My nail polish collection

So this came about second in the voting on my 'little round up' post but i decided to do this one before my 'top 5s' because i am lazy and those posts will take more effort than this one! XD

Basically i store my polish on these weird little 'shelf'' things in my room. I'm not sure what they are, maybe an odd form of picture rail? But they're just perfect for displaying all my polishes so i can see them all easily. It also saves me a lot of space because nothing else will really fit on the tiny shelves :P

I have only recently got very 'into' nail varnish having seen so many gorgeous, exciting colours and manicures on various nail blogs. The frightening thing is that i have probably bought more than half of these in the last 6 months :O

Wall of polish!:

 

Mizz Worthy and Illamasqua Elementals Contest - Fire

This is my final entry for the contest (i actually did 2 more looks but they were rubs and will be confined to the depths of my picture folder for all time) and is based around the element of fire. One of my failed looks was a sort of take on traditional punky makeup but using fire colours of red, orange and yellow and i decided to again use a punk aesthetic but try and create a look based on smoke of fire instead of the flames. The idea behind going for a punky look was that, while all the elements can be dangerous, it is fire that is regarded as the most so (in my opinion anyway) while water, air and earth all have tranquil aspects to them fire is mostly thought of as a destructive force. And i thought this went with the idea of nihilism and the shock and fear of punks conservative people often had in the 70s.
So this is sort of my take on a smokey eye but taken to the extreme (I am useless at a regular smokey eye because i'm pretty bad at blending, but with this look i thought i could get away with it being messy)

 

 

 

I did my face as usual and added a little red eyeshadow under my cheek bones and down to my jawline. Then i applied a thick rim of black eyeshadow around my eye before blending it (as best i could) up, down and out to my hairline. I also very lightly blended in some red eyeshadow and lined my waterline in red. Then i tapped on some red glitter (this time actually eye safe!) and stroked some over black mascara too. finally i added a little of the black shadow and red glitter over my lips.

I used:

Urban Decay Surreal Skin cream-to-powder foundation

Avon translucent powder

Sugarpill Love + eyeshadow

Sugarpill Bulletproof eyeshadow

Kryolan Red eyeliner pencil

Red cosmetic glitter

black mascara

Also i am a ginger now :)

Mizz Worthy and Illamasqua Elementals Contest - Ice

 I had so much fun with my first two looks for this contest i decided to do some more :) This is a second entry using the element of Water but this time i wanted a sort of Ice Maiden look.

 

 

 

First i painted my whole face white and powdered with a white translucent powder and then an iridescent shimmer face powder. I contoured my nose, eyes, cheeks and forehead with blue eyeshadow and applied it lightly to my lips too. Then i used the white side of a double ended mascara on my eyelashes and eyebrows and then pressed an opalescant, chunky glitter on top (the glitter i used specifically says not to use it on the eyes but i paid no heed to this. Oooh i'm a rebel!). Finally i slicked my lips with a blueish, iridescent lipgloss and sprayed my face with a setting spray before shaking large flakes of glitter all over my face :)

I used:

Kryolan White face paint
Screen face white powder
Aromaleigh Opal powder
Sugarpill Tako eyeshadow
Illamasqua Medium pencil
Estee Lauder crystal flash lipgloss
Sleek double ended mascara
Rocket City glitter
Early learning centre 'snow glitter'

Hmm i think i prefer my first 'water' look, but this was a lot of fun to do too :)

Little Round up

Hi everyone!
I just wanted to make a quick post to thank the new followers i've got recently and also to thank my old followers, you guys are totally the greatest! :D I hope to have a giveaway up soon but i'm absolutely skint at the moment.
Thank you for all the comments and well wishes on my Illamasqua contest entries (i have a few more ideas in mind but i think the two i've posted might actually be the best!)
And thank you all for your top coat suggestions. The concensus seems to be that Seche Vite is the most loved, but i am put off by it going so gloopy. I actually picked up 2 new ones to try because i got them on the cheap, a GOSH high-shine top coat that was only £1 in superdrug because the bottle had a small chip (its on the base) and the Barry M 3-in-1 as all Barry M nail paints are 2 for £5 in Superdrug.


