My Little Friends Box

When I was looking back through my old blog posts, I couldn’t believe how long it had been since I unboxed a My Little Box on here! So, I thought I would snap some photos of the August Friends box to share with you. If you’ve never heard of My Little Box it is a monthly lifestyle subscription box, which originally started out in France and Japan, but now sends to the UK as well. As much as I love a good beauty box, I really enjoy the idea of a lifestyle box, as you get some really interesting pieces that you wouldn’t ordinarily find in a traditional beauty box.

Every month, the box has a theme, and in the past themes have included ‘Energy’, ‘Frenchie’ and ‘Super.’ August’s theme was ‘Friends’ and, as with previous boxes, on the inside lid of the brown box was a cute sticker. This particular one came in the shape of a blue speech bubble, with the phrase “We go together like bikinis and ice cream.” These stickers tend to vary – some months I will hang on to them to use for crafting, whereas other months they’re not really something I will use. They’re good fun though, and I like the way they help tie the theme together. As always, the contents of the box were beautifully displayed, tied together with a bow.

After untying the ribbon, the first thing I found was the My Little Box A5 magazine, which is always nice to flick through. It contains various articles from inspiration for how to use the contents of your box to interviews, mainly with French personalities. Underneath the magazine was an A5 print, this time with a simple slogan, “In Girlsquad we trust.” I’m usually pretty happy with the majority of these prints, as they can be good for popping on my pin board or using for crafts, but I’m not sure if I’ll use this particular one yet. Also in the box was the regular material bag containing the beauty bits, but this time with a pretty red heart design.

As this box is a lifestyle box, you usually get two or three non-beauty items, which is always good fun. The first of these was a little packet of Propercorn Sweet and Salty popcorn. Probably not enough to share with a friend, but certainly something to snack on while you watch a film together or something. As you saw in my Sunday Snippets post, the Propercorn Coconut and Vanilla popcorn is one of my absolute favourites. I haven’t tried this flavour yet, but if it’s anywhere near as good as the other flavour I’m pretty sure I’ll love it.

The next lifestyle item in the box was this clip-on fisheye lens for all smartphones. It’s definitely something different from anything I’ve seen before in a box! I’m not sure how much use I will get out of it, but I will certainly give it a try. It might be fun to use whilst taking selfies with friends (if I can work out which way round to put it!) 

The final lifestyle item was this pretty little manicure kit, made by My Little Box. This kind of thing always comes in handy when you’re on the move and break a nail or something, so I shall be popping this in one of my handbags. The pouch is a mixture of really bright, cheerful colours including navy, green, orange and pink, and is made from a fairly soft material, but strong enough to keep the contents protected.

With My Little Box you then tend to get three beauty items inside a little canvas bag. Two items are branded, and one is from My Little Beauty. The first product was a hairspray from Batiste in this colourful container. I knew Batiste did dry shampoos, but didn’t realise they also sold hairspray, so I will definitely be giving that a try to see what it’s like. Next up was a face cream from a brand I hadn’t heard of before – Kadalys. I’m guessing it might be a French brand, as I know they like to try and include French brands where they can. The packaging is clean and simple, and the comforting cream sounds like it should be nice to use. The final beauty product, which was from My Little Beauty, was a summer lips lip balm, with SPF 15, which is always good! I’ve generally found the My Little Beauty products pretty good quality, and particularly like their night cream, which came in a previous box.

So that was everything that came inside the My Little Friends Box this month! I think this was a bit of a mixed box, with some things I will definitely use and others that I’m not really sure about. The popcorn will go down well and I look forward to trying out the beauty products, but I’m not sure how useful the fish-eye lens will be. Unfortunately, this is going to be my last My Little Box, for a while at least, as I’ve had to cut down on my subscription boxes for now. But I’ve been getting the box for well over a year, and have really enjoyed being introduced to some new products and receiving a box of surprises through my door each month has been lovely.

Are you a fan of My Little Box? Or is there another subscription box that you would recommend?

