Grey with Silver Stamping

When a combo just goes right

Base - Barry M - Grey

Stamping - MoYou - Silver Dust

Stamping Plate - UberChic 14-02

Tahlia from Elune by Emily

A duo chrome, holographic glitter dream

Base - Elune by Emily - Tahlia

Silver Stamping - MoYou London - Silver Dust

Stamping Plate - Uberchic Beauty - 3-02

Easter Chick

Easter can only mean one thing, Models Own Speckled Egg nail varnishes!

Index Finger - Models Own - Dove

Middle Finger - Models Own - Magpie

Ring Finger - Models Own - Goose

Little Finger - Models Own - Swan

Bottle - Models Own - Duck

Stamping Polish - MoYou Black Knight

Stamping Plate - MoYou London - Festive Collection 60

A Little Bird

A little bird told me it was spring!

Base - MoYou London - Soft Iris

Layer 1 Stamping - MoYou London - Periwinkle

Layer 2 Stamping - MoYou London - White Knight

Glitter - NYC New York Color - Lights-Camera-Glitter

Stamping Plate - MoYou London - Festive Collection 60

Back from a Blogging Break

I've been away from my blog for a little while now, but my love for nail painting didn't stop, I was still posting weekly on Instagram, but felt I was struggling to keep up with posting, along with finishing the planning for my wedding.  I have enjoyed my little break, but I want to get back to my blog again.

I thought I'd share the nails that I did whilst I was away.  I won't go into details about them as there are quite a few, and they are all on Instagram, but I thought it would be a nice post to get me started again.

January - Blues and Sparkle

January tends to be grey and miserable, so it's always nice to have pretty nails to brighten the month up.

I'd asked for some MoYou goodies for Christmas, so I decided to use them for my first  design for the month.

Ciaté Regatta was the perfect base for my MoYou Silver Dust stamping with SciFi Plate number 08.  I was a little disappointed that I managed to smudge my stamping when I added my top coat, but I was still happy with my design overall.

I love darker colours in the colder months, and hadn't used OPI Black Cherry Chutney for a while so thought I'd do a simple manicure with a glitter accent nail.  This colour is such a gorgeous deep purple red, and is perfect for a gothic look.  You can't see how pretty In True Stefani Fashion is in this photo, but trust me when I tell you, all the different shapes and sizes of the glitter really catch the light.

Despite the previous manicure to this one, and loving darker colours for winter, I've got a rather important even coming up in a few weeks time so want to steer clear of the darker shades for a bit to avoid any staining.  Bearing this in mind I decided to go for Heather from the Barry M Silk collection.  It's such a pretty and delicate colour on its own with a beautiful shimmer, but I couldn't resit adding a coat of NYC Lights, Camera, Glitter.  It has to be one of my all time favourite glitters and I have used it over many different base colours and haven't found a combination that I didn't like.  My mum looked for a new bottle of this one, as she likes it too, but couldn't find it in Superdrug, so I headed to Amazon, and bought three bottles to be sure we didn't run out any time soon!

I still can't decide whether my final design for the month was a nail fail or not.  I wanted to do a bit of a different kind of ombré across the nails rather than on all nails, so I chose Models Own Beth's Blue and Grape Juice.  I think the colours complimented each other and gave the ombré look, but I'm just not sure it's what I had in mind.  I added some little love hearts with Jacava Lavender Court to finish off the look.

My favourite this month has to be my sparkly Lights, Camera, Glitter, nails.  I can't resit sparkle and shine, so it just ticked all the right boxes.

Thanks for stopping by

Aimée x

November - Odds and Ends

I have had a bit of a mix and match month this month, with some darker nails, some lighter ones, and a bit of fun nail art.

I was inspired by the colours in my October Nailbox box, and for my first design this month I did some cute owl nails.

I started off bt masking my nails with round stickers on my middle finger and ring finger.  I then painted a base colour of NailsInc Kensington High Street on all fingers.  I had to peel the stickers off carefully to create the ears of the owls.  I decided to add a reverse glitter gradient on the 'non owl' nails with Essie Summit of Style.  This is just such a pretty antique gold glitter that really sparkles.

For the details on my owl nails I used Rimmel Caramel Cupcake for the tummy feathers, with individually placed glitter particles from Summit of Style.  Then I dotted on white and black for their eyes and orange for a beak.

With a little less time to come up with a nail design I tend to fall back on to nail stamping because it's quick and easy and looks really effective.  I went for a lacy butterfly effect with this design using Essie Ballet Slippers as a neutral base, and white stamping over the stop using MoYou London White Knight and the number 10 Princess Plate.  I really liked the overall look, but wish that I had been able to vary the stamped image.

