(Really late) March Favourites 2015

Hey! I actually cannot believe how late this post is! haha! Soon I'll be doing an April favourites soon! But oh well I'll just go with it!

So here's my first ever favourites post! I hope it lives up to expectations (even if that is just mine!). Just to note these are in no particular order and are all my own choosing.

1. Lush No Drought Dry Shampoo - £6.95 115g
   This dry shampoo is amazing! I was so happy when I found it in lush, as I had ran out of the normal spray type dry shampoo and really needed some more. This stuff is like talc, except it smells like grapefruit, so fresh! Plus it looks better in my hair than talc, as well as being better for my hair! This is a bit more expensive than the usual dry shampoo products but its definitely worth it as its all natural and it lasts ages! That's one of my favourite things about the bottle design as it stops me from using more than I need, as I sometimes go a bit crazy with the sprays. Just one thing I'd recommend is using it in the bathroom, even the bath or shower because it can get a bit messy! Have a look on the site (linked to the product name) they give a great tutorial on how to apply!

        2. Collection Work the Colour Purple Eye Palette - £3.99 6g

            This is my go to palette at the moment, the entirety of march I ended up using this! When I'm             wanting a everyday look I usually use the gold/pink and the lilac (the two most used) and for

            more night-time evening look I still use the pink/gold but with the darker purples smudging                 them to create a smoky eye look. This palette is such good quality especially for the price it                 is! I actually used it not long ago to re-create the eye make-up look done by the make-up artist             at Assisi's Salon. (You can find the original look and my review of the experience here). 

  

   

       3. The Sim City Build it App - Free on the Apple App Store.

            I am addicted to this app, my March evenings in bed were spent fervently building up my city             (called Narnia) into a thriving metropolis! I actually prefer this to the sim city PC game, one               of the best things about it is the fact you can use it offline and it will just upload the saved                   data when the internet is back. Plus it's not one of those apps where you have to use actual                   money to progress quickly, its one of my favourite apps ever!

         4. Umberto Giannini Sleek and Chic Blow Dry Cream - Unsure of Price.
             I couldn't find this anywhere apart from amazon and even then it was unavailable so I                          honestly don't know what the price of this is, especially seen as this was part of a Christmas n              gift box years ago and I found it last month and started using it again. I am sure glad I did!                  This product smells amazing and it keeps my hair so sleek after blow drying, not a bit of frizz              in sight! If you can find this snap it up!

           5. Lush Popcorn Lip Scrub - £5.50 25g 

               This lip scrub is a God-sent! I cant get enough of it (as the packaging would suggest!) I used                this a lot through March due to the colder weather and it became one of my handbag staples.                The best thing about this is that its all natural (edible!) ingredients so you can lick it straight                off your lips once your finished, it tastes and smells so much like popcorn! And like all                        Lush products it seems to last forever! 

           6. Radley London Umbrella - Sale £11.00 

               I got this particular umbrella from their discounted store in Cheshire Oaks so I think it's one                of their older designs as I couldn't find it on the site. You can read about my experience in                    Chester/Liverpool and Cheshire oaks in my Liverpool and Chester Post.  The March                            weather was a bit drizzly so I purchased this right at the right moment really! I love it's                        design and the size is perfect for nearly all of my handbags. 

           7.  Crabtree & Evelyn Pomegranate, Argan & Grapeseed - £5.00 25g 

               I got a few different crabtree & evelyn hand creams for Christmas and my birthday from                      Owen's mum and dad and I have to say this is one of my favourites, especially through                        March when my hands needed it most! It smells great I end up looking like a weirdo                            smelling my hands! Also this is such a good size that it fits in my purse so if I don't need to                  carry a hand bag I can pop it straight in my purse and I'm set! 

