Look Fantastic Haul

Hey All

Hope you've had a great week, mine has been a crazy one. I'm pretty sure they're always busy lately.

At the moment I'm in a massive hair dilemma, I don't know what to do with it at the moment. I'm so torn between grown up hair and pastel colours. Over the past few years it's taken a bashing with dye so I'm constantly getting new hair products to show it some love. I really do think it's worth investing in more expensive products. I find my hair doesn't like cheap shampoo.

When I saw a tweet about this months Look Fantastic beauty box had Moroccan oil in that was worth basically the value of the box I decided to order it. I've never ordered from Look Fantastic before but have been tempted as they sale the Sebastian range that I love (reviewed here) but never gotten around to placing an order.

The box also included a full size lip liner (mine is quite dark so I'm tempted to use this as an eye liner!), a lip balm (my lips are so dry I'm hoping this helps as nothing seems to at the moment!), a Korres body milk (I've tried this before and loved it!), a make up primer and cleansing bar.The primer seems great it's thick but feels smooth and the skin and adds a healthy glow without feeling greasy or oily.

I also couldn't resist some new shampoo and conditioner so went for the TIGI Bed Head Resurrection set. It was a bargain at £24 for 750ml bottles and came with a free hair brush. Other Bed Head stuff I've tried I've liked so fingers cross this is as good. It sounded like the perfect set for my over abused hair.

Even better when I ordered the Code MOB15 got me 15% off!

Have you ordered this months beauty box? I like that all the beauty boxes have the same stuff in so you can find out what you get before you order.

Love M

xxx

Vintage Fairs and Payday Treats

Morning!

Just over a week ago me and my mum went to the Lou Lou's Vintage fair in Cardiff. We've been once before and I loved it, so we decided to go again for their January sale. It was lots of fun and I picked up a few accessories before we also headed into Cardiff to raid a few shops there too!

I really enjoyed our trip previously and although i didn't expect to find much here again I did spot some lovely things. I love having a browse of the stands and a small rummage - I haven't quite got to the stage of rummaging through the rails of clothes yet....that's still a bit beyond me. I find it hard enough to buy clothes in shops nowadays so I don't think that vintage clothing is going to cater for my taller frame. A longer body with longer legs than the average person makes certain types of clothing hard to buy, but rest assured accessories are always available!

How beautiful are these cat eye sunglasses?! They cost only £5 and they're UV400 which is something to think about when purchasing vintage sunglasses - this means they are probably not real vintage just vintage style but nevertheless you won't be finding them in any other store. I love the marbling effect in the frame too, it makes the shape seem less harsh.

The necklace is a steampunk style - it's the insides of a watch attached to a gold chain. I loved it as soon as I saw it, I've got a bit of a thing for watch necklaces as it is (I own about 6!) with the official Harry Potter time turner necklace being one of them. This cost me £15, a little more expensive but worth it for the unique design.

The ring is a beautiful clear crystal set in a silver coloured twisted ring. The crystal is cut to be pear shaped - it's a gorgeous design and when me and M were looking at rings in a shop window the other day it was one I surprised myself by liking so when I saw it at the vintage fair I had to grab it! This was £8 so a few bargains at the fair this time as before I spent well over £100!

Next up was Primark. I don't find many clothes from Primark but their pyjamas and casual tshirts are normally something that catches my eye.

Harry Potter pyjamas are number one in my eyes; I've bought as many of them as I can get my hands on. The above navy tshirt and vest and shorts combo were ones that I couldn't leave without, I didn't get the matching navy bottoms but wish I had so I think I need to go back! You can never have enough pyjamas....

Which is why it would have been SO RUDE if I had left these Batman pyjamas behind too!
I do love the leggings and tshirt combinations and anything superhero and magic related I just cannot resist.

I would say that I don't need any pyjamas for a while now but that would be silly; I'm sure I'll be back in there soon!

I also had a browse of their workout gear and was surprised at how extensive it has got. The grey hoodie will be great for my running in the evenings and so will the armband (£2.50 by the way!). They seemed to have a few colour ranges with neon green, orange and pink being the biggest, the orange was definitely my favourite.

The gloves will also be good in future, only £3 and I love the pattern and colours!

What have you been buying recently? Are you a superhero fan like myself?

Do you like going to local vintage fairs?


L xxx

Fitness Friday: Writing a Diary

Hi there!

This week's Fitness Friday is all about accountability. I've never been one to write a diary but this year I really wanted to start writing one and noting down my meals, as well as attendance at any classes and any subsequent improvements I've made to show my progress in that respect.

My plan is to write out the following:

1) my meals and snacks each day - even when I've gone way over what I should have eaten. I don't count calories but occasionally I do add my food into an app like My Fitness Pal to calculate my calorie intake and see if I need to increase or decrease my intake of total calories, proteins, fats and carbs.

2) my exercises, classes, run distances and times, weights used, reps increased - basically anything that I've done. I know that I've improved over time but I would have liked to have seen the improvements over the months and years if I had written them down initially. It's greatfor giving you a boost when you're having a bad gym day and can't even do one rep.

