UK Blog Awards 2017

UK Blog Awards 2017

It's finally here! The UK blog awards. Someone kindly nominated me (thanks anonymous person) but I thought hey why the hell not! I haven't entered anything like this in the whole 4 years of me blogging.. jeez.

There's some lovely blogs also up for nomination and I'm going to have a good browse at all these lovely bloggers.

Although winning an award seems abit outrageous as I'm not some influencer who has thousands of followers, but it's nice to enter anyway, any opportunity to get my blog noticed! I put so much effort into creating content not only for my blog, but for my instagram, promotion, my photography and I pour my heart into my personal and anxiety related posts.

Winning an award would just be amazing.. am I right? As a student studying fashion marketing & communications it would be so lovely to put on my shiny CV when I graduate this year.

But now it's the time to vote!

So if you really like reading my blog and enjoy my content and effort to make everything beautiful I would really appreciate your time to click the link and vote for me!

Click here to vote for me!

Thanks for your support!

I READ // All The Bright Places

YAS. I finally did it, I finally completed this book. It was a hard one & I was really disappointed with it as I thought I would really enjoy it. I've tried to make this review thing as unspoiler-y as possible as not to ruin the whole complete book for people still reading, just my thoughts on the overall book and story :)

So the story is basically boy meets girl. I really really struggled reading this book, like seriously. I just I don't know I just couldn't really get into it, it all felt a little naive and not really well structured at all. I didn't really understand most of it, like why they were doing certain things or just in certain places, in all honesty it just felt abit rushed and pointless.. it didn't really have any plot to it all and I felt like you were just aimlessly following this couple around while they did boring AF activities.

I also feel like the book almost romanticises unhealthy mental health, I get that the end of the book it's about preventing suicide and stuff but why create a "love story" about it. It's sort of trying to be fault in our stars and paper towns almost mixed together. Paper towns is in my opinion is such a boring book and why you would want to combine the two just makes this huge chunk in the middle of the book a total yawnfest.

I really wanted to enjoy this book, I really did, but after struggling the entire way through it and only getting an emotional feeling towards the end, I thought this book fell short if I'm I'm honest. I did try :(  I don't want to delve too deeply because I don't want to spoil it if you are reading this book.

I'd give this book maybe 2/5 I will probably never pick it up again and it's probably going to sit gathering dust on my bookshelf... (sorry not sorry)

What were your thoughts on the book? Or are you still reading it? :)

It's okay to not have any friends at university

I'm constantly my own worst enemy.

Recently I've been going back to university to finish my degree, it's my final year and after dropping out last year, all my friends and acquaintances I had made for the duration of the 2 and a bit years I was there, have all graduated and fleed the nest! This really leaves me in a strange position as I go into uni and literally know nobody. (apart from my tutors of course) But it's such a surreal feeling not having anybody to even say a little hello to in the corridor or a catch up in the canteen.

I used to struggle with social anxiety pretty bad. I hated going into university because I felt like an outsider on my course. It's amazing what anxiety can make you feel and think and I constantly thought I had no friends and nobody liked me, I knew I wasn't a bad person or mean or horrible - So why wouldn't I have friends right? And although I felt that way at the time, I did have friends. It was just my mind telling me I wasn't good enough to have them.

So this year is a huge strange leap for me, because I now know nobody. All that time my mind was telling me I had no-one but I had lots of people to talk to even if they were just people I knew.

I don't really know where this post was going or what I was trying to conclude from it, but I just know that having friends at university isn't the end of the world. At the end of the day we are all just there to study. I've sort of got a fresh head on my shoulders.. Of course it still bothers me that I have to sit alone at lunch sometimes but hey, I just whack out a book and read that.

I guess I'm feeling a lot more independent, I feel like I can finally function like an everyday person and not be too terrified of getting on a bus and being around people. I actually attend university now which is great and no longer do I eat my lunch in the toilet like a scene out of mean girls. I have crap days when I still can't say out loud what I think to the class or ask for help from my tutors, but at least I'm actually there and making progress.

This title was abit literal. Because I do have friends and they are amazing. But for now university is just an acquaintance in my life before I can finally hit the big wide world and it should be the same for everyone. Just be nice to people because you never really know what they're struggling with. Be kind. If you're at university and you're abit of an introvert like me, well it's okay to not live up to those party and popularity expectations that people have of university. It's unrealistic. By all means have a good time, and say yes to as many social things as you can, but it's okay to be abit of a loner too. work hard, and cut yourself some slack.

Colourpop Ultra Matte Lipsticks

My favourite lipsticks hands down, have to be the Ultra matte formula from Colourpop, I'm hoping and praying that they open a UK store because the postage from America makes me really sad. But they are amazing I have 5 now, and I prefer them over my MAC lipsticks most of them matte formula too.

There's just something really satisfying about a liquid lipstick, I feel like they give much more coverage and they literally do no budge off your lips. I have tried some liquid matte lipsticks from some cheap brands like MUA and Makeup Revolution, but they are often too thick and heavy or just not great coverage but Colourpop have just got their formula so so right. I can wear them all day and not have to top them up which is awesome.

Shades from top to bottom, SOLOW, INSTIGATOR, CHI, MIDI and TRAP. 

One thing I do find about these lipsticks is that they come out quite dark as swatches and on the lip as opposed to in their bottles.

Solow 

Its a lot different in person, its a darkish mauve-y kind of pink colour but it's really really beautiful and what I love most about these lipsticks is that they're super wearable.

