Christmas Wrapping?

Hey Ladies,

As promised yesterday, here is Sephora By OPI's Untarnished Image with some shimmery fauxnad.

I had been wanting to do a mani like this all winter but wasn't sure what base to use. I had considered a straight up white, or China Glaze's Frosty; but honestly, that polish is perfectly beautiful on its own! ...anyways, the silver glitter reminded me of snow so this was perfect!

Click to enlarge :)

I used Bundle Monser plate BM14, and Claire's polish in Twinkle Twinkle, which is an awesome blue jelly packed with blue glitter. I was really impressed with the pigmentation of Twinkle Twinkle, it stamped very well! I completed the look with a thin coat of Seche Vite and some white rhinestones I picked up at the dollar store. I wish you could see the depth the Seche Vite added to the polish, its super glossy!

Click to enlarge :)

After about 5 mins I had rhinestones popping off lol. Since I knew I wasn't going to wear this mani for long, I didn't use nail glue to adhere them to my nails like I usually would. So I picked off the rest and decided to go with some hex glitter I had gotten from my Viva la Nails blogger package a while back instead.

Click to enlarge :)

Either way, rhinestones or glitter, I really like this mani. It reminds me of foil Christmas wrapping... which is kind of a step back in time lol but thats alright, snowflakes = winter, not necessarily Christmas. Although after Christmas I wish it would just stop snowing all together lol

Click to enlarge :)

So, as we approach New Years Eve tomorrow, any resolutions you plan on making for the new year? I hope to have up photos tomorrow of my New Years mani in which the polish is pretty well named for the occasion ;)

*this product (glitter) was sent to me for review.

Now Begins the New Years Eve Manis...

Hello Ladies,

Today I have a simple, sparkly mani for this last week of 2010. New Years always seems to sneak up on me right after Christmas. Still don't have definite plans, but looks like dinner and a quiet night alone with my wonderful boyfriend :)

For today's mani I used a polish I was crazy lemming last year around this time, Sephora by OPI's Untarnished Image. I don't know why I was so crazy over it, but I had to have it! I even did a quick mani with it in store on all of my nails once or twice around Christmas and New Years Eve!

Since it was a part of the limited edition Christmas collection last year, it was very hard to find. I did, however, end up finding it on a short shopping trip to the U.S in late February, they had tones! I got so excited I almost purchased 2!

As you can see, this polish is comprised of silver micro glitter in a clear base. To reach opacity I believe I used 3-4 coats, which was no problem at all because it dries super fast. In the photos you can see slight VNL, but it is less apparent in real life. I actually really like this look :)

Stay tuned, tomorrow I have some sparkly fauxnading :)

Christmas Haul? More like boxing day haul!

Hey Ladies,

Hope you had a great Christmas and are enjoying time off if you have it. I go back to work tomorrow but it is a short week, I get Friday off. I was looking forward to creating an after Christmas haul post... but no one got me nail polish! lol My family refused because of all the polish I currently own, which I guess I can look at as a good thing. My boyfriend and his sister, however, did pick me up some polish for Christmas :)

First up is OPI Ink. My Boyfriend sure does know polish ;) Both he and I love these deep, multishimmer shades. I'm really glad he picked it up for me and plan on putting it on my toes very soon.

Click photos to view all the shimmery goodness!

Next, what his sister got me, L.A Girl in Groovy and Stayin' Alive. Both these polishes are black light glowing! Can't wait to try these ones out :)

For readers out there who are unfamiliar with boxing day, its the equivilate of the States black friday. Basically on boxing day in Canada stores are open super early with limited amounts of door crashers and sales to get rid of their winter stock and make way for the new items.

I'm usually not one to venter out on these days as I can be very inpatient when lots of people are around. But the last couple of years me and my sister have gone for fun, I never go for the bigger door crasher sales. whatever is left when I get there is all I look though. This year there were some okay deals, but I didn't really buy much. BUT, I did make sure to stop by a local beauty supply to get my fix of polish that I did not receive for Christmas!

I doubted that they would have any sort of sale, as their prices are the lowest I have seen for China Glaze and OPI, but they had a small promo for no tax. Works for me!

Click photos to view all the shiny goodness!

As you can tell I was still in the holiday spirit! I picked up Mistletoe Kisses and Midnight Kiss from China Glazes current Christmas collection. These were $4.99 each.

Click photos to view all the shimmery goodness!

Continuing on with the holiday theme, the OPI's include Tease-y Does It, Brand New Skates and... wait for it ... MERRY MIDNIGHT!!