I've got a list of upcoming posts i am planning on writing or have already started to write (or make videos about as i haven't made any for ages) and wanted to see if any of you had preferences as to what you would like to see first :)
So options include:
Soap and Glory reviews
My nail polish collection
Favourite perfumes
A post (daren't call it a tutorial) about changing your lip shape
Top Shop makeup swatches and review
BFTE foundation, eyeshadow and blush reviews
Top 5s of lipsticks, eyeshadows, varnishes etc (i cannot possibly do a top 5 overall, i would die!)
Or do you have any other suggestions?

And as well i will have a lot of Outfits, faces and nails of the day to share :)

And now, just to make this post vaguely amusing:

 

O HAI I R SUPER SEXEH!!!

Mizz Worthy and Illamasqua Elementals Contest - Water

 The second element i decided to try and convey was water. I wanted to make a sort of creature-makeup and tried to look like some sort of watery spirit creature. I was attempting to look like i wasn't wearing makeup, but that i just naturally looked like this. It was a lot of fun! :)

  

  

Ok it looks awful with the flash, but i wanted to show the shimmery skin properly :P

 

The first thing i did was block out my eyebrows with a glue stick and powder and then applied foundation heavilly to properly cover them up. Then i started covering my face with shimmering blue eyeshadows and various other bits and pieces. I contoured a little with a green shadow and then used the Illamasqua liquid metals and lipgloss to make little 'scales' by making little fingertip marks under my cheekbones, down my nose, on my chin and forehead and the sides of my face. I added some shimmery white shadow as a highlight on my cheekbones and forehead. Then i put glitter on my face using a round brush to make sort of circles of glitter (again trying to look like scales). My lips were covered with blue lipstick and gloss and then patted a lot of glitter on. Finally i patted some of the blue shadow onto my waterline to try and get rid of the red (i wish i could have done this to the tear duct too, but that would have been a very stupid idea :P). And then i teased my hair to try and make it look like i was underwater and pated some eyeshadow and glitter on it too.

I think it ended up looking pretty good but i worked over it a bit too much and ended up losing the look of scales i had tried to achieve. I only wish i'd bothered to continue it down to my shoulders so the photos would look better :(

I used:

gosh x-ceptional wear foundation in porcelain

dainty doll concealer in fair

Avon powder

aromaleigh forget-me-not

evil shades banshee

evil shades moonlit

evil shades silver bullet

aromaleigh greenbrier

illamasqua liquid metals in enrapture, phenomena and surge the new one

illamasqua intense lip gloss in galactic

morgana minerals serenity

evil shades lip gloss banshee

wet n wild glitter (no name)

morgana minerals twinkling teal glitter

Mizz Worthy and Illamasqua Elementals Contest - Air

Mizz Worthy and Illamasqua are having another amazing contest! I adore these collaborative competitions and have entered the previous 2 (i was lucky enough to win second prize in the last one :)). Mizz Worthy is one of my favourite bloggers and, as you know if you read my blog frequently, Illamasqua is my favourite makeup brand. These contests always have a wonderful, fun and exciting concept and they provide me with the motivation to get off my chubby butt and really do something interesting with my looks. 

This time the theme is Elementals. Go here and enter yourself!

I had a bit of trouble thinking of an idea to do with the element for air simply because it's, in a way, the most abstract of the elements. It's invisible for one thing :P The others can instantly conjure up images in my mind and have clear colours and symbols associated with them. Air is more ethereal and subtle.

However i didn't want to do an ethereal or subtle look. So i came up with an idea that would let me be bold and brash while still representing the element of air. My idea was that i was standing in a wind so strong that it managed to blow my makeup from one side of the face to the other.

