A Trip To Westfields

A couple of weeks ago Claire and I took a trip to Westfields which at the moment is my favourite place to go shopping. It really reminds me of a peoper huge American mall, has tonnes of shops I really like and it's really spacious and airy so it never seems too crowded (which means I feel less anxious). 

I didn't do very interesting makeup as I wanted to get out the house quickly.

 

Claire wanted to take a picture of my (not particularly interesting) outfit but as we went out to the garden I realised that the burly polish builders working on the house next door (who constantly play really loud Europop from the nineties) were watching us, which explains my expression (I hope).

 

Our first stop is always at Butlers Chocolate Cafe because it is AMAZING! It does the worlds best hot chocolate and you get a free fancy truffle with every drink.

 

Drinking a delicious chocolate milkshake and wearing my fake Jeremy Scott sunglasses ( I wanted the real ones but these were £6).

 

Claire likes her Chai tea.

We shopped for a while and then had lunch. The food court is great, it has loads of choice and healthier items. I got falafel and hummous and Claire had a huge vegetable burrito.

Westfields is absolutely great for a makeup fiend like me. There's regular shops like Superdrug and Boots then higher end brands like Makeup Store, Mac and Inglot (I think it's the only Inglot shop in the UK, but I may be wrong) and Debenhams which has various brands like Chanel, Dior, Urban Decay etc.There's also an OPI shop (which I think is the only place in the UK to get Nicole by OPI polishes), some kind of mineral makeup place and Kiko (which is a great shop with bargain prices and fun colours but seems to always playing really horrible loud club music). There's also Beauty Base which is..odd. Beauty base is like a big discount perfume place (though some of the discounts are only 5p off RRP) and then it has some high end makeup brands like Shiseido (which seemed to have no discount) and also really cheap, obscure brands. You can get L.A. Colors there which is great because everythings under £5. And finally (I think, I may have forgotten some shops) a Models Own shop has just opened. 

The shop looks cool because it's in the shape of a nail polish bottle!

 

(photo belongs to Models Own)

 

My experience of the shop however wasn't that great. The staff seemed very nice and friendly but there were  a group of about 5 SAs standing in a big group chatting to each other. This meant there were bits of the shop I couldn't access and they continued their conversation even when I was paying for my goods which is a real pet peeve of mine. The stock seemed a little odd, they had hundreds of the nail polishes but they seemed to be arranged by colour, while this might usually be helpful it means if you want something from their collections (I wanted some Beetlejuice colours) you have to go hunting for them all individually. And there were about 4 sections, all of which had the nail polish in a slightly different order (some colours were on all sections, some were only on 1 etc). Models Own has a huge variety of products but the shop only had certain products. Finally the check out system is just weird. Instead of scanning barcodes the SAs are all equipped with tablet computers and have to manually search for the colour you're buying, it seems really inefficient, especially as it took took of them (one to call out the name of the product and the other to find it on the tablet)

On the plus side however you can make your own little gift box of 6 polishes for £20 (on the website you can only get premade selections)

 

Those are (rather terrible) swatches of the new Models Own Matt Brite lipsticks. from top to bottom:

Flaming Red, Annalise's Pink, Pink Hawaiian and Orangeade. 

Then an amazing thing happened, I was in Topshop looking at some glittery brogues when I heard a call of 'Lillian?' and turned to discover Robyn, my fellow Makeup Hero, looking at the same shoes! :D

Topshop wouldn't let us take a photo inside for some reason (they also wouldn't let Claire come in the changing rooms with me which sucked because I wanted her opinion on a dress I was trying) but we took one outside. Robyn is just as beautiful in real life as in her blog and a super funny awesome fellow!

 

We ended up both buying the aforementioned shoes. Oooh friend, shoe friend!

All in all a good day was had.

My nail polish (and one lipstick) haul is under the cut. I got a few other bits too (mostly tights) but I haven't taken photos of them yet. 

Haulage

 Last week I decided to leave the house on my own (apart from to walk the dogs or go to my sisters house) for the first time in about 5 months (probably, I cant remember). Scary! I was all shaky and very anxious and didn't stay out long at all, but I did it! Hooray. Go me. So I treated myself to a haul, which I shall now share.

Firstly I got these awesome huge headphones from TK Maxx

 

And they also had this Color Club Starry Temptress set for a bargainous £8. I'd seen these on blogs and was thinking of getting them from t'internet because they are both neon + glittery! :)

 

Then I got some bits from Superdrug.

