The great hair timeline!

So....I was about to do a post on my hair care products and the Moroccan Oil I got for Christmas. But then I realised I'd hardly mentioned anything about my hair on this blog at all!

I seriously have a love/hate relationship with my hair. My hair is a light mousy brown and naturally straight with a slight kink. It lacks any body whatsoever, it relatively thin and gets greasy so quickly I literally have to wash it daily! But on the positive side it does have a good shine to it, grows quite fast and can be easily styled.

I really do think hair says so much about you.

So let me introduce you to my hair through the years......

Age 15

Aaah the height of my 'chav' faze. I had started to have blonde highlights put in at the salon, much to my mothers dismay! I could never afford a whole head of highlights so was getting a half head which was giving me the blonde on top and dark underneath look. I used to straighten my hair within a inch of it's life and kept it long and feather slightly at the front









Age 17

I'd had a side fringe cut in here and gone a bit shorter. I'd stopped the highlighting (probably as my student wage didn't go that far!) and I believe this is actually my natural hair colour, as by this time all the old blonde streaks had grown out! Looks much healthier!

Age 18


A year on and I was growing my hair at 18. I'd stopped having my hair cut (really bad idea folks) and was letting it grow out here, which you can probably tell by the side clipped fringe! It looks messy thick here!

Age 19


Blurgh. For my 19th I wanted a 'funky' hair style and had my hair chopped off. I remember hating it so much that I cried walking home from the hairdressers, it seemed a lot shorter at the time! The base colour is my natural colour but I'd had 'slices' of black dyed in under my fringe and the back of my hair. I didn't really know how to style my hair properly so it always looked a mess!




19 (and a bit!)


Still 19 here, even though I hated my previous cut, for some reason I decided to go shorter and for a full fringe, I'd obviously decided I like my hair short! I was going up to a pricey salon in London with my mum now and I trusted the guy to do what he liked. Plus my mum was paying so probably had to have something she liked! The black dye had been mostly cut out now and I was back to my normal colour.



Still aged 19!


Wow 19 was a busy year for my hair! This has got to be the shortest it has ever been. I'm can't really think why I was getting it cut so short now as I'd started to dabble in hair extension! As you can see I'd also begun to dye my hair. I was buying home hair dye and every time I dyed it I went up a darker shade as I was terrified of it fading and me having dodgy ginger hair (I'm not by any means against redheads!). It was probably too dark for my skin tone! Also it's a bit like a mullet, don't you think?

Age 20


Aaah my 20th birthday. As you could see my extensions are in full swing now. I rarely went out without them and had started to grow my hair. My hair was almost black here and I don't think it suited me. I remember it taking me ages to get ready because my hair was so short and my extensions were so long I had to make sure it all blended it perfectly! Not perfect, but I don't think I did a too bad job, ay!?

Age 20


2 days after my 20th birthday I went back to blonde. This time I went to the hairdressers! Where my hair was so dark I had to go lighter in stages, so this is the first stage. I thought I was really blonde at the time but I'm more of a mouse brown! I specifically chose this picture so you can see how bad my extensions were! I'd had to buy a new set of clip in hair and had attempted to dye it to match, I was so desperate for long hair that I hadn't cut any length off the extensions so it didn't blend in at all. What a mess my hair is, and so am I!!!

Age 20


Apparently my hair took to dye quite well, the next time I had it dyed it actually went pretty blonde! I have a centre parting here and was still growing it but had a fringe cut in. The extensions were cut in slightly better, but they still were being worn pretty permanently! I actually like the colour here.


Age 20


Dye job complete! I was happy with my colour a cut here. Still the same style though!









Age 21

My 21st birthday! Full barbie mode here! My philosophy was the bigger and longer the hair the better. Extensions were still a permanent fixture so not much to say about the cut of my hair other than that I was still growing it! I've obviously got another set of longer extensions here too.


21 and a half


I started to have my hair tinted rather that highlighted as I was afraid my hair was starting to get yellow/orange tones and look brassy! Although I loved the clean look of my hair I actually realised I was going blue! As so wonderfully highlighted in this picture. Wow! Can you tell I've got extensions in here?! Haahaha. I'm embarassed to say this is less that a year ago!










