New Glasses

I have been after a new pair of glasses for a while now. I've had my Chanel pair, which I wear every day, for almost 5 years now and I fancied a bit of a change. I posted about a bargain pair that I bought in January (here), but I have to admit I barely wear those as I think they make my face/cheeks look even rounder than it already is! I bought this Anna Sui pair from Metsuki.com for a bargainous price of approximately £40 (£29.95 for the frame, £10-ish for the lenses and £2.50 for 2nd class recorded postage), as they were in the sale. Although they're very similar to my Chanel glasses, I was a little undecided about them at first, as they felt quite tight and I wasn't sure if they were too narrow for my face. Now that I've worn them more, I really like them and I love the little butterfly detail on the arms.

Do you wear glasses? Where are your glasses from?

Thank you for reading. xoxo, Joy

*Bought with my own money

Tommy Hilfiger brings Charity and Fashion Together

For the sixth consecutive year, Tommy Hilfiger is partnering with Breast Health International to raise awareness and funds for women who are fighting breast cancer. The bag, modelled by Charlotte Gainsbourg, is true to Tommy Hilfiger's style and is made up of his staple navy blue, red and white, with a twist of rose gold.

The photos and video were shot by none other than Drew Barrymore. Who knew she was so multitalented? In the video, Charlotte reads a poem which was written especially for this initiative, that is very moving and the video can be viewed below:

The bag is already available now in select Tommy Hilfiger stores in Europe, the United Stated, Canada and the Asia Pacific region and £80 from the sale of each limited edition bag will be directly donated to the Fund for Living, a global BHI initiative that provides assistance to women with breast cancer and their families by covering costs that may not be covered by traditional health insurance programs. It can also be bought online here.

xoxo, Joy

*This is a collaborative post. All words and opinions are my own.

Blog Birthday and May Favourites 2012

Hi! Today's post is primarily about my May Favourites, however before we jump into that, I wanted to make a quick announcement...

Image: Google

My little blog turned two earlier this month and I sincerely cannot believe how fast the past two years have flown by! Thank you to all the old and new readers for your continued support. I truly appreciate all of your comments and thank you to those who take the time to read my little blog. To celebrate my blog turning two, I have given the design an overhaul. What do you guys think? For some reason, I couldn't sleep last night and ended up working through the night to make the design perfect and personally, I am rather proud of it :)

Moving onto my May favourites. This month I have been loving a variety of things, ranging from make-up to nail varnish to skincare. I have also included a 'random' favourite of the month too. 

From left to right: American Apparel Nail Lacquer in 'Office' - Rimmel 60 Seconds Nail Polish in 'In Style Coral' - La Roche Posay Effaclar K & Solait Mattifying Face Sun Fluid - H&M gold hair cuff - Garnier Body Tonic Sugar Scrub - NARS Laguna

Sleek Life's a Peach

What products were you loving this month?

Thank you for reading. xoxo, Joy

Collective Haul

I'm sorry I haven't been blogging very regularly lately. I have had writer's block for a while now, which ultimately made me post less as I didn't know what to blog about. I have also been super busy with uni, as I am in my final year (eek!). Hopefully posts will become regular again soon - Probably around March time :)

Today I have a collective haul from the past few weeks to share with you. I say it in the video, but sorry that some of the stuff has been worn! I think it's nice to keep the labels on for hauls, but I can never wait to wear new clothes! Is anyone else like that? Hope you enjoy :)


Thank you for watching. xoxo, Joy

New Glasses

Hey everyone, I'm currently blogging from my iPhone so please excuse if there are any typos or anything!

I have recently been after a new pair of glasses, as my Chanel ones are starting to wear a little after 4 years! When I chanced upon selectspecs.com and saw their budget line had a pair of glasses in a similar style for £6 including the lenses and a scratch resistant coat and UV coating, I couldn't resist! What a bargain! The postage cost £4 and considering they were coming from China, they came in just over a week and came with a plastic glasses case and a cleaning cloth.

One disadvantage of buying online is that you can't try the glasses on, but the site has measurements which you could compare to glasses you already own or try a similar style on in store. Luckily these suit me more than the Wayfarers did and I'm so in love with them :) I also really like that they're a matte black plastic, rather than your typical glossy finish.

What do you think of wayfarer style glasses?

