It's Australia Day!!

Today's the 26th January... which, here in Australia, is Australia Day!
I love going all out for Australia Day!
This year I decided to do an Aussie Flag mani.

 I used OPI DS Magic for the base colour ( It's like the perfect blue for this!) then OPI Alpine Snow and Sally Hansen Diamond and Rubies for the stars and Union Jack!

On a related note... I found this at Priceline the other day!

 I had heard that Priceline started stocking Violent Lips recently, and although I was curious about how they would turn out I wasn't brave enough to try the designs they had (cheetah prints, polka dots, glitter).  And then I saw the Aussie Flag one and it was the perfect excuse to buy them and try them on!

They cost $14.95 at Priceline...a bit pricey..but they contain 3 lip "temporary tattoos" so you could share them with 2 other friends...? or save them for another occasion (the only thing that comes up is a sports match?)

So here's what the tattoo looks like:

It also comes with instructions on how to apply them...I'm going to try to put it on later today and hopefully I can get a nice picture up!

Edit: Here's the outcome....

They pretty much work like temporary tattoos, cut them to size, place them on your lip and soak the paper backing with water and then take the paper off...voila!
The top lip was a bit harder to do (it's a bit wonky lol)
But overall I like it!

Hope u guys have a great Australia Day!

Happy New Year!!

 Hey guys!
I decided to do a fun festive New Year's Eve/New Year's Mani, and since I'll be going to watch the fireworks, I went with glitter! I also wanted to incorporate Shatter because I feel like 2011 has been the year of the shatter/crackle nail polishes! And finally I HAD to have OPI Teenage Dream on my nails since it is definitely my favourite nail polish of the year!

So this is what I came up with:

I started off with a bottom coat of glittery colours, and to make it super sparkly I also added a layer of glitter pieces. The glitter pretty much covered the nail colours completely so I won't bother mentioning the nail polishes I used. On my thumb I used OPI Teenage Dream.

 Then I used pieces of tape to cut out numbers so that I could use it as a stencil for the shatter. It actually ended up being a really tricky process, I had to take out my dissection kit and use a scalpel to cut the letters out! (couldn't find a razor thingy at home).
Finally I added a coat of black shatter. I was quite surprised that the shatter sort of moved away from the tape so you can kind of see the numbers without removing the tape.

 So that the numbers stand out a bit more, I outlined them with Sally Hansen XtremeWear in Black Out. Then I peeled the tape off, added a Top Coat and cleaned up...and voila!

Hope you guys have a wonderful new year!

Merry Christmas!!

Hey guys!
Merry Christmas!
Just a quick post before Christmas officially ends haha.
So I played around with some Christmas-y colours: red, white, green and gold (for that extra sparkle) and I came up with this:

I alternated with OPI Alpine snow with OPI Red Shatter and Sally Hansen XtremeWear in Emerald City with OPI White shatter on my fingers and I put Orly Luxe on my thumb.

To make it extra sparkly (what's Christmas without sparkles right?) I topped it off with Maybelline Express Finish in Pot of Gold and some extra gold glitter on my thumb!

Oh and here's what I did with my sister's nails!
I made the candy cane stripes with OPI Alpine Snow and Maybelline Wet shine Diamonds in Cherry Carats. Then I added red and silver glitter on top and sealed it with a top coat.

I really like how this turned out! I'd probably wear this on non-Christmas days too!
and it kinda reminds me of one of Katy Perry's dresses haha.

Hope you've all had a lovely Christmas!!

Xmas mani...Presents!!

Hi guys!
Christmas is almost here!
..which means I have an excuse to have holiday themed manis! yay!

I got these Bundle Monster plates a while ago and I haven't had a chance to use them..until now!

One of my favourite activities at Christmas is wrapping the presents! I kinda go overboard with the ribbons and everything haha. So I thought it'd be fun to stamp a whole bunch of presents on my nails haha ( it also gave me a chance to test which nail polishes were stamp-able)

I used OPI Alpine Snow as the base colour, Konad special polish in green for the tree

  and for the presents I used:
Essence "Into the Dark" (Vampire Love collection), OPI "Planks a Lot", OPI "Mermaid's Tears", Konad Special polish in purple and red, Orly "Luxe", Essence "Choose Me! (Colour & Go), Rimmel "Tangerine Queen, and OPI DS "Magic". 
Then I topped it off with a coat of Essie "Shine of the Times" which you can't see very well in the pictures.

I picked the colours at random and I like how they worked out! It's so colourful!

What's your favourite thing to do at Christmas?

You make me feel like I'm living a Teenage Dream!

This is my absolute favourite nail polish.."Teenage Dream" by OPI.

