Essence: Thermo Effect Polish - It's Hot Stuff

Hello all,


I love to have fun with my nails, so if there's a polish that adds to the fun it's going to be likely that I want it!  I spotted Thermo Effect colours from Essence a while back on a European blog, but that was before Essence came over to the UK.  When they arrived here, I sent them a cheeky Tweet to ask if we would be getting them as well and I was told they would be here soon.  On my last trip to Westfield I popped into the shop, obviously, and spotted this gorgeous pink that I needed to try.

Gone Wild - Animal Print Nail Art

Hello all,

Well, it seems it's only too easy to change my mind.  Having done a first last week, leaving a manicure matte, there is no stopping me now.  I have only gone and done it again!  After a comment on Twitter on my nails last week I was inspired to create my design this week and I am so so SO pleased with how they turned out.

These are my gone wild animal print nails.  Aren't they fun?  These took me quite a long time to do, but only because I wanted them to be just right so I took plenty of time.

From my thumb round to my little finger I have done, zebra, leopard, tiger, giraffe and cheetah prints.  I had the first four in mind all week long before doing these but had to think a bit more to come up with cheetah.  Want to know how I did these?  Well here goes.

Zebra - I started off with two coats of Snow White from Models Own.  After this had dried I used my Barry M nail art pen in black to freehand the stripes.  I bought the nail art pen especially for this as I was quite worried about this print and trying to do it with a striper or brush.  I can tell you now that I am most definitely not a fan of zebra print.  On my other hand I ended up removing it three times before it was only ok.  I do not think I will be doing this print again.  Well not freehand anyway!

Glam Animal Print Nail Art

Hello all,

I didn't post last week because I didn't do anything fancy with my nails.  I just did a simple French manicure with a glitter accent nail.

On Saturday I got distracted by all things shiny and bought myself three new glitters, well I didn't really even buy them, they were on offer and I had a voucher so it was even better!

I have had my eye on Models Own Jack Frost (Centre) for a little while now because, well look at it, it's just so pretty! Ive also been thinking about Bora Bora from the Hed Kandi collection (right) and you can't go wrong with a pretty gold glitter!  My boyfriend spotted the other polish, so it's his fault, not mine!! It's from Miss Sporty but it doesn't seem to have a name, sorry! **Edit - It's called Amethyst Dust**

I normally paint my nails on a Sunday ready for the week, so I got all my bits together and started on a design that I had had in mind for a while now.  I had nearly finished, but I just wasn't happy, so ended up taking it all off and doing something different instead!

So as an alternative design I thought I would try out one of my new glitters seeing as they were there in my nail bag glistening away.  I have had a go at tiger stripes before and thought they were really fun, but I had never tried leopard spots.  I know that lots of other people have done them and thought it was about time for me to have a go, so I combined the two!



I used Models Own Bora Bora as a base and Barry M Mushroom for the leopard spots.  All the black was done with my Models Own Nail Art Pen.  The stripes are really easy to do, just use a striper and flick the brush towards of the centre of the nails.  For the leopard spots I dotted on the Mushroom with the larger end of my dotting tool.  Once this was dry I added a bracket of black around the spots with the smaller end and added on a few smaller black spots of good measure.

I am really pleased with how my glam animal print nails worked out!  I love the fine gold glitter contrasted with the bold spots and stripes.  How do you think I did for my first go at leopard spots?

White Tiger and Glitter Nail Art

This week I was inspired by cutepolish.  She had posted a Glitzy Rainbow Tiger nail design and I really liked it.  I wanted to give the tiger stripes a go and I liked the glitter and stripe combo.  I didn't want rainbow tiger nails though, so I decided to adapt the design slightly and make it a white tiger design.

To create this look I painted all my nails with Models Own Sterling Silver polish.  After this had dried, to create an accent nail on my ring finger, I topped the silver with Models Own Freak Out from the Glitterball collection.  To create the tiger stripes on the rest of the nails I used a black striper from Andrea Fulerton.  All you need to do is have a very small amount of polish on the brush, start at the edge of the nail and flick the brush towards the centre of the nail.  You then repeat the same steps again next to your first set of lines to make tiger stripes rather than just single flicks.  As always I finish off with a top coat to protect the design.

I hope you like my version of this cutepolish design.