Recreation of a Recreation!

Today I have a recreation of something I already recreated last week lol. I loved my manicure inspired by The Lacquerologist so much I did it again. In less than a week! I really, really liked it the first time so I did it twice in a week which is unheard of for me!

This time I used two coats of Sinful Colors Opening Night and two coats of Sinful Colors Inkwell. I then did the stripes down my ring finger with Essie Good as Gold. The contrast between the teal and blackened plum wasn't as stark as it was in the previous manicure, so I'm not sure I loved this combination as much.

What do you think of this combo?

Thanks for reading!
 

Girly Glitter Gradient

Girly Glitter Gradient! Say that three times fast!!

I think the title today is pretty self explanatory, so here's the details. I used two coats of Sinful Colors Starfish and then did a glitter gradient with Sinful Colors Fantasy. Fantasy was really runny and hard to use for the gradient, so my nails were pretty thick at the cuticle. Next time I use it for a glitter gradient I'd use a sponge instead of just painting it on.

Thanks for reading!

Fall Themed Nails

One quick fall themed post before fall has completely disappeared! I know winter has already arrived in some places but it hasn't here yet so I thought I'd sneak these in before they're just a reminder of better, less cold times, lol.

All fingers are two coats of Sinful Colors Ruby, Ruby (it's such a juicy, squishy colour!) except the ring finger which is two coats of Sinful Colors Nirvana. The ring finger is stamped with Bundle Monster plate BM208 and Essie as Good as Gold.

It isn't too cold out yet for this is it?!

Thanks for reading!!

Inspired By…The Lacquerologist!

I love looking at other nail blogs…it's just so fascinating to see what other people come up with and of course, the swatches add to my never-ending have to have it list, and sometimes end up inspiring a bottle in my ever growing pile of polishes!

A looong while back The Lacquerologist posted a manicure I ADORED, you can see it here. I love her work in general, but this one really stuck in my head and I finally had to try it out. Here's my interpretation of the her awesome manicure, I used two coats of Sinful Colors Shock and Awe on my pinky, and two coats of Sinful Colors Nirvana on all the other fingers, except the ring finger. On the ring finger I did half of the nail in Shock and Awe and the other half in Nirvana. Then I added in the stripes down the middle using Sinful Colors Inkwell.

I loooooved this manicure, it was so bright and eye-catching and I got lots of compliments on it when I was wearing it too :)

Really random, but my bottle of Nirvana says Matte on the label…but it dried shiny, what's up with that?!

Thanks for reading everyone!

My Nemesis Stamp

This manicure features a stamp that I can never ever get to work properly no matter how hard I try! Does anyone else have an image like this, where you just can't for the life of you get it to work?!

Stripes…my stamping nemesis. Doesn't matter what brand I try, none of them work for me. I ordered a squishier stamper so hopefully that will help, I'll see when it gets here. Any other tips for mastering this stamp?

This disaster of a manicure is one coat of Sinful Colors Southern Belle and three coats of OPI Solitaire on the pinky. I used Konad white and CH10 for the stamping. It's not perfect and I can't seem to get it right, but I wanted to show it anyways. This blog is about nail art, success and failures included!

Any helpful suggestions out there?

Thanks for reading!

Sinful Colors Vacation Time with Love Birds

Hi everyone!!

Today I have a fairly simple manicure for you that I really enjoyed wearing. The simplicity of it was refreshing.

I started with one coat (!) of Sinful Colors Vacation Time on all my nails. It's a smooth, dusty brownish-pink colour, it reminds me of my favourite blush, lol. My ring finger and thumb are stamped with BM-H22 and Sinful Colors Coffee.

Since Vacation Time was opaque in one coat I'm going to have to experiment with it for stamping purposes. I love finding new, unexpected stamping polishes, can't wait to see if it will work!!

Thanks for reading!

Halloween Ruffian

Hello lovlies!

Today I just have a quick manicure for you. I write my last midterm today so I haven't had a ton of time to do my nails, in fact I've been wearing this manicure for 4 days now and it's just showing tip wear now, phewf! I'm so happy it's lasted this long so I can concentrate on studying.

