Glowing Greater Than The Gods | Revolution Beauty Liquid Highlighter & x Soph Highlighter Look & Review

Hey everyone!

Welcome to a brand new blog post! I thought that, today I would talk to you all about some Highlighters that I have been trying out lately. If makeup isn't your thing, then check out some of my other posts. If you love makeup then carry on reading. 

Revolution are a well known high street beauty and makeup brand, Revolution are well known for creating amazing products at very affordable price tags. Revolution are also known for their ranges that are in collaboration with influences and their top notch highlighter ranges, As I've only heard god things about their highlighter ranges, I thought that it was time to try a couple of them.

This is my first proper makeup review so please don't judge me if it isn't the most informative. 

Revolution Liquid Highlighter in Starlight 

As I have been watching a fair few drag makeup tutorial videos, that start off with putting down a liquid/cream layer of makeup before putting on a powder version on top, I thought that it would be good to get a liquid highlighter and a powder highlighter to ensure that I got the most shine possible. I wanted to be glowing greater than the gods.

I walked into my local Superdrug, and scoured the store for the highlighter section on the Revolution stand. When I had found it, a problem arised, I had no idea what shade I was, so I decided to swatch a couple of the testers on my hand to see which one matched the best. After deciding that Starlight was the one that matched my nearly as pale as a vampire's skin, another problem happened. A lot of the ones in my shade were already somewhat open. After a fair few moments, I found a unopened Starlight. I grabbed it like it was the ring from Lord Of The Rings and made my way to the till very quickly. (My precious...)

The product comes in a sort of metallic finished bottle with a pipette to get the product out. I love the packaging alone, because well I love anything with a metallic finish. It's also sleek and compact therefore its easy to fit into any makeup bag. It took me a few times to properly master the getting as much as I want from a pipette technique, but once I did I loved what came out.

The colour is a sort of white to silver sheen with a touch of pink to it which I love. As I said, my face is pretty much near to the same colour as a pale vampire, so having a bit of a pink undertone in my highlighter means that it will warm my face a touch and just make the silver pop that little bit extra. I love this colour too because even before applying it, I could tell that it was going to make me shine bright than well the Sun during a British Heatwave weekend.

The highlighter blends onto the skin beautifully. It has a creamy texture and could be used mixed into a foundation to give it a more glow look. I loved the shine from this alone and it lasted for a good couple of hours. The best way that I found to use it was to blend it with a wet beauty sponge as a brush wasn't doing much.

This highlighter was £6 when I purchased it which is a great price for any high street highlighter.

Soph x Highlighter Palette 

I got this a while ago, after Michelle used it on me before going on one of our epic nights out. These always start with catching up and end up with us both having no voices from singing. This palette contains 8 different highlighter shades to suit most shades of skin. I only use the first four due to my skin being very pale. (Read the Liquid Highlighter to find out how pale my skin is...) I mainly use a mic of all four or the top two in the left corner. (I have zero idea on the shade names.) This creates a very shiny powder highlight that can be built up for more intensity. I used the top two on top of the liquid highlighter for more shine, and, because well, there was a heatwave when I was using them so I needed to ensure that the liquid highlighter didn't end up melting down my face.

There was a bit of fall out with this one, but most powder highlighters have a tiny bit of fall out. I used this all over the body and the face, but this could be used wherever you want, I think that its an amazing palette and if you mix some of the shades together, it can create a unique shade for yourself.

This palette was £10 which is an amazing price for 8 highlighters. It is more than worth the money and there is a good amount of product in each pan.

Final Thoughts

I would give the Revolution Liquid Highlighter a 9/10. The only fall down was getting the amount that I wanted out of the pipette and I would give the Soph X Highlighter Palette a 9/10. My own critique would be about the slight fall out but that's expected with all powder products.

Check out Revolution Beauty.

Have you checked out any of these products? Let me know down below!

Thanks for reading!
Jamie x

Let's Talk About Some LGBTQIAP+ Topics | A Ramble About Being Myself

Hey everyone! 

Welcome to a brand new blog post! This post may be controversial for some, it may be relevant to others, but, as it's Pride Month, I thought that it was best if I had a little discussion with you all about some stuff. Without sounding self centred, most of this post will be about me, and it will be rambly, but I hope that you don't mind that.

