Cosmo Blog Awards 2012

Hello everyone :)
Another quick post from me today about the Cosmo Blog Awards! These awards are for all categories of bloggers in the UK and I would be delighted if any of my wonderful followers would nominate me for best newcomer blog award sponsored by next. Of course if you nominate me and comment on this post I will run a small giveaway for all those involved :)
The link to vote is http://www.next.co.uk/cosmo-blog-awards/
I'd really love to be nominated for these awards so if any of you nominate me then thank you so much :)
Thanks for reading :)
Charlotte xxx

Zoya Charla!

Hello everyone :)
Today I have some swatches for you of my new favourite polish! It's Zoya Charla :) I've been trying to get hold of OPI Catch Me In Your Net for quite a while but eventually settled on Charla instead because I had an Amazon gift card thing :P It arrived yesterday and I couldn't wait to put it on! Here's some pictures...

I used 3 coats of Zoya Charla for these photo's. The application was perfect, so smooth and easy to clean up around the cuticle area too. You can still see a visible nail line in these pictures but it isn't that noticeable in real life because of how sparkly the polish is :)

I have literally fallen in love with this polish, it has so much going on I can't stop staring at my nails :p In some lights Charla looks blue and in others green. It's just beautiful. However, my camera didn't like photographing the colours so it looks more blue than green in these photo's. 

I'm so pleased I got this polish now, I really want to try stamping over it at some point too :) Also, just check out how much better my clean up has got around my cuticles! I've surprised myself :P

Do you own Zoya Charla? How do you like to wear it? let me know in the comments :)

Thanks for reading :)

Charlotte xxx

Floam Day

Hello everyone :)
Last week I signed up to Polish days which is run by Hannah over at Polly Polish. Our first post was named Floam day and your mani had to use Floam somehow. So I started thinking about a different way to use Floam that I hadn't seen yet. This is what I came up with...

I did my first splatter mani! :) I'm really pleased with how it turned out. I used 4 coats of OPI Don't Touch My Tutu from the New York City Ballet collection as the base, I then splattered using a straw and OPI Fly & Did It On 'Em from the Nicki Minaj collection. I used these two colours as they are similar to the two colours of glitter used in Floam. I then used the same method to splatter Floam on top of the previous colours.

I really love how this turned out. it's so bright and fun to look at! I'm glad that I decided to use colours that coordinated with Floam nicely :) I will definitely be doing a few splatter mani's in the future with different colour combinations :P 

Check out the other girls who are taking part in Floam Day!

Hannah at Polly Polish

Sabine at My Polish Stash

Jen at The Nail Polish Project

Lauretta at A Lacquered Affair

Jenny at Beauty By Jenny

Deborah at Love Varnish...

Melissa at The Crimson Petal

Esther at Fab Fingertips

Rachel at Claws, Nails & Beauty

Mara at Mara In Polishland

Stephanie at Sincerely Stephanie

Jasmine at Colour Coated

Carolina at Colores De Carol

Salla at OMG! Polish 'em!

Cassie at Sparkles Make Me Happy

Chrissy at Nail Utopia

Kirsten at Glitta Gloves

Sabrina at Not Without My Polish

Do you like splatter mani's? Do you own Floam, if so what's your favourite way to wear it? let me know in the comments :)

Thanks for reading :)

Charlotte xxx

Avon voting winner!

Hello everyone :)
Just a quick update today on the random giveaway I did for the people who voted for me in the Avon Compettion. Unfortunatly I didn't win but I wanted to reward those of you who voted. I numbered those who commented in order and then used a random number generator...

Therefore the winner is...Ria!

Well done Ria, I've emailed you and you have 48 hours to reply before I draw another winner.

Thanks to everyone whop voted for me :)

Also, keep an eye out for a post on splatter nails later on today :)

Thanks for reading,

Charlotte xxx

Elle Girl Japan!

