Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Temporary Pic Spam until I can get time to update.

Friday, July 13, 2012

30 Day Challenge Summary Part II

Day 7- Black and White

I'm not a fan of white on my nails so I went for black with a white lace water decal high light. The sparkle above the lace is a genuine Swarovski crystal. The black is Revlon Black Lingerie topped with China Glaze Fairy Dust.


Day 8 - Metallic


My interpretation of metallic went towards representing a metal type. I chose copper because I'm totally in love with my Ozotics and wanted to show them off. This is Ozotics 531 over Revlon Black Star. The Feature nail is Black Star under Ozotics 530, a gorgeous colour shifting glitter. Both of these polishes have been discontinued (sob). Pop into piCture pOlish and grab them while you still can.



Wednesday, June 13, 2012

Models Own Stash and Haul

The Hoars from TFIMP rocked my world today! I ordered the treasures in the top row below to complete my Beetle Juice set plus the two HedKandi glitters and those sweet hearted angles added the Champagne Box set that I had to drop from my order because of a credit card debacle and needing to help out a family member. I am in heaven.  You guys are the best! There were also two yummo treats in there. The right size for the weekly treat my food plan allows. Thank you Knithal!
Pic Spam!

Top Row- what I ordered~ Emerald Black, Golden Green, HedKandi Ibiza Mix, Purple Blue, HedKandi Disco Heaven           Second Row- My surprise RAK- The Champagne Box Set~Sterling Silver, Lili Pink, Mystic Mauve, Champagne, Gold Rush and Green Flash.

My Original Models Own haul. 2012 Beetle Juice Box set
 There will be Mani pics from this lovely RAK posted shortly. I'm having a hard time choosing what to wear first.

Thursday, June 7, 2012

One loves a Jubilee

In honour of Her Mage's special celebrations and because I am kind of fond of our monarch despite my republican leanings I am sporting a Jubilee mani. Apologies for the lack of clean up. It was late and I was tired. I was going to take new shots but it's chipped now and looking tired.

Ozotic 509 (silvery holo) China Glaze First Mate under Blue Years Eve, Revlon Get Reddy, Sally Hansen Crushed Gems in Showgirl Chic for the bling. Red striping tape and two sizes of fimo cane Union Jack. Seche Vitae is holding it all together.


I plan on doing a second one this week for The Queen's Birthday long weekend. I think it might involve real crystals and some stamping of crowns.

Friday, May 25, 2012

30 Day Challenge Catch Up

I have been a neglectful blogger lately. To make up for it I have a whole bunch of 30 Day Challenge pics to post.

Day 3-Yellow 

I am not a fan of yellow so I had to find a way to make it bearable for me. My solution was to stamp over it so it's at least half another colour then coat the lot with my Frankened Seche Holo Top Coat- I've christened it Crystal Shine. I am quite pleased with the result but I still think it would have looked much better in pastel pink or violet. 

Ulta 3 Honolulu under Konad Stamping White topped with Seche Vitae Spectra Flair Franken

 Day 4- Green 

This was a major fail mani. The base is OPI Fly from the Nikki Minaj collection. It stained my fingers, my nails and everything I touched with my stained fingers after trying to remove it. I love the colour but it's hard work. It's topped with three coats of Save Me from the same collection. It looks a bit like silver Muppet fur. Next time I use Save Me I'm sticking with one coat only.

OPI Nikki Minaj  Collection- three coats of Save Me over Fly.

Day 5- Blue

This one is all Mish Mash from piCture pOlish. Multi chrome Holos, what's not to love. It's the best of everything. The feature nail is 531, the others are 533. Mish Mash are among the list of soon to be discontinued colours. Get in and get them while they're still available. American readers can find Ozotics at Llarowe

I know you're not supposed to top coat a holo but without my trusty Seche Vitae nothing lasts more than a few hours. Both colours are over black in this shot. I prefer Revlon Black Lingerie or Black Star for my multi chrome underpants.


Ozotic Mish Mash 533 with 531 for the feature nail. These work best over black.

Day 6  

Fantasy Fire by Max Factor is the star of my Violet mani. I used Revlon No Shrinking Violet for underpants. This Mani was dangerous. I could not stop looking at it even while walking. I ran into a lot of stationary objects over the few days I wore Fantasy Fire. It looks a lot like Clarins 230 (aka Unicorn Pee). The bottle is tiny and won't last long. I have plans to get my hands on more of this gorgeous colour shifting beauty. 

Max Factor Fantasy Fire over Revlon No Shrinking Violet.
 
