My Recent Nail Polish Hauls Part 2

This is the second part of my nail polish hauls, you can see the first part here. I'm also expecting another large Enchanted Polish order to arrive, but this is all for now. I'm going to concentrate on showing you my newest make up purchases, I actually have bought some make up for a change!

Llarowe order

See more pictures after the jump!

NOTD: Color Club Hot Couture over Oh My Gosh Electric Pink

Today's manicure is a lovely springtime one (although I actually did it back in November), it's very appropriate for Easter, even though the weather in the UK resembles more Christmas than anything else. It was 2.8 degrees at 9 am this morning. Brr!

I used Oh My GOSH Electric Pink polish as a base and then applied Color Club Hot Couture glitter top coat on top. The result: bright pink sparkly nails! Lovely.

Both polishes has a good formula, not too thick, not too runny. Hot Couture has a very good glitter coverage, you don't need to fish around for glitter. I only had a couple of tiny chips after the first day, but after 2 days I had loads of chipping and peeling. Still, it was very pretty while it lasted.

I bought Hot Couture as part of a set from TKMaxx and Electric Pink from Superdrug.

See more pictures after the jump!

Topshop Holographic Nail Polish Swatches

I have been on a MASSIVE nail polish kick (especially holographic nail polish!) lately, even though I shouldn't be buying any more, so expect to see a few more nail polish posts here on the blog.

I picked up these holo beauties on a recent trip to Topshop as I'd seen them on their website. I was a bit worried they might not turn out very holographic, but to my surprise these are actually pretty good. The holo effect isn't as smooth as the China Glaze Hologlam polishes, the holo particles are bigger in the Topshop ones. The effect is more similar to the Color Club Halo Hues polishes (maybe I should swatch all 12 of those too), but less strong.

The colours are nice, but nothing special, you get a silver one, a pale blue one and a pink one. I hope they come out with more colours as these are really nice polishes and at £6 for 8 ml each. I've yet to wear them, but they swatched really nicely and dried quickly and you can see for yourself how pretty they are. Now if only Urban outfitters sold their holo polishes in the UK...

See more pictures after the jump!

China Glaze Hologlam Collection Haul and Swatches

My China Glaze Hologlam collection holographic nail polishes arrived today! I was so excited, I had to take pictures and swatch them all. Unfortunately one of them (Strap On Your Moonboots) broke in transit, so there is quite a bit of polish on some of the other bottles, but I just quickly wanted to take some pictures while it was sunny. Luckily the bottle didn't smash completely, only the top broke off, so I could still swatch the polish (there's about 2/3 left in the bottle as it remained standing).

I haven't worn any of them yet, so can't comment on wear time. The swatches show just one coat, I'd probably do two for a better coverage, but they are nicely pigmented. The holo effect isn't as strong as some other (namely Color Club and Glitter Gal), but it's not too bad, it's still linear and perfectly visible. The pictures were taken in strong sunlight, so they are as good as they get. All the pictures were taken without flash.

The colours are nice, not massively unique, but pretty anyway. OMG A UFO looks rather yellow/gold in the pictures, it's actually more khaki than yellow in real life. Don't Be A Lunatic and Sci-Fly By are very close, Sci-Fly By is a little bit darker, but hardly noticable. Get Out Of My Space and Astro Hot look quite similar in the pictures, but Get Out Of My Space is definitely more purple in real life.

While the holo effect isn't as strong as I hoped, these polishes are really nice and I'm glad I got them all. I ordered mine from Nail Polish Direct and they cost £8.95 for 14 ml each.

See lots more pictures after the jump!

Another No-Buy Update

I'm trying to think how long it's been since I started my no-buy, I think it's 4 months now.This time I can honestly say I've done well. Last month I decided I wasn't going to buy any nail polish for a month and I did it - well almost. I actually only gave in to temptation at the very end of the month when I ordered the new Color Club holographic nail polishes. They only arrived on the 1st February, so they don't count, right? Just kidding. I also picked up a Butter London nail polish and lipgloss set (Shambolic) in TK Maxx on the last day of the month, but for £9.99 it would've been rude not to, right?

Other than that I only bought 3 new Revlon Just Bitten Kissable Balm Stains (still to be reviewed) because I like the first one I tried out, so I really wanted to get a few more.

I guess that's not too bad, is it? I'm actually planning on continuing with being very strict with my nail polish purchases, the only ones I really have my eye on are the new China Glaze Hologlam collection polishes, I just love holographic polishes and I can't possibly not buy those.

Now if only I could say no to eyeshadows and pretty powders... But then what would I blog about they in day out?

