Primark Haul - July 2013

Posted by Unknown - 05:22 - ,
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Primark is becoming one of my favourite bargain places for fashion forward trends - things that aren't necessarily going to last that long and also trends that I'm not sure will 100% suit me.  I am quite comfortable with my style at the moment but that does mean I am normally in a dress and a cardigan which can get a bit boring from time to time.

I managed to get down to the nearest Primark store and picked up a bunch of bargains so I'm going to share these with you now...


Light Denim Jacket: £16, American Denim Gilet: Reduced to £7, Cropped Cat Tshirt: £6.00, Friendship bracelets: Reduced to £1, 2 x charm necklaces: both reduced to £1 each.

I ended up buying the size 16 for both the jacket and gilet so they are really tight, but the denim jacket larger size had a big stain on the back and the gilet was all sold out.  With the spinner arriving on Thursday it made sense to size down. 



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Day Nineteen: The Blogger Challenge (Five of your favourite blogs)

Posted by Unknown - 09:50 -
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Day Nineteen: The Blogger Challenge - Five of your favourite blogs and what you love about them

I can't believe we are on day 19 of the blogger challenge and I haven't missed a single day - RESULT!  Now for today's challenge... I spend far too much time reading blogs - mainly plus size fashion but also some recipe / healthy versions of food blogs too to pick up tips for feeding the family :)  It was really hard to choose only 5 blogs to mention but here is my shortlist in no particular order...

 1.  What Laura Loves
I've mentioned Laura's blog before but I'm going to again because her blog is one of the reasons I decided to start my own.  I think she has fantastic style and she has a love for dresses that I equally share.  Laura's blog also highlights beauty products as well as fashion so I think it's a winner.

 2. The Ramblings of Mrs Bebe
I love reading Becky's blog - her outfit of the day posts are really inspiring and I have bought dresses based on her reviews / OOTD posts. I also find Becky's posts really entertaining and they keep me hooked (I haven't read through the whole blog yet but I am sure I will eventually get through her archives!)

 3.  A Rose Like This
Rosie's blog is really cool - her fashion style is pretty retro which I love and her photos are always really clear.  I've been reading Rosie's blog for a while now and I find it really informative too :)

 4. Danielle Vanier
I only recently discovered Danielle's blog but it's one I have been reading regularly.  She has some awesome clothes ( I want her wardrobe ha). Danielle's blog is more photo orientated than text, but her photos are really inspiring :)

 5.  Fuller Figure Fuller Bust
I absolutely love George's blog - she has a figure I would love!  Really cool dress sense and her posts are always really great.  George reviews a lot of outfits and also underwear which doesn't really apply to me because I'm not that lucky up front! I like George's blog because it's full of personality and her style is awesome.

 I wonder who everyone else has chosen for their favourite five blogs?

Day Eighteen: The Blogger Challenge (A childhood memory)

Posted by Unknown - 05:17 -
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Day Eighteen: The Blogger Challenge - A childhood memory - Tell a story from your childhood.

 The story I've decided to tell from my childhood is from when I was 13 years old and my family all flew out to Mauritius where my sister got married.  For some reason this holiday sticks in my head with plenty of details.  My parents and I flew out separately to my sister and her husband to be.  I remember the flight being around 12 to 14 hours non stop and as a bad flier due to my ears feeling like they are going to explode when I am on a plane it was a complete nightmare journey.

 Once we had arrived at the airport in Mauritius I couldn't hear a thing.  We got on the tiny minibus and headed to our hotel.  I'm not sure if it was the travelling, lack of hearing, heat or the bumpy Mauritian motorway but I threw up all over the lady sat in front of me. My mum helped me to clean myself and the minibus and I was stood on the side of the road in my knickers!  The driver went to a local house and got some bottled water for me.

 We got to the hotel and I was feeling a lot better.  The reception served us with this amazing orange tropical juice. I have never tasted anything this good since. I must have drank 4 or 5 glasses of it! We were staying in a little thatched roof hut and what would have been my bedroom was tiny and filled with spiders!  I slept in the double bed with my mum while my dad slept on a sunlounger next to us!  Bless him.

