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

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

FNUG Futuristica

Introducing one of my new favourite polishes.

And of course, it’s holo.

It’s FNUG Futuristica!

 

This is inside. INSIDE!

 

And now outside:

 

Aaarghh! So much beautiful holo. This is a lovely pale blue colour and the holo is off the charts. It’s definitely the most holo polish I own.

I used the FNUG Aqua Base and that really help in application. It was still a tiny bit patchy but not too bad. I didn’t use top coat which means it didn’t last very long until it was chipped but the top coat definitely dulled the holo effect

 

I just love looking at photos of this polish. It is such a stunner.

 

Do you have any FNUGs?

 

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

Color Club Cloud Nine

It’s not often that I open with a photo. But look, just look!!!!
Color Club have really raised the bar in regards to holo polishes. This is Cloud Nine from their 2012 Halo Hues collection. I can’t believe it took me so long to get this polish. It is just so pretty and so, so holo.
Two coats and the formula was perfect. I even wore a top coat with no issues.
WINNER!

What’s your favourite holo at the moment?

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

OPI spam–What’s With the Cat-itude, DS Signature and Stranger Tides

I have a bit of a built up of photos happening since I’ve been slack with blogging. I’m not sure of an exact number but it would be well over 100 polishes to blog about Whoops!!!

 

So here are a few of my favourite OPIs.

The first is a fairly hard to find polish from the Shrek collection. It’s one of my favourites!

 

What’s With the Cat-itude is a beautiful eggshell blue. Two coats, a creamy formula which was easy to apply. This colour really flattered my skin tone.

 

 

DS Signature is one of my favourites too. A beautiful medium pink linear holo. Two coats, such an easy formula for a holo. *Drools*. What’s not to like about this?!

 

Stranger Tides from the Pirates of the Carribean collection is one of my favourite neutrals. This is a bit of a strange colour but it is just so flattering. It’s a green toned neutral.

I layered Peita’s Polish Sky’s The Limit over my ring fingers and thumbs. This Peita’s Polish is a custom made just for me which I got from Peita when she was my Secret Santa in the Aussie Nails Facebook group last year. I love this gorgeous mint green and white glitter combo.

 

Hope you enjoyed!
Em

Jade Delirio Rosa

Holos make me happy. Do they make you happy? There’s just something about a polish that looks relatively inconspicuous inside and then transforms into a gorgeous shiny rainbow when it catches the sunlight.

 

Enough of my babbling, here’s Jade Delirio Rosa:

Beautiful, right? This is two coats. Great formula, no issues at all. The Jade holos are brilliant in that the formula is always trouble free. It doesn’t streak or get bald spots and you can whack a coat of Seche Vite over it without worrying about it dulling the holo. Basically, you can treat it like any other polish.

 

Want another photo? Sure

 

Lovely!

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

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

Jade–Vermelho Surreal

Ah, holos. What’s not to love about them? I don’t actually think I know anyone who doesn’t love these beautiful polishes.

Recently Sarah Claire organised a group buy on the Jade holos in the Aussie Nails group on Facebook. I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to get my hands on these beauties. I ended up getting about six different colours including gold, pink, blue and this beauty right here:

Vermelho Surreal, a stunning true red holo. Oh man, this is perfect. There is no other word for it. I’m in love, head over heels for this polish.

This was two easy coats. No fancy base coat needed, and a coat of SV on top didn’t dull the holo effect at all.

 

Have some more holo spam:

Ooh ah.

 

Check out those rainbows!

 

This is probably the least holo-y of all the photos I snapped.

 

Sigh. Wonderful!

 

Aussies, are you loving the holos now that the sun is out in full force?

Em

Ozotic-513

Would you believe this is my first ever Ozotic? Yep, it’s taken me that long to jump on the Ozotic bandwagon. I recently ordered a few polishes from piCture pOlish for a swap and decided this gorgeous holo was too pretty to pass up.

