Ilcsi Sour cherry and Blackthorn Face mask

Hello and a very Happy New Year to you all!

I know I've mentioned it in a post before, but the cult brand Ilcsi's Sour Cherry and Blackthorn face mask is an absolute favourite of mine, and after trying and loving a tester a while back, my excitement upon receiving this full pot for Christmas was unbelievable. Not only could I not stop smelling it, but I'd forgotten just how effective this wonder product is at clearing up my skin! Ilcsi's products may be expensive, but well worth the cost, and this beautiful mask leaves my skin healthy and hydrated every time, reducing any redness I may have noticed prior to use.

Saatchi Gallery Visit

As somebody who, until recently, had a very limited knowledge of art, I thought I'd start expanding my horizons ahead of the New Year in time for New Year's Resolutions. I've always been interested in artwork, but I wouldn't say I've really 'got' or 'understood' modern art in the past, and school trips to the Tate Modern always seemed a little wasted and pointless to me, as I'd spend half of the trip complaining and grumbling to my friends that 'I could have done that!' and that I wanted to go to the Tate Britain or the National Gallery instead. With that in mind, I thought I'd have another dip of my toes in the pool of art a few years on, and visited the Saatchi gallery on a cold and windy Monday afternoon, which was particularly easy given that I now live just a short walk away.

I had initially decided to make a conscious effort to get something from each piece, and told myself that if I really thought about it I may just see what each individual artist was attempting to portray in his or her work. This proved to be unnecessary, however, because as it turns out, my (arguably) more mature mind appreciated the concept of interpretation in a way that my 14 year old self hadn't.

Initially, I was struck by the minimal arrangements of each gallery, and although I was unsure what to expect, it definitely wasn't such a wide variety of media and concepts! I was enthralled by the range of different pieces, and found myself interpreting each piece in my own mind before reading the plaques and seeing just how different my view was from that of the artist, and I even took the opportunity to pose for a few photos as well! 

Much to my surprise, I was seriously disappointed when I had visited each gallery, and picked up a few postcards of my favourites to stick onto my pinboard at uni (oooh, artsy kid) before leaving.

 Such a well spent day has changed my opinion of modern art, and I now value it every bit as highly as any other form of artwork, with a newfound regard for everything I look at. If there is anything that I have taken from this experience in particular, it's that I really can't base my opinion of something on the views of my past self. People change, and their views with them, and it's always worth trying out something new. I think I'll try to broaden my horizons as much as possible within the New Year (and see how long that resolution lasts, too!)

My favourite sites for Christmas Shopping

If, like me, you're prone to being a little lazy, impatient with queuing, unable to find good gifts without first indecisively flitting between about six items or just wanting to make use of this valuable aid open to us called 'the internet', you'll most likely be doing the bulk of your gift shopping online this Christmas. Honing my (very well practised) skills of browsing and buying, I thought that this year I'd share a few website I use repeatedly for gifts - whether for Christmas, birthdays, engagements (which are now the norm amongst my peers, apparently) or even just for spontaneous displays of appreciation:

1. I Want One Of Those
http://www.iwantoneofthose.com/

A personal favourite of mine, this site divides gifts by gender, occasion and price, and their '3 for £20' selection is not only a brilliant idea, but vast, and full of great little gift ideas for your nearest and dearest.

2. Not On The High Street
http://www.notonthehighstreet.com/

Usually my second port of call after IWOOT, this is another fantastic site with great individual gifts and equally brilliant prices. Great for Secret Santa ideas!

3. Firebox
http://www.firebox.com/

If you're panicking because you need to buy a present for the person who has everything and a voucher just isn't personal enough, look no further than Firebox. There is absolutely no risk of buying somebody a gift they already have, trust me!

4. GiftVault
https://www.giftvault.com/

If you're looking for a really special gift for an equally special someone, GiftVault is fantastic if a little more pricey than the other sites mentioned, but I really couldn't leave it out because it's just so brilliant! I often find myself making a wish list as I dreamily procrastinate on this site... but I wouldn't recommend you do that if, like me, you have essays you really should be writing instead...oops!

Moisturising your skin and Acai Berry body butter

Moisturising is something you should do daily, particularly if you have dry skin. Not only does it keep your skin fresh and smooth (and smelling lovely!), but it also protects your skin against the harsh world outside of your lovely warm bathroom and bedroom, providing a barrier for all sorts of pollutants and wind damage that the world decides to throw your way on any given day!