2012 Favourites - Part 4: Nails

2012 was definitely the year of the nail polish for me. I bought over 550 nail polishes (I know, crazy!) and discovered some amazing brands. (Check out my stash video and pictures here.) Until 2 years ago I'd hardy heard of any nail polish brands that couldn't be bought in Boots or Superdrug (and back then there weren't a lot of glittery, shimmery, duochrome polish around, or at least I didn't notice them). As well as continuing to buy from mainstream brands like China Glaze, OPI, Orly and the likes, I discovered some very unique and interesting brands and nail polishes. My favourite polishes are holos and duochromes, or preferably both together in one product, and I'm also rather partial to glitter.

The picture above shows a few of my recent purchases including the new Color Club holographic polishes that I regret to say I haven't tried yet as well as Topshop glitter polishes and Enchanted Polish duo(multi)chrome polishes.

My favourite newly discovered brands in 2012 were Topshop, Enchanted Polish, Layla and Glitter Gal. Out of the four I'd say Enchanted Polish is my definite favourite, the only thing I don't like is how difficult it is to come by as the polishes are only made in very small quantities and the shades are limited edition. Nevertheless I have managed to get my hands on a few of them and here are some:

These are from the Beatles collection (I Am The Walrus and Magical Mystery Tour) and from the Falloween collection (Witchful Thinking). The new holiday collection came in a new style, fancier, more professional looking bottle:

Green Peace on Earth, Dance Of The Sugar Plum, Bruised Nutcracker, Olive The Other Reindeer

Enchanted Polish nail polishes are absolutely gorgeous, duo- or rather multichrome with scattered holo, straight forward holographic or glittery. I have showed you Across The Universe here if you want to take a peek.

Find out what other nail polishes and nail care products I loved in 2012 after the jump!

My Actual (Almost) Christmas NOTD: Color Club Gingerbread

I'm sorry, I know I said I was going to continue with my 2012 Favourites posts today, but after a whole day of putting away Christmas decorations and sorting things out for children starting school tomorrow, I just didn't have time for it. You'd be surprised if you knew how long those posts take. I promise I will continue with my 2012 Favourites post tomorrow.

Instead here's the manicure I did for Christmas. Or rather Christmas Eve as unfortunately it had chipped by the end of Christmas Eve and I had to change it, but never had time to take pictures of the actual Christmas Day manicure (it was Color Club Art of Seduction - a gorgeous red glitter).

This is Color Club Gingerbread, a gold glitter polish full of holographic glitter that sparkles in the colours of the rainbow. It was part of the Under The Mistletoe holiday collection (2010). It has a nice formula, and only took 2 coats for pretty full coverage. Unfortunately it chipped on me very quickly, so I had to remove it after just 2 days.It was very pretty while it lasted though.

Color Club polishes are available from TK Maxx, or I have bought many on eBay too. I don't actually know anywhere else in the UK that stocks them.They only cost a couple of quid on eBay, so even with postage you can get them pretty cheap. Beautyzone2007 is my favourite Color Club seller on eBay.

See more pictures after the jump!

Festive Nails - Part 1

Since it's now December I thought now would be a great time to start a series about festive nail polishes. However, as I'm still playing catch up and have had absolutely no time to take, crop and watermark pictures, I thought I'd start out with a quick recap of the festive NOTD posts I did this time last year. I have gained a lot of followers since last year, so some of you might not have seen these posts anyway, and even if you have, it's always nice to get some ideas for Christmas.

So without further ado, here are the links to last year's festive NOTD posts, and I will be back soon with some frest posts. To see more pictures and read the relevant posts, just click on the pictures.

China Glaze Champagne Bubbles

Check out some more festive nail ideas after the jump!

Update On My No-Buy 2 Months On

In case you're not a regular reader of my blog (and why not?), to fill you in, 2 months ago I went on a no-buy for lipsticks, lipglosses and nail polishes (you can also read my original post by clicking here). Well, an intended no-buy anyway. I have been doing well in some areas (lips) and not so well in other areas (nails).

Firstly, the positives. I haven't bought any new lipsticks this month, so that's a definite well done to me. I have bought 6 lipglosses, but those were still (just about) within my limit, and now I've reached that, I'm not going to allow myself any more.

Secondly, I can't stop buying nail polish. I did better than last month (not hard), but still bought far too many. The picture below shows a small portion of my nail polish haul. I have to say, 9 of them came from my wishlist (those gorgeous holographic Color Club polishes on the front and left of the picture and the Enchanted Polishes on the right), and one was sent to me by the lovely Liloo as a prize (the other gorgeous holo by 17 on the right), so surely that doesn't count, right?

The trouble is, there are just too many pretty, glittery, holo polishes out there, and I'm too weak. But I'm trying. I have quite a long wishlist now and I have been better about not just buying things when I see them on a blog or in a shop, so hopefully it's a start. However, feel free to give me a kick up the bum and tell me to stop buying them since I already have enough nail polishes to last me 20 years or so!

