Now I have started college, where unlike high school, I am able to wear nail polish on a daily basis, so have been wearing it more often. I own quite a few nail polishes from Maybelline because I often end up picking one up on a 3 for 2 alongside their other products, and I know they are good so I tend to stick to them. But which ones are my favourite?

Color Show - Latte

I love the Maybelline Colour Show range because they are really affordable and long lasting. My favourite of which is the shade Latte, a simple nude shade which I think is an essential in any nail polish collection because it is wearable all year round and matches with everything. I am actually on my second bottle of it because I really love it that much!

Color Show Crystal - Rose Chic

Rose Chic is such a pretty glitter shade! I love wearing this for special occasions - I tend to only put this on my thumbnails and paint the rest a light pink because it matches really well with that. Again it lasts really well and because it is glitter, you only really need one coat which means the bottle is going to last a really long time. Obviously it's a little more difficult to remove being glitter but I think it is so pretty that it is worth it.

SuperStay Nail Colour - Poreclain

I love their SuperStay nail polish collection because although they are slightly more expensive than the colour show shades, they last a fair bit longer. I love the shade Porcelain, I actually used this for prom because it's a really stunning rose gold colour (it actually matches my iPhone perfectly!). It is also a gel effect so it has a lovely glossy finish.


The bottle claims the polish lasts 7 days, which in my experience I can't say is true, by a week quite a bit had chipped off my nails! But it lasted long enough and looked so nice. My only tip is don't use it when it's really warm out like it was at prom because it wouldn't dry for ages! On a usual day it dries really fast and it looks really pretty.

My last post, if you haven't read it yet, was my first impressions of the beauty that is Urban Decay's new Naked Heat palette. But while I was getting the palette, the lipsticks that were launched alongside it caught my eye, particularly the shade Fuel. I decided to split up my reviews of the palette and the lipstick since I had so much to say about the palette, so here's all about their new lipstick, Fuel.

Alongside the Heat palette, Urban Decay released three lipsticks, two metalized shades which are much darker, out-there tones, and one cream shade in Fuel, the one I opted for. You may remember I love Urban Decay's Backtalk lipstick, but that was in their comfort matte formula and I was intrigued to try a cream lipstick of theirs.


The shade of Fuel is a beige toned nude, actually lighter than my other lipsticks. Believe it or not, I've actually been searching for a shade like this for quite a while. My first ever lipstick was a Rimmel one in shade 43 and although it isn't the best formula, the shade was really pretty and I always wanted one like it. I never found one in MAC - Honey Love came the closest but even that was too brown toned. I would describe it as a peachy-beige and I really like it.


As I mentioned earlier, this is the first of me trying an Urban Decay Cream lipstick, and it didn't disappoint. Of course, it is different to the mattes I'm used to in which you can feel it on your lips for a bit, but it feels very similar to MAC's Cremesheens (which I own three of and love). I actually think it's quite long lasting for a cream shade as well, while I write this it is still on my lips hours after I applied it.


I also love the packaging of the lipstick; it matches with the rest of Urban Decay's vice collection in its shape however it is encased in a copper-toned lid rather than the gunmetal used for the original collection. This was another plus for me because you know how much I love copper. I love how the UD logo is embossed into the lipstick as well, a real Urban Decay finish to the lipstick.


A swatch of the shade Fuel, completely unfiltered! As you can see, it's a lovely peachy nude shade.

The lipstick retails for £15.50 which I definitely think is worth it, compared to other lipsticks in its price range it is just as good, you can tell from the pigmentation of the product that it is good quality. But what else would you expect from Urban Decay?


So there we go, we got to the end of my two part review of my products from the Heat Collection! I would love to try the liners they also released so I'd love to hear your thoughts if you've tried them. What's your favourite lipstick at the moment?

After months of going into every Debenhams near me to find the new Naked Heat palette out of stock, I finally went in last Friday and was beyond excited to find they had some in store.

I am a huge fan of the Urban Decay Naked palettes (I hardly use any other eyeshadows, to be honest, they are that good) and the Naked Heat is one I've been lusting for since they day they announced it. Now that I have finally got my hands on it, I decided to share my first impressions of the palette with you all. I also picked up a lipstick they have released alongside the Heat palette so expect a post going up about that too very soon!


