A quick NOTD

I thought I would do a quick NOTD post for you whilst I have some peace and quiet as my boyfriend has his rowdy friends round, but they're currently pumping iron in the gym downstairs. Ahhh, bliss!

I first saw this on Missglamorazzi's YouTube channel and I thought it looked pretty cute. It's simple yet different to the normal french manicures. I did change it up a little and used China Glaze - Cosmic to do the black tips as I wanted a little bit of glitter in there, but even that didn't fulfil my glitter needs, so I added a swipe of my Saffron polish (pictured) to add a bit more sparkle to it! The base I used is Basil Street by Nails Inc, which I got free with Glamour magazine - wooo!

This is probably going to be my last post of 2011 :'(. I was going to do a top 10 polishes this year, but everyone seems to be doing so. BUT if I have time before I go out tomorrow I may have a little swatch fest and get them uploaded sometime. If not, then i will possibly do it first week into the new year. Happy 2012 (let's hope we see Christmas 2012 ;))

Friday Nail Mail!

I've been slacking off a lot lately when it comes to my Nail Mail posts, mainly because I haven't had much recently but I did a little bit of shopping the other day, I got a couple polishes from my mum at Christmas and then some arrived in the mail today, so it's about time I show you the recent additions to my collection.

First up is the little nail polish set my mum got me for Christmas. It's by Front Cover and is found in Boots (and Superdrug I think) for about £10/£15 (again, don't quote me on that) and contains 7 polishes and 2 nail files. The colours are great, but they do need quite a few coats to get full opacity. Also, the brush handles are SO small, so they're a nightmare to work with, especially when adding them to my Nail Wheels!

The next polishes I picked up from Superdrug (minus the lilac foil - that was a present from my mum too) although when I went to Superdrug I did pick up another Lilac Foil for a swap. The colours I got were Gold Foil and Indigo. If you know me you'll know I love BarryM polishes, and I WILL complete the whole collection.

I also nipped into Sallys whilst I was in town to pick up some new China Glaze polishes, I was originally going to get a couple from the Metro collection I've been wanting for a while, but when I saw these two (Blue Year's Eve & Champagne Baubles) I had to get them so my Let It Snow collection was complete. When I got to the till to pay for them, they rang up at £2.88 each! I actually had to repeat the price in case the guy had made a mistake. Turns out they're discounted as they are now classed as discontinued. Awesome.

Finally I bring you to the little beauties that arrived today! The Kardashian Kolor collection from Nicole by OPI. These are my first EVER NOPI polishes and I am SO happy. I got Khloe Had A Little Lam Lam, Follow Me On Glitter (A dupe for CG - Some Like It Haute) and Listen To Your Momager! I was so tempted to buy a lot more of them, but at £8 each they got a little bit on the expensive side. At the time of ordering these, they didn't have Rainbow in the S-Kylie, but now they do, I'm annoyed at that simply because it's the one I wanted most as I can't find Rainbow Connection ANYWHERE (well at least for a decent price). Think I will have to get it next payday (if it's still there!)

So that's the nail mail for you guys, I have a NOTD post coming soon-ish and also I will be updating my stash swatches with the new polishes and also the ones that weren't swatched previous. So stay tuned!

We did it, Ladies!

Firstly, thank you to everyone who gave me suggestions of how to get rid of horrible stained nails! You girls are literally my saviours. Secondly, if you haven't already guessed, I have successfully de-stained my nails! They're not 100% perfect, but for the 5 minutes it took, I'm pretty impressed with it!

Here they are before! *Sick bucket*

Here they are now! WOW

I know you're probably dying to find out how I de-stained them, I basically took two pieces of advice I was given and did them both; Buffed my nails with a Nail File and then I got a small bowl and mixed together hot water and baking soda then got an old toothbrush and gave it a scrub with that. Once most of it was buffed/scrubbed out I then just got a cotton pad with a tiny bit of Nail Polish Remover and went over it with that. Then added a little bit of cuticle oil to each nail to give it some extra love after their ordeal. And voila! SO HAPPY. Thank you to everyone who commented on the last post, you really did help!

Snapshot of the 'tools' used!

WARNING: UGLY NAKED NAILS.

