Sometimes I wonder why I bother? This post should have gone live at Christmas, but we all know what happened there, then I promised you it way back in March but again life got in the way again, and do you know what it just keeps getting in the way again, and again. I've got a little update post coming later this week but in the meantime here's a little nails of the day that I shot way back in December.
Over the last couple of years my nails have pretty much gone to hell, accurate reflections of my health I guess, but after scouring social media for nail growth tips I decided to give the whole BIAB, builder gel in a bottle thing a try. Basically builder gel is a thicker form of gel polish that can help support the growth of natural nails. I bought the stuff and started using it as both a sort of second base layer, and as a polish in it's own right, and gradually my nails started to grow.
Not super long by any stretch of the imagination but long enough to showcase a bit of colour and a tiny bit of easy nail art. My plan was to wear two different gel shades in December, a fabulous emerald green glitter for the big day itself, and this fabulous Sensationail Color Gel Polish in the shade of Disco Fever for the start of the month.
Disco Fever is a fabulous metallic silver with an almost holographic sparkle. These pictures really don't do it justice.
I must admit the coverage wasn't the best. It took 3 coats on top of a layer of base coat and a layer of builder gel, and it still looks slightly sheer in some of these pictures.
It's such a pretty shade though it's much of a neutral silver, rather than a bright, metallic silver if you know what I mean and of course I love anything with sparkle and holographic nail polishes really are my thing!
I think this final picture probably shows it off at it's best (excuse the dry cuticles!) the smoothness, and gloss of the polish, and of course the fabulous sparkle.
This polish certainly did it's thing for the for the first week or so of December, but for my festive cinema trip with one of my besties I thought they need a little bit of extra sparkle.
I do love me a nail sticker, and these silver snowflakes, added a festive twist to a my super sparkly mani and they also helped to detract from a weeks visible nail growth! Being silver on silver the effect was quite subtle (less so in real life though) but I still think it looked super pretty.
Being a gel polish the wear time was pretty good, I did add an extra coat of top coat when I added the nail stickers but after two weeks there were only a few tiny tiny chips, and a tiny bit of tip wear. The plan as I said earlier was to remove them on Christmas Eve and to do a new set in a gorgeous emerald sparkly green ahead of the big day but like so many plans I've made over the years it went quickly down the drain.
Instead I ended up with a horrible flu bug, and a hacking cough, being upright was hard enough let alone inhaling a load of chemicals so I left then be, with vague plan to remove them when I felt well enough. December ended and January began and still the lurgy continued, my nails just weren't a priority. They were grown out, chipped, a few had already peeled off and I bet you can guess what happened next? I did the worst thing I could possibly do and I picked and peeled the rest off.
Predictably my nails were shot- lifting, splinter hemmorhages, breaking and ultimately peeling off - the photos below show my nails on the 15th February this year, and even though I took these pictures when the bleeding and worst of the redness had subsided they weren't a pretty sight!
My immediate priority was to baby them, and give them some love so I bought some tea tree nail oil, and started to take care of them, with love, oil, and moisture. It's been a long journey, I'm talking one step forward, two steps back territory.
I've tried lots of different products, and whilst I still have a long to go to achieve the length that you can see in this Tik Tok (follow me on Tik Tok if you haven't already) they are much healthier, and I'm starting to see some growth in fact I even painted them for my birthday, with my old favourite Milani 3D Holographic Nail Lacquer in 512 Cyberspace.
As I say still a long way to go length wise but at least I have something to work with - I've been taking pictures for months now monitoring my progress so when they've reached a level I'm happy with I'll be sharing an update post, showing time lapses and giving more info on some of the products that I've used and that I would recommend x In the meantime though I have definitely learned my lesson don't pick off your gel polish, take it off properly and respect those nails. Honestly this is nothing against the polish just my 'method' of removal, Disco Fever like a lot of Sensationail polish is quite hard to find now but there are a few available on eBay if you fancy giving it a try. If you have any questions or any nail growth tips please leave me a comment below x Thanks as per usual for sticking with me and I'll see you soon with an update and life lately post x
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Hi Guys x I hope you’ve all had a lovely long weekend, and if you’ve been celebrating Easter I hope you haven’t eaten too much chocolate ;) I definitely have and it’s been much needed! The last month or so has being pretty rubbish in LouLouLand. Almost exactly a month ago I woke up and the left side of my face was completely swollen, I looked as though my face and lips had been pumped up with filler, leaving my eye just a slit! A call to 111 lead to an out of hours dental appointment and as it turned out two courses of antibiotics which were to put it mildly horrible. Thankfully the gum swelling went down and I’m currently like so many people in the UK trying to find a NHS dentist after without my knowledge my own dentist removed me from their list after I had (justifiably) to cancel two appointments in a row #fuming. Anyways my mum has been too well either and another one of my relatives is now seriously ill - it’s safe to say that 2024 has been a pretty horrid year so far and it’s showing no signs that it’s going to get any better :(
I’m still not feeling 100% but I thought I’d try and cheer myself up by sharing a little nails of the day with you. My nails have been pretty awful for a long while but I’ve recently been trying out a product that seems to be making a difference.
