a few things i've been loving

I haven't posted anything in forever ( I know i say that everytime) but I thought today I would share with you my recent favourites!


Obviously, one of my first faves is food. I bought these maryland cookies from the co-op a few days ago and i've been obsessed ever since. They're honestly so nice and probably my fave cookies of all time.

I picked up this essie nail polish recently in maximillian strasse her, it is honestly one of the best essie polishes i've ever used, you only need one coat to make them like in the picture and as you may know from my homeware haul, I love all shades duck egg, although fiji is yet to be replaced as my all time fave.

Ah look, another food fave.. I picked this up from tesco recently and thought it would accompany pj's and old episodes of all the midwife quite well, and it certainley did. Although, just a heads up the cherries are NOT sweets and are in fact, real cherries so...they could count as your 5-a day?? maybe???

When I was in Bath a few months ago, I picked up a few things from soap and glory. One heck of a blot and the kick ass powder concealer are so amazing, especially when you're out and about and want to fix your make-up on the go! The kick ass cream concealer is brill for dark circles under your eyes and if you look like you haven't slept for weeks (like me) this is perfect for you and I would defo recommend.

 I've spoken about this before but the naked 3 pallet keeps returning into my life and i keep returning to love it. Recently I've been using it a lot, especially the matte shades and as my eyeshadow skills continue to grow (slightly) i'm sure i will continue to use this.

So those are my recent favourites. Granted, a few are food but you're lying if you say you don't love some specific items of food as much as makeup...
have you got anything you've been loving lately?
Dais xx

Sunday Skincare Faves

All week I seem to be so busy, I sort of start neglecting my skin a little bit. So on Sunday's I like to really look after my skin and I thought I'd show you what I use because I absolutely love them.



I love the peaches and clean cleanser by soap and glory. It gets your make up off so quickly it makes wipes seem useless for fast make up removal. Next time you go into boots, looking for the make up wipes i'd definitely try this instead.



This Una Brennan face mask has been a skincare staple of mine for so long. There are so many good facemasks and cleansers in this brand but this is probably my favourite. It really moisturizes your skin and it makes you feel so clean which is always a lovely feeling after a week of wind and rain in your face.














The smoothie star body butter by soap and glory is probably one of my favourite scents that they do. I think it used to be called something else but I'm not sure. Its not a refreshing smell but its so cosy and it's defo a winter night time smell. It soaks in super quick and after i've used it i can't stop smelling my skin.




So those are my end of week skin care faves,
If you've got any tell me in the comments - i'm always looking for new ones!

Love Dais xx

Autumn Essentials

Autumn excites me so much, with Halloween, bonfire night and the run up to Christmas there's so much to do and I just love it, and as the weather gets colder and more rainy I actually have an excuse to stay in, curled up on the sofa all day. But, when you do have to face the outdoors there are a few things that are much needed to motivate me to leave the house.

Obviously a scarf is just a necessity round this time of the year, I got this one from Primark last year and I still love it this year so I've pulled it back out of hiding and it will hopefully keep me from freezing to death.

Dark lipsticks are basically made for Autumn, and I really love the Topshop Beguiled one and, everyone's favorite, Kate Moss 107. Neither of these were overly expensive and they make me feel very autumny and cosy so they're always on side to help me look a little bit more presentable.

During Autumn and Winter my hands feel really dry and I really hate dry hands, so I take a little hand cream round everywhere with me to make sure that my hands are always soft and hydrated. This one is a travel sized soap and glory one and it smells really clean and soaks in quite quickly, but it's the perfect size to carry around.

I have got to admit, during the colder months the lighter colours in my naked 3 pallete are rarely touched, but I love the darker colours for this time of the year and they go really well with a dark lip too. Although 50% of the time doing eye shadow takes up too much time and I do tend to skip it.

Honestly...can someone tell me why I've never tried a pumpkin spice latte before last week? I think I'm in love with them, they basically taste like a mix between autumn and winter and if someone gave me a gallon of it, i'd happily drink it until I was sick...what a lovely image.

