LUSH Sauchiehall 20th Birthday Celebration

Oh to be 20 again...

Earlier this week I was invited to head along to the Lush store at Sauchiehall Street in Glasgow to help them celebrate their 20th Birthday.  It was lovely to be able to have a proper look at the products - the store is usually pretty busy and it's quite tricky to have a good old mooch around.  

We were introduced to some of the Oxford Street store exclusives and boy oh boy do they have some amazing stuff.  I am hoping that they will consider rolling some of these out over the rest of the country, otherwise a trip to London may be on the cards.  My favourite was the Experimenter Bath Bomb, which was dropped into a small bowl of water.  I can only imagine how pretty it would be in a full size bath - like bathing in liquid rainbow!

I was also treated to a delightful arm exfoliation using the Life's A Beach Body Scrub Powder, which is an unusual product in that it's mainly a blend of sea salt and sand.  I was stroking my arm like some kind of weirdo for quite a while afterwards - I couldn't believe how soft it had made my skin feel.

Lush also have a Spa.  Who knew?  Not me!  And by the sounds of it not just your run-of-the-mill soothing music and soft lighting kinda spa.  Lush seems to have considered the whole sensory experience with specially choreographed music, unusual techniques and spa-exclusive Lush products.  I must admit it sounds amazing, completely indulgent and I fully intend to treat myself at some point at their Spa in Edinburgh.

We got to try our hand at creating our very own Big Blue Bath Bomb, which is one of their hero products.  It contains arame seaweed, which not only softens your bath water, but the iodine helps to regulate your metabolism plus the lavender oil helps to calm and is an antiseptic - there's a lot of good stuff packed into that little blue ball!   If I wore a hat, I would take it off to the people in the Lush factory who make these all day (up to 200 per hour I'm told!), you need some serious arm muscle to smoosh it together to form a ball. 

Look at my wee face. 

The evening was rounded off by a game of 'Who Wore It Best?', getting creative using their range of knot scarves.  I panicked, folded the scarf up and tied it round my head.  Not my finest look let me tell you.  Needless to say I didn't win that particular game...

Lush kindly gave me a selection of products to try so keep an eye out for my thoughts on those in an upcoming post.  It was a lovely, fun evening and it was great to meet some rather awesome fellow bloggers too.

Do you have any Lush recommendations?  What are your favourite Lush products?

Loreal Infallible Matte 24 Hours

I first learned about this foundation when Sam Schuerman raved about it recently and I pretty much dismissed it as being one of the many products which never make it across to the UK.  So imagine my delight when I found myself (read: made a beeline) for the beauty aisle in Tesco and saw it sitting on the stand!  Day -made.  No seriously, it was a slow Saturday.  It was only £5.99, which I assume was an introductory price, so if you're curious about this product, I suggest you hot foot it down to Tesco soon.  

It claims to wear for 24 hours.  That's nice an' all, but where will it end with these ridiculous claims? 72 hour wear?! We will have to have the damn thing surgically removed from our faces next!

I really like the packaging; it's easy to control how much you use by squeezing out the products and it also has a narrow nozzle so there's no mess or overspill.  I picked up shade 20 - Sand, which would be suitable for those around a MAC NC25.  The foundation has a fairly firm consistency and I assumed that when I applied it, it would be full coverage.  But, it actually applies to a medium coverage which can be built up where needed.  I noticed that it doesn't become matte until it had dried down, which happens after about 5 minutes.  True to the claims, when it did dry down the finish was perfectly matte but I did find that I needed to add a bit of 'life' back into my skin with some strategically placed highlighter.  

Let's have look at some pictures.  The first is bare-faced (eek!), the second with all make up applied and the third is after about 8 hours, just to show how it wears after a significant amount of time.

Sorry for the extreme close-up in the last photo, but I wanted to get close in so you could see if the foundation had slipped or faded.  It does seem to have rubbed off slightly round my nose if I'm being uber critical, but apart from that it held up well and still looked good.  The finish changed from matte to more natural and skin-like, but without any oiliness.  If you're looking for a fairly affordable, long-wearing foundation you just might like this!

