Lots of you are probably getting ready for the celebrating season, picking out your favorite products to help you look your absolute best at all of those holiday parties this year.

One thing that’s super important is your hair and to help you make things a little easier on you, the folks at Clairol have given me an opportunity to host a sweepstakes for you with Natural Instincts demi-permanent hair color.  This means that you can try out any color you want to and know that it won’t stay permanent and will wash out in 28 shampoos if you don’t love it.

What’s better is that Clairol Natural Instincts wants you to choose what color you win so that you can go out with your best look this season.  With three different lines, Natural Instincts, Golden Shimmer, and Brass-Free you are sure to find a shade you love from 36 total colors to choose from on their website.

To help you select a shade, check out these great hair coloring tips from Jason Backe, Clairol’s Color Director:

Now that you know what to look for, fill out the entry form below with your shade preference from November 10th - 14th, 11:55 PM EST for your chance to win.  Ten lucky winners will be selected to receive Natural Instincts hair color!  Good luck!

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A couple of weeks ago when I got my first facial at International Orange Spa I was told that my skin could use more regular exfoliating, at least 3 times a week to slough off the dead cells in order to reveal healthier looking skin.

When I heard that, I immediately freaked out since my current favorite for exfoliating is Philosophy’s Microdelivery Peel ($65 US) and that baby ain’t cheap!

Then I found Bioré’s new Detoxify Daily Scrub ($7 US) with yummy extracts like rosemary, sage, aloe and chamomile and felt the relief on my wallet almost immediately.

This baby contains two sizes of exfoliants in it to make it effective while keeping it gentle enough for everyday use.  I love that you can feel the scrub working while I cleanse and I love it more that my face doesn’t feel raw after I rinse.  It does feel a little taut after cleansing but a little moisturizer will work just fine to remedy that.

To keep with the doctor’s, er - esthetician’s orders, I’m going use Bioré’s Detoxify Daily Scrub about 4 times a week and then treat myself every few weeks with my Microdelivery Peel.  In this economy, aren’t you thankful for those golden drugstore finds?  I am!

Have you tried Detoxify Daily Scrub?  What are your favorite bargain finds?

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Remember a couple of weeks ago when I brought you those amazing before and after photos from my L’Oreal Feria makeover party?  Well Total Beauty has posted all the pictures from all the makeovers from around the blogosphere for you to vote on!  Choose your favorite transformations and I might have a chance to win a trip to Paris (!!!) to attend Beyond Beauty in France in a couple of weeks!

If you agree with me, you’ll love the richer shade with touches of red we gave my friend Mary for the fall season, or the brown to fiery red we gave Shannon with Feria shade Copper Shimmer.

Check out the slideshow on TotalBeauty.com now and choose your favorite before and afters!

For those of you who are signed up for The Daily Cookie’s monthly newsletter, you got a chance to ask CoverGirl’s celebrity makeup artist Molly Stern a beauty question in last month’s contest. If your question was answered by this makeup maven, you won a goodie bag full of new CoverGirl products to jumpstart the fall season in style.

If you who are not signed up for your monthly dose - here is the winning question and answer featured in this month’s issue:

Question: How can I achieve a polished look in less than 10 minutes that will keep me looking beautiful all day? I don’t have any time in the morning for makeup, but I want to look like it took an hour.

Answer: Choose a great lightweight foundation like CoverGirl TruBlend liquid makeup. Mix it with a pump of your daily moisturizer, spread it all over your face using your hands to blend. Dab a smidge of a cream blush on the apples of the cheeks, I am crazy about NARS Cactus Flower.

Curl the lashes with a Shu Uemura lash curler. Apply a coat or two of black or brown mascara; CoverGirl Volume Exact is my favorite. Finish off the look with a swipe of CoverGirl Amazemint Lipgloss in Red Riot. Shouldn’t take more than 8 minutes. Simple, fresh, and easy to maintain.

Congratulations, Angela B.! You are this month’s newsletter winner and will receive: 3 new AmazeMint Wetslicks, 2 Eye Enhancer shadows, one TruCheeks blush, and your very own tube of LashBlast mascara!

If you want more chances to win beauty goodies from your favorite beauty brands on The Daily Cookie, just sign up for our monthly newsletter! You never know what we’re going to be giving away next!

Love contests? Subscribe to The Daily Cookie RSS feed and email for more opportunities to WIN beauty products from your favorite brands!

I’m so embarrassed to say that I’ve been using Aussie’s new line of hair products called Opposites Attracts for a month now, and am only just now sharing it with you! Bad Cookie!

I always use drugstore brands for my hair because it’s inexpensive and, honestly, because I can’t really tell how products work on my mane. I have fine hair that needs minimal attention because I’m just not that savvy when it comes to styling and have pretty much given up on trying - LOL. With that said, all I need is something that makes my hair look and feel soft, is manageable and affordable.

