Turning Twenteen!

These are scary times. Over the weekend, I turned 20! 20!? I am no longer a teenage mutant ninja turtle. Instead of twenty, we are calling it twenteen or two with a zero, because it sounds so much less daunting. Quite a surprise though was the gorgeous gifts that I had for my birthday. I guess that's one good thing. 

So, two coats (I bought the biker jacket with some birthday money), a pair of platform boots, some make-up brushes, a tangle teaser, bottle of Malibu, a range of Disney DVDs (because we are all a Disney princess at heart), some candles, the naked 2 palette, a complete works of Shakespeare and plenty of other bits and bobs later, I'm 20.

I had a lovely weekend, Saturday night we had a great alcohol fuelled night of dancing out in town, a pasta lunch on Sunday followed by a night of white wine spritzers and fancy food. I've felt very lucky this weekend, have had a fabulous birthday and with the gorgeous messages and cards that I've received, I've been once again reminded what amazing friends I have around me.

Now that is all over and done with, I am back and totally at your disposal. So hopefully, fingers crossed, my blogging uploads will be a little more frequent. 

Hello Golden Wonder

There are times in life when you just need a good soak in the bath. And most of these times, for me at least, only a Lush bath will suffice!

The Halloween/Bonfire Night/Christmas range this year has been so exciting! I think a little bit of wee came out when I found out about all of the pretty things that may or may not be gracing my bathroom this festive season...

I've been eying up the 'Hot Toddy' shower gel since it came out and I am so happy that my all time favourite 'Melting Snowman' has made an appearance. 

Another returning favourite is the 'Golden Wonder'. I didn't get chance to try this one last year, and to be honest I just brushed it aside as something that wasn't going to be my cup of tea. But...how wrong I was.

I dropped this little (actually it's really big) lime and cognac present into my bath and wonderful things happened. We had glitter, colours, bubbles, an amazing smell and even little gold stars. It was pretty spectacular! I'm now also desperate for a pot of 'Celebrate', the hand and body lotion with the matching scent, because it's just a little bit divine. In fact, if anyone would like to buy me the little gift box that has the Golden Wonder and Celebrate in it, then please do, I will love you forever! 

Although it's something that I would never normally go for, this gorgeous sparkly bath bomb really hit the spot. I would even go as far as saying that it's one of my new favourites! Like, seriously! 

Thrifty bedroom extras...

For the majority of people these are far from exciting, but for me, these are the best thing since sliced bread. 

I hate throwing things away, especially if I can see another use for them. And I'm always looking for cute extras to put in my room, ideally that cost as little as I physically possible. So this sort of became a winning formula.

Take my little cute vintage styled bottle 'vase'. Yep it's just a Fentimans bottle that I saved. But how cute are those bottles? 

I've had those fabric flowers for what seems like forever, they only cost a couple of pounds in the first place, but they were looking a bit sorry for themselves in a spare mug that I had lying around. They just needed something to make them more of a feature.

Cue the bottle. Now they actually make a really nice little display on my desk. And alls it took was to save my bottle from lunch one day. This would look good in any sort of bottle, you could use a wine bottle or maybe you're lucky enough to have one of the retro looking coca-cola bottles. 

The second two, housing my cotton buds and cotton pads are actually old candles. I love jars and things like that to use as storage but I desperately don't want to pay nearly £10 for a jar just to keep cotton wool in. 

So instead, this is just an old Yankee candle. When I had completely finished the candle inside, I just melted the wax that was left, removed it, gave the jar a clean inside with some washing up liquid and then it was ready to house my cotton pads. I just did the exact same with the square shaped glass and ta da I had two new containers.

Removing wax from a glass jar. This part can be a little tricky so I thought I'd tell you what I did. It's really simple, you just have to be patient and careful.

You're going to need a bucket or washing up bowl and some hot water. Alls you simply need to do is float the candle jar in the hot water to melt the wax inside, and then you can pull (or tip) the wax out. 