Now I have been to this beauty supply A LOT, so I'm not sure if I had just greatly over looked this polish or they got it in recently, but I almost had a heart attack when I found it! I was so close to purchsing this off ebay for $25+ I wanted it so bad. So happy I found this polish, it really made my day :) each OPI cost me $7.99.

I also got a bottle of Seche Vite for $6.99, but you all know what that looks like lol.

So how did you ladies make out for Christmas? Any special gifts you were extra excited to receive? Any lemmings finally fulfilled ;)

Merry Christmas!

Hello ladies,

Christmas is finally here! Doesn't it feel like December went by so fast! Today I have my Christmas mani to share with you. It was so hard to just pick one idea, colour or design but I finally came up with this.

Click to enlarge!

This is actually not what I had planned out at all! I only got this colour, Orly Meet me Under the Mistletoe, a couple of days ago by fluke! I was at Sally's taking advantage of their buy 2 get 1 free on all China Glazes (which I will talk about next week) and I actually found this polish, so I snatched it up! I'm really glad I did, this has a subtle but awesome duochrome with those amazing flakies like the Orly Cosmics. The colour shifts from a yellowy, golden green to forest green to a green blue. Very pretty :)

Click to enlarge!

Anyways, Meet me Under the Mistletoe was the base for my Christmas mani.. For my ring fingers I applied 1-2 coats of OPI's bubble bath (can you tell I am getting a little obsessed with it now lol) just to even out the colour of my nail. I then applied a couple of coats of China Glaze, Party Hearty and $OPI, Only gold for some awesome sparkle! I had originally wanted to do the same thing to by thumb nails but they both broke :( I am currently wearing some false nails until they grow out a bit, they were painful short :( so to add glitter to fake nails, not a good idea.

Click to enlarge!

Since I applied my polish at night and had to work the next day, I topped off this mani with Seche Vite for quick dry and glossy shiny nails :)

For a quick las minute Christmas mani, I have really been enjoying it. And although it was not what I had planned to have to today, I think it is perfect and I love it :)

Hope you and your families have a very Merry Christmas :)

A Party Hearty French - 2 More Days Until Christmas!

Hey Ladies,

Today I have another festive French to share with you! I really liked the look of my last French mani and I never really do them, so when I needed a quick mani change I thought I'd try out my new Nailene French manicure kit I purchased the other day to help me out.

I was sent another kit similar to this one from Nailene a while back (it came with a polish pen and a sheer base coat), but when I saw this one on sale I knew I had to have it! A quick overview of the contents include:

- Acrylic strong topcoat

- Sheer shimmer base coat

- White polish

- French tip nail guides

I won't go in to much detain on the kit, I mainly just used the white and tip guides.

The look I was going for was Christmasy but simplicity, that is why I chose to have a white tip with Party Hearty (pure Christmas in a bottle) on top.

I applied 2 cots this time of OPI bubble bath for my base. Once I was 100% sure that the polish was dry I applied my sticker guides, I love these things :)

look how long my nails are here! i chopped them down a bit last night, they were getting a little too long for me!

Unfortunately I had some issues with the white polish that came in the kit. It was a little thicker than I expected and the brush was a littler smaller that what I an normally used to. It was hard to apply the white polish. I'm not sure if it was because the formula was so thick, but when I carefully peeled the stickers off with my tweezers the polish wanted to lift off also :(

I ended up doing some freehanded touch ups, and since the lines weren't crisp I added a chrome stripe under like in my last mani. I finished everything off with Seche Vite because if I didn't the polish would have probably never dried!

Overall I think the mani is alright, I would have preferred it without the stripe it it is okay for now. I wore this for 4 days and got some chipping on day 3. I want to give this polish a second chance so i'll have to thin and test it out again.

What do you think?

Christmas Nails - Party Hearty Refresh

Hello Ladies,

Wow, only a couple of days left until Christmas! My family usually celebrates on both Christmas eve and Christmas day, plus I'm Italian so there's usually LARGE amounts of food involved! lol, but I love it, what's better than spending time with your family and eating amazing food for 2 days straight!?

Anyways, on to the mani. Below I have Party Hearty, it kicks ass, best Christmas glitter ever! I decided to use this (finally) for a quick and easy mani refresh on my red and green french I shared with you the other day.

To update my last mani I used a striper brush and a Sally Hanson chrome polish to carefully draw an outline along the smile line of the polish.

Next I added Party Hearty to my ring finger for some extra shine!

Pretty simple huh? I like really liked the French mani on its own but this was fun too :) I only wore it for a day or so before I moved on to something else.

What do you ladies think? What is your favorite way to use Party Hearty?

