Fresh as a Daisy

Last weekend I traveled home for a long overdue visit to see my friends and family. I hadn’t seem them in months so I was really excited about seeing all their beautiful faces. I went to a housewarming BBQ which actually turned into a surprise wedding reception. My friend’s Mum and her partner Mark have spent the last 7 years building their dream home from scratch, mostly doing it all themselves with the help of friends and family. They bought this plot of land, knocked down the old fishing house and built from the foundations upwards. Saturday was to be their big house-warming party, allowing us all to enjoy their hard work. Friday afternoon my friend was meeting up with the rest of her family for dinner, with a strong feeling her Mum and Mark were going to announce that they were engaged. They have been together for around 12 years but have always dismissed the idea of getting married. Well their announcement was that they had got married that very morning to everyones delight. My friend and her family were thrilled for them. The BBQ then turned into an amazing casual wedding reception for them both, just with close friends and family. The weather couldn’t have been better either! It was a wonderful celebration.

Check out the views from the top balcony.

I have known these girls for many many years and I love that we can all be so busy with our lives but when we get together its like we only saw each other yesterday. We chat, we laugh and dance around the same way we did when we were still in college. We are growing up, but it is exciting to hear all about the new things happening in their lives. Some of my friends have new homes of their own, one is newly married with a bubba on the way, one has been travelling and is settling back into English life and starting new job opportunities and it was great to hear they are all doing so well.

So on the Sunday we chilled out after maybe one too many rum and cokes and caught up with my Mum, my Brother and my Sister-in-Law. As we relaxed in the garden and whilst my fella snoozed off the remainder of his hangover I decided to paint my nails in a style that would reflect my weekend. Blue sky, sitting in gardens surround my flowers…blue daisy nails it is then. Apologies for my photo quality in this post, I had to leave my Canon in London due to lack of room on the bike, so my Iphone had to do.

I found the most amazing thing in boots the other day. Barry M have a Matte Nail Paint Top Coat!!! So instead of buying matte nail polishes I can make any of my colours matte with this beauty. I decided to try it out with this design. For my base coat I used Seventeen’s lasting fix in Mint Choc Chip and for the flowers I used a combination of Barry M’s Nail Paint in White and Seventeen’s Quicker Slicker colour in Lemon Tart.

Once the lovely sky blue coat had dried I took a scrap bit of newspaper and poured a little bit of the white on there. You don’t need loads but this is just easier than trying to get it from the polish bottle. You take a pin, and dip the flat top into the white. Make five white blobs in a circle on your nail. As I have rather large nails I can fit between two to three daisies per nail. Once you have placed all the daisy petals on one nail, wipe the excess of the top of the pin. Place the pin into the middle of one of the blobs (not too heavy) and sweep the pin into the centre of the group of dots. This will create a petal effect. Do this for each of the petals for each of the daisies. Once all your petals are complete wipe the top of the pin clean and pour a little bit of yellow nail polish onto the newspaper. Dot on yellow nail polish to the centre of all your daisies. Allow this to dry completely before adding a top coat to seal your daisies in. Here is where I used the matte top coat for my nails. I loved the end result, they looked slightly like nail stickers. The flat end of a pin is really handy as a dotting tool for nail art. Next time I’ll try to do more of a step by step guide in photos for you all.

What do you think?

I’m off back to my hometown next weekend for another housewarming celebration with my friends, this will also be a birthday celebration for the new home owner so should be a good laugh. It’ll be just after 4th July…mmm maybe Independence Day themed nails next week guys and girls?

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Products

Barry M Nail Paint in White – £2.99

Barry M Matte Nail Paint Top Coat – £2.99

Seventeen’s Quicker Slicker Colour in Mint Choc Chip (seems to be the same as the old Lasting Fix polish) – £2.99

Seventeen’s Quicker Slicker Colour in Lemon Tart – £2.99

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Hope you enjoyed my little weekend breeze. Until next time.

