Breezy British beach day

I wanted to post a collection of photos telling the story of my day at the beach and I decided that these were my favourites from those that I took, and boy did I take a lot.

I had fantastic fish and chips, probably the best I've ever had, and the ice cream is honeycomb flavour with chocolate underneath and was delightfully tasty. I paddled in the sea which was unnaturally cold and hurt my feet walking across the pebbles littered across the shore. But all in all it was a lovely day with my family, with beautiful surroundings and lovely weather, I would gladly do it again sometime.

Sunny London Day - ootd

So I thought that this gorgeous summer day would be the perfect opportunity to show off one of my most favourite outfits that I have been wearing this summer. It was such a lovely day and I thought that the breezy maxi would do wonderfully to help me cope withe the heat and the sunglasses, well aren't they just so awesome.

I also really enjoy this shell top which is simple yet looks so put together, I just loved this outfit so much. I put this all together with my chunky sandals as I feel like they made it more informal and gave it that slightly more edgy vibe, I also can't seem to get these shoes off my feet right now,they are just so good for the summer.

Outfit details: 

Top - Topshop

Skirt - H&M

Bag - Urban Outfitters 

Shoes - New look

Sunglasses - Topshop

Sorry to myself...

So I was planning on posting regularly about the things that I have been getting up to this summer... Look what happened...

I'm not really apologising to anyone other than myself, just because I really wanted to make this work and make it happen like a proper blog and it didn't really. So I have decided that as soon as I have all of the time I am going to work on making this into something proper that I can be proud of. I want to work on better posts with better images and improved content. I also want to try and set up social media links so that I can try and spread my blogging around for more people to see if they are interested.

So that's the plan, and although I doubt that it will happen I don't want to make this blog into a list of failed ideas, and I am quite excited about making exciting and interesting posts. I just hope that this works and I am actually able to create things that I am interested in and that make me happy.

My new camera: fujifilm x10

This is my new camera, isn't it pretty! 

I just love the retro style that it has going on, with the big lens and the leather wrap around. I honestly think it looks so cool. And as much as this might have been a factor when buying the camera, there were also many other features that caught my eye, aside from the wonderful aesthetic. One being the manual functions that it has, as you can manually set the exposure and shutter speed and other fun things. This means that I get to play around with proper photography, which I have been wanting to do for a long time as it really interests me how just a camera can be used to create vastly different images. As well as this, it creates an extremely high quality photo as it has a super high tech sensor which makes even my photos look all pretty.

And now that I own the camera I am so happy with it, it is so pretty and produces such good quality images, it makes me want to document as much of my life as I can in images to treasure them as stills of memories that can aid my mind, I want to be a memory maker and this camera is going to come along with me every step of the way. My aim is to always have my camera with me so that I can capture every moment and treasure them. This will allow me to create a photo album every year with pictures of the year gone by, as I remember being a child and enjoying looking through photo albums of my parents when they were younger, and this will allow me to create something for my children to enjoy as well as me. 

So I plan to try and take as many photos as I can, whether this will work and whether I will remember I'm not sure, but I will try my very best to share photos on there so that my life is well documented, just as I mentioned in my last post about summer and documenting what I do this summer, I will also collect images on my new camera to share.

This may even become an activity that I do one day, I might decide to explore my new camera and work out how all of the manual functions work so that I can optimise the photos that I take.

Summer so far...

Summer so far has been distinctly average and to some extent a little days, having to fill so many days yourself when people don't tend to be around can be difficult and I have struggled to find things to do. I really need to find myself a hobby and this is where I get stuck because there have been so many projects that I have started and then given up on and I want to find myself a hobby that I can fully immerse myself in and use to take up much of my time. The difficult thing is, I always thing of so many ideas and then discard them because of reasons that I create in my head. I just need to pick something and work on doing it for a while to see where it takes me, I'm sick of having back to back days of sitting in front of the TV eating food.

So I have decided that I want to document my summer here, I don't know whether I will be able to and I don't know whether I will end up actually doing anything or posting anything about what I do, but it doesn't matter, I'm at least going to try! I feel like if I have a place to document what I do with my days then I will actually get something done so that I can make a post about it here. I hope this goes well, I just have to think of something to do tomorrow now... Wish me luck!

Favourite brush ever

Literally this is the most amazing brush. Honestly. It's wonderful. You need this brush in your life.

I cannot explain the greatness of this brush, it has magical properties.

Although to me this is the wonder brush, it's official name is the ELF Powder Brush, and boy is it good at being a powder brush!

It does just look like a standard brush, but don't be deceived, the soft hairs and flat top make it wonderful for applying powder to a fuller coverage. The closely packed bristles allow the powder to glide onto the skin without clogging up the brush. At a very very low price, it would be silly not to buy this brush, it is one of my most favourite products and I feel that soon I shall be finding myself buying another to add to my every growing collection of brushes.

Scrapbook!!

As part of my birthday present my boyfriend offered to take me to Hobby Craft and get me a selection of things for me to start creating my very own scrapbook, so of course I accepted the offer!

