Love Hundreds and Thousands? Then you'll love MUA's Nail Constellations!

Hello my Sweets!

If any of you love sprinkles, Hundreds & Thousands or anything cute and sweet then you are going to love MUA: Makeup Academy's Nail Constellations!  They are bottles of little beads in an array of cool colours that allow you to add that 3-dimensional feel to your nails!

The Constellations come in 5 colours Scorpio, Pisces, Leo, Gemini and Libra so you can pick a shade to suit your mood.  The packaging is very simple and practical as the pointed funnel top allows precision application and the clear bottle lets you see the different colours easily.

From www.muastore.co.uk

Here, I have the Gemini shade and it is made up of lovely, light pink, peach, gold and green beads that work together to create a fun look. Because I am not very skilled when it comes to detailed nail designs I decided to use the constellations on just one nail and I think it worked very well.

To apply these nail beads, it is best to apply the nail colour you want underneath then apply another thick coat of that same colour or a clear varnish.  Then apply the beads using the pointed tip to the nail or area you require. Make sure you do this while the varnish is still wet as this will be what holds the beads into place.  

Once you have all your beads in place, apply a clear coat of nail varnish over the top to keep them in place.  I found this step does dull the colour slightly, but it helps it last longer.  

I really like these Nail Constellations, in one quick and simple application you can jazz up your nails and give them that 3D look. I wouldn't say they are great for an every day nail as the beads can catch on your clothes etc but they are great for a weekend look. The colour combinations that are available are great and I cannot wait to collect them all (although they're sold out everywhere I look!)

You can have so much fun with these that it feels like you're topping your nails with sprinkles!

Dani xxx

UPDATE: I'm sorry guys, I didn't realise until afterwards that I didn't tell you about the price etc. The Nail Constellations cost £3 each and I got mine from Superdrug.  You can also order them from the MUA website where I believe they offer International delivery if you are not based in the UK.  For me, you can't go wrong for £3!

Halloween Inspired: Vampire look

Greetings to my ghoulish readers,

Its October and I seem to be more excited about Halloween this year than I have been for years!  I think it may be because I know what our plans are for Halloween this year and it's not going to be a last minute fumble around to create something!

So this year, I thought I would start early and try out a few looks to get in the mood!

I found some great teeth that you stick on your own teeth with putty, so I had to start out with a Vampire look.

 I created a dark smokey eye using purples and blacks and made sure the halo of purple showed above the crease.

The products I used were the following:

FACE:

Foundation: 17 MIracle Matte Foundation in Porcelain

Concealer: Mary Kay Concealer in Ivory 2

EYES:

Primer: Urban Decay Eyeshadow Primer Potion

Eyeshadows: Black and purple shades from the eye colour palette (similar to Coastal Scents 88 palette).
Eyeliner: Collection2000 Extreme 24hfelt tip liner in black
Mascara: Mary Kay Lash Love Mascara in Black

LIPS: 
Lipstick: Kryolan palette

 

I'm not sure if this will be my look for the night , but it was fun to try!

What will you be dressing up as this Halloween?

xxxxx

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Buttons, buttons, buttons!

I am crazy for buttons! ha ha!

After reading a post from All My Love where Lyndsay mentions a site called Passionfruit I thought, hey I may aswell try it out!  Passionfruit is an advertising company like no other. Their goal is to make advertising easy and reliable as they help you to use the advertising spots on your page in a simple and efficient way.

I really enjoy blogging and really want to grow my blog for the right reasons and I think the people that are part of the blogging community are amazing and I want to know everyone more.

So I have decided to take part in button swapping! The buttons I am making available on my blog are free, yes totally free and will be rotated to keep it fresh.

If you are interested in swapping with me, simply go to the top of my page and click on the Lets Swap! link and follow the instructions making sure you use the promo code.  Then take one of my buttons and we would have successfully swapped!!

Alternatively, if this sounds a bit too confusing, feel free to leave me a comment below or email me on dani@daniduffymakeup.co.uk

Now lets get swapping!!  I am so excited about this and looking forward to advertising for you!

Not a bad Friday....

Hey guys,

So I thought I'd send a quick post to tell you about my day.... While I'm promoting myself as a make-up artist, I do some temping on the aide to pay the bills and today I'm playing a receptionist at the Aston Martin dealership down the road from me! How fun is that! This means I have time to catch up on my blog reading in between making tea and answering the phones, oh and this is the view I get to look at all day!

A Fresh New Look!

Well, I had wanted to spend the day today and be all creative and write some great posts, but instead I started redesigning my blog and that kind of took over!

I read a few blog posts that helped me and came across an amazing program online called Pixlr which is amazing and free so you must check it out!

So instead of a creative blog post, I thought I would share a few snapshots I took today!

