A trio of pretties from Femme Fatale Cosmetics + the evil Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease

Why hello there!

 

It’s been a long time! I had good intentions to keep blogging regularly but then something threw a spanner in the works: I got hand, foot and mouth disease. For anyone who has had this, you are probably cringing right now. HFM is easily the worst sickness I’ve ever had. It started out one Tuesday after a public holiday. I felt tired and achey and had a sore throat. By lunch time I was struggling so I went home. I tried to sleep but I couldn’t get warm. I ended up having to go steal my partner’s warmth because he was on night shift. I didn’t feel too bad after I woke up that afternoon so I was lulled into a false sense of security. That night I woke up every half hour to an hour either freezing cold or boiling hot. It was awful! I barely slept! The next day I went to the doctor’s who said I had “a virus”. Soon after that I started developing spots on my hands. By late that afternoon my hands were covered in large, angry red bumps. I barely slept that night because they were so itchy. The next day I went to the doctor’s again and showed him. I also showed him the ulcers that developed on the roof of my mouth. He said I had “an infection”. I knew he was wrong. From everything I’d read, I knew I had hand, foot and mouth disease. I also knew it was going around the small town I lived in and I work in a hospital soooooo… you do the math!!

 

Spots started popping up on my feet too, and my hands got so sore that I couldn’t even hold my toothbrush to brush my teeth. I couldn’t stand washing my hands. I couldn’t do anything!! The next day I tried to take a shower and my feet were so painful that I physically couldn’t stand on them while I tried to shower! I had to turn the taps on using a towel and it still hurt!! I lasted about 30 seconds in the shower and then gave up and left the shower half running because I couldn’t turn it off properly. I went back to bed for the day. I also got weird crusties around my nose which were painful, red and weeping. Over the next few days the pain got less and less and the rash started disappearing, apart from my poor nose. A week later, it was almost gone. “Great!”, I thought, “The worst is over!”.

 

WRONG! That’s when the peeling started. Oh, the peeling. Over the next week my skin peeled way too many layers off. The poor, new skin underneath was raw. It peeled right under the free edge of my nail and right up close to the sides of my nail bed. This was big, thick chunks (sorry!). It hurt and I looked like a leper. I was so self conscious of it and everyone asked me what was wrong with my skin. Everyone just assumed I had dermatitis. If that’s what dermatitis is like, I never want to experience it.

 

Anyway, it’s over two months later now and I’m still suffering from the lasting effects of HFM. My nails have peeled from the cuticle down towards the free edge. They form a white bubble on the surface of the nail first and then it starts peeling. It is revolting. It could be a lot worse – the whole nail could have lifted! But for someone who is so precious about their nails, it’s fairly cruel.

The whole point of this story was to explain why I am so delayed in sharing these beautiful polishes from Femme Fatale Cosmetics. I actually took these photos when I still had the remnants of the rash but it wasn’t sore anymore. Thanks to some strategic lighting and cropping, you can’t really see the rash. I’ve got loads of pics though, if anyone is interested

 

Cirque Powwow

This is such a stunning Barbie pink holo with an added bonus of purple micro flakies. It is gorgeous! This was two easy coats and it lasted and lasted on my nails!

 

Liquid Sky Lacquer Spring Showers

In the interest of full disclosure and honesty, this polish wasn’t for me It was really, really sheer. This was four coats and I still had VNL. It’s supposed to be a thermal but I always have issues getting thermals to change colour. Maybe it’s because I’m so hot blooded It has a pretty, delicate pale blue, almost silver base. I think it would be great layered over a pale blue or even white, but I’m not really a layering kinda gal!

 

Rainbow Honey Ultimate Weapon

Oooohh this is bootiful! Such a deep, shimmery, shifty polish. A gorgeous deep blue/purple base with purple and blue shimmers. This was almost a one coater! Such easy application and so striking on the nail. I just loved this one.

 

Hope you enjoyed my babbling story about HFM and the pretty pics

Em

Huge destash!

Hiya all,

How are you all? Happy Easter!

Just letting you know I’m having a huge destash! You can see what I’ve got to get rid of here:

 

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Bwu32dpg_3e_5wa7aFzVb5Ki1RJ5blVbYuI_w2wIknA/edit?usp=sharing

 

Postage within Australia is $7.50 for up to 8 polishes, $12 for any more than that.

I will ship international but please bear in mind it is expensive!

 

If you would like to buy anything please email emma@lovethypolish.com

 

Cheers

Emma

Sea Siren Cosmetics Cabin Fever and Seashells

Hi hi all!

