Giveaway Reminder & Questions

My Follower Appreciation Giveaway is ending very soon! I can't believe it's been a month already. However, I'm very excited to finally get to choose a winner and get the prizes shipped out.


There's still time if you haven't entered or simply want more chances to win (each time you post about my giveaway on Facebook or Twitter is one extra entry) go do so now!! If you don't enter you can't win after all.


Good luck to all those who have or will enter!!


As for my next giveaway, I have a few ideas. I'm trying to come up with things that can be shipped internationally this time. With this in mind, how do you gals feel about artificial nails? What about if they are designed and painted by me? What about preferred lengths? Short, medium, long? What about things that aren't nail related but simply beauty related? With this idea, I've heard that some countries don't allow the shipment of cosmetics. I would have to do a bit of research to find out which countries.


I'm open to suggestions for prizes. If you have something you'd like to see in a giveaway you can post ideas in the comments or use the 'Contact Me' section of this blog to find my email.

Dots Galore

Hello, my lovely followers!! I hope everyone is doing great today. I would be better if it didn't insist on raining. Still, I managed to get enough sun for pictures so I can't complain too much.

I'm not sure if anyone noticed, but I did a standard trim before painting my nails for the last post. I hadn't realized how long they were getting, and I'm really beginning to enjoy them short. I'm happy to say that this nearly evened out the break of my index nail. It's nearly unnoticeable now. Yay!


I also want to give you an update on my 'Electrify on Fast Track' mani. Electrify may be the prettiest glitter I own, but it's still a glitter. I seem to have forgotten that while I was enjoying it so much. It took me nearly an hour to remove Electrify from the tips even using the foil method. It was a painful reminder of the tediousness of removing glitters. By the time I was done there was bits of red and gold glitter everywhere and my nails were scrubbed raw. Glitter reminds me of sand in the way that it gets everwhere!!!

Full Sun

My left hand with its pretty purple thumb.

With this fresh in mind, I went for a very simple mani today. It's a recreation of The Polished Perfectionist's Polka Dots mani. I went with a different color theme and they turned out nice, but I still think hers are prettier. I definitely recommend that you go take a look at this mani as well as others by her. :) I loved her idea of taking a picture with hands wrapped around a cup so you can see the full effect, so I borrowed that as well.


Have I ever mentioned my love of my dotting tool? I bought it years and years ago as a tool for clay working. While I left the clay behind I found another use for it with my nails. I would love to pick up a set of various sized dotting tools but for this mani my medium sized dotter gets the job done nicely.

Natural Light, Slight Cloud Cover

My left hand with its mint green thumb.

I think these are a perfect combination of Spring and Easter. Everyone who saw them thought they were Easter egg nails.


Polish Used

• Borghese - Brillante
• Sally Hansen - Mellow Yellow
• Borghese - Buon Viaggio Mauve
• China Glaze - Secrete Peri-Wink-Le
• Sinful Colors - Beautiful Girl
• Sally Hansen - Mint Sorbet
• L.A. Colors - BCC 561 (White)
• Sally Hansen - Insta-Dri

Electrify on Fast Track

I am absurdly pleased to start this post with the happy, happy news that I now own both Electrify and Riveting from China Glaze's Hunger Games collection, Capitol Colours. I'm still trying to find Luxe and Lush, but that's not what this post is about.

Cloudy

2 coats Fast Track, 1 Electrify, 2 top coat.

Taken while out; I didn't have a nail polish bottle handy so forgive the partial zombie/lobster claw I have going on.

I was hoping to get better (read: sunny) pictures of these nails, but we'll all just have to make due with what I do have because it's a rainy mess in small town Pennsylvania right now.

Still, look at just how great Electrify looks with Fast Track. Personally, I think Electrify is one of the prettiest glitters I own with its small gold hex glitters and its larger bright red hex glitters. The red and gold really brings out the golden shimmer in Fast Track and adds spice to it's nude/tan color.


