Hello 2013

How is it even possible that we have less than 24 hours left of 2012? It seems insane and this year has flown by, and it's definitely been an interesting one! I'm planning a seperate post on what 2012 means to me but for now I'd like to focus on all the things I would like to achieve in 2013

I never fail to amaze myself with how I can be completely OCD about some things and so chaotic with others! In 2013 I'd like to become more organised, especially on my blog and with all my University work. Hopefully this will mean more frequent posts and make things a lot easier and less stressful for me!

2013 needs to be the year I learn to drive and pass my test! I always say I'm going to get round to starting lessons but I never do, but it's becoming desperate times now! I'm promising myself to start saving up for a car and making time to get some driving lessons! 

When it comes to skin care I am so lazy it's actually shocking. This year I need to be more strict with my skincare regime, which definitely means no more sleeping in my make up after a night out! I'm also going to remove my make up wipes from beside my bed, which will force me to take my make up off properly instead of just wiping my face while I'm in bed watching TV! 

This year my mum and dad very generously decorated my bedroom for me, and they put so much time and energy into making it exactly what I wanted but in the past few months I've been abusing it a bit and it's been so messy! I've given it a quick post-christmas present tidy up but I really need to sort through all my things and get rid of the things I never use and KEEP IT TIDY! 

The past month or so I've been really down at University and I'm really not enjoying it much, which is ridiculous seeing as how hard I worked to get to where I am now. So in 2013 I'm going to try and focus on it a lot more and keep going with it! 

Have you got any New Years resolutions? Let me know! X 

*all images taken from weheartit.com 

Christmas Gifts 2012

Hi guys! First of all I'd like to wish everyone a very belated Merry Christmas! How quickly has this week flown by? This time seven days ago I was laying in my bed too hungover to move feeling sorry for myself and dreaming of turkey and presents! The past few weeks have been a complete whirlwind of working (damn you retail!) getting my last minute Christmas presents, eating, lazing around and sleeping! 

I thought I'd share with you some of the presents I received over the Christmas period, I've been so incredibly spoilt this year and I'm so lucky to have such amazing loved ones! 

For Christmas my mum and dad gave me the money to finally be able to buy the Ted Baker bag I've been lusting after for pretty much forever! It took me forever to decide on which colour to pick, I was quite taken by the baby pink but I thought that might be a bit too in your face, and black was too boring so I settled for half way with purple! This bag is one of the best gifts I've ever received and it hasn't left my side since I've got it! 

My phone was due for an upgrade from the 1st of January but after some top class bargaining from my mum (the woman is a genius when it comes to getting things from companies!) I was able to get it a few days early (and half price!) so I decided to treat myself and class it as a delayed Christmas present! I wasn't too excited about the iPhone 5 as I've had a 4 for the past two years and I didn't think there will be much difference but I was so wrong and basically I'm in love all over again!

My eldest brother gifted me the Nails Inc Runway Collection gift set and if I didn't know better I'd think he was reading my blog! My nails have been in appalling condition recently so this has given me the kick up the bum needed to sort them out! I'm currently wearing Porchester Square with Technic's Carnival over the top for a New Years inspired nails! 

My brother also gifted me the Benefit 'Passport to Posh' gift set. Bad Gal mascara is one of my favourites but I cant bring myself to spend money on the full sized so this was very eagerly received! I'm looking forward to playing with this set! 

I'm a massive sucker for Yankee Candles and this Christmas gift set has a lot of my favourites in it! Despite Christmas quickly becoming a fond memory I will be using these for months to come just because I adore the scents. 

I also treated myself to the Naked Basics palette just before Christmas, but I'm still not 100% sold on it, and have been using my MUA palettes over this recently. Admittedly I'm a little put off by the vast array of matte shades as I'm usually a shimmer girl but I'm determined to try to make friends with this palette! 

How were your Christmases? And have you got any plans for New Years Eve? I'm going out to dinner with my mum and dad (and my TB bag!) and then I'm gonna crack on with the million assignments that are due in soon that I've been neglecting! X 

Soap and Glory 'Best of All' Christmas Hamper

I'm sure one of the most talked about products on the blogosphere this weekend is definitely Soap and Glory's 'Best of All' and in particular the great value it has been, due to it being Boots' Gift of The Week, meaning its RRP of £60 has been slashed to only £27.This is great value and I definitely didn't want to miss out, so I traveled down to my local Boots first thing on Friday morning to pick one up! I was the first one through the door at 9am and I was a little apprehensive to see that they were still advertising the previous weeks GOTW! Luckily a lovely sales assistant explained the promo was in the middle of being changed, but she went out the back to fetch me what I was so desperate for!
I was really looking forward to seeing this years offerings from Soap and Glory after being really impressed with last years Big Splendour set, yet I'm still undecided if this years live up to my high expectations!