Hello everyone :)
Today I have some exciting news for you all! :) A few weeks ago I was contacted by Elle Girl magazine asked if they could feature some of my nails in the June 2012 issue. Obviously I agreed and sent my photos off to them. The magazine has literally just arrived at my door!! Take a look...

They used my ladybird nails and some others on the other page. I'll get some more photo's up later to show you. I'm so excited! My readership in Japan has gone up by a lot according to bloggers stats so that's awesome! hello if you're from Japan :P

I really wanted to share this news with you all, I hope you enjoyed seeing this :)

Thanks for reading :)

Charlotte xxx

First Successful Water Marble!

Hello everyone :)
I have a very exciting post for you all today! I finally managed to do a water marble successfully!! :D I'm so happy I could cry :P After seeing so many beautiful water marbles on my blog roll recently I thought I needed to attempt it again, so after reading a few new tutorials I gave it a go this morning. Here's what happened...

I only attempted an accent nail this time as I wasn't feeling too brave :P I used Sally Hansen Pink Boa for the hot pink, OPI Alpine Snow for the white and Hot Looks Candy Floss for the light pink. Overall I'm very pleased with how it turned out, although I would use a white base next time as the tip of my nail is quite sheer, not as sheer as this photo shows though :)

For this attempt I dug my dads long forgotten Brita Filter out from the back of the cupboard and used filtered water. This seems to work like a charm as it's the only time I've been able to get a decent marbled look. Usually when I try to water marble I pull my nail out and end up with a thick gloopy mess :( But I can do it now! I honestly can't wait to try this out in different colours and as a full mani! :)

Do you like water marbled nails? What colours suit this style best? let me know in the comments :)
Thanks for reading :)
Charlotte xxx

April Showers Challenge - Spring Design of Your Choice

Hello everyone :)
Sorry for the lack of posting over the weekend, I've been ill again :( I'm okay now though so back to the nails! :P
This is the last post for the April Showers challenge :( But I have a few challenges coming up that I'm taking part in so keep an eye out for those soon!
Anyway, this last post for April Showers was labelled as the spring design of your choice. I've been thinking about this one for a while and decided I wanted to combine two things, here's what I came up with...

I knew I wanted to try gradient nails again but I also wanted to do sheep as they remind me of spring and they weren't included in this challenge. So that's how I came up with this idea :)

For these nails I used two coats of OPI What's With The Cattitude? for the base. I then sponged on Color Club Twiggie for the grass and OPI Ogre The Top Blue for the sky. I then used a dotting tool and OPI Alpine Snow to create the sheep's body, Revlon Lunar for the legs and eyes, OPI Pink Friday for the nose and Essence Twins Romeo for the ears. Wow! That's a lot of polish :P

I'm so pleased with how these turned out! You can actually tell what they are and I really like the effect the gradient gives to the background of the sheep :P I'm really going to miss this challenge I had great fun coming up with different designs, but hopefully the next challenges I have lined up will be just as fun and creative :)

What colours do you think look nice in gradients? let me know in the comments :)

Thanks for reading :)

Charlotte xxx

April Showers Challenge - The Paper Gal

Hello everyone :)
Today I have the last but one post of the April Showers Challenge. Today's post is The Paper Gal, which is based on newspaper nails :) Now I tried this once before here and it didn't turn out too well. So I'm glad this has come up so that I can improve on the last attempt :P
So here's how I did...

Onto the polish! I used two coats of Essence Twins Chuck. I could have gotten away with one if I was more careful when applying it. This colour is beautiful but my camera never picks it up properly :( My camera picks it up as a royal blue but it's definitely blue/purple, there are some accurate swatches hanging around online if you want to check the actual colour. 

