09.11.2016: Kylie Jenner Lip Kit Review - Koko K

A month or so ago, I received my Kylie Jenner lip kit in the colour Koko K. I've been wanting to try out one of these for a super long time, but unfortunately I either couldn't afford to splurge on a sole lip kit, or when I could afford one, the colour I wanted would be out of stock. Eventually both factors lined up for me, and hey presto, I ordered one.

Being in the UK, I was frustrated to say the least when Kylie Jenner brought out her range with a hella big pricetag on international shipping. I waited to strike as soon as she had an offer on her site for reduced international shipping costs down to $5.00 (I'm an avid follower of her snapchat, so I knew exactly when it was dropping). Once ordering the lip kit, I received an email letting me know it would take 3-5 days for the order to process, and then a further 10-15 days for it to be shipped over to the UK. Standard stuff, so all was good. 

Around 14 days after placing the order, I checked on the tracking website which had said that it's been delivered to the UK, as if the item had been delivered to me and that was the end of this. Now, I rarely order things from the US, so it totally escaped my mind that I had to pay an international handling fee (ugh!). In total, this racked up the price of the purchase so overall I paid around £45. For one lipstick. Most of the time I reject Mac lipsticks because they're £13.50, and now I've just gone and bought an equivalent for over three times that price. But there you go. In order to get value for money, my advice would be to order several in one go, as you only have to pay the shipping and the handling fee once but get more bang for your buck.

Anyway, onto the actual review of the product. I chose the colour Koko K mainly because I didn't want to risk getting a dark colour for such a hefty price, and also I just wanted a classic nude/pink that I can shove on my lips for whatever the occasion. I even wore it to an interview I had this morning, such fun! I've swatched the liner and the liquid lipstick for you to see. It dries super quickly once you put it on the lips, and I've found that even though it's not too drying, it can get a little flaky a few hours in. However, you can't really re-apply on the go, you sort of have to start from scratch whenever you want to top up, as it can really feel heavy on the lips if you wear more than one coat.

The liner, even though I haven't tackled trying to sharpen the thing yet, goes very smoothly onto the lips and feels very creamy. The liquid lipstick is applied using the dofer applicator which is a good size (too big means clown lips and too small means 'can I even be bothered to paint my lips with this?') and goes on very smoothly also. As it dries quickly, you need to work fast to get your lips covered precisely, but I haven't had much of an issue with that. 

In short, I really like this lip kit. Would I go through the process of ordering and waiting for one, then having to pay a handling fee on top again? Probably not. I'll wait until they come to the UK in a few years time. I'll just have to be super sparing with this one!

Let me know in the comments below if you've tried any of Kylie's lip kits, or if you're definitely going to be giving one a go! I wish I had unlimited money so I could get all of them and not give a hoot about shipping/handling fees, but there you go! Don't forget to subscribe for more content and comment below if there's anything you'd like me to take a look at in the future! 

Have a great day guys!

07.11.2016: October Favourites

Well hello! Another long stint without any posts or updates from me. It's frustrating when all you want to do is document your thoughts, interests, absolute hates etc. but everything else gets in the way. I've started my third year of university which is notoriously 'the hardest out of all three, holy shit you have to write a dissertation alongside reading a million and one books, doing exams and other pieces of coursework' and all, yada yada yada. Summer was just a blur of working. However, I'm going to start looking at this blog a little differently. Rather than it being an obligation and feeling guilty whenever I take time away from it, I should look at it instead as being my down-time, because it's fun to write.

So, without further ramblings, lets have a nose at my October favourites. (October went super quick, didn't it? I honestly can't remember writing down month number 10 in my notebooks. Weird!)

Big

My hair is the bane of my existence. Why the heck does it go from flat as frick to a ball of frizz that won't budge? Now granted, it has gone through the old bleaching rigmaroll but can't it just adapt already? Anyway, I was nosing on the Lush website because payday got to me and I wanted bath bombs goddamnit. So I was going through and adding a Frozen and Snowfairy here and there, when I thought that maybe I should get something for the mass of blonde on my head. That was when I read the description for Big. 'To make you feel like a mermaid' - a tagline like that will always get me. Made from seaweed and seasalt, this stuff is amazing to just shove a big dollop on your head in the shower and smush into your hair. You instantly smell like the ocean and your hair feels weightless. I love it.

