Saturday 31 January 2015

OOTW:Plus Size Gym/Active Wear!

gym

Over the years, being a plus size girl I think that the fashion industry has changed so much to accommodate a curvier figure. However I think that the one area that the industry has neglected is the sports/active wear for plus size women.

We are either expected to wear head to toe black 'comfy' joggers that are so unflattering and tops that are not designed to sweat in. Just before Christmas I noticed that H & M+ had started to stock some serious active wear for all us plus size women and now have a new line out at the minute which inspired my OOTW this week to be a gym/active wear look, I hope you like it!

Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 21.18.36H&M+ Sports jacket£29.99 


Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 21.17.41H&M+ Sports bra Medium support£12.99


Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 21.18.07H&M+ Sports top£7.99


Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 21.17.02H&M+ Sports tights£19.99 (They also have some funky printed ones if you were feeling daring too!)


Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 21.22.05Nike Free 4.0 Flyknit £109.99


Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 21.22.50NEON PINK BOBBLE WATER BOTTLE £9.99


Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 21.24.26FITNESS TOWELS | DUAL-SIDED DESIGN


I am so pleased that there is finally some attractive sportswear out there that has been designed with fitness in mind! Have you found any great gym wear for the plus size figure? If so please let me know where, I am always looking for new fitness clothes.


I hope this has maybes inspired you to update you gym gear and let me know what is your favourite! I love those Nike trainers!!


Thanks for Reading


Tracy xx



My Very First Blogger Of The Month for 2015!! January Edition!!

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Sometimes being a blogger you can be overwhelmed with all of the other amazing blogs and bloggers out there, which sometimes means it can be hard to keep up to date with new blogs to find.

Thats when I decided to create my 'Blogger of the Month' series and I hope that you have enjoyed my previous blogs and bloggers that I have shared.

This month, rather than set out to look for a blogger for this month I decided to simply share with you an amazing blogger, not only is their blog great and full of great posts, this blogger is also great at taking time to read other peoples blogs and commenting too!

The blogger in question? Cat from Oddly Lovely!!

Being able to write posts that get reactions, get people talking or just very informative is a talent that makes a true blogger, she is not afraid of giving her opinions and thats what I like about her blog!

So seeing as I can talk all day about all the amazing bloggers that have appeared in this series so far I will now hand you over to Cat to find out a little more about her and her talented blog!
Name: Cat
 

Name of your Blog: Oddly Lovely
 
Website address: http://oddlylovely.com
 
Blog category: Lifestyle blog
 
How long have you been blogging for? 


Around 15 months, but I took a six month break after the first three months, then started back up again with a vengeance last July.
 
What inspired you to create your blog?


I actually work in social media marketing and often coordinate sponsored post campaigns with bloggers. After doing that for a number of years, I was like, "hey, I'm creative and like to write, I bet I'd enjoy this blogging thing!" And you know what, I really have enjoyed it!
 
What do you enjoy most about blogging?


There's two big things. The first is I love how it keeps me creative - writing is my true passion, but I also adore cooking, photography, books, fashion, social media... blogging encourages me to keep working on projects and not stagnate. The second thing is the incredible relationships I've formed with other bloggers and readers. I try to write posts that spark conversation and help us have a genuine dialogue. It can be really powerful stuff!
 
What has been the hardest thing you have found about blogging?


The hardest thing about blogging is finding the courage to share vulnerable and controversial posts. Whether I'm talking about growing up pagan or body image issues or taking Plan B, I'm always so scared to share that intimate side of myself and afraid that others might not understand. The honest truth is that people have been so supportive, and I've received such heartfelt comments. In a weird way, the hardest part of blogging has become one of my favorite parts!
 
If you could give advice to fellow bloggers trying to increase their followers/subscribers what would it be? What have you found most successful? 


The best thing is to test out a lot of different things on your own blog, because it's unique for each of us, but based on my experience I'd recommend sharing a mix of both "pin-able" recipes, DIYs, movie recommendations, etc. and some more personal posts. The first category will help make your blog be more shareable and look visually interesting, but the personal posts are what help you form strong relationships with your readers, which is what keeps them coming back to hear more from you.
 
If you could give someone thinking about starting a blog one bit of advice what would it be?


Just start somewhere. Keep a running list of blog post ideas on your phone or in your purse, and just start writing. Write about what interests you and what you think would interest the kind of readers you want to attract. Make each post as perfect as you can, but also cut yourself some slack because everyone starts somewhere. You will find your voice and your style and your topics with time and practice, I promise. No one has a perfect blog on their first day.
 