I bought a couple of Sea Siren Cosmetics polishes recently and the owner, Deb, was kind enough to include a few of her “Captivating Classics” shades.

 

She included these two beauties:

 

Cabin Fever. A beautiful red crelly. This is too squishy to be simply a creme! As you can see, it leans very orange on me but I don’t mind it. It flattered my skin tone!

Because it was a crelly I needed three coats for full coverage but it had a great formula. So gorgeous!

 

Next up is Seashells:

A perfect nude creme! I loooove this. It’s hard to find a good nude and everyone’s skin tone is different so we all suit different shades of creme. This is definitely a shade that flatters my skin tone. I love it! This was two easy coats.

 

Aaaand, the two I bought:

Sea Dayze and Code Purple. Such gorgeous, vibrant cremes. I loooove these. They go so well together so I had to wear them both at once. This is my current favourite way to wear a couple of shades if I can’t choose which ones to try first.

Two easy coats of each.

I added some stamping to jazz it up a little:

Love this  

 

Aaand one more shot just because I liked it:

 

Have you bought any Sea Sirens yet?

Em

Ulta3 goodies

I’ve been absolutely loving nail stamping lately. Well, more so than usual Everyone knows it’s my favourite form of nail art! Stamping never fails to wow people and have them asking how I did it. I then go into an explanation of stamping and how awesome it is and people just stare at me like I’m from another planet. Don’t get me wrong, they’re impressed, but I know a lot of people can’t fathom spending so much time and effort on nails. To me, and most other nail addicts, nails is a form of therapy. If I go more than a few days without painting my nails, I get craaaaanky.

 

Anyway, I got some more goodies from The Heat Group to play with. More Ulta3s – YIPPEEEE  

 

This is Footloose Fuschia:

A perfect, glossy fuschia creme. This is one of their older colours and I luuuuurv it. It’s such a vibrant pink. Formula was absolutely perfect and it was very nearly a one coater! I did two for good measure.

 

I added some Bundle Monster stamping for good measure:

Splatters! I used the Konad Special Polish in Pastel Pink. I am a huuuuge fan of the Konad pastels. They stamp so well and I love the single colour contrast of it over a darker shade!

 

Here we have Sizzling Red:

Yeeoooow! What a sexy shade! I love a good red creme and this one didn’t disappoint. This too was almost a one coater with a perfect formula but I did two coats as per my usual routine. I didn’t want to cover this beautiful shade but my partner loathes red nail polish (he calls every single red “Wh*re Red”) so I had to do something to try and redeem it in his eyes. Enter, stamping!

 

Booyah! I looove this! I can’t remember which plate this was but I looove it. My partner actually really liked it too so that means it’s definitely a winner

 

And last but certainly not least:

A mix n’ match mani with Striking on the pointer and middle fingers and Get Teal on the ring and pinkie fingers with a coat of A Lister on top. Two coats of Striking (although you can see I probably need a third because I have a liiiitle bit of VNL), two coats of Get Teal (which only needed one) and one coat of A Lister. Striking and Get Teal are two of my favourite Ulta3 polishes. Striking packs so much ultra fine glitter and shimmer into it but it remains sooooo smooth. It doesn’t even NEED a top coat! Get Teal is the perfect shade of deep teal and it glides onto the nail. I loved this colour combo!

Here’s another shot to show the glitter properly:

 

What’s your favourite Ulta3?

 

Em

Winner of the Mont Bleu competition

Hello all!

I'm pleased to announce the winner of the Mont Bleu competition - Sarah Claire!!!
a Rafflecopter giveaway Congratulations, Sarah!!!

Ulta3 spam

Hiya

 

Onto the second part of my spam from The Heat Group, the Ulta3s! Aussie nail fanatics are very familiar with these $2 bargains. Ulta3 is awesome quality polish for a fraction of the price of most others. Ulta3 has been awesome at keeping up with the latest trends and have come out with some really cool polishes lately.

 

Here is a shade from their recent pastels collection, Corsican rose:

Gorgeous, right? This is a dusty mint green. Ask anyone and they’ll tell you that I LOVE cremes and I LOVE pastels. Honestly, you can’t go wrong with a good creme and pastels are perfect for the warmer weather. It also helps that it flatters my skin tone like nothing else and makes my nails look twice as long as they are

This was two easy coats of a great formula. Pastels can be notoriously difficult to apply but this was an exception. I do have a lot of shades like this but in my opinion, you can’t have enough of them

 

This is one of Ulta3’s oldest and most common shades, Lollypop Lilac:

It’s a glitzy foil which is more of a dusty purple than a lilac. Talk about bling bling! This was two coats but it would easily be a one coater.

