Your daily dose of pretty: grumpy earrings and a dangerous dog

See this my pretties, this cute, fluffy, butter-wouldn't-melt because I'm such a sweetie face?

Don't let that face fool you my pretties, that dog is a menace. He broke my toe!

Ok in all fairness there was no malice aforethought in Fred's actions, it just happened that I was at the precise point in my stride where all my weight was on my toes and he ran across my bare foot. Ouchies. Big ouchies. I had to curtail today's trip to the mall because I was all "oh woe my toe hurts bad", and I didn't even buy anything! No shopping and sore toe make Selina a grumpy girl.

These earrings are an exact representation of the look on my face when I came home:
 

Seriously, if I donned a pink dress and grabbed my grey cat Molly who loathes being picked up it would be like looking in a mirror! The Indy Grrrl Earrings are US$12.50 from Indy Grrrl on Etsy, and they're too too cute!

EDIT: Ok you know that thing I do where I taunt you by blogging about something and then end up buying it for myself? Yeah, about that ...

But hey, it put a smile on my face and when Selina's happy everyone's happy right? Right?

Post-Christmas hauls

Christmas has lasted a while here. At least that's what I tell myself every time I spend more money on polishes - it's just another Christmas present to myself because I'm generous like that!  Anyway, here are a few pictures for you of polishes and other stuff I've given myself recently:

First up, from todays mail, some polishes from Tsuya Tsuya. I can't remember whose blog I discovered this brand on (if it was you drop me a note so I can give credit where it's due). I ordered Green from the Candy Shop Collection and Purple Dot from the Incandescent Collection.

One small gripe: the website only shows one photo of what I assume is the Candy Shop collection, and there is a drop down menu allowing you to choose between the three collections (the third is Classic French), and then choose how many polishes from the collection you want. Tsuya Tsuya then email with the colours available in each collection for you to choose from, but it would be really nice to see each colour listed separately on the website, currently it's a bit of a lucky dip choosing by colour name only.  Luckily I love the two colours I bought, plus they came packaged in a plastic pouch with a nail file (decorated with lemons) a buffer block and a 'magic' nail buffer, along with a cute little drawstring carry bag as modelled by a sleepy Fred!:

 
The photo doesn't do justice to the gorgeous glitteriness of Purple Dot - a purple jelly base packed to bursting with pink glitter. Aside from my minor gripe about the website design I was impressed with the communication and customer service of this Singapore-based company, and of course the free gifts!  Tsuya Tsuya nail polishes are S$12.90 each.

Next up some Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab nail polishes from Black Phoenix Trading Post.  I was on the site ordering a couple of their awesome tshirts as Christmas presents for The Eccentric English Boyfriend (this one and this one), but I couldn't possibly do that without putting some of their gorgeous nail polishes in my basket now could I?

Robotic Scarab, Destroying Angel and Smokestack. Great names, great colours - can't wait to see these babies on. US$9.00 each.

Some Mode cheapies found in a drugstore bargain bin, a new brand to me:

Blue Steel, Party Girl (much greener than the photo suggests), Style Magnet and Midsummer Dream.

Some Constance Carroll polishes - they seem to be updating their packaging and the colour range available in New Zealand has improved from the reds and pinks I previously knew them for:

Diamond, Midnight Rouge, Midnight Blue and Viva Las Venus.

The Range of Color Club polishes available in New Zealand is also increasing much to my joy - although it's still nowhere near their full range. I nabbed this navy blue beauty at the drugstore the other day:

Naughtycal Navy. At what point do you think I should admit I have too many navy polishes? No, no, you're right - I could never have too many navys.

Remember when I said I'd ordered two pairs of shoes in the New Look sale (in direct contravention of my no-buy, but totally justified because they were on sale and cute, so there!) - well turns out it was actually three pairs, but one pair was a cute pair of trainers for 14 Year Old Daughter so they don't count.  Here are the other two, apologies for the tiny grainy photos taken on my netbook's webcam in bed - just because I can laze in bed with my netbook and take photos with the webcam!

Purple cuties! Less blue and more gorgeous vibrant purple in real life than in the photo.

More cuties! I'm not sure about the placement of the strap though, I may end up cutting it off.

And of course I threw a couple of cheap polishes in with my order:

Star Gazer 128 and 131.

Finally check out these cute little spider earrings I picked up for NZ$5.00 in the Diva sale:

Adorable!

SQUEE! And then more squee

I am one very bouncy blogger this morning, as I won a competition. The wonderful Mary over at Body and Soul (go show her some love) ran a giveaway of the new Essie Sweet Time of the Year Collection:



Can you even begin to imagine how excited I am about getting my paws on Mint Candy Apple?

