Today's post is short and sweet. Nude but sparkly!
I used the gold glitter from the "Under the Mistletoe" collection from Colorclub that I luuurve so much, over a non-named nudey colour. I dabbed a bit of the glitter at the base of the nail and then spread it out in mini strokes with a brush!
Hope this post finds you well wherever you are! Thanks for viewing :)
You will be glad to know that today's mani does not bring a hangover with it. Hooray! I've been seeing lots of very simple manis with a base colour plus glittery bits on top and have been loving the layered simplistic look so I gave it a go:
I used Model's Own Lilac Dream and No 7 gold glitter top coat
Please don't look at the crappiness of the first finger.. I did this in a bit of a rushed/careless manner!
Not sure if you lot can tell that I've been trying to actually take care of my cuticles for once. I have been attacking them with orangewood sticks and cuticle clippers and they're not as dry as usual thanks to a weirdly named product that my Dad* uses called "Mane 'n Tail Hoofmaker." It has actual horses on the front so for a long time I thought it was for horses and I thought he was going nuts. Or at least something declaring itself as a hoofmaker does not sound conducive to softness does it?? But no, turns out it makes your hands and cuticley bits nice and soft!
That's all for now nail-lovers! I'm off to go and pick up my squidgy little sis from the train station :) yeyyyy!!
Wig Wam xx
*He has offered himself to be featured in the blog in a nail-related way (yes that's right. You didn't read that wrong. A NAIL-RELATED way haha!!)soon so keep your eyes peeled for that!!! Watch le space!!
Before I start this post, I will interrupt myself because I am a bit too excited about my first encounter with the Essie counter at the massive Boots on Oxford Street (in London). I almost wanted to take a photo of it and then realised I would look a bit weird slash suspicious but I can promise you I saw it with my own eyes cos I bought the Tart Deco colour that I've been loving in some of you bloggers' posts. But that's not all my dear friends... I had a lovely £5 voucher for No 7 so bought the limited edition gold glitter topcoat too. Once I have got bored of my current mani and try these out I will obviously post some photitos of designs with hte polishes.
Now I will shut up about that and show you what I actually wanted this post to be about.
For those of you who haven't watched Cutepolish's incredible videos on youtube, you have to check them out here. She offers "easy and cute nail art" which is certainly true! The designs look great and the majority of them are quite simple, only requiring a few colours and a dotting tool which she shows you how to make if you haven't got them already. I have to admit that some are pretty challenging and require a suuuuuuper steady hand but that all comes with practice practice practice (as my Dad repeated to me a million times when I was frustrated with drum kit practice).
I've seen gradient manis all over the shop, appearing in tonnes and tonnes of you lovely bloggers' posts and I suddenly thought: I feel brave enough to do one!! All that sponge business seemed a bit faffy so I found a brilliant video tutorial from Cutepolish that actually looked do-able (that is a word right...?) Check it out below:
The brilliant thing about this mani is that glitter covers all the sins of misplaced brush strokes and instead makes it look super amazing and tres chic baby!
I chose to use blues and used:
No 7 Minty Fresh as it is a thin layerable formula for the base coat
Nails Inc Queensgate Terracehalfway up and dabbing on to the nail, then when that had dried I dabbed it on the end to make it solid colour
Miss Sporty Sparkle Touch for the forgiving glitter over the top
CY Stamp It! in Star For a little star on each nail that you can just about see on the photos
And this is how they came out:
I liked the overall look but it's not something I would usually go for. Maybe if I tried a more striking colour with some neons it would be a bit edgier and bolder (just how I like it!!) and a bit more me.
Sorry for zi lack of posts recently. I have a few up my sleeve though so watch zis space!
Over Christmas my nails grew without me realising, and even though they were peeling at the ends (not enough calcium methinks?!) I still let them grow. I have to say they made manis look so much nicer but long nails are very annoying cos they catch on everything. I thought they looked like frosted peaches!
Nails Inc. Wellington Square plus Colorclub twinkly stuff
First on the agenda: apologies for being so rubbish at this challenge. It's almost as though as soon as I started it, I got ridiculously busy at work and had no time to be nailing about!
Second on the agenda: I've realised I will have to concede to defeat with this challenge, as I really don't think I'll be able to get it all done!!
Sooo as a peace offering to the Christmas nail elves, I have made a little selection of the Christmas days (basically all the ones I can actually do!!)
Day 5: Christmas gradient Using Rimmel Riviera Red and Colorclub gingerbread
Day 7 Christmas glitter nails Using Colorclub sugarplum fairy
Day 3 red and green nails (fashioned into a Christmas tree of course!) Using Rimmel Riviera Red, Barry M Mint Green and Nails Inc St Moritz
Day 17 Present Nails Using Barry M Mint Green and Rimmel Riviera Red
Day 6 Christmas Stripes (reminiscent of candy canes) Using Rimmel Riviera Red and Pamela Grant Manicure Fancesa
Day 8 Christmas Dotting Using Colorclub Gingerbread, Rimmel Riviera Red (oh but of course!),
Barry M Mint Green, Barry M NP150 and Colorclub Holiday Splendor
And so there are my Christmas offerings for this year! Not quite finished the challenge but at least I tried :)
On the way home from a day off spent squidging my 5 month old cousin, I had a little look in my local TK Maxx for a cardigan. Bit of a fruitless search for the cardie but I stumbled upon some nail varnish bargains!!! I came across this Christmas set of Color Club varnishes:
Let's do some maths here!!
£8.00 ÷ 7 bottles = £1.15 per bottle -- TOTAL BARGAIN!! Now let's see the results. I've had to use my mum's hand as I only painted my nails with a lovely midnight blue colour just yesterday.
Holiday splendor
Sugarplum fairy
Candy cane
Gingerbread
Beyond the mistletoe
As formulas go, these polishes painted on really well. Only gingerbread, beyond the mistletoe and candy cane needed 2 coats for a perfectly sparkly look. With a little top coat I think they would all be perfecto for winter and Christmas!
On my mum's other hand are a few nail designs that I was trying out and she insisted on showing them in the blog tehe!! So here is a photo:
I've never used Color Club before as I think it is much more popular in the US than over here in the UK.
So this week I tried out the strawberry Barry M and I have to say I wasn't very impressed... It really didn't suit my skin tone so I decided to 'fix it' with a bit of a tape mani with a lovely glittery varnish that has no name (I used it in my tape mani in my second ever post!) It still came out pretty rubbish so before showing you lot how they came out, I'll show you my amazing breakfast I made this morning so the mani won't look as bad!!!!
Today's breakfast: Poached eggs on toast with Brittany butter infused with rock salt crystals
Worst nails I've done in a while!! Apologies.
I took a day off work so that my cold germs stay at home rather than infect my co-workers, so I decided to have a yummilicious breakfast that I usually wouldn't be bothered or have time to make. Cue in mine and my dad's breakfast that we eat together and BAM! Poached eggies on toast. Yuuumm! Buttery and salty yey! And I'm not even gonna talk about the disaster nails. Not even a last ditch attempt of layering China Glaze Matte Magic helped them. Methinks one of my 'get better' activities today will be to re-do my nails.
