September 2013 Topbox Unboxing and August 2013 Topbox Review + A Life Update

Hello everyone,

I hope you all are doing really great. I am writing this post quite late, I try to write these posts early on Wednesday but it is now 11:55pm and this post is going up at 8:00am and I still have some pictures to edit. Life has been quite stressful with school and work and life stuff but hopefully everything will come to a state of peace soon.

I am really excited to be hosting my first blog giveaway next week so stay tuned for that. If you want information on how the blog giveaway is going to take place and the rules, all the details are in my blog post from last week that you can read here.

Today I am going to be reviewing my August Topbox and showing you all my September Topbox. If you don't already know, Topbox is a monthly subscription service in Canada that sends you 4 sample sized items at the cost of $12.00 a month. This month there was a special Chatelaine edition which featured products that are picked out by the editors of Chatelaine Magazine. Before I go into the September box I am going to review the August one and tell you what product I liked and which I did not care for.

August 2013 Topbox

Product: Miyu Teas and Beauty Hydrate Mi or De-Stress Mi Pairing

My Thoughts: I was really impressed with this item or pair of items. I never thought I would love a hydrating spray for my face but this was awesome and the tea was delicious. 

A Shopper's Drug Mart Haul Featuring Elizabeth Arden and La Roche Posay + A Few Updates

Hello Everyone and welcome to my brand new posting schedule for the rest of 2013. 

Just a few little points I wanted to make before I get started with today's fun post. 

1) The blog layout has changed. I really liked the dynamic view that I had during BEDA, it was very image centred but I was getting some feedback that said it was a bit annoying for mobile users so I thought I would simplify the layout and I actually like it this way, it lets you pay more attention to the posts and I prefer the turquoise on white colour scheme. Let me know what you think about it in the comments. 

2) October will be giveaway month and as promised I will be doing 2 separate giveaways to thank you for all your support during BEDA (Blog Everyday in August). The two products that I will be giving away have been featured in the blog during BEDA (in a positive light) so you will be familiar with them. 

3) The first October Giveaway post will go up on Thursday October 3 and will last 2 weeks until Thursday October 17th in which I will announce the winner on the blog post that will go up that day as well as on my Twitter account (so make sure you are following that). The Second giveaway will also be revealed on Thursday October 17th and will run until Thursday October 31st. I will always announce blog winners on both the blog and twitter. 

4) When you win one of my giveaways I will contact you with the information I have garnered through your subscribing to the blog. You may also contact me by my email which is located in the "About Cate W." section of the blog which is located on the top underneath the blog title. 

*side-note: If you have won one of my giveaways and have not go in contact with me within 72 hours (3 days) of me announcing the winner I will be forced to pick another winner so please keep an eye out on these dates as they will come in handy. 

5) Giveaway rules will be very simple. The rules will be as follows:

1) You must be a blog subscriber (This giveaway is only for blog supporters). I have finally successfully added a follow button on the right hand side of the blog to make it easy for you to follow the blog but you must be following in order to win (I will be checking). 

2) You must comment below on the giveaway blog post. This is the only way I know that you have entered the giveaway. 

3) You can live anywhere in the world. I do not want to exclude anyone from winning the things I giveaway so my giveaways will never ever be specific to any country. I will ship your winnings anywhere in the world!

4) You may enter as many times as you like by commenting on the giveaway blog post. 

5) Lastly, if you are under 18 you must have your parents permission because I will need to ask for your mailing address to ship the item to you so they need to be okay with you providing me with this information. 

*The last point I wanted to stress about giveaways is fairness. I will promise to always choose my winners fairly and through no biased. All winners will be selected by the use of the website www.random.org. I will put in how many comments are on the giveaway blog post and then select the first random number generated by the website and that will be the winner. 

HAUL TIME

My Weekly Highlights

So if you follow me on twitter (link here) you will know that I have been wanting to make this blog more personal...

I have been thinking of adding things like "What I eat" posts and posts related to decor (I am in the midst of a bedroom transformation). I think this will be a fun element to the blog and it will allow you guys to get to know me better and you can comment back and I can get to know you as well.

I thought of this fun idea that I would do weekly highlight posts. Now these won't be done every week because my life can be quite boring and so I wouldn't want to make these boring and unbearable...

For this post I thought I would do a little more than a week and do the first 10 days of September.

Feel free to comment below and tell me about how your week is going...

Highlights

School:

 I have returned to school to finish up my third year of my four year degree... It has been really fun getting back into the groove of things. I took the summer off so I was quite bored and was actually really missing having the structure of a fixed schedule and assignments due. Although having the summer off did give me a bunch of time to do BEDA (Blog Everyday in August) it also made me anxious for school to start. 

I have a really fun teacher for one of my English classes this semester... He is really into dark arts and witchcraft so we are going to be looking at 17th century British literature from that perspective and me may even get to learn how to perform a seance... spooky...

New Blog Posting Schedule for the Rest of the Year

Hello everyone and welcome back to the blog...

I have missed you, even though it has been a day since BEDA ended. If you haven't read my Thank You post click this link here.

I know that I mentioned in that post that school is starting and that posting is going to be a little more difficult but I am committed so that is why I decided that I will be posting a new blog post every Thursday for the rest of 2013. The Thursday posts will start on September 19th and go on from there.

If you don't follow me on Twitter, you can with the link here. I mentioned on Twitter that I wanted to do a "Cleanser Spotlight" where I review new cleansers and scrubs each month. I will be posting those on the third Thursday of each month.

I hope you all are excited for this new schedule of posts and I am committed to not missing any weeks.

If you have any requests or things you would like to see on the blog, please comment below and tell me. After all I want to write posts that you will enjoy.

I will talk to you all soon and good luck to any of you who are starting school or who have started already, I'm sure you guys will rock this school year!!!

Stay Happy!

- Cate W.

BEDA is Over: A Thank You

Hello everyone,

As BEDA is now over I wanted to take this time to give you all a very sincere and heartfelt Thank You. I know that their really are the few of you who went back to the blog every single day in August to check out the new posts and I really appreciate each and every one of you who made the effort and took the time out to sit down and read my posts. I know I am not a famous blogger by any means and am only new to the game but to know that their are still some of you out their who show your support is truly astounding and I am very grateful.

During BEDA I was lucky enough to get tweets and mentions of my blog posts by Top Box Canada, Josie Maran, Benefit Cosmetics, and Perricone MD. Those are some big names and I really feel giddy about that.