Cult Nails I Got Distracted

Hi Guys,

I know what you're thinking... It's the last post of the month, where are the Five Favourites? Well, that should be today's post really, but seeing as my posts have been few and far between recently, I'm feeling like I want to post about nails! My Five Favourites March Edition will be up on on Monday or Tuesday. As will an Easter manicure. Honestly, Easter has crept up on me this year and I have bought far too many polishes, so I wanted to wear a few of them before doing an Easter mani!

That brings me on to tonight's post! I originally planned to post the Barry M Textured yellow tonight, but the swatches from my light box weren't great so I need to re-swatch it before posting. So in it's place is an something I bought recently! I'm currently wearing it so I wanted to share...

It's no secret that I love Cult Nails. Toxic Seaweed from them was my first post here on Truly Polished and they'll always have a special place in my heart! Their customer service is great and I really admire their mode of operation. Maria and John stay in contact with their customers all the time on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and I think that's great. Not to mention they make the best glowy shimmer polishes ever!

Tonight I don't have a glowy shimmer though, I have a deep blackened jelly base packed with green and holo glitters. This is I Got Distracted from Coco's Untamed Collection. I bought this along with a couple of other polishes recently.

The formula here was a breeze, nearly a one coater but I used two for the photos below. This is with three coats of topcoat, it was a bit of a topcoat eater, but all glitters are so I don't mind!

Natural light

Flash macro to show the holo glitter

Isn't this beautiful, I haven't worn such an amazing, unique polish in a long time. I'm so glad I bought this!

I didn't really want to post this to be honest tonight and this is for one reason and one reason only... It's sold out... However, I think it will be back because on the website it isn't listed as Limited Edition. Keep your eyes peeled HERE for when it comes back. It retails for $12. 

Be careful though if you're ordering here and you live in the UK, Royal Mail will get you, idiots... They charged me the tax, which I don't mind, but they charged me £8 handling fee, outrageous! I hate Royal Mail, not only have they destroyed a parcel I sent to a friend in America, but they charge stupid fees!

Barry M Ridley Road

Hi Guys,

Another tired post from me I'm afraid! These days I just can't seem to get any energy! At my Mum's the room I sleep in is really light and so my son wakes up about two hours earlier than when his blackout blinds are there! I would have to get to bed around 9 to get enough sleep but that's way too early for me, I need down time after little monkey goes to sleep!

I went out shopping and he was a total nightmare all day, so this is going to be brief-ish because I can hardly string a sentence together out of sheer exhaustion!!!

Anyway, tonight's post is the third out of four Textured polishes from Barry M. This one is the green, called Ridley Road.

I used three coats for the photos taken in my light box but for day to day wear two would be fine. 

The formula was good, the coverage was decent and I loved the colour, a gorgeous mint green creamy polish.

I love this picture of the whole range!

Pretty!

Macro

This polish retails for £3.99 in Boots, Superdrug, and the Barry M website here.

What do you think of this polish? And the textured nails trend in general? It seems to be pretty much split down the middle. I wasn't a fan until I tried it for myself, now I want ALL the textured polishes out there!

Barry M Kingsland Road

Hi Guys,

Sorry for my absence! I've been so busy... I'm at my Mum's at the moment, my boyfriend is going away on Saturday and we've got tickets for Micky Flanagan tomorrow so we're at my Mum's for all that.. We had some bad news tonight that her cat was run over. She was missing since Monday night and it turns out she was found on Tuesday. We only just found out and it's such a shock, I'm really upset, but I feel like I should do a post today.

This polish is from the Barry M Textured range, and it's one of my favourites from the collection.

Kingsland Road is a baby pink textured nail polish and I love it. I'm not a pink lover of clothes but I've always loved pink polish. This is no exception!

The photos below show three coats. It was okay in natural light at two coats but in my lightbox it looked a bit patchy so I used an extra one for the photos. The formula was pretty good for this. I find these polishes a bit lumpy but okay, and I struggled to clean up my cuticles, but apart from that, they're good!

