Shove it all in for double the pleasure then lie back and think of England... (Lush English Countryside Ballistic Egg)

Member Name: Sarccyslayer

Product:	Lush English Countryside Ballistic Egg
Date:	15/04/09 (293 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Smells delightful, lots of bubbles, easy to find and purchase, great for the skin

Disadvantages: None it is fab

I hope everyone got lots of lovely gifts for Easter! I did but not in the form of chocolate, but before you shed a tear I was whooping with delight because I had an Easter egg from Lush! It has been a long time since I have ventured into a Lush shop, this time I was on a mission to buy some hair conditioner as I had run out of my trusted favourite that I like to use when taking a break from my more regular forms of shampoos and conditioners. However, once I got into the shop I was delighted to see they had already got their Easter range of gifts ready for purchasing and I quickly made a beeline for the display.

The Easter range from Lush comprises of a wide array of products ranging from Bath Ballistics and soaps, all created to resemble all things you would normally associate with the event itself such as eggs and bunny rabbits. So rather than going overboard and buying the whole range (I know I was shocked too) I decided to have one thing from each line of goodies which was a soap, a bath Ballistic and a soap.

I purchased The English Countryside Bath Ballistic to give it the full title because out of the selection of other Bath Ballistics to me this one smelt the most fragrant at that time and for once it wasn't a product which was pink, the soap I purchased was however but that's another review. The English Countryside Bath Ballistic is shaped like an Easter egg and although it isn't the same size as an Easter it does sit neatly in the palm of your hand. It is bright green in colour and mixed within the main body of the Bath Ballistic are little fragments of other colours such as yellow, orange, brown and cream and I suspect that when this product was made not only did the people at Lush have the original English Countryside Ballistic in mind, but also their view of an English Garden with the greenness denoting grass and the other colours to resemble a garden. This particular Bath Ballistic retails at £2.50 which some might think is expensive for one bath, you can however under the current economic climate economise and saw the Ballistic in half so that you can have double the pleasure for the same price or be greedy like me and shove the whole thing in!

For those people who don't already know, my name is Rachel and I am a Lushaholic and one of my all time favourite Lush products are Bath Ballistics like the one I am reviewing. I love to spend an hour or so in a nice hot bath, relaxing with amazing smelling aromas which for me is not something you get with a bottle of bubble bath from your high street store, add to that a good book and a nice glass of chilled wine and that is perfection for relaxing especially after a hard day at work or a long stressful week.

For those people wondering what an earth a Bath Ballistic is - a Bath Ballistic is usually a rounded tennis ball shaped bath bomb, of which bicarbonate of Soda is one of the main ingredients. It is this bicarbonate of soda which gives Bath Ballistics (the Lush description for Bomb) the 'fizzing effect' sending it whizzing around your bath. Bath Ballistics are also are packed full of essential oils, which give off wonderful aromas to help you to relax, unwind and turn your bath water a pretty shade of some colour. One thing about Ballistics is that they don't readily create bubbles, which is a downside as I like bubbles, but you can create your own by swishing your hand around in the bath.

Now for the easy part. When you come to use your Bath Ballistic, Lush always it suggest that you place your Bath Ballistic into a bath a of warm running water and it dissolves a lot quicker if there is a few inches of water already within the bath itself. Once you have an inch or two of water in your bath, you simply place the Bath Ballistic into the water and watch it roll around the bath and fizz away on its own. As the Ballistic is whizzing and spinning about your bath, slowly turning your water into a bright green colour from this Ballistic, you should also notice the smell as the oils are released into the water and they linger around the room within the vapours from the steam. Once the Ballistic has fizzed away into the water and copious amounts of bubbles have appeared (after I swished the water round with my hand) I was ready to get into my green coloured bubble filled bath to relax.

So what contributes to such a wonderful smell? For me there are two main ingredients within this bath Ballistic, the first being Geranium Oil which has floral smell to it and is promoted as an uplifting oil which has a great all-over balancing effect both on the mind and on the skin because it helps to create a balance between oily and dry skin. Sandalwood Oil which works very similarly to Geranium oil in that it promotes hydration and moisture for the skin whilst bringing about a calming and harmonizing effect on the mind to help you relax and wind down. Then mixed in with these essential oils are a whole host of other ingredients such as Poppy Petals, Pink Delphinium Petals and Sunflower Petals which are the yellow, pink and red bits I referred to earlier within the review which are used a decorative effects. Add to that Rosa Centifolia which is used for its sweet aroma which has been likened to honey and you have an amazing mixture of aromas which all work together to really help to you relax and finally to add to all that excitement as the Ballistic dissolved into your bath you will find little fabric butterflies swimming around in your water!

As always with Lush there is a whole list of further ingredients, which can be found on the Lush Website. Within most Lush products you will find a lot of essential oils, which are specially picked for each product and I would suggest that you visit the Lush website to read the entire list of ingredients, especially those of you who are pregnant, suffer from epilepsy or have sensitive skin.

After my very long but very lovely soak in the bath, I was feeling very relaxed and suitably destressed and my skin was smelling rather lovely and feeling very moisturised and clean. As I have extremely sensitive skin and often find that I am limited in which products I can use but Lush never seem to cause any bad reactions, spot outbreaks or dry my skin out which is why I became a lushaholic.

Doing the job that I do can be very stressful and the word multi-taking is a given, so to keep myself calm and my blood pressure low, it is little treats like this that I look forward to.

Once I had emptied out my bath water I was pleased not to find anything left lurking behind clinging to the bath tub, which with some similar products has been the case.

So would I recommend this product? I absolutely would without a shadow of a doubt. For those people who enjoy baths as much as I do to relax I don't think there is an alternative.

Summary: An Easter Treat from Lush