Win a beautiful peony bouquet from Serenata Flowers!

I recently received this beautiful Estella peony bouquet from Serenata Flowers and I have to say it's actually one of the most gorgeous floral arrangements I've ever seen! It contains four different types of pink and white peonies (Mr Jules Elie, Sarah Bernhard, Dr Fleaming and Duchesse De Nemo) along with hosta leaves and greens. I LOVE pink and white peonies so the Estella bouquet was right up my street.

As a bouquet it's HUGE and way surpassed expectations - peonies are generally expensive (I should know, I'm having them in my wedding bouquet and they are pricey) - I was expecting it to be much smaller but I'm so glad it's not! It's one of those rare times when it's better in person than in online photos which I don't think do the bouquet justice at all! The flowers are all really big, luxurious and flawless; just how peonies should be in my opinion.

If there are any guys reading who are looking for a really special floral gift for their partner (or you're single and you really want to treat yourself - don't act like you've never done it) then I'd honestly recommend this, it's really impressive and you can customise a lovely little card in there too so they know who it's from. You can even throw in a little extra gift too if you're feeling generous!

It arrived when it was meant to, was well packaged and the flowers were nice and protected during transit. None of the flowers were squashed or anything and it was nice and hydrated - no drooping here!

I would 100% buy these (or quite a few other bouquets actually, the choice on there is fantastic) from Serenata Flowers in future, I think they look way more expensive than they are (£39.99 with free delivery) and are just amazingly beautiful.

If you'd like to own this beautiful bouquet, Serenata Flowers have kindly offered to give one reader the chance to win their own gorgeous Estella bouquet.  

All you need to do to enter is use the form below and a winner will be chosen at random on 10th July 2015 - good luck! Sorry, UK only.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

To see more of the fantastic bouquets and gifts available visit Serenata Flowers here.

May Nailbox Review with swatches - a beauty subscription box that's nails only!

Ok, so beauty subscription boxes aren't anything new and I remember when they first came out I found it really exciting but over time I realised I'm a bit too picky to ever subscribe to them long term. I tend to do a lot of research before I buy beauty products and I know the kinds of things I like which mean I ended up wasting or giving away product regularly.

But the latest beauty subscription box from nailbox is right up my street - 5 nail products delivered every month for £13.50-£15 depending on your subscription which is great value! They only launched in April so are pretty new and offer a range of different subscription types - month to month, 3 month prepay, 6 month prepay or 12 month prepay and obviously it works out cheaper the more you buy at once.

You're guaranteed to receive 5 mystery items and this will include 3 or 4 nail polishes and 1 or two nail tools. The other good thing is that subscribers get 15% off at nailpolish.co.uk if you want to order a backup of your shade or the same nail polish in a different shade. Y'know, just in case you didn't quite have enough nail polish at this point!

I received the May nailbox for review which included:

• ORLY Fiery Orange Color Blast nail polish
• Rimmel Lucky Lilac nail polish
• Essie Status Symbol nail polish
• Nicole by OPI Modern Family Alex by the Books nail polish
• Elegant Touch Cuticle Pusher and Nail Cleaner

I liked all of the products I was sent, however the Nicole by OPI polish is probably one of my least favourite colours so I haven't even swatched that. Swatches are bwloe (ORLY Fiery Orange is work over Essie Status Symbol)

All of the polishes are full size and good quality, all of them were easy to use. Based on this box I'd definitely be happy to subscribe and receive polishes each month as it's really good value, particularly good if you're trying to build up your polish collection or are maybe new to blogging and needing some polishes to review. I think there is a colour for everyone there and the tool I received will always be useful.

The packaging isn't quite as glam as I've seen with other subscription boxes but it's functional and I guess it's a good lesson - it's what's inside that counts ha!

You can subscribe to nailbox here - the next box will be coming out on 21st June, you can peek at what's come here!

