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

Epic Nail foils

This post has been a long time coming and for that, I apologise. After working for myself for the past year and a half I leapt back into part time work as well as working for myself and then complicated things further by starting ANOTHER job! And then it was Christmas and New Year, I got more hours at one of my jobs because someone quit and yadiyadiyada. The result is my life being eat, work, sleep and repeat.

 

Anywho, enough of my whingeing. I truly am happy with how things are at the moment

 

I got some nail foils to review from Epic Nails. Now, I’ve never used nail foils before. Silly me assumed that they were like full nail stickers in that you applied the glue, pressed the foil on and then trimmed it and top coated it. WRONG!

It’s a little more complicated than that. I painted my nails with the glue provided by Epic Nail and waited for it to dry and become tacky. I tried a few different lengths of time and found that 3-4 minutes was plenty. I had pre-cut strips of the foil to lay on my nail and applied them and then used a cuticle stick to rub the foil onto my nail. The foil actually separates from a plastic layer on the back of it and sticks to your nail!

I’m not going to lie, it wasn’t a piece of cake. I chose to layer mine over an existing polish (Love Thy Polish A Beautiful Mistake) so it was a little more forgiving if I missed spots.

So you place the piece of foil (design side down) on your nail and rub, rub, rub. Make sure you get the corners and sides!

I ended up with this:

Pretty cute, right? I did miss some spots but using a base colour meant they didn’t stick out like a sore thumb.

These were SO sparkly and eye catching. I couldn’t stop looking at them! The design is so cute!

 

I’ve heard that the tacky layer that you get after applying gel polish and before you wipe it off with alcohol is perfect to stick foils to. Unfortunately I couldn’t test this out because I don’t have a decent gel polish kit I bought one last year and it was pretty cheap and crappy and ended up damaging my natural nails because it was so difficult to remove!! Anywho, after speaking to a few friends they assure me that using gel polish is the way to go when applying foils, so give it a go!

 

If you want to buy some Epic Nail foils that are truly epic, you can get them from Epic Nail. They also have a Facebook page. They have kits available if you’re just starting or you can buy the foils separately. They have heaps of cool designs and also stock loads of other products.

I will have a discount code for Nails in the Desert readers soon so stay tuned and you can get a pretty epic discount on Epic Nail stuff

Hope you’ve enjoyed this post
Em

HARE Golden Years & Oceans of Alloys and Dollish Polish Go Luigi!

I have a couple of pretty indies for you today. We do really have some talented ladies out there who create some beauties.

The first is a couple from HARE polish. Nikole creates some gorgeous polishes and I believe she creates them with her partner/husband!

The darker blue with green and silver glitter is Golden Years and the light blue is Oceans of Alloys. Oceans of Alloys is “a dusty light blue jelly with a mixture of gold and copper glitter in both hexes and squares in several different sizes. Mysterious iridescent blue glitter is scattered throughout, as well as delicate gold flecks.” It really is lovely. Golden Years is “a semi-sheer navy blue jelly packed full of gold glitter in squares and hexes in all kinds of sizes, mysterious iridescent blue glitter, navy blue hexes and delicate gold flecks”.
I used two coats of each and had no issues with application despite the fact they are very glitter-heavy.

The next polish is quite old but a favourite of mine.

Dollish Polish Go Luigi! layered here over black. Isn’t this CUTE!? I just love green and blue glitter. I had to fish for that poor lone star, so that’s my only complaint. This was two coats.

What’s your favourite indie brand?
Em

China Glaze Hanging in the Balance and Whirled Away

I really, really loved this mani.

For my Secret Santa present from the lovely Peita from Peita’s Polish I received three of the polishes from the China Glaze Cirque du Soleil collection.

 

This is Hanging in the Balance, a beautiful bright blue creme. Stunning, isn’t it? It stains like a biatch, so beware! I layered Whirled Away, the black and white glitter, on top.

I really love the colour combination but the glitters were just too big for me. I’m not a big fan. If the glitters were smaller then it would be a winner!

I also stamped a koi fish design from plate A48. Beautiful fishy!

 

What do you think?
Em

Love Thy Polish Dreams collection

I’m proud to announce the new Love Thy Polish Dreams collection will be released tomorrow (27th April) at 10am South Australian time.

This collection is inspired by Stevie Nicks and is a collaboration between Love Thy Polish and Tammy from Lacquer and Leather. Thanks so much, Tammy, for coming up with some amazing colours and being truly inspiring. And thanks for keeping me in line and telling me when something isn’t good enough

 

Thanks also to Kristy from The Polish Haven for the amazing swatches and blog post.

