Tip #1: Skimp on the toiletries

You really don’t need your entire make-up bag, straightener and half dozen hair styling products for a weekend away or a month in the middle of nowhere (plus if you’re staying in a hotel, they’ll probably supply sample-size body wash and shampoo). Why not try buying some small containers, like these Airborne Refillables, from My Tagalongs, for short trips (if you’re going on a plane with just carry-on bag, you must have your liquids under a certain size – check out the airline regulations before you pack):

From mytagalongs.com

For longer trips, consider getting a shampoo bar from Lush – takes up very little space, lasts a long time, doesn’t spill and equals clean, gorgeous, no-fuss hair:

From lush.com

I suggest you also buy and/or make yourself a moisturising body soap and separate face soap (Dove are fantastic for these basics – and very affordable). Throw a roll-on deodorant, toothbrush, toothpaste and hair brush in your bag, and you’re almost done. Grab some hair ties (black is always a good colour) and bobby pins and you can style your hair quickly and easily in a chignon or braid. Or just let it dry naturally! (Often hotel rooms will supply you with a hair dryer, or if you’re on camp another girl will probably have brought that or a straightener.)

Photo by ediphotoeye

As for make-up? Keep it simple! When I’m on holiday, I don’t want to bother with spending ages perfecting my lipstick and eyeliner, so I just take three things – a natural mineral powder foundation (use it with a concealer brush under your eyes and to cover redness, lightly dust the rest of your face with a foundation brush), a lip balm with a hint of colour and mascara. If you’re planning on going out while you’re away, pop a couple of other items into your bag – an eyeliner, an eyeshadow, a lipstick. They won’t take up much space.

Tip #2: Get the basics

Fashionable Travel by Pretty in Pink... featuring Havaianas flip flops

Regardless of where you’re going, these basics will always come in handy:

• black leggings
• black tank top
• black long-sleeved top
• zip-up black nylon jacket (if you get these in lightweight, breathable material, they’ll take up hardly any space. You can wear them underneath or over things for warmth, or to get a different look with a dress or jeans)
• sarong (not just if you’re going to the beach! Can be used as a towel, pillow, scarf, dress, bandanna… and takes up no space!)
• big scarf (fashionable and totally dresses up/changes any outfit)
• flip-flops
• black flats
• sneakers (these three pairs of shoes will help you through almost all situations – you can go out in the black flats, walk around all day and even hike in some good sneakers, and wear flip-flops to all the non-formal occasions in between. A pair of nice sandals might also help for formal events – heels tend to take up a lot of space).

To those 9 items, you can add dresses, jeans, hiking pants, shorts, skirts or sweaters, depending on where you’re going! You can pack light and still feel ready for anything. (Plus the obvious – take enough underwear for the number of days you’re going away. If you’re going away for an extended amount of time to somewhere where there might not be washing machines, take laundry soap with you and be prepared to wash things in the sink!)

Tip #3: Take only what you need

Suitable clothes for where you’re going, what you’re doing and how long you’ll be away, your basic toiletries plus the other things you can’t live without – your cell phone, camera, a first aid kit (never know when you’ll need it!), money, and, if you’re going overseas, your passport and other relevant papers. Maybe you’ll also need your laptop or netbook, and something to read. Make sure, after you’ve finished packing, that you’re not taking anything with you that you won’t need or use – it’s no use taking up valuable bag space with something that serves no purpose! Make sure all your clothes are suitable for where you’re going and what you’re doing.

Tip #4: Accessories = your friend

Mix and match by Pretty in Pink... featuring Forever21 dresses

Accessories will totally change any outfit! One dress = one outfit. One dress + big scarf = another outfit. One dress + leggings + a sarong around your waist = another outfit! You get my point.

Share your fashionable packing tips!

xo,

Anyone whose ever been camping must have enjoyed the delight that is s’mores! And now… they have be immortalized on a bracelet. Check out this super cute S’Mores Campfire Bracelet….

