January favourites

Sally Hansen moisturising polish remover - Since the start of January, I think I've gone through about 2 bottles of this. It's not over expensive yet it removes polish incredibly well, and leaves your nails smelling and looking lovely. Need to try out the other removers from this range.

Shockwaves ultra strong power hold hairspray - I've lost count of the amount of years I've used this hairspray now, they always seem to be on 2 for 1 in Tesco so I always pick up a few, I think I currently have about 6 of these scattered around my room!

Cross earrings -  These were gifted to me as earrings for Xmas from one of my best freinds, Rosie. It took a lot to break me out of the habit of constantly wearing pearl earrings! Now it's these half the time, pearls the rest :)

Gucci envy me - One of my most favourite perfumes. Was an Xmas present. Smell reminds me of being in Barbados and that's enough of a reason for it to be a favourite!

Mac Angel lipstick - Just the lipstick I seemed to have reached for alot this month! I hate how it doesn't look new anymore! Strangely, this lipstick has survived many nights out in my handbag without melting, win!

Mac Lets skate! paintpot - A base I have been using on my eyelids to make any eyeshadow I put over it appear more sparkly. The most requested eye product from my mam if I'm ever doing her makeup :)

What are your January favourites?

Love, Hol xxx

Health & Fitness - Graze box

When it comes to healthy eating, I'm useless. Quite frequently I'll open a big bag of dorritos and sit and munch on them until they're completely gone. Savoury is my downfall! I'm not a massive chocolate eater but put some tasty crisps or some cheese and biscuits infront of me and I'll eat until they're all gone! Often my mam will come home from work and raid the cupboards and tell me how she'll get hungry towards the end of the day at work and give in to a biscuit. This is where the "Graze box" comes in!

Designed for you to be able to reach over and pick something to "graze" on when hunger strikes, the Graze box homes 4 different snacks for you to pick and choose from when you feel like it. Personally for me, I don't think I like a wide enough range of healthy types of foods ( eg. seeds! ) for me to benefit from it! Plus, working from home baking, It's easy enough for me to quickly nip out to get something compared to my mam who works in an office and is constantly surrounded by biscuits and coffee!

I used a free code for the box I received to give to my mam to try out since I didn't think it was worth me having them, and I got to have a good old fiddle around on the "My account" page on their website. You can go through all of the different types of foods they offer and you can tell them wether you want them sent to you or not, or wether you dislike them altogether!  You can also choose from two types of boxes, the "nibble boxes" which are made up from the majority of the foods you select, and the "nutrition" boxes, which are made up by the "Graze nutrition team". I think you can then go in to more depth about the nutrition boxes but I went for the nibble box.

When our Graze box came through the post I thought it looked great! I mean I thought the nuts and seeds looked horrid but I thought the box was made up really well. I dare say that I was even tempted by the nice looking dip one of the snacks came with! The great thing about the company is that everything that the box is made from is "100% biodegradable and 100% recyclable. It's always great to help the environment! The box also comes with a little booklet letting you know the nutritional and calorie information about the food in the box.









Usually the boxes cost £3.49 each, and you can pick to have them delivered as many times as you would like a week. I think you really have to like this type of food to enjoy it. My good freind Lauren is the same age as me, and she has these boxes for work a couple of times a week! So I don't think its a case of it being aimed at a certain age range! I have a couple of codes for free boxes on the leaflet I got included in my Graze box, I'm not sure how many times these can be used so I apologize if you go to enter one of these codes and it doesn't work! Anyway, here they are:



I would love to know what everybody else thinks about these little boxes?! Do you think they will take off?

