NOTD : Deck the Halls

Hello everybody ! Long time no see, but I swear I have a perfectly reasonable explanation for that ! You see, as my work load at uni has gone up so much this year, I'm having to make a few sacrifices as far and nail art and blogging are concerned. I barely have any time to do my nails at all, and even less to blog about them so I'm afraid that blogging here will have to be reserved for the holidays from now on, and maybe the odd couple of times during term time if i find the time for it, I hope that's okay with everyone !

But anyway, it's Christmas and I'm home for the holidays ! That means nail time (albeit limited to the few polishes I was able to bring home with me), and today's design is inspired by one of The Illustrated Nail's Christmas 2013 designs !

So I guess that not doing my nails properly for over a month has taken its toll - these nails took me forever to do (although I was watching TV at the same time I suppose), although these are better than the nails I did a few days ago, a mix of a bad nail art pen and not having practised for a long time made for some very shaky snowflakes !

For this design I started with a base of OPI You're Such a Budapest, then for the holly I used OPI Jade is the New Black, Essie Toggle to the Top, and for the outlines I used American Apparel T-Shirt and a Models Own black nail art pen. I really like the way the white outlines highlight the holly and make it stand out even more from the background. It's a shame I didn't bring any rhinestones with me, otherwise I could have done red rhinestone berries like in the original design.

So that's all from me for today folks ! I hope you've all had a wonderful Christmas and have eaten far more than you should ! I know I certainly have ! See you next time !

Beauty Superstar on Cut Out + Keep : Day 1

Hi everyone ! This is a post to let you all know that I am being featured as a Beauty Superstar on Cut Out + Keep this week ! Each day for a whole week a new tutorial that I've prepared will be posted, so make sure you tune in each day to make sure you don't miss any !

Today is the first day, and the tutorial I've done for you all is my go-to design when I'm lacking inspiration or when I want something quick to do. Yep, you guessed it ! It's leopard print !

To see the full tutorial with extra details, make sure you head on over to my project on the Cut Out + Keep website, where you can even read an interview all about me !

Hope you enjoy the tutorial !

Another Update !

I was so ready to post my nail design I've got on at the moment and I had my memory card with the photos all ready and everything.. BUT for some reason my laptop has decided it no longer wants to recognise my memory card whatsoever and so I can't access any of my photos from my camera... It makes a noise when I put it in and take it out, but I can't for the life of me work out why I can't find it on my computer ! Has anyone had this problem before ? Any advice ?

In other news, it's reading week ! I've been travelling around the UK visiting family this week but I'm back off to Bath tomorrow ! It's been great to have a bit of chill time (unfortunately none spent doing nails !), especially as I've been feeling seriously overwhelmed with the amount of work I've had to do so far. I'm hoping to be able to go back to a regular post schedule but I really don't know if I will be able to, it all depends on my workload !

So anyway, I'm off to do some more research as to why I can't find my photos, and I will try and get something up soon ! Thank you so much for being so patient though, you're all amazing and the comments I've been getting through are really helping ! I haven't forgotten you, but just bear with me a little longer !

Sarah xx

A Quick Update !

Hey there everyone ! So it's been two weeks since I posted any nails on here, so I thought I'd give you all a quick update and explain why I haven't been blogging ! As you may be aware, I started uni again at the beginning of the month, and the workload this year is proving to be a lot heavier than what I was used to last year ! I've barely found enough time to do my nails, let alone edit photos and write about them ! I hope you can understand my situation, but I will be making a concerted effort from now on to make time for blogging !

I've had the same design on for 10 days now, it's all chipping and wearing away at the tips, but I haven't had time to take it off yet so I'm just having to put up with it ! I have two presentations to do this week (one in Russian, one in European Studies) so I've been working my bum off all weekend trying to get them done and ready for Monday and Wednesday respectively. On Thursday I'm meeting up with my Mum and my sister as on Friday we're going to the Harry Potter Studio in London, which I'm SUPER excited about ! I'll definitely try and do my nails to mark the occasion, and of course, I'll do my best to post them on here !

