Obligatory Christmassy Stuff

Well Ho Ho Ho to y'all! I did some Christmas nail art in the few moments I had to myself in the raucous Christmas season! Yeah okay so I'm posting on Boxing Day, but I know a lot of you are still celebrating the Big Day, so I wanted to share. Hope you're ready for a whole lotta green, red and gold!

More after the jump......

ABC Challenge: O

Hello there! I know, slack blogger is still slack, but I've had SO many new beautiful new babies to play with lately (ordered online, and also my local Farmers (NZ equivalent of Target) has just started stocking Essie polishes - previously unavailable in stores here!!) so I haven't been concentrating on getting blog posts ready - sorry! >.< I'd like to say I'll get better but in all honesty, there's a strong likelihood that I'll stay as slack as ever especially as we get into the crazy holiday retail season! Anywho, today I have a nice bold PINK to share with you for 'O'. Presenting Sinful Colors Oasis.

ABC Challenge: D

Hello there, friends! Today's post is gonna be a bit of a guessing game for me, as I did this mani over two months ago (>.<) so I'm having a wee bit of a hard time remembering specifics! Let's see how we go...

Today's featured polish is China Glaze Dance Baby. I'm pretty sure I used two coats for these photos.

 Click through to see how I nail-art-y-ed it up!

ABC Challenge: C

Well hello again, friends! Welcome to day 3 of my ABC Challenge! As mentioned at the end of yesterday's post, I had no idea what I was gonna do for 'C', and since I'm crazy-indecisive, I decided to jam two (and a half) polishes into this post so I didn't have to choose which one to showcase. I'mma make today's one nice and quick - here's OPI Can't Find My Czechbook and Charged Up Cherry!

Golden Glitz

Hiya lovelies!! Happy Friday! ^_^ It's after 9pm, and I have a BIG day tomorrow (going to a friend's wedding, and I'm doing her nails in the morning - eek!!) so I'm a bit too tired and lazy to do proper writings of wonderfully witty snippets of goodness. Instead, you can just enjoy the pics of my latest Christmas mani!

All nails are two coats of OPI Glitzerland, and the accent nails are dotted with OPI Big Apple Red and China Glaze Holly-Day. Everything's topped off with a coat of Cult Nails Wicked Fast.

Sorry for the nasty dry cuticles - I've been neglecting them lately =(

That's all, folks! Quick and painless, huh? =P Hope you all have exciting weekends ahead! Thanks for stopping by ^_^

Quickie for Nickie

Hiya!! Hope your Mondays are off to a nice easy start! I've got a super quick post dedicated to one of the most wonderful ladies I've met in the nail-blogging community - Nicole of Young Wild and Polished. She is insanely talented, amazingly sweet and tears-in-your-eyes, rolling-on-the-ground-clutching-your-sides funny! On top of all of that, she's one of the most supportive and understanding ladies I've ever talked to, and she's dealt with more crap than anyone should have to and has come out smiling! 

Nic (and Dot) - this one's for you! ♥

Watermarbling is Nicole's self-confessed "gateway nail art", so I used OPI Kiss Me On My Tulips and Black Onyx for a double nail marbled accent à la Nic. I used the same colours on my pinky and index fingers to re-create a design that she's been playing with since she got her Born Pretty Store nail striping tape. Honestly, doll, I dunno how you do it so neatly - that tape was not cooperating with me!! A coat of Seche Vite topped it all off.

These flowers are absolutely 100% what I associate with Nicole! They are so trademark Young, Wild and Polished that if I ever see them re-created anywhere (not just stolen like on Instagram, grrrr...) I automatically think of her! She's got a quick and easy-to-follow tutorial to let you borrow some of her talent ^_^. I used the same polishes again, and added some light dots throughout in China Glaze Something Sweet. I stole this directly from one of her Instagram photos (obviously I highly recommend following her). 

So there ya go! Go check out Young, Wild and Polished for some gorgeous nail art and some serious lols, or follow her on Twitter and Instagram! Thanks for reading, babes! 

Dots on a Stranger Tide

Hello you lovely people! Hope you're having a wonderful day =D Mine was pretty wonderful - I did.... nothing. Absolutely nothing! It was great! Don't cha just love those days? Today's mani features a polish I bought a while ago and lost instantly to my mother's stash. I re-adopted it and found it extremely difficult to take off because I loved it so much! I'm really not a green-polish kinda gal, but OPI Stranger Tides won me over in a heartbeat.

This is two coats over a base coat of OPI Don't Touch My Tutu!. TBH, the base coat really doesn't make a difference to this shade, it's just a precaution because I'm trying to encourage my nails to un-stain themselves ;-). If any of you have at-home tips for nail stain removal, I'd appreciate them! I've already tried the lemon juice and the baking soda ones to no avail. Humph. 

Yummy yummy yummy! This grey-green has enough green in it to make sure it's definitely a green, but lacks enough green to be wearable everyday. My other couple of green polishes get pulled out for Christmas and St Patrick's day, and for the occasional rainbow, but otherwise I steer WELL clear of green polish. Not this baby. We've started a very serious affair ♥♥.

