HBC Ber Fever~!

'Ber Months is almost here, on which we Filipinos mostly associate it with Christmas time.... seriously!
Hahahaha!

So to welcome it HBC is having the 'Ber Fever!
Time to stock up on your favorite HBC Products.

‘Ber Fever offers up to 70% discount on selected HBC Beauty Exclusive products like San San, Allue, Body Recipe, Hortaleza Professional and Hortaleza, M.D.Offer The SALE runs from August 29, 2012 – September 3, 2012.

Do check out their ongoing sale!
^_^

BFF Challenge:Cath Kidston

We're down to the 2nd to the last BFF Challenge.
This is Sally's week & i love her chosen themes! Cath Kidston & Flowers!
Cath Kidston for now...

I do not really know who or what is Cath Kidston so i did some googling & when i found out about it. I fell in love! It screams girly & you all know i love girly prints!

So, here's my version of a CK nail art~

You have to check out Cath Kidston to know what i'm talking about!
It just screams homey & cuteness!
hahaha

This is an easy nail art, except for the thumb but the polka dots & that flower bud is easy.
Again, i promise to make a tutorial for it once my camera is up for it.
Just a couple more & i'll be able to send it to the service center. I'll be without a camera for a while but i guess it's ok.hehe

A close up look of them...
The thumb~

 I love this design!
I'll make a tutorial on how i did the rose sometime.
 Then the rest of the nails~

What do you think?
Kawaii,ne?
I got lots of compliments about my nail today! I'm just grateful that no one insisted that these are stickers or else i will be slapping their faces..LOL!

You can check out these ladies doing the same challenge with me:

Pram of My Nail Polish Addiction

Bec of Lacquer Dreams

Kerrie of PishPosh and Polish

Caitlin of Caitlin's Creative Corner

Emma of Manicurity

Alyssa of Fancy Phalanges

Sally Of Nail Pron

I'm looking forward to the last challenge because i adore flowers.

Don't you all?
hehehe

Have a happy day!
Jaa ne~!
^_^

BFF Challenge:City

I went all out for my nail art for this challenge & i am on time this time! hahahaha!

I was really planning to do it last black & white because i really adore black & white combo but i was sick at that time. I already had everything planned out... such a shame. So this time, armed with my acrylics & faux nails, i set out to paint Manila, the capital of my country.

dum! dum! dum!

*the song Manila playing on the background*

Manila, Manila.

I keep coming back to Manila.

Simply no place like Manila.

Manila, I'm coming home!

I don't live in Manila, mind you. The city where i live in belong in the Metropolitan Manila though. Manila is just 30minutes away from where i live so i can go there whenever i want to. Let me give you a tour of the city by my nails!

Manila Cathedral~

Officially known as Cathedral-Basilica of the Immaculate Conception & i just quoted Wiki there. .. hehehe
Located at the heart of Manila, this church has been one of my favorites. We mostly go here on Sundays when we are celebrating something special in the family, specifically birthdays!

Rizal Park

Commonly known as Luneta, a place that has a special mark in our history. The place where our national hero was executed thus igniting the revolution that freed our country from colonization.

People mostly flock the park for picnicking or just simply unwinding. I grew up going to Luneta together with my uncles & grandmother before. Last time i went here was together with bf just because i'm curious to see how it is.

Manila Bay

Watching the sunset has always been a pleasure especially if you are along the banks of Manila Bay. The myriad of colors displayed for everyone to see is a true beauty which is quite hard to capture on the camera.

Modes of transportation:

Jeepney

Tagged as the King of the road, i don't know if they are still considered as king of the road now.lol
I don't drive & im not even that tempted to learn how to drive. Why?
I might sound weird but i actually do enjoying riding the public transportation. There are fun & interesting things to see on a public transportation. I love riding the jeepney. I'm serious!

You know, one of my lifelong dream is actually to ride at the edge of the jeepney just holding on to the railings. When i told the bf about it, he laughed at me. I know it is funny but i would really love to try it. That also goes with having my hair shaved & selling balut at night. I have simple dreams. lol!

