Orange Nail Varnish Collection and Swatches

Orange is one of my all time favourite colours. It always perks me up to have a pop of orange in my look and nail varnishes are ideal for this. I think orange is one of the most lively and positive colours there is and I find myself picking up cosmetics in this shade far more often than I'm willing to admit! As I was packing away some of my things for my upcoming move (nothing dramatic, just going back to Grandma's before University so we can help each other out) I started idly scanning my polishes and a few really stuck out to me. So here are my five favourite orange nail varnishes!

From Thumb to Pinky: Models Own Fluro Orange, Nails Inc Porchester Place, Essie Fear or Desire, Rimmel Tangy Tangerine, W7 Pastel 16

Fluro Orange is ridiculously bright, no camera on earth could capture it's insane beauty. I didn't keep this bizarre (but kinda cool right? No? Just me then...) mani on for long but it's definitely the one that I couldn't keep my eyes off. If you're after some seriously attention grabbing talons I can't recommend this enough. It has a semi-matte finish but you could easily add a glossy top coat for a little more finesse. Porchester Place and Fear or Desire are fairly similar but Porchester Place has a touch more pink and is a little more muted. Both perfect for holiday toes! Tangy Tangerine is a classic apricot and was my boyfriends favourite of the lot for some reason. When I first asked his opinion he replied that they were all the same (my jaw nearly hit the floor at his blindness) but when pressed he claimed that Rimmel's offering was "more subtle and pretty."  I have to agree, it's a great transitional shade for Spring/Summer and won't offend your poor blind boyfriend. W7 is such a pain in the bum to effectively track down but I do so love them! I got a ten pack of pastels from TK Maxx and this is one of my favourites. Very delicate and cool and gorgeous with a tan.

I really hoped you like this! I have a real soft spot for colour-themed collections and adore seeing them on blogs so I couldn't resist! I think I may go for pink lip products next time. What do you think?

Which is your favourite shade? Any others that I have to try?

Lauren

Guest Post: Albertine's Floral Nail Tutorial

During the last Sunday #bbloggers chat I talked about how I'd like the opportunity to do/host more guest posting as it's such a nice way to put yourself out there. Luckily Albertine from DippyWrites had saw what I said and dropped me an email with her fantastic tutorial idea and we arranged to swap guest posts! Albertine is a really lovely girl and a great blogger so please go and check out her blog and maybe even give her a comment or follow! Keep a look out for her super cute moodboards that always leave me feeling inspired. Over to you!

Heya everyone! As Spring is (literally!!) just around the corner, I thought I would share with 

you a nice and simple floral nail tutorial. This is something I taught myself after seeing a few 

tutorials online and it's actually a lot easier than you would think to do!

I used my nail dotting tools to do this, but I think you could just as easily do it using a toothpick.

Okay so firstly paint your nails with a nude coloured polish. I used just one coat of Essie's Topless and Barefoot. Don't worry too much about it being a little bit streaky, as the majority of it will be covered with flowers.

Then, use your nail dotting tool or toothpick and a pale yellow nail polish to create the middles of the flowers. I decided to go for 3-4 per nail so it didn't look too crowded. Again, it doesn't really matter about getting these a perfect circle shape, as long as they're not too big, they'll be fine :)

Next, take a lilac nail polish and your nail dotting tool or toothpick and gently dab nail polish around the yellow centres of half of your flowers. I used Model's Own Lilac Dream for this (which is also a pretty good dupe for Essie's Splash of Grenadine!). The key to this is to make sure you don't have too much polish on your tool/toothpick, or it could end up looking a bit too messy.

Finally take a pink nail polish and repeat step 3. I decided to use Essie's Cute as a Button for this. And there you have it! Simple floral nails for spring :) Another great thing about this floral nail art is that you can use any colour you want for the petals, next time I'm thinking of using oranges and blues to create a bit of a clash!

I hope you've enjoyed reading my guest post for Lauren, and if you have, please feel free to check out my blog: DippyWrites :)

Thank you so much Albertine! Very pretty for Spring. I'm utterly dire at nail art so I'll definitely be trying this out some time soon. I'll be posting about my Top 5 Nail Varnishes for Spring over at DippyWrites so please go and check that out too when it's up, there are some really gorgeous colours that made the cut! 

