4 Reasons Why I Don't [Always] Agree with "Skincare is YMMV"

One of the least controversial, most-repeated refrains of the international K-Beauty and Asian cosmetic community is "Your Mileage May Vary", meaning "not everything works the same on everyone.  Perfectly logical, and it's often how we agree to disagree and stay polite even as someone else is dragging your favourite skincare product until its label is worn clean off.

"I hated the smell, it broke me out, the packaging design was hard to use, and I don't agree that it was hydrating at all!" [img credit giphy]

I was inspired to write this post because I was complaining to someone that the Lador hair care products I had just tested had a horrible, permeating scent that bothered me and my husband all night, and to my surprise, they said that it was almost odorless for them.  When I pressed for more details, they good-naturedly shrugged off my questions with "I guess it's just YMMV of skincare then" and I actually found myself (gasp!) disagreeing on that too (for reasons I'll explain below.)  Heresy! Blasphemy!  Certainly a shocking departure from my usual mantra of YMMV in all skincare.

YMMV is the great equalizer; almost everyone can agree that a lot of the conflicting results people get with the same product can just be chalked up to their unique skin's reactions, their personal tastes, even how they might be using it.

But I don't always agree, and here's four reasons why.

K-Beauty on Amazon: Rebuilding a 15+ Step Routine if My Stash Caught on Fire

Phew, I did it!  As I mentioned in Beginner Friendly: Simple K-Beauty Starter Kits for 4 Skin Types, that if I managed to not throw myself  off a cliff after finishing all 4 skin types, I might do a bonus "My personal kit if my house burned down and I had to start over with nothing but Amazon gift cards" version.  *knocks on wood that will never happen.*

I also warned that unlike the original starter kits, my lineup would not have just 5 items or less, because that's not how I roll.  Here's yesterday's products, for example:

Instead of "drive it like you stole it", it's "layer it like you bought it & it has a limited shelf life"?

I'm coming back to this series as it's something that people seem really interested in, but I'm going to have to break it up a bit because I want these posts to be heavy on visuals and light on wordswordswords.  This is also going to help answer those questions like "why does toner go after a first essence?" and "where do I sheet mask?" which despite all the numerous guides I've made over the years, still remain a frequent visitor to my inbox.  Visuals for the win!

What I'm going to do once this post is done, is create visual examples of how these products can be combined into different routines.  That will be coming up next, woo!

In this post: 

• My K-Beauty picks on Amazon (if my house burned down)

• Cleansers: 1st & 2nd Cleansers + Toners

• Actives: Anti-Aging & Anti-Acne

• Hydrators: Essences, Toners, & Sheet Masks

• Occlusives: Creams, Oils, & Sleeping Packs

• Sun Protection, Spot Treatments, & Mists

Let me just say before we start that 1. you do not need all this stuff.  Really.  2. this is not a recommendation of skin treatment; that is a discussion between you and your doctor.  This is just a curated (eurgh that word) round-up of Korean beauty products I throw my money at that are readily available on Amazon, in case you are the "two day shipping or bust" vs the "80% off retail and wait 3 weeks" type.  If you're the latter, this post is for you: From Beginner to Expert Mode: Where I Buy K-Beauty & Asian Cosmetics

K-Beauty On the Road: Inappropriate Sheetmasking & Involuntary Strobing

If you follow me on Twitter or Instagram, you've no doubt already seen/heard my special-event-attendance woes leading up to this weekend; I live a hectic life full of important things like reorganizing my spreadsheet or inventorying my sheet masks, not to mention writing a blog post every weekend and working 60 hours a week at my day job.  This means social outings that require the trappings of non-hermit life such as well-behaved skin, makeup, and spanx is more than I can handle.

Having had to do it a few weekends in a row has me ready to retire from human contact until at least midsummer.  Stress and troubled skin is a bad combination, but weddings are one of those events that you can't really dodge, so I took advantage of our out-of-state drive and loaded our car trunk with (I kid you not) a cardboard box full of skincare, makeup, and sheet masks.  Being 'ready' was beyond my means, but this was as close as it was going to get.