I would just like to point out that even though I signed up for my free box, I still got sent a box the next week and charged for it. So if after you've received your free box and you don't like it, then cancel your account as soon as you can! I've cancelled mine purely for the fact that I got it for my mam, I do think it's a great idea but not all the food is my cup of tea :)

Love, Hol xxx

My Glossybox contents - January 2012

What was supposed to be just a one time trial of Glossybox to see if I liked the idea or not, turned out to be me not being able to cancel my order because the excitement and surprise when you open your Glossybox is just too fun! This months is the valentines edition, and even though every single Blogger on the planet will probably write about it, I'm pleased to say that I have a few different items from everybody else that I havn't seen blogged about yet! (Just a matter of time..) If you would like to see what I got, keep on reading...











What's inside my Glossybox:

• Eyeko Skinny Eyeliner (£9.50)
• Davines Moisturising Balm (£17.40)
• Davines Cleansing Nectar (£18.50)
• Fab Gentle Body Wash (£13.00)
• Murad Hybrids Skin Perfecting Primer - Dewy Finish (£29.00)
•  A little boiled sweet with GlossyBox written on it!

With some of the price tags attatched to this months Glossybox, I think it's definetely a very luxurious one, I love trying out new primers and the Davines products look great, I can't wait to try them out! I was a bit bummed I thought I was getting 2 Clarins products, surprisingly I didn't and Davines looks much more interesting. Unfortunately I received a pink eyeliner pencil, just the worst colour ever, and the bodywash seems perfect for me with my dry skin! All round I think my Glossybox has been great this month, now to test the products!

What did you get in your Glossybox?

Love, Hol xxx

Lauren Luke brush collection

I'm always on the hunt for great affordable brushes to fill gaps in my collection, I don't think enough brands offer a wide enough range of brushes. You mainly have to buy them from the more high end brands such as Mac, Nars etc. and as much as I love Mac's makeup, brushes are always the very last thing I will splurge on. The only brush I currently own from Mac is the 263 as I did want a good quality brush for filling in eyebrows. Other than that I much favour Sigma over Mac, which has a such a large collection of brushes for a considerably less amount of money. Since they come from the US I tend to buy quite a few brushes when I do buy from them to make paying for the shipping worth while.

I remember looking at Laurens brushes when they first came out and just passing up on them because I think I thought they were too expensive! I've been hunting for brushes lately so I went back for another look and I do not remember them being this cheap! I searched the internet and alot of other people had been saying she had dropped the prices too. When the most expensive brush in the collection is only £6.50 and you've heard great things about them on the internet well, I decided to just buy the whole collection. It consists of 8 brushes and as a total came to £33.75, thats roughly £4.20 a brush! On to the brushes...

This set includes:

• Angled liner brush (£3.25)
• Blending eyeshadow brush (£4.50)
• Flat contour brush (£5.25)
• Flat eyeshadow brush (£4.00)
• Foundation brush (£6.00)
• Large powder brush (£.6.50)
• Pencil brush (£3.25)
• Tapered blending brush (£4.50)

First off, you can never have too many blending brushes. There's nothing more soul destroying than applying your makeup and trying to blend it out with a blending brush you havn't cleaned yet. It looks like a muddy mess! When I was looking at this collection the other day I considered just stocking up on blending brushes since they're so affordable. I was also surprised at how stiff the angled brush is too, I love my Mac 263 but this one is really pretty decent! Also, the pencil brush included in this collection I favour more over my Sigma pencil brush, this one is much more fluffier, I find the Sigma tip is way too pointy, that's just personal preference though. There's not much else I can say about the eye brushes, except they're amazing quality. This brush set truly does have all the essential eye brushes needed to create simple/dramatic looks.

Owning quite a few eye brushes, I was more excited to receive my face brushes, I don't have so many of these because you can never seem to find anything decent under £10! (and that is at an absoloute push!) This brush set really does hold a hidden gem of the brush world. I don't know if you're familiar with Louise Young brushes but I first saw these being used by the Pixiwoo sisters ( Love them) and the brush that always stuck with me was the LY34, it was a domed foundation brush, used for buffing in liquid products to give a seemingly flawless finish, I HAD TO HAVE IT..but not for £24..I wasn't that desperate. So you can imagine how ecstatic I was to see that Lauren had included a domed foundation brush in her collection! I've used it a couple of times and it doesn't dissapoint. Here are a few close ups of the beautiful face brushes!







