19. Drink a cocktail from a coconut.

Well, I've been absent for a while, I can't deny that. As always, living life gets in the way of writing about it. Just a quick one though to say that I actually did one of the things on my bucket list whilst on holiday. Not exactly the most challenging thing, but I enjoyed it none the less! ;)

Lush Wednesday's: Curly Wurly Shampoo Review

Today's review is going to be a little different than usual in that it will be both shorter, and not quite the positive light as usual.

I have been for the past month or two religiously using the Curly Wurly shampoo in an attempt to control the frizzy mane that I have created with my perm. I figured if I used it long enough it would begin to make a difference, but I am sad to say that it has not. The texture is truly bizarre, mostly resembling porridge, lumpy and sticky. As such, attempting to lather this into your hair is not the most pleasant of feelings, and it leaves undesolvable chunks of coconut stuck tangled in your tresses.

Having said all of that, the smell of this product is pure luxury and even though the consistency is pretty gross, it feels rich and creamy.

I certainly have to admit I feel it is overpriced for the results that it provides, at £9.95 a pot that makes it even more expensive than Aussie. I expected far more from a Lush product, but it left my hair dry and frazzled. Although I'm disappointed, I've heard many good reviews of this shampoo for dry, curly hair, so I would urge you to try it for yourself! Perhaps your hair is less stubborn and damaged than mine.

Lots of love and happy thoughts

Puddy <3

Things I've been thinking lately

Okay, okay I suck at blogging, I am a terrible blogger. I am going to try and write all of this weeks posts in advance so I fail less this week, but we'll see :P

I was thinking earlier of coming on here and writing something really inspirational and fluffy. But now I'm really tired so instead you are stuck with the hopeless wonderings of my tired mind...with some fluffy inspirational stuff sprinkled on top wherever I manage.

Recently, I've thought about inspiration and what makes someone inspirational. What are the requirements to being a good role model? How do we know whether someone's actions are inspirational, or just good? What causes us to want to be like someone else? It's got me wondering if I really should be comparing myself to other people that I admire, or if I should be spending more time on becoming the person I want to be. Perhaps instead I should be my own inspiration.

I've been looking back again, comparing the person I am not to a 6 months ago, a year ago, two years ago. I've discovered that actually, the changes I've made to my life and my way of thinking are quite inspirational, in the way that they drive me to continue evolving. For once, I can say that I am proud of the person I'm becoming, step by step, even if I stumble and relapse here and there.

Life is full of surprises they say, and I'm beginning to learn how true that is. On more than one occasion, I've blogged about how much people can improve an already awesome experience, and it's been a constant learning curve during the ups and downs of changing my lifestyle. I have many incredible people in my life who help me every day to remember to smile and keep positive, but right now I'd like to tell you about one in particular who has really shown me how quickly things can change.

A couple of months ago, my company took on a new recruit, and I was pretty excited as she was the first person anywhere near my age to join in a while. It took literally around 2 shifts before I realised that this girl was about to change my day to day life majorly. She kept cracking me up with the way she was so relaxed, and so unforgivingly confident and we actually clicked in no time. We were gossiping about our love lives, and getting to know that our backstories really weren't all that different. I invited her on a night out as she had never been to town and we laughed our hearts out from getting dressed in my room, to having to run for the train, to stumbling home with cheesey chips at 2am. Not long after that I got pretty sick with my appendicitis, and not only did she come to visit me in the hospital, but she organised a collection around work that bought me a lovely orchid plant, some chocolates and a card signed by all my colleagues. Since then, we've been joined at the hip, and generally spend most of our time cackling in the corner of the office like naughty school girls. I absolutely adore her and I couldn't imagine my life without her. As I posted on Facebook earlier, a friend that within a month of knowing you, runs to get you a bin, holds in front of you while you are sick, pushes your wet hair out of your face, and walks backwards down the stairs to keep the bin in front of you while you walk to an ambulance is a friend for life. I love you Sarah you munchkin <3

There's a few more lovely people that have cropped up from nowhere, one in particular recently (if you're mad enough to be reading this, big kiss to you!) that have helped remind me that you never know what's around the corner. Two years ago I would never have been brave enough to get to know any of these people, but I'm so glad I did because they serve as a constant reminder that only I can decide who I am, where my life goes and how I let my past affect me.

