Challenge - Birthday/Halloween Nails - Zombie Cupcakes

Last week was my birthday and this week, I got my present from Rachel! Happy Birthday, me!! Ladies and gents, I've made it 30 years on this planet and finally met the polish of my dreams.

After breaking the crap out of my nail and having to mow them to less than half their length (TRAGEDY), I was feeling less than elegant.  I wanted to do something fun to make up for it and haven't yet tried the cupcake nails I see so many ladies on r/redditlaqueristas sporting on their birthdays. With Halloween around the corner, Rachel and I brainstormed these adorable zombie cupcakes!

I had started the manicure with Julep Francis, Julep Cleopatra, and Sinful Colors Dream on. As I was being indecisive over what to use as sprinkles, my birthday present came: Nerd Lacquer All of Time and Space! It is stunning and made for some perfect sprinkles!

The formula is ridiculously smooth and full of glitter. The glitter does settle in the bottle but simply turning the bottle upside down for a short time remedies the issue. All of Time and Space applies evenly, dries quickly, and results in a smooth (no glitter bumps!), shiny coat of polish. I'm in flipping LOVE.

Have you met a polish that raised your expectations of all other polishes? I'm pretty sure that just happened to me.

Challenge - Monster & Halloween!!!

Once again, I have put two challenges together since they were pretty similar. Monster and Halloween!

I chose to do a Witch-y theme. Not that many witches are monsters, but it works. I am very happy with my mani this time! Took a bit, and I tried a new technique of bubble mani. Definitely need practice for that technique, but the effect came out ok.

The index finger is a cauldron using the bubble technique. Meh, but was interesting to try it out. Will definitely be attempting again. Then middle is the lovely witch. I didn't want her to be ugly, so she is kinda glamourous with sparkly skin. My ring finger is "eye of newt". I have always loved that phrase for some strange reason, and Cadillaquer's Masterpiece just screamed it! Of which, it is a spectacular polish! It's like a reverse Scofflaw's David Bowie's Bulge. That's a combo that will be tried, fo sho! Last, pinky kitty! I didn't give him a pink nose because my cat is all black with a black nose. I did want him to have one, so it made it grey.

My thumb I did a sparkly jelly green for sparkly slime!

What do you think?! I really loved doing this one. My freehand has been getting pretty bad lately, so this turning out was a big boost in confidence.
What were your Halloween mani's?

Rachel

Glitter Gal Crushed Ego, with special guest Naild'It PURP... Excuse Me!

Huge fan of holo's here!
Today is Glitter Gal Crushed Ego. LOVE IT! Got a lil' bit o' accent with Naild'It PURP... Excuse Me!

Now these pics came out really close to the real color for Crushed Ego. I would put it as a bright royal purple. PURP... Excuse Me! is pretty close too. I am still learning, but they are great polishes, and highly recommend you get you some!
Naild'It is a new brand for me to use, and have been wanting to try them out for a long time. TWO lemmings knocked off my list!
Please ignore the chip on my forefinger I did not see before taking the pics, even if it is very obvious I SHOULD have seen it...

I did find PURP a little on the thicker side. After reading the description on Etsy, they did say that because of the raw ingredients that it can be a little thicker, and you can add some thinner later if you want. It dried quickly and was pretty easy to apply. And talk about glitter pay off! The large circle glitters I had to fish a little for, but I was not looking to have a million of them on my nail, so turned out perfect after sitting it upside down for a couple minutes.

Have you gotten any new polishes recently? Let me know, and what you thought of them!

Wing Dust - I Am Yours, You Are Mine

I treated myself to a couple new indies, including Wing Dust's I Am Yours, You Are Mine.
By now, you may have guessed that pink, or any shade/hue of pink is my favorite color. This polish is now... My favorite of all time?! IS IT POSSIBLE?! The formula was perfect, color perfect, glitter perfect, holo PERFECT! In the sun it looks like holo strawberry sorbet. Who could ask for more, because that stuff is tasty.

The name reminds me of my dad listening to Crosby, Stills, and Nash. I think that really adds to the love I have for it. We would listen to the oldies station every Saturday. I still remember hearing him whistling along.
Thank you, Wing Dust, for bringing back such a wonderful memory and making a FANTASTIC polish!

