Q-Pot Pink Shell Macaron Necklace

My birthday is coming up (and it's a big one) so I decided to save up and treat myself to something from the Q-Pot International shop. I was a little nervous as I'd never bought a necklace from them before; only rings which aren't as expensive. I shouldn't have been worried though as the pink shell macaron necklace I had decided on was so beautifully made and of such good quality that it was worth every penny. 

The only problem I have is that it's so lovely I want to wear it all the time!

Q-Pot Luxe Heart Chocolate Ring

I've always wanted to own a piece of jewellery by amazing Japanese designer brand Q-Pot, but for years I had forgotten all about it until something brought it back to mind recently. 

Tickled Shop, I found out recently, is one place that has a great variety of Q-Pot jewellery available to buy online. After taking ages to decide which item to treat myself to, I finally decided on the Luxe Heart Chocolate Ring and, when it arrived in the post, I wasn't disappointed with my choice!

I just love how much it looks like a real chocolate truffle. The heart is made of PVC so it has a really nice weight to it as well. I even bought myself some big gold hooped earrings so I've got gold jewellery to match the ring when I wear it.

I'm definitely planing to buy more jewellery by Q-Pot in the future. What about you guys? Do you own any Q-Pot? What are your favourite pieces?

Resin Foxjaw Necklace by Hysteria Machine

It was my birthday last weekend and my husband got me this beautiful silver resin cast foxjaw necklace from Hysteria Machine (aka Cara Trinder) on etsy. I can't wait to wear it.

Picking Up Small People After School

I went to pick up my little niece and nephew from school the other day for the first time (for me, not for them!). As it turned out, my sister was there in time to pick them up anyway, but it means I now know where to go if they need picked up again. Or even if they don't. Because spending time with them is pretty great fun anyway (they're nuts).

Of course I arrived an hour early, but better early than late. It means I had some time to have a coffee at one of my favourite coffee places and do some reading. I've just started on this series by C. J. Cherryh.

The kids were picked up safe and sound. Even if my wee niece's school bag looks bigger than her.

My nephew doing his homework. He's a maths genius already because my sister is a maths teacher. Also, check out how cool my sister's kitchen is. I always think it looks like something from a magazine. Don't tell her I said that.

And I finally had a chance to give my sister the fimo ring I had made her for her birthday. It's the black, bulbous one on the right and the other two are ones she made herself.

What's In The Box?

I've been desperate to share this Christmas present I got from my sister and brother-in-law, but I wanted to get some proper photos first.

Unwrapping this hand-made box covered in bats, I couldn't figure out what could possibly be inside. All I knew was the fact that my sister and I had decided to give hand-made gifts this year and that she had been looking at my pinterest for inspiration.

Inside the box was a tissue seemingly stained with blood. Eek!

And inside the tissue was this amazing present. My sister has a lot of skill when it comes to jewellery-making and her husband is a dentist. Together they made me a human jaw necklace and apparently it was all my brother-in-law's idea which is really cool.

It's molded from a real person's jaw too (the work experience girl's apparently, haha) and then painted black. I can't tell you how much I just love this piece of jewellery. What do you guys think?

Tombstone Locket

Before Christmas, I treated myself to this tombstone necklace that opens like a locket. I haven't put anything inside it yet. I think it'll probably end up being either a photo of Tim and me or a little quote from scripture. Not sure yet. Either way, I love this necklace!

Milkshakes In The Sunshine

My little 3-year old niece asked if we could come into town on Saturday to meet her and her big brother after they'd been to the pictures with their Grandma. So, naturally, we made our way to town. I mean, how could we resist a request like that?? I was too distracted though by the all the noise and commotion in the toy shop and in the eatery we went to to remember to take any photos of the wee souls, but we still took some photos of each other in the sunshine after buying milkshakes. We're not quite as adorable as my niece and nephew though. 

I thought I'd wear my new Barbie t-shirt and new purple scarf since it was such a nice day and I wanted to show them off.

And here's my husband, looking disturbingly like a men's fashion model. The jumper over the shoulder probably doesn't help actually.

I found this teeny wee necklace in Accessorize the other day too. They had it in months ago, I didn't buy it and regretted it ever since so when I saw it was back in stock I had to snap it up. It has a black plastic heart with a little gem inside and, although it's gold rather than silver, it's so tiny and cute that I don't even mind. 

Metallic Green Eyes With Purple Glitter Underneath

Here is a make-up look I tried out this summer. It's lots of metallic greens on the lid and purple glitter underneath the eye. I wish the photos showed off the purple glitter properly, but I'm sure you get the idea. I was wearing my little bird skull ring at the time too.

