PS Nail Polish in Burnt Orange

Hello! Happy New Year's Eve everyone. I should probably be posting a more sparkly New Year's Eve nail look but I'm currently in London and I wanted to continue showing some of the polishes I showed in the December Nail Polish Haul post. So far I've showed the Essence Little X-Mas Factory polishes, the Barry M 2016 A/W Superdrug Exclusives, the Essence Colour of the Year in Jeans On! and the Barry M Jingle Bells polish. Phew! Not bad for someone who is usually dreadful at showing the polishes after I've done a haul post. Today's nails are the PS Nail Polish in Burnt Orange.

I have a few PS Nail Polishes but haven't used them a lot. They are usually good though for picking up on trend colours and when I saw Burnt Orange I had to have it! Yes, it's more of an autumn colour, the reason it drew my attention is because it reminded me of Essie's Playing Koi, as well as giving me the same kind of vibes as Essence's Colour of the Year My Love Diary. While I haven't got my hands on Playing Koi to compare them, I don't think they're going to be a dupe, but close enough.

I probably won't be turning to this much now that autumn is over but it'll always be there for next year. Speaking of, I hope you have a great New Year's Eve and a Happy New Year to you!

Christmas Nails With Barry M Jingle Bells

Hello! I hope you've all had a nice week or so, whether you're celebrating Christmas or not. I get more and more excited when Christmas rolls around each other and I plan on doing things like Christmas nails. But I never give myself enough time to do so. Next year hopefully I'll be more organised but I did manage to do some nail looks. First off there was the Essence The Little X-Mas Factory collection I showed as well as the Barry M Superdrug Exclusives for this winter. I also managed to pick up one of Barry M's 2014 Superdrug exclusives, I showed it in a nail polish haul. I don't know why I didn't pick it up or some of the others I missed out on that year (I did pick up Twilight and Starlight). Jingle Bells is definitely one of my favourites this Christmas and I did three looks with it.

This is it over Meet Me Under the Mistletoe from the Essence Little X-Mas Factory collection. I don't tend to go for darker greens but I'm super glad I picked it up this. I love that you get all the traditional Christmas colours in this look and it's so fun. I will definitely be recreating this next year!

This is over Let's Take an Elfie from the Essence Little X-Mas Factory collection. If I hadn't that Essence polish I would have put it over a pure white but what I love about the Essence one is that it adds an extra bit of shimmer and sparkle to the look.

This is the above look but I've made it into a crelly look (so similar to a jelly but using a semi opaque polish to give it a milky look). I love crelly polishes but find it's more indies that make them and they're harder for me to get. So I DIYd it by adding a very sheer Essence polish I had on top of the glitter and I love how it tones down the glitter a bit but it's still sparkly and fun.

Next year I'll be more organised with more looks! Do you have a favourite polish or look for this time of the year? Leave a comment below and let me know

Barry M Autumn/Winter 2016 Superdrug Exclusives

Barry M do great nail polishes and they often do exclusive shades for Superdrug and Boots. For Autumn/Winter this year they have two shades in Boots and there’s four in Superdrug. Two of the shades are on the shelf and the other two are free gifts when you spend a certain amount on Barry M products. So naturally I bought the first two shades so I could get the other two!

From left to right: Nutcracker, Twinkle Twinkle, Gingerbread and Icicle

Nutcracker and Twinkle Twinkle are the two shades I bought to get the free gift Gingerbread and Icicle.

Nutcracker is a very bright magenta foil nail polish. Truth be told, when I first saw this shade online I wasn’t overly gone on it. But when I saw it in the shop I decided to give it a go. And I’m glad I did! It’s beautiful and can be applied in one coat.

 

Twinkle Twinkle is a soft rose gold foil. This one also applied really well and it’s a great metallic to have in your nail polish collection.

 

Gingerbread is a warm bronzey brown foil polish. I don’t like brown shades usually but this one is beautiful! I think the fact that it’s a metallic foil that makes me like it so much. It did need 2 or 3 coats though, it was a bit patchier than the ones above.

 

Icicle is a glitter topper, full of glitter pieces and bar glitter. I’m not the biggest fan of bar glitter in polishes, I don’t own too many. But I’ll give it a go, I think it would like nice over a black. Here one coat over Essence Jeans On!