Thank you for reading. xoxo, Joy

*I bought these with my own money. But wanted to share my bargain and good experience with Select Specs with you.

TK Maxx Treats

It seems like all I keep doing throughout my holidays is shop! I just tend to end up at my local shopping centre, because there isn't much else to do near where I live. I went shopping with my mum yesterday and she insisted on popping into TK Maxx. I normally avoid TK Maxx like the plague, because it stresses me out. (Does anyone else find it super stressful?) But this time, I'm glad we went in because I found some lovely things that I am in love with!

Photo: Google

As you may or may not be aware, I've been on the hunt for the perfect trench coat. I have a navy one from H&M, which I love but I wanted a more classic Breakfast at Tiffanys style one, like the one worn by Audrey Hepburn above. I was going to get one from Warehouse which cost £85, but alas that was not my dream coat (and my purse is thanking me!). I spotted the coats rack and started riffling through, looking for a cute quilted Barbour-esque coat as they seem to be everywhere now. Instead I chanced upon this Michael by Michael Kors beaut! It was in the final clearance at only £32, so I snapped it up right away!

It looks huge here, but would you believe it's an XS!

I love the attention to detail, like on these buttons.

I also managed to pick up this TIGI Let It Be Cherry Almond Leave-In Conditioner, which Sarah has mentioned before. Can you believe it was reduced down to 50p?! What can you get for 50p nowadays? Not much! And omgosh, it smells amazing! If you like cherry bakewells, you will love this scent!!

Whenever I go shopping I always look through the purse and bag rails, knowing full well that I don't need more bags and purses. When I saw this Modalu purse on the stand, I knew I had to have it! Modalu has been made famous recently, due to Pippa Middleton toting the 'Bristol' bag, which they hastily renamed the 'Pippa'. I will admit, I had never heard of the brand until it was made famous by P-Middy. The purse reminds me of the Anya Hindmarch Joss wallet, which I could only lust after, and at only £19.99 (RRP £49), this was a lot more purse friendly. The leather is a beautiful grey 'shark' colour and the leather is buttery soft.

I love the consistent shell detail, from the labels to the shell studs to the lining of the purse - So cute!

Have you found any amazing bargains recently?

Thank you for reading. xoxo, Joy

Recently

Over the beginning of the week, I became a little obsessed with the London riots, poring over the news and Twitter, worrying that the riots would spread to my town. There were riots in surrounding towns, but my town was missed - probably because there's nothing to loot, apart from some charity shops, the 99p store and Morrissons. But I felt such despair over the towns, businesses and homes that were ruined due to the events over the past few days. However seeing the photos of the riot clean ups, the Sikhs protecting Southall and the post-it notes stuck on the shop front of Poundland in Peckham helped to restore my faith in humanity and it shows true community spirit. I hope nothing too major happened where you live and that you're all safe.

Despite these riots, I still found time to do a little shopping. I didn't pick up much and I'm sorry if this post drags on! I could ramble for England.

I picked up the September issue of Marie Claire magazine (£3.60), because of the free Ciaté nail polish. There was also a sample of a Dove Intensive conditioner. I've tried two Ciaté nail polishes before (Swatches here and here) and was highly impressed. There was a choice between a dark purple and this nude colour, but I settled on the nude because I'm still going through a nude nail phase. 'My Fair Lady' is a lovely pinky-caramel nude (Can you tell that I suck at describing colours?) and the NOTD above shows 3 coats. I feel that it could have done with another coat, but I couldn't be bothered. There was a discount code on the back of the box, so I thought I'd pop it into the picture in case anyone wants to use it.

I went to Boots in search of the Nivea Anti-Cellulite Gel-Cream, because it was half price (£5.50 down from £11). While I was there I spotted this Vichy Dermablend on No15 (Opal) in the clearance section for only £7.75 (RRP £15.50), since the box was super battered but the product hadn't been opened, so I snapped it up right away. I've heard rave reviews about both of these products, so I'm excited to try them.

I spotted this ring in the sale jewellery section of Miss Selfridge for £4.25. I've wanted a ring like this for a while and love it! It reminded me of and Alexander McQueen ring and I love the little pop of turquoise in the eyes.

