Christmas Bloggers Meet Up

On Saturday night I had the pleasure of being invited to a Christmas blogger dinner all organized by the amazing Lisa from PinkSugarSparkles . She hosted the most loveliest (totally a real word) event and went above and beyond with all the preparations and getting amazing sponsors for it too! You can see her fab self above, along with one of our sponsors, wonderful girls from Preen hair and beauty on Dame Street. I expected a few fancy frocks considering it was so close to Christmas but all the girls turned up looking stunning - meow!

We went to Bel Cibo in Smithfield for some wonderful noms and lots of chatting and catching up with old and new faces. Above you can see I might have had a sneaky glass of wine along with some pasta. The restaurant was really bright and modern, I'd love to have a bite to eat in there again some time soon! After all the fun was had and the poor staff were trying to politely kick us out, someone got the bright idea to go for 'just the one' cocktail in Oscars bar right beside the restaurant. Best/worst idea that ever was! I had a total ball and myself, NurseFancyPants, AllTheBuzz,  GirlFriday and TotalMakeUpAddict all got a few drinks in, many many laughs and a lot of chatting that will forever stay a secret. I myself got a bit OTT with the G&T's so I must say sorry to bloggers, Sams poor friend that I had brief chats on the phone with, bar staff and men of the pub! 

I snapped a sneaky photo of Chloe and Sam on the sly, don't they look lovely glammed up!? Also our drinks and a lovely photo on the wall - you are not alone. Struck a chord with me, I can get down a lot, even in the company of such great people so this was a nice reminder. After that I'm sad to say that not a lot of photos got taken but a lot of memories were made! 

 Lisa went a bit crazy getting all us bloogers some amazing goodie bags and really jazzing them up for us, such hard work that she really didn't have to do - total star! Above is one of the lovely surprises I got in my bag and honestly can not wait to wear it, a rose gold bow necklace from BettyandBiddy.com. I never ever wear gold or rose gold so this is such a treat!

How could I not add in photos of all the little extra special touches Lisa added in? Some cute and sparkly Christmas glittery snowflakes, snow men and lots more. She added beautiful glittery bows on the bags along with Christmas decorations and Christmasy tissue paper. How gorgeous an idea is that?! And I think we all know how much I love glittery little bits!

If the bows and sparkles weren't enough Lisa wrote us lovely little Christmas cards - Its a pink hello kitty, need I say more! One of my #Idie surprises was a Sigma eyeliner brush that is to die for, my pictures do not do it justice at all!

Other wonderful things L to R included; NYR mineral blusher and samples, a handy nail file, two amazing Body Shop perfume and shower gel set, Kardashian lipgloss, Zap omega body cream, Lots of Nimue goodies, two REN body products and a Ciate nail varnish (- squeals!!)

Also some Mane and Tail samples, Image skincare goodie bag and I won a Bia Beauty skincare gift set. Lisa had a prize for everyone which was so amazing of her - I've never won a thing in my life so I was pleased as punch!!

Photo credit to AllTheBuzz.com

My blog is now just a year old and when I signed up to Blogger this time last year I did not for one second think I would come to the end of 2013 with such amazing friends and such a supportive online community that are the girls and guys of the blogging world. Everyday it amazes me how lucky I am to know the wonderful people I do and I'm still meeting more and more daily. So to my blogger buddies and to all you fab readers, thank you for making my life extra great and special by being in it. x

N.B. GFC is now gone as you can see from the lack of it on my blog! If you still would like to follow my blog and see all my posts then find me on BlogLovin', or if you have a Google+ Account you can follow me here.

The Dublin Meet Up #3

I'm sure a lot of you will have seen my first post about the day and my second about the bloggers themselves. This is my last post about the day even if it is super super late - sorry about that! I'm so baffled at the amazing generosity of the sponsors who gave each blogger a goodie bag that was filled with so many lovely things that I have been trying out over the past while. Once I'm happy that I have really tested out the products well I will do a few reviews for all you lovely people! There is already one or two shiny things that I can't get enough of and will be ranting and raving about them. My gran is in love with the Dove soap bars and has robbed them from me, cheeky thing! But after all, sharing is caring.

The Cosmitic Outlet was one of the main sponsors of the day and oh my did the goodie have a some beauts inside! As you can see from the picture below there was a YesTo cleanser, GOSH eyeshadow trio and blue eyeliner, a MaxFactor mascara and a lovely Models Co. foundation. I have full plans of going to visit this place soon to find some great bargains and maybe a few sneaky surprises for Christmas stockings too.

Next up is Derma V10 who kindly gave everyone a massive selection of all their lovely products! Below is a moisturizing face cream, mascara, dry skin cream, lipcare lip balm and a body moisturizer. I know right? The big tub of moisturizer smells edible, just to tell you.  

Two other main sponsors were Niume Skincare who kindly gave us a pretty white bag with some gorgeous skin care gems inside. And the last main sponsor was Peter Mark who gave us a full sized Keratase product, courtesy of Style Club North Earl Street which is about to celebrate 1 year in business! 