22 my hair now!


Growing my hair has been a long slog! But I'm finally at that stage where I wash, blow and straighten my hair and think wow, I actually like it. No need for any extensions! I'm really happy with the colour and although I sometimes ponder going back to black I'm not sure I'd actually go through with it. It's too much effort to get it back to blonde! I still wish my hair was a bit thicker and have to use a few extensions when I curl it. I am still growing my hair though! I have my roots tinted/dyed every 4-5weeks (roots make me very sad) with L'orel mojiblonde and I like the way my hair is very clean looking but without the blue tinge this time!


Phew what a long post that was. I hope you found it as funny as me. What did I look like back then?! Seriously guys, I'd recommend you do this, it's a laugh to look through pictures and see how you hair has changed! I guess mines not very exciting, I've never actually been that wild with me hair!

So I tag you!

Boogie night OOTD

Christmas is all busy for me as I have to work, booo.

So longer more exciting posts coming soon.

But until then here is a little night OOTD. I haven't really been out much of the holiday season and I won't be clubbing or partying on NYE, so I went out last night with my friends and had little boogie to make up for my losses!


Excuse the toilet!

Dress: ASOS
Tights: Henry Holland for Pretty Polly
Shoes: soyoushoes.co.uk
Outfit as before

Both pictures are pretty shoddy, but like I said I am rubbish at taking any before I go out, hence why I've cropped a picture of me from the night out! Double cheesy. But I wanted to show you a good shot of my beautiful tights!

I'm really getting into patterned tights this season. Any recommendations?

Merry Christmas

A big Merry Christmas you all.

Especially my 4 followers! I appreciate everyone who comments and looks a my mediocre blog!

Thanks guys!



Christmassy nails.

Max Factor polish in Ivory
OPI polish in Sparke-icious

My favourite Christmas present - Chloe perfume

and some bangles from Topshop. :)

Christmas shopping OOTD

Quick little outfit for you guys to ponder...

I stupidly decided to hit Oxford Street for the remander of my Christmas presents on Thursday (yep, the 23rd). I kind of thought everyone would have finished shopping by now and that it would be a little quieter, stupidly.

Needless to say it was very busy, I got extremely harrassed as I do with busy shops which was not helped by the fact that I wore 5inch heels and bought a very large, heavy present within the first half an hour.

Here I am taking a break from Christmas shopping and instead shopping for myself in Topshop changing rooms.



Cape: Topshop
Suede thigh high boots: Topshop
Mulberry Bayswater

Lame photo time

I suck at getting ready on time and therefore I suck at taking outfit/make up pictures. But I wanted to show a picture of me wearing the Fire and Ice lipstick from Revlon that I blogged about below, because it is such a good red!

So here is a massivly cheesy picture from my work Christmas party.

But you get the idea right?


This is near the end of the night so the corners of my lippy are starting to fade - plus I have some how managed to get a streak of it in my hair which is very tragic of me, can you spot it?! (I hardly even drank so can't blame alcohol for that mishap!)

Over all I'm really pleased with the wear of the lipstick, apart from the corner fade (but I had just eaten a 3 course meal plus wine) the colour stayed really vibrant and I'm pretty sure I managed to stay lipstick free on my teeth!

This photo does highlight how my foundation is a little too pale for me and that my eyelashes are wayyy to long! But I still love the lipstick!

Fire and Ice

May I just say these colours win in life.


Amazing.


Plus 3 for 2 at the moment in Boots. Go get, go get, go get!

The night owl...gets the shoes?

Posts have been lacking due to my money going on Christmas presents this month. Which I'm guessing is the same for most of us!

I've have obviously managed to pick up a few little bits for myself for all my hard work. Including a E.L.F haul (video coming soon - hopefully - urgh technology!) an amazing woollen cape from Topshop, and last night, these beauties.

River Island £89.99 - reduced to £55

I say last night because I worked a night shift. There aren't many advantages of being nocturnal, but Internet sales starting at around 2am has to be one. Luckily it was very quiet at work last night and doing my usual Internet shopping rounds I stumbled across the River Island website - displaying a banner saying it was updating the website for the Christmas sale....15minute website refreshing ensued (like I said...quiet)

When the sale actually went 'live' I wasn't all that impressed. I put a few bits in my 'basket' but took them out, remembering the golden rule...