Nyx 'Bitten/Mordue'

Recently I've been going super boring on the old daily makeup routine. Usual Bourjois healthy mix, Nars Laguna bronzer, Sleek brow kit, Nars Orgasm on my cheeks. But wait, hold up. When Nyx hit boots several months back, I remember picking up a blush in the flurry of manicured hands swatting others' away to get to the matte lip cremes. Just so happens that this blush was a Nyx High Definition Blush in Bitten/Mordue. This deep plum colour can make you look like a clown if you go in too heavy-handed, but when blended looks very autumnal and flattering on the cheeks. It has a few little flakes of shimmer, but nothing too in-your-face glitterbomb. Also the 'Mordue' name reminds me of the evil guy in Brave and how they constantly say it in an intense Scottish accent. Just me?

OPI's Tiramisu for Two

image taken from OPI

A week and a half ago, my mum had us booked in for a 'full on friday', which included getting our brows, lashes and nails done at our local salon. I always love walking out with brows that look good, especially after making the last job take me through two months, at the end looking slightly walrus-esque. However, this time I was most enamoured with my nails. Now, I'm normally an Essie nail varnish lover, mainly because I like the colours and they're easier to get my hands on than OPI polishes. But at the salon, I had a choice of several OPI shades for my gel nails. Wanting a dusky pink colour, I chose the closest shade going which was Tiramisu for Two. It is the bomb. I've had so many compliments on it, and it just looks like the perfect nude for my skin tone. Definitely going to be picking up a bottle when I get the chance!

MACs Warm Neutral 15x Eyeshadow Palette

It took me ages to bite the bullet and buy this, simply because I've just got so many palettes that I just throw to the wayside as soon as I get a new one. Guess what? It happened again. After picking up this palette, I haven't touched any of my UD Naked's, my Gwen Stefani bombshell, not even good old faithful Sleek palettes. I was wary that I wouldn't use this much because of the ratio of matte to shimmer shades, as I tend to stick to matte shades on my eyelids most of the time. Turns out that I don't really know my own taste, as I've been shoving glitter upon glitter onto my lids since getting this. Amber Lights is definitely a stand out, usually pairing it with some Creative Copper and a dash of Dance in the Dark just to smoke it out a little bit. Another shoutout goes to Gingersnap, and the only shade that I've hit pan on is Brule. (I will forever be a matte lover.)

Hunted

image taken from Channel 4 Hunted

Over the past few days, my boyfriend and I have been glued to watching Season 2 of the Channel 4 show Hunted. I absolutely love it. If you've not heard of it before, the show focusses on 10 people going on the run for 28 days whilst a team of, yep you guessed it, Hunters, try to track them down. Whilst my boyfriend remains sceptical of whether or not it's fake (I don't think it is, however they do mention prior to the start of every episode that some aspects are recreated), I'm just sat in full-on hyper-alert hoping that the runners don't get caught. I'm not one for action, but this programme is just very interesting. I only managed to catch the back end of the last season, but this time I'm hooked. Just one more episode and we'll be fully caught up- so no spoilers please!

I think I'll leave it at that today, but rest assured there will be another post up soon enough. Let me know if there's anything that you've been loving recently, or if you've tried out anything from my favourites- or even if you're thinking of hitting any of them up since reading a little bit about my love for them!

10.02.2016: Wardrobe Qualms of a Larger Lady

Normally, I absolutely hate buying clothing, but over the past couple of days, I've dawdled into a few clothing shops and tried a few things on and actually picked some bits up. I ended up getting a white turtle neck jumper from Topshop, which I luckily found in the sale (Thank goodness. I don't think my bank balance could take another hit!), and a pair of ankle boots from River Island. This got me thinking a little bit about sizes, my wardrobe and my weight. At the moment, my wardrobe consists of four distinct sections of stuff. 

