December Favorites

If you’ve been reading my past few monthly favorites posts, then you’ll know I don’t just include the standard beauty/hair/body products. Although I’m generally a beauty blogger, I don’t fall in love with enough new products each month to justify a post about them. Instead, I include entertainment-centered things that I’ve been watching, reading, or listening to over the past few weeks. Hope you find a few new things to check out!

 

Movies: As I’ve said before, my local theatre recently closed down so I haven’t watched a film in theatre since AUGUST. As a movie and popcorn lover, this is a real tragedy. Of course, I still watch movies with friends and on my own so there are two that I really liked from this month! The first is a horror movie called Dark Skies. I’m a big horror fan and I don’t scare easily, but this one genuinely gave me shivers. It starts off similar to the standard haunted house movies, but a family is being targeted by aliens rather than ghosts. I especially liked the ending and if you like scary movies, you need to see this. Also, at the beginning of this month I had a movie day with my friends and they decided to watch a film called Southpaw, which is about a boxing champion. I’m not usually interested in sports films but this one was amazing. It stars Rachel McAdams, one of my favorite actresses, and it was really touching. Warning: it’s a bit of a tearjerker. If you want a captivating drama or you’re looking for a movie both you and your boyfriend would enjoy, this is probably a safe bet.

 

TV: I have been watching a lot of TV since going on winter break so I’ve had a hard time narrowing this list down! I’ve decided on four that I can’t stop watching. The first is a teen drama from the early 2000’s called The OC. I bought the box set of the entire show over the summer and just now started binge watching it. It focuses on a group of teenagers living in Orange County, California, a ritzy area. The characters are actually quite relatable and the throwback fashion, music, and technology is always fun to watch. Another show I love, which I’ve already seen before, is BBC’s Sherlock. I told my aunt about it and we started watching it together whenever I’m at her house. It is the classic story of Sherlock Holmes but in modern day London. There are only three seasons of three episodes each, so this one is a quick watch but then comes the endless waiting…

I’m not too big on crime shows but the show Stalker, from last year, has really captured my interest. It’s quite violent, especially in the first episode, but so good. Unfortunately it was canceled after only one season, so when I finish it I guess I’m back to SVU reruns. The last show that has really impressed me this month is called Humans. It’s a sci-fi drama about really humanistic androids that are basically servants to people. Most of the androids don’t have feelings, but one man programmed a few different so it mostly follows that man, those particular androids, and a family that bought one of the reprogrammed androids.

 

Books: To be quite honest, I haven’t been reading much as Finals week burnt me out. However, I recently purchased (inspired by the Sherlock series) the ENTIRE Sherlock Holmes book collection, so I’m eager to get started on that. I’ve read a few of the short stories before and I always liked them, so I can’t wait to read the novels and the rest of the shorts.

 

Music: Two albums that I have seriously loved in December are Adele’s 25 (which, yes, was also mentioned in my November favorites) and Troye Sivan’s Blue Neighbourhood. My favorite songs from the new Adele CD are definitely Love in the Dark, All I Ask, Water Under the Bridge, and Hello. There isn’t a single song I dislike and I love singing along to the album in the car, although it does strain my vocal cords after a while. I received Troye Sivan’s album for Christmas and have literally been listening to it nonstop ever since. I have the deluxe version, which I really recommend. My favorite songs so far are Wild, Fools, Ease, Heaven, Blue, Suburbia and Youth. I literally couldn’t narrow it down more than that. I think most of the other tracks will grow on me as I continue to listen to them. Troye’s a bit unheard of amongst older people because he’s a YouTuber, but he is seriously talented and I suggest you check him out if you’re looking for new music!

 

Beauty:  One new product I purchased this month is a Mac glaze lipstick in the shade Hue. It’s an extremely wearable pale pink nude, and lately I’ve been choosing this over any of my brighter shades. A review will be coming soon! I was also having some difficulty with my eyebrows. They are naturally a very very dark brown, and I bought three different pencils/powders in the hopes that I’d find one dark enough. I had no luck until I thought to try out a eyeshadow palette I already happened to own. I figured there isn’t much difference between a matte eyeshadow and an eyebrow powder, and thankfully Maybelline’s ‘The Nudes’ palette has the perfect shade for my brows. I’ve also been using it for its intended use (on my eyelids), too, as there are so many options between the twelve included shadows. The last product I’ve been loving throughout December is another drugstore product from a brand called Flower. I hadn’t heard much about the brand so I was hesitant to try it out, but I picked up their Glisten Up! Highlighter Chubby in Pearl Shimmer. The highlighter is a pearly gold shade and it looks lovely on my cheekbones. The design is similar to the Benefit Watt’s Up highlighter, but for a third of the price I think this Flower one is a great substitute.

 

If you’d like to check out any of the products I’ve mentioned, here are links to where you can find them yourself:

Troye Sivan Blue Neighbourhood Deluxe album

Adele 25 album

MAC Hue Lipstick

Maybelline The Nudes Palette

Flower Glisten Up! Highlighter

Sherlock Holmes complete series

 

What have you been loving this month?

Xx Katie