Turquoise Ombre Nails

Something a bit more challenging this week! If you didn't know, ombre means a colour that is graduated in tone, thanks google for summing that up so nicely for me. In this case I started out with Boots No7 Stay Perfect Nail Colour in Stand Back on my middle nail and then mixed with white going towards my little finger and black towards my thumb.

If you're lucky enough to have 5 different shades of one colour you can just do it that way, painting one on each nail but I went for the cheaper, messier method. I love the results though, will definitely be doing this again in future!

Nails: Hello Kitty London ~ Light Pink

After the mediocore results from the last Hello Kitty nail polish I tried I was much happier with this one. I've been wanting a pearlescent pink for a while so was happy to see this colour in the set I got. It still took me 3 coats to get decent coverage but I really love the colour. I'm not sure why but it made me feel like I had Barbie nails.

I did a bit of stamping over this one as well. I really need to practice more at getting all my stamps straight, that thumb is a mess!

Hello Kitty London Nail Set

Hi everyone! Hope you all had a great christmas and a happy new year. I'm back and feeling rejuvinated after a couple of weeks of relaxation and eating far too much.

I got some awesome gifts this year, including this Hello Kitty nail polish set.

It includes 5 polishes (Light Pink, Purple, Pink, Pink Sparkle, Clear Sparkle), some toe seperators and a nail file. One thing, it seems that this year any sets that come with plastic packaging like this, the individual items have been glued in! I've never seen this before but these polishes were and I bough a set of bubble baths and they were glued into their plastic as well. It's really annoying as it's a nightmare to get the glue off. Not a big deal, I know, but still....*rant over*

I decided to try out the pink first. Sadly, it was a bit dissapointing. The brush is really slim and unsubstantial so it's not the easiest to apply and the colour isn't very pigmented. So even after 3 coats it wasn't entirely opaque.

I'm not sure what's happend with my photo here, the colour looked fine when I was editing it but when I saved it, it's turned it more pale and peachy, it's definitely more pink in real life.

Nails: Technic ~ Be Dazzled

My craving for glittery nails led me to buy some more new polishes the other week. I spotted this brand, Technic, in a discount beauty shop. For 99p a bottle I thought it was worth a try.

I got a couple as I couldn't choose make my mind up what colour I wanted. This swatch is 4 coats of Technic - Be Dazzled, a copper coloured glitter in a clear jelly. It could have done with a base coat colour underneath but I don't really have anything that would match.

I don't have a lot of experience with glitter polish but I don't think I could really be disappointed with this at 99 pence! Have you tried any of the other polishes from Technic, do you think they are worth looking at again in future?

Gingerbread House and Castle

Here are my gingerbread creations for 2011! I made the icing too runny again, d'oh! So I couldn't do any nice piping. Maybe I'll finally have learnt my lesson next year.

I'm really starting to feel festive now and I have a real craving for mince pies. Hopefully I might have some free time next weekend to do some more baking.

Do you make your own gingerbread house at christmas? I think a lot of people seem daunted by it but it's not as difficult as you'd think, just quite time consuming. It's so rewarding though, it's definitely worth the effort.