Out of every beauty product, nail varnish is my favourite. I don't even know how many I own, I can never stop buying them. There just never seems to be a limit as to how many colours I need.
I don't know if anyone else is the same, but whenever I go into a beauty store I normally come out with a new nail varnish or lipstick and recently it was no different.
Now, I normally have no preference to nail varnish brands, as long as the colour is pretty. I actuallt have a nail varnish regime of 2 coats, then a coat of clear and re do this every Sunday night. One of my favourite colours to wear is a mocha colour but I also love pastel colours, especially in the spring/ summer.
When shopping recently, I saw a gorgeous baby pink colour in the MUA range that I just had to pick up. To top this off, it was only £1. How could I not!?
I have heard a lot about this range but never used anything from it and I am very impressed by this nail polish. It stays on your nails a lot longer than many other more expensive brands and there is hardly any chips!! I am very impressed and will definitely be purchasing more colours it in!
Another good feature of this is how quickly it dries, this is huge benifit for me as I like to apply more than one coat and I hate waiting for it to dry!
If you would like to see more about this product you can find it HERE
Firstly I hope you had a lovely Christmas and enjoyed your day whatever it was you were doing!
In today's post I will be sharing with you some of the lovely things I received for Christmas. I will be doing this post in 2 parts and will shortly be posting a 'What I Gave' blog post for you all. So on with the presents! Now I am not going to share with you EVERY present I got, so I am just going to share with you a selection of my favourites.
BaByliss Curl Secret
If you follow me, or know me at all, you will know I have been banging on about this for AGES. I asked for this for christmas and yes I finally got it. I am so excited to use this! A lot of you have asked me to do a review of this because I know it is highly sort after, but the price puts a lot of people off so I will be doing a review for you to let you know exactly what I think of it.
I have actually used this already as I was far too excited to try it and did a photo shoot with the after effects to show you. I am currently editing all the photos and videos now which is taking a lot of time so will be posting this in a few weeks for you.
Here's a sneak preview from the shoot <<
Now onto more presents..
Harry Potter
Now.. this was a funny one. Without knowing me and my sister bought each other one of the same presents. We are both HUGE Harry Potter fans and have been to Harry Potter land in America but haven't been to the studio tour in London yet. So.. for christmas we both accidentally got exactly that. Luckily before we both opened the same present for each other on christmas day my dad told us the situation once he found out and I was able to return them due to having already purchased tickets.
So.. after all that palaver, me and my sister will be going to the Harry Potter studios in February, so we just catch it whilst it's still in the snow. I'm SO excited eeek.
Little Mermaid I'm a huge huge huge Disney fan and my favourite Disney film, although a hard choice is The Little Mermaid. Now for the past few years, this has been a nightmare to get hold of, but as it was released recently my sister managed to snap me up a copy and get me the boxset. Can't wait to watch this!
As well as the first film, this contains the second one which I equally love and a third one I didn't even know about!
Have you seen or heard of the 3rd Little Mermaid film?
Oribe Texturising Spray This spray is something I have wanted to try for a while now after seeing many other bloggers talk about it. The spray is quite expensive at £38 a bottle but I'm excited to try it. Having long hair, I really hope this is worth the price! This is also something I may do a review on.
Understandably it is not an everyday purchase at that price as many other dry shampoo's and volumisers are cheaper. However, if it's worth it is may be an investment.
Let me know if you'd like me to do a review on it?
So, like those are the main presents I wanted to share with you. Find below a nice little photo of all my presents. Some include a flashing Paris canvas, many cupcake books and a lot of nail varnish and jewellery. I hope you all had a wonderful day, I certainly did. I just can't believe how quick it goes by!
I will be posting part 2 of this next week where I share with you what I gave for christmas and make sure to stay tuned for the curl secret review in the next few weeks.
I thought I would give you guys a few quick updates regarding my recent posts.
BaByliss Curl Secret
I'm so excited to say this has been bought! I got a phone call at the weekend to say it has been picked up and will be waiting under my tree when I go home for christmas. This is something I can't wait to try out, and I will definitely review it and let you know if it's worth it, which fingers crossed it will be. Check out my BaByliss Curl Secret post here.
Puppies Name
After a LOT of deliberation, me and my family think we have finally decided on a name for the puppy. We are going with Pepper. We all liked this name, and as she will start off as black colour, this name is quite fitting. I would love to know what you all think of the name, do you like it? If you would like to see the post regarding previous puppy names and photo's click here.
