Elliot Rose Apothecary Haul and Review

This is going to be a two for the price of one kinda post today! Before Christmas I visited Elliot Rose Apothecary in Bakewell. This is an individual business and one of my favourite shops. You can read about my first visit to Elliot Rose Apothecary and see some more photos of the inside of the shop here. As you can probably tell by the photos, this post is a little late! But I had a lot of posts to write over Christmas and the lovely Joe from Elliot Rose kindly sent me some tea to try (and you know how much I love tea!) so I decided to wait and write about the Christmas haul and review the tea in one post.

Of course, as it was Christmas I had to pick up some festive goodies! I purchased a lovely bath bomb called "Chilly Millie", a gingerbread man bath bomb and this adorable little ice cream with a robin perched on top. I have since used them all, and I was very impressed! Firstly they all smelt amazing, especially the ice cream, it smelt sweet like a strawberry smoothie! The gingerbread man made my bath all nice and pink and glittery, and I think it was my favourite. I also purchased this Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh candle. I can't really imagine what these scents are meant to smell like, as they aren't really scents are they?! But the candle smelt nice and made me feel festive!

I also picked up some Pukka teas! I bought some of these last time so had an idea of my favourites. I picked out a wide range of flavours, but I particularly like their Three Fennel and After Dinner flavours. I love how at Elliot Rose they let you fill a box with 20 different teas, so you get to try a wide range and see which ones you like! Such a good idea, it's like Pick n' Mix only with tea!

Moving on to what Joe sent me to try. He sent me a few of the teapigs' teas to have a go with. Tung Ting oolong, Roobios Creme Caramel, Silver Tips White Tea, Jasmine Pearls, Peppermint Leaves, Yerba Mate and Chai Tea.

I'm yet to try them all, as I'm still getting through my Pukka ones and I like to save nice teas for nights when I feel like a treat! How exciting is my life? but as you can see I drank the White Tea straight away, as I love white tea, and this one was amazing! I can't explain the taste, but to me it just smells amazing and I would drink it when I want to relax. I am yet to try the Oolong tea, but Joe tells me it is a cross between black and green tea, which sounds perfect to me. Roobios is said to have good health benefits and is caffeine free, which is good if you're trying to replace regular tea and coffee. Jasmine tea is a green tea that has been rolled in jasmine, I'm a bit apprehensive about trying this one so I'll probably try that last! I've tried the Peppermint Tea, and was actually surprised to say it was a bit too much for me! I usually love Peppermint Tea, but this one was a bit like drinking toothpaste! I think I'm going to stick to my Asda home brand! Yerba mate is known for its health benefits, and according to Joe is used by Bootea Teatox, and it's just tea! I'm excited to try this one. Chai Tea - I haven't tried this one but I've tried Chai Tea before and wasn't that struck on it so we will see if this one changes my mind. 

Joe also sent me over one of their loose green teas to try, and he's currently working on his own for the shop, how exciting! I can't wait to try these! Now I'll just say I've never used a tea strainer before!! So this was a new thing for me, and I found it quite difficult to work at first, I'm not sure how's the best way to use it and I seemed to get tea leaves everywhere! I'm sure I'll get the hang of it. But once the tea was in the strainer and had done it's thing, the flavour was amazing and it was the best green tea I've tried, and I think if you have a little more time it's definitely worth using loose tea. 

Elliot Rose Apothecary is located in Bakewell, and if you ever visit Bakewell I would definitely pop in for a browse! They also have their own website now, which you can order things from, which makes it a lot easier if you're not local. You can visit their website here.

I can't wait to visit Elliot Rose again myself, it's a little haven filled with candles, bath stuff and teas! My favourite things!

*Disclaimer, this post was not sponsored, but I was sent some of the teas to try and I decided I wanted to review them.

Long Hair Problems List!

A bit of a short, random post today! I've been really busy, so although I have a lot of ideas and posts on the go, it's just getting around to finishing them that's the issue at the moment.