It's probably going to be best to sort this rambling thread out into sections. I felt that it was mainly important to create this post, because not only is it Pride Month, but the LGBTQIAP+ community as a whole, are still very marginalised and as I'm a part of the community, I thought that I needed to speak up about some stuff. Some stuff is positive, some is negative, and some is in-between.

Non-binary

If anyone didn't know, I identify as non-binary. This is defined as, a term that is used for people that are not exclusively masculine or feminine‍. ‌Identities that are outside the gender binary and cisnormativity. I did a post a while ago about being non-binary (click here if you want to read that.) Being non-binary is sometimes a weird concept to explain to anyone that is cisgendered (someone whose gender identity matches their anatomical gender at birth), because being both masculine and feminine can come across as a new subject to them, even though it has been around in many cultures for many years. Being 'enby' is still something that I am trying to express in a way that I want to and is still something that I am working on. I think that celebrities coming out as enby has definitely helped. It's showed me that the representation is slowly getting better therefore more people are learning to understand and accept enby, but also that no one fully has it together which helps my state of mind a lot with my gender. When I came out as non-binary, I got a fair few people asking me, can you be non-binary with a beard? Doesn't facial hair instantly make you conform to the attributes of one gender? Well no, why should something that grows on my face instantly define who I am? Society has told you to think that beards are ultra masculine, and well in my opinion, they are not. Clothing, again. shouldn't be categorised into gender specific sections. Yes, I know that many within society and media have had this debate, but for me, having gender specific sections, scared me when starting to understand my gender and who I am. I felt awkward going through female clothing sections in stores in case someone stopped me. I know that sounds stupid, but that's because society has told us that if someone that isn't a cis woman is looking at women's clothing is dodgy and weird, which is not completely true. We need to realise that most just want to look at female clothing, because, well there's sometimes better designs for certain aesthetics in the 'women' section. That was about a year ago, and I can't thank my female presenting friends such as Abbey and Michelle, who would help me look through such sections in stores so I didn't feel anxious. This year alone, I've dabbled more in makeup (an expensive and tricky hobby), worn crop tops and dresses outside and had genuine fun presenting as feminine when I've felt it in front of random strangers. All things that I was scared to do on my own this time last year. Dysphoria still and will happen,

Being Polyamorous

Polyamory is defined as, engaging in multiple sexual relationships with the consent of all the people involved. (I have also done a post on this before so click here to read it). When writing my previous post about being poly, I didn't really know how to explain any of it I just knew that it was something that I knew that was for me? I've slowly figured that it's more to do with mental health and that it helps my anxiety as I have a tendency to push some away when feeling 'bleh'. I also think that polyamory has a sort of stigma around it. I know that sounds slightly silly seeing as we live in an inclusive society, but stay with me. Polyamory has kind of being perceived as this thing that only a small minority do, that may be true, but its also been shown to be portrayed via hippies or America. By that I mean, polyamory being the centre of a communal lifestyle where many people come and live together and they share everything, or, something hidden in the corners of America in places such as Utah for it to be gawked at by the mainstream media, due to it being niche. The first one sounds kinda interesting, and, like a Marxists dream, but also sounds problematic. Also why was the stereotype with hippies? I guess that media didn't;t know what to do with it due to it not being mainstream and therefore decided to seek the first sighting of polyamory and just lump it altogether? That was wrong to do then, and, it's wrong to do today. When others ask me about polyamory, they get confused and anxious. I get that, being confused and anxious about something that you're not used to is expected. However, when I try to educate someone on it, they either just don't want to grasp it, slut shame, or, instantly come back with, 'oh well, I'd get jealous'. First of all, Karen, if you're confused about something and I educate you, the nice thing to do is to at least listen and nod. If you don't get it, that's fine, but ask questions, that's what questions are for. If you're not going to listen then why should I bother? Second of all,  you shouldn't slut shame anyone, no matter what. If I don't judge you, then why should you judge me? Third of all, everyone gets jealous, we compare and contrast within life. We shouldn't but its an innate thing to do, so of course polyam's get jealous, but communication is key. For me, polyamory is something that is still new in my life, but the way that I view polyamory, is something that improves my life. I'm not sure where I am with it, just like my gender, but I love love and I love people, so shouldn't that be enough for right now?