One of my main worries about Best of All was the packaging. After stalking Soap and Glory's Facebook Page last year I saw many ladies left disappointed after the products being damaged in the box, and having to go back to Boots to replace them. As I was heading straight to Uni after picking this up I was worried that I was going to damage something but luckily I didn't! S&G have chosen to use the same method as last year and place the products inside the bag in a cardboard box. This allows the products to move around which could potentially lead to bumps and leaking products, although I have seen no complaints as of yet! 

Im pleased to see that Best of All has included some newer products as well as some old favourites. Most of these products I have not used before so I was more than happy to receive them!

Smoothie Star Body Lotion - RRP £10 

This is one of Soap and Glory's offerings that I have yet to try, but it smells lovely! On the packaging it recommends using this with The Breakfast Scrub, which is my favourite scrub of all time so I look forward to trying this! 

Clean on Me Shower Gel - RRP £5.50 

I first tried this after getting it in last year's gift set, which I still haven't finished using! I would have preferred to see a newer product such as Foam Call in it's place but I was still more than happy to receive more of this staple S&G shower gel!

Sugar Crush Body Scrub - RRP £8.00

Admittedly this was not a product I was originally drawn to when it first popped up on my local Boots shelves! I personally think the scent of Lime is too overpowering for me so I'm in no rush to swap my beloved Breakfast Scrub for this, but I'm still willing to try this when my other runs out! 

The Righteous Butter - RRP £10.50

I'm already a massive fan of this moisturiser, and you can read my full review of it here. I always have a tub of this close by to my bed! Unfortunately for me I brought a litre tub of this not too long ago so it will be a while before this baby gets used! 

Hand Food Hand Cream - RRP £5.00 

I have honestly lost count of how many of these I have hidden around! It seems this appears in most Soap and Glory gift sets so I must have at least 10 tubes of these! I'm really terrible with using hand creams so this will probably just get thrown in my bag and forgotten about! 

Peaches and Clean Deep Cleansing Milk - RRP £7.00

This is another Soap and Glory product I have yet to try but I know my lovely friend Sophie featured it in her  October Favourites and I trust her judgements! I really liked the Face Soap and Clarity that was featured in last years gift set so I'm looking forward to trying this out! 

Heel Genius Foot Cream - RRP £5.50

This is another product I always tend to neglect and I really don't know why as I really shouldn't! I have a nearly full tube of this beside my bed to remind me to use it more often so again this will be another spare for me! 

Thick and Fast Mascara - RRP £10 

I'm glad to see some of Soap and Glory's cosmetics range in the gift set but I was a bit gutted to receive this particular mascara as it was free in a magazine (Company?) earlier this year! Despite that it is a lovely mascara and I have no problems with it! I suppose this was an easy choice for the manufacturers as mascara is a pretty simple product everyone uses, without worrying about different shades and such! Would have personally preferred one of their eye-shadow palettes or eyeliners but that is just my personal opinion! 

Sexy Mother Pucker Lip Gloss in Punch Bowl - RRP £9.00

This is another product that appeared in last years gift set, although in a different shade. I went through a phase of wearing these lip glosses all the time but grew out of them pretty quickly. The Lip Plumping effect is incredibly usual and I'm still not 100% sure I like it! However I have been sticking to my lipsticks (no pun intended) recently but I might switch back to this as it is a gorgeous pink colour! 

Soap and Glory also included a booklet full of saving vouchers which I think is a brilliant touch! There are nine offers to use between boxing day and March so plenty of opportunities to save money of earn extra Boots advantage points! Each voucher has a different time span of about 4 weeks to use so there is always something different of offer! 

Overall I am incredibly impressed with this years offerings and I will use most of the products in it. However if I remember correctly Big Splendour had 10 items in and was slightly cheaper? Can anyone confirm this? Despite that it is definitely amazing value for money! 

Unfortunately Boots have sold out of these beauties online, but they are still available in store for £27 until this Friday - the 21st! 

Have you brought this gift set for yourself or as a gift? X 

NOTD: Christmas Nails!

I've been really struggling with getting into the Christmas spirit recently and I have tried everything on the list, my Christmas shopping is done and wrapped, the tree is up and I've been forcing myself to listen to the Christmas songs that are playing constantly at work but I am just not feeling it! 

