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I recently signed up to the Littlewoods fashion blog partner program. Unfortunately there were a few problems sorting out my product and it didn’t work out. Luckily Very.co.uk – which sells the same stuff under a different name (and with added Fearne Cotton) – swooped in to be my knight in shining armour and offered to send me an outfit instead.

True to their word, stuff arrived a couple of days later, so thank you Very for sorting me out.

The dress they chose for me is unfortunately not really my kind of thing. It’s a semi-fitted A-line shape, which makes me look like a barrel. As you can see in the left pic, I’m not too impressed! I added a belt to cinch it in a bit, but it still does very little for my shape and would be better on someone with smaller hips.

That said, the frills on the top are surprisingly pretty and flattering for a bigger bust. Reading the customer reviews on the site, it seems to be a hit with women who’re bigger up top. I found I liked the neckline much more when I pulled it down to an off-the-shoulder shape.

The dress is well made and fully-lined, and its now in the sale for only £12, making it quite a bargain.

Print-wise, snakeskin is not really something I’d wear normally, and I think a better bet would be the plain coloured version of the same shape with a tie belt for £49, which is part of Holly Willoughby’s collection for Very.

More successful were the accessories they picked out for me.

The bag, which I love, is by Dune and is now £22. It’s satin with a hard frame, a detatchable snake chain strap and a hard diamante bow. It’s much prettier in real life than it looks in the pictures. I carried it on New Year’s Eve, and it was big enough to hold all the essentials. There are even matching shoes.

While we’re on the subject, the shoes Very sent me are from the So Fabulous collection aimed at larger women, thus they’re wide fit. I’ll review them in more detail on Big Girls Browse shortly, but to sum up, they’re comfortable, they’re timeless, they’ll go with most outfits, but they’re a bit too wide for my size 6 feet!

It’s totally the wrong time of year for this review, but I didn’t go on holiday until late September so even then it would have missed the boat a bit. For those of you going away to sunny climes over the Winter break, here is a way of rubbing it in even more. For those of you who won’t be going away until next Summer, it gives you chance to stash a couple of quid a month so you can buy this in June!

This Summer, the folks at Imedeen were kind enough to send me some of their Tan Optimizer to try. I have very pale skin that just doesn’t seem to tan, so I thought I was a fairly good test subject. Some people argue that everyone tans, but I promise you that for 26 years I’ve found it really difficult to get my skin to go any colour other than bright lobster red. I lie in the shade, I top up my SPF 50 every couple of hours, and still if I get any colour it’s pink to say the least. And don’t tell me to use a lower SPF, try sunbeds or ’sit in the sun for a bit to get used to it’. I don’t want cancer, kthnx.

So a product that tops up all the stuff in the body that encourages a tan seemed like it might be a good solution. Tan Optimizer isn’t a miracle formula, and to be honest, you could probably get the same result from feasting on tomatoes (for the lycopene), taking loads of multivitamins and so on, but this offers all that in one smallish daily capsule. You take the capsules for four weeks before your trip, continue taking them while you’re away, and then continue after you return to prelong the tan. The idea is that it “supports your skin’s own sun protection mechanism”. You’ll still need to use an SPF, but if you take it properly, you should get a more even, longer-lasting tan.

So did it work? Well, if you bear in mind that I didn’t really sit out in the sun much, but walked around a lot in desert heat of 30 degrees plus and didn’t burn at all, then yes it definitely did. I didn’t go St Tropez bronze, but that wasn’t my plan. On my return people actually commented that I’d picked up some colour – a miracle for me. Looking back on photos of the holiday, I can see that my arms in particular did indeed tan lightly, and that colour lasted a good few weeks after I got home. For me, this is worth £40. It may sound a lot but I spend that on a taxi to the airport without thinking twice. Protecting my skin for a fortnight is worth far more than that (because every bad sunburn increases the risk of skin cancer).

Imedeen Tan Optimizer £38.50 for 60 capsules (2 month supply)

When the kind folks at Electric Shopping offered to send me one of the newfangled hair removal products to try, I couldn’t really say no. As far as I’m concerned, hair removal is up there with ironing and washing up in the list of things I hate doing the most so anything that might stop me having to do it so often is a winner in my book.