Other things that were added to our bags was a Numa Brush which is so lovely and soft,  Baby B Browne full size tan, Orifalme daily boost shield, Antomicals facemask, Wapo and Neals Yard Remedies samples and Dove soap bars that my gran loves. 

Check out Samantha's blog AllTheBuzz, shes the lovely lady who made this day possible and I still can't get over how much work she put into it!

Also a shout out and big thanks to David of davidmcauleyphotography  who took the pictures for the day and kindly let all the bloggers who attended rob them to use on their blogs, with permission of course! He is so down to earth and friendly, not to mention an amazing photographer, Check out some of his amazing work!

The Dublin Meet Up #2

As you will know from my last post, I was off having a lovely old time on Saturday at the Dublin blogger meet up organised by the lovely Samantha of All The Buzz. I got to meet some bloggers I love and discovered some new ones that I'm getting stuck into reading lots of their posts! Here are some of the bloggers I met. If your not listed here I'm sorry, I talked to so many wonderful girlys that day that I might have got a bit confused. Feel free to tweet or message me and I will add you in!

Killer Fashion  First girls I got chatting to who were so so lovely! Thank you for the photo and great natter!

TownMouseCountryMouse Both of these sisters were so friendly and stylish to say the least!

Zee-Railed  Zita was the one who told me all about this meet up so a big shout out and thank you to her! After all our talking and planning we never actually got to talk to each other which was awful but I'm going to go on a hunt if we are at the next meet up to say a huge hello!

GlitterMamaWishes Lovely lady who has a third baby on the way - good luck Yaz!

PinkElephantBloggin More gorgeous ladies who gave me one of their very fancy cards - next on my shopping list are cards!

SoPolishedIreland I bumped into Manal at the very end just before she was leaving and chewed the ear off her, the poor girl! She is so lovely and so so talented with nail art!

GirlFridaysBeautyBlog Last but not least Anne Maire was uber lovely to get to talk to, she showed me some picture layouts and said if I was nervous at meet ups she would walk in with me so I wasn't alone. How nice is she?

I hope to meet more bloggers and make lots of new friends. I am gutted I didn't get up the courage to go and talk to more bloggers as they were all so lovely. But theres always next time!!

Photo courtesy of David Mcauley Photography

Photo courtesy of David Mcauley Photograph

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The Dublin Meet Up #1

Last Saturday I attended my first every bloggers meet up and I was terrified! I even went off to the shops and got new tops because I clearly had nothing acceptable in my overflowing wardrobe... But I need not have worried as everyone was so nice! The event was organized by the wonderful Samantha Johnston who writes AllTheBuzz. Can I just say this girly was totally amazing to take on something like this, it doesn't seem like an easy job to do! We all met at The Church Bar and had a little place to ourselves to natter and mingle. When I got there I was warmly welcomed by Samantha and told to take some goodie bags. My gosh what fab things were inside too! 

Not only did I get to meet loads of bloggers that I love (que fan girl moments that I'm ashamed of!) and some new ones too, but there was also a demo by Niamh Martin, creater of Nima Brush. She has been a make up artist for over 10 years and did an amazing job doing Lisa of Pink Sugar's make up while throwing in some handy tips. The next speaker was Michelle McMahon of Her.ie who gave a really great inspirational talk on how she came up through the world of journalism and landed at her desk in Her.ie. As a massive fan of the site and Michelle I might have had a huge fan girl moment, evening asking for an autograph which is below in the biggest possible photo size setting. (I honestly have no shame.) After her talk I wanted to go straight to a computer and type, then run to Kerry and back, just for the hell of it considering how inspired I felt.

 While we were all chattering away Rosin from Reach Out Ireland which is a non profit, non government funded charity for youth mental health handed out post cards so we could all write positive notes to ourselves and they would get posted back to us! I thought it was a lovely way to give yourself a mini pick-me-up and to make you have a proper think about all the good things in your life. By the end of the event €150 was raised through buying raffle tickets for some great prizes. Go us girls! On a side note how amazing is Rosin's blue hair?

Photo on the right courtesy of David Mcauley Photography

 This was a really great day and I couldn't have asked for more. Everyone was so friendly and nice, the atmosphere was cool and the guest speakers were unbelievable. I can't wait for the next event to see them all again and catch up! I will be doing a separate post on all the bloggers who I managed to meet on the day as I feel they deserve their own part. And I will also be doing a post on what I got in my goodie bags and the sponsors who were so generous!

One last thing I must say before I sign off for now (I know, such a long post right?) Samantha put all this together herself without any prior experience doing meet ups. She wanted to meet other bloggers, help other bloggers build friendships and the blogging community and help with her fear of public speaking. I can't get over how amazing a person like Samantha is to undertake such an enormous task arranging everything. Down to the goodie bags, a thank you card, lovely cup cakes and glittery red lips to greet us on the tables. My little bit of inspiration for the week.

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