OOTW

One of my outfits from this week.  Yes I was wearing boots in the middle of summer.  It was Australia Day Eve and we were on our way to a BBQ and we were in the middle of a tropical rain storm, so boots were a necessity!

Also again a shoddy photo, my bad.  It was literally two minutes before we dashed out into the rain so was another super quick shot.  Will do better next time I promise.

These boots are my new obsession.  They are so comfortable to wear and sych soft leather.  The heel on them is a great height so they are perfect for during the day or dressing up in the evening.

* Tee - Country Road
* Jeans - ASOS
* Boots - Bertie ASOS

I have this tee in white also, they are so easy to wear I'm tempted to go buy another, plus they are currently in the sale.

Hope your all having a good week.  It's the weekend here and the sun looks like it will be shining on the weekend. B.E.A.C.H. 

NARS Long-wear Eyeliner

For ages now I have been wanting an eye liner for my water line that's not a white (I find white a little too garish) but more of a nude/soft peach colour to brighten up my eyes.

I popped into MAC pretty confident I would find what I was looking for.  I was so disgusted with the service in there (well there was none) the MUA's were too busy gossiping at the counter and when I indicated for some help they both carried on.  So I dropped everything I had in my hands and walked straight out and headed for the NARS counter in Mecca Cosmetics.  

Straight away I found this gorgeous nude eyeliner.  The MUA came over and was so helpful and lovely.  Makes such a difference.

I ended up buying the Larger Than Life Long-Wear Eyeliner in shade Rue Bonaparte 8056.  

The consistency is so creamy and it's waterproof. Hurrah!   

The MUA said that you may need a good make-up remover to get it off and it's defiantly a stayer, but as always found my baby lotion did the job just fine.

I did a few swatches when I was there the other week of some of the other colours (the green is just out of this world) and it was on my hand for the rest of the day. No smudging, nothing.

So I new this bad boy was going to be a worth while purchase.

The MUA also told me that at the other end of the pencil, if you twist it more will come out once your running low and if you pull the end off there is a tiny little pencil sharpener in there.  How fantastic is that.

All in all I am so impressed with this eyeliner and would highly recommend it to anyone who is looking for a bit of eye brighting.  Girls if your in Oz and there is a Mecca cosmetics near you go check it out.  The MUA's are always so helpful in there and I'm regularly seen at the NARS counter with endless amount of swatches all over me!

Whoopie Pies

The other day I really fancied doing a little baking (but the lazy way) using an already measured cake mix.  Betty Crocker and Donna Hay are probably my top two cooks when it comes to cake baking.  Donna Hay's cook books are just simple beautiful.  You want to be able to reach into the page and pick every yummy delight off and devour in one go.

I wanted to bake something a little different and couldn't resist when I saw Betty Crocker's Whoopie Pies.  I mean how cute are they!

There isn't really much point in me telling you the ingredients that you need as it has the key bits in the box and they tell you what else you will need to make these little bits of heaven; e.g. eggs, milk etc.

It's really quick and easy to do and a lot of fun decorating the end result with sprinkles.   I also filled some with the vanilla cream and a rhubarb and raspberry jam, which tasted amazing!

Here are some photos of the process....

They look more like little burgers than pies.

Highly recommended with a hot cup of tea, a comfy sofa and a good movie.

Australia Day

Happy Australia Day to all my Aussie lovelies.  I hope the sun is shining for you today.

Youtube - My first ever video

Hi lovelies, 

So I thought I would push the boat out a little and try a go at Youtube and have created my own channel.  This is my first ever video. A 'What's in my bag video'.

I hope you enjoy and please be nice (I was heaps nervous for some reason).  

Please 'Like' or 'Subscribe' and I will be attempting to do a lot in the next coming days (esp as it's Australia Day on Thursday!)

Thank you.xx

p.s. the sound is shocking sorry. Had to film on my laptop as my camera decided to die on me!  Will be better next time!

Polish Overload

Please don't judge me!!  

As you all know well from previous posts, I do have a slight nail polish obsession and have done for a good couple of years now.  All of my polishes use to be dotted around the place at home and were really starting to irritate me.  So for Christmas I got this fantastic polish stand where I could organise them and put them all in one place.  Sad I know...  

I've also come to the conclusion, once seeing them all lined up that I need to have a mass cull and banish some (ok a lot) from my collection and give to a new loving home.

I started branching out an buying more polishes when I stopped chewing my nails into silly little stumps.  I was finally proud of them and would every few days change the colour.  From this, my nails went through a bad spell so I am happily rocking for the time being polish free nails and they look great.

I'm sure I'm not the only one out there with this much of a polish addiction right?