It's getting late and I skipped Day 7 so I'm ending this post here. I'll post the next three tomorrow when I've finished my Black and White mani.
 





Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Glitterlicious! Happy Pink Wednesday.

I'm a sucker for anything glittery. If it sparkles I'm there. I'm also a pink princess. Yup, that's right I have just confessed to being sparkly pink princess. I own way more pink polishes than any other colour and glitter is the biggest category in my collection of 402 polishes.

Here's the sparkly pink proof.

Revlon Cotton Candy (a gift from The Mama- thanks Mum), China Glaze Fairy Dust for all over shimmer and BYS Glitterazzi Starlette for the gradient. Topped with my much loved Seche Vite.
BYS Gitterazzi is a series of glittery jellies all containing holo glitter. And now for an out of focus shot to show off the holo glitter.


Le sigh they were just getting long here. I nubbinned my nails a couple of day ago. I miss my long talons but they were splitting. I guess it was the last of the grow out from before I knew about using quality base coats and non acetone remover. The remaining nail is healthy strong and unsplit. I aim to keep them that way by giving them one day off each week with just a coat of my Sally Hansen Miracle Cure Strengthener.

PS The Sweet Libertine Sale is still on. Jump on the bargains and your last chance to get colours like the beautiful about to be gone forever X Marks the Spot.



 I use this pot of gorgeous a lot. This shimmery lilac pink can look dressed down and work ready with neutrals or princess pretty with sparkly silvers and a splash of purple.

Monday, April 16, 2012

Blogs and Stuff I love Part 1

After the Great Healthy Lifestyle Make Over That Had to Happen of April 2012 in which all of the bad food and rotten habits were shed in one great cathartic purge there are only two vices that remain in my life. They are biggies but are both good for my self esteem.

Vice #1 Nail Polish (well Duh!). I have the big love for the finger paints. My collection numbers over 400 and they are all beautiful. Having pretty nails makes me smile. Researchers released information a couple of years ago proving that smiling leads to genuine happiness and other research proves that happiness extends your lifespan, improves your over all health and boosts immunity to disease. Therefore my nail polish is good for me.

Happiness (and good health) is Layla Purple Galaxy Magnetic Polish with a Seche Holo top coat made from Spectra Flare.


 Vice #2 Eyeshadow, specifically Sweet Libertine's beautiful boutique mineral eye shadows click their name to see for yourself. These little beauties started me on the road to caring about how I look. Before I discovered them I stuck to the same purple pink cream eye shadow that made my eyes itch topped with some sad grey eyeliner and clumpy charcoal mascara. I looked the same day in day out, morning and evening. I also lacked confidence and barely kept up with keeping my regrowth in check. I just couldn't be bothered

The day I got my first package in the mail from Sweet Libertine something magical happened. I started to want to live up to these beautiful colours, for the first time ever my eyelids didn't itch when wearing make up. I played with my look and started to want to take care of myself. These wonderful little pots of potential beauty changed my life and gave me self confidence.. They work as eye shadows and as an eyeliner when mixed with a drop of water. Their staying power is legendary- especially if applied wet. Putting on make up in the morning is something to look forward to doing not a chore to get done. I now have around two hundred colours, including glitters. I've made myself a make up station in my study where I sit and pamper myself daily.

The Sweet Libertine range is original, all mineral with no additives like talc to create itchies. They're having a sale right now to clear their retired colours. Get in and get them before they're gone.

This is Dragonfly. It's a must have colour. It looks plain here but it comes to life on your skin. It shimmers blue, green and even purple. It adds instant sheen to solid neutrals when dusted over the top and as an eyeliner it looks like dragonfly wings shimmering a swirl of metallics across the lid. PS I totally stole the pic from the Sweet Libertine site.
Last of all I'd like to give a shout out to my new favourite Blog. Vintage Musings of a Modern Pin Up  Click the title to check it out. I just discovered it a couple of weeks ago. Carli has 3000+ followers. Her gorgeous Blog features nail polish and a whole lot of retro chic. There's a competition over there right now to celebrate her 3000th follower. Pop in and enter while you're over there drooling over the vintage pretties.

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

30 Day Challenge Day 2: Orange

Day two is my second least favourite nail polish colour- orange.

I decided to be literal and add fimo orange slices to accent fingers.

This is two coats of NYC Colour Peachy Keen, a singel coat of Ulta 3 Crystalina, tips Sinful Colors Tokyo Pearl and Cloud 9. Seche on top as usual.

Sorry about the lack of clean up. After smearing and redoing it all twice I just want it over with and off. It's dinged all over the place and thicker than 80s acrylics.


