Introducing Jacava London

Hi Guys,

It's taken me a little bit longer to come back than I had hoped! Since I got home from my Mum's just over a week ago I haven't had a single day off playdates, preschool and playgroup. My life as a stay at home Mum is a lot more stressful than the imagine of chilling out in a onesie with a cuppa! 

Anyway, today while my son was at preschool I finally swatched some samples sent to me by the lovely people at Jacava London. I had actually played about with these last week but I wasn't happy with my pictures so today it was back to the drawing board!

Jacava London is a British brand (which I love, always nice to support some good UK brands!) and all of their nail polishes are non-toxic and 8-free. This means they are free from Formaldehyde, Formaldehyde Resin, Parabens, Camphor, Toulene, DBP, Pthalates and Animal Ingredients. As I'm currently pregnant, the idea of using non-toxic nail polish is very appealing to me! They are also vegan friendly and do not test on animals, so a great brand all round!

Before I start on the colours, let me just say this... These polishes all have a great formula. With the exception of Regent Street where I used three coats, these were great two coaters with good colour payoff.

So onto the pretties!

I'll start with the polish I originally picked out, Midnight's Secrets*. If you're a long time reader of this blog, you'll know my endless love for blue nail polish. When I saw this one, I knew I had to have it! I wasn't disappointed, I let out a gasp when I painted this on and immediately sent my friend a picture (as well as posting to my Instagram - @truly_polished) declaring my love! 

This is a gorgeous blue polish with a bright blue shimmer. Today was sunny so I could really bring out the best in this polish and the flash really brought the shimmer out. It's very, very photogenic, so there are quite a few photos....

The photos below show two coats without topcoat. Honestly I could've put topcoat on this but it dried to a satiny finish and I thought it was too pretty to change! 

Natural light

Bright sunlight

Flash - LOOK AT THAT SHIMMER!!!!

Next I'll show you Regent Street*. This was actually my second choice, but luckily the very generous people at Jacava sent me a couple of extras, so I still got to try this out. It's a berry jelly base with large pieces of holographic hex glitter. I'm not 100% happy with my swatches of this, mainly because of my dry cuticles, but that's what happens when I try to swatch more than one polish a day! 

These photos show three coats with the Jacava topcoat. This was fine after two but I wanted to even out the base colour a bit.

Natural light

Sunlight

Macro shot of the bottle. I love how the base coats the holo glitter!

Thirdly I have Dance With Me* to show you. This was another one I had in mind when I was making my original pick, so I was really happy to see it in my package! It's a red toned berry shimmer polish, the kind of thing I love to wear in the Autumn/Winter. This had a great formula, went on really nicely in two coats, and the photos below are without topcoat, it definitely didn't need it, it was so glossy on its own!

Natural light

Sunlight

Lastly, Jacava kindly sent me a bottle of their topcoat* to try out. This has UV inhibitor properties to stop the colour of your polish fading while you're out in the sun. While I'm sure we'll get some proper sun in a few months, we don't really have enough right now to test this properly! Nevertheless it's glossy and dries incredibly quickly for a topcoat that isn't marketed as speedy drying!

Here's how it looks on my naked nails that are looking horribly long. Pregnancy is obviously serving them well, I'm having to file them every other day at least!!

You can see the full range of what Jacava has to offer here on their website. Their polishes retail for £11 each.

Have you tried out this brand? What do you think of what they have to offer? Let me know!

*The product(s) in this post were provided for an honest review. Please see my disclosure page for more information.

Introducing Bonnyprints - Personalised Greeting Cards

Hi Guys,

I know it's a little out of the ordinary for me to be posting on the weekend, but I haven't been able to post as much as I have wanted to this week so I thought I should get another post in before the week's end!

Today is the first of December, and you all know what that means... Time to think about Christmas! I'm normally the worst when it comes to Christmas preparations, I leave everything until the last minute but this year I vowed that wouldn't be the case. I've actually nearly finished my Christmas shopping, and I ordered all my wrapping things on Friday night, so next week I'll be all done! 

In any case, today's post is very fitting for the time of year. It's all about greeting cards! 

Christmas cards are one of my favourite parts of getting ready for the big day. I love picking them out, and personalised cards are always the best to me. I rarely buy cards for any occasion that aren't customised in some way!

A few weeks ago I was contacted by Bonnyprints about reviewing a set of cards, and after having a browse at what they had to offer, I said yes. They sent me a set of five personalised flat cards*, which would usually cost £6.20 and I love them.

The order process was very simple and the website was extremely easy to use. I decided to order photo upload cards because I think that's the best test for quality! The photo I used was my blog header photo, and the design I chose was the Merry Christmas Ball card, as I thought it matched my blog theme pretty nicely!

Here they are!

Close up 

Two cards out of the set of five

Lined envelope

The cards* turned up at my house while I was away in Manchester, so that was a nice surprise to come home to. They took just over a week to arrive, which is slightly longer than I would usually want... However,  I opted to have them quality checked before they were sent out. This is a free service and can delay the cards by a day or so, but I thought it was worth it, I'm really happy with my cards!

