piCture pOlish Blog Fest 2013 - Celebrating the Year of the Blogger

piCture pOlish Ocean, piCture pOlish White Wedding, piCture pOlish Dorothy

Welcome to the most epic post in the history of Little Nails! This is my 2013 piCutre pOlish Blog Fest post. piCture pOlish is an Australian brand with the greatest tradition. Every year they have The piCture pOlish Blog Fest and invite bloggers to review their nail polishes. 

This year's Blog Fest theme is Celebrating the Year of the Blogger and has an emphasis on nail art.

As soon as I heard which shades I was getting and the whole nail art side of it I knew exactly what I was going to do. It's not new news that I'm obsessed with making nail art sticker/decal stripe things, usually with a chevron pattern and over the past few months I've found that piCture pOlish shades (and Ozotic shades, also sold by PP) are fantastic for this kind of nail art. They seem to be more flexible than other brands and the strips never crack when you handle them. 

This time I thought I'd branch out from the chevron pattern. I played around with stripes and triangles and ended up with a red, white and blue mixed manicure. 

And just in case you want to try this kind of mani out yourself, I've whipped up tutorials for the decals which are at the end of this post (warning, I may have gone slightly overboard! The general concept of each tutorial is the same but it's always fun to try different patterns)

Dorothy is a red glitter polish. It's actually tiny silver glitter in a red jelly base and doesn't need many coats to get the great red colour. 

Ocean has piCture pOlish's amazing little shards of rainbow goodness, what I've previously described as "particles of magic". They're suspended in a blue jelly base. I wouldn't call this kind of polish a glitter, but it has a lovely sparkle and glimmer to it. 

White Wedding also has "particles of magic" in it. It's absolutely impossible to capture on camera the rainbow hidden inside this colour. It's definitely a wearable white and was great to apply. Three coats was more than enough. 

All shades can be purchased online at www.picturepolish.com.au and if you don't live in Australia don't fret, you can purchase piCture pOlish all over the world through their network partners. They also have everyday deals to take advantage of.

You can find piCture pOlish all over the internet including Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube.

Once you get the hang of sticking down the polish pieces it's really easy to make cool geometric patterns and the possibilities are endless. This is all the same method, just with different shapes. I use tweezers and a dotting tool (or a pen or pencil if you lose your dotting tool like I did) to apply the polish pieces. Sometimes I'll dampen the dotting tool with clear polish or even remover to make it easier for the polish pieces to stick to the dotter. 

 

These polishes were provided to me for review

Check out all the other amazing Blog Fest participants:

Day 23 - Inspired by a Movie

Orly Androgynie, piCture pOlish Heavy Metal, Spectraflair Topcoat

Finally, day 23! Posted 242 days after day one, but let's not dwell on how long this thing is taking me (to be honest, I kind of forgot about it for a while). Fingers crossed I'll get all 31 days done within a year! 

Day 23 is Inspired by a Movie. Saturday was May the 4th, also known as Star Wars Day. I originally attempted a mani with a Stormtrooper, R2-D2 and C-3PO, but it was a giant fail and I gave up half way through. I settled for painting my nails with Orly's Androgynie, which is the most space/galaxy looking polish I own, and then later in the day I added some piCture pOlish Heavy Metal and spectraflair sparkles! 

piCture pOlish Gene Doll

piCture pOlish Gene Doll, OPI I Eat Mainely Lobster, OPI Ate Berries in the Canaries

I love a good glitter. piCture pOlish's Gene Doll is a lovely fuchsia glitter polish. I've been obsessed with feature nails lately, and Gene Doll matched perfectly to OPI's Ate Berries in the Canaries. 

Summer is in full swing here in Australia and I love being able to wear super bright, colourful nail polish. And what's better than bright polish? Bright glitter!

piCture pOlish Gene Doll can be purchased online from piCture pOlish.

This polish was sent to me for review.

Ozotic Beam 908

China Glaze Kinetic Candy, Ozotic 908

OPI Lincoln Park After Dark, Ozotic 908

Ozotic 908 is a new polish from Ozotic's Sugar & Beam collection. This one was really hard to take photos of. It's so sparkly in real life! The glittery pieces are pink and green. Like most Ozotics, it looks amazing over black and dark colours, but I prefer 908 over lighter colours for a more subtle shimmer. I rocked it over China Glaze Kinetic Candy and, believe it or not, on its own! Yep, if you're happy with four coats (I'm a solid three coater, so one extra is no big deal) 908 is opaque enough to wear on its own. It's my current favourite wearable white!

