Who's in my sidebar... August Edition

 

Welcome to the August edition of ‘Who’s in my sidebar’! Lipsticks and Lashes now offers advertising packages, and I am beyond excited to introduce this month’s sponsor, Shivon whose You Tube channel is ‘shivonmakeupbiz’. I love sharing other bloggers and you tubers I come across, especially when their channels are as fab as Shivon’s!

 

What Shivon has to say...

“A creative You Tube channel dedicated to make up tutorials, reviews and fashion posts. I'm 19, a Gemini, love purple eye shadow and live in the South-East of England!”

I have spent a ridiculous amount of time checking out Shivon’s videos and I though id share with you my top 3...

Glittery Smokey Green Make-Up Tutorial

I love a smokey eye, but am terrible at applying without looking like I’ve been punched in the face! Shivon’s tutorials are so easy to follow and she is really clear about what she’s doing. I am definitely planning on having a go at this one myself!

The Power of Make-Up

If you only have time to only watch one of Shivon’s videos then please, please check this one out! It pretty much sums up my love of makeup and why I’m a beauty blogger!

Summer Sunset Tutorial

My favorite beauty vloggers are ones who make their makeup look like a piece of art work. It inspires me and I adore the looks they pull off. This is one of the first videos of Shivon's I watched, inspired by sunsets she uses this to experiment on her eyes and the result is stunning!

If you’d like to advertise with ‘Lipsticks and Lashes’ in September check out my sponsor page for more details and any questions please get in touch!

To celebrate Lipsticks and Lashes second birthday and reaching 1000 bloglovin followers, I am now offering a 50% discount code for anyone who decides to advertise with us during the next month! Just email whatsinyourmakeupbag@gmail.com for the code.

Book Club: What a Girl Wants by Lindsey Kelk

 

The Blurb

Being arrested in your own bedroom is never a good start to the day. Tess Brookes really needs to sort out her back-stabbing flatmate – and her life

Should she gamble all on the new photography job she’s landed, or snap up the offer from long-time crush and best friend Charlie to start up on their own – in more ways than one? There’s just one small thing she hasn’t mentioned. Or rather, one tall thing. He’s handsome, infuriating and called Nick…

For the first time, Tess has to choose between the life she always dreamed of and a future she never imagined possible. From London to Milan, with high fashion and low behaviour thrown in, she’s going to have to make up her mind what a girl really wants…

The Review

I feel so unbelievable torn!! There's nothing worse than a book coma, when you finish a book and you don't know what to do with yourself as you were immersed in a story with amazing characters and then it's all over and you’re not sure you'll ever find a book to compare. Hence, I love a series, it's crap those few months (or in some cases a year or more!) that you are waiting for the next instalment but you feel so relieved that it's not over just yet!! I want to feel that way about this book, it's number 2 in this series and I am in a severe book trauma state, wanting to know what happens next, happy there is a follow up but gutted I've got to wait till next year!! Boo! Are you following my rambles so far?!

Anyway, enough of my emotional state, let's get back to an actual review of this book. I have such a girl crush on Lindsey Kelk, her books are all fab, if you've not read her I heart series I can only assume you've been living under a rock. As I mentioned above this is the second book in this series, the first titled ‘About a Girl’ saw Tess high jack her evil flatmates identity after losing her job in advertising and sleeping with her best boy mate, Charlie. She hightails it under her new identity to Hawaii and pretends to be a fashion photographer for a week, whilst falling for the charms of the gorgeous journalist nick. Check out my full review of about a girl here.

So 'what a girl wants' picks up Tess arriving back in London and follows here taking photographs in Milan for the lovely Al who she met in Hawaii. Our Tess is in a quandary with so many decisions to make from choosing  to continue a career in advertising to pursuing a new avenue in photography. She also needs to decide on her leading man, team nick or team Charlie?! For me this is the biggie!!

