hair dye

August favourites

2017, lifestyle, music, student

Hello!

I’ve not done a favourites for a while, but it’s nice to be able to look back on the month and pick out the things I enjoyed the most. Lots of new content came out in July and August and I spent a lot of money on things I really didn’t need, so I really love the selection of things I’ve picked this month!

Image result for spider-man homecoming

Spider-Man Homecoming: Spider-Man has been my ultimate favourite superhero since I first saw The Amazing Spider-Man with Andrew Garfield in the cinema – his wit, morality and agility are just everything I would like to be really (who wouldn’t want to swing so high you feel like flying – yes please!) so I was nervous seeing this film. I had every faith in Tom Holland having seen him in Civil War but there’s still every chance this movie was going to be awful. But it wasn’t! It was incredible! Every film has pros and cons and no film is without it’s flaws, but I thoroughly enjoyed it and couldn’t recommend it more (and omg Zendaya).

‘You’ – dodie: A new dodie EP? Of course I’m obsessed. I treated myself to a bundle with a t-shirt, the EP and a vinyl version of the EP and I just love it. I love how the yellow of the case brightens up my room, I love having a studio version of ‘6/10’ (because god knows that song is my anthem) and ‘Would you be so kind?’ is just so happy. On the first EP, ‘Absolutely Smitten’ was the token really happy clappy mood lifting song and wybsk is the ‘You’ equivalent and I just can’t put into words how much it makes me smile.

Overwatch ‘Summer Games’: I think I’ve mentioned it fairly regularly – I’m obsessed with Overwatch, it’s all been very sudden but I’m now properly invested in my first and only video game and there’s been a fun event with extra things to collect and a fun new game to play and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BYNd5DUgMpX/?taken-by=ahealthiersophie

My elephant water bottle: We all know about my major obsession with elephants, but I was going to Primark to buy plain black t-shirts to work at Reading and it was in the aisle you have to go down towards the tills and it was all by itself and it was calling my name. It’s just gorgeous and I could never resist. I love it.

From Ikea’s website

Ikea shelving unit with wheels: For some reason, I went to Ikea three times in August and the first time I went I spotted this unit that I became utterly obsessed with it. On the second trip, I resist and it was that third trip that I gave in and just did it. I’m not recommending just spending money like I did if you can’t afford it but I knew exactly where it was going to go in my room, what I was going to put on it and how gorgeous it would look and I don’t regret it for a single second. I love it and it looked beautiful.

Jeffrey the bear: In August my sister was doing a summer course at Arts University Bournemouth and I went over to see her for the day. My boyfriend and I love this arcade cafe place called Fun Central and we’d decided we were going to win the bear that was worth 6,000 tickets for sure on this, our third time to the arcade. Shock horror, a new bigger bear worth 14,000 tickets had been added but my bear had been reduced to 5,000 tickets. We totally smashed it and I named him Jeffrey. I love him so much there aren’t even words.

My new hair colour: I haven’t really photographed it properly at all but I finally got my hair fixed at the hairdresser! It’s a deeper pink than I wanted (I was going for red) but I adore it because the blue is gone and it’s actually a nice colour and I’m still growing it out – think I’m going to get it dyed properly again in December when I’m next home and can go to the salon again. Can’t wait.

jelly > meringe > melted chocolate > sprinkles

The best dessert I’ve ever made: Just a silly thing I got very excited about – strawberry jelly with crumbled meringue, drizzled in melted chocolate and sprinkled with an excess of brightly coloured sprinkles. I recommend stirring it all around and mixing it all together but I’m very excited to have it again soon, I’m not going to lie.

Reading Festival: I wrote a whole blog post about why I loved working at Reading Festival, but I wanted to include it here as well because I’m still just so in awe that I was lucky enough to get to go.

