Nuclear Waste

Goood Afternoon everyone! Firstly, my Tatty Devine inspired Manicure has been featured on the front page of their website! They've also written an article on me and my silly little blog which has made it a very exciting day! I rang my Mum and everything! Waaaah! Exclamation Mark!

On to today's nails - I did not get on with this polish AT ALL, it was a gloopy, horrible mess and painted on like a gross, blobby creature. It was so minging to the point where I actually think I have a defective bottle. I tweeted this at Collection 2000, and they suggested I buy a polish thinner. Cheers, Collection 2000, I will go out and spend money I don't have, on products I wouldn't need, if you quality controlled your stock properly....ya douchebags. Maybe I'll try and take it back to Superdrug, but I doubt I'll be successful.

Collection 2000's "Spangle" from the "Hot Looks" collection is a bright, lime green, and "fast drying". It turned into a stringy mess after about ten seconds, and left me with no option but to schloop it on in big, thick, gloopy layers (which, I might add, still didn't reduce the amount of coats I need to eliminate VNL). This resulted in HORRIFIC bubbling - to the point where it looked like Toxic Waste, which did inspire the Nail Art. Maybe I should be thanking Collection 2000? You can make up your own minds!

From the Giveaway feedback, a lot of you are asking to see some plain swatches, but I also know that a lot of you tune in for the Art, so I thought I'd balance it out by showing a swatch of the base colours that I use before launching into the Art Part.

Here is the bubbly mess that is Collection 2000 Spangle (a shame because I LOVE the colour):-

Bubbly Jubbly.

I also added a Claire's Shimmer Topcoat to my left hand, just to see if it made a passable dupe for Illamasqua's Radium:-

Hmmm. I'm not so sure, but if anyone asks me if I'm wearing Illamasqua, I have no problem lying shamelessly and saying "Yes. Yes I am, and it cost me £13.50."

As I mentioned, the ugly bubbliness inspired "Toxic Waste" Nail Art:-

Anyone recognise Blinky, the three-eyed nuclear fish from "The Simpsons?!"

I've got a Drum of Nuclear Waste on the ring finger, and Blinky the three-eyed mutant fish from The Simpsons on my thumb. HE IS THE CUTEST THING EVAAAR - I really didn't want to remove this manicure purely for that thumb haha.

urgh bubbly wubbly

I used Claire's black and white Nail Art Pens for the accents, as well as a toothpick for filling in the orange highlights and light grey highlights and yellow circle. The Neon Orange is Barbara Daley for Tesco in "Salsa", and the yellow is Miss Sporty "Taxi!". The dark and light grey are Barry M Grey and Sparkle and Fade Light Grey.

On a final note, this polish also stained pretty badly, despite two layers of base coat  - very unamused. It's such a shame as I love the colour, and now I feel like all I've done throughout this post is bitch and whine! Get it right, Collection 2000, and we won't have any beef! Has anyone else had this problem with any of their polishes?

BYE EVERYONE!

Don't forget to enter the Giveaway!

FOTD Green Eyed Monster

...Well, not "monster" hopefully. I used to rock this look a lot in my final years of school, I was a lot bolder with my style back then - I had pink hair for a start! I met my good childhood friend Emma for a free lunch today. I am a 'mystery diner' which means we get £40 to spend on food if we do a review afterwards! SWEET DEAL! We stuffed our faces, naturally. I was wearing a forest green dress from forever 21, and I decided to co-ordinate my make-up -

I absolutely HATE taking pictures of myself haha! here we have:-

• FACE - Benefit Erase Paste in Medium, Rimmel Stay Matte foundation in 100 Ivory, MeMeMe Blusher in Rouge (these are meant to be a dupe for the benefit blushers, and although very pigmented, this is muuuuch redder than Coralista despite looking almost identical in the box. I'll have to do a comparison one day)
• EYES - I used a very, very old 17 green eye palette. Dark forest green, light green and a yellowy gold - none of them have names. I don't think they do the exact combination anymore, but their green Eye Shadow Trio will do a treat, with a yellow gold shadow, in creating this look. Eyeliner is H&M Brown, Mascara is Max Factor False Lash Effect.
• LIPS - Topshop Lip Polish in Iced Coffee. 

Here's a couple of shots so you can see the blending on the eyes -

This look is dead easy and you can use the same technique with literally any 3 shades of you choice. I started with the medium green on the eyelid, then used the gold in the corner, blending it outwards and slightly under the eye. I then took my darker shade of green, with a smaller shadow brush, and blended this from the outside edge inwards, creating a slight taper as I went, taking it under the eye and across to about halfway. Added some eyeliner to the water line and just along the top lash line, some mascara, and voila!

This is what my hair looks like from the back today, a messy rosette with the hair from the crown:

Close you eyes to the mountain of crap on my bed...cheers!

Another easy one - take two medium sized pieces of hair from each side of the crown, bring to the back of the head and pin in a cross shape, with 2 bobby pins, so one overlaps the other (this will hold it in place better). Take the little pony bit and wrap it around your finger so it makes a twist. Form the twist into a circle and pin in place at the end and the top, weaving the bobby pin inside the rosette so it cannot be seen. Spritz with hairspray. Five minute up-do!

