25% off at Viva La Nails!

I've heard legends of Black Friday but being in the UK, I've never had the chance to experience a Black Friday sale! Viva La Nails are running their own Black Friday sale this weekend and you can get 25% off everything, and that means EVERYTHING using the code BLACK. 

I've lined up a few of my picks from their shop below. Viva La Nails is where I got the gold bullion used to create my now notorious studded manicure so if you've been thinking of recreating the look or have your own ideas for using those little bouncy balls, I'd snap up a pot or two today.

VivaLaNails.co.uk

Code: BLACK

code valid Friday 25th November - Sunday 27th November 2011

 

 

 

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Day 25: Inspired by Fashion

I'll be honest here - I'm not a very fashion conscious person. I'm not trying to sound conceited but I may come across like that anyway, but I believe personal style > fashion. So the first thing I did for researching today's nails was to Google 'Fashion'!
After a bit of searching, I stumbled upon Michael Kors' website and fell in love with the simplicity and elegance of his dress designs. I quickly chose this dress as my inspiration.

Thankfully, Rie and Cris know a bit more than me about fashion. Head over to see their couture creations today.

I used W7 Black as a base colour then slicked on GOSH top coat and placed on the bullion before it dried.
I used a top coat of NYC to seal it all in.



This dress is so classic yet the studs give it that rock-chick rebel vibe. I love it! I feel like such a bad-ass wearing studded nails! I'll be wearing my biker boots and leather jacket today.



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Rose water decals

Hello~ :) Woohoo, I've finally finished exams and am ready to party haha ♥ I wore this mani into my exam and was constantly distracted by it...good thing it was an easy exam :P The full nail water decals are from Viva la nails and part of the blogger sample pack I received awhile ago.

I spent waaay too much time trying to get the water decals to work though, they just refused to dry and stick onto my nails! :( And on top of that, I ruined my pinky one and had to make do with left over decals. Because of the oopsies I made, I used some rhinestones and bullion beads I received from Born Pretty Store - a nail art etailer - to cover them up. I loove the rhinestones, they're so easy to use :)

And a picture of the rhinestone wheel. My favourite has got to be the beautiful light blue under the purple rhinestones on the left. It seriously flashes so many colours ♥

~Sharon

Some products featured in this post were provided for review. For more information, please see my disclosure policy.

Full nail water decals

Hello~ :) As promised in my previous post, here's my attempt at using the full nail water decals from Viva la nails.

I chose to use the Burberry patterned decal first. Application was pretty simple, you simple dip the strip into some water like other types of decals for 10 seconds and then gently slide it off the backing. What I found the most difficult to work with was that the decal took a really long time to dry and as a result moved around on my nail quite a bit. The entire mani took me close to 2hrs to finish, although this can also be attributed to my inexperience with applying it :P. I'd say with more experience I'll be able to do it in half the time.

Photo taken with flash:

What do you think of these full nail water decals? I think they're a nice change to the nail polish strips which are being released by other companies although I haven't experienced using them. With more practice, the nail decals should be easy to work with, you just need to be patient with drying time before applying your top coat.

~Sharon

The above product was provided to me to review. For more information, please see my disclosure policy.

May haul

Hi everyone~ Yes, this is finally another haul post! I really haven't been feeling the nail polish collections since China Glaze's Anchors Away collection which I hauled waaay back in February. However, a few weeks ago I found a seller on ebay who sells Zoya polishes at a pretty reasonable cost and combined with cheap shipping costs, who can pass on that? :)

I also found Essence polishes being sold in Target awhile ago and couldn't resist getting Choose me hehe.
Zoya Dannii, Faye, Ivanka, Gemma, Mimi

Viva la nails also offered some full nail water decals for bloggers to review. I received the following sample pack~ I'll have a review of one of the decals up soon! :D

What do you think of the recent nail polish collections? Anything I missed and should be looking out for? :)
~Sharon

Feeling the blues?

Hello! Sorry for the temporary absence, I've been completely swamped with Uni work recently. Today's mani is from the vault, can you believe my nails are naked right now? o___o I have something in mind though since I have a wedding to attend on Saturday and I definitely can not show up without a mani! :P

The following photo was taken under the sun.

I applied two coats of China Glaze Caribbean blue then stuck on some nail stickers from Viva la Nails' free blogger pack. I actually quite liked this and the stickers stayed on surprisingly well :).

Thanks for dropping by~
Sharon

Out of the Ordinary

Here are some more goodies from Viva La Nails, hopefully this will make a nice change from all the stamping. These are Water Decals and I'm gonna say again that they are great - so pretty and easy to apply. Enjoy all the pictures!

The base colour is Barry M Berry Ice Cream.

Nail art #15 - Spring is upon us

Well, spring is upon us down in the southern hemisphere anyway :P.

For this manicure,  I used two coats of Color Club's Uptown Girl. Then to spice things up a little, I took out my sample pack from Viva la Nails and chose some nail stickers to put on my fourth finger and thumb. To finish off, I sealed my nails with my Poshe topcoat. I love the result loads and the stickers held up really well for the two days I kept this mani.