In an attempt to get some Christmas cheer I busted out my nail polishes and got to work on this Christmas print. Admittedly it's not my best work as I haven't used my nail art pens in forever so my hand was a little shakey, and it looks terrible because my nails are in horrendous condition, but doing this definitely got me in the mood for Christmas! 

Unfortunately though due to the amount of hard work I've been doing at H&M recently this design lasted a grand total of a day before going all chipped and horrible, but I definitely will be redoing this again soon and making the most of the festive season on my nails! 

Have you created any Christmas inspired nail art? Let me know! X 

Ramble / New Hair!

Hi guys! Before I start I have to say a huuuuuuge sorry for being so crap recently! I have literally had no free time to think of anything bloggy recently! Despite buying an iPad with the intention of using it to be able to blog on the go I have only really used it for silly little things! But I have so much living in my 'to blog about box' so expect a whole heap of posts coming up soon! 




One major thing I have to share with you all is that I've gone blonde! After a lot of umming and ahhing I've finally plucked up the courage and bleached my hair! I originally had a bit of a disaster and I had about a hundred million different shades if yellow, white and ginger in my hair I've managed to salvage it and I'm so happy with it now! Admittedly it's a little dry and sad from the amount of abuse I've put it through this past week so I need to give my hair a lot of TLC! Unfortunately in all of the drama I didn't manage to take many pictures of the various stages or note down the names of the (many) dyes I used! However I know the final one was a L'oreal Ferria one in one of the lightest blondes they offer! Here's a few pictures of my new colour.... 

The super observant among my lovely readers will have noticed I took these pics while getting ready to go to work (hence the lanyard and badge!) The new store in Bletchley opened yesterday and its actually amazing! everything looks so pretty and new! I don't want to ramble on about it too much but if anyone is in the Bletchley/Milton Keynes area come by and say hello! 

Models Own Southern Lights

For my birthday my lovely friend Aimee brought me the Models Own Wonderland Collection, which incorporates my love for nail polish and all things glittery, so this seemed quite an appropriate gift choice for me! With my magpie tendencies I really couldn't decide which to try first so it was really a case of closing my eyes and pointing, and I picked up this little beauty! 

I can only describe Southern Lights as a disco ball for your nails. It is so difficult to capture the beauty of this product on camera, but it is SO GLITTERY! It is a lilac toned polish with small traces of multi coloured glitter, which looks silver in some lighting and I have found myself momentarily mesmerized by how pretty this looks! 

The lasting power of this really is something else! With a lot of glitter polishes I tend to find it comes away quite quickly and I usually leave glitter all over the place but this is definitely not the case with Southern Lights! The pictures are on my third day of wear and they are still as perfect as when I first applied the polish! 

Overall I would class Southern Lights as quite a 'statement' polish in that it really grabs peoples attention. I have had a few people comment on it at work, so I think I will probably save this polish for certain occasions, mostly for my own benefit so I don't find myself staring at it for prolonged periods of time! 

Have you tried any of the Wonderland Collection? Which is your favourite? X 

Essie Sand Tropez

When Essie nail polishes were released in Boots I was not one of the many that flocked in to try them out, although I was impressed with their range of shades I was never really blown away by any so it was never a priority for me to try some. However I received an offer of 2 Essie polishes for £12 in Boots 'say yes to summer' offers a few months ago, I cut it the voucher out and popped it in my purse but never really made an effort to use it! However I noticed it was due to expire sometime soon so I went into my local Boots to use it while I still could! 

Sand Tropez is a cool nude shade and it perfect for winter. It's a cool grey-toned nude beige colour which is incredibly versatile! I'm currently wearing it as a base of leopard print nail art! The formula applies so nicely and I am a big fan of the wide brush which Essie is well loved for! However after wearing this polish a few times I have concluded that it needs quite a hard wearing top coat as it is prone to small chipping after a little wear. 

Overall I am really loving Sand Tropez at the moment as a transitional polish from Summer (which seems forever ago!) to winter! It has really made me sit up and take notice of Essie polishes and I feel I will definitely be investing in some more soon! 

Which is your favourite Essie shade? Let me know! X 

New Tattoo!