My order was printed on high quality thick cardstock with a matte finish. The cards I got were flat, but they do sell conventional folding cards too. These ones are great for those who are a fan of pegging cards onto a string to display them, which is what I plan to do this year...

The order came complete with five white envelopes which are actually lined! What a great idea! That is actually my pet peeve when it comes to card giving, I hate when you can see the card through the envelope. Usually I draw all over the envelope to avoid this, but with these envelopes I don't need to!

As I said, this set of five flat cards retails for £6.20, and you can check out the whole range of Christmas cards here on their website. 

They also sell a variety of other greeting cards from wedding invitations, to moving announcements, to thank you cards, so it's well worth a visit to their site!

The product(s) included in this post were provided to me for an honest review. All opinions are my own. Please see my disclosure page for more information.

Introducing Cosmetics Fairy - Swatches Galore!

Hi Guys,

Wow, what a busy couple of weeks I've had! My birthday was a week ago so my Mum and brother came to stay, then I got ill, now my boyfriend has gone away for work again, and to top it all off we got a kitten! I'll be filling you in on everything I've been up to in another post, so that's all on that for now!

Not too long ago I had an email drop into my inbox from a website I love, asking if I would like to review some products. Of course I said yes, and here I am tonight!

That website was Cosmetics Fairy. If you aren't familiar with them, they are a discount cosmetics website that stocks all sorts of goodies: fragrances, skincare, hair care, makeup, nail polish, brushes, and even jewellery. I recommended their site in this post as I am a huge fan and have shopped there on a few occasions. They recently overhauled their website and introduced a points system where you can set up an account to collect points on your purchases, so their site is definitely worth a look when you have some time to browse.

Now, onto some swatches. The lovely people at Cosmetics Fairy let me pick a few polishes to try out. I tried to pick a variety of finishes so I hope there is something for everyone! 

Enjoy!

Sally Hansen Bewitched*

Bewitched is an aubergine purple creme. I'm a big fan of the Complete Salon Manicure cremes as I think they're generally smooth and this one was no exception! Great application, I loved the brush, and it was opaque in two coats. These pictures were taken in natural daylight with topcoat.

Sally Hansen Coco-a-Gogo*

Coco-a-Gogo is a brown polish with a copper/brown shimmer. When I was browsing Cosmetics Fairy and looking for swatches online this really caught my eye. I don't usually go for browns but this is no normal brown! The shimmer is a very red toned brown and this is very flattering, it'll be perfect in a couple of months in the peak of Autumn. This is two coats with topcoat and the photo is taken in natural daylight. 

Sally Hansen Grape Escape*

Grape Escape was a nightmare to photograph, let me start by saying that! This is a very blue toned purple and my camera seriously freaked out! I love this colour, and it has a beautiful shimmer made up of blue and fuchsia which you can see in the second picture. While I was photographing this it was like I was looking at two completely different nail polishes. In real life this is purple, more in line with the third photo, which I took with my phone by the way! I love this, it reminds me of an old nail polish I had as a child and loved! These photos are taken with flash because there was no sun... The third photo is in natural sunlight. All photos are with topcoat and this is two coats of Great Escape, although it only really needed one.

Essie Bordeaux*

Bordeaux is simply stunning. As soon as I saw this I needed it! It is a wine coloured jelly and it is so beautiful I have no words. I'm wearing this on my toes right now. I used three coats for this because it's a jelly and my nails are too long to have something translucent to show off my visible nail line. The whites of my nails are too white that it shows up with a jelly. This is good for layering. I've worn this layered over China Glaze I'm Not Lion and got lots of compliments on my sparkly red! This is sheer enough to layer over glitter with one coat, and opaque enough to wear alone with a couple of coats. These photos are without topcoat, Bordeaux is seriously glossy!

L'Oreal Owl's Night*

Owl's Night is a charcoal/black polish with a very strong gold shimmer that looks like it has some copper particles. This was actually the first polish I wore from this package. It lasted through a birthday night out for a friend and a good few days after with topcoat. I don't have anything like this in my stash, it's very pretty and very unique. Both photos are with topcoat. The first photo was taken in natural daylight and the second was taken in sunlight.

L'Oreal Platinum 300*

Platinum 300 was actually a replacement for one of the polishes that I liked that was out of stock. It's a champagne pearl finish, so a little bit prone to brushstrokes. However I didn't think it looked as brush-strokey in real life as it does in the photos. The formula of this was just as I though it would be: excellent. Foil type polishes are generally one coaters and this one was. Although I probably won't wear this alone as I don't find it flatters my skin (I'm too olive toned I think) I have a feeling this will be perfect for stamping. I wanted to try it out but my Konad stamper seems to have got lost in the move! The first photo here is in natural sunlight and the second is with flash to show the greenish tinge to the shimmer, very pretty!

