Update on Shellac and Giveaway

Today is the last day to enter my 300 Followers giveaway. Click here to go to the post about this to enter.

My shellac is gone. I took it off last night. It was a really pretty colour but it had chipped on all but 2 fingers. I think it is my nails, because apart from my experiences everyone else I know has found it great and really long lasting. It is a shame that it doesn't seem to like me much. I have tried it three times now, but really don't want to spend the $60 each time to get it, if it is going to chip on me. I didn't take any pictures of what it ended up like because I didn't want to give it a bad rap, when I know it does work well on many others.

Luckily it is sunny today (first time in about 3 weeks), so I'm trying to get a lot of swatches done.

Hope you all have a great weekend.

Lots of Love
Lisa

OPI Last Friday Night

On Saturday we managed to find a Farmers that actually had some of the Katy Perry polishes left in stock. These are selling for $25 each, so luckily I got mine ages ago online.

Here is Last Friday Night from the much anticipated and sold out Katy Perry Collection.

OPI Last Friday Night - Sunshine

OPI Last Friday Night - Shade

This is three coats.. Slightly thicker than I thought it would be. Light blue jelly with 2 different sized blue/silver/rainbow glitters. Not great alone if you don't like visible nail lines, but great as a top coat.

The Katy Perry collection was the first to have the shatter polish as part of the collection. All four polishes were designed to be layered with Black Shatter.

OPI Black Shatter over OPI Last Friday Night

I am still wearing my shellac at the moment and it has been horrible weather here all weekend so I haven't managed to get a photo of it in sunlight yet. I do have a couple of little chips that I am not too happy about. My salon gives a one week free touch up, but I so cant be bothered going all the way there to get them fixed up. I'm getting a bit bored of the colour and cant wait to try out some of my new un-trieds (Color Club Starry Temptress is calling my name). I'm thinking I might be able to make it to the end of this week before I have to remove it - It just seems a waste when it costs so much.

Lots of Love
Lisa

Color Club Fractured Collection

Color Club has jumped on the crackle/shatter/fracture bandwagon and is releasing 6 fracture shades.

Color Club Fractured Collection (L-R): Clean Break, Broken Tokens, Tattered in Gold, Have a Bash, Crush on you, Smash Hit.

Break it up! Get a Jagged-edge finish with fractured, Color Club's latest lacquer innovation. Just brush fractured over dry polish and expect a radical transformation.

• Bold shades designed to shatter expectations
• Brush over any polish for an edgy “cracked” effect.
• Always Formaldehyde/Toluene/DBP-free

Lots of Love
Lisa

Spotted in NZ: Orly Precious

I failed.

I broke my no buy.

Me and Lisa went out to the movies and before it started we went shopping. Not a good idea when on a no buy with your best friend who also loves nail polish as much as you do.

Farmers had a full display of the new Orly Precious collection.

In my defence Farmers was selling Orly polishes at buy one get one free. How can you turn that down? We both got a bottle of Royal Velvet each.

Hope your Easters are going well.

Lots of Love
Lisa

Easter Cupcakes

I made these for the people in my office at work. They are lucky to have me.


Lots of Love
Lisa

Shellac 2.0

Since Shellac brought out new colours, I thought I would give it another go.

Shellac still hasn't brought out a great range of colours, but there is a lot of layering going on of the current colours to make new ones. I went for a great dark green colour that was make by layering Iced Coral over Black Pool.


Unfortunately the sun hasn't come out and I couldn't get better pictures. It is a lot more emerald green and brighter in real life. These pictures do not do it justice - I will work on getting so better pictures over the long weekend.

This was 2 coats of Black Pool followed by one coat of Iced Coral, which is a green shimmer (it seems a lot like CND Emerald/Teal Shimmer)

So far I have had this on for 3 days. Luckily the colour is shimmery a pretty so I am not yet bored with it.

This time my nails and cuticles are in much better condition than they were about a year ago when I first got shellacked. Last time the shellac peeled off when my nails flaked off. This time I am expecting it to last a lot longer.

I got this done at Finishing Touch Salon in Wellington, and it cost $60.

Have a great Easter ladies.

Lots of Love
Lisa

China Glaze 3D Fantasy

Holographic polishes don't really need many words do they?

China Glaze 3D Fantasy - sunshine

Enlarge the picture to see the holo goodness this polish has - again compressing the image dulls the holoness - but I assure you it is holo!

This is a red/orange scattered holographic from the 2011 Tronica collection. I love these polishes. China Glaze make great 2 coater holographic polishes.

Lots of Love
Lisa

Spotted in New Zealand: Color Club Untamed Luxury

I just saw these an hour ago in my local Life Pharmacy. A whole entire untouched display of the winter Untamed Luxury collection.


