New Year Nails!

Well, I hope you all had an amazing year! I personally don't care much for New Year - I stay up to watch the countdown on TV and then go to bed, haha. I did decide, however, to do some kind of nail polish with the inspiration of fireworks and lasers in the night...
Before I get into that, I hope you like the new design to the blog... it took me absolutely ages because certain things just wouldn't co-operate to begin with, and after about 3 hours, html becomes extremely irritating.

 Anyway! To the nails! I have 2 designs today, fairly similar really. The main reason is that the first one chipped within 24hrs of doing it, so I had to do something else. This is the first one! I used Barry M Navy and then used some Barry M Jewel Glitter Amethyst at the tips, blending it a bit with the brush so that it was kind of a gradient.

My Seche Vite topcoat didn't hold it though, which was a first. For me, anything that is sparkly on dark polish looks like sparklers or fireworks so BOOM! Glitter on dark blue it is!

 As I said though, the polish chipped fairly quickly so I decided to use some of my new tapes (which I learned- the hard way - loses it's colour if you apply it onto damp nail polish so must applied to completely dry polish). I have such tape on the index and ring finger. The thumb and ring finger have OPI Casino Royale as the base, and the others have the above mentioned Barry M Navy.

 The thumb has the same glitter (Barry M Jewel Glitter Amethyst) as above, covering the nail completely and only the tip of the pinky nail.
The middle finger has Models Own Mirrorball Freak Out! - I found that it matched really well with the tapes I was using.

I took quite a few pics, too many really! I found it difficult to choose because some are better for different reasons.

Anyway, this is lasting a lot longer, I've had it on for about 3 days now!


I hope you have a marvelous new year!

Christmas Nail Art!

So, I got the chance to do some Christmas nail art last week and managed to keep it on for about 4 days with Seche Vite. As you see, from thumb to pinky, I painted on a snowman, Santa, Rudolf, a Christmas tree and left the fifth with snow.

The background has some China Glaze Techno and some white dots painted on. For the Christmas tree, I used 2 greens I have, with the sparkle from the limited edition Barry M Christmas polish. I've used some jewels, such as those on the tree, Rudolf's nose and the end of Santa's hat. :) I used a lot of polishes on this, so if there is any you would like to know, drop me a comment. It took me about 2 hours to do this haha, very intricate work!

 Hope you have a very Merry Christmas! :)

Barry M Ruby Glitter

Hey all! Well it has taken me over a month to post this, I've had so much work to do. I'm on 'revision week' for my upcoming exams so naturally I'm taking this chance to post some actual nail polish stuff.
My posts may not be as long as I would have liked, but I have so much to get through, and honestly, there isn't a lot to say about some of the polishes so I'm not going to go on for a paragraph about how shiny something is.
Before I start, I'm gonna say... I 'ombre/dip-dyed' my hair yesterday - it was a magical experience(!) Actually, I did it yesterday afternoon, and with it being winter the sun was down so in artificial light it looked fine but this morning I was like 'oopsies!' so I dyed over it with a lightish brown I had bought just in case of such a catastrophe... I'd like to think it doesn't look quite as frightening as it did this morning (at least it no longer looks like my hair is on fire). I'm not a massive fan of dying my hair every day or anything, so I'm at that point that I don't even care at the minute -- I'll maybe dye it again with more brown some other time and let my hair heal from the bleach... :P
Well anyway, now to move on to some actual nail polish. Here's some Barry M Ruby Glitter. Basically, it's a black and pink glitter, with teeny tiny specks of black throughout. The base is clear, and in these pictures, I painted it over No7 Thunderstorm. I want to try it over something lighter some other time as the contrast isn't that great on grey, but you get the gist. I hope.
Anyway, I like it.

BYE.

I haven't forgotten you!

Just a quick message to say that I have not forgotten my blog, or stopped blogging. I've just had a lot of uni work to do so I've really not had the time.
I have been painting my nails, and I have SOO many polishes that I've been buying that I want to put on here and hopefully I will soon! This is my last week of uni so I might manage something next weekend, then I have exams to do... but come Christmas I hope to be doing quite a few, and catch up with the backlog of photos I've been taking!

I've missed blogging!

Best of British Weekly Roundup 04/11/12

It's time to see what out other bloggers are up to!

Lyndsay has had busy week this week showing off her Halloween manicure and taking delivery of a new polish haul over at Pie's Eyes.