"if you didn't want it full price do you really want it half price?"

But then I hit the shoe section. I've been lusting after these boots since they came out late autumn. I've tried them on a couple of times but have been put off by the price tag and colour. I mean red boots don't go with everything, plus I'd already purchased my staple winter boots for the year. That didn't stop me from stroking them every time I went into a RI though.

Finally they will be mine, granted in one size too big, but thick socks are very fashionable, right?!

Cupcaking

I adore baking.

I find it very therapeutic and I love making people happy through food! I am by no means an amazing cook but I can follow a recipe quite well.

My favourites are cupcakes, but I like my cupcakes to be more than just sponge and icing. So these badboys are chocolate with caramel centres and a chocolate cream icing.


I don't like to blow my own trumpet but these were GOOD!

I followed the recipe for the cupcake sponge and icing from this book.


The Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook - If you like baking I would advise that you get this book. It is amazing. Seriously all the recipes are good!

The chocolate cupcakes are good on there own, really moist, but to make mine a little more exciting I made some caramel sauce and injected it into the centre of the warm cake. Before letting them cool down and smothering the thick chocolate icing on top.

Caramel sauce is pretty simple, I just googled a recipe for it but all you need is sugar, butter and cream. Tastes great over ice cream too.

Anyone been to the Hummingbird Bakery?

Give a house a home!

One of my absolute favourite things to do whilst shopping is pop into Lush and pick up a bubble bar or two. It's like a little treat for my hard day shopping! Haha.

But seriously I love a bath, and although I like the excitement (ooh ahh, they are so pretty when they fizz) of a bath ballistic, I am a bubble girl at heart.

The last few times I've been into Lush I've noticed the Christmas holiday collection, but never really looked twice, I guess I prefer fresh smells and Christmas fragrances don't really fit into that category. However, the Gingerbread House bubble bar caught my eye. The few times I've seen it a stack of them always seems to be left on the stand. A little bit dodgy looking with a wonky cinnamon chimney and some unevenly scattered candy pieces, I too am guilty of leaving it on the shelve.

Not this time I thought.

I am so happy with my new home. I split it in two (seriously, one whole bar produces a lot of bubbles, no one needs that many) and used it last night. It filled my house (brick, not gingerbread) with a lovely spicy scent. It softened my skin and the other half sitting in my draw is doing a good job of making my room smell lush too!

So I implore you, ladies and gentlemen, give a house a home!

Consolation MAC

After being so horribly upset about not getting my hands on a Pink Friday lipstick last Friday. I felt the only was to console myself would be to buy a different MAC lipstick.

I decided that I wanted a coral lipstick, the 'coral' that I got from MAC a few months back is not orange enough for me and is more of a pink coral - it's Costa Chic by the way and it's swatched below. I had originally tried to get the Maybelline colour sensation in Coral Fever, but it was all sold out and my previous experiences of Maybelline lipsticks haven't been that great, so the empty shelve didn't bother me too much, I'd just have to take a trip to MAC instead.

What.A.Shame. Teehehe!

I was actually quite disappointed by the choice of MAC coral lipsticks, nothing really stood out. I even hunted around the lipglass and cremesheen stand a while too, until I plumped for Vegas Volt, it's an amplified colour and I was a little bit hesitant to how bright it would be on.

Initially, when I got it home, I was like OMG it's too similar to Costa Chic! Wahhhh, too pink! But I then swatched them together below and the difference is clear. I also thought it was a bit like Victoria - but clearly my eye is way off!

(L-R) Victoria, Costa Chic, Vegas Volt (all MAC)

My lips are naturally quite red, which I hate because it screws up all my lipsticks!

But here it is on.....


I could only get a picture with the flash on, so it looks nothing like the swatch. So it's all pretty pointless, but I thought it looked cute in the picture.

On this note, I'd love to do more posts about make-up but my camera skills are so shocking I'm finding it hard to get any decent picture of my face, my lighting is way off too. So bare with me, I'll ask for a photography book for Christmas!