First of all I want to say hello to all my knew followers, and also apologise for being MIA lately. Christmas has been SO hectic I haven't really had time to post anything.
If you follow me on Facebook, you'll know that I recently had a MASSIVE fall out with OPI - Swimsuit...Nailed It. For some unbeknown reason, it has completely stained my nails, turning them a horrible shade of aqua. They're so bad right now that I can't actually wear any light colours, as the stainage just turns into a weird grey colour and comes through the polish. Annoying isn't even the word, luckily it is Winter, so dark colours are the 'in thing' right now. Thank GOD.
Enough introduction, are you ready for the monstrosity that are my nails?! Firstly though, please excuse the ridges, I made the mistake of having acrylic nails a LONG time ago and they've never recovered :( BRACE YOURSELVES GUYS!.........

Stash Swatches! (Pic Heavy)

I did it guys! I finally got around to swatching my whole collection (well most of it, I ran out of Nail Wheels to put them on, >.<) Let me tell you, I had headache for the WHOLE day after doing this, I think I might have even got a little bit high too, is that even possible!? Anyways....I've swatched them by colours, not brands, so they're a lot easier to compare. All of these were taken with flash, as by the time I'd finished swatching everything it was dark outside, and like I said before, I have a Red bedroom, so photos not taken with flash tend to look a bit like this;

Horrible Orange Tints >.<

Wednesday Nail Mail

Today in the mail I received these little beauties that I purchased on eBay. I also received one set of 10 Nail Wheels I ordered, just another 35 to come ;) and a package from MAC.
I have a bit of a thing at the moment with getting some China Glaze silver caps to add to my collection, I currently have 6, need more asap. The polishes pictured here are; Atlantis (you have no idea how long I've been wanting to get my hands on this!), Naughty and Nice, Peppermint Cuticle Oil & Mrs. Claus. These roughly came to about £10 all together, which is a total bargain! Also, as I mentioned, my nail wheels arrived so I'm currently in the process of doing a stash swatch post for you guys!

A closer look at the polishes!

Andrea Fulerton - Donna (Peel Off)

Today I have for you Donna by Andrea Fulerton. Now this isn't your average nail polish, in fact it's a one coat, peel off polish. Yep, no remover necessary. It's marketed mainly for pregnant women who want to feel pampered and primed but cannot stand the smell of acetone/polish. Although, I'm not pregnant, I think it's an amazing idea, it doesn't smell at all like nail polish and it really does just peel off. Perfect for a quick fix for your nails if you're rushing to get out of the door/going on a night out with friends.
Donna itself is a gorgeous hot barbie pink creme, no shimmer or glitter and it applies like a dream!
These retail for around £4 in stores and come in a limited amount of colours at the moment, but I'm sure that's subject to change. I think it's a brilliant idea and if I'm ever expecting and the smell of remover makes me ill, I know I will be saved by Andrea Fulerton!

Polish Count; December

Last month I decided to do a monthly polish count, to keep track of my vastly growing collection and boy has it grown.
When I counted last month (November 22nd) I had 99 polishes. This month, my collection has grown a hell of a lot since then, to the point where I think I have a problem. I said I was going to include photos of all my additional polishes every month, but to be honest with you, I can't even remember half the stuff I got this month, if you're interested though, most of the new polishes will be in various nail mail posts.

POLISH COUNT (DEC 17) ; 175

No, this isn't a typo. I've actually bought a whooping 76 polishes less than a month...Holy cow. Houston...I have a problem.

Friday Nail Mail (Pic Heavy)

I've always wanted to try Ciaté Paint Pots ever since I received my first polish free with Marie Claire earlier this year. However, I was always put off by the price (£9 each for a 13.5ml bottle or £11 for Nail Treatments) I couldn't bring myself to spend £9/£11 for one bottle of polish. So when I was looking through my e-mails, I noticed that I had one from Ciaté, it was an offer. Any 6 polishes/nail treatments for £36 and presented in a Luxe Gift Box. I couldn't really pass this offer up, it was an opportunity to sample more of Ciatés polishes without having to pay a mammoth price to do so.
I was originally going to go half colour and half treatments, but as you can see, I went 100% colour. How cute are the bottles btw?! It's one of the main reasons why I was lusting over getting more in the first place and the cute box they came in is an added bonus!

Please excuse the swatches. I tried to get them in the minimal daylight we had left, but some needed a flash. I also have a red bedroom, so that's the reason for the orange tint!