They were selling these for $14.99 - which is an improvement because the exact same pharmacy was selling the Poptastic Color Clubs for $22.99 over summer.

You can buy the 7 piece untamed luxury packs online in New Zealand at www.usanailsonline.co.nz for $59 each (that works out to only be $8.40 a polish!).

If I weren't on a no buy at the moment (Paying of a huge credit card bill and trying to save for my wedding) I definitely would have picked up Covered in Diamonds (the flakie top coat) and Untamed Luxury (teal green glitter)

Lots of Love
Lisa

H&M Envy Me

The wonderful Jill sent me three H&M polishes from Europe in the parcel I got from here. We don't have H&M in New Zealand. The closest I have ever gotten to an H&M store is the H&M expansion pack I have for the Sims 2 computer game.

But I think I need to get some more of these. I love them!

This is my favourite green ever! It is gorgeous!!!!!

H&M Envy Me - sunshine

This is a dark pigmented smooth polish which only needs two coats. I love this colour so much. Its a dark dark green teal shimmer.

Envy Me is almost identical looking to Butter London's Thames in the bottle, but on the nail Envy me is 1 million times better. Thames looks great in the bottle but is flat and unexciting on the nail.

Butter London Thames - sunshine
Read my previous post about this here.

The only let down with these H&M polishes is the awkward shaped handle that takes a bit of getting used to. But its sooooo worth it.

Do you have and H&M in your country? do you like their polishes?

Have a good weekend

Lots of Love
Lisa

HELP!!!!! (shipping question)

There is a challenge going on in the NZ and Australia Blogging community.

How do you ship polishes legally from New Zealand to Australia for a reasonable price???

Any ideas????

There are rewards if we solve this!!!!!!!!

Color Club Factory Girl + Comparison + Glitter

This is another polish from Color Clubs Poptastic Collection. These are still on sale in New Zealand at www.usanailsonline.co.nz for only NZ$8.90.

Color Club Factory Girl - Sunshine

Factory girl starts of sheer but after three coats is fine. It is a light blue creme polish with a smooth finish. Dry time was good and wear was good as well.

I thought I'd do a comparison of some other light blue creme polishes to show you what it is like.
Here is a comparison between Color Club Factory Girl, OPI Whats with the Cattitude? and Color Club Take me to your Chateau.

Light blue creme comparison - sunshine

Factory Girl and Cattitude are both three coats. These too are the closest in colour to each other. I think that the OPI polish has a nicer formula, where theirs are slightly jelly-ish. Color Club Take me to your chateau is much lighter. This one was only two coats. It is a much thicker creamier polish that needs less coats to reach opaqueness. My favourite of the three is OPI whats with the cattitude? It has a nicer formula than the other two.

Light blue comparisons (same order as above photo) covered with OPI Last Friday Night - Sunshine

I then covered the comparison in OPI Last Friday Night from the Katy Perry Collection. I love this jelly glitter as a top coat over blue polishes. I think it works well with all three of these blues. Here the lighter blue of take me to your chateau works very well - but this polish is designed to go with a glitter top coat (Color Club Si Vous Please!)

Lots of Love
Lisa

Essence Bonnie and Clyde

This is the second pair of Essence Nail Art Twins sent from the lovely Jill that I tried.

This is set #03 - Bonnie and Clyde

This is Bonnie and Clyde. I think I am of a slightly too younger generation to really understand who Bonnie and Clyde were.

Essence Bonnie - Sunshine

Essence Bonnie - Shade

This is a medium creme blue. This was two coats, but again if you were in a hurry (and were using the top coat) you could get away with one thick coat. This is a smooth creme polish.

WARNING - use a base coat!!!! this thing stains like a *******

Essence Clyde (over Bonnie) - Sunshine

Essence Clyde (over Bonnie) - Shade

This is one coat of Clyde over the two coats of Bonnie. The glitter is a few different shapes and sizes. The bigger bits of glitter in this are silvery blue squares, floating in a blue base filled with little tiny blue and silver glitter pieces.

It does look pretty and I like these pairs, but please please please use a base coat underneath! I cant stress that enough!!!

Lots of Love
Lisa

China Glaze Virtual Violet

China Glaze Virtual Violet is the first of the Tronica polishes I tried out. Thanks again to smoochiefrog for sending me these polishes (check out her month of holographic polishes here)

China Glaze Virtual Violet - sunshine

These pictures look alot better englarged. Compressing them hides the rainbows and the holographic-ness of this polish, so click on them to see the holographic awesomeness.

While the polishes in the Tronica collection are as holographic as the OMG and Kaleidoscope collections, but they are pretty and are holographic. The Tronica collection have scattered holo and do look really great in the sun. They are two coaters and dry quickly. You can easily wear them with out a top or base coat.

