After I became a mum back in 2013, I made an important scientific discovery; that being dry shampoo is life.

LIFE, I TELL YOU.


What on earth did I do before it? Washed my hair three times a week like a sucker, that’s what. So when I had the chance to review the new Dove Hair Therapy dry shampoo thanks to BEAUTY / crew, I was well up for it, being the expert long-term user that I am.

I have tended to stick to the one brand in the past as it works for me, is often on special at Priceline* and the XXL Volume version in particular delivers much needed oomph and texture to my fine weave.

The Dove product promises to not only refresh but also care for my hair, which seems pretty aligned to the Dove brand although I am noticing a distinct lack of one-quarter moisturising cream.

I put the product to the test over the course of a week. It applied in the same way as other aerosol-based dry shampoos and had a pleasant fresh fruity scent. It didn't seem as powdery or thick as my usual brand but still performed well at refreshing my hair and soaking up any grease.

Dry shampoo tips

• Lift up your hair and spray in at the roots where the hair is greasiest.
• Let it chill for as long as possible to do its work before you start styling. Some people recommend using it the night before – I have done this and it does work – I just need to remember to do it!
• A bristle brush works best to work through your dry shampoo, breaking up that white powder look
• Speaking of white powder, the colour of OG dry shampoo works well to hide regrowth on blondes. Again, I speak from experience.
• Overwashing oily hair can make it even worse. Why not give your bonce a break and start subbing in dry shampoo instead. Don’t give up after just trying the one brand. Find the one that’s right for you.

Is dry shampoo your saviour too? Any tips to share?

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* affiliate link

This product was kindly provided for review by BEAUTY / crew and a modified version of this review has appeared there. For more information, please see my PR & Media policy.

As mentioned somewhere else on the internet, I briefly considered a "No-Pay May" abstinence month but then I remembered I was going to Sydney and where's the fun in that. I do like a challenge but I'm also not a robot so normal retail activity took place.

The first items I acquired were by way of taking some stuff into a local clothing exchange and getting some store credit which I promptly turned around into an Alice In The Eve lace-up back blazer and a leopard print faux fur scarf. I finally accepted the size 6 blazer was in fact too small for me and passed it on to my sister but the scarf came in handy for a "Day At The Zoo" themed first birthday party I attended with my cheeky monkey in tow.



Also for the party, I picked up this cat ear headband from Kmart for $9 and turned myself into a real-life Snapchat filter.


While in Kmart, I also picked up this lace-up hoodie which I really like BUT it started to pill on the second wear which was disappointing but what can you expect for $15.


Also nabbed a tie-up top in - HOLD THE FRONT PAGE - stripes, also for $15 but I got the wrong size and I still haven't exchanged it yet, so bear with me on that.

I had been looking for long tan boots for ages and finally popped on these ones from Spendless, accidentally stylejacking Kathy from work, but she was okay with it. I paid full price but only because I was dead keen. Also on my long-term wishlist was a khaki anorak*. I had specific requirements in mind; a fur-lined hood, a sherpa-lined interior, functional side pockets and a drawstring waist. Behold, Katies and their 40% off sale . . . it was eventually mine for $59.40. I say eventually because there was a glitch with the online ordering system and I got charged full tote odds but eventually the customer team got back to me and sent a refund through. Anyway, here they are pictured together.


I was on the hunt for a soft grey knit and I tried on several high-end ones from Witchery that made me look like a hot water bottle. Depressed, I browsed through Harris Scarfe on a whim and picked up this grey light knit with silver spots for a mere $20.


While in Sydney, I visited Ali at Philosophy Australia, as detailed in my post last week, who very kindly gave me a couple of clothing gifts; this Aztec knit and a long sleeved reversible jersey top . . .


Also on the Sydney trip, I scored big at H&M who NEED TO COME ON WITH IT TO ADELAIDE, AMIRITE? Please explain why they have a fully functional website displaying the entire range with no ability to actually BUY the stuff.

Anyway, I have wanted a black tulle midi skirt for roughly ever, and they delivered, with this number for $29.


Also got a rad long top in (surprise, surprise) stripes (but they are VERTICAL, you guys) and it's short sleeved so I haven't had a chance to photograph it yet because FREEZING.

And this pink waterfall cardi caught my eye, so I got that too. It is single-handedly responsible for rescuing this dress from the donate pile and I'm wishing I got other colours now. Anyone headed east in the near future?


