Since it's now November and pretty much winter, I thought it'd be fitting to do a little post on lip care. Since I started my job I've had all the problems in the world when it comes to dry lips so I'm here today to share all my favourite tips and products to stop your lips turning into prunes cause that's not cute.

Protection
So if the winter hasn't already attacked, you're going to want to protect your lips from the environment and the best way to do this is to create a barrier between your lips and the outside, This can be done with next to anything, between lip balms (a personal favourite of mine is the eos line, up above I have pictured the Summer Fruits one, you can get that from Topshop and Urban Outfitters), Vaseline or lipstick. If you're like me and generally opt for lipstick as a barrier, you're going to want to avoid lipsticks that are drying on the lips, generally this rules out matte formulas, but I wear MAC and Wet 'n' Wild matte lipsticks all the time and they're really nice on the lips and don't dry them out, when it comes to lipsticks like MAC's retro matte formula or matte drying liquid lipsticks, you're going to want to avoid those if you think your lips would be easily damaged as they're drying enough in themselves. As well as this, you're going to want to moisturise your lips before bed, again, with either a lip balm or Vaseline so you don't wake up with dry lips! I've found that this generally works really well for me and my lips have gotten into some pretty bad states over the years!

Solution
If your lips have already gone to shit and you need to solve that, you neeeeed Lush's Lip Scrub. I have the Bubblegum flavoured one, but it also comes in Popcorn, Mint Julips and the seasonal Santa's Lip Scrub, which is Cola flavoured. This just gets rid of any dryness on the lip and I'd generally use it in the morning if my lips are looking a little dry before I apply any lipstick to them. I don't use this until I need to because your lips are a pretty sensitive spot so you don't want to exfoliate them all the time, but you do get to lick this off once you're done and I can say for the bubblegum one anyway that it tastes unreal. Before bed my best tip to try restore moisture to the lips before morning comes is to absolutely plaster them in Vaseline, it'll do its job overnight. During the day I find the best thing to use, especially if your lips are at the point where they hurt, Nivea's lip care range is really good to carry around and top up during the day, plus I find it lasts longer on the lips rather than eos balms, so I'd usually use Nivea ones while I'm in work and can't reapply it all the time.

Hope this was helpful for some of you! Not as exciting as my usual makeup filled posts but I'll be back next week with loadsss of makeupy goodness when I'm home from Manchester!