Review | LUSH: Whoosh

LUSH is a store you're probably familiar with, known for their fresh hand made bath and body products and a huge advocate for not testing on animals they're one of my favourite brands in terms of bath and body products. I remember discovering LUSH when I was younger on a weekend trip to York, I somehow still remember what we bought, Happy Pill, a citrus smelling bath bomb that's sadly no longer available in shops.

Whoosh shower jelly is another product that was a favourite of mine when I was younger, shower jelly seemed like the coolest thing ever when I discovered it, it was packaged quite differently in a plastic tray and cut into a slab then but the product was the same. This citrus smelling jelly is great to wake you up in the shower in the morning as it's so fresh! Being jelly however it is slightly awkward to use, it's very slippery. I find it's best to smush it up in a shower scrunchy. The LUSH website also suggests chilling or freezing the jelly, which although I've never tried I'm sure would wake you up in the morning.

Have you ever tried shower jellies? How do you use them?

Good Friday OOTD

Hat - Topshop

T-Shirt - Jack Wills

Skort - Zara

Bag - Topshop (Similar)

Shoes - Juju Jellies

So the latest blogger challenge topic was outfit of the day (ootd), which I was pretty excited about as I've never posted one before. However doing this post I have discovered I am the most photographically awkward person I know so it is a good job I'm not usually a fashion blogger! Anyways, here is my ootd from Good Friday, a day later than I intended to post it. Hope you're all having an amazing Easter weekend!

He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed. 1 Peter 2:24

ZARA Delivery

I've spent the best part of this week rather unglamorously in waterproof pants and wellies on lambing work experience, which despite the mud and cold was very cute. On Monday however, the delivery of my Zara Skort, added a little stylishness to my week. 

Until recently Zara was somehow a brand I was fairly unfamiliar with, I'd always somehow got the impression that Zara was a bit out of my price range, but having actually looked through their website their prices are the same sort of range as Topshop. The website set up is certainly more high end than high street, with a similar layout to the Burberry website. I was also pleasantly surprised when my skort arrived by the attention detail in the packaging. I had expected a plastic wrapped parcel like most other high street stores send out orders in but instead I received my skort wrapped in pink tissue and packaged inside of a box. Zara, you have impressed me.

I've had my eye on the skort itself for a while now, you might remember I featured it in my February Lust List. Every year at Easter my Nana gives me and my brother some money towards new clothes to wear at Easter, it's a bit of an Easter Tradition, so I knew immediately that this was what I was buying. The skort has not let me down either, it is beautifully cut and will go with a lot in my wardrobe, it will be easily dressed up or down and will certainly be worn a lot, safe to say, I'm in love.

Lemon and Thyme Loaf

The latest blogger challenge post, which I am very late in writing, was food. So for this topic I thought I'd share my favourite cake recipe: lemon and thyme loaf. Before I share as a little disclaimer this is a Nigel Slater recipe, I didn't come up with it, I saw it on T.V and had to try it for myself. It is a delicious recipe that makes a very lemony cake and always goes down a treat!*

For the loaf:

• 200g Butter (or margarine)
• 200g Golden Caster Sugar
• 100g Plain Flour
• 100g Ground Almond
• 1 tsp Baking Powder
• 4 Eggs
• Zest of 1 Lemon
• 1 tsp Thyme Leaves

For Syrup:

• 4 tbsp Sugar
• Juice of two lemons
• 1/2 tsp Thyme leaves

1. Preheat oven to 160 degrees C. Line a loaf tin.
2. Cream together butter and sugar then separately sift flour and baking power and mix this with the ground almond.
3. Lightly beat eggs and add a little at a time to the butter and sugar, also add some flour mix each time egg is added until all is combined. 
4. Mix the lemon zest with thyme leaves and add to the mixture.
5. Spoon the mixture into the tin and bake for approx 45 minutes (or until a skewer inserted to the center of the cake comes out clean.)
6. For syrup dissolve the sugar in the lemon juice over heat and add thyme leaves.
7. As soon the cake is removed from the oven poke holes with a skewer into the top and drizzle the syrup over the cake while it's still hot. Leave to cool.

The syrup flavours right though the cake, making this a perfect recipe for lemon lovers. You can eat it cold or I like it still a bit warm from the oven. 

 

February Fashion Lust List

I'm on a bit of an unofficial spending ban at the minute as I'm saving and fundraising for my volunteer trip to South Africa in the summer (keep an eye out for my blog sale coming soon) but despite knowing this I'm still forever browsing online and looking at things I can't buy right now. So I thought I'd share a few fashion pieces I'm coveting at the minute. 

H&M Straight Cut Jacket £14.99
I've recently decided, thanks to pinterest, that a blazer is something I'd like to add to my wardrobe. I found this one browsing on H&M and I love it, it's less structured than some others I've seen so is much more casual and something I'd wear often, probably over white t-shirts. At £14.99 it's a bargain as well, however with my trip still to pay I can't justify it right now.

Missguided Deynara Rose Print Collared Dress £29.99 
I spotted this dress a few weeks ago scrolling though Missguided and fell in love with it immediately. I love the cute little collar and the rose pattern is a perfect winter floral. I think this dress could easily be dressed up or down to wear anywhere with heels or flats.

