My favourite authors and books

Hi guys!
I thought I would talk about my favourite books of the moment that make me feel good and happy and I have found myself reaching for them more and more recently and choosing them over new books.

Sophie kinsella has to be my favourite author. She is witty and her books are amazing! I relate to a lot of her characters and find that whatever mood I am in I always enjoy these books greatly.

Confessions of a shopaholic series
For those of you who don't know, this series of books is by Sophie kinsella and was actually turned into a film.
I love these as they are funny, especially the emails she gets in response to her requests and suggestions (which you don't actually see but can guess from the replies)! She is in a world of her own but always sees the good in the world which j love! The reasons she has in her own mind about having to buy things relates well to me, although I have never been in debt because of it. We see Rebecca meet a man, get married, pay off her debt, find out she has a sister, move to new York and have a baby! And a lot more but I won't spoil it for you!! This series is a work of genius and never fails to put me in a good mood! The new installment is coming out soon and I can't wait!

Wedding night
This is Sophie kinsellas most recent book and is hilarious! It follows two sisters, one who has just ended a long term relationship and rushes into a marriage with someone she hasn't seen in years, and the other sister tries to stop the wedding, and failing that tries to stop them from doing what normal married people do on the wedding night so it can be annulled! It is a really great book and I have read it about 4 times now since I got it!!

Twenties girl
this book is good, but a bit different from the other Sophie kinsella books. A woman goes to her great aunt's funeral who she doesn't know,  and sees the aunt's ghost. The ghost is stuck in the past and thinks she's still young! She wants nothing more than to go dancing with handsome men like they did in the twenties, and find her missing necklace which she thinks someone stole. It is a gripping read, and I don't mean that in the same way that people say it about horror books or anything like that,  just you want to know what happens next and what the aunt will do next. The ending is so heart warming!

Got your number
This is probably my favourite after the shopaholic books.
Poppy loses her engagement ring, which was a family heirloom, and to make matters worse she then loses her phone! She finds another phone in a bin which a PA threw away when she got offered a better job. Poppy gives this number to everyone so that she can still find out if anyone has found her ring, but Sam (the person who had the PA) rings the number and wants the phone back. They agree to share the phone so poppy can be in contact with everyone but she has to forward all of his messages and emails to him. They end up having a friendship and poppy helps when the company goes into crisis using the knowledge she got from reading all of his emails! Right up until the end there is a will she marry her fiance or leave him, and the ending is a bit of a shock although you kind of expect it at first then think you're wrong. This is such a heart warming story and makes me want to believe in love!

The undomestic goddess
Samantha has a high powered job, where she is expected to work really long hours and not have a social life so that she can become partner at the company.  She misses family functions and is basically stressed out, but she is one of the best. she is messy though and finds a contract on her desk that should have been filed, and because it hadn't someone lost a lot of money and her job is at stake. She freaks out and basically just jumps on a train and accidentally becomes a maid! This is hilarious as she has never cleaned up after herself never mind anyone else! But she struggles through and finds that she loves it but she wants to clear her name. We follow her as she learns how to cook and clean, and how she tries to prove to everyone else that she didn't lose the money. The question throughout is did she do it or was she setup? And what will happen if she is offered partner at the company? There is friendship and romance and everything I look for in a book!

Can you keep a secret?
This would probably be me! Emma is on a flight that has really bad turbulence and she thinks they're all going to die so she blurts out every lie she's told to the stranger sitting next to her as she doesn't think she will ever see him again. As it turns out she sees him sooner and more regularly than she expects, but will he remember all of her secrets and more importantly will he tell anyone?
You can't help but feel sorry for Emma here, she reveals all her secrets to someone and then has to face them every day knowing that he knows everything about her! He knows her code words for things like sneaking out of work to get coffee with her friend and that she tried to kill her colleagues plant and some much more embarrassing than that. I found it quite funny and you think it is going to be predictable but then something happens which I wasn't expecting! Definitely worth a read.

There are a few more but this post was getting too long!
Have you read any of these books and what did you think of them?