Keeping with the Halloween theme I have a sorta-ruffian manicure. I say sort of because the bottom color continues up the sides of my nails but in a true ruffian it wouldn't.

I used two coats of Sinful Colors Citrine for the orange and one coat of Sinful Colors Black on Black for the top color. Next time I would make the black as smooth as possible with a small paintbrush, but I just didn't have time this weekend to let my perfectionism get in the way!

I'm very excited for this evening, no more studying! Which means I can squeeze in one more Halloween manicure for tomorrow :)

Thanks for reading!

Random Nail Plate - Halloween Themed!

Wow...I don't know how I got so lucky. My very first random plate draw and it's holiday appropriate! Hurray for randomness! Note: I will not be so fond of randomness when say a Christmas plate comes up in January, but for now I'm happy with it!

So the plate that came up on the very first draw was BM-222. Which is this little guy here:

I quite like the full nail designs on this one, the scrolly one in the bottom is so nice. And the right side is so intricate too, either would make a very classy manicure. I've actually been itching to try out the top image to make Dalmatian nails. The butterfly would be cute for some springy nails, but since it's fall here I figured I would pass on that one. The left hand full nail image was out because, well, it's not Christmas yet. But as I'm sure you got from the title of the post, I decided to use the little pumpkin to design my manicure around. This is definitely not the sort of image I'd usually gravitate towards (I really like the full nail images on this plate), but I figured I should embrace the Halloween spirit!

So today I have a Halloween manicure for you featuring the little pumpkin from BM-222. Since it's a skittles manicure I'll list them out finger by finger, it's just easier that way! All the stamping is done with Wet N Wild Black Creme.

• Pinky - 2 coats of Essie Chinchilly with a glitter gradient of Sinful Colors Black Magic (sidenote: I LOVE this glitter gradient! It looks even better in real life. I think it would look really awesome to do a black to white ombre with this glitter over it in a gradient)
• Ring - 3 coats of Sinful Colors Cloud 9 stamped with the pick of the day BM-222!
• Middle - 2 coats of Essie Chinchilly stamped with BM-H08
• Pointer - 3 coats of Sinful Colors Cloud 9 stamped with BM-H06
• Thumb - 2 coats of Essie Chinchilly stamped with BM-213

Look at that gradient, yummy! It worked way better than I ever imagined.

And now a picture of the claw pose as awkward as it is to show some thumb love!

A close up of the glitter gradient in all it's yummy shimmery goodness! Black Magic is from Sinful Colors' 2013 Halloween collection - run out and get it now if you don't already have it! It's amazing, I love it!

Thanks for reading!!!

OMD 31 Day Challenge - Day 4 - Black and White

Today is black and white! I love black and white mani's, they're so sharp and eye-catching.

Unfortunately my mani today is neither sharp nor eye-catching. I attempted to do an ombre saran wrap look, but I think my color choices could use a bit of work.

All fingers started with three coats of OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls. Here's what I used on each of my fingers for the saran wrap effect:

• Thumb: Sinful Colors Tantalize
• Pointer: NYC Sidewalkers
• Middle: Maybelline Express Finish Cool Couture
• Ring: China Glaze Concrete Catwalk
• Pinky: Wet N Wild Black Creme

I'm kind of meh about this whole manicure. I feel like there's not enough difference between the shades when I used the saran wrap. I think this would be a neat look but needs better color choices than the ones I made. Maybe I'll try it again sometime with different polishes. Lots of potential, bad execution. Oh well, part of blogging is about sharing the good with the not so good right?! 

 Thanks for reading!

You can find the other participants mani's here

Golden Midnight in Moscow

The blog has been lacking glitter these last few posts. Thus, today we have glitter! GLITTER!

I started with two coats of OPI Midnight in Moscow. I maybe should have used three coats, but I stopped at two. I then sponged on some of Sinful Colors All About You on my ring finger. Why? Because I Love glitter...and who doesn't really? This mani was dark and vampy and glittery all at once, I loved it!

Sorry about the weird fluff that appears to be stuck on my fingers...wonder where that came from lol. 

Thanks for reading!

Turquoise Lightening

Today I have a charcoal and turquoise skittlette manicure with a little bit of glitter!