The whole range!

What do you guys think? Have you picked any of these up yet? They retail for £3.99 at Boots, Superdrug and the Barry M website.

My Week in Pictures #2

Hi Everyone,

Happy St Patrick's Day!

I know, where have I been, right? Well, that's a bit of a long story, and the main reason behing this "My Week In Pictures" post. As well as the reason behind me posting on a Sunday. Normally the weekends are a time when I spend a bit of down time with the family and don't think about blogging. But right now my son is asleep and my boyfriend is watching football, so here I am!

The reason for my absence is actually a last minute trip away to Paris. We decided to go after I wrote the last blog post and booked immediately. It was a bit of a disaster. Stupid weather, see below for...

My second Mother's Day (third if you count being pregnant) and Caleb got me a
lovely card with one of my fave photos on!

The weather was like this in Kent when we were on our way to Dover.
We got stuck on the motorway, took snowy country roads, then missed our ferry.
It had been cancelled anyway, so they put us on one to Dunkerque rather than Calais.

By the time we got on the ferry, our car was filthy!

And then it all went even more wrong! We were fine from Dunkerque for a little while, then we hit the road out of Calais. Abandoned lorries everywhere. We slept on the motorway that night, we were stuck from past 8pm until nearly half past 4am...

Traffic at a standstill...

Only just moving again, it's 5:20 French time and absolutely freezing.
We've been stuck for 8 hours...

Then we got to our hotel eventually at gone 7 in the morning. There was snow everywhere and we weren't happy with the hotel. The Disney New York Hotel... Do not stay here!!! We slept until about 1pm then went to the Walt Disney Studios Park for a little while, that was nice. Had an okay sleep that night and woke up a bit fresher on Thursday.

Here at last and the snow isn't falling anymore!

Extended 20 year anniversary... I was 2 when this was built in 1992 

Mickey Mouse in the parade

Friday... Time to go already! We left really early, about 10.30am for our 6.30pm ferry in case we got stuck again. We flew through and got there at 2.30pm! We paid for new tickets and left at 3.30pm, we just wanted to get home!

Checking out the duty free! 

My purchases! Nein! Nein! Nein! and Don't Talk Bach to Me were under £6 each!
I also bought My Vampire is Buff from the Euro Centrale collection.

I was so excited to finally see the White Cliffs of Dover!

 All in all, not a great trip, but my son loved it! He was really good in the car given the circumstances and we got lovely photos of him and Mickey Mouse. Our hotel was terrible but Goofy was there the morning we left so Caleb got photos with him too.

We got back Friday night, had the rest of the plastering done in the living room on Saturday, and here we are!

I haven't forgotten that the 10th of this month was the 1st birthday of Truly Polished, and this coming week or the next one I should be announcing my celebrations! Thank you all for sticking by me, even in my absence I have gained new followers here and on Bloglovin and that means so much to me!

Barry M Atlantic Road

Hello everyone!

I'm so proud of myself today for fitting in a post this evening! Things have been so busy this week, we've totally painted the stairway ready for the carpet fitter to arrive tomorrow morning at 9am. We've picked out a wooden floor for the living room so we're going to order it tomorrow. And on Saturday we're having a bit of plastering done. We've got so much done since my boyfriend has been home from offshore, it's a bit overwhelming! He was meant to go away again on Sunday but it's been put back a couple of weeks so we can get even more done. It's nice to see our house becoming our dream home! 

Tonight I have one of the new Barry M Textured polishes to show you. I bought all four of these the day after they came out, so my next few posts will be of these I think. The first one is Atlantic Road, a pastel blue with texture.

I used three coats for the photos below. In normal day to day wear you can get away with two but my lightbox was showing up patches. 

The formula was okay with this. I found it a bit lumpy to start with but after a couple of nails it was fine and I got used to it. I love this polish so much that I've worn it since I swatched it before I went to Wales. It wore really well and I got four days out of it last week without chips.

