~Storenvy Store Review: MEI NU Store~

Hey guys! It's been awhile since I did a store review! Mostly because everything I've been ordering has been from Amazon and they've been beauty products lol. I haven't been ordering from Storenvy since my experience with Mountain Deer. But I recently discovered a few cute stores that I wanted to check out and they have a lot of buzz on Instagram and Tumblr so I thought I'd give it a go!

***HINT: If you want to skip my mini guide on how I shop and whatnot, just scroll to the part with the pictures! <3***

I don't have much background info on MEI NU store. All I know is that it's (now) a pop up shop type store that is only open the first week (7 days) of every month. This is due to the owner of the shop going to school and being busy in general. If you don't know what Storenvy is, it's basically a platform that allows independent brands and people to sell all their cool things! MEI NU has a few rules that are all easily accessible and understandable in the FAQ section that talks about shipping and stuff so make sure you look at that before buying! And under every description of a garment there is a notice talking about how MEI NU only accepts Paypal so if you don't have one it would be a good idea to sign up if you want to buy from here ^.^ Just a heads up!

I don't know if anyone has noticed by my style has changed quite a bit from the beginning of the year til now. Maybe I just notice it because I see myself everyday and know about what my personal style is haha. I use to prefer buying a TON of printed things (OK I still do) especially if it was a really cute print like a bunch of cats or popsicles and things. So those were the only types of things I would buy. As I continue to experiment with my style I've been noticing that buying print means I end up wearing a lot of double prints, which I used to think was the bomb! But now it's not really my jam and I'm aiming to wear more of my printed clothes (which I still love a lot) just with less printy things~ So when I looked at these new Storenvys like MEI NU, Bread N Butter, Milk and Sugar (is this a grocery list? LOLOL), etc. I saw cute but also simple clothing items. And I think they were really aiming for that kind of cute but minimal style at the same time thing, ya know? SO without further ado, here are the things I bought at MEI NU Storenvy.

Customer service: I follow Wendi, the girl (or one of the girls maybe?) that runs the MEI NU Storenvy, on Instagram and I almost bought a dress off her personal Instagram sale page (but it seemed to run small for me huhuhu T___T) and she was very nice and helpful on there so I thought I might try and buy something from her main shop since I didn't buy her dress hahaha. One of the first things I did was I scrolled through all the items and put the ones I liked in the cart without looking at size or price. This is my shopping process you guys lolol. I'm terrible.

THEN I go through all the things I put in there and click on each one and look at the measurements, size options, and sometimes even color options to see if they fit the bill! My measurements are:

Bust: 41 inches (over not under my bust)
Waist: 44 inches (widest)
Comfortable length: most things around 70 cm (unless I specifically want a crop top! I don't really like super long things)

But most of the time I'm looking at the bust and waist measurements since those are the areas I most often run into problems with. Especially in places that sell things that are One Size only. This usually occurs in places that sell items from overseas like from China, Japan, and Korea to name a few popular places.

Once I have the garments with comfy measurements (which usually ends up paring my cart down quite a bit anyways lol) I go through and check the prices of all the items and assure that they're reasonable. Here's my list to check to see if a garment is reasonable for me or not lol:

-How many things can I wear this with?: If it's above $15 I should be able to wear it with at least five different outfits with it($5 per outfit). If it's below $15 I can usually justify it if I can wear three outfits with it.
-Is it in a color scheme that goes well with some of the clothes I already own? If it's a jewel tone, for example, and most of the stuff in my closet is pastel (it's not, I have a jumble of colors and that's why I'm shopping so strictly now lol) then I probably can't justify the jewel tone unless I'm trying to redo my wardrobe.
-Is it unique?: If I've been having a hard time trying to find a particular style in regular stores like Forever 21 and H&M I like to look online~
-Can I buy this somewhere else or buy something similar for a better price? A lot of the times Storenvy stores stock some of the same things, so it's smart to browse around and check to see if another vendor is selling something for a cheaper price!
-Can I make this myself? This is a question I ask (and my family and sometimes friends ask as well) all the time and it can get frustrating because then I get to thinking if I really can make it and I pan out my supplies and consider the if making it would be cheaper etc. But it's also a good thing because it prevents me from buying so many things that I easily forget about later. I'm a joke lol.

