ANNY - Green Hills

I was overwhelmed when I saw the ANNY stand at perfumerie Douglas. There were just too many gorgeous colours to choose from! Take a look on their website and you know what I mean. And the bottle shape.. LOVE it! I had to take one bottle home, I picked Green Hills. Green Hills is a blackened green polish with a jelly-like consistency. It looks mostly black indoors, but outside or under my daylight lamp I can definitely see the green. I adore this colour, it makes me so happy! :D I used two coats of Green Hills and both coats went on smooth and even. The flat brush is easy to handle.

ANNY nail polishes cost €9.50 per 15ml. A bit on the expensive side for me, but I'm afraid I have to try more colours!

Thanks for watching!

Lynnderella - Mademoiselle Violette de Bleu

First, time to pimp my Nail Art Challenge Giveaway. You can win some Lynnderella polishes just for entering, cause two of the three prizes are random draws.  Aussie girls, so far only three entries, your odds of winning Lynnderella's my never be as good as this!

Now, what does ten layers of nail polish look like?  It looks like this.  It's glassy smooth and it's bullet proof.  I didn't realize I had done ten layers until I counted it all up. But, I think it needed every coat.

This beautiful polish is Lynnderella Mademoiselle Violette de Bleu, or MVdB from now on.  This shade is described as a mixture of royal blue, blue violet, navy, holographic royal blue multi-sized hexagons and squares with a touch of purple and iridescent blue hexagons in a sheer blue-violet base.

Another bottle of glitter perfection, Lynnderella, I bow down to you. I'm not worthy, I'm not worthy.  And people, if you think I'm going a bit over the top, just wait until you get your little hands on a bottle of Lynnderella polish and see for yourself. They truly are the best glitter polishes ever. Period!

You really can see the different shades of blue, as well as the violet and purple hexes.  Just look at how those glitters overlap.  They give it so much depth it's like looking into to deep sparkling pacific ocean.

So this is how I came to ten coats.

1 coat  Nail tek II foundation

2 coats Ulta3 Blue Marlin

2 coats Lynnderella MVdB

2 coats glitter tamer - it was a little rough

2 coats Seche Vite - yep still a little rough after one Seche Vite, so I did two.

1 coat Ulta3 Non-Chip (Australian made version) - added the next day as it was textured again in the morning.

I got a teeny bit of shrinkage on the pinky here, but otherwise it was so smooth.  I really expected it to be an inch thick but, I was surprised how thin it still was.  I guess because I allowed it to dry well between each coat, and I only did thin coats, it never go squishy or dents.

I'm slowly making my way through all my Lynnderellas.  Sorry it's taking so long, but I really need to appreciate each one as a full mani, I can't just swatch these beauties.  

Did you notice I started a colour guide for my Lynnderella swatches too?

Lynnderella - Cauldron Drippings

I'm not sure if one really should wear orange polish outside holiday periods, but let me tell you, I totally rocked this bright orange number at work on Monday.  My outfit was black pants and a black top, very office appropriate, then these most awesome nails.  They certainly were attention grabbers.

This is Lynnderella Cauldron Drippings from last years Early Halloween collection.  I'm still enjoying sporting the matching base colour with all these polishes.  This time I chose Kleancolor Metallic Orange, one coat.  Two coats of Cauldron Drippings, glitter tamer and then Seche Vite

Lynnderella say's that Cauldron Drippings is "the first random glitter: every bottle is intentionally different. But basically oranges in an sparkling orange base, plus whatever happens to be in the cauldron at the moment."

I just couldn't pick which macro shot to show, so what the hell, I'll put both in.

I don't believe it needs to be said, but I will say it anyway.  Legend - wait for it - dary!

Windmillion Glitter Sandwich

Today I'm showing you glitter sandwich nails (polish-glitter-polish). I started with applying two coats of Thanks a Windmillion from OPI and one coat of Essence - Blair. Blair needs some thinner, all the glitter was clumping together, argh! But still, an awesome glitter polish.. I think I need a backup bottle. ♥ To complete the sandwich I added one coat of China Glaze - Innocence. The result was a bit lumpy after that, so I decided to use a layer of matte top coat. I kinda like how this looks, but I don't think I'll keep it on my nails for more than a day. Let's say it was a nice experiment. ^_^

Thanks for watching!

Lynnderella - Change

Yesterday's Lynnderella - The Telltale Heart, may not have been a me colour. But this one, Change -  it doesn't get anymore me than this!