My Favourite Memories of 2014

I thought if start the new year by taking a look back at 2014 and some of my favourite memories.  These were captured on my trusty old iphone camera which is never far from my side.

In March Darren and I were lucky enough to spend a weekend in Stranraer at the amazing Corswall Lighthouse.  It was in this totally remote setting with no phone signal or wifi (eeek!).  It was so lovely just to spend some couple time together and enjoy exploring the beautiful surroundings.  We even hopped on the ferry across to Belfast for the day where it poured down with rain the whole day!  I even tried my hand at vlogging - check it out here 

In April we moved out of our little one-bedroom apartment.  This picture makes me laugh - we were trying to carry as much stuff as we could because we had 5 flights of stairs to walk up and down!  We moved into a slightly bigger place with a spare bedroom...and only one flight of stairs!

Not long after we moved, Darren's parents came up from Gloustershire for a visit.  We took them to see The Kelpies, two massive sculptures of horses built beside the Forth and Clyde Canal.  It was such a beautiful evening and they looked stunning in the fading light.

In May I picked up my wedding dress and this was me trying it on for the first time!  I fell in love with the dress when I initially tried it on in a size 12, but wasn't quite expecting the extra amount of fabric on the skirt once it was sized up to my correct size.  Regardless of this, I still loved it and it really started to feel like I was getting married!

In June, I volunteered as a Steward for the Commonwealth Games Baton Relay as it made it's way towards Glasgow.  It was such a great day - everyone was buzzing!  

In July it was time for my Hen Do!  My bridesmaids excelled themselves organising it.  We stayed in a beautiful apartment in the Duchally Estate in Gleneagles with it's own balcony.  As you may be able to tell from the picture, one evening we had a Country theme and everyone got right in the spirit!  It was a brilliant night which ended with a show and tell where everyone brought something and shared a story about me and them, it was amazing!  During the day we chilled out at the spa, played rounders, ate brilliant food and at night we all got glammed up and headed to Gleneagles Hotel for a meal - perfect weekend which I will treasure.

In August I got married!  I struggle to put into words exactly what the day meant to me.  Our ceremony was outside in my aunts garden and the sun shone as we said our vows.  Darren looked so handsome in his kilt, even though he isn't Scottish is was a lovely guesture for him to wear it for my benefit.  Later on everyone filled the dance floor and I literally danced the night away.  It was our perfect day.

In October, we jetted off on our honeymoon!  Our was a bit non-traditional as instead of two weeks by the beach we headed off for a road trip of Southern USA!  We started in Atlanta, Georgia before heading to Talladega in Alabama to watch the NASCAR.  Then we went to Memphis, where we explored Graceland, Sun Studios and drank way too many cocktails on Beale Street!  We then headed to Nashville.  Now if you ever have the opportunity to visit, do it! It is an amazing place.  We even took in an NFL game at LP Field which, although I don't understand the game, was a great experience.  We stayed at an Airbnb in East Nashville which was an annex to a bigger house.  It was super cosy and our hosts baked us fresh cookies every morning.  Our next stop on the road trip was Pigeon Forge which is famous for being the birthplace of Dolly Parton!  She has her theme park there, appropriately named Dollywood.  It was such a pretty setting, up in the mountains with all the autumn leaves.  On our way back, we had 24 hours to spend in New York City. We had agreed on the places we wanted to fit in - The 9/11 Memorial, Times Square and Empire State Building.  We also saw Taylor Swift perform at Times Square!  We were both completely knackered when we got back home, but we have so many happy memories and experiences to look back on it was totally worth it!

So there we have it.  2014.  I'm kinda sad to see the back of this year so it was bittersweet wishing my husband a Happy New Year as the clock struck midnight.  I can't wait to see what adventures 2015 will bring!

Glam Candy Blogger Event & Reader Offer!

