Birthday fun

Yesterday was my 27th Birthday (Checks for grey hairs) and I thought I'd do a wee little post of the funtimes that were had:

First up, on Tuesday 29th I went to see Rita Ora and I LOVED IT! The lady is amazing live, unlike quite a few bands/singers/acts I've seen 'live' she actually sang every song live and still managed to jump around the stage like a loon. And of course, she's a bit of a babe!

For my Birthday meal I went out for Tapas with the girls and posted an OOTN last night. It was my first time trying Tapas and I have to say it was quite nice, although the topic of many conversations weren't all that pleasant haha

Prezzie time. I just want to say thank you for the cards, gifts and birthday wishes from all of my friends and family, I had a great Birthday!

* Accessorize mini lipstick in 'Infatuated' 

* Rimmel Kate Moss '101' '01' and '08'

* An ipad mini case, screen protector and 'pen'

* Topshop GEEK Tshirt

* Simple mini travel set

NOMMMY!!!

* Malteaser Bunnies (the best thing about easter)

* Lucky Charms cereal <3

I also got gift cards, money and dollars for my NYC trip ROLL ON AUGUST!!! 

Thanks again for a great Birthday y'all <3

Thanks for reading :)

S xx

January Empties

Well, it's time for January empties. I can't believe it's the end of the month already!!

Lets start with skincare:

* Kleenex facial cloths - We all know by now that these are the only things I love to remove my make up/apply toner. And I think they've been discontinued! Well that's what the girl in Superdrug told me *sad face*

* Simple babywipes - Again I always use these as part of my skincare routine. I like to use these to remove the majority of my make up before I use a face wash

* Superdrug cucumber face wipes - Another must have for me. I think the main reason I like these is because of the smell!

* Lastly Skinology tea tree face cleanser from wilkinsons - This is my second bottle and I'm well into my third. I love this stuff

Bath and hair:

* Avon senses shower gel in 'Mystique' - This is a weird one for me. I love the scent, but the consistency was strange. It was like a jelly! And it didn't really lather up all that well Don't think I'd hurry to buy this again

* Avon dry ends serum - I've bought this for years and love it. I usually apply to damp hair, but I've started applying it to dry hair and much prefer it this way

* Soap and Glory 'Clean on me' - Heaven in a bottle is all I can describe this as. It smells great, lathers amazing and the smell lingers on your skin ages afterwards

* Avon 360 nourishment moroccan argan oil shampoo and conditioner - I didn't notice any difference after using this at all. I think I'll just stick to my Timotei

Make up:

* 17 miracle matte powder - Holy grail powder! I always use this, it's amazing for anyone with oily skin

* Playboy lipgloss in 'Hef's Favourite' - A tacky product I know, and I know that it isn't used up however it's ready for the bin as it's started to separate. I love the smell and colour, and yup I would repurchase

* Urban Decay primer potion - This has taken an age to use up. At first I wasn't all that keen on it because I find it quite thin to apply, however the more I used it the more I liked it. I still prefer MUA eye primer in comparison 

* Wilkinson lip balm - I love these things. They're 3 for 99p and if I could only ever have one lip balm, I'd have these. They leave my lips so soft and smooth, and smell great!

That's it for this month, until Feb!

Thanks for reading :)

S xx

Birthday OOTN

It's my Birthdaaaaaaaaaay and I think I'm having a mid-life crisis already, I'm 27 and devastated!!! Anywhoo, I'm going out for a meal with my best girls and wanted to do a quick OOTN post for y'all :)

Clothes:

* Chiffon shirt from Primark £5.00

* Jeans from H&M £10.00

Accessories: 

* Shoes from Primark £10.00

* Clutch (Can't remember price or shop, sorry)

* Two bracelets from Internacionale £2.00each

* Ring (pack of 3) from Primark £2.00

* Earrings from River Island £1.50

Make up:

Have a good evening everyone!

Thanks for reading :)

S xx

Review - Sheer Cover Base perfector primer

Time for another little review on a product in my December Lux box, the Sheer Cover primer

I was pretty excited when I opened the box and spotted this because I love trying out new face and eye primers, even though I think my heart will always belong to No7 Beautifully Matte primer. Anywhoo back to this product.  The first thing I noticed was the scent, it reminds me a little of Nivea cream. It's not too overpowering, but it is a little on the strong side. A little of this goes a long way, it's easy to blend but I found it didn't absorb into the skin that quickly, and it left me with a dewy finish.