This was the first Lynnderella polish that I really, really wanted.  I wanted is so bad I made my own version of it here, called Coinage. I love my version so much and its the only polish I now wear on my toes.  Because I love it so much, I was worried that Change may not live up to my expectations.  I had high, very high expectations for Change.  So I left it sitting there, taunting me, sparkling out from my little stash of Lynnderellas.  This week, I decided it was time.  

I pulled out my swatch sticks to find the perfect accompanying colour to wear as undies.  I have a lot of gold polishes, it's my go to shade and the colour of at least 1/4 my stash.  I have every shade of gold - warm and cool tones  - duochrome golds - holographic golds.  I knew I would find the perfect undies for this.  In the end, the perfect undies choice this time was Chanel Peridot.  The fact that Peridot has a duochrome green shift was a perfect match with chartreuse green glitter hexes.

Other the the amazing mix of gold, silver, pewter, copper, bronze and chartreuse glitter, there are two spectacular pieces of glitter in this polish that really make it one of a kind.  The first is the huge silver hexes, as clearly seen on my ring finger above.  The reason I love these so much is because they really do remind me of change, as in the stuff that jangles in your coin purse.  Here in Australia we have very large 50 cent pieces.  They are silver and have angled edges.  This literally feels like I have money on my tips.

The other bits of glitter in this polish that are super duper amazeballs are the huge gold holographic square glitters. On this hand I go one on my thumb, index and middle fingers.  They are actually hard to spot in these photos because the glitter is almost the identical shade to Peridot.  But when the light catches the holo, like on the middle finger above, WOW.   And they are not light on, there are plenty of both the giant silver hexes and the holo squares in this polish.

You can see the massive square glitter in this macro, it just blends in until the light hits it.

Here is the huge silver hex, as well as a good shot that shows the other size glitters in this polish.

I felt like a million dollars wearing this.  I think it was the combo of Chanel Peridot and the rich glitters.  People, this is the polish combo I want to die in!

Lynderella - The Telltale Heart

This here is Lynderella's The Telltale Heart.. Once again, it's a truly amazing polish and a fabulous colour, but to be perfectly honest, it really isn't a me colour. 

When I was looking for undies to wear under this polish, I noticed that this was basically the exact same shade of glitter as Nubar Petunia Sparkle, so if you like that polish, you will love this.

The Telltale Heart has magenta/fuchsia squares, hexagons and micro glitter in pink tinted base.  I also noticed a definite blue sparkle in the tinted base. This was two coats over Ulta3 Sunset Pink.  I'm not convinced I got the right undies for this. I needed something more blue than just a fuchsia based pink I think.

And in other news, I got my first two Helmers today.  We don't have an IKEA in Canberra, the nearest is in Sydney.  They cost $129 there.  But if I ordered through the Adelaide shop online, they were only $79 each + postage.  Sure the postage was a bit hefty, but they still cost less than buying them from Sydney, and I didn't need to drive anywhere.

They arrived this morning, and this afternoon I opened up Kaz's guide to building you Helmer, and I was done building both of them in just over an hour. Whoo Hoo.  Now just to label the drawers and I'm all done.

Essie - School of Hard Rocks & CND Effects - Crimson Sparkle

The two nail polishes I used here were part of my last Transdesign order and I just couldn't wait to wear them. I'm not sure if this is the best combination, but I do know both polishes are a-ma-zing. Essie - School of Hard Rocks is a dusty greenish teal creme. A difficult colour to photograph, so it's obviously the perfect choice to wear when you're learning to work with a new camera. :|| SoHR looks more greyed out/dustier in real life, it's a beautiful shade that appeals to me a lot! Formula was great, I applied two coats. Then I added one coat of Crimson Sparkle from the CND Effects range. I'm telling you nothing new, but the Effects polishes from CND really are the bomb!

Thanks for watching!

Lynnderella - Forget you not

Set your phasers to drool everyone.  Check out today's beauty!  This is Lynnderella Forget You Not and it is the most glorious shade of blue EVA!!

I am so happy with the choice of undies I picked for this.  This is one coat of Picture Polish Denim layered with two coats of Forget you not.  It's so pretty, so so so pretty.  Really, it's very very very pretty. OK.

I love that this glitter isn't so metallic and blingy.  The glitter pieces are much more muted, not matte finish, but more of a satin finish glitter. 

Forget You Not is made with multi-sized periwinkle hexagons, but what makes it so much more special than just a regular glitter polish is this pink and blue sparkly shimmer in a very lightly tinted blue base.

