Wedding Fever!

Hi all!

I hope you're having a lovely weekend!

Today I will be off to my friends wedding and I'm so excited!

It's the first wedding out of all of my friends and I think all of us are really looking forward to it.

I've been getting ready pretty much all week, as you can imagine! I've been scrubbing and scrubbing so my skin is buffed to perfection before my tan was applied last night so fingers crossed it won't turn out to be patchy or streaky!

I had a pedicure the other week that I am hoping will still be in tact by Saturday. I went for gold glitter for lots of sparkle as choosing an actual colour was so hard!

For my fingers I have been playing all week with different nudes and effects. I am sure I will be tweeting a picture of my nails if you'd like to see the end result...

I previously wrote about my dress choices in my post here i you'd like to see them, but I eventually picked this pink shift dress from LK Bennett:

It's such a classic cut in a bright colour and I think it will be perfect!

I'm teaming it with nude heels and bag and this jacket for when it goes colder in the evenings:

What do you think of my wedding outfit choices?

I've also got a diamante comb for my hair, I always curl it but never do anything else with it so am planning on pinning it half up with the comb so it's a bit more special.

Any tips for weddings?? Do you have any friend's weddings to go to coming up?

I have another in a month or two after so I'll be planning my outfit for that one soon enough!!

L xxx

Tea Time!

Both me and M have been so busy the last few weeks and lots of things have happened, so I decided to do a catch up post instead of a product review today. So get yourself a brew and settle down.....

I am absolutely loving my new job and it's everything I've been hoping for....but helllllllllllllllllllll is it hard work!

There's so much to learn my brain feels like its about to explode every evening I come home, I've even got into bed at 7pm and completely crashed out til the next day.

I'm still training but now that I've got the basics I'm getting to do a lot more fun things (if you can call analysing drugs a fun thing?!) so fingers crossed my brain won't be so bombarded soon.

They've even offered for me to a PhD next year...eeeeek!

The biggest event this week was of course M's birthday! We had a lush day at the spa on Thursday, we started off in the gym knowing that we had a huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuge afternoon tea to follow:



Look at those sandwiches, warm scones and welsh cakes, pastries and even jelly and strawberries!

There must have been 1000s of calories on this tray so I was pretty glad I'd been to the gym before it.

 

Afterwards we got glammed up and went for a few cocktails before M met her family for food.

I wore out an animal print jump suit with nude court shoes, and M had on a dress she got for her birthday which was a gorgeous burgundy lace dress from Lydia Rose Brights collection.

 

We have the same plan of attack whenever we go for cocktails, first drink is a Cosmo followed by a Long Island Iced Tea. After that we tend to grab whatever else is on the deal (ha!) but we thought we'd try a different one called a Kentucky Jewel which we would 100% recommend ;)

We also went shopping last weekend and I picked up a few naughty pieces!
First up was an unplanned dress purchase....a beautiful red dress from Oasis in the sale for £35. I couldn't resist it as it was so beautiful on, a classic shape and colour......and in the sale!

The blazer was a cheeky Zara purchase. I did need a blazer for the weddings I have coming up, and although this beauty was £50 I know it will be worn a lot and will go with every dress that I have to wear to weddings and other summer events. Hopefully this will be worth the cash!

I've been working hard at the gym recently so I decided to pick myself up some new trainers. I know everyone loves the super bright coral Nikes and I would love to get some for myself but at £90 with crazy delivery I will have to wait for now!
I picked these up from the Nike Factory store for a bargainous £38 and cannot wait to rock up to the gym today with them on.

What have you been up to recently? What have you been spending on and looking forward to?

Me and M have a night out planned for next week.....I'm thinking of wearing the red dress! Do you like it?

Hope you're all having a gorgeous weekend in the sun!

L xxx

LK Bennett Spree

Well girls, (and any gents!) I have officially got to the age where my friends are getting married.

I am currently single so talk of weddings is a) not on my radar, and b) getting a little too much sometimes.

A lot of my friends have been very fortunate in that they've got jobs straight out of uni and haven't had to do Masters etc and so as a result are considerably better off than myself.

Because of this weddings and mortgages are a constant topic of conversation, and whilst I love my friends and am happy they are getting everything they want out of life it's difficult when you can just about make ends meet. 

I have 2 friends getting married this year and as I have now got myself a new job I decided it was time to splash out a little and get myself some really nice dresses to wear to the weddings as I really am excited for them and will have the photos forever!

Wedding 1 is a big fancy city affair with lots and lots of guests and she is spending absolute thousands on it, whereas in contrast Wedding 2 is a more home made and country type celebration and done to a budget. This meant it was going to be a challenge to find something that could be worn for both weddings (we all knew I was going to have to buy 2 in the end though don't we!)