Christmas Nails ...4 more days till Christmas!

Hello ladies!

Today I have a funky french Christmas mani to share :)

For this look I used:

- Nailene guide stickers

- OPI, Bubble Bath

- China Glaze, Emerald Sparkle

- China Glaze, Ruby Red Pumps

- Seche Vite top coat

I applied 1 coat of OPI, Bubble bath as a base (...and to cover up some slight discoloration in my nails), waited a bit for that to dry and once I was 100% sure they were, I applied the french tip guides.

This was my first time using the nailene french tip guides and they worked out very well! the only issue I had with them was the line wasn't as crisp because of the glitter in the polishes. I did go over some nails again to try and get a cleaner line, but it was nothing that bothered me too much :)

Left Hand

I finished everything off with a a coat of Seche Vite, which was also my first time using it and wow, everything dried so fast and the final look of my nails was super glossy and shiny! They almost looked like acrylics! I can't believe I never used this before, definitely need to stock up, I really love the look, especially for French manis.

My rarely seen right hand lol

So that is it, I used Emerald Sparkle for my thumb and ring finger and ruby pumps for the rest, but you can see that in the pics lol. What do you think? I really like this one, simple but festive :)

Candy Cane Nail fail

Hey Ladies,

Is everyone else super busy and feel like they have no time lately or is it just me? I finally finished all Christmas shopping and wrapped all my gifts up, tonight I will bake a final batch of sugar cookies. I am almost officially ready for Christmas :)

With that in mind, I have some Christmas themed "nail art" I really didn't wanna post lol. This was my attempt, attempt being the KEY word, at a candy cane mani. I thought it was only fair to show you ladies since I had asked for your opinion on how I should go about doing a candy cane pattern.

There it is, not clean up and all... As you can see I used a striper brush with VERY thick polish... I really should have given it a good thinning before using but it was too late to save what was already on my nails :( I will definitely want to try it again, maybe next year.

I ended up just taking all the polish off and starting over again, but this time with a new design in mind. This week will be full of Christmas manis, I hope to keep up on my blogging and not miss a day this week because I think I do have quite a bit to show you.

I haven't decided 100% o what I will be wearing Christmas Eve or Day but I am open to suggestions :) some polishes I am considering using are:

Revlon - Emerald City

China Glaze - Frosty

China Glaze - Party Hearty

China Glaze - Ruby Red Pumps

China Glaze - Emerald Sparkled

OPI - Here to day Aragon Tomorrow (Suede)

What do you plan on doing for your Christmas nails? Let me know, I am really interested to find out :)

Revlon Powder Puff

Hello ladies,

I fell like I have had no times to blog lately, let alone do my nails! I am currently still wearing this polish, Revlon's Powder Puff, I applied it Thursday night.

The formula overall was kind of weird to work with, it is white and it does need to be built up. I used 2 base coats of OPI, Bubble Bath to try and eliminate as much visible nail line as possible. Once that was dry I applied 2 coats of Powder Puff. I ended up dinging one nail so when I applied an extra coat to that one nail, I added them to the others as well.

One note I'd like to mention that I hope helps you with application is to apply thin, even coats and allow a good amount of time between. This way you can get the best coverage and because many coats are needed it should help with overall drying time also.

The colour is a soft white matte that is not as harsh as other whites. I tried layering it over white to get rid of the VNL, but it took away from the softness of the polish. It looks almost creamy.

These pictures are of my nails right after I painted them. As you can see in the bottle, there is a slight blue flash that is hardly seen on the nail in its matte/suede form. I have not added a topcoat yet, but I would imagine it would be more visible with one.

Overall wear has been great, minor tip wear not really any huge chipping, the worst I got was on my thumbs, but that has always been the case for me.

I found myself really loving this colour the first couple of days, but now I feel like it is dull and not as white as the first day.

Now, back to the quick post from yesterday, candy cane nails. I would like to do some nail art themed around candy canes, I am still trying to decide which method I should use, please take a look at yesterdays post for some options I listed. If you have any other ideas, please let me know, I will be making a decision and creating the design tonight!

Candy Cane Nails - I NEED YOUR HELP!

Hello Ladies,

I need your help on deciding on the best/interesting way to give myself a candy cane mani. I currently am wearing Revlon, Powder Puff (which will be posted tomorrow!) and I would like to create a candy cane inspired look over that polish. Some ideas that come to mind include:

Konad/Fauxnad. Diaganal lines can be stamped with my BM plate. The only issue I have with this is that the stamp is a tad bit too tiny to fit all my nails.