I think this is a primer best suited to those with dry or normal skin types. I have oily skin and my make up didn't stay on that well at all. After around 2 hours I had little to no foundation on my chin and it was starting to disappear from my cheeks too. I'm not too keen on the finish either if I'm honest, my foundation doesn't look as flawless as it does when I use my No7 primer and I didn't seem to have as much coverage with my foundation as I usually do.

The lowdown:

* Price - £21.95

* Product - 36.9ml

* Recommend - Yes, to people with a dry or normal skin type

* Repurchase - No

* Where to buy - online

Have you tried this? What do you think of it?

Thanks for reading :)

S xx

DIY brush holder

A little while ago I put up a DIY kinda post 'The little book of happiness' and so I thought I'd do a make up style DIY post today - make your own brush holder. It's a simple thing to make but I enjoyed doing it and wanted to share what I came up with.

All you need is:

* Either a used can (be careful the rim isn't sharp. My tin opener takes off just the lid, leaving no sharp edges) or you could use an old jam jar

* Some strong glue or a glue gun

* Lastly some buttons, or jewels anything you want to stick on really

And that's it. Simple but funky :) And cheaper than a lot of brush holders out there

Have you make your own make up containers? 

Thanks for reading :)

S xx

Tuesday Tip

Time for another dose of Tuesday Tip. This week : Brushes

If you're sharing a house or flat with another make up addict and you don't want to get your brushes mixed up, paint the end of the handle with a nail varnish of your choice.

Or if you're like me and have different brushes for different things, colour coordinate your brushes. I painted some of my eye brushes for certain colour eyeshadows: Green, purple and brown for neutrals:

Thanks for reading :)

S xx

Review - No7 colour calming primer

I suffer slightly with red cheeks, not really bad but it kind of makes any blush I wear more pink toned. I've been on the hunt for a green colour correcting primer to help tame the pinkness, and noticed that No7 sell one. Since I already use their Beautifully matte primer and love it, I thought I'd give this one a go.

 At first glance this is pretty scary looking, it's bright green! But once applied and blended well it's not so scary. That's maybe the problem. I tried this for a full week and I'm really not liking it or seeing any difference at all. I applied it to my cheeks and to a spot I had on my chin, and although it toned down the redness completely on my spot it did nothing for my cheeks. Once blended it went completely sheer so it was a waste of time applying it. Obviously I didn't want full blown shrek cheeks but I'd have thought some of the green would have stayed in order to counteract the redness? Nope it didn't.

I also found it quite hard to blend, the Beautifully matte primer is the same in that if it isn't blended properly and you apply foundation you end up looking like you have toothpaste splattered on your face - not a good look.

 I don't really like writing negative reviews but I think sometimes they're helpful. This is not something I'd recommend to anyone with redness, I just didn't find it worked at all. Sorry No7!

Has anyone else had problems using this? Any other colour correcting primers I should try?

Thanks for reading :)

S xx

Make up Monday #3

Time for another make up Monday post , where I rifle through my make up kit and pull out products I haven't used in a while.

Here's this weeks little bundle:

Face:

* NYC Pressed powder in 'Translucent'
* e.l.f studio blushes in 'Tickled pink' 'Fushia fusion' and ' Pink passion'

Lips:

* Barry M lip paints in '129' and '153'
* Barry M lip glosses in '4' the other two were limited edition

Eyes:

* Natural Collection eyeshadows in 'Golden Sand' and 'Moss Shimmer'
* Avon Supershock gel liner in 'Blackened metal'

The majority of these products I either haven't used, or have been used once or twice then stuck back in my collection

Thanks for reading :)

S xx

Book haul

As you can tell from the title of this post, I have a bit of a different haul. I have a confession to make. I'm a bit of a book hoarder, and for some reason I can't seem to ever go out and buy ONE book. I always come back with way too many. This time? I bought 6. Whoopsie

* A thousand splendid suns by Khaled Hosseini - £1.00

* Chocolat by Joanne Harris - 50p

* Paddy Clarke ha ha ha by Roddy Doyle - £1.00

* The Latchkey kid by Helen Forrester - 20p

* I heart Vegas by Lindsey Kelk - £2.00

* Tess of the D'urbervilles - £1.50

I'm not sure how many people are interested in book hauls, but I figured I'd do this post anyway.  I'm a complete book worm as much as I am a make up geek. Another little random fact, I love second hand books! Yup, the more scuffed and old looking the better. Weird I know but I really don't like brand new books for some reason.