 

I did some weird nail art with it:

I used Essence Sweet Or Nude? for the base colour, which I liked a hell of a lot more than I thought I would. It’s a shimmery pale pink which is a touch frosty but not too much. Two coats. Then I dotted some random Lollypop Lilac dots on it. I’d say it’s a bit of a fail but oh well, I gave it a go

 

Have you got either of these bargain pretties?
Em

Essence spam!

Hi there my pretties!
Today I have some Essence polishes to share with you. Sarah from The Heat Group was kind enough to send me some polishes to review, so here is the first instalment.

Metal Glams
This is from the BRAND NEW collection, Metal Glam:

Petal to the Metal. I actually liked this polish a lot more than I thought I would! It’s a pretty, delicate pink-toned lilac. It went on quite smoothly with not too many brush strokes. This was two coats but it was almost a one-coater! Almost unheard of for such a light shade. This would be fantastic to use for stamping, I think.


Steel-ing the Scene. Not going to lie, this isn’t really my kind of colour, but I didn’t mind this. It wasn’t a brassy bronze  so it went a lot better with my skin tone than most bronzes. This one was streakier than Petal to the Metal but still not too bad. I wasn’t too careful when applying it so I think you could get a lot less brush strokes than I did.

This is one of Essence’s core collection, Red Ahead:

Er. It’s brown. I didn’t realise it was meant to be red until I read the label! To me, it’s a beautiful chocolate brown creme. I love it! Browns are one of my favourites (even though a lot of people don’t like them) and this will be perfect for winter. I’m really unsure as to where the ‘red’ in the name comes from, but I don’t mind as I’m chuffed it’s a brown instead! This was two easy coats.

I hope you enjoyed the Essence spam! I’ll be back tomorrow with some Ulta3 spam!

Em

Sea Siren Cosmetics All That Shimmers & All That Glitters collections

Hi all!

I’m back from a short hiatus. I’ve had computer problems and they were finally fixed today so I have my precious computer back *strokes*.

 

Today I have for you the new pretties from Sea Siren Cosmetics, a new Aussie indie. It’s a collection of four glitter toppers, the All That Glitters part, and four shimmers, the All That Shimmers collection!

And away we go, maties!

 

I’ve layered a glitter over the shimmer that I feel best corresponds with it. But there are endless possibilities here

 

Bronzed Siren and Seaduce

This is two coats of Bronzed Siren with a coat of Seaduce on top. The formula of Bronzed Siren was good but I found it quite brush strokey and more frosty than shimmery. It’s not really a shade I’d usually wear but I’m sure it would appeal to a lot of girls who want a bit of metallic bling on their nails! I layered Seaduce on top and had no trouble getting any glitters out, including the big silver holo diamonds which you can see a lot of on my middle and little fingernails.

 

Seas the Day and SeaQuake

First of all, don’t mind my ring finger. I bumped it and didn’t realise it was that bad until I looked at the photos over a week later.

This was two coats of Seas the Day which is a really pretty pink-toned purple shimmer. It is inspired by the Pantone Colour for 2014, Orchid, and it is absolutely spot on in that regard. It’s quite a glowy purple with a lot of depth.

I layered a coat of SeaQuake over it. I’d heard reports of curling in some of the larger glitters but I didn’t experience any difficulty applying it. Looking at my photos, there’s quite a lot of reflective curling happening but I didn’t have any problems applying it!

 

Okay NOW we’re getting to my favourites.

 

Temptress and Enchanted

Um, HELLO gorgeous glowy red with a golden shimmer. This is stunning! I did three coats because I had some pesky nail line showing through, but the formula was great. I am a huge fan of reds but I am really, really picky with them. This one passes the test with flying colours. Formula was great!

I added a coat of Enchanted, a simple gold and black glitter topper which kind of reminds me of a bumblebee! I think I needed a second coat because it just doesn’t look right to me.

 

And now, drumroll please …. my favourite of the collection!

 

Jealosea and Great Barrier Reef

Jealosea is a stunning deep aqua with a lovely delicate shimmer through it. It’s almost a one coater but I did two just to be on the safe side. The formula is amazing. I’m in lurv!!

I added accent nails of Great Barrier Reef, which is my favourite glitter of the collection. I love the vibrant purples, greens and blue glitters. This is just one coat so it’s got a lot of glitter packed into it!

 

You can get these at the Sea Siren Cosmetics website for $6.95 for a 5mL bottle and $15.95 for a huge 15mL bubble.

