Tanya Burr lips & nails: Exotic Island & Penguin Chic

Feeling slightly sleepy already due to waking around 6:45am on a Saturday when I don't start work until this afternoon.. annoying or what! So having done most of the lazy things you tend to do on a weekend morning I thought I would now share a new post with you, one that I've been meaning to share for a very long time. The gorgeous Tanya Burr launched her own lip gloss and nail polish range a while back and I picked up one of each to test out.

When these first launched they were pretty darn hard to get hold of. I ordered mine from Feel Unique and due to the high demand delivery did take rather a long time. But I did finally get my hands on these and I'm super excited about both and love them both - bonus! There are such a wide range of both lip glosses and nail polishes including your bright bolds, hot pinks and neutrals. This made it super hard to decide which shades to choose from (all of which also have super cute names making it even harder). But in the end I opted for a bright lip gloss in Exotic Island and a neutral nail polish in Penguin Chic.

Firstly the lip gloss.. The colour is just oh my, so beautiful. I really was hoping this would be as pigmented and bold as it looks and I can tell you it definitely is. It glides on effortlessly, not sticking to any dry patches which I tend to suffer from. It's a lovely hot purple toned pink which I think is perfect for the coming summer months and nights out. As I said it's super pigmented meaning you can afford to just wear it on it's own but you've also got the option to put it over the top of lipstick maybe for a night out. The packaging is simple which I love and I have to tell you about the smell. These lip glosses just smell absolutely incredible, literally like strawberries and cream or something sweet! I'm never normally a huge lip gloss fan but this one has definitely won me over, it's not too tacky/sticky and gives the perfect amount of colour. All in all this is a great product and definitely worth the £6.99 price tag.

Next the nail polish, I picked up the shade Penguin Chic which is a gorgeous brown/purple/grey, nice and neutral for everyday/every season wear. The formula is lovely, I would recommend more than one coat to achieve the super glossy look which I love. These are easy to apply and dry relatively quickly. They do leave your nails looking nice and glossy although I also apply a top coat to prolong the wear. I absolutely love the packaging again, very chic and simplistic which I think makes the product look a lot more up market. At only £5.99 these nail polishes are affordable and worth it. Again the colour range includes all of the must have colours for each different season which is perfect.

Overall I definitely recommend getting yours hand on either a lip gloss or nail varnish or even both if you feel like splashing out. They're both amazing quality for the prices you pay and in my eyes worth it. Tanya Burr's collection is now available in Superdrug which is a lot easier and means you can really see what all the shades are like. So pop down to your local and see what takes your fancy (also give the lip glosses a whiff!) Enjoy your weekend :-)

Benefit gimme brow

The minute I say that I'll be posting more I leave it longer than usual, how does that even work ha ha. I haven't even been on my laptop since Thursday, it's now Monday, that's a crazy amount of time! But I've just been super busy so I apologise for the lack of posts over the past week or so but I'm back with this beauty from Benefit.

This marvelous invention has added fibres which help give the appearance of naturally thicker and fuller brows with just a few sweeps of the brush. Easy huh? Benefit say:

"Bring on the brows! This innovative brush-on fiber gel adheres to skin & hair…creating brows where before there were none. It builds easily for thick, lush arches, thanks to a tapered brush for blending & precision tip for shaping." 

So the brush, the teeny tiny brush is perfect for brows. It just fits meaning you can really work to build up your brows naturally in all the nooks and crannys, filling any sparse areas. With this brush there are no worries about getting it all on the skin around your brows due to it's size. I find this small brush so easy to work with meaning I can really focus on shaping and filling without worrying about getting it everywhere. 

This product comes in two shades: light/medium and medium/deep. I have the shade medium/deep as naturally my hair is a very dark brown so this shade suits me perfectly. Benefit say that to match your shade get a section of hair from right underneath near the roots to get the best colour match. The darker shade can be quite dark once built up so it's best to get the right shade for yourself.

The formula of this product is just great, a tinted gel with the added fibres just glide onto your brows effortlessly. It's super quick and easy to apply making those dreaded brows a nice job in your make up routine. It's not an overly wet gel so it dries quickly and evenly but also you're not left with crispy looking brows, which is not a good look. The tiny fibres in this product really grip to your brow hair leaving them instantly fuller looking and just magnificent. Everyday I'm impressed with the results from this product and due to always having that morning rush to work I love that it's so quick, quicker than any other brow product but with amazing results.

Overall I am in love with this product and I will definitely repurchase this in the future. It's just so effortlessly brilliant and I'm all for an amazing, easy make up product. This just ticks all of the boxes for my brows and I couldn't recommend enough. Go buy it!

Uni's out for summer!

Image sourced from Google

I finally finished my first year of university and boy does it feel good! So I just thought I would do a little update on my blog and share my first year with all of you guys. 

It was such a quick and rash decision for me to go to uni and was all a bit of a whirlwind. After finishing my first year through all of the stress, tears and tiredness I can honestly say it was great. The weight that was lifted off my shoulders when handing in my last piece of work was strange and my nights now seem strange. Even when writing this I'm thinking there must be some uni work that I have to be doing, but no (not until September anyway). 