Luck shined upon me today ... with sunlight!!

Morning Sunlight

Ignore the wear at the tips. I was particularly hard on my nails this weekend. Actually, they held up much better than I expected with only slight wear & no chips.

This is definitely one manicure I have no want to remove! :)

Vintage Inspired

Can I just say thank you for all the wonderfully sweet comments on my Spring mani? I know I don't answer the comments as often as I should, but I just want you guys to know that you really know how to turn a bad day around and make a girl happy!! I treasure each and every comment.


I decided to stick to the theme and do something with flowers again. I know this has been done a thousand times before by others but this is a mani I haven't tried before.  So, I figured, why not give it a try? Vintage inspired, here I come!

Natural Evening Light

I tried to keep everything soft without bright sunlight. It just felt right with these nails.

Yep, that's a broken nail. Both index nails broke yesterday and contributed to my very bad day. Sadly, this hand, my left, is by far the worst. And it just grew out from the last break too!! :(

I did a Google search for vintage and came up with this vintage floral wallpaper. That and the tons of other vintage floral nails are where this idea comes from. With this design, I really don't think I can claim anything as mine since it's all been done before. So I give credit to all the nailers out there who have done this design before me!!

I think I'm finally getting the hang of swirled roses. It only took two days of near non-stop practice.

Is there anything you guys would like to see me do on this blog? I'm open to suggestions. :)

Polish Used

• Borghese - Brillante
• Sinful Colors - Beautiful Girl
• Wet n Wild - French White Creme
• Sally Hansen - Mint Sorbet
• Sally Hansen - Green With Envy
• OPI - Uh-Oh Roll Down The Window
• Hard Candy - Matte-ly In Love

Hello Spring!

And hello to all you wonderful followers, and happy spring! I became oddly attached to my 'Feeling Blue' mani, so I left doing a Spring mani to the last second.


Forgive me for at least some of the messiness of this design. My beloved nail art brushes are beginning to fray. They are old and I knew this was coming, but I'm still terribly sad to see them go. I've been putting off get new ones, but I think it's finally time.

I had a lovely sun going on my thumb but bumped it while it was still wet and sloughed off half the polish. :(

Today was a lovely day to begin spring in my small town. Slightly cloudy at various points in the day but it reached into the low 70's so I can't complain. I had the blinds and the windows open enjoying the sun and cool breeze. It's turning into a perfect evening as well.


How is the weather in your part of the world?


Polish Used

• Sally Hansen - Blew Me Away!
• Pure Ice - Free Spirit
• L.A. Colors Art Deco - Bright Green
• Sally Hansen - Green With Envy
• Sally Hansen - Mint Sorbet
• OPI - Uh-Oh Roll Down The Window
• Wet n Wild - French White Creme
• Revlon - Cloud
• Sally Hansen - Sun Kissed
• Sally Hansen - Fuchsia Power
• Revlon - No Shrinking Violet
• L.A. Colors Art Deco - Yellow (unseen sun)
• Pure Ice - Siren (Whoops, forgot this one)

Feeling Blue

I've been having problems with breaks along the edges of my nails lately. I've attempted trimming them way down. I'm sure you've noticed the differences in nail length since I started blogging. This has really helped the strength of my nails but hasn't stopped the edges from bending and breaking regularly. Recently, I tried rounding the edges a bit more than my perfectly squared off tips. I'm hoping this works, but I have a feeling it won't. Does anyone know any good remedies for brittle, easily broken nails?


I'm really excited to show you today's nails. There's really nothing extraordinary about them, but I was lucky enough to find Sinful Colors Pearl Harbor again. Pearl Harbor is part of my Follower Appreciation Giveaway; the one that almost didn't make it into the giveaway after I saw the bottle in the sunlight. I picked it up in my last haul and finally got around to using it today. It's such a real gem. These pictures just can't capture the awesomeness of Pearl Harbor.