Anyway here is what i came up with:

  

 (a close up of my lips so you can see that i am nowhere near my natural lip shape :P)

To achieve this look i basically did the right side of my face as normal (apart from the lips), then did the left side, dragging my blush and eyelashes to the right (i also attempted to do this with my eyebrows but they did not want to cooperate) and i put the wing of my eyeliner and the false eyelash on the inner corner instead of the outer (it was horrible doing this, it feels completely unnatural). Finally i redrew my lips completely in a wonky, picasso-esque shape, dragging the cupids bow in a slant to the right and extending the right corner.

And to top it off i dragged my hair to the one side.

I think it was a good conceit but not sure how well i pulled it off. What do you reckon, can you see the idea i was going for?

I used:

Face:

urban decay surreal skin foundation in illusion

no 7 powder

kryolan Frambosia (not sure if this is meant as a blush or eyeshadow. I used it as blush)

Eyes:

2true eyeliner

black mascara

Nyx false eyelashes

clear brow gel on my eyebrow

Lips:

Barry m lip laquer pencil in no 2

Please tell me what you think, constructive criticism is welcome as always. Expect quite a few more entries from me, this contest has got my creative juices flowing :)

Find me a new top coat!

Last night i was doing my nails. I used a lovely colour, Model's Own Pink Punch and it was looking lovely. I left it a while and then applied my top coat which is by Collection 2000. It seemed fine and by bed time seemed perfectly dry. I went to bed with beautiful smooth nails and woke up with THIS:

Look at that bubbling! And it is so much worse in real life, my camera couldn't pick up the true ugliness.
I know it wasn't the polish because i had used it before without a top coat and it had been fine, no bubbling at all.

So... i need a new top coat. Preferably one i can get in Superdrug or Boots or somewhere and that is reasonably cheap. However if there is one you love that is from a higher end or international polish brand please tell me anyway :)

Animal Testing

Something that has been doing the rounds on the beauty network lately has been posts about cruelty free products and bloggers opinions about animal testing.

The majority of products i own come from companies that are certified cruelty free, and until recently i honestly thought my whole collection was. However i have been horrified to discover, since reading up on the subject that i do own a few items that may have been tested on animals.

I am a vegetarian and try my best to stay clear of any animal by-products ( i do own some leather shoes but the majority i have are synthetic) however i have a terrible problem of short sightedness where i just forget to check. It's pretty inexcusable but it's the truth. There are companies that i know never animal test (because they make it well known), some i know that definately do and stay well clear of and then some i don't know. Usually i will google a company to check but sometimes i just forget and when that happens i generally just forget that such a barbaric thing exists. There are also some companies that i have been informed don't test on animals or vice versa and then discover the person who told me was mistaken. For instance i was told that Lancome were cruelty free and so happily started purchasing from them. Turns out this is completely incorrect and now i feel very guilty for owning several Lancome mascaras.


Thankfully a law is coming into effect in 2013 which will see that no products being made in the EU will be tested on animals and it will be illegal to sell products in the UK that have been tested outside the EU.  This is amazing news and I just wish it could come into effect sooner.

From now on i am going to be absolutely stringent about what i buy and keep a list of cruelty free companies with me at all times so whenever i need to buy anything i will be able to check on the list.
Having recently found out that a lot of companies i assumed were cruelty free are not i have been feeling an awful amount of guilt. And so instead of just wallowing in self pity I am going to take action.
I am not going to throw out the products i own already that may not be cruelty free as that would be wasteful but i will be getting rid of them and will never purchase from these brands again, and if i were to get them as gifts from nowi would not use them. From now on shall never feature or even mention anything in my blog made by them or any companies that do test * This blog will now be 100% cruelty free.


There is absolutely no excuse for cosmetics to be tested on animals. There are so many good alternative and it is simply a barbaric practice. It's a cause that is close to my heart for many reasons.

So i apologise for my stupidity in the past. My ignorance is just really unforgiveable and i can just hope that i can make up for it in even the slightest way in the future.