China Glaze - LOL

Today I have for you China Glaze - LOL from the OMG Collection. I got this from eBay along with IDK and 2NITE for £10, total bargain! For those of you who aren't aware, the OMG Collection is one of the most sought after collections I've ever come across. Released in Spring 2008 the OMG collection consisted of 12 Limited Edition holographic polishes, unfortunately back in 2008 I had no idea about China Glaze, so I completely missed out on the opportunity to own them all. I have since, like every other polish addict in the world, started to lust over them and one day, I hope to make them all mine.
LOL itself is a gorgeous purple holographic polish, but it was a nightmare to apply. The formula was a bit gloopy and all over the place, but I can forgive it for that as the outcome is amazing. One HUGE disappointment for this polish is that it definitely needs sunlight to show it's true holo self, I found when indoors it just looked like every other purple on the market, tad disappointing, especially when there's hardly ever beautiful sunlight where I live! This one is definitely going to be a summer favourite though!

GOSH - Ocean & BarryM - Croc Effects

First of all, excuse the lighting, I took these less than an hour ago whilst my boyfriend banned me from using the net whilst he played his game...So I thought it would be a good time to get some swatching done.
I have another GOSH polish for you today in the form of Ocean. When I saw this in the shop I couldn't help myself but buy it, it's absolutely stunning.
Ocean is a mermaid green/blue/turquoise metallic shimmer polish, it can look 100% metallic indoors, but outdoors you can really see the shimmer sparkling away.
I thought this would be a great base colour to try with my new BarryM Croc Effects polish, and boy was I right.

Beautiful, isn't it. I was feeling a bit impatient when I did the Croc Effects, you're supposed to wait 3 minutes before the design starts to appear, but I couldn't wait that long. So a quick blast with the hairdryer soon sorted that little problem out, which is probably why it's so broken around the edges of my nails but I think it looks good anyway. I used 2 coats of Ocean and when the polish was touch-dry, I added a thin layer of Croc Effects over the top.

Has anyone else tried the new BarryM Croc Effects polish yet? What are your thoughts on it? Like or Loathe, let me know!

Nail Mail

Just a mini Nail Mail for you guys today, I got these from eBay (Color Club) & ASOS.
You may know if you have me on Facebook, that I was a little naughty and purchased Revvvolution from eBay, even though the money used was what I owed my boyfriend....oops. I've been wanting it for SO long and now it's finally mine!
From ASOS I ordered OPI - Swimsuit...Nailed It for £7. I have so many blue nail polishes, but I don't have any that even come close to this colour, which is good. I also picked up BarryM's Croc Effects polish, just to see what it's like. I'm sure I'll do a post on it soon! :)

If you're not aware, I'm having a Blog Sale that's open internationally. All funding from the Sale will be going towards polishes for the upcoming (hopefully) 100 follower giveaway!

Models Own - Aqua Violet

Today I have for you Models Own - Aqua Violet from their recent Beetlejuice collection. The collection was released on November 1st and consists of 5 shades; Aqua Violet, Purple Blue, Emerald Black, Pinky Brown and Golden Green.
Aqua Violet is an Ocean Blue/Lavender Purple duochrome with hints of Green shimmer. It's by far my favourite colour from the collection and takes on a different colour in different lighting. I used three coats for the photo, but you can get away with using two. I've seen many people layer this polish over black, but I am yet to try this myself.

What are your 'go to' nail treatments?

Recently my nails have been looking pretty sorry for themselves, they're so stained to the point I can't even look at them naked so they constantly have to be painted, which is bad I know, as one of the main reasons they're stained is because I don't let them breathe! Also, for as long as I can remember, they've been full of ridges and constantly peel no matter what I try and do to stop it.

Can any of you lovely followers recommend some products to me to help make my nails healthy again? They can be UK or international brands, as long as I can get my hands on them easily enough. I'd really appreciate all the help & advice I can get, my nails seriously need cheering up. If you can also recommend the best cuticle creams/oils you use too! Especially since it's so cold here in England now, my hands need some loving!

The Nail Polish Tag!

I was kindly tagged to do this by the lovely Thalie @ Glazed Talons to do this tag, and who am I not to?!