Out of all these it’s hard to pick a favourite. I thought Twinkle Twinkle would be my favourite as I have a soft spot for rose gold but actually I think Nutcracker might be my fave. It’s a nice brighter take on a berry shade for this time of the year.

Essence Colour of the Year Polish in Jeans Ons!

So I’ve made two Colour of the Year posts this year. The first was my nail polish picks for the colours Rose Quartz and Serenity. The second post was the Essence Polish of the Year polish they brought out the shade Forgive Me for the Rose Quartz shade. I didn’t think they’d bring out one for Serenity but low and behold, when I was looking at the Essence stand the other I noticed that this polish, Jeans On!, had a Colour of the Year sticker on it! It would have been nice to have both Forgive Me and Jeans On! in the same post but this will have to do.

It’s a pretty shade and a good enough match for Serenity, more on the periwinkle side of blue than a baby blue which was key for a Serenity match.

While I kinda liked the idea of Rose Quartz and Serenity at the beginning of the year, half way through my interest fell. I had planned to do loads of nail looks with the colours but I just couldn’t motivate myself to do so. However the 2017 shade has been announced and it’s called Greenery. It’s a beautiful bright lushious green, I’m very excited about it. Also Butter London have brought out an official collaborative shade which is awesome! They also have 5 other Pantone shades and they’re all lovely looking. Buttercream is calling my name and Calypso Coral looks like a lovely coral shade (not that I need any more!).

Essence The Little X-Mas Factory Nail Polishes in Meet Me Under the Mistletoe and Let’s Take an Elfie

Hello! So I showed some nail polishes I’ve acquired over the last month or so in my post two days ago and I’ve actually managed to take some swatch pictures of them! I know, shocking times. I have two polishes out of the Essence The Little X-Mas Factory limited edition collection. I picked up the green and the white polishes and there’s also a bright pink one and a gold one.

Meet Me Under the Mistletoe is a beautiful pine green, it’s a lovely colour for this time of the year. It’s not a colour I typically gravitate towards but something about this really caught my attention. I used two coats here.

 

Let’s Take an Elfie is a shimmery white polish. It kinda reminded me of a sparkly version of the icing on top of a Christmas cake! It’s a beautiful polish but I found it a bit difficult to work with. The 2nd coat would start to strip off part of the 1st coat and things ended up patchy. It was worth it in the end though! I can’t remember if I used two or three coats above. If you can get it to work ok for you, then two coats will be enough. But you might need three to make sure it’s fully opaque.

These two polishes are great additions to my Christmas polish collection. There’s a hand full of polishes I have that are perfect for this time of the year and these will be added to those. Let me know below what polishes you like to use this time of the year.

December Nail Polish Haul

Hello! So I was looking at the nail polish I’ve bought recently and realised I’ve managed to pick up a nice amount of new polishes and thought I’d show them on here. I’ve picked them up in Superdrug, Boots, Penneys, Claire’s Accessories and Dealz.

The first four polishes are Superdrug exclusives for Barry M. The first two, Nutcracker (the bright pink one) and Twinkle Twinkle (the rose gold one), are the two autumn/winter Superdrug exclusives (Boots have two as well). The next two, Gingerbread (warm bronzes) and Icicle (sparkly topcoat), were a free gift once you spent a certain amount on Barry M products. The Gelly Hi Shine is Blackforest, the first black Gelly from Barry M. I picked it up in Boots when I was buying something else and I had a voucher to use. The final one is Jingle Bells. It was the Superdrug autumn/winter exclusive for 2014, which I didn’t pick up at the time (I did get one of the Boots and the Tesco one) but when I saw this one in Dealz (Poundland) I snapped it up!