 

 

You can buy the new Dreams collection from www.lovethypolish.com … if you live outside Australia please contact me via the website to arrange your order as I will need to do a shipping quote for you.

 

I’m excited! Are you?
Em

Boe Green Valley with Modi

Don’t you love it when you find dupes for expensive polishes that are super duper cheap and even better than the original!?

 

A dear friend of mine, Tammy, gifted me this gorgeous Boe sea foam green:

 

It’s called Green Valley and was a lovely squishy crelly. Two coats of a lovely application.

The awesome find was this Modi black and white glitter which is pretty much a dupe for Lynnderella’s Connect the Dots. This beauty only cost me a few dollars + shipping from Korea Depart. What a find! I think two coats of this looks amazing over Green Valley.

 

Do you own Connect the Dots or a dupe?

Em

Holo heaven–Chemistry 518 and Jade Hypnose

It’s still quite warm and sunny out here in the desert. You wouldn’t know it’s autumn, that’s for sure I’ve been wearing quite a lot of holos because well, why not!?

This is Chemistry 518:

Two coats, gorgeous formula! Chemistry is a dupe brand of Ozotics and a friend of mine got this for me for cheap cheap. I did some stamping with Konad and an accent nail using Cult Nails Nevermore and 518 to stamp on that. The stamping didn’t turn out great on the accent nail but you can still see the holo-ness!
This next one is one of my faaavourites.


Jade Hypnose. Jade holos never fail to impress. This is two coats. I just love this gorgeous, summery blue.
e

What’s your favourite holo?

Em

Chill Out polishes with french tips

Hi all  

Don’t you just love polish swaps? Last year I did a swap with a lovely lady from The Netherlands and she sent me a couple of “Chill Out” polishes which were promo polishes and had no other details on them. I’ve tried to Google them and couldn’t find any info but here is a pic:

 

 

There was a gorgeous orange shimmer and a lime green shimmer. They are to die for! I wish I could get more of these babies but I’m happy hoarding these two beauties.

I finished the look off with black tips.

 

What do you think?

Em

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

Revlon–Scandalous

Please forgive me for the crap photo below. This photo really does NOT do Revlon Scandalous justice. Honestly, please believe me!!!


I forgot to take a photo until a couple of days after I did this mani, hence the chip and tip wear.
This is two coats of Revlon Scandalous, formerly Facets of Fuschia. Such a beautiful polish! My friend got this for me for my birthday and I loooove it

What do you think?
Em

China Glaze–Something Sweet with accent nail

I saw this design somewhere recently but for the life of me, I can’t think where. Wherever it was, I loved it and decided to try it.

 

Here is China Glaze Something Sweet:

Two coats. Good formula. I used NYC Color Night to freehand a stripe down the middle of each ring finger nail and used the Konad top coat to stick on some square shaped rhinestones which I rotated to look like diamonds.

I was pretty happy with it until I went to bed and woke up the next day and I’d managed to imbed the rhinestones deep into the polish so they looked awful Boo!

Apart from that, I was pretty pleased with the design and I’ll give it another go when I won’t be going to bed soon after I do my mani.

 

Have you done any different nail art lately?
Em

Custom Polish-One Small Step for Man

This is the last of the custom polishes I made last weekend. I’ve loved wearing them all week and love each and every one of them for different reasons.

 

This is One Small Step for Man:

This was the ONLY photo I managed to get outside in the sunlight. All the rest I had to use my lightbox for because it’s been so overcast and gloomy every time I manage to make it outside to take photos!

Anyway, this is just ONE coat! Truly awesome. I love it. It looks so space-y, which is why I called it One Small Step for Man.

 

This is it in artificial light:

Still gorgeous

 

 

I’m just going to spam you all with loads of photos of this polish now:

 

 

I thought the bottle looked amazing in this photo!

 

 

And that’s the last of the custom polishes from last weekend. But don’t worry, I’m sure to make some more soon

Em

Custom Polishes using Spectraflair

I have something to confess: I have an addiction. My addiction comes in powder form and is purchased by the gram.  I only have 1.5 grams left so I’m going to have to hit up my dealer for some more.

Have you guessed what it is yet?

Iiiiiiit’s Spectraflair! The holographic powder of the gods. I seriously love this stuff.

Last night I whipped up four awesome looking holos:

 

These are unnamed at the moment because I haven’t managed to think of anything decent. I also made half full bottles because I knew I’d never get through a full bottle! Ah, the beauty of making your own polish.

