Unlike me, my sister is very much into fashion accesorries (remember the tiger ring?). Her latest obsession are vintage pieces like pocket watch necklaces. Erm...as in the pocket watches our grandfathers carried around? Yup! I have to admit that they look pretty unique to me, so I snatched them away (..okay, politely asked if I could borrow them) so I could take a few pictures for my blog!

My sister got her two necklaces from Ebay, from this seller. They were 6 dollars each and the shipping was free (however, we wouldn't order there again because the package took 2 months to get here). For a pretty cheap product, they are actually nice and sturdy. It comes with a long chain but you can easily replace it for a shorter one. Here are a few more pictures:

The back looks nice as well, I love the extra details. I think these would be very nice during the summer when it gets really sunny and when the sleeves get shorter. I'm a wristwatch wearer myself but I always hate that 'white line' on my wrist (hello imperfect tan).

They aren't insanely big either, my sister loves to wear the darker one with her neutral outfits and the silver one is more of an eyecatcher. It's also a lot more detailed and my personal favourite, because it reminds me of Giorgio Martello jewelry, which is inspired by architecture.

A lot of webshops sell these kind of necklaces, but if you'd like one I'd look around on Ebay first because they are definitely a lot cheaper there!

Hi everyone! Yes, it's time for a blog post again! ;) Today I'm going to show my newest nail tools (from the haul post) and talk about nail tools in general. I got the idea when I opened my brand new manicure kit and felt like I was preparing for surgery, I know what a nail clipper and nail file look like...but that's about it!

Some pictures of the (very budget friendly) manicure set I got. I forgot the price, but I think it was somewhere around 2-3 Euros. I just love it because the case is pink and pretty flat. The Dutch girls can find it at a store called Action, which is pretty much budget heaven ;)

Here we have cuticle scissors/trimmers, I don't cut my cuticles but some girls also use them to help shape their nails or to trim their eyebrows. One of them is slightly curved and the other one has a round tip and is supposed to be safer.

The one in the middle is a simple toenail clipper (well, I guess you could use it for your fingernails but my nails are a bit too small for this one). Not much to say about it, it's always nice to have a spare.

On the other side we have a whole bunch of...stuff. Tweezers, cuticule pushers, cuticule cutter, a nail file and another nail clipper. First of all, the tweezers are pretty crappy for removing hairs but they could be useful for nail art. The nail file is pretty 'hello garbage can' as well, I prefer my old one. The second nail clipper however, is really nice! It's small and pointy, just really easy to work with.

The cuticle cutter is something I don't use, it looks quite scary to be honest. The two cuticle pushers are nice, one is slightly pointier than the other one. I like their size and if you want, you can also use them to clean underneath the nails. They're also very nifty if you want to get a bit of product out of a tiny jar, just make sure that they're clean!

And for those who are interested, the worst bit of studying is over so I'll finally have some more time again to focus on blogging. I promise things will be back on track soon!

What is your must-have nail tool?

Hello everyone! My college exams are on their way so I'm busy with studying at the moment, I also made some lifestyle changes so it's time for a personal update! I'm not going to take a break although I will be posting less than usual. I just can't find the time right now to swatch products, take pictures, edit, type my thoughts on a product etc. I hate it, because my blog is like my baby and I really enjoy blogging, but I just can't do everything at once. I hope you guys understand that, I really didn't want to post just crappy stuff or just skip posts without giving you a reason :) The situation makes me feel like a bad blogger, but I have to let college go first.

And no worries, after the exams I'll return to 'full-time' duties ;) I have some great products coming my way so there will be a lot of interesting reviews next month. Next month I'm also celebrating the one year anniversary of my blog! Time is really going fast.


Okay, moving on to my lifestyle changes, I finally decided to work out and eat healthy! I have a soft spot for chocolate and sweet stuff, and even though my weight is fine I just have the speed of a snail. I'm not really doing it to lose weight, I just want to feel fit (well okay, I do want to work on my butt and thighs a bit, shh!). So far I'm only gaining weight because of all the muscle building though, but things are still going a lot better than I expected. I don't miss the snacks/sugar yet and the workouts are going well. Wish me luck!

I think that was enough chatting for now ;) I'm not sure if I should blog about my workout results/experiences in the future, let me know if you'd be interested in those kind of updates. Again, I hope everyone understands that I can't blog very often at the moment, I'll post something when I have the time for it but if you really want to get some daily news you can follow me on twitter as well!

Hi everyone! Today I'm going to show the things I ordered from the webshop 'In de Watten'. It took a while for my package to get here because the mailman lost it (grr...) but luckily Caroline, the shop owner, quickly came to the rescue and sent me another package. Thank you again Caroline! ;) But to make a super long story a bit shorter: I'm really excited about this webshop. The products are all handmade and look good enough to eat! I wanted some more soy wax to add to my little soy wax stash, but it was hard to ignore all the lovely soaps, face masks and body scrubs. I can't wait to place another order, but let's take a look at this one first ;)

I bought myself 7 different pieces of soy wax to try. They are 0,85 Euro each and cutely wrapped in a coloured piece of paper. It's hard to describe the scents, they are not too strong but when you walk into the room it's still noticable, in the 'hey, what's smelling so nice?' way. They just smell like nice little soaps!

Here we have 'Oriental Rose' and 'French Vanilla'. Oriental rose is very flowerly and gives me a bit of a luxerious feeling. French Vanilla is subtle but nice, I think a lot of girls would like that one!

'Magnolia', 'White Tea & Ginger' and 'Wild Honeysuckle Blossom'. Magnolia is my least favourite, the flower scent is just a bit too overpowering in my opinion. White Tea & Ginger is really nice! I wish our kitchen could smell like that all day. Wild Honeysuckle blossom is one of my favourites, it reminds me of musk and it's a nice yet subtle scent. I love how it lingers around for a while.

Last but not least we have 'Sakura' and 'Moonlight Promgranate'. Sakura is great, it's a nice girly scent but not too sweet. Moonlight Pomgranate is the winner of the whole bunch though. Smells sensual and sweet, love it!

Their shapes remind me a bit of cupcakes! ;) The scents are definitely not 'fake' though, when you take Sakura for example you don't just smell some vague flower, you can smell all sorts of fruit, vanilla and more.

I break the soy wax in half before I use them, and they last me quite a while (5-6 hours). Unlike the soy wax I've used before, these ones aren't hard to break. If you have a small burner like me, you can easily break the soy wax in smaller pieces and use them like that.

So far I've tried French Vanilla and Wild Honeysuckle Blossom, I really liked both of them. Now that I know how nice the soy wax smell, I really can't wait to try some of the other products! I have my eyes on the Enchanted soap and the Pink sugar scrub ;)

Hi everyone! Today I'm going to show my newest lipstick, the one I showed in the haul post a couple of days ago. This lipstick is from the latest Catrice LE collection, Urban Baroque. After seeing so many gorgeous looking swatches, I really wanted 2 of the lipsticks: 01 Marie Antoinette and 02 Elisabeth. Unfortunately, I could only get my hands on Elisabeth.

I paid 3,99 Euro for this little beauty. The packaging is a bit so-so, I don't hate it but it's not really my cup of tea either. I absolutely love the names though!

Elisabeth is a very nude shade (just like the other lipsticks from this collection), it's a bit of a pink mauve.

Here's a swatch on the skin first. The pigmentation didn't really blow me away, but the Catrice lipsticks are always pretty creamy and moisturising, which is a huge plus. They don't last very long, but I don't really mind a few touch-ups during the day.

