31(ish!) Week Nail Art Challenge 17-Glitter

Hello lovelies!

I'm back with another 31WNAC prompt today, although I hardly feel it's right for me to call it that any more, it's taken me SO much longer than 31 weeks, haha!

Today is glitter which surprisingly I'm not sick of yet, even with all my Glitter Me Monday posts! I've got another fun microglitter from Mentality today. This one is Antisocial-teeny tiny black and white glitters in a clear base. I used a layer of my trusty Barry M-Coconut for undies and then added about three coats of the glitter on top.

After a layer of Seche Vite I added some striping tape in horizontal lines and then added a rainbow of colours on top: Revlon-Fire, Sally Hansen-Man-go Team!, Sinful Colors-Pistache, Barry M-Damson and Sinful Colors-Amethyst.

I still really enjoy doing simple nail art over these busy bases-and it occurs to me looking at those photos that this glitter would look really quite cool underneath some jelly polishes, might just log that one away in my mind for future reference!


I'm going home for the weekend tomorrow to go to the fair (Yay!), and I hope you have as much fun with whatever you're doing as I'm going to!

~Nail Art Novice~

31 Week Nail Art Challenge 15-Delicate

Hey loves =)

Originally the only thing I could think of for this challenge was stamping as I have some fairly "delicate" looking flowery stamps on my MoYou London Pro plates but then I remebered the saran wrap (cling film!) technique and was really glad I did. Delicate to me implies girly, pale colours so that's what I used! My base was Barry M-Vanilla, which is one of their matte range from last autumn, and a pinky-nude sort of colour. On top of that I did a saran wrap mani using Barry M-Prickly Pear, Tara's Talons-Christmas Fairy and Revlon-Silver Screen. I then topped it all off with some China Glaze-Fairy Dust for a little added sparkle!

Now this is really really girly and subtle which means it's not like any of my normal manis at all but I really like it! There's something about the shiny shimmeryness of it that really catches the eye and I think all the layers of colour have added up to be a really nice colour. I reckon this would definitely be work appropriate but with that little bit of sparkle it's quite glam too!

What do you reckon? Do you like Saran wrap manis or loathe em?

~Nail Art Novice~

31 Week Nail Art Challenge 14-Flowers

Hello lovelies! Hope you are all enjoying your weeks so far!

This is another one of my 31 Week Nail Art Challenges (that are taking much longer than 31 weeks) and today it's flowers. I've been wanted to do this design for a while, inspired by a particularly wonderful pair of shoes of mine that I love:

They're so bright and colourful and I knew I'd have to stick them on my nails someday!

Polishes I used: Barry M-Coconut, Mango, Cobalt Blue, Spring Green, Revlon-Electric and Rimmel-Red Obsession (all of which I realised I took with me to Oz, coincidentally!)

They aren't the neatest flowers in the world because I did them in a bit of a rush but I still think they look  kinda cool! Especially side by side with their inspiration:

Hehe! So fun =D Whaddya reckon?

Short and sweet post for me today, that's all folks!

~Nail Art Novice~

Straya Baby!

So this is it! This is my last 24 hours in this country until the end of July which is both exceedingly exciting and also nerve racking!  One of the reasons I'm going to Australia is to meet my boyfriend's parents so I reckon I'm allowed a jitter or two! I know it's going to be a truly amazing trip but I will miss home a lot, I love Britain!

In honour of the occasion I have done Australian themed nails using Aussie flags, their national colours and a couple of adorable marsupials! Polishes used were: Barry M-Navy, Spring Green,  Rimmel-Red Obsession and Revlon-Electric, plus my Barry M white nail art pen. The decals were from YRNails.

I know the Union Jacks aren't quite right but since I only have dotting tools to work with I thought it'd be too fiddly to fill the blue in again, and I still really like em! I'm hoping they last a good few days as I have no idea when I'll next get to do my nails (which feels really weird!). I honestly don't know how much time I will have to post any manis I do do, but never fear, I have lots of guest posts from lots of fabulous nail artists to keep you interested! Also I am going to try and update my manis to instagram even if I cannot blog them, so if you want to keep in touch with me on my travels make sure you follow me over there. Also also, make sure you stick around for when I'm back cos I have a giveaway or two planned, so you don't want to miss that!