It took forever and looks chunky and gluggy so it's definitely coming off tomorrow. I have an idea for the yellow that might actually make me forget how much I hate yellow nail polish.

Monday, March 26, 2012

The 30 Day Challenge: Day One-Red

I've finally come over to the dark side and decided to hit the 30 day challenge. It will give me a chance to break into some untried reducing my excessive untrieds shame.

Day one is red. I decided to go for a holo red because my GlitterGal red has sat in my drawer for months untried. I haven't had much success with any of my GlitterGals lasting more than a day. True to form it chipped by midday the day after I applied it (which was around 10pm the night before)- less than 24 hours after application despite a coat of Seche, wrapping on every layer and babying my nails. In an effort to make the minuscule bottle last longer I undercoated with a metallic red that usually has excellent staying power before applying a single coat of GlitterGal. I'm going to have to stop being hopeful about this stuff. The formula just has no staying power. I really wanted it to work this time. It would be nice to give an Aussie company a good review.

NYC Colour (The Heat Group) Ruby Shoes as underwear for GlitterGal Red Holo. Ruby shoes is a gorgeous metallic red with fantastic one coat opaqueness.
Obligatory blurry shot to show off the holo flare. It's really pretty, pics don't do it justice. So sad that it's a one day wonder.

Yarn Love

This post is really just here so I can post this pic of some Wollmiese so I can offer it to trade for my dream nail polish- Nfu Oh Laquer 51.
Premium yarn for premium polish- a fair trade I think.

Monday, February 27, 2012

SpectraFlair Spectacular

About a month ago I invested in a gram of SpectraFlare glitter via a fellow nail enthusiast. So of course I put some in a half bottle of Seche Vitae. Best idea ever. It makes what ever I put it over into a holo.

This is my first mani using my new Instant Holo Top.

NYC Colour Australia Purple Monkey topped with Polka Dot, Instant Holo Seche, BM 206 Plate, Konad Special Polish, Silver Glitter.
And now for the artsy dark pic that shows up the holo sparkle. Apologies for the messy flooded cuticles, I'm working on learning to leave a tiny space between my cuticles and nail bed.



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Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Happy Mardi Gras!

In honour pancake day I have decided to paint my nail in traditional New Orleans Mardi Gras colours: purple, green and gold. The green is lovely bright metalic that insists on showing up blue on camera. I've tried several shots but it's the same thing every time. This camera isn't so hot on purples either.
Right Thumb- Rimmel 60 second in Green, Born Pretty nail art jewels, China Glaze fairy dust and Seche top.

Left Thumb- NYC Colour Purple Monkey under Ulta 3 Grape Shimmer, teeny beads from Born Pretty and of course China Glaze Fairy Dust and Seche top.

The purple nails are NYC colour Purple Monkey Under Ulta 3's Grap Shimmer, they're topped with China Glaze Metallic Crackle and Fairy dust. Greeen Nails are Rimmel 60 Second in Green topped with OPI Niki Mina Minaj Super Base, China Glaze Fairy Dust. Highlighted with jewels from Born Pretty and topped with Seche.

Saturday, February 18, 2012

LSG Gets Nailed Blackout Challenge Week Three- Black Tie Affair

Gliiter Gal (Pink) under BYS Quake topped with Seche in a vain attempt to keep this on for a few days. Black lace decal from Born Pretty. Check them out- they are bargain Grand Central with FREE SHIPPING. 
I was thinking more Valentines than Black Tie.
Glitter Gal are really expensive for a very small bottle. It chips and gets edge wear within hours despite being covered with Seche. I can't say it's a brand I'd buy again despite the colours being so pretty. I'm all for supporting Aussie companies but when they charge nearly triple compared to overseas equivalents I have to throw my hands up and import from eBay sellers and friendly nail polish mules. I bought about nine of them direct from the Glitter Gal site.  Because the bottle is basically a mini they only hold what I estimate to be around 6 manies. Below is a pic after two manies consisting of two very thin coats each. The brush is dreadful- it's too thin and ends up pulling off half of the previous brush stroke.


This is the edge wear I woke up sporting only 8 hours after the mani was done- I finished up with a coat of seche, read for half an hour and went to sleep. I can't imagine what I did in my sleep to get this kind of wear considering that I wrapped the nail with Seche.


Below is the chip that showed up an hour or two after waking up. The only thing I did besides surf and goof off that morning was pour myself a bowl of cornflakes and make a cup of coffee using  an automatic coffee machine that requires a couple of button pushes to make coffee. Oh how I suffer with such hard manual labour.