Kalesa

I am proud to say that i grew up in a time where riding kalesa is very common.
Kalesa is a horse carriage that was used way back when tricycles are not yet widely used. I remember my grandma taking me along the market with her big straw basket at hand. Line of kalesas would be waiting for passengers from their trip to market. I love love love sitting at the front where i get to sit beside the Kutsero (the kalesa driver), on this plank of wood that serves as a chair.

You can still see few kalesa's at select places in Manila.
It costs way too much than before but the experience is something!

I tried writing in cursive. I know it's not perfect but it's so hard to achieve perfection if you are just using a brush, but i tried.hehe

So, what do you think?
Interesting enough to try visiting Manila?

You can check out these ladies doing the same challenge with me:

Pram of My Nail Polish Addiction

Bec of Lacquer Dreams

Kerrie of PishPosh and Polish

Caitlin of Caitlin's Creative Corner

Emma of Manicurity

Alyssa of Fancy Phalanges

Sally Of Nail Pron

Hope you all are having a great day!

Jaa ne~!
^_^

BFF Challenge:Movies

This week's theme was chosen by Alyssa.

Let's talk about movies!
I'm sure most of you like to watch movies. I'm not a frequent movie-goer but i do watch movies every now & then. i have lots of movies that i like but every time someone asks me the question "what is your favorite movie?" the first thing that will pop on my mind would be Moulin Rouge.

I love it~
If you love romance movies then you have to watch it. That's it!

I do not have an idea how i'll go about making a nail art about Moulin Rouge so i tried looking for pictures. As i did, i just saw the lovely combination of black & red so i also made a franken polish inspired by it. I'll show the nail art first.

I just had to draw the windmill.
Moulin Rouge is not Moulin Rouge if not for it,no?
I love the elephant scene so i just decided to do a part of it where it overlooks the city, hence the heart.

This is how my thumb looks like.hehe

The design are just accents, but what i am really liking in this is my base polish.
This is my franken.
I call it as dark pixie.

Originally, it is Moulin Rouge but i can't use the name for polish because there's already something like that. I was thinking of Cancan but in the end i just had to change it too so i just opted for dark pixie.hehe

I love how this sparkles under the piercing rays of the sun!
The dark magenta jelly makes this polish stand out. It's so dark it almost looks like black,no?
But it's really magenta.hehe

Here's a close-up of it.

I must make more of these polishes, they look really pretty!

You can check out these ladies doing the same challenge with me:

Pram of My Nail Polish Addiction

Bec of Lacquer Dreams

Kerrie of PishPosh and Polish

Caitlin of Caitlin's Creative Corner

Emma of Manicurity

Alyssa of Fancy Phalanges

Sally Of Nail Pron

Until this saturday for the next BFF Challenge.
Have a great day,ladies!
Jaa ne~!
^_^

Ebalay Nail Polish in A06

My favorite duochrome polish!
Another Ebalay swatch for you all. If you haven't tried duochrome polishes, you have to. It's like having 2 color on your nails all at the same time.

Again, duochrome polishes look best underneath a black base, so this swatch is done under a black polish.

It looks a glittery plum on a certain angle but once you tilt your nails & it caught the light, then that's when the magic starts!

Look at that green-ish tint almost screaming at you!
Here's a close-up for your inspection

Duochromes are great,no?
hahaha

You can get this at KKCenterhk.com or go straight to this LINK. You can use the code BLGA124TH10 for a 10% off.


Hope you all are enjoying your day!
Jaa ne~!
^_^


ps:
Product sent as sample. I did not receive any monetary compensation for this post. Opinion shared is personal view & is no way influenced by the company. Use at your own discretion.

BFF Challenge:Texture

Texture nail art, picked by Emma.

I'm not a fan of 3d nail arts. In fact, i don't like using rhinestones.
I'll only use rhinestone if the the top coat that i am using is thick enough to be able to really cover the whole nails making sure that it has a smooth finish. This is when Seche Vite comes in handy though.

I never did like the bead mani so there's no way that i'll be doing that. Well,unless i don't have any idea what to do. It would just be the last resort.hahaha!

