Sass and belle Archives

saharasplash24 August, 2018

What’s in our travel bags

You’re either two types of person: one who loves packing or one who hates it. After stressing out the day before for about half an hour, I’m generally ok and then I get into it. Although we have flown with Alice before to Ireland, I’m having to organise this one all by myself, so there’s a lot to do! I’d like to show you what’s in our travel bags as we head to Glasgow for the bank holiday weekend…

What’s in Alice’s bag

In Alice’s bag we have:

Mamia nappies and travel wipes from Aldi, we find these are the best value for money and the best quality too.

A few snack pouches for the journey just in case from Piccolo Foods and Aldi. Note that there are no restrictions on baby pouches in hand luggage even though they are technically a liquid, but airport security know that babies need the food!

A spare change of clothes, not that we have ever needed one but you can’t be too careful.

Sebamed diaper rash and baby cream, this stuff is the best in the business.

Nuby teether, as Alice’s top two teeth are now coming through. She bit my arm as I was packing!

Our baby bag is from Fact + Fiction. This bag is designed to look like a ladies handbag, but in fact is equipped with all the changing compartments and storage a baby bag needs. If you’re after a stylish way to travel with a baby, this is the one!

What’s in mummy’s bag

In my bag we have:

Sunglasses by Roberto Cavalli. These come with me on every trip and I don’t really use any other pair.

My trusty Tangle Teezer, as my hair constantly needs brushing and this size is a great one to travel with.

Sass and Belle notebook, in case I need to jot anything down quickly.

Nyx liquid lipstick in my favourite shade: satin ribbon.

Bag: Dune London. You may be thinking why take a white bag on such a journey, but this bag is seriously good quality. Any marks or dirt I get on it comes right off with a baby wipe, which I just so happen to always have on me! I picked this bag up from TK Maxx this Spring.

Living Proof dry shampoo, because lord knows by the end of the weekend I’ll be using it. This won’t be going in my hand luggage as it’s an aerosol but it will definitely be in our main suitcase.

Gluten free snacks, because I never leave home without something to nibble on. The hazelnut cholocate bars from Aldi are so handy and mess free.

Breast pads galore. For some reason I’ve gone back to spontaneously leaking and so to avoid any embarrassing moments, I’ve got a stash of them handy.

Mavala double lash treatment is also coming with me. A weekend trip is a great excuse to take some extra pampering tools along you wouldn’t normally use day to day. I’m giving my lashes a well-deserved treatment over the weekend.

Let’s not forget our Sky Baby, a clever travel mattress which can be used on flights and when travelling with babies. This is probably the last trip we will use it on as Alice approaches her first birthday in October. Look out for my insta uploads for the plane pics! See you on the other side ✈️

What’s on your travel bag essentials list? Let me know in the comments below!

Saharasplash x

PR samples included, all thoughts and views my own

saharasplash24 November, 2016

LAHENDO2016 PART TWO

So now part one is done, it’s time for part two! Apologies if this is slightly lengthy, but we actually did a hell of a lot of stuff on the Saturday which ended up going on till about four in the morning- I blame the strippers!

So I came downstairs to find that most of the girls were already up and making themselves breakfast. Sharon was making herself a lovely meal and I had my breakfast made by three or four hens which was lovely!

Soon after this we had the spa team arrive! We could choose a massage, nails or a facial- I had a special hot stone massage using lava shells which was just fabulous.

After this, it was time to get crafty! For my wedding I decided to have handmade flowers on the tables and so enlisted the help of my hen party to finish the job! We made red and white flowers to go with the theme using tissue paper. I think I’ll be doing a mini snippet of how you make these in my hen do vlog if any of you would like to know how to make them!

After a solid craft session, it was time to relax those muscles with a trip to the jacuzzi outside on our decking. I was so excited to whip this out of my suitcase…

I’m wearing a one piece swimming costume from To Dive For, a brand who you might remember hearing about on my recent trip to Dubai this summer. I love the bright colours of the design and I will be showing you more (including the back detail) on my hen do vlog on YouTube!