I loved the dark cherrywood of this desk so much that I'm writing this covered in sawdust. More on that later.

I'm actually already a few hours overdue to be asleep for an early morning workday, so this post is going to be brief (ahahaha no) and terrifying; I'm going to include a demonstration of the cushion + (accidental) highlighter on my skin.

I've also finally figured out how to properly create a linked table of contents (I think), so you can now just jump to the section you want, woo!

In this post:

• Preparing my skin in advance
• What I brought with me
• Unedited photos of the Hera cushion
• Unedited photos of my face wearing the Hera cushion (I need a drink.)

I need an adult, or preferably an adult beverage, but then I'd fall asleep at my computer and the rest of this post would be endless lines of "dfghjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj" and then possibly a tweet tomorrow about how I caused an electrical fire by drooling into my keyboard.  If you don't want to see how my repurposed highlighter + cushion looked after a full night of wear, duck out after the money shots of the cushion.  You've been warned!

How I Test and Review Products

While working on an upcoming project, I went looking for a post to link that detailed my testing and review process, and I realized I didn't really have one.  Whoops!  I do have a pretty in-depth post about my spreadsheet which focuses on how my stash is organized and how the testing schedule works, but I don't really have a stand-alone post about the testing process despite being pretty passionate about it ... so here we go!

An automated testing schedule is a lovely thing.

In this post:

• Why (isolation) testing is important
• How I test products for review
• My testing schedule because I'm nerdy and unrepentant about it

While this post is intended to offer people a behind-the-scenes look into my process because I'm really keen about transparency and sharing my nerdy testing schedule with people, it's also going to be beneficial to anyone who's keen on a multi-step Asian skincare routine.

LS Cosmetic Oriental Herbal Skincare Premium Mask Pack Review: Four Flavours of Hanbang

I like sheet masks a lot, and I use them a lot, but I don't review them often as my blog would be nothing but sheet mask reviews if I did.  I'll sometimes review them on my Instagram, or I'll put them in a Best of post, or pick my top masks for a season's routine.

I'm making an exception for the LS Cosmetic Oriental Herbal Skincare Premium Mask Pack sheet mask set, of which I have types but one, as they're worth reviewing and people have expressed a lot of interest in hearing about them.  I'm sure this is due to 1. them being very, very Hanbang (한방, traditional Korean herbal medicine) and 2. being in ultra cute packaging that looks like different styles of Hanbok, a type of traditional Korean garment.  Normally cute packaging results in really disappointing masks, but these were a pleasant surprise.

I've also already used almost all of them, as you can see in this image below, so it's high time I review them before they're all gone.

Yes, I did save these empties for this post. You'd think that I didn't like the blue or green ones as I have 3 left of each, but actually I'm hoarding them because precioussss.

I purchased these in my Korean buying service haul from the terminally adorable Boyah Shop, which you can read about here: Boyah Shop Korean Buying Service Review + Haul of Hanbang & Sheet Masks, and at this time they're not available (affordably!) anywhere other than Korean sites, but if that changes, I will definitely update the review.  These were about $0.86 each before shipping, and I'm quite pleased with them.

Even the boxes are fancy, with pretty gold detailing on the edges:

Image from: Boyah Shop Korean Buying Service Review + Haul of Hanbang & Sheet Masks

Still, when it comes to sheet masks, it's what's inside the package that counts, so let's get to it!

In this post:

• Chaga Mushroom Sheet Mask - Wrinkle Care Type Review
• Shang Whang Mushroom Sheet Mask - Sensitive Type Review
• Silk Worm Sheet Mask - Whitening Type Review
• Wild Ginseng Sheet Mask - Cleansing Type Review

Each mini-review contains product details, comments on fit, scent, essence, ingredients, and other details, including which ones I will (and won't) be repurchasing.