So that's all I really wanted to tell you, I'll try and get a post up in the next couple of days so make sure you stay tuned for that ! See you all then ! :)

Sarah xx

NOTD : Autumn Stars and Stripes

Hey there everyone ! So I really need to get to bed so that I can read for a bit before I go to bed (yay uni work !), but I think I can just about manage to squeeze in a post for you all before I go ! I've been super productive today : I did 3 loads of washing, cleaned my room, did all my homework for uni for next week and still managed to fit in doing my nails after a whole hour of searching the internet for inspiration ! In the end it was my mum who came up with today's theme of stars and stripes, and I picked the bright-ish yet autumnal looking colour scheme for the nails !

I think these colours really work well together, especially as they're all from the OPI Euro Centrale collection, and despite the fact that these were released as Spring/Summer polishes, some of them still work quite well as Autumn shades ! I love having all mismatching nails but still keeping a theme that brings them all together, I think it makes for a really interesting design !

The three nail varnishes I used for today's design were OPI My Vampire is Buff, OPI Eurso Euro and OPI My Paprika is Hotter Than Yours. The latter polish shows up a lot redder in the photos than it actually is in real life - to me it looks far more orange which really adds to the autumnal look, it's a shame it hasn't shown up that way in the photos but oh well !

So I hope you liked today's design, it's really put me in the mood to do more looks to go with the current season - nothing beats autumn shades... except maybe pastels in Spring, let's just stick with Autumn at the moment though !

I'm off to bed now, see you all again soon ! Night night !

Breast Cancer Awareness Month : Moons and Tips

Hey there everybody ! So I apologise for the long gap between writing posts, but I've been busy getting back into the uni routine this week ! I managed to find some time to do my nails but I just completely ran out of time in the evenings ! Luckily I only had one lecture today so I've had plenty of time to do everything I wanted to and now have time to write this post for you !

So as you may already be aware, October is the official Breast Cancer Awareness Month (BCAM), a time during which people are encouraged to wear pink to show their support. I'm going to do my best to do as many pink nail art designs this month as possible, so we'll see where that takes us ! In any case I've got my first pink design for you today !

This design is kind of similar to the technique I used for my "R for Rasta" nails I did during the Alphabet Nail Art Challenge, except I've only used two different nail polishes as opposed to three ! Obviously the centre part is much thicker than in the Rasta design which makes the tips smaller, but I really like how it looks !

So these nails were done using two nail varnishes from the OPI Couture de Minnie collection which I received for my birthday : OPI Chic From Ears to Tail and OPI A Definite Moust-Have. I really love pink nail varnishes as it's one of my favourite colours (I have a huge amount of pink shades in my stash), so I'm really pleased to be able to add these to my collection ! What colours do you have most of ?

So that's it for tonight, I need to do some work before I go to bed so I'll have to love you and leave you ! I hope you enjoyed my first design for BCAM, I really loved wearing these nails, although I re-did them this morning with another pink design I'll be showing you soon ! Ta ta for now everyone !

Tutorial : Rose Floral (Alphabet Nail Art Challenge)

Good evening everyone ! I'm back in Bath now and I had totally forgotten that I hadn't actually scheduled a post for today, but luckily I prepared the tutorial image the other day while I was still in Salzburg ! I start back at uni tomorrow so I don't know how often I'll be posting anymore, but I will still do my best to post whenever I can ! Obviously I won't be stopping painting my nails, but work has to come first and so I'll just have to wait and see what I'm able to fit in ! My nails need painting tomorrow in any case because I've been wearing the same design for 10 (!!!!!) days now, and my nails have grown so much it just looks weird with loads of bare nail near the cuticles !

Anyway, today I've got the final tutorial of this marathon weekend of step-by-step designs for you, and it's another one of the popular designs from the Alphabet Nail Art Challenge,  for which a lot of people asked for a tutorial ! Today's tutorial is for the "F for Floral" design, the one with the roses, it's a very abstract way of painting them, just using quite a lot of different colours to add depth to the flowers, so it's not too difficult at all ! Here's a quick photo reminder of the design :

So here's the tutorial for this design, you can use whatever colour scheme you want of course !