 

The first two polishes are from Essence and their Little X-Mas Factory limited edition colllection. There’s four polishes and I got Meet Me Under the Mistletoe (the green) and Let’s Take an Elfie (sparkly white). The other two polishes are a gold and bright pink. The next polish is a PS Nail Polish from Penneys/Primark in Burnt Orange which also describes the type of shade it is! I picked it up as it reminded me of Playing Koi by Essie, though I don’t think it’s a dupe. The next two are from China Glaze and I picked them up in Dealz. They are Mistletoe Kisses (green glitter) and Glistening Snow (silver glitter). Mistletoe Kisses is from the 2010 Holiday Collection and Glistening Snow is from the 2012 Holiday Collection. I picked up the Claire’s Liquid Metal in Rose Gold because there was an offer on that day and it was less than half price. Of course, just after my Essence Colour of the Year post with the Rose Quartz shade, they then brought out a blue one. This is called Jeans On! and it’s their pick for Serenity. Finally this PS Metals comes in a range of shades, this is the silver one. I have previously picked up the rose gold one too.

Phew! Lots of polishes, including some good scores from Dealz! It can pay to have a good root around every now and again. I have some posts planned to show off some of these but if you have any requests for swatches let me know in the comments below.

November’s Reads 2016

So October’s Reads was late going up because I had a cold. And November’s is late going up because I got round two of that cold! I hope that’s it gone and it doesn’t come back again. November was a quieter reading month than I thought it would be. I’m still getting through some books I started during the month and as I write this, I’ve only finished one book so far in December. Sickness has just sapped me of my interest to read. I did read more non-fiction in November, which I mentioned in this Non-Fiction November post.

November Reads

Cheer Up, Love by Susan Calman

Susan Calman is a Scottish comedian and in this book she talks about her experiences with depression and anxiety. Susan characterises her depression as The Crab of Hate, sitting on her shoulder spitting out spiteful remarks. The book was interesting, I always find it interesting to read about other people’s experiences with depression and anxiety. Susan is very honest and at times I found myself nodding along in agreement. We find out about Susan’s life as well and some of her anecdotes were very funny. There’s lots of helpful advice too, though like every book I’ve read on mental health it isn’t the be all and end all. Susan’s view on depression is hers and the way she deals with her depression suits her and it isn’t for everyone. I enjoyed reading this and I look forward to seeing more from Susan Calman.

 

Danny Wallace and the Centre of the Universe by Danny Wallace

I love Danny Wallace books and I picked this up for one of the Book Riot Read Harder Challenges to read a book out loud. It’s under 100 pages and it was perfect to read to my boyfriend (we tried a longer book but he kept falling asleep and we weren’t getting anywhere with it!). This is a story where Danny goes to a town called Wallace in Idaho, who claimed they were the Centre of the Universe. Danny spends 24 hours in Wallace and it was an interesting enough story. I did find it very repetitive though in some of his sentences and phrases which I found really tiring when reading out loud. I don’t think it’s a must read if you’re a Danny Wallace fan, it’s really just a blog post or article stretched out to fit into a short story for a book.

 

 

A Closed and Common Orbit by Becky Chambers

I LOVED A Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet when I read it in May. It was such an interesting and heartwarming story and when I found out there would be another book set in the same world coming out this year I couldn’t wait to read it. A Closed and Common Orbit follows two characters we briefly see in A Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet (we don’t see any of the main characters from that book). The story is told in the present, starting after the end of A Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet as well as a flashback story of Pepper and how she grew up. I don’t want to say too much about the characters or story in case it gives anything in the first book away but the two storylines mirror each other at times before they merge into one. It was a beautiful story, I love love love this world and even though this is sci-fi and that might scare some people away, please give these books a chance! They are full of interesting characters and worlds and Chambers had me in tears several times reading this. I loved both the books and I can’t wait for the 3rd one (which is listed on Goodreads but I’m not sure if Chambers is writing one. I hope she is!). I can’t wait to reread these as well. Wonderful!

 

Mandela: An Audio History by Desmond Tutu

This is a short audiobook, just over an hour long. I listented to it on the train on the way home from the Bord Gais Energy Irish Book Awards. This is more like a documentary or podcast than a traditional audiobook, it has clips of people recounting their experiences during the time, speeches, radio and television reports and singing. It documents Mandela from his rise in popularity against apartheid, his trial and sentencing, what was going on politically at the time while he was in jail and his release in the 90s. Some of the elements I didn’t know about, like how school children protested at the introduction to Afrikaans as the language schools had to teach in and the brutality of the police at these protests was truly shocking. The book is beautifully produced and I love that we get to hear such things as Mandela’s speech at his trial which ends with his famous words ‘It is an ordeal for which I hope to live for and to see realised. But my lord, if it needs be, it is an ordeal for which I am prepared to die’. A short but powerful listen.

