Tag: festive

Best Festive Sweaters: Christmas Jumper Round-up 2015!

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I’m not going to lie. From November until January, I wear as many Christmas jumpers as I possibly can. December is obviously reserved for the most Christmassy of my collection, but there’s nothing wrong with wearing a nice Fair Isle inspired sweater, or a cute reindeer print in the dark days of January (and beyond…?)

With that in mind, I’ve scoured some of my favourite retailers to bring you my best of the festive selection!

The Best Christmas Jumpers

Here’s where to get your hands on these beauties, starting from the top left, then moving left to right, row by row:

Which is your favourite? I have to say, it’s hard for me to pick, but the Joules navy stripe with stag print might just be my favourite – I’ve purchase one, and it’s so soft I don’t want to take it off! And, as a bonus, the stag head is knitted with gold sparkly wool, too! Heaven!

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Burberry Body Gold Collection AW 2013: Trench Kiss No. 216

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You guys know I’m a bit of a Burberry girl at the moment, so when I saw the new festive collection (complete with gold packaging) as part of Burberry’s new beauty range for Christmas, I pounced right away! I bought Trench Kiss (which is available as a lip mist all year round) and Soft Gold as a nail varnish. I’m saving the nail varnish post for tomorrow, but first, here’s the lovely packaging it comes with!

Burberry packaging

Love the postcard and the beautiful little gold card attached to the bag! I’m overflowing with Burberry bags at the moment, because the lip mist and nail varnish came in separate ones. Who’s complaining? Not me!

Anyway, Trench Kiss is a very neutral, nude colour, with a gentle, moisturizing finish that’s very sheer. It’s £22.50 and available from the site here in a regular silver edition, and here in festive gold. I am so impressed with the finish on Burberry’s lip covers and lip mists. They slide on like a dream, and feel gorgeous on your lips.

Burberry lips montage

Check out the rest of the Burberry beauty Christmas range here, and come back tomorrow for my nail varnish post! (And check out my post on other A/W 2013 Burberry nail polish here!)

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Bag ‘n’ Shoes: French Sole Quilted Red Henrietta Flats and Accessorize Alessandra Satchel

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The Great French Sole Factory Shop Haul continues – this time, with the incredibly festive looking pair of red Henriettas with white trim! The main body of these flats are quilted, but the toe is nubuck, which makes them look really pretty, but is a bit of a nightmare if you’re going anywhere that’s a bit damp!

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However, there’s no denying that white and red seem made for Christmas (thanks, Coca Cola!). And, I paired it with one of my favourite bags, my red Alessandra satchel from Accessorize, which my friend Lisa bought me for my 30th birthday. You can purchase similar bags from Accessorize here: they’re one of my favourite companies!

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Attached to it is a little Parazul charm I bought on holiday in the Caribbean. Parazul are one of those companies you see everywhere on a cruise, but at the time there was no way I could drop $100s on a bag, so I bought myself a little charm instead. On the shuttle back to the ship, one of the crew started cooing over my shopping bag, but his face completely dropped when I showed him what I’d actually bought! Still, I like it! And, as well as being a reminder of my holiday, it’s also a nod to my family’s shipbuilding heritage too!

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And, finally, my nail varnish is Goldeneye by OPI – in my opinion, the best bright gold varnish for the Christmas season. Perfect if you want to get into the holiday spirit!

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Christmas party daytime look: Nordic print T-shirt and ballet skirt combo

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I can’t be the only girl who secretly wants to wear ballet skirts all the time, can I? There’s just something so beautiful and elegant about the soft layers of netting that will make anyone, even a heffalump like me who only barely knows what a pirouette is, feel like a prima ballerina! So I took the plunge and ordered a cheap skirt from eBay, figuring that even if it didn’t suit me, at least it wouldn’t break the bank in the process…

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I have to say, I think it looks pretty good, even with my pear shape – the length is long enough to make it tolerable for winter, too!

Ballerina skirt detail

I paired it with my new Brat & Suzie Loose Fit Nordic Stag T-Shirt from ASOS (here), which I love, because it’s very festive and comfortable. AND, it’s not another Christmas jumper, but it’s still very seasonal. Now, don’t get me wrong. I LOVE Christmas jumpers. But, as we all know, most of the time, the heating on in people’s houses means it’s actually too hot for a lovely thick jumper, and then what are you supposed to do? My answer: rock a festive T-shirt!

Stag Tee detail

Check out the adorable detailing, with the Rudolph-lookalike, and the Fair Isle style patterns. Love it! The colour is bang on trend, too.

I had to break out my latest favourite shoes, which I’ve been coveting for months now – these beautiful leopard print, pony skin* India flats from French Sole! (* Just so you know, pony skin is not actually made of ponies!)

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If you had told me last year I’d be buying a pair of animal print shoes, I would have thought you were mad, but somehow the trend has really grown on me – I think it’s all the vintage fashion I’ve been looking at recently! And the red trim is amazing, too!

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Of course, you know I love me some French Sole, right?! There’s just something about these shoes which are really Christmassy and festive – I guess it’s the implied warmth of the animal print, and the red trim which just screams FESTIVE TIMES ARE HERE!

This kind of look is the sort of thing I think would work really well for an informal, daytime Christmas party – it’s not too dressy, but it is playful and festive. And, you won’t be panting like a dog in your thick knit jumper when someone whacks the heating up!

18 Dec: Ciate Mini Mani Month – Candyshop

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Dec 18 Mini Mani Month Candyshop
18 Dec Ciate Mini Mani Month Candyshop
Inside Candyshop bottle

Yay, another bottle of Caviar Pearls! This mix is called Candyshop – fairly appropriate, I think!

Mini Mani Month Ciate Pearls bottle

This is an amazing mix of sweet colours – hot pink, light navy blue, and orange!

Baubles

So Christmassy – it ties really well into the Russian Christmas theme I’ve seen in some of the shops this season, based on the  amazing colours of the famous Onion Domes seen on Eastern European churches.

I had no end of trouble trying to capture the beauty of these colours in the dull overcast light of a miserable Tuesday…

Ciate pearls on tree

This one is probably the best reflection of these vibrant colours – lit by the fairy lights of my Christmas tree, appropriately enough!

10 Dec: Ciate Mini Mani Month – Ladylike Luxe

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Today, behind door number 10, we have a beautiful, festive gold colour – named Ladylike Luxe! You might remember from a previous post that I’ve been searching for the perfect gold colour, and this comes pretty close. It’s nowhere near as bold as my favourite, OPI’s GoldenEye, but it’s a strong yet subtle gold that might be more suitable for the day time or low-key festive occasions where you don’t want to go too over the top. I guess ‘ladylike’ is a good descriptive for this pretty gold!

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Here’s how Ciate describes this shimmer: “Pure gold silk in a bottle. Iridescent gold with a subtle layer of shimmer to  catch the light. Champagne darling!”

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Very pretty – a true gold with a soft edge.

Nailed it: OPI’s GoldenEye

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Ever wondered what happened to the golden nail varnish of my dreams? I’d been too afraid to try it on properly until yesterday, keeping myself to just a one nail swatch to try it out. Why, you ask? Well, because I didn’t think I could handle all that awesome at once. Who knows what could have happened? One minute, you’re painting your nails, and the next minute, you’re standing in the garden, holding your hands up to the sun, shrieking “EUREKA!” and doing a special nail varnish dance*. (Don’t look at me like that, you know which one I mean.) Frankly, my neighbours think I’m weird enough as it is. Anyway, I finally tried it out last night, and here are the glorious results:

OPI GoldenEye

Here it is in the daylight:
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Ahhh, so beautiful and shiny! The colour is actually glitter suspended in a clear varnish, I think, and you layer it up over several coats (this is three). This is the perfect way to get a complex, ultra sparkly colour, without it being overly girly or glittery (nothing wrong with glitter! But I wanted GOLD!). This, to me, is the perfect festive shade! Has anyone else planned some festive colours this holiday season?

* Actually, the real reason I haven’t worn it yet was because I was saving it for post-Thanksgiving/birthdays Christmassyness… WHICH IS NOW!

In search of: the perfect gold nail varnish

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You know, sometimes you get an idea in your head, and you just can’t shake it out. I was like that with gold nail varnish for the past year and a half. I got it in my head that what I really NEEDED for the holidays was gold nail varnish. Proper bright, sparkly, beautiful, rich gold nail varnish, varnish that would say “HELLO CHRISTMAS! Yes, indeed, I am ready to party!”

People, I am pleased to say, my search is over.

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Please excuse the hasty rush job on these nails, I got over-excited when they were drying… Sigh. Anyway, I hope you can see that gorgeous shade on the bottom thumb there – that is the gold of my dreams! What is this exotic metallic varnish called, I hear you cry?! Why, it’s OPI’s Goldeneye! The MUST-HAVE gold varnish for 2012, I reckon!

In a clockwise fashion from the bottom, these are the ‘gold’ varnishes I am wearing: Goldeneye (OPI, the clear winner), Gold Coin (Revlon, just not at all what I hoped for, it’s basically just silver!) Glimmer (TopShop, my second favourite, but more of a bronze), Gold (GOSH, another tame looking gold), then Star Dust (Rimmel, another bronzy one).

Here, though, is the clear winner. Isn’t it beautiful? You can purchase this shade from HQHair for £11.