Holding Peoples Hands In Public

Most of you may think that holding hands in public is nothing, but for anyone in the LGBTQIAP+ community, it's not just a simple mundane thing. Homophobic/anti-queer attacks still happen. They happen in the UK, they happen around the world, and they probably happen in the town that you live in. Holding hands shows that you're being intimate within public grounds. Sometimes, this might be within safe spaces, sometimes this might just be shopping, but this still shows bravery. It shows that you know that someone might come up to you and shout slurs at you, they might punch you in the face but it shows that you're being your true authentic self. I'm still getting used to this for many reasons. Not only am I holding hands with people to show that I'm being myself, but I do it with my closest friends, due to needing help with seeing sometimes. I have an eye condition that means that I can't see that great within dimly lit places or well dark lighting/no lighting. Frankly, this isn't going to stop me going out at night, nor is it going to stop me going on nights out and adventures. This means that I let friends help me by holding my hand and guiding me, and that's fine, but to strangers they may not realise. By this, I mean that, invisible illnesses or even eye conditions, aren't recognised unless there's a visual cue to go along with it. No one gets that someone has a disability unless there's a wheelchair or a cane to show the disability. This means that I have still gotten scared that my face might get punched, or I'll get slurs shouted at me. I know what you're thinking. 'Jamie, it's rare that it will happen.' That's true, but it has multiple times. That's the only problem, most want to say that we've come a long way within queer rights, but have we? Should anyone be scared to hold hands? Hell no. Should someone be scared to show their loved ones affection in public? No. Yes, the LGBTQIAP+ community have some rights under the Equality Act, but that doesn't solve everything. We are slowly getting there though. This is why I've started to not care. Why should I be scared in case one thing happens, when I know that even if someone did punch me for being myself, that won't stop me being myself. I've started to hold hands with anyone and everyone that I know (after consent of course) because well, why should we care what others think?

Finding A Tribe

A lot of the LGBTQIAP+/queer community, decide to create their own family, as sometimes we're not lucky to have a family that accepts us as our true authentic selves. I have a family that does. I love them a lot, but I think that having a tribe/second sort of family was the best decision that I could have ever made. Not everyone in what ever tribe you find are the same, and that's fine, because its the best thing about being in a part of a smaller tight knit sort of community. You learn new things, you get educated on things that you would never know about otherwise, but, you get to do the same back. You can also rely and trust the people around you. and honestly, its fabulous. Finding people that share the same ideas and values has opened my mind up. It's also boosted my confidence, showed me that I can be open and not get hurt for doing so, and so much more. I don't talk about my mental health on here much anymore, but, its calmed my anxiety down so much. Honestly, if I hadn't had found people that I could trust, I wouldn't be able to write the above. Hell, I wouldn't really be able to write this post at all.

Thank you to, Alex L, Richard and Alex, Jim, Shaun, Mike, Vince, Johann, Kevin and Richard, Ben, Jos, Toby, Kris, Axel, Abbey, Michelle, Dan and anyone else that I've forgotten. (I'm writing this in the early depths of the morning.) Not to be cheesy, but to quote a misfit character that I relate on a spiritual level to, 'this is my family, I found it all on my own. It's little, and, broke, but still good. Yeah still good.' (Comment down below if you know the quote.)

Businesses With Rainbows/Commercialisation Of Pride

I read an article whilst planning this post that talked about how sticking rainbows onto brands logos isn't enough by one of the members of Years and Years. They said that they were sick of businesses just changing their logo to rainbow and thinking that it's enough to show their pride. I think that this is true. A brand can't just change its logo for a month and think that this is enough. If a brand is truly wanting to show their pride, then why not give a percentage of your profits to an LGBTQIAP+ charity? Why not make sure that your LGBTQIAP+ staff are being treated equally? Why not have a Pride range all year round? Pride can't just be a gimmick for a month to increase sales. LGBTQIAP+ can't be reduced down to a BLT with some added Guacamole to make it inclusive. It's pandering and it cheapens your brand as a whole. I'm glad that some brands have ensured that their Pride ranges do donate to a charity, but the ranges are only out for June which is problematic, because well Pride isn't just in June. Rainbows can happen at any time, and so can Pride and celebrating equality around the world. If you're going be loud, be so loud that they can hear from you the other side of the world and keep with it.