ASOS Floral Blouse with Curved Collar £15.00 (sale)
This blouse popped up shopcade a few weeks ago and I immediately added it to one of my lists. Like the missguided dress it has a great little collar and is perfect for everyday, maybe even with the H&M blazer? Currently in the sale it's also a steal at £15.00.

Zara Mini Skort £25.99
I've seen quite a bit about skorts lately and I'm loving this one by Zara. Looks like a skirt but is actually shorts and in black will go with pretty much anything you want it to. I'm way too tempted to buy this at the minute but if you think £25.99 is a bit much for a pair of shorts I've seen blog posts about Primark dupes!

Topshop Vibrant Snake Ballet Pumps £16.00
With all of the current rain storms ballet pumps are probably not the most appropriate shoes but when Spring finally rolls around these pale pink snake ones will be perfect to add a little pastel to any outfit.

Warehouse Oriental Print Top £28.00
This morning I woke up to an email for ASOS about new season style and scrolling through the Warehouse page linked in the email this top caught my eye. I love the floral oriental pattern and the pastel colours, it's definitely something I could see myself wearing a lot.

Are there any fashion pieces you've been lusting after lately? Have you picked any of these ones?

Mally Lip Favourites

Mally High-shine Liquid Lipstick Pen

Before I start I thought I'd say a quick sorry for lack of posts recently but I do have a lot lined up at the minute but also my laptop has just broken so I'm having to borrow my mums and so posts might still be a bit irregular until I can sort something out with mine.
With that out of the way this post is about one of my favourite brands for lip gloss: Mally. A while back when I did my 'Day-to-day make-up' post I had my Mally Peach Sorbet lip gloss in there, it's still probably my favourite lip gloss so I thought it was about time it and my other Mally lip glosses got a review.
All three of these Mally colours are great to wear everyday or for any occasion. This product claims to be lip primer, lipstick, lip gloss and lip liner all in one tube and in my opinion it lives up to this pretty well. I've never used a lip primer so I can't really comment on that but this 'Liquid Lipstick' is well pigmented and very glossy without being sticky. It also stays in place a good few hours so it's great if you don't have time to be touching it up every 5 minutes. I also love the twist up tube, it means you can easily see how much product you have left and there's less waste than with other lip glosses.

Punch: This is the pink colour, I think this is very much a 'your lips but better' colour, and of course it's glossier than natural lips. The pink tint in the gloss is noticeable but not too loud making it perfect for a day to day colour.

Peach Sorbet: This is probably my favourite of the three colours, it's a perfect peachy lip colour and is again amazingly glossy.

Super Natural: This is an amazing nude colour which is great for creating a nude lip without ending up with a 'foundation lips' kind of look, it's definitely my favourite on days where I fancy a nude lip.

Have you used Mally before? What's your favourite lip gloss?

Ketchup Clouds: Book Review

Being a beauty blog book reviews are not somethings I'd normally post, however I'm a big reader (when I'm not swamped by college work) and this book deserves a review and, as it happens the current 2014 blogger challenge topic is books.

"I've done something wrong. Not a little bit wrong or even quite a lot wrong. What I've done is awful. And do you want to know the worst bit? I got away with it."

Zoe Collins has a secret - a dark and terrible secret that she dares confess to no one she knows. But then one day she hears of a criminal of death row who knows all about secrets. And lies. And betrayal. Desperate to confide in someone Zoe picks up a pen, and takes a deep breath. These are the letters she wrote.

I'm not sure what caused me to pick up Ketchup Clouds when I was book shopping at the start of last summer, I don't remember if it was the name or the cover but the blurb - above - had me dying to read it, I was intrigued and had to know what Zoe Collins had done, which, despite my efforts, could not be found by reading the first few pages stood in Waterstones. 

To start off we quickly learn that Zoe Collins is not the name of the girl writting the letters, she's so scared that she'll be found out that even a prisoner on death row half way across the world cannot know her real identity and address. Just in case. And without ruining the story I think I can say that not too far in we find out her terrible secret. She killed someone. 

This entire book is written as letters to a Mr S Harris, prisoner on death row in America who killed his wife, the letters switch betweens Zoes tales of what is currently happening in her life - like the person she killed's mum coming over - and the story of how she came to kill someone. What if find really lovely about the way this book is written is that you see Zoe become more trusting and familiar towards Mr S Harris, her first is rambling, it begins 'Dear Mr S Harris' and ends 'From Zoe' but letters and letters later, when Zoe writes her last letter she begins 'My dearest Stu' finishing the letter, for the first time with her real name. 

Throughout the book, in her letters, Zoe tells Mr Harris not only her home life, with two sisters one of whom is deaf, but also of school and parties and particularly the relationships she develops with two boys who she meets on the same night at the same party. I don't want to spoil the story for you so I don't think I can say a lot more or I'll get carried away and have told you every detail, however this is a strangely beautiful and inevitably sad story that I recommend everyone read. So to wrap up my review I'm going to share one of my favourite lines of the book, I couldn't tell you why but it seemed to stick in my head:

It was the wisest conversation anyone had ever had and I smiled wisely because of my great  wisdom and also possibly because of the whisky.