Barry M ~ Blue Glitter

Hello!

Here I showed off, using my wondrous new phone, the presents my fiancé got me - 4 amazing Barry M polishes!  The lovely man went into Superdrug, searched out an assistant with sparkly nails and got advice on what kind of polish to get ^_^

He ended up choosing for me two foil effects polishes in Gold and Lilac (the limited edition I'd been tempted by on more than one occasion), the glittery Pink Iridescent (which I have but am running out of because I love it so much), and the one I am wearing right now, Blue Glitter!

Below are two coats painted over a metallic blue base just in case of bald spots, and with two coats of top coat for a super shiny smooth finish.  Now, I went through all the settings on my camera trying to best show off the hue I'm seeing as I look at it in various lights (although I suspect my eyes take in light/colour a bit funny), and these are the closest I got:

But here are the rest of the pics, taken normally in proper light!

I freaking LOVE this glitter.  As soon as I put it on it became one of my favourite polishes.  The coverage is so rich, and full, and indulgent.

Hugs,

Lisa xx

Sally Hansen ~ Lagoon

Hello!

Yet another market stall find here - Lagoon, a lovely shimmering turquoise.  I haven't seen a lot of nail colour by Sally Hansen, it's mostly their nailcare products that you see (I don't know if there's a difference in the US?).  The bottle is a bit unfashionable but you do get a lot of polish!  At a bargain £1.99 I couldn't pass it up.

Here are two coats.  I have to say that the VNL you see in the natural light photos was not at all visible when I applied the polish the night before - the polish applied wonderfully and looked great.  I'm not sure it's 100% 'my colour', but somehow I like it anyway.

Also, I had a flash of inspiration and wanted to fo a funky French mani with Filthy Gorgeous' ice blue glitter Opulence as the tip.  Here it is!

Ugh, that flash pic really doesn't show off the polish well!!

Hugs,

Lisa xx

Eeeeee!

Look what my fiance got me!!!

Bourjois So Laque! ~ Rose Lounge

Beautiful jelly sammich up ahead!!!

I found Rose Lounge on a market stall for £1.99, which is a great deal considering the shade is still in shops and costs quite a few quid more.  It's a sheer French-manicure-style pink, which might be boring to some people, but for me it's the best, non-streaky sheer pink I've ever found and I love it!  Here it is on its own, it gives a lovely healthy look to my nails (which have turned practically orange through over-polishing!):

After trying the polish on its own I wanted to experiment with it a little.  I learnt quickly that I have a long way to go to be able to do a nice French manicure... but then I thought of the jelly sammich idea!  Between 2 coats of Rose Lounge I sandwiched a coat of Saffron's multi-sized silver glitter - the one I used to make my franken - and it looked brilliant!!

So, so, delicately snowy!  I love it!  What do you think?

Hugs,

Lisa xx

Boxing Day Mani

Hello, and all the best of the season!

I'm not sure that every country has Boxing Day - traditionally it's when wealthy families gave gifts to their servants, but basically it's just the day after Christmas!  For me it's when my family go to see my nanna and uncle :-)

This was another mani choice to sort-of go with my sparkly jumper, and I chose Claire's baby pink glitter (I wish their polishes had names!)  I first painted a coat of No7's metallic pink Milan in case of any bald patches, then I added two coats of the dense glitter.  Here we are!

I love this glitter and am still wearing it now - OK, partly because I'm nearly out of cotton pads and this will require a massive removal effort, but I am very very happy to wear this on my nails all day long!

Hugs,

Lisa xx

Christmas Day Haul & Mani!

Hello, I hope you all had a lovely Christmas!

I've been so lazy in posting, but I'm back and am going to line up a few posts with the neglected photos I have just uploaded!

We'll start with my Christmas presents - I was a lucky lucky girl this year!  I received an Android phone (I think it's a Samsung Galaxy?), the features of which fill me with wonderment and confusion!  I am currently addicted to mobile timewasting games.  If I can manage it I might do a 'Mani on the Move' post sometime using this clever new phone.

I also received some fabulous polishy presents, both expected and unexpected.  These are the things I found myself: Sally Hansen's Hidden Treasure for £1.99 on a market stall (!), a lovely purple and blue glitter from Claire's Accessories, and a set of fishnet stocking nail wraps from Ann Summers.  These are my first nail wraps, and seemed a bargain at £6.25 for 24 - I'm hoping that by being very careful I will get two manis out of them, and that they will look decent!  Here are the pics:

In addition to these I got a French manicure set from my brother and a Strictly Come Dancing themed box set of polishes from my parents - now I do not watch Strictly Come Dancing, but this makes zero difference to how much I love this present!  The set has been made by Boots - I checked this because a couple of the colours look the same as ones from the Boots No7 line.  Further investigation will be done ;-)  So here are the surprise presents:

I can't wait to try all my new polishes out.  But now, onto my Christmas Day mani!

This was a mani of Glitter Gal's Frappe (over a base of pink to make the colour richer) with some festive snowflake nail art stickers on a few accent nails.  The colour was chosen to go with my warm sparkly jumper.  It was a bit rushed as my nanna was coming over, but it was Christmassy enough!

Whew!  Well I hope you are still enjoying the festive season, I will be be back soon with my Boxing Day mani ^_^

Hugs,

Lisa xx

My Most Festive Mani...

...that made it out the door, at least!

When it came to attempting a Christmas nail art challenge, I realised that I'm really not into themes.  This stretches to other areas... when shopping in Ann Summers for an outfit with which to surprise my fiancé (!), I balked at the idea of a skimpy Santa costume!!!  It's strange as I do like the festivity of Christmas, but there we go.

I did stretch to this mani, however - I painted my nails with No7's Salsa, a festive red I'd been wanting to wear around Christmas.  I have a small pot of white glitter that I found for 99p in a market, and before the final coat of Salsa dried I dipped the tips of my nails in the pot!

Ho ho ho!

Lisa xx

Filthy Gorgeous Opulence, an all-out glitter celebration!

Merry Christmas Eve Eve!  ^_^

I haven't posted in the past couple of days (oops!) so will post a couple of manis tonight to make up for it. 

I will start with what I'm wearing right now: in the run-up to Christmas I wanted to go all-out with my sparkliest, most smile-inducing glitter, and I decided upon Opulence by Filthy Gorgeous! 

I did add a coat of INM's silver holo glitter, but its warm sparkle contrasted with the ice cold blue of Opulence so I'm quite glad it doesn't show up too well in the end result! 

My mani sparkles so, so festively and definitely cheers me up!

Hugs,

Lisa xx

Accent Thumbs!

Hello!

My usual go-to accent nail is my engagement ring finger, so I decided to do my thumbs this time!  The thumbs are Miss Sporty's Hip Pop and the fingers are 17's Sweet Kisses, and they're all topped with Barry M's Pink Iridescent glitter.  I hate having to photograph glitters with flash because it doesn't show them off too well, but especially over Hip Pop it looked fantastic.

Hugs,

Lisa xx

Lilac Crush Nail Foil

Heya!

I have a selection of lovely nail foils that I bought from Nail Delights' online store, but I've had trouble getting a good finish with the proper foily-foils (Does that make sense?!  I mean the shiny wrapping-paper type ones ^_^) - they can look untidy on the whole nail if you get gaps, plus top coat can spoil the foil. 

Sooo, I had this idea: I painted my nails a solid black then randomly dotted and dashed on some nail foil adhesive.  I then patted the foil over my nails and it came out as a cool shatter-type look!  Plus top coat didn't ruin it!

I am REALLY glad I found a cool way to wear this foil, because I am a little kid over shiny things and Lilac Crush is just so purdy!  Does anyone else have nail foil mani ideas?

Hugs,

Lisa xx

Colour-Change with Glitter!

Hello!

I really like combining my BYS pink/purple colour change polish with glitter, and this mani is with 17's Glitter Top Coat :-)

Hugs,

Lisa xx

Stamping ~ Silver on Indigo

Hello!

Along with this mani I did my very first tutorial!  It's at http://happynailsuk.blogspot.com/p/tutorials.html .  When I first started stamping I had trouble getting the image to transfer, so thought it might be useful for other polishers?  Please excuse the poor lighting, and I was a bit nervous!!

The polishes I used were No7's Violetta as the base purple, and 17's Moonstruck for the stamping.  The design is from Konad's m71 plate.  Here we are:

Hugs,

Lisa xx

Gift-Wrapped Nails!

Happy happy nails!  ^_^

This festive mani is Milan by Boots No7 - a fantastic, metallic, foil-style pink - topped with ribbon water decals!

I seriously love water decals.  Happy happy happyyyyy ^_^

Hugs,

Lisa xx

Pairing Purple Glitter over Deep Purple ^_^

Hello!

Yesterday I swatched Bourjois' 1 Séconde polish in Shade 9, and after trying some glitter over it I was dying to do a mani with Accessorize's 3D glitter Magic!  This is one coat of Magic over two of Shade 9, topped with two coats of top coat...

The darker pics best show off the effect ~ the combination creates a richer, more mysterious look to the glitter.  I love it personally!   It wouldn't replace wearing the glitter on its own, but it's definitely a lovely alternative ^_^

Hugs,

Lisa xx