Rachel

Challenge - Plants - Venus Fly Trap

Daffy looks just like my late Basil. RIP

Plants are collectively some of the neatest organisms on the planet.  My grandmother is a plant fanatic and has always stopped to smell the roses in her own way (usually that way is by keeping little baggies with her to take clippings and seeds home with her to plant later).  From a very early age I had a healthy respect for how difficult it is to balance loving your plants with drowning them. I don't have any houseplants because I still haven't mastered not going all Abominable Snowman on them. That said, I was pretty stoked for this week's inspiration.

I decided to go after The Venus Fly Trap and I love how they turned out! The texture of the spun sugar feels really neat on the nail while the contrasting colors really pop.  It was a time consuming manicure but definitely worth it for the final look!

First, I painted 2 thin coats of Julep Francis. I free-handed a ruffian over that with NYC Broadway Burgundy Frost and topped with a coat of seche.

Next, I dropped a bit of Julep Francis on some photo paper and mixed it with a toothpick until it was thick and no longer freely dripped. On a fresh toothpick, I grabbed a bead of the tacky polish and brought it up to the nail. I touched the bead to the nail and slowly dragged it diagonally down the nail. When I had gone far enough, I retraced my route so any stringy bits could be easily masked in the line I'd made. Rinse and repeat! When the polish got too thick, I'd add another drop or two and mix thoroughly.

Finally, I used a detail brush to paint the outside edges of each nail with a thin dry brushing of Julep Leah.
This is my second attempt at Spun Sugar.  Have you tried it?

Carpe Noctem Cosmetics & OPI

A while back I got a gorgeous, perfect, spectacular custom polish from Emily at Carpe Noctem Cosmetics. We also were generously given another bottle for our relaunch giveaway. Again, Emily was so AMAZING to work with. I could not gush enough to get this point across. Also recently I purchased Mermaid Tears by OPI. They work PERFECTLY together.  And really do match my kitty's eye color!

Please forgive the dry skin. It's been nutso dry here lately.

With Flash.

I am smitten with large circle glitter. I love how they flash in the light.
One thing I am seeing, and this happens with a lot of super glittery polishes, is that it sucks up the top coat like crazy. However, this does NOT bother me. I like texture, it adds another layer and creates depth, which I enjoy. Some have a problem with that, and it is easily solved with a coat or two extra of top coat.
BRAVO EMILY! Once again, I am so loving this polish!

Until next time,
Rachel

Challenge - Plants

Just like everything, this challenge was filled with good intentions.
And like some things, it fails miserably.
I chose to take pics of this mani anyway, for posterity. I have to say, this is quite possibly the WORST mani I have ever done. Possibly would take 1st prize in a contest for "Worst Mani's EVER". I'm actually pretty proud of that.
No... No I'm not. LOL!
So, I had used Orly's Royal Navy and just LOVE it! I did have a lot of VNL, but the color is just gorgeous. OF COURSE, no pics of the before the rampage of awful came across it. On to the terrible!

Yep. Since I started this blog with Tey, I promised myself that no matter how awful, I would still post it. I think the pinky looks like a daisy put it's leaf in a electrical socket. Looks kinda punk. 

No... No it doesn't.

It's like those "country" hand painted flowers on furniture, but done by a two year old. ROFL!

I was thinking of doing this challenge again, but am ready to just move forward. Already took of that monstrosity and am ready to put on something cheerful and sparkly to make me happy.

Until next time,

Rachel

Challenge - Animal - Nudibranch Nails!

Meet Mr. Chromodoris roboi.
He can grow as big as 26mm! (We're really impressed)

I'm a teensy bit too excited about these! I pinterest stalk nudibranchs pretty hard and it came to me that they could make for some amazing nail inspiration. The hard part was trying to narrow which tiny color bomb could be done justice in polish! I couldn't hope to capture it completely since they are such ethereal, surreal little things.


In my pinterest "research" (If I call it research I can procrastinate doing the dishes guilt free, right?), I came upon this little guy who reminded me of reverse gradients.  I formulated my plan based on that idea.

First, I laid down a coat of OPI My BF Scales walls and topped it with Julep Bess. Then, I sponged a gradient using F21 Earl Grey to about three quarters down the nail and covered it all with a topcoat.  Next, I cut irregular shapes out of tape using an xacto knife and placed them on my nails to mimic the pattern on the nudibranch.  I sponged a gradient of Julep Nina, Lucy, and Cleopatra over this (careful to line up Bess with the Lucy/Cleopatra gradient), removed the tape and popped on another topcoat.