I can't see me getting a whole lot of use from the large powder brush, I rarely powder due to having extremely dry skin and I favour a more 'dewy' look, over matte. It's definetely worth having for the price though, large brush prices in Mac and Nars can be ridiculously expensive! The flat contour brush however it just simply amazing! Brilliant for precise application of bronzer and for dotting blusher on to the apples of your cheeks for a rosey glow! I really can't praise these brushes enough, can I?!

I've always been such a fan of Lauren, she was the first guru I ever watched all the way back in 2008, I consider her one of the origionals! She is such a lovely person and an inspiration when you see how well she has done for herself, can you imagine your makeup collection being sold in Times Square?! If you have a big enough brush collection, then I would probably skip these out (Unless you're curious!) But if you're just starting out or filling gaps in your collection, these are a must!

Love, Hol xxx

Clynol curl bounce fluid

I'm very rarely seen with straight hair, infact, I dont think my straighteners have been on for a number of months now (maybe even a year or 2!) I'm forever using a curling wand/curl stick to acheive more volume througout my hair. Once again my problem with my long hair is that my curls drop very easily and as my hair is so heavy it can really flatten down on my head and around my face. So the next product in my journey to find something to tame my long, thick hair is....Clynol curl bounce fluid! Clynol is'nt a brand I had ever heard of until before recently, so I didn't really know what to expect.





First Impressions: First of all I like the bottle a whole lot more than the schwarzkopf one, but I'm not sure that if I was browsing for some hair products that I would be drawn to this or if I would buy it. It looks a little but more sophisticated that most other hair product packaging, and comes with a pump on the top for easy application.

Initial thoughts on the product: First thoughts on the product itself and the smell is that it seems to have a similar consistency to conditioner ( That's the only way I can describe it!) and I really, really like the smell! It's sort of zesty in a way, and I think of holidays when I smell it, but I just cant put my finger on what it's similar to! It's not really stick at all and I found it really easy to control the amount of product I wanted to put on to my hands and through my hair.

How it works for me: Like the Schwarzkopf product, It instructs you to work through damp hair before drying, or you can apply to dry hair to refresh your curls. After application and blowdrying, I found that it has a similar affect to when you hairspray your hair first and then curl your hair (If you know what I mean) As for applying to damp hair, I thought to myself, "Isn't this going to make my hair really greasy?!" And actually it's not that bad! I applied it to uncurled dry hair as I didn't want to risk it turning my curls greasy, and I can't describe what your hair feels like but it seems to make it more...pliable?! I can see how you could get some really nice messy effects from this product, so stay tuned! The great thing about this product is that is seems like it has multiple functions :)

This is something I'm definetely going to experiment with, it could just turn out to be a product I can't live without! What are your favourite hair products for creating certain styles?!

Love, Hol xxx

*This product was sent to me for reviewing purposes. This has not affected my opinion! :)

OPI Nicki Minaj collection - Metallic 4 life

This collection from OPI was something I've been pretty excited about since I first heard Nicki was collaborating with them. I literally wanted all of the polishes when I went to buy them, but I had to be sensible and just choose one! I had already looked at them loads of times on various blogs and on the internet so I already knew I wanted this one the most. Its primarly a black polish which is infused with lots of different sizes of gorgeous silver glitter. I'm always drawn to these flippin glitter nail polishes! Please keep in mind my nails are really poor and are not the best to do this lovely varnish justice!







As you can see it's absoloutly packed full of glitter particles! I found that after 2 coats it was good to go, I can't wait to wear this some more. Has anybody seen the other Nicki Minaj polishes?! How nice are they!

Love, Hol xxx

Recent cake adventures #2

The winner of my giveaway..

Phoebe!

Congratulations I'll be emailing you for your address to get your goodies out to you!