Chips ahoy!

Wednesday, February 8, 2012

LSG Gets Nailed Blackout Challenge Week 2- Rockstar Nails

Thanks to Erica (a totally awesome nail polish enabler and all round sweetheart) I now have a full set of Finger Paints Special Effects. OMG The Pretty!


This week's Black Out Challenge was Rock Star nails. What could be more rock star than glitter over black? This is three coats of Special Effects on each nail over the top of NYC Colour (Australia- by The Heat Group) Night. Of course it's topped with my ever favourite Seche.

I just ordered a salon sized Seche  kit with the Restore from EBay at a great price. I'll get back to you on the seller if she turns out to be any good when it comes to service and getting it out quickly. There's already some iffiness on the  lack of promised combined postage when checking out with eleven items as one transaction.. She has OPI really cheap for us Aussies and will post to our golden shores but if postage is going to be that high then savings aren't that great. I'm hoping she'll fix up the postage issue. If not then my nail budget gets spent elsewhere.

My thumb is sporting Flashy, Twisted is on my pointer (it's the flakiest of the bunch and I think my fave), Asylum on my bird flipping finger, Motley is on my ring finger and the Pinky is wearing Flecked. I'm holding Twisted in the picture.

They don't look like much in the bottle but on the fingers they are like little opals. I'm planning on trying them over a bunch of other colours. I think they would look like white opals over NYC Colour's Angel (pearl white with a delicate gold sheen).

I officially love flaky polishes! I can't wait for my Essie Luxe Effects to get here. Gold Flakes people! GOLD!

Oh and Sweet Libertine have new gorgeous colours out and there's a sale on with big discounts on blues. Get your butt over there. You know you want your share beautiful mineral eye shadows and bargain prices. I've already blown my make up budget for the month over there. Yay for being back at work and having money to be self indulgent.

Monday, January 30, 2012

LSG Gets Nailed Black Out Challenge

If you're a Ravelry user you probably know about LSG. It's a no holds barred group where bad language and being awesome to one another is the creed. There's an offshoor group called LSG Gets Nailed for the nail polish obsessed knitters and hookers (crocheters). This month there's a challenge on to get us to use a little black. I've always been a little stand offish with black so I'm giving it a go.

Challenge #1
The Rorschach Test
Give me a mani that uses black to enhance or accent your look. Black lace or Pinstripes? Get your nads on! This is a great way to ease into black. I want to be seeing Rorschach all over your fingers.

So here's my attempt
NYC (Australia by The Heat Group) Metal
Konads Special Stamping Polish in Black
Seche Vitae (am addicted to the glassy look)

Thursday, January 26, 2012

Happy Australia Day

It's the anniversary of Europeans landing in Australia and traditionally the day we celebrate our nation. Personally I can think of some much more sensitive days than this one. Australia's first inhabitants, Aboriginals, call this day Invasion Day. It's the anniversary of the day they lost their country and the beginning of genocide, hardship, plagues and starvation. Today I am taking the time today to acknowledge the traditional owners of the country from where I am writing, the Burramattagal people of the Dharug language group. I would like to show my respect and acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land, of elders past and present, of the land on which I live and from where I write.

For more information about traditional owners in the Sydney area visit Barani, a site that explains it all really well.

Political sensibilities aside I love my country and consider myself fortunate to be a daughter of the antipodes. Although I really wish Australia Day were on another day I still want to celebrate my country. So how do I celebrate things? I put it on my nails so I can look at it while I'm knitting.


My Supplies- (from left to right) Seche Vitae (best top coat ever despite the dreadful chemicals), NYC Silver Sparkle, BYS Red and White Nail Art Polishes, OPI -Yoga Ta Love this Colour, tiny silver metal balls for the smallest star in the southern cross, tiny diamantes for the bigger stars and BYS Silver Nail Art Polish, a fine but firm brush for making the stars on the flag and a skewer for picking up the bling. I also used NYC Mushroom over my Seche base as an opaque neutral. The OPI is a little transparent.




The Union Jack (the flag of Great Britain which is a whole bunch of flags united) in the corner of the Aussie flag was done using the BYS Red and White Nail Arts. I painted the white section first (St Andrew's flag representing Scotland) starting with the cross in the middle then adding the diagonals. I added the red diagonals next (St Patrick's flag for Ireland) being careful to leave the white frame for the cross in the middle which represents St George's flag (England). Then I added the middle of St George's cross in red.