Ruth found some inspiration for her Halloween Special this week, with some fun nails and pumpkin carving for the day!

Wendy from Wendy's Delights has just done her first ever Half Moon Mani with added glequins!

Nada went a bit crazy and created two designs for Gruesome Halloween Check it out!

Claire at nuthin' but a nail thing has cats popping up all over the place... Miaow!!

Hannah at Doodle Nails got into the Halloween spirit with a skittle mani!

This week The Teenage Shopaholic has been... getting spooooky! She created and wore her cute Halloween nail art mani to a Halloween party

Rachel from Phoenix Nails has started a new challenge The Lazy 15 and the first is a tape mani

Steph has been taking inspiration from others and recreating their mani's and celebrating 100 followers with a new competition over at Never Mind Suzi.

At Northern Nails this week , Jo has been celebrating Halloween in style check out her Halloweenie Series Posts will also be a bit thin this week as she is also recovering from a cold!

D is for Dogstooth? Or is it H, Houndstooth Enigmatic Rambles gets confused here!

Emma bares all on holiday in this naked nail post at Emma's Little Corner.

Lou is back from holiday with the new Christmas Holiday 2012 Chanel Polish Malice which is a complete stunner and has a go a finding a good dupe

Kerry at JustTalkNails shows off her first Jade Holographic spectacular.

Jazz at Glitter Infatuation has been trying out nail art for the first time!Will it be a win or a fail? Glitter is appropriate no matter what occasion.

That's all for this week!

HALLOWEEN SPECIAL!

YIPPEE!! First of all, I want to apologize for not posting for a bit - I've has so much stuff to do for uni and I've missed blogging a lot! I've not had the time to write up posts, but I have been taking pics whenever I've done my nails so they will be coming up in the hopefully not too distant future, however I still have a lot of work to do right now.

Now, I've been planning on doing one big post for Halloween seeing as I didn't have time for anything more so here you go!
The first design here was inspired by a picture I saw on the internet and I thought I'd create it myself as I love gradients. :) I really don't have the mental capacity to go through all the polishes I used as I'm now off sick with the cold and my head is filled with goo.

However if you want to know a particular colour, just ask and I'll go look. :)
I didn't have a 'witch' stamper so I drew it freehand, and the witches house was in my stamping kit but when I used it, it didn't show up much so I basically drew that on too. I blended Avon Lemon Sugar and some orange Essie colour to get the effect of the moon like in the picture.









This is another one I did just before the one above, but pretty much just for the blog haha. I used an orange Essie one for the base of most of them and used this to paint on the pumpkin on the middle finger, Sally Hansen's Black Out on the middle finger base and for stamping the black pumpkin and bats. I also used an orange glitter with a darkish base. It's called Pumpkin Spice by Sally Hansen (quite fitting I think! I bought it ages ago just for Halloween haha).




 Also on the ring finger I have a layer of black Barry M Croc Effects - I was originally going to get the Limited Edition Web Effects one but after everyone said it was horrible, I went for this one and thought I could do the opposite haha.


And finally, I thought I'd share with you what I carved into my pumpkin this year. :D FLOUNDER! Makes me so happy! Haha. I did it all freehand and it took me about 3 hours - would have been a lot easier if I just used a template but I like giving myself a lot of work...

Thanks for reading! Now let's party with the Ghostbusters!

Best of British Weekly Roundup 21/10/12

Best of British Weekly Roundup time!

Emma has started a Quest for the Holy Grail in honour of the retirement of the a-england shade she has rarely used and is now trying to use it in a personal Holy Grail challenge at Emma's Little Corner

Mimi does freestyle Halloween nails funky halloween nails .

Lyndsay at Pie's Eyes has taken a delivery of some new Christmas themed HB image plates for stamping with and has been trying them out to see how they perform

In need of distracting this week Enigmatic Rambles' spent waay to much time painting frog eyes on her nails for a Sat-ART-Day nail challenge.

Claire at nuthin' but a nail thing has been doing some checkerboard themed manicures. Pink, White and Black and a more spangly Blue, Black and White checkerboard mani, which do you prefer?

Sam at Polished Art has made her second and final attempt at water marbling for the 31 Day Challenge. Never again!

More Halloween spookiness over at Never Mind Suzi, Steph is playing with ZOMBIES

Jo at Northern Nails has been entering a few competitions this week, from skulls to coming up with Taglines!, She has also joined in with Pink October, with a lovely pink bead mani !

