Nailed it!

I'm really feeling the spring/summer pastel nails at the moment and the weather has been especially inspiring the past few days, so I decided to go with it and crack out some polish.

I went for a toe/fingers spring combo with a light minty green on the fingers and a peachy soft pink on the toes. I topped it all off with a hint of sparkly gold. You can't see it terribly well, but I did gold on the 'ring' toe of each foot. 

American Apparel Nail Laquer Rose Bowl
Hema Long Lasting Nail Polish 441
NYC Top of the Gold
top coat

p.s. apologies if I scared anyone with my freakishly long feet

L'Oreal Feria Follow Up

So, like I said in my video comparison review I was due to dye my hair again soon and that I would be using L'Oreal Feria this time. Rather than waiting another couple of weeks, I got bored of roots and lack-luster colour so just went for it yesterday. Oh my, am I glad I did!
My colour has been given a new lease of life, I am once more a scarlet woman (although not in the biblical sense).
I wanted to do a couple of before and after pictures just to illustrate what I was rambling about in my video, I know the difference may not seem so huge because I went from one colour to basically the same, but it is a huge difference to me.
I didn't edit these pictures at all just to give the most realistic view.

Before:

After: 

Roots-be-gone! 

Video Review: Garnier Olia vs L'Oreal Féria Preference

Oh golly, I finally did it. My first ever video.

I'm sure with time I will perfect the art of speech and stop waffling so much, but I've wanted to do a video for a while now and so I sucked it up and got on with it.
I decided to do one on hair dyes because it's the kind of thing I watch a lot and conveniently I had two kits to compare! I always find it really useful to know what someone really thinks of a dye before I choose to use it myself and I wanted to be able to contribute to someone else's decision in the same way.

So, enough of that, here's the video. I never actually found the picture of my hair after I used the Garnier so had to make do without. 

I hope this was ok for a first try and I look forward to doing the next one! 

Face Masks!

Who doesn't love a good face mask? Smearing gunk all over your face, lounging around for a while and letting all the goodness soak in, ending with baby soft skin.

Last year I tried making my own a few times, the ol' banana and honey mush, which was ok. It worked nicely, but was pretty gross to have on and I ended up picking dried bits of banana out of my eyebrows for ages after doing one.
Then for Christmas, my sister-in-law and I both received a pack of Dr Van Der Hoog facemasks! This is a really good, dutch company that offers a full range of facial cleansing products etc.
They have 19 different 'flavours' of mask available, from Amazing Avocado to Tipsy Tequila Sunrise! We were given an envelope pack that contained 4; Charming Chocolate, Crazy Cranberry, Passionate Pearl and Romantic Roses.

The first mask I tried was the Crazy Cranberry, which is "Nourishing and Protective". The website says "Let's go crazy! Pamper your face with this delicious Crazy Cranberry mask. The perfect face mask for extra protection and nourishment. Cranberries are naturally full of vitamins. They give your skin that little bit extra that it needs sometimes. After use, your face will feel soft and supple again." and boy, did it!

The tiny sachet that came out seemed very small and I was doubtful that it would be enough to get a good covering. I was wrong, so wrong. I applied a thin layer to start, just making sure I would get good coverage, but then more and more kept coming out and I practically needed a trowel to layer it all on. The packaging said to apply generously (no kidding) and leave it on for 10 to 15 minutes, but with nothing better to do I idled in front of a film with this mask on for about an hour.
The smell was very 'clean' and nothing like as fruity as I'd expected, with an almost clay-ish earthiness.
When the time came to wash it off it did take a bit of work, but considering how thick it was that didn't surprise me. After drying my face I had a little rub and it was sooo soft and smooth! I felt like it had taken years of my skin and woken it up beautifully! Big success.

The next mask up was the Charming Chocolate, billed as "Euphoric and Revitalizing". The description for this mask was "Chocolate makes you happy, every woman knows that. But it also makes your skin happy, maybe that you didn't know. This delicious chocolate mask contains pure cocoa extract that stimulates the production of beta-endorphin. It gives the skin a huge boost and provides a blissful feeling. In addition, the natural cocoa butter provides a soft skin. The skin is cleaned by pure kaolin and vitamin E protects the skin from external influences. Can skin care get any tastier? This mask gives you a few moments of happiness."

