Sea Siren Cosmetics–Yellow Submarine

Why hello there!

How are you all? Can you believe it? Another blog post from me. Aren’t you lucky? Turns out having full weekends off for the first time in a few years is agreeing with me! Plenty of things to do to keep myself busy, that’s for sure.

 

Sea Siren Cosmetics is a new Aussie indie who put the call out on their Facebook page for swatchers not long ago. It took me a while, but I jumped at the chance to review some pretties. When Deborah, the owner and creator of Sea Siren, asked me what kind of polishes I’d like to review, can you guess what I said? CREMES! GIVE ME CREMEEEEEEEES! When you ask most nail fanatics what their favourite polish finish is, they usually say holo, glitter, duochrome … it’s not often that you get someone who says creme. But ladies, that’s me! I love cremes. I love them so much that I never have any new ones to try because I always try them as soon as I buy them So I was chuffed when my Sea Siren parcel arrived.

 

Let’s take a moment to talk about Sea Siren’s branding and packaging. Anyone who knows me knows that these things are very important to me. Having a bit of a background in graphic design and pursuing this field more recently, good packaging leaps out at me. Similarly, poor packaging really turns me off. It can be a make or break for some.

Firstly, Sea Siren wrapped the polishes and other goodies so beautifully in blue tissue paper with her own branded labels on them. She included flyers with information about her products.

Take a look:

Sorry for the dodgy phone pic, but I was at work and there was no way I was waiting until I got home where my camera was to rip into these bad boys. But just look how pretty it all is! It was a shame to destroy such lovingly wrapped parcels.

 

Inside …

AHHH MY GOD! SO CUTE! These boxes are stunning! The bottom ones are the big ‘bubbles’, as Deb calls them. They are a huge 15mL. The top are the Wanderlust minis and they are an ADORABLE 5mLs. I posted them together so you could see the size difference. The itty bitty boxes are so adorable!

Deb sent me Tranquility (a pastel purple), Motion of the Ocean (pastel mint), Pamper Me Pink (pastel pink, duh) in the full size. The minis are Yellow Submarine (pastel yellow), Beachy Peachy (pastel peach) and Sea Mist (pastel blue). All delicious cremes

 

She also sent me something completely and utterly amazing.

MONT BLEU CRYSTAL FILES!!!!!!!!! I squealed when I saw these, I really did. It’s lucky I was by myself at work because I can imagine how silly I looked. She sent a hard cased one (the blue) which is GENIUS. I can keep it in my bag and not worry about it snapping and a gorgeous travel sized blue file with sparkly Swarovski crystals on it. Oh so beautiful. I had heard such good things about these files. I had only used cheap glass files in the past and was not impressed, but I’d heard these were different.

 

I was NOT disappointed. I used them for the first time this morning and holy moley they work a treat! They are so smooth and SHARP! They take off a decent amount of length but they are not harsh on the nail at all. Usually I HATE the feeling of my nails after I’ve filed them but I didn’t after using Sea Siren’s file I am completely in love. So completely in love. I think I need more of these products. Deb also stocks a cute little travel kit which has a travel sized Swarovski crystal file, a pair of nail scissors and some Swarovski encrusted tweezers all in a little case. LOVE!!

 

I’m going to stop babbling now and show you the first of the Sea Siren polishes I used. This is Yellow Submarine:

A beautiful, glossy pastel yellow creme which is actually quite bright! This was two easy coats. Usually yellows are a pain in the rear to apply but this one was fine! It actually flattered my skin tone really well and looked so fresh.

 

You can buy Sea Siren Cosmetics from the website and make sure you ‘like’ the Facebook page too!

 

Em

Epic Nail Coupon Code

Hi all

 

I’m just updating with the discount code that Epic Nail have kindly given to me to share with you all!

 

If you go to www.epicnail.com.au and purchase anything, use coupon code “BLOGDESERT” for FREE SHIPPING!!! What an awesome way to try out heaps of their range!

 

This coupon will be valid until 28th  February.

 

Happy shopping!

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

Deadset Babes–Dark Night

Boy do I have a preeeetty polish to show you today! I recently bought some beautiful holos from Deadset Babes and the lovely Bella threw in a couple of extras to review.

 

This is After Dark, a new DSB polish which “a black creme base loaded with a purple to blue and slight red duochrome.”

 

This is two coats:

How beautiful is that? The formula was awesome and it wasn’t a stainer which meant easy clean up  

You can see the gorgeous deep blue and purple. I had trouble catching the red but it’s definitely there!

Here’s some more pics:

 

 

*drool* I just lurv this polish. You can get it from Deadset Babes who are also on Etsy!

 

Em

Femme Fatale Cosmetics Sea Pony

This is the last of my products from Femme Fatale Cosmetics to review It’s one of Sophie’s very own, Sea Pony.

 

Sea Pony is a vibrant purple crelly base with a boat load of pink, yellow, red, purple and more glitters of all shapes and sizes.

