Festive Fridays #6

Hi Guys,

Today is my last Festive Friday post! I've enjoyed doing these Christmassy themed posts, it's been the only thing getting me into the Christmas spirit! Honestly, the last week has been so stressful. It's been jam packed with things to do, and I haven't had a spare minute to post anything. Really I should have scheduled posts but I just didn't get around to it! 

What makes me really happy is that people are still reading my blog, so thank you for your support during this busy time!!! 

This Festive Friday post is just to say...

Have a Merry Christmas!

I hope each and every one of you gets exactly what you wish for over the holiday period.

I'm not sure how much I'll be able to post over the next week and a half because my family are coming up to stay at the new house. Plus we have some furniture to make, specifically a wardrobe, my floordrobe idea hasn't been going well!

Hopefully I'll be popping in soon to show you some beautiful Christmas Day nails! That's if I have time of course...

See you soon! And thanks for sticking with me!

Festive Fridays #5

Hi Guys,

I've been a very bad blogger! This week, as I mentioned, I've been staying at my Mum's house. But we've been sorting out our old house ready to hand the keys in. It's been so stressful and we finally handed them in today! Yesterday we decided to take a break from thinking about the move and went to a swimming pool with a slide and everything. It was nice to have a relaxing family day but it meant we had lots to do today. I say we had lots to do, my boyfriend did it all!

Tonight I have another Festive Friday post and this time it's all about me! These are a couple of bits and  pieces from my Christmas list this year!

IKEA Helmer in white - £25:

Helmer in white - £25

I've been blogging since March and I still don't have the classic blogger storage unit: the IKEA Helmer. I love IKEA, it's a good day trip out (haha!) and I love the furniture. In fact, I was there yesterday before swimming to buy a new bed, our little double looks lost in our new bedroom so we got a superking sized one. I can't wait to buy new bedding, it's one of my favourite things to buy. I want the Helmer in white to match the rest of my furniture, it's all white in our room.

Yankee Candle, Large Jar, Snow in Love - £19.99

Snow in Love Candle - £19.99

In my new house, the only thing missing from the living room is a nice big candle. I love the look of Yankee Candles in their jars, and I think Snow in Love is such a beautiful smell, it's from their winter range. The link in the photo caption will take you to the page showing the whole Snow in Love range. On the Yankee Candle site, most of this range is out of stock, but these candles are widely available... Even a little card shop in town here stocks them!

Topshop Amos Boots - £62

Amos Boots - £62

I am in desperate need for a pair of boots. I got some from Kurt Geiger last year and they look a bit scruffy now, so I want something else to wear day to day. I spotted these boots in my local Topshop when I was trying on another pair that I liked. They made my feet look really long so I tried these instead and fell in love with them. They're comfy, and they can be dressed up or down. I wear boots every day in the colder months and I think these would be perfect for the job!

Baking Made Easy by Lorraine Pascale - £4.85 at Amazon

Baking Made Easy - £4.85

It's no secret that I love baking, and this is one of many baking books that I want. There is a recipe in there for lemon and blueberry mille-feuille that I can't wait to cook! I love this programme and watch it whenever I catch it on TV, the recipes look really simple and I was really pleased there was a book to go along with it! 

Mummy Mitts - £19.99

Mummy Mitts - £19.99

No, these aren't floating hands, they're gloves! I need these gloves for my son's pushchair so badly. The cold weather is really damaging the skin on my hands no matter how hard I try to keep them moisturised, so these gloves that velcro onto the handle would be perfect to keep my hands warm!

So that's it, my five picks from my Christmas list this year. Obviously my list is longer than five items (a girl can dream, right?) but I hope a couple of these things are hiding under my tree on the 25th!

I hope you enjoyed a little peek into my Christmas list, see you next time!

Have a great weekend!

......................

Before I go, I just want to say that my thoughts are with the parents of the children who lost their lives today in Connecticut. I can't imagine anything worse than losing a child, my son is my absolute world, and my heart goes out to each and every one of them. This time of year is supposed to be about happiness, and to have your happiness stolen from you by some madman with a gun is sickening. It is at times like these when everything gets put into perspective, and you realise that you can't take anything for granted, especially your loved ones.

