Rimmel Kate Lasting Finish Lipstick in 008 review

I bought this earlier in the week as I got itchy fingers for a decent lipstick after my disappointments from the Rimmel 1000 kisses lip tint and the Revlon just bitten lip stain. 

I'm so glad I picked this up! The Kate lipsticks are becoming a fast favourite of mine (my Kate Matte lipstick in 107 is my all time favourite) and this one doesn't disappoint at all! I was originally looking for the shade 019 but they didn't have it so I picked up 008 instead! I'll definitely be looking into the other shades from this range.

As always, the packaging is simple but very pretty. Unlike the Matte version of this lipstick, the packaging is black and I love it! I really want to collect more purely so I can line them up and look at them! 

As you can see, the colour is really subtle but it is slightly darker in real life so it gives a 'lips but better' look. It's a really great every day colour and it has an amazing staying power - it was still on after eating and having a glass of water so I was impressed! These lipsticks also smell amazing which is always a nice change from the horrible plastic smell you can sometimes get from lipsticks. The application is as smooth as ever and is soft and creamy when on which is great! In real life, the colour is semi-matte with a slight sheen which also gives the more natural look which I love - this is definitely my favourite nude lipstick!

At £5.49 from Boots, this lipstick is such a great investment and I really recommend buying one - I'm probably going to buy another sooner or later!

Jess xx

The Body Shop Colour Crush Lipsticks in Damson in Distress 240 review

I passed my driving theory test yesterday so to celebrate, I met up with a friend in Reading! To treat and congratulate myself, I bought a colour crush lipstick from The Body Shop as I'd heard a lot of good things about them on various websites and in magazines. 

The colour I chose was Damson in Distress which is a gorgeous purple/berry colour. I've never bought a purple lipstick before but this one suits me really well I think so I'm really happy that I chose it! I've been looking for a darker lipstick that isn't red for a while and this one fits the bill perfectly!

The packaging is really simple but pretty and the lids co-ordinate with the colour group they belong to (pinks, reds or browns) which I think it quite a cool way of separating and identifying colours!

The colour is actually darker than this and more purple but my bathroom lights are really bright and always seem to take away some of the colour of my swatches which is annoying! The lipstick is really soft and moisturising and lasts for ages, over 3 hours when I tested it! I love the colour and despite it being quite bright and different, it seems to go with everything which could make it a daring every day colour! I can't wait to wear it out properly (not just testing it) and see how it really does though, so far I'm loving it and it will become one of my favourites I think!

The name isn't actually on the lipstick, only on the website, but the number is displayed by the lips at the top! 

This was £10 and can also be found on The Body Shop website. The swatches they show there are actually quite accurate compared to most websites (looking at you, Boots...) so it's quite easy to choose colours, but just for safety's sake, it's still worth checking them out in store to make sure the colour suits you as £10 is quite a lot for just a lipstick. 

I also love these as they're cruelty free, and with such great quality, I will most likely be buying another of these eventually - there are 23 more colours to choose from!

Jess xx

Top 5 Winter Films

Not all of these are specifically set in the season but they're my favourite films to watch during this time as you can just curl up and enjoy watching them. These are also in my favourite film list - I've watched them all too many times to count! 

Love Actually

This is such a great Christmas film and will leave you smiling for ages afterwards. The beginning always makes me laugh until I cry - Bill Nighy is fantastic.
I haven't seen this as much as the other films but I love it equally. 

The Proposal

These two are the perfect pair. It may not be a Christmas film but it's so great to watch while snuggled in a duvet. It's so funny and adorable, it's fantastic!

The Holiday

 An actual Christmas film!Kind of... I don't think they could have picked a better cast; Jack Black, Jude Law, Kate Winslet and Cameron Diaz?! Yes please. Although I can't help but think of Princess Fiona when Cameron speaks...
It's such a feel-good film and it's so great for around Christmas time too!
 

Notting Hill 

I don't actually know how many times I've seen this film but I know it still isn't enough. I love it so much and it's so funny! When I went to Notting Hill a couple of moths back, I tried looking for where they filmed but I assume they filmed somewhere else as I couldn't find it anywhere along where the market is!