Other than the last few weeks which seemed to slightly drag, due to work overload, the year went by so quickly. It doesn't seem right to say that I've finished my first year at university already. If I'm totally honest I'm half excited and still half scared to go back next year. Nerves due to the workload again, the stresses and different/harder topics. Excitement due to my university friends I've made who make it ten times easier to attend but also the prospect of bettering myself more academically. 

As I've said it was such a rash decision for me to go to university but I'm definitely glad I finally did. After already having two gap years it was my time to take the plunge. My gap years showed me that I needed to go and I finally did so when I was ready, not when anyone else wanted me too. And I'm very glad that I did have those gap years and do not dwell on the thought that my friends from school/sixth form are now graduating, my time will come.

Now the first year is over I'm hoping to blog more often as it definitely took a back seat throughout the year, although university was obviously the priority. So keep your eyes peeled for a lot more content throughout the summer on my blog and also my YouTube channel (here). And now I await my results in a few weeks, although the first year means nothing technically (I've still gotta pass here guys) so fingers and toes crossed I've done ok :-)

Overall my first year has been a whirlwind but altogether worth it and definitely will be when I've completely finished! Now I'm hoping to speak/see you more often :-)

Bourjois bronzing powder

Hello, I hope you all had a lovely weekend enjoying the sunshine! I spent my Sunday at the seaside and I can't think of a better way I could have spent it. It was a beautiful day and if you know Southwold then you'll know how lovely it is to spend the day there. So I thought as summer is finally starting to show signs of appearing that I would share my new favourite bronzer with you today. As we all want that lovely bronzed look through the summer months.

This product is a very raved about bronzer in the beauty blogger world but I had never really been much of a bronzer wearer. But when Boots were doing their 3 for 2 on all make up a while back I couldn't resist picking it up and finally trying it. And boy am I glad I did pick it up. It's the Bourjois bronzing powder, supposedly smelling like chocolate, what more could a girl want. Now I will admit for the first couple of weeks I had this I didn't actually use it, but now I've started using it I can't stop. A bronzer, this one in particular, is now part of my everyday make up routine and I love it. Bourjois says:

"Its subtly iridescent formula enriched with flecks of golds gives a radiant but non shiny glow. Its delicious chocolate perfume and ultra soft texture will make you melt with pleasure!"

This bronzer goes on so effortlessly and you can really build it up for a night time look or keep it nice and more natural looking for everyday wear. At first I was scared using this but it's so simple to apply, I don't know what I was thinking! I just use a rather large brush, the one I'm currently using is just from Avon but I do need to invest in a new one suggestions?, and it just glides on. I apply this to my cheeks and temples mainly as that's my personal preferred look but you can go more to town by putting it down your nose and under your chin. I think this product just instantly makes my face look, well, more alive ha ha. It just lifts my face and makes it look a lot nicer for the coming summer months.

I was also slightly worried about the flecks of shimmer in this bronzer but I really think they make the bronzer. They don't show up too much on the skin, the shimmer just makes it look more glowy but still keeping it natural. This bronzer can be easily blended into the skin, another worry of mine was applying too much, but if you do then it's super easy to blend out. I sometimes just get my powder brush to blend it in more if I have applied too much and it's all sorted. Now the smell of this, supposedly smelling like chocolate.. Yes it does have that hint of chocolate smell in it which does smell divine! Thankfully the smell doesn't linger once you've applied it to your face as I don't think personally I would want to walk round with my face smelling like chocolate.

Overall I definitely recommend this bronzer, it's absolutely perfect for the coming summer months! And if you're like me and slightly scared of using bronzers then this one is a great place to start. This product is definitely now a staple in my make up bag, bring on the sunshine! :-)

VO5 instant oomph powder

I'm all for an easy hair product that does what it says and this is exactly one of them. I actually picked this up in a 'cheapy', random shop and it was 99p! I couldn't resist, I'm always on the look out for hair products that help volumise my hair. I've got long, thick hair so not very voluminous without a little help.

This product is basically a white powder which you apply to your roots, give it a little rub in and then voila - volume! It really is as simple as that. I section off the top parts of my hair and apply a small section of this to each section. Obviously the more you apply, the more volume you get so depending on the look you're after depends on how much product you actually need to use. A small amount of this really does go a long way so for just a bit of volume for everyday hair you don't need too much. It would also depend on your hair type, my hairs thick so I think I would have to use more than someone with thinner hair for example.

There is one down side to this product and that is the feel of your hair after using it. It's not a huge flaw but it doesn't leave your roots/where you've applied the product feeling the nicest. Yes it gives amazing volume which is great and I'm not saying this flaw stops me using it. It's perfect for a night out and a small amount does great for day-to-day, I'd just love it to not leave my hair feeling slightly sticky. It's a weird feeling, if you use it then you will understand, ha ha.

Overall this is a great product and really does give great volume. The downside, although not great, doesn't avert me from using the product so I definitely recommend it :-)