1. Start with your choice of base colour. I used OPI My Vampire is Buff.
2. Use a nail art brush with your darkest coloured nail polish from your colour scheme to paint on some round blobs with some frilly bits around the edges. I used OPI Dim Sum Plum.
3. Using one of the other colours from your choice of nail polishes, add some lines to the frilly blobs with a nail art brush. I used OPI Strawberry Margerita (very subtle).
4. Do the same again with another colour. I used OPI Sparrow Me the Drama.
5. And again with your lightest colour. I used OPI Steady as She Rose.
6. Using your lightest green polish of choice, paint the shape you would like your leaves to be with a nail art brush. I used OPI Don't Talk Bach to Me.
7. Leave some light green around the edges, and fill in the centre of each leaf using a slightly darker green nail polish and a nail art brush. I used OPI Jade is the New Black.
8. Do the same again using your darkest green. I used OPI Live and Let Die.
9. Put some top coat on and you're all done !

I hope that you all like this tutorial, it's pretty much all about the layering to give the depth to the design, so it doesn't really matter what colours you use, just as long as you use plenty of different shades !

Tutorial : Kitties (Alphabet Nail Art Challenge)

Hellooooo everybody ! So I should be back in the UK by now, but as I'm staying with some friends before going back to Bath tomorrow I thought it'd be best for me to schedule a post for today ! I've got another tutorial today for you all, for a design which was really popular during the Alphabet Nail Art Challenge... it's the K for Kitties design !

Here are the steps for creating this design (obviously you can do whatever colour kitty you wish !) :

1. Paint a base colour using a very light or sheer nude nail polish shade. I used two coats of Champneys Nude.
2. Paint the head with the brush from your nail polish : make a rounded motion when painting, the same as you would do near your cuticle. Don't worry if it isn't perfect, you can always do some touch-ups with a nail art brush ! I used American Apparel Hassid.
3.Using a nail art brush, paint some ears for your kitty. I think it looks nice when their ears are quite close to the edge of your nail, so really far away from eachother !
4. Use a medium size dotting tool and some white polish to paint two eyes. Again, I like placing these quite far away from eachother, so I aim to paint them roughly under each ear ! I used American Apparel T-Shirt.
5. Paint on the insides of each ear and the white part of its nose using a nail art brush and some white nail polish.
6. Using a light pink nail polish, paint a tiny nose at the top of the white part and a line coming down from it, then add a smile ! For the nose bit, I paint it in the shape of an upside-down heart ! I used OPI Sparrow Me the Drama.
7. Add a couple of whiskers on each side with some white polish using a fine nail art brush, as well as the centres of each eye using either a nail art brush or a small dotting tool.
8. Finish with some top coat and that's it !

This is a very simple design to replicate, and it's easy to find bits and pieces around the house you can use if you don't have all the tools ! A toothpick works really well for tiny dots and fine lines, bobby pins and the balls at the end of pins you use for sewing also work well for larger dots !

If you don't own any nail tools whatsoever I would truly recommend investing in a set of different sized dotting tools - I didn't have any nail brushes for ages but my dotting tools served me really well, I even used them for painting like I would have used a nail art brush ! They're not expensive but are really worth having around if you're in to painting designs on your nails !

Tutorial : Triangles (Alphabet Nail Art Challenge)

Good afternoon everyone ! I'm writing this post early today as I'll have lots of packing to do later, so seeing as we're in the hotel room now (we went into town this morning, have been inside as it's been raining a lot this afternoon) I decided that I'd be better off posting this now ! I've got tutorials for you all the way through until Sunday, so I hope you enjoy them ! The three I'll be posting over the weekend are all for designs from the Alphabet Nail Art Challenge, and today's is from the "T for Triangles" prompt ! Here's a quick reminder of the original design :

You can choose whatever colour combinations you wish, just as long as you have 4 different colours, plus a white nail polish ! So here's what you've got to do to replicate this design :

1. Start by applying your base colour. I choose to use my lightest colour for the base as it makes painting the lines on top easier. I used two coats of OPI Steady as She Rose.
2. Use a nail art brush to paint on a random thick chunky line with your first colour across your nail. It can look however you want it to ! I used OPI Dim Sum Plum.
3. Do the same again with your second colour just over your first line. There's no need to be perfect here, it's fine to change the way your lines look ! I used OPI Can't Find my Czechbook.
4. Now do it again over the second line with your third colour. Leave a gap between your first line and then paint a new line underneath that in your same third colour. I used P2 Who Cares.
5. Carry on with the same sequence of colours until you have filled your nail.
6. Using white nail polish and a nail art brush, paint on the outline of a triangle which will be your chevron. I do this by looking at my nail and just making a little dot as a marker for where I want the point to be ! I used OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls.
7. Fill it in !
8. Add some top coat, and you're all done !