Shopping freedom OOTD

After being effectively trapped inside my house for the past week, thanks to the snow, I decided to hit the shops today.

Apparently so did everybody and there mother. It was very busy, actually it was very, very busy for a Monday. I got a little harassed but it all and didn't do much shopping, although really I went to get a few Christmas bits anyway.

This is what I wore, the pictures where taken in Topshop changing rooms as that's the best light I could find. Oh, and the crouching tiger pose was an attempt for a close up of my shoes. Lets just say I am no photographer!


Very similar to my outfit the other day, but, oh well.

Jeans & Black top - True Religion
Cardi - New Look (actually stolen from my mum!)
Boots - Steve Madden
Necklace - ASOS


Sliver cross ring - Urban Outfitters
Claw ring - ASOS

In the pictures I am also wearing a black ring, but it is so old and paint chipped that I'm too embarrassed to photograph it up close!

A not so pink Friday

Image (www.thebeautyoflifeblog.com)

Due to overwhelming demand, Pink 4 Friday Lipstick is currently out of stock. Coming back on the 17th December

Damn it!

I love a MAC pink and I also love Nicki Minaj. Sigh.....why do MAC have to make it so hard?

Toe.....NOTD

My job does not allow me to wear nail polish. So any nail varnish I put on my nails is usually only on for 2 days max, unless I'm going away! Because of this I love a good pedicure! Usually I'm a fan of the Minx pedi that Nails Inc does. Actually my last one lasted almost a whole 2 months, which was amazing! But due to my boredom I've gave myself a pedi.

The thing I love about toenails is that you can be a bit slapdash and no one is going to notice. Unless of course you post pictures on your blog of your efforts.......oh.......

My half-baked leopard tootsies


Psst, don't zoom in!

Inspired by.......

This tatty leopard print hair clip


Well I tried?!

Used:

Nails Inc - Basil Street
Barry M - Black nail effects
Barry M - Mushroom
Barry M dazzledust - 39

I was hoping for a bit more gold in this nail but I forgot I chucked my gold nail polish out a few weeks ago and so I used dazzledust!

Snow bored.....

I managed to get into work today, but it was a horrible scary 20 minute journey and I have decided that car trips in the snow will be for emergencies only i.e. work. Plus the slight problem of parking in a pile of snow, rendering my car stuck, until some gentleman digs me out i.e. dad, pretty much means I'm trapped inside. I actually hate snow. So bored. So here is a boring little haul that I picked up in Selfridges last week.

May I just add that I am in love with Selfridges. Love Love Love. That yellow bag always makes me smile.

Anyway here we go


H&M nail polishes (sorry obv not from Selfridges, got waylaid on the way there!) in Moody Model (greeny blue) and Miss Stone Heart (grey).

Great colours, love that they are both a solid and sparkle free. Miss Stone Heart is 1 coat friendly and wears pretty good. Whilst Moody Model is almost 'watery' and needs a good 3 coats to be solid, meaning that it chipped very quickly. Which is a shame because I love the colour. Maybe its a dodgy batch?

MAC brush 188. Using it for stippling my foundation, its quite small which means that I can get into all my crevaces! Fab, as all MAC brushes are.

Clinique Redness Solutions foundation in calming neutral. Amazing coverage for me. I've never found Clinique foundations very good at hiding my blemishes but this does the job. It's a perfect colour for me and has good staying power. I'll probably do a post on this as I'm so pleased. Makes up for my YSL disappointment.

Laura Mercier loose setting powder in translucent. I've never been a powder wearer as I hate the chalky appearance it can give. But decided to get some of this as I'd heard good things. The jury is still out, I'm yet to go on a night out wearing so I can't really review it properly. I've been using it during the day without too much chalkiness and I guess my make-up does last longer, but I'm not raving about it so far!

Snow day!

It's snowed a good 10cm overnight here. Luckily I have a day off today, unfortunately I was planning on going shopping. I think my money spending day has been snowed off! I don't trust my driving at the best of times, let alone in a blizzard.