Lauren

NOTD Barry M Black and MUA Nail Constellation in Libra

I was very lucky recently and won a giveaway from the lovely Jasmine at Oh So Flawless (thank you!) Included was one of the fairly new MUA Nail Constellations which are a high street dupe of the Ciaté Caviar manicures. They come in a few different colour mixes and I got Libra which contains mostly black beads with a few turquoise. I figured that it would look best over a plain black background and I found a Barry M one in my collection that I hadn't tried yet.

The Barry M Black was streaky on the first application but fully opaque on the second coat. It also dried fairly quickly which is great. The Nail Constellation managed to thoroughly confuse me. It literally couldn't figure out how to open the damn thing! I pulled off the tip and nothing came out... turns out I was being an absolute fool. The entire cap comes off (with a bit off effort) and there is a small piece of plastic sheeting covering the beads. Despite there being an applicator tube I decided it would be easiest to go for a dipping method and promptly poured some into a bowl. The hard part came later when I was trying to put the excess back in the bottle!

I decided to opt for an accent nail rather than a full manicure because it just seems so much easier to wear! The beads themselves stuck very well and I loved the black on black. I think the amount of turquoise beads wasn't very well thought out though. It's practically impossible to achieve even spacing so they just look a bit random and out of place. Not that the colour even mattered, because within a couple of hours the turquoise beads had turned silver. As soon as I got them wet the colour disappeared which is a bit disappointing. Despite the issues I actually really did like the look and they lasted much longer than I thought they would. I always imagined caviar manicures to be more of a one night deal but these lasted a good few days until I took them off (because the Barry M polish had chipped.) I did lose a few on the first day when I pulled something out of my pocket but they mostly stayed put when the polish solidified. I think this pot is going to last absolutely ages, you need hardly any for the look. I'm not sure if I'll buy any more though simply because I'm not sure how much I would wear them. I'm very happy that I got the chance to try them out though, thanks again Jasmine!

You can buy MUA Nail Constellation at Superdrug or on the MUA website for £3. (Bargain!)

Have you tried these or the Ciate manicures? Would love to know what you think!

Lauren

Haul: No7, Models Own and much much more!

On Friday morning I woke up to my bank account looking plump and healthy after my very last pay cheque (boo.) I decided that I was going to go out in style. I passed a lot of it onto my boyfriend to cover some bills and to put some into savings. The rest was for me to spend on things that would make me happy. Queue teen movie style shopping. I've grouped the items into purpose.
First up, Skincare:

From L-R: The Body Shop Absinthe Hand Cream (sample), The Body Shop Mango Lip Butter £4, No7 Beautiful Skin Eye Make-Up Remover £8.50, No7 Beautiful Skin Hydration Mask £12.50, No7 Beautiful Skin Cleansing Balm £9, Nivea Daily Essentials Express Hydration Primer for Dry & Sensitive Skin £4.99

I tried out the Absinthe hand cream in store and really liked it. It has a light nettle scent that's really refreshing. It's thick and smooth and also comes in a hand butter which I'm quite curious about. I'm glad the assistant gave me this because I'm going to try and collect the little pots and one day mix Sleek Pout Paints in them (I WILL HAVE THEM ONE DAY!) The Lip Butter is my Holy Grail. I just finished up my Dragon Fruit one and it's lasted me absolutely ages and smells divine but I really wanted to try something new. It has a slight shimmer and more of a neutral tone to it which means I'll probably be able to wear this during the day more than my other one. Here's hoping. No7 Eye Make Up Remover is to serve as a replacement for the body shop cucumber cleansing milk which I find leaves a residue behind on my skin. Ick. I'm really excited to try the Hydration Mask. I've read some reviews and they all sound really promising. I suffer from dry patches of skin so this should help. Cleansing Balm is again to try and help my dry skin. I currently use the body shop aloe foaming facial wash, which I do love and recommend to anyone with sensitive skin, but I'm hoping this will give my skin the extra push it needs for moisture. I asked the #bbloggers a week or two ago during the chat to recommend a primer and the Nivea Express Hydration cropped up a lot. Since it was only £4.99 in Superdrug I couldn't really say no.