If you want to do your nails like the accents on my thumb and ring fingers like in the original design, start by painting your white base, then paint on the chevron using what your base colour would have been for the other nails, in my case it was OPI Steady as She Rose. Continue by using your other colours to make your lines inside the chevron with the same sequence of colours as in the normal design. Don't worry if you go over the edges, as you can always go over the sides with your white polish to make it neat again !

So as you can see this isn't really so much a triangles design as it is a stripes and chevron design, but I've named it my "triangles tutorial" as that was what the original title was ! I really hope you've enjoyed this tutorial, and stay tuned for more over the next couple of days !

Helen Dardik Week : Swan Song

Evening all ! The weather has been pretty miserable today here in Salzburg, so we stayed in for a few hours this afternoon, but still went out in to town this morning ! There was an amazing farmers' market we had no idea about, which was selling all sort of amazing food - mainly cheese and meat, but there were loads of vegetable stores and pretty autumnal floral wreaths on stands - it was just so colourful ! We fought the rain for a while and did a bit of shopping in the old town and then we went for a coffee (a hot chocolate in my case !), where my mum had a very nice looking slice of Black Forest gateau !

Today is the last day of my Helen Dardik Week series, and it's going out with a bang ! It seems appropriate that the title of this pattern is "Swan Song", since this is the final design in the series ! This is the design that is on a par in first place with the design I posted yesterday, although my mum has admitted that this is her favourite !

When I chose to replicate this pattern I was originally set on painting the swans, the flowers, however, ended up really catching my eye and, knowing me, I of course went down the floral route ! The two different beige nail polishes I've used for this design aren't as contrasted as they are in the original pattern, but I do like the subtlety of it ! I added the tiny flowers on at the end because I thought the design needed something more than just the big flowers, and I really think the orangey centres bring this design to life !

I started with two coats of OPI My Vampire is Buff for this design and then painted the big black stamens with American Apparel Hassid. The petals were done using OPI Did You 'Ear About Van Gogh, with little accents of American Apparel T-Shirt on the ends and in the black parts. The little flowers were done using American Apparel Hassid and Essie Meet Me at Sunset.

So what do you all think then ? Which design has been your favourite from this week ? I'm glad I was able to wear this design for a couple of days before having to change it, as it was the last design I painted for this series when I was preparing it all back at the beginning/middle of the month ! I'm still torn as to which design is my favourite between this one and yesterday's design !

I need to go and get ready for bed now, but I'll be back again tomorrow, this time with a new tutorial for you all ! See you then !

Helen Dardik Week : Botanical Fantasy

Hey there guys ! So today has been a very eventful day - we caught the train to go to Vienna for the day (well it only ended up being about 6 hours, but it was still very very very fun) ! I thought it was very similar to Prague (except here I could actually understand the language), as a lot of the old architecture was still amazingly in tact, plus the fact that it pretty much every building had a unique characteristic about it ! I'd definitely go back again - there's so much to do there that we obviously weren't able to do due to time retraints, the only problem was that it was very very expensive there !

We're moving on to my final two designs in the Helen Dardik Week series, and I've got my two favourites left to show you still ! I'm not sure I could choose which one is my true favourite, so I've decided that they're both joint first place ! Today's design is inspired by Helen Dardik's "Botanical Fantasy" pattern, which is probably my favourite of all of them !

There are so many flowers on the original patterns that I could have chosen for this design, but I decided that all the bigger ones were quite similar to other flowers I chosen previously for this series' nail designs so in the end I went for one of the smaller, less noticeable flowers. You can actually spot them quite easily in all of the original patterns, but I think it's usually the bigger ones that initially catch your eye !

For this design I started with two coats of OPI My Vampire is Buff, then for the flowers I used OPI Planks A Lot, OPI Funky Dunkey, OPI You Don't Know Jacques, P2 Hug Me and P2 Summer to Go. The leaves were done with the usual OPI Mermaids Tears and OPI Jade is the New Black. I'm glad I chose to do this colour combination, with the two different purples, although I do like the alternative reddish/pink combination in one of the other pictures of the pattern !