Its getting very cold and wet here and the sunshine has dissappeared, so getting more pictures of these holographic polishes is getting harder.

Hope you all had a good weekend

Lots of Love
Lisa

Inglot 319

This is Inglot 319. It is a shimmery frosty pale green. It has a pretty purple yellow shimmer/duo-chrome. Dont be put of by the frosty-ness of this polish. It is still beautiful.

Inglot 319 - shady light

Sorry there was no sun here when I took these pictures. These don't quite show how pretty it is. This is three coats, which is good for a pale green shimmer which are usually very sheer.

I am surprised at the lack of hype about these polishes. From what I can tell they are sold in quite a few countries around the world, including America, but unfortunately not in New Zealand. Googling these polishes yields very few hits and hardly any swatches. I think they are under-rated.

I enjoyed my shopping experience at Inglot in Melbourne. I got a 4 pack of eye shadow and 2 nail polishes. I loved how you can customize your own eyeshadow palette, and the four I brought are now my favourite eye shadows.

I wish people talked more about these polishes. I would love to get more of them, but as far as I can tell no one is shipping them to New Zealand (not to mention I am on a massive no buy so that I can pay off my credit card and save for my wedding)

Have you tried Inglot polishes? What do you think of them?

Lots of Love
Lisa

Spotted in NZ: Color Club Electro Candy Collection

The whole Electro Candy collection is now being sold in New Zealand online at

www.usanailsonline.co.nz

These are selling for $13.90 (which is $2 cheaper than in stores) with a flat rate shipping to anywhere in New Zealand of $3.90.

I love the Electro Candy collection. Ultra Violet is my favourite polish of all time. The whole collection is made up of neons, with flashes of blue shimmer running through them. They are all gorgeous.

Go and get yours now!!!! It might be a little late to wear them this summer but you can wear them next year! (or like me and all year around)

Electro Candy

Volt of Light

Ultra Violet

Tangerine Scream

Pure Energy

What a Shock!

Lots of Love
Lisa

Color Club Peppermint Twist

I think Im getting pretty close to owning all of the Color Club Poptastic polishes now.

I bought Peppermint Twist ages ago, and the sales assistant was completely confused by the name, we both thought it should be a light green mint colour, but peppermint twist is a gorgeous medium pink (I think that's where the twist bit of the name comes into play).

Color Club Peppermint Twist - natural light

This is a great barbie doll pink creme. It isn't neon bright so it totally wearable. this is three coats and is easy to apply. It dries nice and shiny. I think this is definitely one of my favourites from the Poptastic collection.

China Glaze Fairy Dust over Color Club Peppermint Twist - natural light

Because there was no sun the day I took this picture you don't get the full effect of Fairy Dust. It is a holographic glitter top coat, and I love to wear it over creme polishes to make them sparkle (you know I am a sucker for sparkles)

We have just had daylight savings here, so now it is dark really early at night. This makes swatching hard, so from now on we have to hope for sunny weekend days so that I can actually get some swatches done.

Lots of Love
Lisa

BYS Colour Change Bright Purple

This is the second polish I tried from BYS's Colour Change range. And this was a much better experience than the first one.
Originally I wasn't so keen on this one as it didn't have the glitter in it, like Glitter Blue did (see that post here) But it is made up of two really nice girly colours that may actually be ruined with glitter.

BYS Colour Change Bright Purple - cold state - sunshine

This is 3 coats. The polish goes on this purple and dries this colour too. If you enlarge the picture you can actually see there is some very fine shimmer to this polish. Although in the bottle it looks creme. this applied easy and dry time was good. It is a little on the runny side, but not too bad that you cant work with it.

This one was the opposite of the Blue glitter one I used last time. Here I had to run my hands under hot water to get the polish to change colour (last time I had to use cold water).

BYS Colour Change Bright Purple - warm state - sunshine

I do quite like this one. I am currently doing a mani of this at the moment. Although to be honest I'm not sure about what happens when you put a top coat over these - does it then just stay the one colour? or change under the top coat? I'll let you know.

If you are interested in owning 2 of these BYS colour change polishes, then enter my 300 followers giveaway! (see side bar)

These are available in New Zealand for NZ$8.90. Also available in Australia and online at fashionaddict.com.

Lots of Love
Lisa

Edit: I am now wearing this again, with a top coat and it seems fine. Although my temperature must be different from last time because my nails are pink , with purple tips at the moment :) I wish my nails were longer so i could have more purple looking coolness at the tips.

Edit number 2: I have had this on for over a day and absolutely love it! It is much pinker than the photo above shows. It lasted well with a top coat and still changed to full on purple when i was cold or washed my hands in cold water. LOVE