Sinful Colors What's Your Name*

What's Your Name is the polish I was looking most forward to receiving. It is a one I've wanted ever since Sinful Colors came onto my radar. This is a blackened teal polish with teal glass flecks that have a duochrome shift to purple. It reminds me of Smoke and Ashes from the China Glaze Hunger Games collection, but with much more prominent glass flecks and a purple duochrome rather than gold. This is so pretty on. When I saw the bottle - I included a bottle shot below- I saw the duochrome straight away but was worried it wouldn't show up on the nail, but if you look at the macro shot in the second image you can definitely see purple around the edges of my nail. So gorgeous! Photos are taken with topcoat in natural daylight.

Wow, that was a long one! This post has been a little while coming! It took me a bit of time and 600 photos until I had swatches that I was happy with! As you can probably imagine narrowing that number down to two or three images per polish took ages, then I had to edit them... 

I hope you guys like these pictures, and remember to go and check out Cosmetics Fairy for some great deals, I've already been looking for more things that I can buy, so you may be seeing a haul soon!

*Disclosure: The item(s) in this post were provided for an honest review. As always, all opinions are my own, see my disclosure page for more information

Introducing... Sweetaholic Charms!

Hi Guys,

Sorry for the lack of posts, everything has been really up in the air lately! My boyfriend is home now and so we've had a lot to do! Plus his car broke down yesterday while we were on the way out for dinner last night, typical, and so three hours of waiting around for the RAC and a tow-truck meant a blog post was not on the cards!

Anyway, onto bigger and better things! Allow me to introduce you to... Sweetaholic Charms!

One of my favourite bloggers, Rachel from Life of a Sweetaholic, recently started her own business making charm bracelets. They are sooo pretty, simple, subtle, and everything I love in jewellery. Best of all they are handmade, so each one is extra special. 

She very kindly sent me two bracelets of my choice to review and I picked the cupcake (of course!) on white waxed cotton and the heart on teal. And here they are! Each order comes with a little sweet treat, as you can see in the photos, they were so yummy!

Beautiful wrapping! And sweets!

My cupcake bracelet*

Heart bracelet*

Beautiful charms!*

Here is the size of the charms* in relation to my index finger nail

Aren't they pretty? These would make great presents!

The length of the waxed cotton is 30cm, so you can adjust or trim the bracelet to create the perfect fit.

The colours available are: white, teal, lilac, baby pink and dark pink. They are all gorgeous, I struggled to choose between them!

You can choose between flower beads, or a butterfly, heart or cupcake charm.

Prices for these bracelets range from 75p to £1.20, so they are super affordable. You could have one of each charm in each colour and mix and match.

I love wearing my two bracelets together, the teal and white looks great together, and after all, I do heart cupcakes!

You can check out Rachel's online store here:

SWEETAHOLIC CHARMS

Right now she is only shipping in the UK, but she hopes to expand to other countries in the future. All orders will be sent out Royal Mail First Class within 48 hours. I couldn't believe how fast the shipping was, Rachel sent my bracelets in the afternoon and I received them the next morning! 

Keep your eyes peeled on here, because I will be doing an OOTD post before too long featuring these, they look perfect with everything I wear!

The product(s) included in this post were provided to me for an unbiased review. Please see my disclosure page for more information.

VO5 Hot Oil Treatment Review

Hi Guys!

I'm so sorry I didn't post last night! Since Wednesday evening I've been living a nightmare... I noticed a dripping sound coming from underneath my kitchen sink, so I thought I should try and tighten up a connection under there, big mistake! Water started coming out like a hose! I turned the water off and then realised there was an isolator thing just before the leak, so the stopped coming out. The only bad thing is that my dishwasher and washing machine are now out of action! The last thing I need while looking after a baby is no way go wash clothes, and I don't have time to eat, let alone wash up! Last night I'd had enough of life so I didn't feel like posting!

Anyway, I have something slightly different to share with you today!

I managed to find my camera (here's a tip, always double and triple check places, you never know what you might find) and on it were my review pictures for a hair product I mentioned in my Five Favourites: September post. This is a product that really worked for me, so I thought I should post about it!

VO5 Hot Oil

First things first, I should mention that I'm obsessed with my hair. Not in a vain way, but I've spent a lot of years being unhappy with the length of my hair and its growth rate... Looking back at pictures I've had a terrible amount of growth over last five years! Apparently the average rate of hair growth is 1cm/month, so if you're supposed to get a trim every 6 weeks, progress is pretty impossible. My hair has probably made 18cm progress in the last 5 years with haircuts. Yes, that's 60 months....... 

Lets see some (embarrassing) photos to prove it shall we?! These range from summer 2007 (I was 17) to winter 2011 (I was 21). I'm 22 now, so the before and after photos show my hair as it is now.

The pink incident resulted in damage and a drastic need for a cut and colour!
I feel like my hair hasn't grown since November 2010!

So that's enough back story, onto the review! Click "Read More" to read the review, this post is super long and pic heavy, so I thought I would put in a jump break!