         8. Soap and Glory Beauty Sleep Accelerator -  £13.00 45g 

             *Bruce Almighty Impression* "Love Love Love Love Love!" I actually look forward to the                  point before sleep when I get to put this on. I plan on doing a review of this pretty soon so I                wont say too much about it now but all I will say is Peaches! It smells like PEACHES (Best                smell ever!) I definitely saved the best 'til last!

Sorry it was a bit late, okay a lot late! I've been looking forward to doing this post for a while and I loved writing it and can't wait to do Aprils! Comment below if you love these products as much as I did! 

Charlotte x

Liverpool & Chester

Me outside the Museum of Liverpool (taken by Owen)

Happy Easter to all! I hope your enjoying your holidays as much as I am. As you can probably tell from the title I took a trip to Liverpool this Easter. It was a great trip and I just thought I would write a quick post on my highlights.

So why Liverpool you ask? Well for one I hadn't ever been before, and it was well recommended as well as being part of Owen's birthday present from his mum and dad who kindly took us. We didn't actually stay in Liverpool itself, but in the nearby city Chester which was where we spent our first day.

Chester Cathedral. Very gothic! (By Charlotte) 

The Cathedral (Charlotte)

Cathedral (Charlotte)

Chester is a lovely city with such amazing architecture which was great as both Owen and I took our DSLR's to hopefully get some good shots of the beautiful buildings and structures. However there was one aspect of Chester that was very bizarre and I feel I must point it out! For all the beautiful buildings and lovely architecture there was always something (usually a big hideous 70's esque building) distorting the view creating a massive juxtaposition in the scenery. Something that shall probably be apparent in my photographs. Just a quick note here, I actually only took photographs in Chester because the wind was so strong at Liverpool I was unable to hold my DSLR steady! So apologies in advance for the lack of photographs from Liverpool.

A Robin outside the Cathedral (Charlotte)

Closer... (charlotte)

It let me get so close! (Charlotte)

I had a few favourite parts of Chester, the first being the wonderful architecture as mentioned, specifically the two story shops that run down the high street! I don't think I've seen anything like it before, I loved it! Every now and again the would be a set of narrow uneven stone steps by the side of one of the ground level shops which would take you up to a sort of sheltered balcony walk way which had its own row of shops lining path. It was fun to walk above the hustle and bustle of the city high street, giving a different perspective on the experience. I also really liked the wall that encased the main part of the city allowing people to get places quicker as well as having a great view. I'll be honest at some parts of the wall I was unable to appreciate the view due to my phobia of heights, however the lower parts of the wall still satisfied my viewing needs! It reminded me of the old castle wall found in York, and was clearly appreciated by students in the city. Whilst wandering around the city, we also came across a lovely little park which had an abundance of squirrels bounding about the bushes. I didn't have my camera out at this point due to the rain but I had to quickly get some snaps of them, thankfully they managed to stay still long enough for a couple of good pictures! (posers!).

Love a good old sweet shop! (Charlotte)

The Next level of shops balcony walk way (Owen)

A view from the Upper walk way shops (Owen)

A View from the wall (Owen)

Another view from the wall (Charlotte)

From the wall again (Charlotte)

An archway I liked! (Charlotte)

Squirrel in the park posing! (Charlotte)

The same squirrel posing again! (Charlotte)

Loved these window graffiti art (Charlotte)

I actually thought there was a cat at one point! (Charlotte)

Both evenings (we were only there 3 days 2 nights) we ate out in Chester. The first evening we ate at Barton Rouge, a lovely contemporary Indian restaurant. I had my usual dish from an Indian a Dopiaza, as its not too spicy but very tasty! I'll not go into a lot of detail as this isn't a review post, but the service was great, as was the food and atmosphere so if your in Chester and love a good Indian I would recommend it. The second evening we came back from Liverpool to eat in Chester as we couldn't agree on where to eat apart from a grill house we had come across in Chester the day before named blackhouse grill. There was so much to choose from on the menu and I ended up going for the steak sandwiches, they were very nice but came with cheese on, something that wasn't in the description on the menu which wasn't bad for me but Owen ordered the same thing and is mildly allergic to cheese so he had to request another one. The service however was very nice again and the atmosphere was too, especially the live pianist playing in the background.

Now on to Liverpool! We spent most of our time in Liverpool being blown around by the blustery wind, as well as in museums, galleries as well as the occasional shops and caffe Nero's! I really enjoyed the Maritime museum we visited first, especially the basement floor exhibition: seized! The border and customs uncovered. I mean the amount of things that people tried to get through customs is unbelievable and the ways they tried to do it as well, it was really shocking and interesting to find out. I also really enjoyed the other exhibitions based on a number of different ships from Liverpool, one being the titanic exhibition they had on. However it was almost shocking to read about and see the amount of other ships that sank around that time and the amount of lives lost that aren't really talked about in comparison to the titanic, such as the Lusitania. I would definitely recommend going to see the Lusitania: life, loss legacy exhibition if you get the chance it was very interesting and deserves as much recognition as the titanic!

The Pump house (owen)

New and old (Owen)

Kind of obvious what this is! (Owen)

Me being battered by the wind outside the Gallery (Owen)

We also visited the museum of Liverpool while in Liverpool (who would have thought it eh?) which again was very interesting. Owen and I both enjoy museums but also don't feel bad if we skip through some of the bits we are less interested in because otherwise I find I will get sick of museums very quickly so some of the exhibitions we kind of skipped over, but the bits that really caught our attention we focused on more. One particular part that interested me was the Liverpool overhead rail way, it reminded me a lot of the overhead rail way situated in Gotham from the batman comics, it just seemed to me a bit of a futuristic idea, which I didn't expect to find as part of Liverpool's rich history!
The open eye gallery was another of my highlights from this trip, they had two floors filled with photographs taken in Japan after the war, I especially enjoyed one of the pictures that had women stood next to each other with some in modern clothes and some in traditional clothes, very juxtaposing and interesting to see in such close proximity.

Obviously some shopping occurred whilst we were in Liverpool! We mostly spent our shopping time walking around Liverpool one. Not many of the shops lured me in as I didn't have much money to spend but I had to find the Cath Kidston that I knew was there from my Google maps searching the day before! I only bought one item from Cath Kidston which was on sale, a little flask that I could use for hot and cold drinks mainly for use at uni, as all of my others leak! It was reduced from £22 to £11 so not too shabby!

So pretty! (Charlotte)

Thought id pop the bag in there too! (Charlotte)

(Charlotte)

On the final day of our trip we ended up at Cheshire Oaks the outlet shopping centre. I absolutely love outlet shopping places and this one was definitely one of the better ones I've visited. I could have gone crazy buying all sorts of bargains but had to refrain from lack of funds! However I was determined to purchase one item: An umbrella as it had been raining on and off the whole time we had been visiting Liverpool and the surrounding areas. I managed to get a lovely handbag sized telescopic umbrella from Radley! I love Radley but I haven't yet made a purchase in one of their shops so I was quite pleased by this find, and it was only £9 from £22! Owen also managed to get some awesome new running trainers from the Nike store which were reduced to £66 from over £100 so if your planning on doing a large amount of shopping/spending and are in the area I would definitely recommend you visit Cheshire Oaks. I mean the giant M&S alone is awesome! Plus there are a number of my favourite chain restaurants dotted around. We actually had breakfast at Frankie and Benny's their which was so scrummy! and inexpensive, plus you can get really cheap refills on not only tea and regular coffee but also cappuccinos!

Yay! Radley! (Charlotte)

Proof that it is actually Radley! (Charlotte)

(Me again)

final pic! (Charlotte)

Oh just one more thing about Chester, if you go into the main Debenhams their be prepared never to leave again! That place is like a bizarre maze designed to trap women in the shoe section! And you know what happens to women in the shoe section, we can't help but buy things!

Did you go for a quick break this Easter holiday? Let me know in the comments :)

Charlotte x