To celebrate the official start of summer time, and the little bit of spring sunshine that we’ve had over the weekend (although it seems to have disappeared today for some reason!) I decided to go for a lovely pastel, creamy lilac shade, the Sensationail Colour Gel Polish in Heirloom Lilac.
Since I actually started using my gel polishes and my Sensationail kit, I keep asking myself why I didn’t start using it sooner, I find it takes about the same time as normal manicure minus the dry time. It lasts longer and it’s much more hard wearing than normal nail polish. The only down side is the removal but I can live with that
The coverage is also superb, this is just two coats and whilst my application isn’t exactly of a professional standard, it’s so easy to apply and it looks decent.
As nice as it is on its own though I couldn’t resist giving this polish a bit of an Easter twist with some Shein nail stickers.
Nail stickers are great for livening up a tired or less than perfect manicure, and you can be as subtle or as over the top as you like.
With flowers, bunnies, carrots and sheep, it’s like Easter threw up on these nails and I love them, a touch childish maybe but so fun. I just cleanse the polished nail and the stick the sticker before applying a coat of top coat and sealing it under the lamp. You do need to apply another top coat layer every other day to keep it sealed in and to keep your mani looking fresh but it’s worth it.
As I say I got these particular stickers from Shein, who have an amazing selection of nail art bits but you can find nail stickers at various online retailers including eBay and Amazon. Sensationail polishes are getting harder to find now but there are a few bottles of Heirloom Lilac to be found on eBay.
Are you a fan of more subtle nail art or do you subscribe to my philosophy of more is more? Let me know in the comments and I’ll hopefully see you soon with another post xx
Hey Everyone - Happy Thursday! I hope you're all having another good week. As I said in my last post I seem to lurch from mini crisis to minis crisis, and this week has been no different! Being 'clinically vulnerable' I had both of my booster jabs on Tuesday and as a result I've felt pretty bleugh, and then my Internet went down for two days, which resulted in an Open Reach visit! Great fun I'm sure you'll agree but I'm back now with a little nails of the day post.
I haven't posted many pictures of my nails for what seems like an age now but that doesn't mean that I haven't been wearing polish. My nails haven't been great for a long time, so I didn't really feel like sharing but rightly or wrongly lately I've predominantly been using gel polish.
I got the Sensationail Deluxe Gel Starter Kit a few Christmas's ago now and I've added a few of their polishes, and a few from other brands to my collection, and I have to say I'm a bit of a convert.
Yes, it's a bit of a pain to remove (I would recommend this stuff though) and my nails are in slightly drier and flakier than they were, but they're growing, and gel polish last way longer on my nails then just every other normal polish and top coat that I've tried.
This shade Macchiato was one of the two shades that came in my starter kit. It's a real basic colour, and one that every person should have in their nail polish collection. It's just that perfect neutral, nude beige mannequin hands colour.
Like most of the gel polishes that I've used the coverage was fantastic. After my primer and dehydrator, I just applied one thin coat of base coat, then two thin coats of polish, followed by a thin coat of top coat and voila super shiny nails.
My nails aren't that amazing by hand model standards, my cuticles are a bit dry and flakey, and I do have a habit of of applying a bit too much polish, and flooding my cuticles, but I hope you can see just what a real staple a colour like this is. You can wear it to the office, on a night out or on the school run and your nails will just look perfect and polished. As nice as it is though, dare I say some people might argue that it's just a touch boring! The good thing about shades like this though are that they make great base colours for a bit of nail art.
Although I am practising, I'm not that arty so a lot of my nail art attempts leave a bit to be desired, something that takes very little practise or skill to use though are nail stickers. Just peel them carefully off the sheet, apply them to dry, or 'cured' nails, gently press them down, apply a top coat and you're done.
These Autumnal themed sticker are from Shein, and whilst I think i could have played with the placement and the application, and obviously the base colour, these nails took minutes to do, and I think they've really added an extra dimension to an all be it quite basic, and simple polish.
They may not be perfect but I love playing with nail bits, and that's what it should be all about having fun with nails and make up, and I am pretty pleased with how they turned out. There are definitely a few application flaws out there, and if you look carefully you may spot the odd cat hair or three, because this little one decided that he wanted to get in on the action - cats who would have them?