I started with two coats of Barielle Coalest Day of the Year on my pointer, middle and pinky fingers. Coalest Day of the Year is a dark charcoal with silver shimmer in it. It could have been a one coater had I been careful in my application, but alas, I was not, thus two coats. I added a glitter gradient to my pinky finger using Sinful Colors Kissy and Nubar Sky Sparkle. The teal and blue glitters sparkle much more in person.

On my thumb and ring finger I started with three coats of China Glaze Turned Up Turquoise. Then I stamped using Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Gone Grey using Bundle Monster plate 305. This was my first time stamping with Gone Grey and it was not as opaque as I had hoped. I think it worked out ok though, I like the sort of translucent quality that it has, it makes the stamping look subtle. I really love the lightening stamp, the whole time I wore this mani I kept staring at it and thinking ZAP! Well...when I wasn't staring at the glitter I thought that! :o

Then the next day, just to see what it would look like matte, I used NYC Matte Crazy. And I LOVED it matte. I wore it for another couple days this way. I especially loved how the glitter popped against the matte Coalest Day of the Year.

Which do you prefer? Matte or shiny?

Thanks for reading!

Sinful Colors Cinderella Stamped

I had read all around on the blogosphere about Sinful Colors Cinderella and it was a lemming of mine. It's a beautiful light sky blue with a pink shimmer, and I was ecstatic when I found it on holidays last year. Even though I had read complaints about the formula I still was psyched to get it. The formula does leave quite a bit to be desired, it's really sheer and streaky. Since I'm fairly impatient and don't like to do multiple coats I sloped on three pretty thick coats for this manicure. It was fairly thick feeling on my nails which bothers me so next time I think I use it I think I'll exercise a bit more patience and use thinner coats. I really like the color though so will likely suffer through it's application issues again!

I stamped over top of Cinderella on my middle and ring fingers using Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Slick Slate and Bundle Monster plate 313. I used the two flowery images on the plate, to me they sort of look like mature dandelions ready to disintegrate in the wind on a summers day.

Thanks for reading!

Feeling Froggy?

I've been feeling a bit under the weather lately and am just now starting to feel better, but I have this stubborn frog in my throat that just won't go away. I decided to give my throat frog a little buddy and did a frog themed manicure!

I started with two coats of Essie Da Bush. On the first coat this polish was very runny and sheer, but it evened out quite well with two coats. On my ring finger I hand painted a much happier frog than the one living in my throat! I used Sinful Colors Happy Ending for the frog himself, the whites of his eyes are done with Barielle Going to the Chapel and the eyes and outlining are done using Wet N Wild Black Creme. He didn't turn out quite the way I wanted him to since I'm a perfectionist and he's not perfect, but I still think he's cute! And there's always room for improvement right? It just gives me an excuse to practice my freehand skills another time!!

 And here's a little close up of the frog himself!

Thanks for reading!

Purple and Gold Glitter and Stamping

Going through my archives of mani photos it turns out I don't use glitter nearly as often as I thought I did! But...what would the first nail post of a blog named after glitter be without glitter? SUPER SILLY!

Thus, I present gold glitter! Oh, and some purple and gold stamping to go along with it.

To create the look I used two coats of Joe Fresh Eggplant, a creamy dusty eggplant purple, on my pointer, pinky and thumb. After that was dry I stamped with Essie Good as Gold and Bundle Monster plate 314. The ring and middle finger contain the piece de resistance, the glitter! I used one coat of Sonia Kashuk Golden Ticket as undies and covered that with three coats of Sinful Colors All About You. All About You is a lovely warm gold glitter with some copper flecks in it to give some depth. It's very sparkly and beautiful and goes well with the dusty purple.

Look at the lovely sparkles in All About You! It's even sparklier in real life, but since it's more of a dusty seeming glitter it isn't as in-your-face as other glitters can be, it's more subtle. Can you tell I'm quite enamoured with this glitter??

The photo below shows the purple truer to real colour, it's a bit dark in the above photos. It doesn't read quite as blackened on the nail.

I really liked this design, it had a sort of elegance about it with the scroll like stamping and the golden accent fingers.

Thanks for reading!