June favourites...

Glossy lips have been my go-to this month, and I've completely adored Tanya Burrs lipgloss in First Date (and not just because it smells like milkshake, although that helped). I've also discovered the l'Oreal L'Extrodinaire glosses which are super long lasting, beautifully glossy with just the right amount of colour to wear on their own or over a lipstick. I want to pick up more of these they're just gorgeous. For the face I've rediscovered the famous Benefit High Beam dupe by Me Me Me, Beat The Blues liquid highlighter. It's a super subtle, pale pink highlighter that looks great under foundation for a really subtle glow, or over the top of a liquid foundation for a bit more impact. I've loved wearing it teamed with the Borjois Exlusif cream blush - a really interesting product that adapts to your own skin colour and gives a stunning pink glow to the cheeks. Another re-discovery this month has been my brow tastic Illamasqua Brow Cake in Gaze. Holy Grail brow product without a doubt and, as you can see, very well loved! I've been all about the winged liner and lashes for eyes this month, and have been pairing my Kate Moss for Rimmel mascara with the Maybelline Lasting Drama Black Shock gel liner…another Benefit dupe! And lastly for makeup…Essie Blanc has been firmly on my toes for the entire month. Nothing screams SUMMER to me more than white nails!

I've started a new job this month so I've been all about products that make my life that little bit easier. The Batiste XXL dry shampoo has saved my hair through day two, three, and sometimes even four when I've had no time to wash and dry it. The Body Shop Camomile cleaning oil has been a great quick fix to remove my makeup at night before bed, and to save my tired, stressed out skin I've been applying the Avon Clear Skin pore penetrating black mineral mask. It looks a bit odd as it's black, but leaves my skin looking and feeling fantastic, I get a really great glow when I apply makeup the day after I've used this! Another Avon product I've loved is their overnight foot renewal cream…I'm on my feet all day every day at the moment so they've needed a bit of extra attention. Lastly for June, is f course a tan. Again another quick fix product, the well blogged about Cocoa Brown one hour tan. It says one hour, but to be honest I apply this at night and wash off in the morning and get a beautiful, natural, non smelly, non streaky glowing tan that lasts a week on my skin if I keep up with good skincare between applications.

What has everyone else been loving?

Loves

xxx

Soap & Glory Archery brow tint and pencil…

I've recently fallen completely out of love with my eyebrows, and all my eyebrow products I have in my stash. I just can't seem to get them even, nothing is the right colour, and I can't get an arch to save my life. So when I needed a few bits in Boots the other day I took advantage of the 3 for 2 on (as you do) and picked up the much talked about Soap & Glory Archery brow tint and precision shaping pencil. I got mine in the shade Brownie Points, which is a really natural taupe brown shade that actually matched my brow colour perfectly, although I usually like to darken my brows up to match my hair. 

left - felt tip, right - crayon

I'm not too in love with the felt pen end as I don't get anywhere near enough colour out of it, but if you prefer a more natural brow then I think you'll love that part. The pencil, however, is an absolute dream. Just the right amount of waxiness, the perfect thickness to get a nice tapered end to the brows, and just generally really easy to use. 

This was the only shade on the shelves in Boots and I don't know if they do another, darker shade? If they do I think this would be beyond perfect for me, but for now I'm using this in conduction with a brow shaping gel with a tint and I've got the brows I've been looking for!

What other brow products does everyone recommend?

Loves

xxx

NYX haul....

Words can't describe my excitement when I first saw the NYX stand in my local Target, and I whipped my 'Things I Need From NYX If I Ever Get Around To Placing An Order' list sharpish. 

I admit I've since been back and bought heaps more lip products and their famous Milk pencil (how have I called myself a beauty blogger and not owned this until now??)

Stand out products for me were their Matte Lipsticks (I'm now the proud owner of over half their collection), the Butter Gloss (not too keen on the darker shades of these but the pinks and peach's are incredible) and their Rouge Cream Blush in Boho Chic. The only disappointing product was the eyebrow pencil....nice consistency but far to red toned to look anything near natural on me.

What else should I try from NYX? I really want to get involved in some of their shadows but not sure on the quality of the palettes?

Loves

xxx

Napoleon Perdis haul....

A brand that isn't too readily available in the UK, I thought it was something I should try out while I'm over in Australia. I thought I'd get a small range of things so I can get a feel for it and so far I'm loving it. They have the original range (which I haven't tried anything from yet) and the 'set' range which is a fresher, younger and better priced take on the originals. First up I love the sleek, white, simple packaging, and the range is named around places in the world, a cute idea.

The brow kit has two shades, a wax, a brush and mini tweezers. The tweeters are a good size, the brush is fairly decent for one in a palette, and light shade is maybe a bit light for my brows, but my god the darker shade mixed with the wax is brow heaven!!! I've had so many complements on my brows since I've switched to using this.