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First impressions Friday

Hi guys!
As well as sample sunday, I am also going to be starting a first impressions friday for those products that I buy rather than get a sample of.  I will be doing a first impressions post the first time I try the product and then doing a full updated review after I have used the product for a few weeks.

The first product I am going to do a first impressions post on is the herbal essences nearly naked dry shampoo.
I loved the batiste dry shampoo for dark hair, but I found that it made my scalp very itchy! Constantly itching my head all day is not a look I want to be going for so I thought I would give this one a try.  It claims to be invisible, which I was actually quite excited about!
I used it for the first time on saturday, and the first thing that I noticed was how difficult it is to spray.  I am probably just being very weak, but it took both hands to get the button to press down, this made it very difficult to spray it where I wanted it.  I ended up just spraying the front of my hair rather than the back too as I couldn't reach there with both hands, and even after a few sprays I couldn't spray it with just one hand.  I am hoping this is going to ease up a little bit or I am not going to use this very often.
The second thing that I noticed was the smell.  Oh my word it smells gorgeous! It's perfumey but in a good way, everytime the wind (or air con) blew my hair I was getting a waft of the smell and it was so lovely!! I actually am very impressed with it for that reason.
The product itself did actually come out invisible, so there were no telltale white marks in my hair, and no telltale brown marks on my face!!It seemed to work really quickly and my hair looked less greasy immediately.

Overall, I do love this product but I wish that it was easier to spray!!
Will update soon
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#samplesunday dior star foundation

hi guys!
Someone came up with a pretty good idea about doing mini reviews on samples ( I can't remember who it was but I do remember that she is doing it on instagram) and I thought it was a really good idea and so have decided to do my own Sample Sunday.  This won't be a weekly thing as I don't have that many samples left, but I will only post about them on a Sunday.  It is going to be a mini review of the product and kind of a first impressions post as with samples you only usually get a couple of uses out of them.

My first Samples Sunday is going to be on the Dior Star foundation.

In the cosmo magazine (or glamour I can't remember which one but it was one of them) they gave a little card entitling you to a free 7 day sample of the Dior Star foundation and a colour match.  I got very excited about this, if you follow me on twitter you will know that I tweeted quite a bit about this, and I convinced LJ to come with me to our nearest Boots store that stock Dior.  I was that excited I actually went after a night shift so I was pretty knackered but thought it was going to be worth it.
The device they use to colour match suggested a colour that the two girls on the counter disagreed with, they tested it on about 7 different parts of my face and got the same result every time but decided to go against that and choose the colour they thought was a better match.  I was a bit dubious about this as what is the point in having a device that matches the colour if they aren't going to listen to it?
Anyway, I thought I would try the sample out yesterday as I was at an interview on Friday and wanted to wear a foundation that I knew I liked, so Saturday it was.

Firstly, the sample was smaller than I was expecting seen as it said it was a 7 day sample.  It came with a leaflet stating that the best way to wear the Star foundation was to use the Star primer and the Dior backstage blender, which I think is meant to be like the beauty blender.  I don't have either of these so I did just apply it over my Smashbox primer and with my real Techniques brush.
The first thing I noticed was the colour, it was way too dark for me, but I thought if I blended it a little it might look okay.  No.  I looked orange!! In the end I applied my usual foundation over the top as i didn't have time to take it all off and start again.  It is a slightly more liquid texture than the no7 foundation, but is thicker than the chanel foundation that I have.  The coverage seemed to be medium, but will probably be buildable.  It seemed to blend quite nicely with the real techniques brush, but it was a very dewy finish that I got.  I like matte finishes as I have oily skin, so I wasn't too impressed with the finish.  It would probably be okay with a setting powder but obviously I applied foundation over the top so I didn't have the chance to use a powder with it.  I would say from the five minutes that I was wearing it alone, it would probably be more suited to people with dryer skin.
I will point out though that wearing both foundations together made my skin look stunning!! If a little too dewy for my liking.
I will try this product again in a colour more suited to my skin tone as I think it could be nice for the summer weather or when I go on holiday.

x

Shower routine before interview

Hi guys!
As you know I love the soap & glory breakfast scrub and have used it every day for the past month or so, but I have a very important interview tomorrow and so I wanted to make sure that I smelled amazing! I thought I would do a quick.post as to what products I used for my pre interview shower.

