What I'm reading + NOTD pt.16

With this weather it's not unusual that this is the third book post in a row. When it's raining and it's foggy outside what is there to do than read? 

This time the young adult novel A Swift Pure  Cry brought me to Ireland in year 1984. After Shell's mother dies, her obsessively religious father descends into alcoholic mourning and Shell is left to care for her younger brother and sister. She must also deal with school, friendship and first love. At top of that Shell finds herself pregnant and the center of a scandal that rocks the small community in which she lives, with repercussions across the whole country. The lives of those immediately around her will never be the same again. This is a story of love and loss, religious belief and spirituality it will move the hearts of any who read it.

Here I would like to write some things about the author because she was not just the writer, but also an activist and helped the children in need. In 1984, she joined the writer's organisation International PEN, initially as a researcher for its Writers in Prison Committee and later as Program Director of PEN American Center's Freedom-to-Write Committee in New York City. Her work there included founding and leading the Rushdie Defense Committee (USA) and travelling to Indonesia andGuatemala to investigate local human rights conditions for writers. During her seven-year stay in New York, Dowd was named one of the "top 100 Irish-Americans" by Irish-America Magazine and Aer Lingus for her global anti-censorship work.

On her return to the UK, Dowd co-founded, with Rachel Billington, English PEN's readers and writers program. The program takes authors into schools in socially deprived areas, as well as prisons, young offender's institutions and community projects. During 2004, Dowd served as Deputy Commissioner for Children's Rights in Oxfordshire, working with local government to ensure that statutory services affecting children's lives conform with UN protocols.

Before her death from a severe case of breast cancer, the Siobhan Dowd Trust, a registered charity, was established, wherein the proceeds from her literary work will be used to assist disadvantage children with their reading skills. If you'd like to learn more about the Trust click here. 

After reading all of this it seems a little bit shallow to talk about the nail polish, but since this is now a regular category on my blog, here you go. The nail polish is from H&M with the name Lady Luck. It is a duochrome that shifts from green to blue. The application was easy, two coats were needed for full opacity.

Have a great day! :)

What I'm reading + NOTD pt.15

Who doesn't like Jane Austen? I don't know how many times I read Pride and Prejudice. For me it's some sort of "lift me up" novel. I haven't read Masfield Park before, as I believe it was first published in Slovenian language in 2013 and in two volumes. So here I have just the first volume. And I really don't like the cover.

Taken from the poverty of her parents' home in Portsmouth, Fanny Price is brought up with her rich cousins at Mansfield Park, acutely aware of her humble rank and with her cousin Edmund as her sole ally. During her uncle's absence in Antigua, the Crawford's arrive in the neighbourhood bringing with them the glamour of London life and a reckless taste for flirtation. "Mansfield Park" is considered Jane Austen's first mature work and, with its quiet heroine and subtle examination of social position and moral integrity, one of her most profound.

The nail polish is from Manhattan Lotus Effect and it was a limited edition, it goes with the name 13. I bought it because of the colour, it is a mix between blue and purple. I believe that it the nail polish world this colour is named blurple. Two coats as usual, no problem with the application.

Have a great day :)

What I'm reading + NOTD pt.14

It's pure coincidence that today is Valentine's Day and I'm showing you here a great love story. I don't care a lot about this made up day brought to us from United States and that it's driven by consumerism but I like love stories and this one unfolds in front of us on thousand pages so magically that you don't even know that this story is also a love story. 

Here is the third book, or better said the third part of 1Q84. In the third part the things are moving forward, and Aomame does not yet know that she and Tengo are more closely bound than ever. Tengo is searching for Aomame, and he must find her before this world's rules loosen up too much. He must find her before someone else does. 

A book that has a grip on you right from beginning to the end. If you missed first part, here it is. 

Also a shout out to my mum and dad, who are celebrating tomorrow their thirtieth anniversary of their marriage. A love story in real world :) Congratulations! 

The nail polish is from Bourjois, from the line So Laque! Ultra Shine, number 22 Rouge diva. Easy application, two coats, classic red. Nothing special, but at a same time classic and pretty.

Have a great day ;)

Essence the gel nail polish in 33 wild white ways with nail tattoos

I got this nail polish along with nail stickers as a New Years gift from my cousin. We were both happy that I didn't have a nail polish in my collection and that this polish was actually on my wish list :)

The nail stickers or maybe nail tattoos have the design of comic books/graphic novels and in the package you get three different designs and each design has twenty sheets. Because I so stupidly threw away the packaging (to save the storage space) I can't tell you the name of the tattoos. 

Today was the day that I decided to try these nail tattoos and show them on the blog. These are the instructions.

Apply one to two coats of (colour) nail polish and allow to dry.
The nailpolish itself it is fully opaque in two coats, and there are no problems with the application, witch is great for a white nail polish.

Cut out the tattoo you want to the nail size and remove transparent protective film. 

One thing I should do next time is to cut the stickers first and then apply nail polish. It is extremely difficult to draw and cut the sheets in form of your nails when you have freshly painted nails and I'm also extremely clumsy, so I managed to ruin my manicure in the process. Two nails were more than enough for the first time.