Aristocats 

Being me, I obviously couldn't have a list of films and not include a Disney film. Aristocats is my favourite Disney film by far, it's adorable and the songs are so catchy; when I played piano, I could actually play everybody wants to be a cat! 

I hope you guys enjoyed my list! If you haven't watched any of these films, I suggest you do, they're all fantastic!
Jess xx

Jezebel by Irene Nemirovsky

Jezebel is one of the books I read for my English coursework over the summer and I was surprised about how much I liked it!

"In a French courtroom, the trial of a woman is taking place. Gladys Eysenach is no longer young, but she is still beautiful, elegant, cold. She is accused of shooting dead her much-younger lover. As the witnesses take the stand and the case unfolds, Gladys relives fragments of her past: her childhood, her absent father, her marriage, her turbulent relationship with her daughter, her decline, and then the final irrevocable act." 

It seems like a pretty self-explanitory blurb, but as you read it, the plot gets more complicated and you see the full extent of Gladys' obsession with her youth and beauty. It ends with such an amazing plot twist that just left me starting at the last words on the page for ages. It's written beautifully and is such a brilliant book, it's probably one of my favourites to date! I would definitely recommend it to anyone who likes reading, it's fantastic! I can't wait to read other books by Irene Nemirovsky and see if they're as good!

Jess xx

Books vs. Kindles

I always found this such a funny argument that comes up all the time. I own both and don't see why people have to have either one or the other! They're both great and I wouldn't want to have to choose between them!

Books
I love the smell and feel of books. There's just something about opening a new book and getting that fresh page smell. The sound of pages turning is also great. I could spend hours in bookshops and I actually ended up using up nearly the whole hour I had in between the train I missed and the next one just browsing the local Waterstones the other day.
The smell of old books is also amazing. I don't even know what it is but the browning pages and musty smell is so nice.
The downside to books is that they are so expensive! However, trawling through sale shelves and secondhand bookshops always produces some hidden gems! Some of my favourite books were found in an amazing secondhand bookshop in Northumberland!

Kindles
The most obvious difference: Kindles are one size and can store thousands of books without changing shape which makes them so much easier to carry around and fit into bags.
The books are cheaper on the kindle and the one I have doesn't have a lighted screen so it's literally an electronic book which is really nice! It's also a really handy feature that you can download a sample of any book then once you've read it, you can buy the book fully!
I also think they're really handy because it is connected to your amazon account and 3G so if you want to buy a book, you can search for it on the kindle shop and download it there and then, then read it straight away without having to go to a shop and buy it, or ordering it and having to wait for days on end for a book you want to read then.
The downsides are that it isn't the real book so you don't get the feel or smell of pages. I also find the more recent versions of kindles that are trying to be cheaper iPads because that isn't what kindles are for! They were designed to be a device that you could store and read books from, not play games! I think the lighting is a good idea but the rest of it is pointless. It defeats the whole point of it being a reading device!

I love them both and they're both good, just at different times and in different situations! I tend to carry them both around in my bag because I tend to have multiple books on the go, normally one actual book and at least one book on my kindle! I don't have a preference particularly but I like having my favourite books in book form; it's just nice to be able to have them there physically.
Tell me your thoughts!
Jess xx

