Spring Time Water Marble

Hi loves!

I can start to feel Spring creeping it's way in, finally!  It'll take eons to get all that snow to melt but as long as the sun is shinning and I don't need to wear 17 layers, I'm happy ;)

I was craving spring-ish colours, but I had no idea what kind of mani to do so I went for a water marble.  It seems to be my go-to lately when I'm feeling uninspired.  I still need practice but they're starting to look pretty awesome *pats self on back*

For this mani I used Color Club Dress for the Parade (yellow), Color Club Pucci-licious (purple) and Sally Hansen Mint Sorbet.

I then topped it off with Finger Paints Asylum to give it a little more depth.

Now I'm crossing my pretty painted fingers for the warmer weather to keep coming!  I try really really hard not to complain about the weather but I. can't. wait. for winter to be over.

Hope you're all having a great start to your week!

Pink and Purple Funky French

Hi all!

I'm so behind on posts!  I actually still have a Christmas mani to post but that will have to wait a few days since photos aren't even uploaded to my computer yet!  Holidays are just so busy.

This mani was entirely inspired by one of my favourite bloggers, Heather from Peace, Love & Polish.  She always does really fun french manicures and after seeing THIS one I felt the need to also do a funky french :)

I started with a 'base' of Finger Paints Flecked, which is a green to blue shifting flakie.  When my base was dried I used OPI Suzi & The 7 Dusseldorfs and Color Club Hot Like Lava to create the funky french.

Then to clean up the lines a little bit I used a blue glitter striper polish to outline the tip.

What do you all think of funky french manis?  I rarely ever do them but I have to admit I really loved this look!

And in the case that I don't post again before the 1st, I want to wish each and everyone of you a safe and happy New Year!

Joe Fresh Ink + Stamping

Happy Tuesday!

How was everyone's weekend?  I spent mine with my family celebrating my nephew's 11th birthday.  Hard to believe that kid is 11 already (and pretty much my height.. with bigger feet than me, how does that even happen?)

This is a mani I sported last week.  I had a hard time getting inspired but I think it turned out pretty decent!

For this look I used a base of Joe Fresh - Ink, a dark shimmery purply-blue.  I topped it off with Essie Pure Pearlfection to add a little bit more shimmer and dimension to the polish.

On my index and pinkie I also have a coat of Finger Paints Asylum, the gorgeous red/blue/purple flakie combo then I  finished them off with a medium sized silver hex glequin near the base.

For my ring and middle finger I stamped using Essie Blue Rhapsody and Pueen-49 plate.  I'm super happy with the way my stamping came out, too.  Those Essie mirror metallics are perfect for stamping!

Thanks for reading!

Blue + Flakies

Hi all

Quickie for today.  Here's an amazing combo that I unfortunately did not think of :P  If you're on Instagram, I suggest you follow @MrsLochness, she comes up with stunning manicures, and I have her to thank for thinking of pairing these two gorgeous polishes.

What you see here is Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear - Pacific Blue topped with Finger Paints - Flashy then mattified using the Joe Fresh Matte top coat.

Isn't it beautiful?  Unfortunately I jacked up my ring finger nail so these didn't last very long at all, but I enjoyed this mani while it lasted :)

Revlon Moon Candy and Expressionist polish Review

Not long ago Revlon Canada's Facebook page posted something about becoming a Revlon Select, where they were looking for 500 applicants to review some of their newest product.  I filled out the form not thinking much of it, and to my surprise I got chosen!

I got sent two of their new dual ended polishes (and some other goodies that I will review in another post).  I'm sure you've heard of them before, the Revlon Moon Candy polishes that have a base colour and a mylar flakie topper, and the Revlon Expressionist line, which comes with a base colour on one end, and a striping  polish on the other end.

Revlon Expressionist in Vincent Van Gold and Revlon Moon Candy in Orbit

 

Revlon Moon Candy - Orbit on my ring finger & Revlon Expressionist - Vincent Van Gold on the remainder of my fingers.

 Both polishes that were sent to me had gorgeous purple bases.  The base for Vincent Van Gold had some blue and pink shimmer to it, whereas the base for Orbit was a dark purple creme.  I've read that the Moon Candy bases are one coaters, and if they're all like this one they most definitely are!  I hardly ever paint on just one coat but this one really didn't need a second.  

I used two coats for Vincent Van Gold.