I was recently having a look around in Kiko, and I was taken with three sparkly shades.  I was going leave them and put them on my Christmas, but my fiancé wouldn't let me leave and bought them for me.  This is 531.  How pretty is this?  I am a little disappointed that it doesn't have a fun name to match the beautiful sparkle.

To finish off the month I decided to go with a metallic and black plaited nail design.  I only added the plaited effect on my ring finger and thumb because it can take quite a bit of time to get the finished look depending on how long your nails are.  I used True Brit London Taxi Cab, Barry M Grey, and OPI Turn on the Haute Light for this look.

So, as you can see, a bit of a mixed bag overall.  I think the owls were my favourites this month.  What;s yours?  Leave me a comment and let me know.   I can't believe December is already knocking at our door, but that does of course mean it's time for Christmas nails - yay!

Thanks for stopping by

Aimée x

October - Autumn Fun and Glitz

Autumn is my favourite month, I love all the changing colours and being able to snuggle up in cosy hoodies and boots.  I also love darker nails.

At the start of the month I went to see The Martian, so I decided to do some space nails.

Now I know that The Martian is about Mars, and that Mars is the red planet, but I thought that it was pretty fitting to use Rimmel's Space Dust in Total Eclipse polish for this manicure.  I love the MoYou Sci-Fi stamping plates, and this little astronaut is just so cute.

Barry M got it spot on with their limited edition glitter Gelly polishes, and I just couldn't resit them.  This is Sparkling Amethyst, and it's just stunning - I think it's made it's way into my list of favourite polishes.  I love the subtle glitter and beautiful shine of the Gelly formula.  I also got Sparkling Ruby, which will be making it's way into Christmas designs.

As I said before, I love the changing colours of the autumn leaves, so really wanted to do a manicure to reflect them.  I remembered that I had come across this design on Pinterest a while a ago and it gave me the inspiration for my falling leaves design.  I used Graffiti Nails Tuscany, Barry M Mushroom, and Bright Red, and Jacava Cherry Brandy for my autumnal colours.  I added in quite a few more dots and falling hearts than in the original design, and was worried that I might make a mess when drawing the tree, but I was really pleased with my design and it was my favourite this month.

I think it's part of nail law that in October you must do at least one Halloween design.  This year I had order some brilliant nail vinyls from She Sells Sea Shells, so it made my pumpkin nails really easy to do.  Tuscany from Graffiti Nails was the perfect base.  I got Taxi Cab from True Brit London and Queen Victoria Street Nails Inc, in my Nailbox subscription and both were perfect additions.  I think my pumpkin leaves look a bit more like hair than leaves, but they are still cute overall anyway.

Do you agree with my favourite this month or did you prefer one of my other designs more?  Make sure you follow me on Instagram to keep up with me weekly.

Thanks for stopping by

Aimée x

August - Colours and Designs

You may have read in my previous entry that my posting schedule was going to change and the end of August brings my first round up of what I have been up to.

Overall I kept things quite simple this month, which gave me the chance to try out some colours that I hadn't got round to using yet, and some new colours that just happened to fall into my basket whilst out shopping.

At the beginning of the month I got my first Butter London polish so, of course, I had to try that out right away, and I paired it with a beautiful new Orly colour as well.

I started with Fluorescent Fuchsia from Orly, as my main colour and used The Black Knight from Butter London as an accent nail.  Orly polishes that I have tried before have a lovely smooth application and this is no different.  With it being a florescent colour it dries to a matte finish, but I simply used my normal top coat to as shine.  The Black Knight is opaque in two coats, which also means you get a good helping of glitter.  The glitter particles are tiny pink and blue flecks, with even smaller gold sparkles running throughout.

I have really been enjoying watching the International Space Station fly recently, so I thought I'd do some nails inspired by watching the night sky.  I started with a base of Essence It's Raining Me, which has a subtle shimmer so it seemed like an appropriate colour to start with.  For extra stars I added a coat of Disco Ball from Rimmel because it has varying sizes and colours of glitter giving the idea of distant stars in the sky.  To finish off I stamped the ISS and The Plough constellation from my MoYou Sci-Fi 03 plate.

I hadn't done a gradient in a long time so thought I'd crack out some nice summer coral shades so this one.  I started with a base of white to make the colours really pop and then sponged on the gradient with a make up sponge using Model Own Peach Melba and OPI Toucan Do It If You Try.  I smoothed it all out with a glitter top coat and then added small white hearts with my dotting tool.  I got lots of compliments with this design.