2 Coats Polish + 1 Coat Glitter + Top Coat
Sunset Lighting

I adore Pearl Harbor over China Glaze First Mate, but it is just as lovely over China Glaze Secret Peri-Wink-Le ... just in a much more subtle way.

It's amazing how different Pearl Harbor can look over different colors. Over First Mate, the dark blue, it looks like a teal or a Persian green. While over Secret Peri-Wink-Le, it looks aqua or even robin egg blue. I'm eager to see this glitter over a variety of colors.

If you like this glitter and want it for your own, head over to my Follower Appreciation Giveaway and enter for a chance to win it!!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Happy St. Patrick's Day, my lovely followers! I had absolutely nothing planned for today as I was so excited by the China Glaze Hunger Games collection. Still, I felt I had to do something. I hardly ever let a holiday go by without giving at least a slight nod of acknowledgment.


So, I went with something very simple. This is a design that anyone can do. (Which is always great, right?) It's simply two coats of white polish on all my fingers, then I used a semi-small dotting tool for the dotted nails; you can use a different size or even a toothpick to get your dots. The rainbow nail is my shaky freehand (way too much coffee lately) but you can use the tape method to get near perfect lines. It's all very simple but gives a very eye-catching set of nails.

Full Sun

A hint for doing dots? Do them one line (up and down) at a time and stagger them. Every other line should match up. It's so much easier than trying to do them vertically across your nail. 

Flash

What's on your nails for St. Patrick's Day? I would love to see any designs you guys have come up with. ♥

Polish Used

• Borghese - Brilliante
• Sally Hansen - White On
• Pure Ice - Siren
• Sally Hansen - Sun Kissed
• Sally Hansen - Mellow Yellow
• Pure Ice - Free Spirit
• Sally Hansen - Blew Me Away!
• L.A. Colors - BCC 590 (Purple)
• Sally Hansen - Insta-Dri

China Glaze Capitol Colours

Wow! Could this week have gone any faster?


Capitol Colours are here!! I wanted to have these swatches posted for you guys mid-week but it was just one thing after another! Sadly, I still have only three of the six polishes I want from this collection. I've checked most of the local shops, and they're all sold out. I think if I want them I'm going to have to splurge and order them online. I just hate paying shipping costs and then having to wait for them to arrive. I'm not good with waiting! However, if the other colors are anything like these three the collection is certainly worth the effort and extra money.


The first polish I have to show off is the one I was most interested in, oddly enough. This is Fast Track, a gorgeous beige/tan color chock full of gold shimmer. I'm the kind of girl made for bright colos so I'm not a fan of nudes, but I adore this polish. The shade is just different enough from other nudes to catch attention and the gold shimmer really makes it stand out in a crowd. Fast Track is one of a kind in my opinion.

3 Coats in Sunlight

Next up is Harvest Moon. I'm a bit unsure as to how to discribe this color except stunning. I've heard it described as a copper color, but I would go with more of a tawny bronze. Truthfully, it's only a slight shade different, but I think it better manages to capture the near orange tint that mixes with the copper. Harvest Moon is a hidden gem in this collection that puts me in mind of Autumn, pumpkins, and the golden orange of turning leaves. You know me with shimmering metallics; there's no question that I adore this, both formula and color.

2 Coats in Full Sun

Last, but not least, is Stone Cold. This color certainly brings to mind stone: caves and caverns with thick stone walls. It's dark grey bordering on black in some lights with a thick silver shimmer. This is a matte polish so the shimmer doesn't shine or really sparkle but mixes perfectly with the deeper, darker background. I manage to get my nails covered in one coat, but my coats tend to be a bit thicker than most people use. This polish starts to dry very quickly as the matte sets so work quickly if you don't want it pulling up with your brush.

1 Coat in Full Sun

Stone Cold Close-Up

Can I just say I am stunned and so very thankful to all you followers, new and old? You guys are amazing!!

