A few months ago I was invited to take part in a skincare trial for the new bareMinerals skincare range - SkinSorials, and then review the products ahead of their launch (review available here). I was also given the opportunity to go down to the London Head Office and meet and have lunch with Lee Etheridge - the International education director for bareMinerals, have my makeup done by one of their makeup artists and then shoot some promotional videos on my experience of the SkinSorials skincare range.Now my blog post title says 'our day' because the only way I could manage to take part in this amazing opportunity was to take Arthur with me!
When I was initially contacted by bareMinerals my heart actually sank as I really thought i would have to miss out (as many Mummies do, when you have a small child to look after) - it would involve an early start on the train, and a late finish arriving back home - tricky if you are breastfeeding still, like I am. Even trickier when your husband has an incredibly busy job and can't offer any help with childcare. I initially declined and gave my reasons, but the team at bareMinerals HO were amazing and so accommodating. They said that I could bring Arthur with me, if this would help, and they would arrange a taxi (as well as the train travel) ,to and from the station with enough room for the pushchair. I could also be 'first up' for filming so that I could leave by 4pm rather than 7pm as originally planned. YIPPEEEE!
In spite of all of that, even I am not naive enough to think that doing any of this with a toddler in tow would be plain sailing, so I called up Arthur's 'Uncle James' who lives in London, to see if he was available to give a helping hand once we arrived - thankfully he was! (and we really couldn't have managed on the day without him!)
This still left me with a number of things to worry about and plan for:
- Pushchair - Virgin trains website makes it clear that they must be folded away and stored during the journey with your child on your lap. Our Bugaboo comes apart into two pieces and would be pretty hard to do this alone and carry it with a toddler.
- Toys, books - how do you plan to entertain a very busy 1 year old on a journey that takes over 3-4 hours, keep him entertained for the day and then again on the journey home. How much would I need and how heavy would it be?!
- Food, snacks, water - For Arthur of course - my fussy little eater who changes his mind daily about what he likes. Making sure I have enough, and making sure it in non-perishable.
- Nappies, spare clothes - again, how much would I need, and how would I carry it all?
- Transitions - essentially, how do get on and off the train with a toddler, a pushchair and a bag without letting one slip?
- Toilet - train toilets are horrible, how would I go for a wee with a toddler in tow (without losing my train seat too!) and/or change my toddler
Amazingly, on the train journey down to London, Arthur's godfather happened upon our carriage looking for a spare seat as he was travelling to London on business, and so spent the journey sat next to us - a spare pair of hands hurrah!
When we arrived at the bareMinerals Head Office, lunch had been laid out on a long table in the staff kitchen area and Lee Etheridge was sat with us, talking to us about our experience of the products and also giving us lots of information about the new SkinSorials skincare range.
Lee told us all about the secret ingredient within these new products - a herb called the 'long life herb' which only grows on a tiny island off the coast of Japan called Okinawa, known as the ‘Island of Long Life’, they have one of the oldest living populations of today! The people on the island believe that eating this herb (which contains zinc, potassium, sodium, calcium, magnesium, iron and vitamins B2,B6 and A) extends their life.
BareMinerals have infused the Skin Longevity serum with this amazing long life herb, which, admittedly left me sat at the lunch table in the Head Office (with Lee Etheridge - International education director giving us this amazing insight into the products) wondering if I should just pour the vial of serum down my throat instead of the delicious pizza and pasta they had on offer! (In all seriousness, please don't eat the products - although I'm thinking it might be worth trying to get a job in the manufacturing side of things...'long life herb packaging specialist and quality taster' *sorry...tester!* sounds like a good plan!)
I felt too nervous about the impending filming to really eat anything - typical! The one day I have a whole table of pizza, pasta, salad and brownies to choose from and I can't manage a thing!
The bareMinerals offices were fab - as soon as you walked in, this was the scene that greeted you:
Yes, they are shelves of actual bareMinerals makeup, on display. Clearly I wasn't the only one who found these totally irresistable:
Amazing fine motor puzzle for toddlers made from makeup! Here is a video of Arthur trying everything out:
There were some really lovely touches which definitely made this a 'bareMinerals' office, such as the wording across the beam in the kitchen which says " We believe that beauty can change the world" in big, bold, pink letters.
They also had a mirror on the wall with one of their mottos, "Be original, Be natural, Be good" .... of course I couldn't resist taking a picture!
The meeting rooms were all named, with the names written on the black door ( again in bold pink lettering) such as "Buff" or "Glow", and everywhere you turned there were inspirational photos or posters...
After meeting the team and having a look around, we were given a paper itinerary which included our lines for the shoot - I had some pretty long paragraphs to remember and I kept practising these over and over in my mind! We were all taken to the makeup room where a lovely makeup artist called Ally did our makeup ready for the shoot! I was first up, and everyone watched whilst she applied the bareMinerals makeup in super quick!
