Nail Polish Haul ♡

Hello Ladies. ♡

I've really been trying to get back into painting my nails recently as I've been a bit of a lazy twonk to say the very least. I'm one of those people who either takes care of their nails, or just doesn't. The latter including nail biting and peeling (disgusting, I know). So I figured I'd treat myself to a few new polishes to keep my nails nice and pretty.

What I bought

Left to right: Rimmel 60 Second Nail Polish - Mind the Gap Victoria, Nicole by OPI Modern Family - Haley Good Lookin'..., Essie Nail Lacquer - Licorice, Revlon Nail Enamel - Radiant, Nicole by OPI Selena Gomez - Selena, Loreal Color Riche - Sequin Explosion, OPI RapiDry Top Coat.

Rimmel 60 Seconds Nail Polish - 503 Mind the Gap Victoria

This is a pastel bluey colour that most people would only wear during spring/summer but I thought I'd be awkward and rock it through winter. I absolutely love the colour and currently have it on my nails. It does need two coats to become opaque but it does dry fairly quickly so you don't need to wait around for a long time if you're layering it up. I think Rimmel's 60 Second range is great for those of you who are busy and don't have time to sit around like little madams waiting for your nails to dry. Oh, and at £3.69 it's super affordable too!

Nicole by OPI - Selena Gomez - Selena

I've really wanted to test out Nicole by OPI's nail polishes so I bought for this gorgeous pink from their Selena Gomez collection. I did swatch it on one of my nails after I'd bought it and it wasn't very opaque at all. I think this polish may need three layers to achieve the colour shown in the bottle which is a little bit of a disappointment. I won't judge it too soon so I'll post a full review on it when I've had a chance to use it properly!

Nicole by OPI - Modern Family - Haley Good Lookin'...

As soon as I saw the glitter and sequins in this I just plopped it into my shopping basket haha! It's so pretty and would be great to wear on a night out or to a party. I've tested this out on one of my nails and absolutely love it. It's so glittery, pink and gorgeous!

Essie Nail Lacquer - Licorice

I desperately needed a black nail polish as the one I had from Rimmel's 60 Second range had dried out to nothing. I've already tested Licorice out and it is so well pigmented you only need one coat. It has a beautiful shine too. I'm in love with this product and think I'll be using it very frequently!

Revlon Nail Enamel - 441 Radiant

This bottle contains little specks of blue sequins and glitter. It's pretty similar to "Haley Good Lookin'..." just in a different colour! I'm thinking of trying them both lightly layered over one another!

Loreal Paris - Color Riche - 842 Sequin Explosion

This bottle is so teeny and cute! It contains multicoloured glitter and sequins and is so so glittery. I think it's absolutely gorgeous and would look amazing layered over a black nail varnish. I'm really looking forward to painting my nails with this!

OPI RapiDry Top Coat

I was expecting this top coat to be quite glossy as the packaging it came in said it gave a "high-gloss shine" - It doesn't. Don't get me wrong it doesn't make your nails matte but it certainly doesn't make them glossy at all. A bit misleading OPI! It does however dry rather quickly which is great if you're as impatient as me! I'm yet to find out how long it prevents chipping but I hope it prevents it long enough to justify the price of this stuff!

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That's the end of it guys. As you can probably tell I got quite a few glittery polishes. I just think they look gorgeous layered over painted nails and make them so glitzy and pretty. My favourite glittery purchase has to be Loreal's Sequin Explosion as it has so many different colours in it. I'm hoping to do a few NOTD's using these products so keep an eye out for those if you're into nails!

See you soon! x

♡ L'Oréal Paris Préférence Wild Ombrés || REVIEW / APPLICATION | FEAT. Sissykins ♡

Hi dolls! ♡

My sister has been wanting to ombre her hair for a while now so she went out and picked up this do-it-yourself kit by Loreal for £6.99. You can find it here.