A good body butter can be picked up reasonably cheaply, and my personal favourite is the Good Things Acai Berry body butter, which, as you'll remember if you've read a few of my older blog posts, is a brand I particularly rate. This can be picked up from Boots or, as I've found a few times now, from TK Maxx for the incredible price of £2.99 (Student Budget Shopping, right there!) and it smells absolutely heavenly, rubbing smoothly into your skin without remaining sticky for ages afterwards - especially handy if, like me, you enjoy your time in bed and wish to remain there as long as humanly possible in the morning!

The Trouser Transition: Why buying trousers was the best decision I've made

It's no secret to anybody that I'm in love. I'm in love with dresses and skirts and clothes that swish about if I spin like something out of a Disney film. At only 5'4", I've often struggled to find trousers that a) fit me properly in terms of length and b) that don't make me look like the shortest, fattest pear in the supermarket. For these reasons, I sort of gave up on looking for a good pair of trousers a few years ago, but after seeing this checked pair for just £10 in Primark and thinking about how cold my legs get on my daily walk to uni (feel for me, people), I decided to give them a try, and welcomed trousers back into my life; and what a sheltered life I've been living!

It seems that in the few years I've been avoiding this item, I've been missing out majorly, as the second I tried these on I began to see endless outfit possibilities. The simple yet exciting design means I can team these with a block or neutral colour shirt and easily have a simple statement piece and a smart-casual outfit with very little effort or thought.

It would seem that I learnt a life lesson in Primark this weekend (the last place I'd ever think this would happen), and I discovered the importance of keeping your mind open. I'm definitely going to have to return and get this style in another 3 patterns, minimum!

Squared nails: Worth the hype?

I clearly remember being about 14 and insanely jealous of my way cooler classmates with their professionally filed French manicures (which were never complete without a diamante on the thumb, obviously), and would watch in envy whilst they scribbled away, wishing I had equally such neat and even nails to worry about in netball training. I never got around to actually getting this shape myself, applying my claire's accessories £2 pink polish liberally to my short and damaged nails on Friday evenings and scrubbing it off Monday morning before school to avoid a detention. As I grew up, though, I tended to veer more towards oval shaped nails, carefully filing them until I deemed them perfectly even, and rarely revisited my past dreams for squared-edges. After seeing a friend's gorgeous flat-topped gel nails, however, the 14 year old me came flashing back, and I decided to see whether the style suited me.

Initially, this felt weird. I'm not used to scratching an itch and leaving a mark from the harsh edges of my own fingers! It's also shown me the difference nail shape can make to the appearance of your fingers and hands overall, which meant I really couldn't stop looking at my own almost unrecognisable hands after so long sticking to the oval shape, but after a few hours and numerous compliments, I'm starting to really like this style. It's even quite exciting to have another option in mind when I do my nails (and you know I love to regularly change them up), and I think I'll keep this new look for a while longer, yet.

I have definitely gone off the French manicure with diamantes, though. That one can stay in the year 9 classroom.

Royal Geographical Society Drinks

This first October weekend started off pretty wonderfully with the first event of the academic year from my school's old student association taking place at the Royal Geographical Society in Kensington. I decided to keep my outfit simple, and start to introduce some more Winter colours into my wardrobe, like this forest green skater dress with a cutaway in the chest and a gorgeous black velvet pattern of intricate swirls adding detail. This is a pretty old favourite dress of mine now, so I can't remember exactly where it was from, but the simple black heels with a mesh inlay were from Primark just this week, and I'm absolutely thrilled with them! They added just enough detail to prevent my feet looking boring, but not so much as to detract from the dress, and I got loads of compliments throughout the evening. In order to keep myself warm, I threw on my favourite grey and white checked Topshop coat from the Topshop Petite range, and was grateful of it walking to and from the venue on the cold streets of London!

In order to keep things simple, I tied my hair in a half up-half down style to keep it out of my face and pulled a few front strands loose to soften the lines of my face. Additionally, I kept my make-up simple with a quick and small cat eye liner flick and a brown shade lipstick - a favourite of mine for the Autumnal months.

