Younique 3D fibre lashes

Today's review is on a new product hitting UK shores, it's the Younique 3D fiber lashes* - currently $29 each, but launching soon in the UK. 

Here's what they have to say about it "Our simple three-step process combines Transplanting Gel and Natural Fibers to help create the appearance of incredible thickness and volume to your existing lashes. Watch as your lashes transform into something you have only dreamed of! The 3D Fiber Lashes are water resistant but easily washes off with warm water and facial cleanser at the end of the day."

They say to put a coat of your favourite mascara on first, you really need this for the fibre's to stick to. For this I used the Max Factor Clump Defy mascara, which I must admit is drying out a little now.  I did also try this with a newer mascara and the fibres did actually stick even better.  I followed up with a coat of the fibre before the first coat of mascara dried and it stuck nicely.

Once I'd done that with both eyes, I coated them with the 'transplanting gel' which set it all in place and secured the fibres in place.  Now, because I'm a bit of a numpty, I wore dramatic liquid eyeliner, so the lashes don't show up that well in the pictures (note to self: leave the eyeliner alone when reviewing mascara!), but in the last pic you can really see the length that the mascara gives which really shows it off.

I really do love the packaging this comes in too, it's like a little glasses case with the mascaras fitted in place inside.  The actual mascara packaging feels great quality too.  I was really impressed with the finished look, my lashes looked more voluminous and longer, without looking false (which is a big deal to me).  This definitely gives me better lashes than just wearing mascara by itself, there was a tiny bit of fallout after wearing it for about 6 hours, but it didn't leave any blackness or black streaks on my cheeks, they brushed away really easily.

All in all I'm really impressed with this, I'm looking forward to seeing how much they'll be selling it for here in the UK :)  If you want to get informed when they're going to launch here, you can sign up here.

This months Biggest-Pixi3 advertiser is the lovely Casey from A Topsy Turvy blog

 

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A spring meetup in Cardiff

 Carrots!!!

Strawberry massage bar

Gorgeous scented Lush bath bombs

Our lovely new friend, Alice :)

The ever-stunning Charli

The gorgeous Laura

The lovely Claire and Leanne

Rosie - the lovely organiser :)

e.l.f have a 'selfie' mirror, so we took a big camera selfie :)

A gorgeous eye shadow palette, love the shapes!

Pretty containers with pink ribbons dotted about the shop

 Our goodies - lip shine, eyebrow lifter & filler, 2 nail polishes & an eye shadow dust in sweet

A mini e.l.f haul - face wipes, brush cleaner and the small stipple brush

Yesterday myself and 6 other lovely bloggers descended on The Brewhouse in Cardiff for a casual meetup in the name of charity (Give & Make Up).

I got there a little late as I just couldn't drag myself out of bed in the morning, and the traffic was terrible, taking us the best part of an hour to get in (usually a 20 min drive).  When I got to the Brewhouse Rose and Claire were both there snapping away some lovely products that Lush were on-site selling (see pics above).

A few minutes after I got there, Leanne and Chari arrived too, and after a bit of a catch-up, we went and ordered some food.  Because of the pregnancy I'm craving really plain food at the moment, so I opted for a 'Classic Pizza' which is just mozzarella and fresh basil (I think you needed a microscope to find the basil!) - it was a little rich for me so I ended up leaving some, it was only luke warm too, and I'm not good with cold pizza.

After we'd all had some food, we headed over to the e.l.f store for a bit of a blogger event.  They'd prepared some lovely goody bags for us (pic above & my mini-haul).  They talked us through and demonstrated the different products that were in our bags.  It was lovely to see the e.l.f girls, they're really lovely and passionate about the store :)

After that Charli and I headed off, I was getting really tired and needed a bit of a recharge before heading over to my friends house in the evening.

All in all a really lovely day - I love small meetups, you actually get time to chat to people and catch-up, and hopefully meet some new people too (I'm looking at you Alice!).

This months Biggest-Pixi3 advertiser is the lovely Casey from A Topsy Turvy blog

 

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The Spring TAG!

It's been a while since I started a TAG, the last one was The Christmas TAG so I thought it was about time, now that it's officially Spring that I start a new seasonal TAG.

If you do this TAG, please leave a comment below with a link to your post, and I'll add it to the bottom of this post, if you could remember to link back to me as the original creator of the post I'd really appreciate that too, although, you don't have to of course :)

1.  What's your favourite nail colours for Spring?

For me it's bright pastels, if that's even a thing!  So, Essie's mint candy apple, and soft but bright pinks, they're just so happy and full of the promise of summer.

