Wish Upon A Breakout

Before I start let me make a disclaimer.  I am a huge fan of Soap & Glory, huge fan. My go to shower gel and body scrub are both S&G products and I can't see that ever changing.

I don't generally get breakouts. And by generally, I mean ever. I mean I will get the odd spot, but that is literally it, one. And it will usually be on my chin or jaw line as a result of drinking too much alcohol, ...and I rarely drink any alcohol. So, I am panicking at what I am experiencing, and I don't know what to do to fix my skin.

Wish Upon A Jar is a 21 day collagen overhaul moisturiser. The S&G websites says:

"Our unique formula contains a potent mix of shea butter, tetrapeptides, antioxidants and oxygen boosters to help boost moisture levels, smooth fine lines and wrinkles, brighten tired skin and hide flaws."

 My fine lines are not smoothed, my face is glowing red and in short I look like a pizza. 

Did I mention how I never get breakouts?!

I emailed S&G to ask advice. I had a very contradictory email back that basically said it was too potent for my skin, which I don't entirely believe because my fine lines haven't improved in the slightest.

This is how much I had used during the 21 days:

And this how it applies - super thick.

It smelled like chocolate orange so I'm super sad that it didn't do as it was supposed to on my poor little face.

If anyone else has had a problem with this I would love to hear about it.... Alternatively if anyone could suggest any way to speed up the healing process or a tried and tested method for getting rid of spots please bring that information to my attention!

Charlotte xx

Tweezy (Like Sunday Morning).

I hate Sundays. 98% of the time I have to be in work in under 24 hours, and its also a whole day closer to Monday than Saturday is.

But, being the mature grown up that I am I suck it up and get on with my life and try to enjoy the time I get to spend at home with all my lovely things... I have a Sunday ritual, I'm sure we all do! Throughout the week I'll continue to moisturise, and apply pore strips and facemasks and keep everything in working order, but Sunday is the day it all comes together and it's like pressing the reset button in order to be brand new and shiny for a miserable Monday morning.

It feels as though this may become a series! The Sunday Ritual Series... Stay tuned!

Today's ritual is the art of the eyebrow. I love time dedicated purely to removing unsightly hair and reshaping my eyebrows to within an inch of their existence. If I'm feeling super lazy, I'll combine everything and usually end up tweezing half heartedly in the bath, with a face mask on. Other times, on days like today, I'll stem my face for 5-10 minutes with boiling water and a few drops of tea tree oil, then pop a pore trip on my nose (and my chin if needs be) and get to work.

I use a magnifying mirror to get every little hair. It's difficult because, as I'm sure all my fellow ginger headed blonde facial haired babes will confirm, I have standard eyebrow hair, but along with that I have really fine, really infuriating white blonde hairs that look like peach fuzz. They hurt like absolute Heck to tug out, even with the steaming.

If I can be bothered with the fiddling of heating and keeping it hot then I use this thing of beauty to get the peach fuzzies.

Picture courtesy of Google.

If I'm just wanting to get in and get it done then this is my kit of choice:

The scissors are fantastic. I think it's important to keep eyebrows from looking unruly. If they're perfectly plucked but long and straggly and forming their own combover then it ruins any look you were originally going for.

Top tip for avoiding any redness immediately after plucking: pop some Benefit BooBooZap on a cotton bud and run it over the newly exposed skin. Unf. So soothing.

Do you have a set date or time do certain things? Or any sunday rituals  (that I can "encorporate" into mine)?

C x

Fingertips of a Femme Fatale.

Look at that colour. Aint she a beaut'?  I'm aware I can be more than a bit of a Negative Nancy where most products are concerned but I think my love for this nail polish can easily make up for any misery-tainted-past-posts!

It's L'Oreal Colour Riche in 403 Femme Fatale and it had me at the bottle. I always (where available) opt for a travel size over a full size were nail varnish is concerned, I get bored very easily, wasting my money isn't what I'm about.

It took two coats to become thick, opaque, and beautifully glossy. I didn't need to do any tidying up! The formula seemed to be magic on my fingers, knowing which gaps to fill, and where to not go. It wasn't the fastest drying polish I've ever tried but I can make my peace with that for a finish like this.

It lasted full and intact for about 4 days before my index finger chipped... When I went to pull off the shard of polish that was sticking out at an angle I managed to pull the entire finger off in one sheet! Not to everyones taste I understand, but for me that is a quality nothing short of glorious. The rest of the polish followed swiftly after and I was left sitting at my desk with a fingernail shaped pile of red next to me, and super clean fingernails.

 B-E-A-Utiful.

Really, really, late February empties and a beauty Haul.

First up: empties.
I'm not going to list everything, it's all pretty self explanatory boring stuff!

Gee whizz, that's more than I thought it was. That's the problem with keeping your empties in a box under the bed and slotting any new ones in through the top. You never get to see the mountain grow. That is not a saying. I should probably delete that. There is no need for it.

Special shout out to these things I'm tossing, too:

It's a shimmery body lotion that smelled really pleasant when I first bought it, but I recently rediscovered it and realised it had started to smell like fish. A little lesson for all of us there, body lotions are unlikely to keep phresh (yep. Phresh.) for five years while hiding out in a drawer. The grotty rag it's hiding in has been my make up bag for equally as long, but I've recently treated myself to a new one so bye bye bacteria.

And now. The exciting bit. My beauty haul! This is what I indulged in during a trip to Cardiff two weeks ago.

Waaaaah so many beautiful things! I'm particularly excited about trying out the Aveda goodies, in an attempt to tame my unreal amounts of ginger frizz...

Look. Look at it shining in all its glory. A true king of the jungle.