I also played around with making nail art decals after seeing this tutorial on Small Good Things using 908.

Ozotic 908 can be purchased online from piCture pOlish.

(This polish was sent to me for review) 

Ozotic Scatter Chrome 912

Ozotic 912

This sparkly thing is one of Ozotic's new Scatter Chrome polishes. It's a lovely purple polish with little bits of holo goodness in it. It's not holo glitter, more like chunky shards of holo-ness. For this mani I used three coats of 912. I'm a solid three coat kind of girl, but you could get away with two coats. I'm just so used to three that I can't help myself, especially when it's a smooth lovely polish and such a pleasure to apply! 

One of the things I really like about 912 compared to some other Ozotic polishes I own is that you don't need a base colour (Mish Mash 534 and 531 I'm looking at you...) It's opaque on its own! Hooray! 

The effect of the size and shape of the holo bits is really interesting. I think that if you did layer this polish over black it would make a fantastic start to a galaxy manicure! I'll definitely be getting this out when I finally make it to Day 19 of the 31 Day Challenge (which could be in one million years at the rate I'm going!)

Ozotic can be purchased online from the lovely girls at piCture pOlish.

(This polish was sent to me for review)

Ozotic Sugar 903

Ozotic 903 (over China Glaze Rodeo Fanatic)

Hello people. Do I have a doozie for you. This is Ozotic 903 from Ozotic's new Sugar & Beam collection. I honestly haven't been this obsessed with a nail polish in a very long time. It was on my nails in various forms for over a week, which is an insane amount of time for me to have one polish on my nails. Basically, I spent last week staring at my hands. I was mesmerised! No work was done at all! 

I also saved this very special nail polish for a very special post... It was exactly one year ago today that I first posted on Little Nails! Hooray!

Straight after I opened my nail mail I tried it out on one nail (over Essie Coral Reef and white dots!), then I tried it out over black on one nail. Then last week I wore it over China Glaze Rodeo Fanatic (one of my all time favourite nail polishes), OPI Russian Navy, OPI The One That Got Away and lastly back over Rodeo Fanatic for the weekend and to take these photos. 

903 is made up of these little particles of magic (I don't really know what to call them) which kind of have the same look as glass fleck polishes. It's like someone went at some flakies with a mortar and pestle and crushed them down into tinier pieces of awesome. 

Apart from being super sparkly and sugary looking, 903 has a kick a** duo chrome colour change happening. I had so many comments on my nails while wearing this. And it looks amazing in all kinds of light. As much as I love holo polishes, when you're not in the sun all day I feel like you miss out on a lot of the amazingness. 903 even looked amazing under the florescent lights in my office! It looked great everywhere!

I couldn't help myself so I made this to show the colour change. Look at it go! 

Ozotic can be purchased online at piCture pOlish and for only AU$12 it's an absolute steal!

(This polish was sent to me for review)

piCture pOlish Blog Fest 2012 - Pshiiit

piCture pOlish Pshiiit is part of the Collaboration Collection and was jointly created with Camille from Pshiiit. Pshiiit will be available from piCture pOlish online and through Pshiiit Boutique.

I just can't get over how much I love this nail polish. Firstly, it's green. I love green. Secondly, it has flakies. Thirdly, the shimmer seems to secretly have all the colour of the rainbow in it. Fourthly, the flakies change colour. Fifthly, this could go on all day so I'll stop here.

Pshiiit's flakies change from green to blue, and the nail polish has a duochromeyness to it also. It's one of those polishes that looks completely different at different angles and lighting. It's just all round awesome! Here's my thumb nail in different light and from different angles.

Because it's a perfect sea green kind of colour, I couldn't help but add some mermaid accent nails.

piCture pOlish Pshiiit, OPI Teal The Cows Come Home, Orly Glitz, Deborah Lippmann Brown Eyed Girl

piCture pOlish is available through their website (check out the piCture pOlish Network if you don't live in Australia). You can also check them out on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest!

