Easter Nail Art

Happy Easter Everyone.

First off this weekend my blog has hit 5,000 views, Thank you all so much, its a nicer present that n any Easter egg to know that your reading and hopefully enjoying my blog :) 

So this week, I was undecided what I wanted to do on my nails for Easter! I knew that I fancied a colour injection, but other than that I wasn't too sure!! So I picked 5 bright colours and started from there. I'm sorry I didn't take a photo of my nails before I started to doodle!! 
But here is how my nails turned out. I left both thumbs out of this (incase your wondering)

RIGHT HAND 

So I decided that I would do every nail different, I started with the pretty yellow nail, I was thinking a lil cute Easter chick, I was trying to make it look like he was peeking out of an egg shell, not a bad first attempt, but his eyes and nose could be better!! 

The bunny on the pink finger I think is cute. The other two nails i decided to try to decorate like Easter Eggs, I used nail art pens. I like the end result especially on the blue nail.

LEFT HAND 

As you know I'm dotty for spotty :) and time wasn't on my side unfortunately, so spots over all these pretty colours seemed like a good option to me, and I was happy with the outcome, I didn't spot the drag marks over the spots until I uploaded the photos onto the computer!! 

I had left my ring/yellow finger blank with the intentions of attempting another chick on this finger, but sadly I never got around to it!! But hey, Yellow is a nice Eater colour and it looks pretty as it is I think :) (good excuse? lol) 

WHAT I USED

From Left to Right

• GREEN = Avon Speed Dry + nail enamel - Don't be jaded
• BLUE = Catrice 400- Blue Cara  Ciao
• PINK = Barry M Gelly Hi Shine - Grape Fruit
• YELLOW = Catrice 700 Birdy Reloaded!
• ORANGE = ESSIE 210a Orange, Its Obvious
• BLACK = Essence Color & Go 144 - Black is back
• TOP COAT = NYC 202 Grand Central Station
• WHITE = OPI Alpine snow
• WHITE = Essence tip painter - white
• Nail Art Pens - Orange & Silver = Penneys
• Dotting Tool & Tin Foil

Overall I'm happy with these nails and I've received lotsa compliments for the pretty colours over the weekend :)

What do you think? Did you brighten your nails for the Easter Weekend? leave your link below, I'd luv to see your Easter nail art :) 

Enjoy your Easter Eggs today. Happy Easter 

When a Cheat Treat turns into a Cheat Day!

Hey Guys,

What do you do to celebrate after you’ve had a good result on weigh day? Do you go shopping and buy yourself something nice? Do you met the girls for lunch? Do you allow yourself a glass of wine that evening? Everyone has their own version of a “treat” more so after a hard day or a long week! 

For me, I allow myself something nice after I’ve been weighed on a Saturday, so all during the week, I focus on what lovely thing I really want to have as my “treat” on Saturday. Sometimes it’s a cream egg, other times a cupcake with lotsa butter icing with hot lovely tea, maybe a bag of crisps and a can of coke, it varies for me weekly. Some weeks I may be going out or dinner and that would be my treat, other times a trip to the cinema and ice cream would be my “treat”. Sometimes I’ve thought about it and imagined eating it so much during that week, that come Saturday it’s the last thing I want!! Weird eh!!

But I’ve found that since I was sick at the start of the month, that my one “treat” for being good all week has spilled over into a whole day of cheat eating. So instead of eating one of the above I  could easily have all of the above during the course of the day! Its shameful I know but its true!! And I end up consuming more calories in one day then I usually would in the whole week!!

I know I shouldn’t beat myself up about everything bad that I eat, and I don’t to be honest, but the fact is my cheat treat is becoming a cheat day. And if this day were to turn into a weekend, then I’m only fooling myself!
If I was at the maintaining stage, then this would work for me, because I’d spend 5 days eating good and clean and having 2 days off to eat whatever I like.

I’ve been blaming my “lack of routine” at the weekends, but I know that this is a total cop out!! I know that I’m being lazy and reverting back to my old ways and being a greedy guts, but the thing is, once I get a taste for the wrong thing, I get this out of control feeling and I block out my conscience and in that moment, whatever I’m eating is the nicest, tastiest, yummiest thing I’ve ever had and I HAD to have it.
Also at the weekend I find that I can’t have a cup of tea without having something nice with it? Yip, again I thought that this was a dirty habit I had kicked months ago! Funny how during the week I wouldn’t dream of having anything with my tea, but at the weekend, all bets are off and I HAVE to have something. My inner demons have a lot to answer for.
I live by the motto What I put in my mouth is my responsibility. .but sometimes I’m weak!