I also bought a new crease brush, and one of their eyeshadow duo's in 'Antigua'. The brush is so soft, really easy to use, and hasn't shed a hair since I've been using it. The brushes aren't cheap but if this one is anything to go for I'll be collecting more. They eyeshadows are a stand out product for me. They are so soft and creamy for a powder shadow. I love the pale pink brown colour right across the lid, blended up into the crease with a dark matte shadow, or the dark shadow in the crease and winged out. 

Lastly is the lipstick. I picked up 'Noosa' which is a matte orange-red shade and I adore it. I haven't worn this one yet but I think with a plain eye, huge lashes and dewy skin this is going to be the perfect spring look.

Has anyone else tried the Napoleon Perdis Set range and can recommend anything else for me to try?

Loves

xxx

Face of the day....

Not normally one for eyeshadow, I donned my (limited collection) of Mac shadows and tried out a bit of a golden/purple smokey eye for mine and my Ty's 6 month anniversary meal (altogether now....ahhhhhh).

Dress - Jay Jays (Australian)

Foundation - Revlon photo ready

Concealer - Benefit erase paste

Brows - Rimmel eyebrow pencil

Eyes - Mac shadows Retrospeck, Sketch and Cognac, L'Oreal HIP colour truth cream eyeliner

Lashes - Cover Girl Clump Crusher

Blush - Mac Well drressed

Highlighter - Essence Circus Circus in It's Magic

Lips - Chi Chi in Shake that booty and Revlon gloss in Glitz and Glam

 

I'd love to start a Mac palette one day, any suggestions of some first basic colours to get me started would be much appreciated...

Loves

xxx

'Ere love, you got yourself one of those Scouse Brows....?

Yes, this actually came out of the mouth of my taxi driver at around 3 in the morning not too many weeks ago. Being a Towie and Chelsea fan, you'd have thought I'd gone for this Desperate Scouse Wives but it had actually passed me by, so skip to me googling 'Scouse Brow' at 3.10am on a Sunday morning. 


Whether it is or not I'm not sure, but I was drawing my eyebrows on many months before it became popular/talked about/laughed at (delete as appropriate). 

(Before)

I really can't express enough how much I hate my eyebrows (or lack of them). Pale considering my hair colour is dark brown, stubby, and just WEIRD. It's very rare I leave the house without drawing my eyebrows on, and over time they have got stronger and stronger. My kit for this is:

Rimmel eyebrow pencil in hazel to extend my eyebrows out

HD brows in the darkest (almost black) shade applied with the (amazing!) Eco Tools angled eyeliner/eyebrow brush

Gosh eyebrow gel

(After)

I LOVE a strong brow, like I say not everyones taste but I could happily go out with a bit of foundation to even up my skin, some mascara and my eyebrows drawn on. Everyone's taste is personal, but I personally LOVE a Scouse Brow!

Anyone else like a strong brow or do you favour the more natural look?

Loves

xxx

Forget me not....

I've been having a bit of a new year clear out and was hunting through all my makeup, skincare etc I found a few things that I think I need to find replacements for. These products have served me fine for the past year or so, but they don't blow me away, and I think I can certainly improve on them!

Simple eye make up remover stings like a bitch and never really gets rid of all my waterproof mascara; I think I can do better. I also fancy a new liquid eyeliner that a novice like me can use without ballsing it up. The main thing though is brushes. I use my eyebrow brush everyday but it's starting to shed (it was only a pound and I have given it a bit of a battering over the months!) and I really want a decent contouring brush because...well...I don't have one!

If any of you have any suggestions for things I could try as replacements I'd love to know!

Are there any products you're looking to replace/upgrade in 2012?

Loves

xxx

Weekly review....HD Brow kit ....

I don’t quite know how to put my excitement into words…sad but true. I recently, like a lot of you out there, received the September GlossyBox which came to face some fairly mixed reviews. I myself wasn’t too sure when I opened it as only the HD brows stood out as being a ‘wow’ product.

My eyebrows are a ‘must do’ element of my face every morning. In fact they are a bit of a laughing point among my friends who enjoy hearing my tales of waking up next to boyfriends in the early stages of relationships and having the instant panic of ‘shit my eyebrows’ then having to carefully reach over to my bag to grab my eyebrow pencil for some DIY brow maintenance before they wake up (note: this was a while ago, I'm not as bad anymore!)

Considering I have such dark hair, my eyebrows are pale and half the length of most (normal) peoples so I definitely need to pay them a lot of care and attention and I’ve purchased many different products to help with this in the past. I recently had my brows waxed and tinted to try and define them a bit more and you can read all about that here. I always have swear by the Rimmel eyebrow pencil in either 001 Dark Brown or 002 Hazel depending on my makeup look, and swap between my Gosh eyebrow kit and Elf eyebrow powder and wax. All of this gets finished off with a sweep of the Gosh eyebrow gel and I’m (finally) good to go.

