High Street Stylist

Merry Christmas everyone! I hope that you all had a fab christmas I certainly did and I was so spoilt. Today I am going to show you some of the wonderful gifts that I received from my friends, family and boyfriend. I am in no way bragging, I just wanted to share them with you as I love finding out what other people get as to me its just like a haul. I was lucky enough to get a variety of presents, therefore I have split them into three sections; home bits, beauty bits and cocktail bits.

Firstly here I have my home bits. If you didn't already know I love elephants and I got multiple elephant themed presents, here are a couple of my ornaments and a cute mug. I love candles and fragrance but I am not allowed to light candles in my flat, which is why this candle warming lantern is amazing, as it allows me to melt them without a flame. The Yankee Candle I received is one from America and has a Cotton Candy scent, it smells AMAZING. I also got a reed diffuser in the classic scent Midnight jasmine ,which I think I am going to put in my bathroom. 

The next lot of gifts are all beauty themed. Yes that is two Naked palettes and yes I was overwhelmed when I opened the first one let alone when I opened a second. I have wanted these palettes for who knows how long and am extremely grateful to now own them. I also got some D.I.Y bath bomb sets which are really cool, definitely going to do a post and maybe a video with them! Got some make up bags and brushes which are always super handy. I am also really excited about my No7 Cleansing brush, I've used it a couple of times and loving it already.

The last section is cocktail/alcohol! These people obviously know me very well and how much I love cocktails. In the middle is a really cool device that helps separate the colours when trying to make fancy looking drinks, I cannot wait to try this out! I also got some different flavoured mixers that sound delicious and of course some alcohol to go with them. That is definitely me stocked up for quite a while.

Some other presents I received, but do not have on me to share with you, are some really cool Game of Thrones cushion covers they are honestly amazing each one has a different house sigil on it. I also got a Game of Thrones colouring book and some other normal ones. Multiple Lush items, more candles, a lovely big canvas with an elephant design on it, a backdrop for my photography and much more. I love all my friends and family so much and cannot believe I received so many wonderful things.

I hope that you got some lovely gifts too or at least had a wonderful time over the holidays. See you in the new year!

Lots of love 

Rachel xxx

Hello lovelies, today's post is about a Uni project I have done recently. For my Advertising brief I decided to photograph some of my favourite Lush Cosmetics products. I was looking at the idea of what is in the product, either the actual ingredients or the colours and surprises that are hidden inside of the actual product. The first image is a very simple clean looking advert for the Roots hair treatment, peppermint oil, olive oil and orange oil are all in the ingredients of the product which is why I decided to include them in the image and placed them on a chopping board to emphasise the idea of them being fresh ingredients. My favourite image has to be the second one, which is of my all time favourite twilight. I put this picture on Instagram, which then got regrammed by my local Lush Plymouth store and then again by Doubtfulsound (Jack Constantine) and was then liked by LushLtd! I am so pleased that they love the image just as much as I do! I then wanted to get some shots of Golden wonder as I wanted demonstrate what was hidden inside of the product as it has a lovely surprise inside. I shot these on a black background he make the colours and texture of the products stand out against the background. The last two images were because we had to shoot something that was on location and not in a studio environment. I got hold of some lavender as the twilight bath bomb is known for its lavender scent and ingredients. I took it into the garden and photographed it outside again to emphasise the idea of fresh ingredients that are grown and used.

Here are the images below, I hope that you like them I know this post is a little different but if you love lush as much as I do I'm sure this will be an interest to you :)

Hello lovelies, as it's christmas time my family are holding a mulled wine and mince pies evening for some of our friends and family to come round. We decided we wanted to make a few nibbles for people to snack on with their mulled wine. We made sausage rolls, mince pies and a huge variety of cakes. The sausage rolls were delicious and I am going to tell you just how easy they are to make!

You will need sausage meat 

Jus-Rol Puff Sheet (or you an make your own puff pastry)

one egg yolk

table spoon of milk

 flour 

and will need to preheat your oven to 200C degrees(fan assisted)

Step one: Open up your Jus Rol box and take out your puff sheet. Remove the packaging and un roll the sheet onto a chopping board or worktop saver. I dusted mine in a little bit of flour to avoid it sticking but you do not have to do this.

Step two: You must then cut your puff sheet in half going long ways and making sure that they are quite equal.

Step three: you can now open up your sausage meat and begin to put it on your puff pastry. you want to position it in the middle of your sheet and trail it all the way along, as this will be the centre of your sausage roll.

Step four: Now take your egg and separate you yolk and the egg white, you only want the yoke. Add a dash of milk to the yoke and then using a pastry brush gentle give the pastry that is exposed either side of the sausage meat a little coating.

Step five: Now you can roll your pastry and place it on a try and put it in the fridge for at least 10 minutes.

Step six: When you take them out of the fridge you then need to coat the top of the sausage roll with more of your egg yoke.

Step seven: You can now begin cutting them to the size you want and putting them on a tray.

Once they are in the tray for decoration you can draw little lines on the top of each one to create a pattern once it is done baking.

Step eight: put them in the oven until they pastry looks golden.

Step nine: when taking them off of the tray you want to be careful as the bottoms can stick meaning your sausage roll splits in half.

Step ten: put all of your sausage rolls onto a cooling rack and wait until they are not too hot and you can begin to enjoy them.

These sausage rolls are lovely hot or cold, but I personally liked them most when they were warm.

Hope that you enjoyed this post and you are all having a lovely time during the festive holidays!

Lots of love

Rachel xxx