Birchbox - Merry & Bright - Dec '16

Long time no blog! I've been really busy with my job, which causes hell for my hands and nails in this cold weather, as well as using all of my creative energy on gifts and such. Birchbox has inspired me to do a little writing, however. 

Bad pic is bad, soz.

• Benefit "the POREfessional: Matte Rescue": So this is kind of a makeup primer? I guess? I'll be using it as such regardless for my cavernous pores, and I'm pretty excited to be using a Benefit product! Though, last two times I got Benefit from Birchbox, they either didn't work well or wouldn't come out of the tube! We can hope...

• Ciaté London "Fierce Flicks Eyeliner": And just when my last Birchbox liquid liner had started to go janky, woo hoo! I love Ciaté's polishes. Fingers crossed that this eyeliner gives the same depth of colour, because there's nothing worse than faded, imprecise, chunky eye flicks.

• Laura Mercier "Caviar Stick": Another great eye surprise! I can't go with just eyeliner these days but don't want to spend the time on eye shadow, so just contour with a thick brush. This is going to make it a lot easier to get some nice colour on my lids. I got the shade "Amethyst", a surprisingly brown, shimmering shade.

• Leighton Denny nail polish: Yay! A proper fancy nail polish, and in a colour I don't already own from this brand! I got the shade "Just Perfect", this gorgeous blush pink. Actually I don't own a pink quite like it, so that's another bonus! 

• Percy & Reed"Perfectly Perfecting Wonder Balm": A hair balm you put in before styling to give it extra oomph. I'll be using this exactly zero times. I don't style and my hair gets shiny enough on its own, not a good thing. The one let down of this altogether wonderful box. 

Quite bland for Birchbox, if I'm honest. The colours are nice and the bag inside is better than the usual tatty looking ones, but not very festive in it? I like the vertical design, though, and will use it to store everyday makeup. The box itself also came in some neat postage wrapping. How cute is this? 

Now, I'm off to work. 

Different Dimension - Atlantis

It's time for a random review! At work I love to have nails that look flashy and eye catching, so on some occasions I like to dive into my indie collection for my fix. So why not do a review on one?

Different Dimension"Atlantis" is a dark green to dark purple duochrome polish with scattered holo glitter.

2 Coats Different Dimension "Atlantis";

ILNP "Mega" on the accent.

Just flashy enough to give me a hit, but easy enough to match with everyday outfits, especially in my work environment. The duochrome shift is quite subtle because of how dark it is but in this case I quite like it. Gives the holo glitter its space to shine and turns one polish into a whole galaxy. I think I need the rest of this collection, to be honest. My only problem with "Atlantis" is that it wears pretty fast and is extra noticeable because of how dark it is. Still, one of my faves! 

★★★★✰

Birchbox x Tatler - Nov 2016

Macaroons. They look gorgeous but the inside is all levels of disappointing. This month's Birchbox is a macaroon: beautiful to look at but a letdown within. Maybe I'm just tired from work but today I feel like being a little more 'honest'. When I get Birchboxes, I expect to be wowed and that just wasn't the case here. 

• Beauty Protector "Protect & Blonde Toning Shampoo": Shampoo. Yep. Birchbox isn't exactly cheap and from tiny shampoo bottles like this I'll get one, maybe two uses. Hardly value for money, right? I have been meaning to get a blonde shampoo, though, but never a purple shampoo - I'll keep my brassy tones, thanks.

• Khairpep "Transforme Masque": Conditioner. Yep. Again, not value for money with maybe only five uses out of this. I'll get damage repair from this but, seeing as I don't use heat on my hair, I don't really need it.

• Marcelle "BB Cream Golden Glow Illuminator": I don't use BB cream. Sure, if I self-tanned in winter then it would be fine, but as a matter of not wanting to spend too much time and effort on skin that won't be seen anyway, I don't. So using a tinted BB cream on my face would make me look silly. This will have to wait until summer.

• NUXE "Crème Prodigieuse" : Moisturiser, basically. I've already got those coming out my ears from Birchbox, particularly anti-oxidant loaded ones. At least I won't run out for months.

• Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics "Lip Tar Primer": Out of all of these, I was actually most intrigued and excited to try this. It's a good idea, right? A soothing balm that also "keeps lipstick looking great, in place, for longer". I need that for them long hours. But then I tried it... Another macaroon. 

To cheer myself up, I also included a lil perfume in the picture that I got from Tenerife in May. It's from a shop in Puerto de la Cruz which sells imitations of branded perfumes, and the owner has an encyclopedic knowledge of which perfume is a knock off of which, and what scents are where. It's amazing, and so cheap! They come in adorable little bottles too. So yeah, I feel better now. 

Angelica Nail Colour

Starting off Sparkle Month with five polishes from Angelica Nail Colour, which all happen to be glitter of some form! I'm sad I can't find these in Primark anymore because they're cheap but so good.

Angelica "Black Magic" is a black and silver glitter polish.

2 Coats Angelica "Black Magic"

Ooh, black glitter! Actually, silver and black glitter, which gives this polish a classy grey finish. I don't honestly see many polishes like this around so I'm happy to have it. Opaque in two coats without sponging. It's tough too! Tough to remove (obviously) but this shot was taken after three days with minimal wear and no chips! A surprise for a glitter polish, honestly. With a nice glossy topcoat, "Black Magic" is one magical, gorgeous polish, and it's probably my favourite Angelica.

