Product: St. Ives Skin Firming Lotion

St. Ives is my brand of choice for body lotion and I have been using it for the more than 10 years now, experimenting on different variants (my favorite is Collagen Elastin). I've seen the packaging, the label and the prices change but the effect on my skin has remained the same. My mom uses this, too and both of us would try another brand every once in a while, just out of curiosity or the desire to try something new, but we always go back to using St. Ives whenever the other brand would fail to live up to our standards of a good moisturizing product.

Our standards are fairly simple -- keep the skin soft, smooth and moisturized. Well, actually I just added another criteria -- that it's free of possible harmful ingredients like Parabens and Phthalates (the more natural the better). Scent and other gimmickry are just secondary and don't really matter most of the time.

After I gave birth, the effect of more than nine months of not applying lotion on my skin was horrible (I just didn't feel like using lotion when I was pregnant). I could see and feel how dry, dull and aged my skin has become and I badly needed a good moisturizer to bring it back to life. 

But for some reasons, I bought a different brand (Avea Naturals Lotion) and wasn't satisfied with the results. So I did what I should've done the first time: bought St. Ives lotion. I choose the Skin Firming variant as I thought my skin needed some toning and firming, aside from lots and lots of moisturizing.

St. Ives Skin Firming Lotion costs a little over P200 and comes in a 532 ml pump bottle. The scent is somewhat neutral and doesn't linger on the skin. The color of the lotion is white and has a thin, spreadable consistency, which I really like because it feels light on the skin, is easily absorbed and leaves a non-sticky, non-greasy feeling. 

It took only a week of daily use for my skin to recover from dehydration and lifelessness. Aside from keeping it soft, smooth and moisturized, it also gives it a visible healthy glow, which is more evident whenever I go outside. And you know the scratch test? It doesn't leave white marks anymore.

It's also quite economical as I only need to apply a thin film (although I think this depends on how dry your skin is) and it's enough to hydrate and moisturize my skin. I also apply it on my feet (I use twice as much) and it helps to improve the appearance of cracked heals.

I'm not sure about the skin firming property, but by just looking at my skin, I could tell that it has improved a lot. And I mean a lot, considering how bad my skin looked before I started using St. Ives Skin Firming Lotion.

After I empty the bottle, I will definitely buy again but I'm planning on trying out another variant.