Sunny Spot: Gone dotty for Fee

Other than countless failed attempts at French manicure nail tips, I have never tried my hands at nail art. I don't have think I have the flair for it, the imagination, talent, patience and all the skills required for it. When I reviewed the beautiful Wyoming Nail Polish from Accessorize, many of you commented that you would love to see it as a base for some sort of nail art. When Fee from MakeupSavvy invited us to take part in her 15-day nail challenge, I thought this was the time had come to experiment. Today, it's day 14 and the theme is dots.

So I decided to go ... dotty for Fee.
The motivation: you guys!
The reason: Makeup Savvy 15-Day Nail Challenge.
The theme for day 14: Dots
The inspiration: Lucy's Stash Manicure for Sweet Sugar.
The polishes: Accessorize Wyoming Nail Polish (reviewed here) and New Look Colour Pop in Pistachio (reviewed here)
The tool: The only thing I could find in the house: a hair pin like this one.
The time: 30 minutes to do the whole thing (including taking photos and writing this)
The challenge: find a sunny spot to photograph (see what i did there?)
The result:

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Ok, before you look. Try to remember I've never done this sort of thing before
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Ok now, you can look
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The dots are so big and uneven and rubbish. Must try harder next time… if there is one that is!

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Accessorize Wyoming Nails

Third nail post in a row? Yes. I should mix things up a bit but when I am excited about something, I find it very difficult to wait. I want to share with you my latest acquisition from Accessorize Makeup. I was in the Accessorize shop, stumbled onto this nail polish and it had to come home with me. It's called Wyoming, like the American state famous for its national parks and nature in general and I couldn't think of a better name for it.






The creamy formula was such pleasure to work with and the coverage was superb and almost good enough to be a one coater. This is now the 4th creme finish type of polish I have from Accessorize which I am absolutely delighted with and Accessorize, yet again surpassed themselves with the quality. You can read more about mink, heart beat, and passion nail polishes here.



Long gone are the days of the first generation of accessorize polishes which were seriously patchy and a bit too bit runny to be honest. How do you know which polish is first generation or not, will you ask? I have summarised all the first generation polishes here. I am not saying they are all bad but from my little experience (I have tried 5 polishes from the first generation) I have not been happy enough to want to repurchase. Truffle was adequate and the best of the lot but Notorious, Superstar, Mermaid, and Electric Blue have given me patchiness.


Back to the majestic Wyoming. If you are looking for your ultimate shade of khaki, and for a price which doesn't break the bank, you might want to try it. I hope my pictures will give you a taste for it. Can I just add as well, that no clean up whatsoever was required for this. I am so impressed.













The best bit?






Yes, it was on half price sale in my shopping and only cost me £2. I was about to indulge in the new khaki shade (Lazy Green) from Gosh but now that I've got Wyoming at home, I don't need to anymore.


what: Accessorize Makeup nail polish in shade Wyoming
how much: £4 (special offer, half price at £2 in my shop)
where: Accessorize Shops and selected Superdrug nationwide
disclosure: bought by me

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Accessorized with passion

I am as shocked as you to believe that only that 2 coats of nail polish were needed to achieve this opacity. Meet 'Passion' nail from Accessorize Makeup or Electric Guava as I'd like to call it. The formula of passion was a dream to work with: not too runny, not too thick, delightfully creamy and I could just take all the time I needed to guide it along my nail bed. I could tell you that this is the perfect colour for summer but quite frankly this polish is bright enough to shine on its own, come sunshine or rain, heatwave or chilly days.





Copying the trademark lipglossiping.com pose here ;)










what: Accessorize Nail Polish in 'Passion'
how much: £4.00
where: selected Superdrug stores and accessorize shops
disclosure: PR sample

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Accessorizing my dreams {notd}

Life is too short to apply 4 coats of nail polish to hide the white bit of your nail and achieve opacity so I took a shortcut and chose to apply Accessorize 'Dream' over a coat of an ordinary blue nail polish. The result is quite simply stunning despite a not so dreamy application and finish: I found the formula to be a bit lumpy, and the finish a bit gritty, even after a top coat but Dream is so much richer than your traditional blue glitter polish - say your barry m blue glitter polish - and that makes it so much worth it.













