El Willmer

Thursday, 26 February 2015

Banana Berry Smoothie

I feel like I haven't done any sort of recipe blog post in so long and its not good enough, therefore when trying out this recipe from Lucy Mecklenburgh's book I thought I'd blog it!

I'm actually not the biggest smoothie or juice fan, although I'm trying to be because they're good for you, so when seeing this recipe in Lucy's book I thought why not give it ago. And I actually really really enjoyed it! It is also so incredibly easy.

The Ingredients:

1 Banana

1 Cup of Water

1 Teaspoon of Honey

1 Cup of Mixed Fruits

The one and only step:

Just blend everything together, I added the banana bit by it so I could see if I actually wanted it all. And then put in a glass and ENJOY!

I actually used a Ikea vase as my glass as it looks so nice!

Ikea Milk Bottle Vase - £1 - HERE

Kilner Plastic Straws - Random Kitchen Ware Shop

This smoothie was so delicious and filling!

Love El
xxx

Timeless Truth - Charcoal Detox Brightening Mask Review

Before we get into the review of the face mask I want to both pre-warn and apologise about the photo of me in the mask as it is quite scary! Also there will be an over-use of the word mask, I can feel it already.

I have never tried a mask like this before and so when Beauty Masks sent me this one I was extremely excited to try it out! Beauty Masks, a UK based company, has created 2 main categories of fusion masks and luxury masks, and with these 2 categories there are many different types of masks. The difference between fusion and luxury is to do with the cloth, fusion is non-woven and luxury has elasticity, bio cellulose and silk fibre.

You can follow Beauty Masks - Timeless Masks HERE on twitter, and I will say the contact via email was so quick, very impressed!

The mask I am trying out today is, as the title suggests, the "Charcoal Detox Brightening Mask". When you open the packet you have the mask folded inside, with plastic protecting the one side that goes on your face and some excess serum at the bottom. The fantastic thing about this mask is there is so much serum you can easily use it more than once! Just be sure to place it in the fridge and use it within a couple of days. If you want the mask to be refreshing place in the fridge or place in warm water before use to be more pampering and comforting.

Putting the mask on was weird but so so easy, however folding it up and putting it back in the packet was tricky! Before using this mask be sure to wash your face and then apply the mask for 15-20 minutes! You will notice there is one lighter side and one dark side, be sure to place the dark coloured side on your face.

I then took it off my face, rubbed in the excess and I must admit my face felt so unbelievably soft, this was amazing considering how horribly dry my skin actually is at the moment! The charcoal mask is for brightening, smoothing and hydrating the face, which it 100% did do!!

Overall, I think this mask is fantastic, especially for the amazing price of £4.95, as you can re-use it.

Hope the photo on me with the face mask wasn't too terrifying for you!

Love El
xxx

Random Haul - Ikea and Lush

Today I've got a post full of some very random and nice things I bought the other day. As you can see by the title the things in this haul are from Ikea and Lush.

I'll start off with Ikea. First up I bought some decorative pieces to have in my bedroom to add a bit of colour, so I got these fake flower roses for £1.75 each and I bought three. You can cut the stems to whatever length you want but be warned DON'T use scissors as the wire running through the stem will break them! I am absolutely in love with these fake flowers as these colour roses have to be my all time favourite flowers! Now of course the flowers can't stand up by themselves so to go with them I bought this vase which I can only describe as a milk bottle, and it was only £1!

Fake Roses - £1.75 each - HERE

Milk Bottle Style Vase - £1 - HERE

Next up from Ikea I wanted to grab some bedding whilst I was there so I just got some plain white bedding and I really impressed with it (feel so old saying I'm impressed with bedding!) I bought this for a double duvet and 4 pillow cases, all together it came to £17 and it is honestly so soft I love it. Plus it'll make a great background for Instagram (be sure to follow me HERE, shameless promotion.)

DVALA White Bedding - £17 - HERE

As there was a Lush near to Ikea it would have been rude not to stick my head in, but of course that always ends up in spending money, I should have learnt that by now! I'm running out of my usual toner so I decided to go for something different, did a bit of research on Lush's website and went for their "Breath Of Fresh Air" toner, and I'll let you know how I get on with this. I've always been a big fan of Lush's "Honey I Washed The Kids" soap, so wandered over to their soap section, and after smelling "Miranda" I couldn't put the bar down. The ingredients to this all equal to a sweet citrus smell and I'm obsessed. One thing I will say is I don't think Lush's soaps would be very good for dry skin and I do personally find them quite drying!

Breath Of Fresh Air - £4.25 - HERE

Miranda Soap - £3.40 for 100g - HERE

I hope you enjoyed this haul!
I intend on adding in some makeup looks very soon to my blog again as I feel I'm lacking them at the moment!

Love El
xxx

Nails of the Week

I said the next "Nails of the Week" wouldn't be too far away, so here it is, and its a bit more of a creative one this time!

These nails were actually inspired by a picture I saw on pinterest (you can follow me HERE) that I desperately wanted to recreate. I love how the nail look turned out as they're something fun and a bit different. I also think this style could be done with lots of different colour duos e.g. black and white, or even do an ombre triangle or ombre base, in fact I've just thought of that and now really want to try it out!

