nailbox - October Review

Yey, October's nailbox is HERE and the colours are perfect for my 30 Days of Colour Challenge. This month we have an autumn themed box with three gorgeous polish for the season.

First up is Rimmel's 'Caramel Cupcake' what a great name and also a lovely polish. This was opaque in two coats and it's been a while since I bought or used any Rimmel polishes and they've made the brush much thicker. Just one swipe with this bad boy and my little fingers where DONE!

Really liked this polish and used this as my base and to create the gradient on the manicure below. 

Next is another Gel Effect polish from Nails Inc, I think this is the third polish I've received from nailbox from this brand, This is a gorgeous burgundy/purple colour and one of my favourite colours. This again was opaque in two coats and in the gradient came out much brighter than in the bottle.

Last but not least is a effects polish from Essie called ' Summit of Style' a lovely packed glitter polish with gold glitters of two different sizes. No need for fishing with this glitter just one dip and apply to the nail deposits plenty of glitter. In fact it's so packed in the bottle I wasn't sure if it was in a clear base or if there was black glitters in there too.

This month's nail care items were some nail scissors, useful because I'm always hunting for my pair, and some Drying Drops from OPI. I did use these when doing my Thanks Giving manicure, bit hard to tell if it dried the polish any quicker as I ALWAYS use a quick dry topcoat. Also when applying to the nails I wasn't sure how to apply it so it covered all my nail. Something to experiment with, if you have any tips or experience with drying drops let me know.

Here is the manicure I created using all the polishes in this month's nailbox and is also my manicure for the next prompt in the 30 Days of Colour Challenge 'Fall Gradient'. 

nailbox - September review

September's nailbox was Halloween themed and I couldn't wait to see what creepy colours they had included. I gotta admit that I really look forward to receiving nail polish from nailbox every month as you never know what you're gonna get and it's always a surprise to see what polishes and colours they have included, especially as they may not be the choices you'd necessarily make yourself. Here's this month's goods!

Here we have from left to right, a base coat from Elegant Touch, not one I've tried before as I always use OPI Nail Envy as my base. I'll report back, but let me know if you've tried it and how you rate it.

Next up is this gorgeous bright green from Nails Inc called 'Queen Victoria Street'. This went on like a dream, almost opaque in one coat, but I did two here, formula was spot on!

Next up is a purple metallic polish from Sinful Pro Shine, not to be confused with Sinful Colors and it took me a while to seek them out. These retail at £7.95 each a bottle.

I love the way all of the polish bottles in this months box have the silver cap. Makes me think they're a bit fancy!

This one is a gorgeous colour called  'Show Off' however I found the formula on this a little thick, again I used two coats to get opaque.

This month nailbox included some nail art brushes, which will always go to good use, there is no branding on these so not sure what company they are from.

Last up is a black polish from a brand called True Brit London, this is another brand I've never tried or even heard of. Great formula, have no complains about this one, went on like a dream, may even be a one coater. I layered this over the above polishes as you'll see in my manicure below, so it will need putting to the test. The polish is called 'Taxi Cab' and retails for £12.50, so already you can see that £15 a month for this subscription service is a great deal.

My challenge next was to create a creepy manicure with my new polishes, so had a scout around on the inter-tubes and found this halloween inspired manicure on Lucy's Stash. I created this look using all the polishes above and a white crackle from China Glaze! Here's what mine looks like.

I'm not sure if the green wasn't dry or if it's just highly pigmented as it made the white crackle go yellow, I like it though, more creepy!

Here's some close ups...

Overall another great selection from nailbox, I wonder if we'll be getting something Christmas related in the next box?

Neon, Neon, Neons

Last week some of my favourite nail Vloggers did a collab video on their favourite neon polishes. This is a colour and style I've never sported myself as I often opt for dark vampy shades but for some reason these videos rekindled my nail polish addiction and I hunted down some the top polishes they picked and raided my collection to see if I had anything I could sport until my new bottles arrived.

Seemed I had a few polishes that claimed to be 'Neon' but the jury seems to be out on what each person considered a neon polish to be and don't even start on Neon Pastels.

This is Nails Inc 'Kensington Park Road', it's probably not a true neon as it's a blue, but it sure is BRIGHT. I layered this over a white base too in order to make it pop. (Again the jury is out on whether you need to layer a true neon over a white base or not).

I also found a Nails Inc polish in a bright Orange Neon called 'Optic Flame' but my mani chipped quickly and my pointer finger on my left hand that I'd been patching for a week broke off very low so lovely swatching pictures weren't to be...