Nails:

From L-R: Models Own 3 in 1 (clear,) Golden Peach, Blooming Pink, In the Navy, Juicy Jules, Blizzard £5 each, Revlon Liquid Quick Dry £6.49

So I went a little crazy on the Models Own offers in Boots. I've never tried them before but they seem to be really highly rated by a lot of bloggers and I absolutely love the colours I picked up! The only one I've used so far is Blizzard which you can see here with Illamasqua's Caress. I've been a bit nail varnish mad recently and I think I'll be doing some collection posts soon which I'm excited about! Revlon Liquid Quick Dry is a product that goes on after the top coat to speed up drying time. It contains oils and vitamins which (apparently) help your nails stay healthy. I saw this and I was like omg if this works it will change my life. I'm one of those people that is just terrible for getting smudges and indents in my manicure. I've tried this once today and so far I'm pretty impressed. it definitely helped give me a rock solid mani. I'll give it a few more tries and review soon!

Hair:

Colour B4 Hair Colour Remover in Extra Strength £11.99 each

Eye wateringly expensive. I resent paying full price for anything so this was a struggle for me. I've been thinking about doing this for over a year now and I've finally decided to buy the stuff and take the plunge. The issue is that I'm currently trying to grow out my chemical-laden coloured hair and I can't deal with the bizarre colouring any more. It's dark blonde/light brown at the top, dyed brown in the middle, and auburn at the bottom. It could look a lot worse but I'm very aware of it and that's all that matters to me. By no stretch of the imagination do I think I'm gonna be blonde again afterwards but I'm hoping that this will make the divides less noticeable. I will definitely let you know what happens!

Miscellaneous:

The Body Shop Amazonian Wild Lily EDT 50ml £15, Collection 2000 Lasting Perfection Concealer in Light £4.19

I'm always on the hunt for another perfume that I like and I gave Amazonian Lily a spritz on a whim and fell in love. It's very fresh and light and the floral notes aren't overly strong. I dislike exptremely sweet/floral perfumes and I wasn't expecting to like this. Perfume scents are very personal but if your tastes are anything like mine I urge you to give it a try! I bought this with 40% off. £9 for a perfume! Bargain. Believe it or not I've never tried the Collection Concealer.  I have the illuminating touch version and I really like it, but I needed something a bit heavier for pigmentation issues. I swatched the fair shade but it is very very pale. I think Light will do nicely!

So that's everything! I did also snag a couple of the Apocalips today but it was after dark so no photos I'm afraid! I'm sure you'll see them here soon enough.

Have you tried any of the products I bought? What do you think to them?

Lauren

Boxing Day Sales Haul

I was feeling very brave on Boxing Day and decided to battle my way through the sea of people in such of some bargains! Sadly the only thing that I desperately wanted was the only thing I couldn't get - The Clinique Whole Lotta Colour set. Literally sold out EVERYWHERE. If you chat to me on Twitter you will have seen my pitiful moans about finding one. No success yet. Maybe there'll be a few about in January? Here's hoping. Here's what I did manage to find:

I picked up these ten W7 polishes from my new favourite nail varnish store - TKMaxx. I've had some fantastic luck in there recently, as you can see from this recent haul. I've never used W7 before but I just couldn't pass up this fantastic set of pastels for just £10! They are screaming SPRING at me and I can't wait for the daffodils that will be the backdrop to these ice cream shades. I can only hope that the formula will be up to scratch for me! Let me know if you've tried this brand before. Also, there's a massive amount of product in them, I've never seen 15ml nail polishes before! The only negative is that they don't come with names, only numbers. I love pretty names for products and I won't lie, I've spent some time fantasising about what I would name these. I won't tell you what I've named them because it's sad and embarrassing... how about Pina Colada for the yellow though?!