 

Left-right:

MUA Professional quake polishes in Quiver and Shiver

Sleek True Colour lipstick in Mystic

Sleek Pout Paints in Peek-a-bloo, Cloud 9, Lava, Milkshake and Mauve Over

But now the most exciting thing....

 

VEGETARIAN PERCY PIGS!!

Oh how I have longed for this day! They're just how I remember only made with no animal bits. Oh frabjous day!

I also got some boring bits and bobs and some CP things. Woo! Leaving the house! Woo!

First proper haul in aggggeeessss!

At the moment I still have basically no income (should have some basic ESA reinstated but the DVLA forgot about it -__-) so I can't really afford to buy makeup or clothes or other nice luxuries. I still make some very small purchases occaisionally but they are few and far between. I'm also currently having some problems leaving my house, so Claire decided to take me out shopping and buy me some presents. We went to Kingston. I was very anxious and had some real difficulties but in general I had a lovely time, Claire was really good at looking after me and calming me down and she was really generous! I got lots of goodies and technically only spent £2 of my money! I felt accomplished afterwards.

Claire also decided I needed to have my picture taken. I'm not sure why, I didn't look particularly nice! And yet I am sharing for some reason :P

 

It doesn't look it in the photo but it was too bright for me to see, which is why I'm pulling a silly face.

And I like this photo because it's just like this one from about a year ago when we first got Weevil :) Yet again it looks like I'm strangling him when I'm not, and he's a lot bigger of course!

And the other day Jesus appeared in my cooking!

 

It's Jesus or some kind of crab-beast anyway :P

Now please follow under the cut if you wish to see my haul. 

Almighty Haul!

So recently i have been very very naughty. I've been a little bit better financially so decided to blow it all by going on a shopping binge :( naughty naughty Lillian. Last week the Seven dials in covent garden had an event one night where the majority of the shops all had 20% for one night. So i had a little splurge there and then i went to Kingston on saturday and had another little haul. There's also some bits and bobs shoved in that i got a while back but haven't shown yet.
I know some people don't like seeing hauls so it's all under the cut :)
Also i've put a * next to products i'm planning to review, if there's anything else you'd like to see a swatch or review of please just leave a comment :)
All prices are without the discount taken off.

There are men on my roof

They're meant to be there, they are fixing the roof but i'm terrified. This is the first time i've been alone in the house with them around and i'm all shaky and nervous. I'm very scared to leave the house incase they see me so i've basically been hiding in the front room with the curtains closed. They're making really loud banging noises and things and it's really freaking me out :(  Whenever they talk to each other my heart skips a beat. They're going to be here for another week, but hopefully i won't be left alone with them again.
Also the front door has to stay open because they're using our plug sockets and it's cold! The poor dogs are going to have to wait until they've left for the day to have their afternoon walk because obviously i can't leave the house with the door open.

I've been photographing clothes to pop on my blog sale, i was wondering if maybe i should send the portion of the proceeds to Chile instead of Haiti now, i've already sent £30 from the sale to Haiti so maybe i should give some to Chile now? Anyone have any thoughts on the matter?

I'm really failing at my No-buy :( I just can't help buying stuff, it really is an addiction. I'm trying so, so hard though. I bought a few bits last week with some discount codes, but now i have even more codes and i'm scared i won't be able to keep myself from using them. I think i've worked out the root of my shopping addiction and it scares me a lot. I realised that i think what i own sort of defines me and if it weren't for the stuff i have people wouldn't like me or think i'm interesting. I know this sounds utterly ridiculous, and in my head i know it's not true but i think it's a deep seated thing in my head. It probably relates to my social phobia. When i had cognitive behaviour therapy for my phobia a few years ago my therapist (who was useless) kept going on and on about how i dress (which really irritated me) and i had to try and work out why i dress so 'outrageously' when i'm so shy. I couldn't fully work it out, but i thought of a few reasons.
1. There might be no reason at all, i just like what i like.
2. I dress the way i do because it creates a sort of 'front' to keep people away, because some people can get a bad impression of me because i look so silly.
3. Because i can't express myself like ordinary people, by talking to people, i express myself through the way i look.

Hmm that was all a bit morose wasn't it?