One last thought: the things that happened to you made you who you are today, and whether you are proud of them or not, you shouldn't regret them. However they don't have to shape who you become from now on, that is entirely your choice, so don't let anyone take it away from you.

Lots of love and happy thoughts

Puddy <3

Apologies.

Hi guys,

Just a very brief post to apologise once again for my absence. Things have been pretty crazy at work the last week, and will be until at least Monday, with the chance to get even worse after that! Sadly that means I have not been keeping up my schedule here or on my channel. I will be trying my best to post a review this Wednesday, but however this week it will not be a Glow product as I have something else I really need to talk about. I'll try to be here as often as I can with some shorter than usual, a little less structured posts where I just share my thoughts with you or something, cool? For this weeks video (if I manage to find time) I'm thinking of doing the "whats in my bag tag" so you can look forward to that :)

Lots of love and happy thoughts

Puddy <3

Glow Wednesday's (again on a Thursday!): Away with the fairies bath mallow

"Tiptoe to the back of the garden, where the fairies live and use their

magic combination of cocoa and shea butters with pure jasmine

and clary sage essential oils to leave your skin, soul and spirit enchanted!"

Hi geeks :) This week I'm reviewing Glow&Co's away with the faires bath mallow. I'm pretty excited to be reviewing this as I really loved it, and it's always great when you get to write about something that makes you feel all warm and fuzzy.

I'm going to start by giving you the description from Glow&Co's instagram: Brûlée - these lovely bath bombs last up to six baths. They're slow release moisture and make your water very creamy and soothing for your skin. Full of luxurious Shea butters and a wonderful scent these brûlées are perfect for a pamper evening.

And perfect it was! This bomb smelt absolutely amazing. Last week's product filled the room with the wonderful childhood scent of sweet shops which was beautiful. However this weeks product felt far more personalised. Had I paid more attention at the time of purchase, I'd have been prepared for the scent, but I'm glad I didn't because it only made it all the more delightful when the soft scent of jasmine began to swirl around my bath. For those of you who don't know, my absolute favourite scent is the combination of jasmine and ylang-ylang, something I have only ever found together once in a hand cream.

Using this product I had one of my most relaxing baths to date. The water was soft and smooth, and I could feel the jasmine and clary sage oils soaking into my skin. The scents were very soothing and it left a thin layer of foam along the top of the water to leave you with some dignity ;) Much like last weeks bomb, it did take a while to melt into the water but it was absolutely worth the wait and I truly enjoyed it considerably more when using in the evening with time to spare. This is definitely going to be bookmarked as a favourite product after a stressful day.

I was incredibly pleased with this adorable little bomb, styled beautifully again like a cupcake with a mushroom. It was a reasonable size and having checked their instagram after using it I wish I had known I could have used it for more than one bath! So I guess I'll make that bit bold for you guys ;) At only £2.25 it's an absolute bargain, and you get the pleasure of chatting with the lovely staff and the adorable packaging included in the price.

Overall a fantastic product at a very reasonable price, something I don't get to say nearly enough nowadays. I cannot recommend a visit to Glow&Co enough, they have stores in Basingstoke and Lymington, so if you're anywhere near by why not drop in and tell them I sent you.

As always, I will leave a link to their Facebook below, please give them a visit and let them know where you came from ;)

Puddy <3

Glow&Co's Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Glow-Co/211957398822171?fref=ts

Glow Wednesday's (on a Thursday!): Chasing Rainbows Ballistic.

Morning Geeks :) As promised I have tried to step straight back into my blogging, but I'm still a little late! As they say better late than never so let's get into it.