Although there are perks to having long hair, it's not all as good as it seems. Sometimes it gets so annoying that I'm tempted to chop it off in favour of a long bob! So here's my list of long hair problems:

1. It gets caught in everything. Car doors, watches, under handbag straps..

2. You have to tie it up when you eat unless you want to be finding food in your hair for the rest of the day.

3. You also have to tie it up during any "romantic fun time," your man being smothered by your hair is not sexy!

4. Although it keeps me warm in the winter, in the summer it is so hot. It's like wearing scarf.

5. Curling it is impossible! They stay in for a minute, then gravity takes hold.

6. Wind!! Be prepared to gag on your hair.

7. When it gets stuck in lipgloss/lipstick. Ew.

8. Hair, just everywhere. Everyone moans at you because it's all over the place, and every time you wash it you have to hoover up!

9. It gets so knotty, brushing it when it's wet takes forever, and so does drying it!

Although having long hair is a pain in the arse sometimes, part of me does love it, and I like how it's swishy! 

What are your hair problems?

Victoria's Secret Body Spray: Sensual Blush

This is the second year in a row I've waited until the Victoria's Secret Boxing Day sale to buy a body spray, I think it's becoming a tradition! I can't bring myself to pay the full £10.99 for them, but £5.50 is much more reasonable! Last year I bought True Escape, and you can read my review of that here (also interesting to see how my blogging style has changed since then!)

The claim:

I can't say this spray "calms me" when I use it, but it does make me smell very nice and sweet! Sensual Blush is much more sweet than True Escape, bordering on sickly, but I do like it. It's nice for every day wear, and the scent does last a while, longer than most body sprays. I like Victoria's Secret sprays because you get a lot in them so you don't have to worry about spraying them sparingly. They're also good just to make your room smell nice, and the bottle just looks so pretty in my bedroom!

If you live in the UK Victoria's Secret isn't available online yet, but they are slowly expanding their stores across the UK. My nearest ones are Bullring, Birmingham and Meadowhall, Sheffield. I got my friend to pick up Sensual Blush on her trip to Meadowhall as I was sadly working the sales myself!

Have you tried any of Victoria's Secret's body sprays? What did you think? 

New Years Eve: 1980s Party Look

First up I apologise for my poor quality outfit photos, I didn't have time to set up my tripod so you'll have to make do with my instagram photo! 

This year for New Years Eve (also my 22nd birthday, I'm feeling twenty twoooo!) my best friend decided to host an 80's themed party. So we all went for the stereotypical 80's workout class look! I'm pretty impressed with my outfit if I don't say so myself. The lime green cycle shorts (never thought I'd be writing that I own a pair of these..) were from Ebay. They're actually an age 13-14, but they fit like a size 10/12. The tutu is also off Ebay, it came in a set with gloves and other things for a really cheap price (I think they're made for charity races etc.) but I forgot to wear the long, pink gloves for these photos! The leotard I just got from New Look a couple of years ago as I like to wear it with high waisted skirt. My scrunchy is also from New Look!

For my makeup I had a lot of fun with my new Urban Decay Vice palette! These photos really don't do it justice.. Poor lighting at nighttime! I used a pink colour (Alien) all over my lids, then a purple colour (Alchemy) which I blended into a blue colour (Freeze) which I put on the outer half of my eyes. I then put a dark purple (Bondage) in the crease to smoke it up. I just put a white shimmery colour (Bobby Dazzle) on the inner corners to make my eyes pop. I smudged these colours in the same order just under my waterline. I then applied my Loreal liquid liner in a cat eye flick and applied my Eyelure eyelashes. For my eyebrows I used Benefit Browzings (review here). I'm also wearing my new Benefit Brows! Anyone want a review of their brow arch wax and tint? 

On the rest of my face I'm wearing my usual Revlon Colorstay Foundation, MAC pro longwear concealer, Benefit bronzer in Hoola, MAC blusher in Springsheen, and I never thought I'd use this but on my lips I'm wearing Playboy lipstick in Bubblegum Pink. I received that in my Blogger Programme goody bag which you can read about here. I was actually quite impressed with how it went on and looked! I'm not much of a pink lipstick girl usually.

For my hair I plaited it a few hours before the do in lots of small braids, I then had the fun of taking them all out! I got the desired effect though, after some back-combing it was satisfactorily hugeeee and 80s worthy! I then put half of it up (messily) in a scrunchy! Done!

I really enjoyed creating this look! And I had a great night too! I hope you guys all enjoyed your New Years Eves', what did you do?