GOT Polish Challenge: Dots

It's almost time for the next prompt of the Golden Oldie Thursday Challenge but I figure since I had this mani done and photographed since Wednesday, I might as well post it. 

So here it is my GOT dots manicure. I brought out a heap of old polishes that I've been wanting to use together again and I'm fairly happy with the result. 

White base: Sally Hansen in White On

The following five are all Face Of Australia polishes from their Pastels collection, which came out in Nov 2012 and were all under $2 cheap :)

Light Blue:   Once in Once In A Blue Moon 

Purple:        Boys'N'Berries

Pink:           I'll Take You To The Candy Shop

Orange:       Would You Like Some Orange Sherbet?

Yellow:       Easy Peasy Lemon Squeezy

Once I was done the dotticure and added a coat of Seche Vite, I felt my nails looked unfinished so I added one coat of OPI and I Juggle... Men, one of my first OPI's, and one coat of Rimmel Pro Matte Finish top coat. I bought both sometime in Sep/Oct 2012 but the one that I have used the most has been the Rimmel top coat. I have used it in a good amount of posts in this blog and it's the one that started my love for any polish that's satin/matte. So if I was to pick the top Golden Oldie polish of this post, this top coat would be it. I know, it's not a colour but it's a good polish.

I had some trouble photographing the pastel colours as they looked extra pale against the white so I had to colour tweak the photos a little bit. I tried to keep it colour accurate but get it to have a little more contrast and I managed to get my hands to look red (or should I say super tanned?) in the process. It's about the polish, right? Not my hands.

Till next time, 

Laura

33 Day Challenge: Tribal

Having you own blog gives you the liberty to try out any nail styles you want, discover what you're good at and try a heap of new things you never thought you could do. It also lets you NOT do things you think you suck at and avoid them like the plague if you don't want to do them. Tribal nails was one of those things that I always wanted to do but every attempt turned out disastrous, I even bought a pack of stick on nails so I could wear this pattern. I stayed away from trying to draw tribal patterns on my nails for a while until today. Today's prompt for the 33 Day Challenge called out to do a tribal manicure. I did a bit of research to see if I could avoid the traditional tribal nail but nothing really caught my eye. 

Here it is, my what-I'd-like-to-think-is-acceptable tribal mani. I followed Nailed It's tutorial for tribal nails, which was super easy to follow. From cuticle to free end I used Face of Australia in Boys 'N' Berries, Ulta3 in Honolulu, Ulta3 in Carrot Top and Essence in That's What I Mint. For the black outline I used my Sally Hansen Nail Art Pen in, er..., Black. Topped it all off with a coat of OPI Matte Top Coat.

The lines were so uneven and the patterns irregular but that adds to the rawness of the tribal print, yeah? 

I'm think I'll start putting page breaks after two photos to tie up all my posts and make the blog look better as well as let you enjoy photo spamming at your leisure (when it happens). If you like page breaks, they bother you to no end or have a particular opinion about them, let me know. Feedback is always appreciated!

Dry Marble with Face of Australia Pastels

 Browsing through YouTube I came across this video from MissJENFABULOUS. I had actually seen it when it first came out back in June but I was browsing through her channel. Yes, I'm a fan of hers and she has some cool ideas.

So as a good 'Monkey See, Money Do'-er that I am, I brought out my lightest coloured polishes and created this mani.

Excuse the lobster-coloured hands and shiny cuticles, the colours of the polishes are the best I've captured and my cuticles have been way too dry from work. 

Polishes used: 

White (as a base): Rimmel London I <3 Lasting Finish in London Clouds

From left to Right: All Faces Of Australia from their Pastels Collection. After Dinner Mint, Boys 'N' Berries, Easy Peasy Lemon Squeezy and I'll Take You To The Candy Shop. 

Top Coat: Sally Hansen Insta-Dri

I'm really happy with the result and the technique is super easy. Including drying time and clean up, this mani only took me about twenty minutes. I also need to say, even though the formula in Face Of Australia polishes isn't generally great, I'm really loving these polishes for their slow drying time. Basically, it means that I can play around with them to create nail art (like this marble) and if I stuff it up, I can take it off without too much trouble. I'm seeing the positive on these polishes... Plus they were $1.65 each when I bought them. :)

What do you reckon? Would you try this technique? Maybe other colours? Oooh, I might try this with some metallics...

There's something really exciting (for me, at least) that I wanna show you guys in the next couple of posts. It might involve a long time lemming... Stay tuned.

Til next time, 

Laura

Not So Afraid Of The Marble Anymore

I went to Big W yesterday in search of a new foundation but stumbled upon their massive beauty sale. I found Max Factor's mini bottles for 72 cents. Yeah, that's right. When have I seen such prices for ANY brand of polish on Australia? Never! There were only three colours left so I picked them up and turn around to start running to the checkouts. 

However, in my way, I came across the Face of Australia stand. I'm not a massive fan of their formula as it takes a while to dry but every so often they come up with decent collections and fairly nice colours. Their last one is called Pastels (innovative, right?) and each bottle was $1.94. Woohoo!! I grabbed 6 out f the 7 colours of the collection and ran off to pay. 

When I got home, I took my little $14.52 stash of nail polish and then realised I didn't really like pastels. There was a reason why I never had any before!!! So I had to think of how to use them all at once and the idea of a marble popped up. I brought out my plastic cup of water and started playing with the colours and come up with something I'm actually proud of.

Look at my ring finger. Yeah, I like it.

And some more detail of my index and middle finger (excuse the bubble).

Polishes used:
All Face of Australia
Pink: I'll Take You To The Candy Shop
Purple: Boys 'N' Berries
Blue/Green: After Dinner Mint

I applied the pink polish as a base and added the three colours to the water. The beauty I found with these three polishes is that they took about a minute or so to dry up on the surface of the water so there was quite a bit time to play around with the shapes. I was also really easy to clean up. I didn't use sticky tape or Vaseline to protect my fingers but I managed to just wipe the polish off my skin with some cotton. I found some tiny bubbles from not drying my fingers quickly enough but they're barely noticeable in real life.

I originally intended to use all all six colours for the marble but the yellow and orange polishes from the collection would dissolve in the water by themselves but wouldn't let the other polishes dissolve and dry out really quickly. Really strange considering when when I combined only the yellow and orange, they would play nice and actually create a marble. 

 So, Face of Australia polishes have shown me the beauty of the marble and how I shouldn't be so afraid. Hmm... I wonder what other colours I can try.

Till next time, 

Laura