Aztec Nails

Hello my lovlies! It's been a little while since I've posted anything about nails, so here is a cheeky little how to for you to feast your eyes over.

Aztec is arguably one of the key trends for summer every year, so why not channel it through nail art?

I had a little time the other day and thought I would try out my brand new Barry M Nail Art Pen.

Black Nail Art Pen, £4.99, Barry M

It took a little while to actually get any polish out of it, had to pump it a good few times on a tissue before it worked properly, which was quite annoying but in the end I got it working. It is worth knowing that, at the minute, this pen also comes in white and pink.

Anyway...

First of all, after my base coat, I painted my nails with Barry M's Ridley Road Textures Nail Paint, (the review can be found here). 

Once I let that dry, I experimented with painting aztec patterns on my nails and, after many variations, I came up with a pattern that was easy enough to do and looked quite nice, and here is the finished result!

Paint a quick top coat over the top to seal it and you're good to go! I will say, usung the pen over textured polish was harder than using it over normal nail paint, but I really like the colour! The pen was quite difficult to use, but that might be down to the textured polish. I will try it on normal polish and let you know!


What do you think? What patterns do you like to paint on your nails?

Just a cheeky little reminder- my blog now has it's own Facebook page- fancy! So click here to give it a like!

Also, I'm starting to get a little bit of bloggers block and don't wanna keep churning out the same content, so if there is anything you want me to blog about then please let me know!

Hope you're all okay!

Ice Cream Cupcakes

My love for cupcakes is no secret. It is also clear that I love decorating them, possibly more than I enjoy eating them. The perfect party food- they are guarenteed to go down a treat and you know that if you take cupcakes to a party, you won't have to awkwardly pack them all back in your cake tin and take them back home afterwards.

My last cupcake post was my Rose and Vanilla Cupcakes. Today's cupcake recipe is these delicious ice cream cupcakes.

To make them you will need:

Cakes

 2oz Baking Butter

2oz Caster Sugar

1 or 2 Eggs (2 is better)

Couple of splashes of Vanilla Essence 

3oz Self- Raising Flour

Cupcake Cases

Decoration

Icing Sugar

Baking Butter

Vanilla Essence 

Flakes

Choice of Treat Sauces

Cute Birdhouse Gift

Every week or so, a couple of companies come into my work and leave us a selection of books, gifts and cute homeware. There's normally one or two things that I quite like, but a couple of weeks ago I came across this adorable novelty birdhouse!

 

It's a little different and by no means your average gift, but I just thought it was too cute to pass up and for just £6.50 I just couldn't help myself! You can get away with just using it in your house for decorative purposes or you can stick some protective spray on it and hang it in a tree in the garden. The attention to detail is amazing- there's even a mini satellite dish on top!

I thought it was a really lovely, quite different gift for my Nan for Christmas. I know, I know, it's only August, bit keen! Thankfully, my Nan doesn't have a computer, let alone internet access, so the surprise will remain intact until Christmas morning.

It is so cute, I just had to share! You can get them on ebay and various other websites, just give 'novelty caravan birdhouse' a Google and see what you can find.

Have a lovely day!

Soap and Glory: Thick and Fast- Mascara Review

Normally, I am a one-brand girl when it comes to mascara. I have been using Benefit Bad Gal Lash since about 2008 and have never looked back. Until this Summer when mine ran out and I didn't have the cash or time to go and replace it. I was forced to rifle through my big stash of toiletries for uni and came across Thick and Fast by Soap and Glory. I'm a die hard Soap and Glory fan so I was quite happy to give it a go but had hardly any expectations, but I was so impressed.

I've heard mixed reviews about the S&G make-up range so I was surprised when this product worked so well.

L: Thick and Fast, R: no mascara

I'm quite lucky to have fairly long eyelashes anyway, but when I applied this mascara for the first time, I was asked if I was wearing falsies. Then when I did stick a pair on, no one noticed because my lashes looked the same. Considering it came in one of the S&G gift sets I got for Christmas and so was technically free, I was really happy with the result. It's also only £10, which is cheaper than my usual brand, and if you hurry, you can catch a '2 for £15' offer on selected S&G cosmetics at Boots!

What mascaras do you recommend? What do you think of this one?

Attention Freshers!

Many of you would have got that little brown envelope last Thursday (or in July if you, like I was last year, are an IB kid). For a lot of you, that little envelope held your golden ticket into university in September! For those of you brave enough to venture straight into the world of work, treat this post as the ultimate pay day wishlist, for those future freshers among you, this is a selection of the things you will most definately NEED at university.

If you are anything like I was last year, you will feel like an entire new wardrobe is needed for uni. So you will head for Primark and buy everything in the shop and then have nowhere to pack it, nowhere to store it when you are at uni and the millions of items you purchased before uni will probably be quite poor quality. I did this last year and regretted it massively when my entire wardrobe basically fell apart within the first few weeks because I had gone for quantity over quality.

