Polish Days - MANicure

It's Polish Days time again and Novembers theme is MAN-icure.

I'm sure you are all aware by now about Movember. But just in case you are not, each November men all over the UK sport a moustache for the duration of the month to raise funds and awareness for men's health, specifically prostate cancer and testicular cancer.

Obviously this is a bit tricky for us ladies but we can show our support in other ways.

Such as on our nails!

For this months theme we were given the choice to go with the Movember moustache or a tribute to an important man in our lives, I had a choice of five men, and I chose them all!

The thumb is a computer circuit board to represent my Dad who works with computers, don't ask me what he does because I have no idea! I'm just going to call it magic!

The index finger is and Xbox symbol to represent MrGT. Yep, I am an Xbox widow.

The middle finger is lots of little toy cars to represent my four year old son, he is, as most four year old boys are, completely car mad.

The ring finger is an anchor to represent my father in law who is ex-navy.

And lastly the pinky is tartan to represent MrGTs Grandad who is Scottish and proud!

I used lots of polishes for this so I will try my best to list them all for you.

Thumb - Base No7 Totally Teal. Lines Barry M Mint Green. Dots Barry M Black.

Index - Base Nails Inc Charlotte Street. The X is a mix of Barry M Yellow, Mint Green and Spring Green. The Highlight is a mix of Barry M Matt White and Nails Inc Charlotte Street.

Middle - Base Barry M Matt White, Cars Barry M Bright Red, Spring Green, Yellow, Cobalt Blue. Wheels Barry M Black and Silver Foil.

Ring - Base Barry M Cobalt Blue. Anchor mix of Barry M Silver Foil and Black.

Pinky - Base Barry M Bright Red. Stripes Barry M Spring Green, Yellow and Matt White.

This was done in a bit of a mad rush so I could get the photos taken before we lost the natural light, so it'd not as neat as I would like but I'm still incredibly pleased with it and very proud to be wearing it!

♥ A ♥

The Lazy 15 Challenge - Day 2 Gradient

I do love a gradient, and to me there's no better gradient than a nice bright neon one!

So for todays challenge I broke the China Glaze Summer Neons out once again.

I love how this turned out and I love having some bright colours on my finger nails again too!

I used China Glaze Hang-Ten Toes as a base then sponged on Orange You Hot?, Surfin' For Boys, Hang-Ten Toes and Beach Cruise-R for the gradient.

Next up is Dots!

♥ A ♥

Lazy 15 Nail Challenge - Day 1 Tape Mani

Today is the first day of the Lazy 15 Nail Challenge.

Day 1 is Tape Mani and this is what I came up with.

Nothing original I'm afraid but with my track record of tape mani disasters I thought it best to keep it simple!

However this was a lot harder than it looks!

The colours used are:

Barry M Berry Ice Cream

Barry M Bright Purple

Sally Hansen Bewitched

Models Own Southern Lights

Here is the Lazy 15 plan for anyone who is interested!

As you can see the next challenge day is Monday 5th and the challenge is Gradient!

Head over to Phoenix Nails for the inlinkz to all the other lovely bloggers taking part because I have no idea how to add it myself!

Hope you all have a lovely weekend!

♥ A ♥

(Edited to add the inlinkz 03/11/2012)

Free Nails Inc Swatches - Glamour Dec 2012 Issue

Nails Inc are back again as a freebie in Glamour Mag this month!

There are four colours to choose from Glamour Glitter, St James, Motcomb Street and Elizabeth Street.

I have swatched them all for you, after the jump!

Some one has been keeping me busy...

In case you don't follow me on Twitter or Instagram (@glittertip) and were wondering where I've been this week...

This little fella has been keeping me busy!

His name is Rolo, we picked him up on Thursday and he is 9 weeks old tomorrow!

Plus it's half term so I have the MiniTips to entertain, but fear not, I am still painting my nails so I have plenty of posts to come!

♥ A ♥

Jelly Sandwich - OPI Houston We Have A Purple and Barry M Yellow Topaz

Houston We Have A Purple is another of the four OPI polishes I picked up for £5.99 each at Fragrance Direct.

I was going to use this one along with Skull & Glossbones in my Braided Manicure from my last post but what with it being a jelly, or as OPI like to call it, Sorbet, it wasn't going to work so I decided to create a jelly sandwich using Barry M Yellow Topaz instead.