From girlzlyfe.com

I love owls, and this necklace is adorable…

From girlzlyfe.com

I’m kind of tired of plain old flash drives… if you have to carry around your information for school on a USB like this, why not make it an accessory? Loving these Robot Flash Drives…

From girlzlyfe.com

If you’re a bit of a rebel, and love Asian-kitsch and geek-chic, you might like this Hello Kitty Nerd Lunchbox… I know, awesome, right?

From girlzlyfe.com

I love that Kristen Stewart has totally trendified converse with evening wear, but when you can’t wear your high-tops on your feet, you can wear your Converse as a necklace!

From girlzlyfe.com

This Cartoon Dog Phone is seven million shades of awesome… say it with me – Awwwww….

From girlzlyfe.com

This cassette tape tote is so retro-cool and is the perfect size for a shopping day or trip to the beach…

From girlzlyfe.com

I have guitar, piano, Pac Man, musical note and various fluorescent earrings, and I’d totally love a cute pair of Choc Chip Cookie Studs…

From girlzlyfe.com

What do you think? Bought any quirky, crazy or novelty accessories recently? (I bought a pair of crazy glasses the other day… there are eyes on the outside of the lenses! Can’t wait to surprise people with them at a party.)

In search of the perfect laptop bag (the shopping centres near where I live seriously lacking in this respect!) I started looking around online, and – guess what? – I found some gorgeous bags! Now my only problem is trying to decide which one to buy…

From careerbags.com

I love this messenger bag in ‘red blossom’ – funky enough to carry around even when I don’t need my laptop…

From rainebrooke.com

This pink laptop bag from Rainebrooke is affordable and girly! Perhaps a little plain for my tastes, but I could always add some iron-on badges or find some pretty keyrings to dangle from the zips…

From careerbags.com

With the black shiny vinyl on this laptop bag, it reminds me a bit of Betty Boop and those old-school bowling bags – just my style!

From careerbags.com

Ooh, and I love this rolling laptop bag – I think I’d feel like a flight attendant wheeling this one around! (Don’t worry, it comes in colors other than green! I just thought that looked pretty wild… if you like statement bags, maybe green is for you!)

Do you ever have trouble trying to decide on laptop bags? (Or any kind of bag, really!) And which one do you think I should get?

Set in a glamorous and seedy Los Angeles, HOLLYWOOD ENDING is a story that will make your heart skip a beat.

Pink-haired Hilda and endearing punk Benji, each seventeen, have an obsessive hobby – they haunt the places where Hollywood celebrities have died.

In rundown Echo Park, once the hub of the movie business, they find the squalid apartment where a second-rate silent movie star died. Its current tenant is Hank, an old man with a mysterious past.

While Benji dives deeper into the cult of celebrity death, Hank and Hilda make an unlikely pair. Then Jake the screenwriter turns up. What’s his story?

HOLLYWOOD ENDING is a thriller, a comedy about growing up, and a wry love-letter to Los Angeles. Kathy Charles has written a debut novel to die for.

This novel was wonderful, and unsettling, and sometimes just plain scary. I hate to use the word ‘edgy’ but I think it applies here.

Hollywood Ending will appeal to everyone with a bit of morbid curiosity, and is a must-read for anyone who’s ever been fascinated by a celebrity death (it’s certainly very timely after a whole string of deaths of well-known personalities). I really enjoyed this novel, though there was something so disquieting about Benji and the obsession he shares with Hilda in celebrity death. I was really happy to hear that this’ll be published in the US by MTV Books, mainly because I think American readers will love the LA setting, which is almost as central to the story as the characters and their struggles.

Hollywood Ending was certainly a novel that kept me reading, interested, and every odd celebrity death described felt almost haunting. I was so fascinated by the premise of this – two teenagers that spend their free time going to the places where famous people have died – and all the characters within the world Kathy Charles has created (an LA that seems gritty and dazzling and deadly all at once) were puzzling and strange and a bit offtap. I had difficulty liking them, I think, but I still wanted things to work out for Hilda, and I kept reading to see what happened.

This seems to me a novel that could develop a cult following. It definitely has the capability to become a hit amongst emos (You knew I was going to mention emos, didn’t you?) but it’s intelligent enough to be popular amongst both teens and adults. Definitely a novel worth checking out.

Click here and here for the brilliant book trailers for Hollywood Ending (featuring the author touring places where celebrities died – spooky…).