Last chance to enter my giveaway!(CLOSED)

My giveaway ends tomorrow night at 11:59pm, I wouldn't want anybody to miss out on it! So if you weren't a follower before or you just missed the post, then click here to be in with a chance of winning some brilliant goodies, including Models Own, Batiste, Aussie hair, MUA, and many more! All it takes is a simple 'Enter me!' on the comment form, so go and get stuck in!

Love, Hol xxx

Fierce heels, or too Lady Gaga?

I'm always on the hunt for a great pair of heels as I'm such a shoe-a-holic, and being such a short arse I never settle for anything shorter than five inches! (Heel wise) I was having a little look on Ebay the other night when I came across these beauties, I already sort of knew that even for me they were probably going to be a little TOO high, (whattt?!) and at six inches tall I'm wondering if these are worth a broken ankle or not! They're surprisingly comfortable to walk in, well comfortable in comparison to some heels I own anyway, and they're just so beautiful to look at but I'm wondering realistically if I'm ever going to wear them! I know these won't be everybodys cup of tea but personally I like over the top shoes!





I tried them on before and they literally look massive compared to my feet, and the slight point at the toe made me think Lady Gaga! I know she has had some major falls in those ridiculous shoes she wears and I don't want to be next! I can't make up my mind at all, I know I'll regret giving them up but I don't want them to be another wasted pair of shoes that will sit inside my cupboard for god knows how long. What do you all think?!

I bought these shoes from here for £27.99, they come in a ton of other styles too!

Love, Hol xxx

Brilliant blogs to follow #1

I've decided every now and again I'm going to do a post on 3 blogs I've came across that I really like. I've seen this done on other blogs (leanne-marie!) and I've found some blogs I now read religiously from those. It's a great way to support other bloggers and help to uncover some hidden gems! Why not share the love?!


1. amisinwonderland - LOVE this girls style!

2. cherry-myth -  Hauls, reviews, OOTD'S, great little blog.

3. brightandbeauty-ful - Simple. This blog DESERVES more love!

Hope you take the time to check out these lovely little blogs, can't wait to discover some more brilliant bloggers out there!

Love, Hol xxx

Laura Ashley Green Meadow perfume

On one of my many recent trips to Laura Ashley to purge their sales I noticed a small collection of 3 perfumes sitting on a glass table, I thought the bottle of the perfume was beautiful, and being a lover of how any candle or insence stick from Laura Ashley usually smells, I couldn't resist going over to have a sniff! The perfumes were named 'Pink Petals', 'Floral Heart', and of course, 'Green Meadow'. With names like this I almost had an idea of how I thought they would smell before I picked them up, thinking Green Meadow would be a really fresh summer smell - and it is! To be honest, just by smelling a perfume I would never be able to tell you what its high notes etc. were, and you'll never decide if you like a perfume from imagining its smell from a blog post, but I went on Laura Ashleys website to find out for you.

"Our new Green Meadow fragrance features top note higlights of soft fruits combined with a passionate heart of flowers and hot amber and musk as its base."



This perfume to me is really feminine and clean, usually I like very heavy perfumes (Kim K), but this is very light and. It really makes me think of fresh green feilds, summer breezes, just summer in general! If you're in your local Laura Ashley at any point I recommend you go and have a little smell. The bottle itself is gorgeous aswell, it looks very luxurious and high end, I don't know why but I always thought Kim's felt kind of cheapy when you picked it up?! Could be just me! But this is definetely good quality packaging. I even thought the box it came in was really pretty, it won't be everbodys cup of tea, but since I'm not a major girly girl I was pleasantly surprised that I liked it!

If this sounds like a perfume you would like you should definetely go and try it out for yourself. I like to recieve perfume for my birthday as sometimes I think it can be quite pricey and at £48 this perfume is no exception. Luckily it still is on sale at the moment for £34.56 ( on their website anyway, which you can go to here ) so now is the time to go and have a look if you're interested.