Again, huge amounts, smear smear smear, lush. The mask smells like the rawest chocolate, healthy and fresh, again with the earthiness from the kaolin (china clay) not a hint of over-sweet, sickliness to be found. I did this yesterday, a lazy Saturday (our one day off in a string of gigs), so once again left it on for an inordinate amount of time. My face felt so light and rejuvinated after and not dry at all!

Still to come are Passionate Pearl: "Pore Refining and Mattifying", "A gift from the sea forms the basis for this jewel of a mask, Passionate Pearl! A beauty mask that perfectly combines luxury and passion. The ideal base for your makeup. The natural pearl extracts are full of nourishing and protective properties. This refines your pores and expression lines. After using this mask your skin will be smooth and feel velvety."

and Romantic Roses: "Relaxing and Smoothing", "Ready for romance? Then this Romantic Roses mask is perfect for you. This face mask is developed based on three different roses: the rosa canina (Dog rose), the rosa damascena (Damask rose) and rosa centifolia (Cabbage rose). The creamy texture and natural sweetness make for a relaxing and delicious pink pampering. Your face will feel relaxed and silky again."

I'll let you know how I get on with those at a later date. Check out the full range of Dr Van Der Hoog products here. Sadly, I think it is only available in The Netherlands.

So, get a face mask on and happy pampering!

Nailed it!

Today I was reading through my regular blogs and I came across this. I have long been amazed at the designs that The Dainty Squid creates on her nails and wished I could do the same, wondering what her secret was! Nail art classes? The steady hand of a sniper? Magic? And now she has revealed it's scotch tape! (Sellotape for all the non-americans)
I was instantly eager to try this technique out! Here's my attempt:

Revlon Super Top Speed Polar Pink

No7 Stay Perfect Betty Blues

w7 Diamon Top Coat

Sellotape 

I never dreamed it was so achievable! I decided to start with something fairly simple as I didn't have an small scissors anywhere, in hindsight I think it maybe wasn't smart to go to the edge of the nail as it was very hard to trim the ends evenly. I have a sneaking suspicion it might peel off in an hour or two if I'm not careful.

Anyway, give it a go and see what happens! And check out more of The Dainty Squid's polish adventures, they are awe-inspiring!

Beauty: Bobbi Brown Gel Liner

Yesterday my mum and I went to the Bobbi Brown counter in Browns and had 'Pretty Powerful' makeup lessons, their signature 10-step lesson. "We'll teach you Bobbi's tricks of the trade and create a beauty routine that's right for you" is the description on the flyer and it was a brilliantly thorough lesson that covered every step of a full look. The woman doing mine was lovely and we were chatting about products the whole time, she asked me about every step of my normal routine and then we discussed what products she would like to show me and why she thought they would suit me. Then, with each new product, she told me all of the aspects of it and various ways it could be used and how. She wrote down everything she used for my look on a sheet and they kept a copy for if I ever came back and wanted to know what to get!  Sadly I was in a rush in the morning and forgot my camera so there are no pictures of the process or the products. Afterwards, my mum bought a few of the products used on her and offered to get me something too! I had read a lot about their gel liner and was considering trying something similar (I've mostly been using the pen-like eyeliners and my latest one has run out) so I asked specifically for that to be used in the lesson so I could see what it's like, the woman chose 'Graphite' which was a beautiful smoky, slightly shimmery, dark grey. It looked great, but I'm much more of a classic black liner kinda gal, so I chose the 'Black Ink' gel liner to buy. My mum also got me the Ultra Fine Eye Liner brush! 

It's a long-wearing, water-resistant gel that is really easy to apply, goes on so smoothly and dries quick enough that you won't smudge it mid-application. I LOVE IT!

My product file from the lesson

The brush is perfectly angled for fine application

 My usual cat-flick eye liner with the gel liner, nice crisp lines

Excuse the messy hair!

Find the liner here! 

Beauty

Today was my lovely boy's birthday, and though my presents have yet to arrive (which I am raging at!) I was determined to try make it a good one. So we decided to treat ourselves to our latest food find, an all you can eat sushi restaurant that we loved when we had our New Years Eve date night.  I'll post more about this tomorrow along with pictures, but my point here was that I didn't want to spend time thinking about something to do for a post, so I decided to just write about the makeup I did for our evening out.
Bear with me, I am no makeup expert, I am only just starting to come to terms with all the different products and probably use half the things I should for a proper good finish. This is by no means a tutorial, just my effort to try get a bit better every time (having people judging me is my incentive here).