Why? Because...
1. It's pink!
2. It super sparkly!
3. It's associated with Katy Perry!
And finally, the most important of all...this bottle, along with the rest of the OPI Katy Perry collection was given to me by super awesome besties/co-bloggers and this was the bottle that started my nail polish obsession!!

If that doesn't convince you that Teenage Dream is the best nail polish ever, then i'll just have to let the pictures do the talking!

This is my go-to polish when I need a pick me up!
Not only does it have fine pink glitter, it also has large hex holo pieces which makes it super sparkly in the sun!
It's just soo sparkly that you can't help but smile!

It's quite sheer, it takes about 3-4 coats to build it up to full opacity, but as you can see 1 coat  looks great over a dark colour like black.

"Teenage Dream" OPI over white, black, clear; 1,2,3 coats

I love it so much that I'm already halfway through the bottle and I only got it 7.5 months ago!

 What is your absolute favourite nail polish?

Happy Halloween!!

Sorry I haven't been posting for a while, exams are coming up so it's been pretty hectic... =/
Anyway, Halloween isn't very big in Australia (no one went trick or treat-ing on my street =(... )
but it's a great excuse to go all out on nail art right? =)

So this was the first design i did...

My camera didn't want to cooperate so i apologize if it's a bit blurry.

I did some cobweb designs and a (happy looking) ghost on my ring finger. 

I used OPI Ink as the base colour, then OPI DS Coronation for the designs, and for that extra sparkle, I added Rimmel I<3 Lasting Finish in Disco Ball (who doesn't love sparkly cobwebs??).

For the other design, I was inspired by a design by this youtuber, meliny.
Aren't these Jack-O-Lanterns super cute??

Left Hand

Right Hand

I used:

Revlon "No Shrinking Violet" for the base colour, 

Rimmel I <3 Lasting Finish "Tangerine Queen" and Australis "Citrus" for the pumpkins, 

OPI "Mermaid's Tears" and Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear "Emerald City" for the stalk + vines,

Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear "Black Out" and Rimmel i <3 Lasting Finish "London Clouds" for the eyes and mouth

Sun

And....I also did my sister's nails...

 I used the same base colours, but i used Sally Hansen Diamond Strength "Platinum" for the ghosts and cobwebs.

I also bought BYS Glow in the Dark topcoat, which works really well, but i can't seem to capture it on my camera =(

I had a lot of fun doing these designs... hope u guys have a fun Halloween!

It's spring down-under!!

Its Spring in Australia! *cheers and general celebratory happiness* ANNNNDDDD since it's a new month, go and download the latest OPI calendar from their website! www.opi.com

This month's calendar theme is based on OPI Lincoln Park After Dark- which looks fabulous in both its original version as well as the suede and matte versions! =) Scrangie has some great swatches of these, so if you're curious, go check it out!

Anyhoo, I know it's been almost exactly one month since my last post buuuttttt, it's my mid-semester break right now (thank god) so hopefully I'll have time to post more! (fingers crossed that all the pictures I've been taking of my manis will actually make it up here xD)

Now, I know this is kinda corny and very much cliche.... but spring = FLOWERS!!! :D

Here are two of my flower-power manis!

For this mani, I used OPI PLanks a lot for the base (two coats). For the flowers, I used bobby pins for dotting - OPI DS Extravagance for the outer ring 'petals' and OPI Need Sunglasses? for the center of the flowers. I used a needle to dot the inner circle with Konad white Special Polish. You can use nail dotting tools to do this but bobbypins, toothpicks and needles will work just fine =)

I really love this second flower mani! I used OPI Dim Sum Plum as a base colour, OPI Steady As She Rose for the petals, OPI Need Sunglasses? for the center and Rimmel Double Decker red for the petal detailing.

Hope you guys enjoyed this post!

xxx

Sparkly sparkly holo goodness!

I've been wearing this nail colour for the past couple of days now. The weather's been horrible so what better way to brighten the mood than wear sparkly holo nail polish!

OPI DS Sapphire

 This is OPI DS Sapphire! OPI's DS range aren't super holo which is kinda disappointing but i do like this one! The one thing I didn't like though, was that the colour was so sheer I had to put so many coats on that I lost count. I'm not sure if it's just my bottle...does anyone else have a problem with theirs??

And then I stuffed up my thumb when it was in the process of drying =(

 Oh! So I was browsing Priceline today (as any normal person would do) and discovered that Rimmel had some new nail colours! I'm not really a fan of their quality (long lasting my butt!) but I was totally attracted to this colour, it's called Disco Ball and it's sooo sparkly!! i loveeee it! I think it's a mixture of big holo glitter pieces and blue glitter pieces. The pictures don't really do it justice though...

