2016 has left to be desired. Worldwide? It's been fairly shit. Personally? Only averagely shit. On a whole - well, I'd like to move to the moon after the whole ordeal.

Despite that, I have had some rather nice times, some of which I captured on camera and decided to upload it on the internet, and now I'm showing you lot my favourite bits. Fun times. Let's get on with it, shall we?

Well this post is horrendously late, isn't it! Me? Useless at doing anything on time? Lies!

I feel like I've rediscovered make-up recently and I finally enjoy putting make-up on, and it's a lot less of a burden than it has been in the past.

Base

I've decided to give up on foundation. Dun dun duuun. This decision was made when I did put foundation on and realised that it doesn't suit me, really. It dulls my freckles, but not quite enough to hide them completely, so it just looks a bit dumb, so I gave up on the stuff. Instead, I've opted for the MAC 'Pro-Longwear' concealer. Of course, (when I remember, at least) I prime my face with the Benefit 'Porefessional' primer, as usual. Also under my concealer, however, I'm going to put some green concealer in any places where I have any redness or hyper-pigmentation (generally that means chin, jawbone, under my nose and on any spots), then I'll lightly blend it in. I was a bit skeptical at first but actually turns out this shit is great! I'm setting that with the E.L.F "High Definition'.

Eyes


Recently I've taken to not using eyeliner or anything, simply because, as I've already said many times, I end up looking like a panda, and as you can imagine it's really unattractive. Instead, I've opted for eyeshadow. I've been quite liking putting the shade ME-512 (that lovely champagne colour in the middle of the bottom row) from my Make-Up Forever 'Spring Flower' palette on the entirety of my lid, and then with a slanted brush, just dabbing a bit of ME-930 on my top lash line and on my bottom lash from the end of my eye to the middle of my eye. Sometimes, if I'm feeling a bit bolder, I'll do it from the beginning of my eye to the middle which I feel defines my eye a bit more.
I'll finish it up with the TooFaced 'Better Than Sex' mascara which I need a whole other post to discuss because OH LORDY it's good!

Blush, Bronze and Highlight



I have nothing to say about this part, I'm literally in love with these little beauties in my TooFaced palette! They're really amazing, pigmented and all the heart-eyed emojis! I think I'm going to do a full review on the set I got for Christmas because it really is great!

Lips



I'm going quite neutral on my lips of late. I'm not sure quite what's come over me but I just haven't had the reflex to grab my Kate Moss in 107 or my Clinique lipstick. I've actually, for once, been longing for more nude lips, and focusing more on the eyes. Saying that, I do love a good lipstick, and these two have definitely been doing a mighty fine job. I've been mostly reaching for MAC lipstick in the shade 'Hug Me' or more recently the TooFaced 'Melted' liquified lipstick in Chocolate Milkshake WHICH SMELLS OF CHOCOLATE MILKSHAKE and I had a fit when I realised this.

What have you been wearing recently? I hope you guys had a nice Christmas and are going to get horribly drunk and have a blast with your friends on New Years Eve!

I blame you lot for this post. THIS IS YOUR FAULT, DON'T START JUDGING ME!

How's the build-up to Christmas going for you lot? Personally for me it's going pretty smoothly, but I know that's not the case for everyone.  I worked in a salon for 3 weeks and almost everyone when asked admitted they were nowhere near ready for Christmas. With that in mind, I thought I'd do a realistic gift guide for people who, like me, are broke and desperate and need a hand. Some of these are a little more expensive, but this is also to help give you some ideas also of things that could be nice to buy.



MAC Lipstick-Soap and Glory "Peach Party" Blush-Oversized Scalf-Harry Potter and the Cursed Child by J.K Rowling-Black Thumb Succulent Print-Personnalisable LED Message Box-Zara Eau De Toilettes-The Lost Art Of Keeping Secrets by Eva Rice-The Meaning Of Liff - The Original Dictionary Of Things There Should Be Words For by Douglas Adams and John Lloyd


Sorry there isn't many ideas but I'm shit at buying presents - especially stocking filler/cheap type presents! Hope this helped jog your thought process though.

Merry Christmas! I may post something on Saturday, but I'm not sure because I'll be with my family. We shall see!

This is being written from a very precarious position, I've just painted my nails and I'm terrified off chipping this.

I want everyone here to know what this post was born out of procrastination. But not the usual kind where you're avoiding doing a job you need to do, no, I'm procrastinating from relaxing. I'm having a really relaxed Sunday, Mama and I went out for lunch, and I've been on the sofa doing little jobs on my laptop for most of the afternoon. I finished everything I have to do, and I found myself gagging for something to do. I didn't want to switch off and think about nothing. I needed to be totally immersed in something, because if not then my brain was going to go hay-wire. I was caught up on social media, I didn't have any inspiration to finish or start a blog post, all my blog admin was done, my Youtube subscriptions box was dead, everything was impossibly quiet. The horror.