A couple of weeks ago I was invited along to find out more about the Glam Candy Make Up School at the beautiful Papillon Salon in the heart of Glasgow.  We met the Managing Director of the company, Hayley, who was just lovely and shared the story behind the company.  Glam Candy offer various masterclasses and well as more professional courses for those keen to get into the industry.  Alongside the professional course, they also offer an agency service for new artists.  I think this is such a spot-on idea as I would imagine it's tough to get bookings until they become more established.

We were introduced to Carol and Nikki from the Pro Artist Team.  Nikki showed us how to achieve a couple of looks; a beautiful neutral smokey eye and a Christmas party-appropriate purple sparkly look.  Nikki really knew her stuff, especially when she started pulling out her palettes - it was a blur of Lorac, Hourglass and Anastasia Beverly Hills! I got a bit giddy at that point and before I knew it I was in the make up chair and Nikki was teaching me how to achieve the perfect eyeliner flick and smoking up my eye look with the Lorac Mega Pro palette!

We were kindly gifted a brush set and I have been really enjoying playing with them all.  In particular I have been enjoying using the fan brush, which I have been using both to contour and highlight as it seems to both concentrate the product and blend at the same time.  I also love the little spooley brush for taming my brows and the small shader brush for smoking out my liner on the lower lash line.  The angled brush is soft and fluffy and is ideal for crease work.

They have given me a cheeky little discount code for all my readers too! Click on over to Glam Candy now to snap up the deal, whether it's for someone else or for yourself...self-gifting is totally justified at Christmas!

They have also kindly invited me along to one of their Masterclasses in the new year, which I'm really looking forward to. I'll keep you all posted on what I learn!

Glowy FOTD featuring Bobbi Brown Shimmer Brick

Well, well, well...Summer has officially arrived and when it comes to make-up that means a lighter base, an extra dusting of bronzer and anything I can find to give me face that dimensional, glowy effect.

The rise in temperature conveniently coincided with the Bobbi Brown Shimmer Brick in Rose landing on my doorstep!  These little shimmer bombs have cult status amongst us beauty geeks and are a cornerstone of the Bobbi Brown brand.

Ain't she a little beauty?  After my initial 'ooohing' and 'ahhhing', I realised that I wasn't actually sure how to use this.  Was it a blush? A highlighter? Or some kind of in-between?  Luckily, a Google image search taught me that it can in fact be a blush or a highlighter.  I did apply it as a blush but unfortunately I think my skin is a bit too dark at the moment and the pink glow doesn't really show enough for me to be satisfied, so if you are NC25 or lighter this might work better for you.  However as a highlighter it gives a smooth, glowing finish.  I used it in all my regular highlighter areas; tops of cheekbones, down centre of nose, cupids bow and centre of my chin and I must say it is really natural and not harsh in the slightest.

Here is a photo of it in action.  I think this really shows how natural and healthy it looks.  Of course, as with any product, if you swirl this on like there's no tomorrow it's going to start to look very obvious, so go easy ladies and build it up.

I also used the Shimmer Brick on my eyes with a little bit of brown in the crease, so this product can be a right little multi-tasker and ideal for holidays.

You can find the Bobbi Brown Shimmer Brick, along with plenty of other Bobbi Brown products as part of their mahoosive selection of beauty products, on the QVC website.

June Favourites

I don't normally post about monthly favourites, but there have been a few products I have really been diggin' this month, so I fired up the camera and blabbed on about them!

You can check out the video below, or click here to see my YouTube Channel.

Bye Bye Google Friend Connect

Follow my blog with Bloglovin

I'm sure you'll all be sick of hearing this, but I thought I'd pop this quick post up anyway for anyone who wasn't aware that as of 1st July, Google Friend Connect will be no more.  GFC is the little box on the right hand side of my blog, the one with all the little smiley faces of my lovely followers.  Somehow Google thought it would be a good idea to get rid of this...yeah, good one Google!

So, after we have all shaken our fists angrily at Google for taking it away, you can follow me on Bloglovin, which is a great alternative.  I haven't personally made much use of Bloglovin up until now, but I'm going to move my blog reading list over there later - eeek..wish me luck!  Hopefully you'll want to take the time to follow me over there!

See you on the flip side!

Heather x