Any other bookworms out there? I'm always looking for recommendations

Thanks for reading :)

S xx

Weekly favourites #4

Where has this month gone? I'm pretty sure I say that every week! I won't ramble on, here's this weeks faves:

Eyes:

* 17 Peep show eyeshadow quad. I got this so long ago and used it for a little while then I forgot about it. I'm so glad that I pulled it back out again, I love it!

Lips:

* Rimmel Apocalips Lip Lacquers - I only bought these on Wednesday but I absolutely LOVE them. Here's my review on them if you want to know more

Random:

* My ipad mini - I LOVE THIS! I've only had it a week and literally haven't put it down. I love that I can now edit pictures for my blog, so handy!

What have you been loving this week?

Thanks for reading :)

S xx

Celeb Saturday #4

Whilst trolling the Internet for inspiration I came across a picture of Kim Kardashian, that wasn't just her usual smokey eye look. Here's what I came up with. Again like each week, this is my interpretation of the look a) I'm not Kim b) I'm not her MUA and c) I don't know what products were used, so I did the best with what my mamma give me ;)

For this look, I used:

* First I applied Urban Decay primer potion all over my lid, and then on a shadow brush I swept Freestyle from the Urban Decay Smoked palette all the way up to my brow bone

* Next I took Pink T from the Soap and Glory what's nude quad, and with a fluffy blending brush, I applied this to my crease

* Next, taking Blackout on a flat shader brush I applied this only to my lid and blended both this and Pink T together

* For brow bone highlight I used MUA shade 1

* For eyeliner I used No7gel liner and the e.l.f angled eyeliner brush for a neat precise line. On the water liner I used Urban Decay 24/7 eyeliner in Perversion

* Finishing off the look with Collection Skyscraper mascara

So, what do ya think? I'm on the hunt for a bright celeb look for next week I think

Thanks for reading :) 

Sxx

Review - Rimmel Apocalips lip lacquer

I think every single beauty blogger and make up junkie has one or two of the new Rimmel Apocalips right? I went to Boots with the intention of only buying the shade 'Celestial' and ended up leaving the shop with 'Galaxy' and 'Big bang' My excuse? They were on 3 for 2 *whistles*

The first thing I noticed about these beauty's was the scent, they smell AMAZING!! So fruity with a hint of lipstick, weird description I know. The second and third things were the shades and the pigmentation. They're fab!

* Celestial

* Galaxy

* Big Bang

I applied this at 7:30am and have to say I was SO impressed with the pigmentation and consistency. To me this applied like a thick opaque gloss and after around an hour it started to dry like a lipstick. By 9:30am my lips were still as pigmented as they were when I first applied this, and I noticed after I took a drink from my water bottle, there was no transfer of product. By 10:30am I noticed the pigmentation wasn't as full on as it was earlier but I still had a nice amount of colour to my lips. I checked again at 1:30pm when I was about to leave work and there was no product left. However I got around 5 - 6 hours of wear from this which I'm pretty amazed by!

Final thoughts: I love these and highly recommend giving them a bash! They apply like a glos, dry like a lipstick and finish off like a stain :)

The lowdown:

* Price - £5.99

* Product - 5.5ml

* Shades - 8

* Drying - Not at all

* Repurchase -Definitely

* Recommend - Yes

* Where to buy - Facebook page

           - Boots

                  - Superdrug

Have you tried these yet? Which shade is your fave?

Thanks for reading :)

S xx

Little e.l.f hauling

I ordered a few things from e.l.f last week and they came in the post yesterday so I thought I'd do a wee little post and show y'all what I got. I haven't tried any of these products before, so expect some little reviews coming up ;)

I found a good use for the snow - pretty background ;)

* Nourishing cuticle penn - £1.50

* Eyelash and brow wand - £1.50

* Blush with brush in 'glow' - £2.50

* Studio matte lip colour in 'Tea rose' - £3.75

* STudio make up lock and seal - £3.75

* blush with brush in 'glow'

* Studio matte lip colour in 'tea rose'

Have you tried any of these out before? 

The e.l.f store 

Thanks for reading :) 

S xx

Review - Sheer Cover Smokey eyes palette

If you read my December Lux box post then you'll have seen that I received a full size Sheer Cover smokey eyes palette, how excited was I?! Before I signed up to Lux I decided that I was going to review each product in said box, hence this post.

This palette comes with 6 satin shadows from a white to a dark grey. The shadows are so pigmented and are very silky to apply, and blend really well. This palette is great for sticking in your bag for a night out and has everything you need to create a number of smokey eye looks.

