China Glaze goodies!

Hello, hello! I'm taking a little break from uni work to write a few posts and to cure the boredom! The lovely postman brought me some goodies yesterday morning so I had to share them with you. Hopefully my nail polish photography skills will improve sometime soon :(

Raven Cosmetics is becoming a firm favourite and I placed my second order a couple of days ago. Postage is pretty quick and came 2 days after I paid, so I cannot complain!

I opted for the China Glaze lucky dip (again) purely because it's such good value! 3 bottles for £12, with 15% off each order at the check out. Can't get better than that to be honest!

First up is the lovely, lovely 'Velvet Bow' which is a really deep maroon red. I put this on as soon as I could, and it's so dark. This would look much more amazing on long nails, which makes me miss my acrylic nails so much! Hopefully I can keep going with my natural nails for a bit longer. They're soooo bendy and it really creeps me out. 

I think this colour will grow on me the more I wear it. It's very dark and wintery so it will be lovely with a bit of glitter at christmas time.

Next up is "Glittering Garland" which is growing on me. I never really was a massive fan of green polish until I got Revlon's Emerald City matte suede. 

I tried to take a close up of all the shimmery, glittery flakes in this polish but I think my little camera may have let me down :( The photos just don't do it justice and it's such a pretty green. However, it's a bit dark for spring/summer so this one might get more use in the autumn and especially at christmas time. 

Last up from my China Glaze goodies is "Lighthouse", which is a shimmery, golden yellow. Personally, I would have given it another name like Daffodil or something summery.

At first I thought it was really similar to CG's 'Champagne Bubbles' but on comparison that's gold with silver flecks. 'Lighthouse' is so pretty. It's a yellow base with shimmer that complements the colour nicely. This will look really pretty in the summer, especially if you've got tanned skin. 

Overall, I'm extremely happy with the colours I received as I don't have any almost identical or similar. I'm glad I received a deep red because I don't own many at all. 

Have you ever bought a nail polish lucky dip? Were you happy with the colours you received?

xxx

China Glaze

While searching for new colours, I found a wonderful little website called Raven Cosmetics and purchased a few new little beauties! Every order has 15% off, no matter what your total cost and postage is reasonable; as is delivery time. I'd definitely purchase from there again.

Be warned, this may be a long, picture-heavy post!

L-R: Stella, Wink, In Awe Of Amber, Champagne Bubbles

I've been wanting China Glaze's 'Stella' for quite a while now, so of course, I purchased that. I love this colour. It's a deep and rich purple with a magenta tone and looks fabulous. I currently have it on my fingernails and it only needed 2 coats to be completely opaque.

Now I can cross it off my Wish List!

Raven Cosmetics have a great Lucky Dip promotion, 3 China Glaze polishes for £12, and several others too. They're well worth checking out if you don't mind what colours you receive. With an individual value of around £39, this is a brilliant deal.

The first Lucky Dip polish is 'Wink.'

A nude/beige sheer polish with a very very subtle shimmer.

This is so sheer that I imagine you'd need 4-5 coats before it became anywhere near opaque. I've used it on my toes just as a bit of a shimmery-sheen. I'm more of a colour girl so perhaps this will be used as a base coat.

Secondly, 'In Awe Of Amber' is a polish I probably wouldn't have purchased if I had the choice, BUT after testing it out on my practice wheel it's a lovely bronze/amber shimmer. 

It reminds me of swatches of OPI 'Warm and Fozzie' from The Muppets collection, so on review I'm pretty happy that I own something similar. The glitter particles are smaller than in 'Warm and Fozzie' but I reckon it's pretty close. 

Lastly, from my Lucky Dip, we have 'Champagne Bubbles' from the Holiday 2011 collection which is a gold base with silver glitter particles. Again, in the bottle, it isn't something I probably would have popped in my basket but I may have changed my mind. Gold polish hasn't always been my favourite because I'm rather pasty and feel that it looks nicer on tanned or darker skin. However, with a black outfit and gold accessories it would look fab. The silver glitter looks lovely with the gold base and really show up on the swatch.

In my order was a free 4ml mini Nails Inc. polish, which was a nice gesture. 

I received 'Swan Walk' which is a lovely baby pink with a blue shimmery tone to it. It's very sheer so would need multiple coats to become opaque. 

I'm very happy with my first China Glaze polishes and I will definitely be purchasing from Raven Cosmetics again in the future! 

 www.ravencosmetics.co.uk

xxx