But i already knew what i'm going to use.
At first i thought of colored sand but since i can't go out that much to buy it & it would cost a little since i planned a colorful nail art. I was perusing our house thinking about little things that i could use. Lace is out of the question because i've used all of it when i was making my scrapbook. I was taking a bath when i saw my body scrub & i remember sugar!

Sugar!
Why not?!
Sugar, i think, would be translucent so i tried making a base design & covered it with sugar.
This is the final effect, with top coat.

Me thinks, it's not that bad.
A close-up of how it looks like.

Actually, there's a way to have that watery effect when using sugar. This i found out accidentally.
As i finish my mani, i had this sudden urge to wash my hands but since i have sugar on my nails, i just can't let it touch the water because it would melt. So i carefully wet my palm, trying so hard not to wet my nails. But, of course, since i'm clumsy no matter how hard i try i know i would end up with at least 1 finger wet. Sure enough, my pinkie nail got a tad bit wet. I immediately wipe it dry, hoping that it won't melt right away.

As soon as i pat it dry, i applied top coat to my nails. Surprisingly, my pinkie has that wet-look compare to the rest of my nails. I don't know if you'll be able to see it clearly. I still haven't bought my cam to the repair shop because i am doing the BFF Challenge. It would take weeks before i'll be able to have a camera again so i'll just have it repair after the challenge.

I nicked the right side of my thumb as it was drying. hehehe

I thought i won't like it but for some reason i am digging this nail art.
In fact, i still have it until now. I usually snap pics of my nail art then take it off afterward if i hate it but i am still rocking this so i guess this is a keeper.

You can check out these ladies doing the same challenge with me:

Pram of My Nail Polish Addiction

Bec of Lacquer Dreams

Kerrie of PishPosh and Polish

Caitlin of Caitlin's Creative Corner

Emma of Manicurity

Alyssa of Fancy Phalanges

Sally Of Nail Pron

Do tell me if you are into 3d nail arts,hunnies!
Hope you are enjoying your sunday!
Till next time!
Jaa ne~!
^_^

BFF Challenge:Coffee

Once again, im late in posting the bff challenge.

tsk tsk tsk!

Before, i start my story, let me tell you first that this theme was picked by Emma.

I have a valid reason the last time because i was feeling poorly but this time that's not the case. I am just having a hard time doing this nail art. I know what i am all set out to do before. I have really been thinking of water marble just because i love looking at latte art but i really can't do water marbling. I have tried everything but it just doesn't seem to work on me. I have watched tons of videos, asked lots of people & read many blog posts but i still can't get the hang of it. I altered water temperature, room temperatures & different polishes but to my disappointment.

*sigh*

So, i just had to use acrylic to try the marble effect that i wanted to do.

It's still a fail though. hehehe

but i tried! lol

I don't drink coffee just because my body can't handle caffeine so whenever i go to coffee shops, i only order matcha (it means green tea) latte, i love it! So i only have to use the color green since i only drink matcha.

Let me tell you, im not really satisfied with this but i'm so dead set on marble effect so this will do for now.
This was my inspiration behind this:

I'll make it up on the next theme which would be textured. Now, that is gonna be really interesting! hehehe

You can check out these ladies doing the same challenge with me:

Pram of My Nail Polish Addiction

Bec of Lacquer Dreams

Kerrie of PishPosh and Polish

Caitlin of Caitlin's Creative Corner

Emma of Manicurity

Alyssa of Fancy Phalanges

Sally Of Nail Pron

Hope that you will have a good start for this weekend!
Jaa ne~!
^_^

BFF Challenge:Music~

I wasn't able to post my music-inspired nails last thursday for the BFF Challenge. I'll be putting it up now even if i'm almost a week late. The theme was chosen by Caitlin.

The weather has been pretty bad the time when i did this so the picture is not that good because the lighting is not enough. I have been thinking of a specific song that i could base my nail art on but i can't seem to find a specific song so i just thought of painting on musical notes & piano keys.

It looks quite dull so i just had to add the shaped rhinestones for an added flair.


