NOTD - Butterfly stamping and taping.

Hello lovelies,

Quick post today to share some nails I was wearing recently (terribly behind in posting, dear me)!

I decided to get back into my stamping (for more details on getting started, read my tutorial here), so I decided to do some accent nail stamping and then did tape nails for the remaining nails. Please pardon the tip wear, I've been doing quite a bit of housework lately and with the lack of daylight savings, I couldn't photograph it before it started to show!

For the stamping, I used Sally Hansen White On as a base, and stamped the butterflies using Zoya Karina and ORLY Liquid Vinyl* (using Konad plate M39). With the tape nails, I used Liquid Vinyl as a base and then painted Karina over.

I hope you enjoyed that, lovelies! I'm thinking of getting more plates soon, so stay tuned!

Much love,
MM.
x


Note: Products marked with a '*' were kindly provided for my consideration. This has not affected my opinion in any way. I was not obliged to blog about it but am choosing to do so at my own discretion. For more information, please refer to my Disclosure Policy.

Valentine's Day 2013 Inspired Nails!

Hi lovelies!

Happy weekend! It's been a week of experimentation for me, as I've been trying out different nail looks all week. I've always been curious about stamping, and bought a Konad stamping kit about six months ago, but only managed to find time yesterday to have a play with it. It's surprisingly easy to do (although a wee bit finicky to get the hang of in the beginning), and overall, I'm quite pleased with my first attempt.

I used the M4 Konad plate which came with my kit, as it had a cute little stencil saying 'Kiss Me', which I felt was appropriate for Valentine's Day! I stamped the design using white Konad polish over Karina by Zoya (incidentally, I used the same polish for my Christmas 2012 nails - I'm sorry for the lack of diversity but I didn't pack many polishes with me).

Here's what I ended up with!

In shade.

In shade.

In direct daylight.

 

In direct daylight.

In direct daylight.

There you have it, lovelies, my first ever stamping manicure! I'm afraid I've caught the stamping bug now and I can't wait to experiment more!

I'm thinking of working on a new manicure for Chinese New Year next...and maybe another look for Valentine's Day too!

What do you think of this manicure? Would you like to learn more about stamping? Have you any interesting plans for Valentine's Day?

Much love,
MM.
x

Nails - Purple Ombré Gradient Manicure.

Hi lovelies,

I do apologise for not having blogged in a week, work has been a little bit insane and I've also had social engagements every single day, so I've barely been home! I did sit down to write this post on Thursday but unfortunately, I accidentally deleted all the good photos! As you can imagine, I was a little upset, so I decided to take a little break to get over the disappointment.

Anyway, here are some photos of my first attempt at an ombré gradient manicure. I do apologise for the quality of the photos, but these are all I had left after inadvertently deleting the rest (I couldn't take more photos either as I'd already removed the manicure)! :( Oh well, I'll just share what I do have with you, and take more photos the next time I do another gradient manicure.

I used Zoya Valerie for the basecoat, and sponged on Zoya Arielle and Essence Sparkling Water Lily over it for the ombré gradients.

I was quite happy with how it turned out, but then I got to wondering what it would look like with a glitter overlay, so I applied a layer of Essence Time for Romance over all the nails, and voilá!

What did you think of my first ombré attempt, lovelies? Do you prefer it with or without the glitter overlay?

I hope you enjoyed that little post, and I will have more upcoming posts to share soon, so please stay tuned!

Much love,
MM.
x

NOTD - Dree

Hi lovelies,

It's been a while since my last NOTD post, so I decided I'd better get cracking and share this with you!

I was wearing Zoya Dree last week, which is a gorgeous olive/khaki creme polish. Like all the Zoya polishes I've tried so far, it applies very smoothly and easily, providing an even, opaque finish with two coats. The formula is neither too thick nor too thin, which is great because you don't get a streaky application, and you also don't get early chipping within a couple of days from too thick a polish layer.

Dree is part of the Smoke and Mirrors collection (which I love as it sounds like something out of a fairy tale, for some reason). This manicure actually inspired me to wear my olive coloured jeans (as you can see from one of the photos below), and it went together perfectly!

Zoya Dree in artificial light.

Dree in natural daylight (on top of the jeans)!

Dree in direct sunlight.
(My favourite photo of the lot)

After a few days, I decided to dress it up a bit with some gold shatter on top, and this is what I came up with!

That's all for now, lovelies! I do have a couple more NOTD posts which will be following shortly!


Much love,
MM.
x

NOTD - Zoya Karina and a bit of nail art

Hello lovelies,

Another quick NOTD to show you what I'm wearing right now. It's another of the Zoya polishes I picked up from Salon Melbourne, and this one is called Karina, it's a gorgeous, metallic scarlet polish. It's got such amazing depth of colour, I'm actually reminded of the paint job cars have just looking at it!