I started by using the garnier ultimate blends shampoo and conditioner with argan oils and camellia oil as they are amazing and leave my hair silky and smooth! They also smell pretty nice too!

I leave the conditioner in my hair while I wash my face and body. I used the scrub of your life and clean on me, both by soap & glory as I love the smell and I think it smells more fresh than the breakfast scrub, and more like a good interview smell!
I used sanctuary hot cloth cleanser on my face as I want to use it all up before I start the liz earle one properly. I used a pink flannel from primark to wash it off as the cloth that came with it is being washed.
For the first time in ages I used a body butter after the shower and I used soap & glory the righteous butter as it smells like the clean on me shower gel and smells so gorgeous!

I tried to keep the scents all the same so that none were competing with each other and there wouldn't be any weird combination of smells!

do you do anything different to your shower routine when you have a big day?

X

No7 pedicure set

Hi guys!
Just before the start of the summer I realised that my feet were embarrassing. I had dried skin all over them, on the soles, on the heels and even along the side! Nothing was working, I applied foot cream (soap & glory heel genius) and the skin wasn't getting any better. Until LJ bought me a pedicure set.
It's amazing! It is hand held and battery operated, and has four different heads. One is a pumice stone, two are used for filing and one is a buffer. After just two uses of this (while my skin was soft after being in the shower) my feet were amazing.  The difference was both shocking and impressive! I use it once a week now and my feet are the best they have ever been! (Although I do also use soap and glory breakfast scrub on them while in the shower which probably also helped).
I can't recommend this product enough and I know that without it my feet would have been too embarrassing to be on show! I have been able to wear sandals and flip flops this summer thanks to no7!

Have you tried this product or something similar?
X

Get ready with me updated

Hi guys!
I thought it would be a good idea to do an updated get ready with me routine.  I am only going to be talking about what I use on my face but obviously I brush my teeth and wash my underarms etc.

Every two days I use the clinique exfoliator for oily skin, I don't use this every day as I think it would be too harsh but any less than that and I'm not too sure of the benefits.
After this, or on the days that I don't use the exfoliator this is the first step, I use the first step of the clinique 3 step system. On the days that I don't exfoliate I use the champneys brush along with the soap, and then rinse off with a damp flannel, I don't use the brush on the days that I use the exfoliator as I think it would be too much for my sensitive skin.
I use the clarifying lotion, and then the moisturiser that are both part of the clinique three step system. 

This is all I do but my skin is so smooth and nice recently that I don't want to change anything. 
After about 5 minutes I apply my makeup primer and leave that while I straighten my hair.

This is my morning routine currently and is a lot less products than I have used in the past.
I have noticed that I have been using everything clinique recently which is weird for me as I tend to use different brands but I am loving my routine atm.

Do you use any of these products?
X

Get unready with me..not a shower night

Hi guys!
My morning and evening routines have recently changed so this is the most up to date routine!

Firstly, I use clinique take the day off balm to take my makeup off. I use a small amount and rub it lightly all over my face and eyes (I tend to get panda eyes at this part), then I use a damp flannel to wipe it off. I am actually very impressed with how much makeup this removes as even the hot cloth cleanser doesn't remove all of my mascara like this does.
I then use the clinique three step system. Unlike on a morning, I use a flannel to rinse this off rather than the champneys brush as I don't like to overuse it. I pat my face dry and then use the second step of the three step system which is the clarifying lotion.
I then use the moisturising gel. If I have the no7 advanced protect and prevent serum I will apply this before the moisturiser but I ran out of this a few days ago and haven't got round to purchasing a new one yet.

This is all I do on a night time now. It may still seem like a lot but it's actually not very many products and I am happy with it. My skin has never been so good and I have actually been confident enough to be in the house without wearing makeup lately.

What do you do for a night time routine?
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