Of Love and Lipstick

Hi guys, remember me! Yeah, it's been a while since I've uploaded a post. I'm so sorry. April was a very busy month for me, preparing for my final exams. Fortunately, I only have two left and then I'm a slave to my blog again. I have a very large backlog of posts that I am so eager to share with you all. It's the start of May so I thought I'd sit down and do my April Beauty Favourites. I feel like I've been using some great products!

Cliche alert, but where has this year gone already! Just handed in my final dissertation and my exams start at the end of the month! I could have sworn it was just January. That end of another month has come upon me on and so I would like to share with you all my March favourites. 

This is one of the longest favourites posts I have ever written! I forgot to post January's Favourites so this is a combinated favourites over the last two months, as opposed to the single month. February has been a good month for beauty favourites, I've been making the effort to switch up what products I've been trying in an effort to not get stuck in a product rut.

Now I won't lie to you guys, I'm shocked to be writing this post. You might wonder 'it's just eyeliner, what's so wrong with that?' A couple of months ago...I had only ever used one type, one brand of 'everyday' eyeliner. Since the dawn of time I have only ever used Rimmel Glam Eyes Liquid Eyeliner. Last month I kinda went a bit crazy and snapped up a lot of new eyeliner types to try, after all 'how do you know you don't like it if you've never tried it?' In this post I decided to talk about different eyeliner types, favourite product for each, and how I feel about them.

I know lots of people have already done their version of this post since summer is nearing it's end, but I still have to go on holiday. I seem to have left my summer holiday until the last possible moment.  As I'm going to Florida, I have been given quite a high luggage allowance, but I plan on bringing back A LOT! This means that I have to be rather scrimping with what goes in as too much will leave little space to bring back. I probably still have too much!

When I was shopping last November, for the first time in Glasgow, I knew I wanted to pop into the bareMinerals Boutique. It was never my intention to get something of this magnitude, perhaps just a lipgloss, but this was calling to me. This kit was essentially my introduction to bareMinerals products.

I thought I'd do another get ready with me; the first for this year! I was going to an outdoorsy summer party which I thought would be a fun 'subject', as such. I kept my face makeup very simple: L'Oreal True Match foundation; Makeup Revolution Blushing Heart Blusher; Essence Make Brows Wow! Kit; Benefit Boi-ing concealer, and bareMinerals Mineral Veil. The look was finishes with my MAC cremesheen lipstick in Creme Cup; which was very subtle as to now drag attention from they eyes.

Before I got all super into makeup, I had no idea what a makeup primer was. I had no clue; it seemed like such an 'extra' product that was not a necessity in my minimal kit. But I was wrong, so wrong. Primers have changed the way I use my makeup. I feel much better when out and about; that I don't have to be checking in the mirror every two seconds to see it I need a top up. A primer guarantees me a couple of hours before I even have to consider topping up.

The bareMinerals 'In the Spotlight' was one of those gifts that you really wanted to buy back at Christmas but something else caught your eye. Then your all sad because it was limited edition and you can't buy it anymore. I was very fortunate to find this in my local Tk Maxx; unlike some others I got that second chance to buy this even after it became no longer available. The original retail price was £49.00, but it was reduced down t0 £29.99!

I  had such incredible luck at the weekend. I usually like to visit my local Tk Maxx at least once a month, just to check up on any bargains and such. For the past month though, I had been resisting the urge. Well, on Friday the call became too strong and I had a small pop in (small in that I never ventured farther than the beauty area). What I saw there shocked me to the very core of my beauty blogging being.

I unfortunately missed out on the success that was Cohorted's first beauty box last month, so I was super excited to see what was to be included in this months! I had super high expectations for Cohorted's beauty boxes. They are an online retailer which feature discounts on big brand makeup, such as: MAC, Chanel, Urban Decay etc. From the beginning, I knew that they had the potential to have amazing boxes, but my question was; would they live up to my expectations?

I am totally in love with this and could not wait to try it out. I saw it sitting oh-so innocently in Tk Maxx; upon which I had to dive on it before anyone else saw it BareMinerals, and anything similar to that standard, is hard to come by in my local store, so this was amazing. I was worried that it was going to contain totally weird and obscure shades but no!

Most of this haul comes from Tk Maxx and I make no apologies for that. It is no secret that it is my absolute favourite shop to find little amazing beauty bargains. I also like that fact that I could chance upon some exclusive brands from America, which are not stocked here.

Hey I've been wanting to show you guys my desk setup for a while now. I thought that I'd wait to get my new furniture first. I have not had a new desk in years; before this I was using a hand-me-down from my younger cousins that only had three tiny drawers. I can safely say I've upgraded to a Micke desk and the Alex Nine Drawer Unit.

Happy Halloween everyone! The day is nearly over here in the United Kingdom, but there is still plenty of day left over the pond. I love Halloween but, personally do nothing. There are plenty of parties currently going on, up I prefer to sit down to a Most Haunted/ Ghost Adventures marathon! I also set out my plastic, light up pumpkin in the window to let trick-or-treaters know I'm home. Although Halloween is nearly over, I have had time to get one more makeup look up. My last look is the 'skele-girl'. I've seen a lot of people, today, preferring to only do a half skull but I think that it's creepier to do a full face.

With the rush up to Christmas I decided to go back to the shopping capital of Scotland: Glasgow! As if the hundreds I spent last week weren't enough. Today was all about the makeup though. TK Maxx is one of my favorite places to get branded makeup at a mere fraction of the price; 'lo and behold, Glasgow has two in  the central shopping district. I was in my element. Soem of the things I bought were: Set of three Rimmel Apocolips £5.99!!  (The day before I paid just under a fiver for a single one; daylight robbery!) OPI nail polish £6.99 (RRP £11.99) Ciate nail varnish £2.99 (RRP £9.00) BareMinerals All Over Face Colour £5.99 (RRP £19.00)          As you can probably tell I had a fantastic day collecting all my little treasures all over the city. My only sadness is that I have to wait until Christmas to play with any of it, but I shall PERSEVERE! Any more bargain hunt shall be posted here as I see them. Louise x ...