Here are some wonderful resources to give information about cruelty free companies.
Buav website
Companies that DON'T test
Peta's caring consumers

* Of course sometimes things are not  always black and white. For instance i have been informed that while L'oreal does or has previously tested on animals it also pours huge amounts of money into research into cruelty free alternative. Also some companies on the list have tested on animals in the past but no longer do so. And then there are ingredients tested on animals by one company, deemed to be safe and so then used by another company. This second company can then use the ingredient that has in the past been tested but as they have not done the testing themselves they are considere cruelty free. To be on the safe side I will be avoiding all the companies on the list that do test until after 2013 when the legislation comes in.

BFTE Cosmetics

I was contacted by the lovely Crystal from Beauty From the Earth cosmetics to see if i wanted to try any of their products. Did i Ever! 

Again please believe that any reviews of these products will be entirely truthful and not sugarcoated in any way because i recieved the items for free. 

I have had a soft spot for BFTE since I first heard about them which was when the scandal about Lime Crime's repackaging was found out. It turned out that BFTE had been repackaging but didn't realise how it would upset people. When they found out they instantly apologised for any upset they caused anybody, reduced the amount of plain micas they sold and relabeled them all as 'primary pigments' so people would be aware of the fact. This seemed such a good, sensible way to deal with the problem, admit it and apologise and learn from your mistake. It made them seem quite trustworthy.

BFTE sells hundreds of multi use minerals (mainly used as loose eyeshadows) the vast majority of which are unique, original blends, as well as foundations, veils and blushes, lip glosses, primers and some false eyelashes and brushes and other supplies. Their website is really professional looking iwith tutorials, before and after looks and more. Their prices are competitive for an indie, mineral makeup company (for instance $6.50 for a full jar of shadow, $2 for a sample jar, £9.99 for a lipgloss etc). 

Anyway Crystal asked me to send her a long list of products i'd like to try and she would choose some to send to me. So, assuming i would be sent just a few samples, i went to town creating a long list of choices. Really long! My parcel arrived a week or so after i sent my email and was shocked to see that they had sent me basically everything i had said i was interested in! Of my ludicrously long list only a few items were missing. I couldn't, and still can't, believe the genorosity!

Here is what i was sent:

 

See, so generous!

I was sent 3 full multi-use minerals, 13 samples of multi-use minerals (12 pictured here and also a small baggie which i have forgotten to swatch), 4 blush samples, 3 foundation samples and 1 veil sample.

:O

Please see below the cut for swatches.

Skin MD Natural Shielding Lotion Review

This is the first review i have ever done where i have been send the product for review. I was kindly sent this by the lovely people from Skin MD who have been exceptionally kind and helpful (they also offered to sponser a giveaway but it would only be available to people in the US and, seeing as i am in the UK and a lot of my readers are outside the US i didn not take them up on this). I know some people may be put off by the fact that i did not actually shell out my own money for this product but please be assured that i will be treating this product like i would if i had bought it myself.

When I was also offered to test this i jumped at the chance, having read up about it this stuff sounded amazing. Not only is it a moisturiser but it also acts as a shield from outside pollutants, it's been recommended by doctors and is not only vegan and never tested on animals but is an eco friendly product, using solar power in its manufacturing and is full of natural ingredients.  'Hello, wonder product alert!' thought I.

Along with the bottle i was sent a few leaflets explaining more about Skin MD and a few sample sachets of the lotion (i gave these to my Mum to try, which i will discuss later).

So here is some information about Skin MD Natural Shielding Lotion (nicked from the very informative website which offers reviews and free samples)

'Skin MD Natural lotion combines Aloe Vera, Vitamin E, Arnica, Comfrey, Chamomile, and Yarrow to provide the gentle, soothing moisture needed for natural skin that is healthy, soft, and touchable...
 
Antioxidant-rich Aloe Vera and Vitamin E help soften skin while Arnica soothes and revitalizes. Chamomile enriches the skin while vitamin-rich, Comfrey and Yarrow, help the skin to look its best. The ingredients in this natural lotion work together for skin that has rarely looked or felt so good...


