Tuesday 28 May 2013

This weeks polish haul:

Ok so this little lot all arrived over the last week. Some are from ebay, nail pages on facebook, sally magpies and boots. 
As you will see from the pictures below...I've been busy again! Next week I'll be more restrained...Honest!!




Row one-from left to right:  Barielle-slow motion, Pure ice-No means No, Barielle sterling silver, 17 blue magnetic, Models own-Thunder and lightning, Jack Frost, Bourjois-Rainbow apparition and essence-peel off base coat.

Row 2: Picture Polish-tease, essence-Grey-t to be here, Maybeline colour show-speckled pink, Layla hologram effect-misty blush, Hits Hello Kitty-mint, Sation-pretiest player and most hue-nique.

Row 3: Enchanteds-see below, Nubar mini-Dazzling, Orly mini-it's up to blue, nailnation 3000-eye of newt, bon bon-pale green, nails by Laura-Leo's luxury and nailnation 3000-out of your league.

Row 4: Nails by Laura-Barbie Girl, Lush Lacquers: gumballs, oopsy daisy, dream on, seas the moment and peace-love-polish.


Lush Lacquers!

Nailnaition 3000 and Nails by Laura (sorry for the sideways pic!)

Sation:
I've had my eye on some Sation polishes for ages! So you can guess my delight when these two cropped up on ebay!!

Sally Magpies mini haul:
There was another Layla-Emerald Divine, which was swiftly confiscated off me as it is being put up for my birthday. The first two polishes were on sale, Complete bargain! I'm excited to try the peel off base as I'm fed up with removing glitter-even the foil method, I find to be a huge pain-I'll let you know how this works!

Enchanted Polish...

These were purchased from a lovely lady on Facebook, whom is fast becoming my polish BFF! Hehe.


Britney SpearMint-A gorgeous pale mint green with a subtle linear holo finish.


J'adore a pale pink, duochrome with a subtle holo shimmer *sigh* it's just too pretty!

Now Brace yourself...Remember what Enchanted do best??
The most Yummy polishes filled with holographic scrummy goodness!


With Flash.
*Drools!*

Aren't they beauties?! I Don't think that I have ever seen an Enchanted Polish that I haven't fallen head over heels with! 
I am on a desperate mission to find Castle On A Cloud, as I want to wear it when I go to see Les Mis-I'll let you know if I manage to hunt it down!! *crosses fingers!!*

Have you tried any Enchanted Polishes? Which is at the top of your Wishlist??

Thanks for reading
and I hope to see you again soon! 
xoxo

Monday 27 May 2013

Hello Kitty inspired dotticure!


Today i'm going to show you the pics from my first attempt at using a dotting tool-which was inspired by a cute picture of Hello Kitty! 

It's pink week on the all things nails page on facebook, Which happens to also be my favourite colour, so It was easy picking the colour for my dotticure! 

I used OPI nothing mousy about it as my base colour. This was available in last years vintage Minnie mouse collection, of which I bought the mini set, only to discover that I loved them all and needed full sizes!  It is a gorgeous bubblegum pink creme; application was a piece of cake-fully opaque in two smooth coats. 

I then took my dotting tool which I bought in a set from Topshop, available here (they also sell the dotting tool on it's own now for £6), and I dipped it into white nail polish, which i had put a few drops of onto a piece of plastic-I made the mistake of dipping it straight into the pot first..what a mess!! Then i starting randomly placing the little polka dots all over my nails. I then waited longer than normal before adding topcoat so as the dots didn't smear. Easy Peasy and the results are so cute! 

Here's the pics:






Matchy Matchy time!





I loved the vintage Minnie collection and I can't wait to finally get my mitts on this years Minnie couture collection!
Will you be purchasing any of them?? 

thanks for reading
 and I hope to see you back here soon!

xoxo



Friday 24 May 2013

The Great Gatsby inspired nail art.


It was a book that I never had to read in school and with the film coming out, I thought I would read it first. I really loved it-from its use of an omnipresent narrator to the way it captured the feel of the era. Flapper dresses, art deco, the charleston-needless to say I was feeling inspired! 

At about the same time as I finished the book I had a wonderful parcel arrive from the lovely Lou at tipsandtopcoat. It was my prize for winning a competition on her blog (eek-never won anything before!!). It consisted of 3 of the 2013 colour club halo hues collection:

Over the moon, cosmic fate and beyond.