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Sunday Snippets - 14th August 2016

It’s been a bit of a quieter week this week thankfully, although I have had a couple of bigger outings. My GP has told me I need to relax more and let my body and mind have a break, but I’m finding it very hard to just chill out and do nothing. There’s always something that needs doing – whether it’s my blogging and YouTube (which I love doing, but do find very tiring), tidying my room, University related things, catching up with e-mails etc. So if I ever try to relax, it’s always on my mind that I should be doing something else, and that then means I can’t relax. So, if anyone has any tips on how to just chill out without having to go on holiday or to a spa, I would really love to hear them!

Last Sunday I woke up fairly late, had my breakfast and sorted out my medications for the week ahead. The rest of the morning was spent watching a Disney film that was on TV and doing some blogging. In the afternoon there were back-to-back Simpsons episodes on TV – heaven! So I watched them and tried to catch up on some of my blogging e-mails. Why do I always let them build up so much!? In the evening we had a full house for dinner, as David, Emma, my Grandma and Rosiie’s boyfriend were all over. Rosiie and I decided to get Emma back into Snapchat. There were a lot of giggles (especially from Emma!) and some rather interesting photos taken!  

As I mentioned in last week’s Sunday Snippets, this month I’m joining in with the Crown and Glory Glitterati 2^nd birthday celebrations, which includes a photo challenge on Instagram for the whole of August! If you want to see everyone else’s, simply search the hashtag #CGGlitteratiTurns2. Day 7 is ‘Silly Selfie’ – It’s not hard for me to take a silly selfie with my face, but I decided to go over to Snapchat and use one of their filters. I particularly love this colour lipstick – I wish it were real!

On Monday morning I decided to do some more blogging, so spent quite a while writing a post I’ve been wanting to put up for ages. But when I went to sort out the photos I found there was a problem with about half of them, so I’m going to have to re-upload and edit them again, which is slightly frustrating! I then edited a set of different photos, wrote a whole new post and finally got that uploaded. I spent my whole afternoon snuggled up on the sofa, binge watching YouTube videos and doing bits on my laptop. In the evening I went to a meeting with my Dad about the coffee shop our church is building. It all sounds really exciting. I also opened a rather exciting parcel, which is something I’ve been thinking of buying for months. I’m looking forward to wearing it now that the weather is a bit warmer!

Day 8 of the August Crown and Glory photo challenge is ‘Sharing’s Caring’ – I found it really hard to pick one favourite brand to share with you, as there are so many I love! But I do love the funny drawings and postcards from Gemma Correll - I’m definitely the exhausted pigeon!

Tuesday morning I got up a bit later than I’d planned and couldn’t seem to get myself going for some reason. Thankfully I managed to get myself half-ready before my friend, Katrina, arrived to pick me up. We headed to the cinema first and saw Finding Dory, which was so good. I already can’t wait for it to come out on DVD so I can watch it again! We then went to Bill’s for a spot of lunch and a chat before Katrina moves over to Ireland. I had this amazing watermelon, peach and raspberry smoothie – I almost felt like I could be on holiday somewhere exotic! Katrina dropped me home and I found that Richard and Lisa were over, so I had a catch up with them and found out all about their lovely honeymoon. We also booked our day out that we’ve been planning for a while now. I was pretty exhausted by the time they headed off, so I crashed out on the sofa for the rest of the afternoon and dozed a bit.

Day 9 of the August Crown and Glory photo challenge is ‘Hobbies’ – I guess my biggest hobby is my blogging and YouTube channel. It takes up a hell of a lot of my time and energy, and there are definitely times I wonder why I do it, but I love it. It’s introduced me to a whole new community of people, gives me something comforting to read/watch when I’m struggling and really allows me to express my personality and creativity. My other hobbies include photography, writing to penpals, art journaling and scrapbooking (when I have time!), reading and watching films (especially Disney!)

