Sunday 27 April 2014

Fingerfood's Challenge: Something New

Today for my something new nails I have gone all out on the 'new'!
I have used 2 new polishes and 2 new techniques. :)



The first new polish is the 'Jess' Polish, in Madison, which I reviewed here yesterday. This is the base colour in these pictures, and is actually a deep purple. The second new polish I have used is a crackle polish. I have to admit to having never used a crackle polish before. The look just doesn't do anything for me. But I saw one yesterday and thought I'd give it a go so this is Sally Hansen, Star Burst, on my index fingers. The crackle effect actually looks better than I imagined  and it has glitter in, which creates quite a cute look, so maybe it will get a bit of use!


 I also tried out two new techniques today. First, I tried the Saran wrap method on my ring fingers. I love how this looks on other people's pictures, but mine doesn't seem to have had the same effect. I did think this might be because I used an insta-dry polish so it dried before I could get much off, but I'm not sure. The top polish I used was Sally Hansen, Grape Race.


The second technique I tried was making my own decals. These are on my thumb nails and I kept it nice and simple with just a star on each hand. I used the sandwich bag and clear polish method of doing this and was surprised how easy it is and that you can't see or feel any edges at all of the clear polish once on the nail. Although, peeling the polish from the bag was extremely difficult and I ended up breaking one star in half, then having to line it back up on my nail!! I will definitely be doing this again, as it is so much easier than trying to paint designs straight onto the nail.


I then finished the whole mani off with a matte topcoat. :)

 Does anybody else's Blogger keep turning their photo's around? At least 3 of these photo's started off the other way around! It's very frustrating!

Saturday 26 April 2014

Jess Polish Review

Today I bought new nail polish!! Standard Saturday!
I'm just going to tell you about one of them at the moment, which I tried out this afternoon.
This Poundland 'Jess' polish. I was just looking at what colours they had and I fell in love with a purple polish called Madison. I'm not usually a big purple lover, therefore don't have many purple polishes, so I thought 'why not!'. My biggest issue with this polish was it's inability to appear the right colour in photo's!

This first photo I edited, to try and make the nails look the colour they actually are!! My skin is not actually this yellow, it's a side-effect of the editing!


They definitely are not this blue at all, I tried several camera's and several different intensities of light to take the photo's too, but no luck... just imagine they are the same colour as above!!


I absolutely loved this polish! One thick-ish coat was enough to fully cover my nails. I began adding a second coat to some nails, out of habit, but realised I could tell no difference whatsoever, so I stopped again! As you can see, the colour is really intense, even in just one coat. It went on so easily and smoothly too! I can't stop stroking my nails, as they have not been so smooth in such a long time! 


 I love how super shiny the finish is too! These pictures are without topcoat and they look so good. This polish also dried really fast. By the time I had finished one coat, they were dry enough to add a second coat straight away, so this mani literally took me 5 mins! Although, I do think this dried so fast, it might cause problems if you like to take your time painting your nails and it would not be very good for stamping.


All in all, I would definitely recommend this polish. Well done Poundland! I think I might be going back tomorrow to pick up a few more, as it is much better than some of the big brand polishes I have, and all for £1!

Monday 21 April 2014

Fingerfoods Challenge: Gothic

The theme for this weeks Fingerfoods Buffet Challenge was Gothic.
Being a complete girly girl, I couldn't get any further from Gothic if I tried. Hence, I found this theme incredibly difficult!! I ended up basing my mani on Gothic Architecture after much Googling.
I'm not sure about the result... I like my thumb, reminds me of Alice in Wonderland! Not so keen on the others!



Excuse the sideways pictures, for some reason Blogger turned them when I uploaded.

I used Rimmel's Right Royal Red as the base colour, then freehanded the designs onto the nail using a Black Sharpie.
I've never used this Red polish before, but I really liked it! I love the pop of bright colour, which was achieved in just 1 coat. And I hadn't realised before that it's a gel finish polish, and it is super shiny! I just wish it had a better brush. I love the bigger, flat brushes most Rimmel polishes have and was disappointed this didn't have one. Nevermind!


Saturday 19 April 2014

Fingerfood Theme Buffet & Africa Inspired: Fishtail Braids.

So this week I entered the Fingerfood Theme Buffet, for the first time ever, although I was a little late! The theme was fishtail, which was apt considering this was one of the techniques I wanted to include in my Africa Inspired Mani's, so it works as both!


I wanted this included as an Africa inspired mani as all the girls in the school who actually had any hair, had their hair braided. Apparently, this is a bit of a status symbol. Many of the children had their hair shaved, including girls, for ease. Those who had their hair braided are the ones who have a little bit more money. The girls in the school also began to braid my hair whilst I was there, although they didn't get very far, as I have so much more hair than them!


I've never tried a fishtail technique before and found it to be very time consuming, despite two of the polishes I used being Insta-dry! Hence why I only did the technique on one finger, rather than the full hand. I just wish I had got the sizes of the stripes a little more accurate, as some are much smaller than others.