Needless to say they are gorgeous and as soon as I saw beyond I thought it would be great in my Gatsby mani!

Also I could only pick two colours for this mani as it's polish roulette week on the All things nails page on fb: 2 colours, 1 mani!

Some more Gatsby inspiration:



Finally my mani, involving my novice attempts at nail art and first time of using striping tape! They are far from perfect but I am quite pleased with them.

For this mani I used a base of zoya trixie and colour club beyond. I also used nails inc electric lane on some nails and a tiny bit of lynnderella mercury's rainbow on the little fingers.

I stuck to quite basic designs: chevrons, triangles etc and then I added a little star jewel on the ring fingers.

Here are the piccies:

outside in shade.

outside, in indirect sunlight.

outside light


with flash

with flash


with flash.


Have you been to seen The Great Gatsby yet?
Thanks for reading
and I hope to see you back again soon!
xoxo



Sunday 19 May 2013

Seven Deadly Sins Tag! 


I hadn't actually heard of the post doing the rounds at the moment, until I was tagged in it myself by the lovely Anna at AnnaBean's Nails. Now I am a self confessed beauty junkie so I can't wait to complete this!! 

1 GREED: what is your most expensive beauty item? 
 Umm eek! I love my cosmetics and tend to splurge 2 or 3 times a year on the expensive bits and bobs, when I go up to London. If we are talking make-up or skincare, I would say it has to be either my Bobbi brown foundation £27 or my Laura Mercier Shimmer bloc £31-I buy the foundation a lot more! Also If we are talking about the area in general that I spend the most on? It would, without a doubt, be nail polish!!

2 WRATH: which beauty item do you have a love/hate 
relationship with?  
It would have to be base-foundation/concealer. I am so pale that I can only find a shade to match my skin tone in the more high end brands. Brands like rimmel, Lo'real etc-their lightest shades all make me look orange! The same goes for concealer, I found my perfect concealer it covered all multitude of sins, only for it to be discontinued!! It was Laura Mercier flawless fix pencil in light-if anyone knows of a similar concealer please let me know!! In telling you all of the problems I have with base, I couldn't live without it! 

3 GLUTTONY: what brand makes up the biggest chunk of your beauty collection? 
 Hmm...If we're talking makeup I'm going to guess it would be either Mac or Too Faced cosmetics. Nail polish, without a doubt would be OPI (which has taken over two drawers in the helmer!!) 

4 SLOTH: What product do you neglect to use due to laziness?
I probably should wash my hair everyday but if I did that, it would be all I would ever do! My hair is very long, very thick, with a tendency to go oily very quickly. This will tell you how bad it is, it takes my hairdresser around 3/4hr just to dry my hair..I just leave it to dry on its own otherwise. All I can say is Whomever invented dry shampoo "I love you!!"

5 PRIDE: Which beauty product gives you the most confidence? 
This would have to be between two items: Concealer would probably win as I wouldn't leave the house without it! The other item is polish-I get such a buzz if someone tells me they like my nails, especially complete strangers! 

6 LUST: which item is at the top of your beauty wish list?
Bobbi Brown BB cream, as it looks like it gives more coverage than your regular BB cream and also it comes in shades that are light enough for me. If we're talking polish it would be...Lynnderella Boy-Girl Party-the ultimate Lemming!!

7 ENVY: What make up product/look looks great on others but not on yourself?
Cream Blusher, as it shows up any imperfections and I want the impossible-a matte finish with a cream look! 

Now I will tag the following 3 lovely ladies:


What's your biggest beauty sin??
Shh...I wont tell if you wont!

I Hope you like this post, as I loved completing it!
Thanks for reading and I hope to see you again soon!
xoxo

Saturday 18 May 2013

Mardi Gras in May??!

Pretty & Polished Mardi Party.

Well it took me so long faffing around, trying to choose a polish for Indie week, on the all about nails page on facebook, that I nearly ran out of time! So I finally chose Mardi Party from Pretty & Polished, one of my recent purchases from the nail sale page.

I layered it over OPI my vampire is buff. (the name springs up connotations of True blood...There's just something about the way Bill Compton says "Sookie"...) Ok, ok, back to polish! 

This polish was quite stressful: first coat as to be expected was a streaky mess, second coat evened it out a lot, but a few nails needed a 3rd coat as they seemed to develop bald spots. I somehow can forgive this as I do like the colour, it's such a change for me to wear something so muted.

