioner!

 -picture credits to watsons-

Yes, that's Watsons' house brand, their Naturals by Watsons Argan Oil Shampoo and Conditioner. I've actually gotten the entire set of  this range, including their hair mask and leave-in serum. 

Price range: Affordable 

Might come across as pricey for being a watsons' house brand but comparing to other argan oil products, this is significantly cheaper. 

Efficacy: Excellent! 

It got my DIY hair dye damaged hair smooth and soft again! Magic or what!

Will I repurchase: Yes, definitely! 

But as I have the habit of alternating my hair care products, I will only repurchase this after I'm done with a replacement.

My current replacement: Essential Deep Cleansing Care

Next up, for my make up remover! 

Orbis Cleansing Liquid Oil Cut

Price range: Affordable

Departmental store skincare/cosmetic range at drugstore pricing, need I say more?

Efficacy: Excellent! 

For my usual make up routine of bb/cc cream or liquid foundation with concealer, setting powder, and occasional mascara and blusher, I only need about 1 to 1.5 pump in the shower (wet or dry hands, doesn't matter) to get rid of all the make up and dirt on my face.  

Will I repurchase: Yes, definitely!

In fact, I'm already regretting the decision of my replacement. 

My current replacement: Kao Biore Micellar Cleansing Water

Then, I have a facial spray that I usually use to set my make up in the morning.

Bio-essence Miracle Bio Water

Price range: Pricey
I'll say that it's a little pricey (about $17 for such a small bottle) for "just a spraying water".
Efficacy: Nothing visible (Bad)
The problem is, Bio-essence boasted too much about this product. Just for a spray of refreshment or to set make up, I'll say it's a decent buy. But marketed as a miracle water, I have to say that this product didn't really deliver what it has promised.
Will I repurchase: Yes.
In fact, I've repurchased a handful of times because I like how it sets my make up in the morning and spraying some in my stubborn tweety hair did help to soften them down a bit.
My current replacement: Nuxe Refreshing Moisturizing Mist

And for my trusty facial sunscreen....

Biore UV Perfect Face Milk
Price: Affordable 
Typical pricing of a drugstore brand, even cheaper than other brands like Neutrogena and Loreal.
Efficacy: Excellent
What I absolutely love about Biore UV products is that they're more towards the mattifying range, with those milky lotion like consistency that doesn't leave your skin sticky and oily. The highly raved one is the pink bottle, which serves to brighten up your completion, but this one works just as well if you do not have horrible dull skin.
Will I repurchase: Yes, definitely!
Have been using Biore UV for years. After I found them, I never switch to any other sunscreen brands, but just switch around different products in the same line of Biore UV.
My current replacement: Biore UV Aqua Rich

And one type of make up product which I've seldom used previously, but fell in love with this particular one.

Orbis UV Cut Liquid Foundation

Price range: Affordable
As mentioned above, Orbis is actually a departmental store brand priced at drugstore brand pricing. I can't remember the exact price of this liquid foundation, but I reckon it was $20 plus minus.
Efficacy: Average to Excellent (Depends)
The reason why I love this is because it's extremely lightweight and give a light coverage to even out your skin tone, but doesn't help to conceal your spots and blemishes much. So for ladies who prefer heavy coverage, this will not be a good choice for you. However, with SPF 50 PA+++, this will be an awesome product to use if you do not require much coverage and is lazy to spend that extra minute applying a separate sunscreen before putting on base make up.
Will I repurchase: Yes, definitely
This one of the rare liquid foundations which I have no fear of clogging up my pores and messing up my heavily facial dependent skin.
My current replacement: Pixi Flawless Beauty Fluid Liquid Foundation 

And the loose powder, which I've just emptied out recently....

Christian Mode BB Mineral Powder

Price range: Very affordable
I bought this in one of the drugstore while I was in Japan previously, and I got this for about SGD $15 only, for such a big tub!
Efficacy: Average
The powder isn't exactly very fine and smooth, no amazing oil control benefits either. This is just a very normal loose powder that I got in Japan with a pretty cheap price tag.
Will I repurchase: No
If I'm not wrong, this brand Christian Mode is not available in stores anywhere in Singapore. So nope, I won't be repurchasing this online either.
My current replacement: Luv Carat Loose Powder

Have you used these empties of mine or even my current replacements? Leave a comment down below and let me know what you think about them!

Till then,
Mia Foo

Continue

Mia's Review: Orbis X'mas Edition Petit Shakes [Sponsored]

As touched on in my post on Orbis Focus Group previously, Orbis offer a wide range of very yummy, yogurt-smoothie like meal replacement drinks. And I'm very lucky to be given a chance to try out their Christmas Edition flavours! 

Orbis's Petit Shakes contains 10 kinds of vitamins, iron and water-soluble fibre to serve its purpose as a healthy diet option with the right nutritional requirements. 