Christmas Advert
On Friday, I wrote a piece on the new John Lewis Christmas Advert before it's release on Saturday. Now you've hopefully all got a chance to see it, I would love to hear your thoughts on it. What did you think of it? Do you prefer any of their other Christmas adverts? If you still haven't seen the advert, click here for a full review and the advert itself.
Graduation
Now, this isn't regarding my old posts, but it will probably involve my new posts. At the end of November, I graduate University. This is a very scary thought as it is completely closing this chapter of my life and I am not ready to stop being a student yet. This will be a very special day and I will keep you updated on this and most probably blog my experience.
Nails
This is also an upcoming post update. I recently wrote a post regarding halloween nails and showed you quickly my penguin nails that I had previously done. This was requested and I have been asked to show you how I did them, so nearer to Christmas I will be taking you through the stages of completing this look. If you would like to see the penguin nails click here for the previous post.
So that's it for all the updates! There is a lot going on at the moment, so my blog is swaying a lot more to lifestyle around Christmas. I will be keeping you up to date and on the eye out for all the amazing Christmas adverts and will share the best ones with you!
(WARNING: Gushy part coming up)
I also just want to say a massive THANK YOU for all the support I have currently received regarding this Blog. I started this mid September and am astonished by how well everyone has taken to it. The support I get on my Blog Twitter is overwhelming, and you all tell me how much you love reading my posts which is so lovely and I am very grateful for that. There are now over 600 of you lovely people following Char's Insights and over 7000 page views, which is surreal to think about. I love hearing what you think and if you would like a specific post on something please do let me know and I'll happily do it.
If you don't already follow me on my blog twitter, I'm at Char's Insights and I post about updates regarding my blog, as well as interacting with you guys. I also love checking out other people's blog's so please feel free to send me yours and I'll take a look. Love you all and thank you again.
So, the wait is over. The John Lewis Christmas advert is here.
I wait all year for the Christmas adverts, it is the one time of year that retailers know they have to get right and pull out all the stops to outdo their competitors. John Lewis have held the top spot for a while in the UK, and their adverts have now become almost iconic with people waiting all year for them and waiting to see what emotive advert they produce. I am one of these people. I have loved John Lewis' adverts from the start and throughout the year, not even around christmas time, I find myself searching for all of the adverts on YouTube and watching them from beginning.
So, if you are wondering why I am writing this blog post when it isn't even Christmas yet, it is because John Lewis have released their christmas advert. Yes people, it's been released!! It is due to be released on TV during the X Factor on Saturday night, however it has been released online for all of us searching for it prior. John Lewis have actually bought out the entire advert break during X Factor, which the agreement of Simon Cowell, to make sure their advert is memorable and everyone is talking about. Which I'm sure they will. Watch the new 2013 John Lewis Christmas advert below:
The advert tells the story of a bear and a hare around Christmas time. The advert is animated so is quite different to anything they have done before. It shows the bear not in the Christmas spirit, whereas his best friend the hare is trying his very hardest to get his best friend in the spirit so they can enjoy it together. The advert shows all the other animals enjoying decorating the tree etc but the bear yawning. It is soon clear the bear is going into hibernation, and will always miss christmas due to his sleeping patterns and is therefore not aware of how enjoyable christmas can be.
The advert really pulls on your heartstrings when the hare is looking at all the other animals enjoying christmas day and he is so upset his best friend can't be there. The next thing, the bear comes along with a huge smile on his face after receiving the hare's present of an alarm clock to wake him up just in time for Christmas. And they all live happily ever after. Of course.
The advert cost a whopping 7 million so I do hope they sell a lot of those alarm clocks!
Something I think John Lewis do perfectly with their adverts is the music choices, this again is a perfect choice and I'm sure this cover of Keane's 'Somewhere Only We know' by Lily Allen will be a hit, as all the other iconic, slowed down, covers are. The music is so emotive and beautifully fits with the story. The music for last year's snowman advert particularly stood out to me because it was so entrancing, it made the advert.
Their adverts are so iconic, and are always known for being a tearjerking and emotional. They could be criticised for being very repetitive and following the same story, which is some cases they do. A lot of John Lewis christmas adverts follow the same story for finding the perfect christmas gift for your love ones, which this new advert follows too. However, John Lewis know if they feature products in their adverts, people will buy them, which is exactly what happens. This alarm clock will now be on everyones Christmas list.