Easy Updo: Messy Plait Bun

This is my go-to hairstyle for casual wear, date nights and even events (particularly weddings!) and I love it because it's so damn EASY to do! I'm sorry I don't have any photos of the process, but I'll talk you through it step by step:

1) Section off the front part of your hair (or your fringe if you have one) and french plait this along the front of your head, securing with a clear or thin elastic (you'll be hiding this later)

2) Plait the rest of your hair on one side and secure it with another thin or clear elastic, pulling parts of it loose to create bigger sections in your bun

3) Twist your plait into a bun, securing with bobby pins as you go to create a tight side-bun, making sure that both clear elastics are tucked within your bun

4) Pull out sections where you want to create the effect of loose plaiting

Et Voila! Set with hairspray if you need this look to last, and do what I did and take lots of arty photos!

Budget Birthday Celebrations: Sushi Sunday

When asked what they would like to do for their birthday, most people will say they want nothing more than a day with friends and/or family, and so finding a fun way to spend an evening which didn't cost the earth was the number one priority for us, a group of students, on a friend's birthday! Eventually settling on a sushi evening, we enlisted the help of our wiser (and far more cultured) friend to guide us, although I'm sure it could have worked just as well with a YouTube tutorial, and sharing the end result (however awfully they may turn out) and splitting the price of the ingredients just make this all the more attractive as an idea! All in all I was particularly pleased with my slightly misshapen sushi rolls, however bad they may appear to a more experienced sushi chef, and I like to tell myself that it's definitely the taste that counts in this situation...

All of the ingredients required can be purchased fairly easily at a local supermarket, although if there's one near you, the Japan Centre is well worth a visit for the most authentic ingredients - and you can pick up some amazing sweets there, too! Site link at the bottom of this post.

 https://www.japancentre.com/en

Things I Realised When Sharing a Bathroom

With three showers between fourteen students in my flat, things can (understandably) get a little tense now and then, and all sorts of rules have been born out of necessity following rather  *ahem* interesting experiences. Such exciting circumstances have led to a few realisations for me, many of which I wish I'd been aware of before arriving.

The first of these is that it will always be damp.

You know that disgusting feeling of cold water under your feet in swimming pool changing rooms? Yeah, that. That is constant. It's quite unsettling the first few days when it takes you by surprise, but, worryingly enough, I can't say I notice it any more.

Secondly, people pee in the shower.

This is one of those situations that led to a rule. With a wet-room style shower, peeing is really not ideal for anyone, and the smell lingers (sorry for that thought). Thankfully, this hasn't happened since, and I'm really hoping it stays that way.

You can't keep your stuff in the bathroom.

There are two parts to this one. Firstly, there just isn't the space for it. For a flat designed for so many people, the storage really isn't optimal. For this reason, I'd recommend investing in a shower basket which lives in your room on a shelf and you can just pick up and take with you. Quite possibly the best investment I've made this month. Secondly, although this hasn't happened in my flat, I've heard tales of 'borrowing' from others. I guess this is where I'm grateful to have such fantastic flatmates, because if I had space I'm confident we wouldn't have this issue, but it is a thing. That happens. Just not to me.

You need to reconsider your shower schedule.

You're a morning showerer? So are seven others. And all of you are trying to lie in for as long as humanly possible in a personal game of 'how quickly can I get ready?' Waiting for a free shower can take a while, and when one is free you have to get in there quickly, because I can guarantee that someone else is also on the lookout. This isn't helped by the fact that I, along with most of my flatmates, have a shower of preference. It must also be remembered that point number one still applies when you finally get into one.

Despite my grumbles and complaints, however, sharing showers really isn't all that bad, and once you're into a routine it flows pretty easily. It also makes for an interesting conversation starter when one has a plumbing issue, to shine a positive light on a less than ideal situation!

Selling Ice Cream to Hipsters: Vintage Clothes Fair

In true East London fashion, myself and a few friends decided to spend our Saturday fighting off hipster types and rummaging through piles of vintage clothing in an 'everything £1' warehouse sale. Underestimating the level of interest, we turned up at about 11 only to stand in line for a good hour and a half before finally entering the building and grabbing everything that came to hand in a vicious scrabble that brought to mind the Hunger Games (with me as Katniss, of course). With neither time nor space to try anything on, this was a bit of a guessing game with some items, but I managed to pick up four pieces I was really happy with, and so I think the ridiculously long queue was worth it. Plus a guy came past selling ice cream and sorbet, so I was happy. I'll upload a post about my purchases on another day, when they've been washed and dried, but until then it's goodbye from me and have a great week!

