A 2014 overview!

Last year was pretty amazing overall. There were obviously some ups and downs as there always are but the good definitely outweighed the bad. 

This year I...

- I passed my driving test (March)

- I turned 18 (March)

- Met Lewis Watson (July)

- I passed my exams (August)

- I got into University (August) 

- Saw Medea in the theatre (August)

- I got my first job (September)

- I got a boyfriend who is completely amazing (November)

I hope this year goes just as well because I already have some amazing things lined up! 

Jess xx

Instagram snapshots #5

I haven't done one of these since the beginning of last month so I apologise for that! I have a good selection of snapshots for you this time around though! 

Absolutely brilliant book.

They actually are heavenly!

Costa date!

MY CAR! Absolutely brilliant 18th!

Beautiful silver trowel necklace, I'm so lucky :)

My minion birthday cake!

It's nice to treat myself sometimes.

My current favourite lipstick!

Because I like my make up and hair for once!

Captain America was so good!

Perfect revision snacks!

Hope you guys enjoyed this!

Jess xx 

Instagram snapshots #4

I'm 18!

I'm really sorry for not blogging much recently, the last four days have been filled with my birthday celebrations so all of my free time has been taken up by homework to make sure I could do all of the awesome things over the last few days!

On Wednesday, me and my college friends went to Pizza Express for a birthday meal as everyone gets Wednesday afternoons off college. It was a lot of fun and it was nice to do something with them that didn't include school! We had a really nice meal and I even got a mini chocolate cake with a candle on! I got my presents early from them as I don't see most of them around college apart from my friends who are in my lessons. 

Lots of chocolate!

Beautiful purse with a mirror in the back, a pen,
desk organiser and animal rubbers!

I now have enough chocolate to last me until Halloween, let alone Easter! I love the little French purse so much because it's just so me! French themed and with stripes?! Yes please. I also love the pen and organiser, definitely helps for Uni in September! I really don't want to use the rubbers though, they're way too cute!

My birthday was on the Thursday and it was an amazing day! I woke up and had to get done quicker so I could open my presents - I GOT A CAR!!! It's also insured with Compare the Market so I got a meerkat toy with it which now sits in my car! I got baby Oleg and  he comes with the most adorable grub! My parents said I would get my car at the weekend but I came home from college and it was sitting on the driveway! My car is a red VW Up and I've decided to call him Perry! I've been out in him quite a bit considering I only got him on Thursday and I love him - he's really great to drive and has a lot of room considering he is actually only a 3 door car!

I love my car so much! And the bow on top!

Oleg, his grub and his bed!

I got money from quite a few family members but my grandma got me a couple of really pretty bracelets that I can't wait to wear. My auntie and uncle got me a gorgeous silver trowel necklace which came in a brilliant little box that is so clever as it looks like a special (small) finds box! It's possibly one of the prettiest and well thought out pieces of jewellery I've ever been given!

The bottom bracelet was given to me by a friend on Wednesday.

I'm in love.

My mum's friend also made me 24 minion cupcakes which are chocolate and taste amazing! After we got back from our meal out, I also got given a minion lemon birthday cake which looks and tastes just as good!

These are the cutest little cakes ever!

I can't believe how talented my mum's friend is!

On Saturday, I had some old friends over for a movie day as I didn't want to involve alcohol and we couldn't afford a big party. It was a lot of fun and we ended up watching Pacific Rim, Despicable Me 2 and part of Monty Python's Life Of Brian. I love catching up with my old friends as I don't see them much any more due to work which is sad, but we act like we only saw each other yesterday when we do see each other again!

The Fault in Our Stars poster, it's so gorgeous!
From Julia.

Loki sticker also from Julia!

Weeping Angel and TARDIS biscuits also from Julia!

Julia is basically the girl who gets me tonnes of fan stuff and it's always the best! I love it all so much!

Bourjois little round pot intense eyeshadow in 08, Maybelline jade high heel mascara in brown,
Maybelline illegal length mascara in black, Dainty Doll eyeshadow in 002 Treat Her Like A Lady,
Maybelline colorsensational lipstick in 380 Sweet Bordeaux,
Maybelline colorsensational lipstick in 720 Drive Me Nuts.
From Lisa.

Left to right: Sweet Bordeaux, Drive Me Nuts, Bourjois eyeshadow in 08,
Dainty Doll eyeshadow in 002 Treat Her Like A Lady.

I'll probably review all of these at some point but so far I'm loving them!