Reading

This is currently my favourite quote ever. It's so true! It's my phone background at the moment.
Reading is such an amazing thing and I believe that everyone should be given the opportunity to read. It's such a fantastic experience that broadens your imagination and lets you discover worlds that you could only dream of! It gives you the opportunity to meet new characters, get to know them and their stories; and the best part of all is that no matter how long you take to read the book, and no matter how many times you put it down and pick it up again, you'll always be sucked right back in to old adventures with old friends and they'll be as fresh in your memory as if you read them yesterday!
There are so many genres of books that there will be a book for just about anyone! You're bound to find one you fall in love with if you search enough.
Also, the smell of old and new books are amazing, you have to smell it to understand!
I always find myself visiting bookshops when I go out, they're always cosy and warm and have such a peaceful atmosphere that you want to just sit in a corner and read for hours. (I have actually just sat on the floor in Waterstone's before and read for about half an hour, it's great fun!) I can mostly tell if I'm going to like a book or not from the first chapter or so, so before I buy it, I always read a bit first! The problem then is that even if I don't think I like it, I still want to know what happens next! It shows that a book is good when it actually makes an impact on you!
Just thinking though, my favourite thing to do is actually curling up with a hot chocolate and a book! So peaceful and nice to get away in your own little world and forget the real world for a while, it's amazing.
Anyway, if you don't read, just pick up a book and read the first few pages! If you don't enjoy it or aren't at least intrigued as to what happens next then try another until you find one that gives you questions that you want to answer! Then read the book! You might surprise yourself!
Jess xx

Biology sucks!

I've been doing my biology catch up work from friday the whole day now...I'm beyond bored! I have no idea how I'm going to end up with a decent grade for this, I'm so crap :/

Anyway, on a brighter note, one month until Christmas! I'm so so excited! I love Christmas, definitely my favourite time of the year :3

I'm still ill as well :( I was fine yesterday but I'm back to feeling rubbish again, I hate this :(

Anyway, I have to finish my homework....
Jess xx

So I'll spend all night looking into your eyes because I want to remember them if I ever fall blind...

This is currently my favourite song ever.
Lewis Watson is amazing, he has an amazing voice (very Ed Sheeran-esque) and he's pretty x3
The title for this blog is from my favourite song by him, called Bones
I swear, if someone ever sang this to me, I'd just fall in love instantly, it's such a gorgeous song with amazingly sweet lyrics :3
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pl9Jkq060s <---- Lewis Watson - Bones
I lovelovelove him :3 Check it out pleaaase!

On another note, Hudson Taylor's new EP, Cinematic Lifestyle came out yesterday!! THE SONGS ARE AMAZING. BUY IT!!! I love these guys so much, they seem so lovely too, have the funniest videos as well ^^
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndnXlY_H55c <--- Hudson Taylor - Cinematic Lifestyle
Harry and Alfie are just ugh. I love them :D plus Alfie is dating Gabrielle Aplin (John Lewis christmas advert singer :D) so even more of a reason to love (or hate) him!

I'm off to do more biology homework .___.
Note to self: Don't miss another day off college, there's way too much work involved in catching up.... .___.
Jess xx

Computer vs. Phone

Recently I've been doing more blogs from my computer instead of from my phone like I do usually and I actually find it easier and nicer!
Blogging from my phone is good when I'm out and I get sudden inspiration for a blog post; then I can write it there and then before I forget the ideas. I find blogging on my phone a bit rubbish too though. For starters, you don't get to manually add photos where you want them, they're just added to the bottom of the post, and you can't even give them a caption which really sucks!
Blogging from the computer means that you can change the font, change the writing from normal to bold or italics which you can't actually do on the phone! You can also add photos where you want, add captions and add links a lot easier than on a phone. However, with a computer, you don't have the mobility you would otherwise get from a phone. When you get an inspiration, you can't automatically just get your computer out of your bag and start typing.
The obvious answer would be a laptop! Hopefully some time in the future I'll be able to get one but it really isn't in the near near future. I'll just have to hope that it'll be around next year sometime! :D
My replacement computer is dying so I really hope that a laptop will be a replacement when one can be afforded :)
What's your guys' views on phones vs computers? Do you have a favourite? Do you want to sacrifice inspiration for appearance or the other way around? Let me know! :)

By the way, I have a new favourite artist! I've loved her for a while but I've re discovered her, Ingrid Michaelson is just amazing!!! She has the cutest songs and they're so pretty! She does amazing covers and amazing original songs! Plus she originally wrote 'Parachute' (Performed by Cheryl Cole) and performed a (much better) version of it! :D I suggest you check her out! Start with this song, its one of my favourites by her:
Ingrid Michaelson - You and I http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ps6aN4sWX68&feature=BFa&list=UUmyAvsS7zUzuK6ijKLlG51w
Jess xx