Borough Market

Being a self-proclaimed foodie and market lover, I of course jumped at the opportunity to go with my friends to Borough Market, just a stone's throw away from my uni accommodation. Despite the slightly drizzly day (pretty standard), I managed to get a good look around and snap a few pics. Although perhaps not the best market for low prices, you really can't replicate the atmosphere here, even on a day when it's a half market, and it's well worth a visit for the experience if nothing else - a good hour or so can be easily spent wandering around trying free samples!

Room Tour

Now that I'm all settled into my uni accommodation halls (after a good few hours of arranging and rearranging), I thought it was about time for a room tour!

'Currently' reading 'Beware of Pity', which I haven't actually started as of yet due to the busy nature of the first few days at uni, but am looking forward to greatly! I also have a fruit bowl in order to encourage my to stay healthy and not binge on ready meals for a year!

    

I'm absolutely obsessed with Jo Malone, and was given a gift set of Pomegranate Noir which included a 250ml hand soap, 175ml room spray and an adorable 30ml bottle of cologne which just lasts and lasts! So, of course, moving to uni was the perfect opportunity to make use of these, and my blog the perfect place to gush about them! I can't get enough of this masterfully blended scent, and look forward to filling my room with the slightly spicy aroma as the Winter months draw in.

All Pomegranate Noir products can be found at:
 http://www.jomalone.co.uk/products/3576/Fragrances/The-Collections/Fruity#/products/3607

Overlooking the minor error on the Hogwarts crate (which even I, as a self-proclaimed Potterhead, have managed to ignore) I'm fairly pleased with how stocked my cupboards are, and hope to keep them this way, although realistically, we'll see how that goes throughout the year...

Not pictured here is a shelf beside my sink absolutely spilling over with products from Lush, Simple Skincare and Tresemmé as well as my double wardrobe and textbooks (oops - the reason I'm here!)

I hope this was either enjoyable or helpful, depending on your motives for reading/looking!

Naomi Natters: My A Levels Advice

As I watch students go back to school this month, I remembered my own experience of school and, in particular, of A Levels, which got off to a bit of a rocky start (whoops!). One thing I'd have loved when I started Lower Sixth, however, is a bit of advice on staying on top of things and making the most of your education so that you can get the best grades possible for yourself and, hopefully, make things a little easier along the way!

My first piece of advice would be to invest in an academic planner or journal if you don't already have one, and to use this. And I mean RELIGIOUSLY. Write down your homework and coursework assignments (if you have them) and check it at night, just in case you've forgotten something! Alongside this, I found it incredibly helpful to write to-do lists for every day (which may be a bit TOO organised, but I promise it helps! Especially if your days seem to go on forever and you find it reallllyyy satisfying to cross things off), and a great idea is to get a whiteboard and stick it up at home with your work listed (This works particularly well if you do coursework subjects, because it's harder to forget to write those 3,000 words when there's a reminder above your desk, try as you might!)

Another technique that helped me a lot was to think of personal goals (bear with me, I don't wanna sound like your head of Sixth Form here...) every term, and write these on post-it notes which I then stuck up on my wall. These don't need to be unrealistic, don't go thinking you can learn an entire language fluently in a few weeks, but something simple, like 'hand every piece of work in on time' can be an interesting task to set yourself, and this is so important when you're doing A Levels, because you really do need those much loved Study Periods to...well...study.

My last piece of advice is something that I've told friends of mine and scared them with, but it really does sound worse than it is, and that is to read through parts of your textbooks every night. I did this myself during Upper Sixth, and you'd be so surprised how easily and quickly things go in if you read them just twice a week! This is the kind of thing that you can do pretty casually - I would tell myself 'I'll read half an hour of my English Language textbook, and then tomorrow half an hour of the next unit' - but I'd recommend that before doing this you read through and highlight the key areas of study. This makes the pages far less scary late at night (if you, like me, aren't an early sleeper) and means there's far less information to digest. This sounds scarier than it is, I promise, and it really does give you such a head start when you *finally* get around to revising!

I hope these helped at least a few of you out!

Newest MAC purchase

And so, with just a week to go before I start uni, at a time I should really be saving my money, I couldn't resist a sneaky MAC purchase whilst walking past the store today (judge me, people, judge me). I'd been excited to get myself a pureple-y, plum toned lipstick for Autumn/Winter, and this seemed a perfect excuse to finally get around to getting MAC Cyber, which I'd been lusting after for far longer than can be healthy! At just £15, I fully intend to get a good season's worth of wear out of this one, and it now sits proudly in amongst my lipstick collection! Can't wait for a *good* excuse to go out and MACe myself up (see what I did there?)