I have had a busy few days towards the end of this month so I used my limited nail painting time to try out Models Own Blue Spray which I've had for a long time, but never used.  The Artstix from Models Own are a really brilliant idea meaning that you have a colour and a glitter polish all in one. You can use just the base colour or just the glitter, or both together.  Blue Spray is made up of Blue Maldives and Sea Spray which you used to be able to get as full sized polishes, but I think they have now been replaced by other collections.  The Sea Spray glitter has silver bar shapes, red glitter dots and large diamond holographic flecks that really catch the light.

Lastly this month I tried out Barry M Sunset nail paint.  This is another new one, but I didn't even put it in my basket... It was my fiancé, so I don't feel guilty about the purchase - ha ha!  When I first read about the Sunset collection I wasn't sure that the daylight curing finish would be much different from a gelly, but it does feel different somehow, plus, look how pretty Fuchsia Generation is.

Which has been your favourite design of mine this month?  Make sure you visit my blog again at the end of next month for my next round up, but in the mean time keep up with my designs weekly on Instagram.

Thanks for stopping by

Aimée x 

Models Own: Colour Chrome Stamping

I know the Colour Chrome collection came out a while ago now, but I haven't actually had time to try them out yet.  I have to say, whilst they are pretty, they weren't my favourite collection from Models Own so I only bought two as they were my favourites out of the 10 available.

I have read loads of blogs where everyone has said how brilliant chromes are for stamping, so I thought I'd give it a go myself.  I chose my MoYou Sci-Fi 08 plate which features funky whole nail designs.

I have mainly seen the chrome collection stamped over black, which looks lovely, but black nails are a bit heavy for summer, so I picked a neutral base, Utopia, also from Models Own.  I paired this with Chrome Cerise for my stamped design.

If you have used stamping plates before you'll know that you can't hang around when picking up your design, and I found that the chrome colour dries really quickly, meaning I had to work even faster than normal.  Unfortunately this meant that I have a couple of little patches where the whole design didn't quite transfer, but I'm not going to tell you which nail in case you haven't noticed!  The large dots in the middle of my chosen design weren't as sharp as I would have liked them to be, but to fix them I used a small dotting tool and dotted over them.  I tend to find that the whole nail images on MoYou plates are not quite long enough for my thumb nails unless I have really short nails, so I used Chrome Cerise over the whole nail as a bit of a contrast.

Overall I did like the colour for stamping and I think the finished effect is lovely, but have to say that I am not keen on the over-all chrome finish.  There are far too many visible brush strokes for my liking and they aren't very forgiving on any little imperfections.

Thanks for stopping by
Aimee x

Pastel Chequered Ombré Nail Art

We were treated to some lovely spring weather over the weekend, and spring always has me reaching for pastel colours.  Who else is excited for pastels?

There have been some gorgeous new releases recently, fuelling our polish addictions, but not being quite so good for our bank balances!  Having said that I have managed to resist most of the new ones recently as there is a particular collection I have my eye on, so this week I looked through my already rather large stash to revisit some old favourites from Models Own.

I opted for a white base with a combination of Beth's Blue, Lilac Dream, and Pastel Pink.

Beth's Blue has been a long time favourite pastel shade for me and unfortunately you can't get it any more, but there are some other similar beauties in the Hypergel range and also Blueberry Muffin. You can also see my comparison of this against Duck from the Speckled Eggs collection.

Using my MoYou Princess 10 plate meant that this was a really quick ombré without loosing any of the effect.  I have already had lots of compliments and questions as to how I got the look.

Confession time, I haven't got the checks on thumb nails.  I used Lilac Dream for those as I just can't seem to stamp very well on my thumbs with an all over design like this.  I thought it might look a bit odd, but it actually ended up being quite a cute, if not traditional, accent nail.  When I try all over stamps like this pattern I end up with bare ends where it hasn't been quite long enough and you can never get it to line up properly to try to add an extra bit on the end.  Does anyone else have this problem?

What pastel colours are your favourites for spring?

Thanks for stopping by 

Aimée x

Valentine's Day Heart Nail Art

With February upon us I thought that I'd make an early start with some simple Valentine's Day nails, plus I was determined to try out one of my new MoYou stamping plates.

As we still have a couple of weeks before the day itself I wanted to stick with a darker wintery colour, but still have a base that has a Valentine's feel to it.  I chose Revlon's Vixen - How fitting is the name apart from anything else?  It's tricky to describe the colour as it depends what light you look at it in.  Sometimes it can look very deep red with brown undertones, but with two coats it leans more to a purple red.  Either way I love it; but it does tend to stain a bit.

