Phat-I am 100% with you on buying cruelty free products. The last thing I used that was tested on animals was the oil of olay stuff, but that was more than a few years ago when it was still called oil of ulay and before I knew of the evils of procter and gamble and the many other pharmeceutical companies that make money from cruelty to animals. Since then I do my best to use only products that I know are cruelty free. I reserched this with my La Prairie and creme de la mer. My only concern is, in a cosmetics book I have it lists companies that do and do not test, however some references state that chanel do test on animals whilst I was told catergorically by a chanel SA that they dont. Same with dior. I have read that they do and then on a similar website that they dont. So in some respects it can be confusing. I know for a fact that brands such as L'oreal, max-factor, maybelline and cover girl ARE tested on animals and as such would never use these products regardless of how fantastic or rubbish they were. I am the same with household products. You won't find any persil, domestos, flash, fairy liquid or the like in my home. I use tesco's own range that is just as good but with a great no-animal testing policy. The co-op also have a really good policy.

As for Lush, I am a lush addict but their skincare was not for me. I tried the angels on bare skin, gorgeous, and some of their masks and my skin reacted horrible to them. The worst though was the lush handcream. My poor hands got covered in a huge red rash that was really dry and took weeks to go. I think I'll stick to the bath and shower stuff!

I had same outcomes with Dr H. I too bought those sample tins and my skin just did not like any of it! I ended up selling them on ebay!

It's only been in the past year or so that I have been using an eye cream. The first one I tried was an avon one but that just 'sat' under my eye and did nothing except make that are all greasy and felt really heavy even though I only used a small amount. I love that my La Prairie one sinks in right away and doesn't make my mascara run!

I like neals yard, but in terms of facial products a lot of essential oils are actually skin irritants, so I have to be careful with them.

whats this stuff like allergy wise I just looked on the website and I have to say I'm interested it looks like good stuff.


As for clarins its amazing. I had samples recently for a few of their ranges and decided on this one because my skin is so dehydrated. Anyway a week proper into using it and my forehead fine lines which I'd started to panic about have gone. I thought it was just due to lack of sleep but I've not slept properly again for a couple of nights and they aren't back so yay. I just need something decent for under my eyes now.

Be careful about using stuff under your eyes. I didn't have any lines there until I one day decided I needed an under the eye cream - within a month I had developed lines there. I think the cream I was using was too rich and the gel I repaced it with dried out that very delicate skin.

I am going to be really careful I once used body shop under eye gel but got allergic to everything bodyshop I might try a clarins one if its on ebay can't actually afford anything proper again. I have fine lines so have nothing to lose

I dunno about allergies and Dr H - the best way to find out is just to try the little £12 skin care tin - that way you can try out the cleansers, toners and creams for a few weeks and see how your skin reacts. Because they are organic and not chemical, I'd suspect they are kinder to your skin. The little tin has a couple of the moisturisers in so you can try them all - there's a rose one, a quince one and an intensive one if I remember right - and see which you prefer.

I don't use an under eye cream - although DrH make one - as although I'm 44 I'm not wrinkly there, yet! (My hands are the hands of an old crone, though!) I think their Rose Day Cream, plus the Factor 8 moisturiser, is plenty. But using heavy creams can make your skin too dependent and change its natural balance of acids, making it dry out, so it would figure that using heavy and rich creams might have the opposite effect to the one intended! That's why night creams are banned with DrHauschka - because they make your skin more and more dependent.

Some teachers once gave me some Clarins hand cream as a thankyou present for teaching their 11 year olds a craft workshop and I did like it. Not sure how cruelty free or organic it is? I love the Neals Yard Frankincense moisturiser as a hand cream but last week I made my own hand cream as an experiment - rose, myrrh & benzoin which is just spectacular! I do get through a lot of it, so wanted to make something to eke the Neals Yard out but I'm starting to prefer the one I made. I've also just made another hand cream with Neem Oil, for DH's excema.

