Flower Class

Who doesn't love flowers?💐🌸🌹🌷🌻🌼

Last month I enrolled onto a Floristry workshop at Derby and I have to say I LOVE IT!
The course lasts for 5 weeks and costs £125.00.
This was the spring floristry course, but Derby college offer other courses throughout the year, including a full time night class that runs for a year.
I like the sound of this but I'm not sure what my plans for next year are yet :)🌹

For the first lesson we were asked to bring in 10 daffodils, some tulips, an old cereal box, some scissors, secateurs, ball of wool, twine, and an apron. I was so excited I even went out and bought a new floral Cath Kidston apron to wear.🌷

When we arrived at 6pm our tutor introduced herself and talked us through what we would be making each week and what materials and flowers we might want to bring with us.🌿🍃

Our tutor did a demonstration at the front of the class and showed us the end result, we couldn't wait to get started.🌼
We all took our cardboard boxes out of our floristry bags and began to draw around a small bowl and a large bowl that the tutor had given us. We cut this out, stuck the cardboard circles together with glue and attached some green floristry stems as handles. I grabbed some pretty ribbon, my ball of wool and some coloured sisal and began wrapping it around the cardboard circles to make a pretty red collar.🌻
Our tutor then demonstrated the spiralling technique and how to arrange our daffodils, tulips and some foliage into our collar we had made.
This spiralling technique is crossing the stems over each other while holding the collar in place. With spiralling you have to make sure the stems all go the same way. I was told to keep turning the collar round and placing the stems in as it enables you to create a nice rounded bouquet from every angle.

I found the hardest part was tying it at the top of the collar (the binding point) with twine without letting the flowers slip down out of place. You might have to get someone to hold the collar as our tutor did say to use our teeth to tie and cut the twine but I wouldn't recommend that!

I feel like I've learnt and achieved a lot from the first lesson and cant wait for the next ones.💃👍

If you don't fancy going on a course to learn flower arranging there are some books and videos available to help design some beautiful bouquets.
Here is one I've recently viewed:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3b9UnDK1fQ

Have a great weekend

BBB XX💐💋

Urban Decay Smoky Palette

Urban Decay Smoky Palette

This beautifully packaged palette contains twelve eye shadow shades, which vary in texture – from light and shimmery, to satin and buttery mattes.
There are some gorgeous colours in here to create a stunning smoky eye effect perfect for a night out. There is also the option to create something wearable for the day time at the office.

The palette also has a great brow bone highlight - Thirteen, and the palette also includes a fab transition shade, Combust, which is handy for blending.
So far, my favourite shadow is Armor, a sparkly silver colour that lasts all day.

I am also a massive fan of the champagne shade, High, and warm bronzes, Dirtysweet and Radar because personally, I feel they are more wearable than just the blacks and greys. I like to mix these colours up instead of going out looking like a panda bear with smudged eyes!

The palette features a full mirror and a double ended 'floating smoke' effect brush, as well as a booklet on how to create the perfect smoky eye. This brush is amazing as it has a flush brush on one end which is perfect for blending, and a smudge brush on the other end to really smoke out your look. I did find that there is a tiny bit of fall-out from some of these shadows, mainly from Armor, so it’s best to do your eyes before applying your foundation and powder.
All in all it’s a handy little palette to have, and I love all the shades. It is really wearable and has multiple uses so I give it a massive thumbs up!

Has anyone else tried this palette and what do you think?

BBB X

Amazon Audible Review

Amazon Audible

I've recently become a fan of Amazon Prime and the Amazon Fire TV stick (which I also recommend)
After browsing the free trial of Amazon prime I came across the Amazon Kindle and Amazon Audible.
I always remember years ago sitting in my gran and granddads car listening to audible tapes as we drove to different places of interests on a Sunday afternoon.
I loved the idea of being able to listen to a story as I was cleaning or driving and get my book worm fix in a different way.

I downloaded the free monthly trial onto my phone and immediately scanned what books I'd been eyeing up to read next.
I came across "Not quite nice" by Celia Imrie which is also narrated by the author.
I haven't finished "Not quite nice" yet but an audio book is definitely great to have on in the background instead of the radio all the time.
I can imagine I will be using this in the summer when I get back into my running.

xox