Fotheringhay Castle

Oh my, Adina did it again! A England has a new collection, and these polishes are exactly what I think of when I think of Adina's creations. Flawless application, great coverage (I'll tell you straight away that I think these 5 polishes all work for stamping, wooo!) and stunning colors that all have that A England feel to them. Yeah, what can I say, I'm a fan :) The Elizabeth & Mary collection brings us 5 polishes, and they all deserve a post of their own!

But having said that, I'm very busy at the moment and I'll be visiting my boyfriend soon again as well (he lives in a different country), yay! So I'm not sure when you'll see the other 4 on my blog. I've swatched them all today, but that's something I can do in between, sorting pics takes more time! I do want to prepare some posts as well - if I find the time for it. But i it goes quiet on my blog for a while, you'll know why :) Oh! And my giveaway ended today and I've emailed the winner of the Mont Blue files. Congratulations Angela!

Now, I was telling you about A England beauties, time to show the first one! No basecoat, 2 thin coats, with top coat.

A England Fotheringhay Castle.

Fotheringhay Castle has that holographic effect that we know from A England, but unfortunately there wasn't any sun when I swatched this polish. So I wanted to use my lamp... and then I dropped it :/ Right, next option, flash!

photo taken with flash

Here the holo effect does show up a bit better, but I can't wait to see this in real sunlight!

Fotheringhay Castle has an olive green base with a touch of golden glow and it's packed with holographic sparkle.

This is not my usual kind of color, but it won me over straight away, I love this one! And if I had more time I'd try it for stamping right now ♥ What do you think of it?

The Elizabeth & Mary collection can be found on the A England website, or in webshops like Hypnotic Polish. Thanks for stopping by & take care!


The product(s) in this post was/were send to me for review. For more information, please have a look at my Disclosure Policy.

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Aaaand here's another stamped mani

This time with double blue, although the stamping shows a little more silver than blue on my pics :)

OPI I saw...U Saw...We Saw...Warsaw with Kiko 623 Blue and plate Lily Anna 09.

I never used that image before, but I like it! But it was a bit tricky to stamp with a metallic, those fine lines with a fast drying polish... Had to clean the plate a lot more than usual, and had a few fails on the stamper as well! But it ended up fine on my nails :)
Thanks for stopping by & have a great weekend ♥

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A green oldie from the vault!

Good morning, here's a mani that ended up in my still-to-post folder and never came out again, oops! Think it's from last year even, lol! Ah well, better late than never, right? :)

Cadillacquer I'm The One Who Knocks with China Glaze Jolly Holly and plate DRK-C.

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Sponged leopard

Hey all! For this mani I started with a cream base and randomly sponged some different brown polishes on it. That didn't look nice at all to be honest and I was ready to take it off again, but figured I could at least test 1 nail with the stamping I had planned. Turns out the stamping pulled it all together! Note to self: if random sponging doesn't look good, stamping might fix it :)

OPI My Vampire Is Buff sponged with Catrice Lost In Mud & Walk In The Woods and Essence The Only Chance! & Jungle Drum, stamped with Konad Black and Pueen plate 09.

Thanks for stopping by and take care ♥

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Used 3 favorites... can't go wrong with that!

Hi guys! Picking favorites is near impossible for me, or well, it becomes that when I have to narrow it down, haha! There's a LOT of polish and stamping images that I absolutely love, and my top picks vary from time to time as well. Having said that, the polishes and image that I used for that mani are things you've seen before on my blog - several times even! So yeah, they definitely belong on my favorites list :)

Catrice How I Matt Your Mother with China Glaze Deviantly Daring and Konad plate m64.

Deviantly Daring is richer in color than it shows here (still learning the camera a bit!), but either way, I hope you'll like it as much as I do :) Thanks for looking and have an awesome weekend! ♥

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Copper & cream

Morning all! The OPI that I used for this mani came with a magazine deal that I recently got; 4 colors and a base-/topcoat together with 6 months of a magazine. Don't really care much about the latter, but I sure am happy with the polish! This color is one that I didn't have yet, and I can see myself using it a lot as base for nailart. It did need 3 coats, it applied a bit streaky and soso, but the third coat evened things out. I went with some copper stamping, I like it but I do think I have to get used a bit to this color combo :)

OPI My Vampire Is Buff with Essence Copper Rulez! and DRK XL Designer plate 1.

