Nail Art: Spring!

Hello guys! So my Facebook following is slowly growing, I'm almost to 20 likes! For anyone here NOT following me on Facebook, I've been talking about trying a giveaway when I get 50 likes. I've been apprehensive about doing giveaways, but I like the idea of giving back to such a fun community :-)

So today I really needed a pick-me-up from my nails, after having FOUR students in my class be sent to the principal, along with a nice, but timid substitute (I'm an assistant in a special ed behavioral class, but that's still a lot out of eleven!). Today was exhausting, but at least I had a cute spring mani! Here we are:

The pink background: OPI Pink Friday
The sparkle: China Glaze Fairy Dust
The blue petals: Color Club Wicked Sweet
The stem/leaves: OPI Did It On 'Em
The yellow center: Sinful Colors Morning Breath Nail Art

I know it's not overly impressive, but for me this is quite the accomplishment, and it's adorable!! :-) (Not to mention has a touch of sparkle, what can go wrong?)

Fabulous Giveaways!!!

Okay guys, so I usually leave giveaways on Facebook, but I figured I'd put it out here too. Check out Princess Polish, who is able to give a set of Zoya's summer collection!!

http://princesspolish.blogspot.com/2012/03/500-follower-giveaway-zoya-beach-and.html

OR You can check out Glam Polish, giving away China Glazes OMG polishes:

http://glam-polish.blogspot.com.au/2012/03/glam-polish-1000-follower-giveaway-omg.html

You won't regret checking these out :-)

NOTD: Gold and Green!

So I know last night I posted some St. Patrick's Day nail art, but unfortunately I wasn't as happy with it as I wanted to be. Soooo...I removed the nail art, painted it and put one more coat of polish on all of the fingers :-)

I took my China Glaze It's Alive and put two coats on the finger that had had the rainbow nail art. Then I added China Glaze Luxe and Lush on top of all my fingers. The results is AMAZING, the green polish underneath really brings out the gold in Luxe and Lush, which was exactly what I wanted (the picture does no justice!).

Happy St. Patrick's Day to all!

While I'm blogging...more hauls!!

Okay, so I'm gonna make this short and sweet. Here's my latest haul (it's like March Madness around here!) I will say Sally's was having an awesome sale :-)

Here is China Glaze Lubu Heels, Dorothy Who?, Fairy Dust, Some Like it Haute, and Love Marylin. Love my sparkles!!

So there's a funny story about my Hunger Games polishes. From left to right, we have Stone Cold, Luxe and Lush, and Electrify. Now, instead of Stone Cold, I thought I got Smoke and Ashes. Up until my order came, I had thought I ordered Smoke and Ashes, but had I checked I would have realized I ordered Stone Cold, instead. BUT I'm really liking Stone Cold's matte finish, so I may just  need to make one more Sally's order while China Glaze is on sale :-)

Then a few random loves, we have Wet N' Wild Gray's Anatomy (a really cool iridescent green/gray/purple/pink), Finger Paints Red Crackle, and China Glaze Cracked Concrete.

So I have probably bought too much recently, but there's been so many pretty colors!! I guess there's never too many pretty colors!

St. Patrick's Day Mani!

Okay, so, got my St. Patrick's Day nails on for the weekend! Plans are thus far:
1.) Get some house cleaning done (may lead to a need to repaint nails, hehe, don't know what though!)
2.) Going to my local high school's musical , Seussical the Musical (have a family friend in it, doing amazing!)
3.) Going to the Boondocks Bar and Restaurant for drinks and dancing!

While doing all of this, I will (hopefully!) be sporting these nails:

The green is China Glaze It's Alive!. The nail art is done with Wet N' Wild Black Creme, The Gold and the Beautiful, and an array of the rainbow colors that I can't remember at the moment (plus some "Broadway" yellow nail art jewels). I'm not entirely happy with it, because my cat decided to get in the way and help smudge the design. But overall, it's cute, so I may have to stick with it :-).

So there you have it! Enjoy your St. Patrick's Day, everyone.

One post after the other: Store Haul!

I've been talking on Facebook about all the polish I've bought since March began. Well, here's an idea of what I have thusfar:

Of just the China Glaze I bought, I have from left to right:
China Glaze Magnetix in Instant Chemistry and Cling On (plus magnet of course!), China Glaze Crackles in Oxidized Aqua and Latticed Lilac, It's Alive from the 2011 Halloween collection, two mini Ruby Pumps, and China Glaze base coat and fast-dry topcoat.

The rest is mainly Color Club, with a few others in between. From left to right there is: Savvy French White (plain white creme), mini Color Clubs Pretty in Platinum, Starry Temptress, Translucent, Wicked Sweet, Nouveau Vintage, and Fame and Fortune. Then there's Zoya Gemma, Sally Hansen Diamond Strength Pink Proposal, and Orly Twilight.

Someday I will start swatching my colors as I buy them (mayhaps on a color wheel? But for now I'm thinking my fingers, even if I do one finger). But for now, you at least see what my latest purchases have given me!

Now, for that Sally Beauty order to come in with THREE Hunger Games polishes, two crackles, and five sparkly fun China Glaze polishes (cannot WAIT for Dorothy Who? and Lubu Heels).

