Butter London–Pillarbox Red with Cult Nails-Coveted

Merry Christmas, everyone!

So, the Christmas mani I did yesterday didn’t quite work out but I have another one for you. This is the mani I did for the Christmas Pageant in my little town:

Two coats of Butter London Pillarbox Red and two coats of Cult Nails Coveted. So, so gorgeous. Pillarbox Red is honestly the most perfect red I’ve ever seen and Coveted is such a lovely, deep green jelly with glass ‘shards’ in it.

 

I decided to make it a little more Christmassy:

I sponged white on the tips and stamped some Konad designs on. Cute little snowmen on my fingers and “Merry Christmas” on my thumbs. Everyone at the pageant loved this!

 

Hope you’ve had a happy and safe Christmas!

Em xx

Jade–Mystic Gold with stamping

I don’t usually ‘do’ gold, especially not yellow gold. White gold, oh yes, but yellow gold just doesn’t suit me.

I did have to try this particular gold polish, though. Why? Because it’s a holo, of course!

 

Jade Mystic Gold, two coats. Stunning, right? It’s a really rich yellow gold so it doesn’t look tacky. I just love the Jade holos because they have such a strong holo effect. You just can’t go wrong!

I added some Konad stamping on top, a cute and funky zebra pattern.

 

What do you think of my zebra nails?

Em

Max Factor–Fantasy Fire over Kiko 336

I’ve been wearing some gorgeous polishes lately, some of which have been hiding in my stash for too long. For example, Max Factor Fantasy Fire. Why on earth did it take me so long to wear this pretty!? I knew I’d love it so I bought multiple back up bottles, yet it sat in the untrieds drawer of my Helmer for months.

 

I chose to layer FF over Kiko 336, a pretty bright royal blue very similar to Nails Inc. Baker Street. I got 336 in a swap  I did with a lovely lady from The Netherlands. It’s a lovely colour on its own but silly me forgot to take a photo so you’ll just have to deal with a couple of pics of Fantasy Fire (oh, what a shame ).

 

One coat of FF over Kiko 336. *Happy sigh*. The royal blue base really brings out the hot pink and purple sparkles in FF. I loooove this. I got so many compliments on it and I think this mani needs to happen again SOON.

Here’s another shot:

Hmmm… yes, I think FF is calling … You’ll have to excuse me!

Em

p2–Blue Hawaii

This little beauty took me by surprise. I got it in a swap I did with a lovely girl from the Netherlands a few months ago. I thought it was a plain medium mint green creme, but as soon as I put it on, I knew it was something more special.

 

This is p2 Blue Hawaii. Why they call it blue, I will never know. It’s clearly green. A lovely shade of medium mint green with a brilliant shimmer through it.

It’s been a while since I wore this polish but I think it took about four coats to be opaque. The formula was lovely though so it didn’t bother me in the slightest.

 

Do you own any p2 polishes?
Em

Cult Nails–Untamed with OPI Teenage Dream and Cult Nails–Time Traveller with China Glaze White Cap

I’ve been loving Cult Nails lately. The creator of Cult Nails, Maria, has done such a fantastic job at producing unique and wonderful colours.

I was feeling creative so I applied two coats of Cult Nails Untamed:

This is a gorgeous Barbie pink with a lovely micro-shimmer throughout. Two coats gave me great coverage and it wasn’t uneven or patchy at all.

 

I then blinged it up:

I lightly painted some OPI Teenage Dream on the tips in a gradient pattern and stuck rhinestones in a half moon design on my thumbs. I loved it! I felt so, so girly.

 

Next up is Time Traveller:

Such a lovely deep midnight blue creme. Unfortunately the formula was a tad thick and gloopy, but I get the feeling my bottle could have done with some thinner.

 

I couldn’t leave this alone so I added a few things:

With one coat of China Glaze White Cap a gorgeous gold shimmer top coat. Lovely! I stamped some stars from the Cheeky plates on in Konad Yellow.

 

What do you think? Are you as much of a Cultie as I am?

 

Em

Revlon–Glitz n’ Glam

This is another ancient photo but I still remember this mani well. Why? Because it was the first time I tried the PVA base coat from Essence, of course!

Now ladies (and gents – I don’t discriminate), this stuff is revolutionary. Essence released their Peel Off Base Coat in their Ready for Boarding collection a few months ago. It didn’t take long for the cluey girls at Aussie Nails to figure out it was simply PVA glue in a bottle.

And now, using the foil method to remove glitter bomb polishes is a thing of the past. Now, I’m actually encouraged to peel my nail polish off! As I said, revolutionary!

Enough of my babble. Here is Revlon Glitz n’ Glam:

Two coats of this blingtastic pink glitter bomb gave me full coverage. It had been so long since I’d worn such a full on glitter because of the pain-in-the-ass removal process. But I applied a thick coat of the Essence Peel Off Base Coat and away we went.

