The New 31 Day Nail Challenge - Day 8 - Duochrome, Flakie or Holo

Today is Day 8 of the challenge and we had the choice of Duochrome, Flakie or Holo.

I chose Duochrome as I only have one holo and one one flakie. This is simply not good enough, I will be remedying that ASAP.

On to the nails.

When I walked the Mini Tips to school this morning the weather was beautiful with a lovely blue sky, but by the time it came to taking these photographs it was back to dull grey clouds. Not the most ideal conditions for photographing duochrome nail polish but I did what I could.

Roll on Summer!

For this design I started with two coats of Barry M Black on the pinky and index fingers, and one coat of Barry M Matt White on the rest. Then over the white I used two coats of OPI Skull & Glossbones.

Next I decided to use three of Rimmel Londons Metal Rush polishes (Review and Swatches here) in Purple Reign, Royal Blue and Gold Save The Queen for a gradient on the pinky and ring fingers and leopard spots on the other three then used Barry M Black to finish of the leopard print.

I love these so much I really don't want to take them off tomorrow!

Tomorrows challenge is Saran Wrap which I have never tried before!

Can't wait to see how that turns out, and don't forget to take a look at what the other ladies taking part have been coming up with!

♥ A ♥

Rimmel London - 'Precious Stones' Collection Review & Swatches

Last week I showed you Rimmels new 'Metal Rush' collection and today I have two of their new 'Precious Stones' glitter polishes.

Precious Stones consists of two high coverage glitter nail polishes named Ruby Crush and Diamond Dust.

001 Diamond Dust.

High coverage is no joke! This is two coats with no 'underwear' other than a base coat!

Diamond Dust is a gunmetal grey with plenty of holo glitter for sparkle. It applied evenly without a hitch and dried to a slightly matte affect, which looked amazing for those who like their glitters slightly more muted but I like my glitters to really twinkle, so the photos show it with a coat of Seche Vite.

I wore this for a night out and I'm sad to say it did not last the night, I looked down at one point to find one nail on each hand had come off in one big chunk and several other nails were chipped. It's not like my nights out are of the wild variety either, a few drinks, a bit of chatter, then maybe some dancing towards the end of the night, so I saw no reason for whole nails to chip off.

For me however, this is not too much of a disaster as I very rarely wear a polish longer than a day anyway. But if you like yours to last at least the week or possibly more, you may want to consider wearing a polish underneath as 'underwear' and be prepared to touch up the tips.

At least that's one of the perks of a glitter polish, easy touch ups!

I still love this polish and will get a lot of wear out of it simply because I adore the coverage, colour and the sparkle! It's an eye catcher for sure!

002 Ruby Crush.

Ruby Crush is a mix of fine red glitter and larger silver glitter particles.

Maybe it's just the time of year, but this polish feels really, very festive to me!

I applied two coats over a coat of Barry M Bright Red and then added a coat of Seche Vite in an attempt to avoid the chipping I had with Diamond Dust. Obviously, with it being a different polish, having not tried Diamond Dust with 'underwear' or Ruby Crush without, and the fact that I didn't wear Ruby Crush on a night out, I can't say for certain that this has solved the massive chipping I had with Diamond Dust but it has lasted longer. So far it has lasted a whole day, which has consisted of housework, playing with puppy, decorating a Christmas tree, showering, cooking and the kids swimming lessons. I've touched up some tip wear but that's it.

Again it applied evenly, if not maybe slightly sparser than Diamond Dust (but maybe that's just me) and dried to a Matte finish, though with a coat of topcoat it is a mass of sparkly festive goodness!

Both are available to buy online or in store at Boots and Superdrug for £3.99.

Has anyone else tried these out? If so did you have the same issues as I did with the chipping?

♥ A ♥

Rimmel London - 'Metal Rush' Collection Swatches & Review

Happy Friday!

I'm back blogging today after a little while off, the entire household came down with a sickness bug one by one, meaning the kids were off school and we were all left feeling pretty tired and rotten!

