Cosmetic Cupcake

When I'm in a nail art rut Japanese nail magazines always give me that nail boost I need. I haven't bought many nail mags this year actually so I made a trip to Kinokuniya last week to stock up on some mags. Kino has cut back on the number of nail mags they stock which is so disappointing - they didn't even have Nail Up! which is one of my favourites! I still managed to pick up 3 though phew.


I saw this adorable cherry mani in S Cawaii! (which I've never bought before actually) and knew I had to recreate it. I love doing bright summery manis during winter and this is super cute and fun!! Plus it's a fruit mani and you know I adore those! ♥


What I used:


Pinky and index: I used 2 coats of Barry M Gelly nail effects Grapefruit and added a small gold bead to the bottom centre of my nails.

Ring fingers: I used 3 coats of OPI GoldenEye.

Middle and thumbs: I used 2 coats of Essie Where's My Chauffeur? as my base. To create the cherries I used a dotting dipped in Barry M Gelly nail effect Grapefruit and a small brush to paint the stems using Ulta 3 chocolate cake and for the leaves I used Barry M nail paint Mint Green before adding detail to the cherries using Cult Nails Tempest.

I should have chosen a brighter green because you can't really see the leaves unfortunately but oh well!


My NOTDs will be a bit varied at the moment because I've resorted to using flash because I just can't take pics during the day. The hubby bought me a lightbox a little while ago but I haven't worked out my lighting for it yet. Hurry up and come back summer with your beautiful long days and bright light!

What do you think? Did I do the original mani justice? Thanks for looking as always!

My eczema and contact dermatitis have been playing up so badly this winter that I've had to sport naked nails most of the time since coming home from warm Europe and HK unfortunately. But naked nails make for a sad 'chelle so I had to brave some nail art! I've been following a heap of celeb nail artists on Instagram and one of my faves is Steph Stone Nails and I couldn't go past her adorable summer drippy ice cream nails. I absolutely LOVE drippy nails and I've done them quite a few times but it was time for a proper ice cream looking mani! I followed her tutorial to create them but my version doesn't look anywhere near as polished obviously. Please excuse my terribly haggard looking hands and cuticles!


I started off with 2 coats of Kester Black Butter Cream* as my base for all nails except my accent nails where I used 3 coats of Etude House Dear My Party Nails PPK001 and added criss cross lines using Hello Darling Say No To Cameltoe using a striper brush. For the ice cream drips I decided to go colourful and I used Kester Black Fairy Floss* for my pinky, Hello Darling Ganache for my middle fingers and Cult Nails Tempest for my index fingers.


For my thumbs I used Hello Darling Mint Slice* for the ice cream drip and I used a large dotting tool and OPI Big Apple Red* to create the cherries. For the sprinkles I used China Glaze Tart-y for the Party, Keep Calm, Paint On and Life is Rosy and Models Own nail art pens in yellow and blue.


I love a bit of summer during winter and who doesn't enjoy ice cream in the cooler months?!! What do you think? Thanks for looking as always!

* Product(s) provided to me for consideration but this in no way influenced my review in any way. As always, my reviews are my 100% honest opinion. My Disclosure Policy can be viewed here.

Sooooooooo this manicure is inspired by my favourite Samantha Wills Bohemian Bardot ring in turquoise gunmetal. Unfortunately it was a fail so it's a VERY loosely inspired manicure! I probably should have used a lighter shade to stamp with and also because it's not really a splatter design AT ALL but once I'd started I couldn't be bothered to take it all off and do it again LOL. Oh well!


I used 2 coats of Hema Long Lasting in 81 and stamped the splatter design from Konad plate m70 using Konad Special polish in black.




It was still a fun mani to rock with my gorgeous ring but not the exact look I was after!! Thanks for looking as always!

Besides nail polish and makeup my other love is food. And what better way than to put both loves together for food nails! Seriously I don't think there is any better combo ;) This mani is inspired by the burger nails by The Illustrated Nail. I love their nail art and when I saw the pic of this mani I had to try it out myself!!


