The holiday joy continued this week as the past three days each revealed a new Benefit beauty treat. Day 4 held a tube of Stay Don’t Stray in Light/Medium. I’ve heard nothing but great things about this concealer and eye shadow primer, but since I’m not much of a primer girl, and since my pasty white skin tone doesn’t do very well with anything in the “Medium” family, I decided to share the advent calendar love by passing it along to one of my coworkers! She swears by eye shadow primer and was instantly impressed with how well this one neutralized the redness in her skin.

Two nights ago before bed I was bemoaning the fact that my eyes have been looking extra crinkly these days and that none of my eye creams seem to be doing a thing to improve the situation. Imagine how ecstatic I was, then, to wake up the next day and find a mini jar of It’s Potent! Eye Cream behind door number five! A couple of years ago I did a massive eye cream test and It’s Potent! was one of my top two picks. I am happy to report that I still love it – it felt so good going on and within 24 hours the lines around my eyes looked softer. Thanks Benefit!

Today’s gift was a tube of The POREfessional, a balm that is said to reduce the appearance of pores alone, under or over makeup. I didn’t test it over makeup, but I did try it by itself and under my usual BB cream. Here’s what I found: it works wonderfully under makeup, but by itself I saw very little difference in the appearance of my pores. Now, I don’t have very large pores to begin with, and the effect might change with pore size, but after I smoothed on my BB cream my pores absolutely vanished. Also, though the balm has sort of a tan hue coming out of the tube, it blended flawlessly with my complexion. This product probably won’t make it into my regular rotation, but I’m glad I have a tube in case of large pore emergencies.

Stay tuned for more advent calendar fun!