The nail stickers were part of the free sample pack from Viva la Nails. If you own a blog which posts about nail art or beauty, you too can order yourself a sample pack. You only have to pay for shipping which is £2.95!


Thanks for dropping by.
~shazzii

A day filled with hauls!

I went out shopping without the intention of buying any polishes, but as always I ended up with a few bottles back home :P.

First off, I discovered Sinful Color polishes in The Reject Shop for only 50 cents a bottle!! Of course I had to buy some, even though the colour range was pretty small. It's my first time spotting Sinful Color polishes here in Australia and so I just had to purchase some despite the fact that they were all reds and pinks (and quite a few sheers too).

Left to right: Deepest Ruby, Vela, Noelle


And then too my delight, I also stumbled upon some L.A. Colors polish in a dollar shop! Again, it's my first time seeing these polishes in Australia, so I pretty excited. It was definitely my lucky day today :D.

Left to right: Star light, Metallic purple, Jungle Fever, Sparkling Diamonds

Since I was in full polish buying mode by then, I swung by another dollar shop and bought some rhinestones for future nail art designs :).

Definitely can't wait to try these out!

To my surprise, I received a note in the mail when I arrived home telling me to go down to the post office to collect a package. Since I've only ordered one thing recently, I already had a hunch of what was awaiting me at the post office...and I was right! My free blogger package from Viva la Nails had arrived! Can I just say that I'm totally over the moon at the quick shipping?! The package was shipped exactly a week ago, so this only took five business days to arrive!

I do have a tiny complaint with the packaging though - it appeared that one of the blue glitter packets had not been closed properly and as a result there was glitter spilling everywhere, even out of the sealed packaging. I tried to save what I could and tipped it all into the orange glitter pack. It was quite disappointing and more than a little frustrating to clean all the glitter away - there's still quite a bit in my handbag where I had temporarily stored the package, not to mention my table where I had opened it.

The top row shows the nail stickers and the bottom the water decals. I can't wait to try out the decals, they look so pretty! A review of the products will be coming along in the near future.

Thanks for dropping by.
~shazzii

A Tragic Loss

I got into a little skirmish with a shower curtain and the shower curtain won. And it took the tip of my thumbnail with it!

This is a new polish that I found reduced in Tesco from the Barbara Daly Make-Up range. I haven't captured it very well in the photo, but it's a gorgeous, deep royal purple.

Plate: Bundle Monster BM16

Base Colour: Barbara Daly - Purplicious

Stamp Colour: Miss Sporty - Zodiac

Gold Bullion from Viva La Nails

Top Coat of NYC

Hulk Fail

I was going for a Hulk look with this one. Anyone who is familiar with the comics or the films will know Bruce Banner wears his trademark purple shorts whenever he's angry!

The little pink bits you see are some weird tiny foil strips from Viva La Nails. It's hard to come across ideas for using these.
I tried to make a line with them but ended up just making a mess instead!

Konad Plate: M57
Base Colour: Claire's Mood  - Peaceful/Confident
Konad Colour: L'Oreal LaquiResist - Bebe Blue
Purple: George @ Asda - Hoax
Top Coat of NYC

I'm staying away from home for a few days and trying to travel light which means I won't be packing many nail supplies or my beast of a camera so I won't be able to post anything for a while. I should be back on Friday.

More Stickers

Here are some more nail stickers from Viva La Nails over Barry M Raspberry. There is a random sequin on my index finger there! It must have got stuck to my nails when I was rummaging round in my supplies.

These stickers look amazing and I gave them a fairly good review a few weeks ago but I think I've changed my mind after wearing them.

With these particular stickers, the silver wore off to reveal black underneath after just a few hours.

They are also a nightmare to remove. They won't come off in one piece once you've applied a top coat so you have to literally scratch them off in little pieces.

I'll be sticking to water decals in the future which remove easily with a bit of Nail Varnish Remover.

My First Tutorial: Water Decals

Today I used some Water Decals from Viva La Nails. Since I have never used these before, I checked the website to see if there were instructions. Luckily, there is a video at the bottom of the page with details of how to apply the decals. I'm sure I could have guessed but I wanted to make sure I got it right. Here is how I applied my decals...

1. 

Paint on your base colour and allow to dry thoroughly. I used Barry M Cyan Blue.

2. 

Prepare everything you need:

Cut out the decals you are going to use.

Have a nail stick nearby, or any tool you prefer like tweezers.

A cup or bowl of water, the website specifies warm. You can use cold but it takes much longer for the decals to come away from the paper.

3. 

Hold the decal between your thumb and first finger and plunge it in to the water.

Leave it there for about 5 seconds, or longer if the water's cold.

You will feel the decal starting to slide around on the paper.

4. 
Remove the decal from the water and slide it away from the paper by gently rubbing your two fingers together.
It should come off easily. If it doesn't, put it back into the water for another few seconds.

5. 
The decals are fairly sturdy so you don't need to be too careful when handling them, they can take a bit of rough and tumble.
Get the decal onto your tool and prepare to transfer it to the nail.
Fingers work just as well as any tool when using these decals.