Here's the part that you need to be careful with. Glass does not like heat. So don't just pour boiling hot water around the glass because it's likely to smash or crack. Instead it can be worth floating the jar in lukewarm water first and then gradually (and I mean gradually) adding hot water. That way the temperature of the water increases really slowly, therefore you are much less likely to break the glass. 

If you're trying this, pretty please be careful. Below is what my jar looked like, once you've got the water hot enough to start to melt the wax then it's just a case of waiting. 

Happy reusing!

Making your room your own...

Apologies for the over-instagrammed picture, but that's just what you have to do when you're very excited about your new look room.

I say 'new' very loosely, it's been this way for quite a while now. Until about a year ago, my bedroom had changed very little since I was 9 years old. The only change was that the walls changed from green to cream, and it had taken me 6 years to get that far. My bed was still the same one that my brother had when he first moved out of his cot, it was 26 years old and falling apart. It was time for a change. 

A feature wall, new carpet, some scatter cushions, a furry throw, new curtains and some pretty little finishing touches later, I had a new room that I could really relax in. 

A year on, I still adore my revamped room and wanted to share with you guys some my tips for making your space your own. 

Find a colour scheme and stick to it. A common theme in the Pinterest pictures that we all envy is that, however subtle it may be, all of the bedrooms have a colour scheme. Mine, I will admitt, is less than neutral, but I fell in love with this turquoise blue colour and I just had to have it. Everything in my room is now either blue, black, white or silver, and that includes feature wall, my bed, carpet, cushions, bed covers, curtains, storage boxes, shelves and even photo frames etc... It's just helped make my room feel like a really cute little place to spend time. 

Only replace what needs replacing. It was so tempting to buy a whole set of completely new furniture, and although it all has general wear-and-tear, the only thing that desperately needed changing was my bed. I saved so much money by just cleaning up and doing a spot of DIY on my existing furniture. If that's not going to be enough for you, then why not think about showing your wardrobe or chest of drawers some love with a new coat of paint? 

Dark coloured speckled carpets are hell when it comes to catching spiders. You can't catch something you can't see. End of story. Just bare that in mind.

Refresh! Even if you aren't changing the colour of your walls or ceiling (I didn't, I just put some fancy wallpaper on one wall), I would definitely recommend a quick refresh. Yes it seems pointless painting the same colour over a cream wall, but it makes such a difference. Little marks, cracks, accidental make-up spillages, it's like they were never there.

Optimise your storage opportunities. In my opinion, clutter is the enemy of a comfy room. I invested in the cutest zebra print boxes, they were only like £2 from B&M and are great for hiding away little knick-knacks. I also have two enormous clear plastic boxes under my bed to keep books in and two more in the top of my wardrobe to keep tidy all of the things that I don't hang up. It makes such a difference.

It's all in the details. One thing I was completely certain on was that I wanted lots of photos in my room, so I went out and bought loads of cute cheap photo frames. I love little trinkets and jars so I got some of those too. And I love candles, so they are everywhere aswell (always in colours matching my colour scheme though). I even found a really sweet little wooden sewing box in The Works for about £4, it looks really different and is a lovely touch on my windowsill.

Lastly, it takes time, but it doesn't have to take lots of money. I started my room in August 2013, I would still not consider it completely finished. I only changed my purple curtains to my new blue ones about 3 months ago, and I still want to revamp my chair. But even though it's all a complete change, nothing, apart from my carpet and bed, were particularly pricey, but they are higher value items anyway. Most things cost me less than £10, so it really doesn't have to be an expensive venture at all. I bought so many items from places like Wilkinsons, Primark, B&M and Tesco and there's nothing that I bought which hasn't stood the test of time after a year.

Happy revamping! 

Things I've Learned on the Way to 20 (Part 2)

 

I learned more than 6 things, so I'm back with another 6. You thought that I had put that blog post to bed, and then I spring a second part on you. Pesky, I know.