-MooFace-

 

Meet Lily

So this adorable, people stopping, cheeky little dog is the lovely Lily. She is a 6-year-old shih tzu and belongs to my fella’s parents. She lives in the countryside with two other gorgeous boisterous boy dogs. Get ready for some out loud “awwwwww”s people because she is a cutie.

She doesn’t look 6 does she?! As you can see from the picture below, when his Dad first brought her home she was just this teeny tiny ball of fluff that you could fit in your hand. OH MY GOD I can’t stop pulling gooey girly faces when ever I look at this picture. In the voice of Agnes from Despicable Me “She’s so fluffy!”

She has slightly skewiffy eyes, but this just makes me love her even more.

As it was bank holiday weekend, and we both didn’t have to work, we took the opportunity to bring her up to London to stay with us for the long weekend. We treated it as a little holiday for her, she would have our undivided attention and would be pampered and fussed over. I even gave up my new beanbag for her to sleep on…ok she kind of just took it over but who am I to chuck her off it.

We were so lucky to have glorious sunshine for the first two days, so taking her for long walks around the common was fun. We let her off the lead once she was away from any roads and she loved it. She would look around and when we were ahead she would gallop, literally bound along, to catch us up and then steam ahead. She wouldn’t go far before she would stop and wait for us to carry on past her. This cycle continued for most of the walks.

At her home she would often take great pleasure in running up to crows and pigeons and scaring the bejeebers out of them. As we crossed the common she spotted a crowd of crows just lounging mid field. She was off! Ears flapping in the wind, tongue hanging out of her mouth, she took forth towards the huddle. Now London crows aren’t quite the same as country crows. Tolerant after being chased many times by children and other dogs, these hardy crows did not even flinch when she came near. As she approached the usual scaring boundary, she froze! She looked around to us as if to say “why are they not flying away?” The crows just stared at her, giving her the “come at me!” eyes. Lily retreated and bounded back to the safety of us. No bird scaring for Lily this weekend.

I was testing out a new potential lens (50mm prime lens) for my Canon 550D and she was the perfect model as you can see.

We showed these pictures to my fella’s parents when we returned her and they were shocked to see her running about like a puppy. Lily likes to play the ‘small old dog’ card and often plods along on her walks to his mum’s frustration. Lily does make me laugh.

Apart from the walks, Lily was happy to relax in the comfort of the bean bag or snooze in the sun on our terrace. Enjoying the peace and quiet and a nice fuss every so often. I found it hard to do other things with this cutie pie plodding around the flat.

These two have definitely missed each other.

I miss having pets around. My ginger tom Milo lives with my Mum as he is a proper outdoors cat and I wouldn’t feel good about him roaming around the London streets near busy roads. I think my Mum would miss him too much as well now. Hopefully when I have a house to call my own and a job that doesn’t require me to be out for nearly 12 hours minimum everyday, we’ll have a little dog or cat…or both!

For now, having Lily visit on long weekends and going home to see Milo is enough to keep me dosed up on animal cuteness. Oh just to push you over the adorableness edge, here is a picture of Lily taken last Christmas. Man, just look at that face. You can just tell she is loving that outfit! hehe.

-MooFace-

Friday Frock Wishlist

Happy Friday everyone! Is it me or has this week just flown by?! Cycling to work in the sunshine and spending lunch times relaxing in the park just makes the working week a whole lot better don’t you think?

So I was having a little procrastination time at work and as usual browsed through some of my favourite clothing websites to see what’s about. Yes yes I’m trying to save money for my soon to be adventures but there is no harm in a little window/screen shopping 😉 I thought I would share five items that I am just loving at the moment.

1. ASOS Pretty Maxi Dress In Floral Print

This has been sitting in my saved items tab for a couple of weeks now. Sadly it seems to be out of stock…dammit! But you never know when ASOS might bring more in. I really love the vintage esque style with the small pleats below the bust line and the gorgeous button detailing down the front. It actually reminds me of a dress my mum used to wear when I was little.

