Hey, Big Spender!

I had every intention of making this post a vlog, but unfortunately, my iMovie isn't co-operating today, and so I have had to make-do with photos and a written post, rather than subjecting you all to my nasty Aussie accent!

Last night I had a friend from uni stay over for an old-school sleepover, complete with girly movies, mass amounts of junk food, and a shopping trip to Pacific Fair, one of the larger shopping centres on the Gold Coast, today. We had what I could only describe as an extremely emotional night last night, watching The Vow, The Lucky One, Stick It and G.I. Joe. I think we almost flooded my lounge room with our tears while watching The Vow, which is just such an incredible movie, so we really needed some happy-go-lucky Channing Tatum in G.I. Joe to cheer us up after that!

Today, we set off for Pacific Fair with a very strict list of what we actually needed to buy stuck in our heads, determined that we wouldn't let all the pretties distract from what we were there for. I knew I needed a pair of jeans, some jumpers and some nice, uni-friendly tops and Mikeala knew she needed a nice jacket to wear out and about. Well, Mikeala walked out with nothing, and I walked out with only a pair of jeans from our list, but plenty more pretties as evidence of a day well spent!

The first shop we went into was Temt, and what can I say other than that I was Temt-ed by almost every single thing I saw in there to break my promise with myself! SO MANY PRETTY DRESSES! Thankfully, Mikeala reigned me in, and I walked out with only one thing, the maroon, paisley knitted dress which is at the back of my haul picture. For only $10, I just couldn't say no to it, because even though it is figure-hugging, I know I'll get a lot of wear out of it because it is quite nice to wear to uni, and it's really warm.

The next shop to make me cave was Jay Jays, to my surprise! I don't often shop in Jay Jays, but I really wanted a pair of black, high-waisted jeans and I knew they had them because my sister bought some. I'm planning on wearing them to see A Day To Remember tomorrow night, and so I bought the striped crop-top in Jay Jays as well, to wear with them, but I ended up finding the maroon and black top by my favourite surf brand, Mooloola for only $19 in City Beach straight after I left Jay Jays, so now it will be worn tomorrow, and the stripey top will just have to wait it's turn!

I love the cut-out details in this top, and I also love that it's a little bit longer than a few of the other crop tops I tried on today. I'm not usually much of a crop top person, because ew, belly! but with high-waisted things, I think this top will look really nice! One of the most exciting things that happened to me today is that this top is only a size 8, and the maroon dress is only a small! Normally I wear a 10 or a medium in clothes so this got me all in a tizz. I haven't been trying to lose weight or anything, but I have noticed it has been hapening and I quite like the way my body looks right now. I really started to notice my jeans hanging off my butt a few weeks ago, but it seems that I'm between sizes at the moment, becuase I still had to get a 10 in the black high-waisted ones, so now I'm just praying they don't stretch too much, as I know Jay Jays jeans tend to do!

OH! And today I found out that Australia has Lush!!! I've never seen a Lush store over here before and then, ta-da! There one was, right in the middle of Pacific Fair! This is really exciting to me, because I am allergic to sulfates and have really sensitive skin, so I'm always looking for quality, yet affordable natural products to use on my hair and skin. After describing my skin type to the assistant there, she recommended Angels on Bare Skin for me, as I had guessed she would. I was a little bit sceptical of it at first, after Erica's review, but I have heard great things about it from other bloggers, and when she demonstrated it on my hand, I had no bad effects from it. If I like Angles on Bare Skin, I will definitely be going back for a toner and moisturiser as well, because they felt great on my skin and I love the calming, rose and lavender smells! The assistant kindly also gave me a sample of their Rehab Shampoo, as I had asked about sulfate-free shampoos and told her that I had extremely dry hair and this is what she recommended. Unfortunately, Lush uses sulfates in all of their hair products which was a massive bummer to me. Their excuse was that they haven't found a replacement for it that they don't need to test on animals, but I call bullshit because I've been using natural shampoos for years, and none of them are tested on animals, nor do they have sulfur in them.Apparently the sulfates in Lush's shampoos is natural and derived from coconut, so I'm going to give it a little tester and see if I react to it. I've never had a reaction from eating coconut before, so I'm hoping that their products are safe to use on my hair!

The two nail polishes I bought are from Sportsgirl and I LOVE them! I've already painted my stubby, little fingernails in them, in the hopes that if they look pretty I won't bite them, and boy do they look pretty! The gold is really opaque, which is exactly what I wanted. It looks like frosted gold on my fingers and I only used two coats! I could have gotten away with one, as well if I hadn't missed a bit of my finger. The pink is a little less impressive, as it's much lighter than I anticipated and really needs three coats to even make your nails look painted, but on long fingernails, it would look fantastic!

All in all, I had a great day shopping despite not getting what I was after. Have you been shopping recently? I don't go often so when I do, I usually go all out. This was a very constrained shopping trip, compared to my usual! How do you go at controlling your spending? I would also really love to hear about your experiences with Lush products, since I'm so new to them!