February Favourites

Hi everyone! I actually cannot  believe we are at the end of February this has honestly been the fastest start to the year ever! I think because I'm so busy with university time just keeps going by so quickly, I feel like before I know it, it will be the end of May and I will be done (the thought of that makes me want to cry with happiness). It's not been the best month actually just because of university stress but I've been booking lots of fun things for this year to keep me going. Alongside everything else that's been going on I've been trying a few different products this month and there is definitely some that I have been absolutely loving! I really love writing favourites posts actually and I also love reading them, so I'll share mine and I'd love to read yours too so if you want to link your favourites down below I'll give them a read!

- Noir Tease by Victoria's Secret (50ml £38.24). I already own a Victoria's Secret perfume and I did like it, however when I was in London I smelt this and seriously fell in love, it's amazing! It's a warm fragrance with notes of black vanilla, frozen pear and blooming gardenia. I definitely think it's more of a fruity fragrance which I love, quite sweet but not sweet at the same time if you get me? You can tell describing scents isn't one of my skills, I think you just need to smell it to understand how nice it is! Plus it comes with one of those really cool spritzers that you squeeze to get the perfume out, I don't know the name but I always liked these for some reason. I've been wearing this so much this month so if you love fruity perfumes like me you should definitely give this a try.

- Nars Orgasm blush (£23). I'm really not adventurous when it comes to blush shades and I will always play it safe and go for the pretty pinks/nudes, and if you're like me then this blush is honestly perfect for you. I've been wearing it everyday for the whole month really, it's such a gorgeous rose gold shade, I think it's so flattering and would work for lots of skin tones. It's not cheap at all so if anyone has any good dupes for me I'd love to know them! There will be swatches pictured below by the way so you can see how pretty this is, I wish it was Spring now because I think this is the perfect Spring blush, so it just gives me an excuse to use it more soon!

- OGX Weightless Hydration Coconut Water shampoo (£6.99). I've honestly got the driest hair ever, it's most likely my use of straighteners everyday because my hair needs taming very bad in the morning and this is such a savior. I actually bought this when I went on holiday last year and used it really quickly and I recently purchased it again and smelling it instantly made me feel like I was in Cape Verde all over again, I love how you can trigger memories like that so quickly and it made me love it even more. It's really hydrating and it honestly smells amazing, it's got such a coconutty tropical scent, plus it's only £6.99 and it's really good quality so it's one I would definitely recommend.

- The Body Shop Strawberry Body Polish (£5 75ml). Exfoliating is something I really need to do more of because my skin is so dry, especially in the Winter, I've been reaching for this strawberry body scrub from The Body Shop so much this month, it honestly smells amazing and it isn't harsh at all on the skin but it still feels like it's doing the job. I'm absolutely obsessed with all of the strawberry products from The Body Shop to be honest, I got a strawberry gift set for Christmas and it's feeding my obsession, it just smells so gorgeous! Again this is really affordable as well and if you don't like strawberries they have lots of different scents for you to try. I'm so desperate to try more Body Shop products, I really want the Bouncy Sleeping Mask!

- Vichy Dermablend Foundation* (£18). I've done a review post on this foundation if you'd like to read it here and ever since I wrote that post I've been reaching for this basically every day. It's the perfect shade for me while I'm pale and even though I normally stay away from full coverage because my skin is so dry, I find this has more of a satin finish than matte so with a moisturising primer works really well, plus the staying power is so good! 

- The Body Shop Shea Body Butter (£14 200ml). Another Body Shop product but I have seriously been obsessed with them this month! I don't have the 200ml size of this I have the 50ml as I got a set of the body butters for free when I spent over a certain amount in store. I never normally go for these scents as I find them quite boring, I always go for the fruity ones however this smells absolutely amazing! I've nearly used all of it, it's so moisturising but not in a greasy way and I just love the smell, so if you get the chance I would definitely try this. 

- Charlotte Tilbury Lip Cheat in Pillow Talk (£16). I'm really not a lip liner girl, I honestly rarely ever use them (I actually only own two) however I've been so obsessed with this CT one this month, I just think they're so creamy and the shade is so gorgeous, especially when paired with Bitch Perfect. It's such a nice shade for this time of year and the quality is lovely, it's pricey but since I only own two I thought I'd buy it as a treat!