However some of my Neon polishes have NOW arrived, so I need to create some eye smarting manicures with them and share them with you all!

In the meantime, I took a trip to Primark and purchased some of their £1 stick on nails to cover the ruination that is my nails at, they seem to be breaking quite easily at the moment. These have lasted a day so far although my thumb nail did ping off, but was quickly stuck back on with no bother.

Love these little bright triangles, have a thing about triangles at the mo, not sure why! Let's see how long these last! Next stop NeonVille!

Do you love or loathe Neons? Let me know in the comments below and also what you think about Primark Nail products as whole? I have quite a few polishes too, and for a £1 I think their formula's and colours are really good, undecided on the stick on nails though...

nailbox - a monthly nail polish subscription service

In June I stumbled upon nailbox, the first nail polish subscription service in the UK. I'd missed two boxes already so was keen to sign up and see what I'd receive, this was something I'd been looking for...

Nailbox ship their boxes out in the 21st of each month and I picked up mine from the Royal Mail Depo on the 25th as it had been delivered when I was at work and I think needed to be signed for. This is what was inside...

Each box contains four full size bottles of nail varnish and a nail care item. In June the polishes were:

Essie - Roarrrange (A bright orange creme)

Seche Vite - Fast Drying Top Coat

Tanya Burr -Mischief Managed (Red Creme)

Nails Inc - Colville Mews (Nude Creme) 

The nail care item was some cuticle nippers from Elegant Touch which I haven't tried yet and I do try not to cut my cuticles.

I used ALL the polishes to create a gradient starting off with the Nails Inc polish as my base and sponging on the other polishes to create the following manicure.

I'm familiar with Essie and Nails Inc as brands but hadn't tried any of Nails Inc Gel Effect polishes before, the colour was lovely. The red and the orange worked great for the gradient and blended well.

The only couple of complaints I have was that the cap on my Nails Inc bottle perhaps wasn't on tight enough and the bottle top was crusty when taking out the brush which left the polish a little on the thick side, some polish thinner sorted that out. I also wasn't keen on the brush in the Essie polish, I've not had a problem with Essie brushes before, it just seemed a little fanned out.

I was impressed with the Tanya Burr polish having never used this brand before. I topped it all off with Seche Vite which I have used many time before and a new bottle does wonders to blend and dry the gradient.

Overall, very happy with my first box, looking forward to seeing what's in Julys. Have you subscribed to nailbox? If so tell me what you thought of this month's box.

Until the next Nail Art Challenge

So whilst I'm waiting for my next challenge to arrive, I'm concentrating on what's left of my untried polishes as I've made a MASSIVE dent in them. I have a couple of these MIcro-Dot polishes and not sure what to do with them for best effect.

I topped these over Models Own 'Banana Smoothie' and quite liked the effect, reminds me of sprinkles on a cake, and who doesn't like cake?

The Nails Inc polish was in a set of three from Savers and is called KnightsBridge Place. Took a bit of fishing for the glitters but only used one coat.

Next on the untrieds list was this Revlon scented polishes called 'Raspberry Rapture'. It smells great and the colour is a little more on the raspberry side rather than being the right red here in the pic. It did however take three coats for full opacity. 

In order to sneak in an extra untried I used Sally Hansen SugarCoat textured polish in 'Pink Sprinkle' on my accent nails. It's a pink sheer polish with what looks like orange glitter. I have a few more of these SugarCoat polishes in the untried rack, I'm thinking I needs some nail vinyls to use these with...

Recent adventures in nail varnish

I've not had much time to do my nails justice recently and took pleasure in having a break from trying to keep up with January's 31 Day Nail Art Challenge.

There have been some techniques I've wanted to try out however and I STILL have a fair amount if untried polishes in my possession. 

Doing Nail Art is a great way to try out polishes that have not yet graced your fingers and the below manicure is a perfect example of this. 

Occasionally the Nail Polish facebook Group I'm a member of has an anything goes weekend where you can post not only nail varnish you have for sale but anything else from, clothes to makeup and baby and children's toys.

I picked three Barry M polishes for the meagre price of £1.50 and I used them to create this tie dye effect manicure.

I used a sponge to create this pattern and just blobbed on spots of four different colours and sponged them on to my nails over a white base. I repeated this a couple of times until I was happy with the colour and design. This would have worked well as a galaxy too.