I also took a trip into one of my favourite shops - The Body Shop. They have an amazing selection of body butters in there for half price at the moment. I spent a while holding Cherry, Blueberry, Raspberry and Passion Fruit before I finally reasoned with myself that I should only take one. As you can see, I walked away with Passion Fruit but my heart is telling me that I'll have Raspberry by the end of the week. Oops. I adore the Green Apple shower gel and this is my second bottle. I recently drained my last one and it's going to be in my 2012 favourites. It's so fresh and not too sickly sweet. I'm gutted that it's been discontinued and I urge you to pick one up if you can find it, particularly for only £2 (or £1.80 with the loyalty card)! I'm in love with the Ginger Sparkle Christmas Range and recently reviewed quite a few pieces of it here. It was a no-brainer for me to grab this adorable little half price hand cream since my Soap and Glory Hand Food is on the way out. The three cosmetic bits were all in the sale AND on 3 for 2! I paid £4.05 (including my 10% discount) for two eye shadows in pretty green colours and a Delipscious Sheer Lip Colour in Pomegranate. I'd never heard of the Delipscious range before and I'm excited to try this one!

This Soap and Glory lip palette was £6 in the Boots sale and contains 6 pretty colours. I haven't tried any yet but I like the slightly brown/pink tones in some of these colours and I haven't got anything like them in my current collection. It also comes with a double ended applicator - I'm not sure about the quality of it yet but I'll let you know!

I've never shopped in Internacionale before but I decided to have a quick look on a whim and fell in love with these little pieces from the jewellery section. They were buy one get one half price (including sale stuff, yay!) so I picked these up for £3.49. Serious bargain. The cross is a lovely rose gold colour but I'm afraid the lighting was so bad it's impossible to tell from the picture. I wore the earrings yesterday and got a lot of compliments! People couldn't believe I'd got them for less than £2. They're not too heavy but look much more expensive than they are and I know I'm going to be wearing them a lot in the months to come.

So that's my little sales haul! Did you brave the shops on Boxing Day? Leave some links to show me what you picked up!

Lauren

Nail Varnish Haul: Nails Inc and Essie

TK Maxx is bargain heaven. I have only today fully embraced this amazing fact and spent an eye-watering £40 on nail varnish. BUT. It's Nails Inc and Essie, and it was worth £149. So I can't feel too guilty. I'm trying to but I can't. Here's my lovely little haul of 14 fantastic varnishes:

Fear or Desire, Bikini So Teeny, Navigate Her and bizarrely, Fear or Desire again. To be honest I don't think I'll ever get through one large bottle of neon orange, let alone two, so I'm considering selling this or if I hit a fun milestone soon, popping it in a giveaway. (Maybe an orange themed giveaway to celebrate the colour of 2012? Let me know if you like the sound of that!) This little collection set me back £9.99 which is amazing considering you can expect to pay £7.99 for a single bottle. Bikini So Teeny is the stand out for me here, a beautiful pale cornflower with a light shimmer. Hello Spring!

Great Putney Street, Putney Bridge, Kensington, Sheralton Place, Bridle Lane, Hampstead Gardens, Westminster, Holland Park Avenue, Porchester Place, Fenchurch Street. Phew! Seriously, wow, what an amazing collection! When I first saw this I wasn't too sure on Hampstead Gardens (rich mustard, bottom left) or Fenchurch Street (caramel/terracotta bottom right) but the more I look at them the more I love them. I cannot get over how much I saved here. I bought this lovely lot for £29.99 and of course, with each bottle coming in at a hefty £11 each, saved over £80. Part of me is hoping I can part with a couple of these to sell them on and justify the spend to my long suffering boyfriend, but I'm not sure it's gonna happen! My favourite here is probably Kensington, a dark dark teal/green shade. (How very 2013.) With the fabulous neutral Holland Park Avenue as a close second.

Overall I'm absolutely ecstatic with this purchase, but not ecstatic with the tumble weeds rolling through my bank account. Particularly when I should be buying Christmas presents. Oops. Roll on payday!

What do you think of my most recent haul? Which is your favourite colour?

Lauren

P.S. Sorry there was no eye challenge today. I have a bit of a cold and my eyes don't look great. It'll be up either tomorrow or you'll get a double feature on Tuesday. Sorry!

NOTD: MUA, Plum Noir

I picked this shade up in my fairly recent Superdrug/MUA haul and it was staring at me longingly this morning. I usually try nail varnishes in the order that I buy them, so I'll always wear them at least once, but I put this one off for a bit because honestly I was worried that I would hate it and I didn't want to hate anything from MUA! Luckily this was absolutely not the case and I couldn't be more thrilled with the results!

