Shindig Pictures

I'm absolutely spoilt.

I had a fantastic day on Saturday and was so pleased to see everyone at the afternoon tea.
Everything went smoothly, there were no cringe worthy games but there were a few fun ones, that everyone loved. I really should scan and upload some of the dresses that people designed for me to wear. Some of the drawings are hilarious. There was delicious food. Actually the food you just need to see! I was very spoilt.

Amazing biscuits thanks to Nicks Sister

Absolutely gorgeous cupcakes thanks to our close family friend Gail .  The stand was my present to keep! (as well as the cupcakes)

I was even more spoilt though, Nicks sister and family were kind enough to decorate a glass for everyone. They painted them with blue and added gold hearts. They looked amazing for everyone to toast with, and take as a keepsake. They added a white ribbon to the base with the date 2.7.11.

Decorated glasses

Apparently on Friday night they were all in the kitchen. I had no idea and went into the kitchen to use the computer. Nick followed me through and was apparently blocking them from my sight the whole time. I had no idea lol.

And of course an obligatory picture of me. I decided to wear a black ruffled dress that shows off my boobs and a berry coloured cardigan. Actually the cardigan is the exact colour of OPI Dim Sim Plum, which I wore on my nails!

Me looking ready to face the guests! I really need a haircut, but I have to wait another week for my appointment. Just let me know if you want to know any of the make up I'm wearing. It's a ridiculously easy look to do! 

OPI Dim Sim Plum looking rather odd under my cameras flash.

I hope all the Americans are having a fabulous 4th of July. I know I've been feeling inspired to do a stars and stripes mani after seeing all the gorgeous 4th of July nails!

Tomorrow I'll be posting the pictures from our night out on Saturday!

OPI Blue Shatter

Well yesterday we had sunshine! I wanted a sunshining mani to match the rare glimpse of sunshine we had.
I fished out 108 degrees and layered it with OPI blue Shatter to create this rather bright and 80's coloured mani!

OPI Blue Shatter over China Glaze 108 Degrees

We had an awesome day pretending it was summer again, despite the freezing wind. We visited both nephews. We even took Bradley (5) to visit baby Max. Max is starting to chatter, gurgle and talk back when you talk to him. Bradley sat down to have a conversation with him and was rather disappointed when Max just made baby noises back!

Awwww little baby hand.

A Crackled Pink Wednesday

A few weeks ago I had a little fun on ebay. A few weeks is what I say when I can't remember exactly when I purchased things... but they came in the mail yesterday.

I needed For Audrey for my wedding toes, and I'd misplaced my bottle. Rather than just buying one polish I stocked up on a few. I decided to try out these cheap crackles Mia Secret Crackle. I bought an orange, yellow and deep pink.

Today I have Mia Secret Crackle Rose over Sparrow Me the Drama.

The reason it looks like I dipped my fingers in egg yolk and didn't clean them is I played with the yellow crackle first...It did not want to come off!

Anyway happy Pink Wednesday. I hope everyone has a fabulous day. I have an observation teaching reading today...So I'm slightly freaking.

Long Weekend

Well Happy Birthday Queen Elizabeth...even though it's not your birthday, but thank you anyway for a long weekend!

I'm so excited to have a long weekend this week. I've been feeling so run down and tired. I can't wait to head out and do some shopping. I'm rather keen for a new camera to take away with us to Rarotonga. My current camera is highly cute and waterproof, but not up to taking decent low light pictures.

Anyway on to pics of my current mani, broken nail and all.

Color Club Love 'em, Leave 'em with a helping of Red Shatter

 On Thursday an awesome order of color club polishes arrived and I'm so glad I ordered yet another Love 'em, Leave 'em because this one actually is the amazing holo I dreamed it would be. Well ok it's a lot more holo than my previous version! Anyway I've been looking out for combo's for mum to use with her red shatter and I think this one is awesome. Don't look too close though you might see my awful patch up job with tape I tried on my ring finger... Unfortunately I didn't apply it very well this time and couldn't stand it anymore... I peeled the tape off and the polish came with.

Love 'em, Leave 'em, Red Shatter and Rule Breaker

After peeling off my tape I had a naked nail in need of polish. Rule Breaker just happened to be sitting there. I thought I should probably try and make it look purposeful...I used some cute nail stickers I picked up on Wednesday to try and blend it in. I haven't taped my nail again, I'm kind of hoping the copious amount of top coat I applied will keep the break in place...I'll sort it out tonight.. :S

A Pirates Day

We were planning on having a night out last night. Getting something delicious for dinner and heading to see the latest Pirates of the Caribbean. Unfortunately on my way to school I started feeling rather ill. By the time I got to school I had bad stomach pains and felt like I might be sick. Quite a few kids from class have been off sick with a stomach bug and I'd sent two home on Thursday because they vomited. The joys of teaching children?
 I managed to last the day. MY stomach pains went from bad to gurgling and churning, which I could put up with. I just didn't risk eating! So I thought it might be better to just take it easy and rest up.

I'm feeling much more settled in the tummy today. That means it's Pirates time! Yup I'm excited. I don't care if it got bad reviews from some stuck up movie reviewer in the paper. I'm going to love every minute of it. Just like the last 3 films!

In honour of Pirates of the Caribbean I'm wearing Stranger Tides with Silver Shatter and I thought it was the perfect opportunity to show the awesome Pirates of the Caribbean collection from OPI.