The colours I used are MUA Plum Noir, Sally Hansen Grape Race and Sally Hansen Fuchsia Flare.
I also wanted to give a quick review of the MUA polish in this post. I had heard good things about them, so invested in two, Plum Noir and Frozen Yoghurt. I used Plum Noir in this mani, (the main base colour) and have to admit I was not very impressed. The polish was difficult to apply evenly and left lines on my nails from the brush which you may be able to see in some of the pictures. This was two coats, but really it needed at least another one, if not more.


Africa Inspired: Waterfall Nails

Whilst in Kenya, I visited and climbed a waterfall called Thompson Falls.


As part of my Africa Inspired posts, I wanted to recreate the beauty of this waterfall, on my nails.




I sort of used the waterfall technique, but wanted to make it quite realistic so blended the colours together more than you usually would in the waterfall technique. I started with a base of Barry M Blueberry Ice Cream, then used stripes of lots of different shades of blue, to try and create the look of the water. I also sponged Barry M Matt White onto the tips of the nails, to create the foam that forms at the bottom of the falls and finished with a layer of glitter, Barry M in Diamond.


All the polishes I used were (From left to right):
Maybelline Dark Denim
H&M unnamed blue polish
Revlon Blue Lagoon
Revlon Chroma Chameleon in Aquamarine
Barry M Matt White
Barry M Glitter Diamond
Barry M Blueberry Ice Cream.

Friday 11 April 2014

Feather Effect Pretty Polish

A few weeks ago I reviewed this glitter 'pretty' polish from Poundland. I was surprisingly impressed with the results and wanted to try more of their polishes.

So I bought two more:


  • The first is a purple feather effect polish, with long pieces of purple, white and silver glitter.
  • The second is a scatter effect polish. A white base with blue, pink and red pieces of glitter in.
First, I tried the feather effect polish. I used a Barry M Matt White base coat on the thumb, middle and little fingers. On the ring and index fingers I used Sally Hansen Grape Race. I then painted the feather effect onto just two of my nails. 




The first picture is the most true to colour. This mani was incredibly hard to photograph to get the full effect of the polish. Again, I was impressed with this polish, considering what it costs. It was easy to apply, with a nice even spread of the feather pieces. The different coloured pieces within it created a pretty effect, which seemed less flat, as they were not all the same. I used two coats to get a nice, thick coverage of the feathers, but I think this would look even better with more coats. The only downside of this polish was drying time. It took an awfully long time to dry compared with most polishes. Even once it was touch dry, it was still extremely easy to smudge for a long time afterwards. I ended up making a complete mess of my left hand!
Overall, I am again impressed with the 'pretty' polishes and will definitely consider buying more.

Thursday 10 April 2014

GOT Challenge. Africa Inspired : Gecko Nails

This is the first post in the series of Africa Inspired mani's I plan on doing, based around my time in Kenya.

For the first post I have done Gecko nails in tribute to this little guy, who lived in our hotel room with us in Kenya.


I picked a coral coloured base coat, so it also fits in with todays GOT Challenge. First a basecoat of Sally Hansen Nail Nutrition. I'm hoping this will help repair my nails after the damage caused whilst I was away! 
I used a Barry M Gelly in Papaya, which has been sitting in my stash for a while, but this is the first time I have used it. Then I used a Black marker to draw on the Gecko's. No topcoat as I currently have lots of unused polishes which I would like to try out, so I don't plan on leaving this on much more than a day!


I had high hopes of the Gelly polishes, as I've heard such good reviews of them and I love most Barry M polishes. However, I found this one quite difficult to apply, and a little streaky, even after 2 coats. I did love the colour of this polish though. Coral colours are always winners for me!

Here are some close ups of the Gecko's!


Kenya Nails

Hello!!
I'm back from Kenya, which was the most amazing experience, and hopefully soon back to doing my nails. It's safe to say the heat and dirt, along with chlorine from the pool, climbing up waterfalls and other activities has well and truly ruined my nails!
Had to chop them all short to get rid of the chips and peeling and put lots of Sally Hansen Nail Nutrition on them, hopefully this will sort them out!

Over the next few weeks I plan to do a series of Mani's based around Kenya, some of the experiences I had and the photos I have taken.
These are some of the ideas I already have for these:

  • Waterfall nails based on Thomson Falls, a waterfall I climbed down.
  • Safari inspired nails.
  • Giraffe print nails, inspired by the giraffe sanctuary I visited.
  • Nails inspired by some of the beautiful scenery I saw.
  • Gecko nails, to pay tribute to the Gecko we shared our hotel room with!
  • Plaited hair inspired nails - Because of the hair of all the little girls I was teaching, and they tried to do my hair similar!
  • Handpainted flower nails. I did an art lesson with the children, where they were asked to paint flowers.
I have not planned specific times to do each of these mani's but I think I will try to do at least one a week, so I still have chance to do other things with my nails too! If anybody would like to join in with any of these ideas, feel free and if you do I would love to see your mani's, so leave a comment and let me know!

Isn't it beautiful!

This is me with some of the girls I was teaching: Alice, Susan and Falilia.