Weekly Round Up!

Heres a look at some of the great things our group have been up to over the past week!

Stacie went Rockabilly http://kawaiinailart.blogspot.com/2011/04/rockabilly-nails.html over at Kawaii Nail Art

The Nail Addict created some beautiful butterfly nails which look like damask silk http://thenailaddict.blogspot.com/2011/04/you-give-me-butterflies.html

Claire at Top Twenty Nails road tested some CDN Shellac http://toptwentynails.blogspot.com/2011/04/shellacs-rock-royalty-great-purple-long.html

Sharon mixed 2 blues to create a gorgeous effect http://polishinfatuated.blogspot.com/2011/04/beautiful-squishy-jelly.html

Linda was inspired by tokidoki and Sanrio http://wuliaonails.blogspot.com/2011/04/tokidoki-for-sanrio.html

Emily decorated her nails perfectly for Easter http://emilysnailfiles.blogspot.com/2011/04/easter-manicure.html

Grace showed her patriotic side with these cool Britannia nails http://ooooohpretty.blogspot.com/2011/04/my-royal-wedding-nails.html

Gradient or Holo? Jen went for both http://moondancerjen.blogspot.com/2011/04/purple-holo-gradient.html

Lena stamped with bundle monster on Essie Bermuda shorts http://thestudentsguidetonailpolish.blogspot.com/2011/04/essie-bermuda-shorts-preview.html

If you would like to be involved in future round ups contact Stacie at http://kawaiinailart.blogspot.com


Stay Gorgeous


Grace x

My Royal Wedding Nails!

Well I am looking forward to the Royal Wedding tomorrow.  We aren't having a street party or anything extravagant but will be camped out on the sofa watching the live coverage, hopefully with a glass of pimms in hand!

I thought I would do a nail design in honour of the royal festivities, its very patriotic and simply just a bit of fun!

A perfect match for my Kate Middleton ring!

A bit of added sparkle!

To get this look I used Alpine Snow from OPI, Indigo (312) from Barry M, Red and White nail art paints and some nail gems.

Take a look at my tutorial to see how to get this look!

I wouldn't normally have union jacks on my nails but if ever I was going to do it now seems like as good a time as any!

Have you guys done any wedding inspired nail designs? let me see if you have!

If you are celebrating the Royal Wedding I hope you have a great day full of festivities!

Stay Gorgeous

Grace x

Hairspray - Part Three!

So this is the final part of my 60's inspired series which means today I am bringing you a Big hairstyle!

Hairspray and back combing were two essentials when it came to hairstyles back in the 60's and I have used plenty of them to bring you my look today.  Its very simple to do and literally takes 5 minutes!

The main part of this style is the volume and to achieve that I back combed in a "U" shape around the top of the head so that it gives a look of fullness over the whole head rather than just the back.  The key to back combing is to be rougher than you think you should, it will brush out so don't panic!  Doing this to the hair will give volume and hold the style in place.

I have naturally wavy hair so I used that wave with in the style but you could create a neater version by keeping your hair straight too!

All you need to recreate this look is a comb, hairspray, hair clip, straighteners or curling tongs and a hair band or scarf to add the finishing touches.

Take a look at my tutorial video to see how to recreate this look!

I hope you like the look.

Stay Gorgeous

Grace x

Stack em high!

In my opinion an outfit is never complete until you have added your accessories, which is good as bangles are back!!

One of this seasons key accessories are bangles and plenty of them, I have always been a fan of bangles so I now find myself back on trend which is always good news! One of my favourite places to pick up some bargin bangles is primark, with prices ranging from £1 to £2.50 you could buy a few to complete your stack!

A small selection from my collection of bangles!

I used to think I could only wear one pretty thing at a time so would carefully choose my accessory of the day, but my sister was the opposite and would wear lots of pretty things at the same time, so one day I thought to myself, whats good for her is good for me so I gave it a try and stacked em high!  Finally I was liberated from my accessory rut!

 Mix colours, textures and sizes together, You can add you watch in to the mix too or just keep it simple!