 I remember quite a bit about the holiday itself - we made friends with the locals and one older boy called Goose used to bring me seashells as presents. I think that it was because I was blonde -  I was a bit of a novelty to the locals.  My family even went for dinner at one of their houses and was served fish stew! Gross! I stayed back at the hotel for that!  We also made friends with some people staying at the hotel too. A lovely lady called Elsa and her friend were on holiday and Elsa tried to teach me how to swim.  As soon as we moved from the children's pool to the adult pool I paniced and that was the end of that! 

 My sisters wedding was a very blustery day.  Everyone was trying to keep their hats on and their hair out of their mouths!  My sister looked amazing in a traditional white wedding dress and I was in a green bridesmaid dress which was absolutely baking in that weather!  Once the wedding had taken place near the sea, we walked into the hotel lobby.  I tripped up the stairs and felt really embarrassed!  I was wearing shoes that were too big for me and caught them on the bottom of my dress.  Some of the hotel guests joined in the reception party and it was a really great day.  We stayed in Mauritius for another week after the wedding then flew back home while my sister and her husband flew to the Seychelles for their honeymoon.  

 Let's see what everyone else remembers... 

OOTD - Outfit of the day - Simply Be feather print maxi

Posted by Unknown - 05:19 - , , , ,
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Today's "Outfit of the Day" features a feather print maxi dress from Simply Be.  Technically, this dress belongs to my mum but one of the bonuses of being a similar size is that I normally borrow all her clothes!  This feather print maxi dress comes in two lengths and two base colours but I think the black is a much more flattering tone. The dress is still available on the Simply Be website at £35.  Unfortunately it isn't in the sale at the moment but they have plenty of sizes left in stock and I think that price isn't too bad for a maxi dress.  I've seen second hand branded maxi dresses sell on ebay for over £25!!

 I am wearing a UK size 18 regular length (52 inches) dress and I have combined it with a bright green shrug/cardigan from George at Asda (size 16) and a bracelet that my mum bought me on her "find a bracelet to match the peacock dress" hunt.  The bracelet is from Wallis and was reduced from £14 down to £3!  My mum is a bargain hunter and that's probably where I get it from!

 
Feather Print Maxi Dress, Simply Be, Currently £35.00, Cardigan: George @ Asda,
Bracelet: Wallis, reduced from £14 to £3 Shoes: Unknown

Day Seventeen: The Blogger Challenge (A favourite photo of yourself and why)

Posted by Unknown - 04:55 -
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Day Seventeen: The Blogger Challenge - A favourite photo of yourself and why.

A bit of a happier tone to todays challenge after yesterday!   I am quite critical over photos of me and with digital cameras being the norm these days I always ask to look at the photos on the preview screen.  If I don't like them, they get deleted!  It's probably a really bad habit that I have that annoys people!

 My favourite photo which is shown below is one that was taken of me with my dad. We were heading out to a party that my sister was throwing and he looked very dashing in his James Bond esq tuxedo while I was in a black evening gown from Debut at Debenhams (How I can remember that is beyond me!)  Although I look goofy, I think this photo sums up my dad.  Cheery and loving and it's one that I will keep forever :)



 Check out the other lovely ladies taking part in this challenge:


Day Sixteen: The Blogger Challenge (Something difficult about your lot in life...)

Posted by Unknown - 02:15 -
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Day Sixteen: The Blogger Challenge - Something difficult about your lot in life and how you're working to overcome it...

I have been toying with a few ideas of what to write about for this challenge and I have finally decided to write about something very personal and emotional to me.  Please note that I am not writing this to gain sympathy or attention - I was very lucky to come out of the situation relatively unscathed but I want to highlight the dangers to others so that they don't go through what I went through.   

 A few years ago I was in a violent relationship with an alcoholic and I didn't have the courage to end it until the night he attempted to hit me with a wine bottle. 

 I met my ex in a local bar and he seemed quite friendly.  In all honesty I was probably on the rebound and it wasn't until a month or so into the relationship that he started play fighting quite rough - rugby tackling me etc.  He drank an awful lot but he had lied to me about his age so I thought he was just a normal early twenties lad.  As time went on, he started to get more aggressive -  hitting, punching and kicking and I did everything to justify why he was doing it to me.  I made excuses about the bruises and lied to my family to protect him. I took photos of every single bruise in case I needed them for proof at a later date so it was obvious I knew it was wrong.