As you can see from the photo I got the print to stand out more this time! This is a great improvement on my last attempt :P So instead of dipping the newspaper into the Vodka like last time, I dipped my nail in and then pressed the newspaper onto the wet nail and this seems to work better! :)

However, I also had some problems with the newspaper leaving little bits of itself behind on my nails as you can see on my little finger :( Also, some nails have marks because my polish hadn't comepletly dried and I was pushing quite hard :( So I know this for next time now :P

Overall, I'm really pleased with how these nails turned out and now that I know how to do them properly I think I'll be playing around with them some more :)

Keep an eye out for my last challenge post tomorrow ;P
Thanks for reading :)
Charlotte xxx

April Showers Challenge - May Flowers

Hello everyone :)
Today I have one of the last April Showers Challenge posts for you all! I'll be finishing this challenge off this week and hopefully be moving onto a new challenge soon, I have lots of new things lined up for you all so keep an eye out ;p
Anyway, this challenge was May Flowers and I've been thinking about it for some time. I didn't want to try and recreate a flower on my nails as I know it would look awful :P So I've been looking around for something cute and fun and this is what I decided to do!!

Pretty dotting tool flowers! :D
I used three coats of China Glaze Octa Gone wild for the base of the nails, I then used a dotting tool to create the flower shapes using Revlon Lunar and then added a center dot with OPI Rumples Wiggin'.

I'm so pleased with how these turned out, I thought they'd be a horrible splodgy mess but they look very cute :) These are so easy to create with a dotting tool and you can use different colour combinations! I really wanted to use a holo base as the sun has just come out here in the UK so I wanted something flashy :P

I'm also really happy with how my pictures came out. I've never had much success capturing holo polishes with my camera but they came out great today!

Have you tried making flowers with a dotting tool before? what are your favourite holo polishes at the moment? Let me know in the comments :)
Thanks for reading :)
Charlotte xxx

250 Follower Giveaway Winner!

Hello everyone! :)
A quick post from me to today to announce the winner of my 250 follower giveaway!!
The winner is...
Krysta Rivera!!
Congratulation! I've emailed the winner and she has 48 hours to respond before a new winner is chosen.
Thank you to everyone who has taken part and look out for another giveaway at 350 followers, which isn't too far away!!
Thanks for reading :)
Charlotte xxx

Island Girl Insights Blog Swap

Hello everyone :)
Today's post is about Island Girl Insights Blog Love Package Swap (check out the blog - http://islandgirlinsights.blogspot.com/)  that I've recently taken part in. I got paired up with a lovely lady named Chacoy :)
We chatted a lot about the kinds of things we'd like to see in our packages, Chacoy was wonderful to shop for and I also learned a lot about her which I thought was great as in swaps you don't really get to make that connection. So hopefully me and Chacoy will swap again sometime :)
Anyway, here's what Chacoy sent me and my son! :)

Here are my sons gifts first. A cars 2 stamping set (which he stole and played with straight away :p) and some wild life expanding animals :)

Here's the polish part of the swap. Sally Hansen nail art pen in white. OPI Last Friday Night (which is a huge lemming of mine!!!) and a mini Bon Bons polish!

I have a huge love for Hello Kitty so obviously I was very excited when I saw these in my package! Also, check out the gorgeous handmade bracelet!!! :D

Overall, I was very happy that I took part in this blog swap. It was nice to make friends with a lovely lady and also to receive a beautiful package as well as send one off. I really enjoyed the whole experience and I would definitely take part again :)

Also, a massive thanks goes out to Chacoy over at http://livinginlalalandblog.com

Thanks for reading :)

Charlotte xxx

SoFlaJo Fields Of Clover Swatches and Review

Hello everyone :)
Last week I had an exciting package arrive...

Jody Alu of SoFlaJo sent me one her handmade polishes to review! She sent me Fields of Clover which is from her Spring Flowers collection.

Jody describes Fields of Clover as a lively green based micro-glitter bursting with greens, gold, purples and pinks. I was so excited when I opened the package and this beautiful polish was there. I'm a big fan of green and glitter so this polish was perfect for me.

