Lola Ramona

I am a total sucker for things that are slightly ridiculous, so when I spotted these shoes I couldn't resist blogging about them!

Lola Ramona is a Danish designer who makes shoes that you "can live your life in". Each shoe has a unique name (Elsie, Angie, Lizzie etc) - so once you've found a comfortable shoe (one you can walk in!) then you can buy your chosen style in different looks. I am really rubbish at walking in heels and have a few pairs that I always rely on, so I love this idea!

Oooh! 1. Elsie Rich court shoes | 2. Angie Sea | 3. Elsie Sea red | 4. Elsie Sea black*

I'm clearly an Elsie girl!

Lola Ramona shoes are pretty pricey, starting at £73, but they are made of good quality material... no cheapy synthetic stuff in sight. Over the last few months I've tried to avoid buying cheap shoes that fall apart after just a couple of wears so this appeals to me. But can I justify spending that on statement shoes that would only be worn on special occasions?

Tricky. Still at least I know that number 3 would be PERFECT for a circus themed party!

Sponsor ever so juliet for FREE

Hiya! So, I've been blogging happily for just over a year now, and it's incredible how quickly it's become such an important part of my life. I may just be a small fish in a massive pond of bloggers (who are all much more glamorous than I am), but I'm really happy with the little space I've carved out for myself. There's cake and cats and normal life things. It's nice.

So, in an attempt to grow ever so juliet I'm going to start taking sponsors for the site (I've got to pay for nail polish somehow!). & while I get everything set up and going I would like to offer like-minded blogs (aka nice people) FREE advertising for a month. All I'd like in return is a link or a button on your site, to help me reach a few more people.

Here are my blog stats!
As of July 2012, ever so juliet is averaging 12,800 impressions per month (and growing pretty steadily!). This is made up by 2,900 unique users a month – 598 subscribers via GFC, email subscriptions, bloglovin and hello cotton. I also reach 357 people through twitter and facebook, and regularly promote this site. Phew!

Sponsor info
The adverts will be 180 x 250 pixels, and will sit in the (newly created) righthand sidebar of the blog. They can click through to anything you want (e.g. your blog, etsy shop, pictures of pandas), and will run for 30 days.

I'm interested, what do I do?
Ace! Thanks for being part of the ever so juliet community! If you'd like to take out a free sponsor advert then all you have to do is:

• visit my brand new sponsor page and click to buy a medium ad.
• add your details and upload an ad that measures 180 pixels wide x 250 pixels high.
• pop in the promo code EVERSOFREE!
• let me know if you've linked to me, or if you'd like to run a button on your site (and I'll send it straight over).

p.s. my amazing new design is by elevatormusik - more on this soon!
  
Thank you to everyone for your interest! Sponsor positions are now FULL (although you are of course welcome to purchase a small or large ad if you'd like!). I'll do more sponsor offers in the future, so please keep an eye out for these. x

Ombre leopard print nails

Rimmel - Professional Finish in Peppermint | Models Own - Lilac Dream

I've been meaning to do this nail art for AGES - there was a wee flurry of bloggers doing it a while ago and I have been meaning to jump on the bandwagon.

It's super simple. You just paint the base colour (I used my favourite turquoisey shade) then take a piece of sponge and lightly dab on the second colour (I used purple). The gradient on mine looks a bit rubbish if you look too closely, but I think it does the job well enough!

Dainty Dresses has a good tip on using clear polish to make a softer gradient, so I think I will try that next time!

Silhouette 'Hold the Look' competition

I really love trying out new hair do's, so I was quite excited to be picked as an entrant in Immediate PR's Silhouette competition. The challenge was to re-create a celebrity silhouette using the new Silhouette Color Brilliance collection. Each entrant was sent out a Mousse, Hairspray and Extreme Gloss Spray.

It didn't take long for me to pick Emma Stone as my celebrity to copy. I absolutely LOVE her, she's so funny and likeable and sweet! She also has amazing hair and I am massively jealous of how well she pulls off different colours of hair - would you have guessed she's not a natural redhead?

Looking through photos of her red carpet do's, I noticed that she quite often wears a loose curly chignon. It's a really pretty style - there's lots of movement which keeps it fun and fresh, but it's smart enough to wear to all those swanky premieres that she goes to. 

I started off by using the Mousse after I'd towel-dried my hair to give it a bit of (controlled!) volume and movement. After drying my hair I then sprayed it with the Extreme Gloss Spray for movie star shininess. I've been using these products for a couple of days to get a feel for them before tackling this challenge and I am SO impressed with the gloss spray - it makes my hair feel like I've just been at the hairdressers. Wonderful.

I brushed my hair to the side and twisted it into a simple chignon. Emma wears hers quite curly and messy (which is right up my street), but I tried to be a little more neat than I normally would be!

I then used my curling wand to add a wee bit more definition to the bits of hair I had pulled down at the front, and sprayed with the Hairspray to keep it all neat and in place.

I'm pretty pleased with it!

Couch to 5k - week five

I am out of love with running. It has been a difficult week.

On Monday I was feeling good. Prepared. Definitely keen. The  pep talk I had with myself was working & I was determined not to skive. I thought this might be the week that I started to really like running (cause that has to happen sometime, yeah?).

I survived the run uphill! 

Ohhh boy. 

It's hard to explain, but I just felt so sore this week. Not the aches and pains that I had at the start of C25k, but an ongoing, weak, exhausted feeling from start to finish. Normally I find my pace picks up after the first run/walk interval, as I'm properly warmed up and I have a nice stretch of running before I start to feel tired. Not this week. I felt like I was counting down the seconds for the app to prompt me to walk again, and at the final stretch I had to repeat to myself "just keep running... just keep running". It's so depressing!

I know this must all be because I'm a bad skiver - the programme is set up so you are running three times a week, not once a week - so I hopefully just have to battle through it before things pick up again. But ugh, a couple of bad days do nothing to help a beginner runner battling with motivation issues! 

I'm off to the Olympics next weekend so FINGERS CROSSED that I come home all enthused and sporty.

Summary of week five:

+ I am glad I did it.

+ I ran five minutes, eight minutes, five minutes, which is the most I've ever done.

- all of the above.

- weighed myself after four weeks. Have lost nada. 

- worst week yet.