The Blonde Diaries

Early Edition: Holiday Gifts Reviewed

I thought I’d do a little holiday gift review guide since I did request a few of the items I posted in my previous threads and I did get a few cool gifts during my gift exchanges with friends and Mike this week.

Dale & Thomas Popcorn- Talk about a great unexpected gift.  I received a gift package from some online friends that contained the peanut butter & white chocolate drizzled popcorn.  I had never had flavored popcorn until about 2 months ago when I tried some moose munch which was tasty as well but alas there are no Harry & David’s in Houston.  I had been reading online recently about Dale & Thomas since it was mail order and very similar to moose munch and was about to give it a try when it appeared in this gift bag.  After literally ripping into the bag and trying for myself, I am now officially converted and can’t wait to try the 12 pack sampler I ordered at www.daleandthomas.com.  Definetly 2 thumbs up on this gift!

Philosophy Lemon Lip Gloss ->  I’m usually a kiehls/blistex girl but I’ll never pass up a beauty gift.  I received this in my gift box noted above with the popcorn.  I also had to pull it out and give it a try.  It has a slight lemon smell but it is not overpowering.  I would compare it to the smell of a lemon pie or lemon filling.  It was a little thicker than I’m use to but it could be due to the fact that I squeezed a lot out!  I did notice that it was not as sticky as other lip glosses on the market which is definetly a plus especially when it gets windy and you start getting mouthfuls of hair.  I will give it a thumbs up as well.

OPI Nail polish - I was visiting the OPI nail site and trying out different colors to request for Christmas and decided on the most popular “I’m Not Really a Waitress” and “Catherine the Grape”.  Anything with my name spelled correctly gets brownie points.  The first polish, lets call it Waitress, appears to be a deep red in the bottle but when tried on its a very pretty summery pinkish red.  The other polish, Grape, I wasn’t too sure about when first asking because it is purple but when I tried it on this morning it is a beautiful deep plum/purple color and could even be considered work appropriate.  Its more of a browish purple color.  2 Thumbs up for OPI!

And the remainder of my early reviewed items came from www.sephora.com and included the Too Faced Life of the Party mini chronicles palette.  I was not able to see this palette in stores this year so I just took a gamble on it.  It was very pretty when I opened it and very holiday/wintery.  The tones in the palette are your shimmery silver and deep red.  I can see a smokey eye being made using these colors and one of the light silver colors I have in some of my urban decay palettes.  I also found that Mike used the code for the lipgloss ring (free with $25 purchase) and that I was a tiny bit disappointed with.  I can’t complain that it was free but it just appeared to be more black stoned than the gray that it actually was.  Its also a tad bulkier than I was imagining but these are just cosmetic things I can get over.  I’ll probably wear it to dinner tonight just because.  Lastly, it was determined that I liked cranberry smells (??) and I was given the cute little Philosophy Cranberry lotion and 3-in-1 gift set.  I have to admit it is a nice gift set and the smell is also very nice and much better than that gingerbread man scent I bought myself last year.  Maybe Mike knows things about me that I haven’t figured out yet.  Definetly a thumbs up on the Sephora stash.

Have a happy holidays and I will continue my reviews as I get things!