Twelve posts of Christmas #12 - My Christmas presents to myself

It's finally time for my final 'Twelve posts of Christmas' instalment... time really does fly, doesn't it? I snapped up some great bargains in the Christmas sales this year so I thought I'd blog about my purchases, as well as including some special buys which I've been saving up for as a post-Christmas treat.

Before I go on, I apologise in advance for the dodgy quality of some of the photographs used in this post. This horrible weather means there's never any natural light to take decent photos! Such a blogger problem, and definitely a first world one too...

Anyway, without further ado, take a look at my post-Christmas buys below and let me know what you think. I've included links if items are still available.

I used my New Look gift card to buy these - absolute bargain (now sold out)!

They were originally £64.99 and, between discounts and my gift card,

I paid £22.00. 

The Other Woman and One Direction's new album from Amazon. 

A bottle of Guess for Women perfume from Amazon.

I'm a big fan of Guess perfumes!

A new leather jacket from New Look with a

lovely fur collar... £17.99 down from £49.99!

Three new dresses - a floral dress for work from New Look,

a party dress from New Look, and a casual dress from Animal.

I saved £37 in total on these dresses. 

A Pandora rose ring to go with my new watch - this one wasn't in the sale!

Some pretty rose gold jewellery from Debenhams which also goes with my new watch.

Find the bracelet here and the second pair of earrings here.

And last but not least, this adorable mug from the Disney Store!

I also bought a few new books for my Kindle with my gift voucher from Nicola... I've recently discovered Rachel Abbott and she's amazing!

A lot of the items above were on my 'want' list for a few months before Christmas, so I'm really pleased that I was able to either buy them in the sale or justify buying them at full price with my Christmas money/vouchers. 

Did you make any exciting purchases after Christmas? Please feel free to send me your links to similar posts!

Outfit of the Day - brisk walk!

If you follow me on Twitter, you'll probably know that I recently had a wisdom tooth taken out. I consequently felt sorry for myself for a few days, mostly because I couldn't eat properly which is really quite catastrophic in my world. We decided to go for a walk the day after the traumatising event just to get out of the house for some fresh air. It was bitterly cold so I wrapped up in a cosy outfit...

Gilet - Tesco (last year)

Hoodie - Animal (last year)

Skirt - New Look (last year)

Boots - Fat Face (last year)

Scarf - Debenhams (this year, but out of stock!)

As you can see, I've had all these clothes for a while (apart from the scarf). I like digging out my old clothes and wearing them season after season as I feel as if I've got my money's worth out of them, and I can't bear to get rid of clothes that I really love just because they're not brand new. 

The gilet was an absolute bargain at £8 in last year's Tesco winter sale... I love gilets and I love pink, so this is the perfect combination. The denim skirt was a sale item last summer from New Look (also £8, I believe), as was the Animal hoodie... I rarely pay full price for anything, as you've probably gathered by now. Continuing in the same vein, the pink scarf is from Red Herring at Debenhams and I bought it a few weeks ago for £4.80. It was supposed to be £16 so I was very pleased with that particular bargain. 

The boots are probably my favourite part of this outfit and they were a Christmas present from my parents in 2013. They're lined with thick fur and I love the little buttons on the sides. These are ideal for cold walks, as long as it's dry! They're very comfortable too so can be worn for long periods of time without making my feet ache. 

In case you're interested, here's a photo from our walk... such a beautiful day. 

What's your favourite 'brisk walk' outfit? Send me links to your cosy Outfit of the Day posts (please)! 

Wedding make up... advice, please!

Where on earth do people learn to apply make up?!

I'm pretty clueless when it comes to knowing what kinds of make up I should wear and what shades would complement my best facial features, I took a trip to Boots last week to get some advice as I'm considering applying my own make up for my wedding. All the make up artists I've looked at are very expensive, and I'm concerned that they might slap loads of make up on which definitely isn't the look I'm going for. I don't generally wear much make up so I don't want to look like a totally different person on my wedding day... all I wear on a normal day is mascara, blusher and pressed powder!

I do make more of an effort in if I'm going out... I stretch to adding foundation and eyeshadow on these occasions!

This is about as made up as I ever get...

Although I don't want to look totally different on my wedding day, I obviously want to look nicer and more 'radiant' than I would on a normal day. I also want to make the most of my best facial features and need to make sure that the make up I choose complements my red hair rather than clashes with it. I think my best facial features are probably my blue eyes and my good skin... I'm not very good at coming up with positive features for myself so it took me a while to come up with those two!

On my visit to Boots, I decided to visit the No7 and Max Factor counters. I've heard nothing but good things about No7 products (and I love their nail varnish ranges), and I'd read some great reviews on Max Factor products recently too. I bought the following...