Love, Hol xxx

Simple white chocolate Cheesecake recipe

I've made this cheesecake using this recipe once before, it is one of my all time favourite desserts and it is so simple to make! So I thought why not share the recipe with you lovely lot so you can have a go yourselves...you could maybe even blog about your cheesecake and link it to me ;D

I was using an 8 inch round tin which you can remove the bottom from, I wouldn't advise using any other kind of tin because cheesecakes are a pain to remove! Also, there wasn't going to be enough of the mix to fill the cake tin I was using so I'll list the origional recipe, and you can improvise and add a bit more of each if you want to do an 8 inch tin like me!

You will need:

• 175g Digestive biscuits
• 75g Melted butter
• 300g Soft cream cheese
• 200ml Double cream
• 250g White chocolate
• Anything you may want to decorate with eg. Strawberries!

Instructions:

1. Put the digestives in to a sandwich bag and crush with a rolling pin until they're all broken down in to crumbs.
2. Melt the butter in a pan, mix in the crushed digestives with the butter. Flatten this mixture on to the bottom of your cake tin using the bottom of a table spoon to push it all down.
3. Beat the cream cheese and double cream together while you melt your chocolate. (I find the easiest way to melt chocolate without burning it is to fill up a pan with water, maybe 1cm of it, break your chocolate down in to smallish sections in to a mixing bowl, and place the mixing bowl of chocolate on top of the pan. Make sure the heat is at its lowest and don't burn yourself when you lift the bowl off of the pan!
4. Add the melted white chocolate to the double cream and cream cheese mixture and beat together.
5. Finally, spoon the mixture on top of the digestive biscuit layer and leave to chill in the fridge over night, or for at least 2/3ish hours (This being the absoloute minimum if you're desperate to eat it, overnight if you can)

When you're done feel free to decorate it however you like! Maltesers, Strawberries, Raspberries, flakes, whatever takes your fancy!

Happy Cheesecaking!

Love, Hol xxx

Keepin' it Simple (skincare)

Now, I don't know about you ladies but skincare is just something I've never been willing to splurge on. I've never had any extremely bad skin problems. If anything, my skin always seems to be very dry and dehydrated but thats nothing a good moisturiser can't solve. Since joining the blogging world I've seen how crazy some bloggers are about their skincare products (E.g Liz earle) but it just never interests me or grabs my attention. I'm sure people who have really oily skin, or have had bad breakouts during their teen years etc. will appreciate these products a little more than I do.

Having extremely pale skin, it's a little bit unfortunate than any mark, redness, or blemish shows up ten times worse than it would on skin which was a little darker, and theres no way I'll ever be able to alter my skintone (Deffo not going an MJ!), so I've just grown to accept the fact that my skin is never going to look perfectly even. I don't know, maybe I should have more faith in skincare products, but it does kind of irritate me that even when my skin is perfectly clear and spot free, I think that with no makeup on my skin still doesn't look nice!



So, unless anybody can point me in the direction of a product that will even out your skin tone (and do a bloody good job of it at that!) then I'm going to stick to my cheap and cheerful skincare products which are...Simple! At £3 a product in Asda they aren't going to break the bank and they've been extremely kind to my skin (Unlike one of the products from Clinique 3 step that literally melted my face, bet it would totes make a great nail varnish remover). Instead of stressing over my uneven skintone and whinging on about not having the worlds most perfect skin, I'm just going to aim to keep my skin happy, clean, and hydrated. About my uneven skintone - that's what makeups for!


Even though I'm never going to be one to splash my cash on skincare, I'm becoming progessively more interested in it as I read other peoples blogs about it! So I'm asking you, what skincare products could you not live without? Which ones do you hate? Are you a skincare snob or are you cheap and cheerful?!