The manicure I did before didn't stay on as per usual I didn't have enough time or patience to wait for the polishes to completely dry before taping up and painting the triangle colour. I also wanted to add a few gems or stick something on my nails from my recent hobby craft and Instagram win.

Here's what I came up with, you can see the unstraightness (that's not even a word) of the lines. Colour combo OK, I used the free Nails Inc polish that came free with Marie Claire magazine last month and Essie's 'Fair Game'. Bobbed a gem on the accent nail from a set I bought a Hobby Craft. Next Blog post will be of all the gubbins I've bought recently and where from.

I created a glitter triangle on my thumb nails for this manicure which came out quite well too. I love how this looks on the macro pic below, I used 'Girls on Film' by GOSH!

Last but not least I have to start using the Models Own polishes I purchased in the sale a little while ago, they are sat on the top row of my untried taunting me! 

This one is from the BeetleJuice Collection called 'Purple/Blue'. It's a Duo Chrome of my two favourite colours. Lovely! 

Holo and Inspired by Pinterest - Days 13 and 14

It's safe to say that I have fallen behind in the second week, but I shall continue on. Realistically doing a new manicure (with nail art) EVERY day just isn't going to happen. As with the last challenge I'm enjoying trying new techniques, challenging myself and using my untrieds. This is going very well, I have now reduced my untried down to a mere 191 well below half of my collection.

So Day 13's theme was holographic and a nail polish effect I love, but only have a handful of. I'd never used GOSH 'Holographic Hero' before so wasn't sure if it was opaque or not, so I layered it over Revlon Parfumerie in 'Spun Sugar'. I'm not sure why the GOSH polish says for 24 hour wear, I'm not going to be wearing it longer than that anyway.

I topped with HK Girl, as I needed these dry before heading about my day, and the top coat seemed to dull the holographicness (is that even a word?). So I decided I needed something else and stamped this pattern from a Bundle Monster plate. Pretty chuffed with how this looks!

Next was to recreate a manicure from Pinterest, which I do all the time anyway. This is one I've tried before without much success, I couldn't figure out what order to put matt top coat and glitter on and whether to paint or dab the glitter. This time it came out much, much better. Here's the pin:

And here's my attempt...

I used Nails Inc 'Wigmore Street' as the base and Orly 'Fowl Play' for the glitter, turns out painting it on a sponge and then dabbing it on my nails worked best. I then topped them both off with a OPI Matt Top Coat. Lovely!

Catching up with day's 9 and 10

Day 9 asked for a Red Base, and red isn't a colour I choose to wear very often, but when I do I'm pleasantly surprised. In this instance I didn't know what to pick as I have quite a number of red polishes that I have yet to try... here's a gander at them! Which one would you have chosen?

That's 10 red polishes I own and have never worn. Now some can be justified, the essie which is a beautiful pillar box red, was part of a set I bought from TK Maxx, and my first essie polishes. Two of the the OPI's were presents, oh and the Nail's Inc and Leighton Denny were freebies from a magazine purchase, so that's half of them justified for.

So I chose, OPI's 'Affair in Red Square' for my Red Base manicure and topped it off with Orly's 'Star Spangled Banner'. Picture does this NO justice and I'd be interested to see how opaque the Orly polish would be on it's own, as this really has depth. The micro glitter really looks suspended in the polish. This is going to be my go to manicure if I want red.

Day 10 was glitter base and the last few days with work and training all day Saturday have left me little time to embellish these manicures with some nail art. However the polish I chose below, Maybellines Color Show in 'Rose Chic' from the Crystallize range needs nothing else. 

I can't believe I have NEVER used this polish before, it's freaking gorgeous! Formula is great, finish is slightly textured but not too bumpy and the other thing about this polish is it's one of those that when applied, doesn't look messy AT ALL. You could get a monkey to apply this to your nails and it would STILL look fabulous. I have no idea if you can still get these Crystallize polishes and looking online the range they had in the US was even more awesome!

I'm STILL wearing this, and don't want to take off, and I need to do Day 11's manicure. I do have a feeling that it's gonna need a soaking in acetone and wrapping in foil for removal.

31 Day Challenge - Inspired by a colour and a song

It was always going to be purple, I have a thing for purple and why complicate things when the colour says it all. I never really thought of purple as a girls colour, that is pink, but turns out it is. I don't care, it's a great colour and the below is pretty much the perfect shade of purple.

