Dazzle Dry - 3 Pastel Sponging Mani

Hope everyone is having a great weekend. We finally have some sun in the UK, warm enough for me to actually wear dresses and sandals! Oh the little things!!!

Today I have somewhat of a random mani to show you. I say random because when I started, I really wasn't sure where I was going with it but it turned into some sort of pastel sponging affair.

I used 3 Dazzle Dry polishes, all from their Spring 2013 Afternoon Tea collection (Petit Four, Strawberry Maracon and Spearmint Tea). I have already reviewed Petit Four and their Quick Dry Nail System here if you want to read up on that. They do the most amazing quick dry top coat!
I topped everything off with a coat of China Glaze Fairy Dust which I would layer pretty much over anything if I could!

You can purchase Dazzle Dry directly from their US and UK websites. You can also see various swatches and manis on their Facebook page.

*The product(s) featured  in this post was sent to me for review.

Erre Due - Neons & Pastel

Today I will be sharing with you three polishes by a brand called Erre Due. I first came across Erre Due whilst holidaying in Greece last Christmas and grabbed a bottle of their Blue Jeans Blue Black polish which is very similar to Barry M Denim. Since this brand isn't available in the UK, I haven't come across it since then, until I was contacted by their Events Manager to review some of their new polishes.

Now onto some of the swatches. First up is No184 (unfortunately no polish names). This is a neon orange which I had to photograph in the shade to capture the true colour. The formula is quite opaque and creamy for a neon. It covers well in 2 coats and I had no problem with brush marks on this one. What more could I ask of a neon?

This is 3 coats of No186, a get-your-sunglasses-out neon green! The formula on this one was totally different from the other neon. It was extremely streaky, didn't even itself out and I gave up after 3 coats. It's one of those I'll definitely be layering over white.

This is 2 coats of No94. I believe this one is from their fast drying range, thus the "1" on the bottle! The formula was good for a pastel. It's smooth, not chalky at all and opaque in two coats. I'm not sure about the drying time as I had been swatching neons up until then so this one obviously seemed to dry much slower than the neons.

They were very sweet and sent me the loveliest box wrapped in a white leather string bow. They even threw in a leaflet of their latest nail trends: Ombre, Gradient, Newspaper Nails and Water Marble.

About the company:

Erre Due are part of Aromca Cosmetics and were one of the brands first launched under the group is 1984. I'm not sure if the Erre Due products are available in other European countries as I've never seen their products anywhere other than Greece. They have an extensive range of make up and nail polish, you can check out their colour charts here. They seem to have updated their collections and even changed the design of their bottles slightly but their website still has pictures of their old bottles. Their Facebook page seems to be much more up to date and features their latest products.

*These products were sent to me for review by the company.

Pastel Watercolour Zebra

Today's design has been on my "to do" list for such a long time. I've always wanted to try a pastel watercolour technique but I don't really like it when all the colours look too messy on the nail. So I only let the four colours I used for this design overlap slightly.

I started with a white base (OPI Alpine Snow) and also used the following polishes to create the watercolour effect - Yes Love 243 (yellow), Yes Love Y17 (pink), Barry M Blueberry Ice Cream and Rimmel London Misty Jade. All of these pastels together remind me of soft scoop ice cream :)

I finally stamped with BM223 (probably my most used BM plate) for a subtle zebra effect.

Mish-Mash of Vintage Flowers, Glitter and Rhinestones

Today I wanted to show you guys a design I did for a contest currently taking place on Instagram, hosted by the ever so talented Bedizzle. The rules were simple, just to copy a design that she had done in the past. I opted for a design that I could manage as every other mani she had done was way to complex for me to attempt!

So that it wasn't an exact copy, I changed up the colours a little and the placement of the flowers and glitter as well. So it turned out a bit of a mish-mash of vintage flowers and placed glitters:)

Polishes used - Essie Mint Candy Apple, Collection 2000 Fruit Loop and Ninja, Rimmel London Apricot Punch, Miss Sporty Gold Backstage and OPI Alpine Snow for the dots and stripes.

Remember the Mermaid Tail nails I did a while back, also for an Instagram competition? I won second place. I couldn't believe it, there were so many great entries!

My Guest Post Over A: Clothes, Cosmetics and Chat

Hi all. Check out my guest post over at Clothes, Cosmetics and Chat. Laura is currently really busy studying for her exams and asked it I would like to guest post for her :)

I decided to go for something soft and with a "shabby chic" feel. Essie Navigate Her reminds me of just that!

Chromatic Pastels

Back in November, I posted this mani called "Chromatic Neon Dots". A metallic foil base topped with colourful neon dots. Since then, I've received a lot of positive feedback on my IG feed for this mani so I decided to recreate it but this time with softer pastel dots.

I still prefer the way the neon dots look against the silver, they are obviously much brighter and stand out more but it's toned down cousin isn't so bad either.

I used Stargazer Chrome Silver #232 for the base and the dots are a mixture of pastel coloured polishes ranging from Jessica Samba Parade to Barry M Lemon Ice Cream, to Rimmel London Misty Jade.

(Haha, the reflection on the bottle...me in my house sweater! Lol!)

Thanks for reading and commenting :)

Pastel Tips - Take your pick

I've been wanting to do this mani for a while, since I saw a girl on the train wearing something similar. She had some sort of nude polish and yellow tips! At the time I remember thinking how cool and fashion forward of her, she even had stiletto shaped nails! It's not something I see everyday at my local train station. She could have been a nail blogger?!

I couldn't decide on which colour I wanted for the tips as nude goes well with pretty much anything, so I used a different pastel for each finger. I can't pick my favourite although my least favourite combo is the pinky.

Which combo do you think is nicest?

Thanks for reading :)

I can have my cake and eat it too...

Hi all,

Double post today to make up for the couple of days of non-posting !!!

Nail Stories is now on Facebook, yaaaayyyy !!!

Since I'm still officially on holidays, I've had a little more time at home which means I've also got more time to experiment with my nails. This morning my husband brought home some cupcakes and they were so colourful and pretty that I had to do some sort of design based on them. I suppose I could have elaborated more but here is how they turned out:

Products used:

Barry M - Blueberry Ice Cream

Barry M - Lemon Ice Cream

Jessica - Samba Parade

Essie - Mint Candy Apple

OPI - Lucky Lucky Lavender

OPI - Alpine Snow

OPI - Keys to my Karma

Thanks for reading :-)

xoxo