★★★★✰

Angelica "Boom Pop" is a clear polish with baby blue and hot pink matte hexes.

1 Coat Angelica "Boom Pop" on ring; sponged on others.

"Boom Pop" is a fun polish, but it's hard to use, let alone remove. It's too chunky to sponge and too sparse to just paint on top. That's really the major problem with this but I love it regardless. In the past I've done some fun glitter placements using "Boom Pop", which is easy to use because of just how chunky it is. Difficult but fun, "Boom Pop" is basically like a child.

★★★✰✰

Angelica "Frostbite" is an iridescent glitter polish with gold and teal hexes.

1 Coat Angelica "Frostbite"; sponged on ring.

Probably the most beautiful in the bottle, "Frostbite" sure does look beautiful over blues and blacks. It's not easy to sponge because - well, maybe I just sponge badly. Anyway, I love this combination of colours, it makes me think of mermaids. That iridescent tiny glitter really catches the light but is so difficult to photograph. Standard difficult to remove. 

★★★★✰

Angelica "Ice Ice Baby" is an iridescent mixed size glitter polish.

1 Coat Angelica "Ice Ice Baby" (over black); sponged on ring.

I knew this one is very disappointing on its own (and even worse over white), so I added a little black to really show off that colour shift. Ooh wow! I only ever wear this over dark colours, especially blues, because the sheen is hypnotic. It's not the only polish like this I own but it's probably the best of them!

★★★★✰

Angelica "Ruby Red" is a cool red polish with iridescent particles.

2 Coats Angelica "Ruby Red"

In some lights, you can really see the blue and purple sparkle in this. Though, as usual, that's impossible to photograph. A really quite pretty polish in the right lights, but the shade of red in this polish isn't my favourite. I prefer neutral and warmer reds. Though for winter months this works better. It's nice looking down and seeing I have jam on my fingers.

★★★★✰

Btw, Angelica...

This Is Halloween

The only way I celebrated Halloween this year was with my nails. Yep... It was a busy day and I only got one bit of candy! No one told me being an adult would suck so much lol. Anyway I got at least 5 compliments on this so it wasn't all for nothing! These nails are based on the best Halloween film ever, if not the best winter film ever.

Before you freak out, no this wasn't freehand! I had no time for the pointer and pinkie so I'm not too happy with how naked they are, but you live and learn. For this I used:

• Nail art stickers from Poundland (no freehand!)
• Primark "Oberon", Sinful Colours "Snow Me White", and Barry M "Mango".

November is the month I like to make my nails sparkle a little bit, for the various special days we have as well as for the sake of keeping the encroaching darkness at bay. So it's time for sparkle!

Halloween Trio

I've been off for a couple of days so I've had time to do more art! As much as I lament not having time to do it anymore, I really love sitting down and watching a good mani unfold. Here are three of my favourite looks to do for Halloween. This first one like I like to call a Slime Drip mani. 

Green and purple go so well together for Halloween! I'm rarely able to get my drips looking how I want them but these are okay. I also like the combination of glossy over matte, gives it that even slimier look. In this mani is:

• Models Own "Pukka Purple", matted by Barry M.
• Models Own "Paradise Garage", dripped using a Poundland dotting tool. 

Another look I've seen done quite a lot and am pretty proud of is the Patchwork mani.

Three more Halloweeny colours all mixed together. Patchwork and Halloween go together like Jack and Sally - coincidentally. Though I wouldn't do it any other time of the year, it's such an easy look to pull off. For this I used:

• Barry M "Mango".
• Sally Hansen "No S-pear Time".
• Primark "Purple".
• Primark "Oberon", using a Poundland fineart brush.

One mani I always do every year is the Fingerprint mani, usually with a few blood splatters. However this year, thanks to all of my white bases being old and taking super long to dry, I've been unable to get it to look how I want it too. My left hand simply wouldn't dry so it got very messy. I managed to get it to look  okay on my Cindy hand, but for obvious reasons I missed out on the splatter.

Featured here is:

• Sinful Colours "Snow Me White".
• Barry M "Can't Get You Out Of My Red", smudged with my finger.

The Week Before Halloween

Hey there cyberspace! I have a few days off so let's make this place look a little busier. Over the next couple of days, I'll be doing a few Halloween manis because yay. Today, here are a couple of manis I wore over the week that weren't just swatches. I've also added a couple of photos to the look book. 

Yeah, this chipped really fast and my hands were dry. Now that that's out the way, this ombre was inspired by a scarf crocheted by my mum which I absolutely love. Polishes used:

• China Glaze "Awakening".
• Barry M "Gold Digger".

I got quite a few compliments on this mani, probably because of how that accent figure just scatters the light so beautifully. One lady even asked what it was and I had to explain to her what indie polishes are... Anyway, something a little Spring-like with a festive sparkle. Polishes are:

• Revlon "Charming".
• Different Dimensions "Pothos".

Turns out gradients really are the best way to add a little art to my fingers for a working day. Expect a lot more of them in future!