And what is with Rimmel nail polishes having the same name as other brands? Sally Hansen also has a disco ball (which is also gorgeous btw) and i swear "Blue my mind" also belongs to another brand...hmmm

On a totally unrelated note..... Yesterday I went to see Taylor Lautner at the red carpet premiere of his new movie Abduction! He was so sweet to the fans, he actually took his time taking pictures with the fans and signing autographs. I got his signature! Yay!

hehehe

Revlon Steel Her Heart

So I was out shopping and this bottle of nail polish caught my eye. I'm not usually a fan of grey/dark silver but for some reason i got attracted to this one.

Isn't it pretty?? And the name is sooo cute! Steel Her Heart! It's definitely stolen mine!
The application was pretty good. The bottle said to use two coats but i used three for full opacity and to eliminate any streaks.
The colour itself can only be described as...steel. Which made me think of the Sydney Harbour Bridge..lol.

Fun Fact: It takes 30 000 litres of paint to paint one coat on the Sydney Harbour Bridge (equivalent to 60 football fields) to prevent the Bridge from rusting. And apparently they use a fast drying type of paint so that it doesn't drip onto unsuspecting vehicle down below.
This makes me wonder whether they use Steel Her Heart to paint it...imagine how many bottles it would take!

I added an accent nail to my mani using OPI White Shatter and Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear in Discoball (you can't really see the sparkles in the pictures, but believe me it's there!)

Then i got bored and decided to mattify it. I used Rimmel PRO Matte Finish. While I haven't been impressed with the quality of Rimmel's nail polishes i really like this matte top coat.
I really like Steel Her Heart matte. The shimmer is still there but it is a bit more subtle.

Pikachu Needs Sunglasses: Pikachu Nails!

Its been a while! I keep meaning to post but with uni and work and laziness, it's taken me forever to get on blogger ><

But no matter, I am sure you have all been absolutely enthralled by the lovely Adeline's posts! I especially loved her Hanni Mani and Princess nails (which look even prettier in person <3)

Anyway! A week of August has already flown by and it was only today that I realized I had forgotten to download the latest OPI calendar! And so you can imagine my added delight when I see that this month's calendar theme is OPI Need Sunglasses! Download it for your desktop too at www.opi.com!

Isn't it beautiful? I was blown away by the butterfly mani by Tara, definitely will have to try that sometime! And I adore this shade of yellow - it's bright, its fun, its playful and most of all....... it's the PERFECT yellow for PIKACHU NAILS!!!!! =D (yes I have to admit, I love pokemon almost as much as I love nail polish xD)

Isn't he absolutely adorable? I remember playing the very first Pokemon game when it came out on Gameboy colour, and being called silly by my friend because I couldn't bear to evolve Pikachu into Raichu using the Thunderstone... I was just too attached haha :P

Anyhoo, look at me getting carried away with calendars and Pokemon - my apologies! <3 Here is my Pikachu mani!

For this mani I used OPI Need Sunglasses, Rimmel Double Decker Red, Australis Blackmail and White special polish from Konad. I used bobby pins for the bigger dots and a needle for the small ones, as well as for Pikachu's mouth.

Do you like like like it? =D

Let me know if you love Pokemon too or have any suggestions for more Pokemon manis! (I'm thinking Jigglypuff next :P)

A V-ery Nude French Mani

Please excuse my lame title..i couldn't help myself hehehe =)
I've been wearing a lot of dark colours on my nails lately, so i decided to change it up a bit and give my nails a bit of a breather.
So here's what i came up with..

Maybelline Colorama Ballerina and Cold as Ice, Essie Topless & Barefoot

A V-Shaped french mani! I used Maybelline mini Colorama in Ballerina for the base. Ballerina was really sheer so it didn't really add any colour to my nail. Then i used Essie Topless & Barefoot and a striping brush to create the V shaped french tips.
Finally I used Maybelline Colorama Top Coats in Cold as Ice to add that extra sparkle!

As usual, I got bored of it after a few days and decided to spice it up with OPI white shatter. I kinda did it in a rush so the V's aren't that straight.

OPI White Shatter

I think i might do more french mani's with shatter. What do you think?

Blue Shatter!

Hey guys!
This is a quick post on OPI Blue Shatter.  i got bored of my mani (which you will soon see in another post) so i put blue shatter over it, and i quite like the effect. I don't know if it's just me, but i found the consistency to be a bit thin for my liking, i had to do 2 quick, messy coats to get the opacity i wanted.

OPI Blue Shatter (partial Sun)

 My camera couldn't handle the shimmer from the gold (Orly Luxe) underneath, these were the best i could get.

OPI Blue Shatter (Indoors, flash)

The Shatters seem to be my go-to polish when i want to extend the life of my mani and hide some chipped polish. =)

Do you guys like shatter/crackle polish?