Bitten

Today I have a shade from the Lite Brite collection, China Glazes 2016 offering for spring. This bright shade of magenta is called Bite Me.

Bite Me is a neon creme with golden shimmer running throughout. It appears a lot more red toned in my photos, which is not true to the actual colour. Application was good and only two coats were needed for full opacity.

In the bottle I feel this shade of bright magenta had a little more pop to it, however on the nail it didn't wow me. In the photos I found the colour to be WAY off. A lot more red than it appears in reality. The last photo appears to be the closest to the actual shade.

I may have to try this one out again to see how I truly feel about it. I do, however, love the colour combo of the other two I purchased with this shade, What I Like About Blue and Lime After Lime. I just may have to figure out some nail art to do that combines all three shades.

Summer Time Haul, Y'all!

I am in full summer mode and atiently awaiting a bunch of fun things in July; my birthday, my wedding and a honeymoon trip! So many exciting things to come in my favorite month and season of the year!

Summer screams brights and neons to me, today I have some of my latest purchases (first and largest in quite a while now). It's so surprise that they are all China Glazes, they manage to put out fun and exciting polishes summer after summer that I actually want!

I'll start off with my picks from the Lite Brights, summer 2016 collection first.

Papa Don't Peach and We got the Beet

Papa Don't Peach is a jelly-like coral shade with gold shimmer and iridescent glitter running throughout. Bright and flashy, I love it!

We Got the Beet is a deep plum jelly with golden shimmer throughout. I honestly like this one more than I thought I would! so pretty!

Two coats of each are shown on the nail wheel below.

Bite Me, What I Like About Blue and Lime after Lime.

Bite Me is a bright pink neon with a golden microshimmer running throughout. Excellent formula on this one! The golden shimmer makes the pink warmer toned.

What I Like About Blue was the must have polish for me! A gorgeous bright blue with a golden and slightly iridescent shimmer running throughout. The shimmer is way more visible in this one compared to Bite Me.

Lime After Lime. I love this name, it makes me think of the choreographed dance sequence from Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion! Light, bright and right on the verge of being a neon green. It has that bleached bright thing going on. Another one with great formula.

One to two coats of each are shown in the nail wheel below.

Next up I have some randoms I picked up for a beauty supply clearance section:

In the Limelight, Daisy Know My Name? and Sun Worshiper.

In the Limelight, an oldie but a goodie! From my research, I have found that this was originally from the Wow Factor collection back in the summer of 2006. This shade a bright green neon with a lightly duochome shimmer, flashing green or blue depending on the light source.

Daisy Know My Name? is from last summers Electric Night Collection. I am actually wearing it right now! Its a bright yellow, but not highlighter yellow. Outside in the sunlight it is close to neon teritory on it's own, but I feel it would really pop with a base of white.

Sun Worshiper is a polish I have admired from afar for way too long. A part of the 2010 Poolside collection, this is a bright, in your face nacho cheese neon! I can't wait to wear this with a tan!

Two to three coats of each are shown in the nail wheel below.

So many exciting new polishes to wear making it hard to decide what to wear next! What is your favorite shade for summer?

East Austin - Remixed!

I actually had time to spare on the weekend and decided to pull out my nail art plates, blow off the collecting dust (from who knows the last time I used them!) and play with my nails.

I decided to try out a new plate I got from  Born Pretty Store, likely late last year. It is plate BP-L030 and is a larger, rectangular plate.

The graphics consist of a large scale abstract lace and florals. I used more of the floral pattern from the bottom left-hand corner of the plate. I attempted to use another new product from Born pretty store, their XL squishy stamper, but it was a total fail so I gave up and used my regular one.

I really like this plate, the final look is more interesting than the standard "copy and past" of each graphic on to every nail. I purposely picked up different parts of the design to stamp on my nail so the design on each nail was unique.

There is something about a bold, black pattern over neon polishes that just SCREAMS summer to me!

East Austin

I am feeling summary and pulled out Color Club East Austin for the first neon of the season!

I love this shade because it is coral (one of my favorite polish colours), it's a neon (duh) and it's soft. It has that sun bleached look to it while still being bright.

Application was good, I can't recall if I applied two or three coats for full opacity now... But I want to say it was two. I remeber the formula being pretty opaque and not very thinned out.

Love this on it's own, but if you wanna check out some nail art (I know, it's been a while!) stay tuned for the best post!