Aussie’s Opposites Attract Shampoo smells deliciously luscious and tropical and for $3 bucks a pop, I really can’t ask for anything more! I’ve noticed that I use significantly less product with Opposites Attract versus other shampoos and conditioners I’ve used in the past. And… with this product, I don’t need conditioner! That’s a completely foreign concept to me. Just the shampoo leaves my looks clean, shiny, and best of all, untangled!

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Last Saturday I hosted a hair dying party for a few girlfriends of mine with L’Oreal Feria and I gotta say, it was a grand old time. I mean, just check out the spread - gift bags, beautiful reads while you wait, yummy munchies, hanging out with the girls drinking some vino and getting beautified is what it’s all about!

We sat around, ate and chatted a bit before getting started. Thankfully I had some help from my friend Helen who assisted me in dying the girls’ hair. For all the girls, we used the new and improved L’Oreal Feria that just released this month. If you’ve used Feria in the past like I have, know that it’s all the same gorgeous multi-faceted colors but the formulas are totally revamped.

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I’m loving all the Olympics coverage going on this week so while looking through my makeup stash for new goodies to play with, I came across CoverGirl’s new Eye Enhancers eye shadows in Golden Sunset and got inspired by all the pretty gold medals that have been handed out this week.

Golden Sunset eye shadow trio has three pretty shades of golden copper and bronze. I love that these are pretty pigmented and silkier than what you’d imagine from a mass beauty brand - a nice step up from the CoverGirl I remember using in high school!

For super quick gold look today, I’m wearing the darkest shade at the lash line and fan out the color using the middle gold shade in the crease. Highlight with the lightest color and I’m just about ready to head out the door.

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Today I’m heading out of the office early to pack up the car and go camping at Clearlake — about 2.5 hours north of San Francisco. I’ve never been camping before since my idea of roughin’ it is a fully functional lakeside cabin. This weekend, we’re pitching tents, fishing and.. well, for me, I’ll be laying out basking in the sun too

The boyfriend tells me I need to pack light and leave the makeup bag at home. And while I’m giving in and leaving the Chanel back in the city, there are definitely a few basics that I’m going to take with me.

1. Pond’s Clean Sweep Wet Cleansing Towelettes - on a campsite where bathrooms and sinks might be scarce, I plan to keep my skin clean and refreshed in 90 degree heat with these easy disposable wipes. These are heavy duty cloths packed with chamomile and vitamin E. Just one wipe will suffice in taking away all the sweat and grime from the outdoors in a few swipes. And, in a 30-pack, I can share with the rest of my friends without a hassle.

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I certainly miss the days of Meet the Barkers on MTV when we got to see Travis and Shanna absolutely in love with each other for all the world to see.

Now, the news I hear about them are few and far between however I just read an article on PageSix.com last week where ex-Mrs. Barker got into a cat fight with Kim Kardashian over Kim’s alleged involvement with Travis while the couple were married. While the article was a juicy tidbit of celebrity gossip, all I could think about afterwards was Shanna’s makeup in the article photo! Check out the subtle pop of teal on her lower lashline. It’s sassy and the look is super easy to do.

Try CoverGirl’s new Eye Enhancers 1-Kit Eyeshadow in Turquoise Tempest using a small rounded smudge brush. Dampen your brush by spritzing a little water to the bristles before picking up the color with it. This will help to intensify the shade even more and allow you to line the color precisely to the lashline.

Hope you all had a great weekend - mine certainly was fun-filled and now I’m exhausted. Hopefully I get a good night’s rest so that I can take on Monday with full force!

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Happy Hump Day!

I have a very exciting event to share with you, my lovely Bay Area readers - I’m hosting an at-home hair coloring event with a new line up of L’Oreal Feria products and I want you to join in on the fun! I’ve invited some of my friends to get gussied up and I thought, hey, why not invite a loyal Daily Cookie reader to get herself made over by me too!

L’Oreal Feria is introducing a new formula of their popular multi-faceted hair color with lower levels of ammonia - which means less stinky beauties! The new product also comes with a savvy pro-touch applicator to allow for a faster and more precise application.

If you’d like to be one of the lucky ladies to join me and my friends at a hair-coloring party in San Francisco please email me at thedailycookie [at] yahoo [dot] com by 5pm PST Thursday, July 24th. I’m hosting this event with drinks, h’orderves, and of course a goodie bag from L’Oreal! I’ll pick one lucky reader at random and will email you with all the details of where, when, and what color! Well, you actually get to choose your color; we won’t make you lovely brunettes go blond if you don’t want to

Looking forward to hearing from you and hope you’re having a great Wednesday evening - remember to watch Project Runway and Shear Genius tonight; I certainly am!

xoxo, Lilan