I've watched a few Primark hauls recently and everyone else seems to be picking up some great buys, but I didn't really see much that took my fancy on my latest trip. Maybe I need to go to a bigger one... I spotted this scarf in Primark for £4. It says it's oversized and oversized it is! I'd says it's about 1m wide and about 2m long, which I think it perfect for the transition from Summer to Autumn and would probably work well into Winter.

If you saw my wishlist post, you would have seen that I wanted a trench from Warehouse and a black dress from H&M. I tried the trench on and I was disappointed as it really didn't suit me :( However I did pick up this pretty coral skirt in Warehouse for £25. I was lucky to get the H&M dress as this was the last one in my size. I guess it makes sense as the dress is a complete bargain at only £14.99! Other stores seem to be following Zara's lead (Re: Frankie Sandford's infamous red dress) and have started making dresses in this shape, but this is the cheapest I've seen.

What have you been buying recently?

Thank you for reading. xoxo, Joy

Hey Mr. Postman (Part I)

Over the past few weeks I've done a spot of online shopping from eBay and blog sales and won a few blog giveaways. I had some stuff sent to my home address and some to my uni address, in the hope that they would arrive while I was there during Easter/reading week or term time. However, I haven't seen some of the stuff until now!

Even though I've had some of the items for a few weeks, I decided to do accumulative posts instead of posting as soon as I received things. In order to stop them from being mammoth posts, I decided to split them into two posts - One with my eBay and blog sale purchases and one with my giveaway wins and LLYMLRS JWLRY purchase.

Sorry it's a mix of camera and Blackberry photos. My camera ran out of battery and I don't have a memory card for my new one yet!

Clockwise from left: Jelly Lens, Hair Spirals, Royal Wedding Mug and Glycolic Acid

Hair Spirals (£0.99 for 3) and Jelly Lens (£0.99): I was on the hunt for some cheap alternatives to the Goodys Spin Pins, which retail at nearly £5 for 2 (Extortionate much?!). I found the hair spirals, after typing in 'hair spirals' in the search bar, from a seller in China who came up trumps with 3 for 99p with free postage! I had a nosy through the other items they sold and decided to also purchase the jelly lens. It's a bit of a gimmick to be honest and since I received it, I've not actually used it! But at only 99p, I thought it'd be a bit of fun. The items only took about 10 days to get here from China, which I was super impressed with.

Royal Wedding Mug (£5.50): Out of all my friends, I was the only person that was super excited about the Royal Wedding last month. With all the build up to the wedding, I had a look at all the memorabilia that was being released. After seeing a lot of merchandise with subtle royal designs, I decided I wanted something that was rather in-your-face, so I hunted around on eBay and thought this mug was perfect! The pictures are from the day they announced their engagement and I just love how happy they look :)

Glycolic Face Peel (£4.75 + £2.25 p&p): Recently my skin has been looking a little dull and I was getting a bit sick of my acne scars, so I decided to take matters into my own hands. I'm a bit of a DIY obsessive, so I did some research on face peels. In the end, I decided Glycolic Acid would be a good starting point and settled on 30% concentration. I chose this one over one with a free neutralizer, because the 'free brush' swayed me... But as you can see, the brush is tiny and pointless! Plus the instructions say to apply the peel with a cotton pad, so I don't understand why they include a brush!

(I have only linked where I got the glycolic acid from, because the sellers of the hair spirals, jelly lens and royal wedding mug don't appear to be selling the items anymore.)

Clockwise from left: MAC Lustre Drops from Ellie's blog sale, Essie Midnight Cami and H&M Blue My Mind from Product Pixie's blog sale and Cloud 9 mini straightners from Ann's blog sale

I never really used to buy from blog sales because I didn't have my own Paypal account and using my dad's wasn't really an option. I used to look at blog sale posts and think what I would buy if I had my own Paypal. Thinking back now, I wonder how many things I wanted but missed out on... Since setting up my own eBay account and therefore a Paypal, I've been a keen bean and bought a number of things. I think blog sales are good opportunities for people to get rid of the stuff they don't use and for others to try things without committing to the RRP.

Sorry this post is so long! If I haven't already bored you to death, I will have the second part of this post tomorrow :)

Thank you for reading. xoxo, Joy

Recent Purchases

I posted this earlier this week, but with all the problems on Blogger, it seems to have unposted itself... So I am reposting this!