What I don’t enjoy is, after spending this much time on them of a morning, finding that they’ve smudged, disappeared, gone wonky during the day or, even worse, night out! So when I heard that the HD palette would last for 24 hours on my brows, and only come off when I wanted it to, I was more than a little bit excited. I wasn’t sure on the colours at first and immediately went for the darkest shade, carbon. This was probably a bit too dark but as it was a night out I got away with it. I danced, I sweated, I laughed till I cried. I even stayed up until 5am with mates, then was awake at 9am to watch the rugby. On waking up (next to a hot guy but I won’t go into the details of that….cheeky!) I thought ‘SHIT, EYEBROWS’. Peering into the blackened screen of my blackberry as some sort of mirror, I noticed that, shock horror and absolute joy! THEY WERE STILL ON MY FACE!

Anyway to cut the above (very long) story short, HD Brows do what they say on the tin. I used the palette again today in the lighter shade and it matched me perfectly so there really is a shade for everyone. They are seriously pigmented so maybe need a light hand and a bit of practice if you’re not used to doing your brows like this, and can also be used as eyeshadows or eyeliner. Bonus! I can’t rave about this product enough and I would like to thank GlossyBox for introducing me to a product I would probably never have tried otherwise!

Did anyone else love their HD Brow kit from GlossyBox?

Loves

xxx

Elf loves and hates...

I've bought quite a few Elf products just recently, some have been amazing and some well, just haven't. I'm especially loving their blushers, and since making this video I've been using a few more bits from their mineral range that I'm enjoying, but here's my rundown of my Elf best and worst....

Also, on another note, I need to have a rant about something....

I may not have taken part in drama or theatre groups as I was growing up, but was always a willing supporter to my friends year after year in their Youth Theatre and school productions. It’s always fun sitting back and watching drama unfold in front of you, watching characters live out their life. It’s the same with films, tv programmes and even books. We laugh at them, with them and for them. We cry at their sad times and empathise with them through their hard times. We even judge them for the mistakes they make, and hate them when they do something wrong.

Then you realise, at nearly 23 years of age, you’re in your own bloody drama. I’m not particularly bothered if people want to talk about my life and laugh at me/judge me/ envy me or whatever else they may wish to feel. That’s their own choice and if their life isn’t interesting enough and they have to sit back and watch mine then so be it.  

But would you get up out of your seat at the theatre, climb on stage and start giving the leading lady a lecture on her behaviour? Or would you sit in the cinema and shout to the hero of the story what you really think about him? No thought not.

It’s not protocol getting involved in the plot line, so where to you get off messaging me on facebook or texting me, sticking your nose in where it’s, quite frankly, not needed. I’m not sure what you aim to achieve by this, although the cynic in me believes you want to ruin anything good I’ve got going in my life. But maybe you’re just bored. If you want to stop me being happy or try and upset me with what you say, then I feel sorry for you and this time, it won’t work. If you’re bored and have nothing better to do, I suggest you get a hobby – I hear the local theatre club is looking for new members.

Sorry about that, just had to get it off my chest and I knew you were the only ones that might be able to put up with me!!

Loves

xxx

Grab someone if you're single, grab someone if you're not...

It's quite wierd waking up and having eyebrows. My own eyebrows used to be non existent until I went and got them waxed and tinted on Saturday morning, and now look how amazing they are...

This is just with a tiny bit of Gosh felt tip eyebrow pen to extend the length a bit, then combed through with clear Gosh eyebrow gel.

I also had my eyelashes tinted. I went for black, so all I'd need was a little bit of clear mascara, as pictured above.

This was just before I left to head into Leicester yesterday to go and celebrate my best friends birthday, sorry about the hair I just washed and straightened it then put it up so I could finish it off later. The shirt is from River Island, dress from H&M, tights from primark and Converse from Office. 

You'll all probably have seen my pre-packing post from yesterday, so here's an outfit picture from when I was all dolled up and ready to go dancing, and then some random ones throughout the night....

Hope you've all had an amazing bank holiday!

2 more sleeps until Cyprus!

Loves

xxx

June favourites...

I love this time of month, I think monthly favourites may be my favourite posts! I was going to do this as a video post again but I'm still having problems uploading, and I've also got a horrible cold so I look a bit like an out of season Rudolph. I'm still trying to upload my 11 most reached for products video, and I've STILL got a hair tutorial to upload which I promise I will over the weekend hopefully. 

Anyway here goes....I've not actually loved much this month, I've been to busy to go shopping and buy anything to be honest. My first two are tanning products, as I'm trying to perfect my tan at the moment. I used to love to be ORANGE and, whilst I hate the pale look, I'm trying to achieve a nice glow which I think the combo of these two do nicely...