Love, Hol xxx

FOTD/Teeth/Why I love Max factor masterpiece mascara

Thought I would do a little update on the whitening strips I bought, I've done about 4/5 days of them now. In all honesty, I can't see a whole lot of difference, if anything they've made some teeth whiter than others, but it's not noticable to anyone but myself really. I would say on the whole they are definetely brighter, but not Simon Cowell white ( WHICH I NEED IN MY LIFE ). I'm not expecting to see a miracle and I've decided I'm going to be patient about but I will be a bit dissapointed if they arent noticably whiter after I've done them all! Still have a few left to do and still brushing with Blanx intensive stain removal toothpaste. Full review coming soon :)





As for my FOTD... I'm not going to list a massive number of products, just what I used for the stand out parts (eg. Mascara, Lipstick ) I suppose I'll do a post on my favourite foundations soon :) I will say though that all my eyeshadow is from Naked2! My mascara I use is Max factor masterpiece, and it always will be! It would take something amazing to make me stop using this mascara. It's easily buildable, doesn't clump on my eyelashes, thickens, lengthens, you get the idea, I LOVE this mascara. On my lips I'm wearing Mac's Pink Nouveau. I don't often wear brighter lipsticks through the day, It's usually just Mac's Hue or Angel, but fancied a little something different today!

Have a lovely day,

Love, Hol xxx

(Not another) Naked2 post.

I'm not going to go in to any detail whatsoever about this palette, there are plenty of amazing and in depth posts about it already out there! Sometimes I think a picture can say more than words anyway, so I've taken a few so that once again, you can have a little look at the already famous Naked2 palette! By the way, here is a great post about it, with information about and colours and swatches from the lovely Vivianna does makeup!











Don't forget to enter my giveaway, which is the post below this or you can click here to go directly to the page!

Love, Hol xxx

100 FOLLOWER GIVEAWAY (CLOSED)

I am SO excited to be posting this! I always set 100 followers as being my goal for this blog, any more than that is a bonus for me! I thought I would celebrate by holding a giveaway, a very generous one if I do say so myself! ;) I've put together a mix of items which I as a beauty blogger would love to receive myself, and I hope whoever the lucky winner is thinks so too! Considering I set myself a £20 limit I think I did well to mix up the producst :) Sorry to all international readers but this is open to the UK only!



This giveaway includes:

• MUA Dusk till dawn palette Post here.
• Models Own Pink Fizz
• Batiste dry shampoo
• Rose & Almond vaseline + Cocoa butter vaseline
• 2 Face masks
• Aussie 3 minute miracle colour hair mask
• Small rose earrings from Dainty Roses

Giveaway Info

• Open to the UK only. (Sorry!)
• Will run until Saturday 21st January 11:59 pm.
• Winner will be picked using Random.org
• ALL items were purchased with my own money.

To enter

• All I ask is that you follow my blog via Google freind connect! Simply comment saying 'Enter me' and leave me a few ways of contacting you. (Twitter, Email etc.) If you're the winner and you don't get back in contact with me after 48 hours another winner will be picked!

This is my way of saying a massive thank you to everybody that reads my blog, I can't wait to find out who the winner is! P.s Sorry this went up a little late, I suppose I should really call it my '140 follower giveaway'!

Love, Hol xxx

What the Postman brought me today...

I've been eagerly waiting for the postman to drop off some goodies I ordered before the weekend, the most exciting thing for me being my Crest whitening strips. My only resolution this year is to have whiter than white teeth! If anybody can point me in the direction of any good products they know that would be wonderful! I've been using Blanx toothpaste aswell. Also my Models Own polishes, which I'm pretty sure I'm addicted to now!





I got 'Emerald City' and 'Pink Fizz', which I should've owned a long time ago but they seemed to always be out of stock when I went to buy them! I didn't bother swatching them because I know they will be somethings you have seen swatched hundreds of times before.





As for the whitening strips, I'll probably post about these after I've completed the set, It's 14 days worth of strips that you leave on for half an hour, I did the first ones today but didn't see that much of a difference, not really going to comment until I've used them all though! I bought them off Ebay for around £25ish. I'm a bit of a panicker when it comes to things like this, had it in my head that they were going to melt my teeth or something haha, time will tell!

Hope you're having a lovely day!

Love, Hol xxx