Halloween make up ideas

Well it’s official, summer is completely over and autumn has well and truly arrived, which means my favorite holiday is just around the corner!

Halloween!

I don't usually dress up for Halloween but I usually go all out on my makeup and hair so I thought I’d share a few looks I’ve done over the last couple of years to hopefully give you some inspiration for this year’s ghoulish festivities.

I am planning on doing some more makeup looks within the next two weeks leading up to Halloween so watch this space for some more creepy and devilishly deviant looks!

 

Don't have nightmares ;)

Liverpool Adventure

On the first weekend of September I travelled up to Liverpool for the first time ever. Without sounding like a complete southern hermit, this was the furthest north I’ve ever been, so I was more than ready to see what the Liverpudlians had in store for me.

Before I set off, I tried to get an idea of what my mum and I could do once we were there; neither of us are Beetles fans (don’t shoot!) so we weren’t going to be doing any of the array of activities which revolved around them…so what else did that leave?

In 2008 Liverpool was named the European Capital of Culture and once you arrive, you can see why. The architecture is stunning and you could be mistaken that you’re walking around a beautiful foreign city. Liverpool is a smallish city but it's packed full of museums, galleries, restaurants and shops; it was hard to find a dull minute during our mini break away. 

We arrived on Thursday afternoon, at around 2:30pm but by the time we had settled into our room and rested after our journey, we didn’t get out and about until around 4pm. By this time, we were quite hungry and unsure of our surroundings, so we did what any normal woman would do and we went shopping.

The shopping quarter is a large, open air area with a wonderful variety of shops and restaurants that even boasts its own mini golf course.

London has an amazing plethora of shops, don't get me wrong, but Liverpool had everything all in one place. They had a few of my favorite shops such as Forever 21, MAC, Illamasqua, Boots, River Island, Urban Outfitters, Topshop and Primark, all within the same shopping center (note to Westfield’s Shepherds Bush….can you get all of these shops too please?!)

I may have also bought a few bits:

£2 Paul Frank PJ top from Primark

£10 Moomins Pj Set from Primark

The Friday was the day of culture and after picking up a few tourist pamphlets from our hotel I had found an array of different historical sites I wanted to visit.

One of the top activities I had on my Liverpool to do list was to visit The Tate gallery. So after catching a bit of brunch at the lovely Café Rouge, we headed back down to the Docks to visit the Tate.

Cheeky Café Rouge brunch.

After we had finished with the delights the Tate had to offer, I was in a bit of a dilemma. I now had so many places I wanted to visit I didn't have enough time to see them all. I tried to find the Slavery Museum which was supposedly located near the Tate Gallery, but after doing a loop of the Docks and searching for it everywhere, I gave up looking.

I also wanted to visit the Liverpool Museum (which I knew the location of) but I really, really wanted to visit Liverpool Cathedral. The only problem was that the Cathedral was located much further away than all the other tourist hotspots.

So obviouslyyyyy, I had to go and visit the one that was the most difficult and furthest to get to! So off we popped to the Liverpool Cathedral.

I didn't really have any idea where it was, I could just see it in the distance and decided to walk in that general direction…I admit...this wasn’t one of my finest ideas. There are tourist buses that drive up there and little did I know that we were about to walk up a small mountain, so don’t do what I did and walk…just take the bus. Honestly, you will thank me later.

The Liverpool Cathedral is located at the top of a very steep hill and can be seen for miles. Once we arrived at the top of the baby mountain, I was astounded at how large the Cathedral actually was (it’s supposedly the largest building in Europe made entirely of bricks - check me out! Being a tour guide!).

If you ever get to visit Liverpool, I suggest you visit here. The outside was something to behold but the inside was equally as breathtaking. The huge stain glass windows, the high ceilings, the organ that has over 10,000 pipes all towered above me and it was awe inspiring!

Another reason to go was that once inside, you're pretty much allowed to go anywhere!

There were several smaller chapels inside the Cathedral, which were equally as stunning. There was so much intricate detail everywhere, it seemed unimaginable that an enormous building like this could be built by humans! (I think it's a cover up, it was blatantly made by dinosaurs).

I didn’t realize how long we would spend walking around this Cathedral and by the time we left…all the other museums we wanted to visit were shut.

For someone who was worried that there wouldn’t be enough to do, I ended up with a list of places I wanted to go and not enough time to visit them all.

