2015 Favourites | Blogmas Day 25

Firstly, MERRY CHRISTMAS! I hope you all have a lovely day filled with fun and food and spending quality time with family!

As it is the last day of Blogmas I have decided to share with you my favourites from 2015. Not just beauty though! As I tend to do monthly favourites some of these things have already been mentioned on my blog but I hope you enjoy reading this anyway.

Of course Roller Lash was going to be featured in this post! You all know how much I love Roller Lash.  I recently mentioned the Benefit They're Real tinted primer which I am loving more everyday. From my Benefit calendar I've found lots of Benefit products that I definitely want to get my hands on.  One of those being the Watts Up Soft focus highlighter.  I loove it.

I've been uncertain of the Lash Sensational, but I kept trying with it and it is now definitely a firm favourite of mine.  If I apply it right, it makes my eyelashes look so thick and long. 

You will of heard me mention the company Prairie Charms here and I just had to put them in my 2015 favourites as they are the loveliest company.  Their customer service is so so good and well, the products are wonderful.  I'm very glad I've had the chance to purchase products from them and be part of their blogging team and designing the Christmas box. 

If you didn't know, I love musicals.  Like, a lot.  The 'Now That's we Call Musicals' CD is literally perfect for me and I find myself listening to it most days haha.  My all time favourite musical is Billy Elliot.  I love it so much. I spend a lot of my time watching the DVD of it live.  I have seen it 4 times and I would happily go 44 more times, haha.  

I've also beeng loving my L'oreal bronzer which I have mentioned maaany times before on this blog! If you haven't picked it up and are looking for a new bronzer I definitely recommend it,

I know I've only had this estee Lauder eye shadow palette which is from the Makeup Artist Collection set (mentioned in my birthday haul) but it is too lovely for me to not mention. Same with the modern Muse perfume, I've only been using it a month but it is fast becoming my favourite scent. 

Vicktor & Rolf's Flowerbomb perfume is my favourite perfume, closely followed by Calvin Klein Euphoria and Modern Muse! I wear Flowerbomb most days and like the name suggests, its a very sweet and flowery scent.  

I wear Estee Lauder Double wear mostly everyday.  I think I have fiiinally found a foundation that works for me! I have also been loving the Urban Decay Naked Skin Finish concealer.  The coverage is so good and it doesn't go cakey, woo! 

I've also been LOVING Justin Bieber, who would ever have thought that?!

That's all my favourites from 2015 and this will be my last post of 2015! I have finally got to the end of Blogmas (YEEEES) I am sorry I didn't manage to post every single day, but you know, life gets in the way sometimes but lets not turn this into a negative post!
I really hope you have enjoyed what I did manage to post and thank you to everyone who left comments and read my posts.

Lastly, have an amazing day today.  Whatever you end up doing, just make sure you eat lots and everything will be fine!!

See you in 2016 

Jessica 

xx

My Christmas Decorations | Blogmas Day 24

In our house, we have a lot of Christmas decorations up and we have colour themes, but who doesn't right?!  Taking pictures for this post has been much harder than I had expected and they don't look great but I thought I'd share them all with you anyway. 

Our front room is a red/gold/green theme which I really love as it make the room feel all nice and cosy! 

 (spot the dog haha)

In the dining room we have a silver theme and this is where the Christmas Tree goes.  How I wish it was a real tree :( 

There is a on our tree and of course, my mum always has to put the decorations I made when I was like 5 on there, haha.

There are more than just this snowman, but you don't want to see all of those haha

 I'd love to see what some of your decorations look like, send me some on Twitter! (@bird_butterfly1)

There will be another post going up tomorrow and then that will be my last blogmas post! If you count what I've done as blogmas haha. Anyway, see you tomorrow with my favourites from 2015!

Jessica 

xx

Mental Health at Christmas | Blogmas Day 23

I'm a bit nervous about writing this post, but I feel like its something that should be talked about around this time of the year.  I'm only writing from my experiences, people may feel different about it to me, but that's mental health.  I wrote a post on mental health before (here) and it went down well and people seemed to find it helpful. 

I've seen lots of people write a post similar to this which inspired me to do my own.   This is just me writing about my experience with Christmas and mental health.

Living with a mental illness is never easy.  Some days will be ok, others will be awful. Its just the way it is with mental illness.  From experience I struggle with Christmas the most. Its so hard when everyone around you is excited and happy and looking forward to Christmas Day.  I find it hard because most of the time I will be feeling pretty awful and the thought of Christmas Day makes it worse.  I feel pressure to feel ok on the day and act happy in front of my family as to not disappoint them and things.  I'm not saying here that "oh I hate Christmas day, theres so much pressure" No, thats not what I'm saying.  I just find it hard because I want to feel happy and excited, but I just don't.

