Hellooooo there

Well hello there, strangers :) I am back (ish) trying to be a better blogger and you know, just trying to get some structure into my days.
Things are pretty much the same as they have been for a while now, still working on regaining strength back in my left leg after all those surgeries and trying to lose the 10+ kg I stacked on as a result of sitting on my bum for 3 years. Thankfully it looks like I might not have any surgeries for a while now, so yay!
I am planning on going back to Uni next year, I'm considering studying nursing or paramedics (although paramedics might be a bit gruesome... I don't need PTSD on top of my other atuff, I have more than enough "quirks" to keep my mind fully occupied as it is haha).
I also invested in an X-Pole to try and improve my fitness and flexibility so am trying to train every day or so on that- it's a lot of fun but holy crap is it hard work! Still, I'm getting stronger by the day.
As for my nail polish buying, well, I have been too broke to buy anything recently, so it's a lot of rehashing. I just bought my first neon collection which should make it's way from the States soon, which I am super excited about (love neons so much) and I have a heap of Grace-Full polish on my "to buy" list too.
 So instead of swatching new polish I'm mainly doing lots of nail stamping and I figured I'd share some of my recent mani's with you;
First up is Sizzle by Picture Polish stamped using an Emily De Molly Plate (EDM13) and Moonshine by Aussie indie stamping polish Hit the Bottle.

This next one is Fruit of the Poisonous Tree by Glam Polish stamped with an unnamed pink, again using plate EDM 13 (my current favourite stamping plate).

 And finally we have Seeing Red by Emily De Molly stamped using Hit the Bottle white and, yet again, my EDM13 stamping plate

I love how stamping can take a lovely mani to the next level and I find that manis with no adornment feel unfinished to me now- whether it me glitter, studs or stamping, I just need something extra (I'm subtle like that haha).

I hope you enjoyed these swatches and I intend to post again soon (I have close to a thousand pics on my phone that need to be uploaded onto my computer, which is a total PITA but it's gotta get done eventually).
Also, I post swatches on my Instagram account almost daily if you would rather just look at pretty pictures than read my ramblings ;)

Until next time, as always, ~love and polish for all~

Em xox

A quick Glam Polish post

Hi y'all, how's life treating you? Well, I hope.

Today's post is a quickie showing off a trio of Glams that I ordered a few weeks ago. These polishes are all from different collections and I've been eyeing them for a while now, so I finally stopped resisting and gave in to the joys of buying beautifully made nail polish ;)

Glam Polish

 The polishes are, from left to right, Witching Hour from the Exotic Illusions Series, Fangorn Forest from the Epic Journey Collection and Tiffany, from the Heart of Darkness Collection.

As with all my Glams the application and formula was excellent with all three lacquers and I only needed two coats for full opacity (and I probably could have managed one with Witching Hour). 

The colours are all to die for and I consider them all to be "car crash colours"... it's just so easy to get distracted when driving because my nails look so sparkly and amazing I keep taking my eyes off the road haha.

Ok, so lets start with Witching Hour. This is a stunning medium purple that has a very subtle shift between blurple and a divine aubergine, red-based purple, depending on the light. It's also chock full of scattered holo sparkle.

Witching Hour

The next polish is Fangorn Forest, inspired by the deep, dark and mysterious forest of the same name in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. This is an amazing dark green polish with green, blue and teal micas floating in a blackened jelly base. Gorgeous...

Fangorn Forest

And finally we have Tiffany, a delicious holo lacquer that is a lush dark berry pink with a lovely gold shimmer in the shade and an amazing holo colour explosion in sunlight.

Tiffany

So those are my newest Glam Polish acquisitions and I love them all. As always the quality is exceptional and everything about them, from the presentation to the polish's wear time, makes Glam a product that I thoroughly enjoy collecting.

And, just to make my tiny polish budget cry tears of despair yet again, Glam have come out with both a limited edition Xmas Collection and an amazing looking Broadway Collection, full of vivid colours and lots of bling.  You can check them all out at their Big Cartel store, here.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this little post and, until next time, ~love and polish for all~

Em xox

Lets have a peek at Glam Polish Cauldron and Banished, shall we?

Hi all, hope everyone is doing well. I'm ok, my girl is off to school camp on Monday, so the house is a bit haotic with doing washing and packing bags, especially as I have to be in Melbounre also to see my surgeon again this Monday, but we're all traveling well.

Can you tell that I'm trying to be more consistent with my blog posting? Only a week between this and my last one. Impressive! haha
TBQH I don't know whether I should do a quick daily thing that just shows you a few shots of my NOTD or if I'm better off doing a weekly post that is a little more chatty and in-depth. What do you reckon? I kinda like being able to ramble a bit, but then I worry I'm not "doing a blog" right.
Regardless, you're getting a post today, so there ;)

This is actually a bit of a quickie, I just wanted to share a couple more swatches from Glam Polish's Cast a Spell II collection, which I am still making my way through.

