Colour block nails: Barry M & E.L.F

For today's post I wanted to share with you my colour block nails, perfect now that summer has decided to make a tentative appearance. I decided to use a twist on an old classic, the French manicure, but this time utilising my most Barbie-esque shades. The two colours I have used here are Barry M Nail Paint in Bright Pink, and E.L.F Nail Varnish in Lilac.

As always, I have begun by using a base coat which in this case is Revlon Quick Dry Base Coat. I then layered two coats of Barry M Bright Pink to create an opaque finish for my base colour. To create the tips I simply swiped E.L.F Lilac horizontally across my nail in two thin coats. Always make sure to paint over the free edge at the end of your nail, as this will reduce the likelihood of chipping.
To finish I am using my favourite top coat, Save The Nail 45 Second Top Coat, which delivers a high-shine finish. Better yet it is touch dry in seconds meaning you are good to go without fear of smudging and chipping. It's fabulous, and I highly recommend it if you, like me, get impatient when painting your nails.

Well, I hope you enjoyed my colour block nails. Below are links to all the products I used in this blog post if you'd like to try this NOTD:

Revlon - Quick Dry Base Coat: Boots £6.49
Barry M Nail Paint - Bright Pink: Superdrug £2.99
E.L.F Nail Varnish - Lilac: Eyes Lips Face £2.50
Save The Nail - 45 Second Top Coat: Boots £6.95

XOXO

NOTD: Barry M & Collection 2000 pastels look

Hi my beauties,

Just a quick post on my #NOTD (Nail of the Day) look for you. I say day... but as these polishes have been long wearing I've had this look on since Sunday.

I'm wearing O.P.I Base & Top coat (my fave), with two coats of Collection 2000 Hot Looks Fast Dry Nail varnish in 33 Button Moon (the mint green colour), and Barry M Nail Paint in Strawberry Ice Cream on my ring finger.

Pastel is back once again for SS12 so I thought I would jump on the band wagon and try to have cheerful nails despite the dreary English Summer we're having. If you're looking for an Essie Mint Candy Apple dupe and have access to a Boots store go pick up the shade Button Moon from Collection 2000 or buy it here at Boots website. For £1.79 you can't really go wrong and they have so many shades!
Strawberry Ice Cream by Barry M can be also found on the Boots website for £2.99 and these are so long wearing. The Collection 2000 Hot Looks polishes are 8ml, while Barry M nail paints are 10ml, so you get a decent amount of product, but they are still small enough to throw in your handbag. All in all a nice cheap and cheerful, but good quality manicure!

Well beauts, it's way past my bedtime.

Hope you enjoyed my small NOTD! (Nail of the night now...*YAWN!*)

Natalie
xoxo

Depotting Urban Decay Primer Potion

Hello my beauties!

I thought I'd finally upload my post about the magical moment that I had to depot my Urban Decay Primer Potion!

I have the old-style genie bottle and when my applicator started to come out with little product I tried tip #1: Take out the plastic stopper!
I had seen this method used on a blog somewhere in the internet ether, and so thought this was a fantastically easy method to get more mileage from my UDPP. This I would say gave me about 3 months extra use. One day I noticed that I was getting hardly any product on the applicator, and with a heavy heart I decided it was time to bite the bullet and depot my UDPP.

 So to start I used the following products:

(Serrated knife, wooden spatula, Surgical Spirit, Antibacterial spray, little pot, UDPP)


I started by using the serrated knife to CAREFULLY cut along the widest part of the bottle (this should only be done by an adult- please take great care when cutting not to hurt yourself). I used a serrated knife as the bottle is made of thick plastic and this was the most effective method.

When I finally cut through the bottle this is what I found:

Top of bottle

Bottom of bottle

To me it looked like taking the plastic stopper out of the bottle had worked wonders as there seemed to be no product left. The top of the bottle however had lots of lovely product in it, waiting to be scooped out! I was a bit sad to learn that taking the stopper out of the bottle was so effective, so I decided to also cut off the bottom of the bottle and found lots of product in there also! YAY!

I took my wooden spatula and broke it in half to create a really thin tool that I could use to scoop out the maximum amount of Primer Potion from my bottle.
I decanted my Primer Potion into a small sample pot from Garnier, but you can buy similar little pots in drugstores and on eBay. Then I simply scraped the primer off into the little pot section by section: top of primer bottle, body and base.

Here is the final result!

As you can see, I've actually got a lot of UDPP left, despite what I thought when I first opened the bottle. I have used an airtight contained so my UDPP doesn't dry up so quickly which I highly recommend. From what I scooped out I would say I have around 3ml of product, so considering one bottle of Urban Decay Primer Potion is 11ml that's just over a quarter of a bottle! Perhaps I even have more but I really can't tell! All I know is that I will continue to enjoy this product for a while yet.

So my beauties, If you have an old-style bottle of UDPP I seriously recommend that you take out the bottle stopper once you feel you are getting low, and then go on to depot. You will be surprised with just how my primer is left! I think next time I will purchase the professional size Urban Decay Primer potion as it comes with a squeeze tube and nib applicator.

Thanks for reading!
Natalie
xoxo

My new blog

Hi My beauties,

So I needed a fresh start and decided to re-vamp my blog and really try and focus on writing. I absolutely love watching and reading product reviews so this is what I hope to focus my blog posts on. Not everyone has access to all products in the world and sometimes it is nice to see what you will be getting for your money before you buy.

I'm getting to grips with the design of my blog so bare with me while I play around with different styles, I have always been a creative person and it has been a long time since I really put my stamp on something, or started a new project.

So a little about myself:

• 25 year old British beauty blogger 
• I live by the sea <3  
• I'm from the North but live in the South of England  
• I love all things beauty and fashion related 
• I love photography and own soooo many cameras 
• I love the sun but don't like to tan (Piz Buin is my staple year round) 
• I LIVE to travel 
• I love all things Japanese: matcha, Pocky, Coleto...the list goes on.

So, I hope you all come to love my blog. I hope it is something I can develop into an amazing beauty, fashion and travel resource!

Stay curious

Natalie

xoxo