At the moment I’m on a slippery slope, and I’m writing this because the long weekend looms and all I’m thinking about is 3 days off = 3 days eating PLUS Easter Eggs…
Which is completely the wrong attitude to have towards the long weekend! I should be planning long walks during the days and making plans to see my friends and family, not thinking about what I’ll eat and if I’ll eat out everyday! The warning bells are starting to go off for me. But I’m hoping that because I’m aware of them I’ll fight them a little bit harder.

I do plan to have a small Easter egg over the weekend and that will be my something nice this weekend. I hope that I will stop at that. I’m my own worse enemy at times!


How do you decide what to "treat" yourself too once a week?? I don’t think that my weekly cheat treat should be food related, it should be a magazine, new top or nail polish, Yet it ends up being a slice of cake or ice cream at the cinema or a dirty Chinese!! which are not really a "treat" because its consuming these foods that have gotten me into this position in the first place!!!

For me this is a vicious circle!! What’s your secret to success?

Zoya PixieDust - London

Since I saw the advertising for Zoya's new product Pixie Dust, I've been looking forward to trying these out for myself. Textured Polish's are everywhere at the moment. I've tried out the OPI Liquid Sand before, see photos here. 

 I really like the look of the bottle, and the colour in the bottle, its all glittery and shimmery.

The instructions say do not apply a base or top coat before using this polish, and it will take two to three coats. 

You really need to let each coat dry before applying another. I used two in these photos and for this colour it was enough

Have a looksy.......

LEFT HAND

RIGHT HAND 

I don't think the photos do this colour justice! Its darker on application than in the bottle, but that's a good thing. And I like the way the glittery bits and catch the light, the camera didn't pick that up I'm afraid.
I like the colour and the shiney aspect.
I'm not a fan of the textured/ sandy feel tho, I'm a high gloss and shiney finish kinda girl, so I'm doing well being on day 3 and I haven't put a top coat over these!! Also there's no tip wear just yet, which is a miracle on my fingers :)
I'm hoping that the taking off process will be easy for these lil beauties. I have another one that I'm dying to try out also :) heehee, cuz one is never enough is it ;)

If you want to get your hands of some of the fab colour from Zoya in Ireland, check out www.supernails.com

Week 11 Weigh-in 2013‏

Its that time of the week again!! this week flew for me!! I spent most of the week trying to recover from the long weekend!!

On the Saturday night I went for a 3 course meal with the boy, it was lush I must say and we enjoyed it, we then went to the cinema and I HAD to have something!! So I had a small packet of peanuts!!

On Sunday, it was St. Patricks Day, my day started with a lovely fry up to “line the stomach” before my day out to break the booze ban, we drank and danced and had a great day, so at 2am it was a great idea to have pizza and chips!! I usually just have a bottle of water as eating on top of booze makes me very sick!!

So on Monday I was a wreck! All resolve, good intentions and will power had left the building! I had a toastie for my breakfast, 2 giant Munchies cookies for my lunch with some coke and then had a lovely Roast in the evening for dinner, followed by apple tart and cream.

I was on a self destruction mission and it worked!!

I had 3 bad days over the weekend and then spent the 4 days of my working week trying to make up for being bold!! This is an old habit of mine creeping back in, and although I’m aware of it, I'm finding it very difficult at the moment to fight the urge!!


On Tuesday morning I was still shattered (aren’t two day hangovers awful) I was back to work and therefore back to some sense of a routine! I drank water and herbal tea all day to try and get rid of the yukky bloated and heavy upset belly I was sporting. I felt like I had gained 5 stone over the long weekend. And it was all down to my own self destruction mode!!
I got a few compliments on Sunday while out about how good I was starting to look, and I let it go to my head “I do look good and I am working hard, so I’ll eat this, this and this” You would think that I’d be learning at this stage of my life, but I’m only too happy to fall back into my own little trap, so that when I fail its my own fault!
BUT because I’ve decided this time to make my journey public, I won’t fail! I’m starting to recognise my triggers and I keep getting back up, even when I do fall down!!