You can’t go wrong with this kind of floral pattern. It’s sparse so it doesn’t make the long dress too busy and distract you from the detailing. I would, like in the photo, team this with a long pendant necklace but maybe go for a sandal style heel rather than these cowboy ankle boots. You could definitely convert this into a wintery dress with an over sized chunky knit cardigan and heeled boots. It was £55 when it was in stock. Lets hope they bring this back in.

2. Olawia Flower Print Skater Dress

Now I am a big fan of the skater style dress. I don’t have the biggest of busts and am quite bony along the chest so I often prefer tops and dresses that come up around the neck. I always prefer keeping my chest covered and show a bit of leg instead. This is from Missguided and is a bargain at only £14.99. They have teamed it with this perfect minimalist leather waist belt just to break up the pattern over the dress and accentuate the waist. I’m also loving this black Fedora hat (£12.99), it completes the look of the outfit nicely. Really tempted to get this! Again it can be transformed into a winter dress with tights, a black or bright coloured jumper and heeled ankle boots. No…must resist!!!

3. Free People Slip Dress in Floral Print from ASOS

This is a little out of my price range at £88 for a causal dress but it’s still a good’un for the wishlist. Maybe if I win the euromillions tonight ay?! How gorgeous is the back and the subtle ruching under the bust. My third floral piece for this post. You can tell I’m really loving the floral at the moment! With floral it comes in so many styles and colours it can just make a plain navy dress go from “ooo I like the style” to “ok I really would love to be wearing that right now” The colours of these flowers just pop out of this dress. I like the combination of this girly style with the biker boots. This is new in for ASOS, nice work guys and girls!

4. H&M Woven Top

Ok ok so this isn’t a frock…unless its a really really really short one?! No? ok I thought I would mix it up a little with some tops on this weeks wishlist as well. I received an email from H&M this morning announcing their new stock and this called to me. It’s simplistic, minimalist but bold with the small yellow insert. You could wear this for smart occasions or throw it on with a pair of denim shorts for a picnic in the park. This is also a bargain at £14.99. I am tempted to purchase this as when hanging the washing out to dry the other day I noticed all my tops seem to be black, white or grey. Yeah this combines two of those colours but the yellow just makes it a little more summery.

5. Bold Floral T-Shirt from Oasis

There I go again with another floral piece. Look at this gorgeous colour though. My favourite colour! I originally wanted a dress from Oasis that was in this pattern for a wedding I was going to. I waited for ages for it to come in store but when it finally did, it just wasn’t very flattering in the end. This has just come in and I’m intrigued to see what it’s like on. No greasy food whilst wearing this though. It says it’s cotton, but you can see a sheen to it so I bet getting marks out of it would be tricky. I have a bad habit of getting food down new clothing, like a magnet ha ha! This is currently £32

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Well there is my little Friday Frock (and a few tops) wishlist. Hope you’ve enjoyed 🙂 I’ve included the links in the titles if you want to have a little screen shop yourself.

Hope you all have a lovely weekend. I’m off to a black tie charity ball this Saturday so I’m super excited about that.

I will try to get a few photos and blog about it soon. I have a few posts that I need to catch up on so stay tuned.

-MooFace-

 

Prepping My Peepers for the Day Ahead

I have three staple looks when it comes to my eye make up. Time often dictates which look I choose to go for. When I say time, I mean how many times I choose to hit my snooze button before I know I really really should drag myself out of bed and make myself look presentable. My au natural days at work are usually a clear sign I hit that button one too many times.

1. My usual look involves lining my upper lid with black liquid liner avec chic flick at the end, paired with nude lips. Stylish yet simple.

2. If I’m feeling in the mood to go bold in the lip department with a fuchsia pink or a femme fatale red I like to keep my eyes simple with just a coat of mascara on my upper and lower lashes.

3. My third staple look is with my Naked II palette (which I looooooove), however I find this palette is a little too fancy for an average working day. I want to save its colours for just special occasions and nights out.