The no!no! is a gadget that uses ‘Thermicon’ technology to remove hair. Basically, it’s the no-laser home alternative to laser hair removal, using only heat to zap hairs in a similar way, disrupting the follicle to stop them coming back. It claims to reduce growth up to 64%, and is also pain-free. Sounds good, but it comes at a price - £139.99 to be precise, plus you may need replacement hot blades.

The product itself looks like a small epilator (I was sent the pink but it also comes in black and blue) and comes with all kinds of extras, including a DVD to show you how to use it. Sounds intense, but getting the hang of it does take some time so it’s worth watching. Once you do get confidence, it lives up to it’s pain free promise, and it’s pretty quick too… it takes slightly longer than shaving, but less than epilating.

So how does it work? First you choose the right element (one for longer hair or one for stubble), slot it in and turn it on. Then you hold the no!no! at a 90 degree angle to the skin, and move it along at a steady pace. A light will tell you if you’re moving at the right speed. It doesn’t hurt even if you mess up, you just might feel a tiny bit of heat if you go too slow. What is unnerving though is the smell. This product is essentially burning hair, so you won’t be surprised to hear that using it fills the room with the smell of, um, burning hair. That takes a bit of getting used to and it is a big con (the guide suggests burning scented candles as you use it – not a bad idea).

Between using the no!no! on each area, you then pause to use the buffer (think very fine sandpaper) to buff the treated area. This removes bits of burnt hair and dry skin and any bits that have been missed. It reminds me a bit of using the silkymit (anyone remember that?) without the intense burning pain an hour later. This new-wave buffer is very fine and soft, but it does the job.

The makers of no!no! are very clear on the fact it may not remove all the hair at first, and you have to make a commitment to use it a few times a week minimum at first to see real results. This was a slight problem given the fact I was reviewing the product in the middle of Summer when I had my legs out all the time, but you can shave in between uses if need be (it’ll just slow down the process of reducing hair growth). As I’m fair-haired naturally, the hairs on my legs aren’t that noticeable anyway so it wasn’t too much of an issue, but worth bearing in mind if you’re darker. If you’re thinking of investing, this time of year is the time to give this a go, as you’ll be in tights or trousers most of the time so a bit of regrowth / missed sections as you get used to using it won’t be on show!

So the big question is…did I see results? Yes, I did, though I have some way to go. This is a long-term solution and there are no quick miracle results, so I’ll probably check in to this review in a few months to update. As of now, the hairs on my legs take longer to grow back and are finer when they do, and I think that will continue. I like that the no!no! is pain-free and easy to use, and it doesn’t make much noise either so I can use it while watching TV or listening to music. There’s no mess and it’s small and easy to store away – all good plus points. The main downsides are the smell, and the fact that it is expensive, but it’s actually not much pricier than a good epilator and is definitely a better option. Overall, I give it the thumbs up, and I hope in time they can reduce the cost so more people can give it a go!

* no!no! Hair Removal System, £139.99 at Electric Shopping

I’m off to Vegas tomorrow, but luckily for you, there is just enough time for me to talk to you about gin.

Yes, gin.

You see, I am a marketers dream. I watch an advert for chocolate on TV, I want chocolate. I read in a magazine that Rimmel / Maybelline / Lancome have created a new mascara and I go and buy it even though at last count I had approximately 27 mascaras. I see someone talking about karaoke on Twitter and I’m on singnap Lucky Voice Home before you can say “I really don’t want to be your friend any more, you loser”.

So when the nice people at Gordon’s emailed and offered to send me a bottle of gin and some assorted goodies for some Friday funtimes, I instantly thought “Do you know what, I really fancy a gin and tonic.”

For the record, I don’t think I’ve ever had a gin and tonic in my life.

Until now.

It worked, of course. The free gin, the retro branded glasses and the Gordon Ramsay cookbook won me over, and not only can I now knock up a pretty good Friday evening beef stir fry, I am also gin convert. After years of drinking Archers and diet coke (no, really, it’s amazing) and buckets of white wine, I will now, occasionally, have a gin and tonic with a wedge of lime instead. This is partly because the people at Archers have yet to offer me free stuff, but also because gin’s actually really nice. Who knew? It’s also a slightly more sophisticated drink than the alcopops, apple sours and white chocolate Corky’s I used to drink on Friday nights in my youth.