Check out all the other bloggers participating:

I nabbed the Inlink code from the lovely Cathy at More Nail Polish

piCture pOlish Blog Fest 2012 - Tease

Happy piCutre pOlish Blog Fest Day! I was lucky enough to get the chance to participate in this year's piCture pOlish blog fest. I was super excited about just being able to be a part of it, but also slightly worried about possibly not liking the polishes I ended up with, or getting ones that were similar to ones I already had. Sometimes I can be quite fussy with my nail polish. Luckily, I didn't need to worry. Both polishes I ended up with were ones that definitely would've caught my eye (and probably ended up in my little stash eventually!)

piCture pOlish Tease

Tease is a new Mesh shade from piCture pOlish. Tease has a gorgeous pink base with teeny tiny silver glitter and it's just so sparkly! So sparkly that I felt the need to show it in motion...

Tease applied beautifully and looked awesome with just two coats. It's one dense glitter and I like that! I have quite a soft spot in my heart for glitter, especially glitter that doesn't need a base colour to cover your nails. 

piCture pOlish is available through their website (check out the piCture pOlish Network if you don't live in Australia). You can also check them out on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest!

Check out all the other bloggers participating:

I nabbed the Inlink code from the lovely Cathy at More Nail Polish

Hello Chi Chi, you look familiar...

I was in Myer yesterday, perusing the beauty area when this little Chi Chi polish caught my eye. A flakie! For only $12.95! And 30% off! Right in my hot little hand! How could I say no? In the shop I had a great suspicion that Chi Chi Crystal Top Coat was a dupe for piCture pOlish Festival. I still bought it, because well, who can say no to multi coloured flakies?  

Both piCture pOlish and Chi Chi are Australian brands, both bottles are labeled "Made in Australia"and I'm wondering if both these polishes actually came from the same big vat of nail polish in whatever factory they're made in. Both polishes are pretty much the same price, $11.90 for Festival from the piCture pOlish website, and $12.95 for Crystal Top Coat from stores that stock Chi Chi. Apart from the different lids, it seems like these are the exact same thing. Not that I'm complaining. It's always good to have spare flakies!

Now... onto the swatch!

Which one do you think is which? They're pretty much the same aren't they!

So this was two coats of both Chi Chi Crystal Top Coat and piCture pOlish Festival and as you can see they're pretty much the exact same. I'm not sure how easy it is to get Chi Chi outside of Australia, but for us Aussie girls, if you don't live near a Myer or a Target (who also stock Chi Chi, but when I checked didn't have it) you can get Festival online, and if you don't like buying online you can get Crystal Top Coat in store! 

Flakies for everyone!!! Hooray!!! 

I Lily Love You Festival

China Glaze First Mate, OPI I Lily Love You, piCture pOlish Festival

It's been a hectic start to the new year so far. With all the moving and unpacking and building flat-packed furniture I haven't had any time to do my nails. I've been keeping my eye out for I Lily Love You for a while now and just as it always happens, the second you start looking for something it'll disappear. Finally I found it a couple of days ago at DJs (have I mentioned I love living in the city!), the last bottle too! 

This mani was just thrown together. I wanted a darker base for I Lily Love You and I hadn't tried out First Mate yet so they were thrown on. It turned out to be quite an awesome combo! Definitely needed a shade photo as well as a sun photo to show off the awesomeness of I Lily Love You. Then, just to make it a little bit more special I added a smidge of Festival on top. 

And exciting news... I finally joined the stamping madness! I ordered the second set of Bundle Monster plates and a Konad stamper and scraper and they both arrived in the mail yesterday. I can't wait to try them out!

Happy Christmas Everyone!

OPI Black Onyx, piCture pOlish Festival, China Glaze Atlantis, Milani Gold

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays everyone!

This was my Christmas Eve/Christmas Day manicure. I couldn't wait to use Festival. It's SO AWESOME!!! So many colours! I have to say... I may not need Cult Nails Clairvoyant now. Then I added a Christmas tree to make give it a bit more festive spirit. Festival was beautiful to apply, this was three coats. One of the things I really love about Festival is that it's in a clear base, so you can put it over any colour and get flakie awesomeness without changing your base colour. Festival is made by an Aussie company called piCture pOlish. The girls at piCture pOlish were just lovely. I received a cute little email along with my order invoice. It makes you feel all nice and special when you get personalised service! While I was on their website I picked up a couple of  Ozotic polishes as well. Prepare yourself for some awesome holo goodness and colour shifting glitter in the not so distant future!

Anyhoo, off to eat my weight in Christmas chocolate now! Have a happy and safe holiday!