I'm pretty sure this comes from my anxiety and paranoia. If I'm left to my own thoughts, I just end up over-thinking things and before you know it my anxiety is going insane and I'm convinced everyone hates me. So I just avoid relaxing and switching off. I force myself to be busy constantly, always looking for something to occupy my mind. That's one of the reasons I love having a blog so much. Before I started this blog, I'd spend my days on social media, but there was no reason to it. There was no productivity, and when social media was dead, I was left with nothing to do. Now I have my blog, if I'm bored, I can take blog photos, finish a blog post, schedule blog posts to come, do admin, contact brands, sort my e-mails.

To put it simply, it opened up a whole new list of things I could do, and it was amazing; I realise now that it was a good thing and a bad thing. A good thing because it gave me somewhere to house my creativity and a way to do something other than scroll aimlessly on Twitter, but it also made it so that my default thing to do when I have nothing else to do is to blog, and now I really struggle to stay focused on one thing. I now am incapable of switching off. Where as some people relish in turning their phones and laptops off for an evening, have a bath and just chill, that sounds horrific to me. The idea of just sitting and being left to my own thoughts is a dangerous concept.

I'm taking baby steps in the whole 'making myself learn to switch off', for example, this afternoon I made myself a cup of tea, closed my laptop and read a book. And guess what? The world didn't end. No one went into panic mode. There wasn't 34564 missed calls from someone in grave danger. Most importantly, no one decided they hated me in that time.

I was a bit apprehensive about writing this post because I didn't want anyone to think I was completely mental, and then I remembered that I don't care and all the apprehension went away!

Saying that, let me know in the comments if you're the same, or you have times when you find yourself actively avoiding switching off for your own good?

I'd love to have an intro right now, really love it, however, I do not, so let's just do this.

Marks and Spencers Frankincense & Myrrh Candle

This is possibly my ultimate Christmas candle. It just smells so amazing and every Christmas Mama orders it from Marks and Spencers and lasts next to no time because we just light it constantly! I don't even know what gets me about it so much about it but I just never get tired of it.

Make-Up Forever 'Spring Flower' eyeshadow palette

Mama got this for me back when she went to Thailand at the beginning of this year, and even though the colours a prettyy af, I was worried I wouldn't be able to use it because there were a lot of colours that were either not going to suit me or weren't really wearable for everyday. I decided to try and up my eyeshadow game at the moment, and I've been using the shades I-544, ME-930 and ME-512 together all the time at the moment.

Incense

It's the small things but I first got into incense through my friend. We'd hang out at her apartment, turn on her lava lamps, light some incense and put on a vinyl. It was great. My dormmate ended up with some incense (I have literally no idea how) and offered me some. I, of course, said yes because I freaking love the smell of incense, and it's literally the most relaxing thing. Incense + fairy lights and lava lamp = total chill.

Photo Wall

This is kind of a random favourite but this is seriously one of my favourite bits of this month. I got loads of photos of my friends printed and I decided to make myself a proper photo wall. It's lovely and I've put a bit of cardboard I found at the back of a frame I'm going to paint and write a lil' sumsum in the middle and it makes me happy to see photos of my favourites everytime I'm in my bed. (Sorry about the photo and how much reflection the photos give off - my window is facing it!)


MAC 'Pro Longwear' concealer

I hadn't used this in a really long time, for some unknown reason - I think it had something to do with the fact that I went really pale all of a sudden and got very scared and disappointed because I thought I bought it in the wrong shade, so I left it to the side and it wasn't touched, in favour of my Urban Decay 'Naked' concealer, but seeing as it is no more, I tried my Pro Longwear concealer and LORDY WHY DID I EVER LEAVE YOU. This is just such a good concealer. It works particularly well for undereye circles and redness.

Benefit 'Benetint' lip and cheek tint

I got this as a mini version in my Benefit 'Life Of The Party' kit last Christmas, and I'd never really looked twice at it because, and I'm going to be honest with you, I was a *bit* scared of it. But since I didn't have my blush in the On The Run palette, and I figured I needed to bite the bullet and give it a go, and turns out it's a bloody amazing blush! It's super pigmented so you don't have to put on a ton and blends like a dream!

Maybelline 'Colour Sensational' lipstick in Red Revolution

I rediscovered this at Halloween, actually, but have been wearing it religously through November. It's perfect if you're looking for something to feel a bit more classy, even if it's just to go to work or to your classes.
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Lil' announcement! I am yet again going to be changing my layout so bare with me if it looks a bit questionable sometimes.

What have you been loving this month?