This is Ozotic 513:
 
Two coats of a beautiful purple linear holo. The holo effect in this polish is so strong, I love it! Wear time was really good too as I wore it for three days before it started chipping like a mofo.

Here’s an outdoor shot of this beauty:

Droolworthy, right?

The sun has come out in full force here in the desert so I’ve been cranking out the holos like nobody’s business. Fellow Aussies, have you?

Em

Revlon–Stonewash & Custom Polish–Party Smurf

I’ve been on the hunt for the perfect white polish for a long time now. I haven’t found it yet but this Revlon polish is pretty dang good, especially if you don’t want a stark white!


Revlon Stonewash, two coats. Formula was awesome and it’s got a slight shimmer to it. As I said, perfect if you want to avoid that “liquid paper” look on your nails.
The accent nail is a custom creation of mine that my sister in law named “Party Smurf”. Someone has been playing too much Smurfs on their Android phone

I loved this mani because it felt so clean! Sometimes it’s nice to have a simple, palate cleansing polish.

My next white to try is Ulta3 Lily White, the PRC version. I’ve heard it’s the best one coater white polish from the Aussie girls. I hope so

Em

Custom Polish–Silver Surfer

I’ve been taking a break from my custom polish line, Love Thy Polish. There has been so much drama in the polish world about ‘indie’ polish makers and it’s made me take a step back and realise the polishes I like to make (and most of the time don’t make) are generally not what the blogging community want. On the other hand, they’re not what the general public want either. They’re somewhere in the middle. They’re what I want. And I’m fine with that! I get more enjoyment out of making half a bottle of polish for myself, trying it then and there, taking photos of it and blogging it. So that’s what I’m doing at the moment.  Who knows, maybe I’ll go back to selling them and I’ll still make them by special request, but we’ll see!

 

Anywhoo, enough babble and onto the holo goodness!

This is my silver holo, Silver Surfer. Nothing fancy, just a shitetonne of Spectraflair dumped in suspension base. I realised I didn’t have a silver linear holo and was craving holo goodness! I love making holos because they always turn out beautiful

 

What do you think?
Em

Color Club–Fashion Addict

This polish has been sitting in my untrieds drawer for months. For some reason I just never had the desire to wear it until just the other day.

 

Unfortunately I didn’t choose a good day to wear this pretty scattered holo. No sun in sight!

 

Here is Color Club’s Fashion Addict:

Apologies for the crappy photo. Artificial light is just not the same with a holo  

Anywhoo, this was a pretty, delicate light purple scattered holo which grew on me more and more as I wore it. It helped that wear time was fabulous and I didn’t get any chips or tip wear after a few days. That’s always a winner in my book!

 

I only wish I got Revvvolution, the black holo from Color Club! But I’m seriously contemplating a No Buy for May … I have way too many untrieds to get through and I have a hard enough time picking one to wear as it is!!!

Em

OPI DS Classic

These OPI DS’ are gooorgeous. There’s just something about them which really does scream quality. I love normal OPI polishes too but these just seem worth the extra money.

 

Here is OPI DS Classic:

Pretty holo goodness! This is such a lovely, classy colour. I got so many “WOW, look at your nail polish!” comments when I wore it outside.

 

This is two coats, fantastic formula and awesome durability. You don’t see many scattered holos in this colour … in fact, I don’t think I’ve seen any others.

 

I’ve still got quite a few DS’ to get through. The hardest part is which to chose next!?

Em

Love Thy Polishes

Time to toot my own horn a bit. Toot toot!

 

I want to show you some of my custom polishes in my new Love Thy Polish brand.

I went to the Market Day here last Saturday to sell polishes and painted my nails skittle-style using my polishes to show people. A lot of people really appreciated being able to see the polishes on real nails! I did have them on a nail wheel but we all know it’s just not the same!

Anyway, without further ado…

Royalty, Struttin’ Like a Peacock, Toxic Slime, Smurfin’ it Up.

 

Fairy Lights, Girly Girl, Kiss Kiss, Crazy for Coral.

 

Thoughts, suggestions, comments please?

Em