This polish retails for £3.99, but when I bought it from Superdrug there was an offer on, I think it was 2 for £6, so the polishes I bought worked out at £3 each, so the normal price for Barry M.

NOTD Models Own Aciied and Jack Frost

Hi guys,

I had planned on posting this last night, but my boyfriend and I went to help his auntie and uncle set up their new laptop, and then they took us out for dinner to say thanks. By the time we got back it was late and we had to get our son into bed. Then we decided to paint the walls by the staircase and the landing ceiling... That lasted until half past one in the morning. Safe to say I wasn't going to be writing a post then!

Anyway, I'm feeling a bit more laid back today, the sun is out, I bought some more fish for the tank, we organised the fitting of the carpet to go up the stairs, so we need to do the second coat of paint before then, but all in all, I'm doing well! 

So this afternoon I have one of my favourite NOTDs to show you. I've worn this quite a few times, the combo makes me feel happy! At first I wanted something crazy and so I threw these two polishes together and I think it really works! If I was going to make a nail polish myself I'd love to recreate this combination in one bottle! 

The layering combo I'm talking about is Models Own Aciiied and Jack Frost. One is a bright chartreuse creme and one is a delicate iridescent purple/blue duochrome glitter with a turquoise flash. It shouldn't work, but it does somehow...

The photos below show two coats of Aciiied with one thin coat of Jack Frost. Ages ago I was preparing swatches of the Wonderland collection but stupidly I still haven't finished. Jack Frost could be in my Top 5 Models Own polishes of all time!

I took these photos in my lightbox, so some of the glossiness has been taken away, these are not matte polishes.

Beautiful!

Love the blue against the chartreuse!

Both polishes retail for £5 here, however I bought Aciiied as part of the 50% off sale a while ago. I got Jack Frost in a set when I bought the whole collection so I saved a bit of money there too.

So... What's the verdict? What do you think of this combination of colours? Pretty, ugly, or ugly-pretty?

Five Favourites: February!

Hi Guys,

Long time no see, right? I have been a terrible blogger. I went on holiday last week though so I think I can be forgiven! We just had a little mini-break in Wales and it was so lovely!

Anyway, less of the rambling from me. I'm going to get back in the swing of blogging next week, I have some swatches done so I can actually do some good posts! 

Here are my Five Favourites from the past month!

1. Valentine's Day:

Obviously with it being February, it was Valentine's Day. We didn't go over the top with our celebrations, we just had a nice meal and watched a film. It was perfect! Valentine's Day will always be special to me because it was our last day as just the two of us. It was the 15th of February 2011 that we found out we were going to be having our son, and our lives changed forever!

2. Spending some quality family time together:

This month I let blogging take a back seat somewhat and I'm glad that I did. I love writing this blog, and I'm so grateful to all of you who read my ramblings, but sometimes it's nice not to be glued to my computer at night!

3. Going away:

We went to Wales this month for four nights. We rented a little cottage in Pembrokeshire and it was just amazing. I haven't enjoyed a holiday that much in a very long time. The cottage was on a farm, so Caleb was able to feed the animals, and one day we went on a one and a half hour walk, it was lovely! We want to go back in the summer, it was perfect!

4. Getting things done:

One of the main reasons for our mini-break rather than a holiday abroad was because we have so much to do at home. We started painting my son's room and that's nearly done. We've bought a load of things for the house, and our chest of drawers is together. Not to mention I unpacked my clothes!!! I'd been living out of boxes and suitcases since the start of December and enough was enough!

5. My car passed its MOT:

I know this is a bit of a stupid one! I got my car in October and I love it so much. Anyway this month, Francoise had her MOT and she passed with flying colours! After taking nearly 4 years to take my driving test, my car is a huge thing to me! I was really worried it wouldn't pass, not that anything has gone wrong with it at all, but I was worried anyway... I couldn't stand it if it hadn't have passed. And it's lucky too, because my boyfriend's car has gone wrong twice in the last couple of weeks!

So that's it for February! It's been a good month! 

I hope you've enjoyed this post, thanks for sticking with me and see you after the weekend!