Max Factor FaceFinity foundation

Max Factor pressed powder

Max Factor blusher

Max Factor eyeshadow trio

Max Factor Clump Defy mascara

No7 Instant Radiance Highlighter

Nivea Soft Rose lip salve

Everything I bought came within budget and it's a great investment as I can use all the make up again and again. I'll obviously be practising a LOT before the wedding and will do plenty of trial runs... I'll also have bridesmaids on hand to help on the day if needed!

I loved the look of the foundation and you can still see my freckles through it. Believe it or not, I actually like my freckles. The Max Factor lady tried a few different shades out on my skin and we concluded that the shade I usually go for is actually a little too pale... the one I've bought for the wedding looks perfect! It's a 3 in 1 primer, concealer and foundation so I shouldn't need to put much else on my face. Luckily I have good skin so I shouldn't need to cover up any blemishes. Let's hope that the stress of the wedding preparations doesn't make my face break out for the first time ever!

I'm not sure if I'll need the pressed powder on the wedding day itself as the foundation's coverage is so good, but it'll definitely get used as I wear pressed powder every day. It's quick and easy to apply and just gives me a bit more colour, so I've been using it every day on its own for years. 

I needed a new blusher so this haul was well timed. The Max Factor blusher I've bought is much better than the 17 product I'm currently using, so that's another bonus. I had considered trying a creme blusher but the overall effect looked too... clown-like. I'm very pale so can't go too overboard with blusher!

I won't want to wear too much eyeshadow on the day, but I will want some colour just to add some definition to my eyes. The Max Factor lady suggested that I should use the lighter shade all over my eyelid then blend in the darkest shade from the outer corners of my eyes. She tried the shades out on my eyes to double check and the overall effect was subtle but effective. 

I love mascara and have to wear it every day due to my very fair eyelashes, so this was definitely a good investment. I do dye my eyebrows and eyelashes every two months or so (perils of being a redhead), but mascara still helps to thicken my eyelashes and to define them a bit more. I always go for black mascara for the maximum effect... I'm hoping for great things from this mascara!

I've read lots of great reviews on No7's Instant Radiance Highlighter so I thought this would be a good investment. It's been suggested that I apply it underneath my eyebrows, on my cheekbones and possibly in the inner corners of my eyelids. One blog post I read suggested that you should apply this highlighter on any parts of your face that are shadowy when you look down at the floor... I might use that tip!

Lastly, I bought the Nivea tinted lip salve as I'm allergic to all lip products apart from Nivea's range. I can't use lipstick, lip gloss, lip balms or lip crayons... this is not great news for the wedding photos but I'm hoping that the tinted lip salve will add a bit of colour on the day. I can't risk trying to use any fancy products on my lips just for the wedding or they'll flare up just in time for our honeymoon!

The one product I didn't buy was eyeliner as the Max Factor lady suggested that I shouldn't wear it on the wedding day if I never usually wear it. However, I do think eyeliner really makes the eyes stand out so I would like to learn to apply it before the wedding day... what do people think? I've also read that you should either accentuate your lips or your eyes on your wedding day, and obviously I can't do anything with my lips so perhaps I should focus more on my eyes. 

All thoughts on my wedding make up in general would also be most welcome... do you think I should apply my own wedding make up? Should I wear eyeliner? Can you recommend any other products for me to try? Let me know!

Christmas presents... the clothing edition

I say 'clothing'... this post will mainly focus on the new pyjamas and fluffy socks I had for Christmas. However, I did have two other very exciting things for Christmas which I've photographed below...

I had these beautiful brown suede boots from Fat Face for Christmas from my parents. I've wanted these boots for ages but could never justify buying them for myself. I love the colour and the button detail, as well as the beautifully fluffy interior. They look great with skinny jeans, hoodie and denim skirt, or my casual dresses. I haven't been able to wear the boots much yet as the weather has been so wet and I don't want to ruin them... hopefully the end of January will be drier! I love them :)

I also had the latest Welsh rugby shirt from Neil's parents for Christmas which I was very excited about, particularly as I'm going to two Welsh Six Nations games this year. My old Welsh shirt was way too big for me so this one came along at just the right time. Roll on the Six Nations!

I love pyjamas! Neil bought the lovely three piece Winnie the Pooh pyjama set for me, and the pink spotty pyjamas are from my parents. A lot of the pyjamas I've had for years are too big for me now, so I might have to organise a pyjama audit and clearout to make room for new ones. If you don't love pyjamas, I don't think we can be friends. 

Everyone loves fluffy socks! I had these beauties from Sarah, my parents and Nicola and I've already worn them all at least once. They're super cosy in the winter and I always stick a pair on as soon as I get home from work. When it's extra cold, I make the bold decision to wear slippers as well with the fluffy socks underneath. Crazy times. 

