Pandora challenge ~ John Greed Jewellery.

I accidentally came across this challenge earlier, and nearly cried when I saw the closing date was yesterday! However, I then noticed that it has been extended until tomorrow! YAYY. Had to give it a go.
The challenge has been set by John Greed Jewellery, and is to create your perfect Pandora bracelet up to the value of £250, blog about it, and if you win, you get the bracelet you designed. Amazing.
So here's mine...

Single woven brown leather and silver starter bracelet, 19cm - £40.
Red faceted murano glass charm x2 - £35 each.
Acapu wood charm x2 - £25 each.
Silver and orange enamel zen charm - £45.
Silver tyres spacer charm x2 - £15 each.
Total - £235
Images from johngreedjewellery.com

What do you think?
I'm so in love with my design. It is me to a T. I chose to design the overall aesthetic of the bracelet how I would like it to look once on, so rather than just picking lots of different charms, I've gone with repetition to keep it looking slick. I just adore natural looking jewellery, weirdly I'd pick something that's wooden and rusty looking over something pure gold or silver! So that's why I have gone for the leather bracelet. I have had my eye on this for a long time now, so this could be my chance! I love pretty much any jewellery with wooden accents, so I had to go for the Acapu wood beads. I think they keep the earthy, boho theme of the bracelet in check, and by placing them equally away from the centre bead, balance out the whole look. Ah I just love it. This red, or Oxblood, is my absolute favourite colour, as you may be able to tell by my blog page and I genuinely (if it didn't make me look like a walking grape) would wear it head to toe. The faceted cut of this bead will catch the light beautifully, and give the bracelet a subtle sparkle which is just enough for me as I don't consider myself to be much of an 'out there bling' person. I chose the zen bead as I like to try and keep my life calm and balanced. I'm a strong believer in Karma and am a very spiritual person so this bead suits me well. I went for the orange as it is kind of a burnt tone, that complements the red and the wood really well and the spacer beads at each end will keep everything together. I chose quite simple beads, as I don't like my jewellery to be too over done so to speak, I like to keep things fun, but with a boho, natural vibe. I hope you like it!

Have you entered? If so leave your blog address in the comments box so I can see? I'd love to see what others have designed!

If you haven't entered but would like to, go to this page to get the full details, but hurry! Ends tomorrow. Good luck :) x

Ps. If you like my blog, then click follow :) Cheers then! x

Barry M & L.A Colors. Festive nails.

Barry M - 66 Matt White
L.A Colors Art Deco nail art - NA905 Red glitter

Please excuse the scabby plaster, I caught my nail on a razor last week. It didn't hurt at all at the time, but now I keep catching it and it's getting really painful! So that's why it's covered, and I can't take photos with my left hand. Well, not very well anyway! So do forgive me.
I thought I'd get into the festive spirit with some red sparkly nails today, and cheer myself up after another extremely stressful day at uni. I would have liked to spend more time on them, or painted fake nails before I put them on, but they don't look too bad eh?!
The base colour is Barry M in shade 66 'Matt White'. I love a good old Barry M, I have way too many of them, but you can hardly complain when they're only £2.99 each. Well at least that's my excuse. As much as I love them, they do chip quite quickly, at least they do on my nails, but I don't have the healthiest of nails to start with. To jazz them up I added a red glitter tri-accent - something I spotted on Leighannsays' instagram. I think it's a really nice idea, but I need to work on my accuracy a tad! I used masking tape once the base white was dry to get the straight edge, what do you think?
The L.A Colors nail art brush is really thin, mainly for designing on the nail, but it's the only polish I have in a glittery red :) so Christmassy.
I need more glitteeeer.

I'm living on such sweet nothing.

Just a quick hello :)
So so busy today, I have endless uni work to do (sigh) and then I have work tonight so I doubt I'll be able to do  proper post! Booo.
However, I thought it would be exciting to share that I working at a Florence and the Machine gig tonight in Exeter, so exciting! I'll try and take some photos if I can but I will be working so it's not always easy :/

Image from weheartit.com

I cannot wait, I love Florence. Yay for me! Sorry this is such a short post, and not really fashion, beauty or in fact anything related.

