Windswept Face, Hair and Outfit of the Day - At The Races

Hi everyone.  Just a very quick FOTD post today, as I've been out to the races for the first time ever in Cheltenham.  I'd meant to take a photo of my face before I left home, but I forgot, so ended up taking a shot in the ladies towards the end of the day.  It was very cold and windy outside, but luckily I just went outside to watch the races and stayed in the hospitality area (in the warm) for the rest of the day.

Face:

Lancome Teint Miracle in 010
Mac Studio Finish Concealer in NW20
Bare Escentuals Mineral Veil
Benefit Benetint
Accessorize Laguna Bronza

Eyes:

Too Faced Shadow Insurance
Revlon Cream Shadow
Colours from the 88 Warm Palette by Coastal Scents
Mac Smoulder Eyeliner
Clinique High Impact Mascara
HD Brows Kit

Lips:

Rimmel Lasting Finish Lipstick in Nude Pink
Soap & Glory Sexy Mother Pucker Lip Gloss - clear

Hair:

Naturally windswept and added to by the constant taking on and off of my woolly hat!

Outfit:

Scarf - River Island, this season
Coat - Next, last year
Jumper Dress - Next, about 4 years old

It wasn't ladies day, so thankfully I didn't have to dress up very much as it was so cold.  However, I was one of the few people not wearing tweed!  I did see some women wearing fab tailored tweed suits, and I now want one for myself, even though I'm not really a hunting, fishing and shooting type of person.  I was a bit surprised about how much real fur was being worn - I didn't think anyone wore real fur anymore, but clearly I was wrong.

Thanks for reading! xx

Quick Holiday Face of the Day

I'm back from my holiday in Glasgow and The Lakes!  I had a fantastic time, although it wasn't very relaxing after my half marathon last week - I drove there and back and we did a lot of walking!  I was packed all the wrong things - I know that Scotland has a reputation for being cold, but it never has been when I've been before, even in November.  And last Sunday, I was running in Cardiff in 15 degrees sunshine - I didn't think I'd need a hat, gloves and winter coat 2 days later.  Well ladies, I was WRONG!  Luckily, we were staying in the centre of Glasgow, which is fantastic for shopping so I was able to pick up a few essentials (and non-essentials) - a haul post will follow shortly.

Anyway, I took a huge bag of makeup, but hardly ended up using any of it - in cold weather, I just didn't fancy doing a full face, and for the last few days in the Lakes, I would've looked ridiculous stamping around in my hiking gear in the rain wearing eyeliner!  I did manage to do one full face whilst I was in Glasgow, but kept it simple - here it is.

Face:
Lancome Teinte Miracle in 010
Mac Studio Finish Concealer in NC20
Bare Escentuals Mineral Veil
Mac Cream Blush in Lady Blush
Benefit High Beam

Eyes:
Too Faced Shadow Insurance
Nars Strada Eyeshadow
Mac Smoulder Eyeline
No 7 Exceptional Definition Mascara

Lips:
Rimmel Lasting Finish Lipstick in Nude Pink

I keep meaning to do a proper review and swatches of Nars Strada - I will do it soon, I promise.  Sorry about my wet hair, and half dressed state!

Thanks for reading! xx

NYE Hair and Makeup

Happy 2011 everybody!  Here’s a peak at my hair and face of the day for NYE.

Face

Lancome Teint Miracle foundation

Concealer and highlight palette

Bare Escentuals Mineral Veil

Prestige baked blusher in pink

Elf bronzer in warm for a contour

Eyes

UDPP

Shroom by Mac over the lids and as a highlight

Beautiful Iris by Mac as a crease colour

Nocturnelle by Mac in the outer V

Eyeko Line and Shine Pencil in Electric Purple as an under the eye liner

Glitter liner from Primark on top of the Eyeko pencil

Smoulder by Mac on the waterline

Blacktrack Fluidline by Mac on the upper lash line and wings

Inimitable Intense mascara by Chanel

Shu Uemura false eyelashes

Hair

I curled my hair with tongs and pinned it to one side.