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-glass by Lewis Carroll and
The Collected novels of The Bronte Sisters. Also got a really cute badge that says 'I read therefore I am'.
From Krissi.

Box of really cute goodies from Katie!

For when you're out and about and have the moments of inspiration for a blog post,
new outfit whatever it is, you can put it in this!

To get the creative juices flowing I guess you could say, or maybe just because
TASTY SWEETS!

This is a memory jar.  Any good memories from the day, write them down on the block then fold up
and put in the jar. Only at New Years eve can you look through all your memories from the year.
It's a good way to remember all the positive stuff and that maybe the smallest of things can be the best!

My old friends have obviously known me longer than most people outside of my family and their presents are all so thoughtful and basically cover every part of my life that I consider important and fun outside of people I know! I really love them and can't wait to use them all!

Kate also sent me a present which was super sweet of her - it's a scarf and mirror! I love them both - the green of the scarf is actually one of my favourite colours so I'm so happy! Thank you Kate!

Overall, it's been an amazing birthday and thank you to everyone who has been involved to make it a really special 18th! I'm so so lucky and it's probably been the best birthday yet! 

Jess xx

Hopeless.

Sorry that I haven't been blogging lots recently, I've had so much work to do and I just haven't had any motivation! I have a few things in the works over the next week or so though so I should get some posts out soon!

It's my birthday on Thursday and I'm honestly so excited! I'm turning 18 which in reality isn't much of a big thing but it feels huge! I know that I won't suddenly turn into a responsible adult and know where my life is heading but it'll be nice to actually be an adult officially! 

I'm going out for lunch with my college friends on Wednesday and having my old friends over for a film day at the weekend so it'll be so much fun!

I shall do a post on Thursday/Friday about my day so look out for that! 

Jess xx

Growing Up.

It's 5 months until my 18th birthday today. 5 months until I'm officially an adult in the eyes of the world. 

On Facebook, I keep seeing people's birthdays popping up, that some of my closest friends are turning 18, 19 or 20 and it's such an odd feeling because I don't feel that old and my friends don't seem that old and it's quite terrifying if I'm honest. I don't feel ready to become a proper adult. I don't feel ready to get a job, pay for everything myself, live by myself, own a house, get married or do any of the other things that seem to be the norm for adulthood these days. I still get nervous signing my own forms and prescriptions as I don't feel qualified. I feel like I need some sort of experience before I can be responsible for anything and it's a weird sensation where everything feels unreal and like I'm not meant to be at this stage yet, like I have so much more to learn. 

But I guess that's the point. 

Life IS a leaning experience and once you finish Uni, you have to learn in a completely new way; by experiencing life, not just learning the facts and taking an exam at the end. Life ends up becoming one big exam where you're constantly tested and assessed and you have to adapt to this whole new way of learning and living. 

I think that's why Uni seems like such a great and attractive concept to me as you're partially given that freedom you need to experience before you get into the real world properly. It's like the pre-school to life where you learn the basics of independent living which is both exciting and terrifying at the same time.

Jess xx

MAC madness

Over the last few days, I've been finding myself perusing the MAC website and every time I'm drawn to the lipsticks.

All of the colours are so pretty and I've heard so many good things about them so I'm very tempted to save up and get a couple! 

My current favourites are: 

Viva Glam I 

Viva Glam V 

Angel

Creme in your coffee

Sequin

Please Me 

Brick-O-La

Ravishing

Shy Girl

Plumful

Pink Plaid

Creme cup

Bombshell

There are loads here and some are really quite similar. However, the swatches very rarely look like the lipstick on so I'll have to go and see what each colour looks like then choose out of my favourites in person! Obviously at £15 each, I'll have to cut this list down A LOT, or hope that they're all still around when I have money when I'm older! There are also Christmas and birthday presents too so I know what I'm writing on my list later this year! 

I'm leaning towards a darker colour for Autumn/Winter as I don't have a proper winter lip colour. I also want a natural/peachy looking lipstick that can be used as a more everyday colour!

Tell me which you guys prefer!

Jess

Friends and realisations.

It was my friend's pre-birthday celebrations today because her birthday is tomorrow and is spending it with her family so me and a few others went to Pizza Express at lunch and then spent the following free with her and a couple of my other closer friends. Lauren had a lesson last so I hung around with a couple of other friends for that time which was a lot of fun because we got to just talk about whatever and rant about lots which was awesome! We then went back to Lauren's house to hang out for a little while and the four of us squashed on to a sofa to watch Friends which was great. It was the first time that I've fully realised that I do have close friends at college and I'm so grateful for them because they're really fun to hang out with. I'm happy I've finally figured this out! 