How can my readers contact you?


You can follow me on Bloglovin (https://www.bloglovin.com/blogs/oddly-lovely-10993419) and I'm also very active on Twitter (https://twitter.com/oddlylovely/) and Instagram (http://instagram.com/oddlylovely). Commenting on my blog is also a great way to connect with me - I make sure to take a lot of time to respond to every single comment!


Thank you Cat for taking the time to answer my questions and I would also like to share with you all a favourite post from Cat's blog, http://oddlylovely.com/bloggers-should-share-controversial-posts/ please give her a visit and say hi from me!


Please let me know if you enjoy these posts and share with me and my readers your blog or blogs you love!!


Thanks for Reading


Tracy xx

Tuesday 27 January 2015

My Top 5 Favourite Concealers!

CONCEALER

I love finding a concealer that just works, covers blemishes or dark circles so I thought I would share with you my favourite concealers that I use on a daily basis but most importantly, work!

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1) When YSL first released their Touche Eclat Radiant Touch Highlighting Pen I knew that I had to try it! This is a highlight/concealer. The consistency is thin enough to not settle in fine lines and wrinkles but thick enough to cover dark circles. As the Yves Saint Laurent Touche Eclat Radiant Touch Highlighting Pen costs £25 I tend to save it for evenings out or special occasions.


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2) Seeing as the YSL Touche Eclat is a bit on the pricey side I decided to try the L'Oreal Paris Lumi Magique, exactly the same concept as the YSL concealer and a great dupe for £8.49! I use the shade 01 Light.


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3) This has to be the most talked about affordable concealer on the market! Collection Lasting Perfection Concealer, great for covering blemishes and hides redness, can be used under the eyes however the formula is a little thicker so I tend to just use it to get rid of those pesky spots and at £3.99 its worth a try at least!


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4)Maybelline Eraser Eye Concealer. This has to be my latest and, as you can see from the images my most loved concealer to date! It covers blemishes, hides redness and I can also use this under my eyes and it doesn't not settle in my fine lines or look cakey! I love the application, the consistency and it lasts well over blemishes to and is £7.99


CON2 CONCEAL1


5) I sometimes in the summer use Rimmel's Wake Me Up foundation, so I picked up their matching concealer to at the time. Now this conceal helps to cover blemishes and redness but also has illuminating properties too. It isn't as thin as the YSL & L'Oreal one but not as thick as the Collection concealer. This is a conceal that I reach for during the spring summer and costs £5.49!


So there you have it, my top 5 concealers, I hope this has maybes inspired you to try thm or even helped you discover a new concealer!


Please let me know in the comments below if you are enjoying these type of posts and if you would like more then please subscribe to my blog, it would make my day!


Thanks for Reading!


Tracy xx



Sunday 25 January 2015

OOTW:Girls Night Out!

ootw

I post a lot about beauty and very rarely about fashion, yet fashion is what I love! I guess I thought that in order to do fashion posts I would have to take pictures of myself in the clothes and being as self conscious as I am at the moment that wouldn't be an option.

So instead I thought that I would share with you a outfit of the week, this could be new stock, old stock or just something that has caught my eye in the plus size stores.

This week I thought I would share with you a look that would be great for a girls night out and also a bargain as the dress is now on sale (I bought it full price!).

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1) New Look Inspire Black Floral Print Tunic Dress (18-32) Was £22.99 now £15.00. click here!


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2) AX PARIS LOOSE FIT BLACK SOFT BLAZER  (12-32)From Simply Be £40.00, Click here!


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3)New Look Inspire Black 120 Denier Tights £5.99, Click here!


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4) SOLE DIVA STRAPPY WEDGE WIDE E FIT for Simply Be £30.00, Click here!


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5) BLACK QUILTED SQUARE CROSS BODY BAG £18.00, Click here!


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6) THEA STATEMENT NECKLACE by Dolly Bow Bow £18.00, Click here!


I hope that this may have given you some inspiration for your next girls night out, if you would like to see more of these posts then please let me know, who knows maybes one day I will be brave enough to model the items myself!


Thanks for Reading


Tracy xx


My Top Pink Lip Products!

lips

As Christmas is over, I tend to stay away from the winter berry shades of lipstick and instead opt for a fresh, youthful look which means that I stay towards pink and nude shades on my lips.