See that rose gold leaf necklace? I also got that in the same visit. Turns out it was broken in half and that's why it was catching on everything. URGHHHH. FAIL. Happily I was able to pick up a replacement at Kmart for $5.

I stylejacked Caitlin unknowingly with the cardi but blatantly and unapologetically with this blush blanket scarf.


That was going to be it for the month until The Iconic* dropped 25% off on selected items and my wishlisted boots* happened to be part of that selection . . .


Monthly totals

Items acquired: 12
Total RRP ticket "value" - $558.90
Total paid - $290.19
YTD spend - $1,086.18
YTD "value" - $2,396.96

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* denotes affiliate links. By clicking through and purchasing, you don't pay any extra but I earn a small amount of coin to put towards next month's expenditure. For more information, please see my PR & Media policy.

I don’t know about you but when I think of Nivea, I think of a brand that is soft and gentle on skin and this new face wash certainly fits in with that perception.

The Nivea Creme Care Cleansing Cream Wash, part of the Daily Essentials range, does exactly what it says on the sturdy dark blue tube it’s packaged in; it’s cream (sorry, creme) and it cleanses. I was sent it by BEAUTY / crew to provide my opinion on it a while back and have duly done so.


Usually I go for a more robust face-cleaning product that has some kind of scrub and / or foam factor. It’s easy to feel that with this product, it’s not doing anything because it doesn’t foam up. It’s like washing your face with moisturiser which, to be fair, is quite nice and leaves the skin feeling appropriately moisturised, as you’d expect.

It’s a product that claims to be gentle enough for all skin types and it certainly feels like it wouldn’t cause any kind of irritation or reaction. I found it delivered a clean enough face without my skin feeling dry afterwards but didn’t have that astringently clean feeling I go for.

Used in conjunction with a separate scrub product would be okay, however if I was looking for an all-in-one cleanser, I probably wouldn’t reach for this one that often. I would certainly recommend to people with sensitive skin.  It's an affordable, accessible product and one worth investigating if it sounds like your thing.

And just to make it easy for you, Priceline have 3 for 2 on the entire range of Nivea products*

Rock on!


Do you look for gentle cleansing products or use Nivea already? Tell me.

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I was provided this product for review by BEAUTY / crew and a modified version of this review has appeared there. All images, words and opinions are my own. For more information, see my PR & Media policy.

* Affiliate link.

When I was in Sydney recently, I got in touch with my friend and fashion designer Ali from Philosophy Australia and asked if I could come and visit the headquarters and meet the team. She very kindly said yes, so once my Uber driver finally found the place, we were on!

My only real exposure to the goings-on of fashion houses has been gleaned from watching documentaries about Valentino and the like so I was keen to experience what a more accessible label looked like behind the scenes.

Here's Ali's office where she does the things. You can see the remnants of our afternoon tea, which included much needed coffee and one of the best brownies I have ever consumed. Ever.


The day before my visit, the team had met with fabric sellers to pick designs and patterns and stuff for TWO SEASONS IN THE FUTURE. Crazy. I got a sneak peek and there is some pretty prints on the way, let me tell you.

Here's where Ali's designs are magically turned into patterns! And by magically, I mean by hard work, experience and talent.


Look at all that fabric! I even saw the roll that one of my Philosophy dresses is cut from. The material is stacked and then cut to pattern with a jigsaw type arrangement which was pretty cool.


The Philosophy team is totally long-term and close-knit. They have pretty much all been working there for roughly ever and enjoy it, which makes for a great team vibe and work with makers who do the bulk of the making right there in Sydney's 'burbs.

Here's the current range for the season, chilling in the show room.


And here's Ali, also chilling in the show room:


From the range above, Ali kindly gave me a couple of presents which I'm wearing below, an Aztec knit wrap type arrangement and a super comfortable jersey top in really nice stretchy non-clingy-in-the-gut material in a long-enough-at-the-front cut in khaki which is also reversible! Joy!

Did you know:

• The label has been around for over 15 years and drops spring, high summer and winter collections annually.
• Over 95% of Philosophy's range is Australian-made; produced and coordinated by the Sydney headquarters and in-house cutters and makers. 
• The only products made off-shore are denim, true knits (like mine above) and embroidered items which can't viably be made locally. The pants team at Philosophy can smash out about 1000 pairs of pants a WEEK but one pair of jeans takes about an hour and a half to make.
• You can find Philosophy stuff at over 300 boutiques in Australia and New Zealand, including regional areas.
• I recently wrote a blog post for the Philosophy website about things to do in Adelaide in winter. You should have a look.