 

I’ve been trying and trying to make that perfect red holo but everything I make turns out slightly pink because of the silver in the Spectraflair. Gerrr! The black holo was a mistake.. I was trying to make green and accidentally poured my BLACK tint into the bottle instead of the blue!!! Ah well, I’m sure I can find a good home for it .

 

The green was a bit of an experiment. I was going for a forest green but once I got to this colour I kind of liked it so stopped mixing.

The purple kind of looks like the Unicorn Tears polish I made a while back:

 

But it’s a bit more pink, I think. And WAY more holo. Honestly, you should see this baby in the sun. I’m wearing it right now and keep drooling over it. Will post photos tomorrow!!!

 

So, which polish would you like to see me wear next?

 

Em

essie Life Saver with Konad

I wasn’t sure about this polish. Sure, it looked great in the bottle but I thought the beautiful shimmer in the bottle would disappear once on the nail.

Luckily, I was wrong  

This is essie Life Saver:

A gorgeous orange with gold microshimmer. It is STUNNING! The subtle shimmer really tones the polish down and makes it something a little different.

This was three coats because I’m pedantic and had a couple of tiny bald spots after two coats. Gorgeous formula, as I’ve discovered most essies have!

 

And what goes so well with orange?

Tiggerrrrrr! Konad tiger full nail design in Konad Princess Special Polish (Warm Black).

I LOVE IT It’s so fun and eyecatching but not TOO out there and garish like some oranges are. Definitely my favourite orange by far!

I wore this to the Christmas pageant here and got so many compliments!

 

Have you done any Konad-ing you love lately?

Em

The Face Shop BK901

I had such high hopes for this polish. In the bottle it looked amazing – a black base with green and purple colour shifting glitter. It looked so, so pretty. But alas, it was not to be.

Here is The Face Shop BK901:

Don’t get me wrong, it’s nice, but it was only in certain lights that I could see a little green glitter. But I could never see the purple glitter, and certainly not both at once.

This was two coats and the formula was fine, I just wanted the pretty glitter *whines*.

 

I added some dotties to jazz it up a bit:

Meh. Just one of those manis I’m not very excited about. I dotted using Rokk96 Silver Screen.  It definitely livened the mani up but not enough.

 

I envisioned this polish to be a lot more like Ozotic Elytra but the black base was just too dark.

Ah well, better luck next time!

Em

Halloween nails–Ulta3 Carrot Top with Bundle Monster

I’m finally posting my Halloween nails (only a week late!!)

I’m really not happy with how they turned out, but I’ll show them anyway!

 

Meh. This is two coats of Ulta3 Carrot Top, which is a really cool neon dark purple with a hint of red. I love this colour! I thought it would be way too bright for me but somehow it works.

I stamped with Bundle Monster for most of the nails but the spiders are Konad. You know what? Everyone raves about Bundle Monster but I just don’t get it. It is SO much more effort to get a clean image from their plates and some images don’t transfer at all! It’s so frustrating and quite often I ruin a perfectly good mani by stamping Bundle Monster over it and the image smudges or doesn’t transfer. It’s so irritating. The ghost smudged whatever I did and I tried to make it better by adding eyes but it so didn’t work. Ah well, better luck next time!

 

Em

Water Marbling using BYS Reign Supreme and Matte Black

My second water marble, woo hoo! This attempt turned out so much better than the first, and I did it for my good friend Alicia. She wanted it matched to her Halloween costume, a purple and black witch costume. We both agreed that these nails were perfect:

 

This is her right hand. I really, really like the white. That’s the great thing about doing a white base nail colour, it goes with everything! My favourite is actually the little finger. It’s black and then has a wavy line of purple and then white. It looks awesome!

 

This is her left hand. Alicia’s favourite was her ring finger and mine was her middle. Look at that cool white line through the purple on the middle finger!!!

 

I used two coats of Nailene French White for the base. It’s a great white to use as a base because it goes on smoothly and is opaque in two coats. Then we used lanolin to protect her fingers and used BYS Matte Black and BYS Reign Supreme for the marbling. Love it!

 

What do you think?
Em

Spectrafranken – Bump in the Night

I’m tired, I have a headache, my teeth hurt and I’m ready to curl up in bed and spend the evening playing Angry Birds.

So let the photos do the talking:








Beautiful Spectrafranken, Bump in the Night. Two coats. A gorgeous black holo which I adore. Probably the most holo of all the ones I’ve made that I’ve tried so far. It was so easy to make: I filled up a 5mL bottle to the widest part of the bottle at the top (does that make sense?!) with NYC Colors Midnight and dropped in 3 tiny straw spoons of Spectraflair. Done!

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to bed.
Em