Tape. Tape off sections of the nail to create a diagonal line template. This can then be painted over to reveal thick bolded lines when the tape is peeled off. Multiple colours can be used (red and green)

Freehand. Using a striper brush I can create a more unique candy cane design when compared to the BM pattern (thick and thinner lines, multiple colours) Many tutorials are available.

Water Marble. Using red and white polish I can create a water marble design that may be close to:

1. peppermint candy (think swirls), or

2. bold lines close to candy cane stripes

What do you think? I really need some help here! I would like to try this out tonight or tomorrow, so please let me know what you think or if you have any other ideas you would like to share.

Thanks a lot :)

Mani Refresh...Again, this time glossy

Hey Ladies,

Another quick mani refresh for Ruby Ribbon, this time I added a top coat to see what the polish looked like glossy.

Most colour accurate

I added only 1 coat of a generic top coat, but I'm sure if I added a coat of Seche it would be glossy to the max! I only wore this for one more day after I applied the topcoat, so it didn't matter to me.

All photos are clickable, enlarge to see the shimmer

What you get when you add a top coat are the little sparklies you see in the bottle. This shimmer is magenta and blue but very subtle. It may be because this was only 1 coat of polish. I'm sure If I added a second coat the shimmer would be more dense.

Notice the tip wear in the pics? I wore this polish for 6 days, I'm at a computer all day and that was all the wear I got from a SUEDE polish! Amazing!

Most colour accurate

Overall, matte/suede or glossy I really love this polish. The colour is unique, both finishes are great, I can wear lotion when I have it matte, overall wear and formula were awesome! I really hope that Revlon chooses to put out more polishes like this one!

What do you think about this collection so far? First thing next week I will post about the polish I am currently wearing, Powder Puff from this collection also.

Have a great weekend :)

mani refresh glaxy girl

Hey Ladies,

I have a quick mani refresh today with Revlon Ruby Ribbon matte/suede.

I used two coats Orly Galaxy Girl to update my mani on my thumbs. I almost did all of my nails, but was still really loving the Revlon polish too much to take it off!

I hadn't used this colour yet and it is really cool, but way darker than I thought. It may have been because I layered it. The colour is a deep plum with turquoise blue and purple shimmer visible in various lights.

I kept the rest of my mani matte, but tomorrow I will show you what it looks like with a topcoat :)

Ruby Ribbon

Hey Ladies,

Today I have Ruby Ribbon, this was a part of one of my recent hauls in which I picked up this and 2 others out of the Revlon 4 piece collection of suede/mattes for fall/winter.

I love this colour, It remindes me of leather! lol. Let me first start by discussing application. The brush on this polish was weird, I must have gotten a wonky one because I had to trim some stray bristles that were sticking out. Other than that the brush was good to wok with once I got the hang of it. ( the other 2 I purchased did not have this problem)

The formula was great, very pigmented. I used only 1 coat! You have to work quicky with this polish since it does have a suede finish it does dry very quickly. The polish would get thick on the brush if I didn't apply fast enough or take a break between hands (leave the brush in the bottle for a minute before doing the other hand). As long as you keep that in mind, application should be pretty easy.

The polish dried faster than other Revlon polishes I own, this is pretty standard for polishes with this finish. One thing I was worried about was not being able to use any lotion while I was wearing the polish in fear of losing the suede finish. This polish was awesome though, several applications of lotion a day and still looks the same as the first day I put it on :) Very impressed with that.

This photo is the most colour accurate

Over all I love the colour, very unique, especially with the suede finish. The colour also shifts depending on the lighting from deep red, burgundy, deep purple and brown! The shimmer appears more in the photos that is actually visible on the nail. I'm sure if a topcoat was added the shimmer would stand out more.

Wear so far has been excellent, I applied the polish on Saturday and the phots were taken on Monday night. I am still wearing the polish now and other than slight tip wear I have no chips at all! I hope Emerald City and Powder Puff wear this well.

What do you ladies think of this colour or collection? Which is your favorite?

Another Christmas-y Haul :)

Hey Ladies,

Today I have a quick post, yesterday was so busy I didn't have a chance to write a post. We did get our first real snow fall in Toronto yesterday though! It snowed all day and it was super pretty :)

Anyways, on to the polish. The First colour I had been seeing for a while now at a independent beauty supplier I frequent. I saw it in the sale section for months and though ick, I don't like that!

