New Moyra polishes - Gel effect, Sand Effect and Holo

Hello everyone! After a massively busy weekend, I have a lovely pile of polishes to swatch my way through for you over the next week or so. There will also be the usual dose of nail art, but I hope you're ready for some super colours coming your way. 

I'm starting today with some more polishes from Moyra. I recently was sent some for review and as I was impressed with the colours and formula, I thought I'd go back for some more. This time I chose some polishes from their other ranges - a holo, a gel look and a sand effect.

Starting with the holo. This has the catchy title No 254 (!), but don't let that put you off - this is a super polish! A lovely silvery blue to start off with, the light catching rainbow from the holo effect it stunning! This is two coats with a coat of Seche Vite.

Next up is the Sand Effect polish, this one is Sahara. I'm not sure why it appealed to me so much in the website picture as its not the sort of colour I would normally go for, but I had to have it! It is a beautiful sandy colour with a lot of gold, but it manages not to be sparkly. The texture is very strong and these photos show two coats and obviously no top coat.

Last but not least, we have the Gel Look polish (and my continuing quest for the perfect green), Marion (No. 933). I had a nightmare trying to get the colour to show properly and I'm still not happy. Its a mid green that's just slightly sagey, creamy and opaque at two coats. It also has a lovely gel shine and is shown here without a top coat.

I stamped over this one and have been wearing it for almost 5 days now. I have had no chips and only very minor tip wear which after setting up the garden for a kids party and hosting said party is a minor miracle!

These polishes offer amazing value for money and having tried at least one polish from most of the ranges, they seem to be fairly consistent. There is a website coming soon, but if you would like to buy in the meantime, check out the Moyra UK Facebook page and take a look at what they have to offer :)

Sam xx

The Digit-al Dozen does Texture Day 5 - Textured Stamped Floral

Hello everyone! Woohoo! I made it! I have completed my first week with The Digit-al Dozen. I have loved every minute of it but it has been a pressured kinda week and its a massive relief to have the first one out of the way! Everyone in the group is lovely and they have been super supportive, but there is a huge amount of talent between all the ladies and its been pretty intimidating to have to jump in to it!

Today I have gone with my new found fave, stamping! It looks a little more Christmassy than I intended as I used all textured polishes to complete the look and the choices from my stash were limited! I started with two coats of Sally Hansen Sugar Fix and then stamped an image from MoYou Pro XL 06 with Konad Black. Once dry, I filled in the flowers with Sally Hansen Sugar Coat Cherry Drop and Claire's Red Leather polish (with a little help from the super sheer LA Colors Moody Red), and the leaves with more Sugar Coat, but this time Sour Apple (and a touch of Sinful Colors Exotic Green). I finished with a little of L-A Glitter Nails fab copper glitter at the centre of the flowers.

I loved how these turned out! The colours show brighter in real life so it looks more tropical (the irony of posting Xmassy looking nails at Easter is not lost on me!). I wasn't sure how the textured polishes would work together for the "colouring in" but they were great. Rexture over texture can be quite unforgiving so I had to be super careful with placement, but its definitely something I'll try again.

So there you have my first week with The Digit-al Dozen. Its been so much fun and I can't wait for next month. Next week is going to be a busy one, with lots of music/tv/film inspired manis for the NCC and a mammoth catch up with the NAILS Mag challenge on the cards. I also have lots of swatches and reviews to post (can you tell that Scarlett is heading back to school??? Normal service will be resumed)! :D

Sam xx

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The Digit-al Dozen does Texture Day 4 - Gemstone Nails

Hello everyone! Another wholly impractical mani for you today as part of Texture week with The Digi-al Dozen! Those of you that know me know that I also make jewellery. I closed my business before I had my daughter as there was no way I could balance all that work with a baby and now its mostly a hobby, but the occasional piece makes it on to Etsy with the nails and other bits and pieces. Anyway, as a result I have cases full of gems and beads. I was joking with Alessandra (The Sparkle Queen) back in January that I should mix it up with the nails and now that time has come!

I went through looking for the smallest chips and settled on some Iolite (one of my favourites because of its lovely violet blue colour. After the denim debacle I couldn't face gluing them to five nails so settled instead for two and created a skittlette. 