Skull and Glossbones

 I'm sorry I know OPI does cheesy names...but I love this one. I love all the names in this collection actually. They're just the right balance of cheesy and fun. Anyway Skull and Glossbones, light grey beige, stone colour? Comparable to the likes of Playa del Platinum. A warm greyed shade with sandy tones still? ahhh look at the pictures, thats what colour it is! My descriptive powers are not good today.

Mermaids Tears

 One of the polishes I was looking forward to the most. My anticipation was well justified because Mermaids Tears is a gorgeous dusty, what I would called jade. It's a very pretty green that works well on most people. And hey I love a green with some blue or a blue with some green. mmmm aqua and turquoise tones!

Sparrow Me the Drama

 Must brighter pink than I was expecting. I don't have another pink like it though. Bright but still dusty. Sparrow Me the Drama is a very pretty polish and perfectly lady like as well.

Planks A Lot

 According to Nick Planks A Lot is a controversial name. I mean OPI don't want to be seen to support planking do they? *rolling eyes* Planks A Lot is however a gorgeous dusty purple. Once again bright but dusty. Very pretty and I think this one will look stunning with Silver Shatter.

Steady as She Rose

 Much paler than I was expecting, Steady as She Rose is a pretty shade in between pink and purple. It's another difficult colour to describe. But it's pretty and delicate.

Stranger Tides

 The movies name sake is a dulled, lightened khaki colour. It's one of those colours that's neutral enough with a bit of kick. The kick of course being the green khaki tones. OPI got it right, it's a strange colour, but it's rather flattering for summer as well. If only we were heading into summer. I only needed two coats. So the formulas great.

Stranger Tides with Silver Shatter

I wasn't sure Silver Shatter would be very good over Stranger Tides, but I actually do like it. Silver Shatter give the almost neutral tone of Stranger Tides a healthy dose of bling! But at the same time is subtle enough. Silver Shatter seems to work best over cremes. Every time I've put it over a shimmer my cracks aren't as big! The base colour doesn't show through as much.

OPI Greek Isles

I've mentioned before that I love Greek mythology and all my electronic devices have a Greek name...except my new external hard drive, I named that Minerva.

Anyway, due to my weird obsession I felt the need to track down the OPI Greek Isles collection. Released in 2004, the Greek Isles collection was of course the summer one. Full of frosty pinks and streaky whites. But I love it anyway. It's a true summer collection. Not one of the shades is a dark vampy colour, they're all bright and cheerful and I can't help but imagine myself cruising the Greek Isles when I see the colours.

Calling All Goddesses

 Frosty white shimmer, streaky and running. This one takes patience to apply. As you can see I didn't have quite enough patience! This was 3 coats.

Cream of Crete

 Cream of Crete may look like and off white creme, but it actually has a very pretty delicate shimmer running through it. Another streaky runny polish that needs a lot of patience to apply. Again 3 coats.

Ti-tan Your Toga

 Haha, Ti-tan, anyway...not really what I'd call tan...more a pale beige sand? A pearly finish with a lot of delicate shimmer. 3 coats again.

Melon of Troy

 A frosty looking peachy melony looking shimmer. This was 3 coats and like most of these shimmery shades I still have a bit of visible nail line, but nothing I'm worried about. This is a rather juicy shade. Melon ice? Maybe I'm just hungry.

Dancing in the Isles

 More of a light coraly pink than a pink pink, though I'm not sure it's coraly enough to be classed as coral. Again a frosty shimmer with some visible nail line, but nothing that worries me. Quite a pretty feminine colour.

Aphrodites Pink Nightie

 Delicate, pink and feminine. Perfectly fitting for the goddess of love and beauty. A frosty shimmer pink that was once again 3 coats. Pretty and girly. Perfect for a pink.

It's All Greek to me

 Wow! It's All Greek to Me is a stunning bright pink shimmery polish. It's definitely a stand out in this collection. I can see why it's such a popular polish and the more I look at this swatch the more I want to paint my toes. Again 3 coats.

Don't Socra-tease Me

 A another stunning colour from this collection. So bright and vibrant. A deeper red based coral with an amazing shot of what looks like blue shimmer in some lights. Rather sheer and this was actually four coats, but still incredibly gorgeous.

Purple-opolis

 These colours keep getting better and better. Purple-opolis is another amazing vibrant colour. I'm not sure I'd call it a purple, more a deep purple pink? Look at the gold shimmer coming through in the second photo. I've never seen that before, it looks amazing though!

Greece Just Blue Me Away

And lastly the gorgeous, though far too sheer, blue from the collection. Greece Just Blue Me Away has so much promise in the bottle. It's shimmer and a gorgeous shade of blue that seems to have some purple duo-chrome. Then on the nail it's sheer. Oh so so sheer. This was four coats, and you can't see any of the duo-chrome.

When Mistakes Go Right

Opps! I may have left the lid off my Black Shatter. When I went to use it it was a thick gloopy unusable mess.

So I reached for my trusty OPI nail polish thinner...

and it made my Black Shatter awesome. Check out the pictures of this shattering!

DS Diamond with Black Shatter

The shatter, in my opinion, looks pretty amazing. It's shattered much more randomly, it was easier to apply and the gaps were bigger showing off the gorgeous DS Diamond I was wearing underneath. Unfortunately by the time I got home last night the sun was disappearing and I couldn't capture the holo in DS Diamond.