What clothes did you have for Christmas? I've bought a lot of clothes with my Christmas money, so there's a blog post to follow on those soon!

Ten things I love about Christmas

Did you all have a brilliant Christmas? Are you all still full of food and wearing your onesie/Christmas jumper? After having a lovely build up (including Fake Christmas with Neil last weekend) and a great Christmas Day yesterday, I thought I'd write a quick blog post about the ten things I love most about Christmas. It was very difficult to whittle it down to 10, believe me!


1. The food

Food just has to be on top of any list about the best bits of Christmas. Or is it that just me? It's the only time of year where I can totally justify eating as much as I want without worrying about calorie counting, going to the gym, eating healthily and so on. Although my mother's beautiful Christmas dinner is always the highlight, I also love having trifle and cold chicken at tea time, ice cream and chocolate at random intervals throughout the day and copious amounts of sweets and crisps. I love food!

2. The stockings

I love our stocking tradition and will be quite sad when this tradition comes to an end. Ever since I can remember, my siblings and I (just my brother and I in recent years) have got up early to open our stockings, then we run downstairs to see the presents under the tree before waking our parents if our squeals of excitement haven't woken them already. Although we had proper woolly stockings stuffed with presents when we were younger, we've had big gift bags for the last few years as they're a lot more practical. I had fluffy socks, a DVD, chocolates, sweets, pretty stationery, toiletries and much more in my stocking this year... long live stockings!

3. The presents

I still get excited about all the presents given to me, but I also get just as excited about seeing other people's faces when I give them their presents. I think this is a sign that I'm getting older! I had lots of lovely presents from my family on Christmas Day this year including DVDs, books, pyjamas, baking things and perfume, but I think my favourite present was my new pair of beautiful boots from Fat Face.

4. The standard Christmas Day outfit

I definitely don't go out to buy a dress specifically for Christmas Day. Who needs a dress when you can wear fluffy pyjamas and a hoodie? I'm afraid there's no photo of me in my Christmas Day outfit... I don't think people need to see that.



5. The chocolate

I know chocolate should come under the 'Food' heading, but it just has to have its own place on the list. I would stop myself in horror on an ordinary day if I decided to eat half a mini box of Quality Street chocolates before 10am. However, on Christmas Day, this is perfectly acceptable. This might be a hotly debated topic, but Quality Street are by far the best Christmas chocolates!

6. The tree

I love Christmas trees and published a blog post last week on my favourite Christmas trees of the year. There's nothing better than sitting around in pyjamas around the Christmas tree with the Christmas lights on! There's something very comforting about a Christmas tree... have I said 'Christmas tree' too much in this paragraph?

7. The company

Christmas is such a great time to spend quality time with my parents, my siblings, Neil, the in laws and my handsome little nephew. Everyone comes together from various corners of the UK, no one needs to rush away, everyone wants to catch up on each other's news and the camaraderie is brilliant. It's a shame we can't all be in the same room more often!



8. The novelty crackers

Who doesn't love crackers and their random novelty gifts? Yesterday we acquired two pairs of tweezers, two little packets of playing cards, a bottle opener and lots of paper hats.

9. The relaxation

I'm usually super busy all year round and find it hard to sit down and do nothing, so Christmas is a great chance to just relax, recharge the batteries and indulge in some guilt-free reading. Does December have to come to an end?



10. The films

I love the films that regularly get rolled out for Christmas. Home Alone 1 and 2, Santa Claus the Movie, all Disney films, Nativity, The Santa Clause, Elf, Jingle all the Way, Muppets' Christmas Carol... who doesn't love these films? Yesterday we managed to watch Toy Story 3, Home Alone 2, Muppets' Christmas Carol and Nativity 2. Christmas film fest!

What do you love most about Christmas? I'm sure there are lots of blog posts floating around on this topic so feel free to send me some links!

Glitter glitter glitter

As you'll have read in a recent blog post, I absolutely love nail varnish. I recently bought some new glittery Barry M nail varnish from Boots as it was on offer, and Barry M make the best nail varnish in the world. I haven't had glittery nails for ages, so I fancied a change. Rather than just using the glittery nail varnish, I decided to use a base coat too to add some more colour.

Aqua Glitter and Turquoise

I painted my nails with the Turquoise first, then painted the Aqua Glitter on top! Here's the finished result:

I've had the nail varnish on for three days now and it hasn't chipped at all yet. The picture doesn't really do the nails justice, as they're actually a lot more sparkly than they appear on the picture. I love them!

Can anyone recommend any other Barry M shades which I haven't tried yet?