7. ALWAYS remember to blow out candles before you go to bed.
Let's go back to the idea of being responsible. If you sometimes fall asleep with a candle still burning in your bedroom, you're definitely not ticking the responsible box. I've gotten better at this, and luckily nothing bad has come of forgetting but you just don't know if you're asleep. Lesson 7: Don't be a dingbat.

8. It is all about you. But it's not always about you.
It's totally time to look after number 1, you have to do what is best for you and you have to make time to do all of the things that you want to do. You matter. However, at the same time as this you have to consider other people's needs as well as your own. The world does not completely revolve around you, although that would be nice. I have a firm belief that it makes you a better person if you give a damn about other peoples' needs, not just your own. If you're acting like an idiot and it's disturbing other people getting what they need, then you guessed it- that makes you a complete idiot. I've tried desperately to consider how all of my actions affect other people around me, if I wouldn't like someone else doing it to me, then I don't do it to other people. Lesson 8: Don't tread on people to get your own way.

9. You can say NO.
Pretty self explanatory. I'm not going to elaborate too much on this one. But if you're not happy with something, say no. You are allowed. This is one that I am really really terrible at, I do not know how to say no. Lesson 9: Don't let people walk over you.

10. Don't listen to people who drag you down.
This is a recent one for me. I let people's opinions drag me down. I take everything to heart and it has to stop. So just recently I've been listening to what people say and taking it in but if it's something that I feel is unhelpful or discouraging then I just brush it aside. It's all made a big difference, now every 'knockback' doesn't knock me back, instead it spurs me forward as an incentive to work harder and prove that I can do whatever it is. Lesson 10: Step away from poisonous situations and don't let it knock you off balance.

11. Clean your god damn make-up brushes!
Think about it this way, you're applying make-up with utensils that are covered in dead skin cells, bacteria and excess sebum. Not nice. I've been trying to make cleaning my brushes a regular thing, not as regular as I like but I have been making the effort. Lesson 11: Show your make-up some love.

12. Don't blow all of your wages on payday.
Although I don't have mounds of bills to pay, don't have too many responsibilities when it comes to money. This is certainly a lesson for the future. Stop spending your all wages on payday. I fail at this, although I don't spend them straight away, I do end each month really watching what I spend, because I realise that funds are low. I'm definitely getting better at this, and if Christmas wasn't fast approaching then I think I would be pretty good at this actually. But especially at the moment, it seems like my money is already spent before I earn it. Lesson 12: Think about your pennies.

So there we are. A few golden nuggets for me on the way to the big but very daunting 2-0. Quick question: will it still be socially acceptable for me to legit order a happy meal in McDonalds, because I'm very worried about that one...

Things I've Learned on the Way to 20

Looking after yourself and getting some downtime.
The bottom left picture was taken by one of my friends while we were in South Africa, isn't it gorgeous?

So...I turn 20 two weeks tomorrow! Help. I feel like a certain responsibility comes with leaving the teens behind. I have realised that I need to start looking after myself, not because I don't shower or clean my face or anything, but I need to take responsibility for more of the choices that I make on a day to day basis.

Bottom line- I don't want to grow up, pass me some wax crayons.

But seriously there are little things that I've learned about life and myself that need to spring into action to make life that bit easier.

1. Find a skincare routine that actually suits your skin.
I'm a major offender of this one. My skin used to get oily during the day, so naturally I've spent years using oil combatting, oil removing, tough, rough skincare to keep a shiny face at bay. Right? Wrong! My efforts had been completely counterproductive! It was when I had my make-up done by someone else that I realised that I actually have dry skin. She slathered moisturiser onto my face and I was just sat there thinking 'Oh my god, how much is she using? I'm going to look like a chip pan by the end of the day'. But I didn't. In fact I wasn't oily at all. WHAT? *Cue light bulb moment* I HAVE DRY SKIN! My skin was just over-compensating because I was stripping so many natural oils from my skin.
Since then I've been using a whole facial range specifically designed for super sensitive dry skin and it's like I've been given a new face. Since switching to the dark side, adding moisture instead of taking it away, I can't use anything as tough as I used to, I never realised before just how harsh they were on my skin. Lesson 1: Find out your skin type!

