listography: Top 5 Beauty Products

I have to confess right here: I have no beauty routine. If something is dirty, I wash it, if it's dry, I moisturise it, if it has a spot, I treat it. End of. I always remember to take my make-up off and clean my teeth. That, if anything, is my Beauty Routine. So I did struggle to name my Top 5 Beauty Products, but here goes.

1). Water.

Yup, I'm an annoying 8 glasses a day girl. I tend to drink more water than anything else. I can tell when I add pop, etc, in because my skin quality goes down the drain.

2). Simple "Vital Vitamin" Day Cream.

It doesn't smell, and it doesn't leave you sticky, which are my two main look-fors in moisturiser. Plus, my big pot was free with a magazine, and I'm still using it, so it lasts a long time too!

3). Johnson & Johnson's face wipes (any flavour, though I like the Dreamy Skin ones below).

 I can't be doing with the cleanse-and-tone thing. I've tried. It's time-consuming and buying two products is (oddly enough) twice as expensive. J&J is one wipe to remove it all. Plus (Handy Hint) save the used wipes to use as throwaway cloths for cleaning your bathroom (or anywhere else) with. You can wash them if you've taken something greasy off with them, which I found out by accident when some of them got into the washing basket.

4). Benefit High Beam.

Highlighter, lip sparkler, eyeshadow (I actually get more compliments using it as eyeshadow than anything else). Downside: ludicrously expensive for the amount you get. But I love it anyway. Fortunately it seems to be an annual freebie on Glamour magazine, so I stock up then at £2/4ml instead of £19/20ml.

5). Mark Smith Magic Drops

Again, ludicrously expensive, but hey, it calms down my hair. Plus, it's usually on 3 for 2 at Boots, whcih is when I stock up like a crazy lady!!

HONOURABLE MENTION:

At some stage I plan on doing a Top 5 Nail Products, but as this is pretty much my only essential beauty product, it certainly deserves a mention!

1). OPI Nail Envy

There is rarely (NEVER) a time that I don't have OPI Nail Envy on my nails. It basically strengthens and conditions your nails, and I love it. I regularly have very long nails, and the strength mainly comes from Nail Envy.

I Re-Decorated!

You might have noticed that I've had a little bit of a Spring-clean and a big redecorate around here! I loved the old background, but none of the available text colours would show up on all of it. So, sadly, it had to go. Also, Mum and Dad bought me a sock set a couple of years ago that is brown and different shades of pink, and I love the colour combination. :)

Anyway...

Today, I have achieved. It took a lot of work. Literally weeks of work. And the expense...well. Crazy stuff. But, eventually, I have achieved my goal.

Yup, a Kermit backpack will be winging (flippering?!) it's way to me ASAP.

Who's That Girl...

I LOVE Zooey Deschanel's new show, "New Girl".

Every time we watch "New Girl", however, my husband gets a Look. Several times throughout the show he looks at the TV, looks at me, and then does The Look. It's a mingled look of fear, amusement, and recognition. He denies it, but it's there.

When pressed for further information he revealed that this is because "New Girl" is "...like living with you".

I can see how that works...

Listography: 5 Reasons I Know I'm A...

Once again this idea is courtesy of Kate Takes 5 who has, by the means of the handy "Subscribe" linky on her page, managed to get me to stick to an idea for this blog for more than two days. Thanks Kate! :D

So, "5 Reasons I Know I'm A..." well, first I have to decide what I am (no suggestions please!!). I couldn't decide, so I'll be running with this one for a few days. Up first...

5 Reasons I Know I'm A(n)...Adult

 

 

1). Getting post is nowhere near as fun as it used to be.

I used to wait eagerly for the arrival of the postman. Now I cautiously push the door open after a day at work, trying to assess the upside-down envelopes on the doormat and save the nice ones until last. An empty doormat is a happy doormat!

2). I get far to excited over white goods.

This fact was brought home to me the Christmas I received my first tumble dryer. After a particularly wet summer (Floods of '07...so I'm not exaggerating when I say particularly wet!) of attempting to dry two people's washing in a very small house I was extremely excited to get the top item on my Christmas list. And then rather worried (and slightly depressed) that the top item on my Christmas list was a tumble dryer.