Here's a photo of me from last spring (i was so thin back then D: want to get back to that size please body!) in an outfit i love:

I stupidly forgot to mention that i won second prize in Mizzworthy and Illamasqua's 'out of the box' contest! My winning look was the 'reverse rococo' one (http://lillianfunnyface.blogspot.com/2009/12/mizz-worthy-illamasqua-contest-entry.html) and i must agree very vainly and arrogantly that, while it may not have been executed amazingly, the idea behind it was quite original and interesting :) My prize is 3 illamasqua makeup brushes and i really can't wait to get my mitts on them! Also finally i will have some higher-end brushes to compare my ELF studio brushes to (review of them is coming up shortly, but basically they are amazing) instead of my old cheap-as-free horrible shedding, scratchy brushes and sponge applicators :P

The first-prize winning look was an amazing voodoo/tiki/jungle man look you can see here: http://jackgatsby.blogspot.com/2009/11/out-of-box-into-jungle.html very much deserved :)

This week has been a lot busier than i thought it would be, firstly there was my birthday (thank you all for your wonderful messages <3) then i had to take down the christmas decorations which is always such a sad job, then today was my nephews birthday and i've been editing and uploading a documentary on one of my favourite bands which took a whole lot longer than i thought it would. Also there has been a huge amount of snow, it is beautiful but england is pathetic and calls it 'arctic conditions' and public transport grinds to a halt. So i apologise again for the shortage of posts and my terrible lack of commenting, i'm trying my best to remedy it. The biggest hindrance to my blogging is that recently something went wrong with my girlfriends laptop, which is what i usually post from, so now i have to do all of my internetting upstairs on the desktop. This makes me feel anti-social so i tend to leave all the windows i want to comment on up and then leave the computer, meaning i have about 100 open tabs D:

I got money for my birthday and have gone on a beauty spree! I've finally splurged on a lot of mineral makeup companies i've wanted to try before but haven't had the money to, so expect in the next few months hauls/reviews from:
evil shades
hi fi cosmetics
fyrinnae
spell
ELF (though i still need to do my first review X/ i stink!)
and morgana minerals

also already arrived but i need to photo/review is a huge order from aromaleigh and christmas/birthday beauty gifts including a bunch of OCC liptars!

Tomorrow i'm free all day so i'm hoping to get down to some serious swatching and photographing :D
xxxx

Morgana Minerals Haul

About a week ago i recieved my order from Morgana Minerals www.morganaminerals.com . This was my first order from the site and actually my first order from any mineral makeup company! I didn't get much but was very impressed with what i did recieve


I was the most excited by the fact that Morgana makes mineral lipsticks, something which seems quite rare for a company to do, and as you may have gathered i LOVE lipsticks. So i bought myself 2 full tubes and 6 samples. The samples come in a tiny ziplock bag and i guess are a few scrapes of the lipstick of your choice. for 50 cents the sample is generous and will easily last for 2-3 applications, which is more than enough for you to make your mind up about the colour. However i found it quite difficult to apply the lipstick neatly because the lipstick stuck to the sides of the baggy very easily. also i found it a bit messy to stick my finger into the bag to get to the lipstick. I think it might be easier if the sample was in a jar, but then they would cost more. However those tiny problems aside, the lipsticks are wonderful. The colours are strong and well pigmented and the formula is creamy and really lovely feeling on the lips. Here are lip swatches of all the colours i tried (you can see the ones that were samples are applied a lot less cleanly than the 2 i have a full tube of):

cauldron:

this is one i bought a full tube of. It is described as 'a matte black with silver hologram sparkle'. To me this doesn't have any discernable scent and none is mentioned on the website. I must say i was a bit disappointed with this one. While it is black with sparkle the sparkle isn't particularly noticeable and when i can see it it just shows up silver to me, i haven't noticed any hologram effects. If like me you already own a black lipstick i really don't think this one is different enough for you to need this one too. But if you don't own one and want one this one is really nice, the opacity is great, the formula is lovely and the small amount of sparkle is pretty and a nice touch, but again if you already have a black lipstick it's not really so different for you to need this one as well.

turquoise:


This one is really lovely. It's a dark turquoise which is a bit on the green side. Very unusual and pretty. Again applies lovely and creamily and is opaque in 1 - 2 coats. Again i couldn't discern any scent and the website doesn't mention one.

icy aqua:


Beautiful. Like Turquoise but paler or indeed 'icy'er. I can't acually decide if i like this one more or less than Turquoise but i wouldn't buy this one as they are so very similar to each other. Again no scent.

nightshade:

A very dark almost greyish blue-purple. My least favourite of the 3 purples i tried but i know a lot of people love this colour.

shrieking violet:

I LOVE this one. It's just a beautiful colour. A really true but vibrant purple. I will definately be getting a full size of this. This one smells slightly of grape to me, but it could just be me.

grape:

Finally one where the website tells me what the scent is! This one smells distinctly of american grape candy or soda, i hate the taste of those things but really like the smell so it gets a thumbs up from me. The colour is a very dark, blueish purple. This one is very unusual again and while i prefer shrieking violet because it's brighter i can imagine this one attracting a lot of people because it's an exciting and strange colour for lipstick.

metallic maiden:

Beautiful, another one i'm going to be buying a full size of soon. This is basically a metallic bright red. Most metallic red's i've seen in the past have been a bit brown or plumish, this one is a pure true pillar box red but with a silvery metallic finish. This one smells utterly delicious, like red licorice.

ravenna:

This is meant to be a very dark blackish red. On the website it tells you to only use one coat otherwise it will become almost black, but to me this was basically black in one coat!

And here are swatches on my hand:

left to right
top: cauldron, turquoise, ice queen, metallic maiden
bottom: ravenna, shrieking violet, grape, nightshade

I also got 3 samples of glitter. These samples also come in a ziplock baggy, but that isn't any problem at all with the glitters. The sample size is very generous at $1 for a gram. 2 of the colours i got, Hottie (a bright neonish pink with blue reflects) and Siren (a plain red glitter) are beautiful but nothing that couldn't be found other places, although you can get them nice and cheaply here. However the third i got, Changeling, is one of the most amazing glitters i have ever seen. It is a dark mix of purple with bright green and fuschia reflects. I cannot describe how absolutely stunning this is.

left to right: changeling, siren, hottie, glitter ghoul
(this photo doesn't do changeling or glitter ghoul any justice and also makes my hand look insanely hairy! D:)

And finally i got a 5g jar of 'Glitter ghoul' eyeshadow from their 2009 halloween collection. It came full to the brim. Another amazing product, this is a matte, very opaque black with tiny sparkles in pink, green and blue.


Oh and i also bought some 10gram jars as i ordered before i knew i was making a tkb order. They were very well priced at 35 cents each.

Would i order again? Absolutely! When i have some money i'm going to be buying full sizes of 2 of the lipsticks i got samples of, shrieking violet and metallic maiden, several of their new christmas lipsticks and a lot more samples of other lipsticks from their main range. They're also bringing out a new set in january too so maybe some of them will get added to my casket basket :P
I think i'd also get a full size of Changeling because i love it so much and perhaps some other glitters and eyeshadows, but i haven't decided what yet.

I would highly recommend you check them out :)

updated repost from my old blog

The British Book-Store Chain Books Etc has gone bust, which is sad, but in a way i'm pleased because there is a small second-hand bookshop near me which is still going strong, and that makes me happy.
Anyway i picked up some things from the local Books Etc's closing down sale:



So i got the best of Jackie, a book of prints from the Day of the dead (i love Day of the Dead stuff, my dad's been to mexico on the day and it sounds amazing, I am very envious) and a book that is basically 'the big book of serial killers'.
Yes i am one of those people who really likes reading/watching/learning about serial killers. But then i like reading/watching/learning about most things.

I'm watching Jeepers Creepers 2, which is one of the gayest films i've seen in a long, long time. I don't mean gay in the new sense (as in a synonym for crap) i mean literally gay. It's incredibly homoerotic. The beginning 3/4 of an hour of the film basically involves a bus full of shirtless, oiled up high school boys running around a cornfield, peeing in large groups and alluding to one and others sexuality. There are only 4 female characters (in a cast of about 25) and they are basically given no character, only get tiny bits of dialogue and are so completely inconsequential i can only imagine they are there to stop the whole thing looking like a gay porn (which doesn't really work)

Aah i love trash.

My poor Guinea-pig Lettice has got a dodgy eye :( we took her to the vet and hopefully it's ust an infection, but she still might lose it. It only happened two days ago, one minute she was fine, the next her eye was red and cloudy and sad. Poor girl.

Update:
poor Lettice died a few days after i wrote this. We don't know what happened, it was really sad. Lettice was such a lovely spirited piggy and now the other two are all sad and the cage seems so much more quiet :( RIP Lettice.

Shopping!!!

So as you may have seen from my previous posts, i've been shopping something fierce recently!