VEDA: I’ve known for a few months now that I wanted to take part in VEDA and I’ve been noting video ideas for that long. But you know what? I never thought I’d actually manage it – 31 videos, let alone all of them being edited and uploaded by 6pm! But I did it, and you can watch the whole playlist here.

Wasn’t that a wild ride? I’m excited to do this again in September because September is my favourite month and my birthday month, very exciting! I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Thank you for reading,

Sophie xx

 

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haircare tips for frazzled hair

2017, lifestyle, photography, student

Hello!

My hair has been through a lot in the past two or three years – so many colours, far too much bleach and not enough trips to the hairdresser.

late 2013 – mid 2014, I think

I wouldn’t say my hair is particularly healthy or in good condition, however it is much better than the straw-like condition it was in January. I’ve put together a few tips for if you’re considering coloured your hair or if your hair is a feeling a bit worse for wear.

Conditioner! I always use too much shampoo and conditioner but I’ve found using a little more conditioner and really massaging it into the ends of your hair (not too much into the roots, if you over condition the roots they get greasy really fast) can help with split ends and dryness and can make your hair feel pretty and touchably soft. I don’t tend to buy a specific brand of conditioner or shampoo but I try to get something different every time they run out so my hair doesn’t get bored (which is a thing) but I tend to go for something that says it is repairing, hydrating or for dry hair. Tresemme is good too but women’s shampoo and conditioner which isn’t own brand rubbish is so expensive.

end of summer 2014 to when I started being the rebellious shit that had coloured hair at school in late 2014, the red was definitely Christmas 2014

Don’t wash your hair too frequently! I spent months (literally months) training my hair to not need washing as frequently – I only wash it every four or five days and that means that the colour in my hair lasts much longer because washing it destroys the colour (only in ‘extreme’ colours, natural colours are fine for that really). It also makes your hair healthier because it uses it’s own oils to keep itself clean – there are people who’ve trained their hair to not need washing at all but I don’t like the idea of taking it that far. But over washing it can lead to your hair becoming really brittle and getting greasy really fast because it becomes so reliant on being washed so regularly.

Hair masks! I’d suggest once every couple of weeks doing a hair mask if you can afford it – it’s a good way to super condition your hair and if you’re looking for a somewhat healthy way to remove colour from your hair because I used an Aussie hair treatment after I dyed my hair red at Christmas and that’s what kickstarted the weird pink pastel hair thing I had going on but the hair treatment did take a good 40% of the colour out of my hair that I’d dyed three days prior. However, hair masks can be really good for your hair and a good way to recover if you’re just about to top up the colour anyway – just be careful about brands and what you want in regard to losing the colour.

then there’s the highlights of 2015 and the blue of when I started uni in November 2015, then the hair cut of Christmas 2015

Avoid using heat on your hair! Curling it, straightening it, crimping it (do people still do that?!) and even blow drying your hair – if you don’t have to, don’t. It makes your hair even drier and more dehydrated and really damaged the dry and split ends you may have. There are natural ways to curl your hair and hairspray can keep it curled, straightening is harder to do naturally but I’ve found with everything I’ve done to my hair it doesn’t curl naturally anymore. I used to have such gorgeous curly hair that I barely had to style because it was naturally so curly but now it doesn’t curl at all, it’s basically a not-quite-straight frizzy mess. I’m hoping that not using bleach anymore, trying to keep my hair healthy and getting it cut short again (soon ish, might be a few months not sure) will bring back the curls, but I’ll keep you up to date!

Get it dyed professionally if you can! It costs so much more money, like painfully so much more money, however it is much healthier for your hair as a hairdresser is a professional for a reason – they know what they’re doing and if they think you’re asking too much of your hair they will tell you and communicate with you and design the hair that will suit you best and is closest to what you want. Or alternatively to forking out hundreds of pounds for someone to dye your hair, aim for three months before changing the colour of your hair. Except for topping up the colour, that doesn’t count.

early 2016 / may 2016 bleached / June 2016 galaxy / faded galaxy

The most obvious tip is to avoid bleaching your hair or consult a hairdresser if you want to bleach your hair for a really bright colour. Don’t do what I did and use an at home bleach three times in 48 hours. I’m very impatient.