There's just no timeeeeeeee.

Love x

So You Shoes wish list.

I wandered onto this site one day whilst browsing through blogs, and I just love it. They have a such a good selection of shoes! I love shoes.
So I thought I'd put together a wish lost of shoes I want, just I case anyone reading this is stuck on what to get me for Christmas ;) ha.

Wood heel lace up boots in Black, Tan suede and Floral £40
Wood heel court shoe in Turquoise suede £35

High heel Chelsea boot - £35
Flat glitter pumps in Gold and Black - £25
Gold stud pump shoe - £25

What do you think? I have always been a fan of the Jefferey Campbell Lita boots, and if any of you read a lot of blogs, or blog yourself, it seems they are the 'must have' shoe if you want to be anyone in blog land. I'm not normally one to conform all that much to the hype, but I absolutely love them. However, as a poor little student the Lita boots carry a way too hefty price tag for my little purse to handle, so a look-a-like pair will have to do. I've seen a few around that aren't bad, but just look obviously a lot cheaper than the real deal, but these ones on SoYouShoes have done well! They don't look cheap, the material actually looks really well made and they are such a good replica I think. I need to get some in my life, and see how they measure up in real life! Do you like these boots? Which colour would you wear?

These Chelsea boots I'm (hopefully) getting for Christmas from pops :) he was stressing over what to get me for Christmas, (such a dad thing!) so I said well, all the boots I own have been worn down to the end and all let water in, which is not ideal for the weather at the moment! So I'd love these! Fingers crossed. They are such a good everyday boot that adds that bit of sophistication to any outfit. I originally wanted the Topshop Allegra boots which are pretty much exactly the same shape, but cost either £75 or £85. When I saw these I actually think I like them more. I love the worn down texture, it makes the, look slightly vintage and have that loved feel about them. Plus they're only a fraction of the price. Boom. 

As for the flats, I know it's not really pump weather with all this disgustingly non-stop rain, but they're so cute! With the glitter ones I fell like I'd have to moon walk everywhere in true MJ style but they are lovely for sparkling up a day or evening outfit. The stud shoes are just as gorge, and the rounded off stud means I'm less likely to stab myself in the back of the heel when I walk!

I have so much uni work to do today, and actual job work tonight too, but all I want to do is lay in bed all day. And eat cake.  

Hope you're having a good weekend :) feel free to follow!

X

Christmas party outfit challenge - FashionVouchers.com

I came across this blogger challenge today and thought I had to have a go, especially as there's a £100 voucher up for grabs! This website FashionVouchers, is running the challenge, where you choose a retailer from their list and create an outfit that's Christmas party perfect... But all for under £100.  I love things like this, definitely going to be google-ing to see if there are any other challenges out there!
Here's my outfit pick, I chose Miss Selfridge as I think it's a great store that always has gorgeous pieces. It was quite tricky though as they don't always have the pocket friendliest price tags. Luckily for me I found some bargs in the sale.

Nude shimmer cape dress - £39
Shiny rose gold court shoe - £42
Gold metallic hair clip - £1.50 (sale)
Nude double zip clutch - £16
Total - £98.50

What do you think? I know most people, when it comes to Christmas party time think, go for the classic LBD, and I'm normally the same. Having said that when I came across this cape dress I thought it was just beautiful. I love the simplicity of the style, it would just hang nicely over any figure, and for me, hide the old muffin I haven't managed to destroy yet! (Diet starts tomorrow right?) So then I decided to keep everything neutral, and just play around with the tones rather than go crazy with colour. Keeping to one Christmas party tradition I stuck to a bit of sparkle, well, it is Christmas after all and everything else is sparkly and pretty so we should be too!

