A Spa Day + A Beauty Giveaway.

Sometimes a girl just needs a spa day, am I right?

Believe it or not, I had never had a facial before. I was your standard manicure/pedicure girl, with the occasional full body massage thrown in for special events. So when my friend Emily at Salon Bella & Boutique contacted me with the opportunity to get a facial with her, my interest was piqued.

Emily modified my facial to show me a bit of each type of treatment she offers (lesson 1: there is not a one-size-fits-all facial). Massage to relax and stimulate blood circulation to the face, a mask to clarify and brighten, pore-purifying to de-gunk pores, and a high frequency treatment on blemish-prone areas. I left the spa with glowing skin, feeling super pampered and stress-free.

I couldn’t just savor this experience for myself, so I have teamed up with Emily to offer a local Kansas City metro reader a free facial with Emily at her salon. (Spa treatment score!) Emily will tailor the facial to your skin’s needs, whether it’s acne, lack of moisture, or sun damage. A custom facial, for free? Sounds like heaven.

I couldn’t leave out my non-KC friends, so this giveaway has a part two: a yummy sugar scrub Emily uses during appointments on her client’s hands (it also makes for a killer body scrub).

The sugar scrub is made by Emily with all-natural ingredients, including raw organic sugar cane and organic sweet almond oil. She used it on my hands during our appointment and it softened ’em right up! Bonus: this stuff smells like summer in a jar, so if that groundhog Phil insists on six more weeks of winter, at least your hand + body scrub can smell like June.

Ready to enter? Get multiple entries to increase your chances of winning. GO!

Emily’s tips for beautiful skin:

• Wash your face every night. If you can’t do the full face-in-the-sink cleanse, use a beauty wipe that cleans + removes makeup. (It’s a must, ladies! Going to sleep with makeup on is a huge skin mistake.)
• Wash your pillowcase once a week to get rid of build-up that can contribute to breakouts + lackluster skin. (I also sleep on a satin pillowcase– it’s more gentle than regular cotton on your skin + hair, and so is less likely to contribute to wrinkles and tangles.)
• You don’t have to shop exclusively at expensive beauty counters to get great skin products. Emily’s drugstore favorites are the Neutrogena face wipes and EOS lip balm. (I always have the CeraVe moisturizing face wash and Almay eye makeup remover pads stocked in my beauty closet.)
• If you are going the beauty counter route, Emily loves Clinique’s Laser Repairwear Focus serum. (I use this stuff, too! Lightweight, absorbs quickly, and is targeted for sun-damaged skin.)

Best of luck entering the giveaway! May the beauty odds be ever in your favor.

Linking up with More Pieces of Me +On the Daily Express, Get Your Pretty On, Style Elixir, The Pleated Poppy, Glossy Blonde + Karly Kim, and Life’s a Party Dress Like It.

*Emily offered her services for my review; thoughts and opinions are my own.