As seen (and tagged), their X'mas edition Petit Shakes comes in the following 4 yummy flavours:

1. Mixed Berry

2. Caramel Pumpkin Pudding

3. Double Berry & White Chocolate

4. Cheese Mousse

For more information on their Petit Shake, click HERE

I was really excited to hear from Rain that the package has been dispatched. As you all know, I've started on this 3 month weight management programme recently and their meal replacement shake is really un-tasty to begin with and slowly gets increasingly difficult to stomach along the way (I ended up throwing away 1/3 of their shake eventually because I get nauseated by it). So now I can 'cheat' and alternate them with Orbis's Petit Shakes, which give me a generous range of 6 flavours to choose from. Now, with these added 4 x'mas edition flavours, we'll have 10 flavours to choose from! You'll never get sick of your meal replacement shakes like this! :)

And with that, let's get down to my review of these 4 special flavours. 

Needless to say, I picked Mixed Berry as my first flavour to try out. 

And Orbis is very generous to give a full size package (two sachets) for me to try out. My take is that this is the 'safest' flavour out of the 4. 

You really cannot go wrong with this flavour, unless you hate fruits and especially berries. (But why would you?) The taste is exactly like a mixed berries yogurt (think of Meiji yogurt!), just very much less sweet (due to no artificial sweetener added), which is nothing less than beneficial for a meal replacement shake. This has got to be my favourite flavour of the 4, very refreshing indeed!

On the 2nd night, I fished out this orange packet (Caramel Pumpkin Pudding) from the parcel. I only remembered it was *something* pumpkin and didn't bother to double check before I tried the taste of it. Actually, I need not even taste it to know it's caramel. The entire shake smells exactly like the whiff I get from opening a bag of my favourite snack, Tohato Caramel Corn. The caramel flavour is really strong and added a lot of taste to this flavour. As this is much more flavourful, it somehow also gave me a fuller effect as compared to Mixed Berry.

Next up, the 3rd flavour I've tried was Double Berry & White Chocolate. Forgot to snap a picture of it, so no close up front picture of the white package (but it's very similar to cheese mousse packaging)! :(

Taste wise, it's quite similar to Mixed Berry (even though this only has double berries instead of 4 types of berries in Mixed Berry), having a very distinctive mixed berries yogurt flavour. However, probably due to white chocolate, this flavour is creamier and tastes much sweeter. Due to the 'heavier' taste, it feels more filling too!

Lastly, I gathered my courage to try out Cheese Mousse. Frankly speaking, I'm really not much of a cheesy person and the flavour 'Cheese Mousse' is a great deterrence for me to try it out. The distinctive sourish smell of cheese was really strong and I could smell it once I snipped off the corner of the packet. 

I was really thinking, "Oh no!" as I was shaking my blender bottle I used to take meal replacement shakes. 

I popped open my bottle and took another whiff. Urgh, it really smells like Cheese Mousse. 

However, I was pleasantly surprised at my first taste. It tasted more like a mildly cheese flavoured yogurt, with the taste still going more towards the distinctive, pleasant sweet-soury taste of yogurt in general. And perhaps it was because my taste buds got used to it, the cheese taste was almost undetectable from the 4th sip onwards and the shake turned out to be pretty enjoyable, albeit still my least favourite of the 4. 

Orbis Petit Shake comes in 100ml sachets, and is to be mixed with 100ml of cold low-fat/skimmed milk until thickened. So yup, do up your maths and you'll know you have only 200ml of a yogurt-smoothie drink for dinner. It's really not much of a problem for me, as I've pretty much conditioned myself to eat very little for dinner after developing the habit of only eating 2 fist size of vegetables+1 palm size of protein with 1 serving of fruit for dinner daily. Moreover, I'm not afraid to 'cheat' on the program to nip a few bites of veggies even after having the shakes. 

So while I cannot confirm that these Petit Shake work wonders and slim you down in no time, I can assure you that as long as you are not a big eater by habit, you can easily follow this Petit Shake Diet to replace 1 of your meal a day. There's absolutely no worries of getting too sick of the taste to persevere, with a total of 10 yummy flavours for you to choose from and alternate throughout the week. :)

Orbis has officially opened their flagship store at Robinsons Orchard (The Heeren) on 8th November 2013 and is currently running 2 pop up stores at Ion Orchard B4 (from 9th to 13th Nov) and Chevron House (from 11th to 15th Nov). Do visit their pop up stores for free sampling of their Petit Shake flavours! 

For more information, visit their Facebook Page or check out their range of products HERE.

Till then,

Mia

Continue

Mia's Update: Orbis Focus Group

Just recently, with the help of Airmeli, I managed to get a place in the focus group by Orbis. 

For those who find this name extremely unfamiliar, ORBIS Inc., established since 1984,  is a leading company in mail-order cosmetics and is also involved markets such as health food and women's lingerie. ORBIS Inc. is well known for its 100% oil-free skin care and has seen its customer's numbers increase dramatically beyond 8.5 million since the introduction of its popular 100% oil-free skin care. Currently, Orbis has sucessfully entered the Korean, Hongkong and Taiwan market and is finally coming to Singapore this October!

