Cupcakes for the New Year !

Happy New Year my lovely bloggers, wishing you all a fantastic 2011 filled with happiness & success.
I am having a little get together tonight at our home with friends and kids. I have been busy making Cupcakes for the party and am really pleased with the results.
I have 6 young girls coming to the party so of course i had to have pink. leopard and glitter for them, ooh yes and a bit of chocolate fudge too. Whats a party without chocolate Right?

I have had to hide them away before the kids scoff them all ha. I'm really pleased as it's only my second attempt even though it did take me forever to ice and decorate them ha.
Have a great night everybody and catch up with you all next year xxx

Pick a pretty pigment !

I thought i might do a few short random posts about some of my favourite pigments to show you ladies. I have quite a few loose pigments and from different ranges and some of them are lovely.
Whilst i love MAC Pigments, there are so many great affordable similar products on the market that i thought I'd start with a cheapy but amazing colour from GOSH:

 

GOSH: In the nude £4.50, I have just looked online and this seems to have been discontinued which is such a shame as its such a pretty colour which is great on the lid and also as a highlighter. I hate it when my favourites get discontinued :( 

If you are lucky though you might be able to pick one up on Ebay for a snippet. xx

Babyliss Big Hair

Hello everyone! I just wanted to do a quick post about my Babyliss Big Hair styler which my lovely husband brought me for Xmas. I was really surprised as i only mentioned it once when i saw it on an advert so it was a lovely surprise.
My hair is very fine and I'm always looking for ways to give it some ooomph.

 Now for those of you who don't know about it. It's a large barreled brush that drys the hair whilst spinning to create fullness and volume. Pretty much like a blow dry but much easier.

 

I washed my hair and blasted it with the hairdryer until it was about 90% dry. Then i applied a small amount of tresemme mousse Volume and Lift to the root areas and sectioned my hair off.

The Big hair is easy to use and it doesn't get knotted up even on long hair like mine. It is easy to control and you can spin the brush in either direction so great for flicking out the ends or smoothing under.

Please excuse the fresh faced no makeup look in these next pictures but i tested it out last night before bed.

It really gives amazing root lift & it leaves my hair looking shiny and bouncy. I cannot recommend it enough. I have to admit i did find it more time consuming than normal but it is worth the extra time as i could never get this much volume before unless i did some back combing or curling with the straighteners.
Priced at around £45 but I've seen it on offer so you might get it a lot cheaper if you shop around.

The Body Shop Big & Curly Mascara Review !

Hi there ladies, I thought it was well overdue to do a little review about The Body Shop mascara Big and Curvy. Over the xmas period i have been alternating between false lashes and mascara on days when I'm feeling lazy. It is so hard to find the perfect mascara and i love reading other peoples reviews on them.

I love the pink packaging of this mascara.

 The brush tapers to a thin end and the bristles are shortish but quite spread out.
I dont have a personal favourite when it comes to brushes but i do find it easy to apply.

 So the above photo is with just 1 coat of mascara. I like the fact that it is quite a wet formula and even with 1 coat it makes my lashes look a lot fatter.

2nd coat applied
The formula is very thickening and it works well for my short stubby lashes. I am a little disappointed though to find it doesn't hold the curl very well at all. The name would suggest otherwise? But having said that my eyelashes don't hold a curl well with most mascaras.

It costs £10 from the body shop and is only available in black. I don't get any smudging with this and i find it fairly easy to remove. The colour is a nice dark glossy black which stays that way throughout the day.

I would give this mascara 8/10 

Have you tried any of the body shop mascaras? What is your favourite mascara right now?

Xmas Wishes!

Here's hoping you all had a wonderful xmas and hoping that Santa brought you something nice. I'm enjoying a bit of a rest and will be back to regular posts soon. xxx

Bargain False Eyelashes Allert !

Hello girls, I just wanted to let you know about the recent order i purchased from E Bay in my quest to find some good quality lashes at a decent price.
I have ordered in bulk before and to be honest the quality has been a bit rubbish. But this time i am more than happy with my order on both quality and price. Here's what i purchased:

The first ones i choose was this set of upper and lower lashes costing £1.98 here. I've never tried bottom lashes before so thought i would give it a go.

 

 Next i Choose 5 pairs of invisible backbone lashes IB10 costing £3.48 here.

Application is really simple:

Remove the lash from the tray and cut the edges to size if needed.

Apply a little glue and wait about 30 seconds before gently pushing into place with tweezers.

 This is the angle i apply my lashes at. I always apply 1 coat of mascara to my natural lashes first.

 My favourite glue without a doubt is the duo adhesive. My lashes never stray when i use this.

The end result with these lashes is really natural. Perfect for an everyday look or a wedding makeup.

 These next lashes were the ones that drew me into looking at this shop in the first place as they are a very close copy to ardell Wispies which are my favourite lash. Bearing in mind i pay about £6 a pair for those and i received 5 pairs of these for just £4.68 :) You can see the attraction. Buy them here

 As you can see they are long but still natural looking. They really give eyes a bit of drama. I love them.

Even from a distance and at different angles they look good.

