THE PERFECT PALETTE

So I haven't been wearing eye shadow for all that long and I'm a bit new at the whole thing bit I am completely in love with basic and nude palettes so I have got together a collection of my favourites. All of these palettes are under £10 as what is the point in splashing out on a Naked Palette costing £36 when you can get something a lot cheaper that has basically the same colours on the high street?

This is an awful photo but I couldn't get a decent one to show what the packaging looks like

1. Boots own palette (roughly £6)- I was given this for Christmas 2012 so sadly it is not available anymore but every year Boots bring out their own cheap makeup range with are all small and adorable and make the best gifts. I absolutely love this palette, it has six great colours that all have a slight glitter effect to them without being too overpowering.
It is definitely worth having a look at the Boots own makeup range every Christmas as last year's was really good, you can find it online in the Christmas section under 'teen beauty gifts' or in stores.

This is my favourite palette by far- you can't see well but all apart from the black are matte, the black is sparkly, and the one in the bottom right is a pale pink

2. Accessorize palette in Exposed (£8.95)- This is the most expensive palette I am going to review but it still comes to under £10 which I personally think is great for how many colours you get (32). This palette probably has every brown, pink, gold, copper or nude colour you will ever want or need in it, plus a couple of blues and a black as well. I saw this reviewed online but then couldn't find it on either the Accessorize or the Superdrug websites and had a bit of a freak that I could never have it and I wanted it, much to my great joy though they were selling it in my local Superdrug. A lot of these colours are shimmery or very VERY shimmery and I would much prefer a more matte selection for everyday use but they are great for going out or for special occasions. This palette is lovely but it is too shimmery for my taste, Accessorize have gone a little too over the top in their use of glitter here.

3. MUA (Make Up Academy) palette in Shade 12 Heaven and Earth (£4.00)- I was a bit wary of using MUA eye shadows as I have very sensitive eyes and I didn't know if cheap eye shadow would aggravate it like cheap eyeliner and mascara does but I couldn't resist this palette at £4.00 with such lovely colours. Heaven and Earth is MUA's best selling palette, and I must say it looks so much nicer in person than it does online; I was not as keen on this palette when I saw it online but now that I own it I am completely in love with it. It has the most beautiful colours that can be put together to make the prettiest eye lid ever and I just love love love this palette so much.
Another MUA palette that I wanted was Undress Me Too (also £4.00) but it was very similar to Heaven and Earth (which was my first choice) and it was always sold out in my local Superdrug so I decided to see how I got on with Heaven and Earth before I got another one; Undress Me Too is a beautiful palette though and it was an almost impossible choice deciding which one to get.

You can't easily see what some of the colours are here (sorry for natural lighting) but the top row first on the left is a creamy colour, top row third from the left is a goldy colour, and bottom row third from the left is a light beige colour.

Other beautiful palettes that I have found but won't be looking at here are:
-Soap and Glory Lid Stuff (£10)- Comes in three different choices which are all beautiful
-Flutter Pretty Purple Eye Palette (£4)- (available from Superdrug online) beautiful selection of purples, appealing even to me who is not a great fan of bright colours on my eyelids.
-The Lolita by Marc Jacobs (around £40 I believe but don't take my word on it)- Very pretty but you can still get great dupes on the high street for a much more reasonable price.
-Nude Tude Eyeshadow Palette by The Balm (£26)- I love this but (as you may already know) I am not a fan of spending overly large amounts of money on things like this; absolutely adorable packaging though.

I am thinking of starting a MAC palette in pinks, browns, neutrals and maybe a white, but as they are super expensive (£10 each) I am currently unsure. Much to my great joy though, MAC do palettes in a smaller size to fit only four eye shadows pans; still expensive but much cheaper than a full palette, and also perfect for holiday-ing as it is small and light.

MAD ABOUT MATTE

*I am wearing the Burgundy Crush in these pictures*

I am a massive fan of matte nail varnishes- especially black, and up until now I have been having to put a matte top coat on my nails which just takes up so much time. The matte top coat I have been using is from H&M and cost only £2.99, no offence to H&M, but this product is awful, I know it's only cheap but Barry M do nail varnishes for the same price at a much higher quality. The matte looks lasts for about a day and only ever appears to work on my thumb, I love you H&M but you should really just stick to clothes.