6. 

Once it's on the nail, you can move the decal around as it takes a while to dry. 

If it dries and you don't like the position you can dab some water on it to loosen it up and move it around again.

7. 

Once the decals are dry and you're happy with them, just add a top coat.

The Verdict

I really like these decals. Application was easier than I expected and the finish is brilliant. Unlike with stickers, the edges of the decals are undetectable once the top coat is on so there is no temptation to pick at them as well as the fact that it looks really professional.

The only downside is that they take a while to dry, I would say close to ten minutes, so you have to be very careful until they do because they will slide around.

More Matte

I've finally got these tip stamps down! For ages, whenever I tried, they would end up trailing down my nail and I would get really frustrated.

I used some little flakies from Viva La Nails. They look pink in the packet but are kind of transparent pink so they just look a bit iridescent on the nail.

Konad Plate: M56
Base Colour: L'Oreal Jet-Set - 225 (No Name)
Konad Colour: Collection 2000 - Moonlight Shine
Sparklies stuck on with Miss Sporty top coat
Top Coat of Essie Matte About You

Back To My Roots

It's been a few days since I did any stamping since I've had all the Viva La Nails goodies to play around with. I've also been in a but of a plain nails mood recently which has contributed to my lack of Konadding. So here are some stamped nails that I really like. I love the combination of blue and gold anyway, so I used some of the 'Pearls' from my sample package.

Plate: Bundle Monster - BM10 

Base Colour: BYS - Fools Paradise

Stamp Colour: NYC Glossies - 243B

Gold Pearls from Viva La Nails

Top Coat of NYC

To stick the pearls on, I just used a clear nail polish applied in dots with the flat end of a nail stick and I used the sharp end to pick up and position the pearls.

These pearls are really fiddly things which roll and bounce around all over the place. So I poured some out into a creased post-it note. This also makes it much easier to get the unused ones back into the packet because you can just pour them along the crease.

Mood Swings - Some Strange Goings On

When I first got these mood Polishes in my swap with Emily, I posted a quick swatch of them. Click here to see it. At that time, they weren't changing with temperature, but when I tried them on after a few days, the difference between hot and cold was obvious. It's very strange, but it's like they were broken and now they're fixed!

This is Flirty/Shy. The lighter blue on the nail is warm and the dark colour towards the tips is cold. I used a butterfly from my Fimo cane and some sequins on my ring finger, both from Viva La Nails.

Viva La Nails Rhinestone Sticker Review

These are some of the nail stickers I received from Viva La Nails to review. 

These stickers are really cute and dainty. I've used nails stickers before and have not always been very pleased with them. They often peel off or look too chunky and a bit tacky but these ones are great.

These are really sleek and stick to the nail really well without obvious edges. 

There a tiny bit of peeling on the thumb where you can see part of the flower is missing, it was there went I went to bed but disappeared over night. The peeling only happened when I put a topcoat over the stickers and I suppose you could just leave the top coat.

Viva La Nails Rhinestone Stickers over Rimmel I ♥ Lasting Finish in Funky Diva

It was strange trying these as I'm so used to my Konad/Fauxnads but I think they're great. They're so much quicker and easier than stamping so great if you're in a rush, but I'm still a dedicated Konad fangirl!

My Viva La Nails Package... Have you got yours?

In case any of you nail bloggers haven't heard about the amazing offer at Viva La Nails, you can get a free sample pack of their products worth £20 provided that you review the products on your site. Just click here.

I ordered mine on Friday 13th and it arrived the next Saturday, since it was posted from Latvia. I had to pay £2.95 shipping so I added a Fimo cane to my order too.

Here is the stuff that was in my sample pack

From what I can tell, since there are no clues on the packaging, 3 of the sticker packs (back) are stickers and the other 3 are water decals.

At the front is a selection of 10 packs of sequins, gems and other cool stuff to stick on your nails. There are some close ups just below.

The Fimo stick is fun! I've seen these before but was always a bit unsure about them because they look really tricky.

I didn't buy the special cutting blade because I figured a craft or stanley knife would work fine, which it did. I actually picked up a two pack of stanley knives with spare blades for £1 in a 'What! Shop' just for this purpose and they're more than sharp enough. 

I was a bit shocked when I saw how small the stick was! I don't know what I was expecting but it looked so teeny! 

I've cut almost a half of the stick into slices of varying thickness. I was trying to get them as thin as possible but it's a fiddly job. You can see below the bits of waste I got from some bad cuts, but the it's minimal compared to the amount of resulting good slices I got.

I actually found it pretty fun and kind of calming to just sit there and slice this little stick as small as I could, haha. Is that weird?!

The only thing I found disappointing about the company was that they printed my phone number on to the front of the package under my address. Surely that's against the Data Protection Act? So if you don't want everyone from Latvia to your house seeing your personal phone number, don't give it. I normally wouldn't but this time I did for some reason :s

If you are interested in any of these products, keep reading for reviews and if you have your own sample package, please link me to some of your own reviews so I can see the other products the site has to offer. I'm really looking forward to trying the water decals. Hopefully they won't be too tricky!