So there it is, fairly simple. Just a slightly silvery grey eye with a natural coloured gloss. I'd normally swipe on a bit of eyeliner too but mine is on it's last legs and I have yet to buy a replacement.

The products I used for the entire look were:

Burt's Bees Radiance Day Lotion

Bourjois Paris Happy Light Mattifying Primer

Rimmel London Match Perfection Foundation - light porcelain

Essence All About Matt! Compact Powder

Urban Decay Eyeshadow Primer Potion - original

Urban Decay Naked 2 Palette - bootycall, verve, pistol, blackout

Rimmel Lash Accelerator Endless Mascara 

Catrice Eyebrow Stylist - brow-n-eyed peas

Rimmel London Lasting Finish Soft Colour Blush - mauve cool

Urban Decay Lip Junkie Lip Gloss - flushed

Urban Decay All Nighter Makeup Setting Spray

I love all of these products and may someday do a more in-depth review of them, but for now that's all I have the energy for. (Here's hoping my makeup skills and Arjan's photography skills improve)   

Nailed it!

Those of you who read my knitting post on Monday will know that, having spent hours doing my polkadot nails the night before, the varnish completely peeled off after a hot bath, lasting all of 12 hours.

It's Arjan's birthday tomorrow and we're going out for dinner, then on Friday he's hosting a night at a local venue, so I wanted to do something a little fun and glittery and I figured I might as well make a post out of it seeing as I forgot to take pictures while making dinner.... 

The polishes I used were No7 Stay Perfect in Betty Blues and New York Color in Top Of The Gold, which is a topcoat (although I did use a clear top coat as well).

(the NYC is a lot less orangey looking when applied, as seen on the other pictures)

The No7 is a beautiful, richly-pigmented, deep blue with tiny particles of blue glitter that give a super subtle shimmer. If you were using this as a base coat for an all-over glitter polish I'd suggest using just one layer as it's thick enough and has more of a noticeable blue colour to it (it is very dark), but seeing as I was just doing the tips I went with two. 

The NYC is a 'gold leaf effect' rather than a traditional glitter, so the pieces are very irregular in size and  shape and give more of a flaked looked. 

I would normally use nail stickers for anything with tips or similar, but seeing as the glitter wouldn't give as obvious an edge, I just free-handed which, ok, isn't quite as neat as it could have been *ahem* left hand *ahem* but it's not bad enough that I would do it differently next time around.  

Apologies for being a little repetitive, I'm going to try come up with some sort of schedule for weekly posts and then stick to it! I'll have some cool stuff to write about this weekend and I'll be playing photographer at the night on Friday, so I'll show you some snaps (if they're any good).  

Nailed it!

Today was spent wandering through the sunshine, taking pictures of anything and everything, drinking fake Baileys and visiting my lovely, little, 'adopted' Oma (Arjan's Grandma). So when we got back home at 4pm I had put little thought into what to write about today.
After a few hours of uhm-ing and ah-ing over it I noticed that I hadn't painted my nails in a few days, which is unusual at the moment.
So with that realisation I knew what to do, and thus I present to you my first attempt at polkadot nails!

The polishes I used were No7 Stay Perfect in French Pink and Kate Spade for Nails Inc in New York Noir (which I got free with Glamour Magazine!)

The No7 is a very sheer polish and so I had to use 3 coats before I got decent coverage (although you may notice you can still see the white of the tips) but it seems to have dried fairly well and wasn't streaky at all.

I used a barbecue skewer (no toothpicks at hand) to make the dots and filed it flat a little on the point to increase the size of the dots. Sadly, as a right handed person the left took a good bit of work and after struggling with the first 2 fingers, Arjan offered to help. Needless to say they didn't turn out much better (hence why only the left hand is pictured).

I waited for the dots to dry as much as possible and then used a top coat.

Overall, I'm quite pleased with the way these turned out and I think it's something I would definitely try again and attempt to improve upon.

As an added bonus here's a little shot of me with Oma: 

BEE-eautiful Christmas!

I LOVE Burt’s Bees. Sadly, I generally haven’t got the money for it, so when my mum announced she was heading to The States again to visit Grandma and asked if I wanted anything bringing back I knew exactly what I wanted.

