Glamour Magazine November Freebies - Nails Inc Nail Polishes

Out of four Nails Inc polishes to choose from as a freebie with this month's Glamour magazine I decided to go for Elizabeth Street (Pale Pink) and Motcomb Street (Blackened Navy). The other 2 polishes available were St James (Classic Red) and Glamour Glitter (Gold Glitter). I think this is a great deal as the nail polishes are worth 11 pounds each.

Having said that, I must say I was not that impressed by Elizabeth Street. The formula was not that great and there was visible nail line even after 3 coats. I am just wondering if I got a bad bottle as I had such high hopes from Nails Inc polish. Let me know if you want to see the swatches of these two polishes.

OOTD + How to wear patterned tights

I have always considered patterned tights to be a bit tricky to pull off...... Here is a picture of how I wore it today...

One of the easiest ways to wear it would be with a simple/plainish black sheath dress and plain black pumps. As long as your tights are not fish net, I am sure it would look nice.

If you are a little apprehensive, you can ease yourself into this trend by wearing it with simple black boots. This way you hide most of the tights in boots.

Try and keep everything else solid/plain/understated. If you do want to mix patterns try and keep distance between the patterns...like the above picture with plain skirt and cardigan with a printed scarf. Try and stick to similar colours if combining patterns and make sure you have one main plain/solid article on to pull it all together.

I like even the footwear to be simple, so that there are not many things competing for your eyes' attention.

How do you wear your patterned tights? Feel free to share your thoughts in comments below...

Movember Nails

As you all probably know, Movember is a charity event held every year during November where guys grow their moustaches in order to raise awareness about Men's health (particularly Prostrate Cancer) and raise funds. Few of my team mates at work have become "Mo Bros" and convinced me to be a "Mo Sister".

Here is a picture of my effort to join in.

I don't normally do free hand nail art, but since moustache water decals that I had ordered from e-bay had not arrived , I decided to go ahead after watching a couple of you tube videos. Here is a link to a great video. I have used Model's Own Nail Art Pen in black for the tash and base colour is from Miss Sporty. I don't think I quite got it right, but I know what to do differently the next time... :)

Striping Tape Nail Art

I guess I was not quite ready to give up on summer when I did these nails. I started with painting Model's Own Jade Stone. But then I felt that it was a little too bright for the weather we are having. So I decided to add a really wintery colour (Revlon's Plum Night). I love both these shades on its own, but I think together they look even more beautiful. This was done using striping tapes (ebay - £1.95 for 10 pcs here). This can be time consuming and sometimes fiddly....but perfect for while catching up on some TV shows....
Formula on both these polishes is great. First coat is a bit streaky, but nothing that can't be evened out in the second coat.
Tip : It is best to cut all the pieces of striping tape in one go and sticking on the edge of the table, as you don't want to be using a scissor or trying to find the end of striping tape with freshly painted nails...

Let me know if you would like to see a detailed tutorial on this nail art....

Too big a boot to fit in?

If you have got really skinny legs (read chop-sticks), I am sure you would understand what I mean by this post title. I have really skinny calves (and ankles) and find it extremely difficult to find long boots that fit. Being just 5 foot tall doesn't help my case either. Believe me when I say that I have tried on quite a few pairs of boots in quite a few high street stores. But even though it might seem like the boots are made for just for me when seen on the model, they just don't fit properly. If they don't sag, they just generally sit at my calves looking like wellies... In my search for long boots I came across a couple of sites that do boots by calf measurement.

Duo

They have a good range of boots to choose from with an equally good range of calf widths to choose from. (30 cms -50 cms) They have a fitting store in London and the customer service there was excellent. Definitely worth a visit if you fall in either extremes of calf widths. It can be a bit pricey, but the quality is excellent and you do get what you pay for. They have also opened an outlet site recently. I think these ones are perfect for everyday wear with their classic design and comfortable mid-heels and are my personal favourite.

The Boot Makers

I haven't tried this site yet...but is on my list to try next...especially because they do take into account your ankle measurement as well as the boot height.

High Street

The other option is the stretchy fabric ones available from stores like Next and Marks and Spencer. Personally I think the M&S ones fit better for skinnier calves. The second and the third link below are more or less the same quality, but the next ones were a bit loose on me.. Bear in mind that I tried it on with just tights as I generally don't like to wear boots on jeans as I think it breaks up my height.

Here are the links to the various stretch fabric boots that I have tried on...

http://www.next.co.uk/x502342s7

http://www.next.co.uk/x50344s9

http://www.marksandspencer.com/Almond-Knee-High-Stretch-Boots/dp/B002XGP2Z2?ie=UTF8&ref=sr_1_1&nodeId=407084031&sr=1-1&qid=1351993570&pf_rd_r=1PX3TEQ8V51CJBW2RSBV&pf_rd_m=A2BO0OYVBKIQJM&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_i=407084031&pf_rd_p=321381387&pf_rd_s=related-items-3