I realised that my first two Youtube videos were collective hauls for February and March, but here's another one for the month of May. I find doing haul videos easier than haul posts with photos and text. Plus I find editing videos quite therapeutic. Haha.

One of the comments I received on Youtube was that I'm not smiling in the video, so I apologize for that now.




Thank you for watching. xoxo, Joy

Recent Purchases

Although I didn't get much of a response on here when I posted my last video, I decided to do another one because I enjoy doing them and quite like editing them. I was thinking of doing a 'What's in my bag' video, so if anyone wants to see that, let me know :)

Thank you for reading/watching. xoxo, Joy

Recent Purchases

Happy Valentine's Day to you all! ♥

I quickly popped into a couple of stores today whilst I was in town and bought a number of things. I decided to document it in a video, because I thought it would be fun to mix up my posts a bit and have something different to just posting pictures, like I normally do. I also thought it would be less time consuming since I didn't need to resize and tag all my photos, however I forgot that I'd have to edit the video, oops. Once I'd gotten the hang of iMovie, editing the video didn't take me as long as I thought.

I was a little hesitant in posting the video, but I thought I would to see what reaction I get and to ask if it's something that you guys would like to see more of.

As a pre-warning, please excuse the quality of the video (I just filmed it on my Macbook) and how jumpy the video is! (I will work on that if I make another video). Be kind, please!

Please let me know what you think, would you like to see more videos? If so, what would you like to see? I'm tempted to do a 'What's in my bag' video, since I love watching those and maybe do some OOTDs? I'd love to hear your thoughts - If you never want to see my face on your screen again, please feel free to tell me!

I just wanted to quickly add in, I noticed that my follower count has creeped up recently. Thank you all so much! :D I really appreciate it and I am glad that people are finding my blog interesting, since it makes me keep working hard to make it as best as it can be. When I hit 50 followers, I'm going to do a giveaway. :)

Thank you for reading/watching. xoxo, Joy

Recent Purchases

Since getting my student loan last week, I've been shopping a few times and bought a number of things.


ASOS
Mini Straightners - £4.50
ASOS Paints by Ciaté in Lauren - £1.00

TK Maxx
Bloch Shoes - £24.99 (RRP = £130!)
French Connection Bag - £19.99


Zara
Scarf - £16.99

Topshop
Hoodie - £20.00
Flats - £25.00


H&M
Top - £5.00

Bicester North Outlet Village
Ralph Lauren Polo Shirt - £16.99(!)

What have you all bought recently?

Thanks for reading. xoxo, Joy

P.S. In case you're thinking "Shoes on the bed!", don't worry, the shoes were clean and have never been worn outside!

Recent Purchases

I had a half day at uni earlier this week, so I decided to do some exercise by walking around the Bullring. Obviously, you can't walk around a shopping centre without going into the shops and buying things!

Miss Selfridge
Studded clutch - £15.00 (Well, £13.50 with student discount) - I bought a clutch like this from Topshop for £45 a while back, but returned it because I didn't think it was really worth the price. When I saw this in the Miss Selfridge sale for only £15, I immediately snapped it up. I love how huge it is and I think it's cool that there is an assortment of different studs on it.

MujiNotebook - 60p - I like having a little notebook to carry around in my bag and I thought this was ideal. It was so cheap (I don't know if you agree, but nowadays it's hard to find things for less than £1!) and I love that it will fit easily into any size of bag.

Boots
Barry M Nail Polish 3 In 1 Basecoat, Topcoat and Nail Hardener - £2.95 [2 for £5]
Barry M Nail Polish in 308 (Berry Ice Cream) - £2.95 [2 for £5]
Rimmel Moisture Renew Lipstick in Nude Delight - £5.99
Natural Collection Moisture Shine Lipstick in Apple Blossom - £1.99 [I managed to break this within a few hours of buying this... What a doofus! After attempting to 'stick' it back together and failing, I decided to just melt it completely using Sabrina's method. You can see my end result in the photo above]
Neutrogena Visibly Clear 2-in-1 Wash & Mask - £3.59 [2 for £5]
Neutrogena Visibly Clear Pink Grapefruit Facial Wash - £4.49 [2 for £5]
Expert Build Up Removal Shampoo - £2.99

What have you bought recently?

xoxo, Joy