Unfortunately I don't have the right "burger" shade in my stash which means I'll have to buy more polish clearly haha! xp


I used 2 coats of OPI Van Gogh* as my base for the bun. For the tomato I used Nail Star 2 way nail art pen & brush in red and for the lettuce I used the green. For the meat pattie I used Ulta 3 Chocolate Cake and I used a small nail art brush to draw the cheese using Bloom Emily Green Ochre*. Lastly I used the Models Own nail art pen in white for the sesame seeds.


Food inspired nails are always so much fun!! Any recommendations for other food manis? Thanks for looking as always!!

* Product(s) provided to me for consideration but this in no way influenced my review in any way. As always, my reviews are my 100% honest opinion. My Disclosure Policy can be viewed here.

Hello from HK ladies! I thought I'd squeeze in a quick post before I head out for some shopping. Shops here don't open until 11am and I've been waking up early so I'm trying to use my time wisely haha. Today's mani is from a little while ago and is inspired by this gorgeous mani by one of my favourite ladies Aysh. Being a lover of glitter gradient manis of course I had to do her mani myself!


I couldn't find my Ulta 3 mermaid green anywhere so I used 2 coats of Misa Dirty, Sexy, Money instead and applied China Glaze Atlantis (thank you so much Ange for this beauty!!!!!!) and Essence nail art twins Edward to the tips. Not the best glitter gradient I've done but oh well!



I haven't used my Dirty, Sexy, Money in ages so it settled haha.

I hope you're all doing well! My nails are currently nekkid while I'm on holiday and it feels so weird! Must do my nails sooooooooon.

Do you guys love glitter gradient manis too? Thanks for looking as always =)

Happy Sunday guys! I hope you've had a great weekend =) I've been stressed out lately due to work so I took this weekend off and enjoyed myself by doing not much lol. D and I went to see The Expendables 2 today (awesome action and I love Jason Statham!!) and I just had to do popcorn nails inspired by this awesome tutorial by Katy from Nailed It. She does fantastic manis and nail art tutorials!


POPCORN!!! I freaking love popcorn - sweet, buttered, flavoured.. MMMMMMM!


What I used:


I used 2 coats of white creme OPI Alpine Snow as my base and Nail Star Two-Way nail art pen and brush in red to draw vertical lines on each nail. Once that all dried I used China Glaze Lemon Fizz and a large dotting tool to draw small dots close together in a popcorn shape. I then used Essence Colour & Go Sundancer and a smaller sized dotting tool for the kernel shells.





I have a thing for food manicures I think haha. They are just so much fun to shoot and wear! I don't want to take these popcorn nails off. My sis helped me take some of these shots and we had fun doing it even though my room was littered with popcorn bits afterwards LOL.

Have you seen any new movies lately? I hope you like this mani as much as I do! Thanks for looking as always =)

I saw this fabulous NOTD on instagram last week by the super duper talented Deniz and I just had to do my own version. She is so freaking talented and I love seeing her beautiful manis! Her stamped manis especially are just amazing. I didn't feel like coral so I went with my favourite nude creme for accents. I don't know if the design really looks like filigree but hey that's what I'm going with!


I used 2 coats of Glitter Gal Serpent Black* on my index, middle and pinky. On my thumb and ring finger I used 2 coats of Bloom Toni* and stamped filigree-looking design from Bundle Monster plate BM-214 using Konad Special stamping polish in black. I then added some small black studs. I had to stamp the design twice because I messed up the 1st time!


Bloom Toni has to be my absolute favourite nude creme and it's so typical that it's a LE product and it's only a mini size!! Toni is my mannequin nails shade and I love just how elegant it is.



I hope you've all been well! Can you believe it's September already???! Only 3 months until Christmas.. scary! Thanks for looking as always =)

* Product(s) provided to me for consideration but this in no way influenced my review in any way. As always, my reviews are my 100% honest opinion. My Disclosure Policy can be viewed here.

Happy Monday ladies! I hope you've all had a good start to the week =) Yesterday I watched Snow White and the Huntsman with 2 of my lovely girlfriends so I thought I would do a Snow White inspired mani. But it was a massive fail because I didn't know what I wanted to do for each nail and I don't think it gelled properly! ARGH. I hate when that happens. My photos suck as well because my heart wasn't into this mani doh.