I hope you enjoyed that my dears, any questions just let me know on the comments, or drop me an email :) A bit of exciting news, I will be doing a guest post for Leanne over at DoNotRefreeze in the next couple of weeks - it's a nail art tutorial, and a good one at that! :D

I'm trying to do tomorrow's Mani tonight and I'm SO uninspired. Need to have a think and a peruse of the BundleMonsters  I reckon. Only thing I know, it will be blue haha.

Take care everyone! xxxxxxx

I'm Shamrocking this look

I lied to you, My St Patrick's Day Manicure is coming today!! Woooooooo. I'm sure you forgive me. I do not understand why there is not a pint of lager in my hand right now. Something is Topsy-Turvy about the world.

Another appearance from El Orange. I swear he's the only spherical object I own, being so abject to sports and all that. It will be a sad day when I get peckish.

The Green base is Barry M 290, two coats, probs should have done a third. I stamped the four-leaf clover from BM03 using Bloom Goldie. For the accent nail I did 2 coats of Barry M Black polish, used Rimmel Tip Whitener to do a Ruffian-style semi circle, and added some flicks with a cocktail stick in Nails Inc Caramel. I did the Guinness logo in Bloom Goldie and use the Claire's White Nail Art Pen to write "Guinness" - I swear my heart stopped for a minute while I did that bit! On the thumbnail I added one coat of Barry M Green Glitter. Topped it off with Barry M topcoat! All round a pretty Barry M themed Manicure!
My housemate was astounded by intricacy of this one, the letters on the accent nail really do look TINY in real life!

I've seen some fantastic Paddy's day manis out there today, well done everyone! now get drinking, that's a direct order.

Spring has Sprung!

I went to the shop and bought myself some daffodils (buying yourself flowers? I don't think I've ever looked so lonely...ha!) and the sun is shining through the window! I've done a celebratory Spring Manicure Inspired by the British countryside - flower boxes in the windows of kitsch little cottages and Apple trees on the meadows! I may also enter this into That's SO Fresh's Spring Mani contest, we'll see if I have the confidence haha!

There's that pesky orange again...

 I used so many polishes for this haha, here goes, pinky to thumb :-

• Lilac is American Apparel L'Espirit, flower stalks are Clarie's Matte Violet and MUA shade 16
• Blue Sky is Models Own Blooboo, grass is American Apprarel Office, Pale Sun is Rimmel Lemon Drop, Tree leaves is a blobby mix between Barry M 290 Green and Claire's Jade Green. tree trunk is Barry M Mushroom, and the Apples are Barry M Red 292.
• Pale yellow is Rimmel Lemon Drop, flower stalks are Miss Sporty Taxi! and Bloom Goldie
• Mint green is American Apparel Office, flower stalks are Barry M Green 290 and Claire's Jade Green
• Baby doll pink is American Apparely Coney Island, the flower stalks are MUA shade 3 and Bloom Flamingo Sands.
• All the little daisies were created using Claire's Nail Art Pen in White (thought you could just as easily use a dotting tool, cocktail stick, or even a straightened out bobby pin) and the centre of the daisies is Miss Sporty Taxi!.

PHEW!!!
I don't yet have any brushes or tools, so I used a bobby pin and cocktail stick to draw the details on the ring finger and daisy stalks, as well as the White Nail Art Pen for the picket fence! The contrast between the green grass and blue sky is more pronounced IRL, I wonder why it didn't translate in the photo hhhmm.
I also totally forgot it was St Patrick's Day today (dickhead) and thought it was tomorrow, so I will post pics up tomorrow! I'll give you a hint......Guinness. Haha! Happy Birthday to my Nanny too, sharing a birthday with a Saint's day is pretty apt fort his Wonderful Lady.

I hope you will all do the Irish proud and drink copious amounts of beer - We Brits know how to celebrate.

xxx

Back to Nature

After a couple of unfortunate breakages, I'm sporting the short nail look for a while! I really don't mind it, I'm used to short nails, and I think you can still get some great looks with them :)
I painted my Nails using Claire's dark green jade colour, and obviously I can never leave my manicure alone! so I added some Konad in a shimmery, metallic green. It makes me want to go and live in the forest haha!

Here is the Claire's dark green on her own:-

And here's the full manicure after I finished playing around with it!

This was quite difficult to photograph, as I was losing light, and the Konad is pretty subtle anyways, only showing when the light catches it in the right way. It's pretty IRL though!
A blurrier photo with no flash, but it captures the pattern better:-

So there we are! The polishes I used are:-

• Claire's Jade Green
• Barry M, shade 284, to stamp the swirly pattern from BM19
• Bloom Goldie to stamp the flower from BM03 onto the thumb and accent nail
• Barry M Topcoat

I hope you all had lovely weekends, I unfortunately have badly sprained ankle (more like a MANKle at the moment, all black&blue!), which is going to impact on my Fifty Fit challenge!! Hopefully I can be back at the gym in a couple of days! My best childhood friend, Emma, is coming over tonight and we're going to cook Thai food and talk about the good ol' days!!
xxxx