Skincare binge~Naruko and My Beauty Diary

My skin has been super erratic lately so I decided to indulge in some new skincare items. My friend has been trying out a few night jellies from Naruko (a skincare line from Taiwan) and had a positive experience so I decided to give the line a shot since there were a few promotions going on the Taiwan website. My friend had acquired the night jellies through the Taiwan website since Sasa.com was not selling the line at the time (Sasa does carry a few items now).

I cannot read Chinese so google translate was a great help, my bf was a minor help. My friend had experience with the site so she was also kind enough to give me the basics of how to navigate on the page. The Singapore website for Naruko also provided some info in English although the layout is different from the Taiwan website. I placed my order on a Friday, it shipped on Wednesday and I received my order the following Saturday.

Price wise, items on the Taiwan page was cheaper compared to Sasa.com. It was also nice that you could order sets of things. However, the big drawback is the cost of shipping (I think it is based on weight), although EMS is used so your order arrives quite fast after it is dispatched. Overall, my order contained 18 items and shipping ended up being around $70.

So this is what I ended up with:

Rose Basic Toner (x2)
Narcissus Total Defense Fundamental Serum
*Narcissus Total Defense Night Repairing Dew (x2)
Narcissus Total Defense Moisturizing Night Repair
Narcissus Total Defense Night Gelly
Niaouli & Tea Tree T-Zone Blackhead Remover
*Niaouli & Tea Tree Acne Toner
*Niaouli & Tea Tree Balancing Moisturizer
Marjoram and Lavender Brightening Serum
Magnolia Brightening and Firming Night Gelly
Job's Tears Whitening and Cooling Night Gelly

Not pictured:
*Narcissus Total Defense Mousse Facial Wash
*Narcissus Total Defense BB cream
*Facial Spa Massage Cotton Pads (3 packs)
Facial White Illuminating Cotton Pads (3 packs)
*Celestial White Moss Shower Mousse

Items with an asterisk (*) are the things that I'm currently using. The facial items have been pretty nice so far. Nothing has any offensive scents or residue. The BB cream is very sheer and light but works nicely as a primer for me. The shower mousse is not very remarkable and the bf described the scent as the kind you smell when you're in the bath aisle at an Asian supermarket here in the states -_- I kind of have to agree, it's pretty generic. Thankfully, the scent isn't very strong and doesn't linger much. The mousse is moisturizing enough so I'll most likely keep it in my rotation of shower items.

A niffy feature of the Naruko packaging is that it can transform into different types of containers as a means of promoting recycling.

Flatten box and instructions

Here's a few final products:

The box/container depends on the size of your item

My other skincare indulgence has been sheet masks. I'm ending up with a bit of a Pokemon syndrome and trying to catch all the My Beauty Diary varieties that have been released but I only have one face, so I'm trying to start using up all the masks that I have before acquiring anymore. However, I couldn't resist the new Hello Kitty collaboration ones. Each kind comes with 3 different sheet mask wrappers:

Top: Strawberry Honey
Bottom: Strawberry Milk

So cute, I almost don't want to use them

The other My Beauty Diary mask to recently land in my lap are the Earl Grey Tea and Macaron kind. I'm curious as to what this one will smell like.

I hope to report positive skincare results soon!

Cellnique Skin Action Sebum Gel, Advance Bio Renewal Masque, Diamond Serum Foundation

I had received an invitation to review a few Cellnique products and after indicating that my main skin concern was congestion; I was sent 3 items-the Skin Action Sebum gel, Advanced Bio Renewal Masque and the Diamond Serum Foundation.

I never really had much breakout issues but in the past 2 years, I've had a lot more congestion issues and clogged pores especially in my t-zone. The problem was made worse since I am the type to pick at my skin even though I know it will make the healing time longer and make it more likely to have the blemish leave behind a scar.

I've actually ordered the Skin Action Sebum Gel before having been contacted by Cellnique. I was interested after seeing eki's fab review a while back and decided to finally give it a shot back in December. The item arrived super fast from Malaysia, I would say within a week of placing my order and customer service was helpful in answering questions.

The sebum gel comes in a small pump bottle. The pic below is my old bottle that I've had since December, hence the writing has worn off a bit. The gel comes out clear and has a minty/menthol type of smell but it's not noticeable once you apply the product. I use it after cleansing and toning day and night. I concentrate it on my t-zone and blend out any excess to the rest of my face. After a few weeks, I did start to notice that my congestion had improved. I still get the occasional bumps but they are definitely fewer in number. In terms of controlling oiliness, I did not notice as much of a change but that has never been a major concern for me. The gel costs $51 usd but a little goes a long way. I use the gel day and night and one bottle has lasted about 6 months.

Bottle and back of the box


This is about the amount I use for the t-zone area

Forehead before (Dec.) and after (Mar.)

The second item I tried was the Advanced Bio Renewal Masque. It's a clay based masque meant to exfoliate and help clean pores. It smells like really ripe pineapples and has a soft paste like texture with granules. The mask spreads really easily on the face and can give a slight tingling sensation. The first 2 times I used the mask, I did not feel anything but on 3rd time I did notice a bit of tingle. I applied the mask on my dry face and left it on for ~15 minutes. Then, I use wet hands to massage the product for a few seconds and then rinse off the mask. Afterward, my face feels significantly smoother and looks brighter. The Advance Bio Renewal Masque costs $51 usd.

The last item that was sent to me was the Diamond Serum Foundation. I would called essentially call this a BB cream since it offers many skin benefits including firming, brightening, lightening, and soothing. It comes in only one shade and for my NC 35 ish color, it did not really match it. The cream comes out brown but once it's blended out, the color lightens quite a bit. The smell is similar to what I call a generic foundation smell (if that makes any sense) and is undetectable once you apply the serum foundation on your face. The cream also has quite a shimmer to it due to the nano diamonds incorporated in to the product. By itself, the serum foundation does feel pretty moisturizing and not too heavy but since the color was not quite right for me, I tried to wear it as a primer of sorts and apply another base on top but that combo was a bit heavy feeling. However, I could see that it did smooth out my skin and the shimmer showed through just enough give a more glowy look. The Diamond Serum Foundation costs $45 usd.

Please visit the Cellnique site for more info and to see other products. I've been pretty impressed by these products and I decided to order a few other items to try. I purchased the Vital Repair Cleansing Milk and Oxygen Mousse Cleanser. I'll post reviews for them soon.

If you're interested in trying the Skin Action Sebum Gel, Cellnique is offering to send my readers a sample. The first 50 who email their full name and mailing/shipping address to fbfreesample@cellnique.com with the subject beautymoogle.blogspot.com will receive a 3ml sample of the sebum gel. This offer ends a week from this posting and the sample will be delivered within 4-6 weeks. Enjoy!