This particular bottle of Macchiato is the mini size that came in my starter kit bu the full 7.39ml size is available from both eBay and Nail Polish Direct for around £10. If you want to try the Sensationail system for yourself then there are various starter kits on the market, which contain an LED lamp, and all the things that you need to do your own at home gel manicure. The starter kits are available in several configurations at several different price points from various retailers including eBay and Amazon, and as I say my nail stickers are from Shein, where they were around £1 for 2 sheets. You can also get a wide range of similar fall / Autumn themed nail stickers from eBay.
Are you a fan of nail art or gel nail polishes? If you are then I would love your recommendations for gel nails polish brands, particularly if you can recommend a top and base coat, so please leave me a comment and let me know you favourites.
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Happy Halloween x I hope you've had a thoroughly spooky day whatever you've been doing and I hope that tonight it equally scary - I'm planning to snuggle on the sofa and watch some scary films and eat a lovely bowl of Delia Smith's Pumpkin And Toasted Sweetcorn Soup - Yummy! My pumpkin this year was a bit of a fail - he had a bit of a sunken head but hey at least I tried!
To coincide with the bright orange of Mr Pumpkin Head I decided to match my nails to his bright orange exterior with Essie - Braziliant
This picture is probably one of the best for showing off the real colour -. I've found it nigh on impossible to capture it's true colour but it's a true bright, bright orange shot through with a touch of shimmer, that just seems to be reflecting on my flash and making it look quite a bit redder.
Like a lot of Essie polishes, Braziliant was pretty easy to apply. This one has a wide brush and the formulation is quite thick, so with careful application you could probably get away with one coat but here I've used two.
I love, love, love this shade and whilst it would amazing with a tan or on the beach, I think orange is a real autumnal colour and it looks really nice with some of the browns, tans and rust shades that are around at the moment.
Seeing as it's All Hallows Ever though I decided to give this polish a bit of a Halloween twist. There are so many amazing Halloween nail art tutorials out there but I've gone for the cheats option and used some really easy nail stickers.
This set that I got from Top Shop isn't particularly scary or complicated but black cats are most definitely associated with Halloween. Black cats definitely have a bad rep but I love them and so I thought I'd add some black cat face stickers on to both my thumb and my middle finger to create an accent nail look.
Nail stickers are the easiest was of playing with a bit of nail art and creating an accent nail. I just use a pair of tweezers or a hoof stick to peel the sticker off the sheet, and then you just place it on top of a dry, polished nail, press it down and put on a layer or two of top coat to hold it all in place.
I hope you enjoyed this post, and the lovely bright, cheeriness of Essie - Braziliant on such a dark and spooky night x Happy Halloween x
Hey Guys x I hope you've all had a good day but if you haven't hopefully today's epic haul will cheer you up a bit. Shopping or even window shopping always lifts my spirits when I'm feeling down so hopefully my manicure and pedicure haul will do the same for you.
I'm going to start off with some nail art pieces that I picked up from Poundland. Every time I go into Poundland now I always have a little look through their nail bits and this I got some of their Disney Minnie Mouse Nail Stickers.
The packet contain around 120 little stickers ideal for creating an accent nail. As well as Minnie and Mickey heads, the packet also contains bows, flowers and little birds. I think these are great for both big kids like me and little people x
As well as the stickers I also had another look at Poundland's selection of Allura nail art wheels and I was pleased to find one that I didn't have.
This one contains a variety of silver and gold tone metal shapes and studs including teardrops, triangles, stars and hearts.
The kit also comes with a wooden hoof stick and a small nail file. I think these kits are great value for money and I really hope that they introduce a few more varieties.
Although my nails are pretty short at the moment I'm determined to get some length back in them so I can start to experiment with nail are again. I currently addicted to looking a nail art tutorials and something that you see popping up in a lot of videos and posts is peel off liquid tape or palisade. All you do is paint the liquid tape around your cuticles and your nails and when you paint your nails the excess polish sticks to the tape rather than your skin. You can do it with PVA glue but I thought I'd try the proper stuff first and so I got a bottle from ebay.
I paid £2.19 for this bottle from this seller and having received it I definitely think it is just PVA glue but I do love a bit of glue peeling and anything that can make my manicures a bit neater is worth trying.
Something else that I got from ebay is a nail and cuticle oil pen. I mentioned one of these in a recent empties post and I think for the price and the convenience they are well worth the money. Cuticle oil is my new best friend at the moment and I always like to have one in my handbag. I have a couple which I'm using at night but these pen applicators are great for travel and for during the day.
As I've said previously I don't think these are genuine OPI products but the product feels nice on your skin and it seems to be helping. This time I went for the lavender fragrance but to me it smells more like my Melissa shoes with a sort of floral, bubblegum scent. This was just 99p including postage from this seller.