Jess xx

Blog's first birthday!

It's been a year since I wrote my first blog post (I was the ultimate cringe, forgive me!) and what better way to spend it than with my one and only friend made from blogging, Kate! We went to Guildford and did quite a bit of shopping which was loads of fun!
A year has gone by stupidly fast and even though I only have 10 followers, I appreciate every single one and anyone who reads my blog for that matter! Every page view makes me happy! -virtual hug-

Getting in to Guildford was rather stressful - my train decided that it would be delayed for 20 minutes before showing up and Kate also had train problems so yeah....that was a good start! We ended up wandering around for a bit and then decided to go to New Look where we ended up buying the same skirt! Luckily we don't see each other often enough for it to matter, just another thing to show our similar tastes! I've been looking for a floral skirt that I like for ages and this one is perfect; I have lots of nice tops that have pinks, reds and white in them so they'll go perfectly with it! The skirt is made of a really light and soft material and is really swishy (if that's even an adjective...) so it looks really pretty!

I love it so much!

I love the pattern so much! 

It wasn't a true trip to Guildford without a visit to the American sweet shop. I haven't bought any for ages so I think I was well restrained! That, and the fact that the stock they had wasn't terribly good. I got my usual favourites and also picked up a box of berry flavour sour patch kids which are really good!  

I've heard countless bloggers rave on about these tinted lip balms for months now, but they've only been available in UK shops since the beginning of the week. There's a 3 for 2 on Maybelline at Boots so instead of just getting the 2 colours I wanted, I also got a 3rd free of charge! 

Baby Lips are supposedly super moisturising and make your lips softer and I can tell you, the hype was definitely worth it because these are the best lip balms I've ever had (either equal to or better than my tinted Burt's bees lip balms but yeah, still really good!). Their claims are pretty big but they're definitely up to scratch; I've been wearing one for an hour and a half or so now and my lips already feel softer. Quite a few lip products are quite sticky but these aren't at all, they feel light and you barely notice them! It takes a couple of goings over to get a really strong/bright colour but it also means that you get a choice with the strength of the colour you decide to make your lips which I find really good!  

From left to right: Pink Punch, Cherry Me, Peach Kiss

How cute is the packaging?!

They each have a smell corresponding to their names (Pink Punch is just fruity) and they're just fantastic! I think overall Peach Kiss is my favourite because the colour is more wearable every day as it matches my lips almost exactly and I'm a sucker for anything peach so it's perfect! Cherry Me is also a lovely smell but it takes longer to get it to an equal colour over all of my lips so it isn't as good for me. I really like Pink Punch but I have a feeling I'd need to be in the right mood to wear it because it is pretty bright. The colour and smell are still nice though! 

We went to H&M because there are usually pretty good deals in the sales and boy did I find one! This deep orange jumper was originally £7 in the sale but it had 2 holes in (one on the shoulder, one on the left of the jumper on the pic) so I managed to get the price down to £5 because they were pretty bad! Luckily my grandma is a dab hand at sewing and sewed the holes back up so now it looks brand new and I got a big discount from it! It's quite baggy but still looks good, plus it has a really cute neck too! I can't wait to wear it through autumn with some leggings and my brown boots, hopefully it'll look good!  

As I said earlier, I'm a sucker for anything peach and when I was at Sicily, the only alcohol I liked was Bellini (Prosecco and Peach puree). I came home from my trip today and mum had bought me this! It's a non-alcoholic version of Bellini but it tastes almost identical, even keeping the slightly sharp/bitter aftertaste and fizziness of the Prosecco! It's also amazing because it apparently has 1 of your 5 a day so it's even healthy!

All in all, I think today was a pretty brilliant way of celebrating my blog anniversary, thanks to everyone who's been a part of this so far! I hope you keep reading! 

Jess xx

P.S. You know I said I'd keep you updated on the Barry M nail polish? Yeah...it hasn't worked out so great! 

Left hand

Right hand

As you can see, they haven't lasted very well! I haven't used a top coat because I don't own any but they had already chipped a little bit the night after I had put the nail polish on which doesn't bode well. The nail polish also stops looking as shiny and nice quite quickly and now looks dull and smudged even though I didn't touch it at all while it was drying (I left my nails for about half an hour before checking them). I'm quite glad that it's only cheap because it wouldn't be worth any more sadly! It's a shame because the colours are amazing! I might just have to invest in a top coat so my Barry M nail polish isn't a waste!