So on Tuesday night I attended what I thought was a 50 minute spin class to try and ease my conscience aswell as my bloated belly!!! The class turned out to be half spin and half abs. it was honestly the longest hour of my life!! The emotions I went through in that long long hour!! I started determined, then I got tired, then my hair fell down. Then my nose started to leak, then my foot almost came loose in the pedal, then I was tired and fit to cry, How sorry I was feeling for myself was no ones business!! Yip I was pathetic! BUT I didn’t stop or walk out! I told myself that I deserved to feel this bad and worse because of what I CHOOSE to eat the three days previous, and this was my punishment!! The abs part of the class was extra tough! By the end of that class even breathing was an effort and every part of me ached!!  But I walked out after that hour feeling like I was taking back control of my body. I had the longest hottest shower afterwards and happily crawled to bed, and slept like a log!!

On Thursday, I was still sore from Tuesday night and was signed up for my regular Spin & Abs class. On my way in I met the instructor and she complimented my weight loss and said I was looking well and asked lotsa questions. I was beaming from the praise from essentially a stranger and this got me through this tough class, where I managed my first side plank from the ankles J its defo the small things!!I don’t know why praise from a stranger boosts me so much more than praise from my family, I guess its because a stranger doesn’t have to comment, so its lovely when they do J and it means a lot to me!

And so I was very anxious about the scales on Saturday morning! Would my 4 good days undo the damage of my 3 really bad days???

It was a funny weigh in, but I’ll share it with you. I was down 1 on the scales, down 2lbs in fat and up 2.5lbs in muscle.

My advisor decided not to “give me the 1 pound loss” even tho I was down, but she said that all the exercise on top of the alcohol had thrown my reading off!!

But I decided that I NEED to give myself the 1 pound and a little pat on the back, I know I should have been down more., but I’m not perfect and these things will happen from time to time!!

I’ve been very lucky this week, I probably should have been up!! And I would have deserved it too!!

I’ve been given the target of 3 lbs for next week, (she said she’ll call it 3 if I loose 2  in the next 7 days!!??)

So I’m going to work hard before the next long weekend as I really really want to have an Easter Egg!!

I hope you had a better week and weigh in than me!!

13lbs  lost, 47lbs to go.... 

Operation Skinnie Minnie update #3

Hey Everyone,

I've just realised with the jigs and reels and dramas of my life for this month, I never did an Operation Skinnie Minnie Progress report!!
I'm afraid I haven't taken any photos of me in lycra this month!! (thank crikey I hear you say, lol)

I did however get dolled up and have a night out, Yip the booze ban has finally been broken :)  I had a ball and it was definatley worth the hangover, so I thought I'd use snaps of my night out to gage the weight loss to date, because after my shrinking violet wrap, I was down 5 inches from all over my body and I feel that me in this dress shows off the loss the best, in particular in the mid region (Can you spot it???? Yip, I've almost found my waist, How exciting is that for me)

Dress = New Look; Cardi = Penneys

Me = Poser

Also one of the girls on Twitter from the #ThinThursday Crew told me about this fab site, www.modelmydiet.com, Basically you made an avatar of yourself, you put in your start weight and your goal weight and it gives you an avatar version of your before and after photos. I liked playing with this I must say, and I like how my muffin top has disappeared in my "after pic"
I recommend you give it a shot, either for fun or for motivation

I know my weight loss has been slow, 12lbs in 10 weeks, but its a loss none the less and means that I have a better chance of keeping the weight off long term, which is of course my over all goal.

Fellow bloggers and my twitter pals have been helping me big time and in particular I should give a mention to The Skinny Doll, I recently took part in her 10lbs in 10 week challenge and succeeded, I look forward to her next one to get us ready for the summer :)

I'd love to hear from you and how your weight loss journey is going. I know that having the support of others is what keeps me on the right track.

Playing with Matte Top Coat

This Nails Inc – Motcomb Street polish I got free with a magazine before Christmas!! It’s a blue/black colour and very inky. The brush wasn't great compared to other nails Inc polish brushes!! 

I found it to be short and thin and not up to the job really!! I ended up with about 3 or 4 coats of this polish on my nails!! You can see from the photos that its all lumpy and poor application by me to be fair!!  

