Doctor Dresses!!!

I don't exactly make a secret of my Doctor Who obsession, similarly I'm pretty out and proud with my love of a fit and flare dress. So when I got an email from the Doctor Who store showing me a fit and flare Doctor Who dress, I was pretty freaking excited. And it gets better. I immediately clicked the link and looked at the sizing, I felt like all my christmases had come at once when I saw they go up to a 3XL. And it gets even better! They have three different style of fit and flare dresses to choose from (10th Doctor, 11th Doctor and Dalek) AND two bodycon dresses for those who like to cut a more sleek silhouette!

I've placed my order for the 11th Doctor Dress (top middle). The 10th Doctor is actually my favourite (as in the actual character) but I feel like I'm much more likely to wear the 11th dress. I actually feel like a bit of a traitor to my favourite Doctor not buying his dress lol! I may yet buy it, depending on how this first one goes once it arrives. I so hope it fits!!!

If you'd like to get your own, or browse the rest of their range of amazing Doctor Who merchandise, you can find the Doctor Who online store here. Or if you're in the US, some of the range (as well as loads of other coolness) is available through Think Geek.

Box of Goodies!

A few weeks ago I ordered a whole bunch of stuff from Cotton On Group, they have several different retail stores which each focus on a different part of their range, but if you order online, everything gets sent together, which is an awesome way to save a bit of money on postage, especially when they do free shipping for orders over $50! They had 30% off all of their Typo range, so I bought a few canvas prints I've had my eye on, and they had 3 pairs of shoes for $10!!!! I bought a few pairs for myself and a couple for my oldest daughter who can now fit into grown up shoes.

I was so excited to get my order, the box was huge and full of goodies for MEEEEEEE (I have my Smeagol moments from time to time). I'd had a really long day and by the time I got home and opened it up, I was feeling ultra lazy, and as a result I really didn't get the best pictures of my haul, but its enough to give you an idea of the overall purchase hopefully!

Yes, there are duplicates of a couple of pairs of shoes, one in my size and one in my daughter's. She didn't know what shoes I was buying myself when she chose hers. What can I say, she must have great taste lol. The mint green poncho I bought for me but its rather tiny, so she ended up scoring that as well, and she loves it. She's been wearing it every night to lounge around the house before bed. I've yet to put my canvas prints on the wall. I'm still not 100% certain I'm going to keep my room layout as it is, and I'd like to be sure before I go hanging more pictures so I don't have to move them in 2 weeks time when I change my mind. I'm really eager to get them up though. I'll be sure and share pictures when that happens!

Strictly the Necessities

The other night I had a sudden desperate urge to watch Roman Holiday, which I didn't have on DVD! I decided it was absolutely imperative to go out the next day to buy it. And buy it I did! Along with several other things I decided were essential to my life at that point.

Shopping haul!

I bought an Audrey Hepburn box set on sale and a Marilyn Monroe set that was also reduced. Fourteen movies between the two sets, loads of special features, plus a disc dedicated to Audrey's influence on the fashion world. Woot!!!

I also found this brand of makeup I'd never heard of, W7. All of their products were $5 each at the pharmacy, AND they had an offer where you get a free eyeliner pencil with any purchase over $15. So I bought two eyeshadow palettes in natural shades (one with lots of shimmer and the "Naked Nudes" pallete with less), and an eyebrow pencil in a blondey-brown shade. I got a free black eyeliner with my purchase, which I honestly probably won't even use, I rarely use pencil or crayon, but hey, it was free! Also pictured here is an Essence brand nail polish which I bought at Target. Such a pretty colour, I don't think the photo does it justice. I'm such a huge fan of Essence. Their products are consistently quite good and so cheap!

By the time I got around to photographing the eyeliners and eyebrow pencil, Ava was pretty ready for me to move my crap and get the hell out of (what she suddenly decided was) her spot, so I forgot to include close up shots of the two pencils. They're pretty stock standard pencils though, so you're not really missing out on anything special.

