FREEBIES!!!!! 1st Anniversary blog give-away. :-D

EDIT - Give-away cancelled for now, but I will re-run the give-away and everyone that has entered so far will automatically be enetered again. I'm sorry I haven't got round to picking a winner, but life got in the way, here is my post about what's been going on.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I can't believe I've been blogging for a year now (my blog's anniversary was actually in Feb, shh.. don't tell anyone I missed it), I still feel like I'm new to it, but I'm happy that I'm picking stuff up along the way. You might have noticed that I got out the pasting table and put up some new wallpaper I made, I hope you like it, I think it represents me alot better and it looks more fun now.

The best bit about blogging has to be the wonderful people I've got to know, especially Kaz from Pretty Random and Dana from Polished Claws Up, both girls inspired me to start my own blog, and now we're doing swops. :-)

Anyway, I wanted to celebrate a whole year of blogging and I thought I'd do a give-away. I've always been lucky and have won a few little competitions over the years, so it'll be nice to share some of that luck with someone else. Here's what's up for grabs.

In keeping with my love of vintage polish I'm giving away some Sally Hansens and a Revlon.

February's Nail Polish Haul

Hi guys, sorry about the lack of activity lately, I've just not been feeling up to it, but I'm back and will be a better blogger I promise. :-)

Normally I'd do a haul post on the last day of the month with Dana from Polished Claws Up!, Dana's had a busy month so isn't doing a haul post this month, but still go and check her blog out here. I've been a bit behind as I needed to borrow a camera to take the photos, my photos aren't great, but hopefully you'll get the idea.

This months haul included my first Versace polish, I had to get it for it's cute little box, and I got a ton of old Cutex polishes which I just couldn't resist, and here's my lastest haul, as always, if there's any you'd like to see swatched let me know. :-)

OPI - Extra-va-vaganza!, Fresh Frog of Bel Air, China glaze - Trendsetter, Versace - V 2018

Maybelline Colorama - Peach Daiquiri, Purple Party, Twinkling Toffee, Emerald Frost, Pink Pinata x2

Snap Crackle and Pop! James - She's A Star

I've decided that on wednesdays I'm going to do Snap Crackle and Pop! posts, it's just an excuse for me to share my sometimes dreadful music taste with you, I love reading about the music other people love and I've added so many songs to my music collection thanks to blogs, so hopefully if you like music you'll enjoy these posts too.

After the last song I shared (read the post here) I thought I'd spare you more of the same, and share a song from my favorite band James.

Now depending on your age and where you live you'll either know James or you won't, James have been around since the early 80's and are still going strong today, in the UK their biggest hit was Sit Down, in the US they're known for Laid which was used in the American Pie films, and in places like Portugal Getting Away With It was a hit.

 

I've been a fan since 1991 and have seen them on tour so many times, they are seriously the best live band I've ever seen, if they're touring near you go see them, you really won't regret it. So the song I'm gonna share with you is She's A Star, it was the lead single from the Whiplash album in 1997.

Sally Hansen - Black Stiletto

Hi Guys! Hope you're all keeping well. 

I wouldn't usually think it's worth swatching a black polish, I've not got many and when I saw todays polish at the poundshop I thought it was destined to always be underwear, that was until I used it for the first time, I thought I'd use it as a base for the amazing Maybelline Aqua (swatches here), but as soon as I'd finished my second coat I was in love, I had to get photos of this beauty before covering it over.

Black Stiletto is from Sally Hansens Hard as Nails Xtreme Wear range, I'm not sure how old this is but it has a white cap so I'm guessing this is one of the older ones.

What I loved about this polish is the glorious glossy and super-reflective finish, it was also a breeze to apply, you can see how reflective it is in my photos, you can actually see the sun and clouds in the polish!

Rimmel - Tangerine Queen

Hi, I can't believe it's snowing again, I'm meant to change the wheel on my boyfriends car, but there's no way I'm doing it in the snow.  If you're wondering I'm the one that does all the car stuff because I used to work on cars for a living and have training, my fella's the computer wizard and helps me out when I kill my laptop. :-)

Today's swatch is from before Christmas, my nails were loooong then, I think I might prefer them shorter, what do you think? Anyway, the polish on my nails is Rimmel's Tangerine Queen from their Lasting Finish range. In the photos I used three coats, it needed them as it looked streaky, but it worked out okay in the end. I found this quite thick and it dries quick, so you don't have much time to get it right, but it levels out nicely so that's a plus. It's a great Summer colour, although, I'd happily wear this all year round, I love having something bright on my nails.