Today I want to show you Cauldron, which is a deep teal holo glitter polish, and Banished, a deep dark burgundy red in the style of all the Cast a Spell polishes; that is, highly pigmented, lots of holo sparkle and added little hex glitters and probably some fairy dust too, because they all apply, and look like, magic on the nail.
This is Cauldron, shown here with two coats and then one generous coat of Seche Vite to smooth it all out and add that shine that I love.

Cauldron

As you can see, Cauldron is a stunningly rich, sparkly beauty which received several admiring comments when I was wearing it (ok, so maybe I started wiggling my fingers and asking people to look at my new nail polish, but that's pretty much the same thing, right?).

And this is Banished. I will note that Banished was a little more glitter hungry than the others and so I applied one coat of Essence Gel Look top coat and one of Seche Vite on top of that and got a beautiful finish.

Banished

What I love about banished is how the little hex glitters smoulder unnoticed and then suddenly erupt into fire on the nail as the light changes. It really made me think of some witch banished to hell and the fires of that fiery doom were peeking out of the polish... yes, I like to read horror stories and watch shows like True Blood and Supernatural ;)

Anyway, IMHO Glam Polish have totally hit each and every polish in this collection out of the ball park, there isn't a single one that I put on and don't go gaga for- seriously, if you can only chose a few don't worry, because they are all freaking Stunning with a capital S.

Oh, and just to add to my financial woes, Glam have just come out with another amazing looking collection too, inspired by Storybrooke, so I will definitely swatch some of those when they arrive (no/low-buy? whatever do you mean?)

Until next time, ~love and polish for all~

Em xox

Letters from Migraine Land, x-ray pics, some Glam Polish swatches plus a very special upcoming polish review *phew!*

Hello all (and I do mean all... wow, a tonne of new followers, awesome!). Oh, I use ellipses a lot. I know, totally annoying... sorry.
Anyhoo, I have been oh so slack, a slacker is me! It's a terrible thing, but I actually have some valid(ish) excuses for being such a slattern with blog upkeep; I've had the migraine fairy visiting me this week, an adventure that saw me in bed from Tuesday til Thursday.
Fuck migraines, for real. They are unbelievably debilitating and, at the time, you really do wish you would just die already because the pain and the vomiting don't let up for 12, 24 sometimes even 36 hours. Ghastly things :(

Aside from having my head in a bucket for almost two days I also had to go to St Vincent's to see my orthopedic surgeon, to see if there's anything that can be done to help repair what now looks like to be permanent nerve damage and some loss of mobility with my left leg. From crossfit to a cane, yep. Good times.

What do you expect whe you have this much metal holding your pelvis together though, really...

my buggered pelvis :\

See those bright circle things (they remind me of spaghetti-o's)? That's plating and screws, running all the way from the left side of my birth canal to the back of my frigging pelvis. That's a lot of plating and a lot of screws (over a dozen!).
Anyway, after waiting over an hour to get my latest x-rays my surgeon had to leave, so I have to travel back down to Melbourne in two weeks (and it's the drive to and from Melbourne that seems to trigger my migraines, so hell yeah! fun times indeed!).

But, and this is a big but, I have an omg amazing polish review that I will get up sometime tomorrow featuring Glittering Elements and their glorious Halloween collection plus a sneak peak at a very special L.E polish that is so pretty... you will love it :D
Casey, the gal behind the brand, very generously asked me to swatch and review these polishes and I'm so happy to have been given the opportunity to showcase yet another amazing Aussie indie (and I have another one coming up that is very near and dear to my heart).

Plus I still have a whole heap of stunning Glam swatches that I need to post... here's a peak

Glam Polish's Elixir

Ummm can you see this? Isn't it ah-mazing?! Ugh, I can't even. It's too perfect. I wore that baby til chips were showing (gasp!) and I didn't give a damn, it was just that mesmerising and green and sparkly. All my favourite things in one polish. By far my favourite out of the Cast a Spell II collection.
Go check out Glam Polish and see if you can resist their wares. I don't own a single Glam that I don't love, so I have no hesitation giving them a shout out, they're definitely worth a go.

And that's it for now.
Tomorrow, big post, lots of swatches, lots of pretties for you do covet ;)

Until next time ~love and polish for all~
Em xox

Here's the first of many, many posts featuring Glam Polish's Cast a Spell II collection. Today's polish? Pentacle.

OMG omg omg
You guys, I can't... I am just bowled over by what I received in the mail today. Yes, I got my much anticipated Glam Polish mail nail this arvo and holy crap, it is even better than I had hoped for (and my expctations were pretty damn high).
So, I'm going to show you just one of the polishes from the collection today, and it's one I didn't think I was going to like that much. Of course, I adore it now that I've tried it. And I think you'll see why in a moment :)

Glam Polish nail mail

So, as you can see, I bought the whole Cast a Spell II collection from Glam Polish, plus a bottle of Frankenslime 2.0 and another bottle of Maleficent because I love it and never want to run out. Yes, a little excessive, but keep in mind I haven't really gone on a nail polish mega buy for quite a while and I had been on a no-buy for a while in anticipation of buying this collection. So I'm gonna justify it, ok? Ok ;)

Anyway, this is Pentacle, a charcoal coloured polish that I'd describe as a holo lacquer filled with holo microglitter and tiny iridescent hexagon shaped glitter. The application is smooth and easy (as always) and required only two coats, although it does dry gritty so I also added two coats of seche vite to smooth it all out.