So, AWESOME shopping trip for me! I've spent the week watching childhood favourites and becoming acquainted with a few that I hadn't previously seen. I've been watching a lot of them with my kids too, hopefully I can spread the love on to the next generation. Both sets were definitely worthwhile purchases!

How about you, have you had any great purchases lately?

Decor

Since we moved into this house I've been trying to do everything I can to perfect my bedroom. Its a small space but I think I've done a pretty good job of decorating it so far, though there's still a lot more I want to do! I realised that its been a long time since I had my own space to decorate however I pleased, I've always been sharing with someone or had constraints of existing furniture and paint jobs to work around. This room was a blank canvas and I've really been enjoying putting my mark on it. However budgetary constraints mean that for all the window shopping I do, I can't purchase most of the things I'd like to. I recently bought a couple of canvas prints on sale from Typo, but they have about a million other things I'd like to get. I've never really had pictures hanging on walls but I'm really into the idea of buying several and making a big collage on one wall.

I made a set on Polyvore of some of the things on my wishlist, but for some reason its just displaying a bunch of broken images when I share it on here as I normally would, so instead I'll post the image with a link to the page if you'd like more information about the items.

Collage available here <http://www.polyvore.com/typo_decor/set?id=111337563>

The kiddlings went back to school today. They've been on school holidays as long as we've been in this house so the quiet of a child-free home was something new! I don't have terribly long to bask in the peace though, as my own classes will be starting again in less than 2 weeks now. I still have to go into the uni to sort out which units I'll be enrolling in and all that jazz, but that shouldn't be too difficult. I'm looking forward to resuming study, but I'm also a little nervous because I'm onto the diploma level classes now which are harder and have a much higher workload or so I've been told. Hopefully I can keep up without falling on my face!

Off the Radar!

I've been MIA and I apologize to anyone who noticed. I had a lot on my plate finishing assignments for my course and also volunteering at the school, and I was feeling pretty down too so I wasn't much in the mood for blogging. I really want to get back into it now though!

Modcloth are having a sale! There are loads of awesome items for 50% off AND they have free shipping to Australia for a limited time on orders over $150. Sooooooo my friend and I went a little nuts and have a few items on the way. There were so many things I wanted to buy. Its rare to find things on sale AND available in my size, and the free shipping made it even more irresistible. I couldn't go too overboard, but I managed to get a few items that have been sitting on my wishlist for months and months, it was like fate! The dresses below are some of my favourites available on Modcloth at the moment. A couple are on sale, some are still full price. I wish I could have bought them all (and more)! If some wealthy benefactor wishes to sponsor my obsessive compulsive shopping habits feel free to drop me a line lol!

Current Favourites by alyzaria featuring a classic black dress

                            

I'm going to try to keep blogging regularly again. Its hard when I'm stuck in a deep blue funk. It feels like I have nothing interesting to say and there's no point to writing, which may yet be true, but when I'm in a good mood I can ignore that! And hopefully no one minds my rambling too much.

I'm finished studying for the year, I now have a couple of very uneventful looking months before I begin again next year. I'm looking forward to when the kids are off school so we can do stuff together during the day, but I'm also looking forward to going back myself, I feel much better when my days are full and productive. I was hoping I could enroll in some other course just for fun over the holiday period, but there's nothing available until next year unfortunately! I'll have to launch myself into some other projects to keep me busy. I have a few sewing projects I've been meaning to do, and I also really want to get back into photography, so hopefully I can manage to get somewhere with those things over the next couple of months.

I really hope everyone is doing well!

Weekend Rundown

Yesterday I went to a classmate's house for a study session. We have some pretty full on units this term and are on pretty tight time constraints with assignments so we thought it would be a good idea to get together and pool our research and ideas. Corinna, Sam and I spent the afternoon working on our study materials and then had dinner together and got stuck into a few bottles of wine while chatting about life. I had a really great time, I'm glad to have made some new friends, I don't tend to venture outside my comfort zone too often so I don't meet new people much. Its nice to be pleasantly surprised by awesome people when I am in a new and different situation.