NYC - 140B Empire State Blue

Hey, I hope you're having nice weekend so far. :-) 

I'd been meaning to swatch this polish for ages, I was really waiting for some sunny weather to show of the awesome shimmer in this polish. So as soon as the sun came out last week I was out in the garden getting some rays on my fingers. :-)

I think I got this polish from a pound shop, it might even have been one of the first polishes I got from a poundshop, I don't have many NYC polishes but out of the ones I do have Empire State Blue is my favorite.

Empire State Blue is a blue jelly with a beautiful green shimmer running through it. In bright light the green shimmer really pops, it's what I love most about this polish. In shade, or if the light's not catching the shimmer you can just see the blue base. :-)

Gosh - Yellow Bombay

Hi guys, I'm still feeling awful after our burglary last weekend, it's really shaken me up, I'm nervous in the house all the time even with all the doors locked and I'm still really upset about losing all my photos on my laptop. So to cheer myself up I've got something sunny for you today. :-)

I thought I'd share Gosh's Yellow Bombay with you. Ages ago, when I first saw this swatched I fell in love, yellow's my favorite colour and this one looked so pretty, but I couldn't find it anywhere other than on ebay for more than I was prepared to pay. Luckily one day I was in Superdrug and they had a ton of old Gosh products in a sale bin, and in that lot was my little bottle of Yellow Bombay.

I was so happy to find it and it only cost me £2 so it was a steal! Anyway, Yellow Bombay is a gorgous bright yellow, with tiny golden flakes in it. I thought it was going to be a typical yellow polish ie a pain in the ass to apply but this went on like a dream. it was a bit on the sheer side and I hate VNL so I used 3 coats and it was perfect.

Duochrome Vintage Vault - Maybelline Aqua aka Awesomeness!!!

Right, I'm going to start off by saying sorry for creating your latest lemming, because after you've seen this baby it'll be all you can think about, seriously, I'm not kidding, this has to be one of the coolest polishes ever!

This is one polish that I'm really excited to share with you because I've not found anything else like it, and this polish was my number one find of 2012, it pretty much blew my mind when I first wore it.

Aqua was an innocent looking polish going off the ebay seller's photo, what tipped me off though was another sellers photo of the same polish that looked completely different. Both photos were dreadful, so I thought for £2.50 I'd take a chance and see what turns up, it looked like it could be a bog standard torquoise shimmer that every polish company has put out, but boy, this turned out to be one hell of a kick ass duochrome! If you like green and blue polish and love duochromes, be prepared to wet your pants! :-D

Always look on the bright side of life....

Hey, I hope you all had a better weekend than I did.

I had planned for the weekend to be really nice, I had passed my tests for my new job on friday so I was looking forward to relaxing. On saturday me and my fella went to Ikea and he treated me to my first helmer, I got a red one and was so excited, I feel like I'm a proper full-on nail polish addict now I have a Helmer. :-)

I think I'll probably fill it up straight away with all the polish I've got, and that I'll get my second Helmer with my first pay cheque when I start work. Anyway, after Ikea we went shopping and came home and cooked some really nice pasta with a blue cheese sauce. We stayed up, watched some telly and went to bed quite late at 3am, I was so tired so I was out like a light.

So I woke up on Sunday looking forward to building my Helmer and doing some other D.I.Y stuff, I go downstairs all happy, but then see our back door is wide open, I have a sudden sinking feeling in my stomach and realise we've been burgled in the night.

They took laptops, phones and a camera, we were lucky we'd taken some things upstairs otherwise they would've gone too, like the laptop I'm writing this post on, but they stole the old laptop I used to keep all my photos on, so that's all the photos I'd taken for my blog that weren't edited yet, but worst still, it had all my art work on from my Masters degree, some of it's backed up, but because it was faulty it was tricky to back stuff up off it, and I've now lost all that work.

Duochrome Vintage Vault - L'Oreal Holographic Shine 807

Hi guys! Yesterday was a big day for me, I had my Bus driving theory and harzard tests, I had to pass them so I can start to learn to drive an actual bus, then I can start work and have more money to spend on polish, anyway, I passed the tests with flying colours so I'm pretty happy.

Right, back to business, I promised you vintage duochromes this week so here's another one, it's L'Oreal Holographic Shine 807.

This is probably one of my most unusal duochromes, it has a brown base, with duochrome particles that turn the polish from green with brown edges, to pink, and when the light doesn't catch the shimmer it shows brown. I found it at my local market stall in a basket of old polishes, I found some real jems in that basket and over time I picked it clean. :-)

There are a few in the Holographic Shine range, I've managed to get two so far but I really want the whole set, also what is it with duochromes being called holographic? They are such different beasts I don't know how polish brands get them confused.