Something else I got as well was this Ollie & Nic bag. While not strictly a beauty item, it was an anniversary gift from my chap. And I absolutely adore it!

My very first Essie experience.

I know, I know, you're all tearing your hair out, screeching at the screen "WHAT! How? Why!?"

To put it politely, I just don't care for nail varnish too much. I'd love to just wear glitter constantly, day in, day out. Alas, my nails are everything nails shouldn't be and it just doesn't work.

My second favourite thing to wear on my nails is pastel pink. It not very me, but I think it's classy and I can't get enough. So, I thought Essie's We're In It Together would have been perfect.

I hated everything about it. I'm usually fairly messy with my nails, slapping it on and if I get specks places other than my nails, it's usually my fault and I can deal with that. The consistency of this was.... Weird. I painted it onto my nail, carefully, and then it just oozed off, over my cuticles and fingertips. Attractive.

Also, it took two or three coats to look like the colour in the bottle. And when it dried it went all bumpy, which is normally a sign I need to throw that particular bottle away.... You can kind of see what I mean on my thumb in this picture:

Not cool. I have another Essie polish in my drawer called Ballet Slippers, I believe. I may give that a go, but I'm entirely underwhelmed by my first Essie experience.

Was it something I did wrong?

Becoming healthy - fighting to get to a weight that makes me happy.

If anyone follows me on Twitter or Instagram (both @hitnmiff is anyone is interested) you will have been bombarded by pictures of various meats, beans, and egg creations. I am on the Four Hour Body Diet. The basic idea is you eat food that are slow carbs. It's easier to say what you can eat than what you can't; beans, lentils, eggs, meat, fish, and pre approved veg are go. Everything else is no (although you get a cheat day once a week, where there are no rules. Like, NO rules. In the book, Ferriss gives an example of what he eats one cheat day and it wracks up to a good bazillion+ kcal.)

This is the book that's charged with helping me get to a happy weight. Come at me #4HB!

My handsome chap and I have tried this before.... With little success on my part. He found me on my knees in the kitchen on the first day, clutching a jar on Nutella. I missed sugar, and I don't think the diet was quite right for me at that time. Sometimes I suffer from a condition called Gastroparesis, which basically means that my stomach just doesn't digest food sometimes. I'll eat, and it will just sit in there for days, causing me incredible, incredible pain and constant feeling of nausea. I had a bad bout in 2011 with lasted for about 3-4 months, so that was 3-4 months of just living off easily digested foods like yoghurts, milkshakes, scrambles eggs... I don't know if there's any correlation there but it was literally a game of eat and wait. If it didn't make me ill, it went onto the "go" list. I lost quite a substantial amount of weight as a result of that, shrinking from a size 16 to a size 12, and weighing under 10 stone for the first time in my life. I was still at that weight the first time I tried this, so I didn't pour my heart and soul into it.

This time though, I'm trying to do it right. We started on Monday, I haven't slipped at all. I should be drinking a lot more water but I'm having difficulty keeping that one up (I realised today I hadn't drank any water for about 4 days, only coffee and Redbush tea! Eek!) I'm so excited for Cheat Day on Saturday I could squeal, and also eat my duvet!

I've had some annoying people doing the whole "why are you dieting?" thing... I can't fit into my clothes. When I discovered I could fit into a size 12, I basically threw everything into a charity shop bag with tears of joy cascading down my face, and now I can't do my jeans up. So that's why.

A brief photo gallery of my size:

The top picture is from my Uni graduation July 2010 on the right, and October 2012, on the left.
The bottom is from my friend Allie's birthday, 6 months after graduation. During which time I had clearly decided food was still a way to soothe me.

This is kind of my aim, I'd like to get back to around this size, where a 12 was comfortable, and my buttons didn't burst open when I sat down.

This skirt is a size 10. A size 10! I bought it in college in 2006, and managed to get it on in around November 2012 for the first time! Doesn't fit me at the moment. Obv.

Finally... The before. This is what I'm hoping to use as my before picture. I say hoping because in order to do that I will need to actually stick to my diet and actually keep going to the gym. I haven't weighed myself because that's not really important to me. Size isn't really important to me either. My ultimate goal is a streamlined physique. I don't want to be skinny, or thin. I want curves and I want to learn how it feels to have a waist! And, I want to be able to wear my clothes again. I'm sick of stretchy cardigans.

I was getting dressed, and had a Beyonce sing and dance and took a picture.... In case you were wondering.


I am in no way saying that any size is better for everyone. As long as your happy and healthy and fabulous then what does it matter? 

It's serum. Serum for your eyelashes.

I am a sucker for anything that promises impossible results.

It is - drdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdr - Renewal Lash Serum by L'Oreal Paris. On second thoughts, that drumroll didn't translate too well into writing.

I have used this before and saw no results, but to be honest I wasn't looking for them. I saw a bucket of them reduced from something obscene like £11 to £3 in Tesco's so, naturally, my thought process was "well, that was certainly not a memorable product. I will spend my hard earned money on another." And I think I'm glad I did!

My eyelashes are blonde. Like, if I haven't got mascara on, you can't see them. I've noticed the ends are looking more... fluttery and full after using this for a just a week! I read somewhere that you could get thicker lashes from putting vaseline on them before bed, which I did every night for maybe a year. The only thing I noticed was the slight dent appearing in the top of my vaseline.

It's an odd wand, kind of like a sideways smily face. The serum itself is a pretty standard serum consistency, and a pretty standard serum milky white colour. The unusual thing I've noticed, both times I've bought it is that I can't actually find any instructions... I'm layering it on prior to bedtime and just letting it work it's magic. If anyone knows how to actually use it and could give me any tips, it would be appreciated....