Polished Criminails has been busy showing us the OPI - Skyfall Collection this week in her Skyfall Swatch Series with an added insight to each of the corresponding James Bond films

Vic's been carrying on with the Halloween theme but has also managed to fit in some non-Halloween related nail art. Her Frogs mani fits somewhere in between. Check out the cute pic of her two year old who insisted on getting frogs on his nails too!

Jazz has been continuing with her love/hate affair with frankens and has also been divulging in a little bit of halloween nail art! Frankens! Glitter is appropriate no matter what the occasion!

Ruth finally posted up her first fishtail attempt this week!

Carlyn has fallen in love with OPI Diva of Geneva A gorgeous shimmering red then added a rose stamping design

Charlotte at Charlottes-nails has swatched a polish from Born Pretty Store for a review post this week.

Wendy from Wendy's Delights has been going round in circles with her new Circular Magnetic & Magnetic Polish and while your over at Wendy's Delights check out her Nail Foil for the Llama A-Z Challenge

Kerrie from PishPosh and Polish has been on holiday this week. She decided to try out some Sally Hansen Nail Effect Wraps to create Denim Nails and loves the result!

Mimi tries her hand at freestyle nails Halloween and thinks they are really cool!

Danielle gives her first tutorial on Black velvet manicure at Totally Nailed

This week, The Crumpet has done a series of posts for Depression Awareness. Feel free to join in and share your story, or do a green mani in support

Kerry at JustTalkNails has gone all out for Halloween with Daring Digits Trick or Treat a perfect Halloween glitter.

Here is a pastel green manicure with a glitzy difference for Abi's first post back at Volatile Varnish.

This week Sally of NailPron bared her soul with a green manicure and came out as an anxiety survivor, oh and she broke the news about the new Speciallita Hits Glitter World polishes

Until next week!

Bourjois 10 Days Nail Enamel No.23 and First Fishtail attempt!

Okay, so this is something that I did about 3 weeks ago now haha. Haven't tried fishtail since, but really want to! I have absolutely no time for anything at the minute, boo.

Due to the fact I'm so busy, I will be rather brief with this post, sorry!
So I did Bourjois No.23 10 Days Nail enamel - it's a cool camouflage colour I never had before so I may do a camouflage themed nail mani at some point. For now though, I used Barry M Gold Foil and No7 Beanie and the reason I only did the ring finger was because I didn't have the patience to do all of them at that point! It's kind of wonky but not bad for a first ever attempt in my opinion! Must try harder next time!

It applies fairly well (although as I state in my Bourjois No.18 review that the brush really annoys me).  It lasted fairly long and was rather shiny before I even added any topcoat.

Well I'm afraid that's all I have time for!

Best of British Weekly Roundup 14/10/12

Once again, it's time for the weekly roundup!

Northern Nails is back on track this week with Pink Wednesdays Posts and More Adventures in stamping Posts and even a few surprises . Jo has also changed the look of Northern NailsHope you like it !

Jazz is trying her hand at franken for the first time! Glitter Infatuation Enjoy!

PrettyKittyClaws has a extra special mani to show you this week, it's her Wedding Mani featuring Sally Hansen, Girly Bits and Lynnderella

Wendy from Wendy's Delights has been stamping for another week's challenge set by Adventures In Stamping this week's theme being Metallic Madness and while your over at Wendy's Delights check out her 200 Follower Giveaway and you could win some fab Nails Inc Polishes!

Very few posts from Emma as she has been away and also got the lurgy... but she did post this Autumnal mani with a little bit of rare stamping.

Whats this? Whats this? PishPosh and Polish has Nightmare Before Christmas Nails on the blog this week

In between dying her hair, fingers, walls and face there was time for another awareness manicure on Enigmatic Rambles, this time for Hospice and Palliative Care Day.

Lyndsay from Pie's Eyes has had a No7 filled week this week comparing their top coats and trying out Star Shower one of their newly released polishes.

It's nearly Halloween and Steph has been flirting with the "Ghost with the Most" and swatching the new Hocus Pocus collection from 365 Days of Color.

Claire at nuthin' but a nail thing has been trying out gold beads and adding a bit of sparkle this week.

Dimpal at Crazy Polishes showing Born Pretty store stamping polishes stamping polishes and over light and dark base this week.

Ruth finally got her hands on some Barry M Gelly polishes and tasted the pomegranate and the watermelon this week!