I hope that you've enjoyed this post and that you've had a good Pride Month. If you're going to any Pride events this year, be inclusive and be accepting. If you know any LGBTQIAP+ people, talk them, ask questions, let them educate you and accept and love them.

Thank you for reading this rambly post. 
Jamie x

Having A Punk Pizza Party | Adore Delano A Pizza Me Manchester

Hey everyone!

How's everything going?

Welcome to a brand new blog post! I went to see Adore Delano a while ago in Manchester, and, I thought that today I would talk to you all about it.

If you don't know who Adore Delano is? Then where have you been for the past few years?! Adore Delano (Danny Noriega) is a drag entertainer, who first got caught the people's eye via the American talent show, American Idol as Danny. Some years later, Danny grabbed the worlds attention, via, participating in Season Six of RuPauls Drag Race, as Adore Delano. Adore Delano is a drag performer who bases their aesthetic on the punk and grunge movements, and from other aspects of pop culture.

Myself and my friend Alex, decided to go to the A Pizza Me tour, as I relate to a lot of Danny and Adore's views on the world and I love Adore's aesthetic and the grunge/punk movement. I was already in Manchester that weekend, to see Panic! At The Disco (read that post here), so it made sense to make the weekend even better by going to see Adore the day after.

We got to the venue and made our way to the balcony to watch the show. The venue increased the excitement for the show via playing songs from other Drag Race alumni and adverts for shows that were coming up from other drag entertainers.

The show started off with a pre show by Victoria Secret, a drag entertainer from Dublin. They started off the night via telling stories and antics and even included a mix of songs based off the story of Nadine Coyle, from lying via her age to get onto an Irish talent show to being a part of one of the UK's biggest airl groups.

After this, Victoria encouraged four of Adore's fans to get onto the stage for a lip sync to win some Adore merchandise. Even though the lip sync became a dance off, it was still amazing to see people get into the groove of things.

When Adore came to the stage, they started off the show with a rendition of, Britney Spears' top hit 'Piece Of Me'. This mixed with the fact that Adore loves Pizza creates the title of the tour. The rendition was amazing and raw. A perfect way to describe the full show. Adore carried on with more songs, played via just two instruments, their voice and a guitar. After some conversations about her life and past, and a couple of songs, a Q&A session happened. Adore answered questions in relation to, Drag Race, All Stars, the punk movement, favourite songs and artists and much more. Adore even makes references to such TV shows via, adlibing during one of the songs they perform within the set to, 'I don't belong here anymore, All Stars.' They also talk about that its their first tour since sobriety and talks frankly about it during the set.

One of the best highlights throughout the show, was when Adore sang, Cher's infamous track, 'Believe'. Not only did Adore perform it with poise and class, but she explained that it was one of her late Dads favourite song, which meant that you could tell that Adore was pouring all of their feelings into the song and everyone in the room could tell this. I loved the slow acoustic version of it compared to the electronic anthem that we all know and love. All in all, I adored the A Pizza Me show at Manchester, and wish that I could have about five pieces more of Adore, because, I'm greedy like that.

Did you attend the A Pizza Me tour? Let me know down below! Do you have a favourite song from Adore? Let me know down below! 

Thanks for reading!
Jamie x

Taking Pride In The Clothes We Wear | Outfit Of The Day

Hey!

How are you?

Welcome to a brand new blog post! I thought that i would show you my Outfit Of The Day from my adventure in Leeds. (If you havent read it then do so.)

As I said, I had an amazing day hanging out with Michelle getting up to a few things such as, shopping, listening to great music. gossiping and doing quirky stuff such as getting filmed for ITV, getting a glass of Whiskey spilled on me, and, talking about inexplicit topics in the middle of a pub next to an old aged couple. Oops.

We ended up walking back to the train station, and, noticed the rainbow steps that head down to Freedom Quarter. I remembered them from when I went to Leeds Pride a few weeks ago. As Michelle is a professional photographer and a photography student, she thought that it would be a great idea to get some unique and fun shots on the steps.

I love Pride and I love everything that the rainbow flag stands for. I know that Pride has become a bit commercial but. that's for an entirely different post. I thought that it would be great to get some shots in front of something that encompasses equality and the freedom to be yourself. I'm still trying to grasp my confidence and rock the world like the confident kween that I am. Yes, kween, but hey ho.