I was diagnosed with Depression a couple of weeks before Christmas 2 years ago and so I remember that being the worst Christmas.  I was tired and stressed with the medication and my body was getting use to it.  Last Christmas was better. Still hard, but better.  Hopefully this year it will be better still.  I'm not hoping for much though as I feel really pretty crap sitting here writing this, especially after some of the things that have happened this year.

All I try to tell myself is that this will only happen once this year and that if I don't make the most of it I my regret it as things might be completely different this time next year (hopefully not, but a lot can change in a year) Its so hard to not just want to go to bed and sleep through the day, but you can't really.  If you did, you would regret it.  I know I would anyway.

If you're in a similar situation to me this year, with any mental illness not just depression like me, be strong and brave and remember that even if you are feeling crap, at least you are surround by family and friends. Oh, and there is really good music playing haha.

Jessica 

xx

Blogger Love | Blogmas Day 22

Hi lovelies! 

I've never really shared other blogs that I love reading before and I think it is always nice to share the blogger love and let another blogger know that you are really enjoy their blog. 

I've been reading a lot of blogs at the moment so for today's post I have decided to share some of my favourites! 

Aisling's Beauty Bites - I have been loving Aisling's blogmas posts.  She has done a much better job at it than me! Haha.  I find she has a lovely writing style and her pictures always look nice.  Really enjoying this blog at the moment! This is definitely a favourite blog at the moment.

Skinnedcartree - This is blog I've recently discovered through Twitter and I love it.  I really like lifestyle blogs, its a nice change from all beauty.  Corinne shares really useful tips too.

Hannah Delacour - I've been following Hannah's blog since I first started blogging.  I love her blog so much and she is honestly the most lovely person I know.  I love her posts and I find myself checking her blog often to check for new posts haha.  Hannah, if you read this, LOVE YOU!

OliviaCheryl - This is another blog I've recently discovered. (How great is Twitter for finding new blogs!) I love this blog so much and I love the snow falling on it for Christmas, its so cute.  I'm very glad I discovered this blog, its so nice to read.

Amy's Thoughts  - Amy writes such good posts and I feel like they're a bit different to the posts I normally read.  They're written so well too and I love her blog design!

Hannah Gale - I discovered this blog through Aisling and it is fast becoming one of my favourites! I love reading Hannah's posts as I feel her personality really shows through on the blog which is always a good thing.  I don't enjoy reading blogs that show no personality. 

HaySparkle - Blogs with a nice design and nice pictures always catch my eye so Hayley's was definitely going to make me want to read it! Its not just the pictures and design I like about this blog, but her posts are always so good and like others I've mentioned, I love her writing style!

I definitely recommend you go and check out all these lovely people and their blogs!

Let me know what bloggers you're loving at the moment. 

Jessica 

xx

My Blogging Goals for 2016 | Blogmas Day 17

I am sticking to what I said yesterday!! After yesterday's post I thought I would think of some blogging goals for next year and then share them with you! 

Upload once a week 

When I wasn't doing Blogmas, you may have noticed that me uploading once a week regularly was a very rare occasion.  I seemed to have no schedule what so ever and just uploaded when ever I had a post.  Sometimes there would be a month from one post to another! (maybe I shouldn't admit this, but you can all see it so haha) I am determined to upload once a week next year. 

Do not focus on stats and numbers

As you all know from yesterday's post I am terrible at focusing on stats and numbers.  If my views go down or people unfollow me I get so disheartened.  That is not how I should be! Next year I want to make sure I don't pay too much attention to stats. 

Reach 300 Bloglovin followers

Saying that, it would be nice to have more followers.  NOT because numbers matter, but it is nice to know people enjoy what you're writing.  If I don't get that many followers, its not going to bother me!  I shall continue blogging because I enjoy it. Plus compared to some blogs I read, 300 followers is nothing haha. 

Improve my photography 

My pictures for my blog aren't great, but I really want to try and improve this.  I love photography, but I'm not any good at it.  I recently got a new camera so hopefully that should improve the quality of the images and if I use a different flat lay, hopefully the pictures on my blog will start to look better! 

Include more variety of posts
I feel like the majority of my posts are beauty related.  There's nothing wrong with that, of course, but I love reading lifestyle posts and when I've written them I've really enjoyed it.  I definitely want to try and include more lifestyle on this blog.  Baking is another thing I really enjoy so I want to include more of that on this blog!

So there are my blogging goals for 2016.  Lets hope I manage to complete them!

What are some of your blogging goals for next year? 

Jessica 

xx