Here's some looks I created:

I used 'White Ice' as a highlight, 'Silver Polish' all over my lid to the crease and 'Soft Coal' in the outer V blended into the crease, and along my lower lashline

I used 'White Ice' as a highlight, 'Deep Violet' all over the lid and along lower lashline and 'Starry Night' in the outer corner blended into the crease

I used 'White Ice' as a highlight,'Silver Polish' on the inner half of the lid and 'Royal Blue' on the outer half, into the crease and along the lower lashline

I love this palette and it's definitely something that I'll be using for nights out!

This is available to buy from Sheer cover 

Thanks for reading :)

S xx

Urban Decay Smoked Palette

My sister bought me the new Urban Decay Smoked palette for Christmas, and I have to say that I think I now prefer Urban Decay eyeshadow's to MAC  after using it!

Rather than just ramble on about how much I love this, I wanted to post some looks I've worn using the eyeshadows and then ramble a teeeeeny bit :P

I used 'Kinky' as a highlight, 'Freestyle' in the crease, 'Rockstar' on the lid and blended into the crease and 'Evidence' on my lower lashline

I used 'Kinky' as a highlight, 'Freestyle' in the crease, 'Mushroom' all over the lid, 'Backdoor' on the outer V and 'Asphalt' on the lower lashline

This palette comes with a mini primer potion and a full size 24/7 liner in 'Perversion' which I think is now my favourite waterproof liner. It's soft and creamy to apply, and lasts literally all night. I really have trouble removing it, but it's totally worth it!

The eyeshadows are extremely pigmented, so soft and blend like a dream! I've used these with and without primer and both ways work amazingly!

If you're a fan of smokey shadows, I'd totally recommending buying this!

Thanks for reading :) 

S xx 

Tuesday tip #3

It's Tuesday which means time for another tip. I think many people know all about this, but I wanted to post it anyway just in case some of you haven't.

Eye Eye

Applying a black liner to your waterline can make your eyes look smaller, and white can sometimes be harsh. Instead run a nude/skintone pencil along your waterline. This opens up the eye without the harshness of the white, and can make you look more awake.

My faves are:

* Pixi Eye brighter liner £10.50

* Rimmel Scandal eyes in 'Nude' £3.99

Thanks for reading :)

S xx

Make up Monday #2

If you've read last Mondays post then you'll know what this is all about. If not, I shall explain. Basically I have a silly amount of make up, mainly eyeshadows, so each Monday I pick out make up items that I haven't used in a while and use them for that week. This way my make up is getting rotated and I get to work out whether I like certain items or not.

So, here's this weeks little lot:

Face:

* Soap and glory Kick ass concealer - I bought this so long ago and literally think I've used it about 5 times. I love my collection lasting perfection concealer, but want to try and rotate my collection and sort out what I want to keep and what I don't

* Fashionista blushes - 'Rose thrill' 'Rose glow' and 'Cinnamon' I did have four blushes in this palette which was my all time fave but I dropped it and it smashed (sad face) I love these blushes, they're so pigmented!

* No7 gel eyeliner - This is discontinued now and because I use MUA liquid and extreme felt liners I've completely forgot about this. Time to bring it back out

* 17 peep show palette - I got this free when I bought the peep show mascara. I used this for around 2 weeks none stop when I got it, but like I said I have a silly amount of eyeshadow so this got put in the drawer and pretty much forgot about

Lips:

* Collection cream puff in 'Cotton candy'

* Avon glazewear shine lipgloss in 'Pink water melon'

* Revlon just bitten kissable balm stain in 'Lovesick'

* MUA Kiss proof lip stain in 'Kissalicious' 

Thanks for reading :)

S xx

Weekly favourites

How fast are the weeks flying by?! At the end of the month I'll be 27!!! So if the next two weeks would like to slow down it would be very much appreciated. Anyway, onto this weeks faves

* Essie nail varnish in 'Bikini so teeny' - I bought this last weekend from a make up stall for £1.99  And absolutely love the colour. What a bargain! 

* Bourjois magic nail polish remover - £4.99 I think this is the best thing since sliced bread if I'm honest. I painted my nails, then removed it again just to have a play :p

* Soap and glory hand food - £5.00 I love everything about this. It's kept my hands so soft and smelling SO good! The main reason I've been reaching for this over any other is the fact that it sinks into the skin so quick and it's not greasy

* Soap and glory quad in 'off the wallflower' - £10.00 In particular 'Aubersheen. This was part of my  make up Monday and I've been loving it

Well once again that's it for another week. Time to stick some layers on and go build a snowman with my niece. Have a great Sunday! 

Thanks for reading :)

S xx