Kiss Nail Dress - Peplum

Natural Light (Sunset)

Today's post is about my foray into using the new Kiss Nail Dress in Peplum. I was very excited to find them at one of my local Walmarts (even if I found Peplum instead of the one I covet, Gown). It was one I didn't visit often but since I was in the area that day I dropped in. Imagine my surprise to find these when neither of the other two Walmarts I visit had them! And for such a great price compared to Claire's Bling Nail Stickers or even to Sally Hansen Salon Effects polish strips!

Flash

Pros

• Great designs in a variety of styles
• Great price
• 28 nail strips to fit both fingers and toes
• Fairy easy to size since nail strips are on clear sheets
• Very easy to apply and pretty quickly too
• Strips can be cut down for other nail designs or even pieced together with other Kiss Nail Dress for an awesome effect
• They look pretty great on and are certainly eye catching. Follow the 'do not's in the Cons, and they'll look even better.
• If you find a gem situated on the edge of your nail, carefully file with the blue side of the provided file first. I found if I filed carefully enough I could 'cut' the gem with the file and leave half on my nail.

Natural Light (Sunlight)

My attempt at a top coat and you can see the Nail Dress on the pinky pulling up.

Cons

• Peplum nail strips are hard to press smoothly onto nails since they are covered in gems.
• Do NOT stretch the strips to make them fit your nail. They stretch back and leave bits of your nails bare.
• Do NOT attempt to seal with a top coat. Believe me, the nail strips don't like this.
• Nail Dress is pretty harsh on the nails of those easily bored (like me). Don't think you can put these on for a few hours or just a day and then take them off. Even peeling the stickers off slowly as recommended by the packaging made my nails start peeling in places.
• Since you file off the tips of the strips the tips of your nails are bare. With Peplum, the 'polish' is black and the tips of your nails are easily seen.
• The tips of your fingernails get a lot of use. More than you tend to realize. It's the reason you polish the tips. Nail strips get filed off and don't cover the tips. This leaves them very likely to start peeling up around the tips.

Natural Light (Sunlight)

Be careful not to stretch it over your nails; the Nail Dress stretches back to its original shape leaving the tips and sides of your nail bare.

Do the pros outweigh the cons? I don't know. I think it's something each person has to decide for themselves. I think if I ever stumble across Nail Dress in Gown I'll certainly pick it up like a giddy fangirl, but I also don't think I'll ever choose any other Nail Dress design.

Lace Tips + Mini Haul

I went shopping yesterday with a $3 off coupon to my local drug store and came home with a mini haul. I also stopped in at Sally Beauty for their sale price on the China Glaze Hunger Games collection. They were nearly completely out of stock but I managed to snag Stone Cold, Harvest Moon, and Fast Track. Fast Track was the one I was dying for oddly enough. It's not usually a color I would go for but the swatches were gorgeous. I can say it's even more stunning in person! I'll have a swatch post sometime this week for these colors and hopefully more of my haul. Wanna see the awesomeness of my haul?? See that lacy box in the back? That's the prize I won in the Nails, Actually 50 follower giveaway! Must remember to send her a thank you when I get back from family Sunday tonight.

Flash

Natural Light

Enough about that. You'll see more this week. This post is about Diva Couture self adhesive lace tips. Can I just say how much I love these nail stickers? I picked them up by chance early last year at my local Dollar Store and hated them the first time I used them. I had no idea what I was doing since I had never used nail stickers before. I put them on all wrong and they only lasted a day, but they looked gorgeous while they were on. With that in mind I decided to give them another try, and my ability with these stickers improved greatly. The lace tips also come with 5 glittery stipping tapes which I've never used, so I can't give an opinion of them. I buy these simply for the lace.

