GOSH Holographic Nail Polish. :)

I have wanted this nail polish foreeeeever. I missed it when it first came out, so I am SO happy it's been re-released. In case you don't know the background, here's a quick summary: GOSH released the original Holographic polish a few years ago, but there were complaints about the fact it only lasted a few hours before chipping, so it was taken off the market. However, people who didn't care about it's longevity and were more excited about the fact it was HOLOGRAPHIC (omg!) still desperately wanted it and bottles were going on eBay for waaay more than retail price. So, GOSH decided to slightly change the formula, and re-release it as a 'One Night Wear' Special Edition in shade 'Holographic Hero'.

 

I was amaaazed my local Superdrug had it (it's not the best Superdrug in the world), and in fact they had TWO so I snapped them both up at £5.99 each.

 

 

The formulation is strange, it dries pretty much instantly, which I suppose is a must if it's only gonna last one day. In the shade, it looks like a standard silver nail polish - if you're gonna be under dull lighting all day, don't bother putting this on.

 

Still got stumpy nails! :(

 

But as soon as you step into natural sunlight, ta daaaaa!!

 

My pinkie shows it best. :)

 

OMG right?? I cannot stop staring at my nails!!

 

And with the flash (or, I imagine, with bright lighting like in a nightclub or something).Seriously, I love this. Such a sucker for shimmer and glitter!

Again, pinkie shows it best. :)

 

I applied two coats of this on Friday night (one coat is too sheer) and actually by Saturday night I had only a small chip on one nail! By Sunday midday though, it's like my nail polish just gave up and every nail chipped like crazy. So yeah, the 'one night' claim is pretty legit.

 

I have heard of people using the 'sandwhich' technique to maintain the polish for longer - a coat of Holo, a topcoat, Holo again, topcoat and lastly Holo. You can't finish with a topcoat as it ruins the effect.

 

What do you think of this nail polish? Is it worth it to only get one night's use out of it? Would you be interested in a mini-giveaway with my second bottle?

Let me know!

~ Lauren ♥

Motel Rocks Outfits. :)

Motel recently offered a 50% off code on anything on their website for 50 minutes only. I bought a dress and a skirt, both at half price! I admit it was my first time shopping at Motel as to be honest their clothes are not really my style, but I can't resist a massive discount like that!

Because I spent over £70 I got free 1st class delivery. They also sent me a little goody bag which was really sweet:

I got a canvas bag, copy of More! magazine, Batiste dry shampoo, nail transfers, a bracelet, a nail polish, a body spray and 10% off my next order. Thanks, Motel!

 

And here's the skirt I got!

The skirt was £28, so I got it for £14.

The top is from Topshop and boots from Primark.

It's a 'lampshade' skirt, it's made of a sturdy material so sticks out quite a bit, I quite like this structured look tho. I also like the design, it's quirky and cute, and I know this skirt might not be for everyone but for £14 I think I'll get decent wear out of it.

 

I also got a dress which I'll show you in another post! :)

 

Has anyone else ever used Motel? Do you like this style of skirt or do you think it's a bit 'out there'??

Let me know!

~ Lauren ♥

:( - Philip Kingsley Elasticizer Review

I know I'm mega late with this one, but I recently had a £50 voucher for Escentual.com and decided to splash out on a Philip Kingsley Elactisizer. Although I have bonded extensions, I actually don't look after my hair that well haha. I love make up etc, but grudge spending a lot of money on haircare. So this voucher gave me the perfect opportunity! You can see what else I bought with it here.

It comes in a variety of sizes, from 20ml (on sale for £3.10) up to a mahoosive 1litre (on sale at £61.70). There's NO way I could justify the huge sizes, so I settled for 75ml for a sale price of £12.20. I've finished it now, so I can tell you I got 4 full head applications out of that.

 

It's a pre-shampoo treatment, which I'd never heard of. You wet your hair, apply this in sections, cover with a shower cap and then leave it on for 20 mins or so. Then rinse, and shampoo and condition as normal.

 

Now, I use Aussie shampoo and 3-Minute Miracle conditioner every time I wash my hair, and they always leave my hair silky soft. But obviously my hair is fairly damaged from my extensions, so any extra moisture etc is beneficial.

 

I did feel like my hair was nice and soft after using this, but really... not THAT soft. I felt a bigger difference when I used Aussie for the first time. I have to say, I was quite disappointed by this. £12.20 for four treatments that didn't make a huge difference to my hair? Not overly exciting.

 

 

All finished...

 

In summary, if you have really dry or damaged hair that you feel you've tried EVERYTHING to help, then by all means give this a go. But otherwise, save your pennies and get Aussie on a 3 for 2 in Boots. Bargain.

 

Have any of you tried this treatment? Did you have a more exciting experience than me?

Let me know!

