OOTD: new haircut

With the sun finally hitting the UK, I decided my long hair of previous was getting too unmanageable, and thus, in trimming it, I've gone from Alicia Vikander in The Light Between Oceans length to Jessica Chastain in Miss Sloane length! And, in keeping consistent with the Chastain look, I've duly painted my nails black, like Liz Sloane had!

Dress: Marietta dress from Hobbs

Earrings: Amazon

Glasses: Red or Dead

The Marietta dress is now  the third dress from Hobbs I own (the other two: un et deux). Their dresses are perfect for the kind of aesthetic I'm going for at work: elegant and demure.

I find clothes definitely help with the 'fake it 'til you make it' mentality, by which I mean, even if I'm in a sub-optimal mood, if I'm at least sharply dressed at work, I feel better about myself. This then helps to improve my frame of mind, and how I carry out my work.

Mark Twain absolutely nailed it when he said 'clothes make the man'.

Stationery review: SUNARRIVE KIDS DOCTOR KIT

For my Secret Santa this year, I was given the stationery kit below:

As I have to sit professional qualifications as part of my job, I found a perfect use for them: to make notes with, and highlighting the stuff I was reading. In fact, the notes I made for this review were done in the midst of revision, so I could report back on any functionality issues with the stationery as I was using it.

I'll start with the good: aesthetically, the stationery was very pleasing. The faces on the vitamin ballpen are adorable and the design of the syringe highlighters is dinky, with the colour of the ink displayed through the clear acrylic. The overall theme of stationery made in the image of doctor's tools was a neat idea, and visually, the designers pulled it off.

Unfortunately, when it came to usability and practicality, the set fell short. The biros didn't write very well, with the quality of the ink often coming out grainy. This was the case on both the syringe and vitamin ball pens, but it was particularly bothersome on the vitamin pens, due to the needle-thin nib.

In fact, there were a melange of issues with the vitamin ball pen. Firstly, their short, stubby design, whilst certainly resembling that of a cartoon pill, did not make for the most comfortable thing to hold when writing. The material it's made of is also incredibly flimsy, and all of the vitamin pens, without exception, cracked during the time I wrote using them.

The products all have poor longevity. Unsurprisingly, since the vitamins are so small, they don't house much ink. The syringe biros and highlighters also ran out disappointingly soon. On the topic of highlighters,  the blue and purple ones were an eyesore, because they were so dark, they basically covered the writing I wanted highlighting, rather than illuminating them.

Thus, whilst I commend the idea, and think it certainly makes for a cute gift idea, the makers really need to reappraise the materials they use in constructing it, because aside from being pretty to look at, they don't cop up to much as actual stationery.

Grade: E

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For more of my stationery reviews, click here! If you have a product you'd like me to review, drop me an email at lemon_and_lime7@hotmail.com.

10 Most Attractive Men in a 2018 film

As with all my eye candy lists, the only criteria for being on the list is that the guy has to have been in a 2018 release that I've actually watched! The archive of hotness here.

10. Jean Dujardin, Return of the Hero