Instigator

Very very similar to midi but it has much more of a orange undertone to it unlike solo which is a lot more mauve pink. 

Chi

A dark nude colour, very brown toned. I didn't think it would be this dark, but it's quite a medium brown shade.

Midi

A real neutral pinky nude tone. Beautiful for everyday wear, this is probably the one I use the most as it's super wearable and really flattering on my skin tone

Trap

This was my first one that I bought as I wanted that cool greige lip that everyone was going for. Again its a lot darker on your lips than in the bottle. I wouldn't say it was 'griege' as such but more of a purple-y browny nude. Its lovely though and does give off that purple vibe.

And here are some swatches for you (same order)

(Top to bottom) 

SOLOW, INSTIGATOR, CHI, MIDI, TRAP. 

Do you own any colour pop lipsticks? Which one's your favourite?

October Reading List

I love books, ever since I was a little girl my mom used to take me to the library every week and I would take out the maximum amount of books I was allowed and 2 days later I had probably finished them all. I just loved loved reading. This was obviously before the internet was a thing and took over everyones lives. Its so easy to just chuck on your laptop and endlessly browse the web. I think I spent 2 hours on youtube today just watching complete crap (haha)

So recently I've done abit of a book haul, although I don't need more books but I'm hoping it will spark the bookworm in me again.

Im still trying to finish "all the bright places", which I think is just abit naff, I'm so bored of it, but I'm just going to have to power through, because I love to finish a book anyway.

But here's my reading list for October..

Gone Girl - Gillian Flynn

So yeah, I feel abit embarrassed that I haven't actually read this book yet but my boyfriend keeps pestering me to read it because I refuse to watch the film, before I've read the book, it just ruins it in my opinion. So this is probably first on the list, mainly because if I don't I won't hear the end of it!

The Marble Collector - Cecelia Ahern

Cecelia is probably one of my favourite authors, I finished 'the year I met you' a few months ago now and it was such a lovely read. I love how her characters have a sort of life progression to them which is really beautiful and sort of uplifting. I saw another blogger who picked up her latest book, which I'm yet to get but really enjoyed the last book I read, so I bought it and I'm possibly the most excited about this one.

The Girl on the Train - Paula Hawkins 

Another read before seeing the film book, I've seen this floating about the blogging community and it looks really exciting. I don't think its my usual book kind of type, but I've said that with quite a few books before so I'll give it a chance and see how it goes.

So they're my book goals for October, how exciting. I'm hoping to get abit more involved in books again and combining them with blogging. I've started taking part in a lot more twitter chats so I'm hoping it will keep me inspired! 

What are you reading this month and what keeps you motivated to read?

You can keep up with my reading progress over on goodreads! Here

How NOT to dye your hair

How not to dye your hair, a post I thought I would never write.. but look at where we are. It's not really a surprise I can hear most of you saying.. How long could this crazy woman go about dying her hair left right and centre. Well my friends, the time has come where I have and sadly admit that I have quite frankly fucked up my hair.

It all started when I went to university, I had previously rebelliously dyed my hair bright pink, but sixth form made me change it so I never really experimented with my hair apart from the odd toner here and there as I was always a blonde, naturally and dyed. So it was bound to happen, the moment I was set free from the chains of parents I went a little mental.

Blue, green, pink, pink and yellow, orange, red, purple I'm pretty sure you could name a colour and I've probably been there. I think it all comes down to the fact I'm pretty proud of my hair, so it always has to look on fleek, or it makes me all irritated and sad. So I was constantly topping up my hair.
The crazy bright colours were ok because they don't contain peroxide, its just vegetable dyes which was great for my hair and it would soak it all up and be all delicious.  But I used to change my mind and get bored and try a new idea.

The pain started when I decided to take a chill pill from my insane colours. (*I was blonde over Christmas and I stupidly decided to go back to crazy colours because I'm an idiot so I had to fix it)

I've always bleached my hair, it's been through a lot with me (strokes hair lovingly) but I wanted to go a natural colour because I got really annoyed with not being able to wear certain colours (burgundy I'm looking at you) and it was just so frustrating to see all these cute autumn outfits and I was constantly stuck with a black wardrobe because my hair changed so much.

So after trying to bleach the crap out of my hair and go blonde it was stuck green. GREEN. Experience has taught me that blue/green shades just don't come out of my hair. No matter what. Ketchup, toners, I've been on holiday for 2 weeks in Turkey.. super hot, super chloriney and it still never came out.

So I went black.
and I got bored.
and I wanted grey hair.
it went green,
and I spent a small fortune trying to get it fixed at a hairdressers.

So here I am.
a stupid girl with a frizzy damaged mess.
and here's my lesson from this story..

Please don't use box dyes on your hair.
They are full of crap. Because customers have such different hair they have to ramp up the peroxide so it will lift and may people don't need such a strong amount on their hair. I also found out that some box dyes are also full of SILICONE. This is so it stays looking nicer for longer, less fade etc, but guess what, that crap is PLASTIC. SO whenever you use heat, straighteners etc, that gross stuff is melting into your hair. yep.

MELTED PLASTIC HAIR. which a lot of hair removers can't get out.

So please please look after your hair, and be careful when changing colours. Use professional colours when you're dealing with bleach and/or peroxide and if you have any doubts or you know you probably can't fix it, then do a me and hold your hands up, admit defeat and go see a pro ;)