Jo has just moved to America with her mum. She’s always been a fairly average girl – not a nerd but certainly never one of the popular kids. But on her first day in her new school, she seems to be adopted by the It girls – and is invited to one of their parties. There, she meets Jake Matthews, officially the hottest boy in school, and when they begin to play the kissing-in-the-closet game, Seven Minutes in Heaven, amazingly Jake picks Jo join him in the closet! She can’t believe her luck. But the reality of being kissed and groped by Jake is not quite as great as the fantasy… Jo has a choice to make: should she carry on, kiss Jake and secure her position in the It crowd – or should she tell him where to get off and risk relegation back to the land of the ordinary . . . ?

At this moment – Jo splits. She’s Josie the Cool – girlfriend of Jake, member of the It crowd. She’s also Jo the Nerd – rejected by the It crowd, single . . .

Will her two halves ever come back together again? Is Jake the guy she’s meant to be with or could some of the other people she meets along her journey – Rachel the scary goth, David the misfit or Albie the rocker – be the answer?

A fabulously inventive, heartwarming and funny take on the Sliding Doors idea, for teen readers.

Though it’s a bit lighter in tone than books I usually read, I really enjoyed Split by a Kiss – I loved the whole concept of a person splitting in two, though what really happened was two different realities were created. In one, Jo slaps Jake in the face and tells him to be more respectful. Had I been at the party, I’d have given Jo a high-five (Jake is really, truly awful) but Jo’s actions aren’t taken well by the other partygoers. It’s revealed the boyfriend Jo accidentally made-up isn’t real, and she’s suddenly excluded from the popular group, becoming Jo the Nerd (which really is Jo as herself).

In the other reality, she starts going out with Jake, and remains a part of the cool group of girls, even though she kind of compromises herself to do so. All through the novel, we go between Jo the Nerd and Josie the Cool… but in both realities Jo makes a lot of mistakes and everything goes really terribly.

I loved all of the differences Jo notes between the UK and the US, and there were so many really touching, funny scenes. Though through a lot of the novel it seems very lightweight (and quite hilarious) there’s a really nice heart to the story, and Josie is a very relatable – albeit misguided, and boy-crazy to say the least – character. The transitions between her two realities – and how they crash back together – was completely seamless, and never confusing.

One thing which disappointed me was that in the end Jo does end up with someone, when I think, honestly, she’d be far better off on her own, and I think it would be far braver of her to be independent (not that she’s necessarily dependent on the person she winds up with, but hopefully you understand where I’m coming from). That said, that’s only how I would’ve preferred the book to finish. I think other readers probably would’ve been disappointed if she didn’t win a boyfriend in the end.

Fans of Jacqueline Wilson, Louise Rennison and Meg Cabot’s novels I think will really enjoy Split by a Kiss. I think it’d be suitable for girls 12 and older, and certainly worth a read. Split by a Kiss is a super-enjoyable, hilariously funny novel.

From melpdesigns.etsy.com

This is definitely the sort of stuff that’d suit lovers of cute handmade things – funky things for around your room (like the adorable crochet burger and chips), cute gloves for chilly winter days, and gorgeous cow and owl beanies for when you’re feeling silly.

From melpdesigns.etsy.com

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From melpdesigns.etsy.com

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From melpdesigns.etsy.com

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From melpdesigns.etsy.com

I definitely need one of these! You know how on really, really cold winter days your nose will go all red? Well, problem solved:

From melpdesigns.etsy.com

Harlequin Teen, September 2009

Back cover blurb (well, it’s on the flap of the hardcover):

There’s something about the new guy at Crossroads High…

Most sixteen-year-olds have friends. Aden Stone has four human souls living inside him:

One can time-travel.
One can raise the dead.
One can tell the future.
And one can possess another human.

With no other family and a life spent in and out of institutions, Aden and the souls have become friends. But now, they’re causing him all kinds of trouble.

Like, he’ll blink and suddenly he’s a younger Aden, reliving the past. One wrong move, and he’ll change the future. Or, he’ll walk past a total stranger and know how and when she’s going to die.

He’s so over it. All he wants is peace.