Dear Lindsey, of by any chance you see this review pretty please let her end up with nick, he may have emotional issues but he is so perfect for Tess! Charlie is a wet blanket who doesn't appear to give her fanny gallops!! Lots of hugs gem x

There are also plenty of laugh out loud moments mainly brought on by out leading ladies eccentrics pals, Amy and kekipi. Both eccentric and fun in their own way, I really enjoyed that we got to see a whole lot more of them in this book and got to know more of their back ground.

How much do I want to visit Milan right now? Lindsey does an amazing job at making the reader feel like she's experiencing the location of wherever here book may be set from New York, Hawaii, London to Paris. She didn't fail here either, she really made me swoon for Milan from the fashion shopping to the food!

By the end of the book you feel like Tess is sorta getting her shit together. She's starting to put herself first and figure out what she wants rather than putting everyone else first. However I do have that awful end of a tv series, cliff hanger, ridiculous need to know what happens next! I might have to start a petition for the next book to be brought forward!

PS if you haven't started reading these books yet, go get involved! It's a fab, funny read that will have you giggling and crying along with the emotional ups and downs of our heroine!

2nd Blogiversary & a few things i have gained from blogging!

I can’t believe I’m sat here writing about my 2 year blogiversary! Two whole years of blogging have just flown by! I’ve definitely had my ups and downs over those years, but I still love ‘Lipsticks and Lashes’, my happy little corner of the interweb. So to mark this very cool milestone I thought I would share with you what I have gained from blogging over this time….

A wonderful space where I can write to my heart’s desire – one of my aims in starting this blog was to improve my writing as one of my ambitions is to write a book one day. My love of writing has only soared since starting ‘Lipsticks and Lashes

My confidence has sky rocketed! I used to be a huge worrier, I still am to an extent but I now care less about what people think and am so much more happier. Doing my ‘Motivational Monday’ posts every week has definitely helped with this!

One of the things I appreciate most is the awesome blogging community. I love being part of such a supportive network, via twitter and all the blogger chats you can join in with. They really inspire me and give me a kick up the bum when I’m in a rut. Then there are the wonderful folk who stop by here and comment or email. Not forgetting The Bloggers Snail Mail Project (Shameful plug, have you signed up yet?!). All of the above have led me to interact with some fab people in the blogging community.

Through my blog I’ve also improved my juggling skills (not the circus variety!). I am ten times better than I used to be at juggling my time and commitments thanks to my blogging. I am still by no means organised (I would love to be one of those people!) but having to create a balance between 2 jobs, a social life and blogging I have had to learn and have made huge improvements in this area.

Before I started ‘Lipsticks and Lashes’ I was in dire need of a creative outlet, I just didn’t know what form that would take. Then blogging came along and has allowed me to be creative in so many ways! I think this also links back to my previous point around confidence. Being able to do things I love and be as creative as I can has definitely put me in such a happy place. I am much more confident and relaxed compared to 2 years ago!

I also just want to say a massive thank you to every one of you who pop by, spares the time to read my waffle, and those who then spare the time to comment, tweet and email me. It really does make my day and never fails to put a smile on my face!

Nails // DIY Glitter Tips

 

For someone who is obsessed with painting her nails, mainly because it stops me from biting them, I am pretty unadventurous. This makes me feel a bit ashamed really when there are so many cool nail art products out there, I think I worry they will look awful and tacky.

However this week I decided to be a little creative and decided to attempt doing my own glitter tips. For the base colour I used Models Own Hyper Gel Polish in Lilac Sheen, this is one of my favorite colours this summer and has become my go to nail colour. I put on two coats of this polish and let it dry.

When it was fully dry I used a sponge makeup brush (you can pick these pretty cheap in places like Superdrug) to dab on the glitter. For my glitter polish I used another Models Own polish in Southern Lights. It’s quite a fine glitter and very pretty and colour so I thought it would complement the lilac. I just dabbed the glitter to the tips of my nails but if you wanted you could easily do more or make patterns.

I am pretty impressed with my handy work and have had some lovely compliments. I think next time I am going to use the same technique and attempt ombre nails!