I saw swatches of this polish over at Sparkly Vernis, where she did the most beautiful french tip gradient.  I told her in the comments that I was going to copy that design, and I did.  Mine is a little different to hers, she didn't put any glitter on the tip, which I clearly did - and later regretted.  I had too much polish on my tips with the base colour, tip colour and glitter that I had massive shrinkage and a bit of wrinkling.  But I was still really happy with the final look.

This combo is two coats of Bourjois Rose Lounge, french tips in Picture Polish Denim and gradient in Lynnderella Forget you not.

People, I notice there are a quite a few ebay listings popping up for Lynnderella polishes, they are selling for ridiculous prices and quite frankly it pisses me off. 

Yes I get the whole free enterprise system, but I'm pissed that these people are making huge profits when the creator of the polishes is not benefited!  What pisses me off even more is when I see listings that steal bloggers photos.  For nails I've recognised, I've emailed those ladies, but if you own Lynnderellas and have posted pictures on the Interwebs, I urge you to check listings to ensure they are not stealing your pictures.  Report them and have the listings removed!

Also, please don't be stupid and pay these ebay scalpers ridiculous prices for these polishes, this just feeds the problem.  Lynnderella is an amazing woman who is working her arse off, hand making polishes so that anyone who wants one will get the opportunity to buy them.  If you want to join the orderly cue for Lynnderella polishes, send an email to lalas.lynn.network@gmail.com.  The Llarowe shop is managing a wish list order fulfillment process which will see patient ladies getting their Lynnderella wishes.

And to quote Lynnderella on this one "People who are on the Lovely-is-as-Lovely-Does Frequency will probably find themselves most successful in completing orders."

Lynnderella - Mercury's Rainbow

Look, I'm pant-less, I'm wearing no undies!  That's right I'm wearing this Lynnderella on it's own.  

This is Mercury's Rainbow, which is at least eleventy bazillion times better than these photos show.  Glitter polishes are tricky to photograph, and holo glitter is even more impossible.  This was actually one of the first Lynnderella's I wore when I got them, and I have learned a heap about how to photograph glitter polishes better since these were taken.  But I shouldn't deprive you all of a post today because of my shitty photography skills.

Mercury's Rainbow has a sheer shimmery charcoal grey base, with fine silver glitter and gun metal grey holographic hexes.  Here are a lot of ordinary photos of an extraordinary polish.

This was three coats of Lynnderella Mercury's Rainbow on it's own, one coat of glitter tamer and then Seche Vite.

Beware of the Cat

When my new Konad plates arrived I immediately fell in love with the cute little bird on plate m83. For this mani I applied two coats of Eyeko - Rain Polish and stamped not one, but two birds on my ring finger nail with Konad Special Nail Polish in Black. It looked cute, but I felt something was missing so I added a naughty cat face (for the cat and the line I used a small paint brush and black acrylic paint). Yes, now it's complete. I have a little story on my nails! :)

I'm not only excited about this mani, but also about my new camera! Of course I have to get used to it(s weight), but it takes much better pictures than my compact camera, without a doubt. I'm hooked. ♥ 

Thanks for watching!

Lynnderella - Lucky Numbers

Yes, it's another Lynnderella polish today everyone.  This is Lucky Numbers and it has red and black glitter squares and hexagons in a milky clear base with a gorgeous red /gold duochrome shimmer.

I swear that my bottle of Lucky Numbers looks totally different to the one on Lynnderella's blog site. Her bottle shot is very black, with sparkles of red glitter and a fair bit of red and black bar glitter. Her's also looks opaque black (with some red glitter) at three coats. This was two coats, quite scattered with glitter and it is certainly predominately red, not black.

But, having said that, that's what I think is really cool about Lynnderella polishes.  They are hand made and you are guaranteed that your bottle will be unique and not exactly like anyone else's bottle anywhere.

As you can see below, my bottle also settles a little, so I needed to make sure I shook it up real good so I got some lumps of glitter onto the brush.

Now I don't know why, but this polish reminds me of playing cards. 

I think it's the whole combination of of the name and the mix of red and black glitters which reminds me of the four suits. Hearts, Clubs, Diamonds and Spades.  Image how much you'd own the poker table if you rocked up sporting these Lucky Number nails.

This angled sun shot shows that beautiful gold duochrome shift that the red micro shimmer holds.

On this macro you can see the little red shimmer particles over the glitter.

For the record, this was two coats layered of Ulta3 Lily White, topped with glitter tamer and Seche Vite. T

his one very cool polish.  I don't think this version would get opaque on it's own, it's definitely a layering polish. If I could just get more of the bar glitter out of the bottle, it would be kinda like a black and red version of Connect the Dots.