It took me a long time (and a couple of tries) to decide what, if any, design to put over Stranger Tides. I thought black would dampen it too much, stamping would hide too much of the shade, I didn't want to marble with it, I even considered pairing it with a lilac for a while (still a combo that I want to try sometime, whaddaya think?), and finally settled on a tape / dot design with white that amplifies the deliciousness that is this nail polish.

I used a small/medium dotting tool for the polka dots on my middle and pinky fingers, and used this technique on my index and ring fingers, except I taped down the nail on a diagonal instead of across the tip and painted the exposed nail in OPI Alpine Snow, the same polish I dotted with.

I think I'm getting pretty good at my polka dotting, whaddaya reckon?

I really like how this mani turned out, especially as it took me about 3 days to settle on a design I really liked! Yeah, I am extremely indecisive... Anywho, do you like it? What's your favourite polish that you can't bear to cover? Thank you so much for reading!! Hope you enjoy the rest of your week! =)

Tutorial: Interlocked Dot Mani

Hiya lovelies! Happy Saturday! Quick little post today - I haven't really been in the blogging mood since Wednesday's post =\ dunno why, maybe I'm low on whatever vitamin sparks the desire to blog? Anywho, I've had a crack at making my first picture tutorial for a mani that I don't really know what to call... It was this one here... I promised the next time I tried it I'd make a step-by-step guide, so that's exactly what I've done =). This time it's with China Glaze Aquadelic and OPI No Room For The Blues. Will shhh now... Enjoy!

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If you give it a go I'd love to see the outcome! Tag me @RFTP_NZ on Twitter or post it to RFTP's Facebook wall =)

Do you prefer photo or video tutorials? Do you often try a mani you've seen around or do you just like seeing how it's done? Enjoy your weekends, lovely people, and thank you for reading! 

Play Time with OPI

Hiya lovely people! Today's mani is one that I wasn't sure I would ever post, but the response from some lovely ladies who saw it was so positive, I decided to share it here too =). I like to play around with different manis and techniques while watching TV / listening to music if I have down time, and this mani was born while watching Bedlam. Not the most amazing series ever, but I'm totally hooked! Anyway, onto the nails...

I started with two coats of OPI Kiss Me On My Tulips (have you noticed I've been using that a LOT lately? Can't help it, it's pink perfection!) and after applying some magical Seche Vite to speed the drying process along, I taped off the tips of my nails and created a thick french mani with OPI No Room For The Blues. With a medium-sized dotting tool I added dots of NRFTB at even spaces along the bottom edge of the 'french tip', then dotted KMOMTL between the blue dots on the other side... Do you kinda get what I mean? I didn't bother to take step-by-step snaps because I didn't know how it was going to turn out, but if I do this again I'll definitely keep a photo record for ya!

A coat of SV over everything dried and set it all, and took away *most* of the 3D effect of the dotting. Naturally I had to grab my Rimmel Lycra Pro Matte Top Coat for some yummy matte goodness. It's so nice to know that if a mani doesn't look great after applying a matte top coat, you can just apply another shiny top coat and pretend it never happened! ;-)

Whaddya reckon - is this a cool effect you'd want to try yourself, maybe with some colours that don't contrast so much? What does it remind you of? Do you love matte manis as much as I do? (As if that's possible... =P )

Thanks SO much for stopping by, lovelies! 

Spot the Dots

Hiya lovelies! Another one 'from the vault' for you today! I wore this mani just over a week ago after I'd gone through the entries for Marta's 'Dots of Fun' competition and had a spark of inspiration! See if you can spot the one that inspired this dotty mani! My base colours are China Glaze Pelican Gray and OPI No Room For The Blues. Two coats of each started me off.

Aside from my two base colours, I also used BYS Black Satin, Sky's The Limit, and Revlon Indigo Night. I'm glad I took this photo because I never would've remembered what polishes I used =P

Then I got dotting! Using a relatively small dotting tool, I started with Black Satin first and dotted a dot in the middle of each nail. Well, that was the intent anyway. On my index and pinky nails, I missed... I followed the 'centre' dot back down to make a triangle. Then going from the darkest blue to the lightest, I followed the triangle back. On my index + pinky nails, you can see I put the blue outside the black because the design didn't come far enough down the nail for my liking. I don't know if I like it or not, but it's done =P.

You can see I added the grey in where it would be silly to dot in the same colour as my base coat. I'm working on getting my dots more uniform... so far not so good... Not as neat as I would've liked but the overall effect is pretty nifty.

So there you have my inspired dotti-cure. What nail blogs spark your inspiration most often? What's the most random thing that's inspired a mani for you? Thanks for stopping by! =D

Pink Wednesday: Inspired!