On Wednesday morning I decided to sort out the big pile of stuff in my room that I want to blog about. The first thing I needed to do was take photos, so I set up my background and everything and started taking photos. These awesome cupcakes also arrived in the post, so I took some photos of them too. I’m reviewing them for a company called Cake Toppers and decided to have my YouTube logo put on them (which was designed by Amy Rose Studios and looks fantastic!) Keep your eyes peeled for a full blog post about them soon. I ended up running out of time, so had to leave my room in a bit of a mess. My Mum took me to my friend, Katy’s, and I had a back massage, which I desperately needed. Unfortunately my back is still very painful though. I think I need one of those massage chair things so I can have massages whenever I want! We popped into Waitrose and the chemist on our way home. I then tried to take a few more photos, before crashing out on the sofa.

Day 10 of the August Crown and Glory photo challenge is ‘Meaning’ – Being a member of the Glitterati means a lot to me. It is the rainbow on my rainy days (see what I did there with my C&G pieces!) Whenever my box arrives it makes me smile. And whenever I go on the Facebook group there is always a friendly face and someone to talk to.

This month’s My Little Box is very bright and cheerful! I’m particularly excited about the Propercorn Popcorn.

Thursday morning my Mum and Dad kindly drove me down to West Sussex so I could spend some time with my lovely best friend, Sarah. She didn’t want a proper baby shower, so we decided to do our own little one instead. When we arrived I presented her with a labour box I’d put together for her, with lots of things to help her through her labour. I also added a cute balloon for good measure! After lots of chatting, we drove to Avisford Park Hotel in Arundel for afternoon tea. It didn’t get off to a brilliant start, as they gave us the wrong tea (Assam instead of Cranberry and Raspberry!) and a non-gluten-free spread. But they did fix it and were very nice, so it wasn’t too much of a problem. We spent quite a long time enjoying our tea and chatting, which was lovely because we don’t see each other that often. Sarah then drove me back to hers, and my parents came and picked me up. We dropped into David and Emma’s on our way home and had a quick drink with them. By the time we got home I felt absolutely shattered, and for some reason my mental health was really playing up.

Day 11 of the August Crown and Glory photo challenge is ‘Colour Splash – As you can probably tell from this selection of pieces, my favourite colour is pink!

This month’s Birchbox (or should I say Birchbag!) has quite the neon vibe. Sadly I won’t be taking my bag anywhere particularly exciting, but it will be brightening up my bathroom at home.

I had to be up early on Friday morning, as I had an appointment with my GP. It went Ok but I felt quite drained after it – I always feel quite drained after having to face up to the realities of being ill. I’m waiting for a couple of referrals to come through and have to book in for a couple of tests, which I’m not looking forward to. When I got home I decided to try and make the most of being up at a decent time, so edited a video to go up on my YouTube channel (which you can watch here). I then spent a while starting to edit David and Emma’s wedding video. I got a bit emotional watching some of the footage back, but I’m so excited to get it done so they can watch it. I felt pretty tired after that, so rested on the sofa for a while. My Dad took me for a tiny walk outside the back of our house. It was nice to be in the sunshine for a bit, but I found walking in the woods quite painful, even though we hardly went very far. I then snuggled up on the sofa and wrote a couple of penpal letters.

Day 12 of the August Crown and Glory photo challenge is ‘Something Old’ – The first thing that got me hooked on Crown and Glory was definitely the beautiful flower hair bands. They’re really wearable, come in a rainbow of colours and really lift my mood when I’m having a dark day.

Saturday morning I woke up pretty late. I wasn’t feeling good on Friday evening, so ended up staying up late with my Dad to watch a film (we watched something called ‘Bill’ if anyone’s interested!) After a fairly slow morning, my Mum took me to our local shopping mall, as I needed to get a few bits. I mainly needed some supplements from Holland and Barrett but also picked up a few little bits for a box swap I’m taking part in. We stopped for lunch at Starbucks and I finally got to try their Iced Shaken Blackberry Mojito Tea Lemonade. After a quick look round Primark (and not buying any clothes!!) we came home. I sat out in the garden in the sunshine for a little while, then came inside and rested on the sofa. My pain levels were particularly high unfortunately, which was quite difficult to manage, as I couldn’t get comfy.