Here are the rules

1.  Answer 10 questions

2.  Pass this tag to 5 bloggers

3.  Make sure that the bloggers you tagged know about this.

Here are the questions:

1. How many polishes do you have?

Roughly around the 170 mark and vastly growing!

2. What is your favorite brand of nail polish?

My favourite brand of polish has to be China Glaze, they have so many colours to choose from and they're all gorgeous too.

3. Do you like crackle nail polish, or do you hate it?

I'm a bit on the fence when it comes to crackle polish. I only own one and I rarely use it, so I can't comment really.

4. What is your first nail polish brand?

The first brand I actually 'collected' was BarryM, but before that was probably some cheap, market polish.

5. If you're going to have a nail polish line, what are you gonna name it?

Probably Polished Criminails, what else?

6. What nail polish color does not compliment you?

Yellow - But who does it REALLY suit though?

7. What color does compliment you?

Probably Dark Greens & Blues are the most suited to my skintone.

8. Name two of your best nail art friends.

    

Urm, this is a hard one as I haven't really made 'friends' as such in the blogging community, and none of my friends are interested in this stuff...#loner! 

9. What was the best nail polish gift you have ever received? 

  

I don't think I've ever received nail polish as a gift :( maybe the odd giftset from a drugstore but none that's been a 'best present'

10. Make a speech about thanking the blogger who tagged you.

Thankyou so much to Thalie for tagging me! I'd actually seen the tag a little before and contemplated tagging myself, but to actually be tagged is a total surprise! Go check out her blog and send her some love too!

The five bloggers I am tagging are:

The Trace Face Philes

Ashley is PolishAddicted

Lacquer Buzz

See Sarah Swatch

Copy That, Copy Cat

My Name is Rachel & I'm a polishaholic....

It's currently 01:46am and I cannot get to sleep. I've literally just been laid in bed for the last hour & half just waiting to fall asleep, to no avail. So what do you do when you can't sleep? Write a post and hope you're ready to sleep by the end of it! I thought I would show you how my collection has grown since I started blogging merely 2 months ago. As you can see from the photo above, my polish collection was that of someone who liked nail polish, but not to an extremity that I do now. The Models Own & China Glaze polishes were actually only about 2 weeks old when I created this blog, so you can imagine how small my collection really was....Then I discovered blogging, well I say I discovered it, I didn't. It was more of an adventure into blogging that made me spiral out of control.
I look at the amount of polish I have now and can't even justify having so much, I mean as of this moment, I rarely post swatch posts - this NEEDS to change asap (please Britain, give me some good quality sunshine, if only for 3 hours), anyone care to kick me into gear?!
So....in 2ish months, my collection has gone from the above, to this...(and even this isn't all of it, I'm expecting at least 5 more Nail Mail packages...)

This is my collection as of right now, literally, I took these just before I wrote this post. I know there isn't as much as alot of the polishaholic bloggers out there, but this is in just 2 months, I can only imagine what it will be like in another 6. As you can see, the half empty one box has turned into 2 full boxes! Box1 contains all my BarryM, Models Own, Nails Inc, GOSH, ELF & 17 polishes. Box2 contains all my China Glaze, OPI, Cult Nails, Collection 2000, Andrea Fulerton & various other polishes.
I will eventually get around to posting swatches of my whole collection, I'm just waiting for the Nail Wheels that I ordered from eBay to arrive, which SHOULD be in the next 2 weeks. They won't be reviewed swatches, it will just be the polish on a wheel with a number underneath and a link to a spreadsheet with the corresponding number on it. Good idea? Let me know!

Nail Trends: Winter 2011/12 (BarryM)

The next Brand in my Winter Trends is BarryM. As you all know, I'm a huge fan of BarryM polishes, they're so inexpensive, well made and offer a wide range of colours and shades. I've only picked a few out from BarryM, as the majority of my collection seems to be pastels/brights - not very 'wintery' really.

Friday Nail Mail

Today I received my OPI order from ASOS.com. I think that the price of OPI can be a bit steep (£10.50 a 15ml bottle) so I love looking for discounted bottles. I've noticed ASOS are always lowering the prices of OPI to around £7/8 for various colours, so whenever they do I don't hesitate to purchase a few. This time around I ordered Hot & Spicy, Jade Is The New Black, You Don't Know Jacques & Ski Teal We Drop. I've been lusting after Jade Is The New Black & Ski Teal We Drop for forever now, so I thought it was about time I treated myself and ordered them!

