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Wednesday 1 June 2011

Fantastic charity shop handbag bargain!

I've wanted a leather saddle handbag for quite some time now, especially the vintagey bohoy looking ones but they've always been about £40 on ebay!! I've scoured my local charity shops for ages and luck was not my mate, until... today! We happened to be passing our local branch of the British heart foundation and there it was like a shining beacon of handbaggy goodness! On closer inspection it got better, not only did it have the triquetra as a pattern all over it (which is special to my beliefs) but it was the bargain price of £6.99!! I could've exploded with joy. It's made of real leather and made in Wales too. It's big too with 2 capacious compartments and it's just completely fantastic, I love a bargain!


Thursday 28 April 2011

Royal Cupcake Anyone?

Helloooooo! I'm back from outer space :)

So tomorrow is the Royal Wedding and as such
I've been invited to my lovely sister in law Sharon's Wedding party soiree and I couldn't turn up empty handed so I decided to get my pinny out and start baking for the occasion. (Never had as much hype as this for MY wedding, how very dare they!)

I did 2 lots, some lemon gluten free ones for my sis and some cherry ones for everyone else, both from packet mixes but both came out very well, especially the gluten free mix, I'm tempted next time to just use gluten free mixes but they are more pricxey :(

So here's how they turned out, red cherries, blue icing & white paper cases lol:



The best thing when making them was my cheapo icing syringe from B&M Bargains for the icing. I'd previously bought a proper Tala icing bag set and it was rubbish, don't waste you're money if you're thinking of buying one as you'll never ever get the bag clean again. Yet this was really easy to use and clean and gave really good results all for £1.49!! Love it! xx

Tuesday 29 March 2011

My 13 Questions Tag from What Laura Loves blog

Ok so I've been tagged to answer 13 questions by Laura from "What Laura Loves" Blog.

 So here they are:

1. What do you order at Starbucks?
2. What's one thing in your closet you can't live without?
3. What's one thing that most people don't know about you?
4. What's one thing you want to do before you die?
5. What's one food you can't live without?
6. What's one quote that you live your life by?
7. What do you like and dislike about Youtube community?
8. What's your n°1 song on your Ipod/Itunes?
9. What kind of style would you describe yourself as having?
10. Favourite number?
11. Two hobbies?
12. Two pet peeves?
13. Your guilty pleasure?
 
1) I usually order a skinny latte with maybe a flavour shot but I also like their hot chocy and sometimes just regular tea.

2) Leggings! Can't stand wearing tights and they are just soooo comfy!

3) I have a licence to operate scissor lifts & cherry pickers.

4) Visit Venice.

5) Cake or if we're including beverages. tea.

6) Sometimes you're the statue, sometimes you're the pigeon.


7) Like reviews and like minded people, dislikes, can't think of any.


8) Right now it's Mika, We are golden, but my fave changes all the time.


9) Arty, cute, fun.


10) 8.


11) Fimo craft & Xbox gaming.


12) Just 2? People who cough without covering their mouths & people parking in the parent & child spaces when they don't have any children.


13) Watching Horrible Histories. :)

So now I'm passing the tag onto you, post as a reply your 13 answers and pass the tag on. xxx

Tuesday 22 March 2011

Bubblegum Cupcakes!

About 10 o clock this morning my postie knocks on my door with a parcel for me from America. To my delight I discovered that it was in fact the candy oils (food flavourings) I'd bought about 2 weeks ago from an American ebay supplier.

When I say food flavourings, I don't just mean the standard set ones you get in the shops in the UK, I mean really weird and wonderful flavours like eggnog, cotton candy & liquorice!

With these and a pack of Green's butterfly cake mix I set about making some bubblegum flavour cupcakes.

I followed the instructions on the cake packet and added some drops of bubblegum flavouring & pink food colouring to the sponge mux and the flavouring and a blue food colouring to the frosting. I topped them off with some hundreds and thousands. I think they came out quite well.


Or cours I HAD to show you a cut section of one of them to show the pink songe inside so I was forced to eat one for this purpose :)

Hope you enjoyed xx

Sunday 20 March 2011

Red & Black Hair!

OK so my hair has been absolutely minging since just after Xmas and it was time to do something about it.

It has been my plan to do something really mad with my hair but I haven't quite got the nerve to do it yet so I decided to do something different but not too drastic with my hair.

.I was going to do a vibrant red all over but Superdrug only had one box of it, it looks like the Schwarzkopf Live Luminance range is being discontinued as you can only get the ultra violet colour in some places now. I picked up shade L42 in Infrared.