It's all about managing your expectations and as a blogger, I need to advise you: Treat ‘Dream’ more like a top coat rather than a traditional nail polish, expect a lengthy nail polish removal time (all glitter nails polishes are a pain like that really) a tip wear after 2 days and you will enjoy this Dream as much as I did.







what: Accessorize Nail Polish 3D Glitter in shade 'dream'
how much: £4
where: selected Superdrug nationwide and Accessorize shops
disclaimer: this was a gift from my colleague to me, woop :)

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Mink & Heart Beat Nails–Accessorize {notd}

Once upon a time on twitter, there was a beauty blogger/PR who was looking for some keen nail bloggers. There was not much more  information provided in the tweet, I could list hundreds of nail bloggers better than me, but upon encouragement of a certain Kellie,  I decided to put myself forward. The lovely blogger got back in touch very quickly and accepted my expression of interest. I soon found out that I was offered the possibility to review 2 nail polishes from the latest Accessorize collection.       

     
I was very lucky to have been chosen but I  had a very mixed reaction. I didn't have an overwhelming successful experience with Accessorize polishes before, so much so that I  decided not to blog about the polishes I had purchased from the brand and only talk about one of them. My main issue had been with the  formula, leaving me with patchy coverage: covering the nail line with no problem but leaving some patches of blank every now and then.  I absolutely hate writing negative reviews about products I have received for free by a company and I was dreading receiving the polishes.



My two polishes reached me in the speed of lightning. The same day they arrived I had to swatch them on one nail and I felt much  lighter. I don't know what Accessorize has done to the polishes but the formula is totally different from all the previous polishes I  have tried and this makes me really happy and relieved, mainly because I won't have to write a negative review. *phew*     

    
     

So ladies and gentlemen let me share with you my experiences with the 2 little beauties I have been lucky to trial. The first one is MINK. Mink is a  delightful light browny/pinky/nudy/taupey beige.




I am not very good at describing colours as you can tell. What I do know is that I am in absolute love with the colour. But what really blew me away was the coverage I was able to get from one coat. All my photos show you just one coat  of polish, something which I didn't think it would be possible, given my previous experiences with Accessorize Polishes.





The formula is not perfect, mind you. It reminded me of Nails Inc typical formula: applies a little funky and bumpy at first but then  dries beautifully smooth. So MINK made me really happy and exceeded all my expectations.

HEART BEAT is a beautiful dark raspberry shade and was identical to MINK in application. The level of coverage in one coat was  phenomenal. My flash photos make it appear a little brighter than it really is. I was scared looking at the bottle that the shade would be a  big 'grandma' ish but grandma it certainly isn't and it is a very elegant shade.

     



I love this shade. Sorry I couldn’t shortlist my selection of picture any further.






MINK and HEART BEAT put my 'patchy' memories firmly to the past and made me want to try some more from the new collection. In fact, I have already bought 'Dream' the purple & blue 3D glitter (4th one on the right) but let me get some decent hard core glitter nail polish remover before I can play  with it.






    

What: Accessorize Polishes
Where: Selected Acessorize Stores and Larger Superdrug shops
How much: £4      

     
I couldn’t leave you with sharing with you the remaining shades of the latest vast collection of Accessorize polishes.

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Sunny Days Nails: The good, the bad and the laborious

Do you sometimes buy a makeup product despite a big warning issued about it? When I read Lydia's adventures (from Lyd's Blonde Thoughts) with Sunny Days from Accessorize Nail Polish, I didn't want to believe in the problems she had with the application. I was convinced that I would not have the same experience, as I was lured by the perfect dreamy shade of yellow offered by Sunny Days.


It is indeed perfect. Such a soft shade of yellow, which reminds me of a Easter chick. The colour is too irresistible, and is even more gorgeous than BeautyUK Yellow Peril, my favourite yellow polish to date. If I was asked to draw a shade of yellow, this is how I would picture yellow in my head, perfect mix of yellow and orange, soft, in between pastel and bright, absolutely gorgeous.






This is where the dream ends and the harsh reality kicks in. Do not be fooled by the pretty colour. I hate to be so brusque but the application was, in a search for a better word, absolutely shambolic: it's streaky, lumpy, bumpy, gappy, patchy, sticky. The soft focus of my kind camera makes it look better than what it is but believe me, in real life, you'd wonder if that was the first time I was attempting to polish my nails. Let’s have a look at the first coat, shall we? I kid you not, I was totally sober when I applied the polish.






Lumps, bumps, streaks and patchiness eventually even themselves after the third coat but, what a palaver. Do I regret having buying this polish? Heck no. I couldn’t help myself looking at my nails when I wore this polish. If it hadn’t been any other shade, I would have probably chucked it in the bin with frustration, but this colour looks so gorgeous on my nails, that I honestly can’t wait to wear it again.

Maybe this is how Cheryl Cole felt when she welcomed back her cheating husband in her life?