For healthy, natural skin, what's not in a skin care product is as important as what is in it. Our Skin MD Natural lotion is free of parabens, fragrances, colorants, mineral oil, propylene glycol and many other potentially harmful and drying chemicals found in other skin care products. It is a non-toxic and hypo-allergenic skin care solution.

Skin MD Natural also uses only the highest quality food-grade ingredients with no animal products or animal testing. It's naturally vegan, and cruelty free...

Skin MD Natural lotion for dry skin will leave your skin feeling and looking soft, radiant, and hydrated. Skin MD Natural lotion is the natural skin care alternative to the many dry skin care products that can actually dry the skin. Lotions for dry skin that contain petroleum, artificial fragrances, para­bens, colorants and other chemicals may cause dry skin to worsen. Avoid dry skin care products with harsh chemicals and use Skin MD Natural lotion for dry skin on the face, hands, or body.

Let the gentle blend of Aloe Vera, Vitamin E, Arnica, Comfrey, Chamomile, Yarrow, and other food grade ingredients in Skin MD Natural turn your dry skin into silky smooth natural skin that glows. Find the moisture you've been looking for; without the greasy surface created by chemicals with Skin MD Natural. You can finally say good-bye to dry skin and hello to natural skin with Skin MD Natural lotion.  '

Now i want to talk a little about my skin. On my face, overall, i have pretty good skin, I very rarely have breakouts, clogged pores or any oilyness but i do suffer from dryness, especially on and around my nose which is often a bit flaky. My complexion isn't the best, i have a lot of redness in my cheeks, however my skin is very smooth and is usually quite soft to the touch. I'm not the best at skincare. My general routine is pretty shameful. I only cleanse my face once a day at night, and that's only if i've been wearing foundation or powder. Otherwise i cleanse, exfoliate and occaisionally use a mask 2-3 times a week.
I try and moisturise at least once a day, but quite often it just doesn't happen :P
Before using Skin MD i had been using a rich night cream before bed and a lighter day cream in the morning.

Now on to my actual review! (took me long enough didn't it :P)

While this can be used everywhere i decided to use it on my face and hands as i assumed the little bottle would be used up really quickly if i used it on my body. I used it as the bottle suggests, at first every 2-8 hours (for the first week) and then every 12-24 hours. The lotion is a milky, slightly watery cream that has no smell on the skin but if you smell a blob of it really close up (i like smelling things :P) has a slightly odd herbal/vodka scent. I was amazed by how little of this you need. A drop about the size of a 5p piece (or a dime in the US :)) would cover my whole face very easily and then with very little effort the lotion sank into my skin and was absorbed almost instantly leaving no greasy feeling. However what it did leave really shocked me at first, i was totally unused to anything like it. Basically after this absorbed into my skin it left behind a layer that i guess is the reason this is called a 'shielding' lotion. I felt like i had a very thin layer of wax over my face, like the skin of an apple. At first i hated this because it just felt bizarre, but after a few uses i grew used to it and it didn't bother me at all. In fact i began to see the benefits, because if i can feel this layer on my skin i figured that it would be acting as a barrier against dirt and other nasties :)
After a few hours the waxy feeling layer subsided and my skin was left feeling smooth and sort of 'plumped' up. However these effects were quite short lived, disappearing after a while and leaving my skin much the same as it was before use.
After using the lotion skin didn't feel any softer at all, not instantly and not in the long run. At first this didn't bother me but after a few weeks i could really feel the difference and began to long for a richer cream to add some hydration to my skin. Usually the dry skin on my nose will disappear after using a good cream but with this it didn't get even slightly better.
Towards the end of the trial i decided to go back to my old creams but used this as a top-up during the day. My skin felt a lot better for using my richer creams but i began to realise that the Skin MD didn't seem to be making any difference at all :/


I also used this on my hands and I actually did really like it for that purpose. While again it didn't moisturise them as well as my usual lotions the shielding effect really came into it's own. The shield layer really seemed to help protect my hands so even though they didn't seem to be moisturised by the lotion itself, it seemed to help my hands keep in their natural moisture. I could wash my hands and there would still be a protective layer keeping my hands safe.