Models Own Utopia

Hi Guys,

Tonight's post will be pretty short and sweet because I'm so exhausted! I've been stressed out for ages now about this move and we finally moved everything this weekend. We drove up to the house on Sunday (230 miles) and unpacked it all that day. I say we unpacked it, I was shut in a room with my son while my boyfriend, Mum and brother unpacked it! We haven't sorted out any Internet yet, it's going to be activated a week tomorrow, so I couldn't post yesterday, but I'm down at my Mum's now until the weekend so I'm connected again!

I'm happy to say the house is as beautiful as I remembered it to be, and I can't wait to get on and decorate it to make it perfect. All in good time, with Christmas around the corner, now is not the time!

Anyway, I have another Models Own polish to show you tonight. I know it seems like all I ever post about is Models Own, but since I bought 20 shades in their last sale, I have a lot to try out and show you!

I used this polish in a previous post where I layered a gold flakie over the top of it. You can see that post here. It is called Utopia, and it's not the kind of colour I would usually buy, but I love it so much now that I have it. It is one of the iconic Models Own shades.

Utopia is a very pale pink creme and it is perfectly opaque in two coats as shown in the photos below. I haven't used any top coat.

Natural light

Sunlight

I've worn this so much already, and I find that as the weather is getting colder, I want a cold, pale colour and this is perfect. I think it will see me through to the spring too when I'll be wanting pastels, it is so versatile. 

This retails at all the usual Models Own stockists and on the Models Own site for £5, but I bought this in the half price sale so I got it for £2.50. If you see this and don't know whether or not it will be right for you, then just go ahead and buy it, you won't regret it! I definitely don't!

Festive Friday #4

Hi Guys,

Time for another Festive Friday post! Last week I didn't do one because it fell on the same day as my Five Favourites post, so it's nice to be back.

I'm trying so hard to get into the Christmas spirit but it's hard with the move. We have no tree up because the whole house is being packed into a van tomorrow, and so far I have bought one present... I need to be settled and then everything is all going to come at once!

Anyway, this post is focusing on something I think is a must have: FESTIVE JUMPERS! I love festive jumpers and I wish it was socially acceptable to wear them all year round, but it isn't... So I like to wear them from around November until March...

Last winter I got an amazing jumper which I wore on Christmas day! It was from eBay and it's so cute, here it is:

Last Christmas

Click "Read More" to see my picks of the best festive jumpers around! As always the links are in the captions.

Dollish Polish Girls Rule, Boys Drule!

Hi Everybody,

I hope you're all okay! My life has been a nightmare the last 2 days, we've just been packing, packing, packing! My boyfriend got home on Monday and we started packing the house up on Tuesday. It was his birthday yesterday but poor him, he had to spend the whole day getting ready for the move! We're doing a big trip up to the house with a 7.5 ton lorry on Sunday. I'm excited to see the house again, I haven't seen it in a couple of months so I've nearly forgotten what it's like. Not to mention it'll be nice to be in a house that isn't full of boxes, until the new house has all the boxes in it at least!

I'm so excited to have an indie polish to show you! It feels like ages since I bought any. In fact it hasn't, but I just didnt get around to swatching the Dollish Polish Halloween Collection before Halloween... And a month and a half later it might be cruel to show of some things that are impossible to get hold of, so I think I'll save them for some NOTD posts later on, maybe in January when I'm missing Christmas and missing some sparkle!

The same thing sort of applies with the polish I have to show you... Girls Rule, Boys Drule consists of matte pink and purple hex glitter suspended in a clear base. It was super limited edition, with only 300 bottles made. In order to buy it you had to submit your interest in an online form and then Dolly picked out 300 names and sent Paypal invoices. You had to pay within 24 hours or someone else would get picked out. It probably took me 24 seconds to pay my invoice...

The photos below show two coats of Girls Rule, Boys Drule over Essie Bikini So Teeny. I used two coats of NYC Colors Turbo Dry Top Coat on top of this and it was perfectly smooth.

Before I post the swatches, can I just give a little bit of a shout out to the new Dollish bottles, I love them!

Ok, swatches now! Sorry there is only one picture of the polish on my nails. The weather has been so dull. I can't wait to get a lightbox!

The weather was terrible, this is flash photo taken outside
to give the illusion of sunlight!