I can’t feel 100% confident when wearing Sunny Days, I’d hate if someone would look too closely at my nails and go ‘and you call yourself a nail blogger’, it is now in my top 5 most laborious nail polishes to apply, but boy, the colour has me totally in love and I hate myself for it.  






The search for an exact dupe (minus the application woes) has started.


I nearly forgot. Click HERE if you want see it ‘quaked’ with the most
gorgeous purple crackle polish ever made.

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Accessorize Makeup – My little collection & swatches

Ever since I saw a blog post about ‘ultraviolet’ eyeshadow from Accessorize Makeup, I have been really obsessed impatient for the release of the Accessorize makeup line. After lots of frustrating wait  in the dark wait (nobody seemed to have a clue on when and which superdrug shops would stock it) I finally managed to get some bits and wanted to show you my little selection. Was it worth the frustration, twitter outbursts and the wait? Definitely! What a gorgeous brand. 






I had to be extremely good as I could have easily bought all the shadows from the collection but I tried my hardest to buy some ‘unique’ shades. Look at the gorgeous packaging, with the butterfly on it, how can you stay insensitive by its cuteness? The ultraviolet shadow which was the object of my obsession was divine and didn’t disappoint. But I owned a shade of violet by MUA (shade 9) with almost the same vibrant blue iridescence/duochrome effect (should I go ahead and call it a dupe) to it so I had to be sensible and not buy it. In fact while, while I am talking of MUA (see my haul here) I personally found that MUA eyeshadows shade 13 (blackened purple) and shade 5 (acid lime) had their equivalents in Accessorize.

 


Even though I already owned a  the lime green (shade 9)  from MUA,  I just had to purchase ACID LIME from Accessorize: a bit more pigmented, the texture is to die for, soft, velvety but not too soft either and just more fun to work with and doesn’t leave that slightly waxy shiny mark after I used them (that’s the only thing I don’t like about MUA shadows, this shiny waxy indent, other than that, the colour pay off is faultless).  The second shadow I bought is gorgeous, it’s called DENIM and it’s divine.








I also couldn’t resist and I had to buy this pink glitter eyeliner. Despite my huge collection of glitter liners, I didn’t have anything similar in my collection.





And finally, I wanted to show you my little nail polish spree. I wish I could have included some swatches for you, but my nails are in a really bad condition at the moment. So bear with me and watch this space for these :)





 

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Accessorize Truffle NOTD

If there is one thing I have been obsessed with lately is the release of the Accessorize Makeup Line. When the collection was released online, I was excited but I couldn’t wait to see the products for real, hold them in my hand, have a little swatch, a little snif and see what I fancy buying.


I was told by the shop assistant in the big Accessorize from the Arndale Shopping Centre (Manchester)  that the whole makeup line would only be sold in Superdrug, and that they would not sell it in actual Accessorize or Monsoon shops, for a reason they couldn’t explain to me. So you can imagine my surprise when I bumped into some accessorize nail polishes today when I was checking out their Halloween section. Pff, conflicting information much!

There there were staring me, a tiny little sample of the nail polishes collection. My eyes first noticed the Aztec and Bronze but I settled for a boring brown one and went and buy ‘Truffle’ (not love truffle as I incorrectly named it yesterday)  First thing which I noticed is how the bottle looks similar to the nails inc bottle with the same budget looking cap on. Both bottles incidentally contain 10 ml of product but the accessorize bottle is much smaller and I am not quite sure how they fitted 10 ml of product in a bottle which looks to have the same diameter as the nails inc one.





So how did the application go? It’s all right. It’s not your dream application of Barry M, but it’s not a nightmare like this tiny bottle of trouble from Max Factor I purchased last week end (dear me!!) The formula is all right, I would have preferred it to be a little thicker and you would definitely need 2 thick coats, even 3 to have full opaque coverage. 





The brush feels a bit short in the hand, but you forget than the bottle is tiny after all. For the £4 price, I think it’s a decent nail polish. The beginner in me is thrilled to have managed to apply it with not too much effort (Elf smoky brown, your time is up next, and it’s not going to sound pretty!!!!) and I can’t wait to buy a few more shades. Now, if they had a 3 for £10 offer, this would make my purse happy :)





and now for pictures without flash, outdoor.
Stay till the end as I did a little experiment on the last picture :) Thank you for reading xx









and for the final picture, I added a layer of Nails Inc. Glasgow on the finger which is just next to the little one (you’ll know what I mean when you look at the picture) which is a gorgeous gorgeous sheer white with pink iridescence. Super hard to photograph, but hopefully you should get the idea.

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