Right, that's me for now! I will leave you in the very capable hands of all my guest posters and I will see you soon! Have a good summer my lovelies!

~Nail Art Novice~

31WNAC 12-Stripes

Hello loves!
This is my last 31(ish)WNAC before I jet off to Australia on THURSDAY, eek! So I will pick up the challenge with 'Animal Print' when I get back. But back to this week's 'Stripes'! I used another one of my Mentality microglitters-this one is Intense which is black, white and yellow. As a base coat/on my accents I used my all time favourite yellow-Revlon-Electric. The stripes were with W7-Black and some more of my Nail Stickrs nail vinyls-this time the thicker stripes. I drew the bees with my Barry M nail art pen and added their iridescent wings with Picture Polish-Mirage, which I really need to use properly at some point, it's gorgeous!

What do you reckon? I think they're kinda cute! Plus you know I love doing nail art with these micro glitter polishes...although not cleaning them up! It's a real pain!

As I said, I am heading to Australia on Thursday, but hoping to get another mani up before then if I possibly can! I've also got lots of lovely guest posts and manis from Rara to come whilst I'm away, and I will try to post when I can too! If not, have a brilliant summer!

~Nail Art Novice~

Nail Stickrs Review II

Hello! How're you all doing? I'm getting really excited cos I go away to Australia in a WEEK! SO much still to do though, eek!
I've got some more nail art using the Nail Stickrs vinyls (see my first review here) today, also incorporating some texture and my boyfriend's absolute favourite technique-the jelly sandwich. I used the zigzag vinyls, both in a 'tape mani' style and as a stickers to create a skittle mani using Revlon-Silver Screen, Kiko-643 (a gorgeous shimmery green Sugar Mat I picked up in a blog sale a few weeks ago), and Barry M-SLE'13B  for the sandwich (cos my boyfriend really wanted me to use the stickers under layers!).

On my index/ring fingers I started with a coat of Silver Screen and then applied the vinyls on top. They come in a set all together so I just placed them on as one unit and then used tweezers to remove every other strand, which was tricky but doable, even on my off hand! I then applied the Kiko over the top and pulled them off while it was still wet to make the pattern. On my thumbs I did the opposite-started with two coats of the Kiko and then placed the silver zig zags over the top once it was dry-I wanted to see how well they stayed on for. I topcoated over the top of them to secure them, and so far they haven't budged at all, even through multiple hand washings/showers/washing up.

The butterflies are normally silver, but I actually quite like the shade of gold they've turned under the green, and the fact they're still really sparkly, even with topcoat. The vinyls themselves are really easy to use-although a pair of tweezers is always useful to have on hand to help with placement-and I really love all the fun things you can do with them. If you're a newbie to the nail art world you should definitely think about getting yourself some cos they're really easy to use and give you some awesome looking designs  (when we all know they're so much easier to use than they look, but shhh ;) )

You can find Nail Stickrs here: 

  Website | Facebook | Twitter

Thanks for reading! I've got one more design with/review of these coming up this weekend so keep an eye out for that.

~Nail Art Novice~

31 Week Nail Art Challenge 9-Rainbows

Hello lovelies!

I love a good rainbow, so I've been excited about this post for weeks =) They're just so bright and colourful and awesome. I started with a base of Barry M-Coconut (from their new summer Gellies line) so that my gradient would be more opaque. Then I created a rainbow gradient with Revon-Fire, Sally Hansen-Man-go Team!, Sinful Colors-Pistache, Barry M-Damson and Maybelline-Mellow Mauve (although you can only see it on my thumb!).

On top of the gradient I used some more of my Make It Stick Designs nail vinyls, and on all but my accents another coat of Coconut. It was a bit of a messy job getting the stickers off again but I have to say I really love the effect!

What dya reckon? I love them-they're so bright and fun! I think if I had to choose nail art to sum me up perfectly then something like this would definitely be my choice! I'm really sad I have to take them off tonight for something more neutral and work appropriate, booo!

~Nail Art Novice~

Stamp, Stamp, Baby!

Hello loves!

