January Favourites

So here we are, a whole month into 2014 already, now that went fast... I hope this is not too late for a favourites post but I've been almighty busy with all sorts of bits and bobs.

TOPSHOP NAILS// BOY NEXT DOOR
This is a beautiful pastel mint colour from topshop that I have been loving recently. Pastel's like this are my favourite colours for my nails. Some people only wear pastels in summer but, quite frankly, I love them far too much for that, so its all year round for me!

TOPSHOP LIPS// MACAROON
Firm favourite of the month; I really am loving this at the moment! For a full review look HERE!

RIMMEL SCANDALEYES// NUDE 
At the moment I'm loving wearing this in my water line to really brighten up my eyes! I would thoroughly recommend this as it does make a great difference to a simple everyday look. To make it even better it was an absolute bargain -I found it in the bargain bucket at superdrug!

BOURJOIS HEALTHY MIX FOUNDATION// 51 LIGHT VANILLA
I am absolutely and completely in love with this foundation, its such a lovely formula, easily blended, natural looking but great bendable coverage. I take the shade 51 and its the perfect match! I recently purchased the L'oreal True Match but I've reverted back to this as overall I think it gives a much more natural finish. Big recommendations!

SEVENTEEN BROW'S THAT BROW KIT//
I'm afraid I think this was limited edition as it was part of a 17 offer on around Christmas but I couldn't leave it out because my, oh my, I love it! I find it really hard to find the perfect matte brown to fill in my brows so this is a real gem. The colour is just perfect and gives a lovely natural effect.
The kit comes with a wax and highlight also, but I don't use the wax as, honestly, I'm too lazy -Bad I know... Mostly I don't use the highlighter either as I much prefer the one from my sleek contour kit but it seems like a pretty decent highlight. Nothing special, but nice.

DRAWING & DOODLING//
Recently I've rediscovered my love for doodling. I think there's nothing nicer than sitting down and having a little doodle to relax. I've also decided that I have way too many notebooks!

TOPSHOP CRUSHED VELVET SKATER SKIRT// SILVER
I am in love with this skater skirt, I am a great lover of velvet as it is but this is just beautiful. The silver isn't something I would usually go for but I think that's the reason I love this so much! It can easily be dressed up or dressed down for any occasion, so basically its perfect!

Well there we have it; my favourite things of the month of January. Lets see what February brings us!

Bargain Haul

Well recently I discovered something wonderful, and wonderfully cheap too. Make up from Poundland! Now don't scoff and tell me it'll be cheap crap, it's not their own make up it's high street brands only sold in Poundland. I think it must be end of rail items or re-branded products. So you can find things that would ordinarily be sold for much more at only a pound: bargain!

I've been looking for a grey nail varnish for quite some time now, I'm lusting after the matte shade from Topshop, so when I spotted Sally Hansen Wet Cement for just a pound I just simply had to buy it, I needed to buy it. It isn't matte, but I hadn't expected it to be. But to make things even better, after a little research I've realised that it was sold at around £7 so that means I've saved like £6!!

I found a Rimmel Eye Crayon in 700 flaunt so bagged that also. But was slightly disappointed with the actual shade as I found it much more orange than the packaging suggests. I don't really know if I will use it, as orange eye shadows tend to wash me out and look like one of the walking dead; generally not a look I go for...

Whilst shopping I also picked up one of the Maybelline Baby Lips in shade Peach Kiss. It is wonderful, lovely and moisturising, and my god, it smells so good I could eat it! But bullet does show it to be slightly tinted and I didn't find it showed up aside from a slight shimmer which was a shame but it's a good balm so I'm loving it.

I also bought a couple of items from the MUA stall as there products are normally OK and they are such bargains that you can afford to risk it. I bought another grey nail varnish (before I went  into Poundland) called Koala. But after testing I've discovered that it is ridiculously watery and in order to get a decent colour you'd be there for days painting coats, so I don't think I'll be getting any more of their nail varnishes but it was worth a try. I also got a matte brown eye shadow because I only have shimmery ones and decided I needed to expand my neutrals range (OK, I admit it was a spur of the moment purchase...).

So get your purse down to Poundland and check out their make up because you've got to love a bit of cheap!

-alex x

Garnier Fresh Essentials

Apologies for the crappy photos. I rely on natural light, and.. there wasn't any.

Over time I've built up quite a number of the products in the Garnier Fresh Essential Enriched with Grape Extract range so I've decided to share my thoughts on the products.

Firstly, what I've got: The eye make-up remover, the cleanser, the toner, and their scrub. 