It's a really beautiful purple magenta and just perfect for this season. I can also see it being a nice Summer colour because of how pink it leans.

£1, MUA website or Superdrug

Ignore the revolting ex-sticker patch. I toyed with trying to edit it out but I'm a complete novice and I'm certain it would have ended up looking even worse!

The thing that I was worried about most with the MUA polishes is that the brush applicator would be of a really low quality. In actual fact, this is my favourite applicator that I've ever used! It's shaped in such a way that it fans out slightly across the nail. I can paint my little finger in one stroke. The formula of this is quite nice too, I'm wearing two coats here and it's mostly opaque - one of my fingers on my right hand just would not even out, even after 3 coats, but I'm pretty sure it was down to my poor application. My only small negative is that the blocky top made it slightly difficult to manoeuvre around my nails, but this is only a little gripe. For just £1 this varnish is fantastic. I'm already on the look out for my next MUA nail purchase.

What do you think of this shade? Which MUA nail varnish should I pick up next? Suggestions please!

Lauren

P.S. Hello to all my new followers!

NOTD: Barry M Indigo

I think the premise of Saturday Manicure is officially over since my weekends have been ridiculous recently. Perks of working in retail I guess, sigh. I also have to apologise in advance for my shoddy brush work and the fact that the paint has been indented with all sorts of horrific marks! Boo. But here goes.

 I have a ton of Barry M polishes. They are great value at £2.99 and come in a huge array of shades. Indigo is a beautiful deep blue. It's almost navy under artificial lighting but shines a lovely dark prussian blue in the sun. It definitely leans more purple than green.

As always application was very easy, the varnish is smooth and the brush, though not perfect, is a good shape to fill the nail in 3 strokes. The first layer of this varnish goes on very patchy but after a second coat it has perfect coverage and a high shine finish.

My right hand fared a little better.

I've already had a few compliments on this lovely shade and I think it would look even better with a fine glitter topcoat in gold or silver. Very "midnight-sky" looking. The Glamour Glitter from Nails Inc and Glamour magazine would be ideal. Barry M Nail Paints such as Indigo can be bought from Boots, Superdrug or direct from the Barry M Website for just £2.99.

Have you tried Indigo? What do you think of Barry M nail varnishes in general?

Lauren

NOTD: Nails Inc, St James

So sorry, I had this drafted yesterday but I just didn't have the time to post it. Such a busy Saturday. Luckily I have today to relax and maybe even get in a facial later!

Everyone and their mother picked up Glamour this month for the fantastic free nail varnish. I actually read Glamour regularly anyway, so I'm happy to say I didn't get it just for the freebie...but I might have.

There were four colours to choose from,

Elizabeth Street: A sheer pale pink/nude
Motcomb Street: A deep, dark navy
St. James: Blue toned red
Glamour Glitter: A golden glitter topcoat created exclusively for Glamour

It was such a difficult choice for me to choose between Motcomb Street and St. James! But I reasoned with myself that everyone needs a classic red, and it can be worn all year round. Red nails never really go out of fashion, just like red lips and black dresses.

So here it is on me!

This is the most expensive varnish I have ever used and I can honestly see why. St. James was so smooth and lovely and easy to apply. The colour was rich and bright. I even noticed a very, very light red shimmer running through which was just so beautiful and exciting to see. I've had a few people ask me what shade/brand this is and it's so great sharing it with them. This is a colour that I will be wearing all year round. I can't really fault it to be honest. Ordinarily you could expect be shelling out £11 for a Nails Inc varnish, so get one (four) right now!

Which shade did you get? What do you think of it?

Lauren

How I Stopped Biting My Nails

I had been biting my nails for as a long as I can remember. I can never recall having lovely white tips and shiny nails as a child or teen. It's actually a really irritating habit and can be quite painful; no end of times I had been ripping away at my nails or skin and suddenly they had begun to bleed and sting. I was constantly berated by my Grandmother for it and she would smack my hand away whenever she saw me do it! Plus, I was always very aware that people could see my nails and I became paranoid that they were judging me because of it. "Was she nervous and liable to make mistakes?" "Did she have no self control?" "Did she just not care about her appearance?" None of these things were true about me. I simply found myself doing it every time I wasn't fully occupied. I would do it when I watched films or sat on the internet or when I was waiting for anything! It was unsanitary and unattractive.

