Born Pretty Store Review | Sparkling Flower Gems

Hello my dears! I haven't posted in nearly two weeks! I am so sorry... I have been working a lot lately, and I broke one of my nails D: it's all patched up and I have some pretty, sunny-looking nails for you today featuring these beautiful flower gemstones from Born Pretty Store!

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Click the jump to see more!

BPS Review | Thermal Polish & Clear Stamper

Hiya! I'm back with more Born Pretty Store goodies. The one I am most excited about is the CLEAR STAMPER! I combined that with the green thermal polish they sent me to create this look:

Rainbow Flowers! | My Favourite BPS Review to date

You guys have kind of picked up on the fact that I love rainbows, right? Colourful things make me so happy, so when I got my latest batch of Born Pretty Store goodies to review, I snatched these up like it was a bag of Skittles. Which I'm also obsessed with. Because they're delicious (and, coincidentally, rainbow-coloured). But yeah. Rainbow flower and feather nail stickers! They're beautiful!

I never want to take these off! Click the jump to see the details, and like a zillion more photos.

Picture Polish Teal Gradient

Hello! Today I have a simple but pretty gradient design with two Picture Polish collab shades:

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As you can see, the gradient is with Dragonfly and Tail Feather. These are both lovely shimmery polishes, with PP's signature "bijou holo" going on. This only took two sponged coats to look opaque, although I did three to make sure the pics looked perfect.

The fimo flowers are from some canes I got ages ago from Born Pretty Store. And of course, it's topped with Seche Vite.

Anybody else getting a Twilight-book-cover vibe from this?

These polishes are fab! And both are still available on the Picture Polish website, although Tail Feather is being discontinued soon, so grab it while you can--it's discounted!

Thanks for reading today. See you next time! xoxo

Born Pretty Store Review | Floral Stencils

Good day! Just in time for the holidays, I have received a new set of products to review from Born Pretty Store! I have lots of festive, seasonal items which I will post about after this, but the one I was most excited to try is these floral nail stencils!

(click to enlarge)

Plus, Christmas means summer here in Australia, so these aren't out of place at all ;) Read on to see more!

Born Pretty Store Review | 3D Rubber Flowers

Hullo! Last mani before I take off for a week, and last review item from my latest Born Pretty Store haul :) I saw Anna review some similar 3D rubber flowers years ago, and finally got to try them myself!

Love Roses | Valentine Nails

Hello darlings!

Yesterday's Valentine design was all sweet and cute, so I wanted something more classic and romantic today. What's better than deep red with roses?

I started with one coat--yes, one!--of the polish you see in the above photo. It's China Glaze Adventure Red-y, and it's fantastic. Buttery and creamy and a nice shade of deep red. I added a coat of topcoat and let that sit for an hour or so before carrying on.

The roses and the word "love" on the thumb are all done with acrylic paint and a tiny brush. I used black, white, and red to create a few shades of red with which to paint the roses. It's hard to explain the method--I jused used the dark shade first to create some petal shapes spiralling outwards, and then went lighter and lighter to create more definition, shadows and highlights, using the base colour as one of the shades in the rose. It's not the best nail photo, but here's a pic of what kind of inspired this--a Cadbury Roses box:

Anyway, after the roses, I used pure black to create some small leaves, and white to paint the word on the thumbnail. One more coat of Seche Vite, et voilà!

They're definitely more abstract roses. The "idea of" roses, as I think Robin Moses would say :) What do you think?

I'll have one more Valentine look up before Saturday--come back soon to see it, and have a great rest of your week! xoxo

"Hope"ful Daisies

Hallo :)

Happy birthday to my mother! (Now I'll know if you read my blog or not... muahahaha.)
I've been saving this mani for a little while, as I actually did it before I started my Christmas designs. I feel like these pretty wintery-looking flowers fit in well with the kind of weather she's having back in the northern hemisphere. Plus, it's always good to start the new year with some hope, right? ;)

A Rosy Review: Born Pretty Store Water Decals

Hello! The other day I received three lovely items from Born Pretty Store to review for you! The first one I wanted to try are these gorgeous floral water decals. I've never used water decals before, but it was so easy and they're beautiful!

Please click the jump to see more!

#31DC2014 - Day 14 - FLOWERS

Hey hey! 14 days in, and it's flower day! I've already done flowers twice in this challenge... oh well, here we go again! :) This time I have little blue cornflowers!

Indoors with flash... and some water droplets, for extra pretty.

More one-stroke flowers! I've done this once before, and really need to more often. It's such an easy and beautiful technique.