What are your autumn essentials?

dais xx

Autumn Gingerbread Cinnamon Cupcakes

Autumn is probably my favorite season out of them all. I love sitting down with a hot chocolate and a soft blanket and watching YouTube, Netflix or my favorite DVD and it being acceptable to do so, without the constant feeling of guilt that I should be out with friends or enjoying the 'nice' weather. With the days getting colder and shorter (thank god) i feel like this is the perfect time to get back into baking, which sort of took a back seat for me over the last few months- but I found this recipe which produces the perfect autumn/winter cupcakes..you can thank me later.

Gingerbread Cinnamon Cupcakes

Method:
Step 1- Preheat the oven to 180C and place 12 cases into a cupcake/muffin tin.
Step 2- Cream together the butter and sugar for about 2 minutes.
Step 3- mix the spices together with the self raising flour in a separate bowl
Step 4- Crack the 3 eggs into a cup and whisk them a little bit until they're combined.
Step 5- Add a little bit of the egg then mix, then a little bit of the flour and mix. Keep alternating between the two until you've used all the eggs and flour (I would suggest stopping a few times and folding in the flour round the sides of the bowl)
Step 6- Stir in the milk
Step 7- Plop about a tablespoon and a half of the mixture into each cupcake case and put them in the oven for about 17-20 minutes (17 was plenty for me or they would have burnt)

While they're cooking in the oven, make the toffee and the buttercream.
BUT to me the toffee was kind of an unnecessary step and if you're looking to cut cleaning up time I would skip this bit. I didn't end up using the toffee on top, and the toffee I did put in the buttercream, you couldn't really taste.
Step 8- Melt 50g of the 200g of butter in a pan with the sugar until it's turned into a toffee sauce and then add a little bit of milk, you can let this cool because it melts again so easily.
Step 9- Whisk the remaining 150g of butter until it's smooth
Step 10- Add the icing sugar and 3/4 of the toffee sauce (if you're using it) then put it in the fridge for a little bit while your cakes cool down
The amount of buttercream the recipe says doesn't make enough for all of the cakes and I doubled it
Step 11- When your cakes are cool *insert sunglasses emoji* stuff the buttercream into a piping bag and pipe on little swirls of icing.
Step 12- Decorate with anything you want! I used little sparkly gingerbread sprinkle and gingerbread toppers from sainsburys, but you can use anything really! Then that's it, you're done.

If you make these please make sure to leave me a comment below telling me what you think!
(and good luck trying not to eat every single one in one sitting...it's tough)

dais xx

homeware haul

wow it feels like years since i've done a blog post! i literally say that every time I write one but it really does.
Anyway, now that the school year is starting back up again I decided to re-decorate my room to get myself more motivated, i'm not exactly sure if that excuse justifies the amount of money I spent but let's just go with it...

Wilko

I've decided to have an accent wall in my room, before it was white and although i really like white, it was just too white. So i thought a duck egg wall would look nice. Now, I'm not too sure if paint is classed as homeware but for the sake of this haul it's going into that category.
I bought this paint from Wilko and it was only £10 for a tub of it. I'm in love with the colour and it looks really nice on my wall. There is just normal duck egg but after 30 minutes of closely comparing the two colours me and my friend decided the darker duck egg would look nicer.

I also picked this white bedding up from wilko, i've wanted white bedding for a really long time but honestly, i may as well of been living in a hospital, my room would have been WAY to white. We looked everywhere for some plain white bedding with no frills or patterns on it and we couldn't find any..anywhere.
but eventually, hidden away in wilko we found this for only £7.99! I love how it looks with my wall and it makes everything look really clean.

The last thing(s) I got from wilko were these cushions. Keeping with the duck egg theme, these were only £4 each and I feel like they also look really nice against my white bedding.

Primark
I really love the home section in primark, although trying to resist buying multiple candles is a task and a half, they do actually have good quality things for not very much at all.
Me and Lauren were in primark just looking for clothes when I saw this and it was on sale for £4.50 which I think is so good... and also it fits with my duck egg wall so...winner.
It's honestly so soft and considering I got the cushions and this blanket from completely different places they're a pretty good match.