All in all this is definitely right up there with some of my favourite designs ever - I really love the way each nail is different but still the same ! This is a type of floral design I would do again, the combination of the light and dark shades for the petals is really nice in my opinion ! What do you all think ?

Time for bed again now, we were up super early (although I spent most of our time on the train sleeping) and I'm really tired now ! Night night everyone, see you same time tomorrow for the final design in my Helen Dardik series ! Byeeeeeee !

Helen Dardik Week : Summer Gardens

Hello everybody ! I need to do this post really quickly as I still need to dry my hair before going to bed - we're getting up really early tomorrow to catch a train to Vienna for the day ! Today we took a cable car up to Untersberg, a 1,973m high moutain right on the border between Austria and Germany ! There were some really amazing views, looking way out over the Alps and also back down on to the city of Salzburg.

I've got probably my least favourite of the designs I've done for my Helen Dardik Week to show you today, it's still an OK design, I just prefer all of the others I've done ! Today's design is inspired by the "Summer Gardens" pattern from August this year.

Looking back at the original inspiration-image, I sort of regret not having done one of the other flowers that feature in it. There are loads of different flowers on there that I could have chosen, but then I suppose my flowers do look okay in comparison to the original look of them on the pattern !

So I started with a base of OPI My Vampire is Buff for this design, then I moved on to painting the flowers using OPI Big Apple Red, OPI Sparrow Me the Drama, American Apparel Office and Butter London Royal Navy. For the leaves I used (I'm pretty sure) OPI Mermaids Tears and OPI Jade is the New Black. There's also, if you look very closely, some little white teardrops that I painted on as they're in the pattern, but you can't really see them very well at all ! I think it's the navy blue stamens on this one that ruin the look - they look really dainty on the original pattern but on my nails I just think they look a bit "meh" !

So that's it for today ! I'm going to go and dry my hair and then go to sleep ! I'm so worn out from all that walking I've been doing today ! But don't worry, I'll be back again tomorrow, and there are only two designs left which are both my favourites of all the designs I've done this week, so don't miss out ! Byeeeee !

Helen Dardik Week : Joyous Bloom

Hey there everyone ! Today in Salzburg we went on the Sound of Music tour ! It's probably my mum's favourite film of all time, so retracing the locations where different scenes were filmed was an obvious must-do for this holiday ! We already saw the gardens and steps/fountains where they sand "Do Re Mi" (for those who have seen the film), but today's tour took us to see the pavilion where they sing "16 Going on 17", the lake where they fell out of the boat and the church where they get married, very eventful ! We also saw some absolutely stunning views from driving up through all the mountains and in to the lake district !

Today I've got another installment in the Helen Dardik designs, this one is probably up there with my favourites, maybe third place behind two of which I've still got to show you ! This particular design is inspired by the "Joyous Bloom" pattern, but I've reverted to only doing one of the flowers from the huge amount there is to choose from !

The background colour I chose from the final picture of the patterns in the link to Helen Dardik's blog, I thought it made a change from the usual light off-white/beigey colour I've used for almost every pattern this week ! I improvised with the leaves a bit, not wanting to do anything fancy but then not wanting to leave it plain - I chose instead to add some simple leaves and stems to each flower for that extra bit of colour it gives !

So for this floral nail design I started with a base of OPI Skull and Glossbones, then the flowers were done using OPI Funky Dunkey, OPI Sparrow Me the Drama, OPI Big Apple Red and OPI My Vampire is Buff (I think, for the little stamen dots), then for the leaves and stems I used OPI Don't Talk Bach to Me. I was surprised to see how well the green leaves came though, and I thought it might be alright just to do leaves on a couple of nails, but I'm glad I did something to each nail !

I think the bright colourful folowers really stand out against the dull grey background, and I especially love the huge purple stamens - it reminds me of the red floral nails I did witht the huge centres, I think they look awesome !

Time for me to get ready for bed again ! Time flies when you're having fun ! Stayed tuned for tomorrow's nails ! See ya then !