Natural Light

They aren't all sunshine and light. Is any product ever without its flaws? You get 12 lace tips; this gives you a very limited amount of sizes. I always end up with small lines of my nails showing on either side. However, the stickers are clear so it's really not noticeable. If you find you can't stand it, I'm sure you can butcher the two unused and piece them together for full coverage. The last down side is that these stickers crinkle a bit when you put a top coat over them. You can't not put a top coat over them or they catch on various things and simply peel off. I've found I don't have as many problems if I spend a small amount of time making sure all stickers are firmly pressed down and attached to my nails before adding a top coat. Work from the bottom towards the end of your nail. I start with using the opposite (flat) end of my tweezers and rubbing in circles, pressing outwards. Then I follow with my fingers, pressing the extra sticker over the tips of my nails before taking my file and gently filing off the ends of the stickers. Work with your fingers again once the end is filed off and finish pressing the sticker firmly to the tips of your nails. Put the stickers on all of your nails and then go back through them and give them another smoothing with your fingers before adding your top coat.

Natural Light

I like to use these while giving my nails a break from heavy polish, so I do them very simply. One clear coat as a base coat, the stickers, and then a top coat. However, you could spice these up by using any color of nail polish; light colors would probably work best, but I'm happy to say Diva Couture also makes lace tips in white for over dark colors. I've also used these tips with rhinestones for a very pretty effect.


If you're looking for an elegant nail without all the fuss of actual lace this is definitely the thing to try!


Next post: Kiss Nail Dress in Peplum.

The Hunger Games

In honor of my finishing The Hunger Games trilogy and in anticipation of the first movie, I decided to do Hunger Games nail art. I think this is one of the only books I've ever read where I didn't prefer any one character over any other; I just plain liked them all: in various different ways, yes, but still ... I tip my imaginary hat to Suzanne Collins.

The first nail, the thumb, is the mockingjay of course. I mean, what else could possibly say Hunger Games better than the mockingjay? Not my best work, I admit. I'm guessing it looks more like a blob than a bird with an arrow if you don't know what you're looking for.

The index finger is to honor Katniss Everdeen, The Girl on Fire, one light shining gloriously in the dark of District 12 (and all of Panem). The flame, the dark surrounding it, and a little bit of coal using black crackle to show where she comes from.

Next is the one nail I desperately wanted to do but debated endlessly on just how to accomplish it. Even with my love and sorrow over Rue, I was left agonizing over what to do for her. I already had the mockingjay, but that was for the overall series. I could do an orchard tree but that didn't feel right either. Finally, I decided to follow Katniss and honor Rue with flowers. So, I tried covering the entire nail in nothing but flowers. I reworked this multiple times. I can't tell you how many times I had to use nail polish remover. Finally, I used a combination of stamping and a brush to fill the flowers in with different colors. The flowers cover the peephole into another world; one where Rue leaps through the trees like a bird with the whistles of her mockingjays singing that she's safe. Yeah, I'm a big ol' sap!

After that is the forest, stream, and the cave from the Arena. Again, it's not my best work, but I lost a good deal of canvas space. I haven't done a nail art design this intricate since I cut off a lot of my nail length. Still, I'm very pleased. Blue Year's Eve makes an absolutely stunning stream! All that bright blue glitter gleaming from the darker polish just speaks of hidden depths, and whether what lurks in those depths is good or bad will only be found out when you dip in a toe. I tried to add a muddy-ish, sandy bank and some odd rocks before it leads into the greanery of the forest. I'm pretty sure it was the other way around in the books: the forest leads into the barren stream riddled with a mess of rocks and the cave, but I couldn't see filling a whole nail with rocks.

Last but not least, I wanted to do something to encompass the violence of the Hunger Games. I knew I wanted blood, but wasn't sure in what way until I happened upon the trailer while searching out ideas. I saw the reaping of District 12, and when I saw the drab gray blues of their clothes (Katniss's horrific dress especially) I knew what I had to do. The blood spatter is done by straw as per a tutorial I found on Youtube. However, the original idea goes to thepolishaholic.com.


