Lakeside Shopping Haul Part 2

As you may know, a few weeks ago I went shopping with my friends in Lakeside. It is fair to say that I may have gone a little overboard on this day investing in a lot of makeup especially. Therefore I have dedicated this part of the haul to primarily makeup and beauty items but have thrown in my biggest and best purchase of the trip at the end just to top it all off! Let's go!
  You know that you are in trouble when you walk into Boots and they are doing a 3 for 2 promotion across their whole beauty and cosmetics range. This means you can get makeup, brushes and accessories included in this deal and I needed no invitation to make full use of this offer. I may have accidentally ended up buying 6 products but I am so pleased with them.
 One of the first things I wanted to do in Boots was to check out the Sleek makeup. I have been a huge fan of their blushes over the past year and for the past two months have fallen in love with their eyeshadow palettes. Where I live the Boots and Superdrug stores aren't big enough to sell Sleek so it was time to stock up in Lakeside.
  After looking at the palettes in the flesh I opted for the 'Ultra mattes v2 darks' palette because I have been all about matte recently. This palette contains entirely matt shades and the pigmentation of them is incredible. Like the Au Naturel palette the shades blend really nicely and I love the range of colours here. The huge mirror also is really handy if you are on the go and I love that each shade has it's own name like 'Villian' and 'Orbit.' The palettes are also so affordable, costing just £7.99 for 12 shades.

Since discovering the Real Technique makeup brushes, it has transformed the way that I apply my makeup. The contour and buffing brush have been two of my favourites so far and so I decided it was time to invest in a new blush brush. The Real Techniques blush brush cost £9.99 I still can't get over how soft it is and how easy it is to apply makeup with this. It makes product blend so flawlessly and it is the perfect shape and size.

As I've mentioned a thousand times before, I love sleek blushes. Everything to the packaging to the colour range to how easy they are to apply and the beautiful finish they give, it is hard to fault them. Whilst I had to make the most of stocking up on Sleek products I decided it was time to invest in some more blushes. Three to be exact. The first was a shade called 'Coral' which in the pan looks to be a really unique orange/pink colour. It reminds me of the shade 'Flushed' because it looks matte on first inspection but it does contain the slightest bit of shimmer.

 

The next shade that I bought was 'Pixie Pink' which is a gorgeous light pink which is very matt. However from first impressions it doesn't seem at all chalky and I'm expecting this to be great for the summer. It isn't half as bright as 'Flamingo' but it looks a much cooler tone and is so beautiful to look at in the pan. 
 The final Sleek blush I bought on this shopping trip is another matte shade called 'Life's a Peach.' In the pan this shade appears to be a very bright and slightly scary orange. However, I didn't let this put me off when I first bought Flamingo and I turned out to love it and so I thought that I would give this shade a spin. Although this may not be a shade suitable for all year round (well it could be, we will find out when I test it out!) I think it will be great for summer, especially when you have a little bit of a tan. One of the biggest advantages of these blushes is that they are so affordable at only £4.49 each and this is part of the reason why my collection of them has grown so big so quickly.
  My final purchase to finish off my Boots splurge I decided that I would buy a product that I had never previously tried. A lot of my drugstore purchases recently have been lip products, so much so that my storage is getting a bit overrun with lipsticks, crayons and balms. Nevertheless, I still decided that it would be a good idea to buy another lipstick(!) After trying and really liking the Revlon Matte balms recently and having never tried a Revlon lipstick I opted to go for a shade from their 'Super Lustrous Matte Lipstick' collection. To be honest there wasn't many shades in this collection but I picked up the shade 'Stormy Pink' because it thought it looked the best on the back of my hand. Haha. This cost me £7.49 but it turned out to be one of the free items in the deal.  
 By the time we managed to get round to going into Superdrug, it was near the end of the day. Out of a matter of interest I innocently went to look at the Sleek counter in Superdrug just to see if they were selling anything different to Boots. As a matter of fact they were. To celebrate 50 years of Superdrug Sleek have released a limited edition eyeshadow palette called the Showstoppers palette. This palette consists of 7 shimmery and 5 matte shades. Honestly I probably didn't need this palette but because it was limited edition and I loved a couple of the shades especially I decided to buy it. Superdrug were also doing a 3 for 2 on all cosmetics too and so I thought that I might as well take advantage of the offer. This palette cost £7.99  