So here is a wintery NOTD with a mixture of two new polishes

Bottom coat is Mavala in 'Elle' - a solid grey with dark purple tones. Whilst the top coat is OPI 'Sparkle-icious' from the Burlesque range - a clear polish with big glitter particles in gold, blue and pink/purple.

Elle is a great wintery colour - not much to a say other than that. But Sparkle-licious is fabbbb! I just wish the glitter was a bit more densely packed, it's not really a colour you can wear alone. Looking forward to trying it over other colours though!

OOTD

Is it weird that I'm taking pictures next to the toilet?


Top: Miss Selfridge
Trousers: True Religion
Scarf: H&M
Shoes: soyoushoes.co.uk

Anyway two slightly different outfit. The first one is want I was planning on wearing today, I just took my Grandma out for lunch for her birthday. But at the last minute I just changed my top as I thought I was perhaps looking too 'beige', although I actually prefer this outfit now I've seen them both.


Top: Topshop
Rest of outfit: As before

Excuse the lighting in this picture, it was taken after I'd been out so the light is turning a bit rubbish!

Must just say I am a massive fan of H&M scarfs, this particular one is an amazing colour match to my trousers and is a fab dupe of Louis Vuitton's scarf this season. I must just add that I'm not usually a lover of designer clothes 'fakes', least of all Louis, but I actually went and stroked the real LV scarf the other day and lets just say that it is definitely not worth near on £500! (obviously if anyone wants to give me one for free then go on ahead!)

Dear santa.....

Image (www.trendhunter.com)

Please.....

Much Love xx

Mamma Mia!

Image (http://mamamiostretchmark.com/)

You may or may not have heard about Mama Mio. I believe its a relatively new brand, mainly aimed at mums-to-be. I am not a mother nor am I a mother-to-be. But I reckon I found a little gem in the brand!

I was introduced to the brand just under a year ago. Whilst I was minding my own business, having a facial, my beautician commented on how scarred my cheeks were, (yeah, cheers for that love). Anyhoo, I agreed, years of being a serial spot picker had taken its toll on my rather delicate face. She recommended the See-no-Scar solution from the Mama Mia range. I'd never heard of the brand but I must have been feeling frivolous that day because I got it. I remember really liking it but being so annoyed when I ran out 2 weeks later that I never re-purchased it.

Image (www.heaven-spa.co.uk)

Fast forward to now. I decided to have a overhaul of my skin regime and remember my brief love for the stuff. So decided to buy it again. £24.50 later I am in love again.

Now I know £24.50 doesn't seem like a massive spend, but you actually only get 30mls. The bottle is sneakily larger than its contents.....but I digress, down the the nitty-gritty

The Claim

"See-No-Scar Solution will help magic away the reminders of any serious or surgical scars"

The Reality

I'm using it on acne scars, which I don't think I can claim are 'serious', but they are obvious when I'm make-up free. My skin has always been rubbish but I just kind of thought that as long as I had a decent foundation my skin underneath didn't really matter. I've been using the soultion for around 2 weeks now and I can 100% see an improvement. The scar have become a lot less noticable and my skin just looks 'plumper' and smoother.

The only one negative I have about it, is the fact that it does make my skin look extremely shiny after application. I guess it's not actually marketed as a face cream, and so on any other part of the body it wouldn't matter if it gave you any extra sheen. Because of this I tend to use it all over at night and then just on my cheeks during the day, which are the most scarred areas of my face, and don't tend to get shiny (that said, I still use a good matte primer)

I would easliy recommend See-no-Scar soultion, and it's becoming more readily avaliable (in fact, I'm sure I saw it in Debenhams the other day)

OOTD

Excuse the fact that this is taken in my bathroom, it's the best light I could find that morning!
Wore this outfit for a little shopping expedition, which was not very fruitful.



Fur (fake) gilet: New Look
Checked shirt: H&M
Leggings & boots: River Island

The plan was to wear my hair down, unfortunately my hair is quite a similar colour my my fur gilet (I'm not sure this is a good thing at all) and as someone kindly pointed out when I wore this with my hair down before, it does, in fact, look like an extension of my own locks. Brown gilet may need to be purchased.....