Burt’s Bees have long been a favourite of mine, since I first stole my mum’s Rhubarb Lip Shimmer, but even more so since my family got bees! We have two hives and they are so fun to watch, we also got 8 kilos of honey from them this year out of half a hive! I am now even more supportive of anything that encourages bees in the community and helps them thrive!

There were a couple of things I wanted specifically, such as body lotion (my skin gets really dry in winter) and facial cleansers (I am very bad at remembering to clean off makeup and my skin shows it), but come Christmas morning I opened my presents and found many surprises.

I’m sure many of you are already aware of Burt’s Bees, if not complete converts, but I thought I would take the time today to review all of the products I got and let you know how fabulous they all are.

I’ll try to categorize these slightly and so I’ll start with the not-quite-as-exciting-but-no-less-lovely lip balms!

The one I have been using most is the Ultra Conditioning Lip Balm with Kokum Butter. It claims to provide 4-hours of moisturization and lives up to that well! I had exceedingly chapped lips over the holidays and after a couple of applications of this they were so much smoother and softer!
Second is the Honey Lip Balm with Vitamin E. Firstly this smells divine, primarily of honey with an after-scent of candle-like beeswax.  I have started using this as a night time moisturizing balm as it goes on a bit thicker than the Ultra Conditioning, this is because its primary ingredient is beeswax, whereas the other is a mix of plant oils and beeswax which thins out the balm a little. I can still feel it on my lips when I wake up in the morning, luscious.

In my collection I also have a plain beeswax which smells slightly herbal, a beeswax with Vit E and peppermint which is super fresh and smells of candy-canes (yum) and a rose-tinted balm which has a very subtle pink shimmer and came in a nicely designed cardboard tube.

Now on to cleansing products!

My most often used product of all of these has been the Radiance Facial Cleanser With Royal Jelly, which I use 1 to 2 times a day. It has a faint clean scent, lathers up a little and after rinsing and drying my skin instantly feels and looks better.

A little more heavy duty is the Orange Essence Facial Cleanser that is a thicker pasty texture with a strong, zesty smell. You use this with a flannel or face cloth and so it really gets a good rub in to clean off the day’s grime.

Next is the Peach & Willow Bark Deep Pore Scrub. With a beautiful, creamy peach scent this product is gentler than I first expected. The little crumbs of peach stone are very fine so don’t rub too harshly on the skin and just leave a really deep-cleansed feeling. I tend to use this one in the shower as it is creamier and I have a tendency to leave little bits in my hairline.

Finally for this category is the Cranberry & Pomegranate Sugar Scrub, I use this on my legs mostly to prevent ingrown hairs and occasionally my arms if I get little dry patches. I love, love, love it! It smells so fruity and rich and has little pieces of cranberry seeds that also add to the sugary exfoliation. It also leaves a fine coating of pomegranate oil and shea butter after showering which keeps my skin feeling moisturised all the way to the next morning. (I have already almost finished my tub of this)

The final category is moisturizers! I honestly don’t think I have ever written the word ‘moisturizing’ more in my whole life time, but prepare yourself for a few more!

First up are 3 more products from the ‘Radiance’ range; Day Lotion with Royal Jelly and SPF 7, Day Cream with Royal Jelly and Body Lotion with Royal Jelly (getting the theme of this range?). All three have the same very subtle, fresh, clean scent and all are wonderfully light to the touch but still intensely moisturizing. I use the cream every day right now, morning and night most times, as I decided I’d save the lotion for when we get a bit more sun back. The body lotion is amazing, super hydrating for my legs, which get very dry and irritated by shaving, and it also contains Mica, which is a mineral that creates a glittering effect that lasts for about 3 days. My bf did initially mention Twilight when I first used it, but I promise, it is nothing like as intense as that sounds.

I also have a big pump bottle of Cocoa & Cupuaçu Butter Body Lotion for dry skin. This has a chocolatey makes-me-want-to-eat-it smell and is a really good thick (but not too heavy) lotion.

Last, but definitely not least, is the Honey & Shea Body Butter, another mouth watering smell, another top quality product.

Wow, that took longer than I anticipated, I hope at least a few of you made it to the finish and that my endless rhapsodising encouraged you rather than put you off from ever trying Burt’s Bees.
Anyway, I hope you have a lovely weekend whatever it is that you may be doing and that next time you see a bee out on its business you wave to the tiny, fuzzy worker rather than fleeing in terror (if you are severely allergic the latter is acceptable)