Sally of Nail Pron has attended another funeral, received a right slating from her step daugher but cheered her week up by finding a dupe for Gosh Holographic which is cheaper, and easier to apply!

Jazz is trying her hand at franken for the first time! Glitter Infatuation Enjoy!

Kerry at JustTalkNails shares the new Nail Inc Fine Sprinkles this week starting with a nail gradient.

The Crumpet and the Digit-al Dozen have been arting it up for Halloween this week - spiders, witches and zombie blood - oh my!

Carlyn has a nail polish to go with her tan China Glaze Pink Plumeria and stamping using her new konad plate

Vic is well and truly into the Halloween spirit (swamp vodka jelly if you're wondering) - her Ghosts are simple enough that anyone can give them a try. In fact, she dares you to give them a go!

That's all for this week! :)

Barry M Gelly Hi-Shine Pomegranate Nail Polish

The first thing I'm going to say is 'Boooo' my nails are shorter! I broke 2 of them on my right hand while closing the boot of a car (and no, I didn't close them in it, I went to pull it down and my hand slipped so bye-bye nails! I decided to cut all of them the same while I was at it. It doesn't actually bother me to be honest because it's a bit easier to type, especially on a tablet which is what I'm writing on right now. I'm so dedicated to this blog I'm writing this on a 8.40am train *yawn*.

So to the actual polish... thumbs up, my friends! The pictures don't have any topcoat or anything. I painted the ring finger nail with Barry M Gold Foil and put 2 coats of Technic 'Carnival' that I bought in the weekend, I love this glitter! Partly because the glitter doesn't cause the nail to feel rough and the clear polish itself is really good at making the nail shine.

The Pomegranate shade is a really lovely and certainly quite a fun colour to use!

Barry M Gelly Hi-Shine Watermelon Nail Polish

I love Barry M, so when I found out they were going to be releasing the Gelly range I squealed like a little girl, or a little pig... take your pick! Anyway, I went to buy them the day they came out but they weren't yet at my local Superdrug so that was a bummer. I even went to check at Boots even though I knew they hadn't even acknowledged them on their website yet, but to no avail. So, a week later I managed to get them, yippee! I only bought watermelon and pomegranate as I am but a student and 2 cost me £8 as it was and I could hear my brain yelling 'Don't buy any more!'. I did get Barry M Croc Effects for free (when you buy any 2 polishes) so that was good. I was going for the Web Effect even though I know it isn't very good but they didn't have it at the time and probably the croc one is more versatile for my taste anyway. If I go buy 2 more, I will grab that one though, just because I'm hoping to do some Halloween nail art closer to the time woo!

So to the actual polish. Here is watermelon, this was the one I was wanting the most because it looked the most appealing to me... And I love it! The lovely shine is very similar to that of the gel polish variety. (Don't be confused with what they mean by 'gelly', they really do mean 'gelly', not the kind of sheer 'jelly' polishes. In fact, the polish applies pretty thick and opaque (although I did 2 coats anyway) and it really does feel glossy even without a topcoat!

I love this colour and the shine is awesome, you don't feel the need to put a topcoat on at all. Also, I decided to add a little bit of stamping to it as I was bored. I used BM-204 plate for this mani, of which the number I cannot remember. It kind of reminds me of old vintage curtains to be honest, but they actually looked pretty good in real life.

Soon, I'll be putting up my pomegranate post, once I write it!

Best of British Weekly Roundup 07/10/12

It's Best of British Sunday!

Wendy from Wendy's Delights is having a dotting time with her first ever Dotty Mani for the Llama Nails A-Z challenge.

Wendy has also participated in the Facebook Group Adventures in Stamping and this weeks theme is French Nail Tips.

Lyndsay from Pie's Eyes shows off her Swatchicles and explains how they make keeping tabs on her ever growing collection a little easier, she's also done a lovely leafy stamp manicure.

Claire from nuthin' but a nail thing completed the 30 Day Challenge! Which one was your favourite?

Emma has lauched her first giveaway and played with dotting tools again this week, this time creating rainbow manicure using them over at Emma's Little Corner

Charlotte from Charlottes-nails has been swatching some of the new Models Own Wonderland polishes for you all to enjoy!

After taking the weekend off after completing the 30 Day Challenge, Polished Criminails is back with 3 more BarryM Gelly Nail Paints which are bang on trend for the Autumn months!