The base is two coats of Color Club Cosmic Fate, the mangoey-orange Halo Hue. Soooo gorgeous :D I used blue and blue-mixed-with-white acrylic paints to create my little cornflowers, then plopped a matching blue rhinestone in the middle of each flower. I really love the finished look. Plus, I thought the gems would pop off with very little provocation, seeing how they are kind of "tall", but they all stayed on through a full day of work today. Fabulous! I'll blame the two coats of Seche Vite I put over them.

Outdoors in sun. A bit late in the day, so please excuse the warmth of the colours.

I was inspired by the pattern on my Born Pretty Store buffing block for this design. I almost didn't take a photo with it, because it's all used and scratchy and such. But I think it's important to show the inspiration for these things, so...

If only I'd added some mint coloured leaves...

So, there's my flower nails for day 14. Two weeks in! Join me tomorrow for some pretty delicate print nails :) xoxo

#31DC2014 - Day 5 - BLUE nails

Hello hello :) Day 5 of the challenge--blue nails!

I went for a blue ombre, plus glitter and flowers :) From index to small finger, I did a sponged vertical gradient with Revlon Royal, Soulstice Spa Monterey, Orly Blue Collar, Revlon #170 Coastal Surf, and Orly Snowcone. On top of that, the glitter you see in the photos--Sinful Colors Hottie. And finally, some blue flower stickers from a craft store. They actually glow in the dark, but I forgot to get a picture of that!

Topcoated with Seche Vite.

Indoors with flash

Outdoors in sun

On the thumb, I added OPI DS Magic -- the most beautiful blue polish evar. It fit in nicely with the gradient look to boot.

The worst part about this challenge is taking these off so quickly! This is the kind of mani I'd wear a few days, if I could. Oh well... tomorrow I'll be rocking some purple nails, so stay tuned for that! xoxo

Mint Apple Blossoms

Hullo! Today's manicure was partially inspired by the names of one of the polishes... but mostly because I really wanted to paint flowers :)

And I just happen to have a tea towel that matches it perfectly--what are the odds?

Grey with Vintage Flowers

Hullo :)  late post today! Just got home from watching the State of Origin game--big rugby series in these parts. Going to post today's mani and then get to sleep!

"May" I Join the Lacquer Legion? Garden Themed Nails

Happy Wednesday! It's the end of the month, so that means another Lacquer Legion themed collaboration!

This month's prompt is "Garden"... so I took the literal approach:

Coffee Mug Inspiration: Black & White Floral

Hello my beauties :)

Today I have a mostly black & white design, inspired by my pretty coffee mug!

First Try with One-Stroke Flowers!

Hiya! Yep, I'm posting late again. I don't even have a good excuse, really. I have an excuse, but not a good one. I discovered this game yesterday on my phone, and I can't stop playing it. It's disturbing how fun it is! I meant to get this post up last night, but I couldn't tear myself away from it. #sorrynotsorry

But here is my latest creation! I have been so inspired by Raquel and Lucie and their beautiful one-stroke flowers that I finally decided to give it a go myself. I don't know why I didn't try this sooner. It's easy and SO beautiful!

Holiday Manis with Kimmi

Hello! Let's give this Blogger app for my phone a go and see how it works. 

*edit* it was rubbish, I am doing final edits and publishing this quite late after arriving back home :S

I am having a lovely time in Perth! My friends are fun people and wonderful hosts, and we are doing lots of sightseeing and beachgoing and general fol-de-rol. I won't bore you with loads of pics from the trip, but I took one of a lionfish at the AQWA Aquarium, and it came out SO cool, I just have to post it:

"hello, I am Seaking"

Of course, we had to have a manicure night! I will show you my nails first, which I'd done prior to flying over, then the design I did for her. (Her fiancé politely declined any decorating of his digits.)

These photos are all taken with my phone, so excuse the poorer-than-usual quality. On-the-go posts are never quite the same!

For this, I used a base of OPI You Callin' Me a Lyre?, very sheer pink and my favourite for French manis. The gradient tip is done with a makeup sponge and two Orly polishes, Glowstick (neon yellow) and Blue Collar. I wanted more green in the middle as the two blended, but it didn't really work out. There's still a bit :) Over top of that, two coats of China Glaze Fairy Dust for sparkle, and the flowers and butterflies are from a sheet of decals by Cala. Finally, topcoat of INM Out The Door.

Now for Kim's! She has gorgeous slender fingers with longer nail beds and rounded tips, so I wanted to do a softer floral look for her. She requested something involving silver and pink, so I went with this...

The silver is Revlon #928 Silver Dollar, and I used two coats for the tips on most nails, covering the entire ring fingernail for the accent. The pink flowers are Revlon #280 Bubbly & #911 Pink Chiffon, (yes, lots of Revlon in this mani!) and the dots in the centres are Ulta Snow White. The leaves are China Glaze Starboard and Orly Fresh. I used a small brush and dotting tool to create the flowers. Last, for the accent nails, I used 1mm clear rhinestones to add some sparkle and subtle bling to the middles. INM Out The Door topcoat sealed it all in. 