3). I clean items I never (as a child) realised needed cleaning.
Now I was a pretty with-it child, and I was capable of cooking, doing my own washing, etc, pretty early on. But there were some things I never in a million years would have thought of cleaning, because they were just always clean (thank you, Mum and Dad). These include:

• Inside the fridge/microwave/oven
• The powder/conditioner drawer in the washing machine
• The front door (maybe I just now live in a dusty/polleny area!)
• Skirting boards/door frames
• Water jug
• Draining board

4). Pay Day isn't fun any more.
When I lived at home and my board, PAYG phone and petrol were my only expenses, I LOVED pay day. I would have lists of things that I needed to buy. This list would usually entail make-up, nail polish, handbags, clothes, shoes, gig tickets, etc. I  never quite got around to saving as much as I thought I should. Now I still don't save as much as I think I should, however this is because I'm now less of a happy little worker funding my various spending habits, and more of a delivery person, running between work and my bills.  I pick up the money every pay day, gaze at it fondly, and then take it straight to the bank where it is invariably divided up between enough people to ensure that I never see it again.

5). There is no-one to blame when I run out of clean underwear (AKA...I now have a Wash Day).
I am the laundry person in our house. This can often end badly, moreso when we first got married. Mainly because I was used to my laundry cycles, which were sporadic at best. I did not have time for laundry. I owned a phenominal amount of underwear and other clothes. My husband, however, did not. Hence he would run out of underwear after a week, when I could have easily survived for...well...a considerably longer period of time, let's leave it at that. I have now almost mastered the washing. I say almost, because I still sometimes find myself sat up in the dead of night, waiting for the tumble dryer to finish so that one or both of us has dry work shirts for the next day.

Listography: Top 5 Cookbooks

Now, I debated not doing this Listography, because 1) I don't really cook (yup, there it is, I do not really cook), and 2) when I do cook, I tend to find recipes online.

However, I will still play the listography game.

1) Kirstie Allsopp: Craft

Hush, all of you who are saying "But that, quite clearly, is a craft book!" You are right. BUT it is my favourite craft book in the world. EVER. And, it has recipes in it. So...In yo' face. It's my favourite recipe book too.

2) Busy Woman's Slow Cooker Recipes

I love my slow cooker. LOVE. It's like having a tiny little chef sat in my kitchen. I give it meat and veg and go off to work, and come back to a cooked dinner. Sure, this recipe has a few duds (Sausage Bean Casserole is a phrase no longer uttered in our house).

3) St Michael's All-Colour Freezer Cookery Book

This is from 1970-something, and my Nana gave it to me. There are some great recipes and some really weird ones. But if you want classic cooking, go for a classic cookery book!

Four and five don't technically count as cookery "books" as such, but they are my go-tos for Christmas recipes.

4) BBC Good Food Christmas Magazine





5) Good Housekeeping Christmas Recipes

Four and Five are my must-buys. From late September I start trawling the newsagents, pawing through the "Lifestyle" and "Home" and "Cookery" sections, hunting for The Christmas Food Magazines. I should point out right now that, in all of my almost 28 years, I have never actually been called upon to cook Christmas dinner. However, I like having the knowledge and the recipes close to hand should the need arise.

Given my collection of Christmas food magazines (because of course I can't throw them away, they contain different recipes every year), I can now in theory cater any seasonal event that may arise. Christmas Eve supper, Christmas Day breakfast, dinner and tea, Boxing Day brunch, New Years Eve cocktail evening or supper party, carnivores, vegetarians, vegans, all manner of food intolerances, I am prepared.

The amount of items I have actually made from the Christmas food magazines are few. I much prefer the low-stress, low-calorie option of buying them and spending three months poring over them somewhat obsessively, pointing out mouth-watering dishes (that I will clearly never make) to anyone within earshot.

I love Christmas.





Check It Out! Tie The Knot Creative.

Today's Check It Out! offering...Tie The Knot Creative.

Tie The Knot are very closely related to Hey Cutie! who I featured a couple of weeks ago, which means the same awesome style and great customer service...Yay! :)

I ordered one of these adorable cake-toppers to adorn my family Christmas cake this past Christmas:

Cute Christmas Cake Topper (Deer) [£10]

Mr & Mrs Snowman Cake Topper [£10] 

Christmas Wine Glass Charms [£8]

(Super-cute!!)