The other box that caught my eye was theSchwarzkopf  Live Color XXL in Blue Black, I'd previously dyed my hair this colour for my wedding (& in my profile pic) and although the colour was really good, although it did stay a long time in my hair being a black colour and I wasn't sure I wanted that commitment again. Then I had a thought, why not do half and half? I don't mean one side red and the other black that'd be a bit daft, I mean black underneath with the red on top, so I bought the 2 boxes and gave it a go.


So I set about seperating my hair out, not easy, I used a tail comb to roughly separate each half & tied the top bit up hence:

What an attractive look huh?

So I applied the Blue Black to the bottom half with the aid of a tinting brush and croc clipped it out of the way. I then started to apply the Infrared, I could really have done with another box of it as even though I was only doing half my hair the bottle only gave half as much dye as the blue black!




I was a little apprehensive about the ORANGE roots at this point! But there was no going back now.

These hats are available from all Tesco's stores :).

Ok so after 20 minutes was up I rinsed out, dried off and straightened and was quite pleasantly surprised by the result, the "orange" had mellowed into more of the red it promised and the black makes a really nice contrast poking out underneath. I would say that I was hoping for more of a coca cola red than the orangey red so I may in the next couple of weeks put a more cherry red rinse through it to even it out but on the whole I'm pretty pleased with the results.

Unfortunately my bathroom didn't show the red colour too well, I should really have taken some in daylight but I was in my jammies lol, I will try put a photo up in the next blog.



The red really is a lot more vibrant in daylight.


Plus you can see more of the blue tint in the black in the day light too, plus I need my split ends doing badly

Hope you enjoyed my quick hair dye tutorial, remember to ALWAYS patch test. xx

Friday 18 March 2011

Soooo excited, new insrant effect colours!

My little friend on Facebook, Cookie the Barry M bunny has just informed me that there are 3 new colours in the instant effects range!!

Here's the link to the page:

Barry M Instant Nail Effects New Colours Click Me!

Well we've covered VOLCANIC nails, I can't help but think that the white would be perfect for a GLACIAL look with blues underneath, you heard it here first! xx

Thursday 10 March 2011

VOLCANIC NAILS! WITH BARRY M'S INSTANT NAIL EFFECTS POLISH

So as promised in previous blog entries, I'm finally blogging a tutorial/review for Barry M's instant effects nail varnish. It's taken me a little while to do because I wanted to do something original to the many instant effects tuorials already out there. Most people are using just one colour under this to create an animal print type effect but to me the effect has always looked like a volcanic rock so I thought why not try volcanic colours underneath?

The products I used were OPI "get my car reddy", 2true orange and 2true light lime/lemon from Superdrug but you can use any that you want and in fact a neon orange and yellow would be ideal as it would show through stronger.



I started off with the red and just painted the bottom of the nail, you don't have to be neat as the instant effects covers it very well.




I then applied my orange, again dont worry about straight lines or going over the red a bit.




And finally the yellow at the top, this would be a pretty neat look in itself if I've painted the lines straight.




So finally I applied the instant effects, it really is a little bit trial and error with the thickness but don't be afraid to put a good thick coating on as it can look a bit weak if you only put a thin coat on. There are loads of Youtube videos that will show you the product turning from a n all over black coat to it's crackle finish, panacea81 or lauren luke's one is good as she has a proper camera and lighting unlike me :)

Here's a pic of the final volcanic lava effect, apologies for the poor quality of pic and also I did this really quick so it could be neater but the colours in daylight really do pop.



I would definately try different colours as well, the instant effects gives the overall look of a gradient effect which is really cool.

One final point I would make is that the instant effects leaves a very matt finish to the nail, I wouls use a top coat to seal the colours in but also to help prevent chipping.

You can buy Barry M's instant nail effects from Superdrug, Boots (good for advantage points) and directly from the Barry M website .

Again, I don't get paid or endorse any particular brand for money, all my opinions are my own.

Hope you all enjoyed my little tutorial/review. xx

Saturday 26 February 2011

Saturday Goody Bag Time!

Well, it's Saturday & I've been to Claire's again and bought my Saturday goody bag for £3. Bit disappointed though as there were only a few left :(

Here's what I got in it:


The eyebrow ring will be going on ebay as I don't have an eyebrow piercing, free listing this weekend too! Loving my rainbow star bracelets & owl phone sock though.

It was also their sale so I bought these as well:


This caught my eye as it reminded me of Fable 3 as it looked very industrial.

I also bought...

Just because they were cute really. I'm going to get myself a load of fimo and bits & bobs to try make my own similar jewelry and will sell them on etsy so watch this space for my up and coming etsy shop!

Also coming soon, my personal review and tutorial of the new Barry M instant effects nail varnish, there's also a great video by panacea81 aka Lauren Luke on tube, she has some great vids so check her out. xx

Sunday 20 February 2011

My Fave T-shirt ever!

