Grooming favourites 2014

Grooming has been high on my agenda in 2014 so I thought I'd share some of my favourite tools of the year with you.

Clockwise: Tangle teezer, Nailene ultra quick drying nail glue, Tweezerman pointed tweezers, GHD stlyer, Stylfile 2

Tangle Teezer
I don't know how I ever survived without one of these. Using a normal brush on my long hair always seems to snag and pull now whereas the tangle teezer is just so smooth and easy. My only gripe is that it is moulded to suit a right handed person and I'm a lefty, which means sometimes as I'm brushing away carelessly I drop it. Bring out the left-handed tangle teezer please.

Nailene quick dry nail glue
This year false nails have become an important part of my dressing up armoury. You can pick up some pretty decent pairs for around the £5 mark and it saves the time and expense of going to the salon for acrylic or gel nails. With this amazing glue, they even last almost as long as the salon ones.

Tweezerman pointed tweezers
I posted about these here when I got them and I still haven't stopped singing their praises. Quality really is the key with grooming products. With these you can pluck the smallest, shortest of hairs without any bother.

GHD stylers
No matter how many different hair tools I try I always come back to my trusty GHDs. They are so versatile with either straightening or curling, in my opinion they can't be beaten.

Stylfile 2
A great quality nail file and buffer in one with a couple of extra tools for your cuticles and other nail maintenance. I wont bother with cheaper alternatives any more.

Happy new year everyone!

Week 50 manicure challenge

This week I went for some falsies again as they are low maintenance and look great for Christmas parties. 

I thought I'd show you the best false nail glue there is too; Nailene ultra quick (drying). This glue is so strong that your nails will last and last, avoiding any embarrassing public "pop-offs". 

Week 44 manicure challenge

I wanted to make an extra effort with my nails for my birthday, so I picked these falsies up in Superdrug. They were on offer, so only £3.29 I think.

The glue they came with didn't seem to dry very quickly, so I didn't hold up much hope for it. I ended up using my Nailene quick dry glue, which holds very well.

They are quite short, but very neat and looked pretty classy. They had a nice shiny, freshly manicured finish, although that faded after acouple of days.

Loving the look in the photo below with the ring from my boyfriend.

DIY False Nails

Boots 200 clear nails: ★★★★★
Nailene Ultra Quick glue: ★★★★★


Back in my Uni days I occasionally experimented with false nails, but I always found they fell off after a day or two so eventually gave in and started going to a salon.

These days I only go to the salon for special occasions because a) it's a bit of an expense when you're a home-owner and b) it weakens your nails so much.

There is still a massive range of false nails in the shops that it got me thinking about having another go at DIY false nails. Then as I seem to do a lot these days I stumbled across a video on YouTube of someone using "Boots 200 Clear False Nails". They looked good because they aren't ridiculously long and are plain for you to paint yourself, which bodes well considering my ever expanding nail varnish collection. The video also mentioned not using the glue that comes with the nails as it's not very strong but using the Nailene Ultra Quick glue. The other good point is that you get 200 nails for £8.50, so the set is going to last you a while. The glue costs about £2.80.

I did my nails last Saturday night, it's now the following Sunday evening (8 days later) and they are still going strong.

Would 100% recommend you try if you want a cheap alternative to salon style nails.