Helen Dardik Week : Botanical Asylum

Hellooooooo everybody ! We've just come back from a very nice dinner at the Mozartplatz, both my mum and I had beef broth with a cheese dumpling to start and then pork wiener schnitzel with potatoes and salad - very yummy ! We did our own little walking tour around Salzburg today, lots of walking up and down steps and slopes so our legs are seriously knackered now !

I've got another Helen Dardik nail design for you today, inspired by her "Botanical Asylum" pattern. I ended up going for the colour scheme on the right of the last picture on that link, as I thought the light blue colour worked really well as a background, and I preferred the way they all went together.

This design probably took me the longest out of all of the designs I'm going to show you for this Helen Dardik series, mainly because I decided to do a completely different look on each nail ! My favourite part of this design is definitely the little white mistletoe type leaves that you can see at the tip of my index nail and at the cuticle end of my ring finger.

I started off with a base of OPI Can't Find My Czechbook, and then the flowers and leaves were all done using American Apparel T-Shirt, China Glaze Man Hunt, OPI Big Apple Red and OPI Sparrow Me the Drama. I think this design is probably more impressive when you look at it at the same time as the pattern it's inspired by, as you can see where all the different bits came from on the actual pattern !

So what do you all think ? Do you enjoy making your nails all completely different in one same design or do you find it takes too long to do ? I really like the way it all ties together, but then again I do love it when they all properly match !

I need to go and dry my hair now before I go to sleep, so I'll see you all again, same time tomorrow !

Helen Dardik Week : Butterflies Dipped in Eggplant

Guten Abend everyone ! We landed safely in Salzburg this morning after an incredibly early flight and an awfully bad night's sleep at the hotel, so I'm going get this post up as quickly as possible so that I can get some beauty sleep before doing some tourist-y stuff tomorrow ! There's the Saint Rupert's Fair on here at the moment, my mum and I had no idea about it so that was a pleasant surprise ! There were loads of men, women and children dressed in the traditional Lederhosen and Dirndls which look absolutely stunning ! It's so nice to see people all dressed up, and it all fits the scenery so well !

In other news, it's the second day of my Helen Dardik Week series and I've steered away from the florals for this one (spoiler : it's the only design this week that isn't a floral) ! The butterflies in this "Dipped in Eggplant" pattern really caught my eye, and they are quite easy to paint as well !

I hadn't actually noticed the title of this pattern until after I was sorting out what the post titles for each pattern were called that I realised that Helen Dardik had used an eggplant colour for her butterfly. I had already finished the manicure and taken all the photos when I realised that I had painted the butterflies with navy blue instead of deep purple, but I still like it ! I can't help but wonder what it would have looked like had I used an eggplant shade though !

I started with two coats of OPI My Vampire is Buff for the base. The butterflies were all done with the following colours : Butter London Royal Navy, P2 Hug Me, OPI Sparrow Me the Drama, OPI Dim Sum Plum, OPI Big Apple Red and American Apparel Office. I added the little dots in between all the little butterflies with OPI Did You Ear About Van Gogh, a colour which I haven't used in absolutely ages, mainly because it's gone thick and gloopy and I need to buy some nail polish thinner !

I think that this is a really sweet nail art design, it's the first time I've painted butterflies on my nails and it makes a nice change from the monarch butterfly wing nails you see around a lot ! What do you all think ?

Right ! Well I'm going to go and get ready for bed now as I'm super tired and apparently the nap I had this afternoon doesn't want to keep me going for much longer ! See you tomorrow everyone !

Helen Dardik Week : The Smell of Summer

Good evening everyone ! So I'm currently sitting in bed in a Premier Inn near to Gatwick airport where I'm staying the night with my mum before we head off (incredibly early) tomorrow morning to catch our flight to Salzburg ! I had literally no time left before we left France on Tuesday to schedule more than 2 posts for you, so the laptop is coming with me Austria so that I am able to keep you up-to-date every day with all the nail designs I've prepared !

I've decided to do a "Helen Dardik Week", inspired by an awesome illustrator who has done loaaaaaads of different patterns and prints on her blog. You may remember the Helen Dardik Red Flowers design I did last week, and it was those nails that inspired me to carry on with these amazing patterns ! I've got a whole seven days of these designs to show you over the next week, some of which I really really fell in love with, and I'll be showing you the first of those today !