When it came to peeling it off, it was a little more difficult than I anticipated. Instead of being able to peel off the polish in large sheets, I had to do a fair bit of scraping. Luckily since then I’ve refined my PVA technique. I now apply two thin coats of the base coat instead of one thick coat. It works amazingly well. There’s nothing more satisfying than peeling your polish off in one perfect piece. Yes, I’m a freak! But I’m okay with that

 

Have you jumped on the PVA bandwagon yet? If not, what are you waiting for?! PVA is cheap and easily accessible. All you need is an empty polish bottle to decant it into!

 

Em

L’Oreal–Rebel Blue

I’ve been kind of loving sponging lately. It’s so simple yet so effective So when I did this mani I knew exactly what I wanted to do!

 

L’Oreal Rebel Blue with Ulta3 Lily White sponged on and the gorgeous puffer fishies from the 3rd Bundle Monster set stamped on as an accent.

So, so cute Rebel Blue is such a pretty blue and a dream to apply thanks to their awesome wiiiiide brushes.

 

How do you like my puffers?

Em

Gloss n’ Sparkle–Unicorn Droppings & Goblin’s Grave

Hi all! I have been a crappy blogger, haven’t I?! I don’t remember when I last posted and now I have a huuuuuuuge backlog of photos to edit and posts to write. Whoops!

Anyway, here are couple of polishes from Aussie indie brand Gloss n’ Sparkle.

 

Unicorn Droppings:

Love, love, LOVE! A gorgeous milky white base with holo shimmer and rainbow hexes. This was two coats which gave enough coverage! I must wear this again because the night I put it on, I used a PVA base and I had to take my partner to the emergency room and he was admitted for suspected appendicitis. So I peeled it all off while in the ER anxiously waiting.

 

Goblin’s Grave:

Gorgeous!!! Look at the depth to this lovely squishy deep green polish. All the different coloured hexes:

*drool*

 

I used three coats of this as it was a little on the sheer side. This was one time I was too lazy to use my peel off base coat and I regretted it when it came time to remove it. Oh, removal was a bitch alright!

 

I mattified it for something a little different:

Ahhhh, perfect!

 

Em

Diamond Cosmetics–Don’t Teal My Heart Away

Oh my, this is an old photo. I am so, so, SO far behind on blogging it’s not even funny. I couldn’t tell you when I took this photo. Maybe three or four months ago? I can’t seem to get on top of blogging. It’s the editing photos process which puts me off. My desktop computer is being a bit of a dinosaur at the moment so using Photoshop means it runs like a pig. Ah well, I’ll just keep plodding along and maybe one day you’ll get a mani photo which is less than a couple of weeks old

 

You all know I looooove teals. This teal creme is somewhat of an exception.

Don’t Teal My Heart Away by Diamond Cosmetics, two coats.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s a nice colour, but it just seemed to lack depth and whatever it is that draws me to teals. Eh, you have to try these things!

 

What’s your favourite teal?

Em

essence-Where is the Party?

Essence is the bomb, we all know that. Affordable polishes with an awesome range. How can you go wrong?

I picked up this beauty the last time I was in Adelaide (about three months ago now!!) and have only just gotten around to wearing it.

This is Where is the Party?:

Pretty purple!

But wait… what’s that!?

 

Here’s some green!

Seriously?

Yup! This duochrome shifts from purple to green quite obviously. It’s hard to capture it but it’s there. This was two easy coats. No issues with the formula and it wore quite well.

 

I’m not sure if this colour is available anymore since Essence switched to their new shaped bottles, so if you can snap it up I’d highly recommend it!

Em

China Glaze–Atellier Tulle with stamping

The lovely Kristy from The Polish Haven gifted me this pretty, summery polish when I bought from her blog sale. It’s always nice to open up a package and find extras! Thanks, Kristy 

She gifted me a mini China Glaze in Atellier Tulle, a pretty deep red coral colour.

I was feeling summery so decided on a cute and fun mani using it:

Two coats of Atellier Tulle with some cute lollies and sweeties stamping on in Konad Special Polish White. I’m struggling to remember which stamp it is but I’m pretty sure it’s from the 3rd Bundle Monster series.

 

This was such a fun and happy mani. I really enjoyed wearing it

Have you been getting into the summery manis?

Em

Nails Inc.-Baker Street

I love polishes which have a lot of thought put into their bottle/box design. Packaging can really make or break a polish for me, no matter how lovely the colour is.

That’s why I LOVE these special edition Nails Inc. polishes with bling bling rhinestone studded lids:

So cute and unusual, right? My partner just stared at this polish (which also came in a fancy box) when I received it. I believe his exact words were, “what is that?!”

Hahahha Boys! They just don’t get it!

