Powder Perfect Maneater Swatched

*I found this in my drafts folder from May...? Oops. It's a great polish even if my little life update is a little out of date. Well, it's mostly still current, except I am no longer sick!*

I got Maneater from The Lady is a Vamp collection with an order and it was the perfect travel sized bottle to pack.

I finally put it on the other day and I have totally fallen in love.

I was looking for something green to do for Lyme disease awareness month. I didn't really pack a bright green or a lime colour, but I did have this gorgeous green leaning teal.

Incidentally, it must seem like I paint my nails everyday to my flatmates, because everytime I paint my nails, they see me doing them in front of the TV!

I'm home most evenings, so it gives me something to do after dinner. I haven't found a gym here yet, so I have a bit of time. My post viral cough makes the idea not very appealing and my visits to Fitness First was just an aggravating experience due to the crowds. I hate jogging, and that's probably not good until the cough subsides, but I think I need to get into the idea. Not exactly flushed with heaps of discretionary spending money anyway.

Sadly it is no longer available in the Powder Perfect store, but I did find some available through her stockists.

MILV Water decals looks

I've been quiet here, so now I have quite the backlog of nail photos to share! Today I'm here about the MILV decals that Powder Perfect had recently started stocking. They make it super easy for me to be creative and impress people at work and because it's not a "dangerous goods" I can have it posted without fear to me here!

MILV S177 - card suit patterns

Picked these due to my newfound obsession with poker... it's a long story. I'll just say I found it a fascinating mind game to watch.

 

I actually love how the skittle card suits turned out even though my original idea totally failed to translate.

MILV N204 - Floral print

Florals are a little unusual for me, I don't usually got for such looks... but they aren't really in wishy washy colours, but is rather retro looking. 

I did them as double accents and tried my three new The Body Shop nail polishes on the other nails... I may have picked this packet of decals to try next just to try the new polishes out (hey, they were 3 for 2!) They're great polishes, I tried to do a quick swatch of them the other night, but it was too dark to take good photos. I might swatch them again and share.

Sadly, I had some shrinkage, I think it was a combo of the top coat plus not stretching the decal a little bit as I laid it down...

I'm trying to stick to a no buy as I want to move in the near future (my landlady seems to think she's my mother). The only exception has been the two polishes below for a quid each and the full set of Celestial Cosmetics' for the Hella Holo customs group. Cannot wait for them to arrive (via the UK group buy)!

Kester Black Dragonfruit and Nebula double header

I found this sitting in my drafts folder. It's belated, but enjoy!

This is my precious Kester Black Dragonfruit and I used Nebula for some simple details. It never works as a paint on glitter, but I love fishing out the large holo dots for placement nail art.

I remember wearing this mani in the first week at my temp reception job. There were a couple of departures in that first week, so I got to partake in some gorgeous and delicious goodies.

Cupcake is from a place called Lola. It doesn't quite beat my first love, Cupcake Central, but it was more than adequate as a replacement in London.

I love this pink and it's perfect for the lovely Spring (and now Summer) weather I have been fortunate enough to enjoy.

Celestial Cosmetics Men of Mayhem swatches

I started a temp room reception job. While everyone is really nice and the job is not st all demanding, I am keen to move onto a more intellectually engaging job. 

But for now, I'll use the ample spare time I have at work to quickly share some more nails I've done since moving here and a couple of snaps from my daily life.

Love this polish. Great formula and colour. I just think it's so sexy. Edgy and fun at the same time. I think it's been discontinued, but only recently, so some may be floating around in stockists.

Here we have my fluffy flatmate, Bicardi and the view behind my desk. It overlooks Hyde Park and everyone who visits, including me on  my first visit, says "wow". There are not many views like this in London, so I'm quite lucky. 

Polish Me Silly - Envy swatch

I took a selection of my favourite polishes to London with me. And a few basic ones for work, just in case it is necessary.

The first mani  I did in London was  Polish Me Silly Envy. It's an amazing multi-chrome polish! Look at it go in the two slightly different angles! The bank employee, male, even commented on the colour shift when I was opening my account. Lol. Gosh opening a bank account is painful here. I still haven't gotten all the numbers and whatnot I need to access it properly. :-(

Emily de Molly Insipid on Butter London The Full Monty

Easter long weekend! Moving to London on Thursday! It's all happening now. I had my last day of work yesterday, then went to a screening of The Heckler at the ACMI and afterwards meet up with an old friend for a drink. Next thing I knew, I was stumbling out of a gay bar at 4am. Nursing a very big hangover today.

Anyhow, my nails! I am quite pleased with this layering combo. I don't think it is very common - mostly I see these flakies sponged on for an opaque look or layered over a dark base.

I think the gold of The Full Monty looks much more interesting with a coat or two of Emily de Molly Insipid. I used Celestial Cosmetics Solar Ray QD top coat. I must admit I don't know how it's a quick dry - I only use it when I have plenty of time to sit and let it dry (like today, thanks to the aforementioned hangover).

Ulta3 watermarble nails

I used Blue Marlin and Strawberry Sundae in this watermarble mani. As you can see, I need heaps more practice. But luckily I won a set of the top 15 bestseller bottles of ulta3 polish to play with from Sonailicious and have plenty of good quality cremes to play with.

My patterns are a bit off. Other people loved it, but I always end up feeling a bit ambivilent about watermarbles. I think it's because it's a bit psycheldelic and I'm just not into the 60s hippy look.

After a couple of days I added the Glisten and Glow holo top coat. Unfortunately it dulled the colour a bit, so I'm not sure if I should have done that. 

L'Oréal Collection Exclusive - Julianne's Nude Polish + Simple Nail Art

I used Priceline's buy one get one free offer on the L'Oréal Color Riche range with my small loyalty voucher to pick up a couple of neutral nail colours. These are my first L'Oréal polishes, I think. The bottles are a tiny 5ml, but with the size of my collection, I prefer to play with smaller bottles.

This is a swatch of Julianne's Nude. Now Julianne Moore most definitely doesn't have a similar complexion to me, but nonetheless, I love this colour on me!

I then did a simple accent nail by sponging on Freida's Nude. I used Loki's Nail Vinyls for the champagne glasses and a set of the aprons to protect the edges. I sponged so that there would be less polish on the nail and hopefully easier to peel off. I think it worked?

Anyway, that's my Valentine's day nails. It's about as sweet as I can bring myself to be. BUT WHAT'S NEVER TOO SWEET IS CUPCAKES. This is how the ladies in the office celebrated! Love Cupcake Central!

Glam Polish Bewitched with OPI Sheer Tints

I came across a couple glittery nails topped with some sheer tints, but I can't for the life of me remember who did those. Sorry. If I remember or if someone tells me who they are, I'd love to credit them. 

But anyway, it was an easy to achieve look, since I have the full set of the OPI Sheer Tints. I was so excited about those when I first saw them, but then they turned out to be thick and hard to use and sat mostly unloved in my USA haul pile. The base was Glam Polish Bewitched.

Kester Black Bougainvillea topped with Nebula

 I got these two as a little birthday/Christmas present. They were a tad disappointing. The purple is a lovely warm, midtone purple. Being not that light I was surprised that two coats was not quite enough and I really needed three coats. But it's a lovely colour for summer. Dried a little matte, so will need top coat. 

I actually received Suger Daddy, but went back to the shop and exchanged it for Bougainvillea, as I have a couple of dense silver glitters already. My first preference was Milky Way. In fact, I had lusted after that for months but didn't go through with it. I now get to regret it forever, as it was sold out in the store and doesn't even appear on the Kester Black website anymore. :(

Nebula has big hex holo glitters in the clear base and were, as expected, heavy and required lots of fishing. I had already used this previously to make a Christmas tree as an accent with Celestial Cosmetics Deck the Halls.

Howver, I wanted a mani to feature Nebula specifically and to use it as it appears to be intended to be used.

I ended up with super thick polish, as you can tell with the bubbling. I should have used a toothpick or something to pick and place, like I did with my Christmas mani. But the holo was fun, you can see it especially in the bottle.

 

I didn't have any quickdry top coat on and the thickness meant it didn't dry properly and I destroy them at my first attempt to fish my credit card out of my purse!

Cute Snowy Christmas nails

I only managed one other Christmas mani, this cute snowy manicure. I used Celestial Cosmetics Sapphires of Tarth, from the Game of Thrones collection as base. Then used Illamasqua Blizzard for the falling snow effect and Formula X White Matter for the fallen snow. The silver glitter is also Celestial, the LE December 2014. Decal from Born Pretty store that I got last year (if you have a photographic memory you'll have recognised that I used the same decal last Christmas). Topped with Essence gel look top coat. 

I think the mix of finishes made it very effective. My nail art has been more miss than hit lately, so it was nice to get one to turn out nice and cute. Although I am not sure what caused the bubbles on the index finger. Anyway... it wasn't obvious and I just drew your attention to it for no real reason!

The nailguytv said these were "very cool". That made me very proud! Lol. He was on Nail'd It! I want to watch that so badly. 

Celestial Cosmetics Deck the Halls

This is Deck the Halls with some glitter placement for a little holographic tree. I fished the glitter out of Kester Black Nebula. The tree is wonky, I clearly need more practice lining things up on my nails! It's tricky, especially since I am working on it upside down! It's my first Christmas mani this year, I might be inspired again, but hard to say at this stage. I have so many pretties that are so sparkly and complex, I don't feel the need to add more.

In sunlight

From this year's Christmas collection, Deck the Halls is a mulberry-ish purple with fine glitter dust, microdots and small aqua blue and purple dots and some holo circles and some pink diamond-shaped glitters. The jelly formula was relatively easy to work with and I only needed two coats for the coverage you see here. It's top coat hungry though, two coats of hk girl top coat wasn't enough to smooth it out. Should have used my Essence gel look top coat to feed it first!

The Kester Black Nebula appears to have good glitter payload. I got more than enough glitter for the tree with one dip. Also, I've been using a clear, soak off gel manicure as base to try protect my corners. It's going ok so far. Hopefully I don't add any more cracks to the tips.

In shade

Lucy Liu Melbourne for my birthday dinner

I just wanted to share some snaps from my nice birthday dinner and my fun houndstooth nails using the Sally Hansen nail stripes. I picked them up for $5 at a sale a while back. I'm not well practiced,  so it's not the best application, but still really enjoy looking at them! I love houndstooth, but since I can't draw that finely and my stamping skills are non-existent, this is the only way to do it. I'd have picked up more boxes if there was more than one still in the bin!

Mmm... food

The food is, clockwise from top, a schezwan duck, lamb shoulder, ginger creme brulee, soft shell crab pancakes, Collin San (a ginger and lime based cocktail) and eggplant and pork tempura. Not pictured were the duck dumplings... totally forgot to snap that photo! Haha. Failed asian. 

I look rather well and happy there. Doesn't look like I am sick at all. But in actual fact, I became horrendously sick on Friday and instead of going out for my drinks, I had to cancel that at the last minute and laid curled up in bed all day, with rather frequent dashes to the bathroom. That drink is the one and only drink I managed for my birthday, and I was soon tucked back up in bed.

And a proper swatch photo of the nails

Picture Polish Fool's Gold by the Nailasaurus

I have been coveting this one for months, ever since it first came out. When my sister rang while I was half asleep saying she was putting a Picture Polish order in, this was the only polish name that came to me.

Create with the Nailasaurus, this is one sexy shade of blue with hints of gold. That is courtesy to the micro gold glitters and gold shimmer. So elegant, so eye catching. 

This here is three thin coats topped with my old favourite, hk girl top coat.

And Omg, omg! I tagged the Nailasaurus and she liked my photo on Instagram! Lol, fangirl moment!

Glam Polish Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo

I gave my Notice of Intention to be Admitted to be a lawyer this week! The trial I am involved in is now in the media. Despite the nature of the crime, it is a great experience and the staff of the court in particular are great! I feel like I'm part of some greater every time I step into the building. I want to work there one day!

Anyway, onto nails! I had my eye on this one since I first saw swatches and it just had to be the first Glam Polish I tried from my first ever Glam nail mail!

Excuse the colour... kept forgetting to re-do in daylight.

Here are so quick snaps of it over Ulta3 Lilac Bloom. Match made in heaven I think!

Can't wait to try them all. It's like pokémon for nail polish addicts.

Powder Perfect Peeling Wallpaper swatch

This is Powder Perfect's Peeling Wallpaper. I'm not even sure if it's still available. I picked it up in Serenity Nails blog sale... Well, I guess it was technically a fb sale. The combination of wanting to get through new polishes (check out the hashtag #untriednov, I'll be trying to use that as often as I can over there on Instagram) and needing to avoid too much glitter means lots of cremes to show.

But, enough procrastination. I better just hit post and get back to my last little bit of homework FOREVER foreseeable future. Enjoy the photos, sorry about the quality.