Cling Film Manicure

Leanne posted a picture and tutorial of the saran wrap manicure (aka cling film manicure in the UK) and it seemed fairly simple, so I thought I'd give it a go.

The base colour is Models Own 'Utopia' and the top colour is H&M 'Blue My Mind'. I really love how it looks and I like how each nail looks different! I think it's great as a top coat if your current nail colour is looking a little worse for wear or if you don't have time to change your nail colour. I will definitely be doing this again as it was so simple to do and only took about 5 minutes!

What do you think? Will you be trying the cling film/saran wrap manicure?

xoxo, Joy

NOTD: Winter Berry

I received this nail polish for my birthday from a friend and opted for it this week. Winter Berry is a gorgeous mid-tone purple. It applied like a dream, becoming opaque in just one coat! It dried super quick, which is great for me as I get fidgety and hate waiting for my nails to dry. I'm definitely going to have to check out more of Accessorize's nail polishes in the future!

1 coat of Accessorize Nail Polish in 'Winter Berry'

Although the colour is lovely, I thought that my nails needed a bit of jazzing up so I opted for my new glitter polish. I posted about Models Own 'Ibiza Mix' a few weeks ago and mentioned that I had bought a new glitter polish that day... Well, this is it! It's by H&M and it's called 'Confetti' (what a cute name!).

Similarly to Ibiza Mix, it has large hexagonal pieces and smaller circular glitters. The coloured glitters are in a clear base and are lovely, with a blue, green, red, gold and silver. I personally think that this makes it quite 'neutral' and would go with any colour base coat.

1 coat of 'Winter Berry', with 1 coat of H&M Nail Polish in 'Confetti'

The coverage of the polish is great, with lots of glitters on the nails after one coat. However sometimes I would get too much of the clear base on the brush making it too thick and no glitters were transferred. But with practice, it got easier and I found dabbing it on meant the glitter was distributed better than when applying it like a normal nail varnish. I was surprised at how easily this removed, as glitter polishes are usually a pain to take off. I have to say I am thoroughly impressed with this polish! Another great thing about it is that it only cost £2.99!

Have you ever tried any Accessorize nail polishes? What are you favourite glitter polishes?

Thank you for reading. xoxo, Joy

NOTD: Blue My Mind

2 coats of H&M Nail Polish in 'Blue My Mind'

This polish has rapidly become one of my favourites! It's a gorgeous, bright cornflower blue. Annoyingly, I found this quite difficult to photograph the colour accurately. I always receive lots of compliments when wearing this! :) The formula was a little bit gloopy, but I still found it pretty easy to apply. The first coat was a little streaky, but became a lovely opaque colour with two coats. I find this lasts well on my nails, experiencing few chips and only minor tip wear.

I now have 3 H&M nail polishes and love them all! H&M nail polishes are great quality for a great price. I'm definitely going to pick up some more. Does anyone have any recommendations?

xoxo, Joy

NOTD: Sunset Dreams

1 coat of H&M Nail Polish in 'Sunset Dreams'

This colour is a gorgeous, bright orange, perfect for summer. I love H&M nail polishes. This is the third one I own now and the quality of all three is consistent. This was opaque with one coat! The application was perfect and better than I expected for a nail polish that cost 99p! This lasted well on my nails, but I took it off after a couple of days, so I don't know how well it lasts beyond 2-3 days.

Have you ever tried H&M nail polishes?

Thank you for reading. xoxo, Joy

Hey Mr. Postman (Part I)

Over the past few weeks I've done a spot of online shopping from eBay and blog sales and won a few blog giveaways. I had some stuff sent to my home address and some to my uni address, in the hope that they would arrive while I was there during Easter/reading week or term time. However, I haven't seen some of the stuff until now!

Even though I've had some of the items for a few weeks, I decided to do accumulative posts instead of posting as soon as I received things. In order to stop them from being mammoth posts, I decided to split them into two posts - One with my eBay and blog sale purchases and one with my giveaway wins and LLYMLRS JWLRY purchase.

Sorry it's a mix of camera and Blackberry photos. My camera ran out of battery and I don't have a memory card for my new one yet!