Happy Wednesday, fellow polish addicts! Today's Pink Wednesday post was inspired by one of the costumes in the show I'm currently in - Hairspray! For those of you who don't know the show / haven't seen the movie, there's a scene in which Tracy (the 'pleasantly plump' heroine) is trying to convince her previously housebound mother to come out and embrace the 60's! If you've seen it, see it again here, or if you haven't, watch it and love it! In the stage show there are three 'Pinky's girls' that come out of 'Mr Pinky's Hefty Hideaway' (a plus sized clothing store) and welcome Tracy and her mom to the world of 60's fashion. When I saw their costumes in the dress rehearsals, I knew I had to make a mani out of them! They're so gorgeous! Check it out:

I used two coats of BYS French White as my base colour for the white nails, and the pink is China Glaze Something Sweet which seemed perfect for the theme! (Tracy and her mom are rather fond of sweet things...). I used a dotting tool for the dots and used an unnumbered fauxnad stamp for the bow using French White. I did have some necklaces stamped on my thumbs but they came out so badly that I didn't bother to photograph them... 

 Cutest little bow!

Here's a glimpse of the costume that inspired the mani. I'm a somewhat enthusiastic photographer so when we started dress rehearsals I knew I had to capture the incredibleness! The costumes and the set are all directly from the Melbourne production that toured Australia, and they're simply mind-blowing. So much colour and gorgeousness!!

So I went for the pink, white, dots and bow. So cute! Whaddaya reckon, did I nail it? (tee hee...) What was the last random thing that inspired a mani for you? Do you ever do your nails to match your outfit? Thanks for checking in, babes! Enjoy the rest of your week, not long to go now! =D

Matte For Me

My darlings, I'm so sorry I've been away for sooooooo long! Two weeks feels like an eternity and I'm feeling so guilty about it, I hope you'll forgive me! Obviously while I was away I couldn't paint my nails, so there was a week with no polish (aarrrgh!!!), and the manual work resulted in me ripping several nails and having to trim them all back to uber stubby little nubbins! On top of all that, it's just been a rubbish time for me personally so inspiration wasn't exactly flying rampant around my head. All of this combined means I hadn't actually painted my nails at all for about two weeks! Blasphemy on a nail blog I know, but hopefully now that everything's settling down a bit more I'll get my life under control and the blog will follow ;-).


Now, on a wee shopping spree (and I do mean wee, 3 tops and 1 nail polish... only 1!!!!) I stumbled upon a Matte Top Coat in the newly erected Rimmel stand in our local Farmers (department store). I saw it, loved it, talked myself out of it, came back to it about 3 times then finally bought it! Sooo glad I gave in and splurged on that $13 for this baby - I've been itching for a matte top coat for ages but they're not common here at all. So naturally, I have a matte mani for you today!

I started with two coats of BYS Black Satin on my index, middle and pinkie fingers, and painted my accent nails in OPI Glitzerland. The gold shimmer takes a bit more to become opaque so this is three generous coats. Stamped over top is Black Satin with my brand spankin' new Bundle Monster Plates, which you have no idea how excited I was to get! They arrived within a few days of placing my order, and I had a major blonde moment while placing my order (clicked the wrong set... duh...) and the wonderful customer service people sorted it all out for me with no fuss at all - massively impressed!! Buy from them, they're lovely! (Can't remember which plate... I might edit in plate number later...)

I added a coat of Seche Vite to all my nails, mostly to have them dry fast but also because the brush for the matte top coat is white and I didn't want to stain it black on the first use!

I just had to go MATTE - so I added a top coat of Rimmel Lycra Pro Matte Finish to my black nails... Yum yum yum yum!!! Then I dotted Glitzerland over the black to tie it all together. I only used one dotting tool, but by not re-dipping in the polish I got the different sized dots. I had to go over the dots twice as that stunning gold shimmer is just so darn sheer!

Well, whaddaya think? Is this mani awesome enough to excuse my absence? I promise to try and keep up, it's just life's a bit of a poo sometimes and painting my nails was the last thing on my mind for a while there. 


Matte polish: yay or nay? Feedback, lovely people, I do love hearing from you! Enjoy your week!

Spotted Barefoot

Hello hello, lovely people! It's almost Friday, yay! I have a quick spotty mani for you today. This mani is inspired by some wrapping paper I saw while shopping for a friend's birthday present. You know you're obsessed with nail art when you see random things and think "that would make a great mani"! 

For the base colour I used two coats of OPI Barefoot In Barcelona - the most 'nude' colour in my entire collection. This is my go-to pedi colour but it made its way to my tips for today! Dotted over it is BYS Baby Let's Cruise and China Glaze Something Sweet, which arrived today. I love new polishes!

I used my biggest dotting tool and applied random dots of Baby Let's Cruise first, then added Something Sweet over those dots with the same sized dotting tool. Then I went back with a smaller dotting tool and added more Baby Let's Cruise to fill in any gaps. I like the different layers - it adds to the randomness. 

An attempted Macro shot. I didn't get out while the sun was available today so the photos suffered, sorry! 


Have you ever spotted something while out and about and thought 'that would make a great mani'? Did you get around to recreating it on your tips? If you've got pics, I'd love to see 'em! Post them on RFTP's Facebook page if you wanna share =). Thanks for checking in, babes!