Lets start with the eye make-up remover as that was the first product from the range I used. I love this eye make-up remover, its lovely and gentle but does what it's meant to. I don't know about you but I find that quite a number of eye make-up removers often sting or burn my eyes, which, as you can imagine, is not pleasant! But, in all the time I've used the Garnier one I've never felt any stinging. This does mean that it can take longer to remove mascara than a stronger alternative, but I'd happily spend a little more time than have sore eyes! So, over all its a thumbs up for this one.

Moving on to the cleanser, this has to be my favourite product out of the range (that I own) because firstly it smells divine, so fresh, but also it just feels amazing on your skin. I use this after the Witch Foaming Face Wash as I don't think that lotion cleansers truly cleanse deep down and remove every trace of make-up on there own (I have spot prone skin so don't want to leave anything to chance). It applies like silk and is so cooling and refreshing, leaving my skin feeling soft, clean and totally make-up free! As someone with combination skin this is great because a lot of cleansers leave my dry areas feeling tight and totally stripped of all natural oils, but others leave the oilier patches of my skin feeling, well, still greasy. So this is a great middle ground product, I use a moisturiser afterwards and this works really well!

Now for the toner, it's a nice toner (note the word nice) but I wouldn't say its anything amazing. I don't find that it really does anything for my skin if I'm totally honest. It feels refreshing on the skin but as far as making my skin "refreshed, brightened, and toned" nope. Although, I must say that this is something I find with toner's in general... they don't really do anything for me. As far as feeling nice I prefer the Simple Kind to Skin Soothing Facial Toner, but I'm totally open to suggestions if anybody knows any great toners.

Now finally the scrub. I really liked this product as the beads (or scrub particles, or whatever you want to call them) weren't to big or too harsh but they still gently exfoliate leaving my skin feeling soft and fresh, just as promised. This is one of my favourite scrubs and I don't think I really use it enough if I'm honest because it's quite dry in  consistency but when I do use it I'm always pleasantly surprised by how my skin feels afterwards.

So overall I'd say a big thumbs up for the eye make-up remover and the cleanser, a slightly less exited thumbs up for the scrub and in the middle for the toner. But as a range I would say they are lovely products and really refreshing.

Have you tried the Garnier Fresh Essentials Range?

-alex x

Daisies In My Hair

Well, this was going to be a face of the day to show you my new Rimmel Kate Moss Lipstick but... well, to say the least we got a bit carried away and it is what it is. Some pictures of me, a face of the day, and an outfit of the day all rolled into one!

So whats on my face: My Garnier BB cream, Collection Lasting Perfection Concealer, Natural Collection Blush in Peach Melba, Eyebrow Pencil in Blonde, Vaseline in Rosie Lips, Rimmel Kate Moss Lipstick in 01, and L'oreal Voluminous Mascara. Firstly I'd like to apologise for the fact that most of the products are a little battered... I never realised how scruffy my makeup was looking untill it came to taking the pictures (Ooops!).

I've rediscovered my love for the Garnier BB cream after tking a short holiday from it where I switched between just my Collection Concealer and Rimmel Stay Matte foundation, I wanted to wear something less full on whilst we were away hence only using concealer but that ended badly as I've realised it was breaking me out so in the end I was using more concealer to conceal the yuck that was caused by the concealer... clever. But, now I'm back to the BB cream and loving it! I would seriously recommend the garnier BB cream to anybody who is looking for a lighter base, especially if you have problematic skin as I find it doesn't clog up my pores or cause breakouts, which is just lovely!

Moving on to Blusher and I am currently loving this natural collection blush, its nicely pigmented and I find it really easy to get a flush of colour, nothing to strong and it gives a lovely natural finish. You cant really appreciate the full wonders of this product in the pictures as it was rather sunny and that has bleached me out a little... But take my word for it, they are lovely and for only £1.99 you cant go far wrong! I did also have the highlighter from the sleek contour kit on but for reasons unknown to me I just forgot to photograph it... I love this highlighter it gives a lovely glow to the cheekbones and isn't too strong.

As far as eyes go, I kept it very simple only using mascara and my trusty favourite L'oreal Paris Voluminous, not much to say really except that this is wonderful! Now, I have an apology... My eyebrow pencil... In fact I don't even know if its a pencil... It's a turn-ey thing I bought from a stand in a shopping centre I can tell you its great and in the shade blonde but I can't for the life of me remember which brand its from... And to top things off all of the packaging has rubbed of, so apologies for that!