Then using the other end, I added one easy coat of the flakies.  These aren't your typical flakies though, and I had a few that didn't lie completely flat but that got remedied with a thick layer of top coat.

And because I'm not the best at doing free hand nail art using a striping brush, I just used the other end of Vincent Van Gold and just painted on simple gold stripes.

Striping brush from the Revlon Expressionist polish

I really liked the two polishes they sent me.  The striping polish was opaque enough that I didn't need to go over the stripes a second time and I only used one coat of the flakie topper.  The formula for both base colours' was good and not streaky at all.

The only thing I didn't like from these is the packaging.  It's actually really awkward to paint your nails with these since there's another polish attached to the brush which makes it super top heavy!  I had more cleanup to do than usual since the brush was a little harder to control.

What do you all think of these?  I like them, but I think I would rather them come in a set where they polishes aren't attached to each other :P

This post contains product(s) provided to me for my honest review.

Flakie Love

Hi all!

Who doesn't love flakies?  They completely transform the look of a manicure, AND removal is pain free.  The other day I was browsing one of our local drug stores and stumbled upon a full display of Layla Ceramic Effect polishes at a pretty average price, so I picked up this gorgeous purple flakie polish.  I may have to go back and get a couple more :D

  

~~~

 

To create this look I started by using Gosh Deep Purple as my base, with an accent of the gorgeous Revlon Royal.  Then I added one coat of this Layla Ceramic Effect polish (whose name I can't find?), on top of Deep Purple, and Finger Paints Motley over Royal.  I really loved this look!  My only regret was using such a dark base for the Layla flakies, it masked the pretty purple base and basically made it look like the regular orange-to-green flakies.

Here's a bonus photo showing the colour shift of the flakies.  And if you look closely you can see my kitty's reflection in the window (right above my pinky).. if it were up to him he'd photo bomb every single one of my pictures lol.

Hope you're all having a fabulous Tuesday, and don't forget to go vote for your favourite manicure over at the Nail Polish Canada nail art challenge!

Essie - Stylenomics "Skittles"

Happy Monday!

I hope you all had a good weekend :)

For this mani, I started with a base of Essie Stylenomics.  This polish is a super blacked out green but really.. just looks black on the nail.  I stamped the little birds with Essie Blue Rhapsody using one of the new Bundle Monster plates.

On my ring finger I have Orly Mermaid Tail and Spazmatic (I love these glitters so much!), and on my middle finger I added a stripe of Finger Paints flakies in the middle, lined it with a So Easy glitter striper, then added loose holographic hex glitters on each side :)

This was super fun, and now that I've finally bought Elmer's Glue I'll be sporting the glitters a lot more often!  It's so much fun :D

Thanks for reading!

Bombshell Gradient

Hi lovelies!

Happy Hump day!

I apologize in advance for the quality of these pictures.  I did these nails before heading out to my in laws camper for the weekend and had to take the photos there.  I was surrounded by three little girls and well.. these aren't my best photos!

 

  

 

I started off with a base of GOSH Deep Purple which is a beautiful blackened purple creme.  I then added a thin coat of Finger Paints Twisted 3/4 of the way down the nail, then sponged the tips with Orly Bubbly Bombshell to create the gradient.   I loved the look of the flakies and glitter on the dark base.  My accent nails have none other than three thin coats of Bubbly Bombshell.  Such a gorgeous glitter! 

What do you all think of accent nails?  I started doing accents maybe 4 or 5 years ago and I can't seem to stop :)

Flakie & Glitter Layering Combo

Hi all!

I do have a Monkey See Monkey Do to post (late yet again) but the photos are on my camera which is at home.. boo.  So instead I show you a really pretty mani that I wore not too long ago.

 

For this I used Color Club - Express Yourself, witch is a beauuutiful purple creme (it's more colour accurate in Rebecca's post here).  The accent was CC - Mrs Robinson.

 I layered Revlon's Stunning on all nails, a beautiful silver and holo glitter polish, then on my accent nail I also added some OPI - Divine Swine on top.  For the remainder of the nails I layered Finger Paints - Asylum and Twisted.

 

 

I loved this combo, flakies seem to just add so much depth to a mani :)

 