 

Em

Sea Siren Cosmetics–Midnight Moves & Leucosia

Hi all!

I’ve said it many times over the past couple of weeks and I’ll say it again now: I AM SICK OF THE HEAT!!!! We have had two days under 40 degrees (Celcius) in the past 28 days. NOT COOL. That’s what I get for living in the desert, I guess. We are supposed to have over 70mm of rain tomorrow. Bring it on, I say! There are some serious bushfires happening in my state at the moment so we need all the rain we can get.

 

Anyway, I made a Sea Siren Cosmetics order the other day after making my good friend Tracey drool over some of their shades. We ordered together to save on shipping and the gorgeous Deb, owner of Sea Siren, included a few of her classic creme shades.

She included a white and black, which was perfect timing because I’ve been trying to find a decent white to buy lately!

 

These were amazing! Great formulas. The white did take three coats to be completely opaque but it wasn’t streaky, draggy or thick at all like most whites I’ve tried. It also doesn’t have that “just painted my nails with white out” look about it. The black was friggin’ awesome!!! It is almost a one coater. You could probably get away with one thick coat but I did two thin ones. The awesome formula meant I had barely any clean up and it was super easy to clean up and not stainy.

 

Of course, there was one thing that popped into my head when I first saw the white and black polishes …

DICE!

 

It’s amazing how the simplest of manis can be so eye catching and gorgeous. I got so many compliments on this mani and it was so, so simple! I kind of wished I had six fingers so I could do this properly  

 

I’m so impressed with these cremes and I still have two classic cremes and two brights to try – wooo!!

To try Sea Siren Cosmetics, go to their website and check out their Facebook page. 

 

Em

Sea Siren Cosmetics–Sea Mist

Hullo hullo!

I have my last Sea Siren polish to show you today. This is Sea Mist, a lovely pastel blue creme.

 

Isn’t it luuurvely?  This was two coats but I could nearly get away with one. The formula was butter smooth! I’m really enjoying these pastel cremes from Sea Siren. They are just so perfect for Summer! Pastels suit my skin tone and i got loads of compliments on this simple mani.

 

Have you enjoyed the Sea Siren posts? Remember, you can grab them on their website and find out other info and see more pic on their Facebook page.

 

Em

Sea Siren Cosmetics–Motion of the Ocean with Beachy Peachy dots

Halloooo!

Guess what I have today? That’s right, another beauty from Sea Siren Cosmetics!! Are you enjoying these posts? I sure am!

 

This is a beautiful mint green creme, Motion of the Ocean:

Oh, you are beautiful *strokes polish*. I love, love, LOVE this shade. I have always had a thing for a good mint creme and Motion of the Ocean doesn’t disappoint. Formula, as I’ve come to expect from Sea Siren, is perfect. It is almost opaque in one coat and you could probably get away with one coat if you painted a little thicker than normal. This is just a breathtaking colour and so summery and classy. It flatters my skin tone too – winner!

 

I used Sea Siren’s Beachy Peachy to do a dotticure:

Excuse this dodgy photo. I’m not sure why it turned out so orange … When I tried to tweak the colours it threw the mint way out and made it into a blue so I chose to have orange fingers

I can’t really comment on Beachy Peachy yet because all I’ve done is dot with it, but I’ll be doing a full mani with it soon It’s certainly opaque enough to dot with and I didn’t have to use too much polish to get good, clean dots.

 

How do you like dotticures?

Em

Sea Siren Cosmetics–Tranquility and Pamper Me Pink

Woohoo, I have some more Sea Siren polishes to show you I’ve had so much fun trying these out this weekend. This time I have Tranquility, a pastel purple creme, and Pamper Me Pink, a pastel pink creme.

 

These babies are to die for:

Seriously. UNF! Perfect smooth, glossy coverage in two coats. These were nearly one coaters!! I am so, so impressed. The formula was impeccable and clean up was minimal because it was just so easy to apply!

This is my favourite way to try out a couple of polishes: the thumb, pointer and middle fingers one colour and ring and pinkie fingers another! Pink and purple go well together and these two were no exception. Sorry if it seems like I’m gushing over these polishes but I just love them. Pastels can be streaky, slow drying and a general pain in the ass, but these pastels are the complete opposite.

 

I jazzed them up a little with some nail stamping:

I used my Pueen plates and a silver stamping polish. I just love this netted roses look

You can get Sea Siren Cosmetics on their website. Don’t forget to like them on Facebook too!

 

What do you think?
Em