There are no words for my excitement when I was browsing the Superdrug website and stumbled across Barry M's new matte range, I'd seen matte nail varnishes briefly in Topshop but I wasn't really taken with the colours; the Barry M range, however, is amazing. There are five different colours, black, light brown, dark brown, nude and burgundy and I want all of them. For the moment though I have got black (as I absolutely love matte black nails) and burgundy because it is the best colour ever.

Starting off with Burgundy Crush, the matte is very obvious with only one, thin coat, the one coat looks like a pale wine colour. The matte is still there with two coats, but looks less matte than it does with only one coat. Two coats give a much, much darker and definitely burgundy colour, having one thicker coat gives the same effect as two coats.
The one I was most excited for was the Black Espresso as black matte is the nicest nail look in the world ever. I am partially to this product, I have been wearing only one coat for about five days and the matte still look good but I'm not sure how I feel about this product overall. The matte does last really well however and I does actually look matte compared to the H&M topcoat which lasts about a day.

One thing I have found with all matte nail varnishes is that they appear to dry much quicker than a normal nail varnish does.
Another thing I have noticed with this nail varnish is that it looks much better on the second day of wearing it, I don't know why this is but I am more pleased with the way they look that I was when I first painted them.
I look am I wanting to try out but I haven't decided yet if it is too weird is alternating burgundy and black which I personally think will look awesome.

The one thing I don't like about Barry M is I hate their brushes, they are too thin for my liking and you often end up with quite streaky nails.
I am not overly taken with this product, I was very excited for it and it's a bit of a let down. I will be on the hunt for a higher quality matte top coat and I have heard that OPI do a very good one.

AUTUMN TAG

I love autumn, not as much as winter, but autumn is still great and everything is pretty. I saw this Autumn Tag on someone's blog and thought it was such a great idea that I would copy it, basically... (I have edited some of the questions to make it easier for my English ways).

1. Favourite autumn lip product?
As everyone knows I am a self confessed lip balm addict and I get super dry lips all your round but especially in autumn/ winter time I obviously have a million lip balms on the go at one time but my favourite at the moment is obviously Burt's Bees because that is the best and it can be worn under lip gloss or lip stick to stop your lips drying out; dark coloured lip sticks are also perfect for this time of year, the one  I am currently using is the Intense Colour Lipstick in Infatuated (Shade 7) by Accessorize which I bought on a super-quick Superdrugs dash for Halloween but I have completely fallen in love with it as it is the nicest colour EVER and I want to wear it 24/7 (I will write a full review later at some point in the near distant future).

It looks more burgundy in the tube but actually comes out as quite a brightish purple colour

2. Favourite autumn nail polish?
Any dark red is a perfect autumn colour and this year I have gone for the Barry M Matte Nail Paint in Burgundy Crush; dark purples, dark reds and greys work well in autumn. I really like matte top coats all year round as well and they work with any colour.

3. Favourite autumn drink?
It has got to be either the cinnamon or gingerbread latte from Costa- very autumn/ wintery flavours (I like Costa A LOT I go there far to much and my Costa points card is not a valid excuse to go there so much).

4. Favourite autumn candle?
Yankee Candle Spiced Orange- I absolutely love this, the orange and clove scents are perfect together; I don't actually own this candle as the scent can get really strong after a while but it smells amazing in the jar.

5. Favourite autumn accessory?
My current favourite necklace is my Orange Calcite necklace which 'aids learning, study, memory and increases energy' as it goes with everything and I do believe that stones have powers; my father calls it the 'Stone of Education' because he thinks he is funny.

6. Favourite autumn clothing item?
This isn't really an autumn-specific clothing item but I am really loving my lace top from Topshop as it has the cutest little collar and looks amazing under any and every jumper.

7. Favourite seasonal movie?
I can't think of any autumn movies apart from Halloween ones but every year my friends and I have the Halloween sleepover where we basically just eat a lot and scare ourselves shite-less; it has become a tradition that we watch Trick 'r Treat every year even though it is awful but I will choose it anyway for my favourite movie purely due to tradition.

8. Favourite Halloween food?
At the moment I am completely in love with cinnamon whirls from Sainsburys they are the greatest food in the world and I would live off them if I could.