Healthy Kebab

The other evening we had people over for dinner and for a starter we decided to do something light and healthy before delving into the main course.  This is an easy, no fuss recipe which will get the taste buds tingling.

What you will need:

1x Tub of Bambini Bocconcini

1x Bunch of Basil

1x Bag of Red Grapes

Handful of Prosciutto

Wooden Skewers

Prep time: 15/20 mins (took me 20 because I'm a bit of a perfectionist!)

These measurements depend on the number of people you are cooking for so you may need to alter.

Mini Mozzarella - divine!

The bigger the grapes the better.

Take a nice big juicy grape and wrap it up length ways along the Prosciutto, slide it onto the skewer so that it is about 2/3 cm away from the end.  Then you want to take one of your Bocconcini and place that in front of the Prosciutto. Finally add a Basil leaf, folded in half to add some colour and taste.

You want to repeat this three times on the skewer until it's looking something like this... 

They are quick and easy to make and crammed full of flavours. 

OOTW

Here we have it, my second outfit post. I am actually quite enjoying doing these even though this is my second!  But it's making me explore my wardrobe a little more and rekindle my love for bits I had ashamedly forgotten about.

The past few weeks/months have been so hectic. This weekend seeing off my Dad and Step Mum who were here for a week are now avid Sydney fans.  So with a few days rest coming up then I'll be back into the job hunting/applying and hitting the gym like a maniac.  Detox here I come.

The sun has had it's hat on all this week with amazing sunshine and the brightest blues skies. I decided to spruce up one of my outfits to go along with this glorious weather.

* Blouse - ASOS
* Dress - Primark

The blouse is a recent purchase from ASOS.  I seem to be going through a fortnightly splurge every time I get paid and this was one of them (along with some dupe Allegra booties - see photo below)
The blouse has printed black panthers all over it and I love it.  It also looks fab tucked into skinny black jeans.  The dress is a beautiful teal colour which I actually bought when I was back in the UK last year from Primark.  It cost me around twelve pounds (bargain) and all I get is compliments on how lovely it looks.
I do find Primark a bit hit and miss and always seem to get a little panicked when in there due to how jam packed everything is in the stores, but you can find some little gems from near to nothing.

For the evening I shed the blouse and teamed the dress with my new envelope clutch which I bought from the gorgeous girls at Sabo Skirt. (*Note I didn't wear the boots with this outfit. Instead a beautiful pair of gold sandals)

Don't get me wrong I am loving the beautiful weather at the moment but a part of me is wanting Autumn to slowly creep in so I can start wearing all my boots again and light layers.

Still I am a summer girl at heart and am enjoying every gorgeous day as it comes.

Bobbi Brown

As a late Christmas present from my lovely Step mum I got a Bobbi Brown make-up bag of goodies.  I was like a little child when I saw what was in there.  

Inside the metallic silver bag was a gel eyeliner (which I am now obsessed with) eyeliner brush, a stunning metallic cream eye shadow and extreme party mascara.

* Long-wear Gel Eyeliner - Black Ink 1

* Ultra Fine Eye Liner brush

* Metallic Long-Wear Cream Shadow - Black Pearl 6

* Extreme Party Mascara - Black

Let's start with the eyeliner.  I use to be a kohl addict.  Even when I was 15/16 this was my bible piece.  That was until I discovered liquid eyeliner and then gels which I think are the most effective.  The gel is so soft and glides on over your lids.  It's so black and matte which hits top marks with me.  I'm not a fan of glossy eyeliners.

I use to use the Maybelline gel liner but found that it would go hard and a little clumpy on the brush, where as this has stayed a great consistency throughout.

Following on from the liner is the mascara.  In a previous post I mention and raved about how much I adore Maybelline's The Colossal Volume Express Mascara.  This thing does wonders to my lashes.  However on trying the Bobbi Brown Extreme Party Mascara I think I have a new runner up.  

The wand is jammed full of bristles and catches every lash on application.  It's lifts and adds so much volume to my lashes I was blown away by how good this little mascara was.

As much as a love this and will defiantly re-purchase once it runs out, I don't think I could even give up on my old faithful, Colossal Volume. 

Finally is the Black Pearl Metallic Cream Eyeshadow.  I am still yet to use this so can't really comment on application and it's staying power, but the colour is fantastic.  Hints of black and lilac glisten away in the little glass pot along with flecks of silver, I can't help but think this will look amazing for an evening out.  We have a dinner party next week so I think it will be this bad boys chance to shine.

I love Bobbi Brown products, the only problem is that it's so ridiculously expensive over here, as is all make-up.  I'm going back to the UK in June to visit the fam so I will be planning on stocking up all sorts while over there.  

Boots and Superdrug will be my home for the duration I can guarantee!