Now for lips! I freaking love this lipstick! Its the Rimmel Lasting Finish by Kate Lipstick and its bloomin' gorgeous, so smooth and lovely to apply not at all drying which is a big thumbs up from me! And to make things even better, it was a bargain! In Boots at the moment they have £1.50 off the Kate Lipsticks meaning that instead of them being £5.50 they're only £3.99! YAY! So, all I can say is Go Go Go!

I thought I'd include the Tony & Guy CASUAL Sea Salt Texturising spray seen as that has been my go to hair product of late. Its Amazing for lazy hair days (everyday.) it doesn't dry your hair which is great but it adds texture and accentuates my kinks curls to make them a little more controlled, and it smells lovely which is always a bonus!

Anyway, enjoy the lovely weather!

-alex x

What I'm Wearing:
Top: Primark
Jeans: New Look
Shoes: Topshop
Bracelets: French Markets (eek!)

Ps. Apologies (again) for having only one hand painted.. the other totally chipped and had to be removed... Ooops! Bad beauty blogger. Xx

L'oreal Colour Riche Lipsticks Reveiw

Hello,

Well, I'm leaning more and more in the beauty direction of things with this blog. But, that doesn't mean posts will be solely beauty based from now on because, everyone needs a bit of variety, right? I suppose we'll settle into a routine fairly soon.

Anyway to the point, today I'm doing a review of the L'oreal Colour Riche lipsticks for you (oooh think yourself lucky!). I have two shades from the range 241 Orchid and 373 Magnetic Coral, Orchid is a natural nude pink sort of shade and Magnetic Coral is, as you would expect, a bright orange-y coral.

I would say both are very versatile colours and can be worn both day and night, Orchid is great for a natural everyday make up look if you don't want anything too bold, it also works well with something simple for a more sophisticated evening look. Magnetic Coral on the other hand is as bold as can be and looks great with block colours or monochrome, I love wearing it with my Topshop Aztec Print dress. I wouldn't wear this as an everyday lipstick as I prefer a more natural look but on days when it matches my outfit I do really love this shade.

The lipsticks are both fairly well pigmented and give the expected colour, although Orchid is a very natural shade so can be hard to notice. They don't stay put for that long but with a touch up every now and then its not really an issue.

My main annoyance with these lipsticks is that they have a tendency to fall into the creases of your lips a little, obviously this is partially my own fault for having dry lips but, I find that it is a real issue with these lipsticks and it doesn't bother me with others. Another thing that I would say is a draw back is the packaging. The case is a sort of matte gold colour with the band across the middle saying L'oreal Paris, nothing flashy but it doesn't look cheap. That is until you keep it in your handbag or a drawer for a couple of months and it begins to rub of at the edges leaving the black underneath showing. It also shows up fingerprints Very easily which is annoying. But I do like that on the bullet it has L'oreal Paris engraved, I think this gives a more high end look.

Although I must admit the packaging has got a whole lot better as Orchid is in the old style and instead of having a matte gold case. It was shiny, meaning that fingerprints show up almost instantly and the bullet doesn't have any engraving.

Overall I think the L'oreal Colour Riche lipsticks are really good. Not my all time favourite but they come in some truly beautiful colours and are a good quality product, so its a thumbs up from me.

-alex x

hard as nails.

Hello,

Before summer I vowed that I would paint my nails and generally use nail polish a whole lot more. I figured I'd have loads of time on my hands that I could use to paint my nails, pah, how wrong I was... but with then end hurtling ever closer (oh no...) I decided enough was enough I would sit down and be patient and paint my nails.

Lets just say I'm not going to be hired as a processional any time soon... but we got there in the end and I'm very happy with how the colour turned out! I used Miss Sporty Lasting Colour in Blackberry, I think. I say I think as nowhere on the bottle did it have a name or a clear number! So that would be my main complaint about this nail varnish... where's the name miss sporty?

But despite this miner drawback I would definitely recommend the miss sporty nail varnishes the packaging isn't anything flash but for the money they are great nail varnishes. The larger brush makes application much easier (great if you, like me, struggle to make your nails not look like they were done by a 5 year old...) and the product itself is a nice consistency. You don't need an excessive number of coats to get a strong colour I found that two coats did the job just fine. As far as drying time goes I'd say that this one is pretty quick!

The brand claim that it lasts for 10 days but, in the past when I've used other colours from this range I haven't found that it stays for the full ten days but that could just be me being a little ruthless with my nails... but all in all a great nail polish and a budget buy that I would highly recommend!

Lets face it, the colour's not all that summery but it's lovely and rich and makes me think of Ribeena, can't go far wrong with that! What d'you think? Can I get away with it?

What's your favourite nail polish brand?

-alex xx

Ps. Just look to your left a little... over there's some links to where you can find me..do enjoy! xx