And yes, you didn't see it wrong. We're given a $55 worth goodie bag for attending this focus group! If you have no idea what's a focus group, it mainly is some kind of a 'market survey' whereby the staff will introduce their range of products to us and let us try out a sample before asking us to state our feedbacks. And now I'm going to share with you some of the products that made a strong impression on me. :)

First up, we were introduced to the 5 ranges of their basic skincares. The AquaForce range for hydration, Clear range for acne prone skin, Whitening range that is pretty much self-explanatory, Excellent Enrich range for anti-aging, and Excellent White for a combination of whitening and anti-aging. We were given the lotion and moisturiser to test out and I really like the Clear and AquaForce range, especially their moisturisers. The texture is like a clear gel lotion, and is extremely spreadable and light. I need barely a pearl size sample to spread thoroughly over the back of my hand. And while spreading the moisturiser, it gets absorbed into my skin very quickly, leaving a non-sticky and refreshing feel to it. For the other 3 ranges, although slightly heavier in comparison to Clear and AquaForce, are still considered very light and non-sticky as compared to most of the skincare products currently in the market. 

We were also given their aqua peeling gel and bubble masks to try out, out of which I really liked the peeling gel. It's very thin and near watery texture makes massaging the product into the face extremely easy, no tugging on the skin at all. Best of all, despite the watery texture, it took out a great deal of dead skin from the back of my hand (rather embarrassing with the Orbis staff staring at it) and left my skin visibly brighter, softer and smoother to the touch.

Moreover, with their products priced at a very affordable range of $20s, I'm definitely running to the Orbis retail store once I'm out of my current skincare products. 

Next up, we were introduced to their Special Care series, which is basically sunscreen.

We were given both to try, and I really love the UV cut foundation! Even though labelled as a foundation, it's extremely lightweight and blendable, reminding me of a tinted moisturiser, and with SPF50 PA+++! Even though I cannot be sure of it's coverage, Daisy, the Orbis staff, assured us that it can cover some slight blemishes. The other product, Sunscreen on face light, is supposedly one of their best sellers and we even had the product-maker seated in with us, coming over all the way from Japan! The texture is even lighter than the foundation (like, duh!), is slightly tinted and doesn't give a sticky feeling at all, unlike many sunscreens available in the market right now. In addition to these, we were also introduced to their sun powder pact (two-way foundation) and loose powder compact.

And after stacking literally a ton of product on the back of our hand, we were finally given their cleansing liquid to try out. Unlike a normal cleansing oil, which cannot be used with wet hands and required to be emulsified with water (massaged with water after first dry application) before it can be washed off, Orbis's cleansing liquid needs nothing of those burdensome steps. Just pump into our hands (regardless wet or dry), massage onto our face to dislodge all the makeup, dirt and grime, and wash off with water. Viola, cleansed skin! There, another Orbis-must-get added to my shopping list. 

And then, we finally moved on to the diet and health supplement range, and we were given the full range of their diet Petit Shake to try out. 

And as stated, there's 5 other flavours apart from strawberry and I vaguely remembered them as white grape & aloe vera (my favourite because there's aloe bits inside!), peach, orange, pink guava and banana (my least favourite).

The shakes are recommended to be mixed in milk and drank cold. The consistency served to us are like a mix of yogurt and smoothie. Or perhaps you can simply call them, smoothie with very smooth texture. No doubt, very tasty and offers 6 flavours for you to have them throughout the week with 1 day of indulgence. However, I can't advise on how filling these shakes are, I can only confirm on their tastiness. :)

Finally, we were given a small sample cup of Orbis 12,000mg marine collagen to try out, pineapple flavour. First sip and I cringed at the acute sourness. However, the entire group of us later on concurred that we got used to the sourness pretty quickly and it's actually quite an enjoyable acquired taste. I'm not a collagen supplement fan, but after hearing from Airmeli that Kinohimitsu's collagen taste nothing but fishy, I'm pretty sure I'll turn to Orbis if I decided to take collagen supplement one day. :p

And then, to show off my $55 worth goodie bag from Orbis!

This is the paper bag of goodies given to us.

 And within, I found a full sized Cleansing Liquid, one full sized bottle of 6,000mg collagen drink

 Travel sized pack of AquaForce basic skincare (to my choice), kept in a super cute not-for-sale travel pouch!

A sample sachet of their best selling UV Cut Sunscreen on face light

And a redemption voucher for 1 box of Petit Shake and a coupon for redemption of a mini Aqua Peeling Gel with $30 spent.

Orbis will be having their first pop-up store at Ion Orchard B4 (before Muji) from 25th - 30th September, and there will be a FREE sampling bar for ALL petit shake flavours! So drop by and check them out for yourself! 

Do check out Orbis's facebook HERE!

Till then,

Mia

Continue