How to: use a waving wand

After an absolute age, I'm back with a video tutorial!

My hair is naturally curly, but it never dries in a nice way, I always look like I've been dragged through a bush backwards (which really isn't the look I'm going for). So, for well behaved waves I have to use a styling tool, and am always on the look out for one that is simple to use (I can't use tongs to save my life), doesn't take ages, and won't totally frazzle my hair.

For this tutorial I used a Silk Waving Wand*, sent to me by the nice folks at Remington. Here's how I got on...

It took 13 minutes (I timed it!) to do my whole head of hair, which I'm pretty pleased with, given the thick mane I have to deal with. Each curl set really quickly, which is important as you don't want loads of heat on your hair - it'll go all dry and unhappy if you scorch it regularly.

The wand costs £34.99, so it's pretty affordable. It comes with a heat proof pouch and heat protection glove, which is good news if you are scared of burning yourself on the barrel (which gets pretty hot, but you'll probably be surprised by how easy it is to use without hurting yourself. Just don't get distracted and DROP IT ON YOURSELF. Which I didn't do with this one, but have with another curling wand. OW). 

I used a wee bit of hairspray to keep in all in place, and the curls stayed in for AGES. Hooray for wavy (non-frizzy) hair!

A Sri Lankan adventure!

So you may know (mainly because I've been going on about it a LOT), that for the best part of the last month I've been off exploring the beautiful Sri Lanka (with a wee bit of the Maldives for good measure!).

It's hard to sum up just how good it was. 2013 was a weird year for me - there were quite a few low points (but luckily a good number of highs too), but at the end of the year I was definitely ready for a break from the real world, and a chance to explore, refresh my head, and get a bit of a new perspective on things.

In three and a bit weeks, my lovely pal Raewyn and I visited beautiful beaches, jungles and temples, pushed our way through busy, busy city streets, and walked down empty sandy paths in the quietest of towns. We also hula hooped EVERYWHERE (turns out travelling with a hula hoop is a great idea - everyone loves it, and we got upgraded to business class because the flight crew liked it so much!).

As well as taking about a million photos, I also filled bits and pieces of what we got up to, and have put together this... a wee video blog of our adventure.

Sri Lanka! 

So if you are interested in seeing the beautiful places we visited (filmed with a bit of a shaky hand, sorry!), the day we got obsessed with elephants, orrr the time we drank Arrack (a local drink, and pretty potent), then I hope you enjoy!

Nanowrimo update

Hello! I just wanted to share a wee update on nanowrimo. We're onto day sixteen now and I should be at 26,666 words to be on track (I'm not, but I've got all of tonight to write).

Please ignore my terrible working title

It's been loads of fun so far, but definitely tough! This is the first year I've had to balance blogging alongside writing, so it's been a bit of a challenge finding time for both (and still enjoying them). I'm also baking a wedding cake for my lovely pals Jude and Charlotte & am going to their wedding tomorrow - loads of fun, but busy busy busy days ahead!

But hey, I wouldn't do it if I didn't enjoy it. I'm also filming weekly updates on my youtube channel, which you can watch below. Look how fresh faced and enthusiastic I was in week one! Ha. Ha. Ha.

 

& then I'm just exhausted and resigned to battling on in week two.

I'm not going to post every video I make here, so if you'd like to subscribe then you can do so here. Non-writing videos are also on the way (er, when I have a spare moment!). 

Nanowrimo - my top tips!

Hello! So it's almost November, which means it's time for one of my favourite things in the year - National Novel Writing Month (nanowrimo)!

You can read more on how nanowrimo works here, but it's pretty simple. You (the budding author) write a 50,000 word novel over 30 days. If you win, you get to feel great about yourself, and you have a first draft to do with as you will. If you lose, then you have still written something (and can feel good for giving it a shot).

I'm taking part for the fourth year in a row, so I thought it would be fun to film a video with my top tips for getting to 50,000 words (and enjoying the process!).

The challenge starts on November 1st so you have two days to prepare yourself, think of an idea and get ready to write. Let me know if you're taking part & we'll be nano pals. 

I heart Autumn!

So you may or may not know that I have a fledgling youtube channel which I've put a couple of tutorial videos up on, but have not really done much with. Well, that's going to change! I love chatting and I love watching chatty video bloggers, so I'm going to give it more of a go.

For my first chatty video I am copying Lauren from Laurenella & have filmed the I heart Autumn tag, where I answer some questions about how lovely and fun Autumn is. I tried to explain the concept of video-blogging and tags to Craig before doing this and he gave me SUCH a weird look. I promise this isn't weird.

I'm giving myself the challenge to post a new video at least every fortnight... we shall see how well it goes! If anyone has a suggestion on fun topics to film OR a tutorial you'd like to see, let me know. Also, if you'd like to subscribe to my youtube (and join a group of, ahem, four amazing people) then you can do so here.

Thanks for watching! (please don't laugh at me).

How to: rolled hair updo

I was looking through my blog stats the other day (as you do) and was quite surprised to see that my previous hair tutorials (how to use a hair doughnut & how to do a twisted hair updo) had over 4,100 views between them!

So I thought it definitely was time to do another one, and wanted to show you all a very easy updo. I did it earlier (with the lovely Craig helping out and taking photos), but when I started to put this post together I realised it was quite hard to see what I was actually doing in the photos. So I am being BRAVE and have made a wee youtube tutorial which hopefully explains it simply. Please be kind!

I've also included the photos and a brief how-to below in case you aren't a fan of videos. I wasn't quite sure what to call this hairstyle.. is it a twist? Is a a roll? It makes me think of vintage hairstyles, which I like, and you can make it as sleek or scruffy as you'd like. Plus you don't need anything other than a hair bobble and kirby grips!

You want to start by putting your hair in a low ponytail, at the base of your neck. Then pull out the hairband until it is about half way down the ponytail.

Now take the end of your ponytail and start wrapping it around itself, making a roll. You want to roll this down into the space at the bottom of your hair (I hope this makes sense!).

You'll find it makes a nice roll at the bottom of your hair. Try and make sure it's even, and use some kirby grips to start pinning the middle part of the roll.

Now add in a couple more kirby grips at each side of the hair roll - this helps keep the sides neat and in shape.

Use curling tongs to loosely curl any hair that is hanging down at the front - this helps keep the shape nice and soft.

Tada! There you go! It's so simple to do and I really like it as a quick way to get hair up and out of my face.

p.s. please let me know what you think of my video. If it's not too daft I might try doing more video tutorials.. it's much easier explaining things when you can waffle a wee bit!