2013 Holiday Nails #2

I love this Holiday color from OPI.  It's called Wondrous Star and it's from the 2013 Mariah Carey Holiday collection.  It features a micro glitter base that is somewhere between silver and gold with chunky black glitter throughout.  Love the formula and the outcome!

2013 Holiday Nails #1

For this Holiday look, I used Santa Red My List by China Glaze as the base color and Essie's No Place Like Chrome for the stamp color:

Frisk Prickly Riesling

While I do not consider myself a wine connoisseur in any way, I have to share my new favorite wine with the world.  A few months ago, my friend introduced me to Frisk Prickly Riesling, and after just one glass, I knew I had found my white wine soul mate.

Made in Australia, Frisk Prickly is a delicious, semi-sweet variety of citrus flavors with a bubbly zing.  It is dangerously delicious and refreshing, and under 12 dollars a bottle!  Y'all know how much I enjoy making Sangria, and I've decided that my next batch of white sangria will feature this wine.  I'm thinking it will blend nicely with my go-to Sangria flavors of lemon, grapefruit, raspberry, and orange. 

I encourage anyone who enjoys Riesling to pick up a bottle of this magical beverage the next time you visit a liquor store.  You'll be hooked!

Shot of the Day: Dance in the Dark by JulieG

As I've mentioned before, I'm a huge fan of Jesse's Girl polishes.  Their application is amazing and the colors are always highly pigments and very smooth and creamy.  The limited edition JulieG colors are no exception.  Below are swatches of Dance in the Dark from Jessie's Girl limited edition JulieG collection:

As you can see, Dance in the Dark is a highly pigmented royal blue color with purple shimmery undertones.  But to really make those shimmery bits pop, I used my Out the Door Northern Lights Holographic topcoat in silver.

Without the topcoat, the color was still very bright and rich, but I love adding a Northern Lights topcoat to my manis (either in Gold or Silver) to add extra dimension to the colors.  With this polish, I think it has a bit of a galaxy look to it and is almost a dupe for Essie's much coveted Starry Starry Night - but with holographic sparkles instead of just silver sparkles.

What do you think?

Disney Villains Polish Set by e.l.f.: Maleficent

At Walgreens the other day, I picked up the Disney Villains polish set by e.l.f.  The collection comes with twelve different polishes divided into threes (the four villains include: Maleficent, Cruella, Ursula, and the Evil Queen from Snow White).  These 3 polishes are from the Maleficent collection:

The colors include:
"Maude Mauve" (pointer and pinky finger)
"Bubble Gum Pink" (thumb and ring finger)
"Gina Girl" (middle finger)

I really love all the colors in this collection, and each of them applied with a smooth, creamy, and rich texture.  I probably could have only used one coat on the pink and mauve, but I went ahead and did two.  The glitter color in the middle took about 4 coats for full coverage, but it wasn't clumpy or goopy at all, which is nice in a glitter formula.  It's kind of hard to tell, but the glitter has a brownish-purple base with purple, gold, and orange mixed glitters.  I never would have thought to pair these three colors, but e.l.f. did a great job with this combination!  Can't wait to use the other three villainous collections.

You can purchase this set at Walgreens for $9.99 USD, which is a great deal for 12 polishes.  They're not full sized bottles, but they're not as small as minis either.

Shot of the Day: 2013 Halloween Nails #4

This is one of my favorite looks I've done so far this season:

For this look, I used 'Where Art Renoir?' by Finger Paints, which is a really smooth, creamy formula with fine silver glitter.  I stamped with a Sally Hansen white.

Pretty witchy, right?

Shot of the Day: 2013 Halloween Nails #3

Ok so technically this is more of an El Dia de los Muertos look, but it definitely works for the season!

By the way, this base color is 'Iconic Orange' by Finger Paints.  See more swatches here.

Shot of the Day: 2013 Halloween Nails #2

In keeping with the Halloween spirit, I've been incorporating a lot of Halloween-themed nail art lately, so for the next couple of day I'll be posting pictures of those.  Here's from a day where I went a little stamp crazy...

If you can't see the designs clearly enough (sorry for the poor photo quality...I was having camera and lighting issues) the images include: A haunted house, a spider, a cloud of bats, "boo!," and two tombstones.  I added America Apparel's Glow in the Dark top coat, and it really enhanced the green and gave the polish more of a matte finish.