All the nails were painted with a base of Sinful Colors Glass Pink. I added a layer of nail glue and added the Iolite chips to my middle and ring fingers. I had to place a couple with tweezers to fill gaps, but for the most part they adhered really well! I added a coat of Color Club Covered in Diamonds to the index finger as the large holo flakes added to the gem effect. For the thumb and little finger, I used a ton of striping tape to create a triangular pattern (again similar to the Iolite effect) and filled in the sections with Nail Essentials Silver Shimmer, Barry M Gelly Picky Pear and LA Colors Illusion.

This is far from being one of my favourites, but its one of those things that I had to see through once I'd had the idea, and despite how it turned out, I'd put too much work into it not to post it!

One more to go for my first DD week and its been a blast! :)

Sam xx

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The Digit-al Dozen does Texture - Day 3

Hello everyone! Halfway through Texture week already - its flying by! Today I have something a little different for you, there is polish involved but you can't see much of it! A week or so ago we had a lovely warm spell and I was looking for something cool (and cool!) for Scarlett to wear. I found some jeggings that still fit perfectly but were a bit short and decided to hack them into cut-offs for the summer (they look fab by the way!). This left me with some stretchy denim and an idea!

I painted the nails with Sinful Colors Glass Pink and then cut sections of denim a little larger than the nails (the fabric contracts as its glued on so if you ever plan on trying this each piece definitely needs to be bigger than the nail to start off with) I added a few little rips and holes to each piece and then brushed some nail glue on to the nail and stretched the denim over. Once the glue had dried, I cut closely around the edges with curved nail scissors.

This is not the most practical mani I have ever done, but you can't deny its fits the texture theme! I sat there stroking my denim nails for quite a while when I was sitting in Costa staring out of the window, so its one of those that makes you look a little odd if you venture out in public ;)

So that's three down and two to go! I also have some lovely swatches coming up for you this week - in the meantime, have a look at all the other fabulous manis from the Digit-al Dozen ladies below...

Sam xx

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The Digit-al Dozen does Texture - Day 2

Hello everyone! Today is the second day of Texture week and I have something a lot simpler than yesterday's creation featuring one of my favourite colour combinations (so much so that this was the colour scheme for my wedding)!

I painted freehand sections of Claire's Accessories Black Leather polish and Pretty Hot Pink Leather polish. Pretty is a brand I have only ever found in Poundland - the effects polishes are a bit hit and miss and the smell is not something they should be proud of, but some of their polishes are gems and this is one of them. I separated the colours with LA Colors Metallic Silver to add a little bit of shine and that was that!

This is a very "me" design, in very "me" colours, but I'm not a huge fan of textured polishes so I have ventured at least a little bit out of my safe zone! Tomorrow is a little bit more "out there" though, and doesn't really involve a whole lot of polish ;) Check out all of today's other awesome DD manis below!

Sam xx

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The Digit-al Dozen does Texture - Day 1

Hello everyone! I am so excited (and not just a little bit nervous) to bring you today's post as it is my first with The Digit-al Dozen! 

I was thrilled to be invited to join this group of talented nail artists, but I was so nervous when I saw that the first theme was Texture! In fairness though, it could've been "Animal Print Abstracts and Neons" (there's my comfort zone!) and I would've been just as nervous, so here goes!!!

Starting with a confession - I'm a gamer. I love my Xbox. While thinking about this theme I've been playing Fallout 3 which features Rivet City (pictured at the end of the post) as part of the post apocalyptic landscape. For some reason I thought it would be a good idea to try and recreate the rusty metal texture of the city wall (please note the use of the past tense - "thought" it was a good idea...).

I started with a base of Nail Essentials Silver Shimmer and then added in some guidelines for the panels with Ciate Vintage. I sponged along those lines with LA Colors Fiery Orange and Jessica Electric Teal to create the rusted effect and then redefined the lines with a little more Ciate Vintage. I dotted the rivets and screws with Silver Shimmer and Vintage and then sponged around a little more "rust" before finishing with OPI Matte Top Coat.

Finally, here's a picture of Rivet City:

 So, there's my first post for The Digital Dozen! I know its not exactly pretty nail art, but once I'd had the idea, I had to see it through and I'm actually pretty pleased with the results! 

I have four more Texture themed manis to show you this week, some a little more traditional than others ;) You can see all of today's other fabulous DD Texture manis by following the links below and I'll be back with another one for you tomorrow :)

Sam xx

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