// About Bird's Words //
What is Bird's Words?
Bird's Words is a beauty, fashion and lifestyle blog. I focus mainly on beauty reviews and the odd life ramble here and there.
Why "Bird's Words"?
It
is extremely hard to explain this to people who don't know me
personally. I've always had a bit of a habit of referring to my female
friends as my 'birds' or 'pigeons', and throughout the years they have
caught on to these little words of loveliness and therefore now refer to
me as 'Bird'. Which is quite lucky really seeing as it was quite easy
to think of a catchy rhyming blog name.
Why did you start Bird's Words?
I'd recently cut down my full-time hours at work in preparation for uni,
and felt a little bit lost without having something worthwhile to do (i'm not the greatest fan of being bored). I had also been reading blogs for
about a year and quite fancied a slice of blogging pie :) I wanted to share my interests with likeminded people and hopefully help a few of you along the way. As well as loving anything beauty related, I have a lot of love for writing and I thought it would be a good idea to combine the two together.
What can I expect to see on Bird's Words?
I include a bit of everything on this blog - expect to see plenty of beauty related posts and plenty of clothing buys (I do like to indulge in retail therapy..quite often). I must admit i'm a bit of a lipstick-aholic and I make no secret of this. I also like to throw in a few personal posts for good measure..
// F.A.Q //
Who desgined your blog?
I put it together myself after a great deal of googling and a little bit of Adobe Illustrator know-how..
Do you do blog designs?
Not at the current moment. What with my uni course/part time job and running my blog it would be an extrememly tricky balancing act to say the least and would mean keeping far too many plates spinning at once. However, it is something I am thinking of branching out into in the future, so keep your beady eyes peeled and watch this space! If you want to ask anything to save yourself some Google time, feel free to fire away though!
What camera do you use?
In my recent posts (from January 2013) I use a Sony Nex5R with a Macro lens. In all of my earlier posts I simply just used my trusty iPhone to the best of it's potential!
How do you edit your photographs?
I use Photoshop to brighten, sharpen, crop and balance/level colours and whatnot. After this I add text using Adobe Illustrator or a variety of online editing software depending on what kind of style I'm going for (my favourite for quick filters or text has to be PicMonkey) Again, feel free to email me if you want to know anything specific!
Do you use lighting?
In all honesty, I prefer not to - even through winter. I did invest in some lighting however, I much prefer the softer appearance of natural light. That's not to say lighting will not work for you - I'm quite lucky in the sense that my typical 'photography spot' is in front of a wall of large glass doors/windows.
How do you achieve your hair colour?
My hair is naturally a mousey blonde shade with warm light-brown tones underneath. In Summer, I'm sorry to say I don't do an awful lot and just let the sunshine do its thing. I use a Clairol dye (SB1 I believe) to tint it during the winter months, and I have highlights in the mid-lengths that have grown out from my college days. In natural lighting my hair looks quite light, but I actually have little or no bleach in there. If you have fairly light hair, going a blonde shade similar to mine is very easy to achieve and maintain as there's no need for continuous bleaching. I like the slightly undone, 'boho-y' look.
How do you style your hair?
I use my trusty GHD's (to curl) or a variety of curling tongs and wands (Enrapture, Toni & Guy, Remmington...) If you pop 'hair styling' or something similar into my search box in my sidebar then a fair few of them should pop up!
Do you do YouTube?
Not at the minute. I'll be honest and say that the world of YouTube terrifies me a little bit but I'd love to give it a bash one day. I'm quite a chit-chatty person and I love the idea of rambling away to a camera about stuff I like so watch this space.
Do you have Instagram?
Yes and no. Let me explain!
I have an ancient account that I made waaaay before Instagram 'got big'. It's privatised because, being completely honest, I simply cannot bring myself to share with the world old, cringey holiday photos. I use it sometimes to pop a filter on my phone pictures but currently I don't have it joined up to my blog. I do want to link a new account up sometime in the future so watch this space - but in the meantime I'm happy just the way it is. Although I do share quite a bit of my life on my blog, I must admit I can be a bit 'wary' of oversharing on the interwebs; having this blog and an open Twitter account is pushing it for me - so bare with me! I tweet the odd photo now and again and you can often find out about what I'm up to via my Tweets - so feel free to stalk me on there for the time being :) Don't worry - just because I don't have Instagram linked up doesn't mean I'm a social-media-hermit!
You speak about your struggle with panic attacks on your blog, is there any advice you can give to me?
Occasionally, I do like to throw a bit of a personal post into the mix and one thing I'm very passionate about is spreading the word about anxiety issues/mental health as this is something very close to home for me - I've suffered all my life with panic attacks and it's something i think needs to be addressed more openly. If you wish to read my (ancient) post on this click here :) I am by no means an advice guru on the subject or anything - but it's a question I often get asked and I'm always more than happy to have a chit-chat about it - feel free to drop me an email!
What are you favourite drugstore/high end beauty brands?
I like different brands for different things but if we are trying to get this into a nutshell, I'd say my favourite 'drugstore' brands would be Seventeen, Revlon, Rimmel and Bourjois. I'm also very partial to a Barry M nail polish or three. As for high-end, I'm a big fan of Mac (who isn't?!), Benefit and YSL - although my ultimate favourite has to be Nars. I like different brands for different things so it's tough to pick one really.
I've just started blogging, do you have any advice for me?
There is no right or wrong way to write a blog! Just enjoy doing it and don't concentrate on that pesky little follower number. In a recent interview with Mallzee I offered some tips and advice about things I've learnt along the way and what has worked for me and my blog - feel free to have a nosey! You can find it here.