It doesn't give my lips a lot of colour, it looks more like a slightly tinted lip balm. I felt a bit disappointed at first because I was hoping for a bit more colour, although it is the perfect lipstick if you want to keep your lips really nude and natural looking. I like to use it when I do my make-up before I go to college, but it's not a must-have in my eyes. However, if you love nude, creamy and moisturising lipsticks I'm sure you'll like it!

Did you get anything from this collection?

Today is going to be a little bit different, I'm not going to talk about make-up this time, I'm going to talk about cupcakes! To be even more specific, I'm going to share one of my favourite cupcake recipes: The chocolate cupcake with vanilla buttercream and sprinkles. It's easy to make and tastes awesome! In case chocolate is not your thing, I'm also going to show you how you can make a basic cupcake. I took lots of pictures of everything, so don't read any further if you're already hungry and have nothing to eat! ;)

For 12 basic cupcakes you'll need: 125 g of softened butter, 125 g of self-rising flour, 2 eggs, 125 g white sugar and 2 tablespoons of milk.

I'm going to make 12 chocolate cupcakes as well, so I'll need all of the things from the other picture and 65 g of dark chocolate + 120 ml of cream.

Of course we can't forget cupcake cups, I also bought a couple of handy crayons but I needed those for a special purpose ;) They're optional.

For the buttercream (for 12 cupcakes) we need: 25 g of flour, 120 ml of milk, 100 g of butter, 50 g of powdered sugar and 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract.

I'm going to start with the basic cupcakes, make sure the cupcake cups are ready to use :)

Beat the sugar and butter until it's light and fluffy. If the butter isn't soft enough, you can put the bowl in the microwave for about 20-30 seconds.

Then we're going to add the eggs one by one, followed by the flour and the milk. After every addition it's important to beat well, just keep the Michael Jackson song in mind ;)

I forgot to take a picture, but now you can fill the cupcake cups until they are 2/3 full. Easy eh?

Moving on to the chocolate cupcakes! To make these, we follow all of the previous steps first. Then, we're focussing on the chocolate goodness ;)

First we melt (medium heat) the chocolate to make sure we get an extra creamy chocolate cupcake. When it's done, you can add the cream and then add the mixture to the batter.

You should end up with something like that, now you can fill the cupcake cups until they're 2/3 full and place them in the oven. I never pre-heat an oven to be honest, so I put mine in there for 30 minutes (20-25 if you do pre-heat the oven). I bake them at 180 C (350 F). Don't open the oven again until they're almost done or else you'll ruin the cupcakes!

And there we have 12 basic cupcakes and 12 chocolate ones. Take them out of the oven so they can cool down, we're moving on to the buttercream!

Firtst we are going to put the flour and milk in a saucepan and heat it (medium heat again), continue to stir well and add some milk in case it gets clumpy. You need to let it cook for at least 8 minutes. When that's done we need to let the mixture cool off, it's best to put it in a bowl and place that bowl in a bigger bowl with some water. Cover the bowl with some foil.

Beat the butter and the sugar, last but not least it's time to add the vanilla extract :)

Now you can mix the things from the first bowl and the second bowl together for about 5 minutes (medium speed). When you're done, put some foil over it again and place it in the refrigerator. Wait for 15 minutes, and then your buttercream is done!

Time to put the buttercream on top of the cupcakes!

Here my sister is 'decorating' the basic cupcakes, our grandfather turned 80 so we wanted to surprise him ;)

Tadaa~ The 12 chocolate cupcakes together with the basic cupcakes.

To make the cupcakes even cuter, you can add different types of sprinkles.

Here's the pink version!

And the birthday cupcakes :) To make them a bit sweeter, I added a mixture of flour, powdered sugar and water on top (but that's totally optional).

And here's a look at our kitchen after I was done. Yeah, I can bake but I definitely can't keep things clean :P

I hope you'll find these recipes helpful. The chocolate cupcakes taste great, they are not too sweet and firm yet creamy. The basic ones are also nice of course! If you have any questions or suggestions, you can leave them below :)