My Mum tried a few samples of this product and really liked it but annoyingly wouldn't tell me anything more detailed. After i had used this for 2 months (more than long enough to really review how it worked for me) i gave it to my sister Lydia who suffers from bad exzema. She is still using it so i will be writing a follow up when she gets back to me about how it worked for her :)

So all in all i thought it was an interesting product and it worked well in some ways i wouldn't use it myself as it was just not moisturising enough for a moisturiser.I think maybe this would work a lot better on people who have oily or normal skin, with my dry skin i really need a stronger, richer lotion and i think other dry skinned people might feel the same. For me it certainly is not 'The Ultimate Dry Skin Solution' as the websites suggests.

I would recommend getting the version with SPF 15 if you were thinking of buying it because... well why not? You might as well have the added benefit!
I'm not sure about the price, it does seem expensive compared to my usual drugstore brands but is cheap compared to a lot of high end lotions, also you need to use such a little of the lotion each time one bottle will last you a long, long time (i used mine at least once every day for 2 months before giving it to my sister and it's still going strong now).
So overall... i don't know what to say about this! It didn't work brilliantly for me, but it was still pretty good and i think it's a really good, innovative product. But i personally wouldn't repurchase it.

So fed up, NOTD and painting

A little while ago the wonderful people at Beauty from the earth sent me some wonderful samples to try. I had been putting off writing my review until i'd used the products long enough to get a proper idea about them. Now i have and it appears my entire photo of folders (including FOTDs, swatches etc) has gone missing. I assumed i had deleted it but it's not in the recycle bin. I can't find it anywhere though, it's baffling me!
Hopefully i'll find it lurking somewhere deep within the computer memory or i shal have to take them all again X/

 

Here are my nails from last week - Illamasqua's Insanity with Topshop matte topcoat on the tips. The terrible application is my fault, not the polishes (it applied like a dream) i kept smudging and instead of taking it off i just applied another coat :P

And here is a terrible photo of quite a nice painting i finished a while back. Pepito the Performing Pup :)

Pinchy pinchy kiss kiss

The Body Shop Reviews

I'm on a big skincare review kick at the moment :P After this i have some Soap and Glory reviews and then i think i'll have talked about everything i've used up (or enough to review) or far.  I hope you enjoy reading these toilettrie based posts as well as makeup ones :)

Also coming up soon i will be posting a series of blog sales including makeup, clothes, accessories, shoes and miscellaneous stuff. I am absolutely skint at the moment and have an entire room full of stuff i want to sell (i'm serious, a whole room! D:) so i figured i would actually finally get round to photographing it all. I'll be offering it at prices i think are fair but i want to get rid of as much as possible (everything that doesn't sell here will be going on ebay) so i will be up for haggling :) Sorry if you're not interested in blog sales but i do have some nice stuff and want to offer it to my readers first :)

Anyway here comes the body shop post, hope you like it!

Lush Reviews

Firstly I want to thank each and every one of you who commented on my last post so so much. I'm usually alright talking about my disorder but there is still a stigma attached to mental illness so i was a little worried posting such personal details in public but your responses were so wonderful i am just overwhelmed by your kindness. I'm going to reply to each and every comment but there are so many and they are so long and indepth i want to really take me timeabout it. Thank you all again, you really have no idea how much it means to me <3

Also in other news I found out yesterday that the book i illustrated (you can see pictures here) seems very likely to be published in the near future (the author recieved proofs so unless anyhing drastic goes wrong it will be coming out soon). Not all of my illustrations made it in but a good few did and while it's not going to be a huge book and i won't be recieving proceeds just having my pictures in a real book is amazing. I'm a very happy girl :)

Now please go behind the cut to see a big lot of Lush reviews :)

My disability

I got a comment on my blog yesterday that upset me a bit. It was asking about my social phobia, the commenter didn't understand how i could truly have it when from what she'd seen in my blog i seemed to have quite an active social life.