I'm cheap when it comes to handcream. I use good ol' Atrixo - there are pots of it everywhere in this house - and I massage it in to my feet every night as well.

I'm allergic to lots of things and I can suddenly become allergic to something I've used without problem many times before. In the days when I wore eye makeup every day I used to use Almay eye make up remover and one morning I woke up with eyes so puffy, bruised looking and light sensitive that I had to have a couple of days off work. That was pretty much when I gave up wearing eye makeup.

http://www.uncaged.co.uk/products.htm

Clarins don't test on animals they told me their products are largely natural but I'm not sure how accurate that is. They certainly dont make my allergies flare up which is good but they are really expensive.

How do you make your own creams? Are there recipes or do you just make it up?



Anyone got any good holiday tips? I save up sample containers and i've got a pack of holiday pots that I got from Lloyds and I put enough in there to take with me to save space.
I'd like some quick solutions with my feet though. I have the worlds worst feet I've got one of those softening creams but its that strong it does soften my skin but also takes the colour off my flipflops so I normally have to bum around in socks for ages after which I obviously won't be able to do if I'm on the go all the time. Any good foot creams?

Oh? What cream is that you are using on your feet? I don't care about flip flops discolouring.

It discolours my leather ones it actually took the paint off my plastic ones which did worry me somewhat. WHen I get in I'll look it out for you its one of those foot softening ones i need it you've never seen anything like my feet, they sell them in boots the creams that is. Considering I always buy the best fitting shoes I've got hard skin as hard as rock. I was running and tripped and my shoe fell off and I landed on glass the other week when I was running to the station in Birmingham and it didn't even break the skin thats how hard my feet are. And I have bunions on both feet that need doing yukky yuk I hate my feet.

Yeah Mine is rock hard so anything is an improvement, I guess (at the exepnse of my footwear!!!)

I use 'The A-Z of Aromatherapy' by Patricia Davis. That has some basic cream recipes in the back (A basic cream is as simple as bees wax melted into almond oil). Then I added essential oils, or oils that have had herbs from my garden steeped in them, to do whatever it is I need.

I just got a great book in a bargain book shop, 'The Ultimate Natural Beauty Book' by Josephine Fairley which has some great recipes in!

You can also buy base oils or creams, also things like shampoo and bath oil base (you need a special oil base for baths that has 'dispersant' in or the oil doesn't mix with the bath water). You can get them from Neals Yard Remedies, Culpeppers Herbalists, or Body Shop and Boots have aromatherapy lines, too. Then add your esential oils, or whatever.

You have to sterilise everything you use and be very craeful with the quantities. With most essential oils it's 3 drops oil to 5ml (a teaspoon) of base. Once you know the basic rules - you can experiment!

You can also buy stuff like Green Clay to use as a base for face masks. It's way cheaper than shop bought stuff, as a rule, and makes nice gifts for friends if you package and label it nice (I collect Victorian glass bottles, and some of these are nice to us).

Flexitol heel balm. Itdoes soften them up but its that strong you are best off putting it on with gloves

I use Atrixo on my feet every night and I haven't got a trace of hard skin now.

DH's niece is a chiropodist and she used a something that was like a large metal nail file to get rid of a lot of the hard skin and told me that Atrixo was the best to use but you have to use it over a fairly long period, i.e. file off some of the hard skin then massage the Atrixo in every night for a week then repeat and keep on repeating until the hard skin is gone. (It will go eventually.)

Before DH's niece got involved I had hard skin which was also splitting and it actually was hurting to wear shoes. I tried all the hard skin removing creams and, you're right, they are viscious - some of them were like grit in cream - didn't do anything for my feet but my fingertips felt smooth. The Avon one I tried actually lifted some of the varnish off of my bedside table!

My doctor once prescribed me a really strong salicylic acid for them and that did help for a bit but that burned your skin if you got it on a bit that wasn't hard by accident.

Impossible Princess....for holiday use the Johnson's Baby moisturiser in a white tube. It is amazing, I take it on the plane and rub it in all over, on my lips everything!!!