2.  Best drink for Spring?

Hmm, at the moment I'm really loving the Waitrose mango & apple squash, it's fresh and super yummy, plus it means I'm drinking more water.  I'm pretty much off hot drinks at the moment, so squash is all I'm living on.

3.  What goes on your lips in Spring?

If I'm wearing colour, it'll be bright pink, like Illamasqua Eurydice, but 9 times out of 10 I'll be wearing a nice hydrating lip balm and it'll be all about the eyes, that's more my style, but even saying that, I have a stupid sized lipstick collection!

4.  What's your favourite thing about Spring?

There's a few things, like the beautiful blossom on the trees, all the daffodils sprouting up everywhere and the earth awakening from the Winter, but for me, the thing I look forward too the most, is seeing all the beautiful little lambs everywhere :)  They're so so so cute, I adore them, and I'm determined that one day I'll be able to bottle feed a baby lamb :)

5.  Best perfume for Spring?

I'm pretty much a stick in the mud when it comes to perfume, I stick to my No 1. fav and my backup, my No 1. fav is Lacoste touch of pink, and my backup fav is Lacoste for women - both gorgeous scents that I wear every day all year around, although, in Winter I do often wear more spicy scents :)

6.  What TV series are you watching the most at the moment?

Well the ones I'm watching are all coming to an end, i.e. Mr Selfridge, The Walking Dead etc, so I'm in the market for a new series.  I'm thinking about getting Netflix so I can finally watch Breaking Bad, but that's about it :)  Oh, also watching Girls and Breaking Amish :)

7.  Do you wear a different colour eye shadow in Spring?

Me? No, not really.  I tend to wear all different colours all year around anyway - typically neutrals, greens and purples.  I did buy an amazing single eye shadow from Georgio Armani the other day (shade 3), it's purple with gold flakes in it, that's pretty much all I'm wearing at the moment, it's super pretty!

8.  Do you change your hair for the changing season?

Not generally, but my hair is in desperate need of being re-dyed.  It's stilly really, I've had the dye for aaaaaages but I just can't be bothered to re-dye it, silly!  It has been about 3 months since I had my hair trimmed so I'll probably book in to get that done (after I've dyed it).

9.  What kind of music do you listen do in Spring?

I tend to listen to more summery music, like Bob Marley, other reggae, and things like the Juno soundtrack, Less than Jake, Reel Big Fish so lighter happier music.

10.  What kind of fashion items/accessories do you opt for in Spring?

My outfits stay quite similar, except I switch out jumpers for cardigans and wear lighter scarves (not wool).  If it's sunny out when I'm at work, I'll opt for wearing my scarf out at lunch instead of my coat, it always feels so lovely and fresh then :)  Speaking of accessories, I do need to update my jewellery collection, so if you know of any places that sell cheap, pretty spring-time jewellery leave a comment below :D

Don't forget to leave links to your blog posts of the Spring TAG below, and link to me as the creator of the TAG if you do it :)

People who've taken part: A Topsy Turvy blog | Seek my Scribbles | The Italian bunny report | Beauty in my mind | Tammy the dreamer |

This months Biggest-Pixi3 advertiser is the lovely Casey from A Topsy Turvy blog

 

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#SingItKitty from Three mobile

You all know I'm a bit of a crazy cat lady right?  It's no secret that I'm a little obsessed with cats, I've always had them, grew up with them and have my own cat called Matilda now :)

When I saw Three Mobiles new advert for #SingItKitty I was immediately a fan!  I shared it on Facebook and Twitter instantly.  The little girl in the advert is amazing, and the cat, super cute!  So when the guys over at Three Mobile got in touch asking for me to review some cat-themed products I couldn't resist :)

They sent me some lovely Marc Jacobs headphones with cute cats on the ears - I love that the cable for these is material and not rubber/plastic, hopefully that'll mean they're more durable.  As much as I don't listen to that much music at home, I do listen to it nearly all day when I'm at work and ear-buds are my headphone of choice!  Preferably ones that don't cancel out noise too well, that way if someone asks me a question I can still hear them #winning.

