... Pretty Serious Giveaway ...

It's been awhile but it's GIVEAWAY TIME!!

I'm joining forces with the beautiful ladies at The Polish Haven and Nails in the Desert to bring you this fantastic giveaway and I mean FANTASTIC!!!!!

PRETTY SERIOUS COSMETICS!!

We super thrilled to bring you this giveaway sponsored by the FANTASTIC Kaz over at Pretty Serious Cosmetics!!

If you haven't had the chance yet to try out these wonderful polishes then you are seriously missing out. There is so many great colours who come to you dressed in gorgeous packaging and are stunning!

One lucky person will WIN 6 bottles of Pretty Serious polish! Woo!! It will be sent to them direct from Pretty Serious Cosmetics! OMG - That's a lot of wonderful polish :)

This giveaway is open WORLDWIDE!!
CLOSING MARCH 1 [Aussie Time]

Are you excited?? I am!! Get too it!!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

... Australia Day Nails - Great Barrier Reef ...

Hey ... what gives Sarah Claire? Australia Day was yesterday!! Get with the times!! While it's true that Australia Day is the 26th, this year as the 26th is on a Saturday the public holiday is being carried over to Monday. So I'll keep on plodding along!!

So these are my "Great Barrier Reef" nails ... which I was inspired by the turtles on the movie Finding Nemo. For a first attempt of stamping with colour I'm pleased with myself but I can see ways to improve so hopefully we'll go up from here :)

I've used the Lilic's A02 plate for the turtles and the colours used are Ulta3 Lily White for the base, Ulta3 Black Satin for the stamping and Ulta3 Jelly and Scandal Blue Pearl for the colours! [Pinky also is wearing China Glaze Atlantis which is why it slightly looks different to the rest]

For more great Aussie Nail art hit the link below ... although I may be the only one carrying on til Monday :)

... Australia Day Nails ... Fireworks

Happy Australia Day SMC readers!! Thought I'd share some fireworks today. While it's not something when you think of when you think "Australia" it definitely is if you think Australia Day!! There will be many fireworks going off today and Sydney is generally the biggest one.

I was given this tutoria on firework nails [it's located HERE] which is fantastic - problem is that I'm not that fantastic! I really need to invest in a decent striper brush for thin lines but considering what I thought of them last night I think they've really grown on me.

I've used 4 colours from the super fantastic but discontinued China Glaze OMG collection [L8R G8R, TTYL, IDK and 2Nite] and placed it over ever reliable Ulta3 Black Satin.

KABOOM!!!!! A bit of holo is shining through but oddly for Australia Day we are lacking sun and heat. I'm sure it will return soon for us though!

As the public holiday isn't until Monday I'll be continuing on with Aussie nails for 2 more days. Hope to see you stay with me!

... Australia Day Nails - Bogan Flannette Shirt ...

I sat down and thought a lot about what else I could portray for Australia Day ... and I kept coming back to one thing ... Bogans. 

Yes it's true ... Nobody likes a bogan! But I kept thinking of flannelette shirts and while I know they aren't "Aussie" most old style bogans seem to wear one!

I saw this beauty in Big W yesterday and I thought that this would be easy to replicate ... ummm ... yeah right!!!

Stamping ... why do you hate me??? Really!! This one just ended up everywhere ... Plus my top coat bubbled and smudged my stamping *super sad*

Anyway this is Rimmel Double Decker Red stamped with Ulta3 Black Satin using the VL001 plate from Vivid Lacquer.

And I couldn't write a post about bogans without showing my favourite one of all time ... Poida!!

In hindsight ... I think it looks more like the shirt from the Monty Python Lumberjack song!  Better get my thinking cap on for tomorrow!

... Australia Day Nails ... Nails Inc - Little Miss Splendid ....

Woohoo!! Going to cheat today and use a guest post I did for Cathy at More Nail Polish at the end of last year. If you missed it first time around then here it is again!  I figured this fits in well with the Aussie theme for the week!!!

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I've got this special pretty to show to you today to tide you over for a bit longer! It's from the Nails Inc "Little Miss" collection and this one is Little Miss Splendid.

I brought mine from Beautybay.com but there are many other places out there to get your Nails Inc fix!! I regret not buying all the colours in this set as it's fantastic. They have the cute character on the bottle aswell which is a bonus! I love Mr Men!