Place tattoo briefly in water. Place tattoo on the nail and press down for approximately ten seconds. Remove backing paper and coat tattoo with a layer of Top Coat to seal.

Next time I should put the tattoo in the water with tweezers because the design transferred on my fingers and it is a little damaged on my nails now, but otherwise it's fine.

Here is the final result, on just two nails :)

Have a great day! ;)

What I'm reading + NOTD pt.13

Tony Webster and his clique first met Adrian Finn at school. Sex-hungry and book-hungry, they would navigate the girl-less sixth form together, trading in affectations, in-jokes, rumour and wit. Maybe Adrian was a little more serious than the others, certainly more intelligent, but they all swore to stay friends for life. Now Tony is in middle age. He's had a career and a single marriage, a calm divorce. He's certainly never tried to hurt anybody. Memory, though, is imperfect. It can always throw up surprises, as a lawyer's letter is about to prove. This is the story of one man coming to terms with the mutable past. 

The title in English is The Sense of an Ending and the novel is the winner of Man Booker Prize for Fiction in 2011.

The nail polish is from Kiko, and this was the first Kiko polish that I bought. It is number 244. I don't know why, but I have problems with the application with this one. The colour is a really deep plum, it almost looks black, but it's not. 

As always, two coats, a base coat and a top coat in the pictures.

The photos in the category What I'm reading + NOTD are usually taken with my phone (Samsung Galaxy S4 mini) and look fine on the mobile, but when I transfer them to the computer I can see they are not so great. See below.

For this post I tried to take them also with the camera that my friend so kindly lent me. They are better, but there is a problem. The camera is heavy to hold with one arm, and I can't wink, so I can't see what I'm photographing. See below.

We have quite a prodigious photographer here :D

Have a great day ;)

Catrice Ultimate Colour 450 Legend'Berry

Catrice changes their assortment twice a year. Now was the time for the spring/summer edition. I always look forward to this updates and this time a lipstick caught my eye. Catrice added three new colours in their Ultimate Colour lipstick line, I bought the darkest, number 450 Legend'Berry.

You should see me standing in front of Catrice stand for about ten minutes or so, figuring out if the darkest red lipstick in my collection is as dark as this one I wanted to buy. What I really hate is to have dupes in my collection but at the end I decided to risk it and bought the lipstick.

The lipstick is very pigmented and it glides on beautifully. It is quite soft though, so I had problems with the precise application. If you are not careful it goes quickly over the lines of your mouth, so maybe a lip liner underneath wouldn't be a bad idea, or maybe I should try to apply the lipstick with a lip brush.

It is also quite shiny so it is definitely not for the matte lipstick lovers. Because of its creaminess it also transfers quite a lot, so no eating, drinking or kissing if you want your lipstick to stay intact, otherwise you will have to reapply it. This is the reason why I prefer matte lipstick over creamy lipsticks, they don't transfer this much.

The colour, to my relief, is darker than my darker shade at home (it is also from Catrice, but a limited edition one, and matte). The colour in the tube is dark red with brown undertones. On the lips the brown is not so visible, but it's there. Here is the comparison with Catrice lipstick from Revoltaire LE, Bloody Red, velvet matt lip colour, and with Essence lip liner Red Blush, which you can still get (crazy I know :) )

As you can see, the colour is darker than both of them, you can also see the difference in the formula, since both other colours are matte. This is how it looks on me.

I like the packaging of Catrice lipstick. It's sturdy and elegant and it look like it could cost more than 4,29 €.

Do you like the colour? Peffer matte or creamy lipsticks?

Have a nice day! :)

What I'm reading + NOTD pt.12

Discovery - people don't read as much during winter as they do during summer. The shelves in the library are full and it is hard to choose which books to take home right away and which will have to wait for the next time. They were both there (for now, just the two of them are transated into Slovene language), waiting for me. I picked up just Sister, which is on my reading list. And it was good, so good that I can't understand my sister with her dislike for thrillers. The next one(still waiting for me in the library), with the name Afterwards was even better.

There is a fire and they are in There. They are in there ...Black smoke stains a summer blue sky. A school is on fire. And one mother, Grace, sees the smoke and runs. She knows her teenage daughter Jenny is inside. She runs into the burning building to rescue her. Afterwards, Grace must find the identity of the arsonist and protect her family from the person who's still intent on destroying them. Afterwards, she must fight the limits of her physical strength and discover the limitlessness of love.

“You told me once that the last of the senses to go is hearing. But you're wrong. The last of the senses to go is love.” 

“Motherhood isn't soft and cozy and sweet; it's selfish ferocity, red in tooth and claw.” 

“I’m only just discovering that how someone behaves in everyday life gives no clue how they’ll be when it counts.”

Look, the nail polish is not from Catrice nor from Essence :) It is Deborah Shine Tech with the number 59. It needed three coats and still didn't cover my imperfection on the nails (chipped nails). The application was ok. 

As always, a base coat and a top coat were used.  

Have a nice day ;)