Ok, I honestly can't remember why I bought these. They were definitely an impulse buy, but I just think they're so cute. I love how they're all different patterns and quite 'retro' and I'm sure I'll put them to good use, and they're really good for £2

These are the last things I bought from primark and they're definitely not homeware... but I wear them in my home i suppose soo hahaha i'm really funny not.  They were way too cute to not add in this AND they're called snuggle socks..I'm sorry but you can't leave something with the word snuggle in on the shelves.

Ikea
I picked up a bedside table from Ikea which really fits in with my room and it was only £15! I also got this chair from Ikea for only £11 which I think is so good and it's a really nice design. It's actually really comfortable to sit on, which you wouldn't think for an £11 chair, I really like it.

I got these candle holders..which i'm actually using as pen holders. These make me seem so organised and I love it...we'll have to see how long that lasts.

So that's all I bought for my room, I think it looks so much nicer now and you always feel better when you've got a clean, decorated room.
Have you bought any homeware (or cute bambi socks) recently?

love dais xxx

Lush and Primark Haul

i've been getting ready for my holiday recently and that only means one thing...shopping.
i've been to town countless times looking for bikinis, shorts and other holiday attire but it's crazy at this time of year and i think i've left it a little bit too late because i'm finding it really hard to get my holiday wardrobe ready!

but some good has come out of my trips to town and i thought i would show you what i have bought because i love reading hauls and seeing what other people have bought (so im banking on everyone else loving them too)

LUSH

 1. big blue- this is my favourite bath bomb ever (seen as phoenix rising has now disappeared from lush *cries*) i love the sea so this really relaxes me.
2. dragons egg- i've used this before and it's so exciting and the smell reminds me of a sweet shop so i couldn't resist picking it up.
3. fizzbanger- i've never used this before but i loved the cinnamon smell that it had which reminded me of phoenix rising (as you can tell i'm finding its discontinuation very hard to deal with.

 PRIMARK

 this is a skort but having a whole picture of it really didn't do it justice. I love the pattern on this and it fits really nice so i thought this was amazing for just £6- buying this made me feel quite happy because it's something that i can actually use on holiday!

I could probably use these on holiday too but really, i just bought them because of how cute they are. The purple ones are my favourite because they remind me of being a little 7 year old running around the playground, anyone else? just me? ok. 

judging by the lack of 'holiday-esque' clothes in this haul i think i'm in serious need of a little bit of asos shopping.
have you bought anything recently?

love dais x

Recent Favourites

i feel like i haven't done a 'favourites' post for ages, partly because i haven't been blogging but also because i haven't really been using new things. I don't tend to use new things i just stick to things i know work for me, but these are a few things that i have really been enjoying lately.

 scrub of your life and thick and fast mascara

the scrub of your life is probably one of my favourite scrubs ever, i love the smell and i love how my skin feels after i've used it. I've got so many little travel versions of this and i have been using them almost none stop over the last couple of days.

the thick and fast mascara was a new one that i hadn't ever used before and now i love it, it makes my eyelashes look so long!

 Toni and Guy Moisturising Shine Spray

I got this so i could do my hair for prom and i've been loving it ever since. I use it after i've curled my hair mainly and it's the perfect little finishing touch.

 Toni and Guy Salt Spray

I have used this before and i've never fallen out of love with it. I've used it for a few years now and it makes hair styling so much easier! Especially if i get up late and haven't got time to curl or straighten my hair.

 Pretty Little Liars

There was so much hype about this and i must have put it off for at least a year, but i decided, because i've finished my GCSE's and have 10 weeks off where i will be lying in bed and eating chocolate  i should start a new television series and i am now obsessed.

Boohoo

I've been loving boohoo recently, it's a little bit like an online primark to me and i could probably spend thousands of pounds (that i don't have) on that website and the sizes are like real sizes and don't say size 8 when they mean size 2.

what have you been liking lately?

love dais xx