Looking through my make up collection I realised how many pink shades I have and would like to share with you my favourites!

lips2

1) Revlon ColorBurst Lip Butter 045 Cotton Candy


2)Maybelline New York Baby Lips Pink Punch


3) Revlon ColorBurst Lip Butter 080 Strawberry Shortcake


4) Rimmel London Exaggerate Full Colour Lip Liner Eastend Snob


5) Soap & Glory Sexy Mother Pucker Charm Offensive


6)New CID Cosmetics i-gloss Rosey Pink


7) Revlon Just Bitten Kissable Balm Stain 001 Honey Douce


8) MaxFactor Colour Elixir Lip Liner 04 Pink Princess


9) Maybelline New York Colour Sensational 148 Summer Pink


10) Revlon ColorBurst Lip Butter 090 Sweet Tart


11) L'oreal Paris Color Riche Collection Exclusive By Julianne Julianne's Nude


12) New CID Cosmetics i-gloss Icey Pink


So those are my favourite pink/nude lip products, do you have a favourite or a recommendation for me? Have you tried any of my favourites?


Thanks for Reading


Tracy xx

Saturday 24 January 2015

Its's the little things........!

Firstly I hope everyone is doing well and enjoying 2015 so far, today I didn't plan to write a post but sitting here now I feel like I maybes need to.

Just after New Year I was feeling a little down about my weight and decided to try and focus on the good parts of my life rather than the not so good. Have you ever heard the saying 'Misery loves company?' well I have noticed for a couple of months that my Mam has been quite down, I think she's worried about me, her health and our home at the minute.

My Mam is exactly like me, exactly! Most people see us as sisters rather than mother and daughter, so seeing my Mam, in my opinion depressed made me stop and think.

I made it my mission to wake up happy, smile more and try to at least appear happier, fake it until you make it I guess. It worked at least to cheer my Mam up.

I have started a new eating plan which I may go into further down the line, this was my first week, no treats, no cheats I stuck to the plan 100% and lost 5.5lbs, great? no I wanted to lose more, it completely knocked me and I couldn't see the point in continuing with it.

Now I know 5.5lbs is an amazing weight loss however, doing the same plan I have followed it half heartedly and lost more weight so I was not happy, that brought me back down.

If you follow me on twitter you may have seen that I applied for a design job and found out yesterday that I never got it, that also brought me down.

Today I woke up with the feeling of ''Why do I bother' and feel really low. Now to someone who maybes isn't living with depression the outlook would be completely different. They may have expected a higher weight loss, but were still happy with the loss they got and continued on the plan, yes they never got the job but theres always future opportunities and they were just simply not what they were looking for for that particular role.

I know I am being irrational and pathetic but its the tiny little set backs that knock me really low, something so simple shouldn't make you question your worth or your life. When I am happy I am up in the clouds and when I am down I am in such a dark place.

All these 'little' things shouldn't have this sort of effect, but knowing that is the way I approach things has made it easier to notice the difference between my depression and 'normal' sadness.

From now on I suppose I need to be an adult about things, in no way am I belittling depression but I need to snap out of it, see things for what they are and dust myself off and march on! (sorry watched les Miserables last night!)

Maybes you have experienced something similar or noticed someone close that gets very down with the 'little' things, how do you pull yourself around and march forward?

Thanks for Reading

Tracy xx

Wednesday 21 January 2015

How To Create A Hosted Blog Using Hostgator & Wordpress!

Hosting

When I first started to think about blogging, around 3-4 years ago, I created many blogs using blogger, a free site that allows you to create a blog for free. It was great, I was able to upload posts, semi-customise my site and learn tips and tricks along the way.

Now most of the blogs I created never lasted more than a couple of months here and there because if I am honest I was not fully into blogging back then.

Back in September I considered starting a blog to help me with my depression, talk about products that I was using or new things I was discovering. That is when I started to research blogging a bit more and discovered getting a domain name and finding a company to host my blog.

For those of you who are maybes unsure of what hosting is, imagine your blog or website as a document, you have all the information but need somewhere to store it,you then find a hosting site that for a fee will store that document and make it available to view to everyone online.

The first and hardest part was naming my blog, I didn't want to use my name, so instead I started to think about me, my personality and my passions. I finally came up with Little Miss Plus Size, I checked to make sure that the domain name was free and it was.

I then watched a lot of YouTube videos and came across Hostgator, So I would like to share with you step by step how I created my blog and hopefully it might inspire you too!