I'd been to Swindon's designer outlet many times and never seen anything in my size in LK Bennett, so was absolutely astounded when I went there recently and found not 1, not 2, but 7 dresses all in my size.

It was like I'd won the lottery.

I legged it to the changing room, stripped off and tried on each dress one by one, twirling around in front of the mirror with a borrowed pair of LK Bennett court shoes that the lady kindly lent me.

It was amazing until I whittled my choices down to 3 dresses and had to make the important decision which to buy and which to keep.

Originally I'd planned to get one dress because the weddings are for friends from different groups and I could get away with wearing the same dress, but after this decided it had to be 2.
I thought I'd made my decision until my mum insisted one looked better so i was stuck, until she caved and offered to buy me one THANK YOU SO MUCH MUM. She won't ever read this but all the same, I appreciate it so very much, and keep looking at my purchases every now and then!

Without further waffling on lets get and show you my most prized posessions!!!

This is for wedding 1:







I had to get a bigger size so that it would do up over my boobs but luckily it doesn't look baggy, even though I can hold a considerable amount of the material around my lower half.
I own those magic pants with padding in to make your bum appear more like Beyonce's so I think I'll wear those seeing as no one will be seeing me undressed and I can look more proportional!


The next two are actually the same dress in 2 different colours. This was what I was having trouble choosing between as they're multifunctional and can be worn both ways round.
I absolutely love both colours and was finding it hard to choose!










Love this one as, I'm not afraid to say it, I felt like Kate Middleton in my navy LKB dress!

This one is so comfy and flattering with the ruching it's not hard to see why this was so popular. Especially as it can be reversed as shown below.
The only issue with wearing it with a low back is finding a bra, but I'm sure i can find one that will do.

I love the shape it gives me and this is the one my mum insisted on making me buy so bought it for me herself. It was also the cheapest so she did well there ;)
Her argument was that I could wear this to many things including work if there was an occasion and I'm hoping one day she's right.


This is the same dress in coral.







This one didn't seem as flattering as the navy one the second time, mainly as I could see my underwear through it so I'm going to have to be careful, but I just love coral and can't get enough of it!

These styles are all classic so hopefully as long as I don't gain any weight I'll be ok to keep and wear them for a few years to come! I imagine I'll be going to more and more weddings now as more of my friends get engaged and have another to go to next year already.

Which do you think I should wear to wedding 2? It's in September, so could be wholly dependent on the weather! Also, which way round should I wear them??

What do you think of LK Bennett? Do you shop in the discounted designer outlets?

I'm a huge fan!

L xxx

H and M haul and Discount Codes

My mum is a right little bargain hunter lately.  I'm always getting texts through telling me of a new site she's found or bargain piece.  I keep telling her I'm trying to be good and not spend.  My spending ban really did change my spending habits.  Lack of money probably adds to it as well.

My mum sent me a text last week to tell me she'd found a dress on H and M for only £3.99. She kindly offered to buy me it and told me to get a few more bits.

Here is the bargain dress.  Full price is only £7.99. I love the simplicity of it and how easy it is to wear. It comes in four colours.  Unfortunately you can only order one per order and you have to spend over a certain amount to spend online (I think it's £7). I went with the leopard print.  I love leopard print but think it can be hard to wear.  I decided the style of the dress would save it from being tacky!

One thing that annoyed me with all the items I ordered was the sizing.  You either have the option of size 6-8 or 10-12 being a size 8-10 I was unsure what size to go for. In the dress I went with 10-12 as I thought it would look better if it was a bit if a loose fit.

I'm always on the look out for baggy but shapely jumpers.  I loved the mix of neon and grey in this jumper.  I went for the 10-12 in this so it was looser but I do with I'd gone for the 6-8 now. It's still very wearable and easy to throw on with a pair of jeans. It's also a lot lighter material than I expected meaning it's perfect for the spring weather we are having. It's also on sale for £5 here.

Lastly I picked up a black and white striped cardigan.  Cardigans are something I always need but never buy (along with leggings!) I got this in size 6-8 as my top half is generally smaller.  Sizing is so annoying like this. I wish it would just be sized normal! The cardigan does fit fine.  I wear it half unbuttoned as buttoning to the top doesn't suit me! This was in the sale for only £4 here.

Delivery is £3.99 I personally hate having to pay for delivery.  I wish H and M would follow other stores and have the option to delivery to store for free! Not only that delivery was very slow!  I ordered it on a Tuesday night.  Got an email to say it was despatched on Thursday but didn't receive it till the Thursday after! The delivery was within therr estimated time.  Albeit the last date but when I'm paying for delivery I think a week maximum is the most to make someone wait not 8-9 days. What's your thoughts on delivery times? What do you expect to wait?