I just love this bow, and at £1.50 it's a right steal. It's just the right amount of girly cute and just adds that little bit of glam to your hair, what's not to love? Maybe with tousled loose waves and the bow pinned up at the side.

Ah the shoes. I am such a shoe freak. Love them. They just make me excited to even think about. The way I see it, no matter what body issues I may be having, whether I have lost weight or put on weight, shoes will always fit. And they'll always make you feel like a woman. The gold keeps everything feeling festive, but could just as easily fancy up a dinner outfit, with just a pair of jeans and a vest top and blazer. 

This clutch is a lot more peachy than the other items, which I personally think adds a bit of variety to the outfit without going too drastic, pulling in all the elements nicely and just the right size for all your partying essentials. 

I hope you like it?

If anyone else wants to enter click here, and the closing date is the 17th of December 2012. 

As a side note, I'm so excited about Christmas you'd swear I was 5. 

Happy Saturday x

Salon Creative.

I've never really been that into face wash and masks etc, but I guess I've just been quite lucky with my skin. Although now I'm starting to get the odd spot and blemish here and there, and have the worst under-eye bags ever. It's like I haven't slept in years, but I sleep loads... I think the bags are just something I'll have to learn to love! Er yea... Great.
So I've decided it's time to start looking after my skin a bit better, because I do wear makeup everyday so it's bound to clog up if I don't regularly deep clean it. (Don't get me wrong I do clean my face regularly! I have a set of eye-makeup remover, cleanser, toner and moisturizer that I use - I'll do a post on them maybe?)
Also, I'm not one to be blessed in the bank account department, so I'm trying out a few cheaper brands to see how they do, most of the time I find that cheaper versions of things have pretty much exactly the same things in as top name brands, you're just paying for the name really. But everyone loves a good brand at times, and I'm definitely one. But for now... It's a trip to Family Bargains.

Apricot Facial Scrub - Blemish control. £0.99

"Gently lifts off impurities and dead skin cells to reveal newer looking skin. With Vitamin E."

I'm not so sure on this. It smells amazing, so fruity and apricot-y (that could be a word right?), and has little micro beads in to clean away the dead bits on your face. It lathers up just slightly when you use it with warm water, which feels really nice, but I found that the micro beads are a little too scratchy! They're actually quite painful. I didn't expect that as other face scrubs I have used in the past have never been too bad - although they do have beads in that you can definitely feel, none of them have been quite this rough - so I'd gone in all guns blazing and whacked a load on my face and scrubbed away. Needless to say I won't be doing that again! I'll be much more gentle from now on. Saying that though it did leave my face feeling really soft and baby-bum like, which is just what you want from a scrub. As for the blemish control, I've only used it twice, so we will have to wait and see!

Oriental Clay Mask - Green tea and jasmine. £0.99

"A gentle but deep cleansing clay face mask suitable for regular and sensitive skin types."

Again I'm not completely sold on this either. I have quite sensitive skin on my face so generally I should be quite careful about what I choose to put on it. I can't use Clearasil's blackhead wash because it just burns the crap out of my face. But this one says it's okay for us sensitive types so I thought I'd give it a go. And at 99p it's not going to be the end of the world if I really don't like it..

It goes on really lovely and silky, nice and easy to apply and doesn't go very solid like a lot of other face masks which is nice, it means you can still actually move your face. Yet maybe it's just my face, but it was quite stingy on my skin. Although it did smell really nice and had that freshening feeling to it like when you use a minty product which woke me up a little, yet I was planning on a wind down! Despite the stingy-ness, I left it on for the full 10 minutes (you can leave it for up to 15) and then washed it off with warm water. My skin was a tad red, but it did feel super soft and lovely so I guess it did the trick. 

I'm not going to dismiss it just yet, my skin could have been having 'one of those days'. I'll keep you informed.

I hope you're having a lovely bonfire night! Unfortunately I was in all evening doing uni work :( but there's plenty going on outside my window!

Happy Monday, have the best week x