A lot of the stuff that i am wearing is from Primark, not because I've been sponsored, but mainly because as a student, I like to wander into Primark and then end up getting far too many items of clothes due to them being pretty cheap.

The Jacket that I am wearing is from Primark. It was priced at £16 and is made of a pleather sort of material. I wear it out and about mainly because I want a Leather Jacket, but, I don't want to sacrifice my ethics of being animal friendly. It also adds to the grunge inspired aesthetic that I want to submerge my life in.

The shirt that i am wearing is from Primark. I believe it's from Primark or Boohoo, I can't fully remember. It's a Blue checked thick short sleeve Flannel Shirt, that is slightly thick but as the weather has slightly gotten a bit nippy, so I thought that it would be a good idea to wear it.

Next on the outfit list is the tshirt. A black Misfits T-shirt that has a white skull embedded on the front, with Misfits in white on the back. I originally got this from Pulp a few year ago, but, I got it in the biggest size possible so I can wear it no matter what... Even if I put a couple of pounds on, or off. This also adds to the grunge inspired look.

I then wore light blue chinos. This is rare, as I normally stick to dark stretch skinny jeans, but as England has had a massive heatwave, I've been wearing slightly lighter fabrics. I love anything blue but chinos make everything look a little bit more smarter which I enjoyed. As I was meeting Michelle, I wanted to look nice!

To finish it off the outfit, I decided to wear electric Blue Snoopy Vans. Yes, I love Snoopy. Yes, I know that they're childish. No, I don't care if they look cringy or tacky. I love them! I also think that the blue slightly goes with the Blue Chinos. I also think that Vans are one of the comfiest trainer/sneaker brands ever. I just love them!

Do you like this outfit?

I hope that you have enjoyed this fashion post. I hope that you come back next time to read another post! 

Thanks for reading! 
Jamie x 

This Is Me | My Gender

Hey!

Welcome to a brand new blog post!. I thought that I would do something different.

I have talked about it on here before, and, I will probably talk about it again and again. Gender is something that I've never been 100% fully sure about and I thought that today's post would be a good time to talk about it in a bit more detail. I know that discussions about gender can across as intense, but I think that, we all need to be educated on gender. This probably won't be the best laid out post, but I hope that this post does help the conversation in some shape or form. 

A stock image provided by pexels.com

Sex and gender are two completely different things. Sex is what you're assigned at birth due to the biological attributes that you have (including things such as your genitals), but gender is based on society and the things that surround you in the world. I believe that gender is on a spectrum, and things, such as the nature V nurture debate could affect it but I think that's definitely a post for another time. Gender does not have to relate to the genitals that someone has, but also gender could relate to the genitals that someone has. It depends on how the person feels.

Personally, I feel like I'm slightly on the more man side of the middle of the spectrum between man and woman. I'm going off imagining the spectrum being like the Kinsey Scale, which talks about defining your sexuality via heterosexual is on one end, and, homosexual is on the other side with numbers such as 1 being completely heterosexual and 5 being homosexual with marks such as, heterosexual with homosexual tendencies and so forth. I think that's right. (Side note, I need to stop writing blog posts at 3am.) I feel like like I'm masculine ti a degree but I'm also pretty feminine in many ways. I definitely don't feel like I adhere to many masculine attributes or stereotypes, and I feel like I don't adhere to all of the feminine attributes/stereotypes so I've always felt... well confused because society tells us that we should fit into a paradigm. We should be either male, or female. We should either be fat or thin etc and honestly, I hate it.

I want to say that I'm genderqueer. Genderqueer is a person who feels that his/her gender identity does not fit into the socially constructed "norms" associated with his/her biological sex.
Genderqueer is an identity that falls anywhere between man/boy/male and woman/girl/female on the spectrum of gender identities. The only problem with this for me is, that I'm still at the stage where I don't know exactly where I fit which means that labels don't exactly work that well for me at the moment. Don't get me wrong, labels can be great, as they can help others know who you are and they can help you find communities where you feel safe but also they attach an instant assumption and stereotypes to whatever label we decide to go with. I don't want to commit to a label and everything that comes with it until I'm completely sure. That might sound pretentious of me but it's what I prefer and that's what matters.