Hi guys! Just a quickie post to share with you all my latest tattoo! I got it this morning as a birthday present from my brother (best present ever!) I'm surprised by how little it hurt and I'm completely in love with it! X 

Birthday Wishlist

#1 Topshop Lipstick in All About Me - £8 - Beginning to have an insane obsession over Topshop lipsticks after purchasing Sartorial so it make sense that one is #1 on my birthday list, providing I don't end up buying it beforehand!
#2 Republic Disco Pants - £28 - Been umming and ahhing over these for ages, but I don't like buying clothes online without knowing they will definitely fit/look good, but think I'm ready for these bad boys! Again I'll probably end up getting these at the Student Lock In tomorrow providing I don't convince myself not to!
#3 Benfit Watts Up Highlighter - £24.50 - I have been after this for so long but hate spending so much on make up! So my birthday seems the best time to ask for it!
#4 Thomas Sabo Ring - £254 - I have been  lusting after this ring for so long it's unreal, but I would be silly to spend so much money! But a girl can dream, right?!
#5 Black Studded High Heels - £34.99 - Saw these in New Look the other day and instantly fell in love and have to have them although I'll probably never wear them :(
#6 Models Own Wonderland Collection - £20 - Absolutely love this collection! Gutted it was released after the 50% promo!
#7 Samsung Tab 2 Decal - £7.99 - As much as I love my Samsung Tablet there isn't much choice for cases and decorations to make it pretty, but I've come across this lovely Decal Shop on eBay, my favourite is this floral Cath Kidston inspired one!
#8 Marc Jacobs Dot Gift Set - £50 - Smelt this last night as my lovely friend Katie has it and instantly fell in love!
#9 Real Techniques Starter Set - £21.99 - Been meaning to pick these up for ages since using the Core Collection!
#10 Sleep In Rollers - £19.50 - I've never really used Rollers before as I have so much hair but I've heard so many good things about these
#11 Estée Lauder Double Wear Foundation - £26.50 - I've never really paid  much attention to high end make up but I've had so many recommendations for this so I'm desperate to give it a go! 
#12 Owl Cushion - £14 - Been after one of these forever but never got round to ordering one because I have the attention span of a fish!

Little Ramble

Hi guys! Little bit of a rambly chatty post for everyone tonight, to let you all know what i've been up to recently! As I'm sure you've all probably noticed I have been royally crap with keeping my blog all lovely and updated recently, but life seems to be getting in the way a bit lately!

As I've already mentioned I'm back at Uni full time now, which is pretty horrible! I commute from Milton Keynes to Northampton and I spend roughly 4 hours a day on public transport, which is pretty grim! It's definitely taken me a good few weeks to get into a routine but I'm getting used to it a bit more now so I'm feeling a lot more comfortable with my routine! The work is beginning to pile up as well so I've slowly got to work out some sort of organisation!

I started my new job at H&M on Saturday and I absolutely love it! It's quite hard work and my feet aren't loving all day shifts but I feel so much more comfortable than at my last job. It's 16 hours a week which is quite different to my old 4 hour contract, but I'm enjoying myself so much!

I haven't really been going out and spending much since my last haul, simply because I haven't had much time to go shopping! Although I am going to Northampton's Student Lock In tomorrow night with my lovely Katie, which I'm hoping to take advantage of Topshop's 20% discount on their make up ;) Although I don't think I can justify spending too much!

With my Samsung tablet I mentioned in my last haul I can now write up documents on the go without having to spend ages booting up my netbook, so I'm planning on using the time on my daily commute to start writing up blog posts throughout the day, I'm looking forward to posting a bit more regularly, I've missed you all!

What have you guys been up to recently? Let me know! X

Recent Buys!

Hi guys! Sorry for the really long time between posts again but uni is so stressful at the moment! I'm commuting for approximately 4 hours every day which sucks! Today I'm going to share with you a few of my recent buys in one big collective haul! 

Probably the most extravagant thing I have brought recently is my Samsung Galaxy Tablet which I am already addicted to! I chose this over an iPad as I've already got an iPhone and there isn't much difference between the two so decided on something a bit varied! It's a lot more versatile than an iPad and I absolutely adore it! 

This lace peplum top top is £25 from River Island, but my lovely besty Robyn works in their warehouse and got it half price for me because she's the best <3 haven't actually worn this yet as it's a bit too nice for everyday at uni so I'm saving this for a special occasion!

This iPhone case is also from River Island and is £8. I originally picked it up in white but settled for it in Black to match my actual phone. Although it's spikey it's actually soft to the touch and I love the design of it. I'm going to upgrade to the iPhone 5 soon so I really hope this will be available for the new model! 

Got these earphones from Accessorize because they look really cute but the sound quality is appalling! Cannot hear a thing so was a waste of £9. Not sure if Accessorize will offer a refund on these as they're open but am going to try anyway! 

I got this topshop lipstick in Sartorial on Wednesday and have been wearing it ever since. I wasn't originally drawn to this as it's quite brighter than what I usually wear but was encouraged to get it by Robyn and I adore it. It's the first topshop lipstick I have and I'll definitely be getting more! 