River Island, £45. So they look a little hooker-y, sue me.

Section one: Jeans.

I have about nine pairs of jeans, all of which being the Topshop Joni Jeans in the biggest waist size that they do and in a variety of lengths- because lets face it, they are a pain in the arse to order online. Most of the time, they'll have W34 L30 and L34, but will they have 32? No they will not, and the 5ft4 inches of me do not like this one bit. So I improvise by either rolling the hems up or by saving the short ones for when the weather is warm enough to bare my ankles to the world. Now, just to conjure up some imagery for you: roughly four of these jeans are black and one pair has holes in the knees, three are dark navy (one with knee holes) and I have two bright-ish coloured ones. Why on earth do I think it's necessary for me to own nine different pairs of jeans? I'll tell you why. Being a chunky-thighed gal, you get holes. Anyone with bigger legs that orchestrate your trip around town will understand what I'm saying. The constant friction that these jeans suffer due to my thighs rubbing together produces painful, ugly and, let's be frank, bloody annoying holes. I can't tell you the amount of times I've had to take my jeans to my mum and beg for her to work her haberdashery magic on them. In short, I either need to lose a considerable amount of weight on my thighs, or I need to look elsewhere for high waisted jeans in my size. 

Section two: Pyjamas.

Is it weird to keep pyjamas in your wardrobe? I don't hang them up or anything, they're neatly folded. It just occurred to me that this might seem like an odd addition, but it links back to my point so hear me out. I have so many different pyjama tops, it's ridiculous. I don't intentionally go out to buy them, so how have I procured so many? I have fallen victim to constant fluctuation. My weight is either big, bigger or "Oh my God, Katie. You have never been this big. Sort yourself out, woman.". Now, when I get down to a smaller size, I still stick to buying my original sized clothing. I do this because I am always aware that my weight can go shooting back up again in less than 6 months. This has resulted in me either: A) being far too big for my clothes, feeling too uncomfortable to wear them out in public, and therefore wear copious amounts of tops as pyjamas. Or B) losing enough weight to feel swamped in my clothes and wearing them as pyjamas. This is good in terms of never having to buy pyjamas, but bad in regards to my self esteem. (I really liked my "Casse-toi" top and now I have to wear it to bed? For shame. Now who will appreciate my French swears in lecture theatres?)

Section three: Shoes.
Stacked on top of one another, in the impossibly small foot space of my student wardrobe, are a selection of my boyfriend and my own shoes. I love shoes, which is why that space is too small for me. For a normal person, probably not. But I digress. There has always been a reason that I absolutely adore shoes, hats and handbags- but shoes are definitely the top dog of the three. Let me explain. Shoes, once you're past the age of around 16, will never not fit you. Once you reach your biggest footwear size, you will not go up or down. I will always remain a tiny size 4 and shall continue to complain about it until my dying breath. "I'm so out of proportion. How am I expected to carry such a huge frame on such a freaking small base? No wonder high heels hurt me and I can't even be bothered to wear them on nights out anymore. My life is so hard." - Just to give you a snippet of what anyone who knows me has had to deal with at least once. Back to my point, regardless of how much weight I lose or gain, my shoes will not desert me. However, fashion does, so either chuck those bad boys in a charity bag or save them for when 'creepers' come back in- remember those? Awful.

Section four: Jumpers.
Winter is the best, closely followed by autumn. Why? I get to wear my jumpers. I have three jumpers that I wear on loop- all exactly the same, just different colours. I bet you're thinking that I'm bland and boring. You might be absolutely right, but I am comfortable. My jumpers are all turtlenecks, cost me about £38 or so each and are grey, navy and mustard. I love my jumpers because they aren't too thick so that when I'm doing things I'm overheating all the time, and they aren't too thin that I freeze my everything off. All in all, they are great and I love them. Why does this matter? I find it so god damn difficult to pick out things in my size that don't show everything that I dislike about my body. My podgy stomach needs to be concealed, if only for the benefit of my own self-esteem. Whenever I find anything that I like and achieves all of my check-list points, I tend to snap it up (unless I have zero wonga, then I beg). I might get a bit down if it just looks like a huge sack-sized lump of material when strewn upon the floor, but as long as it looks good on me and I feel happy, I brush it off.

