Blogvember day 4: back home!

We had a fantastic time in Brighton, despite such a stormy night. It was quite soothing to hear the crashing waves, maybe for me, Rob didn't sleep too well!

I took some vlog footage to show where we visited and that should be up not before too long :)

Lily was a very good girl for her Auntie, my parents already miss her, aww!

 

Blogvember day 3: off to Brighton!

Just a short blog entry today, as Rob and I are escaping off to Brighton shortly. Looking forward to it lots.
I incorrectly assumed that my mum's iPad charger would be compatible with my iPad so I thought why bother bringing my own, so my own iPad is on critical battery. Boo!

It is pretty good spending time with my kitty cat. We didn't know where she was this evening so my mum had to flush her out of her invisible hiding place using a handheld Hoover, poor cat!



Lily adores her and strokes her gently but diss like showing the cat all her different toys and assembling them around the cat. She did get a rap from the cat but Lil did try to pull a whisker!

Blogvember day 2: Brighton up!

 It is our wedding anniversary weekend, and Rob and I are heading to Brighton, which is where we met.

The weather isn't going to be so great I've heard but the lights on the prom and the pier will liven the familiar atmosphere up.

In the mean time I want to brighten my skin up. Brighten/Brighton. See what I did there? 

I haven't been feeling my best lately and my skin is reflecting this. When I feel sluggish, my skin can break out and just lose any form of vitality.

So I have applied a light layer of Korres Wild Rose Instant Brightening Mask.

It comes in a diddy little thick cardboard box with a matte texture, which could well be produced from recycled materials.

The tube I own holds 16ml, which I think is a bit on the small side, but I ensure I only use as much as I need.

What I love about Korres is that they produce only natural products, or at least try to stuff their products choc a bloc with natural products known for their skin benefits.

They emphasise this point by featuring a hefty list of typical cosmetic ingredients which they don't use and this takes up at least half a side of the packaging. They really intend to mean business here, no beating around the bush. Amongst other ingredients, it contains shea butter, avocado oil and of course rose oil. 

The Korres Wild Rose Instant Brightening Mask is packaged in a tube I would liken to a travel size toothpaste tube. It feels quite clinical in that way, perhaps as a botanical and natural products company that is the look they are aiming for with this style of packaging.

The mask itself is pure white and lacks the consistency of a conventional clay based mask. It resembles a light moisturiser in texture and spreads well onto the skin.

The amount squeezed from the tube in the photo below is the amount I generally use to apply to my forehead and the same amount again to apply to both of my cheeks. If I used this mask all over my skin regularly I would run out in a matter of weeks. So I focus on the parts of my skin which would usually have a natural brightness, especially the delicate under eye skin merging with my cheeks.

As you may be able to tell from the photo below, the applied mask/cream doesn't sit as an even layer on your skin, when you apply it it seems as if some is absorbed into the skin. I leave it on five minutes longer than the recommended time, for a total of 20 minutes.

I aim to use this mask in the morning time before I apply makeup. But as I leave it on for 20 minutes this cannot be a regular part of my skin care routine since my mornings are busy being a mum of a toddler. It is a treatment which I enjoy using once every couple of months or when I feel I would benefit from it.

I definitely see a difference as to how my make up sits on my skin throughout the day and my facial skincare products seem to absorb easier too. I usually see a marked difference in the brightness of my skin especially the day after application, however the most instant difference is the glow and softness my skin has after I wash the product off.

Korres Wild Rose Instant Brightening Mask can be purchased online, for example, at feel unique for £7.00

Blogvember day 1: Nails of the Day

Vlogtober has finished. I thoroughly enjoyed it as my first video every day experience. I didn't find it a problem, luckily my uploading speed is quick due to some jolly good internet around here. Although as you know I had a scare towards the final days of Vlogtober regarding the seemingly imminent death of Rob's PC.

Pinch, punch, first day of the month anyway!

I have decided to do blogvember for the month of November. I actually can't believe it is November already. Next month we will be going to the States, so excited!

Nails of the Day (NOTD)

Lately I have been wearing just models own in champagne. It is a gorgeous colour, metallic, reflects different colours, definitely represents champagne well but if you add a pink undercoat you could get a rose gold effect. But I'd classify this as more of a white gold. And as soon as I tried it I fell in love with it.

I did not even want to take it off, so after a top up I decided to go over the top with Rimmel London 60 Seconds in 600 Deliciously Dark. This is a very very deep dark plum colour. Very autumnal, bordering on gothic. One coat allows the light through it so you can see the red pigments, whilst more coats will deepen the colour and it will appear exceedingly dark with a hint of plum if you scrutinise your nails. I do find that dark nail polishes such as this can stain your nails especially the longer you wear the colour and the colour tends to sink in around the cuticles which is a bit of a nightmare to remove.

The Xpress flat brush is quite wide and excellent for providing as much nail coverage in one stroke. This is exactly how I applied it over my nails already sporting the metallic base coat.

As you can see the champagne colour is peeking out around the cuticle perimeter of the nail. I love the combination of the colours,the metallic base adds a touch of light to a very very dark shade.

Quite experiemental but I love the effect and I will try this look again using a different dark autumnal top coat. But not all of my nail polishes feature such a handy brush as the Rimmel Xpress flat brush, so I may not be able to achieve a one stroke effect and I dislike nail polish lines where you can see you have overlapped.

This style of nail polish application can also give the illusion of neater nails, slimmer and longer with a great shape, which is a bonus of course.

The Models Own and Rimmel London 60 Seconds nail polishes retail at £5.00 and £3.69 respectively.

Homemade play dough, false lashes and happy days!

I was pretty poorly last night so today was a bit of a write off. We didn't go out, we just had a lazy day in drawing and playing with play dough. I made this play dough simply ages ago, July I think. After a quick squish together any salt crystals were disturbed and it was pretty malleable. 

I think I will make another batch with the tangerine food colour gel which I have been using for the Halloween cookies. 

Here is a link to the food colour. I highly recommend it just based on the intensity of colour it produces. I will have to try it with macarons soon.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sugarflair-Spectral-Concentrated-Paste-Colour/dp/B005FGR92G

If you fancy making home made play dough yourself, it is pretty simple and as I have discovered it lasts for ages when stored correctly ( I used a purple ikea food bag). 

This is the recipe I used from a fab blog: 

http://www.thefabulousmomsguide.com/2012/05/how-to-make-play-dough-play-doh-3/

Here is Lily making her daddy play dough cookies :)

No dressing up for us this October 31st. We essentially had our Halloween do yesterday with friends. Lily dressed up as Princess Leia, a costume she was given as a christening present last July from her uncle. He thought he had the baby size but ended up being sent the toddler size, which was perfect for her costume this year.

I was a bit boring and just wore a lot of black and purple with a black cobweb style scarf. I wore a lot of pink,purple and charcoal eyeshadow with purple corner false lashes. I managed to stick them on quite well despite it being my first try ever and not having any tweezers to hand.

 The lashes were pretty flicky and kept brushing my eyebrows! Rob liked the look, but I reverted to usual makeup before ballet (which due to illness I missed :( )

Lily was not impressed when I plonked the Leia wig/hat on her head. For the most part she looked more like Luke Skywalker :)

In other (exciting and relieving) news...

I did plenty of PC testing this morning and essentially the device drivers are all hunky dory which despite being good news did not highlight why the USB ports won't recognise my camcorder.

I stuck in my USB cord which charges my creative zen MP3 player and checked that it worked and it did. So I thought, wait a minute if that cord fits my camcorder then it may just work.

Alleluia! It does and now I can happily continue my future vlogging plans without feeling downcast that they will never come to fruition. Fingers crossed it stays this way. Bit of a worrying few days for both me and Rob, phew!

Possible computer issues and Meals

Rob took his PC to Plymouth for a weekend of gaming with friends. When it returned it did not want to play ball. The noises it made! And every USB port seems to be a bit weak, sometimes it connects sometimes it doesn't. I'm worried it will conk out. I use the PC for editing so I'll be in a pickle if it conked out.

Anyway, unrelated, I lost last weeks meal footage :(

But I can tell you what we had anyway which is the same thing really, you'll just have to conjure up your own images :)

Monday- duck casserole with rice. Lily adored this!

Tuesday- breaded turkey escalopes. I usually use Mrs Crimbles sage and onion stuffing mix as the coating but ocado only offer Hale and Hearty as their gluten free version. It was tasty, but certainly different. We much prefer Mrs Crimbles.

Wednesday- slow cooked BBQ lamb ribs with a beetroot and potato salad with peas. Since there isn't much meat on ribs I could eat this meal before ballet.

Thursday- super quick broccoli and pancetta pasta bake after a day out with Claire and Violet

Friday- sausages and mash

Saturday- shepherds pie

Sunday- gluten free fish fingers, sweet potato, peas

Because if this potential computer problem I am reducing next weeks editing by skipping the meals vlog. Plus it will be a short week as from Friday until Monday we will be away. In fact I will add a picture to here rather than film.

Toodle pip :)

Update 31st October- the USB ports won't "read" anything so I cannot upload any footage from my camera

:(

So the PC did not like it's weekend away at all.

Hope it is something that can be fixed :(

Happy Halloween!

Back to blogging?!

I made an effort to resume blogging again. I started last year but swiftly got distracted with wedding koans and little Lily. I started again a month or so ago and used my laptop which is sadly nearing the end of its days. It was an immense hassle and I'm not sure why that is but it was very difficult to complete a post without experiencing a crash and controlling where photos went was the bane of my life.

So, I had a brainwave today and got the blogger app. Hopefully this will work because I have some ideas to supplement what I am already up to on YouTube.

This week's highlights...so far

Monday- I actually managed to film a complete Day in the Life. Getting back into the swing of actively filming something that involves me rather than the usual Vlogtober. Lily and I had a great day at soft play despite me feeling like I was getting a UTI. I am fine now though, perhaps the 2l of cranberry juice over 2 days helped!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UAD--meeBg

Wednesday- Rob was away on business, but luckily a friend looked after Lily whilst I went to ballet class. I am really really enjoying it, everything is flooding back and I improve every session. Good exercise too, I am definitely getting my flexibility back!

Thursday- We had a day trip involving a just over an hour train journey and met up with Claire and Violet. The station at the destination had no functioning lifts which was super duper annoying for those with prams and disabled people or the elderly. Luckily a young woman with a toddler looking at the stairs in despair results in kind people offering to help. I filmed a DITL throughout the day and that will be published very soon. We had a great day, as usual we wore the girls out at soft play and hit the shops and enjoyed a pumpkin spice latte. I think Claire got my dose of spice in her latte as mine was pretty weak whilst she got a spice overload towards the end of the drink!

Friday- we went to Sainsburys and I couldn't get a look in down the toy aisle since it is the once-yearly half price toy event. From what I could see it looked pretty good, but with so much traffic down that aisle I didn't want to even attempt it!

We got a pumpkin, pumpkin cutting instruments, Halloween cookie cutters and a funky witches outfit for Lily to wear to a Halloween theme birthday party this Sunday.

Rob went away to Plymouth yesterday for the weekend and has taken his PC for a gaming night so my weekend Vlogtober vlogs have been scheduled to publish at 7:30 each morning. Back to normal on Monday! 

My night in consisted of trying to watch tv with a delicious The Collective banoffi live gourmet yoghurt (bit of a mouthful, haha!). That was so good but the tv was not. Hmm maybe we ought to get youview...

I started searching for toddler entertainment for the long flight to San Diego in December. Maybe a pair of toddler headphones would be a good idea since I'm sure not everyone will want to listen to Sarah and Duck or Peppa Pig!

Saturday- Lily was a poorly girl around 10pm last night. She must have eaten something that disagreed  with her but she snuggled on the sofa and cooled down, had a dose of cal pol and a drink of water followed by an episode of Sarah and Duck. Then she went down to bed in fresh bedding and as out like a light. She is her usual self today, hooray!

I have my uni best friend coming up to stay this evening, so I'm excited to have a girls night in. I haven't seen her in ages. She was unable to come to our wedding last November as she had a car crash on the way! So it will be almost a year since I last saw her, not on! Oh well, she is days away from being a qualified science teacher now, so I'll forgive her, haha!

Sunday - we went to a 3rd birthday party today with Lily dressed as a witch. I made some shortbread cookies and added orange food gel so they were really vibrant. Last night was so nice, nail painting, film, cheesecake and Pringles. Plus talking in bed until one of us dozed off, much like sleepovers!

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