Sally Hansen Frock Star

I was very lucky before Christmas and won some Sally Hansen goodies from the very lovely Lynnie's blog, she of the most amazing nail art. I was delighted because I find Sally Hansen very hard to get my hands on locally. Included were the nail strips in Frock Star. 

I have never tried any type of polish strips before so was dying to try them. So on the eve of NYE, I sat down to attempt to apply them. In the packet you get, an orange stick, a combo file and buffer, 16 polish strips and an instruction leaflet (I'm pretty sure this is the first time I've got an instruction leaflet with polish!)

You get two little packets of strips each containing 8 different sizes of strip (so you've two of each size). This is where I ran in to my first problem, I've pretty small hands but never really realised how small (narrow) my nail beds are - the 3rd smallest one was around the right size for my thumb, the smallest perfect for my pinky and then the 2nd smallest was about the right size for each of my other fingers. I realised I was going to have to get 2 fingers out of some strips and use some that were too wide for my nail bed,but wasn't sure if that was going to work so started off. The upshot was I got all 10 fingers out of 8 strips with the 2 most mahoosive ones left over - had I been more forward thinking I could have used these for an accent big toe nail in my pedicure (but my feet are in full winter mode.....).

My Hand looks so awkward sans polish bottle!

Application was pretty easy, even if I made things difficult for myself by trying to get two nails out of some strips. The strips have plastic on both sides you have to remove and a little tab to hold on to while you remove the plastic. The easiest thing to do was apply the strip to my left hand with the tab still attached cut it leaving some excess and then remove the tab and apply the other half the the same nail on the right hand. Retaining the tab means that your not removing too much of the stickiness by touching the underside of the strip. You file of the excess after you apply and for some reason on both my index fingers, when I filed off the excess some of the strip on my nail came with it. I don't know if that's something to do with the fact those strips were too wide for that finger - I removed the excess with the pointy end of the orange stick.

Super dooper close up - Frock star full of lovely various colour glitter  

I'm on day 4, as I write this,  and they are holding up well, with a little tipwear on both my thumbs. The only issue is I feel that they never stuck flush at the cuticle end and when I'm tying up my hair I feel like it's getting caught underneath them.  I didn't apply a topcoat because I wanted to test the wear, but that would probably have sorted that out and the bumpy glittery texture.

I wore these for the full 10 days and I got compliments on them in pretty much every shop I went into, despite my sloppy application! They held up well, so well they were next to impossible to remove. They were absolutely welded on, so it appears that they are just as hard to remove as regular nail polish. Perhaps, one of the peel off base coats might be a plan for wearing under these next time.

Have you tried these or other polish strips? They are a pretty great idea if you are travelling as you don't have to bring any topcoat or basecoat with you, plus they don't take up your liquid allowance if you're flying, They also don't smell as strong as normal nail polish.

Best in Beaut.ie Awards

(picture courtesy of Beaut.ie)

A couple of weeks ago (ummm 3 at this stage! Bad blogger!) myself and the little sister took ourselves of to Dublin to attend the Best in  Beaut.ie beauty awards. The awards were organised by the very lovely beaut.ie sisters Kirstie and Ailsling  Beaut.ie McDermott (who will hence forth be known as the mothership of Irish blogging, since they have been called this so often recently!)  in conjunction with West Coast Cooler.   If you haven't already checked out their blog, you should once you finish reading this post,. The blog is 5 years old, in fact they are celebrating their birthday this month, and they already have one book under their belt, with another on the way shortly. You should definitely check out the blather posts, which is a daily open post were people discuss anything from beauty to current affairs. 


The awards were not only voted for my Beaut.ie readers but the shortlist also came from their readers, so these were definitely a true reflection of what Irish (since they are a Irish based blog the majority of readers are Irish!) gals use and love.

Mmmmm west coast cooler!! 

(picture courtesy of Beaut.ie)

We arrived at the very lovely Dylan hotel and promptly were given a glass of west coast cooler and found some beaut.ies I'd met before and some I hadn't we had a great evening chatting and catching up lubricated by copious amounts of West Coast Cooler - which I hadn't tried before and actually it's quite nice! Then, the awards themselves were announced you can find the whole list here. I'm going to talk about the nail related ones but you definitely check out the whole list, some strange things won awards like the winner of the Best Skin Care Tool was the humble facecloth!


Best Polish brand was won by Rimmel, see the runners up here. The best base coat award went to OPI base coat, see the runners up here. The best top coat went to Sally Hansen Diamond Shine Base and Top Coat, runners up here. The best nail tool went to Boots Buffing Block, see the runners up here. The best hand cream went to (one of my favourites) L'Occitane Shea Butter Hand Cream, see the runners up here. Last but not least the best footcream award went to Scholl Cracked Heel Repair Cream, see the runners up here.


After the awards were announced, we had some more to drink and some more chats and got given lovely goody bags, the contents of which are below, 

From L-R : No 7 Lash Adapt Mascara, Sally Hansen Cafe Au Lait, Rimmel Vinyl Addict Max Lipgloss in Addictive (this has the most mahoosive applicator see below!)  I'm dying to try the Sally Hansen polish, because they've just started carrying them in Ireland but I've yet to find somewhere that sells them,

Some Kiehls samples which came in a lovely bag which didn't make it into the photos, I've been dying to try Kiehls for ages so was very happy to see these. From Clockwise from the top left, we have Ultra facial oil free lotion, Creme de Corps, Midnight Recovery Concentrate, Epidermal Re-Texturing Micro-Dermabrasion, Rosa Artica. 

There was also some bottles of West Coast Cooler in the goody bag but they didn't make it to the pictures..........

I just had to show this, the Rimmel lipgloss pictured above has the largest applicator ever, see below for pictorial evidence, there's Benefit lipgloss on the left for comparison, it's ginormous! 

So what do you think of the winners, are your favourites among them? Have you tried any of the winners, what did you think?

Nail Mail!

This fabulous package arrived for me on Monday but with one thing and another this week  turned in a giant PITA!  I’m only getting around to posting it now,  I won a giveaway on the lovely Jennifer’s blog, Nail Polish Addiction Anonymus, check out her fab blog here. 

So, this is what she sent me, isn’t it lovely? It completely and utterly made my day when I finally got to open it two days after it arrived.

And in a little more detail, China Glaze Halloween colllection, from L-R, Mummy May I, Zombie Zest, Ick-A-Body and China Glaze's Fast Dry Topcoat. 

From L-R, Nicole by OPI, Such a Go-Glitter  (the bottle shape is so weird on this one!) and the very elusive Sally Hansen Hidden Treasure, this is a flakie that is very close to Gosh Rainbow and Nubar 2010.

The minis from the OPI Spanish Collection, from L-R, Suzi Skies in the Pyrenees, No Spain No Gain, Pink Flamenco and OPI fast dry topcoat. 

Two Bare Escentuals eyeshadows in Clarity and Socialite and an eyeshadow brush (seen in picture above). 

I promise I won’t try to do many more make up swatches, I don’t think I’d make a very good make up blogger, I just wanted to show you the lovely colours and there was no other way to show you!

Is there any these you’d like to see, I have Zombie Zest coming up soon as a NOTD post?