2. Your face will not thank you for just using a face wipe at night.
Face wipes. I know, slap my wrists. People either hate them or completely swear by them. I used to be the latter. However now they are my arch enemy. You know how it is, it's late and you just don't want to go to the effort of completely cleansing your face- so you use a face wipe. I hold my hands up. Guilty as charged!
Whenever I take the lazy route I completely regret it in the morning. Cue breakout. It's been a lesson that I still haven't full learned, but it's getting there. If you're like me, using a wipe isn't enough when taking your make-up of and cleansing your face before you go to sleep. Fair enough use them to remove your make-up first (I use a micellar water on some cotton wool) but please cleanse afterwards. Lesson 2: Don't go to bed with a dirty face.

3. Only you can decide where you're going.
You can ask people until you are blue in the face to give you the answers to what you're supposed to be doing with your life. I am constantly turning to different people in the hope that they might just tell me what to do. Let's face it, it's just not going to happen. Unfortunately, you have to pave your own way, whatever that may be. Lesson 3: Just get on with it.

4. It's okay not to know where you're going.
Note: This does not apply to physical journeys. Refer back to no.3. So you're wracking your brain to figure out what to do with your life and you're coming out with no answers. THAT'S OKAY! I know how it feels to watch all of your friends start their second year of uni while you're still at home pondering what the hell you are going to do with yourself. And yes, it sucks. It sucks big time. But it's okay, don't pin yourself to other people's schedules, just because people the same age as you seem to be far ahead of you, doesn't mean that you're left behind. Lesson 4: Do it at your own speed.

5. Bread hates me.
I avoid bread like the plague. You know the film 'Big', where Tom Hanks wakes up one morning as a grown man and his mum goes a bit crazy? That's me with bread. I wake up and my tummy is so uncomfortably puffed up that I look like I'm about to pop. No Mum, I'm not pregnant, I just had bread yesterday. When I was young I used to rock up to school with my little sandwich bag: ham sandwich; yoghurt; orange and a little bar of chocolate. Ham or tuna sandwiches EVERYDAY and to no effect. Gone are those days! Ham sandwiches are just off the menu. Lesson 5: Bread definitely hates me.

6. You need to drink water.
You hear it all of the time: drink 8 glasses of water a day. Let's face it, how many of us actually do that? I'm not joking though, drinking the clear stuff (not vodka, although vodka is good) really does make a difference. Water makes everything better. Clearer skin, flatter less bloated tummy and so much more energy. Lesson 6: Drink water like it's going out of fashion.

Sunday walks, good reads and PIE!

 

Sundays are usually pretty chilled for us, the last day together before the week so we like to have a potter around and a good wander. In the summer, we're all for having a drive out and an ice cream somewhere. But right now, as we're moving into Autumn we are going to have to find more weather appropriate Sunday activities. Minds out of the gutter please!
I rolled out of bed this morning without a hangover from last night's themed party. However my hair was sticking up at really random angles, but I guess you can't have it both way. I threw on my new speckled cable knit jumper from New Look and my high-waisted jeans, tied my hair in a low side plait and we were off.
There's nothing better than getting lost in a book shop on a Sunday. My  boyfriend is more of a bookworm than I am, whereas I'm far more picky. However, my class has been challenged by our acting teacher to read more books, so I made a cheeky purchase. I've decided that I'm going to work my way through 'Great Expectations', I love the story but have never read the book. And let's face it, you can't beat the classics!
Oops, we ended up in Pieminister for dinner. And it was GORGEOUS! We both had a pie called Brew Moo, which from what I gather is a steak and ale pie with bacon. It was divine. I had mine with minty mushy peas and red wine gravy. And who can resist the little bottles of Fentiman's pop, they are so cute and vintage so I snapped up a bottle of the Rose Lemonade. Cheeky indulgent dinner- done.
After our little lunch date, we had a wander around the Italian Gardens. It's so pretty. Even though it's been a bit overcast and grey, sitting amongst all of the flowers was so lovely. We decided that it might be the last time that we can sit in the gardens without a coat, I joked that next time I will probably be in a winter coat with my Uggs. There's nothing better than having a cuddle on a bench looking out over the lake and then a wander.