But I’ve learnt! I’ve vowed never to bleach my hair again and never to dye my hair blue, green or purple ever again because they’re the hardest colours to remove. Always.

august ’16 blue / tried to dye it brown but it went black green september ’16 / it went back to blue by accident November ’16 / christmas red ’16 / it faded so ridiculously fast early ’17 pastel pink

My plan is to keep topping up the purple in my hair (to cover the goddamn blue) until the purple dye I have runs out, then I’m going to see what happens when I put a lighter red over this colour and hope for the best, then when that runs out I’ll use a darker red I have, I’m never ever using the colour indigo because it’s too blue and I’d rather through it away than put it on my head and then by that point hopefully it’ll be a few months down the line and I can afford to go to the hairdresser and get them to dye my hair red properly and cut it short again and make it better. I cannot wait I’m literally so excited to get my hair cut it’s a little unreasonable.

“I tried to add purple to the pink and in went a variety of colours and faded a lot and stuff”

Let me know if you have any more tips in the comments!

Thank you for reading,

Sophie xx

The weird shitty pink/(purple pls)/blue mix I have now. I don’t like it.

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April favourites

2017, lifestyle, photography, student

Hello!

It’s May! How is it May already? I’m not sure how this year has completely slipped away from me but it’s been another month so it’s time for me to talk about the things I’ve been loving this month!

This is the notebook I’ve started making notes for my FMP in – on my course I do a Final Major Project instead of a dissertation and I’ve got so many ideas and I want to do a bunch of research over the summer and this is the place for all my notes and late night idea scribblings to go. I love a white marble pattern and this beauty was only £2.50 from Primark, bargain!

Image result for Maybelline Lasting Drama Gel Pen Black Excess

Maybelline Lasting Drama Gel Pen Black – I struggled to get a decent, in focus photo of this liner but I’ve rediscovered it and I’m obsessed. This the eyeliner I used when I was still in school but the gel with the angled nib it perfect for a really precise line that’s really black. I’ve used a couple of felt tip eyeliners and I love them for their precision but they just fade so fast and I forgot how good this liner is for this. And it’s fairly reasonably price for drugstore make-up.

Going to sound proper vain, but I just adore my hair colour right now – at the beginning of April I dyed it purple and I was annoyed that I was so bad at applying hair dye all the way to my roots but the way the pink fades to the purple and the purple has faded to a bluey-purple colour has just made me so happy. Also I got my note pierced last month, don’t think I mentioned it but I paid someone money to stab a hole in my nose.

This second photo shows a bit better 1) what a bad dye job I did and 2) the variety of shades and colours in my hair. The left over red-faded-pink from Christmas with the purple-fading-to-blue that I added has just made for a beautiful almost-galaxy like hair and I really love it.

My plan with my hair is to keep topping up the purple until it runs out, then let that fade as much as it’s going to and put the red dye I already have over the top, then when that’s faded I’ll use the deep red dye I have. By then, I should hopefully have saved enough money to be able to go into Toni and Guy and get them to dye my hair the colour I really want, cut it short again and just generally fix my hair. I imagine this will probably take me to the end of the year, but I’ll let you know whenever I dye my hair again!

Final Cut Pro has been a blessing – I love editing video, but my December vlog (yes, the vlog from five months ago) has been plaguing me ever since January 1st and I finally got it uploaded in April. Who doesn’t need a bit of Christmas music in the background of Spring?

I’ll be honest, I didn’t buy FCP because I don’t have a spare $300 lying around, but I love the software – it’s so simple to use and for my, very basic, editing requirements and while one day I full intend to teach myself how to use Premier Pro properly, for now – this Final Cut Pro will be perfect!