 

 I love the outcome! Reverse gradients are one of my favorite techniques. What are some of yours?

Challenge - Squee & Animal

Today is my first challenge I have done since... July?! Wow... It's been a while. So, I chose to do this week's challenge of Animal and mix it with a prior one we skipped of Squee.  I preface this by asking you to be gentle. This was the biggest PIA stamping I have EVER experienced. I really don't know if it was user error, etching on the stamp plate, or the polish. Either way... It took an HOUR to just do the stamping! TWO STAMPS! Seriously...

The animal I chose was the frog. However, I wanted to squee it up. So... I did stamping of Kerropi! I'm a huge fan of Sanrio, and recently saw the two Hello Kitty plates on Born Pretty. Could not pass up the cuteness! To be fair, I have only tried two of the images on one of the plates. I will be using them again because they are adorable images, and will figure out the trick to them on a day that I am not trying to do a challenge post... Prior planning, Rachel..........

I used Julep Korin as the base green. My pinky, fore finger and thumb were topped with the glitter topper from Joyful Noise Cosemetics, Ballerina Girl, that I used for the last mani I posted. On my middle and ring fingers I topped with Orly Sparkling Garbage and stamped over that. After the 12th time of trying to get the little bastard not looking like a mutant, he came out semi-mutant. I tried to pep talk him, and it seemed to help... But, seriously... After 4 cotton balls and 6 q-tips, I was over it.

Poor guy has wonky eyes.

And ohhhh the CARNAGE!!!!! (plus dog toy)

Breast Cancer Awareness Mani

Today I have for you my Breast Cancer Awareness Mani!
I did this mani a long time ago, back when my nails weren't nubs. But, I love this glitter topper Ballerina Girl so much from Joyful Noise Cosmetics, I felt it was perfect to do again.
There are two manis. The first is Sinful Colors Glass Pink, and the second I used Sinful Colors Cotton Candy as the bases.  Glass Pink was suuuuuper sheer, and not really what I was santing it to turn out, so I did the second one.

I love the shimmer that Ballerina Girl has. This is also going to be used in my upcoming CHALLENGE! Yep! We are starting them again now that things have calmed down. Can't wait!

Rachel

Sally Hansen Sugar Coat - Red Velvet

I am a huge fan of the textured polishes, and this Sally Hansen Sugar Coat in Red Velvet is gorgeous! As mentioned before, I pet them. Yes. PET them. I am very tactile. Don't worry, I won't randomly reach out and just touch you if we meet. Girls Scouts Honor!

This polish is SOOOO pigmented. The color is gorgeous. Normally my skin can't pull off rich dark reds like this, as it has a more blue hue to it. I am more of a fall color palette for my skin. This one didn't make me look like I had super pale skin. LOVE IT! It really does look like red velvet cake. And now I am hungry.

What do you guys think about textured polishes? Have you tried any from this line?

Until next time,

Rachel

Hard Candy Crushed on Caribbean and Orly Sparkling Garbage

I'M BAAAAAAAAACK!

It's been a very very very long time since my last post. Moving and the new job... Well... Moving and my laziness overtook me.

So, to inspire me, I felt a lil bit o' the sparkle would help! I had not used HC Crushed on Caribbean since I got it months ago, and saw it while unpacking. I love how nutso sparkly it is. Then thought... SPARKLING GARBAGE! Imagine me thrusting the polish bottle in the air in triumph. That happened.

Inside with flash.

Outside in sunlight.

My camera was overcome with the spectacular beauty that it felt that it could not do this mani justice. For real, in the sunlight it is a blue disco ball of awesome. Oh, and please forgive the tip wear on my index and middle fingers. I had to hunt for my SD card, and this mani is a few days old. Which honestly, is pretty dern good for me. I'm hard on my manis. Surprisingly, my cuticles don't look too worse for wear either. Moving wrought havoc on them.

Check out the awesome planter in the background my fiance made with his own two wittle hands. We hauled that thing from San Diego to Sacramento... He was NOT leaving it. LOL!

Speaking of Sactown... If any of you readers are familiar with the area and know of some great polish spots, or would like to meet up and geek out, please drop me a line! I don't know anyone up here and would love to meet some new friends!

Until next time,

Rachel