Throughout our entire stay the weather was amazing and I felt as if I was on holiday. I must admit, I had some preconceived ideas of what Liverpool would be like but I’m happy to say I was completely wrong; I’ve never encountered a nicer and friendlier bunch of people in my life. Anytime we were lost, locals would approach us and ask if we needed help, in every restaurant we visited, our waiters were quick & attentive and brimming full of information on where we should visit and everyone seemed very chatty and happy. I was so sad to leave after such a short stay but I’m planning to go back again in the spring time to check out all the places I missed this time around. I had such a fantastic few days in Liverpool and I would thoroughly recommend that everyone should go and visit.

Have you ever been to Liverpool? What did you think? If not, would you ever consider visiting? Let me know in the comments below!

Heywood House Hotel - Liverpool - Review

Back in February I was fortunate enough to win a two night stay at the Heywood House Hotel in Liverpool with Hotel Rez’s twitter account. The prize was for a mid-week stay in a comfy room for two people worth around £145. I decided to bring my mum along for a short break mini break in Liverpool and so we picked out dates and set off on a Liverpool adventure.

The Heywood is a ‘budgetique’ (a term they have coined) type of hotel and supposedly one of the coolest hotels available in Liverpool, and to be honest, I fully agree.

Description:

The Heywood House Hotel is a boutique styled hotel located within the heart of Liverpool city. All local and historic attractions such as The Dockyards, museums, shops, restaurants and bars are right on your door step and are easily accessible by walking. The Heywood is nestled within a small side street just off the main road which hosts their main shopping Center and is around a 20 minute walk (slow pace) from Liverpool Lime Street Train station.

First impressions:

We arrived at the Heywood around 40 minutes before our 3pm check in time (which I thought was quite a late check in time) and entered a small but modern reception area. Dotted around the reception were lots of tourist paraphernalia along with tea and coffee facilities. My only gripe was that the receptionist was nowhere to be seen for around 5 – 10 minutes. It may have been because we arrived earlier than expected but it did take a little while before we were greeted even though the hotel staff were sitting in a room just behind the reception.

Once we were greeted, we were met by young man who was friendly and informative. He explained our room was not ready as we were so early, so he offered to look after our luggage in a private room in the reception, so that we could go off and explore the city for a bit without having to lug our suitcases around.

After a short exploration around the Docks for 40 minutes we made our way back to the hotel and checked in to our room, 211. This hotel is much bigger than it looks from the outside, do not be fooled but it luckily has a lift to it’s many floors so no need to drag those suitcases or shopping up a few flights of stairs.

The Room:

My first impressions of our room was that it was a lovely size; perfect size for two adults. The décor was modern and sleek but also very cosy. The bathroom was huge, much bigger than I thought it would be and it was fitted with an all-white suite including a bath.

The bed was large and very soft. Thankfully it was quite large as I had originally asked for a twin room but was given a double instead. My mum and me didn’t kick up a fuss and were just happy to be settled after our long day of travelling. The bed did have quite thin pillows which lacked any real oomph or sturdiness; you only got one normal bed pillow and then a decorative pillow, both were paper thin. On the up side, the all white bed linen was lovely, clean and soft; perfect.

Once we had settled in, we started to notice it is quite a dark room; the windows aren’t that big and there isn’t a lot of natural light available. The lights in the room are also fairly dull and even though there are many of them, it didn’t help the darkness situation.

Another thing to mention is that our room also faced an office. I’m fairly certain no one in the office could see through the netted curtains, but as it’s a city, it's expected to be close to your neighbors.

There were also tea and coffee making facilities available within the room, along with a lovely set of shampoo and conditioners in the bathroom.

The room also has its own air conditioning and heating unit which you could control from within the room. This was perfect as the evenings were a bit chillier than usual and we needed to crank up the heating.

Even though we didn't ask for our room to be cleaned after our first’s night stays, after we returned from our day out, we came back to find our entire room and bathroom were cleaned and hovered. It was unexpected but a lovely welcome back as many hotels only do this on the second night of staying. This for me, was a massive plus, nothing beats a nice, clean hotel room.

Location:

As mentioned, this hotel is right in the heart of Liverpool’s city center and within walking distance to all major attractions and shopping districts. The only thing I’d mention is the cobbled streets, I’d advised some comfy walking shoes as there is a lot to see and a lot of uneven surfaces!

With the hotel being located so close to everything, inevitably you will get groups of men and women going out to the clubs and coming back late in the evening a bit merry and a bit loud. Obviously this is not the hotels fault, but don't expect complete silence during the wee hours of the morning on the weekends.

