50 Day Spending Ban | Healthy Edition

Photo Credit (here, here and here.)

Having watched my weight creep up and up and up since starting university 2 years ago, I have finally decided I should really do something about it. Now don't get me wrong, I have tried before half heartedly and lost a few pounds here and there. However, it was never really enough and I have always put it back on. 

Before you read this and think, 'what is she complaining about, she's not fat' no, I'm not. I don't hate my body either, I am grateful for the fact I am a fully functioning human being. However, if I continue to eat the same things and in the same amounts, along with not exercising enough. It won't be long before I am heading to the 'overweight' section of my BMI. I am obviously not there yet, but this is me preventing that before I get heavier and older and it becomes too difficult. I want to be at my best while I am still young and have few responsibilities, I don't want to waste it sat inside because I'm too tired or can't be bothered.

Without going into too much detail, I want to get back down to a weight where I feel healthy and able to run around and enjoy things the way I used to. I want to be able to go clothes shopping without feeling like I want to run away from all the styles I love (bodycon being one of them.) I also think it will help my mental state enormously, especially as I am currently swamped in revision and deadlines. So essentially the aim is fit and healthy NOT skinny, that wouldn't suit me.

I am a complete foodie and am also hopeless at sticking to a budget. Hence, I spend a lot of money on food,  as well as beauty products. Obviously food is a necessity, but the snacks and treats are not. That leads me onto the title of this post...

I have added a twist to the usual 50 day spending ban. Not only will I not be spending my money on frivolous items such as beauty products and clothes. I will also not be buying snacks and junk food! I will track my progress on here every week, so I can look back and feel accountable if I bought anything to hinder my aim of getting fit and healthy.

I am also thinking about adding a few healthy recipes up onto this blog, so let me know if that is something you would be interested in?

By the end of the ban, I hope to have saved up a substantial amount of money AND to have dropped a dress size. Crazy I know, but I think 6 weeks is a healthy amount of time to do that in. I then hope to buy a new outfit with the money I have saved. 

So there you have it! I started on Monday and am already making progress, I will be checking in on Sunday to let you know how this week went.

Let me know if you have any tips or tricks to help me along the way. 

If you want to get involved with this challenge or are doing something similar, either comment below, tweet me, or send an email. I would love for you to join in and any of you that decide to, I will link the relevant posts in my weekly updates.

Wish me luck! 

Nottingham Blogger Meetup Evening Meal

If you have already seen my #NottsBBMeet up day event post, then you will know how much we got up to, tootling around Nottingham last Saturday.

This post is going to be about what we got up to in the evening, when 30 (yes 30!) of us piled into TGI Fridays for food, fun and cocktails.

We arrived at TGIs to find an ENORMOUS goody bag each at our place, we then pulled out our chairs to find another one! It was a crazy crazy evening. I think everyone was fairly overwhelmed with the generosity of the brands and the hard work gone in to organising everything. We were all just sat around staring at each other in shock.

When it was time to order food, I think I was too excited to eat (good diet tip right there ;) so I only ordered a main. I had the BBQ chicken salad which was delicious and a pina colada to wash it down with. Yum!

Here are some photos of what happened...

Sitting down with our huge goody bags in front of us!

Decisions, Decisions!

A gleeful Nicola opening her Liz Earle goody bag :)

Waiting for our food to arrive

Sophia opening the Chanel lipstick we all bought her to say thank you!

The rather appropriately decorated biscuits that we each had in our goody bags, courtesy of Sophia (they didn't last long:P)

Finally getting a good look at all the amazing things we went home with. 

I feel rather lucky!

Its the little things that make the difference.

I had a wonderful time at the meal and was completely overwhelmed and incredibly grateful for such a wonderful evening. Thank you to Sophia and all the brands involved who added the icing on the cake to an already fantastic day!

My Makeup Storage

The #bbloggers chat this week was all about how we all store the copious amounts of makeup we seem to accumulate, as beauty bloggers. I found out so many fantastic tips and tricks so thanks to everyone for sharing!

The chat has inspired me to put up a post about how I keep all of my makeup neat and tidy.
The way I see it, make-up is a huge luxury. We save up and spend our money on it, sometimes sacrificing other things (like food! *joke*) in the process. This to me means it should be looked after.
Now I'm not talking about the - keep it super neat and never use it - kind of looked after. Just clean, organised and unable to be trodden on!

I love organising things, so keeping everything in its place isn't too hard, although things do seem to migrate to different drawers. The storage itself is actually fairly different to a lot of things I have seen before so I hope you enjoy the change!

I currently need to use my desk for its intended purpose, so my makeup sits snugly on a shelf in my wardrobe.

#

This is my favourite corner :) I love my lipstick pepper!