I'm sitting here waiting for the WoW patch to go live - if you also play, enjoy! Few more weeks, can't wait!! :) Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

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Mont Blue Giveaway!

Thanks to the lovely people from Mont Blue, I'm giving away a set of 3 glass nail files! 1 lucky winner will receive all 3 nail files as shown on the picture above, which are hand decorated with Swarovski crystals and come with black velvet sleeves. You can read more about this specific set here.

I've done a review on some products from Mont Blue before, and I'm very happy that I get to host this giveaway, because I absolutely love their products ever since I started using them! Great quality products, perfect for your nails, and they come in all sorts of colors and designs ♥

Here's some extra information:
- The giveaway is open internationally.
- There will be one winner, who will receive the nail file set "Waterfall Color - Lilac" as shown above.
- The winner will be contacted within 24 hours after the giveaway closes, and then has 48 hours to reply.
- After the winner has replied, I will send the winner's contact information to Mont Blue, who will take it from there.
- Mont Blue will ship the prize directly to the winner.
- You can only enter by using the Rafflecopter widget below, entries in comments do not count.

Good luck everyone!! :)

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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Swirly blue

Good morning! A little bit of sun, perfect for a little bit of holo :) Have a lovely Sunday ♥

W.I.C. By Herôme Örebro with China Glaze Strap On Your Moonboots and DRK XL Designer plate 1.

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Plum Wine

Morning lovelies, I'm way too tired to write much, so I'll keep it short! *mumbles something about a late photography course and a cat that thought it was good to get up early* Here's a purple & magenta post:

Catrice Plum Play With Me with China Glaze Don't Make Me Wine and Bundle Monster plate BM-005.

Love the shimmery stamping, I almost forgot about the Autumn Nights collection and how well they stamp, those go on my to-use-soon pile straight away! Thanks for stopping by, wish you a great weekend :)

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Brit Chick stamped

Hey guys! Brit Chick is a polish from Catrice Check & Tweed collection, and it's a bit of an unusual color thanks to the subtle silver shimmer. The basecolor is a brown/burgundy kinda color, which can look quite dark depending on the light, almost chocolatey brown with red. Because of that it made me think of cherry brownies at times, although I'd prefer those over this polish at any time, haha!

Catrice Brit Chick with China Glaze Delight andBornPrettyStore plate QA27.

Because of the unusual combo with the silver, I wasn't sure what stamping polish to choose. But China Glaze never fails me, Delight did the trick! Thanks for looking and take care :)

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Golden leaves

Good morning all, it's still sunny but boy am I loving the Fall colors again! There's a bunch of them sitting on my desk already, waiting for me to wear them again =) It's almost like I have a whole new stash, so much polish to rediscover! ♥ For this mani I used a base with a subtle golden shimmer, and went with a matching stamping polish.

Catrice Squeeze Me with China Glaze 2030 and Bundle Monster plate BM-023.

Hope you like it :) Have a great weekend and take care!

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Sue

Today is a bit special for me, it's Sue's 12th birthday :) I normally don't celebrate my cats' birthdays, in fact, I'm not even sure on their real date of birth, since they're sheltercats and they estimate their age and pick a matching date. But I knew Sue was from October, and I looked it up the other day, they put her Bday on the 3rd which is today!

Sue came into the shelter early 2003 and I couldn't help but falling in love with that chubby kitten with the little head and big eyes, that started to knead with her paws as soon as someone walked in the room ♥ She came home with me and has never stopped being what I fell for in the first place and she's always been such a sweet and cuddly cat! But a few years ago I wasn't sure if she'd be with me much longer. In 2011 Sue had a tumor removed, which turned out to be much bigger than we expected and was an aggressive form of cancer, and the chance was very big that it would come back. About 1.5 years later my sweet Bindi was diagnosed with cancer as well, and it turned out to be pretty much the same kind of cancer. In her case it came back within a few months, and as you might remember, I had to say goodbye... It's a year ago later this month and I still miss her very often :( Bindi was my first and oldest cat, and she would've become 12 a couple of months ago. It stays a bit weird that Sue is the oldest now, and is now an age that Bindi never made. Going through all of that with Bindi, made me realize even more how lucky Sue's been that her cancer hasn't returned! But a while ago, Sue all of a sudden seemed so much older, she just looked and acted as if she was several years older already, and I wasn't sure how that would continue. She was healthy, but just seemed so old all of a sudden! It scared me big time tbh.