NOTD: Color Club Wild And Willling

Since I've been buying so many nail polishes, I'm trying to do a nail post a week, although I actually have quite a backlog of pictures since I change my nail polish 2-3 times week and most manis are actually worthy of sharing on here. Would you like me to do more nail posts in the future or not? I know I'm still not that skilled when it comes to painting my nails, although I have got much better. Let me know in the comments what you think!

Taken without flash in direct sunlight

Today I have this gorgeous Color Club nail polish to show you. It's called Wild And Willing and it was part of the Wild At Heart Collection from 3 years ago. It's a beautiful shimmer polish which is also duochrome, it's pink and orange, with some yellow and a bit of green thrown in for good measure. It looks great both in the sunlight and in shade.

The formula was very thin though, I think it took 4 coats, it was very sheer and runny. It dried pretty quickly though. It lasted okay on me with some very small chips on day 2, I ended up wearing it for 4 days. It's so pretty, I think I can forgive it for the thin, runny formula, but it would be just perfect if the formula was better.

I buy Color Club polishes on eBay from this seller or from TK Maxx (they sell Color Club box sets for around £8 which is a great deal!). I think I got this one on eBay for about $3 plus $4.50 postage to the UK. You get a very generous 15 ml for your money.

See more pictures after the jump!

My Nail Polish Stash and Storage Video (and Lots of Pictures!)

I've spent a couple of days re-organising my nail polish storage and creating a spreadsheet, so I know exactly where every single one of them are, so I though I would show you the fruit of my hard work. Also I enjoy looking at other people's stashes, so hope you enjoy it too.



I have also taken pictures of the contents of each box and separate packs, so if you're interested, have a look! No individual pictures, but I did do a rather extensive series on my nail polish stash last November, so click here if you'd like to check it out.

See lots more pictures after the jump!

NOTD: No7 Vivid Violet and Color Club Covered In Diamonds

I had been eyeing up this gorgeous purple shade from No7, such a pretty purple. I also found Color Club Covered In Diamonds on one of my many, frequent trips to TKMaxx. The two polishes were meant for each other! Vivid Violet, while very pretty on its own, provides the best canvas for Covered In Diamonds. It is a flaky polish with loads of multicoloured flakes in different shapes.

The formula of Vivid Violet was very nice, but Covered In Diamonds is VERY thick, so you really only want to do one coat. Luckily it has a lot of flakes, so you get a good coverage in just one application. I can't remember now how long it lasted without chipping, I think it was the average 2 days or so, but in the end I kept it on my nails for ages because it was so pretty.

No7 polishes cost £7 from Boots and you get 10 ml. Color Club isn't available in the UK (other than TKMaxx I think), but on eBay you can find it for around $3 (£1.80) and you get 15 ml.

See more pictures after the jump!

This Month I...

Rather than just doing a post about products I've finished this month, I've decided to do more of a summary of the last month and all beauty related happenings. So here we go.

Last month I...

• finished 3 products. It's been a slow month, what can I say? At least it's more than nothing, eh? One of the products finished was Maybelline Lash Stiletto mascara which I really enjoyed using and would definitely consider repurchasing if I didn't already own 20+ mascaras. It also lasted for ages, I don't even remember when I first started using it, it didn't go bad or dry out, just simply ran out eventually. 
• have overspent by about £250 again. I think I should just up my budget, because it's clearly too low. Or maybe buy less make up and spend less money. (Crazy talk, I know.)
• have bought another lorry load of nail polishes. I know I'm crazy, I have been buying nail polish all the time, but there are so many pretty colours! I have also discovered a couple of brands (namely Glitter Gal and A-England) I'd not heard about before and they both happened to be holographic nail polishes which is my weakness. 

Here are some pictures of the pretty polishes I bought in April (some reviews will follow eventually, let me know in the comments which ones you're interested in the most). First up, A-England holo polishes:

Princess Tears, Lady Of The Lake, Ascalon, Tristram, Princess Sabra

See lots more pictures after the jump!

NOTD: Layla Hologram Effect Nail Polish Mermaid Spell

As I said before, I'm always on the hunt for good holographic nail polishes, so when I saw Charlotte blog about these polishes, I knew I had to pick some up myself. I ordered 4 of them including a beautiful purple that I'll be showing you later, but for now here's another one: Mermaid Spell.

The picture above was taken in indirect sunlight, so the holographic effect isn't that strong, but even so, it is way more noticable than the Color Club polish I showed you the other day. It really comes to life in direct sunlight or under a strong indoor light, which you will see towards the end of this post. The colour is a really pretty light blue/turquoise. The consistency itself was fine, I think I did 3 coats, two below and one over the Seche Vite topcoat (to prolong wear and make sure the topcoat doesn't dull the holo effect). It chipped on me fairly quickly (day 2), but it's so pretty, I can forgive it.