I say ‘youth’, I mean ‘three years ago’.

We’ll be giving away the Gordon’s Friday Pack on Domestic Sluttery soon, so keep your eyes out for that if you too want free booze and the chance to ruin perfectly simple recipes. Staying in is the new going out, after all.

It’s time for another mascara review, as I hunt for the perfect lash perfector. I’m going to try and alternate between makeup counter options and bargain alternatives, because I truly believe there are some £5 mascaras out there that really do the job.

Today, however, is the turn of the pricey ‘Sumptuous’ from Estee Lauder, a £17+ treat in a swish gold tube that promises bold volume and lift.

Now I like drama, and when I was buying this, that was what I was promised. Well, actually I was told I should try the TurboLash with its vibrating brush, but the idea of putting something that vibrates so close to my eyes freaks me out, as does the £27.40 price tag. So Sumptuous it was.

All in all, this does the job. It’s a proper old-school mascara, with a classic mid-sized bristle brush and quite a thick, dense creamy texture. Where it really impressed me was that it just doesn’t clump. Cheaper mascaras of a similar thickness (Rimmel Volume Flash, for example) give bold results but need loads of combing through to separate the lashes after application. With this, I only needed a couple of coats for a daytime lash, but I found I could keep on adding it without any clumping.

However, it takes quite a lot of coats for anything resembling the false lash look I like, but I do have high hopes when it comes to that. As a does-it-all daytime mascara, it looks the part, stays on all day, and doesn’t weigh down the lashes. Whether it’s worth £17 I’m not sure, but the lack of clumps definitely makes it a cut above many rivals.

Estee Lauder Sumptuous Mascara £17.13

Before: Maybelline Stiletto Lash
Next: Rimmel Glam’Eyes

I’ve been talking about mascara a lot on Twitter recently. As makeup goes, it seems to be the thing that gets people most angry / passionate / vocal. Ironically it’s also the thing I probably spend the least amount of money on. While my skin is coated in £25 foundation and my lips given a bit of shine with £15 lipgloss, the mascara I use rarely costs much more than a fiver.

Thing is, I’ve never found the perfect one. So I’m still on the lookout. Plenty have impressed me, an equal number have let me down. I’m sure you’re the same, ladies, so in an attempt to perform some kind of service on this blog other than amusing myself, I’ve decided I should try as many mascaras as I possibly can and share the results.

I’ll start with Maybelline Lash Stiletto. Looks pretty, has a quirky idea behind it, and doesn’t cost the earth. Sadly, I found it a little ‘meh‘. It does what it’s supposed to – adds gloss and loads of length, but I just wasn’t wowed by it. Maybelline are the mascara brand but this one isn’t their best, I think it’s just a bit too thin. I like drama and drama with this means four or five coats.

One thing I did love, however, was the brush. It’s a godsend if you’re fed up of HUGE brushes or plastic bristles or whatever other ‘new’ idea is trying to reinvent the wheel. This goes back to basics, it’s a long-bristled, narrow brush that gets to the roots and drags the lashes out and up. It’s really good for lower lashes and it allows so much control I can apply it on the train without smudging.

Yes, I do my makeup on the train. Please don’t judge me. It’s A 45 minute commute and I like my sleep!

Maybelline Lash Stiletto: £7.82 (with £2 off at Boots now)

Next: Estee Lauder Sumptuous.

Girls Aloud. False eyelashes. Girls Aloud false eyelashes. Brilliant.

Rumour has it the girls got through 145 pairs of falsies on their last tour, so this collaboration with Eylure was a match made in heaven. Of course, Girls Aloud are not exactly known for their minimalist, pared down style, so it won’t surprise you that even the most ‘natural’ lashes are pretty over the top.

Since I knew everyone else would go for Cheryl’s, I decided to give Nicola’s lashes a go. They’re quite fine and natural in the centre, but soon graduate into super-dramatic wings at the sides. Obviously, I had to finish the look with a side parting and pale lips. If you’re going to do 60s, you may as well go all out.

I have to admit, I love them. I really didn’t want to, but Eylure have always made reliably dramatic lashes at a good price (these are just under a fiver at Superdrug) and adding Girls Alound into the mix is no bad thing. Sarah’s next, perhaps?