This was £4.99 from TK Maxx, originally £9.99 and I love the colour it goes. It goes on smoother than St Moriz, but doesn't come out as dark. After a shower it pretty much all comes off but over a few days it builds up a reasonable colour. 

I was desperat for a facial tanner that didn't smell like biscuits and that didn't leave me a crazily dark colour. I risked it with this one, as it was a bit pricey (about £7.99 I think) but it builds up the faintest healthy glow that looks so natural. 

Considering I'm so in love with my Superdrug vitamin body moisturiser, the fact that I've found another that I love is pretty impressive. I LOVE the smell of this it's so summery. It's got a much thicker consistency than I'm used to, and I probably wouldn't use it every night but it's quite nice between tanning when I need a lot of moisturiser. I'd repurchase this in every flavour to be honest! 

Bit of a random one having perfume in here but I cannot believe how much I love this. It's one of those smells that is perfect for everything. It's not too heavy to wear going to the shops and it's got a long lasting scent if you want to wear it at night. I love the simple bottle, it's just amazing in every way. 

Yes OK I know I'm late on the Peach Melba band wagon, but I was trying to avoid buying any more nail varnishes for a while. Couldn't resist in the end though. I bought this last week and worn it every day since. 

Apologies for not having much makeup in this favourites post but, as I said, I've not bought lots, and the things I have bought haven't been in my 'I have to reach for that every morning' pile. This is the eyebrow kit from Elf in dark, and it's literally amazing, gives me flawless brows. The wax gives just enough hold for the day, and the colour is really natural.

So that's it for m favourites, not a very exciting one but these are literally the things I've used every day this month and will buy over and over again. 

I also went for it and popped to the River Island sale (well come on, it had been trending topic on Twitter all day) and picked a few bits up. It was late in the day by the time I got there and it was what can only be described as a nightmare. Clothes literally all over the floor. I spent less than £20!

I picked a couple of scarves up, the top one isn't really my sort of thing I mainly bought it because I thought Mum would like it (yes I know, model daughter) but the bottom one is gorgeous. It's a chiffon BRIGHT pink with a chain and coin detail, thin enough to wear as a huge head scarf and tie in a bow, or decorate a plain handbag with. These were both £5 each, bargain!

This was £7 and I bought it in an 18 because I loved it soooo much! I don't think I've really got anything lilac in my wardrobe so this made a change, I actually might wear it on Saturday when I go shopping in Birmingham with some denim shorts and a sleeveless leather jacket, and probably some over the knee socks. 

These were my favourite buy, I nearly bought them at full price last week but today they were down to £2!! My turquoise obsession is growing rapidly.....

Can't wait to read everyone's monthly favourites!

loves

xxx

Oh My Gosh…

Popped into Superdrug yet again to day and it looks even better than last time. In case you don’t follow me on Twitter, my local Superdrug is having a re-furb and is looking fab, with new makeup counters and a brow threading bar. I think they’re doing this in quite a lot of the bigger stores and it is such an improvement!

Anyway the makeup stands are amazing now, and I was especially attracted to the GOSH stand and the 3 for 2 sign hanging up in it!

As you may or may not know, I don’t really have eyebrows. I do, but they’re really fair considering my hair colour, and sort of half the length of most peoples, so I would never ever leave the house without some brow maintenance, and I’ve really been experimenting with this just recently. I still have my dirty blonde rimmel pencil, but I’ve been finding some careful blending with me new elf shape and fill double ended pencil in a much darker shade than I would usually choose has been giving me a more defined and dramatic look. Whilst browsing GOSH I came across their new long lasting eyebrow pen which looks a bit like a felt tip pen, which I picked up in 004 Wheat. Again this is darker than what I’ve used in the past and I think it will take a fair bit of practice because mistakes are not easy to correct!

(sorry about this picture, it just would not be clear!!)

I also picked up their long lasting eye liner pen in 008 Carbon black which was a bit of a revelation for me as I’m a kohl girl through and through. I haven’t used it yet but it’s a nice fine tip which should go on quite neatly. What other liquid eye liners does everyone recommend? Or even gel liners that I am also yet to try?

Finally I picked up another one of their limited edition nail varnished since my amazing discovery with their Lavender shade last week. It literally DID NOT chip. For three whole days, I was left with perfect nails and I never found a nail varnish that has ever done that before due to my extremely brittle and pealing nails! I can't tell you what shade it's in because they stuck the security tag over it but I'll research for you.

It's a bit standard for be as I have loads of pink colours in my collection, but now I finally have one that doesn’t chip at the first opportunity!! I’ll probably save this for a bit though because as I’ve got my gel nails on I can wear any nail varnish without it chipping, which I am loving!!