When life hands you lemons, paint your nails with Avon's Lemon Sugar! Or at least that's what Ruth did this week. Including a slightly annoying design!

Vic has started her gel polish course but she's determined not to give up regular polish - after all, she does have over 400 bottles of the stuff. The inspiration for her Sparkle Zebracorn mani was taken from a gel polish tutorial but it works just as well with the lacquers we all know and love.

Spreading depression awareness through nail art, while checking off another ABC Llama nail challenge is Enigmatic Rambles this week.

Sally of Nail Pron is having a month of pink for Breast Cancer Awareness while having a very emotional week

Northern Nails had a little Hiatus this week, after all the posts in the 30 Day Challenge,then Her nails broke! So she decided to give Northern Nails a make over, Hope you all like the New Look!

Carlyn uses China Glaze's Foie Gras and Konad plate M64 to create a stunning Floral manicure, before she gets her nails shellac'ed for her holidays.

Sarah Louise is taking part in a Halloween challenge created by Crumpets Nail Tarts. For the second challenge she creates a Black Cats themed manicure - Enjoy! x

Abi invites you to take a look at her round up page for the 31 Day Challenge that she completed this week!

Lots of new items Spotted! instore this week over at Painted Nails and Baking Scales as Lou keeps her eyes peeled for all things polish!

Ever wondered what Indie polishes are and where to buy them ? Well this week The Crumpet tells you everything you need to know!

That's all folks!

Bourjois 10 Days Nail Enamel No.18 Nail Polish

Natural light - no flash

 Here's another Bourjous nail enamel. I don't normally go for blues as it's not my favourite colour for nails, but for some reason this one caught my eye. Probably because it's quite dark and I do quite like dark shades from time to time.

Artificial light - flash

The polish doesn't have a name other than '18' so if you look for it, that's the number you need.

The bottle claims that the enamel lasts for 10 days -- a claim I can't really verify because I put Seche Vite over most of them, but it has been 3 days since I did them and the parts that have no topcoat are still perfect. It also has an angled brush so that you are able to 'touch-up' any chips that may occur, however I see it more as a gimmick because even touching it up would be obvious because you'd had a small lump where the new polish is so the fact it's pointier at one side is quite irrelevant to me. In fact, I find the angled brush quite annoying because when you're applying the polish, you have to work harder to make it curve at the top of your nail and in a way, you have to apply in a way that is just weird. I like the concept though but not really practical unless your cuticles are completely straight or shaped like the top of a triangle.

Polish on nail

Overall, the colour is really nice. I would say the pictures are quite accurate - however indoors with no flash, this does look darker, like a really dark blue, sometimes verging on a dark teal kind of shade.

Under normal light, it looks like a plain blue, however when you look really closely, you notice that it's got a slight shimmer to it, and in fact you will see this shimmer through the bottle too, if you pick it up in store.

Avon Lemon Sugar Nail Polish (and some nail art thrown in)

Indoors - flash

Today's post is a little more picture based than usual, reason being that I was swatching this polish for the blog and then decided to just keep it on and so some half moon art with it.

So this is Lemon Sugar by Avon, and because I order through a local representative, it takes 3 weeks to get delivered - but delivery is free so I can't complain!

Indoors - no flash

The first thing I will say is that it's a fairly nice colour. I'm not much of a fan of yellow, but it is a nice lighter shade and not in-your-face neon. One coat was actually not too bad but you do get areas where your own nail which is obviously darker than this) comes through, so I did 2 coats.

I felt that this would go with pastel colours so I decided to do the half moon mani on it. The colours used (from thumb to pinky) are: Barry M Mint Green, MUA Shade 16, Barry M Blue Moon, No7 Lucky Lilac, Barry M Boots Limited Edition. Basically the same colours I used for the pastel zebra nails I did about a month ago. I put a glitter topcoat (17 Nail Xtras Glitter) and then Seche Vite.

I have to be honest, I didn't particularly like the nail art after I did it, but I ended up keeping it on for a few days because I was too busy with uni to change it. I think the yellow would work well in some sort of art, but I didn't particularly like it in this way because it stuck out like a sore thumb, no pun intended.

Best of British Weekly Roundup 30/09/12

It's Sunday, so let's see what everyone's up to again!

Emma has had a week of using Barry M Gelly polishes and created her most favourite mani ever multi coloured spots and stripes over at Emma's Little Corner.

Nada'sl penguin obsession is getting out of hand! the little minions are on her nails this week!!