After a year at university, I finally think I have got the must have uni wardrobe nailed. So, I have put together the items I think you definately need to invest in while you still have access to mum/dads bank account and while you are still willing to spend the money (trust me, when you get your student loan you will be studying your bank account religiously everyday).

This is not going to be a cheap list, but if you play it right, these items should last you long enough that you won't need to replace them for at least a year- they are definitely investment pieces.

Fruit Sundae's: Nice and Not Remotely Naughty!

You may or may not have heard me mention my recent health-kick, so far I haven't been a complete failure but I am finding the sweet cravings hard to tackle. This is mind, I thought there just had to be a way for me to get my sugar fix and not feel like I need to just eat leaves for the next few days.

Last night I came up with the perfect solution! Fruit Sundae's. Possibly one of the nicest and feel good desserts I have ever eaten, and it perfectly fuilfills that infuriating sugar craving, without having you reaching for the Ben and Jerry's.

If you wanted to have a bash at one yourself, here's a brief how-to:

You will need:

 -Choose your fruit

-Grab a couple of fat free yoghurts (I've gone for strawberry and vanilla)

- Get some Granola- mine is crunchy nut granola with chocolate and hazelnuts

-Sauce (mine is chocolate)

-Glasses

1. I started by swirling some chocolate sauce into the glasses. Then I popped them into the fridge for the sauce to set while I chopped my fruit.

2. I washed and chopped my strawberries first, then popped them in a bowl with 2 tbs of sugar because I often find strawberries to be a little sour (and these were Sainsbury's Basics, so had check they were sweet!) and then I popped them into the fridge as well.

3. I continued to chop most of my fruit up. After 10/15 mins of chopping, grab your glasses from the fridge and start layering up! I started with a dollop of yoghurt and then added some fruit (don't forget your strawberries!), then granola. I followed this pattern until my glass was full then added a final sprinkle of granola and a drizzle of sauce to finish. 

4. And voila! 

 A few tips:

- I found that this size glass was just too big, today I made a similar thing with just peaches and vanilla yoghurt with granola and sauce in a much smaller glass and it was so much better!

- Ensure all your fruit compliments each other- I used a lot of different fruits as an experiment but I found that some just didn't work together.

- If you do use treat sauce, maybe use it throughout some of the layers as well for an extra sweet kick!

It's never gonna be a TGI's Oreo Sundae substitute but it will cure the more frequent sugar cravings!

What do you think?

On another note, you can now like Princesses and Pink Champagne on Facebook by clicking here.

Happy Saturday!

I've been nominated for the Liebster Award!

Hello lovely readers! Hope you are all having a fabulous week!

I got a nice little comment from the lovely Bridie from 'Young and Foolish Happiness' to say I'm one of the bloggers she's nominated for the Liebster Award which is incredibly exciting! I'm still a fairly new blogger so this is a huge deal! It's wonderful to know that you aren't just writing to yourself- there are people who are reading and enjoying what you have to say which, for an aspiring journalist, is a bit of an ego boost.

For those who don't know what the Liebster Award it, it's an award for bloggers with less that 200 followers. The aim of the award it to put these smaller blogs on the map and get them some more followers which is such a nice idea.

So here's the deal:

• If nominated, you have to answer 11 questions, set by the blogger who nominated you. 
• In turn, you must provide 11 new questions for your nominees to answer.
• You must link back to the person who nominated you.
• You must answer all 11 questions set by whoever nominated you.
• You must choose 11 bloggers to nominate, all with fewer than 200 followers.
• You must go to your nominee's blogs and notify them that you have nominated them

The questions Bridie gave me were:

The Silver Linings Playbook

Ok. Hands up. I watched the film before reading the book. Schoolgirl error I know, but after seeing Jennifer Lawrence get an Oscar for her performance and because Bradley Cooper was just in it, I had to see it. Then the book was in the bargain bin in Sainsbury's (like every book I end up reading) and I thought why not.

For the minority who haven't seen the film or read the book, (although they are quite a bit different from each other which was a surprise...) it explores the life of Pat Peoples, post mental institution, and his efforts to win back his ex wife after 4 years of 'apart time' and then shows how he tries to move on with his life and better himself.

Pat is such a loveable protagonist you almost don't care what he's done to end up in this position (although you are a tad curious until the last 50 pages or so when it is finally revealed). He has a frosty relationship with his father and is a die hard Eagles fan, so there is a lot of man-sport-speak that I didn't quite get but it doesn't matter if you don't know what he's on about, it's his love for his family and friends in connection with his love for his team that matters (bit of a jumbled way of phrasing but if you give it a read, you'll know what I mean!).

It takes a pretty long time to meet the equally messed up Tiffany, the character that won Jennifer Lawrence an Oscar. Once they meet, they start running silently together and eating a shared bowl of raisin bran in a diner every now and again. It was a massive effort for me to accept Jennifer Lawrence as playing Tiffany because she is so young, but Tiffany is in her late 20's/early 30's, so if you've seen the film, you might have trouble getting your head around the age thing. But the way their relationship evolves is really intriguing.