What I used:


Pinky: I used 2 coats of BYS Astro Gold and 2 coats of Sephora by OPI Only Gold for Me top coat.

Ring finger: I used 2 coats of OPI Alpine Snow and used a small brush to freehand the bitten apple using China Glaze Phat Santa, Ulta 3 chocolate cake for the leaf and a green rhinestone for the apple.

Middle finger: I took inspiration from this movie poster and created a gradient nail using BYS Astro Gold, Tom Ford Silver Smoke and China Glaze Jolly Holly.

Index finger: I used 1 coat of Rescue Beauty Lounge Concrete Jungle and stamped the gold crown image from Bundle Monster plate BM08 using China Glaze Passion.


Thumb: I used 2 coats of Glitter Gal Serpent Black* as a black base. For the axe I used a small brush to freehand using China Glaze Devotion for the blade and Essie Brooch the Subject* for the handle with Essie Hot Coco* for the darker wood accents.


I instagrammed this pic on Saturday night halfway through my mani and I thought I'd post it here too xp I like to have everything in reach when I'm doing my mani so my supplies take up about 1/3 of my desk. My routine is to turn on a good DVD and relax while doing my mani!


Have you seen Snow White and the Huntsman? I really enjoyed it and Kirsten Stewart didn't annoy me as much as I thought she would lol. Lots of decent action scenes and a bit of eye candy too!

Thanks for looking as always =)

* Product(s) provided to me for consideration but this in no way influenced my review in any way. As always, my reviews are my 100% honest opinion. My Disclosure Policy can be viewed here.

Today's manicure is inspired by this adorable peter pan collar nail tutorial over at The Beauty Department. They do some really cute nail and makeup tutorials! I only discovered the site a little while ago so clearly I've been living under a rock haha. I'm kind of stuck in a nail art rut at the moment so I thought I would try the design out! It's a dodgy job as you can clearly see the black peeking out from beneath the white collars and my index finger is stuffed up. Oh well! I also completely stuffed up my right hand so it looks like I painted in the dark or something haha!


I stuck pretty closely to the easy to follow tutorial. I used binder reinforcements to section off my nail and used 2 coats of Color Club Where's the Soiree for the shirt. I then used a small nail art brush and Kiss nail art striper in white to draw the collars. I then added 3 gold bullions down the centre of each nail.

For my thumb I used 2 coats of Color Club Where's the Soiree and 1 coat of China Glaze Medallion.


I could have done a much better job at cleaning up but couldn't be bothered oops! Also I need some new nail art brushes as mine are getting a bit tattered so they don't give a clean line.




I look terribly silly in peter pan collar shirts but I loved wearing them on my nails instead! XD What do you think?

Thanks for looking as always!

So I am kind of obsessed with Cadbury Creme Eggs. They just taste so darn good and come Easter time I head straight for the store to get my yearly fix! Now that I'm older and wiser slightly more health conscious I limit myself to one bag of creme eggs only. As you know, I love doing themed/inspired/festive manicures and I have wanted to do a manicure inspired by my favourite Easter eggs since I started my blog. The problem was I always ate them all before I could do my mani! This year I restrained myself so here is my Cadbury Creme Egg manicure for you all!

Apologies in advance for the picture spam. I couldn't resist - I really enjoyed this mani! It might be a bit much for some but hey nail art to me should be FUN!



I used 2 coats of Models Own Pure Purple (a gorgeous dark purple creme gifted to me from Christina!) onto half of each nail. I alternated the positioning of the purple on each nail and then filled in the rest of each nail with OPI Red My Fortune Cookie using a nail art brush. I then used Kiss nail art paint striper in white to freehand a vertical line where the 2 colours met.

For the splatter/yolk, I dropped a large blob (such a technical word HAHA) of China Glaze Happy Go Lucky onto the middle of each nail and dragged it out quickly using a small dotting tool. I then added some random dots with the dotting tool around the splat.


Pure Purple is such a gorgeous shade however it's a blurple so it was ridiculously hard trying to capture the colour properly. It's a dark purple but isn't as dark as it looks in my pics.





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What do you think? Does it remind you of Creme Eggs?

Thanks for looking as always! Don't forget to enter my Hello Kitty Cosmetics giveaway here!