Upon getting the palette out of its box you are greeted with the most beautiful packaging, more similar than the Naked Smoky than the other Naked palettes, with a stunning red, orange and rose gold design. It's clearly a sturdy, well-made palette, as of course, you would expect from urban decay.


Then you open the lid to find twelve of the prettiest eyeshadows you have ever seen encased inside. It seems like the perfect warm toned palette with the most stunning mix of reds, burnt oranges and burgundys. Oh my, the burgundys!! It's no secret burgundy is my favourite colour and this palette is full of burgundy toned shadows. It's beautiful.

Something I am impressed with immediately with this palette is the number of mattes it comes with. Urban Decay are notorious for the fact their twelve pan palettes never include enough mattes (although the Ultimate Basics, a palette full of simply twelve mattes makes up for this). But the Heat palette includes seven mattes and five shimmers - that's right, the shimmers are actually outnumbered in this one.


Starting with the formula of the matte shadows, I was so impressed when I dipped my brush into Sauced, the first of the shades I tried. The pigmentation is incredible and they blend like a dream. I can tell straight away Sauced is a shade I will be wearing in the crease a lot.

The lighter half of the palette also appears to have some really promising shades, such as ounce, the lightest shade in the palette which actually shows up on me, a rarity for the highlighting shade of a lot of palettes. I also think Chaser will be a really nice lid shade. I can't see myself using Low Blow too much but I am excited to try it. Lumbre is a gorgeous rose-gold shimmer and it's really pretty on the lid, not the best of the shimmers in the palette, however. He Devil is quite a red matte, a little adventurous but I actually really like it.


Up next starting the darker half of the palette are a couple of shimmers, Dirty Talk and Scorched. These are both stunning shades and I don't see anything wrong with them, they apply beautifully just like all other Urban Decay shimmers I own. I've seen a lot of people say they are too similar but I actually don't think they are! Scorched is a fair bit darker and rosier and I think they pair together really well for a gradient on the lid.

Cayenne is a gorgeous chocolatey matte, I think you have to have a brown matte somewhere in a palette and this does the trick perfectly for me. However, the matte shades I am most excited for are the two to the right of Cayenne, En Fuego and Ashes. I have searched and searched for a matte burgundy similar to En Fuego for such a long time now and I am so happy to have finally found exactly what I was looking for. I can't wait to create some burgundy looks with it this autumn.
Ashes a more plum toned shade, not dissimilar to my MAC Blackberry eyeshadow but since I find Urban Decay's shadows to be much more blendable than MAC's I imagine I will get more use out of it.


The final shade we have in the palette is the shade 'Ember', a gorgeous metallic plum. It is such a unique shade that I can't wait to try and use properly, I think it will look amazing in a smokier look - especially paired with Ashes.

All in all, I think the Heat palette is my favourite palette I have ever purchased, I just think that it is a really 'me' palette. Since I have experimented with eyeshadows over the past year I have found warm toned shades are my favourite and I own nothing like the Naked Heat. Urban Decay have definitely done it again!


Have you tried out the Naked Heat? I would love to hear your opinion in the comments! Make sure to check out my next post for my opinions of their new lipstick too!

We're soon approaching Autumn, where the dark cozy evenings are my favourite, and the perfect oppotunity to settle into a new TV series. I love finding a new show to watch I can just watch over and over, so I thought I'd share a few of my favourites with you today.

Friends

I can tell you now that I will never find a series I enjoy watching more than Friends. Obviously I feel like most people generally know what it is about, but it is a sitcom from the 90s and early noughties about six Friends living in New York and I just think it is the best thing ever, no exaggeration! It's so funny and I always love the storylines that run through the ten seasons, my favourites being the first season (because it's sooo 90s) and the fifth season because my favourite storyline is based in that season. It's the one show I can put any episode from any season on one night and really enjoy; I seem to never watch it in order anymore I know it and love it so well!

Riverdale

I am so excited for the new season of Riverdale starting soon, especially because I was so into the last one. The first season was gripping, shocking and if you haven't already watched it, you should start straight away! I'm thinking of rewatching it again before the second season because although it was fun to get a new episode each week, the wait was agonising and I'd love to binge watch it over a few weeks instead. The first season had a who did it murder storyline running throughout and it was so interesting.