I Theadora You

The countdown is on guys, just over a month until my wedding and I feel like a lot is going on... but not really. There is still a lot to do, but not in comparison to the big picture of planning a wedding and all that! I feel like I'm at the end at this point. My hardest decision lately is where to go for our honeymoon! Suggestions would be greatly appreciated by the way! I'm looking mostly south, all inclusive.

So why am I bringing this up? Today's mani is what I wore for my bridal shower; A lovely soft shade that is oh so girly. This is OPI's I Theadora You.

I applied more coats of this crelly than I usually apply since I wanted it to be mostly opaque, three coats got me there. The one thing I did not expect is the overall look was more milky than pink tint. You can see what I mean in the flash photos below (last photo below).

I ended up layering Zoya's Godiva Pixie Dust overtop and I really loved the combo. Unfortunately for you guys I forgot to snap a photo. Luckily, I Theadora You is lovey on it's own as well.

Happy Valentines!

In honor of Valentines this weekend I decided to remove my gel nails (honestly have been wearing them for a month!), chop down my nails (because I still don't know how to remove gels properly...) and paint them a festive, pink shade!

China Glaze Hello Gorgeous is made up of soft, rose pink holo glitter and builds up to full coverage very easily. I wish all my glitters were this dense! I only needed two coats what what you see in the photos. The formula was good, more on the thick side because of the glitter but very manageable, no thinner needed!

Hello Gorgeous drys quickly to a matte, gritty finish. It reminds me a bit of the Zoya Pixie Dusts so I decided to leave it matte for a day. On the second day I added a thin layer of regular topcoat, waited for that to dry, then added a final, thicker coat of Seche Vite to help with the grit and add some shine for that glitter to sparkle!

So far the polish has been wearing quite well. I did a lot of food prep today and no chips yet (fingers crossed). That is already outstanding for a glitter polish. It may have something to do with my shorter nails, but I'm not going to question it!

Glided Rocks

Happy Friday!

Today I have (about a week late) New Years mani number two, the one I actually wore for New Years Eve.

I recently stumbled upon Milani's new polishes while at the drugstore about a month back. I did a double take as I noticed that the bottles changed. They are actually kind of cool, fully cylindrical with what looks to be a swatch of the shade on the top of the handle. The one that really caught my eye was Glided Rocks a blush pink glitter with a golden shimmer. The swatch on the top of the bottle looked to be different, however, showing both gold and pink glitter.

I decided to layer it over one coat of OPI's I Theodora You. I applied one generous coat over top and sealed it off with a layer of topcoat. I had expected the blush glitter to be more prominent than the glitter from what I originally saw in the bottle, however, it turns out that the golden shimmer was actually a lot brighter on the nail.

Overall I liked this shimmery look, I think this would look great over a deep base as well! 

Son of a Nutcracker!

Merry Christmas Eve! This is easily my favorite new glitter topper for Christmas, Funky Fingers, Son of a Nutcracker! Not only is the name awesome, but the glitter, like the other Funky Fingers I own, is awesome!

Son of a Nutcracker is a glitter topper made up of various sized hex glitter in matte red, pink, green white and silver. I decided I wanted a clean look with this glitter so I layered it over one coat of OPI I Theadora You. Such a great sheer crelly with the perfect hint of pink to tint the nails. IT leveled out great.

I thin applied one coat of Son of a Nutcracker over I Theadora You. The formula on Son of a Nutcracker was good. I had the bottle standing on it's top to maximize the amount of glitter on the brush. I applied swiping the nail as usual and also some blotting and manipulated some glitter to space it out to my liking.

I applied a top coat of Seche Vite to seal in the glitter and add high shine and I was done!

My Vampire is Hot—Pink!

I decided I wanted to a non-traditional French tip. Something not so classic and more modern. What I decided on was a light, fully opaque base and a slip neon tip.

For my base I used OPI My Vampire is Buff, which as I mentioned in my last post  is an awesome neutral shade. It has more yellow undertones than pink, which work really great with my skintone. Two easy coats were applied to my nails.

Shortly after the base had some time to dry, I applied my hot pink tips. For this I used Color Club Raspberry Rush. Raspberry Rush is apart of the Wicked Sweet collection released in the summer of 2011. All of the polishes in the collection have a fruity scent. I would have assumed the scent of this polish I be raspberries, however to be it smelled exactly like my favorite flavour of bubblegum as a child, Bubblicious, Paradise Punch. Childhood memory below!!

The scent wasn't too overbearing, I really had to sniff my nails after they dried, and almost or got it was scented! I sure if it was applied to the while nail the scent would be stronger.