I'm feeling pretty disheartened about the weight loss situation. I've lost weight every week so far but in smaller and smaller amounts. I feel like I have SO much weight to lose to get to a healthy range that losing less than a kilo a week makes me feel like I'll never get there. I have decided though that I'm going to change my weigh in day to the middle of the week. I've been doing it on Sunday and if I go out to eat or have drinks or whatever its almost always on a Saturday, so I feel like Sunday is the worst day to weigh myself because I haven't had a chance to recover from the previous night. So I think I'll do it on Wednesday from now on. I've been exercising and eating well so I feel like the lack of weight loss this week is mostly due to the eating out and drinking I did yesterday.

I got a package from Forever New the other day which contained a bag that I've wanted for ages! I didn't want to pay $70 for it though so I waited until it went on sale. The bag is nice and big and functional and obviously really cute! I've been trying to build up by bag collection so I always have a handbag to suit the occasion. Until recently I'd really only have one bag at a time, using it until it needed replacing. Now that I'm wearing more pastels and lighter colours I needed more than just one black bag. So I've been looking for a large and a small bag in a neutral colour as well as a large and small in black. I now have both my neutral bags covered (this one being the larger one) so I have to keep my eye out now for black ones! I also bought two little pairs of fingerless lace gloves which are ever so pretty and I look forward to having an appropriate occasion to which to wear them.

The Good and The Bad

So lets get the bad out of the way first. I picked up my Modcloth dresses today and out of 6 only 1 fits perfectly :( One is still okay even though its loose around the top, and there are another two which I may be able to get altered to make them work. All in all really disappointing though. I've just gained too much weight recently and my body is all out of whack. I do love the one dress that fits me well though. Its gorgeous, I'll take photos as soon as I get around to wearing it.

Now for the good! I went out with the bff today and she gave me my birthday present. I also did a bit of shopping so between the two I came home with quite a haul! The gifts I got were a pretty lacy bag, a little shimmery coin purse with a birdy clasp, and three pretty rings!
As far as my shopping purchases go, I bought myself two pearly necklaces, one that has a little pendant and looks more fancy/formal and one that could be more for everyday use. I also bought a chunky cold necklace and a smaller silver one both for wearing with audrey dresses and other higher-necked items, and some earrings.

I love the pressies Snow White bought me ^_^ The bag is so pretty, the pictures really don't to it justice, same with the little coin purse, its much prettier when my camera flash isn't washing it out. And the rings are gorgeous, I love the blue/green one. Its really big and chunky, which isn't something I'd usually pick, but It looks great on and is such a pretty colour. Everything was awesome, she knows me too well!
Here are pics of my new pretties!

Busy, Busy, Busy!

Hello!

So the past few days have been full of cafeteria food, windy weather and getting very well acquainted with the computer desks at my library. I've finished all but one assessment from my current units, but I also have to start two business units tomorrow which will both require assignments, so I'm sure I'll be feeling snowed under again soon! In my spare time I've been trying to read as much as I can because I've been taking forever to finish this damn novel. Normally it really only takes me a few days, but I've only bee committing little bits of time here and there and it has made it impossible to get through a book.

In much more exciting news, I placed another order for some dresses from Modcloth. I'm super eager for them to get here but I know it will take awhile. I think it took about 4 weeks last time. I'm hoping it might be a little quicker this time as I have a 2 day conference I'll be attending in early October and I really want the dresses here for that! I'm also equally worried about the dresses fitting as I was last time because I still haven't figured out my size. Last time I ordered 2 dresses in a 3X and one in a 2X. The 2X fit perfectly and so did one 3X, and the other 3X was slightly large... so I'm still not sure! But even if I was "sure", they're all different brands and cuts anyway, so it doesn't mean that I could order a dress and be certain it would fit. So I've just done my best to order based on reviews and whatnot and hope everything works out! I tried to make sure I ordered dresses that would take me from work to play easily, because I need to start thinking about looking professional. Hopefully the ones I've ordered all fit well!

