Nail Of The Day

Hello Lovelies, 

Since you all seemed to enjoy my last NOTD (see here) or nail of the day post as they are known on the bloggersphere I posted last week, I decided to write another one. 

Todays NOTD features a gorgeous bright pink polish with a glitter top coat, I will show the pink with and without the top coat as it's a lovely polish so I wanted to show it you in all it's glory so to speak.

So without further ado, here's today's "nail of the day"

NOTD

What I Used

To achieve this lovely finish first of all I used my favourite base coat, the Orly Bonder, and then I applied 2 coats of the Max Factor Gel Shine Lacquer in Twinkling Pink, a beautiful and vibrant bright pink polish and I applied 1 coat of the China Glaze Fairy Dust over the top, finishing with my favourite top coat the Orly Glosser top coat. 

Max Factor Gel Shine Lacquer Polish

China Glaze Fairy Dust

I love the Max Factor Gel Shine Lacquer polish, it applies well and dries quickly in between coats, I used 2 coats of the polish and it really does have a gel like look to the polish, it's super glossy and looks very gel like, I did take a photograph of the polish without the fairy dust and a top coat to show you how glossy it is. 

2 coats of the Max Factor Gel Shine Lacquer without top coat

As you can see from the above photo, the polish has a lovely glossy shine to it, and I think it does have that gel like finish to it, lots of brands have launched their take on the "gel polish" but so far apart from one other brand which I wouldn't recommend, this is the only polish to look like gel. I am really happy with the polish and would love to try some of the other shades in the line, so much so I may have just had a cheeky purchase of some other shades (keep your eyes peeled for my next haul video). The polish applied well, and looks great and at the time of writing this post I have had the polish on my nails for 5 days and I haven't got any chips at all, there is a teeny tiny bit of wear on the ends of my nails but nothing noticeable at all. 

My nails today after 5 days wear

As you can see from the above photograph there is minimal wear on the edges of my nails but no chips at all and after 5 days I think that's brilliant. I do think my Orly top coat helps with the wear time of my nail polishes, I usually get at least 4 or 5 days wear time out of my polishes with the exception of the China Glaze polishes which unfortunately chip badly on my nails, sometimes in less than 24 hours. 

Overall thoughts and where to buy

Overall I love this nail polish combo, I painted my nails like this for my date night with Simon for our anniversary last Friday and Simon really liked it too, I chose a bright pink lip colour to match and an all black outfit and the nails and lips looked lovely with the plain black outfit, I do have an OOTN video and blog post coming soon for the look. 

I'm super happy with the wear time of the polish and love the look of the fairy dust over the bright pink, fairy dust is a lovely glitter top coat and looks beautiful over so many different polishes and every time I wear it on my nails I receive so many compliments about it. 

I love the finish of the gel shine lacquer polish, it really does look like gel, I don't feel I can give it a full review though until I have tried a few more shades in the line, so watch this space for that. 

If you would like to try the Max Factor Gel Shine Lacquer polish, you can find them HERE for £6.99 and currently on a buy one get one half price offer. And if you would like to try the China Glaze Fairy Dust polish, you can find it HERE for £3.99 inc free UK postage. 

Have you tried the Max Factor Gel Shine polishes? Or any brands gel finish polishes? What are your favourites? Do you like a glitter top coat? 

Please leave me your comments and questions below and I will get back to you as soon as possible, I always reply to all my comments.

Thank you for reading, much love as always, 

Zoe x

MAC Viva Glam Miley Cyrus

Image Credit - Google Images 

Hello Lovelies, 

I love MAC products and have a lot of their products and if like me you're a lover of MAC products you'll know that they bring out numerous collections throughout the year and also new Viva Glam lipsticks and lip glosses, and like me you'll be excited to learn of such new collections and Viva Glam lip products and some things get me more excited than others.

The new Viva Glam Miley Cyrus has got me VERY excited!!!

On January 22nd (North America) and February 12th (International) yes we have to wait...again!! The new Viva Glam lip products are launching and they are amazing, I am in love!

Image Credit - Google Images

Image Credit

Image Credit

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How beautiful are they, I will almost certainly definitely be picking up the lipstick, lip gloss isn't my thing but oh my, look at the lipstick and I have to admit the lip gloss is pretty amazing too. 

The lipstick is described by MAC as Hot Pink and is an amplified finish which just happens to be one of my favourite finishes, so it would be rude not to pick one up wouldn't it? And the lip gloss is described by MAC as Hot Pink with sparkling pearl and is one of their lip glasses. 

Every penny made from the sale of the Viva Glam products goes towards helping women, men and children living with and affected by HIV/AIDS so it's a very worthy cause. 