Anyway, this is two coats of Baker Street, a gorgeous royal blue which has been said to be a dupe for Revlon Royal. I haven’t tried Revlon Royal so I can’t confirm that. What I can confirm is that looking at my photo of it now, the colour is way off. It is actually much darker in real life!

Is it weird that even though I have dupes of this (a Kiko polish being one), I’ll probably keep this one just because of the pretty bottle?

No? I knew my fellow nail addicts would understand

Em

China Glaze–Deviantly Daring

Oh how I love you, China Glaze. Their recent Bohemian Lustre Chrome collection has caused many people to complain about how non-duochromey the polishes are, but I still love them. They are still beautiful colours which simply glow from within.

Enough of my babble, here’s Deviantly Daring:

Two coats of beautifulness over an existing mani (a dark teal creme). How gorgeous is it!? See what I mean about glowing from within!?

The formula on this was pretty good. A little runny, but nothing unmanageable at all.

Here’s another photo which shows its dark side a little:

Nyommmmmm!

 

Do you love DD?!

 

Em

essie–Coat Azure with stamping

I have a pretty, pretty polish for you guys today. I had this beauty sitting in my untrieds since February (whoops) and I’m not sure why it took me so long to wear it!

essie Coat Azure, two easy coats. It’s got such a pretty shimmer through it, hasn’t it?

I decided to jazz it up with some stamping:

This is a design from the latest MASH plates. I’m really impressed with these plates.. I found them easy to stamp with

I dotted the centre of the flowers with NYC Color Banana Split. Some of the dots are a bit wonky but you get that in the big jobs!

 

It’s such a Spring-like mani, don’t you think?

Em

Cult Nails–Princess

Oh man, it’s taken me a long time to jump on the Cult Nails train but seriously, I am so glad I finally have.  I am now absolutely obsessed with Cult Nails and have since acquired at least 10 more of their polishes. Honestly, I love the unique colours Maria from Cult Nails comes out with. They’re something a little different and I have so many I’m dying to try.

This is Princess, a gorgeous blue creme with a lovely golden shimmer. I was going to call it powder blue but it’s a little darker than that.

Anyway, enough babbling and on to the pretty polish!

Oooh ahhhh! It’s alright, I’ll forgive you if you drool. This was two easy coats of Princess. I really, really love this polish. The formula was awesome and it just lasted and lasted without chips and tip wear.

 

Stay tuned for more Cult Nails posts

Em

Custom Polish–Olive Ya!

This is a polish from when I was messing around making new colours for my Love Thy Polish line of nail polish.

I can’t decide whether I like it or not! I’ll let you guys decide…

This is Olive Ya!

Two coats. I still can’t decide if I like it. Hrmmm!!

Em

Kiko–383 and 389

I’ve really come to love Kiko polishes. They are Italian and I got some in a swap from a lovely lady in the Netherlands not long ago. I couldn’t decide between two colours to try so I decided to try both!

The gorgeous bright mint green is  389 and the dark teal is 383 (grrr to polish companies who don’t name their polishes).

Two coats of each. They both had a pretty decent formula. I couldn’t complain!

 

Have you tried any Kikos? What do you think?

Em

L’Oreal–Divine Indigo

Another L’Oreal for you lovely people today. Is it terrible that I can’t actually remember when I wore this polish? It was a fair while ago because I’m so behind on my blogging.

 

Anywhoo, this is Divine Indigo:

Two coats. What a stunning colour! It had the awesome formula I’ve come to expect from L’Oreal and I only did a second coat because I feel weird doing only one coat. It was really not needed!

Hurry up and bring out more colours, L’Oreal! I’m waiting with an open wallet

Em

Face of Australia–Calypso Gold with stamping

A little while back I won a blog giveaway over at the lovely Kristy’s blog. I love Kristy’s blog and entered the giveaway mainly because I was already reading it so regularly and thought I may as well. I didn’t expect to win, though
I won the whole Face of Australia Barbados collection! This is the first polish I tried from the collection, Calypso Gold.

 

Stunning white gold foil with just a hint of yellow gold. Two easy coats and fantastic formula. I love, love, love this colour!

But I decided it was missing something … stamping, of course

 

I used one of the new Bundle Monster plates and was so pleased with the results:

I just loved this mani It was so classy and beautiful. I used the Konad Special Polish in Warm Black, which is a black with a gold shimmer through it.

 

What do you think?

Em

ANNY-Blue Bikini Girl

I recently did my first swap with a lovely lady from The Netherlands. She thoroughly spoilt me and I loved all the polishes she sent me

This is one of my favourites from her:

ANNY Blue Bikini Girl. Such a stunning electric blue shimmer. This glows, baby! It is such a vibrant, summery colour and I love it!

This was two easy coats. Great formula and lasted the few days on my tips that I had it on for.

 

Blues are my favourite so I’m always happy to welcome another one to my collection.

What’s your favourite polish colour?

 

Em