 

This is two coats:

I really wanted to like this. I know a lot of people do! But it’s just not my thing. I don’t really ‘do’ chunky glitters.

BUT on the plus side, it did have an awesome formula. Two smooth coats, no dragging. There was a plethora of glitters that came out with each stroke so no fishing required at all. I was quite impressed!!!

I do really love the combination of colours. They contrast really well.

 

What do you think?

Em

Rainbow Honey Apple Kid and Sakuri Matsuri Cuticle Balm

I have another beauty from Femme Fatale Cosmetics to show you lovely ladies today. She recently sent me Apple Kid and a cuticle balm. I’ve got a cuticle balm already which I love, and I just knew I’d love Apple Kid too. It is the perfect shade for Summer!

 

Firstly, let’s talk about Rainbow Honey’s packaging. It is superb. Take a look at how my samples came:

 

The polish fit snugly in the little sleeve at the bottom. The cuticle balm was also shrink wrapped in plastic to ensure strict hygiene.

The time and effort put into this packaging really shines through. As I work in pre-press production and design at a newspaper and have my own polish brand, I really appreciate good branding and packaging. I also love the mini bottles Rainbow Honey use. A lot of minis have terrible, short brushes and are awkward to hold in photos. I’m happy to report that this bottle had none of those problems. The brush was great to use and the bottle is aesthetically pleasing.

 

Anyway, enough of my babble and onto the polish! This is Apple Kid:

Oh drool. I adore this. This was two easy coats. Application was flawless. Don’t you just love the shimmer through it? This is the type of colour that makes me happy! I’ve never actually used a Rainbow Honey polish before so I didn’t really know what to expect. I was pleasantly surprised!

Then I tried the cuticle balm. I already have the Summer Juice scent which I love, and received the Sakuri Matsuri scent from Sophie at Femme Fatale. Rainbow Honey describes the scent as “Bright florals, exotic fruit, tea on Sunday afternoons, and just the right amount of sweetness reminiscent of my favorite lychee rice dumplings.” Spot on!

I took a photo of the balm on my cuticles to show you that it is moisturising, yet non-greasy.

See? I had only just put the balm on but it’s not overly shiny or greasy. It does absorb into the skin fairly quickly too so within five minutes my cuticles looked normal but hydrated.

One of my favourite things about the cuticle balm is, you guessed it, the packaging! It comes in a slimline tube which would fit in even the smallest of purses. I take my Summer Juice balm everywhere with me.

I can’t recommend these products enough! You can grab them both from Femme Fatale Cosmetics. Full sized (15mL – a generous size) polishes retail for AUD$11.85 and the cuticle balm is a measly AUD$5.50. Sophie ships internationally now too which is awesome!

 

Hope you’ve enjoyed my babblings, or at least gotten to the end of this post
Em

MUD Lavender Fever and Meet Minty with Delush Star Gazer

Hellooooo everyone!

Long time no blog! Life has been a little crazy so the poor blog has fallen by the wayside. Never fear, I am back I’m not self indulged enough to believe you all missed me, but I am glad to be back blogging!

What has kick started this, you ask? Well, I have some lovely little polishes from Femme Fatale Cosmetics to show you! I’ll just show you one today, but it’s a pretty one.

 

Firstly, I picked up a couple of the new MUDs in Woolies. They were on special for $1.50 each – you can’t beat that! The two I used as my base coats are Lavender Fever and Meet Minty. They are both gorgeous, summery colours. The weather is heating up here in the desert so it’s time I get out of the habit of wearing dark, vampy colours.

I got a mini of Delush Polish Star Gazer in my press kit from Femme Fatale. It’s a neon glitter topper. I hadn’t actually heard of Delush Polish before, let alone tried them, so it was good to get something different!

I admit, this isn’t my usual style of polish. When I got it I thought “It’s okay, I’ll just swatch it on four fingers and take it off straight away”. Then when I painted my nails using Lavender Fever and Meet Minty, I realised it was the perfect base colours to try Star Gazer on. So I decided to do a full mani with it!

This is using one coat of Star Gazer over the top of Lavender Fever and Meet Minty:

It’s pretty, huh!? It almost looks like two different polishes over the different base colours because over the purple, the neon yellows and greens really pop, but over the green, the pinks and purples jump out at you. I ended up really liking this polish What a pleasant surprise!

 

I added an extra coat just to see if it was worth doing:

As you can see, you do get a fair bit more glitter with your second coat.  I definitely think it’s worth the extra time! Being a glitter topper, this dried incredibly quickly and one coat of Seche Vite was all I needed to smooth it out.

 

Overall, I’m pretty chuffed that I got this polish for review because it is not something I would usually choose for myself, but I really enjoy wearing it!

 

You can get Delush Polish from Femme Fatale Cosmetics for AUD$12.00 each. Sophie now ships internationally, so that is great news! She has many other brands including Cirque, Emily de Molly, Gloss n Sparkle, Girly Bits, Enchanted Polish and, of course, my own brand Love Thy Polish!

 

What do you think? Is this a good look for summer?
Em