As I had not bought a new nail polish in a while I decided to have a little look at what Rimmel had on offer. I was aware that Rita Ora recently bought out a range of nail polishes and Colour Rush Balms, but one of the repackaged lasting finish polishes actually caught my eye. This shade is called 'Fancy a Dip' and is a lovely blue shade. I think it is really unique because it isn't a pale blue or a royal blue but it looks slightly lilac and is completely different to the other shades I own. This retails at £2.99 which is so affordable and I'm really excited to try this shade out really soon.
 After buying a lot of the Barry M Hi-Shine Gelly collection nail polishes last summer it was good to see that they have released some more shades for this summer. I've noticed a lot of the new colours focus on pastel shades and these really appeal to me. I've been really attracted to blue tones and shades recently and so whilst browsing the new shades on offer 'Huckleberry' stood out to me. It is a really pale almost white blue shade and I think this will look absolutely amazing alongside tanned skin. It is really similar to the shade Blue Moon from the original Barry M nail polishes but I'm sure the added shine will make a big difference to the appearance of this shade. It costs £3.99 like with the other Hi-Shine polishes in the collection.
  Now on the way to the checkout in Superdrug I noticed that they were selling the Tanya  Burr Cosmetics. I've really wanted to try out some things from her collection ever since they were launched but this was the first time I had seen them in the flesh.
 I decided to try out just one product to start with because I didn't want to go crazy buying a product that I had never tested before and so opted for the nail polish in the shade Little Duck because I had seen some photos of this shade and loved it. I plan on writing a full review on this product, especially because it has been receiving some incredible hype over the blogging and Youtube world recently. This nail polish set me back £5.99 which I thought was quite a bit for a polish but until I try it out I won't know if it is worth the money.
 Tanya Burr's nail polish concludes the beauty and cosmetic part of my haul and I have a load of products now that I will be vigorously testing over the coming weeks and months. There is just one more product that I bought in Lakeside as a treat to myself.
About 5 years ago now my mum and step-dad got me a iPod Nano as a Christmas present from New York. I have had so much use out of my iPod over the years and I have loved using it but now it is starting to show signs of age because the buttons have started to become temperamental. I have been thinking about buying a new one now for about 6 months and decided in Lakeside that I would make the investment. I went into the Apple store and it was so easy to pay and get hold of one and I love it. Once again I went for the limited edition Red and Apple puts some of the money you pay for the iPod towards helping people in Africa who are suffering with AIDS. I haven't had a chance to properly set it up yet because I want to organise all my music first but I am so excited to start using it. It will be going everywhere with me when it is ready to go and I was actually impressed that the 16GB version only cost £129. I seem to remember my 8GB one cost me around £100 when I got that so I definitely got a lot for my money.  

The iPhone 5S

We know live and grow up in a world full of technology. Technology which is always developing and improving and in some ways, making ordinary life much easier. In the past, when all you had in your home was a landline phone, you actually had to visit or write to people to stay in contact with them.
  Even 11 years ago, the likes of Facebook and Twitter were not even a thought, let alone two huge social media sites that attract millions of users sharing and telling people all over the world what they had for breakfast or uploading a photo of themselves with motivational song lyrics.
  What I think is the most amazing thing about the way technology has evolved is the way that it has connected people from all around the world together. Before all this was invented, you would never say meet someone from Sydney in Australia if you were living in the UK unless you actually travelled there yourselves. In fact, you wouldn't meet anybody living in the same country or even county as you unless you met them face to face. Scary.
  One of the most influential contributions to the world of technology over the past years is the introduction and development of the iPhone.
  Now it took me a very long time to finally jump onto the bandwagon, purely because I had decided to have the Blackberry Bold 9900 back in 2011 when I was due an upgrade. I then had to wait another two years before upgrading again which brought me to November of 2013.
  I firstly decided to have a blackberry as opposed to the new at the time iPhone 4S because a) I had previously had a Sony Ericsson Satio which was fully touch screen operated and after having it practically break down by the time I had finished with it I wanted to go back to buttons. Secondly Blackberry's were all the rage at the time and I just wanted to try a new brand that I had never used before.
  Admittedly, it wasn't the best nor the worst phone I had ever had. Aside from it freezing near the end of it's life quite frequently, having awful camera quality and not being able to use Instagram, it was a pretty good phone. It did everything a modern phone is made to do, text, phone and update facebook and twitter.
  So in November I decided to finally buy into one of the world's biggest brands, Apple, and get my hands on the newly released iPhone 5S.
  The phone itself comes in three different colours, silver, grey and gold. I went for the white as I thought it was the best out of the three and O2 swiftly delivered it to my door.
  I already had an iPad at the time, so I kind of knew what to expect from the iPhone. Obviously the phone has many features that the iPad doesn't but it really didn't take me long to figure out all the tricks and features. That's one thing that is so good about these phones, they are so intuitive and I was so glad to have a touch screen back!
 As this is my first ever iPhone it would be unfair to say that it is better than the previous models, but from what I've read and hear from family and friends it does not disappoint.
  Obviously I was instantly playing around with the 'Siri' function on the iPhone, asking it both stupid and sensible questions. There is no doubt that the Blackberry's have no where near anything like this on their devices and this is a huge stand out feature. However, I have found that now after having the phone for almost 4 months, I have hardly used Siri at all. I think once the novelty had worn off it became an unused feature.
  The iPhone has also changed the way that I use social media. The apps for all of the social media websites I use such as Facebook and Twitter are so much better for the iPhone and unlike Blackberry there is an actual instagram app. It is also so much easier to update posts and upload photos and videos, and with updates being introduced all of the time it is nice to see that the developers are still working hard to perfect their products.
Another huge advantage the iPhone has over other phones, especially the Blackberry is the camera quality.
 