Lets talk about depression

Today’s post is something that’s been playing on my mind for the past week or so, it’s very different to what I would usually post on here. It is a step away from the usual positive vibes I try to spread but I hope that it has some sort of response and gets people at least thinking.

 

On the 11^th August one of my favourite actors passed away, Robin Williams, a truly talented actor and warm soul. He sadly took his own life and was suffering from depression. Since his tragic passing it has raised a lot of talk around depression and I have been shocked as I have seen numerous negative and uneducated comments about the subject. It has riled me and made me want to talk about it, so here I am.

 

Now I am no doctor so I can’t pretend to know the scientific or medical explanation of depression, but as someone who has lived with people who have / had severe depression as well as working with young people who have a variety of mental health issues including depression, I feel strongly about the issue.

 

 

Depression is the worst kind of illness, it’s not something visible, and you can’t stick a plaster on it and leave it to heal.  It’s something that makes the strongest person fragile. It creates an all consuming darkness so the person can no longer remember a better time.

Depression can’t be solved by fixing a particular problem and all will be well again, it takes you to a very dark place and there is no light. Its horrendous for those around the person suffering as if doesn’t matter how much good you think they have in their life, how much love they have around them, in the depths of depression it doesn’t matter. It’s heart breaking.

Depression is very real and according to stats it affects one in three of us each and every day. So today I would like to ask you to take a few minutes to be more considerate of every one you meet today, for you have no idea what silent battle they may be facing and one kind gesture can go a long way.

I’d like to end this post with the most heart warming tribute I’ve seen to Robin Williams, a man who spread happiness throughout the world and will be sorely missed

Motivational Monday #24

I can’t believe its Monday again already! How fast has the past week gone?! I can’t complain though as my past week involved a trip to London to see my sister, lots of catching up with various friends and a wedding! All in all a pretty fab week, which I hope will continue into this one!

I love today’s quote, it means so much to me at the moment. I am terrible guilty of being laid back / lazy and just letting things happen rather than taking control myself. Over the past 6 months I feel like I have had a bit of wake up call and have realised if I want to achieve the things I would like to do, it is completely down to me to do that. Each and every one of us makes big and small choices every day and they all have consequences. These choices make us who we are.

I think we can all blame others for things going wrong etc but at the end of the day we made those choices. My aim at the moment it is to be a more positive person to achieve my aims and goals, this will involve making choices and being responsible for those decisions. If I am unhappy with my choices then I need to take action!! I am determined to get to where I want to be!

Happy Monday Lovelies!

L'oreal L'Extraordinaire Liquid Lipstick by Color Riche in Fuschia Drama

 

 

I bought this product late one night whilst being ridiculously naughty and browsing the boots website for treats I can’t afford. I am meant to be saving but am absolutely shocking at it! My excuse that night was that I needed to order some sunscreen and bits for my upcoming holiday at the end of the month. So I got all the bits I needed as well as a few other pieces! Whooops!

So when I’m talking about ‘this product’ its L'oreal L'Extraordinaire Liquid Lipstick by Color Riche in Fuschia Drama, when I ordered it I was expecting to receive something along the lines of Rimmels Apocalips, however when I started using it, it soon became clear that it’s not a lipstick, I repeat, ITS NOT A LIPSTICK! It is in fact very much a lipgloss.

I want to feel cheated and lied to by the name of name product, however, errrr I kind of do love this product! I hate saying ‘product’ but they’ve called it a lipstick when it’s not, so I shall say ‘product’, can you tell this annoys me?!

I am a fan of the old lipgloss, let’s get it back in trend!! Matte lips just ain't my style. Fuschia Drama is however the one thing that is true however I would rename it Fuschia Dream, I love a pop of pink and this doesn’t disappoint. It goes on a lovely shade of glossy pink and isn’t sticky and stays put. The perfect LIPGLOSS NOT LIPSTICK!! I also like the packaging, its very sleek and smart.

So if you are looking for a lipgloss with a pop of colour I would definitely recommend this range. It’s a really good quality product, one that’s already become a go to lip product of mine!