As the afternoon slowly crept into early evening, we all gathered in the living room to play a few games and quizzes. Each hen had their Sass and Belle notebook handy but they couldn’t do anything about beating me in the quiz muhahaha.

Some of the prizes given out were a mixture of underwear which somehow ended up on our heads, so photo time!

I was so excited to introduce the bridesmaids to their dresses for the wedding on the hendo- these stunning dresses are from In One Clothing, and they loved them! The versatility means that each bridesmaid could wear the dress exactly how they wanted- don’t they look gorgeous?

So after playing dress up, it was time to get ready for our evening dinner cooked by a team of chefs who came to the hen house. I laid the table with some very fitting Halloween decorations from Talking Tables– we had a bunch of masks and accessories which were just the trick!

We had a plentiful supply of wine from Premier Estates wine as well as some scrumptious non alcoholic drinks from Luscombe Drinks– the raspberry crush was definitely the favourite of the night.

We took a stunning group shot on the balcony upstairs, I couldn’t have asked for a better bunch of friends.

After dinner, we made our way outside for a quick five minutes to let off our sparklers- you’ll all have to stay patient to see what happened in the vlog!

One thing I wanted to share with you all was a very special present from one of my oldest friends who gave me this..

I couldn’t believe it when I pulled it out of the box, it was an apple made from the book pages of Twilight:Eclipse and it is honestly one of those gifts that I will remember forever.

So the evening ended with a fabulous screening of Magic Mike XXL in the cinema room, the best strippers and we all enjoyed it very much!

Saharasplash x

Missed out on lahendo2016 part one? Read it right here!

saharasplash11 November, 2016

LAHENDO2016 PART ONE

I have been so excited about posting this post, as this will no doubt have everyone jumping up and down. The time is almost upon us (in 9 days to be exact), and I am here to share some great moments with you from my Hen Party weekend extravaganza! LAHENDO2016 Part One will cover the theme, the journey, the place and also some amazing surprises too for the party. I invited along 15 girls (one of which I have to mention was very missed 🙁 ) for the #LAHENDO2016. So for those who don’t know, my mother owns a motorhome. This was decked out- much to my surprise- with designs on the back and sides to let the whole world know of course that we were having a hen party. My sister Evie was in charge of the whole thing from start to finish as she’s my maid of honour and the one with the design skills! She expertly took the colour scheme of the wedding (dark red, white and light grey) to decorate the motorhome and used a font very recognisable to those Twilight fans out there. The wedding will be based around Twilight in certain areas (I’m not giving away too much) as Paul and I met at a Twilight event, so very fitting!

So we set off from Ipswich and were headed to Manchester. We had booked a luxury stay in a gorgeous house through Celebration Cottages. The house we stayed in sleeps up to 20 people and was ideal for the kind of thing I was looking for in a hen do. I am not a party goer nor a fan of excessive drinking and so I opted for the girly sleepover sort of vibe instead which I wouldn’t change for the world.

This shot was taken on the last day but it shows the artwork from the sides so you can see. Plus some more hens too!

We stayed in a house called The White House, and as soon as we pulled up after our 6 hour journey I knew that we were going to love it. The front of the house was made of glass (similar to the Cullen’s house in Twilight) so that made me very happy! The house itself was beautiful. It had a stunning design, more of which you will see later, and it had everything we could possibly need from the marble kitchen to the cinema room. Now I had been working very hard on something for all the hens involoved. As a blogger I wanted to make the most of this beautiful location and this special occasion, and so I had a little help from some of my favourite brands.

Each hen was presented with a bag full of a variety of things for the weekend and they loved it!

So in their gift pack they found:

Premier Estates Wine

I love the Prosecco from Premier Estates. It is crisp and so light and delightful. We all enjoyed this Prosecco throughout the weekend and you can see more of them in Part Two! The bottles fit right in with the designer kitchen and our glasses were at the ready!

Mr Stanley’s

Mr Stanley’s went above and beyond for the hen. Each hen had a glorious selection on confectionary from chocolate moustaches to fudge and lemon fizzies. This was so perfect for the hen party as we had vegetarians, coeliacs and lactose free requirements so there were treats for everyone.