You can check out these ladies doing the same challenge with me:

Pram of My Nail Polish Addiction

Bec of Lacquer Dreams

Kerrie of PishPosh and Polish

Caitlin of Caitlin's Creative Corner

Emma of Manicurity

Alyssa of Fancy Phalanges

Sally Of Nail Pron

Until the next challenge!
Hope you all are having a great day.
Jaa ne~!
^_^

BFF Challenge:Black & White

Hi,ladies!
It's been a while since i blogged because i am feeling quite poorly the past couple of days. Actually up until now i am feeling this terrible pounding headache & i don't have an idea what the heck it is...if it is just a simple tension headache or migraine or something worse. I have to wait until my doctor's appointment to find out what it is.

I am still missing the last BFF Challenge which is supposed to be music but since i can't find my camera for now so i'd rather do the current challenge which black & white chosen by Caitlin.

I already did this mani weeks ago.

I even forgot to watermarked it.

Then i also wore this water decal before which is think is pretty nice too.

I'll post my music-inspired mani as soon as i can find my camera already.hehehe

You can check out these ladies doing the same challenge with me:

Pram of My Nail Polish Addiction

Bec of Lacquer Dreams

Kerrie of PishPosh and Polish

Caitlin of Caitlin's Creative Corner

Emma of Manicurity

Alyssa of Fancy Phalanges

Sally Of Nail Pron

Hope you all will have a great start for this week,ladies!

Jaa ne~!
^_^

Benefit Benetint Review

Wow!
A non-nail related post!
hahahaha

Anyway, im trying to dispel the gloom that i feel by diverting it to blogging. I was scrambling on my pictures to look for something that i can blog about & i just found one product that seems to scream at me. I guess this is something that a lot of people already know about so i just didn't bother posting about it. But now i'll elaborate more about it. hehehe

I'm not a blush-user. In fact, i only have 2 blushes, i think.
I already have uneven skintone & i'm tired of seeing my face red so i try not to put any flush on my face when i do my make-up. But i find that this product is something that i am liking ever since i got it.

You can read the description & ingredients here:

I got this when i won their contest before so i'm really pretty sure that this is 200% genuine.
You have to be wary of purchasing products online since there are a lot of fake Benefit products out there.

Housed in a glass bottle that has a tiny brush at the end. You can easily make sure that you have minimal amount when you applied it. It's completely buildable so you can go from a really subtle flush to a charming bloom whichever you want.

Contrary to what i first thought that this is something that you need to work on quickly because it might leave a stain on 1st contact, it isn't. You have plenty of time to work this on your skin to build the color that you truly wanted.

I'll not do face pictures for now because my camera is still not up to taking face pics. It can only take nail pictures (crazy,no?) since i have a problem with the zoom lens of it.

I applied 3 dots of it on my skin. 

Well, the first 3 dots didn't do it for me. I had to apply 3 more because the color was so subtle my camera is having a hard time picking it up so this flush is what came out after adding more.

Did you notice how there are no marks left from the 3 dots that i applied first?
I think i fairly remember trying out bench's cheek tint & i ditched it later just because you can see how you applied it. It is easily absorbed by the skin that red marks will be left on the skin that had the first contact with it.

Benetint doesn't leave any unwanted marks. it gives you enough time to spread it evenly.
Since this is a tint, it stays on your skin for a long time!
Awesome! I didn't experience any breakouts or anything from it so it's nice. It smells of roses. I usually prefer my products fragrance-free but this one doesn't really smell that bad so i can abide with it.

I mostly use my fingers in applying this, it leaves my finger with the color too, but i can live with that.

PROS:

• it really leaves you with a sexy flush!
• stays on for a long time
• no irritation whatsoever
• last for a long time (12.5 ml would last you for as long as possible!hehe)
• smells nice (especially if you love rose water!)
• locally available

CONS:

• expensive but so worth it! (Php 1,800 each)

Do i recommend it?

For someone who doesn't like any red tint on mt face that much, this is something that i'm glad i was able to try. So i really really recommend it.

You can follow Benefit Philippines' updates on their Facebook page.

Have you tried cheek tints?

What are the ones that you had tried?

Care to share?