So, back to the stamping.  The other week I had to double stamp as my chosen colours weren't as contrasting as I had hoped, and then last week I had a design in mind, but it was just fail after fail so I gave up in the end.  So, not to be defeated I picked a different plate and tried again this week.  Does anyone else go through phases like this with stamping?

I chose my new MoYou Princess Plate 10 which has loads of cute designs on it, but being a Valentine's design I chose the linked hearts and I stamped these with MoYou White Knight stamping polish as an accent nail on my ring finger.  I thought it might be a bit much on every nail in this colour combination, so to finish the design I used the same white polish with a dotting tool to create mini hearts just off centre on the rest of my nails.

Overall I am pleased even though my white got a bit smudgy in places... Seems it's not just black that drags with top coat!

I am thinking of doing my very first full nail wheel of Valentine's designs; anyone fancy joining me for the challenge?  Keep an eye out for it on Instagram and whilst you're there it would be great if you gave me a follow!

Thanks for stopping by
Aimée x 

Blue Stamped Flower Nail Art

This week it took me a while to choose what to do on my nails so I had a bit of a rummage around in my stash for an untried polish.  I had a clear up and organise a while back I haven't got that many untried, but I found Pop Fiction from Miss Sporty and thought it was quite fitting with the cold wintry weather that we have at the moment.

Pop Fiction is such a pretty colour, but it was rather tricky to apply. The first coat was quite streaky, and I don't know about you, but I always find a bit disappointing when that happens; It was fine after a second coat though.  The other problem I found was the size of the brush.  It's really wide and when painting it covered almost all of my nail in one stroke, but it wasn't quite wide enough, leaving little gaps down the sides.  I had to be very careful not to get polish all over my fingers.

I then used Models Own Inky blue and my MoYou Pro Plate 09 to stamp on a pretty flower design, but there wasn't as much of a contrast between the two blues as I had hoped.  To fix it, I stamped again with the same design, but turning it the other way around, with Barry M Blueberry Ice Cream. I really like the effect that it has given because you can see all the different blues in the gaps of the pattern and it almost looks like a paisley pattern.

So my nails ended up being a happy accident, but things don't always work out that well.  Do you have any tricks that you do if your nails don't quite go to plan?

Thanks for stopping by

Aimée x 

I Heart New York Nails

Hello all,

I have been fairly quite on social media since the week before last because I was away, so it seems like ages since I last posted anything properly, but this week I wanted to share with you my nails to match my holiday.

I'm sure you've guessed from the title of the post where I went; the fabulous New York.  And it's true, I really do love it!

I used my MoYou Tourist 02 plate for a quick, but super effective design.  I have been to New York before and visited The Statue of Liberty, but this time I was lucky enough to get tickets to go inside and stand on the plinth (I just missed out on crown tickets - drat!).  I thought it was only fitting that I stamp Liberty herself on my thumb nail on one hand.  And what better background for my picture?

On my other hand I decided to stamp the American flag.  This is the first time I have tried stamping where I've coloured the design with different polishes.  I don't think I did too badly, but there is room for improvement.  Has anyone got any tips for how best to scrape the excess polish away when doing this so the colours don't all blend?

Times Square was the backdrop for this hand and it's a must do visit if you haven't been before.  There are so many lights, so if you're anything like me and love anything sparkly or shiny, it's the place to go.

I used a white base on all nails with Models Own Snow White, which has been my go to polish of the year I think.  It's been the only colour nail polish that I have ever used a whole bottle of before it's gone gloopy.  I stamped the I heart NY on my other nails using Graffiti Nails Jet and Barry M Red.

And just because I do love New York so much here's a quick picture from my trip

Thanks for stopping by
Aimée x

Barry M: Indigo with Flowers

Hi all,

I hope you all had a good Halloween and enjoyed some spooky nail art.  With the festivities over it was nice to do something different this week.

I paired Barry M Indigo with Lady from the Royal Textured Glitter collection.  I stamped these pretty flowers over the glitter using Pro Plate 09 from MoYou London.

I'm really looking forward to wearing some darker colours now that it's starting to get colder and the nights are drawing in.  What are your favourite colours to wear in the winter months?

Thanks for stopping by

Aimée x

Tiffany & Co Nails

Hello all,

Whilst I was out shopping at the weekend, I got distracted by something shiny... Glittery nail polish to be precise!  How could I not come away with nail polish when I was out for a girly day of shopping and the cinema with my mum?

I got an exciting new addition to my Essence collection which will feature on my blog soon, but what I have to show you today is number 184 from Laka.  It's the perfect green glitter to add to some Tiffany & Co. themed nails.