I am no longer ashamed to take photos on my phone and share them with the world, because the quality of these images are incredible. I love taking pictures on my DSLR but sometimes it's a great feeling to know that you can capture a decent image on your mobile instead of having to lug all your equipment around with you all the time.
  I am also loving the filters that come with the camera on the iPhone, with my favourite being the 'Instant' filter.
  Another awesome feature I believe not to be on any other phone is the slow motion filming you are able to capture. It really makes the phone unique and it provides you with endless hours of entertainment. The ability to take panorama shots is brilliant too.
 Probably the most impressive feature on the whole phone is the revolutionary use of fingerprint recognition. This was one of the huge selling points for me and I'm pleased to report that it works!
  You register your finger print (and you can register more than one!) and then you can use it to unlock you phone, verify app purchases (much better than typing in your password) and it adds that extra wow factor. Of course, you still have a numeric or text password too just in case your finger isn't recognised, but the technology itself works so well considering that it is the first time it has been put into a mobile phone.
  Overall I have been so impressed with the iPhone 5S, possibly being the best phone that I have ever used. However, with growing competition from the likes of Samsung, it is exciting to anticipate what Apple will come up with next... 

App Review: Paper 53

Since having an iPad, I've found that I am regularly on the App Store looking for new and useful apps to use. One app that I've found particularly useful, especially during Sixth Form is an app called Paper 53.

The app itself is focused on allowing you to draw and sketch, using the tools available inside the app. You can then use these drawings and send them by email, share them to a range of social media sites such as twitter, facebook and tumblr, as well as sharing them to your camera roll which you can then print off as well.  

When you first open the app, you are greeted with a screen showing you all of the notebooks which you have. This is really useful because you can organise all of your drawings so that they are easy to find. For example, I kept all of my Product Design sketches in one notepad so that I knew where everything was and I could find it easily.

   You can also customise the way that the notebooks look, by selecting your own photos to use as covers by pressing the little 'i' button in the top right corner of the notebook. 

Then inside each notebook you can look through all of the pages, as if you are reading a book. If you find a drawing you want to add to or edit, you simply click on the page and the app opens up your drawing. There is hardly any delay between clicking and being taken to your drawing either, so you don't have to wait ages for it to load. You can also add new pages to any notebook using the '+' button and you can also do the same on the main menu to add new notebooks. 

Once you have opened the page, or made a new one, you are either shown your drawing or given a blank canvas to work on. Here all of the tools available are shown and you can make these disappear by swiping the tool kit down and then make it reappear by swiping upwards.
  You can also turn the pages of the notebook by swiping from the top corners as if you are turning the page of a book, which makes moving between pages extremely easy and practical.
  To return to the main menu or the notebook you simply pinch the screen in the middle of the page and it will take you back. 

The app Paper 53 itself is free. With this you get an unlimited amount of notebooks and pages, and you also get the eraser tool and the fountain pen tool free, along with a range of standard colours.
  However, there are a whole range of tools available within the app, which you can purchase for an additional price. When I downloaded this app, they had an offer on the additional tools, allowing you to purchase the pencil, highlighter, pen and colour brush for a combined price of £4.99, when individually they cost £1.49. I'm not sure if they still have this deal on, but I would recommend buying this if you can. Otherwise, you have to pay £1.49 for each tool individually, which makes the purchase more expensive.
   Then for an additional £1.49 you can buy the mixer palette, which allows you to make your own colours and save them to the palette on the right, so you will always have it. The picture above shows all of the brushes which are available and what each one looks like. 

These are just some of the drawings which I have been able to create from using the app. Although you can use your finger to create these drawings, I usually use a stylus to make my drawings more precise. 

Overview of Paper 53

Positives

• The app itself is free and includes unlimited notebooks, pages and two tools
• You have the ability to organise all of your drawings
• You can zoom in on parts of your drawings and add to them
• You can share your drawings a number of ways such as through email or twitter
• Response time is good and there is hardly any lag between drawing and the drawing appearing
• The app doesn't take long to load
• You can buy additional tools for a set price
• You can mix your own colours and save them to use at a later time (purchase of mixer required)
• Brilliant quality of tools
• No internet connection required
• Regular updates and improvements available.

Negatives

• Currently unable to alter the thickness of the tools 
• You have to purchase the additional tools
• You cannot import existing drawings or pictures and add/edit them. 

Cost

App: Free

Additional brushes and mixer: £1.49 each or £4.99 for the 'essential package' which includes all tools but not mixer

Rating (Out of 5)

4.5