Pentacle

There's really nothing more I can say  about Pentacle except you really need this polish ;) I have a couple of dark grey glitter polishes, but none of them are quite like this and the sparkle you get in sunlight is jaw droppingly amazing. Plus those little hexagon glitters add a beautiful touch that makes this truly unique, it is a definite must have if you like darker colours.

Pentacle

The other cool thing about this polish is that it can look subdued too, so if you're allowed to wear polish at work, just not "bling bling" polish, you could probably sneak this one past the powers that be. See? Totally subdued, just don't let your hands be seen under down-lights or in direct sunlight and you'll be fine ;)

Pentacle

So, that's the first of nine Cast a Spell II polishes that I have here, ready to swatch. Plus I also scored Frankenslime 2.0, which is equally spellbinding (see what I did there? I'm a comedic genius I tells ya, genius!) so that's ten polishes I need to try *phew!* It's a burden being a polish-aholic, make no mistake ;)
As for you, dear reader, well you'd best prepare for a lot of posts and a lot of pics over the next few weeks.
In the meantime, get yourself over to the Glam Polish site and have a squizz at their polishes, there's so many beautiful products with a level of quality that makes them one of Australia's best indie polish makers. Definitely worth a look-see.

Until next time, ~love and polish for all~

Em xox

Super quick post- a little bit of dead easy "nail art" using Glam Polish's Tinker Bell

Heya again- I know this comes close on the heels of my last post, but it's a quickie ;)

And yes, it does feature another Glam Polish- what can I say? I really dig them.
Anyway, this is Tinker Bell, a bright lime green with a sweet gold shimmer running throughout.
It's such a happy colour, so bright and cheerful, but me being me I had to tweak things just a bit...

Tinker Bell

How cute is this colour? So pretty :)

 

After wearing it "as is" for most of the day I decided to make use of some of the nail vinyls I have and add a little attitude to my mani...the black is just a simple $2.00 Mud polish, which I tend to use for all my black nail art needs as it has great opacity and is easy to use.
Anyway, I love the black and green together, it really makes the green pop and it's very eye catching. I even did the same on my other hand, with straight lines on the thumb, diagonal on the middle finger and chevrons/zigzags on my pinkie, just to mix things up a bit.

All up I think it's a great mani, easy-peasy and cute to boot (woah, epic rhyming abilities there, bow down before the master folks haha). I love easy nail art ideas, so please let me know if you have any tips or tricks to making your mani pop :)

Until next time ~love and polish for all~

Em xox

The second half of Glam Polish's Cast a Spell 1 collection

Hi all, sorry I didn't get this post up sooner... I don't actually have any excuse except I forgot ;)
Anyway, Glam Polish's second Cast a Spell collection is now up and ready for pre-order, as is their Halloween duo. I would highly recommend snagging at least a couple of these babies as they look stunning, and if Glam's first Cast a Spell collection is anything to go by, the polishes will also be amazing in terms of quality and wow factor too.

So, here's the last two of my Cast a Spell 1 lacquers, the first three are discussed here in this post.
As with the other three polishes, Coven and Conjuring are beautiful to apply, with each of them being easy two coaters, or three thin coats if you prefer. The high quality and consistency of Glam's products is why I rate them so highly, and not a single one of these lovelies let me down in any way...just throw on a nice coat of top coat to get that shine factor up and you're done.

So, without any further ado here is Coven, a red holo glitter beauty;

Coven

Nothing I say can suitably describe how gorgeous this polish is in real life. It's a glowing, red masterpiece. it has those teeny tiny little circle glitters that catch the light and look as if there's sparks of flame, flashing out of the vibrant red base. I love this so very, very much :)

Coven

And the last polish from the original Cast a Spell collection is... Conjuring;

Conjuring

OMFG you guys! Can you see this? Do you believe in the glory that is Conjuring? Oh man, oh lord, this is such a stunner, you gotta believe me when I tell you you need this in your life, stat. Even if you generally don't like greens, this is just too captivating not to have.

Conjuring

And that, my friends, is the end of that.
Thankfully, Cast a Spell 1 is still available, so if you see anything you like you can still snag a bottle.
I am currently waiting on the new Cast a Spell II collection as I made my pre-order purchase the morning it became available, and believe you me, I will be sharing swatches of those lovelies as soon as I get a hold of them, so keep your eyes peeled for that one.

As usual you can find Glam's store here and they also have a list of overseas stockists on their site if you're not in the land of Oz.
Glam Polish really are worth a look, and I think they would make a fantastic starting point for anyone contemplating exploring the massive market that is Indie Polishes. There's so many new brands popping up all the time, it can get a little overwhelming, but at least you know with Glam that you're going to get amazing quality with lovely customer service and a product that will actually live up to the hype.

Until next time, as usual ~love and polish for all~

mwah! Em xox