 Tie The Knot Creative are for life, not just for Christmas:

Owlways And Forever Wedding Cake Topper [£15]

Invitations, RSVPs and other wedding and event stationery [prices available on request] 

Bird Cage Table Numbers (price available on request).

I am in love with the bird cage table numbers. I would like to get married again, just so that I need some of them. ♥

If you have plans for a big event in 2012 (13...14...15...etc) contact Tie The Knot Creative for some beautiful additions to your special occasion.

If You Go Down To The Woods Today...

We have a few lodgers at our house at the moment. And by "few", I mean "few hundred". And by "lodgers" I mean "stuffed toys". Yes, it's that time of year again: Teddy Toss Time.

That is my conservatory at the moment. I have not-so-affectionately name it "Bear Mountain" (FYI, the bears need the garden chair to be comfortable...Or, I forgot to move it to the garage). In preparation for dealing with Bear Mountain, I have hoovered my entire house, cleaned the bedroom window (and nearly fell out, but that's another story), cleaned the downstairs windows, washed the front door (who does that?!), changed the bed, done all the laundry, and rearranged the kitchen. As you can see, by "preparation for" I mean "avoidance of".

Last week I almost very accurately predicted that I would spend Sunday rocking and muttering about teddy bears in a padded room (a room, most probably, padded by hundreds of soft toys). That was as a result of last minute time-table changes, last-minute dog-sitting, last-minute just about everything, actually, which is oddly ironic considering this year I gave myself a couple of extra weeks to plan, in an attempt to avoid any rushing around. Clearly I work better under the pressure of a 3-4 week panic system I've used in the past!!

It wasn't as bad as I feared, in the end. In fact, it went very well. My auction bidders smashed my personal target of £660 (which was enough to tip the total raised in 6 years over £5000) by donating an astonishing £1384, beating the previous highest amount (£1150) by a considerable sum.

You can see the worthy causes who benefit by checking out the links below:

Amy's House

Sheffield Children's Hospital

Fife Fund for Todd and Olivia Dutiaume

Which just leaves me with my lodgers, who all need un-bagging, sorting, re-bagging, and delivering to their new homes! Which this year include:

Sheffield and Rotherham (and hopefully Barnsley and Doncaster) emergency care facilities

Amy's House Respite Nursery

A variety of church play-groups/nurseries

Shoebox appeals (Operation Christmas Child, etc) for the tiny toys

Scottie's Little Soldiers (hopefully)

Here are a few photographs from previous years:

2006-07: The first year. Also the year a friend and I discovered that, actually, Zambonis are NOT magnetic (leading to me standing in the middle of an office declaring "I can work a magnet!! It's definitely NOT magnetic!!!" after being told I must have been "...doing it wrong." Good times!). Sadly there is a reason more Zambonis are not dressed as teddy bears, that reason being the visibility issues created by giant ears. Hence we have never done it again. (Also, I have a feeling Ice Ice Davy would fall out with me if I made him wear his fluffy ears again).

2006-07: Build-a-Bear, in their sweet generosity, gave us free rein that first year, to build whatever the guys wanted. That was both an enlightening and disturbing experience, as a range of unusually dressed/named animals appeared alongside a glimpse into the minds that dreamed them up! Not that watching a big tough guy painstakingly dress a tiny teddy in a bride outfit (complete with veil, bouquet and garter) before proudly naming her Julia Roberts alters your opinion in anything other than a positive fashion, don't get me wrong. Julia and the monkey, who's name escapes me, stark naked apart from elbow and knee pads, will always stick in my memory from that first year. Them and the little puppy with the happy ears in the pink tutu, which I wanted possibly more than any other toy they've EVER made (and didn't get).

The Build-a-Bear trip is always fun...

2011-12 (Photo Copyright Build-a-Bear Meadowhall)

2010-11

2010-11

2011-12 (Photo copyright Dobson Agency 2012, supplied by Publicasity).

The last photograph is the first time in six years I've actually made it onto the Build-a-Bear shot!

The donated bears also have their own (adorable!) donated jerseys, courtesy of Rhino Sports:

On the night, I always have a team of wonderful kids to collect the bears. I don't want to put detailed photographs of other people's kids online, so here are a blurry couple:

06-07 - The team (and I!) present Molly Hurditch of Amy's House with a teddy.

Thank you to everyone who threw toys, bid on bears, donated items, time, or money to the cause.

I couldn't do it without you all!

~ ♥ ~