Holy Holo Nail Mail

Oh my god. So I was feeling a little under the weather when I woke up this morning, this all changed when I went downstairs and discovered a package on the kitchen table. Granted, I'm a little disappointed I only have one package, I'm waiting on so much >.< but the fact they're my first ever holo polishes, I can hold in the disappointment!
So I got these off of eBay for £13 roughly for all three, absolute bargain I know! So we have from L - R; 2NITE, IDK & LOL from China Glaze OMG Collection! You have no idea how happy I am to have these in my collection, i just wish the rest were so easy to find, but don't we all, right?!

Unfortunately, there isn't any sun whatsoever where I live, so I had to use my cameras flash to get the holo effect, hence why the quality is a little blurry too. Aren't they just A-MAZING! I want to wear all of them on my nails!
Ahhhh, little things like these make me so happy!

Nail Trends: Winter 2011/12 (China Glaze)

I've decided to do it a little bit different this year as I've accumulated so many more polishes, there are a lot more colours in my collection suited for each season. Instead of doing a post with 2 colours per post, I thought I would do it by brand name, mainly due to the fact I've now collected most of the Let It Snow collection by China Glaze, doing 2 at a time would literally go on forever. I actually thought I'd start off with my China Glaze Winter picks...so here we go!

Hello Sailor - Nail Art

I've recently had a creative block going on in my life and it's been the most frustrating thing I've ever experienced. Not only with Nail Art but a lot of things that I usually flourish in! Hopefully, I've now broken the curse.

So today I was wearing my favourite nautical cosy jumper, when it hit me, why not do a mani inspired by my favourite jumper! I instantly went to my nail station, or my bedroom floor that I've now made my nail station, and starting getting out colours for my nautical theme.

At first I was just going to keep it simple with just the stripes, but it wasn't until I was finished and was in the process of packing everything away that I saw my Gold Bullion Balls. Then off went the light bulb in my head...Why not do an anchor accent nail. So that's what I did.

GOSH - Peachy

If you follow me on Twitter, you'll be aware that I planned to have a load of different swatches for you today. However, due to the 'lovely' British weather, as soon as I took my camera out to get some shots, the sun decided to hide and not come back out....great. So unfortunately I haven't been able to get any updated swatches.
I do however, have some that I took a while ago that I am yet to use. Here we have GOSH - Peachy, now I bought this polish online at Superdrug only seeing the bottle, I thought it would be a gorgeous peach colour, as suggested by it's name, but in reality it's a bright orange creme polish. I tried to capture it as best as I could, but even in this photo it still looks more peach than what it's really like...maybe that's why the name? Who knows. As like most GOSH polishes I own, the formula is amazing and can be a one, maybe two coater.

GOSH - Lambada

Just a short post but today I have for you Lambada by GOSH. I absolutely LOVE this colour. It's the most perfect colour for this time of year. A beautiful, in your face, bright red creme polish. Applies perfectly and opaque in 2 coats. For some reason, the camera didn't want to pick up its true colour, making it look a bit more of an orange/red, but I assure you it's simply beautiful.

Love it.

Wednesday Nail Mail

Today I got a nice little surprise in the mail, as I wasn't expecting these until next week. I picked up these little beauties on eBay for £6 with free p&p - bargain right?! With the addition of these to my collection, it means that I'm only 3 polishes away from completing the Let It Snow collection. My only needs now are Blue Years Eve, Glittering Garland and Champagne Bubbles. Definitely in need of a little trip to Sally's next week to see if I can get my hands on them. Unfortunately, they're not all full sized bottles, 4 of them are mini as I got them in a set, but hey, who cares!

So here we have Holly-Day, Twinkle Lights & Poinsettia. I've always been in need of more Reds, as it's such a timeless colour, but for some reason I only had 4 in my collection, until now. After receiving my huge ELF nail mail, that number has quickly upped itself to around 18/19.
As for twinkle lights, I've heard people describe it as 'Christmas in a bottle' and it honestly is. I've already planned out my manicure for Christmas Day, and it definitely includes this polish.
With Holly Day, I have a lot of greens, but they're either really light or really dark, I don't really have that in between colour. So that's the reason this has come into my mits :)