I am back home now, but unfortunately she and I both ended up with a touch of cold or flu or some such by the end of the week. I apologise for being late with this post and the promised finish of my Indie Polish swatches--the latter will be up ASAP! After some hot tea and a nap.

See you soon xoxo

Sweet & Simple Sunday: Fall Flowers

Good day, my lovelies! Today is another Sweet & Simple design, and may be the last one for a while. I am moving soon and will not have a computer for most of the month of December while I get everything sorted out here and fly to another part of the world! So, posting will be rather sporadic until January. Please bear with me and my mini-hiatus! I'll have more time to spend on the blog once I get settled in my new home :)

At the moment, though, I have an easy but SO CUTE design for you. All you need are three polishes and something to make dots with. I chose an autumn-inspired colour palette for these cute fall flowers!

Mix up the colours to match any season, or any outfit!

Easy enough, eh? First choose your background colour. Mine is OPI Every Month Is Oktoberfest. Such a gorgeous brown/plummy shade :)

Next, choose your flower petal colour, and make dots in a circle of four or five per cluster, like so (mine are done with Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Mellow Yellow):

Finally, choose a shade for the centres--I used Soulstice Spa's Buenos Aires--and put one dot in the middle of each cluster to finish off your flowers!

Make sure to let it dry for a while before adding your favourite topcoat! I didn't wait long enough on my right hand, and some of the red dots smeared a little :( It's still really cute though, especially at a normal viewing distance!

Please excuse the small finger off in the corner there. I broke that finger when I was a kid and it's been wonky ever since, lol.

Thanks for reading! Let me know if you try this design--I'd love to see it.

I'm sure I will post at least a time or two between now and January, but I know I'll be a busy girl getting things wrapped up here and transitioning to the new place. Take care, have a great holiday season, and I'll see you for a glitterier-than-ever 2014! xoxo

Yellow & Teal Spring Flowers

Hooray! It's *finally* starting to actually feel like spring around here. Been rainy and grey for too long, but today was sunshiney and lovely! I like to think that, similar to a rain dance, this bright manicure I did last night summoned the sun. Behold:

I love yellow and teal/turquoise together :D Indoors with flash.

Isn't it just... happy? :D

Base colour is by the brand Confetti, and is called Margarita Señorita. Three thin coats of that was opaque enough to be a nice sunshiney background! I then used a dotting tool dipped into China Glaze Turned-Up Turquoise (Neon), the bottle pictured in the above shot, to create the flowers and random dots. The centres were made with the same dotter and a random white polish--I think it was Petites #417 French White. Doesn't really matter; they're all the same. Layer of Orly Sec N' Dry topcoat and I was good to go!

I saw a cute swimsuit at the beach last week in yellow and teal and it made me want to do a manicure with those colours.

Outdoors in this lovely sunlight.

This really was such a simple design to execute--it's just a bunch of dots!--but the result can be so pretty. Give it a try sometime with your favourite shades! xoxo

Baby Pink, Glitter, and Flowers: Easter Nail Design #1

Good evening, darlings :D Next Sunday is Easter! I'll be at the beach then (and am SUPER excited about the manicure I have planned for that trip), so I'll fit in all my pastel Eastery designs this week. Here is the first one...

Awww, so sweet.

I started with Revlon #911 Pink Chiffon. When I first got this polish, I remember being dismayed at how sheer it was and how it took SO many coats to be opaque. I'd sort of written it off, but when I gave it another try, it only took three thin coats to look like this. I think perhaps it's thickened up a bit since when I first used it? Anyway, I'm quite happy with it now! It's very soft and baby-pink.

While the third coat was still wet, I sprinkled on some iridescent pink craft glitter. I was kind of going for a gradient glitter tip, but it ended up going over most of the nail so I just went with it. There is SO much of this glitter, it will last a lifetime:

Anyway, I decided it needed just a bit more, so I accented the index and middle fingers with some nail stickers I got at Nail Polish Canada! The brand is Cala and this set can be found here.

Tried a new topcoat! This is Sally Hansen Insta-Dri #110 Clearly Quick. It's not quite as fast-drying as my others, but it's reasonably fast and has that nice thick "juicy" shine. I'm a fan!

Indoors, indirect lighting. As anyone who's ever tried to photograph this kind of glitter knows, it's hard to show off just how sparkly it is in pics. This was a pretty good capture :)

Indoors with flash. It looks blurry at this scale; you should click to enlarge if you want to see the detail of those cute stickers!

Soft and Eastery enough? xoxo