Going from the muted to the completely crazy-I then added a coat of Pretty & Polished, Mardi Party. The base was somewhat unusual, think wall paper paste, gummy and gloopy. I found it easier to keep turning the polish upside down as the pieces of glitter tend to sink. Also it seemed to be easier to do one coat and then go back and place individual bits of glitter in the gaps.

The polish is a clear-ish base with all different shapes, sizes and colours of glitter. Since I painted my nails it's reminded people of so many different things: a clown, a gobstopper, confetti. It truly is a party in a bottle, but don't take my word for it, here's the piccies:

low indoor lighting

with flash

low indoor lighting

 And finally a shot of the glitter up close, forgive the fact it's a little blurred, I haven't quite caught the hang of the whole macro shot thing!

low indoor lighting


It just makes me think of streamers and banners and parties. It's such a cheerful polish, I'm hoping it may encourage the sun to come out of hiding! 

What's the Craziest polish you own? 

Thanks for reading
and I hope to see you again soon! 
xoxo






Wednesday 15 May 2013

Whoops this weeks polish haul...

Hello, today I'm going to let you in on a little secret, this past week my polish buying has been out of control..way out of control!! 

A couple of these may have arrived a little over a week ago, but most of these arrived last week!


You wait your whole life for a Lynnderella nail polish...then 4 turn up at once:




They truly are little works of art aren't they?! 
from left to right: connect the dots-my biggest lemming slain!! The Glittering crowd-2nd lynn lemming! Mercury's rainbow and Very Pretty Vampire. As you can probably guess (although I consider them a bargain) this little lot cost a small fortune!! I think of it as an investment; some people buy bonds or shares I buy polish and nice jewellery-a much more sensible idea, if you ask me! ;) 

Next up is my polish haul-most arrived last week or the week before:

 

From left to right-
 Row one: Kleancolor holo chrome, sinful colors kissy and nail junkie-how apt! China Glaze hologlam when stars collide, OPI black label Thoroughly Modern Millie.

Row two: YSL mauve reflections, A England Tristam, Pretty&Polished Sand art and Mardi Party and smitten polish You're turning violet, Violet.

Row 3: Girly Bits Jelly shoes (the same colour as the pair of jelly shoes I had when I was little-I love polishes with nostalgic names!), Lush Lacquer Pink Panther, Glitzology Disco Barbie, Different Dimensions Rainbows & Butterflies, Girly Bits Arctic Sunrise and Barry M nail art pen in pink.

Row 4: Lynns- VPV, CTD, TGC, MR and Pretty&Polished Night rider and Power house. 

It's Indie week on the all things nails page over on Facebook and I have no idea which I am going to pick, especially as I was hoping to have bought a peel off base coat before using any more glitters! 
Hmm decisions, decisions...!!

phew, I swear I will try and be better next week!! 

Have you had any new polishes arrive? 
What's your take on Lynnderella polishes?

Thanks for reading 
and I hope to see you back again soon!
xoxo



Monday 13 May 2013

May Glossy Box review:

Glossy box and the terrible twos...

It's Glossy Box's 2nd Birthday and
after last months amazing box, this months has left me feeling a little disappointed.

Here's my box:



so far so good, a pretty neon pink ribbon and special glossy box turns 2 tissue paper.





I do feel a little bad grumbling as A I used my glossy dots to purchase it and B it is a far better box than last years birthday box; from which the only memorable items where: a flimsy plastic GB compact mirror and a rather sad balloon.

As always i'll talk you through the items one by one in order of what I found to be the most exciting.

First up we have a new product from the brand Jelly Pong Pong: 
Fairy Lashes mascara. I am yet to try this but I love mascara and the  packaging is too cute! This item more than paid for the price of the box and p&p in one. full size £15!

Next up is a nail polish by Headline Colours in Graphite. I haven't heard of the brand before, but hey it's a polish so i'm sure i'll like it! The only downside being the colour, which i'll use in the winter as it doesn't scream Summer. Another full size £9!

Beautiful movements cosmetics prime and create mixing medium-that's a mouthful! Teeny tiny 2.5g sample, which at first i thought was petroleum jelly-it's not! It is quite the multi-tasking little product which claims to act as a primer or can be mixed with any loose pigment to create cream foundation, eyeshadows, blushers etc... However, I'm hoping that I have the perfect use for this, as I have a Laura Mercier mosaic block that got smashed to pieces-so i'm thinking cream blusher! full size £20 so 2.5g apprx £2.50

And lastly we have a tie for the two products that excited me the least! 