HI! Those who know me know that I am a huge fan of the "Fable" game series to an almost obsessional level.

The thought occurred to me that it might neat to have some Fable merchandise to deepen my love of the series. Imagine my deep joy when I discovered that there is a line of t-shirts that you can buy!!! So I set about my search through google shopping expecting them to be around £20 like most band or film t-shirts when I came acroos the play website selling them for £4.99 with free delivery! (At this point I almost exploded with consumer delight!

Here's a pic of the said t-shirt (I also bought the busy hands one too)



Still losing the baby weight btw in case anyone wonders :)

The great thing is that you can still buy these for the same price here: & don't forget the quidco if you do that:

http://www.play.com/Clothing/T-Shirts/4-/17405878/Fable-3-Men-Obey-Or-Die/Product.html

Saturday 19 February 2011

Barry M Touch of Magic Lip Paint Review!

Right! Enough procrastinating with goody bags and starmix and onto a proper make-up review. I've been eyeing up this product in Boots for ages and I've finally decided to give it a whirl.


So what is it? It's basically a lip stain that colours you lips according to the alkali levels of your lips. It looks apple green but goes on in various shades of pink & lasts for up to 8 hours. It's worth noting here that you won't get a true impression of the colour by testing on your hand, when I did it looked bright Barbie pink and because it's a lip stain, it's still on my hand and won't come off!!



It cost £4.49 but as I got it from Boots, I paid with my amassed Boots Advantage card points making it essentially free! You can also buy direct from the Barry M website here:

www.barrym.com/touch-of-magic-lip-paint

Thisi s what Barry M have to say about the product:
"A waterproof formula with added Aloe Vera stays on for up to 8 hours. Depending on the alkali level of your lips, determines just how pale or rich the colour will go."

I think the added aloe vera is what makes the formula so smooth & easy to apply, I think 8 hours on the lips without reapplication is a bit of a fib, I'd say more like 4-5 but this is still much better than ordinary liipys.

This is a video of me trying it out on my lips, there are also many more video reviews of this product and probably with better lighting:



If you are looking for a more long lasting lip stain that doesn't dry out (I'm thinking of the Lipfinity ones that crack horribly here) then the colorsport gold ones are excellent, they are now quite hard to get hold of but ebay usually have them, they do tend to be more pinky coloured than is stated on the shade description but this maybe something to do with my own personal ph levels.

Hope you enjoyed this little review. If I've left anything out or you have any comments please pop them into the comments box below. xx

My Saturday Haul!

Well, it's Saturday and I've been into town in search of goodies. Here is what I bought on my epic quest for more stuff!


First off is the hair products I bought for up & coming hair project:


Also on the left, I managed to get 4 lush headbands for £2.50 from Internacionale!

Next up is the Barry M products I bought to do reviews on (video coming up next.)

I bought the touch of magic lipstick & their new Instant nail effects nail varnish top coat.

Then I went Claire's for my usual pink goody bag & noticed they had the big white goody bags too! Double goody bag joy!!

So starting with the usual pink one here's what I got:

Not so keen on the white "Cliff Richard" glasses but as you can see below, the kitten seems to like them :)

So now onto the exciting big white goody bag!!


As you can see there's loads of really good stuff, the gloves look blue under my LED kitchen lights but they're actually a cool purple! I got both bags for £3 each and there must be about £40 worth of stuff in each!!

Again, not so keen on the little top hat but someone else was:

And finally, my usual Saturday foodie treats, including the starmix I plan on shrinking the bags for keyrings :)


Well, that's my Saturday haul, I hope you enjoyed nosing through my goodies lol!
Coming up next is my review on the Barry M Touch of Magic, green to pink lipstick. xx

Thursday 17 February 2011

The Cosmetic Kitten takes five!

After a hard day's shopping & dancing, the Cosmetic Kitten catches 40 winks xx

Wednesday 16 February 2011

Make-up Tip of the day!

Here's the Cosmetic Kitty Tip of the day:

To give a nice crisp smudge free line, keep your eye & lip liners in the freezer until needed. xx

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Tuesday 15 February 2011

Old School Fun!!


Ok so as today has been really rainy & miserable I decided to have some indoor fun!
I bought a packet of marshmallows from our home bargains shop yesterday for 30p & I'm ashamed to say that I ate them all without realising whilst playing Viva Pinata, anyway I decided the packet was just too cute to throw out so I decided to make myself a keyring out of it.

Here is a photo of the said packet with a marker pen for scale:



I usually make the keyring hole using a hole punch but I couldn't find it so I just cut a hole through it:



 Next I put it on top of a piece of foil on top of a baking tray, I use a pizza tray as the holes in it help distribute the heat better.