When the China Glaze Holiday collection was released I saw a colour that was similar that I was kind of on the fence about, this colour was Peace on Earth, the medium to deep olive green with a gold shimmer. This immediately reminded me of OPI - At Your Quebec and Call. This was the polish I had been seeing on sale for all those months. Now I had to have it! Not only was it cheaper and a littler deeper in colour (which I like), it was also a discontinued hard to find colour :)

I snatched this one up for $4.99 on the weekend while doing some Christmas shopping, an early gift for myself :)

The next mini haulage was done a week or two ago when me and my boyfriend headed to an outlet mall kind of accidentally! I picked up most of one of the latest fall/winter Revlon collection, I left out 1 (firefox I think), a little too bright for me.

What I did get was (left to right) Ruby Ribbon, Powder Puff and Emerald City.

I did some quick skittle swatches on my fingers a coupe of days ago to pick out which one I wanted to wear and Ruby Ribbon and Emerald City applied amazingly! I am wearing Ruby Ribbon right now and it's wear is awesome for a matte/suede finish! More on that tomorrow though ;)

Powder Puff, on the other hand, had a bit of application issues that I hope to work out before I do wear it. It is quite sheer so I may have to wear a neutral colour (not white) under to get rid of VNL.

I picked these polishes up for $2 each and I am super glad I did. I will talk more about formula and why these are so great tomorrow, but If you still see them, I would pick them up :)

Claire's Mood polish - Refresh with Topcoat

Hello Ladies,

Today I have a mani Refresh for Claire's Flirty/Shy. I kept it simple, 1 topcoat of Sally Hansen's Hidden Treasure. I really love it :)

Click to enlarge all photos! I couldn't get the flakies to appear with just my camera flash alone (they literally disappeared in the photo). So all of my pictures below are with my desk lamp light.

I will keep this post short so you can enjoy the photos.

Under lamp light to get the reflection of the flakies on camera.

lamp light and flash

lamp light

lamp light and flash

Have a great weekend :)

Claire's Mood Polish - Flirty/Shy

Hello Ladies,

Today I have one of Claire's mood polishes that I picked up late summer, Flirty/Shy.

This has to be one of my favorite colours from the mood selection at Claire's, it's so bright and the color change is really noticeable unlike some others.

cold hands

In my photos I used 2 coats with a base and topcoat. The polish goes on as a deep cornflower blue, but dries to a deep indigo, think Orly - Bailamos. As you know these polishes dry to a matte/suede finish so you will have to add a top coat if you want a glossy look.

run under hot water

The colour when warm is slightly off, I find it to be a bit more brighter, they are both very pretty :) no visible nail line either ( you can see some slightly in the photo)

If you look real closely you can still see some glitter that didn't want to leave from Mrs. Clause!

The only thing I dislike about these polishes are the wear. I have been wearing this polish for 2 days, and already on the first full day I got a chip! I haven't gotten a chip that quickly in a LONG time. I got it on my thumb, this is usually where I get my chips when I do get them.

funky French ;) my now warm hands cooling off

My trick for preventing chips? Add a topcoat of some sort. I was going to add Claire's jelly blue glitter, Twinkle, Twinkle, but then I came up with a better idea :) I'll post it up tomorrow, I'm really loving it!!

What's your favorite mood polish?

Today is December! 24 days till Christmas!

Hey Ladies,

Today, the first day od December, I have a festive polish for you! China Glaze - Mrs. Clause from their current holiday collection.

Not as bright red in person. Click for larger view of glitter.

When I first saw this colour on other blogs it didn't really do anything for me. In my opinion it looked like a faded red that was too glittery. And didn't I already have the better version of this colour? (Ruby Red Pumps)

It was the red/pink jelly that finally caught me! I have very little jellies but really love the look of them. I figure I could layer with it also.

Not as bright red in person. Click for larger view of glitter.

It took only 2 coats to lose the visible nail line, but I wanted a little more coverage so I went with 3 coats overall and minor touch ups in less glitter dense spots. I added one last coat of my new Seche Vite and I was good to go. Considering this is pure glitter, its not too gritty and actually pretty smooth with the top coat.

The whole time I have been wearing this polish I have had a love/hate relationship with it. Sometimes I think it still is too dull, sometimes I think its so sparkly! But overall my opinion right at this moment is like :) not love, but I really do like it. Sure, it may be a little to flashy for everyday but I do like it, in lower light it looks kind of copper/pink and I like that. This would be the perfect glittery colour for Christmas or new years eve.

Not as bright red in person. Click for larger view of glitter.

FYI, removal of this polish was the WORST! I have ever come across :( I used the foil method (my first time) and I'm pretty sure that I still have some glitter stuck in the sides of some of my cuticles lol. I really had to pick the glitter off because it is larger than what I have used in the past.

What do you ladies think? Would you wear this colour? If you own it, how do you feel about it?