Feminine Light Pink Glitter Nails with Revlon 'Sparkling'

Today I decided to do something a bit more subtle so I've done some light pink glittery nails which I think look really quite cute.

I started with 2 coats of Rimmel's French Manicure colour in 'Rose Praline'. The colour itself is really nice - a light pink colour with a nice shimmer to it. I can't say I'm massively impressed with the application however. It was definitely not opaque after 2 coats and it was quite streaky. I managed to get away with 2 layers because I was putting on a couple of coats of glitter. Maybe it would be ok for a French manicure? I'll have to try it.

I then dabbed on (much better way to put on glitter rather than normal brushing which will drag it down to the end of the nail) 2 coats of Revlon's 'Sparkling' (261). This is a lovely polish. You'd need a lot of coats to provide full coverage (in fact, it's probably not really possible) but it looks great on. In fact, I've found a great blog post showing the coverage after 1, 2, 3 and 4 coats - you can take a look at Imagination in Colour here.

I finished the look off with a coat of Seche Vite.

The Lazy 15: Tape Mani

Here is my first manicure for the Lazy 15, a great challenge set up by some of my fellow polishers across the pond! As it's my first challenge, I felt that this was perfect as it's not as intense as doing a mani every single day!

The first challenge is a tape mani. I've done several of these so I wanted to do something I've not done before. I have also been dying to use my purple glitter polish from Models Own, so this seemed to be an opportune time.

The colours used (from base to tip) are: Revlon 'Violet', Models Own 'Purple Haze' and MUA 'Shade 22'. The middle section was quite difficult to do as I had to tape off the top section which I'd done first, therefore I had to wait AGES for it to dry and even then I messed it up and had to start again. I ended up using my trust Seche Vite to speed things up... Also, as the glitter needed more than one layer to look good, and the fact that if I let it dry to apply other coats the tape removal would mess it up, I had to put it on REALLY thick. I was getting a bit concerned that I wouldn't be able to go to bed until 3 am and I would be sat waving my hands in the air... Luckily it didn't take as long as I thought.

Overall I'm really pleased with the results, the glitter is still a bit sparse but it looks good and I love the colour combination. I can't wait to see what my fellow challengers have done!! You can see everyone else who has joined below!

Bling Bling Sequin Manicure

Perusing Poundland this weekend (again!) I found a lovely set of glitters and sequins... I've been looking for some small round sequins for some time now, particularly since I heard of the upcoming launch of Ciate's sequin manicure, but most of what I see around are large sequins, the type with the hole in. These are more like tiny disks...

The pack came with 12 little bags of of 4 colours (pink, purple, orange and mixed) - 2 sequin bags of each colour and 1 'normal' glitter bag. I decided to try the mixed bag as it seems very similar to the 'Harlequin' Ciate version.

As you can see - the sequins are extremely similar to Ciate, as demonstrated on Kiss and Make Up. I don't think I've done the greatest job of it, as the sequins had a tendency to stick up, so the surface is VERY uneven. I used Technic 'Gardenia' as a base colour (2 coats) and then used Sally Hansen's 'Had as Wraps' and before it could dry, dipped the nail in the sequins. (as my bottle is quite old it's a bit goopy, so I thought that would be good for sticking the sequins to). I initially tried using a top coat but found that it made the nail look weird - almost like it had a slimy layer over the top, so I scrapped that idea.

Overall, I'm not hugely keen on this manicure from a distance it looks ok. but looking a bit closer makes it appear a bit 'messy' which I'm not keen on. I'm not sure what the glitter grip provided with the Ciate product is, so you may be able to get away with using this on top, but without being able to use my top coat, I don't think this will last too long. Ciate's promotional pictures are also a bit misleading - the sequins look much, much smaller, as you can see Grazia here.  This makes it look a lot neater...

I've also discovered that Nails Inc have launched 'Bling It On Rocks', as reviewed here on Sugar & Sparkle. I'm very keen to try this (or similar) as it looks more like chunky glitter than sequins, so the effect is classier (in my opinion). What do you think? Have you tried either product, or a similar version?

Orange Glittery Nails

I wanted to do a couple of Halloween nails (well, I actually wanted to do a lot more, but I've really not had chance!) so here is the first. I love anything festive and Halloween is one of my favourites. Unfortunately I don't think my flatmates quite share my enthusiasm for decorations! So, this isn't strictly a Halloween design, but I the the orange is quite fitting....

I used this colour previously in my swatch of Accessorize's speckle nail polish, although you can't really see it under the speckle varnish. It's one of my bargain buys from Xtras and cost around £2. I'd been scouring the shops for a more browny orange colour but I really struggled as everything seems to be brighter at the moment, so I was very impressed with the find!

The glitter is also from Xtras and is Technic 'Bedazzled', you can buy it online here. I think the colours are really seasonal, and remind me of all the fallen leaves at the moment (while the glitter blings it up a little!) What do you think?

As a bonus, here is a picture of my fireplace at the moment - pretty scary!