Here's all i got (except for some christmas presents) from the Carnaby street sale:

Firstly i got this dress:



Which i have wanted for ages, but as it's Bettie Page Clothing (one of my favourite clothing companies) it was too expensive for me to usually even thing of buying. However... 20% off! The sizing in Bettie Page clothing are odd. On anything that is made of stretch material I can be anything from a medium to X-large and there really only seems to be the tiniest bit of difference between them, but with things without stretch i can't fit into anything less that an XX-large because otherwise my boobs get all squashed :P At the moment the size in stretch fabrics (this dress is stretchy) that fits me best is X-large, but the one i bought was just a large. It's a tiny bit too tight but really so little i figured it was worth it. They didn't have x-large in the black but said they could order it in, but that would take several months. I tried it in another colour in the X-large and to me it looked and felt exactly the same as the Large. It was a tiny bit tight, but such a small amount i figured it was worth it anyway. Also i'm hoping to lose a bit of weight :)

Shoes!





These were love at first sight. In a way they sort of reminf me of a funky-punky Margaret Thatcher :P These are by Poetic License, i got them in the Irregular Choice shop, so i guess they're some kind of sub-brand. And again, 20% off!

Some jewellery:



The heart bracelet was from Lazy Oaf. I really like it because i have disproportionately skinny wrists and generally hard bracelets like this don't fit me (i have the most beautiful giant see-through blue crystal heart one and it just slips off my constantly so i cant wear it :( ). The goldfish necklace and earrings are from Octopus. I had to get them because i have a very old painting somewhere of a girl with a (real) goldfish in a bowl for an earring, and they just reminded me of that. Also compared to the majority of my jewellery which is plastic and neon and gaudy these seem quite elegant and classy!


MAC:



Like i said, MAC was so full and busy i couldn't do any browsing, and thus no impulse buying, but i got a few bits that had been on my wishlist. So i got:
Prep and Prime Face SPF 50. I got this for the summer, so it will stay unopened until then!
Dazzleglass in Funtabulous. Have been wearing this a lot already. I love it's blue and purple pearl.
Violetta Lipstick. Just great and fun!
Lip Pencil in Magenta. To make up for the one i bought ages back that turned out to be just an empty box :(

Then today my girlfriend and i went to the cinema (we saw Up in 3D. It was wonderful. I cried and cried) and afterwards i had a little shop while i was in town. I bought the prize for my upcoming giveaway (just 3 more followers left!) and some bits for myself.



revlon lipstick in wild orchid and cherries in the snow. Wild orchid is a fuschia with a blueish pearl and slight shimmery finish. Cherries in the snow is a brilliant very pinky blue based red. This was one of the first lipsticks i had (stolen from my Mum at around age 12) and i just fancied getting it again because i like it and don't have anything that similar.

Sleek Wonderlast lip colour. This looks more bubblegum-ish in the photo than it is really. In real life it is one of the brightest, best neons i've ever seen. It's also ever so slightly shimmery, which is great as most neons are matte and one of those super long-lasting liquid lipsticks (I've never seen one this colour before!). I can't wait to try it out on my lips.

Collection 2000 Glam Crystals eyeliner in Dancing queen (the pink) and Pow! (the blue). These are, i think, the best glitter eyeliners i've tried. They're so full of glitter that one swipe is probably enough! And some of the colours (including the 2 i got) have holographic glitter in them, which i've never seen before!

Also i meant to pick up Revlons Matte Real Red (or whatever it is actually called) but somehad had put the wrong lipstick in the place, so i got 'Love that Red'. Of course i didn't check until i had got it home, opened it and swatched it, so i can't take it back. It's very nice, but just not what i wanted, and because i'm poor i can't really afford to keep it.
So if anyone wants it it's yours for £5.50 (including postage in the UK, £7 for international). It's only been swatched once (though if anyone wants to see it i'll swatch it once more :) and retails for £7.45. Here it is:



I am now incredibly poor :( I'm praying i get paid very soon!

If anyone wants to see a swatch of anything i've posted just ask, though i'm sure i'll be posting some FOTD's featuring these products really soon! :D

Oh and i apologise for the awful state of my carpet! On monday we're having some building work done, so we just keep going 'no point in hoovering until afterwards'. So it is foul!

Can't... Stop...Shopping D:

I have a serious shopping problem. It makes me feel better when i'm down or poorly (i have a stomach bug today). It's not at all good for my bank balance, but when i do have money in my account i just go 'why not have a nice splurge?'.
So... i'm in the process of making another E.L.F. order. Last week i bought some things from Morgana Minerals, an eyeshadow pallette thing from Stars Makeup Heaven, a big TKB haul (though at least my girlfriend and i are going sharing it) and eyeshadow pressing solution from coastal scents. It's terrible!
Also on thursday i'm going to a Carnaby Street event, where you get 20% off a load of shops (http://www.carnaby.co.uk/grazia/) so i know i'm gonna be spending a hell of a lot there. Oh dear oh dear. Shame on me!