Clockwise from left: Jelly Lens, Hair Spirals, Royal Wedding Mug and Glycolic Acid

Hair Spirals (£0.99 for 3) and Jelly Lens (£0.99): I was on the hunt for some cheap alternatives to the Goodys Spin Pins, which retail at nearly £5 for 2 (Extortionate much?!). I found the hair spirals, after typing in 'hair spirals' in the search bar, from a seller in China who came up trumps with 3 for 99p with free postage! I had a nosy through the other items they sold and decided to also purchase the jelly lens. It's a bit of a gimmick to be honest and since I received it, I've not actually used it! But at only 99p, I thought it'd be a bit of fun. The items only took about 10 days to get here from China, which I was super impressed with.

Royal Wedding Mug (£5.50): Out of all my friends, I was the only person that was super excited about the Royal Wedding last month. With all the build up to the wedding, I had a look at all the memorabilia that was being released. After seeing a lot of merchandise with subtle royal designs, I decided I wanted something that was rather in-your-face, so I hunted around on eBay and thought this mug was perfect! The pictures are from the day they announced their engagement and I just love how happy they look :)

Glycolic Face Peel (£4.75 + £2.25 p&p): Recently my skin has been looking a little dull and I was getting a bit sick of my acne scars, so I decided to take matters into my own hands. I'm a bit of a DIY obsessive, so I did some research on face peels. In the end, I decided Glycolic Acid would be a good starting point and settled on 30% concentration. I chose this one over one with a free neutralizer, because the 'free brush' swayed me... But as you can see, the brush is tiny and pointless! Plus the instructions say to apply the peel with a cotton pad, so I don't understand why they include a brush!

(I have only linked where I got the glycolic acid from, because the sellers of the hair spirals, jelly lens and royal wedding mug don't appear to be selling the items anymore.)

Clockwise from left: MAC Lustre Drops from Ellie's blog sale, Essie Midnight Cami and H&M Blue My Mind from Product Pixie's blog sale and Cloud 9 mini straightners from Ann's blog sale

I never really used to buy from blog sales because I didn't have my own Paypal account and using my dad's wasn't really an option. I used to look at blog sale posts and think what I would buy if I had my own Paypal. Thinking back now, I wonder how many things I wanted but missed out on... Since setting up my own eBay account and therefore a Paypal, I've been a keen bean and bought a number of things. I think blog sales are good opportunities for people to get rid of the stuff they don't use and for others to try things without committing to the RRP.

Sorry this post is so long! If I haven't already bored you to death, I will have the second part of this post tomorrow :)

Thank you for reading. xoxo, Joy

Top 5 Nail Polishes for S/S

I forgot to take a picture of all the nail polish bottles lined up, but I'm sure you know what they all look like!

I was painting my nails last night and decided to share the 5 nail polishes that I will be wearing a lot over the spring/summer months. They may not be the on-trend colours of the season, but these are my personal preferences :) I'm sorry to say that while these polishes are widely available in the UK, they may be harder to come by in other countries.

I have NOTDs with mini reviews posted for the majority of these polishes, so I will link those below.

Thumb: H&M 'Sunset Dreams' - 1 coat
Pointer: Mavala 'Samoa' - 2 coats
Middle: Rimmel 60 Seconds 'Rose Libertine' - 2 coats
Ring: Barry M 'Berry Ice Cream' - 2 coats
Pinkie: 17 Fast Finish 'Peacock' - 2 coats

What are your favourite nail polishes for Spring/Summer?

I just wanted to add in a MASSIVE THANK YOU to Jennie for including me in her latest "Blogs I Love Friday". It was such a sweet thing to do and made my day :) If you don't already follow her blog, why not? It's amazing, go do it!! SailorJennie.com

Thank you for reading. xoxo, Joy

NOTD: Miss Stone Heart

2 coats of H&M Nail Polish in 'Miss Stone Heart'

I know this colour isn't particularly summery, but I was instantly drawn to it when I saw it in H&M. Also, how awesome is the name of polish?! The formula is so creamy and I found this so easy to apply. Even with one coat, the colour was pretty opaque. I found that this lasted a fair amount of time, although I think it could have lasted longer if I'd put top coat on.

xoxo, Joy