They also sent me a cute little #SingItKitty pass holder, I'll probably chuck my work pass and Oyster card in here, I know I don't live in London, but I do visit fairly regularly so I always carry that on me. On top of that they sent some cute little lenses for mobile phones, sadly these don't work with my phone as it's made out of aluminium and these are magnetic, so they don't actually fit my phone, but we did hold them in place to see what they did and how they worked and they were pretty neat, they're just a little awkward to use as they don't stay on :)

If you haven't seen the advert yet, 1. Where have you been? and 2.  here it is :)

This months Biggest-Pixi3 advertiser is the lovely Casey from A Topsy Turvy blog

 

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I'm having a baby!!!

It's fair to say it's been the craziest 2-3 months I think I've ever had in my life.  It started off in Jan with the loss of my brother, which you all have probably read about or heard me talking about.  Then I became ill with a cough, chest infection and flu, followed up with bad asthma for weeks.  Then, my husbands auntie died after a long illness.  At this point we were thinking, lets just get to the end of 2014 so we can write it off and be done with it!  Such a bad start to the year, and it seems we weren't alone, I've seen lots of other friends/bloggers having a tough time too, in a way, it was nice to know we weren't alone.

Then, on the 27th Feb, our world turned upside down in a really wonderful way.  We found out, we're having a baby!!!!!!!!!

Yep that's right, I'm going to be a mummy!  I'm officially 12 weeks now and telling everyone.  It feels very surreal but we're super happy.  We'd actually been trying for a baby for about 8 months, and we'd pretty much given up trying, or thinking we'd get pregnant.  Looking back, I had so many symptoms but had attributed them to other things, like side effects of the antibiotics (metallic taste in my mouth and heartburn) or my being ill and stressed (missing a period, achy boobs <-- that was me thinking my body was trying to come on, not my boobs getting ready for a baby!).  So when I went to the Drs about my asthma still being bad, I'd mentioned these symptoms too thinking it was linked to anxiety about all the bad things that had happened, that's when she said 'You really should do a pregnancy test'.

So on leaving the Drs, we went to grab my prescription of steroids (for my asthma) and picked up a £3.50 Sainsburys pregnancy test too.  Got home, did it straight away, and fully expected it to be negative, I've been through this so many times (skipping a period through stress, then thinking I'm pregnant, doing a test, seeing it negative, then coming on the next day!), so this all felt routine.  What I didn't expect was a big, fat, positive test!  It all made sense though, with all the symptoms, the only thing I haven't had is morning sickness, but I have been nauseous.  

Anyway, all that matters is that we're due to be having our little baby on October 13th and we're super happy about it.  Now we have to make some decisions, if we stay in our house, we have to make some serious changes because as things stand, there's no room in our bedroom for a cot etc, or do we look to move? This is all while my hubby is studying for an open university degree while working full time, safe to say we have our hands full!

What does this mean for Makeup-Pixi3?  Well, I fully intend to continue as normal, but if you'd be happy to read them, I'd like to start doing pregnancy updates, maybe just once a month or twice a month and once the baby is born I can include him/her in some of my posts too, so they'll be more lifestyle - what do you think?

How often would you like to see pregnancy updates?  Every week, every other week, monthly?

This months Biggest-Pixi3 advertiser is the lovely Casey from A Topsy Turvy Blog

 

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An evening with Giorgio Armani at Debenhams

Last Thursday I was invited to a lovely blogger evening at the Giorgio Armani counter at my local Debenhams store.  Like all blogger events, as much as it's lovely to get a proper introduction to a brand, it's also lovely to catch up or meet other local bloggers.  There was about 8 of us there, a couple of familiar faces and lots of new ones :)

We were greeted with bubbly, chocolates and grapes and really friendly staff.  They had a station all set up ready to demonstrate some of their products in use on a model (finished look on the 3rd pic).  As they used each product, they passed it around to we could swatch it and get a feel for it.  I was super impressed with their single eye shadows, the pigmentation was pretty insane, they were creamy and blendable, they're kinda like the L'Oreal Infallible - pressed loose shadow.

After the demonstration was finished we had a good look through all the different products, and I bought one of the single eyeshadows, I just couldn't see myself leaving without it!  It's a single eye shadow in shade 3 - which is a purple with gold running through it, absolutely stunning!  I've worn it the last two days and it's really long wearing, love!

When we left they handed us a little goody bag each, inside was a full size mascara and some samples of their foundation, lipsticks etc, I'm excited to try all of them!

All in all a lovely evening, thank you to Giorgio Armani for inviting me, looking forward to many more visits!