Amie Skincare

I took advantage of using the master bathroom for this shot! Equipped with television et al, we really enjoyed a selection of treats from Amie Skincare who I am a big fan of. We had the best micellar water for our makeup removing needs, moisturiser and a selection of their new face masks which I will be reviewing separately on the blog.

Sass and Belle

Sass and Belle are one of my go-to brands for gifts and homeware. They provided us with the cutest notebooks for our games and quizes which I shall be talking more about in Part Two! Their designs were loved by the hen party as each couldn’t wait to open these up and take a peek inside!

KIND Snacks

KIND Snacks are the perfect snack for a big sleepover weekend, especially when you have a lot of guests with different diets. KIND snacks kindly sent us a range of flavours for the weekend which are all gluten and dairy free. My favourite was the dark chocolate and cherry bar- so delicious!

So the first day/evening of the hen was fairly chilled. We explored every inch of our quarters, chose our bedrooms and took a lot of silly photos as we waited for the whole party to arrive. I have to give 3 hens a massive applause who came from Wales, and the journey took them 9 hours in a small car! Every hour or so we would receive an update from them in the form of a dubsmash song 🙂

Here we are having fun with our chocolate moustaches!

Stay Tuned for LAHENDO Part Two, there’s so much more to see including games, knickers and jacuzzi fun!

Saharasplash x Bride to be

saharasplash8 July, 2016

Bloggers Hangout Summer Heatwave

Another month, another fabulous Bloggers Hangout event. This time the location was Charing Cross and the venue was The Strand Gallery. I had been looking forward to this as I do every BH event. Danielle (the founder) always goes the extra mile and certainly puts on one hell of a shindig for the bloggers as well as the brands attending. The Bloggers Hangout Summer Heatwave (as I am calling it) was a 3-day extravaganza of which I managed to attend 2 days. I can’t wait to give you all the juicy details about my fav brands there and who I went with!

On the first day, I went with a lovely blogger called Kendra. She is an American blogger over in London for a few months so we met up and I showed her just how amazing being a blogger in London can be! It was so hot in the venue we both were glad we wore summery dresses!

We visited KB Hair and took this epic snap, KB Hair Extensions had some lovely colours to show us, including grey!

Sass and Belle, a homeware brand with so many lovely things, had a chat with us and talked us through their range of amazing summer products. I adore my pineapple cup which I featured in my Karma Cola post!

We met a fabulous nail wrap designer who was displaying her amazing collection of Dinkibelle wraps. I can’t wait to try mine out and show you!

The Perfume Shop was located downstairs at the venue and they had the most amazing display of all their favourite fragrances old and new. My absolute favourite of the day was Viktor and Rolf Flowerbomb, it’s to die for! Floral fragrances and the stunning setup definitely had me in the summer mood at the Bloggers Hangout Summer Heatwave!

Onto Day Two. This time I took with me my best blogger bud Merrell-Ann from TrousseauDiaries to explore some more!

We met Pink Parcel who are a fabulous brand helping girls from all over with their ‘Classic Period Drama’ It’s a monthly subcription service to help us girls through our stressful times every 28 days and they include not only femenine products but makeup, skincare products and best of all- chocolate!

I met with Faust’s Potions on the 2nd day who were just great. They have come up with some lovely remedies to help wake you up in the morning (which tastes like orange juice) and also they have one to help relax you before bed at night time. I’ll be fully reviewing these products on the blog very soon so not going to give away anything else!

Regenerate were great to see at the event, they are a dental care company who have created products which help to restore your enamel. I must say I’ve been using the toothpaste for just over a week now and there is no sensitivity anymore when I eat cold things which is wonderful. I will definitely keep you all posted on how I progress with the advanced toothpaste and boosting serum.

I also took some shots of three gorgeous bloggers wearing DaSilva London clothing outside the venue. It’s the perfect spot for a blogger to stop and take some photos if you don’t want to trek all the way to Kensington!