Using the brush from the polish, I carefully applied the neon shade to the very tips of my nails. With a steady hand and and quick swipe, I matched the other slim crescents on the rest of my nails. I wouldn't say it was 100% perfect, however I am really happy with the end result. I also do think my photos show off every imperfection but in person it looks a bit more flawless.

The one think I learned about using a neon on the tips of my nails is that they wear fairly quickly. Other than the slight tip wear to most the nails. This wore very well. I am also considering applying the same thing to my toes!

Happy Birthday to Me!

Today is not only my birthday, but Canada's as well :) Always nice to have a nationwide holiday and celebrations on your birthday. I usually pull out a flashy or expensive polish with fun nail art, but this year I am keeping it simple with a new polish I picked up recently from Zoya.

Harper is fun and girly. It has a pink jelly base and is doused with golden shimmer and iridescent glitter like the others I own from the Tickled and Bubbly collection. I found this had a more opaque base when compared to the others (Alma, Stasi and Muse), kind of crelly.

Application was nice and smooth and I couldn't have gotten away with two thicker coats, but I opted for three thinner ones. Since it is jelly-like it is not 100% opaque, however with this type of polish it doesn't bother me.

I think its the girliness of the pink and the iridescent glitter that just scream celebration to me! I may jazz this up with some studs or something, just don't want to overdo it.

As a bonus today for all you other July babies I am sharing Sally Beauty's Birthday coupon for July! I love when people post the other coupons during the rest of the year, so I hope you can make use of it! Just be sure you use it before the end of of the month and be warmed, I find when I try to use these coupons in the States they ask for ID to confirm your birthday is in the month of the coupon, it may just depend on the employee as well. Otherwise, enjoy!

Wanderlust

Another beautiful spring day, another beautiful spring polish! I have another one from the China Glaze Road Trip collection to be exact. I am really enjoying these a lot more than I initially did first swatching them. Today's polish is Wanderlust.

Wanderlust is a pale pink-leaning lavender creme with a faint gold/pink micro shimmer. When I first swatched this on my nail wheel I found it to apply quite sheer, however, on the nail it applied well and built up to opacity in two easy coats. The formula was great to work with and evened it's self out.

The shimmer is mostly hidden, like the others in this collection, but it really shines in direct lighting and outdoors on a sunny day. Considering this was one of the first I "had to have" from the collection I am happy it did not disappoint.

Mattchy, Matchy!

I purchased these new skinny jeans recently and I love them! I needed a basic pastel piece in my wardrobe so badly, and these pastel pink jeans were perfect!

It also didn't hurt that they totally matched my pedi at the time, Bio Seaweed Gel, Marshmallow. Marshmallow is a soft, crelly pink pastel UV gel polish. I had a little bit of trouble trying to apply it, but it may have been because I suck at painting my toenails!

I applied three thin coats to reach opacity with a cure time of one minute between layers. I finished it off with the Bio Seaweed Diamond top coat and cured for another minute or two before wiping the sticky layer off with some alcohol.

So far this has been holding up well on my nails, probably has been between two to three weeks since I first applied it to my nails. And I am finally able to show off my toes, thanks to the shift in weather the last few weeks! Soooo looking forward to summer!

Nail Fail

It may not appear to be a"nail fail" exactly, however I do pride myself on great photography and editing...

I wanted to do a simple mani refresh with Color club, Pardon My French and Bundle Monster plate BM-423. From afar it looks great, maybe even in the first two photos I have displayed as well.

I have a feeling it may have been the actual plate that threw me off with this one. The design may have been too deeply engraved and with the stamper being squished on top, it created the weird texture with in the design. You can see more clearly in the photo below.

Not the worst nail fail, but it still bothered me to the point of removal for a different Easter mani. I'll have the play around with different stamping polishes to make this pattern work because I really love it and want to get a nice clean image the next time I decide to try it out.

Have you had problems with this design as well?

Color Club Pardon My French

I have another lovely spring polish today, I just love spring polishes! This is another Color Club polish, Pardon My French, which is a baby pink creme with just a slight hint of yellow which makes it a slight coral pastel.

The formula was just okay. The first coat was streaky, the second coat was a little less streaky, but also not 100% opaque either. For the third and final coat I decided to add some thinner to the bottle of polish to add one last thin layer to even out any remaining streaks. This is common for me to do so I don't have loads of polish on the nail which can lead to bubbling or premature wear/peeling.

Three coats still did not produce 100% coverage, however, once I added a good coat of Seche Vite it helped to even mostly everything else out. I would say the final mani looks about 95% opaque, the camera, however, does not appear to show the polishes flaws. From a distance it looks great, so it works for me!