This months Biggest-Pixi3 advertiser is the lovely Casey from A Topsy Turvy Blog

 

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Lifestyle: Lodge farm B&B review Hitchin

Lodge farm B&B house - photo credit

Last week the husband and I headed down to Hertfordshire for yet another family funeral.  We figured we'd take the opportunity to stay somewhere really nice as a bit of a treat, so despite the sad circumstances, we actually had a nice time.  I was so struck by the beautiful surroundings, stunning house and lovely owner of the B&B that I wanted to share it with you.

Lovely bed, it was so comfortable!

Lovely smellies.

Cute teacups in our room.

Our bathroom.

The gorgeous breakfast room.

My vegetarian breakfast - vine ripened cherry tomatoes (grilled) on granary toast, with another slice of granary toast with chopped mushrooms on (divine!).

Chris' full English breakfast, which he suitably demolished.

And lastly, this beautiful view (below), our car on the right, fields ahead and surrounded by stables.  This was still when places were quite foggy as you can see from the morning haze in the distance.

Despite it being a sad visit, we had such a lovely time at the lodge.  Our room was lovely, despite an 8-legged visitor which I had Chris quickly dispense of!  We slept really well, which I don't normally do at B&B's or hotels, it helped that the duvet was really soft and the room wasn't sweltering (which is usually is in hotels).

The owner (Maria) was ever so lovely, she made us feel right at home and cooked us up a wonderful breakfast the next day.  The rooms, I think, were a very reasonable price too (£75 for our room for the night), but they do rooms from £55 a night.  It's situated in the middle of Hertfordshire countryside, nestled amongst a series of little lanes and fields.  I loved that there was a stables full of beautiful horses on site too, it was lovely seeing them, I was eager to go and give one of them a pet but we didn't really have time, so this photo was as close as I got :)

If you're ever looking for somewhere to stay near Hitchin/Stevenage/Hertfordshire I'd highly recommend this place, I had no complaints whatsoever, only praise.  If you'd like to visit their site or make a booking via it, you can visit here.

This months Biggest-Pixi3 advertiser is the lovely Casey from A Topsy Turvy Blog

 

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Wantable makeup box - March 2014

Wantable are a subscription box service that offer 3 different types of boxes, makeup, jewellery or intimates.  Of course, makeup is the box I choose ;)  You get 4 to 5 full size products picked out by a beauty icon.  Like other subscription boxes, you complete a profile stating the different things you like, it's very comprehensive and from what I've seen so far, they do pay attention to your choices.

This month (March) the box was put together by Jordan Liberty who's a professional makeup artist, photographer and YouTuber.  The nail polish above is one of his own products called Spellbound.

It costs $36 per box, which is about £21 a month, which when you consider you're getting good quality full size products, is a great price, and they ship to the UK, whoop!

Here's what I had in my box, in a bit more detail:

Liberty Republic - Spellbound nail lacquer in Belladonna - retails for $14

This is a 'your nails but better' shade - also a great base for doing some nail art (it'd be lovely with black polish polka dots or stripes).  I haven't tried this yet, so can't comment on the quality, but I really like the shade, I don't have enough like this so I'm really happy with this being in the box.

LAQA & Co - Fat lip pencil in Wolfman - retails for $18

I had a small 'sample size' of this in a previous Birchbox and really liked it, so to have another (and full-size) made me very happy.  As you can see in the pics above, it's a pretty sheer shade, again, a 'your lips but better' shade, which is perfect for daily wear, especially if like me, you tend to wear stronger eye makeup than lips.

Glam natural - Cream blush in Ashley, Ashley - retails for $32

Isn't this packaging amazing?  So luxury!  It comes in a slide-apart box, inside a velvet pouch!  The dispenser is a pump, it'll take a while to pump it enough for product to come out, but when it does you only need a little bit.  The colour blends in nicely (I've only swatched this on the back of my hand, so this is very much first impressions) and goes quite sheer with a bit of a dewey finish, so this would look nice teamed with a dewey foundation - or just top it with a smidge of pressed powder to set it.

Three Custom Colour - Eye shadow in brown sugar - retails for $21.50

The packaging on this feels really nice quality, the shadow itself is pretty close to matte, with a subtle satin sheen.  Given my paleness and the warmth (redness) in this shade, I probably wouldn't wear it all over the lid, unless it was as a base colour, however it'd be a lovely transition shade, or nice to add to the very edge of your shadow to give it some warmth.

All in all another good box - a total of $85.50 of products, for £36.  It's introduced me to brands I've never heard of before, and not at sample size, but full size :) 

If you're interested in subscribing, just click here to set up your profile :)

This months Biggest-Pixi3 advertiser is the lovely Ash from A Beauty Moment

 

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