This is a five layer jelly sandwich and it's so pretty! Yellow Topaz is just so gorgeous twinkling through under HWHAP. This is the second jelly sandwich mani I've done and now I need more jelly finish polishes!

Any suggestions?

♥ A ♥

Autumnal Braided Manicure

A couple of weeks ago I bought four new OPI polishes from Fragrance Direct for a rather barginous £5.99 each! The colours I bought were Houston We Have A Purple, Plugged-In Plum, Suzi Loves Cowboys and Skull & Glossbones.

It was Skull & Glossbones I had to use right away, I don't know why this colour is so interesting to me but it is and I love it!

I decided to use it in a Braided or Fish Tail mani, whichever you like to call it, along with Barry M Gold Foil and Barry M Raspberry.

I love the simplicity of Braided Manicures and the endless looks you can achieve with different colour combinations. This one felt very elegant, autumnal and grown up to me and I loved it so much I wore it for a few days!

It also made me wonder if I should do an 'Autumn Favouites' nail polish post.

Would you like that? It would probably be a top ten type post as I have trouble narrowing things down to 5 or 3 when it comes to nail polish!

Let me know!

♥ A ♥

Rio Beauty - Marble Nail Art Polish: London Collection - Review

If there is one nail art technique I struggle with it's water marbling.

Freehand? No problem. Stamping? Tricky at first but got the hang of it after a few tries. Foils? Love it. But water marble vexes me. I have tried many times following various tutorials and with all different types of polish but have not for the life of me been able to get it to go right!

So I gave up, until now.

I know they are not a patch on some of the phenomenal water marble nail art designs I've seen elsewhere but I did it! A whole water marble mani! 

And it was all thanks to the little box of magic after the jump.

Barry M Jewel Glitters - Swatches and Review

I hope you are sat comfortably because this will be a long one!
I have so many new polishes I want to blog about at the moment that it's getting a bit overwhelming so I have decided to do some batch swatch posts rather than lots of individual ones, I hope you don't mind!

I'm starting off with the new Barry M Jewel Glitter Polishes because they are to die for!
First up is Yellow Topaz.

Yellow Topaz is a mix of pale gold and holographic glitters in three different sizes, micro glitter, small hexes and slightly larger hexes.

I have one coat of Yellow Topaz over two coats of Barry M Nude in the photos.

I love this polish so much, to me it is just the perfect gold tone, not too dull not too yellow.

Thanks to the holographic glitters it is beautifully sparkly and makes for a stunning and eye catching topcoat to another polish, or alternatively I think it could be easily built up for a more opaque finish, I imagine 4-ish coats would do the trick if you have the patience for it!

Next up after the jump is one coat of Rose Quartz over two coats of Barry M Cappuccino.

Models Own - Hayley's Comet - Swatch and Review

The moment I saw this polish on Twitter I went straight to the Models Own website and ordered it.

Then as soon as it arrived, I put it on my nails!

This is Models Owns newest addition to their duo-chrome collection, Beetle Juice.

It is a difficult shade to describe, to me it's copper with a green/gold duo-chrome shift, with the occasional, very subtle flash of blue/purple. The duo-chrome is more apparent in the bottle than it is on the nail which might be disappointing to some but I like that about this polish. In some lights the duo-chrome makes the colour look almost like a shimmery taupe/nude shade. 

Very pretty!

It's such a lovely Autumn shade for days when you just don't fancy wearing a dark colour on your nails, or if you're just not into the darker nail polish shades.

The application was lovely as you would expect from Models Own, you can see the odd brush stroke but I only noticed because I looked for it, which let's face it, no normal person would actually do!

I have two coats of Hayley's Comet with one coat of Seche Vite on in the photos. I could still see nail line in some lights but one more coat would sort that out if visible nail line is something that bothers you. We all have our pet peeves!

(Direct Sunlight)

I'm really quite taken with this polish, it's not like anything else in my collection, which is always a relief!

You can purchase this little beaut on the Models Own website HERE for £5, or if you like your duo-chromes and have not yet got any of the other Beetle Juice shades then I suggest you grab the box set HERE for £20, you won't regret it! I've also heard that some people have seen Hayley's Comet in their local Boots store also for £5.

♥ A ♥