When I have the patience I like doing things a bit different with my nails, and as I don't have the patience very often I take full advantage when I do have it, and therefore come up with more creative nails!

I created this look you're seeing today by painting my whole nail with Essie's Capri nail varnish, a gorgeous light blue, which enhances any bit of tan you may have! Once Essie's Capri was dry I then applied 2 strips of Sellotape on each nail going diagonally across, corner to corner, so they overlapped at the top, but there is a triangle at the base of the nail, I'm now asking myself why I didn't photograph how I applied the tape but it's easy enough to work out! Once I had the triangle I then painted it using Essie's Penny Talk. To end of this look just coat the nails with your favourite top coat, could even be a matte top coat depending on your colour combination!

Essie - Capri

Essie - Penny Talk

Sellotape

I'm hoping that my "Nails of the Week" posts will become more creative, although I'm not promising anything as I'll have to see if I have the patience!

Love El

xxx

Pipdig - My Blogger Template - Before & After

If you've been reading elwillmer.blogspot.co.uk for a little while you will notice a big big difference in my blog, and that massive difference is the new look! I have been wanting to change the way my blog looked to something more sleek and professional for a long time and I finally did with the help of Pipdig, and I thought I'd tell you a bit about my experience getting the template and installing it.

I really felt I'd outgrown the look of my blog and needed to change it so after seeing so many other blogs that had been designed by pipdig I visited their website. The company have many different templates already premade, for blogger and wordpress, so I went for a premade template. In the end I went for "Aruba Nights" as I thought it looked so sleek and there's nothing about it I could get bored of, so after deciding I bought it! Well not straight away, I actually waited until I hit 100 followers on bloglovin' which I did on the 8th of February 2015!

Now to cut a long story short I decided to install the template myself but you can get someone to do it for you, and it was so simple with extremely easy instructions. However, I did come to one obstacle, as I am no IT technician so I decided to email the company and I got a reply incredibly quickly and then when getting help with issue it couldn't have gone better or been any easier.

Overall, I am SO impressed with Pipdig and if I ever wanted a different template I'd be sure to go to them!

BEFORE

Website:

Mobile:

AFTER

Website:

Mobile:

I'm absolutely loving the new look of my blog and I hope you love it too!

Love El

xxx

Lush - Happy Daze

Today I have a post all about Lush, but no it is not valentine's themed like all the other Lush posts I'm seeing at the moment, I actually haven't been to see the valentine's collection yet!

This post is all about the gift set "Happy Daze", my fantastic friend Beth gave me this set, and I love it!

In this set there's 2 of my all time Lush favourites and 2 products I've always wanted to try. My 2 favourites are The Comforter and Brightside bubble bars. Both bubble bars have such a gorgeous and unique scent, The Comforter, to me smells just like Ribena and Brightside is a lovely citrus smell! The 2 products I have always wanted to try are Granny Takes A Dip and Fizzbanger, and these again smell so so good!! I can not wait to try them. Granny Takes A Dip is not a very strong scent but what you will be smelling with this is ginger, lemon and black pepper. Then with Fizzbanger, which really does smell gorgeous the scent is created from petitgrain which reduces anxiety (which I am all about!), cinnamon leaf and ylang ylang, and these scents mixed together are supposed to create a smell of apple pie! This particular bath bomb also includes popping candy.

I cannot wait to use all of these products and I'm sure I'll be repurchasing them all!!

What is your favourite Lush product?

Love El

xxx

Nails of the Week featuring Jess

Here we are, another "Nails of the Week"! My blog has been seriously lacking these and for that I apologise, therefore today we have 2 people's nails in this post, mine and Jess's.

Unfortunately, both of the Topshop nail varnishes have now been discontinued but I'm sure there are some very similar ones out there!

First up we have quite spring themed nails I think! Going with a beautiful mint green as the main colour and then as an accent nail there is some blue glitter on the ring finger.

Essie - Mint Candy Apple

Topshop - Beleza

Next up is bright red nails with silver/multicoloured glitter. The red is a beautiful metallic shade with a very Christmassy name, and then again there's an accent nail on the ring finger, using glitter.

OPI - In My Santa Suit

Topshop - Razzmatazz

I will make sure that the next "Nails of the Week" post isn't too far away as I love doing these!

Love El
xxx

2 Winter Outfits

Where I live in the UK it seems to be getting colder and colder as each day goes by at the moment! Therefore, I thought, it was only necessary to show you 2 of my go-to Winter outfits that keep me warm. I do usually like to wear thick layers to wrap up warm but do want to look slightly fashionable at the same time, if I can!

This first outfit is certainly one with bulky layers to keep very warm. For this outfit I wore a grey knitted jumper, a faux shearling denim jacket, red tartan scarf, disco pant leggings and warm shoes.

Denim Jacket - Topshop (Similar HERE)

Grey Jumper - Primark

Disco Pant Leggings - Glamorous (No Longer Available)

Shoes - New Look

Scarf - Primark

Now the wellies in this second outfit are of course not obligatory but I was on a very muddy canal path. Normally I would wear my Topshop lace up ankle boots with this outfit (similar HERE), which I've actually owned for 2 years and are still going very strong. I am absolutely in love with New Look's skirts at the moment and have been wearing them non-stop with Primark fleece lined tights.