I also brought 2 other packs of 5 lashes:

Postage was free over £15 so my total for 21 pairs of lashes was £16.50. I can honestly say that all the lashes are extremely soft and the band is nice and flexible so easier to apply than most.
Oh and delivery was really fast. 3 days and they were here, just in time for xmas.
I find Ebay very hit and miss with lashes and i have purchased cheaper ones that are so hard that i had to throw them away. This was my 1st purchase of many more from this fab shop. xx

Bling on the teal !

Morning everyone, oooh it's getting exciting now, just 4 days till Xmas day. I have been busy these last few days and my nails have been left unpainted looking boring, so yesterday i decided to jazz them up with a bit of sparkle.

 1 Coat of no7 Totally Teal, 1 coat of W7 glitter and Sally Hanson Mega Shine Top Coat

So it's not a colour for the faint hearted but if you cant wear this full blown colour now then when can you? I Love it so much I've even given my tootsies a matching set. xx

Sexy hair Reinvent shampoo & conditioner

Sexy hair products is a favourite range of mine. I became hooked on the products after trying some mini sizes of the hair play powder and dry hair shampoo. So i was delighted to hear about this latest range of shampoos and conditioners.

Here's what Sexy hair have to say about the products:

Reinvent is ideal for dry, damaged, aging, over-processed or colour-treated hair.

 Two nourishing regimes for fine/thin or thick/coarse hair, which will hydrate and help repair, rebuild and strengthen — literally reinventing — your hair, from the inside out.

So What did i think? 

I have been using these for about 3 weeks now and i have found them brilliant. The smell is lovely and fresh and the shampoo lathers up nicely. They leave my hair ultra shiny and lovely and smooth without weighing my hair down.

My colour looks bright and seems to have faded less than usual. 

I   I am impressed to read that this gentle, moisturising formulas treat hair with coconut 

    oil , bamboo extract and acai berry, and contain NO: soap, parabens, gluten or 

    alcohol.  So not full of nasties like a lot of shampoos.

    You can buy these products from lookfantastic 

    Shampoo £12.99 Conditioner £13.49

    Have you tried anything from this range before?

Cupcakes and guess work!

Evening everyone, today's post comes a little later than usual because i have been having a bit of a lazy day.
I have been waiting patiently for some scales to arrive in the post so i could have a go at making Cupcakes but they still haven't arrived.
Soooo i decided to just rough guess it, throw it all in and keep my fingers crossed and luckily for me the cakes came out OK ha.
I just want to say thank you to the lovely Milly at pearls and poodles for the inspiration to give baking a try again. Her cupcakes are amazing and looking at her pictures on her blog makes me want to get my mixing spoon out instantly.

So here's what we made: Cupcake Xmas trees:

 I was waiting for silver balls and dark green colouring but my order hasn't arrived so edible glitter and sparkles was put to good use. I don't think it looks bad for a first attempt . Besides they wont last very long in our house anyway.

 The kids loved it and we had a really good time eating a few of our creations afterwards as well.

Of course i had to let the kids do some on there own too and here's what they came up with:

Anyway, i have got lots of pretty girly pink toppings for my next attempt so i think i will make some for new year and hopefully they will look a bit better than these ones.
Hope you are all having a great evening xxx

A few tiny treats for little old me :)

Hi there, my gorgeous girlies, I have been very restrained lately and stopped buying things for myself as all those pennies have been spent on xmas pressies. But this last week i thought I'd treat myself to a few little cheapy things just because i deserve it  (he he).
Here's what I've been buying:

 Long sleeved tops & warm fluffy slippers

Primark hair accessories & rings

 Baking books to help me on my quest to become a domestic goddess

I have spent a few hours today buying the last of the xmas presents and now it's time to relax and enjoy i think. The next week will be spent playing xmas music, cleaning ( I told you I'm on a quest to be a domestic goddess ) pampering myself, baking with the kids, watching movies, wrapping presents and drinking the odd glass of wine.
How will you be spending this week ???

super simple smokey eyes

I love the smokey eye look. It is my favourite look of all time. Be it soft and smokey or dark and intense and just about everything in between. I know a lot of people say they find it the hardest look to do so i thought I'd share my easiest smokey look. It takes 5 mins and i think it's subtle enough for everyday but still looks a bit sexy for a night out.

 The first product i apply is MAC Blackground paint pot. I find this works great as a base and the almost black colour instantly gives a bit of depth to the eyes. I apply this just to the lid without blending.
Step 2 with a soft brush apply Barry M black gold dust over the lid on top of the base colour.
Step 3 Using a clean soft brush blend it out.
Step 4 Apply a soft pencil under the eyes ( i used gosh Metallic brass ) & add mascara.

Smokey eyes done.

Obviously this is subtle, you can add winged liner, falsies etc but i just wanted to keep it simple like the title suggests ha.
The reason it is so easy as well is that the barry m pigment is quite sheer so it sticks well to the base but blends out really easily :)

I wore it with MAC Angel lipstick and added just a hint of blusher as it was daytime and i didn't want it to look too full on.

Do you have a combo that you turn too for a quick and easy smokey look?