Apologies for being a little sporadic with my posting lately, I keep doing manis and never managing to get pics of them before they start chipping off =(
I've got some stamping today and this is going to be a thing I'm going to be doing fairly regularly (once a fortnight hopefully) because I've got a fair few stamping plates that just never get used and I am inheriting some more from a lovely polishy friend as her nails have outgrown them. I do love stamping (when it works), it's such an easy and quick way to get nails that are more interesting than a plain colour so I reckon I should really do more!

Today's base is a first for me-my very first Mentality polish that I won in the lovely Emma's giveaway recently. Cobbler is a really pale blue matte polish crammed with blue shimmery bits and is really pretty on its own:

but then I stamped over it with Revlon-Emerald City and MoYou London-Pro Collection 09.

And while that did look really cool, I am a shiny girl at heart, so I added a layer of Seche Vite to seal it all in and add some shine:

It really brings out the sparkle in both the polishes, and I think it's pretty!

Happy St George's Day!

~Nail Art Novice~

Fingerfood's Theme Buffet-Fishtails (+ My OH Does My Nails!)

I was complaining to my boyfriend the other day that while I really like fishtail manis, they just take so long to do and are basically a bit of a pain and I really couldn't be arsed to do one for this challenge. His eyes lit up and he told me he had an idea and this was the result! I painted the base coat and he did all the details with dotting tools and I have to say I love them!

Polishes used: Sinful Colors-Ciao Bella (which is a simply gorgeous blue jelly filled with sparkles!) and Revlon-Silver Screen, with my black Barry M nail art pen for details.

He also insisted I include this pic too (along with adorably re-enacting the last face-how could I refuse?!)

So there you go, my slightly less traditional take on fish tails, and a host of other marine life too. My boyfriend just asked me to point out that he realises that octopi etc are not strictly speaking fish, but hey, who's counting? I love them, they make me smile every time I see them, plus that base colour is gorgeous! And how awesome are the little octopus/squid/crab? I'll make a nail artist out of him yet =p

See you next time!

~Nail Art Novice~

Fairy Cakes Nail Art

Hello lovelies!
This will have to be a quick post as I am running out the door in about 10 mins so please forgive me if I don't talk much!
I got one of the Nails Inc Sprinkles polishes from ebay the other day and thought it would be perfect for this nail art!

Polishes used: Barry M-Prickly Pear, Sinful Colors-Amethyst, Revlon-Blue Lagoon, Barry M-Cobalt Blue, Revlon-Sunshine Sparkle/Electric, Rimmel-Peppermint, Barry M-Greenberry, Rimmel-Tangy Tangerine, Barry M-Satsuma, Barry M-Matt White, Nails Inc-Sweets Way and Rimmel-Movie Star

I have to say these are making me really happy, which is good cos today I'm just having one of those days where you want to curl up in a ball under your quilt and wish the world would go away, so these are very welcome at the end of my fingers!

As I said, sorry for the brevity, but gotta dash!

~Nail Art Novice~

March Tri Polish Tuesday The First

Hey lovelies! Happy Pancake Day! (Nom!)

Today I'm joining in with the Tri Polish challenge, although it's undergone a little revolution since last year. Basically the rules are now that there is a set of given colours for each month (details of which can be found here) and you do four manis with polishes matching those colour prompts BUT you no longer have to use the same polishes throughout. You still have free use of black/white/silver/gold and glitter toppers. This month's colours are green, blue and purple-all my faves and the polishes I have the most of, so I had to join in.

For today's mani, these are the (rather gorgeous) polishes I've used-all from the Shine On Collection by Nails Inc
L-R: Lyall Street, Elm Park Road, Raphael Street

Aren't they lovely? They're so much more sparkly in real life too! I also used Revlon-Silver Screen to break up the colours a bit. I've done a 'mermaid scale' mani on my accents and then stamped waves from the MoYou London-Sailor 3 plate on the rest.

Yeah I don't know what happened to my index finger either...

I love love love these! They're so shiny and sparky! I really really like the Shine On collection, I think they're all pretty beautiful and together like this they look fab too! The mermaid scales took ages but I like the random look of them.