This is Illamasqua 'Faux Pas' and stupidly enough a polish I have never worn since purchasing it. This pic has no top coat as it dries matt, and I kinda like it.

Day 22 was inspired by a song and one of my favourite songs is 'Seasons' by Chris Cornell. The manicure doesn't reflect the songs lyrics, but the title and I tried to theme each nail around the four seasons.

So blue and white if for the Winter, red and orange is for the Autumn, yellow and orange is for the Summer and shades of green is for the Spring. 

I ended up using glitter top coats for extra effect, as my nail art painting of snow flakes and leaves didn't go according to plan. It kinda works except for the Autumn I think.

Going away to Berlin this weekend to run the marathon so the challenge will have to continue when I'm back!

No buy and untrieds

A challenge laid down by a fellow polishaholic, was to curb your nail varnish addiction by tallying up all your untried polishes and using as many as you can by the end of the month.

I was a little shocked and surprised that over half of my vast collection of polishes have been not so much untouched by human hand, but not touched the nails on either of my hands.

This is when I realised that I do have 'a bit' of a problem. Leading up to this revelation and challenge, I think I managed to buy about 30 polishes within only two weeks.

So challenge laid down and accepted, and doing the maths that means I could almost create a new manicure every day for the next six month using my untrieds (You understand some of these are glitter toppers). So far I have used eight of my untrieds and purchased no polish for two weeks.

 The latest mani, above is Nail Inc 'Regents Palace' a metallic purple polish with Revlon's 'Scandalous' as a topper for the accent nail. God this polish is gorgeous, and was one of the recent purchases. I've previously not been a big fan of Nails Inc, the only polishes I've had from this brand before were freebies with magazines. Both very light colours, which is something I don't wear often anyway, but the formula has been a bit gloopy and one even bubbled, but this may have been a dodgy top coat. Anyway this polish is a keeper and I'll definitely be wearing this again.

USA Haul

So a couple of weeks ago I went to the states for the first time, and I was excited to see what polish I could pick up over there, and at a better price in the UK.

I was limited somewhat as we didn't have a car and were reliant on public transport to get around. So I was unable to visit Target or those kind of places that tend to be on retail parks.

However we spent sometime in New York and Boston, and I was able to visit a CVS, a DUANEreade pharmacy and most importantly when in New York a Sephora! 

So then, not too much excitement on the nail front. I acquire three new polishes on my first shop at Walgreens. Two Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicures polishes (above) in 'Mermaid's Tale' and 'Black and Blue'. You can get these at home, but slightly cheaper in the States and I've had my eye on 'Mermaid's Tale' for a while.

The third was a Sally Hansen Lustre Shine Polish in the colour 'Scrab' (pictures on swatches here on the left). Gorgeous Duo Chrome that shifts from Blue to Green, great for a Mermaid manicure topped with 'Mermaid's Tale'.

My next polish purchases were from Sephora and I picked up a Deborah Lippman polish from the new 80's Summer Collection called 'Video Killed the Radio Star'. An amazing bright blue polish (below). Formula fantastic and wore really well, although I didn't base coat it as I had none with me at the time, and it stained some of my nails pretty bad.

I topped it with my other purchase Nails Inc ' Floral Street Mews' on the accent nail. I've not had a great experience with Nails Inc polishes before, but this one is a glitter with light pink and white glitter and blue and white flowers. Also swatched above on the right swatch at the front.

The last four polishes I bought were from DUANEreade and were, OPI's ' Yoga-Ta Get This Blue' (Right back in the swatch picture). In the bottle looks like a duo chrome that shifts from blue to purple but this doesn't translate on to the nail unfortunately. 

Next Sally Hansen's 'Save The Date' which is a dark plum/purple metallic with very fine shimmer (Left back in the swatch picture). 

A Milani polish, which I have never seen over here in the UK, called 'Sugar High' (Left front in the swatch picture). It has gold, peach, lime green and blue glitters. It looks like sprinkles for a cake.

The last polish I bought was Sinful Color's 'Mint Apple' a cool Blue/Green polish with a slight shimmer. Perfect from Spring/Summer and I used this for the manicure below topped with a blue/green glitter from Technic.

So all in all, 9 polishes purchases and I'd say nothing really out of the ordinary and apart from some of the Sally Hansen and the Milani nothing that you can't really get over here. 

However I did spurge on some make up at Sephora, I'll do a separate post on these. My nail varnish addiction seems to be now expanding to make up in general. I also found out that Sephora ship to the UK too for not too much money, this is bad, very bad...