It wasn't just physical abuse but also mental too. He would make fun of me due to my weight and other physical things, bully me and isolate me from my friends and try to control me.  He didn't work and I was stupidly funding his alcohol and gambling addiction.

 I became very withdrawn and lost my love of life and although I knew I could find someone else, the constant comments of "You're so ugly, no one else would want you" stopped me kicking him out.  My best friend knew and every weekend she would ring me to make sure I was still alive.  She was extremely worried about me but he used to put on a "show" in front of any other people to make out  he was the perfect gentleman.

 Looking back, I was pathetic but at the time I wanted to help him overcome his addictions and he was also a welcome distraction to my dad becoming seriously ill and dying of cancer.

 The night he tried to hit me with the wine bottle, I'd had enough. It was like a switch had changed inside me.  My mum was living with us and it was around 3am when he'd strolled in from the bar.  He was very threatening and seemed a lot more drunk / out of it than usual.  We're not sure if he had been spiked or had voluntarily taken drugs.  I screamed when he approached me threatening me with the wine bottle and genuinely feared for my life.  Mum came upstairs and dragged me downstairs while I called his mum to come and remove him from the house.  Thinking back, it should have been the police I called.  His mum picked him up and at first I was really upset.  There was no going back now and I still had the mentality of being single for the rest of my life because I was so hideous.  After a week it became apparent how much better my life was without him in it.  

 Many months of text messages and phone calls ensued.  I replied to keep him away from the house.  I also attempted to speak to him after he had assured me that he had changed but he was exactly the same so I told him to leave me alone.  Finally, the police were involved after an incident at my house and I haven't heard from him since.

 The point in me bringing this very personal topic up is that if anyone is ever in this situation, please get out.  I have been left emotionally and financially scarred but I am working towards repairing both and I am lucky because I could have been killed or seriously hurt.

A review of lovedrobe (blue peacock print dress)

Posted by Unknown - 13:01 - , , ,
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After the dilemma of what to order the other week, I finally decided to take the plunge and buy the "Lovedrobe Blue Peacock Print Dress".  I ordered from an online store called Desire Clothing as they had it in their sale at only £16, whereas at the time of buying, the Lovedrobe website had it at full price (it is now reduced to £28 on their site too).

My first experience with Desire Clothing was a positive one.  I decided to pay for next day delivery because it was only £1 more expensive than standard and I am impatient.  After placing the order on a thursday evening and not receiving any e-mail dispatch notes on friday I started to panic.  I checked their website terms and conditions and it stated that next day delivery only applies on orders from Monday to Thursday at 3pm so I thought I'd made a bit of a dumb blonde mistake.  I was wrong - the dress arrived on Saturday while I was at the beach.  So far so good for Desire Clothing.

 I opened it up and it looked stunning. The colours are really vibrant and the peacock print is very quirky.  I even think the neckline is quite unusual too - Mr FH said it was very "me".  From looking at the dress it wasn't stretchy and looked quite small.  I had ordered a size 20 just in case however in hindsight I wish I had gone up a size again!  

 While I was trying the dress on, I noticed that the zip was very temperamental.  It kept getting stuck on the blue banding stripe around the dress.  The dress isn't as well made as some of the brands I own however for £16 I would say that it was of a reasonable standard.  I would quite like to try some more of the lovedrobe products to see if the sizing does come up small and to test out the quality.  

This dress has a long zip up the back and also has a blue underskirt lining.  The underlining makes the dress feel quite luxurious.  I was right though - it came up very small.  I own a number of size 20 fitted dresses and this one highlights my stomach area quite a bit.  I didn't really want to waste money by sending it back and getting a bigger one so I decided to keep it (the spinner bike will be here soon and I'm hoping to lose a few pounds).   The only other point I'd like to point out is that I think this dress would crease quite easily as you will see from the photos.




Peacock Print Dress: Lovedrobe @ Desire Clothing, £16. Wedges: Internacionale

I decided to wear my Lovedrobe peacock print dress with some strappy wedges from Internationale.  I have no other shoes / accessories at the moment that will match this dress so my mum is currently on a mission to find some bracelets in new look (bless her!)

 Overall, I am pleased with the dress itself.  I don't think I would have paid full price for it but for the sale price of either £16 or £28 I think it's worth it.  I am disappointed with the sizing and am hoping that my tummy area is just really bloated from this heatwave *fingers crossed*.  


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