Today I could not resist taking the time to try one of my Glow & Co products, they've been calling out my name since I bought them! I decided to start with the Chasing Rainbows ballistic because it's so cute looking and the description on Glow's instagram was very tempting. The smell of this product is incredible as it transports me straight back to being an excitable kid in the sweet shop. This smells like a combination of all the different milk chocolate sweets you used to get in a pic'n'mix, the little white mice, the white buttons with sprinkles on top, the white milk bottles, it's a smell that took a while to remember but as soon as I did it gave me a huge grin. Once in the water it only got better, filling my bathroom with all kinds of pic'n'mix scents.

I love the design of this product, shaped like a cupcake with a cute little rainbow on top, it's something different from the usual ball shaped ballistic. The thing I love most about this ballistic though is what it does, I'll let Glow's instagram give you the low down : "Creamers - These bath bombs are little but luxurious. Packed full of moisturising properties they really are the perfect treat for your skin, leaving your skin completely moisturised and silky smooth. Not only do they do wonders for your skin but they look gorgeous and smell heavenly."

I could not agree with that description more, the smell really was heavenly and they left my skin feeling like silk. The water felt creamy and I could feel the smoothness of the moisturisers if I just run my hands along my skin in the bath. It turned my bath a foamy white on the top and there was a slight blue tint to the water.

My only tiny criticism of this is that it takes a long while to properly melt so it does let your bath water cool off a little, so I would advise to run your bath hotter than usual before you drop this little beauty in, definitely not a product to use when you are on the go! Although to be honest I would definitely say that using this ballistic in a rush would be such a waste, save it for a pamper evening when you can indulge in it's luxury until you wrinkle! ;)

At £2.25 it's a total bargain and they even package it up in the cute little bags with a ribbon that says "bomb cosmetics"- gorgeous. I really enjoyed this product, and I think knowing that it comes from such a small and personalised shop just makes it even better. Glow & Co have two locations, Basingstoke and Lymington, head over to their Facebook or any of the other links below and show them some love! Don't forget to tell them I sent you! :D

Puddy <3

Glow & Co's Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Glow-Co/211957398822171?fref=ts

Twitter: https://twitter.com/GlowAndCo

Instagram: glowandco

                                 

Discovering a gem.

Hi all, I'm back! I know in my last post I said I was out of hospital and raring to go, but apparently I jumped back into everything too soon, thus making myself more ill, whoops! So I've been taking it easy and giving my body time to catch up with my mind. Now that I am finally returning to work, I thought I'd come back to my comfortable corner of the internet :) I'm not sure when my YouTube will be back up, as that involves a lot of equipment set up, but fingers crossed I'll be able to throw something together by next Monday.

I wanted to pop on here and inform you of something that will shortly be coming up on my blog. I know, weird that I'm giving you a preview of a post, but I just can't wait to use the products to be able to review them! So I'm just going to give a little plug to this shop I found and enthuse about how excited I am to have discovered them :)

I recently went on a mini shopping trip with my friend Lily to Festival Place in Basingstoke and she dragged me into a little shop called Glow & Co. I didn't want to go in because I could see the bath products from outside, and I still have an entire drawer of Lush products to review but I am so glad that she did take me in there as the whole shop was adorable. It was not only bath and beauty products, but also candles, stationary and everything I could ever want under one roof. For now though, I'm going to focus on bath and beauty. Many of their adorable little bath bombs were shaped like the cutest cupcakes I have ever seen and they smelled amazing. Their prices are pretty reasonable, while on par if not slightly cheaper than Lush.

Thus far they have only two shops but I really feel they have the potential for far more in future, and at this early stage I'd just like to go public with my whole-hearted support of them. I will be posting reviews of each of the three products that I purchased from them in place of my Lush reviews for a little while, so I'm very much looking forward to that. Thanks for sticking by me through my time of absence and I look forward to spending more time in my internet happy place :)

Also a quick shout out to the Glow & Co team, thanks for being the first people to get me to write my blog down for you to check out, you made my day! :)  Head over to their Facebook and give it some love! :)

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Glow-Co/211957398822171

Where to find Glow&Co in Basingstoke:
http://www.festivalplace.co.uk/store_profile-4947.htm

Puddy <3