The seven pointed federation star, which represents our six states and The Australian Capital Territory, was made by placing a big dot of white below the Union Jack then using the stiff bristled brush to smudge out the points. Next I put the stars of Southern Cross, our famous constellation visible anywhere in Oz. These were also smudged dots, the main four stars should have seven points with the smaller star having only five but I just went for star-like.

Next step was to add the Southern Cross to my ring fingers using BYS Silver Nail Art Polish. I smudged out some points with my stuff bristled flat brush, coated all nails thinly with NYC Silver Sparkle Added the bling to the southern cross then topped with Seche.

Happy Australia Day everybody! We're celebrating Australia's multi cultural heritage by having croissants for breakfast. We're out of Vegemite so it will have to be with jam. We'll be having Chinese take away for dinner to celebrate the contribution of the Chinese people during the gold rush days. There's iced lemon myrtle tea, which is a bush tucker flavour, and Japanese mochi cakes for afternoon tea (no significance for mochi cakes- we just really like them). Lunch will involve meat pies and lamingtons -fair dinkum Aussie tucker.

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Pink Wednesday- Vintage (almost) Polish

The nice thing about nail polish is that it can last for years. The base in this Wedesday Pink mani is at least 15 years old. I bought it sometime in the early 90s. I know not where. It's sparkly- almost in the same way that the more recent holos are sparkly. I compared it to some holos and it wasn't far off. Everything old is new again!



The stamp is a Bundle Monster plate. I didn't write it down and seeing as I am a cushion for a rather large kitty right now I won't be getting up to get my stamping kit to look at the number. It's from the second set released on Amazon. The white is a Konad special stamping polish.


Happy Pink Wednesday.



Thursday, January 5, 2012

The Funky French Attack







  • I have a bit of a backlog of mani pics so I'm posting this lot in a batch. This is my Funky French Collection. I discovered BYS Nail Art polishes. They have this wonderful long brush that practically paints the stripe itself. This lead to a mini Funky French Obsession.

First we had the teal mani. All colours are BYS plain colours range. There were no names on the bottom of the bottles.

  • Seen here with my Sweet Libertine lip balm. They have THE BEST range of mineral eyeshadow in the world. I have over one hundred and fifty of their overshadows. They're that good. It stays where you put it all day. Even if you happen to be running around on a melting hot day. I apply mine using a brush, mixing the eyeshadow with a tiny drop of water in the lid. The colours are a little brighter when applied wet and have longer staying power. They also make stunning eyeliners.

Sweet Libertine gives out samples if you send a stamped self addressed envelope. If you're a mineral makeup newb don't bother with the samples. I highly recommend jumping in and getting one of their really reasonably priced beginner's sets to start you off. And don't forget to grab a mineral veil while you're there. If you're a mineral foundation person they're great for balancing out those too yellow colours that are a problem with some mineral brands. On those days when I'm wearing a conventional foundation I use a mineral veil to set the foundation and extend it's longevity. It goes without saying that Sweet Libertine is my hands down favourite mineral veil. There are rumours that Sweet Libertine might have a foundation in development. I can't wait.
And back on topic
  • Funky French #2- Flirting with a Dotting Tool

  • The pink is a BYS scented. I think it's Floral. This time I taped off the top, painted a BYS black stripe across then ripped off the tape before it dried.

  • After drying add a stripe of BYS Striping Polish in White and another in Chrome Silver.
  • My pointer was done using a medium sized dotting tool.
  • The dot feature on my ring finger used the second smallest tool.

Funky French #3 NYC all the way!

At this point I had discovered NYC by The Heat Group. They also make Ultra3. Both use the same formula. They are cheap and cheerful. They stay chip free on me much longer than OPI ever did. If you use the NYC Top Coat and remember to wrap the nail edge wear rarely happens.

The Purple colour is Purple Monkey the tip is Polka Dot- very sheer but shines up nicely over an opaque colour. The strip is my trusty BYS Chrome Striping Polish.

I used the usual tape and paint technique to get my tips straight.

So there you have it. My Funky French Phase. Up next is the Crackle Crack Up.

The Turkish Delight Easter Egg Mani

This one is over a year old. I was going through old pics on my iPhone and thought I'd update with some of these old shots.
When I did this I had just gotten an OPI haul from Ebay. Both colours are OPI. Pamploma Purple and Glitzerland.
I didn't mean to make a copy of a Cadbury's Turkish Delight Easter Egg wrapper. I didn't even pick up on it until a couple of days of looking at it and thinking it looked very familiar. Then it hit me. I'd recreated my favourite type of Easter egg's wrapper. The Derp- I have it.
No wonder The Husbear had been making cracks about my delicious nails.