Wardrobe Organising

This post I took from my other blog Sweetness In Sydney.  I thought I would share it with you all on this one and is a nice change from the usual posts I do.

Now this isn't the most exciting of titles for a blog post but having a clean organised wardrobe makes a huge difference.  Ladies wether it's yours your thinking of doing or your better half's it's so rewarding to have a clear out and cull all clothing you don't wear any more and sort out the items you are keeping into manageable piles or hanging space.

Wether you have a small wardrobe with a few shelves or drawers, a bigger version with shelves and hanging rail or the luxury of a walk in wardrobe any space can look in order.

After getting a new wardrobe myself recently, my clothes have been folded, stowed away and hung by colour range.  I decided to tackle my boyfriends clothes.

My pet hate as I'm sure is every stylist's or fashion fiend's is wire hangers.  I know people get excited about getting them from the dry cleaners but they do nothing for your clothes.  There is no proper support in them to hold your clothes or give the correct shape they need. E.g. shirts and tailored pants.

It's best to invest in either wooden or plastic ones and for special items even vintage pieces, cushioned fabric hangers. 

After throwing out all of the wire hangers and replacing them with wooden and plastic ones I then organised all of my boyfriends shirts into colour order.  I know this might seem a bit over the top but it's a great way of being able to view what you have and find what you want straight away.

Next I tackled his shelves of tops.  I also sorted these into colour order and placed t-shirts on two shelves, light jumpers and board shorts on the lower and heavier jumpers on the upper shelf.  Belts and other accessories I placed on the shelf under the shirts.

I think I became this obsessed about organising clothes like this while I work in a shop a few years ago as a junior VM.  Everything had to be folded perfectly and the hangers had to be finger spaced apart, which you can see the benefit of.

I think it's a vast improvement and my boyfriend was very pleased with how it looks.  Now let's just hope it lasts.

OOTD

This is my first ever outfit of the day.  A little nervous doing this, not really sure why but here it goes...  

*Shorts - Zara
*Blouse - Sportsgirl

Now I'm going to be honest.  I am not going to be one of those dedicated people who are able to shoot a different outfit every day.  I work (and those clothes are not the most riveting clothes to see) and when I'm not working I'm usually kicking it in shorts (like the ones above) and a singlet or tee.  I am uber casual.

Ok so to the outfit.  The shorts are my new love and I am wearing these heaps at the moment and they are so comfortable.  They are from Zara and were in the sale.  I had been eyeing them up for a while and jumped at the chance when I saw the big sale sticker on them.  I can't remember the exact price but think they were down to around $35ish.  

The blouse is a purchase I made this week from Sportgirl.  It's covered it hundreds of cute little stars and is slightly longer at the back of the top.  Now for the price (a little on the hefty side but I did got paid this week) was at $89.99.  I know I know but I couldn't resist.  It's adorable right?

I am going to try and attempt to do one OOTF or FOTD a week and I will see how I get on with it.  Fingers crossed!

Chanel ~ Le Vernis

The other week a few days before Christmas I treated myself to my first Chanel nail polish.  I was at the make-up counter for the best part of fifteen minuets trying to decide on what to get, till I finally settled on a polish (it's pay day this week and I have had my eye on some other little pieces so look out for an update)

The only thing is there is a slight problem.  As I said in a previous post I for some stupid reason (stress most probably) chewed all of my nails off.  They are now revolting!

So I am in the mean time 'Stop n' Growing' to my hearts content until I can swish the colour onto my nails.  In the mean time it will just have to sit and look pretty on my counter.

The shade is 525 - Quartz and it's from their current limited addition line.  I don't normally go for brown-esk polishes but when this is applied it looks fabulous.  I would show you what it looks like on, but like I said stumpy nails are a no go, no show!

The polish is a metallic brown/silver with a slight hint of purple buried in there.  It really is gorgeous and I'd highly recommend you go try it out.

P.s. If anyone has any other solutions for me to stop bitting my nails other than willpower I'd love to hear it.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year everyone.  I hope you have all had a fantastic Christmas and New Years and celebrated in absolute style.  I know I am a few days late but I was away for the past three/four days but I am now back in sunny, super hot Bondi (summer has finally arrived!)
Whenever it comes to New Years I never ever know what to do and always find it pretty stressful trying to organise things.

This year a group of us rented a holiday house west of Sydney for three days and was a great chance to escape the hustle and bustle of Sydney.

New Years day is also the boys birthday and he has never really celebrated it properly due to being too hung over from NY or people being away etc. So this was the perfect way to celebrate his birthday properly rather than NY.

Enough of my ramblings and I'll let you enjoy the photos.

 

*all photos taken on my dslr/camera phone