P.S. Nailbox are looking to recruit someone for what I think is probably the best job in the world - Nail Tester! You basically review nail polishes for a living...amazing!

Annabelle's Wigs Hair Piece Challenge - 3/4 wig

I was sent this 3/4 hair piece a couple of months ago by Annabelle's Wigs to show it styled in 3 different ways. For those of you who don't know what a 3/4 hair piece is, let me try to explain!  It kind of looks like a full wig but you clip it on to the back of your hair using with these:

It looks like this when you first put it on:

You then you blend your own hair over the top to disguise the joins. I found the easiest way to do this way with a quiff at the front of my hair that I pinned into place to hide the clips. This is definitely one for big volume styles! I had the Rachel style 3/4 hair piece in colour 24H613 - this is synthetic hair so you can't use heat on it but it holds its shape just fine.

I have to admit that when I first put this on it felt and looked quite 'wiggy' - there was a lot of hair and it looked a bit fancy dress-ish. However, once I had smoothed it down and styled it into place a bit I was actually really pleased with it and have gone from feeling like I'd never wear it out of the house to thinking I might pop this in for my hen party next week.  I think this must be the type of hair piece I often see some of the girls from TOWIE and Geordie Shore as their hair often looks like this! When I visited Pro Hair Live last year, I saw loads of girls trying and buying this type of hair pieces.

Here's a little before and after of my hair below - my hair is looking a bit sorry for itself still after my experiments with Khaleesi-style platinum hair last year...never again! These photos are taken less than 10 minutes apart, it's so easy to put in and blend:

It's a really glam look and can be styled in a few different ways, I've done a quiff, some boho plaits and a ponytail below - I tried doing one big plait too but I felt like there was a bit too much hair for that!

I was really pleased with this 3/4 hair piece in the end despite my initial reservations and as I said I think I will wear this at the weekend for my hen party. Woohoo! It feels pretty secure but I think I'll probably avoid whipping my hair back and forth too much...

Check out the 3/4 hair pieces at Annabelle's Wigs here.

Posting over at the Wedding Affair blog today!

As you may have guessed from the recent posts I have full on wedding brain at the moment (just over 4 weeks to go, waaah!) so what better way to get it out of my system than by writing a blog over The Wedding Affair about some of my favourite wedding inspirations.

You can read the post here: A Wedding with Sparkle

Looking after your teeth

As you might have guessed from some of my previous posts, dental care and a smile that looks good are really important to me so I thought I'd round up some of my top teeth tips (try saying that quickly three times) for a winning smile!

• An electric toothbrush - I can't emphasise how much better my teeth look and how much cleaner my mouth feels after I use an electric toothbrush rather than a normal one twice a day
• Flossing and mouthwash - keeps my mouth feeling fresh and my teeth staying healthy, I use floss harps which are much easier to use than normal floss
• Regular visits to the dentist - sounds basic but it amazes me the amount of people who don't go to their dentist unless there's a problem with their teeth, it's about maintenance, people!
• Don't mess around with home treatments too much - your dentist knows teeth, how to get the best results and how to treat you safely. I never find home treatments anywhere near as effective as those at a dentist and I seriously value their advice. If you're wanting your teeth whitened, cosmetic dentistry or even just advice you're best of with a reputable dentist such as Ollie and Darsh in Liverpool where they have offers like whitening Wednesdays where teeth whitening is half price
• Your diet - again, might be an obvious one, but too much sweet stuff (and sometimes you'd be surprised just how much sugar is in certain drinks for example). I always drink fruit juice etc with a straw! Bear in mind things like coffee, tea and red wine won't do your smile any favours either

I'm by no means 100% happy with my teeth, there's plenty of room for improvement there, but they're healthy and I'm relatively happy with how they look.  I'm considering trying invisible braces in the near future to really get my smile perfect.  I really believe great teeth make such a difference to how you look and feel so I think that anything spent on them is well worth it!

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