Not sure if anyone wants know this but I thought I would include it just in case. You can totally skip over this. :)



Polish Used
Thumb

• Wet n Wild - Goldmine
• Funky Fingers - Platinum Record
• Petites - Bronze Baby

Index

• L.A. Colors - Black Velvet
• Pure Ice - Siren
• Sally Hansen - Sun Kissed
• Sally Hansen - Mellow Yellow
• Funky Fingers - Black Scales

Middle

• Sally Hansen - White On
• Revlon - Tangerine
• Sally Hansen- Sun Kissed
• Sally Hansen - Mellow Yellow
• Pure Ice - Siren
• Borghese - Buon Viaggio Mauve
• Sinful Colors - Beautiful Girl
• Sinful Colors - Feeling Great
• Bon Bons - Blue

Ring

• Sally Hansen - Green with Envy
• Sally Hansen - Emerald City
• Pure Ice - Free Spirit
• Funky Fingers - Platinum Record
• Wet n Wild - Metallica
• Sally Hansen - Wet Cement
• L.A. Colors - Black Velvet
• China Glaze - Blue Year's Eve

Pinky

• Revlon - Cloud
• Pure Ice - Siren

Yellow Kitty Newspaper Nails

Sorry for the delay guys. I wanted to post this last Friday but came down with a nasty head cold. I just managed to drag myself out of bed today: not completely cured but I'm feeling much better. I'm pleased to say I've brushed up on my book reading skills this weekend, finishing 7 books. It was a nice rest from my usually hectic days ... even if I was sick. Now, onto the post!



Sally Hansen has to be one of my all time favorite nail polishes. It's everywhere— even my small town, the price is great, and it gets the job done beautifully.


I picked up Yellow Kitty at a 75% off sale where I just happened to have a coupon for an additional $1.00 off. It was the last one on the self (a good sign, right?), and I ended up paying only $0.89 for this polish. That's a good thing, a really great thing, because I found myself disappointed. The color is pretty—just about the shade of pale yellow I was looking for. However, after three coats I still didn't achieve full opacity. I'm guessing this is a polish that can't stand on its own and needs to be layered over white ... or maybe have a design layered over it. Yellow Kitty is workable but disappointing on its own.

Flash

I wish you could see these in sunlight, get a clue of just how much sheerness shows, but we've had nothing but snow or rain lately. 

I may be disappointed with the sheerness of Yellow Kitty but I can't talk bad about the Complete Salon Manicure formula. Yellow Kitty went on slightly better than Navy Baby, smoother and with less mess. Though the less mess is probably just because Yellow Kitty is lighter and harder to see smeared across skin. :) I'm just a messy polisher.


With three coats of Yellow Kitty and a top coat of Sally Hansen Insta-Dri while my nails were still slightly wet, it gave the nails a near mirror shine. Absolutely gorgeous! The Complete Salon Manicure nail polish has it's own rising top coat that I'm guessing bonded with my own top coat to create ten perfectly, ultra shiny nails. I have to admit they look beyond amazing!


After three days, going on four, the nails were still shiny and showed no signs of wear at all. I'm amazed. I'm pretty hard on my nails most days and by this time they always show signs of wear on at least the tips, if not full on chips, usually my thumbs and index nails with slightly less wear on the middle. There was no sign of wear and certainly no chips.


It's going on a full week now and they are still really shiny, not as mirror shined as day three but shinier than they usually are by now (if any polish has ever lasted this long). They also show signs of what I call stress fractures and there are a few minuscule chips near the tips. That said, I wouldn't be embarrassed to wear them for another day or two since they are virtually unseen.


Overall, for all my disappointment over sheerness, I do so love the formula. Besides, once I completed the newspaper nails look over Yellow Kitty the sheerness isn't noticeable anymore. I will definitely be looking into picking up more of the Complete Salon Manicure nail polish and would certainly recommend it to my family and friends.