Don't forget to check out the other gorgeous tri-polish manis in the inlinkz and enjoy all your scrummy pancakes!!

~Nail Art Novice~

Feb Resolutions Check In

So you may remember that last time around when I did this, I had had a really good month and had kept up with my resolutions really well. This month has not been so successful...oops!

Resolution #1-Lemony Flutter
So I have...not used my LF all month. I really should have been but I just haven't. I think the fact that I've moved up to Sheffield and that my boyfriend has been in hospital so much has really just thrown me off. My cuticles look really bad on it though, so I am going to try and use it every night before bed in March if I can!

Resolution #2-Spend no more than £20 on polish things a month and/or buy no more than 4 polishes a month
Ah...this one I have done really terribly at this month. In total I have acquired SIXTEEN new polishes, which is 4 times more than I should have done! I did only pay for half of them though, as I have been very lucky this month and got a lot of freebies from various places. Lets have a look at my collection then:

...oops

Top Row: Pocket Money Polishes-She's Like The Wind and Alien Like You, Black Cat Lacquer-Evergreen (all bought by me), Rara Avis-Cast Iron Cannon (made and given to me by Rara!!)

2nd Row: Sally Hansen-Cherry Drop, Revlon-Haunted Heart, Rimmel-Out Of The Blue, Sinful Colors-Ciao Bella, Sally Hansen-Razzleberry (all bought by me)

3rd Row: Nails Inc Shine On Collection-Elm Park Road, Raphael Street, Cadogan Gate, Lyall Street (bought for me for Valentine's by my boyfriend)

Bottom Row: Chubby Owl Polishes-Roses Are Red, Midnight Owls, Violets Are Blue (I bought Midnight Owls and Jenna included the minis as a lovely surprise in my parcel!)

Here's a pic of the glitters swatched so you can enjoy them!

L-R: Alien Like You (over Out Of The Blue), She's Like The Wind (over Cast Iron Cannon), Midnight Owls, Roses Are Red, Violets are Blue

So my total spend this month was...£35.79-eep! I am officially on a no-buy for the forseeable future now, sigh. I'm going to have to avoid Poundland like the plague and it's going to take all my resolve! Hopefully this month's pretties will keep me occupied for a while!

Total spent: £35.79
Under/Over budget: Over, way, way over!
Number of new polishes acquired: Sixteen!
Fewer/More than four? SO MANY MORE.

I guess that's a double fail for me this month, oops! :-/ Will try harder next time!

See you next month,

~Nail Art Novice~

My OH Paints My Nails

PIC HEAVY POST

The British Nail Bloggers are having another fun group post this week that I thought I'd join in with: My Other Half Paints My Nails. As the name suggests this is asking nail art newbies (not necessarily just partners) to paint your nails for you. I asked my Australian if he'd be up for doing that and he was surprisingly excited! He decided to do a skittle mani across all my nails, incorporating many techniques. He even opted to do a fishtail nail which I thought was pretty impressive! So these are all his nail art, he chose the colours and did them all and I think they look really fab. I'll hand over to him now:

So Ah... Hi!
Having spent so much time with Jenni over the last 7 or 8 months it is unsurprising really that I was asked to do her nails at some point. I have done several "He picks my polish" things, and Jenni has done several designs on my thumb nails, so I guess this was the next logical step. So without further ado here they are:

Left Hand

Right Hand

So I know this isn't how Jenni usually does her posts but I am going to do a nail by nail breakdown with the polishes I used for each nail and the technique used, also possibly some other bits and pieces. (See more after the break)

Mish Mash Challenge Week 26-Favourite Nail Art Technique

This is another one of the themes that I suggested originally, and when I did I had one thing on my mind-fishtails! I do love the way fishtails look when they're done but I don't love the amount of time and patience you have to have with them. Since the challenge has been ongoing, I've discovered a new favourite technique and that's gradients-I love getting the colours to blend nicely together and they're a fab way to have neutral nails but in more than one colour! I decided as a nod to my excited just-started-nail-blogging self I'd combine the two for this mani.