Pvc Collars

Although I'm loving the collars necklaces that in the shops these days, I haven't managed to find exactly what I want in a collar. That's why I decided to make some myself!

It took a few attempts to get the right thickness and size, but, in the end, I think I worked out a way of making them that works well so I'm making up some more. I might sell them online if people are interested, although right now I'm making them with the view to selling a bunch of things at upcoming craft fairs. These black and pink ones are made of pvc, hand-sewn with a chain and metal fastenings.

You can see me wearing my own little black one here.

Illamasqua Lipstick in Kontrol

Last week, I was very excited to have a parcel from Illamasqua waiting from me when I got home from Edinburgh. I had decided to make use of their special offer on lipstick and lipgloss if you order them as a pair. The lipstick I chose was kontrol, an awesome purple lipstick that's tones in with my hair, and the lipgloss I went for was violate which I'll be going into detail on in another post.

My family came over for my birthday the other night so I decided to try out kontrol, knowing that family are the only people you can really rely on to be brutally honest and tell you if you look like a freak because you're too old to be wearing purple lipstick. Anyway, at the end of it, I think I passed the sister test and the even the brother-in-law test and my little 3 year old niece seemed to love it!

I did my eyes in blue and green and decided to go full-on dolly-mode with pigtails and my new lace collar from New Look (£2.50 in the sale, reduced to £1.25 since it had a fault in it I had to sew. I'm turning into a bargain hunter like my dad). Hope you like the look!

Permanent Purple Hair

I've been having problems lately with the colour of my hair fading too quickly. I normally use semi-permanent hair dye such as Crazy Color or Fudge paintboxes since wild, unnatural hair colours are only widely available (as far as I used to be aware anyway) as semi-permanent for some reason. When I was at the hairdressers last time, however, they tried me out with a permanent purple (and a permanent black, as usual) to see how that goes. I'm really excited to see how long it lasts this time compared to the semi-permanent stuff. The ends have faded slightly already because that's where my old green colour is still growing out, but the top of my head still looks great! I plan to keep it topped up now and then with fudge paintboxes to keep it vibrant but at least I have a strong permanent base to begin with.

Here are the photos the hairdresser took. I go to a training salon called UConcept Hairdressing Academy. You can see their facebook page here.

Wearing purple nail varnish to go with my hair

And it was a sunny day too so I got my fishnets out. (Please ignore my husband's feet butting in on the photo)

Here you can see me wearing false eyelashes (which I never do!) and my snake necklace. I also got a new attachment for my labret which I'm pretty pleased with.

... and I found these earrings in Claire's which I love. They're all spiky and thorny and cool. I can only wear one since the hole in my right ear closed up after the wedding, but I think that looks ok.

Gold Jewellery & The New Paperchase Shop

People always say blue eyeshadow is a risky thing to wear, but I'm not exactly a fan of playing safe when it comes to "the rules" of style or whatever.

Seriously, who invents these ideas? Don't wear blue eyeshadow; don't wear blue and green clothes together; eyes or lips but not both; legs or cleavage but not both... *pffff* Anyway! Here I am doing the very (for real!) brave thing of wearing gold jewellery instead of silver. I had a gold candelabra earring in (which you can't see, oops), a gold bracelet, the skull ring from this post and a gold cross with red jewels on a red velvety band.

I'm also very excited because a new Paperchase shop has opened in town. It's a massive one with art and craft materials as well and even a Tinderbox coffee shop inside. If you don't explode with the cuteness of the stationary before you get upstairs to the coffee shop, that is. Tim and I tried it out ourselves one particularly hot day after a visit to the GoMA. I had a vanilla milkshake, but I think they'd forgotten to put any vanilla in it so it was technically just... uh... warm, sweet milk, I guess? At least Tim was smart enough to get a chocolate one .

Daydreams

Here's a bunch of low contrast images I whipped up from some photos I've taken the past couple of weeks because everyone seems to be into low contrast these days and I don't see why I shouldn't have some fun with it myself, dammit.

Drawing in the studio with a coffee and a winter spice scented candle. 

It turns out that coffee plus a little drop of rose extract equals turkish delight hot chocolate. Who knew

Crystal corner in the loo. Most of these were given to me by my dad at some point over the years

My sister got me this ring. I love it because it reminds me of the nome king from Return To Oz

My make-up mirror. This is how I know how to put all the slap on my face so it looks ok

Researching sacred geometry for a logo I'm doing for a client right now

The malachite ash tray where we keep our wedding rings and some of my ear studs