Large Drawers - WHSmith

Small Draws - Paperchase

Makeup Brush Holder - Paperchase

Pepper - I think it was from ASDA but Im not sure!

Pink monkey box - Homesense (a very long time ago)

So there you have it, my slightly odd make up storage. If you have any tips or suggestions on how you store your makeup let me know in the comments. Even better, if you have done a post or video, please leave the link. I love to have a good ol' nosy!

The Nottingham Blogger Meetup Day Event

Yesterday, bloggers from all across the country gathered in Nottingham City centre for a day of shopping, pampering, food and some more shopping. I don't think they knew what had hit them!

My day started at a very sleepy 6am. I had my outfit and makeup planned so it wasn't too stressful, then I tootled on down to the station to meet the lovely Nicola. With a 2 hour journey stretched out in front of us, we chit chatted the time away with makeup musings and excitement over what was in store.

We arrived early and met up with Sophia (the lovely lady behind the whole day) and Jessie (who also helped organise.) After a well needed cuppa we all headed over to meet everyone at the Lions in the town square. There was a huge amount of people huddled around, waiting for the day to begin. 

First on the agenda, a trip to Kiehls! I was in Group 4 which was last, so got to spend my time shopping around where I met even more lovely girls, namely Meg, Michelle and Katy.

When it was our turn to go into Kiehls, we each had a glass of champagne, a yummy cupcake and our own personal skincare consultation awaiting us. 

The lady who did my consultation was absolutely lovely and recommended some fantastic products to keep my crazy skin in check. It turns out there was literally no moisture in my cheeks and my forehead was going mental with oil aha *yum*! I ended up making two sneaky purchases which will be making an appearance on here soon ;)

Here are some photos of the day! Anyone who came to the meet up feel free to use these photos, just make sure you credit them if you do :)

 The lovely Kiehls store.

 Super concentration! 

 Cheeky pic of Katy enjoying her cupcake! <3 p="">

 My new buddy the skeleton ;)

 The lovely ladies who did our skin consultations.

 Hollie having her consultation!

More of all the things I wish I could afford to buy! 

Last but not least an enormous thank you and well done to Sophia for organising and pulling off, such an amazing event. She has a fantastic blog, which you should all go and have a gander at :)

I hope everyone who went had as wonderful a time as I did. Stay tuned for the second part of this post which is the evening meal, including what was in my colossal goody bag! 

Nottingham Blogger Meetup Wishlist

First up, something that I did earlier this week that I find super exciting. I now own a domain name! I am officially the proud owner of www.louminous.com :) I have been blogging for around 5 years now and thought it was about time I bought my own little piece of the internet and I am currently a very happy Lou :)

On with the blog post...

A couple of days ago I explained on Twitter to the lovely Amiiee over at Its Amiieeism about how I didn't have a wishlist, and I was just going to pick up a couple of things when we went to the Nottingham blogger meetup on Saturday. So naturally the next day I think of a million things that I had forgotten about, that I now want to buy. The troubles of being a blogger eh!

So here it is, my list of unaffordable and unobtainable things due to being a skint student (no doubt Ill cave and buy some of them anyway...)

1.Origins Mega Mushroom Skin Relief Face Mask

2.Seche Vite Top Coat

3.Hydraluron

4.Topshop Makeup

5.Origins Super Spot Remover

6.OPI Nail Envy.

Out of all these I definitely want to purchase some Topshop makeup and I need another Seche Vite in my life! Im so excited for Saturday now. I have my outfit planned and Im ready to get up at 6am to tootle on down to Notts!

If you have done a #NottsBBMeet wishlist leave it in the comments below :)

Video: Using Things Up #1

I recorded this video a while ago, but never had the time to edit or upload it. It is the first 'proper' video to go up on my new Youtube Channel so any feedback is welcome.:)

I have actually used a lot of products up since this, so I guess I need to film another one! I will definitely try and film a couple of different videos before then to keep it interesting ;)

If you head on over to Youtube and watch it, there is a full list of products mentioned plus links if you wish to buy them.

Have a lovely day :)

Panic Stations Everyone!

It seems as though yesterday was one massive who ha in the blogging world over the loss of Google Reader (read about it here) I personally, have never really used it. However, I do use GFC and have acquired a lot of my lovely followers through there. I will be sad to see it leave - when it eventually does.

Since there is mass panic, I thought I would hop on the bandwagon of letting you all know the other platforms I currently lurk around on...

The main one I use to follow blogs myself is Bloglovin'. I highly recommend it, its really easy to use and helps me keep track of what I have and haven't read.

Bloglovin'

Facebook

Twitter

Hello Cotton

She Said Beauty

and finally Youtube! More content coming soon...

So there you have it. Lots of wonderful Louminous goodness! I hope among all the links you find something that suits you. Let me know what you think of the whole Google debacle in the comments below.