Things I want but can't afford number 2

Deborah Lippmann glitter polishes! 

A year or two ago if anyone asked me whether I would ever consider spending £16 on a nail polish I would have fallen about laughing. Oh how I wish I could go back to those days! It's all evil nail blogs fault  I never would have known about this brand if I didn't follow them! Now I'm longing for these so much I'm feebly trying to justify the cost. Some of them are just so cool and unique. I mean look at this, Funky Chunky:

(photo nicked from Vampy Varnish)

It's just... SO COOL! Huge black sequin chunks all covered in a black creme like tar or something.

While the creme and shimmer polishes don't really thrill me to much I love basically all the glitter polishes. Bad Romance, Glitter in the Air, Across the Universe, Marquee Moon and most especially Happy Birthday! 

Ohh Happy Birthday. It's called a 'party in a bottle' which is just the perfect way to  describe it. The bright, multicoloured, different shaped and sized glitters remind me so much of being a small child at a birthday party. Or well the aftermath anyway! Floors strewn with confetti, streamers, party hats and so on. And those thoughts give me happy memories of jelly and icecream and musical chairs and party bags.

While there are some very, very similar polishes around (Milani Gems which I own, Wet N Wild Party of 5 Glitters, Ulta Pinyata-Yada-yada) none are complete exact dupe as none of those have the tiny square shaped glitters. 

Now I had decided to just give up on my high end dreams and collect more of the cheaper dupes came along but then I saw this:

This is a new collection for Nordstrum in the US that should be coming out any day now. It contains Happy Birthday and two very similar polishes but with sheer pink and black bases. SO SO AWESOME!

And my little evil brain is going 'hmmm well it's $42 for 3 polishes, that's only $14 a bottle. That's about £9 and they sell for £14 -£18 over here. I'D BASICALLY BE MAKING MONEY!'

Somebody stop me before I shop again! D:

Friendship is Magic Look and Tutorial - Rarity

Sorry I've been gone for a few days everyone, I've been a bit busy working. Claire and I think we'll be ready to set up shop by the middle of August or failing that the beginning of September and we're so excited! Eeeh!

Here is my second Friendship is Magic look, based on the lovely Rarity.

 

Rarity is Claire's favourite pony and I love her too. She's the seamstress for Ponyville and while she has her own strong ideas about style she tries her best to make her friends and customers happy, even if that means going against her own instincts. She's a little vain but never snotty or haughty. And while she is always ladylike she can be tough and strong when she needs to be. I find her character very refreshing, most times when girls are portrayed as being preoccupied with their appearance it goes hand in hand with being selfish. Rarity isn't at all, she's incredibly generous, always willing to give to those in need, even at her own expense.

So here's my look:

 

 As Rarity is an elegant and sophisticated pony I tried to make the look quite classy and stylish, while sticking with the royal purple and light blue colour scheme.

There's a step by step tutorial beneath the cut if you are interested :)

Wow

So sometime between last night and now I got my 700th and 701st followers!
All I can say is, well, wow! Thank you so so much. It absolutely amazes me that so many people could possibly be interested in my little witterings.

I know this may sound super silly but it really makes me feel wonderful to know that there are people who like my blog and what I have to say. At the moment I'm very isolated, I have few friends and I'm too anxious to see the ones I do have very often and so being able to talk to people over the internet really means a lot. Keeping this blog has helped my confidence in ways I can't really describe.

Hopefully soon I'll have the finances or find some other way to do a giveaway so I can give something back to you, but for now I'll just say that I am so grateful and I just hope I can keep entertaining you!

xxx

Friendship is Magic Look and Tutorial - Applejack

Hullo everyone! I'm in a good mood today as it's the first time in about a week I haven't felt ill, yay!

I've decided to do a series of looks based on My Little Pony Friendship is Magic. Claire and I just discovered this amazing programme and we watched all the first series in a couple of days. We've been childishly going 'PPOOONNNIEESSS!!!!' to each other and then giggling madly. If you haven't seen it go watch it on youtube! The animation is beautiful, the stories are fun and all the main characters have proper, well rounded personalities which is rare for any kids programmes but especially one made for little girls. They're actually allowed to be different and disagree and it's shown that that's ok, you don't have to be exactly the same as your friends. Ahh I just love it :)

So this is my first look based on the character Applejack.