Collection 2000 (yes you did read that correctly...) fast stroke eyeliner. However I will probably give this a try, although products like this normally irritate my sensitive eyes. I'll report back once I've tested it out! Full size £2.99

Finally the product which seems to have caused a bit of a buzz and funnily enough it's the product I won't even try...
Paul Mitchel Awapuhi wild ginger shine spray. I don't use anything on my hair except shampoo and conditioner; as it is extremely long, thick and oily.  full size 125ml £18.95 

Also included was a little matchbook of Glossy box own brand nail files and a mini Green and Blacks organic dark choccie bar, which was nice touch.

This months Glossy Box is worth apprx £48.44-which makes me feel even worse for not being over the moon with it!  

Whats your take on this months box?
Did you get anything different?

On a side note, sorry I haven't posted much lately. I've had problems with the tool I use for watermarking, which is hopefully fixed now! 

thanks for reading and 
I hope to see you back again soon! 
xoxo

Thursday 9 May 2013

OPI Mermaids Tears and Which is Witch.



It's blue week over on the all things nails page on facebook and i was deceived by Mermaids tears-which i swear looked more turquoisey in the bottle! 

So this is still going to be my entry as anyone that knows me would tell you i'm awkward like that! 

Mermaid's tears, from the Pirates of the Caribbean collection, has sat untried (but not unloved) in my helmer for nearly a year! So i finally decided I would dig it out and use it. I absolutely love it! It's different to any other colour I own and would really make a summer tan pop! 


Here's a lovely shot of Mermaids tears in the sunshine (when we had sunshine!):

taken in sunshine!

It could almost pass for duck egg blue here...right?!
x
taken in low indoor lighting.


I originally planned to top the whole thing off with Witch is which, from the Oz collection, but Mermaids tears was just too pretty to hide! Instead i used it as a ring finger mani (best of both worlds!)


in indoor lighting.

I'm sure it would look amazing in the sun...if we had any!
So here's the next best thing...
taken with flash




I really love this combination and I can't believe I left it so long before I tried Mermaid's tears!
It's not a colour I would normally go for, but now i think it's among my many favourites! 

What's your oldest untried polish?
I think I still have older!
On a side note I painted my toe nails on Monday and as I foretold it has rained ever since! 

Thanks for reading 
and I hope to see you back again soon!
xoxo

Monday 6 May 2013

June Magazine freebies!!

First let me start of for apologising for not posting over the bank holiday, its been a really hectic time! 

However I want to take the time to do something a little different today: A round up of the best freebies in magazines or beauty samples. I hope you enjoy this post as i'm hoping to make it a semi-regular feature on the blog! 

First let's start with the most exciting freebie of the month...
nails inc in instyle magazine. There are 3 colours to choose from. At first I thought they looked similar to, other nails inc, colours I own..they're not! They really are beauts! 

Heres some piccies: 







 First up I did a quick swatch of 'You're a peach', which was gorgeous and really summery. Applied effortlessly and was opaque in two coats.

from left to right: Peach sorbet, you're a peach and wellington square
 I've included bottle shots of the similar colours i had to all 3 polishes.  As you can see neither are dupes! 

 Next i tried 'totes pink', The first coat was somewhat streaky, (nothing unusual as the polish has a lot of white in it) but the second coat evened in out nicely and to full opacity.
L-R: totes pink and Elizabeth street.
 I don't actually own too many nails inc pinks so the closest I had was Elizabeth street-which as you can see isn't very close at all! Another none dupe!!


Finally I tried 'It's red babez' which is a nice orange toned red creme. This is slightly on the sheer side, as you can see, the nail line is clearly visible, which is a shame as I hate faffing around with a third coat! 




Again it's not a dupe! which is a plus. Still disappointed with the opacity though, it reminds me of my favourite red-Leighton Denny, Viva la diva (however viva la diva is virtually a one coater!) 

Other magazine freebies out now:




Elle has a mini Benefit 'they're Real!' mascara-which I have previously bought, hated, sold, bought in this magazine, hated and passed on. I just don't get the huge buzz around this product: i found it to be clumpier than clumpy and my eyes are still sore-two days later, think i must have had some sort of reaction to it! 

this magazine also has  a sample inside of clarins new BB skin perfecting cream in the medium shade. 
(if you have pale skin (like me) don't even be tempted to try it...I did and was more orange than a carrot! haha) 

 Marie Claire magazine has avon beauty products on offer. choose between their smitten red lipstick, gel eyeliner (in what looks like black) or an eyebrow definer (which from what I can see says dark brown). Also you will get a BB cream sample.