NOTD: Pinkish-silver-blue-purple-sparkle fun!

So my manicure today is a little odd to do, but looks really pretty and got me a lot of compliments at work today :-) Here we have two coats of Savvy French White as a base. On it are two coats of NYC Starry Silver Glitter, which is a pretty blend of silver sparkles with medium blue and lavender hex glittler. On top of THAT is two coats of Color Club Translucent, which is so sheer it only alludes to a very light pink. On on that is my top coat, plus a base coat, adding up to EIGHT layers of polish on my fingers! But its still pretty nonetheless!

Here's the shot with no flash in the florescent light of my apartment.

Here is the manicure with flash, I realize now I never finished cleaning my nails up!

 

So here you have it, a pretty, different, fun manicure for the day :-)

Old Mani's

So as I've said before, I have some pictures of different nails I've had since last October. I've only used my phone to take these pictures, but I still want to share some of them, because some of them are pretty cool :-)

This was a polka-dot mani I did freehand in January. The purple is L.A. Colors "Nuclear Energy" with an L.A. Colors white nail art polish for the dots (I did them freehand with the art brush, this was done before I discovered a dotting tool). You can't see it in the picture, but there was also one coat of Orly's "54" on top, which is a very sheer pink shimmer/sparkle. Overall it was really cute :-)

So another blog I follow, Nails Never Fails talked about a "jelly sandwich" mani, using a jelly-type polish with a layer of glitter. So this is OPI's "It's a Girl!" as a base, with a layer of Wet N' Wild's "Sparked" in the middle, and then the "It's a Girl!" on top. It was the coolest thing, the glitter looked suspended in the polish. Therefore, because of this, I bought "Translucent" by Color Club to try this mani again.

Finally, this is probably my proudest mani. These were my Halloween nails, and it was AWESOME! There are three stripes of color underneath: Wet N' Wild's "Sage in the City" for the green, Pure Ice's "Hot Tamale" for the orange, and L.A. Color's "Amethyst" for the purple. I have Color Club's Black Fractured on top. Love this, and will try this type of  mani for another holiday (I have some of China Glaze's metallic crackles that will be nice for spring/Easter).

Magnetic Nail Polish FTW!!

So I finally got some magnetic nail polish! I know a lot of people say its just another fad like crackle, but frankly I will use crackle whenever I want, and after trying magnetic will feel the same way about it!

So I've had quite a few shopping trips this week, and have scored a little haul of my own which I will post about sometime in the near future (been pretty busy, went with my brother's school band to perform for senators yesterday, shopping the days before hehe). But this is probably one of my favorites. I got TWO China Glaze Magnetix polishes at Sally Beauty Supply, because if you bought one you got the magnet free! (which equates to a free polish, since the magnet costs the same as a polish!). I got "Instant Chemistry," a really pretty plum color, and "Cling On," a sage-y green. Here's Cling On:

(I guess I need to work on camera shots!). I used the diagonal line design from the magnet on my four fingers, and the star on my accent finger. Using the magnet takes time to get used to (you can almost watch it suck the polish in!), and I paint so fast to make sure it doesn't dry, I make a bit of a mess, so timing will take time as well. But overall, I am VERY happy with the Magnetix!

NOTD: Saved by the Blue

So yesterday (Saturday March 3) was The American Heart Associations Greatest Heart Run and Walk of Utica, NY. I am on a team for my nephew who was diagnosed with a heart condition at two weeks old :-(. The team shirts are a very primary blue color, so what better color to paint my nails?

(p.s. this was taken on my phone, poor quality!) Wet N' Wild Saved by the blue, with Hard Candy "Matte-ly in Love" matte topcoat! So much prettier in person, it has such a different sheen!

I have some old nail pictures I found on my phone I will post eventually, and this is a little late to post, but oh well. Just have to keep going!

Hello, nail world!

So, I have joined a large part of the polish world and decided to blog about my own experiences.

Now, I'm going to be up front about a lot of things in this first blog post:
1.) My application techniques are improving, but by no means are perfect. So when I do post pictures, you will notice polish often all over my cuticles, or smudged because my cat jumped on my lap, ect...
2.) I don't own a ton of polishes YET. My collection grows slowly but surely, as I discover the brands I like to use more, the types of polishes that are fun to wear (GLITTER!), and my financial situations.When I can afford more polishes, you can bet your bottom dollar I'll have a larger collection!
3.) I love experimenting will nail art, but I've never actually been a decent artist on paper to begin with, so my nail "art" is often basic and messy (but I love it, and that's the point of blogging about it!)
4.) My nails are never really in good condition, leaving them shorter than I would like for nail art :-(
5.)  I'm ALWAYS willing to take advice :-)

So, my mani for my first post is...

Zoya Gemma! With an accent water marble finger (first success!) done in three shades of Wet N'Wild: Night Prowl, Blue Moon, and Fatal from their "Crystalic" polishes.

Close up of the marbling (the red spot is from dry skin, this weather is horrible on my nails!)

Wow, I need to practice camera skills, as well (or have my husband take pictures). So yea, lots to learn, hopefully lots to share :-). Will continue to keep getting polishes as I can, trying new manis/art, and join the polish world!