Being 20, I feel like I should have reached the stage where I should at least feel slightly comfortable in my own skin- but unless I'm by myself or with my boyfriend, I just don't. I'm constantly sucking in my tummy, making sure that my posture doesn't make anything hang over my jeans or makes my shoulders look too broad. I'm a mess sometimes; but I think that's okay. Maybe I won't ever be one hundred percent happy with my weight or size or shape or clothes, but I'm definitely going to keep trying to improve every aspect of my life- starting with the worst first.

Another ramble post today- sorry if it isn't your thing! Let me know what type of post you prefer to read on this blog. At the mid-point of January, I'd began my diet and now I'm 10lbs down. Now I just have to keep going and not muck it up, which is harder said than done. Also let me know if you find weight-related topics interesting- I know I do. I think my next post will be something to do with health and fitness (or a lack, thereof). Have a great day!

04.02.2016: Beauty Bits I've Been Loving

With Christmas passing quickly and the new-releases of January flashing by, it's pretty easy to get caught up in a whirl with all of the new beauty bits you can acquire. I've managed to whittle these down into five things that I can honestly say I'm glad to have in my collection, and quite ridiculously have no idea how I dealt without. (Of course, this is an over-reaction. I could've done without spending the money but they were just so gosh darn pretty.) So, without further ado, I present to you the five things that I've accumulated over the past month or two and really freaking liked.

Told you they were pretty. Left: Viva Glam Ariana Grande, Right: Honeylove.

Is it a little more justifiable now? Every girl buys MAC, potentially because we flock like sheep towards anything that a pretty-lipped girl recommends. Nine times out of ten, she'll be speaking about the newest nude shade from MAC, or a pink that she believes offers the perfect 'her lips but better' tint. She'll be right. I'm not one to shy away from a lipstick, and matte finishes from MAC are my absolute favourite. So what if they leave your lips feeling like you're stranded in the Sahara? You'll look gorgeous battling the sand dunes.

Ariana Grande's shade is something completely different for me. I've tried to achieve this colour before, when purchasing Rebel (also from MAC) but sadly the satin finish left it looking too light for my taste. So when I saw Ariana rocking this colour in the ads on the side of my screen, I knew that it could be the one. It was matte, dark as hell and the packaging was pink so I was sold. Safe to say that I've been wearing this on my bolder days.

Honeylove is a repurchase for me- after a particularly heavy birthday rendezvous, my beloved lipstick was lost forever. So I bit the bullet and paid a stonking £15.50 for the privilege of having my fave nude back. Lighter than Velvet Teddy, but still matte. It's my go-to lippy to just shove on before I whiz to somewhere last minute.

Gwen Stefani x Urban Decay Blush Palette.

I am a peachy blush girl through and through. I've never gotten on with pinks- probably because I want to stray away from my naturally red-faced-ness. I can't remember where I first saw someone talking about this, but when I did, I couldn't have clicked onto the UD website quick enough. Turns out I was way too early and had to wait another week or so for it to actually be released (a painstaking week of debating whether or not I could actually afford to buy it). Eventually, I persuaded my boyfriend to buy it for me as a belated birthday present and voila. Although, I have to say that I wasn't impressed when we ordered it online and then two days later Debenhams had it in store. Luckily it arrived the day after- but still.

Anywho, my favourite shades have to be OC (furthest away on the bottom row) and Lo-Fi (the closest on the bottom row).  OC is a lovely matte peachy blush that makes me feel like it's the middle of summer as I'm battling against the January winds. Lo-Fi I'm using as an alternative to NARS Laguna bronzer, as it's more matte. I am very excited to try out Angel, too (furthest away on the top row) which is a shimmery, iridescent peach. I'll let you know if it's a third fave.

Don't worry, I bought this one myself. Gwen Stefani x Urban Decay Eyeshadow Palette.