This week on Pie's Eyes Lyndsay has used her new Cheeky stamping plates to create a Double Stamped Manicure plus there's a handy hint for stamping clean up too.

Claire at nuthin' but a nail thing is continuing with the 30 Day Challenge (the end is in sight!) and did a Panda Bear Manicure inspired by the book Eats, Shoots & Leaves.

It's been HoloWeek at the Nail Newbie, featuring lots of holo goodness such as a GOSH Holographic Hero wear test, a some tribal nail art and this holo cloudicure with a-England Tristam.

This week has been Carlyn's very first week of blogging featuring some of her favourite stamping designs Pretty Stamping on Sapphire Such a stand out design.

Well today is the last day of the 30 Day Challenge! at Northern Nails but on the Bright side it is Jo's birthday tommorrow !.

Wendy from Wendy's Delights is having a cracking time with her Croc Effect nails by Barry M

As a collector of vodka bottles, a Smirnoff Vodka Manicure was in order on Enigmatic Rambles blog this week!

PishPosh and Polish's Kerrie is wearing shock horror! PINK this week!

This is Carlyn's first blog week Flower stamping on Sapphire polish one of my favourites

Sally of Nail Pron has brightened up a sad week with the brightest green daisy doticure you have ever seen in your life.

PrettyKittyClaws is joined by a hare and a dog this week with the gorgeous Hare Dog Day Dream

Dimpal of Crazy Polishes has almost come to the end of the 30 days challenge and wearing this

Inspired by Supernatural Mani Inspired by Supernatural

Ruth has a new favourite polish that is purple and splarkly, yay!

Sarah Louise, creates a Ghostbuster Manicure Using Models Own and W7 Polishes

Charlotte has decided her stash needs some cleansing, so she's set up a blog sale with some great British brands

Kerry takes an adventure with GALAXY inspired nails.

Vic continues 30 days of untrieds with A Scream manicure inspired by art work

Apologies for the sharp decrease in posts, just been too busy with uni! x

Bourjois 1 Seconde Rainbow Apparition Nail Polish

Indoor with flash

Today, I'm going to show you what is now probably one of my favourite nail polishes. I bought this a couple of weeks ago, mainly because there was an offer where you buy one and get the 2nd half price (and I'll do a post on the other one soon!).

Natural light - no flash

The first thing you might notice is that the bottle and top shape are unusual, and I think it looks pretty awesome in itself, haha! This 1 seconde polish has, as the bottle states, a 'gel silicone texture'. The purple gel is so sheer that one coat isn't enough unless you want a slight shimmer as a top to another colour. In the images, had to put 5 coats for it to be really strong, and for the glitter to be really concentrated so that the nail isn't visible anymore. It did use up quite a bit of the bottle though, so perhaps putting it over a purple or similar shade would be more economic. 

The glitter is, in my opinion, really pretty and in the right lighting the glitter has a multicoloured, holographic kind of effect (but it is not a holographic nail polish). The pictures really don't do it justice, and I tried shining a lot of lights on it to give a good idea of how it really looks. In regular lighting, the glitter does just look silver but it's the way that the light hits it that makes it have a nice effect.

Also, I'd like to add that I put Seche Vite on top because the polish doesn't dry smooth due to the glitter and the top coat just helps the glitter to sparkle more.

Best of British Weekly Roundup 23/09/12

Once again, it's Best of British roundup time!

Wendy from Wendy's Delights is feeling purrrfect with her Blue Furry Mani with easy to apply nail stickers!

Emma tries her hand at dry drag and becomes The Girl Who Plays with Fire at Emma's Little Corner.

Helly at the Nail Newbie is showing British brand W7 some love by showcasing their gorgeous Lava Flow.

A little recreation of some Bee style nails, with actual stingers from New York Fashion Week, a Fred Butler Creation from Enigmatic Rambles.

Has twenty three days gone by already? Northern Nails' 30 Day Challenge is still going strong, the themes now are all full of inspiration!

Lyndsay from Pie's Eyes is back from her holiday and showing off her colourful Rainbow Manicure she created with her latest Kiko haul!

Sally of Nail Pron is talking about a nailmas Christmas challenge, adding to her stash and doing nails to match her mood.

Sam from Polished Art re-created an old nautical-themed manicure for day 12 of the 31 day challenge (19 to go!).

PishPosh and Polish is featuring Red and Black polishes on her blog this week. See them here! Which is your favourite?