I decided that I'd keep things simple and show you all how the polish looks on its own and over a green base, however if you visit Jody's website (http://www.soflajo.com/?page_id=381) or etsy (http://www.etsy.com/shop/SoFlaJo), she has swatches of it over many different colours :)

I have one coat of Fields of Clover on my forefinger and two coats of my middle finger. I then have one coat of Fields of Clover on my ring finger and two coats on my little finger, both over two coats of Wet N Wild Toss Me A Lifesavers. 

This polish is beautiful, I love the shimmer it adds to the base colour and also the multi-coloured glitter. However, I didn't shake my bottle before I applied Fields of Clover so I didn't get much of the glitter on my nail. When I use this polish again, I will shake it beforehand because I love the look of it when there's more glitter.

I also did my friends nails at uni last week. I used the same base colour and sponged two coats of Fields of Clover onto the tips, however I took the photo too far away so it's quite difficult to see.

I think I'm going to recreate the look in the next few day so I can show you how awesome this polish looks when sponged to. 

This polish is very versatile, you can use it over a variety of colours and it's perfect for this time of year when the weathers turning warmer. This polish also was very easy to apply, it went on very easy and dried quickly, it was also a very nice consistency. I was very pleased with everything about this polish and will definitely be ordering more polish from Jody soon :)

Have you tried any SoFlaJo polishes? if so which ones? let me know in the comments :)

Thanks for reading :)

Charlotte xxx

*I was sent this product for review. All views are my own honest opinion.

Update

Hello everyone :)
Sorry that I haven't posted in a few days. I'm currently working very hard on finishing my last assignment for university which is due in Thursday. So look forward to seeing lots of new posts after that :)
I just thought I should update you all so you know I'm not dead or anything :P
Also, remember to enter my 250 follower giveaway and I hope everyone's having a nice week so far :)
Thanks for reading :)
Charlotte xxx

Cupcake Nails

Hello everyone :)
I've taken a bit of a break from the April Showers Challenge this week as it's my last week of uni and I've been ill with viral gastroenteritis :( My son caught it last week and now everyone in our house has it. So last night I sat down and did some nails that would cheer me up... cupcakes! :)

Please excuse my awful cuticles!! They need some serious attention, what cuticle products would you all reccomend?

I used so many polishes for these nails but they turned out better than I expected them to :P

So here's a list of the base polishes I used on each finger:

Fore finger: China Glaze For Audrey (two coats)

Middle finger: Color Club Twiggie (three coats)

Ring finger: OPI Pink Friday (two coats)

Little finger: China Glaze For Audrey (two coats)

For the cake section of my nails I used two coats of Color Club Almost Famous, I then used two coats of OPI Alpine Snow to create the icing on the tip of my nails. I topped all this off with one coat of Lynderella Connect The Dots and H&M Berry love to create a cherry :)

Overall, I'm really pleased with how these turned out. I don't know what made me think to try this nail art out but I'm glad I did. I've had several compliments on them already. I'd love to try these nails again but using different glitter on the icing and using the same base colour on all the nails. They're so cute and fun!!

Do you like cupcake nails or are they too sweet for your taste? Let me know in the comments :)

Also, keep an eye out over the next few days for a review on SoFlaJo's polish - Fields Of Clover! :D

Thanks for reading,

Charlotte xxx

Avon Competition & A Giveaway!

Hello everyone!
I have a quick favour to ask you all. I've entered a nail competition on Avon UK's facebook page (with my ladybird nails!)

 and I need votes to win a lot of nail polish :P As an added incentive for you all to vote for me,leave a comment on this post if you vote for me and I'll pick one of you using random.org to receive some polish as a prize for voting :)
So here's the link : https://www.facebook.com/Avonuk/app_110741852392919, click to look at the gallery and enter 467 in the search box to get to my entry :)
Thanks for helping me out if you vote :)
Charlotte xxx