A month before the blush palette, I caved and picked this beauty up. Look at all the neutral shades. Let's just ignore the 'slightly' garish Harajuku & Danger shades that are going on all up in that- they might be useful at Halloween or something. There are loads of pretty colours to choose from, so I've narrowed it down to my top five shades: Stark, Anaheim, Zone, Punk and Blonde.

Just a little outline of how I use these shades on the eye: I've been using Stark (bang slap in the middle) all over the lid with either Anaheim (to the left of Stark) or Zone (to the right of Stark) in the crease for an everyday neutral easy eye. When I want to make it a little darker, I put a little dab of Punk (furthest away on the top row) in the outer V of the eye. Finally, I finish up with using Blonde (top left) under the arch of the eyebrow, right on the brow-bone, to act as a highlight.

Photographing mascara is so difficult to do nicely. Too Faced Better Than Sex Mascara. 

Last but not least, this mascara. This mascara. It was totally an impulse buy, I'll admit. Everyone had been raving about it and I was bored of my L'Oréal False Lash Wings mascara, so I forked out £19 of my own hard-earned wonga and bought it. I'm glad I did, but I still wince at the price for 'black stuff that make my eyelashes more pronounced'.

It does make them a lot more pronounced. I've been sick recently, so I've not managed to do anything to my face other than put this mascara on my lashes and wipe my nose. Good for the skin, bad for the people that get to see my face. Either way, my lashes looked long and full. Score.

Let me know what you thought of the bits I've mentioned, has this swayed you on delving into your purse and buying them or completely turned you off?

More on me being sick, to round this post off. It's just a cold, but honestly I am very much over it. I'm currently sitting in my room, feeling very sorry for myself. I have a lecture to head off to in a minute and I'm really not feeling it, but alas, I will attend for the sake of my education. Another blog post to come in the next day or so.

01.02.2016: Thoughts From A Coffee Shop

This is something completely new for me.

Have you ever considered yourself to be striving for something, anything? I've found myself going through different phases throughout my meagre 20 years. I'm not talking about the stereotypes that teenagers flit in and out of; tomboy, goth, hipster. I mean something more along the lines of watching Bridget Jones' Diary and longing to be exactly like her. After a few days of jotting down notes in a diary about how life treats you unkindly and imagining a way that you can become a hotshot journalist in the excitingly fast-paced city of London, it becomes a little tiresome. I'm also guilty of lusting over people's seemingly perfect lives that they portray on social media. I've been infatuated with the numerous 'Instafamous' and gorgeously suave youtubers our generation seems to constantly be churning out. Following so many healthy eating blogs and instagram accounts in the hopes that I'll become as flat-stomached and inspirational as they are. It has yet to work.

I often find myself longing so hard to become something that, at this point in my life, I am not. Since noticing that I was larger than all of my school friends as the tender age of eight, I've wanted to become slim. Watching romance movies which ended with 'happily ever afters' left me longing for the love that the leading lady receives. Hearing of heavily influential feminists in this day and age makes me incredibly proud to be of my gender, leaving me wanting to make an impact on the world just as they have. My point is this, despite wanting all of these things, I have found that striving to make them happen doesn't work. This is within reason, of course. I'm not suggesting that exercise and a healthy diet won't allow you to end up with a slim trim! My point is that getting into the frame of mind where you want so badly to be like someone else isn't a healthy way of changing yourself. It is not an improvement, it's more of a lie. Keeping up such false pretences isn't a way to live, so I think it's time to cut the crap. I know I'll still long for a better figure- but I'll be doing it to become a healthier me, who is happy with herself.

The view I have whilst writing this.

These are just some short rambles I've been mulling over in my head today. Even right at this second, I'm sat in quiet, picturesque coffee shop with my laptop out trying to make my hot chocolate that I bought an hour ago last just a little while longer. I had tried to dedicate this time to finishing a book that I started months ago, but sometimes you just need to take a step back and write down your thoughts. Let me know if you have these thoughts sometimes, or if you downright disagree with all of my jibberjabber- I won't be offended. I'm unsure of the future of this blog- I don't know whether or not to splice little thoughts like these in between beauty bits. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated!