Polka dot

Top: Topshop

Skirt: Zara

Bag: Motel

Arrowhead necklace: eBay

Nails: Barry M metallic silver & black crackle

Another sale buy from Topshop. I picked this polka dot tee up for a mere £8 along with the striped top I wore in my previous post. I teamed it with my Zara skirt which literally goes with anything and helps dress and outfit up, for a few drinks at the pub with friends. And as you can see from the third photo I'm wearing some incredibly large hoop earrings. Also from Topshop they were £2.50 in the sale and help dress up any outfit. I'm so massive, theatrical jewellery is coming back in, I'm just gutted I threw out all of mine a few years ago. 

I'm also so glad I bought this arrowhead necklace off eBay which you can also see in my previous post 'Beetlejuice' in more detail. I haven't taken it off since I've bought and my one friend liked it so much they've now bought it too! Haha. 

Hope everyone has a lovely New Year. I'm off to Bristol with my friend Millie and we're going to an event at Motion. It's an indoor skate park by day and a club venue by night. Haven't been for a few years so I'm looking forward to it, and the line ups not too bad :)

So I guess there's nothing else left to say except HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Unforgettably red

Coat: c/o Motel

Shirt: Twitch Vintage

Jeans: ASOS

Boots: Topshop

Bag: Motel

Cross earrings: Charity shop

I wore this outfit out today for lunch with a friend. I love these jeans but they are always so hard to pair with an other item. The red is so vibrant in real life, I'm always a little self conscious they might be a bit too much. 

Found it difficult choosing any photos for this post, I only ever seem to like the photos where I'm looking down haha. Story of my life. 

I'm still enjoying time off work :) seeing lots of friends and family. Looking forward to New Year this weekend too, do any of you have any exciting plans? I'm off to Bristol with a friend which we randomly booked just the two of us, but hopefully it will be a fun night. If Millie has anything to do with it I'm sure it will be :) x

Beetlejuice

Top: Topshop

Leather leggings: Topshop

Shoes: eBay

Arrowhead necklace: eBay

Cross bracelet: Topshop

Hoop earrings: Topshop

Nails: Barry M

I wore this outfit out on Boxing Day after buying this top in the Topshop sale. I've only ever worn these leather leggings once because I can never seem to find a top that goes with them properly so when I tried this new top on with them I had to wear it out! 

And of course I had to team the outfit with my fake JC's ;) I love love love these shoes.

Now looking at the outfit properly I think it's one of my faves :) Casual but dressy, perfect for a night out. 

My jewellery are all new bits. I picked the crazy big hoops up in the Topshop sale (they touch my shoulders) along with the cross bracelet. I have a thing for crosses at the moment! And this gorgeous arrowhead necklace was off eBay for £3.50 from this seller. I'd seen one similar on Regal Rose and thought I'd try my luck on eBay. I'm sure it's no where near as nice in real life but it will do me for now as I'm on a rather tight budget after Christmas!  

I get a lot of people message me about these fake JC's. I picked them up from a seller from China on eBay, after seeing a post that Victoria had done about them. The seller I bought them off no longer has them listed but if you search for 'platform wooden heel' or 'platform boot' etc haha then you should find some!

Christmas jumper nails

I received this nail art pen by Topshop this Christmas and couldn't wait to give it a go after seeing Gem's post on them. They're totally different to any nail art pen I've used before. It literally looks like a pen and writes like a pen. I had a little trouble to begin with, getting it started. You have to pump the nib a few times and shake well to get the polish to come out but once it does it's really great at producing fine lines and no blobs!

The nail design I've chosen to do as a first practice is a pretty hard one and although it's not perfect this nail art pen did a far better job than I ever would've been able to get the WAH!/Models Own one's to do. 

I am really pleased with it and can't wait to use it more to really get the hang of it. They are a little more expensive than the Models Own ones but I think they're worth it. And they come in a bigger range of colours too including white, black, silver, blue and pink. However it looks as though only the blue is now available online, they must've sold out fast!

All I Want For Christmas...

...are these goodies! Apart from the camera everything else was from friends. They all know me so well :) Over the moon with the gifts I got this year. 

Opened my camera straight away and began playing around with it...Here are some snaps of my presents. How sweet is the book Millie made me?! She's such a talented thing! 

Can't wait to try out my new camera with outfit/nail posts and see the difference in quality. For about the last year I have been using my iPhone 4 and pining over everyone's lovely photos!

Hope you all had a lovely Christmas got everything you wished for xx

Christmas crafts & bakes

Happy Christmas Eve!! :)

Thought I'd show you the festive things I've been up to over the last few weeks in one mammoth post. Firstly these are the Christmas cards I made for my friends. They're simple to make but a little tedious. The hardest part was cutting the tree out on the front with a scalpel. But once that was done I simply stuck wrapping paper behind and made envelopes out of the wrapping paper to match. Tying ribbon through the center of the cards was easy too and made them look more like a present. 

To accompany my cards I made some festive vegan cookies as my lovely friend Millie is vegan! 

I'd never made cookies before and the first batch turned out a little more biscuit like but the second batch were just right! 

Another baked treat were these little mini Christmas puds! Their in tiny cupcake cases so are bite sized. Really easy to make but the decoration was hard. The recipe said to dye so much royal icing green and so much red but that was easier said that done so I ended up just painting the icing with the dye which wasn't such a good effect.

And finally my mum and I made our Christmas table decoration yesterday with bits we found in the garden. I love doing things like this :) maybe I should've become a florist?! Ha!

I hope you liked them all and maybe have got some inspiration for next year. The joys of working part time means I have more time on my hands for things like this which I love.

Hope everyone has a lovely Christmas :) xxx

DIY shirt collar

I'd been thinking for a while of studding a shirt collar, which I still will do, but the other day I came across Lily wearing a gorgeous outfit that including a lovely shirt by My Yard. It had beautiful detailing on the collar, of beads/sequins and I thought this would be so easy to recreate?! So yesterday I bought some beads from a craft shop and spent the afternoon sewing them on and wore this shirt out last night for a Christmas meal! It's the easiest way to spruce up an existing shirt/blouse. The beads cost me £1, they're actually two different sizes, one a pearl colour and the other a pale pink but these photos don't really do it justice. I was careful to try and sew in between the material so you don't see lots of thread on the underneath of the collar :) 

And the beauty of this DIY is that you can always add more to it of bigger beads, sequins, jewels etc! 

I'm now off work for Christmas so expect some more DIY's to come!

Regal Rose

Top: Topshop

Cardigan: Topman

Skirt: Zara

Belt: Vintage

Earrings: Regal Rose

Ring: Vintage

Nails: AA 'Make Up' & MO 'Gold Finger'

The title of this post is after these new cross earrings I received as an early Christmas present. I pointed Regal Rose out to a friend because I had fallen in love with everything on it, totally didn't expect to be bought anything from there. The site is full of unusual lovely pieces and most for under £10. I now really want a couple of necklaces which I may buy in the new year with my Christmas money.

The ring too was an early Christmas gift and it's beautiful. It was my friends great aunt's so it's lovely and vintage. These photo's don't do the ring or the outfit much justice, but the ring is a sparkling blue colour in real life. And it's adjustable which is perfect as I have the smallest fingers ever! 

So far I've done really well this Christmas for gifts :) but I'm not opening anymore now otherwise Sunday morning is going to be rather boring for me! haha. 

Hope everyone's having a good week :) Only 3 days to go YAY! Expect a festive post in the next couple of days full of crafts and baked goods! x

Black velvet

Top: Topshop

Shorts: DIY

Shoes: Primark

Ok so I'm really over doing the posts on these shorts but I couldn't resist using these photos that the lovely Steph took of me last Friday :) I adore this outfit! And it was oh so very cheap. The top is borrowed from a friend, the velvet and lace shorts I made and cost about £3.19 in total, and the shoes are Primarni for £16! Bargain outfit :D

I can't believe it's Christmas in only a few days! Eee I'm getting so excited now. Swapping a few gifts tonight but I mustn't let myself peak, although I'm so tempted after I've been dropped lots of hints. Argh!! But I pretty much know everything I'm getting this year, so I really cannot open any friends gifts early otherwise the big day will be rather boring. x

Sweet Monday 060

Abby, Me & Lyzi

01. First up my giveaway to win a gorgeous necklace worth £50 from Silver Service ended last night, and the winner is.... EMMA from Daisies and Jeans :) Well done Emma I will contact you later tonight!

02. Secondly it was the much anticipated Christmas Bloggers Party on Friday with MyStreetChic and Boohoo! I've not got a lot of photo's but I know that Steph and Bee have also done a post :) And I've only just sorted through the Boohoo goodie bag properly and I'm chuffed! The £50 suit voucher will come in handy for my job, the cream is perfect for me as I suffer from eczema and finally I'm in desperate need of tights! As was Rosie on the night, shame we didn't get the tights before she had to buy some from Motel ;) 

03. Steph also very kindly took some lovely photo's of my outfit, so I'll put those up tomorrow but for now here are a few photo's from the night...

Laura, Me, Lyzi, Ayden & Bee

Rosie, Ayden & Laura

Sarah, Laura & Me

Photo courtesy of Joe

Photo courtesy of Chloe (I love this photo thank you!)

DIY velvet & lace shorts!

I had this idea in my head for a while, and then spent days trawling eBay to find some velvet trousers or shorts, with not a lot of success. I didn't want to spend too much knowing I was going to be customising them. Eventually I found the pair below. They're from New Look originally, awful trousers. More velour than velvet with an elasticated waistband and elasticated around the ankles *shudder*. But I could see the potential and managed to win them for only £3.19 including postage! 

They had a lovely gold zip up the back which is quite on trend at the moment, to have zip detailing on display. When I tried them on they sat perfectly on my waist. I lined them up with a pair of high waisted denim shorts I already have to know where to cut them. My tip would be to try them on and mark an inch or two lower than where you want them to end up. As you can always cut more off but can never stick it back on! 

Once neatly hemmed I positioned the lace to see whether it would look better under the hem so only a little was poking out or on top. I decided on top of the hem so you can see the full effect of the lace. You can pick lace like this up from any material/craft shop. It cost me about 90p for 2m. 

And voila! Once the lace was sewn on they really came together. They fit so well I'm over the moon, I love them! And will certainly be getting a lot of wear out of them :) And they total £4.09! What a bargain!! 

A few friends have commented and said I should make more and sell them, which I would, but the only trouble is getting hold of the velvet in the first place. 

I'm off to the My Street Chic Bloggers Christmas party tonight! I was debating on what to wear all week but now that these are finished I've decided on them. And this is a little peek of my whole outfit :)

Can't wait to see everyone there! xx

Tramp Boutique

Dress: eBay

Cardigan: Dorothy Perkins

Jumper: H&M

Bag: Tramp Boutique

Necklace: JWLRY

Ring: Topshop

Nails: My friends H&M grey

I was sent this gorgeous vintage bag from a friend of mine who is now working for Tramp Boutique. I had never heard of them until she got in touch, and am really pleased that she did. 

Tramp Boutique are a vintage boutique shop in Brighton. They specialise in vintage clothing across the decades from the 1920's to the 1980's. They try to source all of their items from around Brighton but do buy one offs from others around the world. Their website is full of glamorous photos, featuring classical vintage clothing. 

Brighton is such an amazing place for clothing, art, food, nightlife...etc. Tramp Boutique is now another great find, and next time I'm there I will try and check their shop out. 

You can follow Tramp Boutique on twitter or like them on facebook to find out more. 

I'm so happy with my bag, if you've been following me for a while you will know I'm a little obsessed with handbags, and picked up 3 vintage ones from Motel the other week. And now this lovely blue one (I don't own one in blue) is the latest addition to my ever growing collection.