Thanks for having me Ali!


Have you got any Philosophy in your wardrobe?

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I visited Ali and the Philosophy team of my own accord and was kindly gifted the items shown above which was a lovely surprise. For more information, please see my PR & Media policy.

It’s not terribly groundbreaking to write about the original Too Faced Chocolate Bar palette, since it was released way back in 2013 so I’m sure anything I say has been well and truly covered, but bear with me as this is MY Chocolate Bar journey.


For quite some time, I’d been motoring along just using my two Tarte palettes; Tartelette and the limited edition Poppy Picnic for everyday (and occasionally throwing on some single pot metallics for more extreme evening looks) when I decided I’d like to incorporate some shimmer into my world. As a beauty blogger, you naturally hear a lot about different products on the market and there is a huge temptation to get everything ever but quite frankly, the task of narrowing it down was overwhelming and I naturally didn’t want to spend massive dollars on something unseen in real life, as is the struggle of Adeladies. $70 on a palette is some serious coin. I had been thinking about the Zoeva Rose Golden palette but there was something about it that didn’t feel quite right . . .

ANYHOO, one day I got excited by a blogger review and raced out and got the Natio Natural Shades Golden limited edition palette for $20, featuring matte neutrals and shimmers. It was . . . nice . . . . I guess, but . . . I don’t really know why I wasn’t more excited about it and only used it a couple of times.


Then I bought the Morphe 35F Fall Into Frost palette from Beauty Bay, along with some nice Zoeva goodies that are no longer available to be shipped to Australia thanks to the colluding non-compete power of Sephora Australia. ANGRY. FACE. The 35F was lovely, with a huge range of gorgeous highly pigmented shimmer shades and a row of matte neutrals . . . and I used four shades precisely twice before shelving (and recently selling) it. Why? It was too much. Overwhelmed with choice (and the size of the thing meant it had to be kept in a drawer, not in front of my face in my make-up cabinet) meant I never used it, I couldn't open it one-handed and I have no time for mucking around and experimenting.



So the mission remained uncompleted. When I was in Sydney I had a swatch and sniff around the Too Faced stand (buying the Born This Way foundation) and started strongly considering a palette from the Chocolate Bar family - whether the OG or the Semi-Sweet. Now, as I mentioned, 70 bones is a lot to drop on a palette and it wasn’t something I was keen to do online. When I was in Melbourne earlier this year, I had it in mind to pop into Sephora (because it's there) and maybe, MAYBE, suss out a Tarte palette with shimmer shades. I was literally on the way there from my hotel when I passed Myer. Then I concurrently remembered a) Mecca Maxima was a thing in Myer Melbourne AND b) I had a $100 Myer gift card as a farewell present from my old work, so before I knew it, I was in and out with a Chocolate Bar palette to call my own, essentially free. Problem solvered.

or was it?

In the excitement of my whirlwind Melbourne trip which included buying a pretty special handbag, I didn’t have time to open the box before I returned home to Adelaide, whereupon I prepared a backdrop for a flatlay, opened the box and was greeted with this:


TEARS WERE NEARLY SHED, I can tell you. I wondered what to do, whether to blast out the crumbled shade with a hairdryer and get on with life or see if I could possibly get some kind of restitution. Almost Posh's guest contributor Bridie informed me Mecca had really good customer service so I decided to give it a shot, despite the nagging feeling that I may have lost my receipt (I hadn’t, as it turned out) or that I’d be told the breakage may have happened in flight and wasn’t their problem. Well, happily I was wrong and after a pleasant phone call and an email of the photo above (and sending the old one back), I had a perfectly perfect replacement in hand with zero dramas. Yay!

So when I finally got to actually USE it, I didn’t stop and haven’t yet. There is such a good variety of shades that I’ve been able to team to several themes, especially as I don more autumnal colours, and create a range of different eye looks which is great as I’d got into a massive rut with my Tartelette palette. The cocoa scent is divine, the shades are buttery and blendy and I love the overall look of the packaging. I’m using different brushes and overall enjoying my eye make-up situation.

Naturally, literally days after I bought the Chocolate Bar, Too Faced dropped the limited edition Natural Love eyeshadow collection. Which of course, I want.

Have you got a Too Faced palette in your life or any on your wishlist? How do you feel about it?