Marie Claire next month has a mini Ciate Caviar set free! The colours seem to be Cookies and creme paint pot and shooting star caviar pearls.


Harper's Bazaar magazine has a free Ren Morrocon Rose Otto body cream 50ml. I would like to try this as i love Ren products! 


Harper's Bazaar has a very special freebie next month...Leighton Denny colour and go nail duo varnish (one end is the colour and the other is one for all base and top coat). They're are six shades to choose from...so start saving now! 

Also not magazine related but Garnier are giving away moisture match sample packs.

Loreal are giving away Nude Magique CC cream samples.

I'm sorry about it being such a long post but June has some really great freebies on offer and July is shaping up to have even more! 
Have you bought any magazine with free goodies in this month?? 

thanks for reading 
and i hope to see you back again soon! 
xoxo


Friday 3 May 2013

NOTD: Enchanted Polish Gummy worm:


Now I love all polishes and wear all colours, but green, now this was a little out of my comfort zone!
However, I absolutely adore it!! 
Something about this lime green polish with intense yellow shimmer and linear holographic finish called to me and boy am i glad it did!! I think the name helped to sell it to me even more it's just like a nostalgic trip to your childhood sweet shop in a single bottle!
This polish finally made it to me from across the pond-after a slight hiccup...but It was well worth the wait and I love it! 

I have always said that Enchanted polish do the most amazing holos and this one was no exception. The crazy rainbow holographic finish, although not as strong as Austin  Powers (see review here:Austin Powers!), is still visible under most lighting. It has a lovely smooth formula, applies evenly and is opaque in two coats. The best thing is that top coat does nothing to dull the holo effect so it will last a lot longer than your regular holo!


As i live in the UK, I love the time when we finally get a few rays of sunshine and all of the bright and holo nail polishes come out and look amazing! 

Finally some piccies of the very yummy gummy worm:

in shaded sunlight.


in direct sunlight.
See how the sunlight sort of dances across it, creating a sparkly rainbow in among all of that gorgeous yellow, sherberty shimmer! (sorry the alliteration comes out when I try to describe something that's just too amazing!)

with flash. pre-cleamup. Showing the amazing yellow shimmer!

with flash.

I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this polish! It is blooming amazing and perfect for showing off in the sunlight!

Have you unleashed any holo beauties yet??

Thanks for reading
 and i hope to see you back soon!
xoxo

Thursday 2 May 2013

NOTD: Illamasqua Noble and Milani Jewel FX in teal



Illamasqua Noble is a gorgeous bright turquoise creme, which much to my surprise was opaque in one coat! 
low indoor lighting, pre-cleanup.



I then added one one coat of Milani Jewel FX in Teal.
It's a gorgeous polish, with green, silver and turquoise medium sized hexagonal glitters and small turquoise micro glitter. I found this a breeze to apply and only needed one coat for even coverage. I then added a nice, thick coat of gelous to make it smooth and glossy.

Now I am completely in love with this combo, as was the lady in the newsagents today (the sign of a good polish is when random people stop and ask you what it is!), so I must warn you now, there will be pictures-many, many pictures!
taken in natural light.


Sunlight just makes the glitter sparkle like crazy, so i had a hard time capturing it in the pictures!

taken in sunlight! (sorry about the background mess-impromptu nail photo shoot in the car!)




low indoor lighting.



taken with flash.



And lastly, because it was my boyfriend's 21st, and because i'm never one to miss an opportunity, I managed to find a piece of confetti to match my nail varnish! 

very low indoor lighting.


I think i'm a little bit in love with Illamasqua polishes at the minute; they are definitely the best brand that I have recently discovered! 
I'm sure I will be adding quite a few more of their polishes to my collection over the next few months! 

As for the gorgeous Milani glitter, i just wish they were easier to find in the UK! 
This one was bought back for me from America; along with a whole  host of other lovelies-stay tuned for an American polish post! 

I love this manicure, as it really comes alive and sparkles in the sunshine. My First proper Summer Mani! 

(on a side note i really must paint my toenails soon..but whenever I do it always seems to rain! I Think I would rather keep the lovely sunshine and wait a little longer before bringing out the flip-flops!)

What are your Go-to Summer mani shades??

Thanks for reading 
and I hope to see you back soon! 
xoxo