I’m intending to edit a lot of videos this week, so keep an eye on my channel and maybe subscribe while you’re there? I’m very proud of everything I’m making right now!

With YouTube in mind, I’m obsessed with ItsWayPastMyBedtime, Carrie Hope Fletcher, and her series ‘Watch Me, Wednesday!’ where she vlogs her adventures playing Wednesday Addams in The Addams Family UK tour. I’ve already got my tickets for opening night at Mayflower Theatre in Southampton and if you’re a student, I thoroughly recommend having a look because they’re only £15 a ticket for students! Down from the full price of nearly £40, I couldn’t resist and I imagine I’ll be treating myself to move tickets after I’ve seen the show because I know I’m going to love it, I already love so many of the songs and I cannot wait. I just can’t wait and this series is making me even more excited.

Going to sound like the biggest dork in the world, but I’m really enjoying uni right now. I don’t know if it’s because I’m nearly done with second year, because I barely have any classes or because I’ve actually been getting some really good grades recently but I’ve really enjoyed choosing to go into uni in my own time and work on my assignments. It’s refreshing to have the choice – uni is so different from school and looking back, I was ready to leave school way before I actually finished and I’m loving uni so much. I’m having a really good time right now, and that might be the nerdiest thing I’ve ever said.

Even reusing my own photos of uni, this is what Solent looked like last August.

Again with reusing photos from an old favourites and again with sounding like a total loser – I’m really enjoying work right now. Over the Easter holidays, I did 55 hours at work and I actually didn’t hate it – I was a bit tired but I really like my job and everyone there and it’ll be nice to finish uni so work is the only thing I really have to focus on and worry about.

What’s student life if it isn’t going into Asda at 8am on Easter Monday to clear the shelves of cheap chocolate? Lindt is like my favourite chocolate ever so when these guys were only £1.25 each, I bought four. Well, I bought five but one was a present for my sister because she talked about really wanting one and I’m nice (especially when they’re only £1.25). This is my last one and I’m really sad about it.

If any friends of family are reading this and wondering what to get my for my 21st (not that you would be wondering now, it’s four months away); Lindt chocolate. I love Lindt chocolate so much.

This pencil case has revolutionised my bullet journal life – this wrap pencil case, only £8.99 on Amazon, holds 72 pens and has a blue elephant design on it is literally a combination of all of my favourite things. It’s quite big and bulky, but if you’re someone who wants to carry lots of coloured pens around all the time it’s actually quite compact. I literally take my journals and my pens everywhere with me and I can’t describe my love for this thing enough.

And last, but by no means least, Sonar Film – the society at my university that basically runs it’s own cinema. We show up to date films (I’m currently at a showing of the new Fast and Furious film) at a ridiculously reasonable price of £4 for Solent students and £4.50 for everyone else and I’m so proud to be a part of it. I’ve been elected as the Marketing Manager and President for the committee of 2017/2018 and I can’t wait to start working with everyone else on the committee to make Sonar Film the best it can be.

This post has ended up being a lot longer than I intended it to be!

I know my blog has been a bit sporadic recently – I’m really sorry, I didn’t mean to take a week off last week but sometimes things just get on top of me and get the better of me and I’m glad I’ve reached a point where I don’t beat myself up too much if I miss a post or try a new schedule or something, because there definitely would have been a point even a year ago where I’d have forced myself to write something bad rather than not write anything at all. So thank you for allowing me to do that.

I’ve now planned blog posts from now until the end of the month, so hopefully I can plan my time accordingly to actually upload all these posts because there’s some I’m really excited about!

Thank you for reading and sticking with me,

Sophie xx

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December Favourites!

2016, lifestyle

Hello!

I know it’s not quite January yet, but with the New Year approaching I wanted to save those posts for a 2016 review and talking about New Years Resolutions, and I’ve got plenty of favourites to talk about!