 Pop in the oven on around 250 degrees C until the packet won't shrink any smaller. Carefully remove (it will be boiling hot so be careful) and leave to harden and cool. Here's how mine ended up:
 I then put a keyring chain through the premade hole:

It IS quite large for a keyring as it was a fairly big bag to begin with (a rule of thumb when doing this is that the bag shrinks to about a third of the original size). If you wanted something cute and smaller, I would try using the little packets from the haribo starmix multipack bags but I didn't have any to hand today so used the mallow bag instead. I might actually get some starmix in for my next rainy day, plus what a great excuse to nom more sweeties! xx

Sunday 13 February 2011

Barry M Dazzle Dust Vs. Collection 2000 - Lilac

Kicking off with the high end versus budget cosmetic comparison review, I decided to test out 2 loose powder eyeshadows in a shimmery lilac colour.

The first product I chose was a Dazzle Dust by Barry M in shade number "31".  Barry M is mostly known for their Dazzle dust eyeshadows in a wide range of colours & I have been buying them personally for around 4 years now. At the time of writing, these are being sold at Superdrug for £4.59 each and are currently on offer at 2 for £6.99.

The 2nd product is Collection 2000's Dazzle me eye dust in "Stonewash/No. 16" & is being sold in Superdrug for £2.99.

Whilst it is currently more economical to buy the 2 Barry M dazzle dusts for £6.99, ordinarily when this offer isn't on it is cheaper to buy the Collection 2000 product. Plus if you wanted to buy either at Boots with your Boots points, the Collection 2000 works out a better deal.

I was unable to get the product weights for either product but you can see the difference in size in the photo below and you can see that you get a lot more product for your money with the collection 2000 product on the right.




As you can see, both are pretty much identical in colour, but the Collection 2000 product has the advantage of having a handy shaker dispenser, this makes it easier to dispense the right amount of product (simply shake upside down when the lid is on and unscrew the lid, there will be product on the shaker ready to apply with your brush) but also prevents loss of product if it is accidentally tipped over (as Cosmetic Kitten AKA Daisy is prone to do.)

On with the testing.

I first applied Benefit's Lemon Aid all over each eyelid, this is both a fantastic eyeshadow primer but also great as a corrector and will even out any redness anywhere on the skin. It also really helps shimmery or glittery pigment hold for a long time.

I decide to apply each product with a slightly damp brush as not only does this help the shadow to stick and last a long time but it also helps prevent fall out and keeps the product where it should be.

I started off with the Barry M product on my left eye. It was easy to pick up with the damp brush but I was very nervous about knocking the whole pot over. It went on smoothly but required about 3 coats to see the lilac colour. As you can see from the photo below, it's more of a lilac shimmer than glitter.




As you can see, the colour is much more subtle than it looks in the pot, and is more shimmery when applied than it's glittery appearance.

So now onto the second eye using the Collection 2000 product.

I found this much easier to dispense as it comes with it's handy shaker top and it only needed 2 coats to get the same colour as the other eye, however, i did have a lot more fallout than the Barry M one as it is very glittery. I found myself  having to dab the excess fallout off from under my  eye with a tissue.


As you can see, this one is a lot more glittery and you can still see some of the fallout beneath my eye.





Please excuse my blotchy skin and eyebrows lol :)

In conclusion then, both are very similar indeed and both are also against testing on animals which is a bonus. But I would probably choose to buy the Collection 2000 product as it was cheaper, you get more product for your money and lasted just as long as the Barry M product, however, if you are not a fan of glitter then definately go for the Barry M product, especially whilst it is on offer at £6.99 for 2, they have a great range of shades to pick your 2nd colour.

Hope you enjoyed this product review and comparision, if you have any comments please feel free to leave them below & if you would like to be alerted by email of my new reviews etc please click the subscribe link.

Thanks for reading! xx

Hi Everyone & Welcome to my first blog!!!

THE KITTY MISSION STATEMENT:

I will mostly be blogging beauty reviews and video tutorials but there will also be my own personal random ramblings thrown in too including shopping hauls and general musings.

Getting back to the all important beauty element of this blog,  I'm going to try show you how to achieve key looks for less using ranges like Collection 2000, Rimmel & even bathroom cabinet staples like Vaseline!

Where my small budget permits, I will try to compare the high end expensive products against their budget equivalents to see what the difference is - if any!

Why spend £20 on 1 lipstick when you can spend £2 on one that's virtually identical and buy even more lush beauty products with the savings!!

Feel free to leave comments and ideas & if you have any requests, click the email me button under my profile.

Enjoy! XX