Those are some of my main bits of criteria anyways lol.

I originally bought a graphic tee from an independent designer, tote bag, embroidered striped dress, and hot dog sweater from MEI NU but Wendi e-mailed me and told me the dress was out of stock so I could switch it for something else of the same price or get a full refund on it! That was actually SUPER nice and helpful of her since not all stores are willing to go out of their way to tell you that something is out of stock until you've received your packages and find out it's not there! So I ordered an embroidered skateboard shirt in black ^.^ Which was unfortunately sold out as well T__T haha~ So in total I just got the tote, graphic tee, and hot dog sweater!

My package finally arrived today! (Nov. 12) and I'm a super happy camper because I was initially a bit worried that the package had gotten lost somewhere after it was shipped from China. When I last checked the shipping service it's target destination was apparently the UK o.O I e-mailed Wendi about it and she said if it doesn't arrive by Nov. 14 (approx. 40 days after my order was shipped) I should e-mail her so I can get a refund for the items I didn't receive. Oh yes, an important thing to note: it's quite common to receive your order in separate packages even if you ordered them all at once because they are often from a bunch of different vendors! So I actually got my graphic tee a couple weeks after I ordered and the only things I had been waiting for were the hot dog sweater and tote!

The graphic tee came with a little card with care instructions which I thought was pretty cool ^.^ I got the Gildan tee in XL! You can choose between American Apparel or Gildan.

It's a pretty long shirt so I plan on tucking it into skirts and whatnot >.< haha

Sorry for not posting a full body pic of this shirt, I was too lazy to take more and this one is from my Instagram haha~

The Hot Dog sweatshirt and Tote bag came wrapped in plastic in a normal plastic parcel thingy :3

When I first rolled it out I was just so surprised at the length! Also, I only realized after taking this picture how it wasn't a good idea to take a picture of this on my bed...my comforter is almost the exact same color lol. Speaking of color, this is a nice blush pink, not neon and not overly washed out pastel, just right light pink!

Ooops forgot to rotate the pic haha~ The pictures look black only because of the lighting in this picture, but it really is a nice navy blue color. It is a bit darker than in the photos shown on the website. But I don't see that as a particularly good or bad thing necessarily!

The material of the bag is thick! As in stiff. It's a good size for everyday wear if you want to go shopping and need to bring your wallet, chapstick, phone, maybe a cardigan or something, and umbrella, and a snack? Those are my purse staples (OOOO REMINDING MYSELF: do a what's in my purse in the future? :D)

Nice little pocket, somewhat deep. I could put my phone in there nicely with my chapstick for easy access ^.^

There is actually quite a bit of room in this sweatshirt! I was surprised a bit because usually sweatshirts that are one size and supposedly have very little to no stretch, don't end up looking or feeling that great on me (anyone remember the Dog Dog turtleneck?! LOL)

It's actually pretty long as well! I wasn't expecting this sweater to be so roomy! :-D (also this was taken before bed so no makeup on! Just toner and then face lotion on top :3

TL;DR:
Customer service 10/10: One of the best I've had so far in terms of online shopping! Especially with shops that get their clothing from overseas. She would always respond within a day or less and she was always super helpful with trying to work out the issues with my order~ Thanks Wendi!

Fit 9/10: The Hot Dog Sweater listed online had the same measurements as the actual sweater! Super! I don't think you can buy this particular item on the web shop anymore because they're in their winter collection right now. From the items that I bought the measurements were correct, give or take a cm error.

Quality 7/10: Tbh for the price the clothes are semi- worth it. The graphic tee was definitely worth it, I love original art <3 The Hot Dog sweater is a nice quality, it fits me nicely, the colors are the same as online, and it's a good thickness for a sweatshirt.

Price 5/10: Buying overseas can get pricey at times, especially when there's shipping and things. I think the clothes and style of MEI NU are super cute and I want to wear them all, but they're a bit on the pricey-er side? Keep in mind that I'm a super cheap-o though ok because sometimes I don't eat if food is too expensive LOLOL. I mean, you're supporting an online business run by normal everyday people so I guess you kind of know where some of your money is going.