Our Sunday was a little bit cute. How did you spend your Sunday?

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Trials of Fancy Dress for Couples!

October is upon us! How crazy is that? And this month already me and my boyfriend have hit a new milestone...his and her fancy dress...the shame!

I've always had mixed feelings around fancy dress costumes for couples, on the one hand it's completely lame and I'd rather shit in my hands and clap, and on the other hand it can look amazing if you've got a really good idea and both commit to it. So when me and Liam were invited to a 'music icons' themed 18th birthday party, naturally we stumbled upon a little dilemma. To match or not match...

We first had the conversation whilst in the cinema waiting for a film to start (you know that awkward bit before the adverts come on) and we decided that the theme had saved us much humiliation in terms of the options open to us in couples fancy dress ideas. We weren't going to have to resort to Banana-man and Banana-woman at least!
So we got thinking: Sonny and Cher? Well done to Max and Phoebe who pulled off that one. The Carpenters? The White Stripes? Ike and Tina? Half of ABBA? Scraping the barrel, I know. Nothing that we could come up with was going to be right for us. We considered going as separate artists but then neither of us could think of anything without shelling out large amounts of money for bought or hired fancy dress costumes. So we carried on with the couples idea. I jokingly suggested that I'd go as a bee and he could be a policeman...Sting and The Police, get it? (Thanks to Dawn O'Porter for that idea) but apart from getting a disproving look, it still wasn't going to be an achievable goal for us.
So I bit the bullet and crossed into musical theatre/film territory. Grease! You know Danny and Sandy at the end in 'You're the One that I Want'? It was Number 1, you know! And surprisingly, the idea went down well. So we had it sorted, a costume that would be easy enough on a budget. It's just black, leather and tight trousers, right?
Right! But I don't own a leather biker jacket and I'm not one to pull off super tight 'stitch me in' hot pants, and he doesn't own anything black...Oh. My. Life.
So I went out the day before the party and invested in a pair of skinny black high-waisted jeans (let's face it, I'll definitely wear them again) and a plain black off the shoulder Bardot top (I've been wanting one for ages), I thought teamed with a super high pair of platform heels  that I would just about pass.
As I was working on the day right up to the party, I knew that I'd need to some party prep before going to work, so that included make-up (just needing a little bit of touching up in the car and the addition of some false lashes) and my hair! I have quite long hair so was never going to realistically pull off the perfectly permed look that Olivia Newton-John does in the film, so I opted for a quiff and high ponytail, all I would need to do then is get changed in the car.
Just before I left Liam for work I asked him what he was going to wear later...His answer? 'I'll have a think.' Have a think?! Help.
I was very nervous when I came out of work, what was he going to be wearing when I got in the car? But I'll give him credit where it's due. He really had thought about it! There he was black jeans, white t-shirt, leather jacket and slicked back hair. Simple, but effective!
When we got to the party, people knew who we were supposed to be! Winner! We succeeded! And we didn't break the bank to do it.
We had a fab night, the party was great and everyone seemed to have a fab time. There was a Madonna, Freddie Mercury, Guns and Roses, Marilyn Monroe, Lady Gaga, Amy Winehouse and many others. Everyone had really made an effort. We even put in a sneaky request for the 'Grease Mega Mix' before we called it a night. There's nothing quite like a room full of people singing the end of Summer Ni-iiiiiiiiights!

First attempt at his and her fancy dress complete! Now bring on Halloween...Oh Heck!