The accidental purchase

On returning from my holiday about 2 weeks ago I have been slapping on body moisturiser like nobody's buisness in an effort to delay the inevitable....peeling and fading.

I have a few fail safe moisturisers, Palmers Cocoa Butter, The Body Shop body butter (any smell is good with me) and any Soap and Glory moisturiser. But I really begrudge spending much money on body moisturiser, I'm not quite sure why but I do. So when I ran out of my usuals I popped into my local Savers to find the cheapest moisturiser whose brand I had heard of. This is what I picked up



Huh? Doesn't look much like a moisturiser to me. Yes, that is exactly what I thought when I opened it up after my bath to slather on. That folks, is because it is not. Silly me picked up a body scrub instead. But what a fab little product it is.

Feels like its really working, without being too harsh (and I do like a rough scrub), but it moisturises at the same time, and it smells lush!

Good use of £1.79!

Shoppers Block

After very little sleep last night I set out for my shopping trip with a spring in my step, a song in my heart and a credit card in my purse.

I returned bags-o-plenty, but with a feeling of guilt on spending a little too much dosh. And as the bags have been opened and the new purchases flung on the floor, I'm actually starting to feel a bit depressed. The day had such promise......


So I got the aformentioned wedges. During my sleepless night I had already pretty much made up my mind that they were to be mine. I'm having second thoughts though, the colour is a beaut but they only really go with jeans and although I know they will be worn, will I actually get near £90 worth of wear out of them?

Whilst I was in River Island, I duelly noted that there sale had started today, I couldn't be bothered to go through the clothes section but had a browse through the sale shoes. Where I came across these boots. I've wanted a pair of flat, lace up boots for winter and these seemed like a good idea. Size 5, perfect. Random lady commented on how nice they looked. Gay SA (well I presumed he was gay, he was wearing UGGs) reassured me that, no, they didn't look like moon boots and that he was upset that they went on sale today as they were his favourite style. Plus the fact they were £30 (from £74.99) all equates to a purchase for me. However I overlooked the small detail of them being white. Can anyone get away with white boots? No. I think is the answer to that question. Perfect fitting and cheap or not these bad boys are going back to the store.



My last RI buy was a cape. Tricky to pull off but we all know capes are en Vogue for the season and it was £59.99. Unfortuantly I found it on the 'buy it now' rail or whatever its called. Alerting me to the fact that they only had one left, in a size 12. I usually wear size 6-8, but its a cape right? It's one size fits all surely? Plus the pipeing matches my new wedge/boots perfectly.....If I keep them



Oh and I also snaffled this ring, very McQueen, £4 and I cannot resist a ring, or 3.



My other purchases included a dress for saturday night (doesn't fit), YSL Touche Eclat (and 'Top Secret' eye depuffer, that I probably didn't need and got talked into buying) a very good copy of the Louis Vuitton leopard stole and a black tassle clutch (that is a little OTT in retrospect) both from H&M and a red riding hood halloween outfit (more on that later, possibly)

So I guess slightly sucessful, but overwhellmingly disappointing.

Jetlag

Ahhhh the good old blog. Many have been started and forgotten. I start this particular one due to the fact it is 00.26 and I cannot sleep. I've been struck down by the dreaded jetlag.'

"I don't get jetlag" I heard myself cry to my boyfriend, "I slept so well last night"

"The second night home is always the worst" said he.

He was, unfortunatly, correct.

Anyway I guess at least it gives me time to online shop. Regardless of the fact I have just been to Miami, where the sun is shining, the people are beautiful and the shopping is cheap (or cheaper than here). Also regardless of the fact that I brought two bursting suitcases home both over the weight limit. Bursting with clothes, shoes and Lucky Charms.

Still a girl can never have too many clothes, shoes or Lucky Charms.

These are the current shoes I wish for

I actually want them in the tan colour, but they don't have it on the website. But believe me, they are a real gorgeous buttery tan colour and fit perfectly. The only downside to these beauties is the fact they are almost below ankle height, exactly where my stick like legs are the 'stickiest', perfect for skinny jeans wear, but I'm doing the legging challenge with them tomorrow. That'll be the decider. The £84.99 decider.......