I was on the look out for a more natural eye shadow palette, one that wasn’t too shimmery but also not so subtle that I might as well not have anything on at all. I heard about a palette called ‘Wet n Wild colour icon eyeshadow trio in ‘Walking on Eggshells’ ‘ (what a mouthful of a name) and thought I would look it up. Wet n Wild is an American based cosmetics brand, however a lot of their products are sold on Amazon so it was really easy to find and order. It was such a bargain as well, I just couldn’t say no.

It promptly turned up and I couldn’t wait to give it a try. I had to be careful with the first application as I hadn’t taken any photos yet and didn’t want to muck up the cute writing engraved in each shadow. It couldn’t have been easier to use.

Marked with ‘eyelid’ is a lovely soft pink. I was a little worried at first as pink eyeshadow often doesn’t suit my colouring, however this tone was a more beigey pink and had a hint of shimmer which complimented my pale skin nicely.

The second colour is a soft mocha brown that will help define the eyes. After placing it in the crease of my eye, I also applied it to the outer third of my eyelid and took it down to my lower lash line, again about a third of the way in. This just added a little more depth.

The last colour is a light cream colour to help highlight your brow bone. After sweeping it across this area I also dabbed a little to the inside corner of my eye, just to give my peepers a little healthy glow. I then used the softer brush to blend where the colours met so I wasn’t left with any harsh lines. The texture of these colours are ever so slightly creamy, They sweep on really evenly and give a nice coverage. It is subtle, but that’s exactly what I wanted from this.

I was a little dubious at first as I have had experiences in the past, where the brand had sacrificed on quality because it was selling the product at such a low price. I was worried this would be another crumbly shadow that wouldn’t last five minutes on my eyelids and would never see the light of day again after being discarded to the back of the cave that is my makeup draw. Luckily I was proven wrong by this product. I would definitely recommend it as a go to natural eye colour palette.

I finished the look off with a nice even coat of mascara after curling my lashes, applied a hint of blusher to my cheekbones and added a bit of peach coloured balm to my lips. Voila, I’m ready for the day ahead. So easy to do, this palette just takes the effort out of creating a soft natural everyday look.

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If you are from America you can find this product in a lot of stores which are listed on their website. Or you can find it online here:

www.wnwbeauty.com – $2.99 not including tax

If you are not able to find this brand in stores like myself you can find them on this amazon site:

www.amazon.co.uk/WILD-Color-Icon-Eyeshadow-Trio/dp/B005C50W3I – £2.99 plus £3.19 delivery in the UK.

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I’m definitely going to have a little browse at their other products. They seem so compact they would be really handy for when I go travelling next year.

Hope you have enjoyed my first beauty product review.

-MooFace-

 

Colour Run Inspired French Manicure

Today in London was the Dulux 5k Colour Run. If you haven’t heard of this, basically you compete in a 5k race around Wembley Park and people throw various bright coloured powders at you as you run by. How awesome is that!!! I’m well up for taking part in this some day. I love a good race that has a little quirky twist to it, makes things a little more interesting.

I thought I would use this colourful day as inspiration for today’s manicure. A bright multicoloured french manicure to be precise. I did have a coffee today, which is very rare for me as I’m a total tea fiend, but I thought I’d grab a frappe latte as I strolled through the park in the sunshine. This was probably not my best idea when I knew I would be painting my nails this afternoon. It left both my hands a little on the shaky side, so I was a little worried how the french tips would turn out. May have taken a little longer than planned but hey, all worked out in the end. Take a peak…

As the sun actually graced us with its warm presence this weekend I thought I would use an array of bright colours.

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Seventeen’s Lasting Fix Nail Polish in ‘Mint Choc Chip’, which is a bit of an odd name because I’d say it was more of a blue colour.

Seventeen’s Lasting Fix Nail Polish in ‘Orange Soda’

Seventeen’s Lasting Fix Nail Polish in ‘Parma Violet’

TopShop’s Nail Polish in ‘Daydream’ – £5

Barry M’s Nail Paint in ‘Mint’. Now that is a colour I would describe as mint. – £2.99

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Hope you’ve all had a sunny relaxing weekend.

-MooFace-