The hotel is set back on a side street; however there is a comedy pub right next door to the Heywood. On the Thursday evening you couldn't hear a peep from the place, but on Friday night…wooo…there was a lot of noise until the very early hours of the morning. Again, this is not the hotel’s fault but I can’t imagine young families or older people appreciating this. My mother and I were so exhausted from walking all day; we ended up passing out and were only woken a few times during the night from the noise.

Overall:

I’d definitely go back to the Heywood and I would definitely recommend it to a friend. They have amazing deals on their website for their Plush Rooms (some are available with a balcony) which sometimes work out better than their comfy rooms (which I was in). I wouldn't recommend any young families or older groups visit their on the weekend, as the noise from the pub and the revelers coming back home late from a night out, might be a bit much, but during the week it seemed like a quiet and welcoming hotel to stay in. The staff are friendly and attentive, they always asked if you needed help and gave sound advice for us new timers to the city. 

All in all, it's an affordable hotel in a fantastic location, with wonderful and friendly staff with cosy yet modern rooms, what more could you want?

Bank Holiday Weekend Shenanigans

My word, where have I been? I’m posting about my bank holiday a week later. What an eejit.

Anyway.

I hope you all had a fantastic Bank Holiday, I sure did! A three day weekend, what an absolute treat! I firmly believe we should have a three day weekend as standard every week, but my application for the ‘Ruler and Decider of all of Everything’ must have got lost in the post somewhere…

Any hoozles, I had a few lil adventures during the Bank Holiday, which I thoroughly enjoyed!

I had a lovely chilled evening in on Friday, which sounds like a complete sad act scenario (which I am), but I don’t care! I got in, put my PJ’s on, put my hair in a dreadfully large and messy top knot, removed all makeup and sat eating pizza in bed all night whilst watching Modern Family. It.Was.Bliss.

Saturday was a little more lively than my Friday evening, I had my standard 9am ‘I hope no one is out on the road at this time’ driving lesson – which I dominated….(cough). After which, one of my mates and I decided to head into Central London.

The whole morning was packed full of glorious sunshine but of course, it decided to turn into an epic downpour the second we decided to get off the train in London. I was in no way equipped for this type of weather; I had freaking Birkenstock sandals on! Anyway, my mate totally ignored my fashion predicament and suggested that we get off and walk from Baker Street to Covent Garden…

We ended up walking from Baker Street to Oxford Street, to Covent Garden to Southbank in the pouring rain (Sigh. Boys, they will never understand a woman dilemma). Aside from the ridiculous raining situation, the whole day was a barrel of laughs. We ended up being 15 again as we walked around with alcoholic beverages in hand talking about rubbish.

I will admit, I nearly ended up killing us a few times when I dashed across a few busy London streets as oncoming traffic zoomed by…oops. But hey, I’ll do anything for good lighting.

My Instagram game is strong.

We visited a few special places I love….all food related of course.

We went to Kingdom of Sweet where I picked up the below beauties.

Oreo’s are my favorite of all biscuits and I love trying any flavor I can get my greedy mitts on, and oh boy, these new birthday cake flavour did not disappoint! They were £3 for this small little box of them, but they were worth it! They even had little sprinkles inside the fondant, extra yum.

The Root Beer liquorice was a disappointment and at £6 a pop, woo, they were an expensive treat. They tasted very faintly of Root Beer and were very gummy tasting; my mum seemed to enjoy them though, she nearly polished off the entire packet by herself…the brat!

We then visited MeatMarket as I (as always) was hankering for a cheese burger.

After a few more hours of dashing in and out of the rain, walking for miles and sliding down the slides at Southbank...(If you'd like to see/hear me go down the slides at Southbank, click here!) ...we parted ways and headed home, where I was welcomed with this beautiful sight…N’aw!

Sunday was a family day from what I can remember, all up until around 5pm when a few mates and I decided to have a few cheeky bank holiday Sunday drinks. I honestly thought it was going to be a very boring, quiet, low maintenance type of evening, but oh no. There were drinking games, shots, cocktails, workouts, selfies, snapchats and inevitably, chatting to lots and lots of random people. There started off with myself and four other people (my friends) out drinking, by the end of the night, we had gathered about ten complete strangers to come hang out with us. I don’t remember much. It was a blur. There was a lot of questionable dancing. A lot of winding up a poor Scottish fella. And eventually, passing out in my bed at 5am after eating cake and cheese (I think at the same time) in my bed and leaving the crumbs all over my sheets. What a Princess...

Anyway, I hope you all had a lovely Bank Holiday weekend, even if it was over a week ago ;)

If you got up to mini adventures or shenanigans I'd love to hear about them.

Kisses.