Ziaja Haul

The other week I went to a really wonderful event hosted by the lovely Emma from Mastering Your Makeup. I'm a massive Ziaja fan as some of you will know from past posts and monthly favourites, so I was delighted to get to hear more about the brand and try out brand new things from the range. I was kindly given some things to try out in a jam packed goodie bag, but I also picked up a bag full of things that I thought sounded interesting or that I had run out of. Its a serious downer when you run out of your favourite things!

I came away with a lot of the olive leaf range by accident, but everything just looked and smelled really good. In my goodie bag I got a lovely olive leaf regenerating face mask (that I've seen lots of bloggers really love, so I'm excited to try it out!) and a olive leaf micellar water. If you saw my Boots haul you'll know that all my skin care make up removing products ran out at the same time, so I was delighted to get this in my bag. I've had my big 400ml Garnier water for less then a month and I'm almost finished it (!) so this will be next on the list to try.  

I also got my most sought after product from Ziaja in my goodie bag. Their shower scrubs are so cheap and amazing quality, so they are always sold out when I try to get them. I felt extra lucky to see them floating in our bags! Lastly from the goodie bags was a mens shower gel (that smells really good) that I've passed on to himself. And not pictured is a goats milk face cream that my mammy got more then attached to when I was showing her the things, so its living with her now! 

I had to pick up two face products that I buy time and time again. The manka tree purifying toner (that I've talked about in my skin care routine) is one of the best toners that I've tried out in a long time. It also smells clean and it could be a placebo, but I think it cleans my face better because it smells of tea tree!

I also got my all time favourite face scrub, the rose butter micro peeling face scrub. This has to be my 4th easily, I can't do without it. I ran out of this a few months ago and didn't manage to get into the shop to pick it up for about 3 weeks. In this time I tried out some scrubs that I got in Boots but none were as good. This makes my skin so soft and gets rid of the dry pieces of skin that tends to appear around spots. I use this about 3 times a week and always notice how much better my make up goes on afterwards.

After talking to one of the girls from Ziaja she recommended that I try out the olive shampoo and conditioner from them, so I got them. I'm not really sure why the conditioner is so much smaller then the shampoo, so I must tweet them and ask! I was done with buying half the shop until I smelled the olive body balm and knew I had to try it out. It sinks into the skin so quickly and makes me feel lovely and soft without being sticky or weighted down for the day. I can see this becoming a regular buy for me.

Then as I hadn't seen that there was a mask in the goodie bag, I decided to pick up another that was only 70 cent! As I remembered how well they were reviewed by bloggers before. All in all I think I did really well with my little haul and will be steadily making my way through them all in the next few weeks! Make sure to follow Ziaja and Emma on twitter as I've heard that they will be doing lots more events like the one I was at. You might be able to sign up for one soon!

Ziaja: New Olive Leaf Collection

Ziaja is a brand that I use all the time, I love their scrubs, body creams and face scrubs. Theres a chemist on Talbot St that I trek down to all the time to repurchase all the time, I love what great prices they are for what amazing products you get. I've banged on about many of Ziaja's things in the past and now I'm about to do the same with their new Olive Leaf collection.  

First off is the one I was most excited about, the *cleansing oil for dry and sensitive skin in a 270ml bottle. This waterless foaming face and body oil came at the best time as I'm suffering with my skin lately due to some contact dermatitis. I was worried that this would effect it further, but I was totally wrong. Its a lovely feeling to use this in the shower daily for some relief from the current soreness and irritation. It calms it down and helps to relieve the need to touch and irritate it for a few hours. It also leaves the rest of my skin a little softer and more moisturiesed then before. This wouldn't be used in place of a moisturiser, but for an extra bit of skin lovin' I'd highly recommend it. Worried that it would be like pouring cooking oil over myself, I only used a tiny blob to begin with, but its a gorgeous gentle rich oil that works as an emollient that wont strip essential oils from the skin, Olive leaf extract is a powerful antioxidant that helps to protect, purify and sooth. This is one of their more expensive products at €9.99 for 270ml, but its well worth picking up. I'm sadly nearly finished my bottle but will be getting it as soon as I can get my hands on it again.  

The second product is the *nourishing face cream with SPF 20. I'll be honest and say that I'm not a big user of face creams or moisturisers so I'm a little bias. But I was pleasantly surprised by how much I've used this because I want to, as opposed to having to trial it for review. A lot of the time moisturisers are greasy on my skin, heavy and far too rich. But with this cream, it was light and my skin drank it up in minutes. It didn't hurt or irritate my face like a lot of moisturisers and there wasn't any issue putting my make up on over it. - Although I tend to only use it on make up free days as I find with any creams or moisturisers, my make up doesn't stand put on my face as long. Providing 'hydration, broad spectrum protection and skin regeneration'  with the olive leaf extract keeping skin soft, hydrated and smoothing out fine lines, this is another big thumbs up for me. For all that, plus an SPF of 20, I'm surprised that its only €5.99 for a 50ml tube. 

There are three other things in the olive leaf collection. A regenerating mask with hyaluronic acid for 69cent (which I can't wait to hunt down and try out!). A duo-phase make up remover and a gel scrub micro exfoliating, I think that Ziaja can really do no wrong by me. I'll be looking out for some more of this range, along with repurchasing my must-have cleansing oil.  

*I did not pay for this item, it was a PR gift.  Please see my disclaimer here.