Claire at nuthin' but a nail thing is still continuing on with the 30 Day challenge and her favourite so far has been TRIBAL NAILS. What's been everyone else's favourite challenge?

Ruth goes overboard with the half moon effect to create an easy curved stripe look!

Want some inspiration for elegant nails? Lucy from Lucy's Stash did Lace & Roses nail art featuring OPI, Konad and A England.

Feeling the need for something pretty and super sparkly? PrettyKittyClaws has Smitten Polish You're Turning Violet, Violet blinging out her nails!

Vic's feeling a little behind with the times as she's only just done her first set of galaxy nails. She found a fabulously blinging star to go with them though.

Lou had a quiet week this week trying out her new Indie polishes from KBShimmer which is quickly becoming her favourite polish brand

Alexis at Glitter Tips tried some Autumn butterfly nail art

Sarah Louise plays with her Image plates from MoYou / OMG Nails and creates a Crosses & Dot's Manicure

Despite being poorly, The Crumpet has kept up with the 31 Day Challenge and has even had time to launch a Zoya Giveaway - so make sure you enter!

That's all for this week!

Curved Striped Nails

Having done the half moon mani, I decided to go one further and use two ring reinforcement stickers as opposed to one. It takes a bit longer and I was kind of impatient to begin with! This is the first time I've used the Seche Vite topcoat -- I loved it! Dried relatively quickly and smoothed out all the bumps I had from the nail polish and stickers (and there were a lot!)

The first colour I used was Avon Nailwear Pro Electric Green, then I used a blue called No7 Stay Perfect Stand Back, followed by GOSH Wild Lilac at the tips. I added a little star on the ring finger and I just love how the topcoat really holds it on!

What I'm up to!

Hey all!
Just a short post to explain why there may be less posts on this blog from now on. Tomorrow, I'm back at uni so I will have to make that a priority, but I am going to try and get at least 1-2 posts a week done and I'm definitely not going to let this blog go dead! I've already had less posts the last week due to being busy but it can't be helped sometimes!
Thanks! :)

Best of British Weekly Roundup 16/09/12

It's that time for the Weekly Roundup! Let's see what everyone's been up to!

Helly at the Nail Newbie shows her nubs some love with Dollish Polish Expecto Patronum

Wendy over at Wendy's Delights has won a Giveaway from The Hungry Asian and her prize Twenty Ten has been swatched here, also go check out The Hungry Asian's blog and polishes available at Etsy. Going from one extreme to the other see Wendy's Summery Manicure using tape to create a simple & easy square design!

Claire at nuthin' but a nail thing has been continuing on with the 30 Day Challenge with Rainbow Gradient Striped Manicure

Emma at Emma's Little Corner has a little success after a frustrating week of failures PVA experiment Blue and Black gradient mani

Ruth has some more fun with gradients this week, refusing to accept summer is over!

Lou once again is on a bit of a Chanel kick with one of the Fashion's Night Out Limited Editions

Charlotte at Charlottes-nails has been busy with apples and glitter this week for the Fall into Autumn Challenge.

Its the end of the favourite things challenge for Steph, here's Steph's Day 10 Favourite Mani. Steph can't wait for the next challenge, will you be joining in the fun?

Lyndsay from Pie's Eyes drops in from her holiday in Spain to show off some NEW Holographic Polish from Kiko!

Putting her nubbins to good use this week, imPRESS - Press on Manicure false nails were put through there paces over on Enigmatic Rambles' blog.

PrettyKittyClaws put her Nails Inc Sprinkles to good use with a pretty Cupcake Mani.

Sam at Polished Art unleashed her inner geek with this physics-based rainbow manicure as part of the 31 Day Challenge.

Jo at Northern Nails has reached the half way point in the 30 day challenge this week was all about the nail art!

Nada has got her hands on her first set of Models Own nail polish and has swatched them! check it out!

Laura at She Who Does Nails has been continuing the 30 Day Challenge and did a cool rainbow nails design using a dotting tool!

Polished Criminails sticks to the British theme this week by showing us 4 of the new BarryM Gelly Nail Paints in the shades Prickly Pear, Grapefruit, Satsuma & Pomegranate

Kerry at JustTalkNails shows off the new Barry M Burgundy Croc effect teamed up with A Englands Iseult

Vic has been on a major polishing spree this week (13 manis and counting) but she just can't decide whether she wants to show you delicate print or holo bling.

