Vital Brights

I'm not usually one to get into make up trends (or any trends for that matter). However as we're now entering Spring/Summer, I do like to change my make up around and try to experiment with colour a bit more. The limited edition No. 7 Vital Brights Spring collection consists of two cream blushes, two lipsticks, a highlighter and an eye palette and with the €7.50 off voucher that is currently running all of the items work out very reasonably.  This collection was designed by British make up artist Lisa Eldridge who has worked with No. 7 to make some really amazing products. What's better than make up products designed by someone who uses them every day for their job!

I bought the No. 7 Vital Brights Cream Blush  in Blossoming Pink last week after eyeing it up for a while and I wasn't disappointed. The vibrant coral colour may look quite intimidating at first but when blended it gives a gorgeous rosy glow to the cheeks and is the perfect blush for Summer in my opinion. You only really need to tap your finger gently on the blush to get enough colour and you can build it up from there. The blushes and lipsticks retail at about €13.50 and the palette and highlighter at about €16.50. 

Here's a video of Lisa Eldridge herself using the other blush colour as the basis for a beautiful fresh summery make up look. I can't recommend her videos highly enough, she has such a huge knowledge base and I just find her so easy and relaxing to watch

Emma x

Lux Effects

So as you can see I have a little bit of an obsession with glitter nail polish at the moment. It just makes me happy. It might sound silly but it's the little things sometimes.

I bought both of these nail polishes online as I don't think Essie is available in Ireland (that I know of anyway).  I layered one of the new Lux Effects polishes called A Cut Above over Demure Vixen. 

I can't tell you how excited I was when I received this gorgeous glittery polish in the post. It's just stunning! It's got lots of different sizes of glitter in it which gives a gorgeous effect, I painted two layers on to make it really glittery. I have to get more of these Lux Effects polishes, there's a pearl effect one, a silver one and a few others. I definitely recommend this to all you fellow nail polish junkies out there!

I hope you're all having a great weekend. 

Emma x

I've Got A Castle On My Wall At Home

A little outfit post for you today! I'm going to go watch Eastbound and Down with my friends and have some cereal. We just had some of my homemade guacamole and watched Kate and Eric's wedding video! I'll be posting a bit of it somewhere so you guys can take a look if you want. 

Dress, Bangle and Cardigan- Monsoon

Rings, Earrings and Scarf- Accessorize

Belt- Dunnes

Shoes- Marks and Spencers

Nails- Essie Glamour Purse and Cocktail Bling

I love this scarf, I waited until it was 70% off in the sale in work to buy it and I'm so glad because it was a really good price and it's so warm, not that I need it anymore because it's been so mild lately!

Also, the two nail polishes I'm wearing here are two of my new favourites. My mam and I saw Glamour Purse on the air stewardess on the way to Rome and asked her what she was wearing and I saw Cocktail Bling somewhere else so I bought them both online (because I don't know where to buy Essie here if it's even available anywhere). I've also been wearing the rings and belt a lot too. 

Thanks for all your lovely comments about my video and my job and my foot. They really cheered me up! 

Take a listen to the music of Walter Schreifels. Donnacha introduced me to him when we first started going out and he is now one of my favourite musicians ever. If you don't know who he is, he plays with Gorilla Biscuits, Rival Schools, Quicksand and Walking Concert below! Enjoy!

Emma x

Pay Us No Mind

Last Saturday Donnacha and I went along to Michael Kiwanuka in the Sugar Club with support from The Staves. I had never heard The Staves before and I now wish I had gone along to the acoustic session Donnacha filmed with them that morning but alas I was fast asleep having cuddles with my pillow.

Photos by Donnacha

I had heard a few songs by Michael Kiwanuka and had been recommended going to see him be several people and I wasn't disappointed. He has an incredible voice that you could listen to all day. However it was the support band that I liked even more. The Staves are Emily, Camilla and Jessica Stavely-Taylor, three sisters from Watford, England. They have goosebump inducing harmonies and I won't do them any justice with words so please listen...

and this is the video Donnacha and the boys from Cock and Bull Tv filmed

Emma x

Just One Beat of Your Heart and Stranger Than Fantasy

I can't believe we took these photos almost exactly one year ago. There were way more Cherry Blossoms on the trees then, I guess that means Spring will be a little later this year. This is a belated Valentine's outfit, with my heart print tights and earrings and red and pink nails. 