After spending an extremely long time trying to make a decision about what to get, I settled on a selection of things that will act as my scrapbook starter set.

As you can see there is a selection of different things, including patterned papers and the most exciting label maker as well as stamps for me to create titles.

I was very excited and so I have decided to keep part of my blog for my scrap booking adventures and post about how it is going, with photographs of my progress.

Mini product review - The Body Shop Vitamin E Overnight Serum-in-Oil

The Body Shop Vitamin E Overnight Serum-in-Oil

This was one of those products that I bought on a whim, an impulse purchase based on a recommendation, with none of my own research completed in order to decide whether or not this product was for me. Sadly it was not for me, and to be honest I doubt it would really be for anyone, unless you are the type of person who likes to wake up every morning with a greasy, smeary, oily feeling face.

The packaging itself is very nice, very appealing, with the soft pink typical of the Vitamin E range within The Body Shop. The application of the product, however, is not so nice, and using a glass pipet to apply a skincare product feels very scientific and almost medical. There is no clear indication on the packaging as to how much product one should be using, and this makes it difficult, but I only used a small amount as I do have oily skin as did merely want it as a slight moisture boost for when I wake up in the morning. This still felt too much and my skin felt heavy and greasy with this product on it. I ignored that and went to sleep, only to wake up the next morning with a thin layer of oil on my face, making me feel very unclean and sure that my pores were blocked beyond belief. This product seems far to heavy for my oily skin.

I'm sure this product would work wonders on extremely dry skin, however it was not for me, I would not recommend it if you have anything but the driest of skin.

Summer makeup essentials

I have collected together what I feel are five key items that I put into my everyday makeup bag when summer comes around, my essentials for adding to my kit during the warmer months. These tend to be in a large amount of the makeup looks that I have been creating recently and so I have decided to share them.

First of all, a powder is key to set any foundation or concealer at all times of year, but I find that during the summer it becomes even more important, especially with my oily skin. My favourite powder is the Rimmel Stay Matte powder in transparent as it is pale enough for my skin tone but also helps to keep my makeup in place and stops me from looking too shiny. This is a very popular powder and I would highly recommend it as it lasts a long time but also has the benefit of being highly affordable.

A second makeup staple for summer is my waterproof eyeliner from Rimmel which I find stays on amazingly. If you are someone who finds that pencil eyeliner just does not stay in place during the warmer season, then this really is the product for you. It stays on my eye all day and although there can be a slight bit of fading, the product does not budge and you don't end up with a sort of smeary panda eye by the end of the day. Again, this is an affordable product and I feel that it is a wonderful eyeliner due to it's waterproof nature. The fact that it is waterproof, however, does not affect how easy it is to remove and I find that it comes off just as easy as any other eyeliner using eye makeup remover.

Another favourite of mine is a blush from ELF (a wonderful makeup brand, and amazingly affordable) in the shade peachy keen. Now I have incredibly pale skin and I find that in the summer although I want to use a bronzer, many are far too dark for me. This blush almost has a bronzey tint to it which makes it perfect for giving my skin a little colour without looking like I have dirt on my face. It does have as,all amount of gold shimmer within the product which I feel is good for the summer and helps to add to that healthy glow that a bronzed would give. I like to sweep the product across my cheeks, onto my temples and along my jawline in small amounts, just to contour my face to an extent. I feel that this is a great product for pale girls in summer but would also be a beautiful blush for many other skin tones.

MAC Fix+ is one of those amazing products that makes your makeup stay on your face literally all day. It is almost magic how my makeup does not shift at all once I have used this product. It is a liquid which you spray onto your face onto your face once your makeup is complete, after which I like to go over my skin again with a little powder just to set the product and then my makeup stays like a dream. I have used it for parties and proms and I find that even when my face gets a little warm and clammy this product manages to keep my makeup looking pretty much as it was before I left the house. I recommend this to anyone, especially those with oily skin who see their makeup fall off in the summer, this is a magical product.

My final favourite is bright lipsticks in general, I feel that they are a must in the summer to liven up a simple eye look that I tend to be drawn to, especially when on holiday. The two favourites that I have from my collection are a Lip Bullet from Topshop in Heartbeat and a Rimmel Kate Moss Lasting Finish lipstick in 110. These are both beautifully vibrant colours which liven up your face and just tend to make me feel increasingly summery as I wear them. 

Blog

So it's officially summer and I thought I should really find something to do to occupy myself. So since I am interested in fashion and makeup and lifestyle and all that good stuff I thought that it may be a good idea to start a blog on which I can share my interests. Honestly, I don't have much of a clue about what I will actually be posting, but it will be things that are of interest to me. I have been shopping recently and so I thought it may be interesting for me to share what I purchased. I also bought a new camera and so would like to share photos in some posts which may be heavily image based.
All in all I just thought I would create a first post to get this going and maybe allow me to start this as a proper hobby. I'm excited to post more, I just need to actually get up out of bed and get dressed first as I find myself still in pyjamas...