And that's all folks!

Gradients!

I just love gradients! They're pretty easy to do and I find them fun to create.

I started with Barry M all-in-one, then painted a layer of No7 Snowflake (a white polish) so that the colours show up a little easier and that my own nail colour won't show through. I still had to apply the sponge twice so that the colours were strong enough. The colours used (in order) are MUA Shade 16, No7 Lucky Lilac, Fearne Cotton Lime Green, Fearne Cotton Mint Green and Fearne Cotton Turquoise towards the tips.

I painted a layer of 17 Nail Xtras Glitter to add that little bit of sparkle. It's actually a bottle I've had for a REALLY long time and I wasn't sure if they still made it, but I went to Boots to check, and it is the same, with the same kind of glitter. I'm not sure if there's a specific name for that kind of glitter, but it sort of reflects the colour it is on which works really well on gradients because it's like you have different glitters on your nail. Anyway, I digress.

I put some fimo on the thumb and ring fingers, topped with Seche Vite and voila!

Best of British Weekly Roundup 09/09/12

It's that time of the week again for the Best of British Weekly Roundup! Check out the other British nail bloggers!

Lou is back from her holiday and is showing off her new Chanel Nail Polish in a rare glimpse of the British Sunshine

Emma accidentally signed up to two nail challenges this month, so there will be lots of posts up on Imagination In Colour, including herAntique Nail Art post, amongst others!

Sam at Polished Art produced a special Teal Tuesdays manicure for Ovarian Cancer Awareness.

Lyndsay from Pie's Eyes went under cover this week with her Camouflage Manicure and liked it so much it stayed on most of the week with the addition of a matte topcoat.

Claire from nuthin' but a nail thing is all over the 30 Day Challenge and kicked off Day One with a Ladybird Manicure to cover off "RED".

Ruth relives school and tries to 'do the math' with her Blackboard-inspired nails this week!

It's been a busy week over at Polished Criminails, so let's take a look back at the last 7 days of the 30 Day Challenge!

Jo decided to take on the 30 Day Challenge this Month and is having tons of fun painting her nails a different colour every day!

September is Polycystic Overy Syndrome (PCOS) awareness month what better way to raise awareness than a manicure! And that is just one of the manicures on Enigmatic Rambles' blog this week!

Wendy from Wendy's Delights has made her own Water Decals for the September Polish Day themed Geometry

Charlotte from Charlottes-nails tried out some crayon nail art for the start of the Fall Into autumn Challenge.

Lucie from Lucy's Stash is experimenting with the 'ikat' pattern featuring Zoya Designer polishes! Check it out here!

Steph from Never Mind Suzie may be far away on her holidays so here's her holiday nails hope you're having a great holiday Steph

PrettyKittyClaws has had a blog makeover and did a Tape mani with the new KiKo holographics!

This week Nada turned 19 and to celebrate she did birthday nails!!! Enjoy this wonderfully simple manicure!

Laura at She Who Does Nails has been working on the 30 Day Challenge and particularly liked her piano nails!

The 31 Day Challenge started on The Crumpet this week, as did another awesome Giveaway featuring indie polishes

Kerrie's 300 follower giveaway over at PishPosh and Polish is still running and while you are there you should check out her Geometric Nail Art

Kerry does fimo for back to school with China Glaze Ruby Pumps!!

Sarah Louise creates some cheeky Bactiera Monsters , don't forget to enter her 2000 follower giveaway =D - Good Luck xox

Vic has done her first leopard print mani but it's orange, blue and gold. Leopard print nails are her new favourite but she's on a mission to never use the 'normal' colours.

And that's all for this week! :)

Blackboard Nails

 Don't worry! No-one's scratching their nails against a blackboard in this house! Eugh, I get shudders just thinking about the sound that makes...

No, this is an idea that popped into my head last week when I got my Rimmel Matte nail polish and I have to say, I'm quite impressed with how it turned out! It actually felt kinda like a blackboard/chalk (not that I've spent many a day rubbing blackboards or anything).

I started off with my usual Barry M basecoat, then applied 1 coat of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Black Out which was more than sufficient. I then used Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear White On to draw the equations and stuff on (using a small, thin brush for nail art) and then did a coat of Rimmel Matte top coat to give the effect of a blackboard.

I tried to capture the velvet effect more than anything, haha. I took this off a while after taking the pictures -- I'm not sure I'd go out with this but it's still fun and easy to do!

:)