I have done Tiffany & Co. nails before (you can see them here) and they are just so cute to do; so I was excited to try out some more.

Polish Party: Birthday Celebrations - Candles and Glitter

Hi all,

If you read my blog regularly you'll know that Lauren, Madison, and I, along with some other wonderful nail girls decided to join together each month, come up with a theme and paint our nails. Well that was a whole year ago! It's weird to think that it started with a very small group and now there are 55 people involved with Polish Party.  What better way to celebrate than with birthday candle nails?

I posted a plain swatch of Models Own Diamond Luxe Oval Plum last week and it was so pretty I didn't want to take it off.  So I decided to use it as a base for my birthday nails.

I started by stamping the candles from my MoYou Greek Mythology 09 plate in white.  After they had dried I filled in the pattern with pink and silver nail art pens from Barry M.  I finished them off my adding gold glitter to the flames.  I wasn't sure about them at first, but they have grown on me.  I didn't want to stamp on all nails so I used Hot Stuff from the Models Own Mirrorball collection.  It's just the perfect kind of glitter for this design as it looks like confetti.

Don't miss what the other girls come up with.  I'm super excited to see them all.  Follow their links below.

Thanks for stopping by

Aimée x

An InLinkz Link-up

Models Own: Pear Purple and Stamping

Hi all,

One of my favourite colours is purple, and I love purple nails.  So it was only natural that I would be getting Models Own Pear Purple from their new Diamond Luxe collection.  I had a simple swatch of Oval Plum last week, and you can see how pretty this collection is with the real diamond dust shimmering away through the polish.

Rather than another simple swatch I decided to go for a bit of stamping and extra glitter.  If you read my blog regularly you know how much I love a bit of glitter!

Pretty In Pink Nail Art

Hi all,

Even though I love Autumn, I'm not quite ready to give up summery colours on my nails.  Having said that I wasn't quite sure what I was going to do on my nails this week, so when in doubt it's a visit Pinterest to look at all the pretty nails I have pinned there for inspiration.  Scanning through I decided to go for a version of this design, but in pink.

I started with three coats of Ice Cream Sundae on my thumb, index and little fingers and two coats of Pink Flamingo on my middle and ring fingers.  Both colours are from Barry M.  For the glitter gradient on my middle finger I used Princess from the Royal Glitter collection, also from Barry M.  It just compliments the two pinks perfectly.  I then used my MoYou Pro Plate 09 to stamp on my thumb nail and ring finger.  I stamped in the opposite colour to the base and I think it worked out really well.  Overall I am really please with how these nails turned out and I think they are simple but effective.

Thanks for stopping by
Aimée x

MoYou Nails Stamping Plates Review*

Hello all,

I have recently had quite a few goes at stamping and have found it really fun so I was pleased to be asked to review MoYou Nails stamping plates.  I chose plates numbers 102 and 220, and pink polish to review.

*Press sample - sent to me for review

I was sent a catalogue of all the latest products, a bottle of special polish in pink, the two plates, and a stamper and scraper, which is obviously very handy.  Both plates have floral designs, 102 have small single designs and 220 has larger designs meant to cover the whole nail.

It's quite tricky to get a picture of the plates, but this one I uploaded to Instagram shows them quite well.  On first impressions the plates seem rather thin and therefore not very sturdy when picking up the images.  I think they could do with a thicker backing.  The stamper and scraper are pretty standard in comparison to others that I have come across.  I had trouble with another stamper before which was very shiny on the surface so I had to buff it before it would pick up an image.  This one wasn't shiny, so I thought that it would be better however I still had to buff it quite a lot before I was able to use it properly.  

To get going with the manicure I started off with a coat of pink polish on all my nails apart from my ring finger.  For this one I chose to use Essence in It's Raining Men.  I wanted a darker colour to test how the stamping polish would work over a darker colour.  I then stamped with the opposite colour to the base.

I found that the polish dried really quickly and it needed two coats to get full opacity.  Whilst the speed of drying time was good for stamping on to, it wasn't brilliant when trying to stamp with it.  You have to work pretty quickly when stamping anyway, but with a quick drying polish it did make it more difficult.  As you can see I have stamped a selection of different designs from the plate which are very pretty.  On my ring finger I stamped a full nail design with the pink polish.  It worked quite well, but doesn't show up as much as I would have liked.  I think in that respect it's a little disappointing for a stamping polish.

Overall these are not my favourite plates, but there is a nice selection of different designs.  Do you have any tips for stamping to get the best out of them?

Thanks for stopping by

Aimée x