Shipping 8/10: Like I said, things ship separately often and it took a very long time for the rest of my order to get here. HOWEVER! All of this information is discussed on the "About" page of the website so it's always good to look on those pages to see how long it might take for your order to arrive. I knew what I was getting into when it said 2-4 weeks on the about page hahaha. So make sure you keep that in mind! Even though it took awhile I gave it 8 stars because it was all stated on that page and you probably shouldn't order if you're worried about delayed shipments or you're really impatient (like me lol) because those happen alllll the time xD Shipping is free internationally though so that's pretty awesome :3

Overall 7/10: Will I buy here again? There are some pretty cute things in their web shop right now but I think I'll hold off on purchasing more things from here for awhile. Partially because I'm too impatient to wait  again (LOL) and partially because the web shop is actually closed until next year right now! ^__^

I hope this review was helpful! Even though it was such a small order to do a review on hahaha >.< Please let me know if you have any other questions about this store! :3

xoxo Abby

~Skincare Review: Bye Bye Blemishes~

Hi everyone!! For today's review I have a drugstore-ish skincare product to try! I was browsing Amazon (as per usual LOL) the other day and I happened upon these popular blemish products that consist of a pink sediment with a clear liquid above it in a bottle. Reading through the reviews people were raving about how fast acting it was! And they were saying things like "Remember, don't shake this bottle!" And that was interesting to me hahaha. The application was also something different, you have to take a clean Q-tip to put this stuff on! Never heard of this kind of blemish treatment? How about I just show you then! Hahaha~

I read about a few popular acne remedies with this liquid/sediment format, there was one called EradiKate and it was around $24 a bottle and the reviews for it seemed really good! Then I saw this one called Bye Bye Blemish on Amazon that was EradiKate's cheaper counterpart, so I decided to go ahead and try it! Then a couple days later I went to Fred Meyers with my mom and saw that they actually had it there for pretty much the same price and no waiting!! YESSS.

The one I bought came in this box:

Sorry for the bad lighting I took this in my room at around 10 PM haha

We'll see about that lol

When I first spotted this at Fred Meyers I wasn't sure if this was the one. Turned it to the side and saw a picture of it! Yup! This is the one I saw on Amazon.

See the sediment and the clear liquid on top?

It specifically says it's a drying lotion on the bottle, so know what you're buying! Some acne creams just treat the acne without drying it, but this one certainly dries.

DON'T SHAKE! Haha I read all the reviews that said don't shake this!

My current skin condition:

My skin has actually been SUPER bad lately. At first all my acne was only on the right side of my face (and even my SHOULDERS?!) And now it's moved to the left side mostly T___T And this is actually an improvement as it is right now HAH! Last week was just...the worst. So I decided that now's a good time as ever to try this interesting product!


First make sure your face is clean and dry, then take a clean Q-tip and dip it into the bottle, getting a bit of the pink stuff as well as the clear stuff:

Dab it on the acne and get a new Q-tip and repeat on all the other blemishes as necessary!

The bottle recommended that you use this at night as an overnight remedy, so that's what I tried ^.^

The next morning I didn't notice a ton of difference on my face, some of the smaller acne were gone but everything else was the same. Sorry I forgot to take a picture!! I was running late to school hahaha >.< What's new?


Impressions so far (Week 1):

So I've actually been using this for a week or so now. And I must say, I'm kind of on the fence about it? It works pretty well for the smaller acne, which is great because it stops it from becoming the big problematic acne and whatnot, but I was kind of hoping for immediate results on the bigger ones. I also noticed that since I've been using it frequently, my face is starting to smell a little...sulphur-y? I'm probably going to stop using it for awhile haha. It's incredibly drying so I HIGHLY suggest you have a few things on hand while using this product.

1.) The most important thing you're going to want to need is a good face moisturizer. I didn't think I would need to use face moisturizers often because I get soooo oily and sometimes using lotion or creams on my face just makes it oilier. But these days I've also been trying a new primer that prevents oil so it's also kind of dry, in addition to my The Face Shop Magic BB Cream which tends to be quite drying as well. All of these dry things combined really makes my makeup look cake-y and flakey so I have to use a mist toner over it and lotion before I prime! It's only one extra thing to put on your face under your makeup and I assure you it will make all the difference~ I use Clinique's Dramatically Different Moisturizing Lotion. A couple of dabs on my dry areas, let it sink in, and then I'm good to go for the rest of my makeup routine!