As much as I do love this advert, and think the animation and disney like style really sets it apart from anything they have done before, I do prefer some of their other christmas adverts. My all time favourite one (and this is a hard choice) is 'The Long Wait' and I know this is a similar view of many others. The advert shows the boy impatiently waiting for Christmas and when the day is finally here, he cannot wait a minute longer. You assume he is waiting for Christmas all the time, but in fact he is waiting to give his parents the present he has bought him. It is such an emotive advert I do remember I did actually shed a tear at this one, because it is unexpected. Watch it below:
There have been many other brilliant John Lewis Christmas adverts and another favourite of mine is the Sweet Child Of Mine 2009 advert, I absolutely love the transition at the end, it works perfectly. Here are their 2008, 2010 and 2012 adverts for you to have a look, and probably cry at.
I'm sure there will be many more Christmas adverts I will love and I'll make sure to share the best ones with you! So that's it, another long year of waiting for the John Lewis Christmas advert is upon us.
And remember, give someone a Christmas present they'll never forget!
Last year, I went all out with Halloween, outfit, nails, the lot. This year I have neglected Halloween a bit due to my busy schedule, but I couldn't resist looking at a few nails online. Last year I did pumpkin halloween nails however last year I was still at uni so this was acceptable. This year I spent my Halloween in client meetings so had to stick with a plan nude, no pumpkin nails this year for me.
I am going to share with you some of my favourite halloween nail art I have found online when researching. I LOVE nail art and have previously done penguin nails which I will show you at the end of the blog. I always have my nails painted, regardless. I normally go for purply and pinky shades, but at the moment I am loving nude shades. I am currently wearing a muddy nude/brown colour and it goes with everything. I also love bold colours such a minty green as they can really stand out from an outfit.
In the Halloween season, these are some of my favourite nail designs:
Let me know which one these nail art's are your favourite and which you would try. Also if you have tried any before let me know, I tried pumpkins last year, but I love the skeleton and fake blood effect. These type of nails would only be suitable on Halloween however, and I do not recommend these for everyday nail. Unless you like fake blood and skeletons of course.
Penguin Nails
As I said earlier in the post, I have painted my nails like penguins before. I also did this last year and have now done this twice as it was such a massive hit with people. I love penguins and when I found out how to paint my nails like them I was super excited. They did look really good, but the only thing was the time it took. Obviously as you all know nails can take a while to do well, and my worst pet hate is when nails smudge.
The penguin nails were done in about 5 stages and each stage the varnish had to be completely dry because I was painting white on black. In total the nails took about 4 hours to do, but the result is really good.
These nail's weren't stick on and a lot of people thought they were fake but I promise you I did them myself. The black varnish went on first and then I painted half my nail with white nail varnish and filled in the rest with a hair grip of orange, white and black to make the features of the penguin. See the final outcome below:
If you would like I can do a blog post on how to get these penguin nails looks and the stages of me doing it, let me know if this is something you would like to see and I would be happy to do it. Plus it gives me a chance to do my nails again.
So, I hope you enjoyed this post and have a great halloween whatever your plans!
On Monday, I was lucky enough to go to Social Media Week's Opening Party. If you don't know what Social Media Week is, it is a week long event which takes place around the world, holding events, guest talks and lectures revolving the world of social media. For more information, check out their website HERE. The opening party is a great way to get a flavour for the week and a fantastic chance to network so I was very excited to go. For all of you that couldn't make it, I will be including photos of the night, so you all can see.
The first thing that took me by surprise was the giant red carpet outside we had to walk down! As well as this, around 20 photographers were snapping my photograph! I didn't have a clue where to look it was very surreal, but what a fantastic welcome. Upon entering there was also a lobster van which was serving various food throughout the night that went as quickly as you could even say the word lobster.
The inside of the party was decorated beautifully and the lights and effects around the room did look really good. As you can see from my photos, it was quite dark but there were a lot of strobe lights which heightened the atmosphere.
The night itself was good, there were various stalls and stands showcasing brands, but by far the best was the Duck DJ stall. When the ducks and blocks moved around the square, the beat changed and it was almost like a DJ deck. Very fascinating.
At the party there was also a great graffiti battle in which a white blank wall was covered in graffiti, it was great to see this progress and it was done only using a pen, great to see! Although I don't know what the image on the left is meant to be, eggs?
As well as this there were Nokia stands, lots and cupcakes and blue wine. The Nokia stands were showing the various new Nokia phones, which had some great new features and the cupcakes even had Nokia logos printed on them. To top this off and promote Nokia just that little bit more, the wine was blue, blue wine!
Overall I had a good night, although I would suggest more hubs next time, apart from networking there wasn't as many stands or focal points as I imagined there would be. It was a great event and I can't wait to keep updated on the rest of Social Media Week. If you would like to keep updated with Tweets about Social Media Week, take a look at their Twitter page HERE.