I bought mine from Simply Occasions and they cost £11.25 each (so not cheap), and you get 10 ml for your money. Postage is free on orders over £21 (so that's two bottles of this). Well worth checking out if you like holographic polishes.

See more pictures aftre the jump!

NOTD: Color Club Worth The Risque

This was one of the nail polishes I showed you in my recent haul post and I had a request to review some of the Color Club polishes, so I chose this. Truth is, I've been on the hunt for a good holographic nail polish for a while now and as the GOSH holographic polish is selling for crazy money on eBay, I thought I'd try some alternatives instead.

This polish is definitely not as holographic as I had hoped, compared to the GOSH one it really is disappointing. I took the pictures in hazy sunlight and you can just about see the rainbow. It is more visible under strong indoor light, but even that isn't too noticable. My nails just look silver rather than holo-rainbow, sadly. On the upside, the formula is really nice, not too thick, not too runny, fast drying and I'm into day 2 now with very minimal chipping. The coverage is absolutely fantastic, what you see in the pitures is 2 coats, but really, you can get away with one. The reason I did two coats is because I apply an extra coat on top of the Seche Vite top coat to make it longer lasting and also because top coats can dull the holo effect.

All in all, a nice subtle holo polish with a great formula. I got mine from eBay and it cost $3.25 with reasonable shipping cost.

Have you tried any holographic nail polishes? Have you got a favourite? Let me know in the comments!

See more pictures after the jump!

My Recent Haul Pictures

I'm still playing catch up when it comes to writing blog posts, so I thought I'd do a quick one about my recent make up (and mostly nail polish!) purchases. I don't think I will get around to reviewing many of these anytime soon (I have one review coming), but if you are really interested in something, let me know in the comments. So without further ado, here are the pictures:

My Cherry Culture order

First up lots of lovely Milani stuff. I bought these from Cherry Culture when they recently had a 20% sale. Shipping was quite expensive, but I was very pleased that I didn't have to also pay customs duty and the horrendous £8 Royal Mail fee on top of it all, so the above came to a total of £60 which isn't too bad actually.

See what other products I bought after the jump!

NOTD: Color Club Nail Polish in Secret Agent

Around October last year my local TK Maxx had loads of Color Club nail polish sets and among others I managed to snap up the Alter Ego Keep It Under Cover set (with 6 shades and a top coat) for just £7.99. Secret Agent is from this collection and is an amazing bluey purple shade. Sadly as with all purples, it was very hard to photograph as my camera refuses to pick up purples and just truns them into blue. So I used my phone to try and capture the true colour. I think it's still on the bluer side, it's a really amazing purple in real life.

Without flash

I apologise, but I cannot remember how many coats this took (although think it was 2) and how long it lasted without chipping (guessing my average of 2 days), but I loved it so much, I had to show you the pictures. I'm sure this is still available, if nowhere else, then from eBay, and it only costs a few pounds/dollars, so well worth picking up if you can.

See more pictures after the jump!

Festive Nails: Color Club Sugarplum Fairy

I have another holiday nail polish to show you, this is Color Club Sugarplum Fairy from the Beyond The Mistletoe collection. It's really full on, lots of holographic glitter in a light purple base. Very pretty and very sparkly.

Formula is a bit thick, although that means it's opaque in two coats, actually it's pretty much opaque in one, but I applied a second one to even it out. Unfortunately it chips very quickly and in fact one nail completely peeled off witin 24 hours. I stuck it back on with a base coat and it was alright for another day, but by the end of day 2 it didn't look good. Removal was easy in that I managed to just peel it all off, which is probably not the best for my nails, but hohum.

I bought this as part of a set from TK Maxx for just £7.99, but sadly it's not available there anymore. However, you can find it on eBay for not much more (i've seen it for just £2 per polish on eBay). You get 15 ml in a bottle.

Do you like glitter nail polishes like this one? Let me know in the comments!

See more photos after the jump!

My Ever Growing Nail Polish Collection Part 2 - Zoya, Color Club, Mac, Nails Inc.

Here's the second part of my nail polish stash post, if you missed part one, you can check it out here. And don' forget to come back soon to see part three!

As you will see below, a lot of my nail polish sets are still in boxes, this is partly because I haven't used them yet (Color Club), or because they are actually more convenient to store like that. I apologise for being too lazy to remove them from the packs. If you really want to see detailed pictures, let me know in the comments and I'll see what I can do.

First up are my magnetic polishes, I only own these 3, and actually didn't like them much, so won't be buying more of them. I might just sell thm actually.

Nails Inc and 17 magnetic polishes

See more pictures of my stash after the jump!