The kids at the library loved these when I went to work, by the way!  Of course, they didn't get to see the glow-in-the-dark effect, but still...I am loving getting to do all these Halloween manis.

China Glaze Monsters Ball Groupon!

I thought you all might want to know that, for the next two days, there is a groupon available for the entire China Glaze Monsters Ball (2013 Halloween) collection.  For a limited time, the entire collection, which includes 6 polishes, will be available at the discounted rate of $22.99!!  Get it before they're gone!

Shot of the Day: 2013 Halloween Nails #1

Here are my first Halloween nails of the season!

For this look, I used two of the images from Cheeky's Happy Holidays Jumbo Plate.  They stamped perfectly and I got a lot of compliments at work!  What do you think?

Shot of the Day: Sinful Colors "High Strung" + Stamping

For this look  I used "High Strung" from Sinful Colors and stamped with China Glaze's "Liquid Leather," which is my favorite black stamping polish.

For the accent nails, I used "Clearly Spotted" from the Maybelline Color Show Polka Dots collection

Nail Polish Organization/Storage Project

As was eventually bound to happen, my nail polish collection has finally outgrown the plastic drawers and boxes I've been using for storage.  And as it seems, there aren't a whole lot of options for nail polish storage/display for collections of over about 100 bottles. 


Oh look!  Here's phase 1 of the organization process...separating by brand.  As you can probably tell, this part took me awhile (especially considering that this isn't even 1/3 of my collection)

My collection passed the 100 mark long ago, so I decided it was time for a custom tiered shelf insert for one of my bookcases.  My friend Cameron, who is a wonderful artist/designer/builder, crafted some amazing shelf inserts for me, and even though they aren't quite finished yet, I have 2 out of 3 of the shelves organized and ready to go:

Now isn't that one of the most beautiful things you've ever seen?  I am so pleased with this!  It's going to be so much easier to do my nails now that I won't have to go digging around through boxes and drawers for the right color.  Granted, these shelves do not hold my entire collection, but the polishes I use the most are now easy to see and much more accessible.  Thank you, Cameron!

So what do you think of my custom shelves?  I'm absolutely in love!  When the third shelf is installed, I'll be sure to post an updated pic of finished project

Shot of the Day: Green and White Bubbles Mani

For this look, I used Zoya "Hunter" and stamped the bubbles with a Sally Hansen white.

Shot of the Day: Bejeweled Barbie Mani

I recently purchased a bottle of China Glaze's "You Drive Me Coconuts" and I absolutely adore the color.  Usually I'm not into so much Barbie pink, but when I added a layer of Essie's "A Cut Above,"  the glam factor skyrocketed as you can see:

It's so fancy, I'm calling it my Bejeweled Barbie look.  Well, I guess I still can't decide between bejeweled or bedazzled.  Either way, it's pretty fabulous!

Coral and Gold Stamped Mani with Glitter

Shot of the Day: Teal and Roses Stamped Mani

Here's the teal base I used for this look (by Finger Paints).  The second one is in brighter lighting:

And here's the look with the roses stamped in black by Forever 21:

The stamp really darkened the color, but I really enjoyed this mani and got a lot of compliments on it!

Shot of the Day: Metallic "Chevron" Nails

We all know the chevron look has been really popular this summer, so I decided to try out one of my chevron stamps a little while ago to keep up with the trend.  Unfortunately, I did not evenly line up the stamp on my first couple of tries so I just decided the stamp the chevron pattern from a bunch of different angles instead.  I think it still looks pretty cool:

Sorry it's a little blurry...guess I just did not have a steady hand that night.  Anyway, here's a swatch of the base color without the stamp.  I used Sally Hansen's Gilty Party for this look:

And let me just say, I absolutely love this polish.  Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure polishes are some of my favorites, and this one is a perfect cross-seasonal shade.  It has a tiny bit of bronze that makes it perfect for summer, but the overall shimmer and color could be great for a Christmas/wintery look, too.  See how the color shifts somewhere between silver/bronze/gold with the two different lighting settings in the photos?  It's basically a must have polish.