1. My lovely Mug from New York that was filled far too many times today.

2. The lovely pasta bake I cooked tonight (it tasted far nicer than it looks)

3. My lovely cosy slippers, so cute I had to have them!

4. My cute little dog Ruby getting far too cosy inbetween my pillows.

So I hope you like the new design for my blog and I would love to know what you think?! 

I had never tried creating anything like this online, so it was fun creating the buttons etc myself!

My Katy Perry Inspired Look

Hello all you lovely people!

In the hopes to kick start my creative juices, I have decided to set myself a weekly challenge and the first name I pulled out of the hat (literally!) was Katy Perry.

 I have never been much of a fan of hers, not for any real reason as I like her songs, but just didnt really pay much attention during the whole Russel Brand saga.  However, I was intrigued to see what her movie was about so I went to see 'Part of Me', Katy Perry's concert film/documentary a while ago and I'll admit I was blown away.  It was amazing to see how 'real' she is and how hard she works and has worked to achieve the career she has.

I even shed a few tears when you could see how much she was putting herself through and when she finally broke down in tears I just wanted to run up to the screen and give her a big hug! Obviously, I stayed glued to my seat and I gave her a mental hug instead!

So after hours of looking through the images I could find of Katy Perry, I settled on this one.  I thought this is a great look, its simple and definitely suits the summer months (I'm still clinging on) with the mixture of bright colours.

Image from http://enjoyingwonderfulworld.blogspot.co.uk

Here is the look I created,

The products I used were:

FACE:

Foundation: 17 MIracle Matte Foundation in Porcelain

Concealer: Mary Kay Concealer in Ivory 2

EYES

Primer: Urban Decay Eyeshadow Primer Potion

Eyeshadows: Blue shades from the eye colour palette (similar to Coastal Scents 88 palette). Yellow shade was Nyx Ultra Pearl Mania in Yellow Pearl.

Eyeliner: Fatal Attraction Retractable pencil in black (from Primark)

Mascara: Benefit Badgal lash in Black

Brows: HD palette in Foxy

CHEEKS

Blusher: MAC Sheertone Blush in Pink Swoon

LIPS

Liner: George Precision Lipliner in 06 Pretty In Pink (from Asda)

Lipstick: MAC Cremesheen lipstick in Speed Dial

Gloss: Dior Addict Ultra Gloss Reflect in 157

Have a lovely day!

Dani xx

Quick Tip: My 4 Multitaskers

Hello my lovely people,

I hope you are having a lovely day! I am so excited about all you new followers to my blog, and I would like to take this opportunity to say hello and thank you for your support! I really appreciate all of you and would like to say feel free to contact me at anytime!

So, onto my thoughts for today, did you know that you don't always need a separate product for everything? 

Well its true!  So I thought I would share with you a few tips I have learnt about multitasking products.

1. Concealer

Not only does it hide dark circles and imperfections, you can also use it as an eyelid or lip primer. Apply a small amount with your fingers and it will neutralise the base colour, help the colours you apply to pop and will help your products last!

2. Cream Blusher

I would have to say this product is the ultimate multitasker. You can use it as a highlighter (depending on the colour), lipstick, eyeshadow.... oh and yes, as a blusher!

3. Brown Mascara

Not only can this product be used as a lovely natural daytime mascara, but brush a bit through your eyebrows and you can add definition and shape in a flash.  Just please don't try this with black mascara, or you'll end up with slug brows.

4. Clear Lip balm

Not only can it heal your lips and give you a sexy pout, but add a touch of balm to the tops of your cheeks and you have a quick and easy highlighter!

Now we all know that Men are no good at multitasking, but us women are great at it! So have a rummage through your make-up bags and see how many uses you can find with your products!!

Are there any other multitasking products you use that I haven't thought of?

xxxx

Quick Rave: Dove Intensive Repair Mask

Hello lovelies,

I just wanted to post a quick rave about this amazing product!  I have blonde hair, highlighted with bleach and at times my hair can get very dry.  I recently had a lot of split ends and as I straighten the front part of my hair (as it's short I can't straighten everything), after a while the ends of my hair become brittle and damaged. 

So after a lot of heat damage and bleaching I realised my hair was starting to feel like candyfloss and it was time to do something about it.  So I popped to the supermarket, as it was late and didn't have time to head to Boots and I picked up a pot of Dove Intensive Repair Mask.

Now at £3.99 for a pot of 200ml's of product I had doubts that this was going to be able to do anything, but thought I'd give it a chance..... and oh I should be eating my hat!!

This treatment is an intensive mask that you should use to condition your hair for 10mins after you wash it.  Now I don't know about you guys, but I'm very impatient when in the shower or bath, once I've washed my hair I want to get out and get on with my day, so letting it sit for 10 mins was a struggle and I think I have only managed this once in total.  However, I now use this as a normal conditioner once or twice a week and my hair is feeling loads better and less and less dry as the time goes on.

I would definitely recommend this product for any of you that are in need of a conditioning treatment, then at this price you can't go wrong!!