On my face she used a primer and then the Bareskin Serum foundation, along with the new Bareskin Serum bronzer. She used the pop of passion lip oil balm on my lips and also used this on my cheeks as a blusher so that the colours matched perfectly. My eyebrows were filled in very naturally (almost too naturally for me as I don't have that many!) using the eyebrow pencil from bareMinerals and then just a coat of mascara and a dusting of mineral veil for a really natural look!
Once my makeup was finished I was ready to start filming - It was so hot in the room where we were filming, the sun was beaming through the windows and the lighting was so bright, it heated up the room! I was sat on a stool/chair in front of the film crew and I had to make sure I didn't look at them, or at the camera whilst I was talking! I was so nervous on my first go, I kept forgetting my lines half way through so I did a couple of takes! By the time I got round to my second shoot, I was much more relaxed and found it a lot easier to remember what I was saying - phew!
At the end of the individual filming, we all came together as a group, along with Lee Etheridge and did some group shots together ( I am not going to say too much about these videos as they aren't live yet).
I also got to try out some of the other products in the range, and one of them I loved so much I have bought it already! You can read all about that in my review.
Here is a short teaser video taken from the review shoot - you can see me at the end of this clip:
I felt too nervous about the impending filming to really eat anything - typical! The one day I have a whole table of pizza, pasta, salad and brownies to choose from and I can't manage a thing!
The bareMinerals offices were fab - as soon as you walked in, this was the scene that greeted you:
Yes, they are shelves of actual bareMinerals makeup, on display. Clearly I wasn't the only one who found these totally irresistable:
Amazing fine motor puzzle for toddlers made from makeup! Here is a video of Arthur trying everything out:
There were some really lovely touches which definitely made this a 'bareMinerals' office, such as the wording across the beam in the kitchen which says " We believe that beauty can change the world" in big, bold, pink letters.
They also had a mirror on the wall with one of their mottos, "Be original, Be natural, Be good" .... of course I couldn't resist taking a picture!
The meeting rooms were all named, with the names written on the black door ( again in bold pink lettering) such as "Buff" or "Glow", and everywhere you turned there were inspirational photos or posters...
After meeting the team and having a look around, we were given a paper itinerary which included our lines for the shoot - I had some pretty long paragraphs to remember and I kept practising these over and over in my mind! We were all taken to the makeup room where a lovely makeup artist called Ally did our makeup ready for the shoot! I was first up, and everyone watched whilst she applied the bareMinerals makeup in super quick!
On my face she used a primer and then the Bareskin Serum foundation, along with the new Bareskin Serum bronzer. She used the pop of passion lip oil balm on my lips and also used this on my cheeks as a blusher so that the colours matched perfectly. My eyebrows were filled in very naturally (almost too naturally for me as I don't have that many!) using the eyebrow pencil from bareMinerals and then just a coat of mascara and a dusting of mineral veil for a really natural look!
Once my makeup was finished I was ready to start filming - It was so hot in the room where we were filming, the sun was beaming through the windows and the lighting was so bright, it heated up the room! I was sat on a stool/chair in front of the film crew and I had to make sure I didn't look at them, or at the camera whilst I was talking! I was so nervous on my first go, I kept forgetting my lines half way through so I did a couple of takes! By the time I got round to my second shoot, I was much more relaxed and found it a lot easier to remember what I was saying - phew!
At the end of the individual filming, we all came together as a group, along with Lee Etheridge and did some group shots together ( I am not going to say too much about these videos as they aren't live yet).
I also got to try out some of the other products in the range, and one of them I loved so much I have bought it already! You can read all about that in my review.
Here is a short teaser video taken from the review shoot - you can see me at the end of this clip:
It was such an amazing day, but also incredibly tiring after all of the travelling. Arthur really enjoyed himself too - even though I didn't see much of him as I was so busy filming. Here he is enjoying the views:
We left earlier than others as we really needed to catch the 17.35pm train from Kings Cross so that Arthur was not ridiculously late to bed ( he usually has his bath at 6.30pm).
The conductor allowed us to sit in the disabled area of the carriage on the way home so that I could leave Arthur in his pushchair and he could have a rest and eat his food more easily.
I am so pleased we ended up sitting here, because ten minutes after we left London our train had to stop and was held up for 2 hours not moving!! I missed my connecting train back home from Leeds to Ilkley, so I had an hour long wait after that (I had no car seat to get a taxi) and we didn't end up getting home until 11pm in the evening. Arthur did not fall asleep once until we made it home - it was a very long day!
An amazing experience, and of course - Arthur's first trip to London!!! Next time I will have to show him a bit more of it!!
If you would like to read my review of the products and find out a bit more about them, click here.
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