First attempt at geometric nails

Inspired by this design on Pinterest I thought I'd have a go myself and a perfect excuse to try out my 'Butler Please' Essie polish that was purchased a while ago and never worn.

The lighting in my house is rubbish, I feel no matter where I stand the light is always high and behind me. So this picture isn't really the best and makes the manicure look a lot more like a dogs dinner than it actually is!

So to achieve this look I used OPI's 'Berlin there, done that' as the base, two coats, and topped off with a Colour Club Quick Dry Top Coat before applying striping tape. I taped each nail placing the tape not directly in the left corner of each nail but a bit lower and across to almost the bottom right of the nail. 

I used Essie's 'Butler Please' to do the first section in light blue, painting from the tape to the bottom of the nail. When dry I taped again to mask the line for the dark blue colour in the opposite direction.  For this colour I used OPI's 'I Saw... U Saw... We Saw... Warsaw'. I found painting the darker colour a bit more tricky and you can see above where I smudged the colour a little on the middle nails. I used a thin nail art brush to get into the top corners where the tape met the side of my finger and a brush dipped in acetone to clean up cuticles etc. 

Another coat of quick dry Top Coat to smooth the design out and I was done. On reflection I think I'll use a lighter nude for the base and a more true dark blue as the OPI I used was a little on the green side. Anyway I should really try my own colour combination... maybe next time!

21st Birthday Manicure

So a disappointing turn of events at the hen do as we simply didn't have time to do nails. A great time was had by all despite the lack of a finely painted nails.

However, this weekend was my friend Charlotte's 21st and she asked if I could paint her nails. She had gel nails done without a colour and I was able to paint and do a design to match her dress.

I was inspired by this manicure from Beauty Tutorials, for the accent nail and Charlotte asked for horizontal striped on her thumb.

I used striping tape for the lines and started with Essies 'Wrapped in Rubies for the base colour on Charlotte's accent and thumb. I finished off with China Glaze's 'Liquid Leather' for the rest of the nails and stripes. I topped the look off with Color Club's quick dry top coat.

Very happy with the results, a great night was had by all and hopefully this manicure will last Charlotte a few more days until Wednesday when it's her actual birthday!

New Adventures in Nail Wraps

I received some OPI nail wraps at Christmas but have yet to give them a go, my friend Sandrine used them before we went out for my birthday last year, and they looked fiddly and after reading some instructions online it appears it would be better to get someone to do them for you and also a lamp would be useful.

Anyway I saw these 'Talons' wraps in Boots on sale, I think they were £4 and really loved the design. The instructions on the back, said you needed no base or top coat and you simply cut the wraps to the desired size and stuck them to your nails.

I did these on my own and found it hard to stick them to my nail without getting bumps, and cutting the right hand wraps down to size was tricky with my left hand. I also think I need a new nail file as any excess wrap left at the end of the nail needed filing off. Tricky to do without showing tip wear. Next time I'll paint my nails a similar colour I think before sticking. Not sure if that will prevent them from sticking or not.

On day two now of nail wraps, I've showered and done the washing up and and they are still attached. Still bumpy though, removal says to peel them off with warm soapy water, so I thought they'd come off when washing the pots, but seems not. Let's see how long they'll last!

Model's Own Scented Polish Mini Haul

I was ordering some clothes on asos last week and needed to bump up my order to qualify for free delivery, so added a few bottles of polish to my order.

I've had my eye on this Fruit Pastel collection from Models Own for a while, but saw some reviews online that didn't rate them very well, however asos were selling these for £3.50 a bottle (normally £5). I also don't have any Models Own polishes or any of these type of colours. I prefer much darker colours, but I really, really want to do an ombre manicure, I have plenty of blues and purples so I'm hoping these are going to be the perfect accompaniment for the lighter colours for the manicure. I also have been looking for the perfect pastel yellow to go with a dress I bought for wedding attendance. The two yellows I currently possess, from Barry M and Rimmel are too bright and the Barry M one in particular takes 3 to 4 coats to get perfectly opaque.