Macro of the bottle

I think this is so beautiful, I want to layer it over more colours. I'll definitely post photos when I do! It's pretty similar-ish (not a dupe) to Ninja Polish Girly Floam so you could maybe get that if you're gutted you can't get this one. But Ninja Polish stuff is hard to get hold of, I'm dying for Floam so it's best to subscribe to stock emails.

Before I go, I just want to say a thank you to Dolly for bringing out such gorgeous nail polishes. I've been a loyal customer for a while since the old Esty days and I'm still pleasantly surprised by her collections! She has a lot of vision and will probably remain my favourite indie creator for a while. I love the indie nail polish revolution and I've loved being part of it as a customer. I really hope I can be a part of it as a creator one day!

Five Favourites: NOVEMBER!

Hi Guys,

I meant to post this on Friday in place of a Festive Friday, seeing as it was the last post of the month, but I was very stressed beyond belief so I couldn't bring myself to sit down and write a post. I found out on Thursday that I had two house viewings so I spent two days frantically tidying before Saturday morning! It's one thing to have your house tidy enough that it doesn't drive you insane, and it's a whole other thing altogether to have it ready for viewings, especially with a nearly 14 month old child walking about causing havoc!

Anyway, the viewings went well and one of the couples took it, so we won't have to keep on paying rent until March after we move out this month! It was stressful, but all's well that ends well... And now my boyfriend is coming home, he gets here tomorrow (technically later on today, in 12 hours actually because I'm writing this at 4am!) so I'll have a bit of weight off my shoulders and someone to share the burden with me...

Here are my Five Favourites for this month, well, it's Four Favourites and a Hate!

1. My son started walking! 

Clarks Crazy Dig Fst Shoes in Brown Leather

This month my son finally felt confident enough to walk properly! He's been cruising along the furniture since he was 7 months old, and has been able to cut corners with a few steps for a couple of months, but two weeks ago he walked across the room and now he's on a roll. He's got his proper little shoes from Clarks (pictured above) and he's doing really well!

2. Eyebrow threading

I got this photo here but I don't know if it's actually theirs to credit...

I've always been a huge fan of threading. I first got my eyebrows done in 2007 and it changed my life! But before I moved back to England from Spain in summer '08, I couldn't get them done, and then I was a student, so £15 a time in Debenhams was a huge spend, so I struggled along. Now, a few years later, most shopping malls have a stall that does it for a fiver! I just got my eyebrows done on Friday, I can't keep away from these places. The shopping centre near me is really small but they still had a stall and they were so busy that they're now renting a whole salon and offering other treatments, it's great!

3. Getting ready for Christmas!

Credit here

I am feeling very Christmassy... Everywhere I go, Christmas music is playing, and I've started my Christmas shopping. Up until now I hated Christmas stuff happening in November but this year I'm loving it. I think it's because the summer here was so terrible that I just want Christmas to happen now to make myself feel better. I'm dying to put our Christmas tree up, but that will have to wait until after the move... Knowing me, it'll be up on the 24th of December!

4. Mum's birthday!

Credit here

It was my Mummy's birthday on the 29th. She's a total tomboy but she likes a bit of pampering, so I got her some nail treatments, lots of Sally Hansen, some nail polishes, nails wraps and a hair dryer and styling product. I love to spoil my Mum with things she wouldn't buy herself, and I treated her to an Indian takeaway tonight that was so yummy!

This is the card I got her. One of her dogs is a bit mental and she looks like a meerkat, so I couldn't resist this card. I got the Audrey Hepburn one because Breakfast at Tiffany's is my favourite film. This card looked like Maddie was dressed up as Holly Golightly, my Mum loved it!

........

And for number five, there is something that is NOT my favourite, but has had a huge impact on me this month...

5. The weather 

Credit here

It has to be said, the weather is crazy cold right now. There have been severe floods in a lot of the country and I'm so grateful it hasn't happened where I live, but let's just say I can't wait for the summer... I went out the other day at at midday it was one degree. ONE! That's 33.8 degrees for all you Fahrenheit people! It's going to get a lot colder. January is usually the coldest month and if it has already been getting to -5 at night, I dread to think what it will be like then! I did an exercise class on Thursday in a tshirt, and I'm still not over my cold, it's horrendous!

........

I hope you enjoyed this post, sorry it was so delayed!

What has happened in your life the past month that you've loved or hated?

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