3) quotes - Pinterest, instagram and any fitness type of person on twitter will guaranteed have a few quotes up their sleeves. Motivational, inspirational and pretty much anything to get you up and moving and not giving up. I've got tonnes of screenshots on my phone of these, they're really helpful on some days when you need a bit more to get you through. At the back of my diary there's a notes section with a lot of spare pages; I fill these with any kind of quote that inspires me.

I might go days without seeing anything new that makes me want to push harder and then come across 12 quotes that relate to me and my journey perfectly. So I scribble them all down for when I'm at a low point and I need them.

I've never been one for consistency when writing a diary. But I've begun to find it quite therapeutic to end each day writing down my food and fitness accomplishments for the day, plus anything that's inspired me. As well as the quotes in the back I also try and tie in any lapses in my food/exercise with work or social arrangements rather than leave it blank so I know in future what to fix when things start to go wrong.

So how has it been going since January the 1st?

I've had a few bad days of not writing things down but to be honest it's not a big deal; I know if I've eaten badly and when I need to cut back. I think the food part for me will probably be intermittent, when I've been slacking off and cheating a few times a week and need to reel in my snacking, or if I've been out a lot with friends for food and drinks and want the next week to try and make up for it.

What I really want is to create consistency in my plan and show myself my progress when I feel like throwing the towel in.

What I'll need is quotes to keep me going and inspire me.

I am looking into getting a fitness tracker in the next month or so but I do love the manual writing out of progress, and the Alice in Wonderland diary was just too cute to ignore!

What do you think of writing out your own progress? Would you write a diary to help you on your way and keep you focused? If not, how do you keep yourself on track over the long term?

L xxx

Make Up Revolution Ultra Professional Blush Palette in Hot Spice

Happy hump day!

Today's post is a review on something that I have been trying to get my hands on for MONTHS!

I was initially really disappointed as I went to Superdrug in Cardiff (both stores) to pick up this palette so many times and the stands were always empty. And I mean ransacked, covered in make up and with broken bits hanging off. I did tweet them and they responded saying they would speak to their store.
Eventually I went in and found one of these palettes but it was a lucky shot - the rest of the stand was still empty.

I was also disappointed that most of the boxes and general packaging were damaged for all of the products. I opened up a few of the boxes to make sure the one I bought wasn't broken inside (always suspicious!) and a lot of the palettes inside were cracked and scratched. It's just a bit disappointing to have to buy something that is already broken....

Nevertheless I managed to get one and was quite excited to get it home and photographed so I could use it.

The Ultra Blush Palette in Hot Spice contains a variety of 6 blushers in corally orange tones and 2 highlighters, as shown in the pictures below. It's probably a picky thing but I wish they had names, they don't even have numbers so it's a bit hard to refer to each one individually.

With all of my negativity so far, this was one palette I could not stop taking photos of. Look at how beautiful it is! The colours and finishes are perfect:

So how do they swatch? Is the pigmentation any good?

Here's the top row swatched without and then with flash:

These are all extremely wearable shades especially for me and my pale skin. You can see that there is a slight shimmer to the blushes but by no means is it glittery, this makes them great for day time as they give your skin a bit of a glow finish but nothing over the top. These are also really buildable so it's easy to layer on the colours for a variety of definition on your face.

The second row is as follows, without and then with flash:

Again, really wearable and suit my skin tone. I'm really pleased with the palette, especially for £6 as this means it has cost less than £1 for each one and that's pretty amazing.

If I'm honest although the colours vary when swatched on my face there isn't much variation. The highlighters are both flattering and not glittery at all, they seem to be really finely milled so they just have a shimmer.

The darker blushes are clearly darker but overall the variation doesn't show up too much but that's ok as the colour range is exactly what I look for so all of them will be used I'm 100% sure of it.

On my face, here's a few snaps:

These were all different blushes and the 2 different highlighters but this doesn't show at all! It's not a problem for me but may be if you are expecting a big difference. I just love the coral shade of things and couldn't care less - they're all beautiful!

So overall, what are my thoughts?

If you can get your hands on them, do! I've really enjoyed using this; the colour range is perfect, the pigmentation is great and the prices are CHEAP. I love that the palettes are in colour families, maybe in future they will have a combination palette for those who like to change up their blush colour all the time and create a NARS Virtual Domination type one as I'm sure it would be a best seller. Though having said that you could buy all six of their current blush, bronze and highlighter palettes for less than the NARS one!

I am really impressed with this palette as my first ever product from Make Up Revolution. I've got my eye on getting the Golden Sugar Blush and Contour palette whenever I can as it is beautiful and I'd love to try more from MUR.

Fingers crossed my Cardiff store will be better stocked next time I go in as there's so much I'd like to try and would have by now if I could!

What do you think of MUR? Do you love a blush palette? What else would you recommend from MUR?

I've recently added 21 blushes to my collection recently which is mildly obscene....let's not tell anyone else about them yeah?! Whoops!

L xxx