Life: Wedding Photography Inspiration

With our wedding now only 122 days away I have been gathering some images to give our photographer, who is a friend of a friend Barry Khan, some inspiration for the style of shots we want.

As it will (hopefully!) be a sunny August day I have picked shots that play on the light, even in black and white. I love the look of the sun streaming through the trees and even the glare in the top middle shot.

Fingers crossed ours will look as good...

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Life: Our Lego wedding cake toppers

Just wanted to show you our Lego wedding cake toppers...




I got them from the eBay shop Tania's Bookshop and they're both redheads, like us!

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Nails: UV Gel Manicure - Week 2

Just a quick update for week 2 of the gel manicure. There are so far no chips or imperfections and all the nails still have a lovely shine.

Here is week 1 again...




And here is week 2...




There is some visible re-growth at the cuticles, but I expected this as my nails grow extremely fast. I would apologise for the poor iPhone quality photos but my cuticles are far from perfect so it works out quite well ;)

In other news our wedding is only 131 days away now. Getting very excited but worried that I won't lose all of the weight I want to by the time the big day arrives. Already working my butt off, literally, in the gym and cutting down on my carbs so fingers crossed!

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Life: Wedding Dress Second Thoughts?

Our original wedding plan was to get married in Central Park in New York half way through our honeymoon. After some changes (for reasons that I will explain later) we have now booked our new wedding for August bank holiday weekend in good old Manchester.

How is this related to the title of the post? Well, due to the small scale of the original wedding (6 people including us!) I felt like I needed to buy my dress etc. really early just to have something to do. Whilst I love the dress I chose I'm now having second thoughts and really like this one...







This is the Emmeline by Ver Wang, which I'd live to be able to afford but will hopefully get a very close version inspired by the above. Once I have both dresses side by side hopefully I should be able to decide.

I can't believe how Bridezilla it sounds having two wedding dresses but seriously I have so far been the most laid back bride to be. All if the other elements of the outfit will remain the same whichever dress I wear so that kind of makes up for the two dresses thing. No? I convinced myself there for a minute...

More updates when I receive the new dress

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Images courtesy of verawang.com

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Review: Cover Girl Lash Blast Volume Mascara

So for over a year I have been wanting to try the Cover Girl Lash Blast mascara after various people in the beauty community mentioned it or used it in videos. The main culprit is makeupbytiffanyd on You Tube (my fave guru!). She has similar lashes to me (long and fairly thick) so that's always a good sign when judging if something will work for you.

I bought the volume variety in very black on eBay for around £8 including delivery and as we can't get Cover Girl in the UK I thought this was a bargain!




The mascara comes with the wand separate, which I've never seen before. The tube itself had a screw cap to prevent the mascara from drying out.




Here is the brush dipped...huge! It is of the plastic bristle variety and is a similar size to Benefit Bad Gal lash. The bristles are fairly short. I was worried I wouldn't have enough control using this to get the desired effect but it was fine. Creepy eye shot...




I have now been wearing it for about 7 hours and there has been no flaking or drying out. Seems pretty good so far!

Would recommend...

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Nails: First UV Gel Manicure

For a few months now there has been a lot of talk on blogs and You Tube about gel/shellac manicures. They involve a gel, thicker than a standard nail polish, being painted onto the nails and cured/dried under a UV lamp.

The main benefit of this type of manicure is that it claims to last up to 3 weeks! This is massively appealing to me as normal nail polish starts to chip off my nails after literally a few hours no matter which brand, colour or top coat I use.

I really wanted to try this out before the wedding as I don't want to worry about my nails whilst doing the final finishing touches to the wedding look. With this in mind I went for a nude, flesh-toned colour that would hopefully compliment both my skin tone and my ivory dress. Here's the result...




I really like the colour as I have really pale, pink toned skin and this colour is a peachy toned nude so doesn't make me look sallow.

My only criticisms about this manicure so far (after having it done yesterday afternoon) are that fluff and dust have already started to collect around my cuticles due to the gel being so thick (ew!) and there is already a gap between the gel and one of my thumb nails. I think this is due to how thick my nails are.

Let's see how long it lasts!

I had the soft gel manicure at Urban Retreat in Harvey Nics Manchester using Bio Sculpture Gel and it cost around £30 (pricey). I am now very tempted to buy my own lamp and gel kit on eBay, which costs around the same amount. Watch this space for an update!

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Make-up: 2010 - The year of foundations

In 2010 I tried all year to find the right foundation for my incredibly pale, uneven, combination skin.

Ideally it would be long lasting, high coverage and keep the shine at bay whilst also being available in a pale enough shade. Picky? Me?

Here is the selection I tried over the course of the year....




From left to right we have:

- MAC Studio Fix Fluid NC15
- Make Up Forever Mat Velvet +
No.15
- Revlon Colourstay Ivory
- Revlon Photoready Vanille
- Stila One Step lightest shade

Sadly for my purse and sanity these are only the products that made the cut and still get used regularly in rotation. There were also a few products that weren't right from the start (Revlon Colourstay 'mousse' anyone?).

Of the above my favourite has to be the MAC. It gives great coverage, stays pretty matte all day and lasts. The only downside for pal complexions like me is that the lightest shade is just a tad too dark. This isn't an issue if you don't mind blending it down to your neck each day but forget and you get the dreaded two-tone combo...bad memories!

Another notable mention should go to the Stila One Step. I got thus on eBay since Stila pulled out of all but online sales here in the UK and I'm glad I did. Thus foundation claims to rid you of the need for primer and concealer and it does give great coverage. The two downsides are that it doesn't quite 'set', even with a generous dusting of powder. Also it runs at nearly £30. I picked this up for £21 on eBay so check there first if you want to give this a try.

That's enough from me, except to say I think the Mat Velvet + may be the next one to go. Very dry looking and not the coverage I expected.

What were your favourite foundations of 2010? Do you agree/disagree with anything I've said?

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Life: My Wedding Accessories

As we're not having a traditional big, white wedding in the UK (more on that later!) there hasn't been much in the way of planning or purchasing I've been able to do.

What I have ticked off my list though are most of my accessories for the big day and now it's only 9 months away I feel I can share them.

The shoes are from Schuh, the garter from Not On The High Street and the hair flowers from Etsy (courtesy of my wonderful bridesmaid and best friend Helen).










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Life: Birthday Fun in York

It's my birthday today so we had a jaunt to York, which was freezing but lovely.

Here is a pic of the magnificent Minster...



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Nails: Holographic tips

A quick nail if the day today. Apologies for the dodgy photo and cuticles...




As my nails were really long I thought I'd go for some sparkle on the tips. I achieved this with Maybelline express finish in Silver Speed and two coats of Gem by Nubar.

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