Today's flowers are inspired by a pattern called "The Smell of Summer", which looks quite similar to the pattern I drew inspiration from for my red floral last week. These nails took quite a while to do, mainly because I was procrastinating at the time, but even if I hadn't have been procrastinating it still would have taken a long time !

So I started with a base of OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls, then for the petals I used OPI Strawberry Margerita, OPI Sparrow Me the Drama and OPI Big Apple Red, with American Apparel Hassid for the little stamens. For the stems I used American Apparel Hunter, and it could have done with some extra shading really but I'd lost interest by that point and couldn't be bothered to add anything more to it !

And that's it ! I do like these nails and I was sad to take them off, especially as they'd taken me such a long time to do them. At least it's a new type of flower I've never painted before which was a challenge ! Definitely not my usual floral shapes ! What do you all think ?

I need to dry my hair now and then go to bed, need an early night before my alarm goes off at an incredibly antisocial time in the morning ! Night night, see you all again tomorrow !

Ford Retail "Glam It Up a Gear" with Models Own - Fiesta Nail Polish Collection

Hello everybody ! So today I've got some swatches of the new nail polish shades that Models Own have released in partnership with Ford Retail for Autumn/Winter 2013, available only during the month of September. The three shades in this collection have been fashioned to compliment their corresponding Ford Fiesta counterparts, and with just a few simple steps they can be yours as well !

Both Models Own and Ford Retail have teamed up with Glam It Up a Gear so that you can get your hands on these bespoke nail varnishes. All you need to do is fill out the form on the Glam It Up a Gear website to request a Ford Fiesta test drive. Once you've done that then just head off to your chosen car showroom at a Ford Retail dealership and your nail varnishes will be posted off to you (if you haven't got your driving license yet then you could always ask your parents) !

Now, on to the swatches (all of these are two coats, no top coat) !

Models Own - Hot Magenta

First up is Hot Magenta, a deep wine/burgundy shade with a pinky reflection brought through by a fine purple, pink and red shimmer. This is what I would call a typical Autumn shade, one you see around with many variations but along the same line. The formula on this polish was a little on the thick side but wasn't a real problem to work with !

Models Own - Candy Blue

Next up is Candy Blue, probably my favourite shade from this collection ! It's not a colour that I would usually go for, but wearing it just proves me completely wrong ! This is a seriously bright blue with LOADS of silvery shimmer running through it which makes it really reflective. The application for this polish was a dream and was very nice to work with, and there was no clean-up needed !

Finally we have Fashionista, an almost duochrome golden shade, which sometimes can lean towards an olive-y green colour when you look at it from an angle. This formula for this was a little on the thin side, but the second coat got everything to the right opacity. The only complaint I'd have about this one is the visible brushstrokes, but on the other hand I've been wearing this colour all day with some top coat on and you really can't notice the brushstrokes anymore unless you look really closely !

So those are all of the polishes, you know what you've got to do to get hold of them ! They're definitely must-have colours for the coming seasons, particularly for the party-season which will be coming up soon, Candy Blue would be a spectacular shade to wear out !

I hope you've enjoyed these swatches, I'll see you back here again tomorrow evening ! Ta ta !

Tutorial : Polka Dot Drips

Hey guys ! So today I've got a tutorial for you all (the first of plenty over the next few days) and it's for the Polka Dot Drips design I posted last week ! Here's a quick photo as a reminder, just in case you missed it !

And here's what you have to do to get this look :

1. Start with a base of your choice of white (or off-white) nail polish. I used American Apparel T-Shirt.
2. Use a dotting tool (or a bobby pin, or a pin, or a toothpick) to make a polka dot pattern in your choice of colour. I used OPI Sparrow Me the Drama.
3. Using a nail art brush, start drawing a line that swoops down towards the base of your nail. I use black acrylic paint for this, but you can use black nail polish if you prefer (I prefer the ease of application with a nail brush with acrylic rather than polish).
4. Carry on painting the line with another swoop towards the base of the nail and join to the other side of your nail.
5. Fill it in !
6. Add a couple of dashes using white nail polish to give your drips a cartoon effect. I used American Apparel T-Shirt.
7. Top coat it, and you're all done !