So I've been bouncing around the house this morning attempting to share my excitement with all. The Eccentric English Boyfriend was decidedly underwhelmed. The conversation went like this:

EEB (sarcastically): Yes, very nice dear.
Me: But it's three less polishes that I have to buy.
EEB: Given the breadth of polishes available out there I rather doubt that. You'll just find other polishes you want to buy. In fact I rather suspect this will just feed your addiction.
Me: But I love nail polishes! And I told you I wouldn't buy any more shoes for a while, and I haven't, have I?
EEB: That's because you haven't left the house!
Me: But that wouldn't stop me because I can buy them online ... WAIT! Does that mean that as long as I don't leave the house I can buy shoes?

At this stage EEB went a very funny colour. Bless.

Anyway just when I thought my day couldn't get any more exciting, Mr Courier Man dropped three parcels off. Ok one of them was for EEB - software or something. But the other two were for me.

First up from Mika J, a nail art instruction book, and a pack of 12 nail art pens:



Look at the Fred whiskers at the bottom!

See:



He was checking to make sure I hadn't bought any shoes.

Here's the other six colours in the nail art set:



Then a box from asos. Because they were having a sale AND they sent me a £10.00 off voucher for my birthday. So, you know, it would have been rude not to buy something!

So I got the cute tshirt that I blogged about:



They didn't have it in my size, so I bought one for 14 Year Old Daughter.

Then some Too Faced Shadow Insurance, which I've been reading rave reviews about:



I'm interested to see how this goes, because a lot of primers and eye creams make my eyes water. Not a good look.

Then this gorgeous dress, which I had to put on straight away:



It's purple! And it disguises the wobbly bits! Also - LAWKS my mirror needs a clean.

And finally these little cuties by Rocket Dog:



Aren't they adorable ... oh ... yeah ... they're shoes. But no, it's totally ok because I'm pretty sure I ordered them before the no-shoe-buy promise. Pretty sure. And anyway, sale AND £10.00 off birthday voucher. Totally justified. Totally.

Shoes, shoes and purple tutus

What did we do, my pretties, in the days before teh interwebs? How did we shop? Obviously we went to the local shops, but before teh interwebs someone like me in little old New Zealand could never have bought ridiculously cheap stuff in the asos sale without getting on a plane and flying there. I love teh interwebs!

A big box arrived today, and between me squealing and the dogs barking the courier man looked quite concerned.

Here's the box:



Umm, yeah, that would be Fred in the box. He didn't come with the box, obviously. He quite liked the poofy plastic things, until I stood on one and it went POP!

Here's the first pair of shoes, modelled by 13 year old daughter (her feet are slightly smaller than mine, but does that stop her from 'borrowing' my shoes, noooooooooo!):



Here's the second pair of shoes (pink!):



And a doggy bum!

The shoes were something like £7.00 each - wow!

And here's what I bought for 13 Year Old Daughter:



Damn camera-hogging dogs.

There was squealing when she saw the tutu. It was only £5.00, so I bought one for her BFF as well, which means there'll be more squealing when she comes over this afternoon.

Did I mention how much I love teh interwebs?

More reasons to love Barry M

So we all know that I've become a huge fan of Barry M's polishes. And I'm thinking when we go to England next year (did I mention that we're ... I did? oh, ok then ...) I'll be checking out the rest of their cosmetics too. But there's another reason to love Barry M. They're committed to not testing on animals, and even have their very own furry representative, Cookie the Bunny:



Now there are some who would say that I am almost as much of a sucker for fluffy animals as I am for pretty things. They offer as proof of this the two dogs, two cats, two rabbits, two rats and two mice who share our house. They may be right. So I'm totally in love with Cookie the Bunny, especially since he has his very own BunnyCam which means I can spend ages watching the cute bunny do cute bunny things. Or I could go watch my own bunnies, obviously, who do equally cute bunny things.

And just for you, some cute animal pics of some of my animals. I can't find any of my bunnies (I think they're on a backup disk. The pics not the bunnies), so instead here's Fred watching his favourite TV programme:



And ratties doing ratty stuff:



Teehee, little pink ratty tongue.

My latest haul

Look what arrived today!


Apologies for the photo, my camera's not the best. Left to right: OPI Over the Taupe, Essie Greenport, Essie Sag Harbour, China Glaze Secret Peri-wink-le, OPI No Room for the Blues, OPI A Grape Fit.

Essie Greenport is the one I'm most looking forward to trying, it seems to be the closest in shade to China Glaze's For Audrey, which I have been coveting for ages and cannot find anywhere. I'll be interested to see what the Essie polishes are like, it will be my first time trying them. Watch this space for reviews.

This is the third order I've had from Transdesign, and they are fabulous. The postage from USA isn't cheap, but their products are so well priced and my orders always arrive so quickly that they're my go-to supplier.

The six polishes came packaged in a little partitioned cardboard box that I thought might come in handy for holding polishes when I go away on holiday. Fred, however, had other ideas: