Monday 31 December 2012

My New Years Resolutions

Hello! I hope you all have a lovely New Year. I don't want to create too many resolutions this year because I want to be able to stick to them all and make it realistic, so I have four!

1. Lately there have been some things that I think to myself 'Wow, I really wish I could do that!' and then I think, I can do that, I just need to try. For example, I have been thinking how I would love to be able to learn HTML, learn Photoshop and especially how to create blog designs. So a New Years resolution is going to be to learn those things and anything else I fancy trying!

2. I don't think many people's New Years resolutions would be complete without some kind of food or exercise resolution! My resolution is just to focus more on eating healthily and cutting out some of the chocolatey things I eat. I did quite well during the beginning of last year with healthy eating but then they bought out Malteser Bunnies and they're just so yummy! They're back this year too!


3. Relax more! I am not a very stressed person at all but sometimes I find if I spend all my time working, at college, doing college work or just doing anything, I get a bit overwhelmed with it all. I think it's really important that I start relaxing more and having a little bit of 'me time'. I was thinking a couple of evenings per week just switch off from everything else and have a little pamper session, go for a walk, watch a dvd or anything like that!

4. Continue with Youtube. I posted my first video on the 28th December 2012 and I aim to carry on posting videos and carry on blogging. I have been blogging since March 2012 and have loved every minute of it, so I am hoping Youtube will be just as fun and exciting. You can subscribe to me here if you would like to and please let me know if you have any video suggestions!

There's only four resolutions so hopefully I can realistically stick to them all! In one years time I can then look back over them and see how I did.

Let me know what your resolutions are as I would love to know!



Sunday 30 December 2012

Beauty Becky Feedback!

Hello!

I have seen a couple of other blogs posting feedback forms and I thought it was a great idea! I would really appreciate any feedback you have for me so please fill out the form below if you wouldn't mind.

It is completely anonymous and I really do want you to all be completely honest! I don't mind what you say as long as it is honest. I really, truly appreciate all of your thoughts and I will make a list of what is said so I can try and improve my blog!




Thank you for filling this out! I really appreciate it.

I hope you have a lovely rest of the day.


Week In Instagram Photos #10

Hello! I hope you have all had an amazing Christmas! I have been pretty busy lately because of Christmas and have only posted two photos this week... TWO! Oops. Here they are though and I hope you like them both!


The first photo was showing my new scarf that I received for Christmas! It is so pretty and I absolutely love it. Today I filmed a 'What I got for Christmas' video so keep an eye out for that as this will be in it. If you want to subscribe to my Youtube channel then you can click here and then you wont miss any of my videos, plus it would make me extremely happy as it's new and I only posted my first video on Friday!

I am currently saving up for a camera which you may know and the second photo is of my little Piggy where I am saving my money. I am doing pretty well and am so excited to buy a new camera! My dad recently bought a new Canon SLR which I am using and it is amazing! My 'What I got for Christmas' video is filmed on that so hopefully if you watch that and compare it to my first video you will be able to see the difference.

I have a lot of posts scheduled for this upcoming week so I hope you enjoy them all!

Let me know if you get up to anything exciting over New Years!


Friday 28 December 2012

My First Youtube Video - Best Beauty Products of 2012

Hello!

If you have been reading my blog for a little while now then you may know that I have been wanting to make Youtube videos. I have been considering filming them for a while but have always felt quite nervous and worried about putting them up!

I was reading Dana's blog from The Wonder Forest the other day and I find her so inspirational. She seems to be very motivated and if she wants to try something then she will get on and try it! I was reading through a lot of her blog posts and they just gave me a lot of inspiration, motivation and the little push I needed to just upload my first video!

This video is my favourite beauty products of 2012. I did write it out as a blog post at first but it was very long so I thought it was the perfect opportunity to film my first video!

I really do hope you enjoy this and I would really appreciate any comments you have. Also if you subscribe to my channel it would mean the absolute world to me!


Hopefully I will be filming and posting videos from now on because I really enjoyed making this one! My dad has just bought a new SLR so hopefully he will let me film on that and I am planning on buying my own soon too which is exciting!

Do you have any video ideas that I could film? Do you like my first video?

Click here to go to my Youtube channel!



Wednesday 26 December 2012

Christmas Day Outfit

Hello!

I hope you all had a lovely Christmas day and got some lovely presents. I thought it would be really fun for me to do an outfit of the day of what I wore on Christmas day!


The top I am wearing is just a basic black top from Topshop which I tucked into the skirt.

My cardigan is a cream, knitted cardigan from River Island. I find this lovely, warm and comfy in the Winter, however the sleeves are only 3/4 which isn't always great on very cold days!

On my nails I have Barry M Navy and then Deborah Lippmann Across The Universe on top which is so beautiful!



The ivory bracelet is from Pandora and the rose gold from Monica Vinader which I wear everyday. The pearly one with the heart is a Christmas present from my parents and it's so pretty.

I absolutely love the skirt I wore as it's so pretty and it was a Christmas present from my parents! It's from Urban Outfitters and I find the length and fit is perfect. I knew I wanted to wear this skirt because I got it for Christmas so the rest of the outfit was basically just built around the skirt!

I wore simple black tights from Newlook which ladder very easily! I really need some new ones.

My Chelsea boots are from my parents for Christmas and they are amazingly comfy! I wore them all day Christmas day and they are definitely going to be my go to shoes from now on as they are so comfortable! 

I hope you all had a lovely day. Let me know what your favourite presents were! Also let me know if you would like me to do a 'What I got for Christmas' post as I know I love reading other people's!


Tuesday 25 December 2012

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone! I just wanted to write a short and sweet little post wishing you all a happy Christmas and I hope you all have an amazing day.



I am writing this on Christmas Eve so I can schedule it and you will see it Christmas morning if you are online! (Probably not because it's Christmas and there's lots of exciting things to be doing but hopefully you will see it at some point!) I have probably been up since about 5am, pretty normal for my Christmas morning! Hehe, I always wake up really early because I'm so excited. There's actually a video tape of me when I was little opening my Santa presents and the clock in the background said 3am! (I'm not quite that bad anymore...)


Anyway, I hope you all have a lovely day and get everything you wished for. I would love it if you all left comments telling me your favourite present or what you got up to for the day!

 Lots of love,


Sunday 23 December 2012

Week In Instagram Photos #9

Hello! 
I hope you have had a great week and I hope you like my photos!


My cat was so cute and cuddly // Her face makes me laugh! // My mum bought me this candle - it's my favourite and I had just run out // It was cold and I was all snuggled up in my coat and scarf



I don't think 22 hours and 55 minutes of laptop battery life is right // Bought myself some early Christmas presents! // My friend bought me this for Christmas. Yay! // Just found my 2012 New Years resolutions. Need to make 2013 ones soon!


My Asos jumper arrived along with a Halls sweet // I have coloured my hair darker // I want to go back to Greece! // The Macadamia oil from the set my friend bought me is amazing! Definitely going to buy a full size

This week has been so exciting because it's nearly Christmas! All the gifts I have bought people have been wrapped and under the Christmas tree for almost one week now! I absolutely love wrapping presents and I went to Paperchase a couple of weeks ago to buy wrapping paper, ribbon and gift tags.

I have been looking into Cameras more and I am so excited to buy one. I am definitely going for an SLR and I'm looking between the Canon 600d or 650d so please let me know if you have any advice.

My 500 follower giveaway went up earlier this week! Click here to enter. Thank you all so much for following me. It makes me so so happy and I was really excited when I noticed I had 500 followers!

I hope you have had a lovely week and have an amazing Christmas! Let me know what presents you get!



Saturday 22 December 2012

Bobbi Brown Long Wear Foundation


I went shopping the other week with my mum and we spent almost the whole day at either the makeup counters in John Lewis or Debenhams! I really wanted a new foundation that provided higher coverage than my YSL Touché Éclat (review here) for when my skin is having a bad day. We popped to the Bobbi Brown counter and I got colour matched. The lady put this foundation all over my skin and I really liked it, so I bought it!

I was colour matched to Porcelain which matches my skin tone perfectly! I would say this is quite a thick consistency when I first pump it out, however when I apply it to my skin it blends and sinks in amazingly well and feels very light. It provides medium to full coverage whilst still feeling light and looking natural. I honestly can't feel I'm wearing it once it's all blended in!



I have been using a traditional foundation brush to apply this which I find works well. I apply and blend it in sections so do my cheeks, chin, forehead, nose and then blend it down to my neck. It seems to dry fairly quickly. Not too quickly at all but quickly enough that I like to blend as I go, which honestly I do anyway!

Some foundations don't last well on my t zone as it can get very oily throughout the day. This one however lasts all day! I do powder my skin to set it like I do any foundation, but I can almost tell as soon as this dries it won't budge! I was seriously impressed when I got home after the first day of wearing this and looked in the mirror to find that with no touch ups what so ever, it was still on my face providing just as much coverage as when I first applied it.



I personally like a slightly dewier finish on the skin but dewy foundations aren't great for me as my skin is so oily. I don't like fully matte foundations so this is perfect. It is semi matte and I find it looks almost (not quite) matte when I first apply it and then as it settles in and my skin gets oily throughout the day, I am left with slightly dewier skin. My skin also doesn't seem to get as oily and shiny when I wear this which is great! I don't have to powder or touch up on any makeup during the day.

Overall I absolutely love this foundation and would highly recommend it. I actually went to Bobbi Brown on Tuesday to have my eye makeup done and be taught about some of their products which was so fun (and ended up being a little bit expensive!) I think I will be writing reviews of the products I bought when I have used them for a bit longer because so far I am loving them!

Bobbi Brown has never been a brand that I have bought much of before and I don't know why! Over the past two weeks I have bought five of their products and they have all made their way into my everyday makeup routine.

This foundation is available here for £30.


Have you tried this foundation? What is your favourite Bobbi Brown product?



Thursday 20 December 2012

Dior Diorskin Nude Tan Bronzer

The other week I went on a little shopping trip and made a couple of Dior purchases. One of the products I bought was the Diorskin Nude Tan Healthy Glow Enhancing Powder in 02, Sunlight and I have been absolutely loving it!


The packaging of this bronzer is beautiful. The little kabuki brush and the bronzer itself are packaged in cute velvet pouches which just make it feel that bit more luxurious!

The little brush actually feels really nice as well. I haven't used it to apply the bronzer, however it feels very soft so I will definitely be keeping it for when I travel or to pop into my handbag!



The bronzer looks gorgeous with the various different shades and 'NUDE' letters. I am very pale so I want a bronzer that will just add a healthy, natural glow to my face. The name of this is 'Healthy Glow Enhancing Powder' which sounds absolutely perfect, and it is!

This bronzer contains gorgeous pink, apricot and peach shades which help make the overall colour very natural and not at all orangey. It really does leave my skin looking very naturally sun-kissed and it seems to have a brightening affect which I love. The colour is very buildable, soft and easy to blend.


I tend to use my Real Techniques blush brush to either apply this just below my cheekbones for some natural sculpting or on my cheeks for more of a natural tanned glow. I feel like I have said natural about 20 times in this post (okay, maybe not 20!) but I think that is the main reason I absolutely love this bronzer. It brightens, makes me look like I have been out in the sun and adds gorgeous colour to my face whilst looking very natural! (Natural, natural, natural)

I would highly recommend this bronzer! It is fairly pricey and I was contemplating buying it for a while but I am extremely happy I finally bought it. It immediately took over from my Nars laguna as my everyday bronzer. I still love Nars Laguna (review here) but I find the colour of this one look a lot nicer on my skin tone and I love the pink / peach shades in it. I usually bring this onto the cheeks and don't wear a blusher with it.

You can find this bronzer here for £31.45.

Have you tried this bronzer? Are there any products you have found lately that have blown you away?


Wednesday 19 December 2012

500 Follower Giveaway!

Hello! 

I have reached 500 followers and I am absolutely over the moon! Thank you so much to every single one of you that follows me and reads my blog - it makes me so happy!

To say a huge thank you to you all I thought I would do a giveaway. Yay! I was considering waiting until after Christmas to post this as I thought around Christmas time you may be busy and not be online as much and I wanted you all to have the opportunity to see this post, however I am too excited to wait so here it is!


I am going to run this giveaway for 4 weeks so that will hopefully give you all a chance to see this.


I thought it would be a nice idea to give away a selection of my favourite products and some products that are on my own Christmas list that look lovely!

The prizes are:

Benefit Creaseless Cream Eye Shadow in Birthday Suit - review here
Burts Bees Lip Balm Duo
Soap and Glory Hand Food
Soap and Glory Righteous Butter
Rimmel Blush in Santa Rose



This giveaway is international!

I am using Rafflecopter for this giveaway so to enter just follow the steps on there. 

There are only two compulsory options that you must do to enter this giveaway. The first is that you must be a follower of this blog using Google Friend Connect and the second is that you must leave me a comment on this blog post including your email address. Please only comment once. The other options are not compulsory but they will give you extra entries!

There will be be one winner and they will win all of the prizes!

This giveaway will be open for 4 weeks so will close on 16th January.

The winner will be announced on 17th January.


a Rafflecopter giveaway

Enter your email address below to subscribe to my mailing list!





I will email the winner and write a blog post saying who the winner is. If you win you will have one week to reply to my email. If the winner hasn't replied within one week of me sending the email, I will choose a new one.

Good luck everyone!



Disclaimer : All of these prizes were purchased by me with my own money especially for this giveaway.

Monday 17 December 2012

Christmas Party Outfit

Hello! I asked on my Twitter and Facebook if you would like to see a Christmas party outfit and I got lots of people saying they would so here it is! 

It is a little late up considering my Christmas party was two weeks ago now, but I hope you wont mind! On the evening of the party I was really rushed so I didn't get chance to take photos then which is why it's a little late as I have dressed up again to take these! 


I decided to wear this flowery lace top from Wallis which I have had for a few years now! It's really pretty and can be easily dressed up or down.

The lace top is see through so underneath I just paired it with a plain black vest top. Ideally I would have worn a white or cream one but I couldn't find mine so I just wore black! Mine are from Newlook and I find them comfy and they aren't expensive!



The skirt I bought from Topshop is a black, velvet skater style skirt. I love these styles of skirt as they are so comfy and like the top, easy to dress up and down. I tucked my top into my skirt as it looked a lot more flattering!

For shoes I wore my Kurt Geiger Carvela patent nude heels. This was the first time I have actually worn these shoes and I love them! They are extremely comfy and so easy to walk in.



I was looking for a patent nude clutch bag to match my shoes but I couldn't find one, so I used a black one I already had. This is from Primark and it is a lovely, simple black clutch with gold metal edging. It fits quite a lot in as well which is great as I always take many more items and products than I actually need!

For jewellery I kept it very simple and just wore two bracelets which I wear everyday anyway. (Haha I saw that, yet I forgot to put them on for the photos!) The first one is this gorgeous rose gold friendship style bracelet from Monica Vinader. I paired this with my favourite bracelet which is my Pandora ivory, leather double wrap bracelet!

I hope you have enjoyed this post! If you have posted any festive outfit posts then please link them below as I would love to see them!



Sunday 16 December 2012

Week In Instagram Photos #8

Hello! I hope you have all had a lovely week. I have posted quite a lot of photos on Instagram this week compared to usual so I hope you enjoy this post!


Me wearing very natural makeup // What I bought on a shopping day to Exeter with my mum! // Yummy lunch // Bedtime reading. I have read this cover to cover many times! 


All my Christmas gifts are wrapped // Bought a Chanel perfume and it was wrapped beautifully // I think my natural lashes are getting longer // Wearing my new boots out for the first time. 


I put wax from another candle into this one and it looked cool // The tree is ready to decorate! // A pretty decoration we bought for the tree // Yay, the Christmas tree is all decorated!

I have set this post out in a slightly different way to normal by spreading the captions out under every set of photos. Let me know if you like this! I just found otherwise if you wanted to see what the caption was you have to scroll down and then scroll back up to look at the photos!

If you would like to see a haul post or reviews of any products I bought when I went shopping then please do let me know!

I also have a review of the boots I am wearing which you can read here.

One of my next posts up should be my Christmas party outfit! Sorry it is so late but on the night of the party I had no time to take photos so I'm going to dress up again. Hehe!

If you want to follow me on Instagram then you can click here.



Saturday 15 December 2012

Bourjois Intuitive Liner

Hello girls! You may have heard of the Clarins 3 Dot Liner a couple of months ago and I was really intrigued to try it. It was limited edition though and I wasn't fast enough so when I saw the Bourjois Intuitive Liner in Superdrug the other day, I snapped it up.




It is basically a felt tip liner with 3 felt tip ends. You are supposed to dot it along your lash line and it leaves lots of tiny dots rather than a traditional eyeliner would leave a solid line. I really liked the concept of this because I love wearing eye liner to make my lash line appear thicker but I don't always want a thick black line.


I absolutely love this product and it has immediately become my everyday eyeliner to wear. It achieves exactly what it's supposed to - my lash line is left looking thicker but without an obvious, solid line. If I apply this to one eye and not the other then I can definitely tell that the eye that I have applied it to has a thicker looking lash line. When I have this on both eyes though, it is so subtle I can't tell I'm wearing eyeliner which is exactly what I love!

On a daily basis I wear this on my upper lash line and I am starting to wear it more on my lower lash line as well as it adds definition and looks lovely!

I don't know how this would work for a flick as I haven't tried that but for wearing simply on the lash line, it is amazing!

I would highly recommend this product. My Boots didn't seem to stock it but Superdrug had quite a few!

It's £6.99 and available here.

Have your tried either this eye liner or the Clarins one? What do you think about the concept of it?


Wednesday 12 December 2012

Oasis Boots From Zalando

Hello ladies! I was contacted by Zalando almost two weeks ago and asked if I would like to review a product from their website. I was offered a £40 voucher towards whatever I wanted to purchase from their website which was so generous!

The person that first contacted me was very helpful. They quickly answered any questions I had and sorted out my voucher code very quickly. I was really happy with the service I received from them!

I had never heard of Zalando before and I was pleasantly surprised when I visited their website. They informed me that all of the brands they stock are genuine and they are an online outlet. They have absolutely loads of brands of clothing, accessories, shoes and beauty. I was on their website for ages searching through everything and I loved it! First of all I was going to buy some Hunter or Joules wellies but they didn't have my size. I then decided to have a look through their boots.

I decided to order some black boots. I have been on the hunt for some boots for a while now and have found some lovely ones in Russell and Bromley but none of the ones I have found are perfect. Whilst searching the Zalando website I found these lovely ones from Oasis and I really liked them!



They arrived in this adorable and massive box. It is covered in Christmas trees and stars with a big bow on the front which I love!




I ordered these boots on 30th November and received them on 7th December which I was impressed with as that included a weekend. I did receive a tracking number I could use to track the shipping but it didn't work.

Now onto the boots!



The boots I ordered are Oasis boots and I was so excited to get them! They came packed in a lovely Oasis box with floral tissue paper.


I really like these boots! The zip was very stiff when I first tried to unzip them which slightly worried me but they are fine now! I have only worn them around the house a couple of times but so far they seem comfy.

I would definitely recommend having a look at the Zalando website as I will be looking to order more items from them in the future!

Have you ever heard of Zalando before? Do you think you will be purchasing anything?


Disclaimer: I did have a £40 voucher to use towards these boots.