Firstly, I have to thank my amazing friends Nick, Ollie and (boyfriend) Lucas for taking so much time to make me some beautiful fairy lights with coca cola cans. They’re the tiny mini ones that are in the alcohol aisle at the super market and I don’t know why I didn’t question it at the time but they’re absolutely gorgeous and I’ve put them up above my desk – I love them a lot.

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Amazon have been an absolutely blessing with all the Christmas shopping and last minute buys – this photo was original used in my last favourites post to talk about the Grand Tour but it’s an Amazon box, so it’s relevant? I did a fair bit of my shopping in person but Amazon is my favourite way to shop – one massive order that covered 90% of the people I needed to buy presents for, which made me feel really organised. Good job Amazon.

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I’ve been a fan of Busted for a really long time – fourteen years later, they do a signing in Southampton and I got to go! They were so, so lovely, it was an incredible experience (I made a news package on it if you’d like to see that!) and the album is brilliant too – I had a proper listen to it that evening and it’s actually really good. It doesn’t sound all that much like the early 2000s Busted, but their sound has developed and progressed with modern music yet still has hints of ‘Busted’. As a long term Busted fan, having a new album fourteen years later really makes me happy.

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I’m called this ‘David III’. This is a ‘make your own’ cactus pillow – I have a felt cactus called David and a succulent called David II and I’m going to make David III. I’m going to have a collection of cactus-related-David-plants and this is actually really cute. Well, I’m sure when I get round to making it, it probably won’t be as cute but the potential is there.

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Okay, not every lifestyle blogger puts a toothbrush in their favourites post but this is a vibrating brush from Oral B, it was only £8.59 for two of these brushes and I got really excited about it. My teeth are the cleanest they’ve ever been.

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A wonderfully practically Christmas present – a portable charger is very useful but when it’s got four USB ports and a torch? It’s the kind of thing someone who relies so heavily on their phone finds really exciting but isn’t really that exciting. For the price though, it’s really powerful and if you’re looking for a portable charger that will fully recharge your phone about four times I think? It’s here on Amazon, if you’re interested!

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I got quite a few new bits of kitchenware for Christmas and it made me surprisingly happy! I had a really nice set of knives when I lived in halls last year but two of three of them went missing, so kitchen knives were on my Christmas list! I also got a Doctor Who TARDIS cereal bowl, a TARDIS drinking glass and little TARDIS salt and pepper shakers. My mum is trying to give my kitchen a theme, I think. I really wanted the TARDIS salt and pepper shakers though.

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Definitely the cutest present I received by a long run – my sister made this cushion in the shape of a cloud and painted eyes and little blushed cheeks on him, then put fairy lights inside the stuffing! It’s one of my favourite things I got this Christmas, he’s just so adorable. I have another cloud pillow at home and she’s called Sora (because I googled cloud related names and it’s also the name of the main character in Kingdom Hearts) and my family and I named him Nimbus, because it’s a cloud related name and a Harry Potter reference. Perfect!

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I mean, I’ve probably mentioned it once or twice, but I’m a huge Disney fan – I love Disney animated movies because they’re so heartwarming and fun, in recent years they’ve led more towards heartbreaking and I cry at every film but I still love them. Over the summer I decided I wanted a Disney movie collection and I wrote out a list of every Disney animated film ever (over a hundred in total) and my mum got me these four for Christmas – the first three and the most recent one! I’ve got both Jungle Book films in Southampton as well so my collection is well on it’s way!

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And lastly for this months favourites – my new hair colour! On Christmas Eve, I finally got the red dye out and dyed it a dark burgundy red. Following a deep conditioning treatment last night it seems to have gone for more of a rose-gold/pinky-red colour, but I’ll top it up in the next couple of days I think. I love this colour and I’m definitely sticking with it for a few months – the past few months have been a blur of bleach, blue and mistakes!

Thank you for reading, if you have any suggestions for things I should try out next month please leave them in the comments!

Sophie xx

 

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