For both birthdays and Christmas, my sister always gives me a bagful of different bits and pieces, rather than one big item, which I like her to do. For my last birthday she had put in a couple of bits of Primark's essential make up range, which my nearest Primark, being very small, doesn't stock and so had never tried any of it before. One item from this range that she bought me was this Blusher Stick, which I do not know how much she paid, since as I said, my nearest Primark store doesn't stock makeup, though given Primark's general reputation, I can't imagine it was that expensive.

I don't wear a lot of make up on a daily basis, a bit of blusher, bronzer and lip shine. I wouldn't go out of the house without a little bit of blusher, as otherwise I always look a bit washed out. I am a big fan of cream blushes, so I was pleased that this blusher stick resembled more of a cream blush than a powder blush. On the front of the blusher stick it states 'Designed to make your cheeks radiant'. There is a clear cover so the colour of the blusher can be clearly see, and to be honest, when I first took the blusher out from the rest of my present, I thought it was a lot brighter a pink than I would ever normally use.

This blush can either be applied straight onto the skin holding the bottom of the stick or by using a brush, though I think this would be a lot trickier. I applied it straight onto my cheeks holding the stick against my skin. When I first put it on, I looked like a clown, but when I blended it, it did calm down a lot, and blend in quite well, however, it was still a lot pinker than I would tend to use, and I did feel quite self conscious the first time I wore it that it did look too bright on my skin. The other thing I didn't like about the product was that I felt it was slightly greasy on my skin when I applied it so I was in two minds about whether I would even use it again bit I did try it the day and decided to put slightly less on, but within a few days, a few little pimples appeared on my cheeks, which was unusual, and since nothing else had changed in my skin care routine or diet, I put it down to this blusher, especially since I had felt it was greasy when I applied it. Since then, I have kept it in my make up bag, simply as a back up. When I was heavily pregnant I couldn't go out as far and ran out of my usual Maybelline blusher, and so before I was able to get another, I relied on this one, however, if I used it for a couple of days running, the pimples appeared again and I could only ever use a small amount otherwise I was like a clown.

All in all, this just isn't a blusher, either in colour or content that suits my skin, and I'm afraid I will be sticking to my Maybelline cream blush.