I took these photos before I’d done my lipstick or put my earrings on.  But I am wearing my white gold dress. I’d slimmed down so I could wear the dress, and I was planning to wear it to parties before Christmas, but unfortunately I was ill, and then the snow prevented me from getting to another party, so I couldn’t wear it then.  I decided to wear it with thick tights and flat boots for New Year, as there was a bit of walking around involved, and we were only going to the pub. I love the dress, but it is hard to accessorise, as gold looks brassy and silver also doesn't work with the white gold colour.  In the end, I chose antique silver coloured jewellery to go with it.

I ended up having a fab new year, with the DJ in the pub playing lots of cheesy 90s dance classics.  Yes, I was strutting my stuff to Betty Boo at 10 past midnight!  We didn’t stay out too late and I didn’t drink too much either, so I’m quite fresh today!  I hope you all had a great night, whatever you did!

Thanks for reading, happy 2011!  xx

Christmas Party Look

Happy Christmas everyone!!!  Hope you're all well.  Well, the saga of my broken camera continues, I've still not got a new one, but I'm also on the look out for one.  Still not decided on whether to get a compact or SLR... decisions, decisions.

Anyway, I've found some photographs I took on my old camera that were already on my computer of me trialling a Christmas party look I was going to wear back in November, so I thought I'd show you all.  Unfortunately, I didn't get to wear the makeup (or my amazing white gold dress that I'd spent two months dieting to make sure I fitted into) as I didn't make it to my Christmas Party.  The party was in Birmingham last Saturday, and if you live anywhere in the Worcestershire area you'll know that the snow caused horrendous problems on the M5 motorway and people were stuck for hours.  We made it about half way up the motorway from Bristol, before turning round and coming straight home.  So I ended up spending my Christmas party evening at home, wearing half of my glamorous makeup and with curled, but not styled hair, sitting on my sofa watching the Strictly final. Hmmmph!

I don't think I'm going to get another opportunity to rock my gold dress over Christmas or New Year.  I've only got a couple of trips to the pub planned, and New Year is usually quite low key for me, so it's back in the wardrobe for another year.

Anyway, here is my trial of my Christmas Party makeup.  I used the Coastal Scents Warm 88 palette to do a silver/gunmetal lid with a gold crease extending upwards.  I also added some Barry M Dazzle Dust (No. 44) on top of the gold, which I think was a bit too much actually, and I would've skipped it for the actual eye look.  For my eyeliner I used a Rimmel Pencil, but I was planning to use Mac gel liner for the actual party look, and I used Chanel Inimitable Intense Mascara, but would've rocked some falsies for the party.

My skin looks horrible in these pictures - I can't remember what foundation I used, but obviously not a great one, and I used Posey by Mac on my cheeks.  For a highlighter, I used Powderflage by Benefit.  This is supposed to be a concealer, but it doesn't conceal anything.  It's a sort of shimmery powder, but not quite shimmery enough for a highlight.  In fact, it's a completely useless product, and I would recommend that you never buy it!

On my lips I used Cream Cup by Mac (which I won from Julie's fab giveaway) with some gloss over the top (I can't remember which one).

I did half of this look on Saturday before we headed out - it took me ages, what a waste of time!

By the way, I took these pictures on the third day after my Brazilian blow dry, so I was itching to wash my hair.  You can just about see some of the highlights I'd had put in my hair in the pictures as well.  The Brazilian blow dry didn't really work on my hair.  It isn't any straighter, and it's still really big and volumnous, and I can't just blow dry it and go.  It does seem to be a bit softer and shinier and less frizzy, but I'm not sure if that is because I bought some Moroccan Oil when I had the blow dry and I've been using that ever since as well.  I am able to leave my hair to dry naturally and wear it as a natural curl, which is great, but I wouldn't do it again!

I've found a few more pictures on my computer, so I'll try and get a few posts up over the Christmas holidays, and hopefully, get a new camera soon (yeah)!

Thanks for reading xx