New Camera!!!

For about a million years I've wanted a dslr but for one reason or another I never got one. I used to be big into photography back in high school, just before the world went digital. Its been a long time since I played around with an slr and I've never used a digital one so it will take some getting used to. I played around with it a  little after class today taking pictures around the house and in the yard. I can't wait to take it out and get some nice pictures.

I haven't edited these in any way other than to fit them to the square frame

Using the 'miniature' setting

Left: Auto setting, Right: Miniature setting

And what would it be without a selfie. I tweaked the colours on this one to make it all blue-tinged

Movies and Shopping and Sewing, Oh My!

Today was my son's day off school for his birthday, which was yesterday. We went out to one of his favourite restaurants for breakfast, where we stuffed ourselves with bacon, eggs, danish, fruit, yoghurt, and other breakfasty treats. After that we went shopping to kill time before a movie. My son had some birthday money and he spent a little of it on megablock and lego, and I bought him a Playdough set that comes with little molds of some of the Transformers, which I thought was super cool. I also found a little monster plush toy that had to come home with me. He was simply too cute!
We then watched Despicable Me 2 at the cinema, which was great. My son's aunt was with us with her two year old daughter and even she was transfixed through the whole movie. I had actually already seen it last week when I went to the movies with my friend and his kids, but it was still extremely enjoyable, which says a lot for it I think as I'm really not a huge fan of going to the movies.

Awful photo booth pictures, awesome day :)

After finally getting home, I decided I really needed to get a start on making myself a skirt. I bought myself all the materials I needed including a sewing machine, but have been putting it off for a week or so. So with the aid of this tutorial and this Youtube video I set about drawing up a pattern and cutting and sewing fabric and all that jazz. While cutting out the fabric, I realised I'd made a mistake when measuring, as I totally forgot to allow for a seam at the waist, but by the time I realised there didn't seem to be much I could do about it so I just kept going with it in hopes it would all work out. The good news is I made a pretty nice skirt, and this is my first attempt at doing anything like this really. The skirt I fashioned from a table cloth already had the pattern, all I really had to do was the waist, so I'm pretty proud of myself for doing as good a job as I did. The bad news is that because I forgot to account for the seam when measuring, I ended up making the skirt a little too small for me. But its not the end of the world, because I am working on losing the weight I've gained since I moved, so hopefully as I start slimming down, the skirt will become wearable.

I am a little disappointed, because I really love the fabric and was looking forward to having something I could wear now, but I'm pleased I managed to get through it and ended up with a decent looking skirt without breaking a needle or injuring myself with my sewing machine!

My skirt!

Shopping Haul

Ahhhh, coffee <3

Today was fairly busy. I took this kids to the library this morning for the final day of their school holiday program. It was game show day, everyone got split up into roughly equal groups and took turns answering questions in different categories like charades, pictionary and multiple choice. The loved it and did really well. The whole program has been awesome, they looked forward to going every time and thoroughly enjoyed the activities. They were really bummed that today was the final day, but they got prizes for their participation so that helped soften the blow. I really  hope the library will have something similar next school holidays.

Buy ALL THE THINGS!

After the library we went to Spotlight to look for fabric and a cheap sewing machine. Unfortunately it wasn't the world's most successful trip, they'd sold out of all of their $98 sewing machines, and the fabric I wanted to buy only had 1.3m left on the roll. I did put in an order on their website though for the sewing machine, so I'm hoping there's still stock available to send out to me from wherever its stored.

I then met up with my best friend to do a spot more shopping and this was MUCH more successful! I managed to find a bunch of cheap little things that I loved. I bought two dresses, two pairs of tights, a little cardigan, a pair of shoes, 4 eye shadows, a lipgloss and a nail polish corrector pen, and all for less than $100. Quite a bit less in fact, without bothering to look at the receipts, I'm pretty sure the total came to around $80. I absolutely love the little bird dress and the cardigan. Can't wait to wear them with the new shoes!