- Makeup Geek Eye Shadows in Cinderella & Cupcake (£4.95 each). These two shades are honestly my new obsession! I did a haul of all the Makeup Geek eye shadows I bought which you can read here however these two shades totally stood out to me, they're my ideal shades, anything pink is an ideal eye shadow to me to be honest! The quality is so good and I love them paired together, they really make me not want to wear any other colours at the minute I'm so in love with them!

Left to right: Nars Orgasm, MUG Cupcake, MUG Cinderella, CT Pillow Talk

I also have a brand new header on my blog which I'm so happy with, it was designed by the lovely Jemma who you can find here, she was so great at designing exactly what I wanted so if you're thinking about getting a blog header designed I would definitely recommend her. I also have created a Twitter account just for my blog which I'd love for you to follow! You can find me at @LaurenAshBarden. I'm honestly so excited to have finally set one up just for my blog, it's been quite a fun blog related month actually. I was worried I would neglect my blog because I've been so busy with uni but I have found the time here and there which is great. Let me know in the comments what you've been loving this month!

* Post contains PR sample however all opinions are my own

MAC Lipstick Collection

MAC lipsticks should definitely be labelled as addictive, I'm sure I'm not the only one who has bought one, fell in love with them and needed more and more! I absolutely love reading these posts because they give me so many ideas of what MAC lipsticks I need next, I definitely don't have the biggest collection but I thought I'd share the MAC lipsticks I do have to hopefully inspire you to find some more colours you like. Plus I've kind of been neglecting them recently and reaching for other products, however doing this post definitely rekindled my love and I can't wait to start using them again! It's kind of shameful how new some of these are though, my boyfriend says that I have a fear of using things up and he's so right! I absolutely hate coming to the end of products because I find repurchasing no where near as fun as buying something new, so to avoid coming to the end of some of my best loved products I will stop using them, it's honestly such a bad habit I hope I'm not alone here?! 

The shades I have are:

- Angel (Frost). 

- Creme Cup (Cremesheen). 

- Royal Ball (Lustre).

- Call The Hairdresser (Lustre) 

- Blankety (Amplified).

- Velvet Teddy (Matte).

- Craving (Amplified).

- Sunny Seoul (Cremesheen).

- Koi Coral (Cremesheen).

- Flamingo (Lustre).

- Impassioned (Amplified).

Left to right: Angel, Creme Cup, Royal Ball

Left to right: Call The Hairdresser, Blankety, Velvet Teddy, Craving

Left to right: Sunny Seoul, Koi Coral, Flamingo, Impassioned

This post has definitely kick started my love again for MAC lipsticks, I definitely do have my favourites though! Blankety is definitely my favourite out of all of the ones I own by far, if I had to recommend just one it would definitely be this one. However I do have a soft spot for Creme Cup, it's just such a gorgeous pink and I think it would suit so many skin tones. It's so funny thinking back to the first MAC lipstick you bought, mine was Sunny Seoul and it reminds me so much of being on holiday in Mexico because I wore it absolutely loads there, definitely a perfect summer shade. Some of these are limited edition, Royal Ball was part of the Cinderella collection which was so difficult to get my hands on which is why it looks so new because I'm scared to use it since when it's gone it's gone. It's so obvious that I love my pinks from this post, I need to be more adventurous! I haven't bought a MAC lipstick in a while though so I'd love if you could comment below your favourites for me to have a look at because I'd love to get a few more!

Makeup Geek Haul

Hi everyone! I feel like I have been doing lots of posts on eye shadows recently, it's turning into a bit of an addiction! I'm going to try and be good after this and not buy anymore for a while, however the Makeup Geek shadows I'm talking about in this post were a birthday present so I'm trying not to feel guilty about owning more! I've wanted to try Makeup Geek eye shadows for so long now, you seem to only hear good things about them so when I received some for my birthday in a Z Palette I was so excited!

The Z Palette is the small size bought from Beauty Bay for £8.95, I definitely want to invest in a bigger one soon so I can grow this collection, this small palette fits 9 eye shadows so it's really good if you are first trying some shadows and don't know if you will be wanting anymore, it's such a nice travel size as well. I think I will definitely be relying on this when I take trips anywhere, you can choose from pink, black and leopard print, there is more patterns in the other palette sizes but this was the choice for the small palette when I picked mine. I think I'd quite like the large palette next, however there is also a medium and extra large palette to choose from.  