Shot of the Day: Galaxy Nails

Hey y'all!  Hope you had a great weekend.  Now that my husband and I have finished moving into our new place, I have been seriously trying to restore my pitiful, chipped and broken nails.  Now that I've got them looking decent again, I thought I'd celebrate with one of my favorite looks - the galaxy mani.  Here's a picture taken in natural lighting:

For this look, I used Nina Ultra Pro's Purple Xing as a base color, which worked great because this particular shade includes fine-medium multi-color glitter which really adds to that "deep space" look.  Next, I used a cosmetic sponge to dab on the little galaxies.  I outlined each little nebula in white first, then added depth and color with layers of pink, yellow, and dark blue.

Next, I used Essie's Set in Stones to add the little "stars, and then I finished by adding a coat of Out the Door's Northern Lights Hologram Top Coat in Silver.  And by the way, this was my first time using this particular top coat, and let me just tell you how wonderful it is, especially for a look like this.  Just like Out the Door's other top coats, Northern Lights dries quickly and offers great nail protection, but it also adds a subtle holographic shimmer, which kind of gives a 3 dimensional impression.  I will definitely be purchasing Northern Lights in Gold.  Anyway, here's the galaxy look in darker lighting, which really seems to glow with this top coat:

And remember, this is what it looks like in a brighter setting:

Pretty amazing, huh?  I must say, I'm quite proud of myself for pulling this off so well.  I did take me nearly two hours, but I think it was worth it.  What do you think?

Shot of the Day: Giraffe Print Nails

It seems like China Glaze's Lemon Fizz has been a huge hit with nail enthusiasts this summer.  And as soon as I got a bottle of my own, I knew it would be the perfect base color for a giraffe print mani.  Here's 2 coats of Lemon Fizz:

And I was right!  It is the perfect base color for a Giraffe print:

Please excuse my bad cuticle day...But other than that, pretty nice, huh?

Shot of the Day: Magic Carpet Nails

Base color is by Urban Outfitters, and I believe the stamping polish is from the China Glaze Romantique collection:

After I did this design, one of my friends commented that it looked like a magic carpet or something from Aladdin.  What do you think?

Shot of the Day: Tiger Stripes

So I've kinda gone a little stamp crazy this summer, and to be honest, I've stamped my nails so frequently that I couldn't keep up with all the products I was using.  So for the next few weeks, I'm basically just going to dump a bunch of stamping photos here.  It would take me forever to go back and figure out exactly which polish and product I used in all of my pictures, but if you really want to know a polish color name or stamping plate ID, just say so in the comments and I'll do my best to track it down.  Enjoy!

China Glaze base color:

And now for the tiger stripes:

So what do you think of my mani?  Pretty wild, huh?  :)

Happy 4th of July

So, I couldn't decide what to do for my patriotic manicure (there are sooo many options), so I just decided to do a little bit of everything.  Here's my left hand:

 And here's my right hand:

I've got glitter gradients, polka dots, stamps, and rhinestones...I feel like Uncle Sam would be proud!  It's too much product to catalog here, and I honestly can't even remember everything I used for this look, but it's pretty great, huh?!

Anyway, I hope you all have a safe and wonderful holiday! Happy 4th of July!

Shot of the Day: Blue Cross Summer Brights Neon Pink

When I was at Rite Aid a few weeks ago, I stumbled upon the Blue Cross Summer Brights collection.  I purchased this bright neon coral/pink shade, and I do not believe it has a name (I didn't see one at least):

It's a really beautiful, pearly shade that is great for summer.  To add a little extra pop, I added 2 glitter gradient accent nails using Gold/Crystal Glitter from Forever 21's Love & Beauty collection.  Here's a closer shot:

Overall, this was a very quick and simple mani with a fun pop of summery glitter.  The base color did chip off after about 2 days, but I was pretty happy with the polish in general since it cost less than 3 dollars.

Shot of the Day: Finger Paints Iconic Orange

If you haven't noticed, I am absolutely loving the neon nail trend!  I took a little trip to Sally's the other day and couldn't help but purchase this little beauty:  Iconic Orange by Finger Paints

Isn't this color amazing?  And this is only two coats over a base coat of OPI Nail Envy.  A lot of neon shades require a white base coat to really make the color pop, but not this one. 

And OMG the application!  This polish is basically magic...it goes where you want it to go.  It was so creamy and smooth and I didn't notice any staining when I removed it.

Needless to say, I am very impressed with this polish (this is my first Finger Paints polish) so of course I had to  go back to Sally's to get more.  If you're looking for bright summer neon shades that are easy to apply and highly pigmented, look no further than Finger Paints!