I am super excited for these to be launched here in the UK, it's a little annoying that we have to wait until 12th February for them but thats 2 days before my birthday so I think a happy birthday to me might be in order, sounds like a plan don't you think? 

Will you be picking up any of the Viva Glam Miley Cyrus lip products? Have you tried any of the other Viva Glam lip products? I also love Viva Glam Nicki its amazing, but I think Miley may have just taken over. 

Whether you love or hate Miley Cyrus, you have to admit, these products are without a doubt beautiful. 

Thank you for reading, much love as always, 

Zoe x

NOTD - Nail Of The Day

Hello Lovelies,

Today I have a NOTD post or a nail of the day post as they are otherwise known in the blogging world, I think and yes I am pretty sure that this is the first ever NOTD post I have written, I have written several reviews of polishes etc but never a NOTD, how many times can I write NOTD in one post? 

Anyway, I digress as usual, todays NOTD there I go again using NOTD, is a look I personally think is nice for the winter time, and January in particular, Christmas is over and lets face it we're all feeling a bit flat, and who doesn't love a bit of sparkle? 

NOTD 

I love the way the glitter shines lots of different colours and this is fast becoming my favourite glitter polish and even featured in my 2014 Beauty Favourites video. It can be used over any colour but my personal faves are black and red it looks great and sooooo sparkly too. I am often asked if I have gel nails on when I use the glitter especially over red and black polishes it's lovely and of course my beloved HG top coat helps with that look too. 

So here's how I achieved today's NOTD ~

Products Used ~ 

First of all I applied a coat of my favourite base coat, the Orly bonder base coat available here and then I applied 2 coats allowing each to dry fully in between of the Barry M nail paint in Black, available here. Then I applied 1 coat of China Glaze Fairy Dust, available here and lastly I applied 1 coat of Orly glosser top coat, available here. 

I love the finished look and hope you do too, at the time of writing this post I still have the same polish on and it is chip free, I applied it 4 days ago so that's not bad at all, I do give all the credit for that to the Orly top coat it is amazing and helps my polish last so well and is something I highly recommend.

I hope you enjoyed my first NOTD post, if you'd like to see more of these posts please let me know in the comments below, and likewise if you have any questions or comments please leave them below, I always reply to all my comments. 

Thank you for reading, much love as always, 

Zoe x

The Jar Of Happy Things

Hello Lovelies, 

Today I wanted to share with you a little project I suppose you could call it, that me, Simon and the girls are going to do throughout 2015, our jar of happy things. And now you're probably thinking "what's a jar of happy things Zoe?" well I shall tell you. 

Our jar of happy things is a jar (obviously) and in the jar is a notepad and pen, and what we are going to do with the jar and notepad and pen is, when something nice happens or we have a good day or we get happy news, we're going to write it down on a piece of paper with the date and the name of the person the happy thing happened to for example "Zoe & Simon, 2nd January went to the cinema and out for our dinner, we had a great day" it could be anything at all, to having a nice day out with friends or going for a meal or cinema trip or achieving something like passing a course or exams, a funny moment, something that made us smile, good news, anything at all basically anything that has made us happy. We are all going to continue doing this throughout the year then on new years eve we will empty the jar and read out all the little notes and remember those happy times and look back on them. It is a lovely way of remembering all the great things that have happened over the year and I think it will be really nice to look back to those times too, we often forget things, little things that make us smile or feel good and this is a nice way to remember. 

Our Jar

Note pad and pen

We have 3 notes already :) 

Our jar of happy things 

We bought our jar from Clas Ohlson it was £6.00 and the note pad is from Whsmith they were 99p and on offer for 3 for 2 and the pen is just a pen we had in the drawer, we had some white sticky labels and we used one of those to stick on the front of our jar, if you want to have your own jar of happy things you could decorate it any way you wanted to. 

2014 was such a horrible year that we thought this would be such a nice way to start 2015 off, a new year and new start. On new years eve 2014 we looked back on the year with such sadness, and even though we did have some happy moments during that year, looking back over the year was a sad thing to do. This year on new years eve we will open our jar and read out the notes and look back with happiness at all the things we did or achieved or things we did/saw/heard that made us laugh and we will have fond memories of those times. I think it is all to easy to focus on the sad things and bad things that happen in our lives and we forget the good, and I know 2015 will no doubt bring testing times as each year does, but we will have our jar of happy things to remind us of the happy times too. 

If you want to make your own jar of happy things all you need is -

A large jar

A small note pad

A pen

Labels or decoration if you wish 

Are you going to make a jar of happy things? Please let me know in the comments if you do or if you have done in the past, I'd love to hear about it. 

Thank you for reading, much love as always

Zoe x