Dress- Monsoon

Belt- Dunnes

Earrings- Accessorize

Shoes- Clarks

Tights- Penneys

Nails- No. 7 Devil's Delight and Me Me Me and Model's Own Juicy Jules

Lips- MAC Russian Red

Eyes- Urban Decay Book of Shadows IV Missionary, Bust and Skimp

I'll be honest I spent most of Valentine's day in my pyjamas. I love pyjamas, as much as I love putting on make up and a pretty dress, I really do love wearing comfortable warm pyjamas. But Donnacha loves me anyway and prefers when I wear no make up so I guess that's a good thing. We did have a lovely meal together though!

I also want to thank you all for your well wishes about my foot. It helps to know people care about me like that! It's been less painful each day so I don't have to take painkillers that often and I don't have to limp either.

How was your week?

Emma x

Benefit's 'Ticket to Glossytown': A Review

I received Benefit's Ticket to Glossytown as a Christmas gift from my aunts and I thought I'd do a little review of it for you since that's what I'm really into reading and watching at the moment. 

Ticket to Glossytown is a Limited Edition gift set that retails at $24/€39.95 approximately. I'm not sure exactly how long it's available for but you can still buy it on Benefit's site. The set consists of six 3ml Ultra Shines lip glosses in the colours Foxy Lady, Kiss You, Life on the A List, Nudie-Tude, So Frisk Me and Spiked Punch. The full size lip glosses are 5ml and $18/€22 each so you're getting about 60% of the full size glosses in each of the miniatures. 

You can see how each of the lip glosses looks on my lips in each of the photos below

Foxy Lady

Kiss You

Life on the A List

Nudie-tude

So Frisk Me

Spiked Punch

You can read how each of the colours is described on the Benefit site but I'll give you my take on each because some of their descriptions are a bit strange (eg. Nudie-tude is described as "goldspun twist", whatever that means!). First of all they all smell amazing. I know scented products, especially scented lip products are not for everyone but these smell so fruity, almost like passion fruit or mango and I love fruity scented products so for me that wasn't a problem. There is a nice variety of colours, something to go with most looks you may want to wear.

Foxy Lady is a sheer rose colour with blueish shimmer, I would wear this over a red lipstick for a more opaque colour but it's gorgeous by itself as an alternative to a strong red lip. 

Kiss You is a combination of pink/purple with very minimal shimmer, you could wear this over a pink toned lipstick for more colour payoff but alone it's a nice way of wearing this shade without it being too in your face.

Life on the A List is a nude shade, again with minimal shimmer, this is great to wear if you want your eye make up to be the focus but still want some shine to your lips.

Nudie-tude is another nude shade with a small amount of little multicolour glitter particles in it. I think this is my favourite shade mostly because I find a lot of nude lipstick can wash me out but this sits on my lips so well and give an extra dimension to your lips when you want to keep them neutral but still want them to stand out a bit. 

So Frisk Me is the darkest shade from the set and is a gorgeous shimmery berry colour. The tiny particles of gold make it really warm and perfect for this time of year. 

Spiked Punch is a coral colour with almost no shimmer. This is definitely a Summer colour or would also be great for doing a 60s look because it's quite a pastel coral. 

My favourite shades are the more shimmery of the three, Foxy Lady, Nudie-tude and So Frisk Me. I think the colour pay off is better and they look better worn alone whereas I would probably wear the other three over lipstick because they're quite sheer. 

If you like all six shades and would wear them then this set is such great value for money. I would definitely repurchase my three favourites but not the others because I don't think I'll get as much wear out of them but the great thing about sets like these is getting to try out different shades you may not ordinarily and also having a variety of colours for different times of the year. 

The packaging is gorgeous as is the case with all Benefit products (they are one of the brands that made me love make up) and they are handy sizes that won't be sitting in your make up bag for years and go to waste.

All in all I recommend this set to those lip junkies out there, it would also make a great present as it's not something people usually buy for themselves. 

I hope to bring you more beauty reviews and recommendations in future as I love doing my video reviews but there are so many products I use that I would want to go into much more detail about and that would make for very long videos! I have a list of things I'm going to review but if there's anything you would like me to review or know I wear and want to know more about or if you're looking for any recommendations please don't hesitate to get in contact. I've already had several requests regarding beauty products so they're all on my list too.

I  hope you're all doing well! My foot has been giving my some trouble lately and I couldn't walk for a couple of days last week so I had to go get an X ray today. I'll keep you posted on how it goes!

Thanks for reading if you've gotten this far!

Emma x

Hollywood Forever Cemetery Sings

J Tillman has left Fleet Foxes and is working under the moniker Father John Misty. I am currently obsessed with this song and thought some of you might like it too (check out the lovely Aubrey Plaza in the video).



Emma x