2.) It's also probably a good idea to have some sort of exfoliating face wash or brush to get rid of the dry dead skin cells and dried up acne bits (ew sorry haha) once you use this acne remedy for a while. If you don't exfoliate these bits off, like I said, your makeup might start to look a bit flaky like mine did. But after exfoliating your face will be smooth and fresh like new! I recommend using a denser exfoliating product like a salt scrub or Clinique Sparkle Skin Exfoliating wash once a week when you start to get dry pieces of skin, but not so dry that you'll irritate your skin from exfoliating! If you are severely dry, hold off on exfoliating and use oil face washes to gently rub away the skin and moisturize at the same time.

3.) The last thing(s) you're probably going to want to need some good moisturizing face masks and maybe some of those steam tablets from Lush to help your skin back into shape! It also helps if the masks and things have a nice scent to get rid of the sulphur-y scent?! (As long as those perfumes don't irritate your skin of course!) I don't know if other people who used this had this issue, but it just feels like I still have the scent of the sulphur on my face even after I washed it off. Like it soaked into my pores or something. If I use one of my masks right after it initially goes away, until later in the day when I think I still sense it?! Is that weird?! Hahaha

My last tip is that you should listen to your skin, as always, and know that everyone's skin is different so this may work very well for you, or worse than it worked for me, or you could also be on the fence! Just remember, right when you start to get negative results stop using it! You don't want sad irritated skin! Also, try not to use this everyday like I have been doing. If you've been following my blog you guys know how I talk about how oily my skin gets, but now it's SUPER dry even in my t-zone. You would think I'd see that as a good thing, but alas, I'd rather have an oily t-zone to be honest hahaha.

Upsides: Does what it says- dries! Mostly works on small acne though :/
Downsides: Super drying, really strong sulphur smell, doesn't really work on the larger problematic acne.

Let me know what acne remedies you guys have! Maybe I'll end up abandoning this if my skin gets too dry within the next week >.<

Thanks for reading as always sugar peas!!! Sorry for the inconsistent posting again! MIDTERMS.

xoxo Abby

~Skincare Review: Pure Smile Muddy Girl Mud and Clay Masks (Long Post)~

Hello hello lovely people!! It's time for another skincare review! Yippie! This one took me about four weeks to finish. Crazy right? Hahaha~

About a month ago I found these Muddy Girl mud masks in the cosmetics area of Uwaji and (mostly because of my new found love for non sheet masks lately!) I really wanted to try them out~ It comes in a sample pack of four different mud or clay masks! Which is really nice so you can see which one you like best and then buy a full tub or tube and whatnot!

I've tried Pure Smile (Japanese brand) sheet masks in the past, and I would rank them as maybe my second or third favorite sheet mask to use after My Beauty Diary ^.^ Another reason why I didn't hesitate when I saw they also have mud/clay masks as well!

Since there were four different masks in this set and I mask once a week (every Wednesday) it took me four weeks to finish reviewing this product lol. That's the longest it's ever taken for me to finish something so small!

AHH I'M SORRY, I accidentally deleted the picture that showed the rest of the ingredients T__T 

I can't read Japanese (yet) so I just randomly chose one on Wednesday and had a surprise! Lol 

It turns out that blue=charcoal, green=pearl, pink=mud, yellow=red clay.
I've really been into clay masks instead of sheet masks lately. They just feel SOOO good when you put them in the fridge and put it on right after a warm shower that opens your pores ^.^

The first one I decided to try was the blue (charcoal) one, cuz why not? Lol You put this on like any other clay mask. I like putting them on right after steaming my face/showering for best results. The pack suggested 10-15 mins but I forget and always leave it on longer lol.

Doesn't look like there's a whole lot in there, right?

Texture and look is a lot like my Dr. Douxi mask I did a review of before *__*

Right after shower, before mask.

That one dab on my face.