When I first got this I immediately thought of Essie Turquoise & Caicos [and it's dupe Essence Chasing Waves from the BBC Sunclub series] but they are slightly different.

The Essie is on finger #3 and it's a slightly lighter shade and also it's not so opaque as the Nails Inc which you can definitely notice in real life. Also the Nails Inc does have a green shimmer through it which I wasn't able to capture on camera but you can slightly see it in the bottle in this picture below

After all that I thought I'd top it off with a little stamping :) Both these designs are from the Aussie Konad Plate A1 and the colour is NYC Color in Midnight which is a dark blue and it seemed to be a better choice with this colour than black

Aussie Aussie Aussie!!!  I love this plate but don't often get a chance to pull it out and wear it but maybe I should make more of an effort as it's great!

So if you are in the market for a beautiful colour but don't yet have the Essie [or if you just like cute designs on your bottles] then it might be worthwhile checking this one out. There are other Little Miss characters in the set [I believe there are 4 in total] but they have been around now for at least a year so get hunting!!

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Wanna see more Australiana nails?? Click below!

... Australia Day Nails ... Australia Flags

I told a few friends I was doing this challenge and they were a bit miffed as they don't want to attempt nail art but still want pretty nails and they felt left out. Well never fear!!!

You too can have snazzy Aussie flag nails in 4 really simple steps!!

1 - Drive to the shops
2 - Buy nails
3 - Drive home
4 - Apply

Done!! Now you can sit back with a cold one and watch the cricket!

But seriously ... I hardly ever wear false nails because they bug the hell out of me but these weren't too bad and aren't super long and annoying.

These are what I used - Press & Go nails. And they seriously were press and go! For non-glue nails they held up surprisingly long considering I seem to lose one within the first hour.  I picked mine up from Priceline!

The first thing you notice when you open the box is the packaging!

It made me laugh as it's a giant polish bottle! Took me awhile to realise that you had to unscrew the lid to get the container open ... duh!

And incase you get stuck there is handy instructions plus a QR code to an instructional video! But really it's pretty easy.

And here's the results ...

There are 2 different flag designs in the box. One is a full union jack and the other is half but I think it worked out pretty well as a mixture.

** Check out some other awesome Aussie nail art below!! **

... Australia Day Nails - Kangaroo Sign ...

*queue appropriate YouTube clip*

So for the non Aussies ... Saturday is Australia Day down here.  What's Australia Day? Well it's basically like the 4th of July but with more of the 3 B's ... Beach, BBQs and Bogans!

A few beautiful Aussie ladies are getting into the spirit [spirits?? vodka please!] and going the week with fantastic Aussie designs. So here is my effort today which is kangaroos.

I've used Hello Yellow from Cate Ruby and stamped on top using the Konad Aussie plate A1 that is available here.

What's that skip?? Sarah Claire was too lazy to go out and take her own photo of a kangaroo sign and had to source this one from google images??

Credit ... iStockphoto

Wanna check out other blogs with Australiana nails??? Check out the below links!

.... Aussie Nail Monday - Skittles ...

Ah Aussie Nails Monday I've missed you!! Todays theme is Skittle nails! Mmmmmmm skittles - nom nom nom nom!! Probably not the best thing to remind a girl on a diet about!!

Skittle nails basically is wearing a different colour on each finger - or as a friend describes it "what you wear when you don't know what to wear so you just through on every colour"!!

As this week is Australia Day I'm hoping to bring you some Aussie inspired nails so I'm starting this week with one of my favourite Aussie polish companies.

These beauties are from piCture pOlish and they are stunning.  Left to right is Monroe, Pshiiit, Amethyst and Mad Magenta. I've used 3 coats of each!

Now ... I love the colour combo but poor Mad Magenta just looks plain compared to the other 3 so I fixed that up ;)

So I added Festival on top! YAY!!  That's more like it! FLAKIES SOLVE EVERYTHING!!!!

piCture pOlish Festival is a mixture of blue, red, orange, green and gold flakies. It is similar to Finger Paints Twisted but as that is discontinued [and really hard to get outside the USA], this may be a great alternative.

I'm really loving how the flakes look on Monroe and Amethyst - I'm going to have to do a full mani of this at some stage!