I picked the 9 eye shadows that I got myself, it's quite hard when you are choosing them actually because there is SO much choice. I definitely recommend looking at swatches online to choose what you want because the Beauty Bay site doesn't really represent how the colours look in real life, I tried to be sensible when I was choosing and pick a range of mattes, shimmers and foils because I am so obsessed with shimmery eye shadow and I had to convince myself to get some matte shades because they definitely are essentials! The shades I got are:

- Shimma Shimma. Shimmery pale beige.

- Cinderella. Pale shimmery pink.

- Cupcake. Matte warm pink.

- Cosmopolitan. Rose gold with gold flecks and a shimmery finish.

- Cocoa Bear. Matte reddish brown.

- Peach Smoothie. Light peach beige with a soft matte finish.

- Starry Eyed (foiled). Light champagne beige with slight pink undertones.

- In The Spotlight (foiled). Soft pink with coral undertones.

- Grandstand (foiled). Medium rose gold with slight taupe undertones.

Left to right: Shimma Shimma, Cinderella, Cupcake

Left to right: Cosmopolitan, Cocoa Bear, Peach Smoothie

Left to right: Starry Eyed, In The Spotlight, Grandstand

I am absolutely obsessed with this brand now! I can totally see what all the hype is about, the pigmentation is so good and the best thing to me is just the really large shade range and the chance to build your own little personalised palettes. It is so addictive though, you just constantly want to build up your collection because the quality is so nice. The foiled shadows are in my opinion the best quality, however this is reflected in the fact they are more expensive. On Beauty Bay the standard eye shadows are priced at £4.95 where as the foiled shadows are priced at £7.95. The mattes and shimmers are still really impressive though, I was actually surprised I was able to get my hands on Cocoa Bear because this shade is very popular, what I will say about this shade though is that it isn't as pigmented as the rest, it's still good quality but to me it is outshone by some of the other shades, I think the reason it is so popular is because the actual colour is so nice and so wearable. I'ts really hard to me to pick a favourite shade because I love them all! I think if I had to choose I'd say Starry Eyed, Cinderella and Cupcake, they're so pretty and wearable. 

It's really funny when you do start building a collection it's blatantly obvious what your go to shades are, you can definitely see I love my pinks, neutrals and shimmers. If you are considering trying Makeup Geek I would definitely recommend, the quality really is so good, the same as if not better than some high end brands, plus as I said before it's so fun building up your own little personalised collection. I really want more and I definitely plan on buying some more in the future, it's nice because they are affordable so you don't have to splurge too much on them, you've been warned though they are very addictive! Let me know in the comments if you've tried Makeup Geek and what your favourite shades are!

My 21st Birthday

Hi everyone! It was my 21st birthday on Sunday and I'm actually quite sad to be writing this post because it means my birthday is over and that is such an awful thought, I get so sad every year when my birthday is over I don't know if anyone else feels like this too? Anyway I thought I would do a little post on how I spent the day and let you know what I got up to! I apologise for the picture quality by the way as most of these photos were taken on my phone, and there is also some very random photos that I thought I'd add in anyway.

I actually stayed at my boyfriend's house this year on the night before my birthday instead of waking up at home just because it would feel so much more like my birthday there with all his family to celebrate with, I was so ill on the Saturday night though, I went bowling with my boyfriend, my Mum, my sister, brother and brother-in-law and it was hard to enjoy it properly because I had the WORST migraine so it put a massive dampener on my birthday eve! I woke up there anyway and we had a really nice chill morning where his Mum cooked breakfast for us and I opened my presents. Since it was my 21st I just got money off everyone apart from my boyfriend who got me a few bits, including the prettiest Tiffany necklace which I didn't know I was getting, by far my favourite present! The whole morning was quite chilled really, I just went back home to see my Dad and my Nana and also popped by my Mum's house then I packed my case because I was going with Matty (my boyfriend) to a hotel in Durham called Ramside Hall. I've actually done a post on this hotel before because we go all the time, it's definitely our chilled happy place, it's such an amazing hotel and if you're in the North East I would definitely suggest you go!

We had a lovely room, they seriously have the nicest bathrooms, I need a stand alone bath when I get my own house they are my favourite things ever! We had a meal booked in their restaurant for 8pm so we just relaxed in the room for ages before I started getting ready.

I was absolutely obsessed with my cake, just wanted to add that in there! It's supposed to look like an ice cream sundae and it's only from Asda as well so I thought that was really good, plus it tastes amazing! I still have half of it left though so I think I'm going to be eating birthday cake for a while.

The hotel has such a nice restaurant called The Rib Room, it's a steak restaurant that does the nicest steak ever, I'd never normally choose to get a steak anywhere else apart from here.