When we were in Holland and Barrett I picked up a few new snacks to try out, including some new protein energy bites from Bounce, a couple of bars from The Primal Pantry and some Quinoa bars from Nature Crops. Eating little and often seems to be more manageable than trying to attempt big meals, alongside my Fortisips.

Day 13 of the August Crown and Glory photo challenge is ‘Something New’ – One of my favourite newer pieces is this gorgeous rainbow rose clip because it’s so bright and cheerful and never fails to lift my mood.

If you haven’t read my blog before, I just wanted to let you know that I have a second blog, which mainly focuses on my health in more depth than I talk about it here. It’s largely for friends and family to follow and keep up with what’s going on, but if it’s something you would be interested in reading as well, you are more than welcome to follow me over there. It’s called ‘Zebra Crossing’ and you can find it by clicking here. I’m trying to keep it updated fairly regularly, so hopefully there will be something there for you to read!

You can also check out my YouTube channel here, where I have recently uploaded a few new videos (and hope to continue doing!)

I’m also trying to post on Snapchat a bit more, so if you fancy following me, my username is Jennycole44.

What have you been up to this week? I always enjoy hearing about your news and adventures!

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Sunday Snippets - 24th July 2016

The last week has been fairly busy, so I’m feeling quite wiped out at the moment. There have been good times and not so good times, so I’ve just been trying to get through one day at a time. It’s been super hot, which has made things a bit of a struggle. I love the sunshine and I don’t mind it being warm, but there have been a few days when it’s really just been too hot. Still, I guess we shouldn’t moan, as we’ll only be complaining in a month or so when it’s cold and rainy!

Last Sunday I didn’t wake up until around 11am, which means I slept for around 11 hours, so I must have been really wiped out after the blogger event on Saturday! I had a pretty quiet morning sorting out my medications for the week ahead and doing a bit of blogging. I sat out in the garden to drink my Ensure at lunchtime and listened to Ellie Goulding and Adele, which was nice. My brother and sister-in-law (David and Emma) came over in the afternoon and showed us all of their wedding photos, as they’d been sent the link for the proof copies. There are so many beautiful ones; I don’t know how they’re going to choose a few for their album! I then popped over the road to see my friend Sarah, who was visiting her parents for the day. We had a good chat, which was lovely. My Grandma was over, so in the evening we had a family dinner together.  

This month’s Crown and Glory Glitterati subscription box is pretty awesome. Just look at that light-up hairpiece! It would be perfect for a festival (if only I was going to one!)

I woke up fairly early on Monday and went to have my hair coloured at the hairdressers so it’s nice for the wedding. I came home and rested for a bit, as I was still feeling pretty wiped out after Saturday. I ordered a couple of birthday presents for friends and watched TV. In the afternoon my Dad took me to see my GP again. I pretty much spilled out everything that’s been happening with my mental health. I told her what happened last Friday and that I just can’t keep dipping into these crises every few days. We also discussed the fact that I and my family don’t agree with my diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder and that it’s been disputed by other professionals, who believe I actually have Bipolar. My Dad and I feel that my old psychiatrist hasn’t taken it seriously and based her responses on incorrect information about Bipolar (she said I couldn’t possibly have Bipolar because I haven’t been arrested by the police!) My GP was fab – really understanding and seemed to get what I was saying. She’s going to refer me to a different psychiatrist for a second opinion. I popped into Waitrose next door afterwards and picked up an Innocent Smoothie to have as part of my afternoon snack.

I also opened this month’s Birchbox, which is in collaboration with Millie Mackintosh. I absolutely love the design of the box, and am excited to try some of the bits inside.

Tuesday was the hottest day of the year so far, and boy was it hot! I was seriously melting! The heat hasn’t been great for my POTS unfortunately, but I’ve tried to muddle through and keep as cool as possible. I wanted to do some blog work in the morning, but my desktop computer that I use for blogging is in my attic bedroom, which is a sauna in this weather. So I went downstairs, dozed for a bit and then wrote a couple of letters to my penpals (including this adorable cat card). In the afternoon my Mum and I went round to see my friend Katy from Katy Jane Rose Beauty. While my Mum had her nails done I replied to a few messages on my laptop, then I had my eyebrows done, followed by a lovely relaxing facial. We popped into Waitrose on our way home and then I finished off my letters.