9. What is the strangest thing you have ever dressed up as for Halloween?
For Halloween I was a Sith Lord from Star Wars purely so I could walk about with my Lightsaber (yes I have a Lightsaber). This year I went as the three peas in a pod from Toy Story 3 with two of my friends, took a lot of effort explaining to everyone why we were dressed entirely in green. This year I also dressed up as a bearded lady as I had a dress I wanted to wear and I had a beard from when I was Joseph in the church Nativity.

10. What is your favourite thing about autumn?
Basically the fact that it is nearly Christmas and I enjoy being able to wear coats, hats, scarves, gloves and thick jumpers all the time.

HALLOWEEN NAILS

This Halloween was an interesting one, a bunch of us went to my best friend's house and about an hour in she sliced through her hand in the gap between her thumb and first finger when carving pumpkins- typical. I'm not exagerting when I say you could see the flesh inside her hand but she ended up having to go to hospital and sit in A&E for two hours. She ended up with three stitches and can never give a thumbs up properly again whilst we all had to hang out in her house without her. It was a surreal event but typical for her.

Last Halloween (2012- party on) was the first time I'd celebrated (is that the right word?) Halloween properly for quite a few years. Last year was the traditional all-black look but this year I decided to mix it up a bit more.

Part of my look this year was nails. Nails are fun, you can paint them different colours fitting for every season and I was sadly overly pleased with mine this year. I decided to go for the alternating colours which I haven't done in a very long time (alternating nails were the bomb in year 8).
My Halloween look was an obvious choice, a mix of my new Barry M black matte and an old one- from the Boots own brand range from last Christmas in Emerald green. The green comes out much lighter than in the bottle and is also very thin so you need a good few coats before it will work properly. Matte black and glittery green are perfect for mixing up your nails a bit and making them look a bit more interesting and unusual.
There's not much to say really apart from I painted them alternating and it was very Halloween-y but I'd only done one coat so it lasted about a day and they were not looking good five days later. Nails are a quick-ish (depending on if you don't smudge them or not) and easy look and you can always find something to go with every outfit.

ROSIE'S WONDERFUL PUMPKIN CUPCAKES

My cakes

My brother's cakes

 

Hello and welcome to the first ever blog post of 'Cooking with Rosie'. In today's post we are going to be exploring the wonderful world of Halloween, starting with 'Rosie's Wonderful Pumpkin Cupcakes' (jk I'm making cupcakes that look like pumpkins and my mother and brother are 'supervising' so that they can play with the icing and make sure I don't burn them like last time- also they want to eat the mixture). Enjoy!

For the cakes (makes 24):
1. Find your trusty recipe book- here is mine, I got it when I was very young and it is actually brilliant for fairy cakes
2. Collect your ingredients
For this recipe you will need:
125g (4oz) of self-raising flour
125g (4oz) of butter
125g (4oz) of caster sugar
1tsp of baking powder
2 eggs
1tsp of vanilla essence
3. Set your oven to 190oC/ 375oF/ Gas mark 5
4. Sieve the flour and baking powder into a bowl
5. Beat the eggs and then add to the bowl along with the butter, sugar and vanilla essence
6. Whisk until creamy and drops off a spoon
7. Fill up 24 cake cases and cook for 20 minutes
8. Eat the remaining mixture
9. When golden, remove the cakes and leave to cool

For the icing (ices 18):
1. Once again, find the new page in your trusty recipe book
2. Collect your ingredients
For this recipe you will need:
7tbsp of icing sugar
3tsp of water
1 drop of food colouring (for this design I will be using a drop of red and a drop of yellow)
Black icing pen (to draw the design onto the cake)
3. Make sure your cakes feel emotionally ready to be iced (we actually left the cakes and iced them the day after so they would be nice and fresh for the Halloween sleepover but also it was easier time wise- e.g. we couldn't be bothered)
4. Stir the water and icing sugar together in a bowl, make sure your icing is thick before you add the food colouring as the food colouring will water it down quite a bit
5. Add the food colouring, add a little if you want a light colour and more if you want it darker
6. Ice your cakes
7. When dry, decorate with the pen, if using something else (e.g. sweets) then decorate when still wet
8. Admire your work while eating the rest of the icing, Instagram it