~ Lauren ♥

Nail Gel BARGAIN!! So happy! :) :)

I am in love with my new at-home gel nails kit I posted about here. It only came with four colours tho and I'm used to having hundreds of colours of regular polish, so I knew I had to up my collection! You can buy CND Shellac for around £15 each on eBay, which is tooo much for me. So I did some eBay searching and found UV Gel Builder sets. Essentially little tubs of nail gel, they're generic and so lots cheaper. I bought a set of mixed solid and glitter colours, they said there was about 8ml in each tub, compared with 14ml in my Gellure nail polish.

 

Here's what I got! :)

Top left are all the little tubs, and top right is the comparison size to regular nail polish. So it's about two thirds of the size, not bad!

Bottom is all my purple shades, the colour names seem a bit random at times but the colours are gorg!

 

These are my pinks, browns, blues and greens! :)

 

Whites/silvers, reds and then 'others' on the bottom.

 

And THE most amazing part - I got ALL of these (28 colours) for £16.99!! I got them from this listing. I am sooo happy with them. The colours are so pretty and there's lots of variety.

 

I also bought some cheap brushes to allow me to use them and also do nail art (£2.45 from this listing).

 

Aaaaand lastly, on my spree, I bought some nail art tape (£1.50 from this listing).

 

And here's my first nail art attempt (stubby nails sadface):

I used misty pink, a purple nail art strip and glitter silver. This should last for two-three weeks!

 

What do you think of my bargain? Have I tempted anyone to buy the at-home kits??

Let me know!

~ Lauren ♥

At Home Gellure/Shellac/Gel Nails Kit!

I am aaaaaalways in a constant battle to stop biting my nails. I wear falsies regularly cause my own nails are just so ugly. However, my sister bought a Shellac kit a few years back and whenever she did my nails I used to manage to not bite them and so they grew a bit! But everytime I took the Shellac off, the addiction kicked in! Grr! So I bought my own kit. :)

 

In case you're not sure what Shellac is, it's a type of gel nail polish. This is the polish you get done usually at a salon, it is 'cured' under a UV lamp and so dries instantly. It lasts about three weeks and as far as I can tell in my experience, causes very little to no damage to your nail. Now CND Shellac were the first 'brand' to do this that I have heard of, but now there's lots. I bought my generic kit from a Groupon offer, it was about £75 including the lamp, a top coat, base coat, dehydrator, cuticle cream, remover, buffer, orange stick, lint-free pads and four colours. Not a bad price. You can also check out eBay.

 

Here's my kit:

It came with paper instructions and an instruction DVD, but I just used the paper info cause it's really straightforward.

 

You need a 36 watt lamp that has settings to allow for 2 minutes and 3 minutes (mine has 90 seconds and 120 seconds which works).

 

It's super easy. You push back your cuticles, buff your nails and then use the dehydtating solution on them. Then it's base coat (cure for two minutes), two coats of colour (cure for three minutes each coat) and top coat (cure for two minutes). Then wipe with dehydrating solution again to get rid of any excess gel and done!! I manage to stick both my hands in at the same time haha so it only takes me about fifteen mins to do a three week manicure. Awesome!

 

The shades the kit came with are actually nice (I thought they'd send me random stuff no one wanted haha) -

Left to right: a deep purple, a pinky-gold, a bright red and a baby pink.

 

I have the bright red on my toes (yup, toes can be done too!) and the pink on my fingers. Because my nails are still soooo short and fugly, here's my mum's:

 

 

That's the baby pink. So far it's been a week and there's no chipping/peeling etc so looks good! Got my eye on some fun colours on eBay so hopefully get some long-lasting nail art done too. :)

 

What do you think of these kits? Worth the price tag? Would you splash out on one?

Let me know!

~ Lauren ♥

Scottish Bloggers Meetup!

On Thursday night, I went to a Scottish Bloggers Meetup in Glasgow. This was only my second social bloggers event, but whereas at the first one I was really nervous beforehand, this time I was just excited! I met up with some girlies beforehand and we all went to Kuta on Bath Street. I'd never been before but it was lovely and CHEAP haha!

 

I didn't take a single photo (I know, rubbish blogger) so I'm 'borrowing' Karris's! She organised the event and it was fab! There was a great turnout but I didn't get a chance to meet everyone so looking forward to next time!!

 

I wore a pink tutu skirt, a white blouse and black shoe boots. Wish I'd taken a pic of my outfit, but I didn't, boo. I was one of the hardcore few that stayed til the end even tho I had work the next day - hahah, not fun!

 

 Lots of lovely bloggers!

Top left: Melissa, Jen, Stacey, Gillian & me!

Bottom left: Rebekah, Gillian, Louise, Gemma & Jenn

Right: Karris, Gill & me!

 

 Left: me and Gill <3

Top right: Stacey, Gill & I

Bottom right: Paula, Lilith, Stacey, me, Gill, Gillian and Roisin

 

Top: Sami, Lisa, me and Gill - love these ladies! :)

Bottom: The last ladies standing! <3

 

Scottish bloggers are SUCH a lovely bunch! If you're looking for new blogs to read check these ladies oooout! Have you been to any blogger meetups or would you like to go?

Let me know!

~ Lauren ♥