How I Met Your Mother

This show is a fairly recent find, although I'm already up to season five so what can I say? I think I'd read somewhere it was the next Friends, being set in New York and starting a year after Friends finished, and although it will never quite live up to Friends for me I do really enjoy it. I feel like it has been a bit dragged out though because seriously when are we going to meet the mother? But it doesn't matter as much because all the episodes are really funny and I like the characters, especially Ted and Robin.

Gossip Girl

I feel like Gossip Girl is a perfect show to watch in the autumnal evenings, it's so chilled but full of drama and scandal. It isn't my favourite, especially because it took me over a year to finish - I lost interest in seasons 3-4, but season 5 was amazing, as were the early seasons when the characters were predominantely at school. As I said, I found the fifth season particularly gripping and I also love how the show ended. Blair is my favourite character, she is so independent and I really like her, although Darota is one of the best characters too I think!

Pretty Little Liars

PLL was the first series of these I watched, and although I was obsessed with it at the time it's no longer my favourite, the reveals weren't shocking for me like they were in Riverdale and compared to Gossip Girl the relationships and drama wasn't as good. However I loved the early seasons of Pretty Little Liars so much and still highly recommend it. I made a whole post just after the finale about how I felt about it, to sum it up pretty disappointed! I wish they had finished at season 6 because the earlier episodes were the best.

Today I am starting college which is really exciting, so I thought I would show you all the stationery I have bought for the upcoming year - quite a bit because I'm pretty obsessed with stationery!

The first things I got were actually from Primark, somewhere I had no idea they did stationery until I was walking through my local one and spotted these two gorgeous notebooks for £2.50 each. One of them is a marble print with a copper ring-bound which I just feel, if I was designing a notebook, it would look exactly like that! The other is a black soft bound cover which says in copper 'More Issues Than Vogue' which I also loved because I feel like at one point or another I will literally end up with more issues than vogue at college.


For pens, I purchased my favourite fineliners, the Stabilo fineliners. I've had a lot of different sized sets of these over the years but this time I got a set of 20 from Wilko for £8 which is really good value. I also got a set of 5 neon Stabilo fineliners from Amazon because I really wanted to try the neon set and they were really affordable at £1.80 for the five of them.


I also got a ten set f the BIC Crystal biro pens. I used these so much during my GCSEs and so I thought it would be useful to get some more, especially as they are really affordable. I also ordered some Zebra mildliner pens off Amazon but they haven't come yet, unfortunately! I have wanted them for a really long time now so I'm excited for them to arrive.


My favourite thing in possibly the whole haul is my new planner I got from the brand Ban.do which they sell in a bunch of department stores. It's seriously the prettiest item of stationery I own and even though it is quite expensive for what it is (£20) I know it's going to be worth it because I'll definitely get the use out of it.


I also got some lever arch files, I know these are a bit big for some bags but I do manage to fit them in mine and during Year 11 my regular binders broke straight away and I imagine I'll have even more work in them at college! I got these spotty ones from The Range, I got two because my third one I got from Wilko a while back. I really wanted to get 'pretty' files not just the bright coloured ones and these I really like.


I also felt like I'd be needing some paper for the upcoming year so I got a refill pad while I was at The Range to use in my files and a Pukka Pad from Tesco because I had one of these for GCSEs last year and I found it so useful.

Every summer I aim to read a few books while I have the time to spare. During the school year sadly it is rare I make time for books - especially studying English Literature next year I feel like the only reading I do will be the kind of books I study, not books I would go and choose for myself! So over the summer I have read three books I just had to share my thoughts about with you all.

I Was Here - Gayle Forman

 

Holding Up The Universe - Jennifer Niven

Having read Jennifer Niven's novel 'All The Bright Places' I was intreguied to read her next, Holding Up The Universe. Just like in All The Bright Places, it is written in the point of view of both a girl and a boy, Jack and Libby, with the characters viewpoint alternating each chapter. Again, similar to Niven's previous novel, it's a story of the two characters finding themselves, while also finding love. It may be the least favourite of these three books I've read, simply because I found myself reading it so I could write my opinion of it in this post, not because I really wanted to read it. I didn't find either of the characters the most interesting and the storyline was pretty predictable, but it was a decent read.

The One We Fell In Love With - Paige Toon