Color Club - Express Yourself

Color Club - Mrs. Robinson

Revlon - Stunning

Finger Paints - Asylum & Twisted

OPI - Divine Swine

PCFSC: Unicorn Magic

Hi darlings!

Today's challenge is... Unicorn Magic.  What in the world is unicorn magic, you say?  Who knows, but interpret as you wish I suppose ;)

I think of unicorns as sparkly (maybe because they have shimmering blood in Harry Potter? lol) so I went with a shimmery, sparkly kind of mani.

 

I started off with a base of OPI - Go on Green, which took 3 coats to build up.  Then I added a coat of blue flakies, Finger Paints - Motley, which only showed up in certain light (if you click on the photos you'll see them better ;), then one coat of Nicole by OPI - Make a Comet-ment to give it a bit of holo sparkle, and finished off with China Glaze - Marry a Millionaire at the tips. 

 

This was SUCH a hard mani to take photos of.. my camera just wouldn't capture the sparkle that was actually there.

 

Sunlight photo to try and show off a bit of the holo particles.  I'm a bit sad that the pictures didn't do it justice, because it really was pretty :)

OPI - Go on Green

Finger Paints - Motley

Nicole by OPI - Make a Comet-ment

China Glaze - Marry a Millionaire

What do you picture when you think of Unicorn Magic?  Thanks for looking :)

See what the other spring challenge participants did for today's challenge:

Fancy Phalanges
The Crumpet
Purple Fairy Dust
Manicurity
PishPosh & Polish
Bee Polished
Obsessive Compulsive Nail Painting Disorder
Confessions of a Nail Polish Junkie
Happy Nails

Gnarly Nails
The Girl with Rainbow Hands
No Junk Nail
Only Always Soccermom
The Nail Newbie
Polish Me Lovely
Munia's Nails
Geeky Owl
Fanning the Fumes
ColorSplash Nails
okay now joy!
MeMa's Mani's
Angelina's Nails & More
Persistently Glittery

PCFSP: Pink Polka Dots

Hi all!

Happy hump day!  I hope everyone is having a good week so far :)

Today's spring challenge was to do pink polka dots.  I had a pretty good idea in my head, but it didn't translate as nicely as I hoped.

 

Base is 3 coats of Essie - Chinchilly, then I used a dotting tool, put on some white polish, then covered that up with China Glaze - Pool Party so that the pink would stand out.  In real life you can't see see white outlines where the pink polish didn't completely cover it, of course macro shots picked it up :P  And I did an accent nail using Essie's Shine of the Time.

 

Pink and grey look great together, in my opinion, I just wish my stamping was more uniform and that the pink was more vibrant!  Besides that, I think this is still cute :)

 

And how amazing does Shine of the Time look over this?  Soo pretty!

 Essie - Chinchilly

China Glaze - Pool Party

Essie - Shine of the Time

Thanks for having a looksie!

Stamping Sunday: Stars

Hi all!

Today's Adventure in Stamping's theme was stars.  I tried to play in a kind of 'night sky' into my mani as well.. I really like how this turned out even though my stamping still needs improvement :)

 

I incorporated a bit of a tape mani in there as well.  It's simple but I really like the look of this.  For all nails but the accent I started off with a base of Revlon - Not So Blueberry which is a beautiful lilac-ish shimmer (and scented) polish.  And for my accent I added two coats of NOPI - Khloe had a little Lam-Lam.  Then I taped it off and added Sally Hansen Xtreme wear in Mint Sorbet, and Joe - Ink for all other nails. I stamped the stars using Bundle Monster plates, added Finger Paints - Asylum & Twisted and, ta-da!

 

Even though the stars could have stamped better, I really like this!  

And of course while I was taking photos, I had a little visitor that wanted some attention ;)

 

Revlon - Not So Blueberry

Joe - Ink

NOPI - Khloe had a Little Lam-Lam

Sally Hansen - Mint Sorbet

Thanks for looking ;)

Finger Paints - Asylum & Twisted

Stamps & Flakies

Hi lovelies!

Here's a recently worn mani:

 

Essie - Feed Me

Essie - Bobbing for Baubles

Essie - School of Hard Rocks

Seche Vite

 

See the flakies poke through?  I found all of the Finger Paints Special Effects at Sally and bought them all since I have no flakies (I know, right?).  I'm a bit sad that I didn't take a photo pre-stamping, though.

 
Also, funny enough, the stamping on my right hand, having used my non-dominant hand to do the stamping, turned out nicer:

 

I used XL plate B from You Mix Cosmetics .  The images are so big there is no way they won't cover your entire nail unless they're super long.  See?

You can see which portion of the image is actually on my nail, and how much of the image is left unstamped because it's so big :)

Thanks for looking!