I had a Boots voucher for 2 for £12 on Essie polishes so picked up St Tropez and Matte About You. These two look so great together and I will be reviewing them soon so I don't want to go on about them too much. I was desperate for a matte top coat so definitely lusted over this, but couldn't decide on another to use my voucher so just picked up St Tropez on a whim and actually quite like it! 

As you can see I've been putting my student loan to good use recently! Whats been in your shopping baskets recently? X 

Cath Kidston DIY Key Tutorial

Keys are something that everyone has to carry with them, and they're usually quite boring. After reading Islaay's lovely post on how she customized her key it inspired me to try my own! 

It's no secret that I am a massive Cath Kidston style so I decided to attempt a CK-esque pattern on my keys. 

To begin with I painted my entire key with H&M's Pear Icecream. I originally got this as part of a set last year so I'm not sure if it's still available, but it's a dupe of Essie's Mint Candy Apple!

I then painted some spots in OPI's Pink Friday. At this point they don't have to be especially neat as these are going to form the base of the roses.

I then added 2 triangular shapes to each rose to become the rose leafs. These ones are quite dodgy because I used my terrible Nail Stripers from Amazon!

I then went over the Pink Friday with swirly patterns to finish the rose. These ones are quite smudged as I used another of the Nail Stripers which are really terrible, but this shows the shapes I had drawn 

I think this idea is so cute and quick to bring a bit of colour to something as mundane as a key! I really love the idea of it and I will be practising my nail art on my key in future! 

Kobo Touch eReader in Lilac

Hi guys! I have a bit of a different type of review for you all today, I started back at University on Monday and I've really not paid much attention to my usual beauty habits because I've been so tired! So I thought I'd share with you one of my favourite gadgets! 

Since I have started commuting to University everyday I've been using public transport far too often, and it's safe to say it can become quite tedious and boring! So to make my daily commute a little less boring I've been spending some quality time with my eReader. 

The Kobo Touch eReader comes in 4 colours (Black, Silver, Baby Blue and Lilac) but I was drawn to the matte lilac colour. The quilted back gives it an extra edge of class to it and makes it look a lot more expensive than it really is. The design of it is quite strong going as well. I have chucked this in my bag everyday this week and it's remained scratch free!

I chose this eReader over the more popular brands such as Kindle as I never really liked the idea of Kindle only being able to display books brought from Amazon. I like a bit more freedom and Kobo definitely provides me with this! The Kobo store has over 2 million books to choose from, including over 1 million free ones, yet you are able to upload books from other websites as well, and you can also read pdf files which is really useful as well! 

The only downside to my little old eReader is that there is no back-light, which Kobo describe as "like reading actually paper and ink" which is a bit of a pain at times as I used to love curling up under my duvet with my old eReader which was lit! The purpose of this is that the battery life lasts for ages with it, I've had mine since like May and I've only charged it once. 

As well as being a standard eReader, it can also connect to the internet through wireless so you download new eBooks without going through your computer which is really handy! You can unlock achievements for reading different things which provides light entertainment, as well as having a Sudoku and Whiteboard app which makes it a bit more versatile as well! 

Overall I cannot recommend a Kobo eReader enough! They are available at WHSmith stores for £79.99. Do you have a eReader? What do you mostly read? X 

Amazon Nail Striper Fail

I recently ordered a set of 24 nail art stripers off of Amazon. Despite reading about a million and one warnings from fellow bloggers saying not to buy cosmetics online without being 100% sure they were legit I decided to get them anyway (YOLO and all that ¬.¬) and since then I have been eagerly awaiting their arrival, and I must say I've got a huge case of the let downs! 

As you can see the vast majority of them look absolutely rubbish! I was immediately taken back by the fact that most look half full the smell of 'gone off' nail polish was revolting even before opening them! Definitely not a good sign! Despite this set back I soldiered on to see if I can savage anything from my bargain purchases.

I chose a pearly pink colour to test out and see what it was like. The above picture is what it looked like after giving it a good shake, not the best start! Despite this I went to open it and was greeted by an awful Gooey mess! The bottom picture is quite deceiving, it almost looks as if I just got too much polish on the brush and it was falling off, but I can assure you this was not the case, and it just had some dangling, slimey 'bit' on the end, what just would not get off. Grim. 

Despite this, the actual result isn't too bad. The product provides a straight-ish line and the colour pay off is overall really good, the drying time? Almost instantly. However I really don't think I can justify this product much further. Despite the overall outcome being okay I really struggled to get on with these! The brushes are very difficult to control and I feel quite limited in what I can do with them! 

I'm going to contact the seller on Amazon and beg for a refund, but I've definitely learnt my lesson to not buy online! X