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1) So after visiting www.hostgator.com you are presented with something similar to the first image, you then want to click on the 'Get Started Now' button.

2)You are then presented with a new page titled 'Unlimited Web Hosting' and now you need to click 'choose a plan'

2 3) Now Hostgator offer three plans, Hatchling, Baby and business. I went for the baby plan as I wanted the option host more than one site if I wanted to however if you just want to create one blog or website and have no interest of creating any more then the Hatchling plan would be great for you.

4) Now this is the time to register your domain, so once you have your blog name just enter it here to see if it is available, my blog is Little Miss Plus Size so I wanted my blog/website to read www.littlemissplussize.com.

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5) Once you have registered your domain name you scroll down the page to find the information of your hosting plan, you then need to enter a username and create a pin number.

6) Now you need to enter your personal information, email, name etc and also your payment details, I chose to us PayPal as I feel safer doing that.

*If you are creating a brand new blog, it may be a good idea to create a new email account just for your blog, that way everything is in one place plus it separates your personal emails from your blogging emails, I made sure my email was just simply my blog name littlemissplussize@outlook.com.

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7) Now that you have entered all your information it is now time to check and review your order to make sure everything is correct, if you are happy simply click that you have agreed to the T & C's and click submit. (Enter littlemissplussize in the coupon code to receive $9.94 off!)

8) Shortly after doing so you should receive a email containing all of your information from Hostgator. You now have access to your control panel, click the link from your email as seen here.

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9) This is the login screen for your control panel, the easiest way to think of it is that your control panel is the mechanics of your blog, all your blog and website information will be stored here. Enter your username and password that was provided in the email that you received.

10) Once you have logged in you are presented with the screen above, your control panel.

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11) Now scroll down the page until you see the 'Quick install' symbol.

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12) you are now presented with a new screen, look down the left sidebar until you see 'Wordpress' click into this.

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13) click continue, this will allow you to use wordpress to control your blog.

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14) This step, you have to enter your email address, name and blog title, this will be the address that all your wordpress related emails will go to. Once completed click 'Install Now'.

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15) You will now see a progress bar and once it has reached 100% it is complete. You are now given your Wordpress username, password and link to your admin area.

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16) You should have now revived an email containing your information given in step 15,  Now you have to wait between 4-6 hours for your site to be activated, after that time you can then click onto the link to go to your Wordpress admin area.

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17) Now that you have clicked your Wordpress admin link, you are presented with the Wordpress login screen, enter your username and password that was sent to you in the email from Wordpress.

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18) This is now your Wordpress/blog dashboard, the back end of your blog. From here you can upload posts, customise your blog etc. Click the house symbol to take you to your blog.

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19) You have now successfully created your hosted blog, its now yours to customise and upload your content.

This is a bit of a different post for me, please let me know your thoughts and wether or not you would like to see more of these types of posts.

Thanks for Reading

 

Tracy xx

*If you do chose to use Hostgator to host your blog, and use the coupon code littlemissplussize, I will be paid a small commission for referring you, However I chose Hostgator because thats what I used but you can check other hosting companies such as Go Daddy etc. 

St Kitts Herbery Review!

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If you have been reading my blog for a while now, you may have noticed that I love my bath & shower products, so when I was contacted by the lovely people at St Kitts Herbery to try their products I jumped at the chance!

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St Kitts Herbery offer amazing products created with only the finest herbal ingredients, the set I received was their rosemary & bergamot range.

The smell of each product is very fresh, with a hint of citrus and eucalyptus in my opinion. If you don't like herbal scents then this is not for you however for me the range reminds me a lot of Neals Yard and I love that brand.

This set came gift boxed and contains a shower gel, lotion, shampoo and two soaps all in the Rosemary & Bergamot scent. Ideal for travelling or even to take with you if you go to the gym, swimming etc.

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I have used all four products and found that the shower gel was my favourite! I even used it as a bubble bath and it worked really well too. After a day at work having a nice hot bath with these products really felt like a treat and because the products are made with active herbal ingredients they gave you a spa like experience in your own home!

I am going on a little countryside weekend break in February and if I still have these products left I plan on taking them with me!

The set I received is £11.95 and you can also buy the larger versions individually. St Kitts Herbery have a wide variety of scents and I would love to try their lavender range or spiced lime!

If you like to find out more or try the brand please visit www.stkittsherbery.co.uk or click here!

What type of products do you use to help relax and restore yourself?

Thank you for Reading

Tracy xx