I also received some dotting dools I ordered off ebay, so I couldn't resist adding some nail art. I didn't do anything too major as I was heading to work the next day, just put on some black polish (Lunar by Revlon) and  some gold dots (Gold Coin by Revlon). I actually wanted to use my bronze polish for the dots but I couldn't find it anywhere! Grr, most frustrating, it's one of my favourite shades so I might need to buy another tomorrow, if I can find it.

Here we go with photos!

Artificial lighting.

/

Artificial lighting.

In direct sunlight.

Daylight.

I really like it, the tiny bit of nail art really jazzes up the polish!

Much love,
MM.
x

Salon Melbourne - Haul

Hello lovelies!


This is going to be an abbreviated post as I have been out all day and I'm exhausted! I spent a few hours today with the lovely Miss V at Salon Melbourne, which is a hair and beauty event for professionals. It's usually an invite only event but we were invited in as media, due to our beauty blogging. It was held at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre and there were some truly fabulous things to see! Some really big brands like Zoya, OPI, Minx, Vani-T, Gorgeous Cosmetics, Bodyography, Moroccanoil, and many, many others were exhibiting at the event...so it was really hard not to get carried away!

My media pass! It had my name (which I blocked out)
and my blog name. This brings me back to when
 I used to write for a newspaper about 10 years ago!

It was so crowded, they had actually closed the parking lot, so I had to park some distance away and walk in. After a few hours spent walking around the booths and watching the shows, I was quite exhausted. Add on a couple of hours afterwards spent visiting with family and running chores, and I got home almost feeling like I'd done a marathon!

So I've decided to do a quick post today to share my Salon Melbourne haul, and then I'll spend some time over the next couple of days writing about what I saw and sharing some photos! I may have gone a bit overboard with the shopping...I don't really regret most of the things I purchased, but I may have gone a wee bit overboard with the nail polishes. Still, I'm actually going to be giving some away as gifts, etc, so I don't feel too badly about it. I basically stocked up on stuff that I use really often, or stuff that I find pretty expensive/hard to get in Melbourne.

So here's what I got:

Minx nail stickers. I've always wanted to try these, so I was quick to snap up two metallic designs after a quick trial. They were so popular, a lot of the styles were sold out!

My Minx nail stickers.

88 shimmer/pearl eyeshadow palette from Crown Brushes. I'm not sure which brand they're from as there isn't one listed on the palette, but it does have pretty good pigmentation, so I figured it was well worth the $25 price tag!

Look out for more EOTDs coming soon!

Another view because it's just so pretty! 

Stocking up on Babyliss Argan Oil. This stuff is amazing (it's so moisturising and it smells fantastic)! We also got given a free acrylic trial kit by someone as we were passing by her stall.

Vani-T matte mineral lipstick. I have to confess, part of the reason I had to get this is because the packaging is just so...bling! I actually have a matching bracelet and ring that a very dear friend gave me for my birthday last year. I'll be sure to post a photo of it tomorrow to compare.

Also, this lipstick has a gorgeous colour, fantastic pigmentation and unlike most matte lippies, a really soft, creamy texture. I've decided this brand has the cutest things, it's just so girly! Even their paper bag is gorgeous, matte black with metallic gold embossing.

Vani-T mineral lipstick. 

It's a gorgeous matte red, but it feels really creamy on!

Zoya...sigh, I totally went overboard here. I've been wanting some Zoya polishes for a while now but they're pretty hard to find in Melbourne, and quite expensive besides. I picked up a whopping 11 polishes from this brand. I will admit that some of these are gifts, but I still think I got a wee bit carried away. They had some really good deals, where you could buy six polishes and pick two free ones, so Miss V and I split the bill and got four polishes each. We each also picked up a set of six polishes from a Zoya collection. I ended up with Cheryl, Julieanna, Edyta, Karina, Carrie Ann and Kym from the Wicked collection, and Valerie, Arielle, Dree and Divincia for my individual picks. I also picked up Holly for $3 on special. Apologies for the photo quality, the lighting in my flat is atrocious!

The top six are from the Wicked collection, and the lower five
were randomly selected because I loved them!

The OPI booth was a madhouse. Literally. There were so many girls crowding it, you could barely make out the polishes, much less buy any! I did manage to pick up one polish, Pedal Faster, Suzi, for $10, a pretty pale pink with microglitter. I also stocked up on Drip Dry Drops (which I cannot live without), and they came with a free bottle of Dim Sum Plum.

Well, that pretty much sums up my haul! I did score some terrific deals, but I can tell you that my bank account really isn't too happy with me right now!

 I leave you with a complete photo of what it all looked like!

The complete haul!

Much love,
MM.
x