Applejack is one of my favourite ponies. She's down to earth, loyal, hard-working, fun, fair and kind. She works on her familie's apple farm and isn't quite as 'girly' as a lot of the other ponies, she still wants to look her best but isn't completely obsessed with her looks, she's too practical for that. So I wanted to keep the look quite simple and natural (well natural for me anyway!)

So here's my finished look!

Please follow under the cut for a step by step photo tutorial. This is only my second ever tutorial (my first was from over a year ago, you can find it here) it probably not amazing but I hope you enjoy it!

Sawchestra Outfit

A couple of Saturdays ago Claire and I went to see my friend Foz's Sawchestra, which is an orchestra of musical saw players. They play along to silent films, that day we went to see The Adventures of Prince Achmed which was a fantastic old animation made from shadow puppets or silhouettes or something. 

Foz is probably the most amazing person I will ever meet.  He's the guitar player for my second favourite band in all the world, David Devant and his Spirit Wife. He plays just about every stringed instrument under the sun as well as the melodica, saw and various toy instruments. He likes all good things like puppets and art and magic and everything I like too. He's also an amazing graphic artist, he designed the Pop Idol logo! Despite being busy and cool and doing fantastic exciting things he always has time for me and is the sweetest, kindest man. His whole family are amazing too, his wife writes for various theatre magazines and teaches dancing and his sons make films and study circus skills! I want to live with them in their lovely house in Brighton!

Anyway here's what I looked like. These photos were taken after I got home so the makeup is several hours old. 

 

Wearing: 

Face: Illamasqua Skin Base Foundation in 02, Mac Wonder Woman blush in Mighty Aphrodite

Eyes: High Voltage Cosmetics Brow powder in Redhead, Mac Vex eyeshadow, Sugarpill Tako Pressed Eyeshadow, black liquid eyeliner, black mascara

Lips: Mac Dame Edna lipstick in Kanga-Rouge

And here's my outfit, once again situated right near the bin: 

 

The pom-pom headband and dress are from Asos

Tights are from urban Outfitters (and featured in today's tights post at my other blog :) ) 

And behind the cut I pull some Funny Faces!:

Rhubarb Rhubarb

Wow haven't I been good? I've posted every day for a whole week! I think that might be a first in the whole history of this blog :O I feel really good about it, It's been fun! Hopefully I'll keep this up as long as possible, though I ain't promisin' nothin' :P I shouldn't be too proud anyway as today's post is just a sort of round-up as I've been both busy and ill today.

Firstly I wanted to say thank you so so much to everyone who is now following my hosiery blog, I'm very touched that so many people are interested in seeing picture after picture of my legs and read me wittering on about tights.

People are beginning to get their second videos up over at The Makeup Heroes so check them out! I'm not sure when I'll even get to film mine though as I lost my voice over the weekend. It's back now but I'm very croaky and incomprehensible :(

I've realised that I forgot to describe how the Intertubes wear on me in the Shiro review so have added something in now if you're interested.

I'm sorry I'm taking forever to reply to some comments, I've been busy working on the secret project, being poorly and finding things for my blog sale, but I'll have them done in the next couple of days I swear!

Speaking of the blog sale, I'm been quite ruthless and so I have a lot more to sell than I expected. I reckon I should have it all ready by the weekend. Once I've got it ready I'll tell you and schedule it for a couple of days later (so possibly sunday) so you all know when it will start. I've got lots of good stuff including Illamasqua, Mac, Philosophy, Barry M, Sleek and Models Own :)

I made the first of my series of looks at the weekend, complete with a (probably quite rubbish) photo tutorial. I'll give you a little clue as to what the looks are based on: poooonnniiieeeesss!

And now because a post with no pictures is no fun, look at this tiny baby froglet I found in my garden!

(he's under the cut because I know some people are squeamish about amphibians. I don't understand how, he's soooo cute!)

Illamasqua Skin base Foundation

A couple of weeks ago Illamasqua had a little event to celebrate the launch of their new foundation and I was invited. Sadly at the moment I'm just not up to going to any kind of event  or leaving the house in general :( But the lovely Alex was very understanding when I explained and popped a few samples in the post for me to try.

If you've not heard of it before, Skin Base is Illamasqua's take on a BB cream. BB creams are a product started in Asia that act as a moisturiser, foundation and skincare balm all in one. Usually they contain SPF and whitening ingredients but Illamasqua has removed those.

Illamasqua claims it's Skin Base is 'Easily blendable, it effortlessly creates a perfect complexion, and like the entire Illamasqua foundation range, is undetectable in a professional HD environment. Suitable for all skin types, it smoothes, softens and conditions your skin whilst providing natural, buildable coverage.'

It comes in 18 shades from pure ghost white to a deep chocolate so hopefully there's something to suit everyone :) 

My skintone is very pale and very pink (i don't really know if thats my undertone or overtone or whatever and i think i might have very mild rosacea on the lower part of my cheeks) and it's very hard to find a foundation that really matches me. Usually they're either too dark or too yellow for me. I was sent the shades 02 which is the palest pink toned foundation, 04 which has both pink and yellow undertones (somehow :P) and 05 which is the second lightest pink toned shade.

Here are swatches of them:

02, 04 and 05 swatches heavilly

 

And blended out.

You can see that 04 and 05 just aren't right for me at all. Claire is quite pale and has more yellow toned skin than me so I've given 04 to her, if it suits her i'll get her to tell me what she thinks. 02 seemed a pretty close match so I have been trying that one. When I first applied it I feared it still wouldn't work for me but once I blended it out it matched me perfectly. Wahey! I've only been using this a few days but I absolutely adore it. 

It blends really easily. In fact while Illamasqua claim this is a medium/heavy coverage foundation, I've found that if I only use a tiny dot of product I can blend it out to give a light, sheer look. However it's really buildable, I can layer a bit more over my facial redness or any blemishes and it disguises them beautifully. The finish is beautiful, it's neither super matte nor dewy or shimmery, it looks just like natural skin. I love this because I have quite nice skin in general and the buildability means I can use a very thin layer over my whole face, letting my freckles and naturally good parts of my skin shine through, and then build it up on places that need more coverage and because of the finish it looks just like I have naturally flawless skin!  It's really easy to apply, I just spread it on with my fingers and it feels really light, I can't really notice it at all once I've put it on.

The longest I've worn this so far is about 8 hours (this is about as long as I ever wear makeup) and it lasted really well. I got a tiny bit of shine on my nose (the only place my face has any oil) but other than that it looked basically the same as when I'd first applied it. Maybe if your skin is naturally a little oily you'll need to powder over the top. The only negative I can think of is that if I have any flaky patches of skin then the foundation does tend to gather there and emphasize it. However after the actual flaky bits of skin had gone away it never emphasized any dry patches of skin. Oh and while it works brilliantly over spots and my redness I can't quite make it cover the blueish circles under my eyes.

Here are some photos of my face au naturale

 

And now with the Skin Base foundation:

As I've been using it for less than a week I can't really review it for it's skincare benefits. However I swear I've already noticed my skin feeling smoother, softer and with less dry flaky patches. This might of course be coincidental but I haven't changed anything else in my skincare routine (and at the moment my skincare routine consists of removing my makeup with wipes, cleansing and exfoliating about twice a week and moisturising when I remember to. I really need to treat my face better!).

Personally I would love to have some SPF in this product because I am terrible and always forget to put on sunblock (I burn ridiculously easily so I really need a high SPF everyday but I just never remember :( I suck) but I understand why they've removed it. SPF often causes light to act oddly in photoshoots and as Illamasqua like to cater for theatrical use they wanted to get rid of that problem.

They also removed the whitening ingredients so that the formula would be suitable for all skin tones, which I think is great. Most BB creams only seem to come in a few shades, Illamasqua is the first company I've seen that has shades that would cater to dark skinned people (though of course there may well be other companies that do and I just haven't seen them). Also I don't really know if I'd like to use a whitening product myself, I have some discolouration and redness on my face that I'd like to be rid of, but I also have freckles and I love them and don't want them to go anywhere so I don't think I'd better chance them!

So basically I'm in love with this foundation, it's probably the best I've ever tried. I'll definately be buying a full size bottle once I've used up a few other products. When I do end up getting a full bottle I'll do another review!

*I was sent samples for review but all thoughts and opinions are my own. I'm well aware that this review is so incredibly gushing it might as well be another 'Lillian Loves' but honestly this is how I feel about this foundation. I don't want to desperately rack my brain for more negative things to say just for the sake of it. It's a holy-of-holies!*

Lillian Loves... her Tangle Teezer!

 So this is going to be a new semi-regular feature, called Lillian Loves. I never get around to posting my  monthly (or even yearly :/) favourites posts, so this is sort of my alternative. I'll just be posting certain items that I've been loving recently and why.

So the first item is the glorious Tangle Teezer. Sure it may feel incredibly light and cheap and look like something you'd use to groom a horse with, but it is the best darn hairbrush I have ever used!

I've sung the praises of this thing before but only recently have I realised just how much I've come to depend on it. My hair is a bit on the thick side, curly and naturally forms tangles and even huge dreadlock-like matts if left to it's own devices (by which I mean if it's not combed, I do wash my hair... on ocassion :P). And for the last few weeks I've been leaving it to it's own evil devices. Why? Well because Claire and I managed to lose both our  Tangle Teezers a few months ago. At first I tried to keep my hair in check with other brushes and combs but it hurt too much and I couldn't work through my tangles at all because I'd just end up ripping out the tangles and huge chunks of my hair along with them. Luckily I found some styling mousse that stops the tangling a bit and makes my hair into big chunky curls so I gave up trying to brush it and just used that. But today I discovered that Claire had bought a new holy-of-holies! 

Using it was just great. When it runs through my normal hair it's just fab, it easily, quickly and painlessly gets rid of small tangles and the rest of my insane frizz. After washing my hair this morning I was left with three huge matts that I thought even the pink plastic beauty couldn't handle. And it took a little time, and a little wincing, but I got those matts detangled without pulling half my hair out!


Also back before I lost the first 2 and was using one religiously, I swear it made a difference to my hair's texture. It became much less prone to matting and just felt and looked a bit smoother and softer. I don't know how it happened, it could be a coincidence as my more recent hair growth hasn't been damaged by bleach like the ends have. But I do think that using the Tangle Teezer made at least a little difference. And even if it didn't I'd still love it because it's the only hairbrush I've ever found that is practically painless for me to use (it's painless unless I have a big matt)

(my family calls hair matts 'sheep knots', which I thought was normal but after googling it, it appears that noone else uses that expression! Bloody family slang)

Claire has also grown to love the Teezer. She wanted to weigh in with her opinions. It really sounds like a cheesy advert but it's what she thought!:

'Since bleaching about 8 years ago and not stopping to let my poor hair recover since, a particular section of my hair near my hairline on both sides of my head keeps breaking off and never gets longer than about 2inches long. Since I started using the Tangle Teezer, those little bits have actually started to grow, and look a lot less frizzy than they used to. And since I'm pretty horrible to my hair, if the Tangle Teezer can do that singlehandedly, I never want to be without one!'

So yeah, I love this guy.

*despite the ridiculous gushing this is all my own thoughts, I bought this myself and have recieved no form of compensation for writing this post. I just really love this!*

Various chatter

Hullo everyone, just a quick word. I've started up my hosiery blog! Please don't feel pressured to follow if you don't want to, but please do head over and just take a look at the lovely header Claire made for me :)

Also I've decided to do some series' of looks to get me back on the creative makeup game (I have a few in mind but if you have any suggestions please let me know!) does anyone think my looks are good enough to be interested in me making some tutorials, or should I just post looks?

Proper post is coming up later, right now I'm gonna get started replying to comments :)

OOTD - Bunnies!

I've been ill again today. Had an awful sore throat and have just felt exhausted and rubbish all day. Grump grump grump!

Here's some pictures from a less rubbish day! 

  

Wearing:

Top: Next

Skirt: Miss Selfridges

Tights: Generic pink fishnets

Shoes: Office

I was very pleased as the skirt didn't fit me even when I bought it (I kept it to slim into because I like it so much) you can't see the pattern well but it's bunnies too!

And here is my face:

Wearing:

Face: Illamasqua Skin Base Foundation in SB02 (review coming soon, but basically I LOOOVVE it)

Eyes: MUA glitter eyeliner in Shade 7, black mascara

Lips: Models Own Lipstick in Plum

I've added a swatch of Plum to my Models Own Swatcharama :)  

 

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar decided he needed to be picked up when my photo was being taken.

 

Beautiful thing <3

Now have some outtakes!