Polishes used: Barry M-Plum, Sinful Colors-Amethyst, Barry M-Prickly Pear, Revlon-Cloud, OPI-I Juggle...Men

They're not the best gradients in the world cos my polishes wouldn't play nice, but they were still quite pretty. I do still love fishtails but they are a pain in the butt to do! They look awesome when done though so can't complain.
There you go, pretty purple pretties.

Don't forget to check out all the other lovely nails in the inlinkz!

~Nail Art Novice~

My giveaway is running for another week! Make sure you're entered =)

It's Behind You!

On Saturday my family and Rara's family went to see the last night of our local pantomime-something that's become a bit of a tradition in recent years. I know they're not for every one but I love a panto-they're just wonderfully silly and I think they have something in for everyone! This year's was 'Jack and the Beanstalk' so I did some appropriate nails.

Polishes used: Gradients- Rimmel-Mermaid Green, Camouflage and Jaded Glamour with a topping of China Glaze-White Cap for added shimmer. The beanstalks were done with the same polishes on a base of Revlon Chroma Chameleon-Gold. I have to say I'm a bit disappointed with these duochromey polishes-they look like they have so many colours in the bottles but I've not found they translate onto the nail at all! Boo!

Anyways, pics!

I loved these-they were SO GREEN =D Made me very happy, although they didn't last very well, and the panto was huge amounts of fun, oh yes it was!

~Nail Art Novice~

Don't forget to enter my giveaway if you haven't already!

And All That Jazz!

On Thursday I took my boyfriend to see Chicago at the theatre as part of his birthday present and decided that I needed appropriate nails to match-of course I went with red and black and sparklies!

Polishes used: Rimmel-Movie Star, Barry M-Red Glitter, Revlon-Silver Screen, Barry M-Fairy Lights, Revlon-Black Star. 

Pre-clean up shots to show off the sparklies:

 And here's what I ended up with:

The show was AMAZING-we had front row tickets and therefore had excellent views of many many sexy legs! Also the singing was fantastic and the whole evening was just wonderful! My boyfriend had a really good evening too, so it was all a success!

Happy weekend!

~Nail Art Novice~

Don't forget to enter my blog birthday giveaway!

Mish Mash Challenge Week 24-Inspired By A Decade

Finally, finally, I'm back with another Mish Mash mani-there's still a fair few to go before the end of the challenge! This one was one of my suggestions-inspired by a decade-and I've always known what I wanted to do for it! First I should perhaps show you my inspiration, my faaaaaaabulous 70s glam rock boots:

Haha, I love these babies! You can't help but strut when you wear them! I decided to combine some nail art based on them with some retro 70s style wallpaper, with a little help from this tutorial by Holy Grail Nails. I've had this bookmarked to do since I first got into blogging, can't believe it's taken so long!
Polishes used: Rimmel-Azure, London Girl-#46, Revlon-Silver Screen, Barry M-Navy, Barry M-Lady.

Love these! I think they work on two levels-while they are quite retro I also think the colours look a little "futuristic"-like what they thought the 2000s were going to look like in old 80s films and stuff.

Glad to be back with the Mish Mashers!

~Nail Art Novice~

Sparkle And Shine

Hello lovelies! Hope you're all doing well and enjoying the year so far. I had a brilliant time at my New Year's gathering, but it really took it's toll on my poor nails, they're the shortest they've been for a very long time at the moment! I've got no free edge left on most of my nails, it's making me really rather sad =(
So much so that I was feeling really uninspired for what I should do on them once I took off my fabulous rainbows so I made my boyfriend choose something for me! (#LazyBloggerSyndrome lol). He decided he wanted something sparkly and so this is what I ended up with: Revlon-Silver Screen, Avon-Fabulous and Barry M-Majesty from their autumn textures. I decided to keep it simple and do a mixed size dotticure with the Barry M on top of the other colours.

Apologies for the tipwear in these, it wasn't apparent in real life!

This was so sparkly and pretty! I wish I was better at doing these kind of dotticures, I think it looks a bit of a mess personally, but I know they can look amazing because I always admire the ones Emma from Emma's Little Corner does (like this one!), but I just can't get them too look that good! Siiigh.

Anyway, that's my first mani of 2014 done, woo! Onwards!

~Nail Art Novice~