31 Day Manicure Challenge Day 27 - 'Nails inspired by art work'

Today's inspiration is supposed to be taken from 'art work'. I chose not to go for an artist who dabbles in paints and canvas - instead, I took inspiration from a friend and the works of art that she regularly creates.  If you like sweet treats, you might want to visit Dewbien of Bailey Ana Cakes.

Here is my manicure inspired by the artistic goodies:

Not a stitch on the real thing though...

 

Gorgeous right? All I can say is that the birthday girl must have been very, very happy when she saw this!

Tomorrow's inspiration is a flag...

xx

31 Day Manicure Challenge Day 16 - 'Tribal print'

Well hi!  How's it going? What's new?

Today was tribal print day in the challenge and I was under some serious pressure. Now, before I'd even reached day one of the challenge, I had decided that I was not going to do Aztec print. Whilst I had seen some fantastic Aztec-icures (new word alert), floating around on blogs, I thought I'd do something different.

At first, I thought I'd pull out the stops and do a Masai jewellery pattern like this:

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Pretty adventurous after a hard day at work right?

The hubby was eyeballing me because he'd already told me to go to bed a million times already...so I had to scrap that idea. Whilst pretending that I couldn't hear him giving me my marching orders, I came across a blog with this picture on it :

 

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Now THIS was slightly more achievable!

Here ya go:

 

Collection 2000 'Cocoa' - this is a dusty (old/discontinued polish) and I have had this forever. I slathered it in a coat of Nubar 2010 and then did the squares with my trusty acrylic paints.

Don't mind the blue palms.

Phew, glad I got that one out of the way because it was hard just trying to think of what to do!

Delaynee, to name a few ladies, is doing the challenge.

Right, I'm off. I have a date with my Helmer.

xx

Bulter and Wilson, Nails Inc and my current mani

Okay, so after the Collection 2000 launch, myself and Larry went off in search of a swift half, before bedtime.  As we wandered around, we came across some shop fronts that totally blew our minds. 

Check THESE out!

 We found these beauties at Butler and Wilson. These iPhone covers are not as expensive as you might think... Maybe if you're really good this year Santa might sort you out?

Nails Inc have also launched a Magnetic Polish range.

Apologies  for the poor quality shots; I had my face pressed up against the shop front window to get a snap of these bad boys. 

The display video in the window shows the nail technician painting the nails of a customer, taking the lid of the bottle (which has a magnet in it) and placing it near to the wet nail for a few seconds.  When the lid is removed, magnetic particles in the polish have been pulled into a pretty pattern. For those of you who haven't seen this before, it is definitely a sight to behold. Usually I don't rate Nails Inc polishes because I don't think the £10.50 - £11.00 price tag is always worth it. These bottles are £13 each! I don't know... would YOU buy these?

And now onto MY nails! This what I wore in the last post:

 Collection 2000's Fruit Salad with Nubar 2010 on the thumb, index and ring fingers. The stickers were a bit of a nightmare to get off the plastic backing sheet but I managed not to tear too many of them.

Hah. I tried to do an artsy shot like Anastacia but it wasn't quite the look I was going for. We don't have much in the way of plant life in our back garden!


Until next time!


xx

My jollies at Collection 2000's new line release party...pic heavy!

Hello friends, hope you are well.

This post will be diverting somewhat from the norm (nails). Why? Well, I was invited by the very lovely Lauren from Collection 2000 PR to attend an evening of cocktails and cosmetics last night.  In honour of the brand I thought I might buy one of their polishes for the first time.

Some of you may be familiar with Collection 2000, a cosmetics line available at...wait for it...Boots AND Superdrug.  If you know me in the flesh, you will be aware that I do not work in retail and my job is FAR removed from the world of beauty. In short, my opinions in this post are mine and no-one has asked me to do anything apart from attend and play with make-up. Larry, one of my everlasting girlfriends, came with me to peruse.

 The new face of Collection 2000's Autumn/Winter line is Diana Vickers, a young singer well known for her successes during X Factor 2008. The products used to style her (all of the below) will be available at Boots and Superdrug from 5th and 25th October respectively.

The soiree was located in Hush, a swanky restaurant fairly near to Claridges in the West End of London and upon arrival I was met with a flutes of champagne and browsing rights. Wanna see what I saw?

A 'Smokey Eyes' palette (£4.99) with 9 individual colours and instructions about how not to make yourself look like a panda, Metallic Cream Eyeshadows (£2.99) which have an applicator like a lip gloss and Luscious Lashes in Natural and Glam Volume (£2.99)

Glam Crystals Dazzling Gel Liner (£2.99)

Nail Smash - in only two colours (£2.99)  I tried this on someone whilst I was there (I didn't want to ruin my own mani!) and I have to say, the white cracked really well.  I can't help thinking that Collection 2000 left it preeetty late to bring out their version of crackle polish.  Other brands have a multitude of colours already...

Now these are cute and right up my alley, lol! Shimmy shake and Scarlet (£1.79 8ml). They are fast dry and I know this because the manicure I wore was the same brand in Fruit Punch.

 Illuminating Touch Concealer (£?), Super Size Fat Lashes (£2.99), Pump up the Volume (£4.99) and Sky Scraper Mascara (£?) These seem to be the tools to use for impact lashes. I only have the Pump up the Volume but I have high hopes for it...I'll review it and get back to you.

 Cream puff lip glosses. I had one of these already and it feels like you are putting a moisturiser on your lips. It does dry matte though...so you may just want to put some other gloss over it if you don't like that effect. Like me. There is also the Lock n Hold lip gloss (which is supposed to last for up to 6 hours and I don't have a price for).

 Lasting Lipsticks at £3.49 I didn't get to look at any of these properly, because the room was low lit.

Lasting Perfection 16 hour wear powder. I don't know how much these are, but they come in fair, medium and um, dark. 
Unfortunately, the powder range is not something that a woman of darker skin tone would be able to wear. I'm a very light skinned black woman and these colours are no good for me.  In the corner there are some Colour Match Foundations (£5.99) which come in five shades...again none of which were appropriate for my skin tone.
There were other powders and polishes hanging around waiting to be played with but as the lighting was quite low, I didn't get an opportunity to get a good look.

My verdict on the new line? I liked what I saw. The nail polishes and eye products looked fantastic, along with the lashes. I'm also pretty eager to see if I can follow the instructions to create a smokey eye! I had a lovely evening and came away with some really nice products.  I also got to browse in Bond Street at 9pm (when I'm usually on my sofa zoning out) and see some stunning sights. Check back for my next blog post to find out more.

Disclaimer time!
I received these items for free and was NOT asked to review them or blog about them at all...although the pictures of Diana were on the cutest little USB stick which was in the goody bag stuffed full of cosmetics and product info...

xx