You also may notice, buried in amongst my new treasures, the Doctor Who Encyclopedia! My best friend saw this for me the other day and knew I'd love it so she picked it up for me and gave it to me when I saw her today. Its freaking amazing. It has loads of entries with information about the people, places and plots of Doctor Who. I freaking love it and can't wait to read the whole thing.

I really do love me some Who

Curse You Steam Sales!

So anyone into video games knows its that time of year. Steam goes all out with their huge Summer Sale, and gamers weep for their rapidly dwindling funds. I own something around 150 games on Steam, and I swear the Summer Sales over the past couple of years have been responsible for probably more than 75% of those games. I just can't resist! When I see a game that's got 75% or 90% off I just have to buy it. I don't even get around to playing half of them, but if there's a good game on sale for less than $5 I can't help myself. Its less than the cost of a cup of coffee for heaven's sake, and its there for me to play on a rainy day. Many people joke about having a similar problem, unable to resist they're amazing sales and having more games than they can ever play.

I've actually been really good so far and haven't bought any YET. But as I type there are four games in my cart waiting to be purchased. The store is so overloaded with traffic I'm having trouble checking out! But the total of my purchase is under $15 so I don't feel too guilty about my intended purchase. One of the games I've wanted for over a year, I've just never managed to catch it when it was on sale, so I'm not letting it slip by this time!





In other news, I went grocery shopping tonight and in the health and beauty aisle I saw the cutest little set of two headbands. Side by side in the pack, it looked as though the bow was on the pink headband, but when I removed them from the packaging it turned out the bow was actually on the pearl headband. I thought that made the pink one rather plain, so I carefully unstuck the glue holding the bow in place and swapped it over from the pearl to the pink. I prefer it this way, makes them look better on their own rather than just as a set.

Shopping Part 2 - The Thrift Edition

So I mentioned yesterday that my friend and I hit a few op shops (thrift, charity, what have you). My purchases have now all been washed and dried, and photographed for your viewing pleasure! So without further ado:

Purchases 1 & 2: I am a cardigan addict and never leave the house without some sort of cardigan/bolero/shrug, no matter how hot the weather. Most of mine have long sleeves so I was pretty happy to find these short sleeved ones, which will be a little more comfortable to wear in the constant heat where I live. I've grouped these two together because they're actually the same brand and style, just in different colours. The brand is called Master & Margarita, which I've never heard of before, but they feel like good quality and both are in really good condition. The black one cost me $5 and the mustardy yellow one was $3.

Purchase 3: Another cute little bolero I found was this this black one. It has a lacy trim and ties up in the front, so its a little more delicate and feminine than the other two I bought. Again this one is very light and feels like it will be comfortable in the hot weather. The brand is Jacqui E and the cost was $3.

Purchase 4: This dress is definitely one of my favourite buys. Its a brown floaty layered dress by Jacqui E. It fits really nicely, except that the shoulder straps have been stretched out, but I can easily take them in. I love the light, flowy fabric and cinched waist. I don't know how much this would have cost new, but Jacqui E isn't cheap, so I was thrilled when I saw the price tag on this one was only one dollar! That's right, $1. Simply because the straps are all stretched out so it needs a little sewing. Awesome score, I think!

Purchase 5: I love this top. Its in perfect condition and is so pretty and feminine. I've been on this kick of wanting everything to be delicate and floaty. Maybe I just want fabric that flies in the wind when I go on bike rides lol. In any case, this is another light, flowy item that fits the bill. I love the lace and the little buttons. I love dainty little buttons, they're a weakness of mine. The brand is Target and I got the blouse for $5.