I realise now that if you don't have anxiety yourself, or know someone who has it, it can be very difficult to understand. And I guess if you only know me online (which is basically all of my followers) i do come across as quite a cheerful, gregarious person. I'm sorry to the original commenter that i overreacted a bit, i know you didn't mean anything offensive by it. It's just difficult to me to have to prove my disability and when you asked why i was living off the government it just sort of seemed you were implying that i was lying about my disability. I understand you weren't now and just didn't understand.

So for anyone who's interested here's a short explanation of my disability and how it affects me.

FOTD - going for a walk

 I went for a sort of modern-ish 20s look. I didn't have any brushes to hand so all of it is applied with  fingers (which is my excuse for why the eyeshadow isn't blended or anything at all :P).

 

                                                                             

Wearing: 

Face: Urban Decay Surreal Skin cream-to-powder foundation in Illusion, an old rimmel concealer, BFTE blush in Georgia Peach:

Eyes: BFTE eyeshadow in Pewter

Lips: Mac Cockney

Then Claire took some photos of me walking the dogs because she felt like it, so i was silly :P

Pedigree Adoption Drive

One of my dogs is adopted and had a terrible life before she was rescued. For years she was just tied in a field with a heavy, tight iron collar around her neck tethering her. When we first got her she was very shy and scared of her own shadow, anytime we raised our arms or walked up to her she would cower, thinking we were going to hurt her. One of her ears is weird and crumpled which the vet said was caused by her getting an infection and it never being cured and she only has a few teeth and they are rotten and often broken into odd shapes (we think she was probably kicked in the jaw).

Years ago we had another dog, Patch, who we had rescued from Battersea. He had been abandoned and before that must also have been abused. Everytime anyone picked up a newspaper to read, or a stick to throw for him he would start trembling and cower. My parents rescued him when he was about 1 and at the time i was a 1 year old baby. I grewup up with him at my side until we were 14 and he had to be put to sleep because he had cancer. He was the sweetest, most beautiful dog.

Minnie too has grown from that scared, sad little thing into a beautiful mischievious, greedy little hound. Despite being quite an old girl (around 8) she has tonnes of energy and loves rolling around playing with Digby or racing across the park and always comes and sits on our laps for cuddles.

So adoption is a cause that is incredibly close to my heart. Lots of people are hesitant to adopt animals because they worry the animals might be agressive or damaged permanantly in some way. While of course on occaision this can be true (i know this myself but i haven't been put off adopting. Thank god) the majority of the time these animals have done absolutely nothing wrong, they are simply either abandoned or abused, or just come from loving families who, for whatever reason, can no longer take care of them. So i feel a huge amount of love, honour and respect for anyone who works in animal sanctuaries or adopts animal, when i am more financially secure i will certainly donate money to them and if i can get over my phobia it would be wonderful to volunteer.

 Anyway, why am i writing this? Well i saw on Tanya's Blog an amazing post that alerted me to a brilliant thing the big brand Pedigree are doing. Pedigree have launched 'The Pedigree Adoption Drive 2010' to try and bring awareness to the public about how many dogs are without proper homes right now. There are many ways to get involved such as donating or adopting yourself, but of course not everyone is in a position to help like that.  So Pedigree have made something that everyone can do. They have made a video about the drive and for the first 100000 views they will donate £1 per view.

(i took this info from Tanya's blogpost who in turn took it from the youtube channel)

"Last year over 107,000 dogs were abandoned in the UK and one abandoned dog was put down every hour. This year Pedigree wants to change this fact.

Help us by adopting a dog, donating money or simply by making sure as many people as possible see this YouTube Channel page.
Paste a link into your facebook status, tweet it, email it or send it as a text message.

We're looking to improve the lives of thousands of dogs across the UK - not to mention the dog in the video. For the first 100,000 views, we will donate £1 - see below for details.

*For every viewing of an episode of Charlie's story, Mars Petcare will donate £1 to the PetPlan Charitable Trust (Registered Charity Number 1032907), up to a maximum of £100,000. Terms and conditions apply - please visit pedigreeadoptiondrive.com."