So this year, I decided that being 19 was a ridiculous age to still be nibbling at my fingers, and more than anything I wanted to be able to have lovely long nails that I could file and paint.

1. I made sure to think about the bad things associated with nail biting (is there anything good?!?) and kept them in my mind whilst I went cold turkey.

2. I bought a great hand cream so that I could nourish my dry fingers and cuticles. 

Hand Food by Soap and Glory (Buy at Boots) was my choice. At £5.00 it was affordable but not so cheap that I could think about wasting it by not keeping up with moisturising.

But no matter how soft and lovely my hands were I just could not stop focussing on my nails. As soon as the tips started sprouting I kept unconsciously bringing them to my mouth and stopping myself as I noticed. (Disgusting I know...) So,

3. I bought a multi use nail block.

This six-sided battered-beauty came from Boots at a mere £2.50. 

For about a month I was not seen sitting still without this with me. Every time I got the urge to bite I would file, buff and shine my way to satisfaction. My nails gleamed. People would ask me if I had a clear varnish on. It was a great feeling. Seeing my nails growing and gleaming was so encouraging and I couldn't wait for when they had enough growth so that I could paint them!

4. Finally! I bought my very first nail polish, aged 19. It was Barry M's Coral and a Top and Bottom coat to go with it. 

 I spent the entire length of The Little Mermaid (very appropriate for the colour I thought) carefully applying my varnishes. I was thrilled with the result but it felt so strange having these bright orange/pink nails and I would keep noticing them when I was walking or reading etc. 

Once I could paint them it was so much easier to keep up with my new lifestyle choice. No longer being able to see the white tips stopped me thinking about biting them all together. At that point I was changing the colour every two or three days because as soon as it started to chip I would get the urge to bite again. Humans are so weird. 

This is not to say that I didn't ever slip up. I absolutely did and I felt so awful that it completely strengthened my resolve. 5 months later, I can happily go varnish free and it no longer bothers me. I officially destroyed a life long habit, and it feels great! 

Have you beaten this habit or are you still suffering with it? How did you stop?

To sign off I'll leave this list of celebrity nail biters for you to chew over. (Puntastic! I'm so ashamed haha)

David Beckham

Phil Collins

Uma Thurman

Britney Spears

Elijah Wood

Lindsay Lohan

Kylie Minogue

Bruce Springsteen

Lisa Marie Presley

Prince Harry

Eva Mendes

Tony Robbins

And many more!

Lauren

NOTD: Maybelline, Winner Takes It All

I've decided that I'm going to do my nails every Saturday from now on because it's probably the day that I'm least likely to be doing a long shift at work.

Today I picked Winner Takes It All (820), a gold metallic from Maybelline's Forever Strong Pro range. This is the first time I've used this shade and the first time I've used a varnish from Maybelline full stop. I only just stopped a life long nail biting habit this Summer (I'll post about how I did this because when I searched online there was very little to help me!) so colouring my nails is still somewhat of a novelty for me and as such I haven't tried many brands and I certainly haven't perfected my application technique, so be gentle!

Here it is on me. Chubby fingers and all.

This really is a gorgeous shade and I really liked the shape of the brush - it made application super easy, even when using my non-dominant hand. I did find that the varnish was a little thick though and difficult to apply evenly. This has led to clear (when up close) brush strokes on my nails which is a little annoying. It's quite a flat metallic and I think that the next time I buy a shade like this I'll get some with more of a shimmer in it. I've used two coats here but I could have easily left it at one, this shade is super opaque so great for when you're in a rush. It also dried really fast which is always a bonus. It retails for £4.09 for 10mls so it's really affordable and worth a try. I bought this as part of a buy one get one half price offer at Boots though so for just over £2 I couldn't say no! I used my Barry M all in one as a base and top coat.

Which metallic shades are you loving at the moment?

Lauren