Anyways after seeing delivery charges I googled to see if I could find a H and M discount code. I actually found two and was able to use both.  On the forum's I was on the £5 off code is one people have been using for a while.  The code for this is 1304. I also found one for 25% off the most expensive item. The code for this is 0241.

Using these codes I managed to reduce my bill down to just over £10. It was a bargain but lately I find H and M don't have great service.  In the store in town L and I have experienced rude customer service I hate it when stores have a few stuck up sales assistants as it really puts me off! It makes me not want to visit the store.

Do you have stores have you are put off of due to sales assistants?

H and M really do have some great bargains and do good basics.  I think I'll have to start going to the other stores.

Love M

xxx

Don't forget to check out our giveaway here

Birthday Shopping and OOTN

So it was my birthday on Tuesday and I was lucky enough to book the week off work to chill out, and get some fun stuff done including some shopping!

I've been really good recently and although I've been buying things they've been better quality items and I've brainwashed myself into buying less....sort of.

Up until last year I'd never owned wedges and it was like an epiphany when i finally purchased a tan pair with cork wedge. They were so comfy and went with everything so I promised myself I'd have to buy some black ones and then I'd have heels and comfort every time I went out.

It's taken me til now though to find a pair I liked so I literally snapped these up from New Look when I saw them. They were only £25 and not only were they a black wedge but they also have ties for your ankles so my weirdly thin feet won't go sliding around all over the place!

I also picked up the nude clutch bag from River Island which should go with absolutely everything I own!
I was surprised that this was only £18 as their bags are normally more.
It's a decent size, has a hand clasp and a strap inside the bag and a zipper closing which means I can rest assured my stuff isn't going to fall out. I've lost far too many lipsticks this way!

These tops are from Zara, the ones on the right and centre are only£9.99 and perfect to wear underneath layers. The neon pink top on the left will be perfect to wear out with the girls and to the pubs in summer.

It's really bright and makes you happy to look at it! It also has a split at the back but this doesn't go up too far, it's more like an overlap of the material which will help keep you cool in warm weather and look chic!

I love showing skin in places other than the obvious cleavage/legs areas. Showing some back cleavage has become the latest in thing to do and it's definitely a more subtle way to show some skin.

I absolutely love blazers and macs, so picking these up was the icing on the cake!
The mac was from New Look and will be replacing one I've had from Zara for a few years which is slowly falling apart.

The orange blazer is from Zara and I cannot wait to wear it out!
As I'm going out tonight for birthday drinks with the girls I needed a dress (shown below) and the blazer will be the perfect layer to cover me up from the wind chill.
Apparently it's supposed to be -1 so it probably won't help too much but at least I'll look good right???

This dress was a bit of a different choice for me as I've previously avoided body con.

However I saw this in Lipsy and couldn't resist, so I tried it on and couldn't believe how comfortable it was and it sucked me in in all the right places!



I've recently got down to a size 10 so it was lovely to find something that fitted really well, as I still have a bit of a pooch at the front but the material on this dress seems to make it flatter!



Here's the dress with shoes and bag, what do you think???

I'm wearing them out tonight so any hair and make up suggestions would be lush!

I've been tanning all week in a bid to make myself lean and bronze so fingers crossed it will all work out!
The dress is VERY short so I am hoping that as long as my legs are brown all will be ok (and that i don't fall!)

What's your favourite part of a Saturday night out?

I AM SO EXCITED IT'S UNREAL!!!

L xxx

Spending Ban Update 9

The spending ban is very nearing the end, it's completely changed me. Even though I want things I have developed some will power (ignore last week's post where will power disappeared for a brief moment haha). I've stopped buying make up it seems. I'm so proud of this. I am now keeping my empties and I don't seem to be using much of it. I think even when the ban ends I really need to resist buying any more foundation, primer or mascara for a while. A girl always needs more lipstick though right.

First things first I did break the ban twice this week. One thing was absolutely necessary. It was this black dress from Asos. Unfortunately my mum's auntie passed away last week so I needed something long and plain suitable for a funeral. It was only £16.50 and it will be great for work after.

Secondly I went bridesmaid shopping with one of my friends for her wedding. I had decided I wanted to look my best while shopping and decided to do my make up how I may wear it on the wedding day. This involved individual lashes which I didn't own. As in Boots it's 3 for 2 at the moment it seemed silly to just buy the lashes. So I also picked up a Revlon Nail Varnish and the False nails I always use. (shown in this post).

The nail varnish is so gorgeous!! I love all the colours in it.

I will be adding on a few extra weeks to make up for my breaks. I'm thinking maybe I'll go till July. We will see.

How are your bans going?

Love M

xxx