Columbia Road Flower Market.

I think it's pretty standard for every London-based blogger to eventually feature the flower market at some point so now it's my turn!  I feel like Columbia Road is a place that only exists on Sunday mornings.  I've never been there any other time, and I wouldn't be surprised if the shops were shut during weekdays.  But come 9am Sunday, this place is buzzing, and it kind of reminds me of a little slice of Notting Hill in the East. But with flowers. A lotta, lotta flowahs.

Sanne and I are pretty partial to the lady that sells bunches of wildflowers, which dry beautifully.  Seriously, we have some in our bathroom that are two months old and still going strong.  Nuclear flowers.  I recommend getting to the market before 10:30am (it starts at 8am).  Otherwise you're gonna be shuffling through a wall of tourists.

MAC Plumful review.

MAC Lipstick in Plumful £15

I think everyone knows this shade as the essiebutton colour.  I was never particularly impressed with MAC formulas when trying them on in stores, but this goes on incredibly smooth, and dare I say sheer?  This purply pink is definitely buildable but never overwhelming.  I also appreciate how gracefully Plumful fades throughout the day as well; no patchy weirdness so no scurrying to regularly reapply.  I think if you're going for a low key, understated shade, this is a great choice.

Dinner and a movie.

Back in July (I don't wanna talk about it) my good friend Lidewij came to visit us from the the fair Netherlands.  She cooked us supper--eggplant parmesan to be precise--and we [me, Sanne, and Lidewij] settled down on the couch to watch what became possibly my least favourite movie I've seen this year.  Once upon a time I had time to make film reviews and I dedicated an entire video on the disaster that is A Cinderella Story.

MAC attack.

Pictured:  Plumful, See Sheer, Soft and Gentle, 286, Patina, Orange, Charcoal Brown.

Once upon a time I owned nothing from MAC.  I would talk about makeup with people and they'd be shocked when I told them I had zero MAC products. It's a brand, especially with lipsticks, that seems like a standard for anyone into makeup.  Within... well just within October really, I racked up flatwarming and birthday gifts and voilà.

I'd like to try to review each of these so let me know what you'd like to see first!

Also let me know your favourite MAC products so I can expand my already bursting beauty wishlist.

Gevulde koek.

n. the most delicious cookie known to man, 

kinda like an almond croissant in cookie form 

but so much better. 

Origin: The Netherlands.

East London love.

We like to play a game in my flat called "is it Jack the Ripper or is it street art?" whenever we see large tour groups walking up Brick Lane.

Honeymania Body Scrub review.

I got this in one of the many sales put on by The Body Shop after Estée featured this line in a blog post.  Speaking of sales, they are having one right now.  I miiight have repurchased the Brazil Nut body butter and splurged on picking up the camomile cleansing butter (I saw Rebecca singing its praises so I really had no choice in the matter).  Anyway, back on topic for this honey stuff.

As my online alias is honey-based, you'd think I have some weird thing for honey.  And I will say half the impulse to grab this stuff was to see if that was true.  The scent is definitely more floral than honey.  I'm still haven't completely grown into floral scents so I don't think I'll go back to this line.  However, as a scrub, the texture was very fine, it did leave my skin smoother, and the light lingering of fragrance didn't bother me.  I'd say smell [it] before you shell [out for it].

Honeymania Body Scrub by The Body Shop // £12.50

The Getty in June Gloom.

Hasty foursquare checkin before we lose internet.

Hottest chap on campus.

Let's get back to business with some summer shots.  This past June I visited some friends in Los Angeles (classic marionhoney photo backlog).  My roommate from freshman year of uni and I went on a little adventure to The Getty.  It was mostly us and some touring groups of elderly people.  A lot of the architecture reminded me of Joe Wright's Pride and Prejudice so I had to get in a cheeky OotD.  Like most everything in LA, you can only get here by car, but on a clear day you can see out to the Pacific and it's stunning.

Two for today.

Inspired by elephantine's "two for today" photo series.

Korres Vanilla Cinnamon Body Milk & Showergel.

Korres Vanilla Cinnamon Body Milk £10  //  Korres Vanilla Cinnamon Showergel £8



A while back (my order history tells me May), feelunique.com had the cinnamon vanilla line on offer in a bundle.  I had just finished my first cinnamon body lotion of theirs and was set to repurchase so this was perfect.  With a discount code, I think it worked out to £12.50.  For my favourite, high quality body lotion plus its partner body wash, I was pretty pleased.

My favourite scents are hard pressed to be more distant from each other.  If I had my way, I'd either want to smell like a soft peppermint or a cinnamon stick.  Cool vs. warm.  I'd been looking for a cinnamon lotion or perfume for a while when I came across this Korres one.  I was worried it would be too sweet for me because of the vanilla, but then I also like the Zara Black perfume whose predominant fragrance is vanilla.  I definitely prefer the body milk to the showergel.  Both are sweet, but the body lotion less so.  I think I'll be repurchasing the body milk until my deathbed; the texture, non-greasy drying, and scent staying power have me hooked.  The showergel is a nice treat, but I'll be fine to try something new after it too.

Have you tried any Korres products?  I have my eye on this one.

Small changes.

Hey, you.  You know how you spend so much time with yourself you don't notice when you've changed.  Not in one of those oh, she's changed kind of ways.  I mean, if you do notice that about yourself though, maybe you should take a step back and reexamine what's going on.  No, what I'm talking about is how I was outside in our back garden with Rosi and Sanne.  And we were looking at where we could hang a clothes line.  The only post on one end belonged to the neighbors' trellis.  I saw the neighbor at her window, washing dishes at the kitchen sink, made eye contact, and just waltzed right up to her, calling over the fence asking if it would be okay for us to tie our line there.  And she smiled and nodded in assent.

That was an action I wouldn't characterise as me.  Going up to a neighbor and asking them outright for a "favour."  However small this might seem, this tiny thing is something that would have, at one time, worried me and caused me extreme anxiety to muster up the courage to approach a stranger.  Or I would have asked someone else to ask for me.  But today I didn't feel that.  I did it, and it felt fine, and it was fine, and I thought nothing of it.  Until now.  Now I see that little things add up to a new, big changes.

Face of the Day: Bleached out.

I love when people do these and I thought my blog could use a little more face so.  I forgot to note down if I was wearing foundation or a CC cream here (bad blogger), but here's the rest!

Lancôme Star Bronzer Natural Glow Long Lasting Bronzing Powder in 02 Solaire

[at Sephora]

Covergirl eyeshadow in Champagne (inner corner)

[at Target]

TheBalm shady lady eyeshadow in Shameless Shana

Barry M Kohl pencil in Brown

[at Boots]

L'Oreal Voluminous Mascara in Black Brown

[at Target]

Revlon Matte lipstick in Nude Attitude

[at Boots]

Los Angeles scraps [& giveaway winner!]

The winner of my copy of Orange Is the New Black is LaaraBeeFul!  Please get in touch with me at marionhoney@aol.com  And thank you to everyone who left a comment!