[REVIEW] Garra rufa fish spa and paraffin hand bath treatments

Last month was my birthday, and one of my presents was a fish spa treatment and a paraffin hand bath. I never experienced it before, so I was very excited about it.

My bestie and I first tried to find a place nearby that offers said treatment, and once we did, we immediately made an appointment. We were lucky to get an appointment on the same day. And because of the excitement I forgot to take my camera with me, so I made a few photos with my mobile. So please excuse the low quality.

[REVIEW] Born Pretty Store Born Pretty 16-25 stamping plates set

In my previous post I wrote about the mail I received that included the two sets of stamping plates from Born Pretty Store. Today I'll be showing you the second set, which includes the plates BP-16 to BP-25.

And just like the previous post, the photos will be of the designs stamped on a piece of paper.

[REVIEW] Born Pretty Store Born Pretty 11-15 stamping plates set

Today was mail day it seems. Which I love when there's no official mail but only the fun kind. I was excited to get my new Born Pretty plates. They launched their second line of stamping plates, divided into two sets (of 5 and 10 plates, both of which I bought) and today I'll show you the first set, which are the plates BP11 to BP15.

I won't be posting photos of the plates themselves, but I stamped the images on a piece of paper, which gives a better idea about the images.

Yeah, not a good image. I know.

[Review] Essence My Skin facial products for combination skin

About a month ago I received a surprise package from Essence. A while back I had entered a draw for testing the new My Skin products, and I had completely forgotten about it when the mail man came over to deliver me the package. You can imagine my surprise and excitement when I read "Cosnova" on the side of the box, because let's face it, I'm not one to be that lucky to be randomly picked in a draw.

I was supposed to submit my opinion about these products through a special questionnaire, but life happened and I missed the deadline. And so I decided to make a blog post about my experience with the products I received.

Review: Nail stickers from Born Pretty Store

A while ago I won a Tumblr giveaway hosted by Born Pretty Store, and the prize was 20 nail stickers. I was so excited about it, because I have never won a giveaway before! I was even happier when I received my prize (a bit disappointed that it was only 12 nail stickers instead of the promised 20, but oh well). I immediately got confused about which one to use first! I wanted to use all of them at once! Alas, I don't have that many hands. For a nail art enthusiast, that's a disadvantage :)

Anyway, here's a photo of the stickers that I received.

Review - Etos nail polish remover in a pot

Polish removers in a pot are a favorite of a lot of nail art enthusiasts. Myself included. Having to remove a thick layer of nail polish using the usual cotton pad and polish remover can get frustrating when you just rub the cotton over your nails and it just doesn't want to come off! But since I discovered the polish removers in a pot, I have been hooked. I used to have a different brand that started coloring my fingers and I had to clean my hands with acetone after just to get the color off. So it was time to get a new one, and because I knew I wasn't going to get me the same brand again, I was looking elsewhere, and that was when I discovered the nail polish remover from Etos* that I will be showing you today.

Review - Born Pretty Store watches

A couple of weeks ago I received my order from Born Pretty Store. This time it wasn't a nail art related order, but two watches. My friend and I have been needing watches for a while now, and it's just not appropriate or even convenient to take out your phone quite often to check the time. And after not being able to find anything that we liked at stores for over a year (yep, it takes us both that long to find something we really like when it's about a specific kind of item), we thought looking through Born Pretty Store is a good idea to find something affordable and good looking. We ended up buying these two:

I really liked both watches, and so I decided to write a short review about them.

Swatches and review - Miss Sporty special effect polishes

A while ago when I was shopping in the city center, I randomly decided to go to Etos, one of the drugstores we have in the Netherlands. To my surprise, the Miss Sporty polishes were on sale, so I decided to check them out, and ended up buying three bottles that caught my attention. And today I'll be reviewing them.

Review - Essence Magnetic Top Coat

Magnetic nail polishes were very popular when they first came out. A completely new hype of using a special nail polish and magnet together to get interesting designs on your nails. Essence had magnetic polishes for a few years now, they also had magnets, and the latest magnetic gadget was the magnetic pen, which I think came out last year.

But there's so much you can do with a specific set of magnetic colors. What about the other nail polishes that you have? That one favorite shade that you own and try to use in every nail art design possible, because it's just awesome? One of the new products Essence came up with lately is the magnetic top coat. And I couldn't be more happier about it. When the drugstore in my city finally had this top coat on the Essence shelf, I bought it without giving it a second thought. I wanted to test it, and I wanted to use it on my own set of polishes.

Review - Flormar Light Summer nail polish

On the 10th of March I finally managed to do something for the Nail Polish Challenge group that I'm a member of. The day's theme was "What was your last polish purchased?", and so I dug out the latest polishes that I bought. To my surprise (and a bit of pride at my self-control, as well) the last I had bought a new polish was in January when I went to Amsterdam to watch the NT Live production of Coriolanus (which was amazing, by the way).

So while in Amsterdam, I wanted to go to Flormar, a cosmetics company that opened a branch in the city center not long ago. I've read about it from a few Dutch beauty bloggers, and I wanted to see it for myself. After keeping myself from drooling over their nail polish collection, I decided to pick up two colors -that I didn't already own- to test.

Review - Etude House Baking Powder BB Deep Cleansing Foam

While this blog is exclusively nail art oriented, I couldn't pass the chance to share an amazing discovery for me. The Etude House Baking Powder BB Deep Cleansing Foam. Yes, you read that right, baking powder.

I got a sample pack from my bestie after she came back from a visit to Seoul, South Korea. At first I was confused about the baking powder part, but I was hooked after the first time of using it.

Born Pretty Store stamping plate #M83

Today I have a new Born Pretty Store stamping plate to show. I loved the designs when I saw them on the website, and I loved them even more after stamping them on my nails!

Born Pretty Store stamping plate #M83

Born Pretty Store stamping plate #QA61

One day I was just browsing at the Born Pretty Store, and I came across the stamping image plate that instantly captured my attention. That usually never happens. I have to go through reviews and swatches before I decide to buy something, but this one was an eye-catcher. And I just had to have it. So much for just browsing, right?

The plate, just as any other stamping plate, comes with a blue plastic cover which you need to remove before you start stamping.

image plate with protective foil on

Essence Superheroes LE - 06 The Awesome

Nothing like a nice glitter polish to make any nail polish lover's day seem brighter. When I first saw this polish in the preview posts of several bloggers, I decided that I need to have that in my collection. I had no idea how it would look on my nails, but the preview press sample pictures looked promising.

The Superheroes trend edition from Essence is long gone, and replaced by others quite a few times by now. But every now and then I see a post about one of the polishes from the collection (which I had a hard time finding, by the way. It was always sold out! In several cities!)

Here's the one I have tried on today: 06 The Awesome