Purchase 6: A tablecloth. Stay with me. I've been looking at online tutorials on how to make circle skirts, and  found quite a few which make them from old sheets, tablecloths or whatever else you may have available to re-purpose. With this in mind I kept my eye out for such things while shopping, and saw this gorgeous tablecloth. Its already circular, so that saved me some time in cutting it to the right shape, and it had this gorgeous little detailing on the edge that I thought was perfect.
I'm not much of a seamstress, my sewing skills are pretty much limited to fixing the occasional fallen hem and such, so I was pretty nervous (but super enthusiastic!) to start this project. I stayed up much of last night finishing it and I think I did a decent job for my first attempt. There were a few problems, the first of which was that the waist hem (where I cut) was fraying more than I had hoped. I'm going to get some ribbon or something to trim the waistband so prevent further fraying. Secondly, I finished sewing in the waistband, tried the skirt on and it was too long! So I'm going to need to unpick all the stitching in the waistband and sew it down lower to shorten the skirt. This will actually work out well because then there will be more fabric to gather around the waist and I think that will look nicer. Its just so much work! I should probably mention I don't have a sewing machine so all my sewing is done by hand. CHORE!
Anyway, I'm still pretty proud of myself for doing it, and I'll be prouder still when I shorten it and actually have a wearable skirt!

Sha-sha-sha-shopping! :)

Today I went shopping with a friend and our daughters. She's studying beauty therapy and gets industry discounts at the warehouse stores, and when I go with her I do too! So once every month or two I'll go with her to stock up on essentials like bleach and shampoo, and get some treats for myself too. In addition to the beauty supply place, we also went to a discount store and a few op shops (also known as charity or second hand stores, we call them op shops here). I forgot to take photos on my second-hand treasures before I put them in the washing machine, and now they're all wet (but clean!), so I'll share them tomorrow.


Firstly, I snagged this OPI nail polish. It was on clearance and only $6.50, so a freaking bargain compared to their normal retail of around $20. The shade is called Goldeneye. I  have quite a few glitter polishes, but I didn't have a gold so I'm pretty pleased that this one was on special!








The next three nail polishes were purchased at the discount store we visited. I haven't tried them yet so I don't know how good the quality is, but I use cheap nail polishes all the time with very few problems.
This one is a really nice browny nude, kind of like the colour of very milky tea. Actually I might even call it that! These ones only have numbers for the shades and not names. The brand is one I've never heard of, Tips and Toes, and the shade is 05.





Onto much brighter shades! The Tips and Toes brand also had a few neon shades. I'm not really a neon kind of person, but I thought I'd grab a couple anyway because they were so cheap, and I love adding to my nail polish collection. I like to have a lot of options and hate when I decide on an idea for nail art and then find I'm missing a colour. Fortunately as my collection grows, I'm finding that happens less often! This is a neon orange, the shade is number 81.





What? More nail polish? Yes. I have a problem, okay! Another Tips and Toes one. These were all only $2 each by the way. This is the only other neon I bought, although they also had blue, pink, purple, yellow and maybe others.









I thought the ends of my hair could benefit from some sort of treatment to help smooth them and make them feel a little stronger and healthier. I use De Lorenzo for my shampoo and conditioner and have been really happy with them, so I decided to give this product a try. Its called The Ends and it claims to "seal, strengthen and protect stressed out ends". I'm going to put it in before I set my hair each night, so I'll let you know how it goes.





Perhaps the least exciting to read about is the purchase of my regular toning shampoo. However, I'm sure you can understand my excitement when I tell you that usually in a salon or retail store, a 250ml bottle of this shampoo would cost around $30. I got this 500ml bottle for only $18. WHOO! I love this shampoo. I even use it as a leave-in toner when my hair is too yellow after bleaching. I just lather it onto dry hair, pop a shower cap on and leave it for however long suits me (usually at least an hour). I don't know how "good" this is for my hair, but it does a good job when I'm out of proper toner and works out a lot cheaper.



So I had an incredibly productive day. I'm very pleased with the beauty supplies I got and equally happy with my op shop purchases (can't wait to share!). I'm buzzing from the retail therapy and had a lovely day out with the girls. Hope to do it again soon!