I failed the last few days of the Lazy 15 Challenge, missed Polish Days and the start of another challenge I was going to do in December due to being unwell, which is very annoying but couldn't be helped.

Also it was MrGT's birthday on Tuesday and it's two weeks today until mine so we have have a busy couple of weeks coming up!

Today I thought I'd just ease myself back in with some swatches of Rimmel Londons Metal Rush Collection.

There are four different shades, Royal Blue, Gold Save The Queen, Purple Reign and Pearly Queen.

Rimmel say that they use 'Unique metallic nail technology that changes tone with your moves' which I think is a rather long winded way to say 'Duo-chrome'!

60 Royal Blue.

Royal Blue is a mid blue metallic with a purple duo chrome shift. It has a slight teal in it too which is very apparent in the bottle but I didn't expect to translate to the nail, it did though making it a very beautiful colour! 

The photos show two coats with no topcoat.

80 Purple Reign.

Purple Reign is a really stunning purple with a pinky orange duo chrome and a slight blue shimmer. It's so deep, rich and glossy looking, I'm in love with it! It is by far my favourite of the four, and again this is two coats, no topcoat.

70 Gold Save The Queen.

Gold Save The Queen is a tricky one for me, the paler gold/green shift does not suit my skin tone, but the gold/copper shift does. I think for me this one will have to be worn in the summer when I have a little more colour, but the polish itself is so pretty and unlike anything else in my collection!

Once again this was two coats and no topcoat.

100 Pearly Queen.

Pearly Queen is a pinky lilac shade with a gorgeous pale green/gold duo chrome, it is a princess polish as my five year old daughter told me! This was the only one that required three coats due to being slightly on the sheerer side than the others. I think this is one I will be experimenting with layering over darker polishes, I'm hoping it might lead to some pretty combinations!

All in all I was really impressed with the Metal Rush polishes.

There is nothing more disappointing than a duo chrome that looks stunning in the bottle but the beauty doesn't translate to the nail. With these what you see is pretty much what you get and they apply so smoothly, you can see brush lines but with careful application it's no problem.

I bought mine from ASOS when they were on offer, but they can also be purchased from Boots and Superdrug online or in store for £3.99 and from what I can see online they are on 3 for 2 at the moment!

I hope you all enjoy your weekends!

I will be spending mine playing catch up with blog posts!

♥ A ♥

Lazy 15 Nail Challenge - Day 10 Underwater Creatures/Mythical Water Creatures

Today is day 10 of the Lazy 15 Challenge and the theme is Underwater/Mythical Underwater Creatures.

I knew as soon as I saw it I was going to do mermaid nails. I toyed with the idea of octopus/kracken nails, but I just kept coming back to mermaids.

I wanted to give the effect of looking up from under the water at the mermaid against the light, as if she was spotted by some scuba divers or something. I'm fairly certain I'm not describing it very well but hopefully you catch my drift!

I started by applying a gradient over a base of Barry M Matt White.

For the gradient I used a piece of kitchen sponge as usual. On the ring and middle fingers I added Barry M Matt White to the top right/left corners then Barry M Pure Turquoise and Rimmel London 60 Second Nail Polish in Sky High which is a bright teal.

On the pinky, index and thumb I just did a normal gradient of the Pure Turquoise and Sky High.

When that had dried, I mixed a little Pure Turquoise and Matt White and used it on the two middle fingers lightly with a bit of acetone to make the lights rays coming through the water, then roughly at the top of the other three nails to look like light reflecting off the surface of the water.

Next I did the shape of the mermaid in Matt White, then mixed Matt White, Grey and Black, all by Barry M, to do the shading.

To finish I used China Glaze Fairy Dust on the pinky, index and thumb for a little sparkle then topcoated with Seche Vite.

Unfortunately the greeny teal shade of Sky High doesn't show up in the photos, which is a pain as it gives a bit of depth. But other than that I am in love with this one, I'd totally keep it on all weekend if I wasn't going out tomorrow evening!

Hope you all have a fab weekend!

♥ A ♥