Aveda Colour at Kamigata

Morning All

I've been experimenting lots with my hair lately so I thought I'd share with you. Especially for our South Wales followers as the salon I'm loving is a Cardiff one.

For ages I got my hair done in Guy Christian. I'm a believer in you get what you pay for and love a luxury salon as it feels like a feel treat. After telling myself I couldn't afford it I became a groupon gal and jumped from salon to salon. I convinced myself I was happy but after a few disasters when I saw Kamigata advertising on Facebook for colour models I jumped at the chance.

Kamigata is a salon in St David's 2 and whenever I've walked past I've wanted to try it. Anyone who knows me will know over the past 6 months I've experimented with my hair a lot but after a few disasters at the hairdressers (they died it pink but it didn't take to half my hair so looked fruit salad esque, when they 'fixed' it two weeks later with lilac again it didn't fully take!) after this I decided to do it myself. After the condition started to get bad in Jan I had a good 5 inches cut of my hair and it died brown to make it healthy.

As soon as the hair dye went on I wasn't happy. I didn't feel like my hair was me, I felt bland an unhappy with it and quickly ended up putting a blonde box dye on it.

The first transformation by Matthew!

Kamigata were asking for hair models to test out the new Aveda colours. Aveda were a brand that traditionally followed natural hair (you should check out Matthew's balayage skills. A natural ombre!) but due to the trends of bright colours have released some amazing pinks and blues which can be mixed to make other colours.

In daylight. I love the shade it came out.

After a chat with Matthew I felt in much more capable hands. He lifted my hair all over so it was an even base an applied the pink from the collection. We applied it wet at first so it had a toner effect and left my hair with a gorgeous rose pink effect (this is what I want for summer!) as we were playing around with colour we decided to go brighter! Here is the amazing effect.

As it started to fade it turned a lush rose colour!

The thing that has impressed me the most with the Aveda colours is the gorgeous way they fade. No patchy fades and washed out to a soft rose pink then back to basically blonde.

The faded effect!

After this we decided to play more. Let's go three colours. We used the pink mix from before, the blue and mixed the blue with bleach to give a purple colour. I love how mixable the colours are to get results you like. You can get totally different shades of pinks, purples and blues.

eeek it looks scary!

The finished result.

I love how the green and blue poke through.

Unfortunately my hair has to be normal for the next 8 weeks. I'm totally converted to Matthew. I totally trust him to do whatever to my hair as I feel like he already knows me. It's been ages since I trusted someone so much with my hair! I can't wait to let him play again once my brother's wedding is over!

Again it faded to lush icey tones!

and back to rose pink! I couldn't be happier with how it fades!

And here we are now. I can't wait till next Thursday for Matthew to work his magic! We are thinking blonde/ash toned next!

Are you someone that experiments with hair? If you're South Wales based I can't recommend Matthew enough. He's done some beautiful work.

Love M

xxx

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feel like I should say this isn't a sponsered post nor did kamigata know I was a blogger. I just struggle to find a hairdresser I trust and wanted to share when I have find a good one!

6 Vitamin Shot

Evening All

Hope you've had a great bank holiday weekend. Mine has been action packed with way too much drinking occuring.

Yesterday I shared some of my meal prep ideas with you. Something I've been enjoying over the past few weeks during stressful and lack of sleep times is 6 vitamin shots. You can find my review here. They are great supplement which is also a great pre gym workout.

Do you take supplements?

Love M

Xxx

Food Prep

Evening all

I thought I'd share what I've spent my evening doing. In 3 weeks time I'll be landing in Cyprus for my brother's wedding so it's time to step up the diet to match the exercise and lose the pooch! I love the quote 'failing to prepare is preparing to fail' I really do think it's true. If you don't have prepare you can be tempted when you're tired in the morning to just grab food in work and after a long day a quick ready meal may be too tempting.

I'm someone who loves cooking and experimenting with food. Lately I tend to go to the supermarket on a Sunday and get my weekly must haves and then see what is reduced and decide from there what I fancy cooking.

For me my essentials for the week are:

• Spinach
• Bananas
• Low Fat Fromage Frais (this has a lot more protein that natural yoghurt)
• Milk (if I've been paid I prefer to go for Almond milk
• Eggs

I'll also grab whatever fruit and veg is on offer for the week.

My favourite thing for breakfast is overnight oats. I tend to make them in batches of two or three as it's easier. I add a handful of oats and then milk and fromage frais. I'm not the type to measure it out but if you a ramekin full of each. These can be topped with anything, I use fruit and peanut butter or add nuts and seeds too. I do also add protein powder to boost my protein intake.

This week I grabbed chicken breast. I made a rub using herbs and spices. I literally just grab random spices out of the cupboard and then fry in a teaspoon of coconut oil. I cook everything with coconut oil now. I have this for lunch then with spinach, red cabbage and cherry tomatoes. If I don't fancy salad I'll grab soup out of my freezer and usually take a boiled egg.