I had the cheddar souffle to start with a chive cream sauce (probably my favourite starter I've ever had), then I had the fillet steak with a blue cheese glaze and hand cut chips and they brought me out a free cheesecake after with a little candle in because they knew it was my birthday which was so lovely! After that I just went back to the room and had a really nice bath and chilled out in the biggest comfiest bed ever, my favourite part of that hotel is definitely the steak and the comfy beds!

I still can't believe I'm 21, it's something you get so excited for and then you blink and it's over, I definitely don't feel like a proper adult yet though! However I did have a massive pick me up this morning when I managed to get Beyonce tickets when she comes to Sunderland on tour, honestly the most stressful situation ever trying to get tickets to something that high demand and I can't believe I actually managed to get them! It's nice to do a little update post like this, they're definitely fun to write, I hope you enjoyed reading it too!

Zoeva Cocoa Blend Palette

I don't know if it's just me that feels like this but I really cannot have too many eye shadows, having a choice is so much more fun, to be honest I've actually turned into a palette addict. I've got so many palettes and I love buying more, the problem is that I never actually get round to using them, so I was having a look through and I found the Zoeva Cocoa Blend palette which was actually a Christmas present and it is so pretty that I made sure to start using it more, so I thought I'd do a little post on my thoughts on this palette and show you some swatches! 

I'd only ever tried Zoeva brushes before this, I love the quality of them and when I saw everyone raving about their eye shadow palettes I asked for one for Christmas, the Cocoa Blend palette was definitely the one that appealed to me the most, I'm so obsessed with warm toned browns and shimmery shades so I needed it! I do also really like the look of the Rose Golden palette so I'd quite like to try this next. You get 10 eye shadows in this palette which are a mixture of mattes, mattes and shimmers and they are a really good size I think, there is 1.5g in each pan plus the pans are quite big, I hate in some palettes where the pans are really small and close together so you get product everywhere! At £15.50 though even before I had tried it I thought it was really good value for money so I'd definitely suggesting having a look at Zoeva's palettes because they've definitely got something for everyone. The packaging is really good as well, it's not the most luxurious however it's nice and slim so perfect for travelling, only downside is that it doesn't have a mirror but this doesn't really bother me as I always use a big mirror anyway. 

I was actually so surprised at the quality of the eye shadows as well, considering the price and because Zoeva is more known for their brushes however some of these shades in my opinion are better than high end brands! I'm not going to say this is consistent throughout the whole palette, as there are two shades which I'm really not keen on but I will talk about them later, however aside from them the quality is so good, very pigmented and easy to blend! The shades you get are:

- Bitter Start. Palest matte nude.

- Sweeter End. Shimmer duo chrome nougat.

- Warm Notes. Glittering cranberry purple.

- Subtle Blend. Metallic deep bronze.

- Beans Are White. Deep cocoa brown matte.

- Pure Ganache. Pure and luxurious metallic gold.

- Substitute For Love. Toffee brown with subtle shimmer.

- Freshly Toasted. Rich mahogany brown.

- Infusion. Matte dark brown infused with gold glitter.

- Delicate Acidity. Berry toned brown shimmer.

Top row left to right: Bitter Start, Sweeter End, Warm Notes, Subtle Blend, Beans Are White

Bottom row left to right: Pure Ganache, Substitute For Love, Freshly Toasted, Infusion, Delicate Acidity

Without a doubt my absolute favourites from this palette are Warm Notes and Pure Ganache, they are by far the best quality, they are so pigmented and just the most gorgeous shades! The two shades that I don't like are Beans Are White and Infusion, they were just far too chalky for me and they took so much work even to show up on a swatch, for me the pigmentation just isn't there plus I tend to stay away from dark shades like this anyway. Delicate Acidity is absolutely gorgeous as well, this is normally something that would scare me off as it is bold however I can't wait to play around with this more and see what I can come up with. I really like Sweeter End as well, it isn't the most bold and takes a little bit of work however it is so pretty, I really want to use Warm Notes on Valentines Day, I think is it is so perfect for a really girly look! I love them all apart from the two mentioned so to me this palette is definitely a must have, it's a really good price and the quality doesn't disappoint. This was bought for me from Beauty Bay where there is also a few more of their palettes on their so they are definitely worth a look, I will 100% be trying more of Zoeva's palettes I can't get over how nice they are. Let me know in the comments if you have tried any of Zoeva's make up and what you think!