If you don't own anything from piCture pOlish I'd highly recommend changing that. They get the highest recommendation from me and even my mum has brought some - which honestly says A LOT!!

** Check out these blogs also participating in Aussie Nail Monday **

Lissa’s Polish Addiction
Nail Gun XS
Marie’s Manicure Madhouse
Shatter Me Claire
A Polished Prance
Shades of Phoenix
The Epitome of Superficiality
Lacquer Dreams
NananaisNails
Enamoured With Enamel
Adelle1985 (Instagram)
Kelly's Kolors
Polished Peripherals
Every Little Polish
Mel My Issta
Walk In My Eyeshadow
JennLojko (Instagram)
Erinzi’s Nails
Lovessweetas (Instagram)
Jas’ Blingtastic Nails
Mckfresh (Instagram)
Maedaynails (instagram)
Lili_Bete (Instagram)
The Reluctant Femme
Jibber Jabber
Messy Mansion
Nailovelogy
Ronda
It's All About The Polish
Pretty Polish Please

.. Tip Top Nail Chic ...

Tip Top Nail Chic polishes

Available from Tip Top Nails

When I say South Africa what do you think of?? Personally I think of cricket! HA HA HA! With summer in full swing it's an perfectly acceptable Aussie response!

But how about South African nail polish??? I had no idea there were South African brands until these pretties arrived in the mail!!

These are from the company Tip Top [no not the bread place fellow Aussies! Good on ya mum!] and I've quite enjoyed playing with them. They are quick drying and they have a beautiful brush and they apply fantastically!!

The set came with the Tip Top Top and Base Coat - I found this really easy to use and while the top coat wasn't a fast dry, it still dried reasonably quickly!

Let's get too the colours ... This beautiful green is "We have An Green-Mint". I love amusing polish names. They make me smile.

I wasn't sold on this in the bottle but on the nails ... woah!! Loving it so much!!  The world needs more green polishes! The colour reminded me of Granny Smith Apples ... om nom nom nom!

The blue is called "Blue my Whistle" - there is a super pretty blue shimmer that appears in the bottle for this colour but I couldn't get it to replicate on my nails. Shame but it's still a super pretty blue.

Next time I need a sky blue I'm heading straight to this one! Stunning!

The orange is "Orange you lovely" ... and it's a gorgeous shade of orange. It's such a summer colour aswell!

These photos don't justify how vibrant and bright this shade is! You might need to locate your sunnies!

And finally this is Chiffon Squares which is a silver and contrasts the other 3 polishes nicely.

While it's not entirely opaque at 3 coats it's still a stunner and it still looks great by itself or as an accent nail for the other colours!

And I'll finish off with some assorted nail art!

Dotty Dotty Dot!

Big thick stripes!

Polishes were provided for review but all opinions, Aussie humour and dodgy photography are my own!

... Pretty Serious - Blue Gums on Boxing Day ...

Pretty Serious - Blue Gums on Boxing Day

Available from Pretty Serious Cosmetics - $9.95 AUD

Here's one from the memory card and I'll admit ... I wore this on Boxing Day!! Excuse the poor nubs. I am hard on my nails at the best of times but I always have breaks while travelling. Lugging suitcases and what not around - it takes it's toll.

So this is Pretty Serious - Blue Gums on Boxing Day. If you haven't seen Pretty Serious polishes around then where have you been living?? They are a fantastic Aussie brand who have the most beautiful polishes.

So Blue Gums is obviously green and there is a sneaky blue fleck surprise hidden behind all that green goodness!!

And using the Fun1 plate I've done some stamping that had good intentions that didn't appear the way I wished it too.  I've used the "Blues" design ... you know Blues and Guitar ... Blue Gums ... well I thought it was amusing at the time *is the only one in the world laughing*

I used Santas Sunburn for the stamp and I probably should have chosen something more contrasting. Lesson learnt!

** Final Verdict **
Like every other Pretty Serious polish I owe, Kaz has outdone herself with this as it's a beauty. If you love greens then get on this!!

Oh ... I've read on numerous blogs that they were expecting this to be a "blue" and don't get the Blue Gum reference! The Aussie in me finds that amusing but it's basically a tree. There are many variations of blue gums. I'm not a gardener so I have no idea if this pic is actually of the right type of tree ... but it's pretty regardless!!!