Also reduced this week was beef stock. I decided to make a healthy cottage pie. I fry 4 onions in garlic, salt and pepper and a tea spoon of coconut oil. To that I added 500g of extra lean mince beef and carrots. When the mince had browned I add stock and red cabbage. Whilst this is cooking down I boiled cauliflower and carrots to make mash. I tend to make my mash out of any veg and just boil it down. Swede and parsnip also work. Once it's soft I mash it up and put it over the meet mix and cook in the oven for 30 minutes.

Today I also made egg fried cauliflower rice. This was the easiest thing to do. Just grate the cauliflower, melt the coconut oil in a frying pan. Then add the cauliflower to it and two eggs and fry. Such a quick tasty meal. I eat this on it's own or it's great for with curries.

I also made muffins from the recipe L posted on Friday. I made mine with lemon and coconut. They are amazing. You can find L's recipe here.

I also made some red cabbage with apple. I cooked an apple in a bit of sugar and reduced it down. I just added this too boiled cabbage and will freeze it. I've got veggie sausages so think it'll be great with them and swede.

Lastly I made sourdough bread. I absolutely love peanut butter and banana on toast so prefer to make my own bread. Sourdough is made from just flour and water so it's too bad for you. I use a mix of normal and wholegrain seeded flour. I also added protein powder this week so I can tell myself it's better for me.

So that's me prepped for the week. What do you eat when trying to be healthy?

Love M

xxx

Benefit: Gimme Brow

Morning all!

Hope you all had a good evening last night. L and I are probably rolling round in bed hungover!

Gimme brow is something I've wanted to try for ages. Especially since losing my Browzings. Unfortunately after visiting Cardiff's Brow Bar for Brow Arch March we were both left with one eyebrow a lot shorter than others. L and I have had our brows done at Benefit in Bristol, Swansea and Carnaby Street and have always been pleased so we were disappointed to have been left with noticeably uneven brows. Benefit always have amazing customer service and sent us a few bits to try as an apology. I couldn't wait to try Gimme Brow to try and extend the now slightly shorter brow.

I have the light/medium. I find having blonde brows is harder to make them look perfect without them looking drawn on and powdery. Gimme brow is an amazing little brow product. A tinted brow gel with fibres and a tiny brush to make application easy.

One of the things that put me off Maybelline brow drama was the impractical wand for brows. Benefit have created a easy to use wand that has a small tip to be able to fill in fine gaps. Gimme brow adheres to skin and hair to create full natural brows.

Here is my natural brows. They are fair and need filling in or it looks like I don't have them. As you'll have seen if you saw my post on Facebook photos earlier on in the week.



Below is one coat of gimme brow. I tend to wipe of the excess and quickly swipe over the brows for quick definition. This is perfect for those lazy mornings and when you want more natural make up. Brows are left defined, darker and not looking drawn on.



For me I do love a power brow! I like big full brows but not to dark for my skin tone. No scouse brows here. I find Gimme brow layers up really well but I find it's best to do a few light layers as it can go a little flaky if you do one thick coat.



The thing that has taken getting used to for me is that my brows are coated. They stay amazingly all day but they do feel a little hard sometimes.

I am absolutely loving gimme brow and it's been in my handbag since (I do my make up on the bus alot!). It's quick and easy to apply and great for everyday.

My downside is the price. At £17.50 it's not cheap. If it lasts a while I'm not complaining. So far so good so fingers crossed it lasts as I'm loving the convenience of it.

Love M
xxx

Hey there! 

As M has already mentioned were big fans of defined brows, as mine are black and my skin a rather white shade it can be really hard to define mine without going too far and giving myself the dreaded scouse brow or looking like I've drawn them on in permanent marker.

Gimme Brow caught my eye because everyone's brows seem to look so natural after using it.



As the packaging states, its a brush on fibre gel that adheres to skin and hair and has qualities including being water resistant, long wearing, buildable and most importantly natural looking.



The tube itself is tiny, similar in height to a mini They're Real but with the thickness of a pencil its a really dinky little product that has made its way into my make up bag as a firm favourite. 

It's just SO easy to use and defines and fills in the natural gaps that I have in my brows (thanks to my mum, we have the same gaps!)

The tiny mascara type brush fills in even the tiniest gap without any issues and looks perfectly natural. I was worried my brows would be a bit crispy after using something like this but I haven't had that problem at all

I really do love the little brush, so cute!

You can see Gimme Brow in the pictures below, I've got the medium deep colour. The first picture is without any brow product, second with one coat and the third with two coats. 

You can see how it so easily defines and fills in without looking too 'done' because were all natural beauties aren't we ladies??

The only downside for me is again, the price. I think £17.50 for a tiny tube is far too much. But hey ho, you do have to pay for good quality products!

What do you think of Gimme Brow? Are you a fan of natural looking brows or more defined and powerful?

L xxx