I was over this polish as soon as they had dried!! So I decided that it was my perfect opportunity to test out the new Rimmel Pro Matte Finish that I had purchased during the week (6.95 in my local chemist)

I was trying to be arty and attempted to do a tape mani using the matte finish but unfortunately the black was too thick and lumpy on my nails!! And the whole thing ended up being a disaster! But I said I’d show ye anyways! Its more of a what not to do!! The photos say it all really!!

I decided to paint my right hand all matte since the tape went so wrong on my left hand!! And I kinda liked the blackboard look/ effect. 

Even tho I’m a shiny kinda girl the matte look is kinda cool and I’ll give it another whirl before I make up my mind if its for me!!!  I’ll try this again with a nicer black polish underneath it and report back.

Watch this space........

Week 10 Weigh-in 2013‏

Hey Guys,

I'm happy to report that I hit the scales and was down 2lbs.. Woo Hoo :)

I stuck to my food plan 100% no sugar or junk and I didn't eat after 7pm any night.

My exercise still isn't back to where it was as my annoying cough still hasn't left the building! I managed 2 x lunch time walks and I chanced one class that was 25 mins spinning and 25 mins abs, I coughed my way through the first 10 mins but I was ok after that, phew :)

You can see from the blog that I changed my nail colour's A LOT this week, lol.. And it worked to my advantage :) I didn't eat and someone else had to make the tea

Also as a treat I had a shrinking violet wrap and lost 5 inches from my wobbly bits in under a hour, so I'm very happy over all this week.

This post is short and sweet, I promise to get back to proper blogging about my journey soon because its exactly that a long journey for me.

I hope you got good results this week and enjoyed the St Paddies Day Festivities :)

12lbs  lost, 48lbs to go.... 

St Patrick's Day Nail Art #3

Happy St Patrick's Day

Hey Guys, 

Happy St Patrick's Day :) I decided to do another nail art design for today.

Yesterday I managed to smudge two sets of green nails and smash a bottle of green polish on my mothers tiles!! it wasn't pretty!! 

So I had to walk away from the polish and come back a few hours later when I was calmer and ready to sit until my nails were 100% dry with no chance of smudging!! 

LEFT HAND 

So as you can see, I decided to use my dotting tool and make vertical tri colours on my fingers :) I then did a stripey version on my thumb and chanced doing a shamrock on my accent finger

RIGHT HAND

I decided to stick to vertical tri colours for all my fingers on my right/ bad hand, and I was happy with the results in the end.

What do you think? Have you gone green for today??

Here's what I used

NYC 298 High Line Green,
W7 Green,
OPI Alpine White,
Essie Orange, its Obvious,
NYC 202 Grand Central Station,
Tin Foil + Dotter

St Patrick's Day Nail Art #2

I decided that I really liked this colour so I wanted to keep my nail art attempts to a minimum so I could show off the lovely colour.

I decided that little leprauchan hats/ best buckles would be attempted.

I then decided to try a shamrock on my thumb... As you can see, I need a A LOT of practise!! 

I topped off the lot with a coat of Seche Vite, you can see the drag marks on some of the nails! But overall I'm happy with the results.

What do you think??

Catrice - 740 King of Greens

I'm still sporting the green. So I'm really having a green week in honour of our patron saint. I'm liking all the different shades of green I must say and I hadn't realised I had so many in my collection, so there's no harm in giving them a day out :)

This green is Catrice - 740 King of Greens, Its a nice dark green with a gold shimmer going through it. its thick in consistency and it went on very well. I put on two coats and then Seche Vite to give it a lovely shine

What shade of green are you sporting??

St Patrick’s Day Nail Art #1

I got bored of these plain green nails  after a day, although shiny and eye catching, I was dying to doodle on them. And so my NYC - High Line Green nails were turned into pots of gold, at least that is what I was trying to do!! 

I used nail art pens from Penneys to do these, I should really have done the “gold” in yellow and put glitter over, but shoulda, woulda, coulda.

Not a bad first attempt

What  do you think?

NYC -High Line Green

For the week that is in it I've decided that green will be my colour of choice and after rooting thru my stage I've found that I have 7 different shades. I liked the look of this NYC polish in the bottle and so it was the chosen one to be tested. It needed 2 coats and was shiny on its own, but I love my Seche Vite so it HAD to be added.

What do you think? Are you turning green this week??