This month’s My Little Box was coconut themed, which I’m very happy about, as I love coconuts!

With it being ridiculously hot and humid, poor Freddie was really struggling. But he seemed to find a comfy position stretched out on the sofa!

Wednesday was another hot day, but a tiny bit cooler than Tuesday. In the morning my Mum, Dad, sister and I went to B&Q. They pushed me around to look at light fittings. We then went over to Pets at Home to get the dogs a couple of beds for the lounge, and I bought Jaffa a new little toy to play with. I was pretty exhausted by the time we got home, so I crashed out on the sofa and rested for a while. I spent the afternoon watching YouTube videos and writing penpal letters. In the evening we had my brother and his fiancé’s (Richard and Lisa’s) wedding rehearsal, and then all went to the pub for dinner, which was nice. Unfortunately I felt really ill afterwards and had another mental health dip.

I gave Jaffa his new toy, and to begin with he seemed far from interested! But I popped my head round the door a bit later and found him playing with it, so I think he was just trying to play it cool!

On Thursday morning my Mum, Dad and sister (Bekkah) drove me over to Basingstoke to my friend Charlie’s house. They headed into Basingstoke to do some shopping so I could spend a few hours with Charlie and her two little ones, Izzi and Joe. We spent a while chatting while Izzi and Joe played and watched Big Hero 6. Charlie then made us all some lunch, with the help of chef Izzi! After lunch we sat out in the garden watching Izzi and Joe playing. Joe drew a cute picture of me with chalk; they did some hula hooping and played swing ball. We all enjoyed an ice-lolly, as it was still pretty warm. A Change for Life letter came through the door, and spookily it had a game on it called Charlie and Jenny’s Hide and Seek! My Dad and the others then picked me up and we all came home. I spent the rest of the afternoon just chilling out.

I hadn’t really planned on doing much on Friday, but my Mum offered to take me into town to do a bit of shopping. How could I refuse?! So we went into Camberley for a little while. I picked up this beautiful skirt from Quiz and then had a look in Primark but couldn’t really find anything I liked apart from a hat, which was reduced to £2! I think I’ll have to go back to Primark in a few weeks when they will hopefully have more of their new stock in. We popped into Next on our way home so my Mum could pick up a present for someone. I spent the afternoon resting on the sofa, watching some programmes I had on record and catching up on blog e-mails. The evening wasn’t too great unfortunately, as my mental health took a bit of a dip.

Yesterday morning I woke up fairly late – I seem to be so tired at the moment. I spent the morning just pottering around and not doing an awful lot really. At lunchtime we went over to my sister-in-law’s parents’ house for her Dad’s 50^th birthday BBQ. We sat out in the sunshine and chatted for a few hours before we had to come home, as my Dad was going out in the evening. I rested on the sofa trying to cool down a bit, as I’d got a bit hot sitting out in the sun. I also binge-watched some YouTube videos and wrote some penpal letters.

I bought these beautiful sunflowers and stocks this week, and they’re looking lovely. Sunflowers always make me smile and stocks smell so dreamy.

If you haven’t read my blog before, I just wanted to let you know that I have a second blog, which mainly focuses on my health in more depth than I talk about it here. It’s largely for friends and family to follow and keep up with what’s going on, but if it’s something you would be interested in reading as well, you are more than welcome to follow me over there. It’s called ‘Zebra Crossing’ and you can find it by clicking here. I’m trying to keep it updated fairly regularly, so hopefully there will be something there for you to read!

You can also check out my YouTube channel here, where I have recently uploaded a few new videos (and hope to continue doing!)

I’m also trying to post on Snapchat a bit more, so if you fancy following me, my username is Jennycole44.

What have you been up to this week? I always enjoy hearing about your news and adventures!

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