I used the whole thing on my face. It's tingly when you first put it on. And that always gives me the impression that its working lol.

After rinsing my face after leaving it on for about 45 mins lol~

It's hard to tell whether it really "did" anything for my skin right away. I usually wait the next morning and record my results, like a true scientist right? LOLOL This one was very much like my Dr. Douxi glacier clay mask. It even smelled the same! It didn't irritate my skin and I felt fresh (as usual with clay masks) after rinsing it off with lukewarm water. Sometimes I feel the need to use a toner after I mask, but with this one I didn't. The next morning my skin felt smooth and not super oily (just a bit on my t-zone but still a little less than normal). The pack doesn't describe (from what I could see) the benefits of each of the different masks. But I suppose you could look at the ingredients to see what is in there that might help you!

Consistency: It's an absolutely smooth mask. It glides on super easily and feels even nicer coming right out of the fridge.
Scent: Light and doesn't seem to bother me, you get used to the scent after a few minutes and it fades away.
Effectiveness: Like I mentioned above, there is really no immediate difference and the moisturizing properties are average.
Irritation?: No irritation! Yay! Just a bit tingly when you first put it on, but there was no itchy feeling.
Overall: There was just enough product in there for one use on my face which I was a bit surprised about since a lot of the times I can get at least two or three uses from jelly packs that are about the same size!

The next Wednesday I used the pearl mask (green):

Ever so slightly green/yellow

It was kind of hard to document the results over a span of four weeks because I'm so used to blogging about one thing I tried, so I often forgot to record my initial thoughts lol. But I do remember this mask! I don't know if I was having a good skin week or if this mask actually just did me wonders haha. That's the thing about testing something overtime I guess >__<

Before masking~

One swipe

The rest on my face...

All covered!

I look scary/angry in this pic lol. This was when it was all dry after about 30 mins~

And after I washed it off!

Consistency: I'm just going to say that all the masks have the same texture. Absolutely smooth with no lumps or grains. It's a very fine clay/mud combo and it's almost like putting on a very rich lotion!
Scent: They actually all almost smell the same ahha. The differences are very subtle, but you always get used to the scent after a few minutes. It leaves a light scent to your skin in the end but nothing really strong or bad I'd say.
Effectiveness: This one seemed to do something out of all the other ones. But that isn't saying much since the masks did so little lol.
Irritation?: Like the previous one this one gave me no irritation!
Overall: My favorite mask of the four! (blue is my 2nd fave) My skin felt SUPER smooth in the morning. It might be because of the mask. Or it might be because I was having an awesome skin week (I'm back to bad skin right now lol T___T)

OK now I'm just gonna blaze through the other two:
Pink: Mud

Looks like pudding!

Ehh kind of looks weird here I guess O.O

Overall: Mud was my least favorite. This was the only one that actually did irritate my skin. Not badly, but none of the other masks left me with pinkish skin after a few hours. Maybe this was a bad skin day? lol

Last one! Yellow: Red Clay!

I was expecting this to be red...silly me I guess!

They all have the same silky texture.

Just a dab

For some reason I felt like this mask had less product in the pack? It just felt like I had thinner coverage. Hm.

It's dry!!! My forehead! LOL

Meh didn't really do anything special.

Final verdict 6/10: Since these were sample packs I can't really say any of these masks changed my skin miraculously, even in the four weeks I continuously used them. I think this might be good as an every other day mask rather than a once a week mask like I did. You might see actual results if you use this mask more frequently. Based on how my skin reacted to each of the masks I would say the charcoal and pearl masks are the only ones I might actually consider repurchasing if they had small packs of just those separately. Actually I might just look for the pearl one since I already have a clay mask like the charcoal one. It's kind of weird how all the masks gave me pretty much the same results. It's not really a good or bad point since that means there wasn't a particularly bad mask, it's just a little disappointing. I don't think I would re-buy this sample pack now that I know how they all feel.

Next time I want to try the carbonated mud mask or maybe a Lush mask! I just want something with texture or something that promises immediate results, just to see if those actually work! Especially since I try to only mask once a week, I think a mask with more immediate results would work a lot better for me ^.^

What is your favorite non-sheet mask to use? I'd love to try it!

xoxo Abby