Carrying on from this, I think that it's a good time to talk about my name, pronouns and all of that jazz. All of the above and the thoughts about my gender that I've felt for a long while. Call me Jamie. It's as simple as that when it comes to names. My birth name is James, so, Jamie is probably the closest thing to a unisex name that I will ever achieve. Jamie Lee Curtis and other stars like Jamie Lynn Spears reinforce that Jamie can belong to anyone and not just one sex. Don't call me by my birth name unless I say it's fine, or, unless we're family/I completely trust you with my life, If you're unsure about what you should call me, ask. I only let people call me by my birth name at education because it's easier due to paperwork.

I let people such as lecturers call me by my birth name as I'm not sure what would happen in terms of paperwork, but also it saves ignorance. By that, I mean, a lot of people are ignorant on these fronts and, I honestly don't have the energy or the time to correct everyone because I would end up wanting to hit my head on a brick wall very quickly. I normally tell lecturers that I prefer Jamie but if they need to then call me by that. I think because this isn't the norm, the 'norm' (cis het people) don't understand what to do and instead of asking, they dig their own grave that little bit more and I don't want to be pushing them easily into it. If you call me by my name, I won;t be furious, I'll tell you and I'll probably tell you what I prefer and if you keep doing it if I'm in a shit mood, then I'll probably ignore you. Simple as that.

Pronoun wise, I prefer they/them. Before you start to ask why they/them, it's because of the above reasons but it's also because I'll have days where I won't know how I feel so they covers both him and her and it makes me feel less skittish and uncomfortable when using it. If I'm in a good mood then I don't mind either he/him/she/her depending on many things including how close we are. Try and only reserve him/he for when it's needed to be honest. If you have no clue and your head is confused by all of this, then please, ask. It will make myself more comfortable and it will make you feel a little bit less awkward when talking to me. I haven't changed, I'm still me. If you misgender me then I will tell you but to keep you less confused stick to they/them or he/him if needs be. I get that you might not know and it's best to ask because if I don't know how I feel/I'm still figuring out how I feel, then how the hell are you meant to know?

Dysphoria is a sensation of discomfort, loathing, anxiety, and depression revolving around one's social gender role and/or physical sex characteristics. It's a very serious experience that leads to larger anxiety/depression problems, depersonalisation, thoughts of suicide, social withdrawal and many other things. I've had serious waves of dysphoria in my everyday life, and, trust me, it's one of the worst sensations in the world. It's weird to explain to anyone that feels comfortable within themselves that they don't have to experience it. Feeling out of place when it comes to being a circle of friends that are comfortable with themselves sometimes triggers it, social media triggers it sometimes and my own body can. I know I post pictures of myself on social media which includes showing nude parts eg topless photos, but those take a lot of energy. If I'm not feeling my absolute best then they don't happen. I also know that represent body and self confidence but as soon as I think, screw it, I'll post it, I also get moments of self loathing and regret due to hating my body because it doesn't fit into one box. I don't think it does and I hate that sometimes.

I think that my aesthetic is pretty neutral when it comes to items that could be perceived as either 'masc' or 'fem'. but I would like to incorporate more fem styles of clothing into my wardrobe, if I ever have the confidence to rock it. I'd love to just wear a bad ass patterned dress and some chunky heels and be like, well this is my look. Take it in... I'd also love to give zero cares to the world, and wear things such as crop tops, and show my body off in all of it's glory. I'd love to experiment with makeup a bit more and just feel like I can rock a bright lip and a smoky eye someday. I've started experimenting with makeup slightly, but, I think that I would light to delve deeper into it. I'd also love to keep my facial hair and have crazy rocker quiff hair and own loads of leather jackets, and, casually just rock a suit to something casual so I can be extra when I want to feel masculine. I want to walk into a club, wear whatever I want, have glitter smothering my face and not feel like I'm emphasizing on being a 'freak to the norms of society.' I wish for all of these things, but hopefully, in the future, I can look at this post and think back on everything that I've done.

I hope that this post gets the conversation going a bit, I hope that it ensures that the representation of everyone that isn't already represented can have a light shined on them, and, I hope that this post educates someone. Just one person would be fine.

Be respectful of everyone around you, respect pronoun's and preferred names. Have conversations about anything that you don't know or understand with others and help to remove any stigma that society and the media create.

Talk below and further the discussion!

Thanks for reading! 
Jamie x