 I was recently given these two for my birthday, they are massive and I love them, perfect for summer!

Have you seen any you thing I should rush out and get? Do you love bangles as much as I do? If you do send me some pictures and let me see your stacks!

Stay Gorgeous

Grace x

Weekly Round Up!

Take a look at this weeks best of the best blogs!

Claire gave us a right royal review http://toptwentynails.blogspot.com/2011/04/kate-will-nails-inc-limited-edition.html

Grace has gone psychedelic with her 60's inspired nail design http://ooooohpretty.blogspot.com/2011/04/hairspray-part-two.html

Dawn showed us how to have some fun http://thenailaddict.blogspot.com/2011/04/just-for-fun.html

Nicole funked up her French http://nicnacksnails.blogspot.com/2011/04/funky-french.html

Emily had a diet coke break http://emilysnailfiles.blogspot.com/2011/04/diet-coke-inspired.html

Linda was inspired by Despicable Me http://wuliaonails.blogspot.com/2011/04/despicable-easter-art.html

If you would like to be involved in future round ups contact Stacie at http://kawaiinailart.blogspot.com

Stay gorgeous

Grace x

Hairspray - Part Two

Todays post brings you part two of the Hairspray/60's inspired series!

I wanted to create a nail design that was inspired by the 60's but had a modern day twist, so I came up with two!

Psychedelic is one word that pretty much sums up a lot of the patterns that were used in the 60's, one of the designs I have created is taken from a black and white mod style dress that is a well know design from back in the day!  Using colour in blocks and creating a reverse mirrored effect with them seems to have been the trend, so that is the look I decided on!

The first design was created using a black and white nail varnish and black and white nail art paints. If you wanted to make it slightly more festive you could use a glitter nail art paint too. The nail varnishes I chose were Alpine Snow and My Private Jet both are from OPI.  With this design you can do each nail the same of make them all different, as the key trend was a bit zaney if you make any little mistakes it will probably add to the design!  Take a look at my tutorial to find out how to recreate this look!

For the second design I used Konad design plate M63 (take a look at my Konad blog for more info) to create a colour blocking effect, I used a white nail art paint on top of Big Apple Red from OPI.

I hope that you all like these designs, If you try them out or have any of your own 60's inspired designs I would love to see them so please send me some pics!

Stay gorgeous

Grace x

Garra Rufa Pedicure

me and my mama! (kind of!)
need to practice me photography
skills!

I'm sure most of you have heard of the Garra Rufa Pedicure, it's a fairly new treatment that's sweeping the beauty industry!  Well yesterday I had the chance to try one out, I went with my mum  to a the spa Rookery Manor, where we were to have a garra rufa pedicure and use of the spa (unfortunately due to still being on crutches I wasn't able to use the spa).

This treatment is actually carried out by tiny little fish which have been nick named 'doctor fish'. These amazing little fish originally came from Turkey, but back in 2006 a spa was opened in Japan and the garra rufa pedicure became a must have treatment, after that many other countries followed suit and it soon became a treatment that was available pretty much world wide!

The idea behind plonking your feet in to a fish tank, is that the hungry fish will nibble away at the dead skin cells on your feet and leave you with smoother skin! As the fish only feed on dead skin they have also been used as part of the treatment process for psoriasis in some countries!

This is definitely one of the strangest treatments I have ever tried but once you got used to the strange sensation it was fine!  The hardest part was initially putting your feet into the tank, my mums advice would be not to look, just put your feet in!  It is definitely a strange feeling, the best way to describe it is, it feels as if something is vibrating under your feet.  The fish nibble away at any skin that is in the water so our legs got a bit of fishy exfoliation too!

here you can see the fish nibbling away!

Who would have thought sitting with your feet in a fish tank would take off!

I definitely noticed that my feet felt softer this morning so the clever little fish worked their magic on my not so lovely feet!  I'm not sure it will be something I would do regularly but I definitely think it's something you should try at least once!

Stay gorgeous

Grace x