And then he meets a girl who quiets the voices. Well, for as long as he’s with her. Why? Mary Ann Gray is his total opposite. He’s a loner; she has friends. He doesn’t care what anyone thinks; she tries to make everyone happy. And while he attracts the paranormal, she repels it. For her sake, he should stay away. But it’s too late. . .

Somehow, they share an inexplicable bond of friendship. A bond about to be tested by a werewolf shape-shifter who wants Mary Ann for his own and a vampire princess Aden can’t resist. Two romances, both forbidden. . . doomed. Still, the four will enter a dark underworld of intrigue and danger. . . but not everyone will come out alive. . .

I loved the concept of a character with four human souls living inside his head immediately. And when the book opened on him in a graveyard, accidentally raising the dead and then being forced to decapitate them, I was even more excited.

I was disappointed to find Aden didn’t fight any more zombies through the book, but I felt the use of his other abilities incredibly interesting.

Many people enjoy reading paranormal romance. I can handle it, but vampires and werewolves make me cringe straight away. I felt in this book, the four people inside Aden’s head, with their assorted abilities of time travel, seeing the future, raising the dead and possessing others, would have had enough interesting adventures on their own, and the introduction of the vampire and werewolf love interests was done only to pull readers of Twilight. When fairies, goblins and witches started to make appearances, I was a bit unsure where it would go.

In spite of this, I really enjoyed Intertwined. I liked the friendship between Mary Ann and Aden, as well as Aden’s relationships with the people inside his head. I like flawed protagonists in novels, and I felt Aden was, though Mary Ann was a bit of a Mary Sue. Invented details about vampires (like the fact that you can only hurt them in their eyes and ears) felt a bit unnecessary, and some of the fight scenes a bit prolonged.

There were a couple of things I didn’t like: The vampires all had typical vampire names (Victoria, Dmitri), and Aden and Riley always felt the need to protect Mary-Ann and Victoria, and constantly assert their manliness by threatening each other (Do teenage girls find this attractive or something? I don’t get it).

Those things aside, I felt this novel was well-executed. Though I went “What?” when more mythical creatures started to appear, my interest didn’t dwindle, the story was gripping. This will inevitably appeal to readers of paranormal romance, and if that’s you, it’s well worth checking out. I think if I were more of a fan of that genre, I would have enjoyed Intertwined a lot more. It’s already far better than Twilight for me, and really action-packed. Based on Intertwined, I’m definitely going to check out Gena Showalter’s previous YA novels.

–
Gena Showalter’s website plus her cool Young Adult Books site

I so wish I had hair as long as this!

And this is such a cute dress (love the way the lollipo is the same as the sunglasses!):

I love the belt in this one, and the military-style jacket on the right:

This skirt is so beautiful (love the ruffles):

This last one is way too gorgeous. It kind of reminds me of Alice In Wonderland:

All these pictures came from ilovegemmaward.com and the Gemma Ward fan tumblr page – two places you can find way more gorgeous photos of her!

Ava is reinventing herself. She moves to the Billy Hughes School for Academic Excellence, begins making glamorous new friends, auditions for the school musical and (gasp) wears pink – all the while trying to hide her new self from her non-comformist parents and edgy girlfriend Chloe. She misses out on a role in the school musical, joins the misfits of Stage Crew, and things are complicated further, before the collision of her distinctly different lives, to disastrous results.

Pink is engaging in its realism. Quite honestly, I loved this book; Lili Wilkinson is undeniably in touch with the youth for which she writes. Pink was hilariously funny, and the way in which the characters spoke sounded as if it were straight from the schoolyard; Wikipedia references and silly in-jokes were abundant, the characters were easy to identify with and everything Ava dealt with was entirely relatable.

Ava’s voice is honest and compelling – her struggles with her personal identity and sexuality are relevant and dealt with much sincerity. The distinct theme of this novel is ‘it’s okay if you’re not sure’ – not an issue that’s common in YA literature at the moment, but which is masterfully handled in Pink. Both thought-provoking and fun, Pink is a must-read for teenage girls, and is now on my list of favourite books of all time.

Be sure to check out Lili Wilkinson’s blog!