Hope you all have a great day!

Jaa ne~!
^_^

BFF Challenge: Neons + giveaway winners

OMG!
I can't believe it... i've been slacking this week. But i have a reason for that. I guess this rainy season is just getting the better part of me because i feel so lazy & it's like my creative juice had been zapped dry all of a sudden.

The challenge this theme is Neon by Kerrie~

I went over to my stash & i was surprised to know that i only have a couple of them. 1 violet, 2 greens & 3 pinks. I don't even have the usual yellow one. tsk!

I have tried doing 3 neon nail arts for the past couple of days but i can't seem to make the colors work together. Among the 3 that i've done this is the one that looked ok at least. I'm still not satisfied with it, mind you, but this will do. I hope that the weather will clear up by tomorrow because it is seriously affecting me.

Ill tell the details about how i made this nail art sometime soon but not now because i'm really feeling that giddy.
:(

I need the King Sun!
hahahaha!

You can check out these ladies doing the same challenge with me:

Pram of My Nail Polish Addiction

Bec of Lacquer Dreams

Kerrie of PishPosh and Polish

Caitlin of Caitlin's Creative Corner

Emma of Manicurity

Alyssa of Fancy Phalanges

Sally Of Nail Pron

On to the second part, the HBC giveaway winners.
Sorry it took me a while.
Winner 1:

GFC: Ida
FB: Ida Lamban de Roma
Email: idalorena@gmail.com
Twitter: MakeUpnBeautyPH (I tweeted about the giveaway there)

My major skin care woe is acne. =/ Dry skin, blackheads, and hyperpigmenation I can deal with, but acne flat out sucks. I thought my acne problem was over, but recently it's come back with a vengeance! I just hate it but try not to think too much about it or let it get me down. It's difficult to ignore it completely though because I review beauty products almost everyday.

So if I could make a wish to the Beauty Fairy, it would be for me, and for my daughter, when she's in her teens na, to never have acne! If that were to come true, I'd be pretty happy. :)

Winner 2:

Email: quiamoi_tres@yahoo.com
Facebook: Vintagekawaii Onlineshop
Twitter: @quiam
GFC: notyourordinaryteacher
Tweet: https://twitter.com/quiam/stat...
FB post: https://www.facebook.com/vinta...

I am bothered by the dark spots caused by my pimples and chickenpox scars. Beauty Fairy, please grant my wish and give me
H-Hortaleza, M.D. clear soaps
B-Beauty Certificates for Diamond Peel
C-clear and smooth skin :)

Congrats,hunnies!
^_^
Please email me with your contact details.

Hope that this week would be a better week for us.
Jaa ne~!

BFF Challenge:Animals

I almost forgot to do my nail art challenge. haha!
This time the theme is Animal chosen by Kerrie.

You all know that i love my pets. I am an animal-lover.
We've had Charlie for a long time now & now he already got white "beard". He is a very gentle & loving dog. So is our Queen Sassy!. I call her Queen now just because she lays around like she owns the place plus the fact that when you step around her without saying 'excuse me' or even greeting her, she'll sink her teeth on your legs! LOL!

So since i don't have the luxury of time drawing cats & dogs on my nails so i just have to settle for something quick so that means it's gonna be paw prints!

This is an easy nail art. It just took me 15 minutes to finish up.
You can easily do it too!

My stupid camera is acting all weird again. I hate it when it's gloomy, even the flash of the camera makes my hands look...weird. Just focus on the design,ok? hehe

I'll try to do a proper tutorial for paw prints next time.
I'm gonna leave you a picture of Charlie deep in his sleep & dreaming. lol!

This pic cracks me up every single time i see it!
hahahahaha

I love my pets!

You can check out these ladies doing the same challenge with me:

Pram of My Nail Polish Addiction

Bec of Lacquer Dreams

Kerrie of PishPosh and Polish

Caitlin of Caitlin's Creative Corner

Emma of Manicurity

Alyssa of Fancy Phalanges

Sally Of Nail Pron

Have a great day!
^_^

ps:
I'll announce the winners of my giveaway later on. So stay tuned
^_~