The story is really quite beautiful. It's not funny, but there are some parts where you can't help but let out a little giggle to yourself. It's a bit Curious Incident come One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, but the story is more uplifting that either of those, hence the title. Parts are really quite sad in a way, but it put me in a good mood everytime I read a chapter (chapters which are wonderfully short I might add).

If the fact that Bradley Cooper played him in the movie isn't enough to make you fall in love with Pat, give it a read and I can almost guarentee you will fall in love with his character (post reinvetion obviously, before he went into the 'bad place' he was a right piece of work). The only thing I didn't love about the book was that it's all written in the present tense, but that's always been a little pet hate of mine. Like I said, actually quite different from the movie in terms of plot so give them both a go.

Have you read this book? What did you think?
Have a lovely day!

Getting Lippy!

And so my obsession with MUA continues. I recently had a bit of a Superdrug spree and my goodies included a couple of lipsticks for just £1 each so I figured, for the good of womankind (and my fellow students), I had to share these little diamonds with you.

It is no secret that I own pretty much half of the MUA range, but for whatever bizarre reason, this was the first time I had bought any of their lipsticks.

(L-R) Shade 15 and Shade 3

Literary Emoprium

I love books. I love fashion. I love jewellery. So I'm sure you can't even begin to fathom my excitement when I was browsing the interweb, on the hunt for some gorgeous new jewellery and I came across this blinder of a website. Literary Emporium is a website that sells products based on books. It doesn't get much better than that.

They sell other bits and bobs but my favourite section was definitely the jewellery one. Each necklace has a little charm on it and the packaging of that necklace comes with a supporting quotation from a book. Such an adorable idea and the necklaces are beautifully simple and subtle. And the quotation often doubles up as a wee bit of life advice which we could all do with now and then, and it gives your shiny new piece of neck candy a meaning that only you understand. Simple, relateable pieces that really brightened my day!

I've selected some of my favourite pieces for you to have a gander at. Give the website a look- such a good find! http://www.literaryemporium.co.uk

All £12.00

There aren't hundreds of necklaces on the website but it was still so difficult to choose just 4 to share with you! They are all lovely and prices range from about £12.00 up to about £14.00 which I think is pretty reasonable for such a unique piece.


What do you think of my choices? Don't forget to check them out!

Rose Tinted Cupcakes

I am meant to be on a diet for that belated and rather more winter than summer bod, but it was a friends birthday recently and I thought it was as good an excuse as any to whip up a tasty treat for me and my buddies. On a birthday, nothing else quite cuts it (pardon the pun) like cupcakes. But these aren't just any cupcakes. Oh no. These are vanilla and rose cupcakes. Are you intrigued yet?

I've been admiring a variation of this recipe in my cupcake book for about 3 years and today I was browsing the bakery isle in Sainsbury's for inspiration, when the elusive rose water ingredient that I had stuggled to find, caught my eye. All excited about the cute little make over Sainsburys's had given their bakery section and the rows of cute little bottles, (which kept me occupied for a good 15 minutes, much to my mum's irritation) made me eager to get home and have a play. They looked and tasted great (if I do say so myself) and I thought it was a nice little treat to share with my lovely readers.

Makes 6 cakes.
You will need:

Cakes

2oz Baking Butter

2oz Caster Sugar

1 or 2 Eggs (up yo you!)

Splash of Rose Water

Splash of Vanilla Essence 

3oz Self- Raising Flour

Cupcake Cases

Decoration

Pink Ready to Roll Icing

White Fondant for Modelling

Edible Glitter (if you like)

Dorothy Perkins: Back in the Game!

A few years ago, Dorothy Perkins was my go to. No matter how often I went in, there would always be at least one thing that I felt I needed in my life, there and then. It was the place I got my Chanel-look quilted chain bag, (that I still have, 5 years later), and the place I bought my only pair of vaguely bearable heels.

But alas, recently DP has been letting me down. There isn't actually one in Guildford where I go to uni, so that's partly why, but everytime I have been in there in the last year or so, it's always been very.... 'fine', very 'that's quite nice'. Nothing has made me stop, scream and march over to the til to spend my final pennies (apart from my gorgeous kharki spring jacket, must have!). Until today.

I was passing and thought 'it can't hurt' so stuck my head round the door, expecting nothing special. Instead I was hit with a selection of clothes I fell immediately in love with. Turns out the designers at Dorothy Perkins have upped their game significantly at the turn of the season
. I was so excited about my little visit that I thought I had to share my favourite pieces with you, so here is my Dorothy Perkins wishlist:

In Her Shoes...

At the weekend, my trusty black pumps decided to finally give up on me after a year of battling the British weather and my inability to pick up my feet when I walk. So this meant I needed to get shoe prowling pronto.

After hours of traipsing around Bluewater, scowering various shops and many a sales rack in the hope of a good bargain, with no success and so much disappointment, I found myself, as always, in New Look.

Just when I feared even New Look's humongous shoe heaven couldn't help me, I spied these little beauties in the corner, the final 3 pairs. My size. Sold.

New Look, £17.99