Thanks to illness and medication my nails are notoriously rubbish so I really do need to take care of them, as well as using hand creams, cuticle products and strengtheners, I also need to be careful how I file my nails.
If I use anything that is too rough or aggressive my nails just split and peel but thankfully I have found a products I can use.
The Leighton Denny Expert Nails Crystal Nail File is one of my holy grail and go to products. I've written a full review here but it's a product that I now feel that I can't live without. The only trouble is they are a bit fragile so here's a tip- don't sit on it! I did and I ended up with a file of two halves, so I decided to treat myself to another one .
This is a limited edition version to celebrate Leighton's 10th anniversary on QVC and as well as coming in a protective case, it also comes with the number 10 on the end of the file, picked out in clear crystals. I know a lot of people don't like the idea of a crystal file but believe me once you've tried one you will never go back.
Despite the fact that we've had a nice day today, it definitely seems as though summer is on it's way out but I'm ever hopeful that we'll have a few nice days before the seasons change so I picked something up a few weeks ago to get my tootsies sandal ready just in case.
Excuse the stock picture but this little pot just didn't want to be photographed! I used to buy these Pedi Peel Pads a long time ago but like so many thing from Avon they disappeared without a trace. A month or so ago though they reappeared and I decided to stock up whilst I had the chance. All you do is rub a couple of pads over clean dry feet and the glycolic acid helps to exfoliate the skin and leave you with softer, smoother feet. Thanks to a thyroid problem my feet get very so I'm hoping that these will do the business again in between proper pedicures. Avon Footworks Beautiful Pedi Peel Pads normally retail at £6 for 55 pads but it's worth waiting for an offer before you buy x The current offer I believe is two Footworks products including this one for £4 so it's well worth picking these up whilst you can.
I love a good Avon bargain, and in a recent sale brochure I picked up another one of the Stardust Nail Enamels, this time in Teal Glitter.Based on today's shopping trip there seems to be a lot teal around for Autumn so this polish will be right on trend.
I love sparkle and whilst having a little look at Littlewoods online recently I couldn't resist picking up a new Nails Inc Polish. I love their new bottle design and I love their new brushes so I ended up getting Nails Inc Special Effect in Exhibition Road.
Crammed full of sparkle this colour will make an ideal top coat for any colour. In a clear base it contains circular glitter particles in lilac and gold. Okay it wasn't something that I desperately needed but the offer that Littlewoods had on at the time was just too good to turn down.
All you had to do was buy any selected Nails Inc polish and you got a Nails Inc 4 Piece Mini Collection absolutely free. The collection includes 4 x 4ml polishes in some of Nails Inc's most popular and classic shades, Victoria, Basil Street, St James's and Uptown. I love mini polishes and this was a great way of adding some more little ones to my collection.
Next up a bit of an apology x This final 3 polishes that I'm going to show you, we're all magazine freebies. Unfortunately none of the magazines are on sale any more but I still thought I'd show you them anyway as they might pop up in some future nails of the days x First up this ultra, summer shade from Nails Inc.
The recent collaboration with InStyle lead to a a small range of cover mounted polishes all with names themed around 80's songs. This coral, orange,red is Love Will Tear Us Apart. I love a bit of Joy Division and this limited edition colour is perfect for those summer toes. Although this one will be very hard to get your hands on now Nails Inc do have a few similar colours in their line and similar shades are available in most other ranges.
Another polish that came free with a magazine is Jessica Custom Nail Colour in 787 Floating Beauty which came with a recent issue of Red.
I don't have any Jessica polishes in my collection so I thought that this was an ideal way to try a new brand. Floating Beauty is another shade that's perfect for summer it's one of those hot, hot fuchsia pinks that again looks amazing on tanned hands and feet. This polish is still in the Jessica main line and retails at £10.50 for 14.8ml, which made this a pretty decent freebie.
The final product that I'm going to show you was another magazine cover mount and this time it was from Marie Claire. Like a lot of bloggers I have a love / hate relationship with Ciate but they do seem to get an awful lot of magazine coverage, and recently Marie Claire came with both a mini 5ml Ciate polish and a mini 5ml speed dry top coat. I already have quite a few Ciate polishes in my collection so I just picked up a random copy with came with Strawberry Milkshake.
This pale pink shade will either be fabulous or awful. With pale cream polishes like this there is no in between so we'll see. I can't find this particular colour in Ciate's main line but it's an easily duped shade so you should be able to pick something similar up.
I'm on a bit of a video making roll at the moment so I've filmed a very long, and rambling video to accompany this post x So by all means make yourself a cuppa, settle down and have a watch x
If you're a fan of all things nails then make sure that you're subscribed and following my blog, I have quite a few nail related posts to come over the next few weeks including some reviews, some nails of the day posts and a giveaway or two x Thanks for reading and if you have any questions please leave me a comment x
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