My Amazing Parcel from the Polish and Prejudice Giveaway!

I was super-excited when Alicea from Polish and Prejudice emailed me to tell me I'd won! I won one of the two prizes from this Christmas giveaway.

I am still besotted with the babies

I got another huge surprise when I found all the extra bottles inside. Can you believe that I got not one, but both sets?! I guess the other person didn't claim their prize...Here's some picture spam, including some with my adorable baby guinea pigs!

A lovely note with great handwriting from Alicea

I opened and took a photo of each of the little packets, here's what each one contained:

Of course I couldn't wait, so I tried out a couple over my existing manicure. 

Boxing Day sales goodies and a belated Christmas present

Sometimes, trying to find a gift is hard. And knowing that it might be on sale the day after is just infuriating. So my sister decided to take advantage of the sales to find me a present. Although it wasn't on sale in the end, she did also pick up a half priced OPI gift set while she picked up the OPI Euro Centrale mini polish collection. I, too, picked up a bottle of liquid sand on sale, in a brighter shade of blue.

I also picked up some Illamasqua polishes and a interesting Revlon one for $3. After my smelly Boe purchases from Big W the other day, I have decided to go for quality over quantity with polishes (oh the stink of those glitter toppers still makes me grimace). Not shown is the 6 lipstick set from Illamasqua that my sister got and, of which I've taken two.

I also found a Review dress that I liked (they have such big sales regularly that I can't help but wonder what their margins actually are). And my sister wanted to check out EB games, and I ended up with a couple of days somehow as well.

All things considered, this was a very modest spree - the Euro Centrale shouldn't even appear in the photo since it was a gift!

Of course, I had to try my new polishes straight away. 

So the polishes from L-R are: Can't Find My Czechbook, Suzi's Hungary AGAIN!, You're Such a BudaPest, OY-Another Polish Joke!

OY-Anothr Polish Joke was a surprise hit for me - I loved the effect the fine gold shimmer glitter (whatever) had on the already bright and happy colours!

Edited: Here's one with the baby guinea pigs

The Unexpected Arrival of two Baby Guinea Pigs

Today's forecast is for 38 degrees. So my Mum and I decide to bring the guinea pigs in before it gets to it. Mum discovered two unexpected arrivals when she did so. BABIES! One of the guinea pigs had babies overnight!

The other one is looking pretty chubby, and given recent events, we suspect she's about to have babies too! And to think we got two girls to prevent breeding or the need to de-sex any.

Here are the photos! I was so excited I forgot my watermark.

Oh, also... Happy Birthday Dad!

Birthday and Christmas Nails Manicures - Now in more pixels

Just some better photos of the nails I wore for my Birthday on Friday 13th and on Christmas Day. They've already made an appearance as a phone camera photo on the blog, so let's keep it brief!

First up, birthday mani. I used the distressed nails technique I saw done by Chalkboard nails. As you can see, it worked perfectly with my new Review dress! (Oh I just noticed it's called Ashton, like in Isobelle Carmody's Obernewtyn series!)

Christmas in my household is a quiet affairs, since we don't have any other family in Australia. Still, I tried to get into the mood with some festive nails. I messed up the stripes on my left hand a bit, the right looked much better, but it's too hard to switch camera hands!

Merry Christmas Skittle

Merry Christmas! This year is the first for years that the whole family will be home all day together. Between trips and the fact that my dad works in Crown, it's not actually a common occurrence. 

My mum went and stocked up our kitchen at the market and I'm looking forward to some fresh seafood and meaty steaks.I did my nails, but then got a lot of chipping... So they're cute, but not necessarily perfect. Here's a phone snap anyway!

Polishes used are OPI My boyfriend scales walls and A oui bit of red, Ulta3 Jelly and a gold striper I picked up in Germany or Austria (much the sameness). Panda and snowman decals from the bornprettystore.

I started a new job and it's a real rollercoaster!

Hello! So it's been a little while since I started out blogging again. I've been busy, having launched straight into a job just a couple of weeks after finishing exams! It's pretty crazy how quickly that happened. The work is very interesting, and different and so intense at times. I have been doing my nails less and also less elaborately as a result. I haven't had the chance to go through my more recent photos. And also, the Friday 13th was my birthday! I did a really cute matching nail and dress combo. Like I said, I haven't sorted my photos yet, but here's a selfie from my phone.

I've also started hitting the gym after work again — I've not been able to play around with my nails anywhere near as much... plus I want to keep them somewhat professional looking. But I will have the Christmas/NY period off, so I will hopefully get some of my backlogged photos sorted and play with more nail polishes too.

Meet the latest members of my family!

When I was younger, some friends of mine from primary school asked if we wanted some guinea pigs. Ever since then, my sister has had a particular obsession with them. The two first guinea pigs, Timid and Boldy, lived for a while, Boldy for a few years. Years later, we got the second guinea pig, Choco boi. Alas, he did not last as long. My sister was devoted to him and called him her son. We were all devoted really. So it's been a few years before my sister is able to bring herself to get more. This time we have two girls, sisters, whose nicknames are fast becoming their names.

On the left, the tricolour one is known as 大喬 and the two tone one is 小喬. We are still working on proper names, preferably in English. Some more photos after the jump! 

31 Day Challenge 2013 — 21 Inspired by a... colour

So I've been a bit of a hiatus due to lack of inspiration for the inspirations themes. I managed to finally think of something for 21, inspired by a colour. Most of the bloggers went with inspired by the name of a polish, so I went the same way.

After much thought, I went with this CK polish I found in the bargain bin (I didn't realise that they did nail polishes, but guess they do), called electric blue. And did some cool lighting bolts. They are electrifying, you know?

It looks kind of cheap - you'd think a major fashion brand can at least print on their bottles. Instead they use a sticker...

Inspired by the Cake Expo

My sister and I had been talking about making cupcakes for a while, and after the Cake Expo we decided to start practising. My sister did the batter and icing and I did the decorating.

We did a variety of sizes, as we didn't have that many small reusable cups. As for the results... let's just say no cupcake stores are in any danger. I also ended up with stained fingers, despite my best efforts.

This was fun, I have a number of things I would change. After all, practice makes perfect! Alas, this may not be good for my waistline. 

Blue French Manicure with gold decal

I tried to do something elegant and understated. It turned out not as much, but cute nonetheless. I used a gold decal that I got off the Born Pretty Store. I tried to link it, but when I followed the link from my order, it was dead. Anyhow, it was a great big sheet of gold decals of Christmas-sy prints.

The light blue is Natio Turquoise and the navy is Maybelline Sapphire Siren.

Doctor Who nails for the 50th Anniversary!

So I spent way too much time painting my nails instead of going to bed. Due the the fatigue that one naturally has late at night/early in the morning, they were a bit dodgy but I was too tired to re-do. And I'd stained my thumb and index fingers a little when I was making cupcakes (colouring for the icing).

Everything was free handed. Glitter nail is OPI A Kiss at Midnight from the Mariah Carey collection. White is the Essy Blanc.

I have seen the Doctor Who special 3 times now. The first at the cinema in all its' glorious 3-D, surround sound amazingness.

Then the exact same night, I watched it on TV.. and tonight I watched it yet again!

How long till I get more new Doctor Who??

Freehand logo

Melbourne Cake Expo: A long recovery from the sugar high (Photo heavy)

The Melbourne Cake Expo is on this weekend. I went along with my sister to ooh and ahh over the pretty, intricate and delicious cakes. We had a couple of cupcakes, voted in the cake decorating competition and purchased some items to make our own goodies. We have been inspired!