But now? Sue's changed lately and seems younger than before! She's doing fantastic, and we've recently been to the vet who confirmed that she's safe now from that cancer to return (else that would've happened already), since it's been over 3 years now, big yay!! If she would get cancer again it's simply very bad luck, and not the old cancer returning. Besides that, she even lost quite a bit of weight, something which I never thought would happen! We sure did try throughout the years, but her problem was simply being such a lazy cat, lol! But last couple of weeks she even plays a bit every day - and I don't mean lift her paw and poke at something, no, actually run and play :o So having said all that, you can maybe understand why this specific birthday is a bit more special for me. I know I'm very lucky to still have her with me, I'm also very happy that she's been doing so great lately. Happy Birthday to my sweet girl ♥

Here's how Sue usually spends her days (except lately then, there's more variation now, haha)! Sleeping somewhere, and at times hiding her head in her paws, so cute!

But she's also great at pulling silly faces! Sniffing the cold of a homemade popsicle :)

She enjoys valerian toys at times, cuddles them and kicks them with her back legs. This toy has various things inside, not just valerian, and they love it!

But those backlegs also make an excellent pillow, which she often uses

If Sue wants something, she knows how to get it, and she loves her belly cuddles at times. How can I sit behind the pc with her in front of my keyboard like this! :)

Sue refuses a lot of food (another thing that's changed a bit lately, she actually eats a very specific type/brand/flavor cat candy now!) but if there's one thing she loves... No, it ain't meat or fish, it's licking off fruit or veggies, lol! So yes, at times she's allowed to do so, and for her Bday she may lick off a piece of pear later today :P

Another thing that Sue loves, rolling upside down. Often from left to right, but sometimes also just half upside down, and at times she forgets that there's a leg still sticking in the air. No, this isn't a broken cat, it's how she works, haha!

I can't express how much she means to me, she's always there, loves to snooze with me (especially during nights, she's often near me to be my pillow and wrap my arms around :)) and it's just so brilliant to see her come to live more lately! I hope she'll be with me for many more years to come :)

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Summer meets Fall

Hi guys! We're having a bit strange weather atm, one moment it's all grey and bleh, the next it's sunny. So today I went with a mani that combines a typical Summer polish (holo!) and a color that's oh so perfect for Fall. And I'm glad I can wear that polish again, I knew I loved it but I forgot how much I actually do so! Below Deck ♥

China Glaze Blow Deck with China Glaze QT and DRK XL Designer plate 1.

This was one of those manis that really needed the top coat. Without it the colors were much more similar (yes, stamping can do weird things, even to a bright pink & taupe combo! :)), with the top coat the stamping popped out more. If you ever end up with colors that are way too close once they're on the nail, don't give up straight away, shiny or matte top coat can work wonders!
And have I already mentionned that I love the DRK plate that I used today? I've already done several manis with it (they'll be on the blog later on) and I keep seeing images that I'd love to try, or use again! So instead of browsing through a few hundred plates, I've been going for the big one that was on my desk already, haha!

Unfortunately there wasn't any sun when I made pics, so I used my flash for the photo below to show a little bit more holo goodness :)

Thanks for looking and have a great day ♥

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Collage of the Month: September

Hi all! Last month's collage is a mini-collage! ^^ I've been quite busy lately, I've started a Swedish home study ánd a photography course. I've done a short Swedish course in the past but learning Swedish fully always stayed on my to-do list, and so far it's going great! 9 lessons down, only 51 to go, lol. Going to visit my bf again next month, so then I can practice in Sweden :) And a short photography course was on schedule as well after I got my new camera, so I've started that too. I've already learned some new things, yay! Maybe not great for nailpics, but happy with it nevertheless. Because of those things I haven't had a lot of energy lately to sort pics and blog a lot, but having said that, the Fall colors are calling for me and I'm filling up my vault of unposted manis at least :) How about you, are you also going for the warmth, richness, and darkness of Fall colors? Or are you sticking with the bright & happy, holo & neons for now? Take care!

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