 

Christmas at the Little Village Bakery by Tilly Tennant

This book sees the return to Honeybourne, the small cosy village in Wiltshire. And it's Christmas time! The book picks up 10 months or so after the end of the last book and there's been some big changes. Millie and Dylan were the main focus for the first book and while they're in this book too, the main centre of the story is Spencer. We're also introduced to new characters in this book like Millie's cousin Darcie and Spencer's parents. Tilly does a great job of writing loving characters and setting the lovely cosy village of Honeybourne. It's a great Christmassy read too and you could possibly read this book as a festive read without reading the first one (though one or two references will be unexplained). Overall it was a fun festive read that I enjoyed. [NetGalley]

 

The Geek Feminist Revolution by Kameron Hurley

Kameron Hurley is a successful science-fiction and fantasy writer and this book is a collection of essays that centre around feminism, geek culture and Hurley’s experiences of being a genre writer. Having a read a few books on feminism this year, this was a different voice than the other books I read, especially the section of what it’s like being a woman within geek culture and writing speculative fiction. All the essays aren’t *just* about feminism, a lot of them are Hurley’s memoirs and own personal stories. And while there isn’t a lot of intersectionality, Hurley does address this, tries to be inclusive and admits that in the past she’s made mistakes about things and has always tried to correct herself when she has made mistakes which is a refreshing attitude. I was slow reading this (I started at the end of August so it took me 3 months to read) but I did enjoy it. I found myself reading an essay here and there when I had a spare moment. A lot of these essays can be found published online if you’d like to read some to decide if this book is for you. I’m looking forward to picking up some of Hurley’s fiction, any suggestions can be left in the comments below! [NetGalley]

 

November Stats

Number of Books Read- 6

Ratio fiction to non-fiction- 2:4

Number of eBooks- 2 (Christmas at the Little Village Bakery and The Geek Feminist Revolution)

Number of Audiobooks- 1 (Mandela: An Audio History)

Number of Books Borrowed from Library- 3 (Cheer Up, Love, Danny Wallace and the Centre of the Universe and A Closed and Common Orbit)

 

Book Riot Read Harder Challenge Completed

Listen to an audiobook that has won an Audie Award- Mandela: An Audio History

Read a book out loud to someone else- Danny Wallace and the Centre of the Universe

And that’s it! Just one more book to check off the Read Harder Challenge (read a food memoir. I have several listed on my TBR so I don’t know why I’ve been so slow on this one!). Hopefully I’ll read one. I want to finish the books I’m currently reading as well this month before I sit down to plan my reading resolutions and TBR for next year. Which I’m very excited about actually, seeing all the upcoming releases for next year!

Sinful Colors Kylie Trends Mattes in Kitty Pink

Hello! I have a few bad habits when it comes to this blog. One is buying nail polish with the intention of putting up swatches or nail art, taking the pictures but not putting tem up. The other is showing nail polish in a haul post and then never showing it in a later post. Today’s post combines both! I bought this in LA and showed it in my US Beauty Haul, got delayed in taking swatch pictures and then when I finally did forgot about posting it up!

Anyway! I wish Sinful Colors was easier to find over this side of the pond. All the Sinful Colors I have were sent to me from America, bought by myself over there or found in discount stores here. The Kylie Trends Mattes range was lovely, I especially liked Kitty Pink as it was so soft and luxurious looking. I wore it a lot recently as it was just so chic.

It can look a bit streaky because of the matte effect but with practice you can get it to look right. I’ve also heard of putting a glossy top coat over it to smooth everything out and then a matte top coat over that to get the matte effect again but that can be hard work. You can also just put a glossy top coat to a shiny effect which is also very pretty. This collection reminds me of the Essie Cashmere Matte collection, though having never tried any of the Essie polishes I can’t comment for sure on that. This polish is something I think I’ll be picking up more this winter as it’s matte finish really makes me think of cosy soft jumpers!