Initial playing with these polishes, seem that they cover great in two coats but they don't really smell like the fruit the colours relate to, they just smell like nail polish. So from left to right the colours are... 'Banana Split', 'Apple Pie', 'Blueberry Muffin' and 'Grape Juice'. There is another polish in this collection called 'Strawberry Tart' but asos were clean out of this one. Needless to say I shall have to source this last polish too. Quite often Boots will have Model's Own on Sale for 3 for 2, so if you're a fan of this brand, keep an eye out. I've also got my eye on their 'Velvet Goth' collection!

Dream Duo

Last week whilst doing the weekly shop in Tesco, I saw these polishes from a line called 'Along Came Betty'. The range includes make up and various beauty products such as creams and shower gels etc... but these caught my eye as a perfect colour coupling.

The set includes a purple cream polish called 'Style' and a holographic micro glitter polish in a clear base called 'Steal', as shown on my accent nail. These were retailing for £5.49 for the pair in store, but you can get them at Tesco Direct online for the bargain price of £2.75! 

I also bought the other Dream Duo set they had, which has a Gold Shimmery polish called 'Swag' and a duo-chrome shimmer polish which shifts from pink to a gold called 'Dollar'. Swatches and manicure from the other set to follow.

Barry M Autumn Textured Polish

Last week's shopping brought me to Superdrug who as usual were doing a deal on Barry M polishes, two of their effects polishes for the bargain price of £6. I bought two polishes from their Autumn/Winter 2013 textured range. 'Countess' above which is deceiving in the bottle as it looks brown in colour but on the nail is purple. What a lovely surprise, and is so, so sparkly!

I also bought the white textured polish in this range too, called 'Lady'. Pictured on the left of the picture below.

These pictures really doesn't do this polish justice, for more swatches and better images of 'Countess' and Barry M's whole Autumn/Winter textured polish range, click over to Polly Polishes Blog.

These are really a great rival to OPI's Liquid Sand collection, and at a much lower cost too. I only used one coat for my manicure which has covered well and looks great, but check out Polly Polish swatches, next time I'm going with a Top Coat!

Also this weekend in preparation for Nail Art fun, the Konad items I ordered arrived. Two stamping plates and I thought I'd invest in some proper stamping polishes too. Nothing fancy here, just a black and a white, pictures to follow!

Bloglovin

<a href="http://www.bloglovin.com/blog/11534737/?claim=4fahra7ct68">Follow my blog with Bloglovin</a>

Flower Stamping Manicure

My friend is getting married soon and as part of the hen weekend activities I'll be showing the gals how to do nail art. So I thought I'd better practise and of course buy some more stamping plates and some proper Konad stamping polishes as I don't seem to have that many polishes that stamp very well.

Here I used (I think) Color Club's 'De-luxe-cious' as the base which is a gray/sliver with sparkle. I say I think as I bought a Color Club Set from TK Maxx and the names of the polishes are written on the back of the box and not on the bottles and I've mixed the bottles round. Also it seems that the UK versions are different to the US as these polishes look different when searching for them on the internet.

To stamp I used the 'Metal Nails' polishes I got for Christmas along with Konad Stamping Plate m65.

Some of the colours didn't work as well as others, such as the pink and gold. But the blue and green worked well and I used Color Club's 'Resort to Red' for the red flowers. I used two colours on the stamping plate so that the stalk and leaves were green and the flowers were a different colour. Seems to have worked quite well.

New Color Show Street Artist Range comes to UK

I was in Boots today mooching round the Nail Varnish as you do and I spotted this polish in with the other Maybelline Color Show polishes. It was on it's own with no other similar polishes with no sign stating it was a new range etc.... I thought it may have been one left over from previous stock when they were putting all their sales stuff out, anyways I thought it was so unusual that I bagged it and did some research when I came home.

This Polish in is the colour 02 White Splatter and is a top coat with white bar and hexagonal (large and small) glitters. Purple, blue and green hex glitters and silver and I think purple glitters. It's a great combination and would look great over both light and dark colours.

The only information that I found about the range is that it is indeed the new 2014 range and it's been released in the US already but doesn't seem to include this colour. I found this Blog Post by Nouveau Cheap showcasing all the US range here.

So keep you eyes peeled for this range in the stores soon.