So that's all there is to it ! Send me photos of your designs or send me a link if you use this tutorial so I can have a look and see what you come up with ! It's a really forgiving design in that it's quite easy to just add a bit more black around the edges to even things up, and also, top coat does wonders to any design, honestly !

Tomorrow I should have some swatches for you on here, so stay tuned for that ! See you then !

Weather Nails

Hey there everyone ! So by now I'll probably be eating out with my Mum at a restaurant in Bath (probably Gourmet Burger Kitchen, there's no arguing with 40% student discount), having travelled all the way over from France on the ferry (and catching the early morning ferry so having to get up at 5:30am, ugh) and moved all my stuff into my new home for the academic year ! Today I have some nails I came up with a couple of weeks ago... guess what it was inspired by !

So the weather has been really changeable both here in France and in the UK over the past two weeks or so, suggesting the start of Autumn and what better way to honour the beginning of the new season than to do some changeable weather nails ?!

For the sunshine nails I started with a base of OPI Can't Find My Czechbook and filed in the sun with P2 Hug Me, for the rainy nails I used a base of OPI I Don't Give a Rotterdam, P2 GLory and Essie Lapiz of Luxury, as well as a small dash of American Apparel T-Shirt. I used black acrylic paint for all the outlining and the little birds (the ones on my middle finger didn't turn out great, the acrylic paint was starting to dry up and started going lumpy).

My favourite nails are definitely the rainy ones, I love the way the shimmery grey/blue works as a background ! I'd definitely wear those rainy nails as one whole design ! Currently (as of Monday night), the weather looks like its going to be AWFUL and windy and pretty gross throughout most of the week so lucky me !

Tune in tomorrow for the first of my tutorials I have planned for you over the coming days ! See ya then ! Byeeeee !

NOTD : Giant Polka Dots

Good evening everyone ! Juuuuuust managing to squeeze in a post before I go up to bed after a super-busy day ! I helped my mum clip and beautify 4 of our dogs (we have four wire haired fox terriers and a jack russel), then did my nails, then had dinner, than re-organised my whole stash and moved it all in to my helmer, then watched What Remains (sooooo good, did any of you follow it ?) and now I'm finally here to write my post but it's almost midnight so I'd better get a move on !!!

So I've been wanting to do a giant polka dots design on my nails for ages but I suppose it always just slipped my mind when it came to thinking up new ideas ! But I've managed to finally do it now so all is good ! I didn't just want to do it over a simple plain colour so I did funky rough stripes underneath to add a bit of extra colour !

I started with a base of OPI Planks A Lot, then did the stripes using American Apparel Office, P2 Hug Me and OPI Sparrow Me the Drama. I then did the mega dots using American Apparel Hassid which took rather longer than I expected, probably because I had to do it with a nail art brush instead of a dotting tool, but hey ho !

And hey would you look at that - it's past midnight ! In any case I'd better go and get ready for bed seeing as I've got a busy day tomorrow packing all my stuff up to take back to uni ! I've also got a load of posts to write up for you (the first of which won't be posted until Tuesday, so no nails until then), so don't miss those !

See you all then ! Byeeeeeee !

NOTD : Happy Birthday to Me !

Yaaaaaaaay ! It's my brithday !!!!!! My nails ended up being rather last minute as I ran out of time after doing designs to post while I'm away, but they're birthday nails nonetheless ! I've been wondering for ages now trying to think of a design I could do for today and seeing as I won't be getting my birthday nail varnishes for a couple of week,s I couldn't do anything with those !

I thought of maybe doing some candless... but then I didn't want to do that ! And then I was going to use some silver foil... but that didn't look right ! So I settled on using two of my favourite nail polishes with one that I've not used before and I'm pretty happy with how it looks !

I used OPI Tomorrow Never Dies and then OPI The Man With the Golden Gun on all except two nails. The little 2-0 was painted with OPI Moonraker which I haven't used before now, and it's actually really good for this sort of nail art, just not so much as a colour by itself !

I really love all that 18 karat goodness on top of my blurple shimmer polish.... soooo gooooood ! I'm going to go to bed now so I can get up and get stuff done tomorrow - I've still got absolutely loads of stuff to do before I leave on Tuesday and that means I've only got 3 full days left ! Scary ! See you again tomorrow hopefully !