Since she wanted me to apply it to her hair (as she wasn't too confident about doing it herself) I thought I would also photograph and review the process for you guys too. Her hair is naturally rather black so it did turn a brassy shade. She's currently toning it with purple shampoo so we'll see how that goes :-)

This kit includes:

• Expert Brush
• Lightening Powder
• Developer Creme + Applicator Cap
• Lightening Creme
• Conditioning Shampoo
• Colourist Gloves

She also purchased a tinting brush from Superdrug for a more intense application to the ends of her hair. You can buy it here if you're interested.

Meet the guinea pig

Just a note if you're a hair-dye newbie - your clothes WILL get stained if any of the product touches it (in this case bleached!). So you'll be wanting to put on a tatty old t-shirt or other random clothes you don't really care for. I didn't take a picture of it but we also cut out holes for her arms and neck in a big black in-bag for extra protection. This was mostly to protect her skin from the peroxide - you don't really need to do this if you're using regular dye.

Our Set-Up

All set to get bleaching!

We cut out some plastic bin liners and laid them out to protect the floor from any spills. We cut up some foil to cover her hair after applying the bleach so that the process wasn't too messy - this is an optional step - it doesn't really add to the development of the peroxide. Okay, let's get started!

Preparing the lightener

STEP ONE:

Remove the lid and pour the lightening powder into the developer creme.

STEP TWO:

Add the lightening creme.

STEP THREE:

Replace the lid and shake it all up (not too violently!).

STEP FOUR:

Remove the nib straight away to avoid bursting. Now I took mine off immediately and it overflowed.. so I'd recommend shaking it up the old way by removing the nib and covering it with your finger. Whilst doing this just have small breaks in-between. This will allow any excess air to escape.

Application

Bye bye old hair!

Section your hair

The instructions that came with the box said to divide your hair into two separate sections. This is helpful if you're doing your own hair but we went in by sectioning the hair the usual way to make sure that all of the ends were covered.

Squirt the mixture onto the little brush the kit comes with and start to comb this through the lengths of your hair. We started beneath ear-level but you can go higher or lower depending on your personal preference. Long hair should start beneath chin-level for best results.

I couldn't picture the process as my hands were covered in the mixture - I basically just combed the mixture through the lengths of her hair focusing more on the end and used the tinting brush to really concentrate the bleach on the ends of her hair. I then wrapped each section roughly in foil to contain the mixture. When I had finished covering all of her hair I removed the foil after a few minutes and went over the ends again with the remaining mixture. I then left it to process for 35 minutes out of the maximum 45 minutes.

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Shampoo it all off!

We then washed it all off using the doddy little shampoo bottle supplied in the box. We used the entire bottle and it made a lovely lather :-)

Since her hair is naturally very dark it had a lot of orangey tones to it as it had never been bleached before. So we applied some purple shampoo (pictured above) to her hair and worked that into her ends. This helps tone the colour and get rid of the brassy-ness.

I'd recommend using a deeply moisturising conditioner to follow to avoid frazzled hair. Aussie's 3 Minute Miracle Reconstructor Conditioner is a great choice. Apply it and then wrap your hair up in a towel - the warmth of your scalp helps the conditioner penetrate deeper into your hair.

Before & After shots

 The after photo was literally straight after we'd washed and dried her hair. The colour's improved over the past couple of days (refer to pics below).

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Overall this product is great value as it is certainly far cheaper than a trip to the salon. I would definitely recommend going down the ombre route if you want your hair to be coloured without requiring a lot of maintenance work. Obviously with Sissy having very dark hair we didn't expect a super blonde result. However, I didn't quite expect it to be so orange either considering the box she bought had been specifically formulated for dark hair. She loves it herself but I don't think I would've been so pleased if it was my own hair! She is planning to go over it again in a month or so though - when her hair has had a little time to recover!

What do you guys think about how its turned out? Got any advice on achieving the perfect ombre for dark hair?