Swatch Time!: Kleancolor Metallic Collection!

Hello lovelies!

So I'm really excited about what I have for you guys today, it's a really fun (super pic-heavy!) post!

Today I'm going to be swatching a whole collection! This is only my third full collection I've swatched, so I'm excited! 

This took me four hours to shoot, about two & a half hours to edit, and a full netflix-streamed season of Ink Master to get done. It was so fun! & No, that isn't sarcasm. it was sooo fun, and made me realize how much I've missed this work. :) 

So, let's get down to business!

This is the Kleancolor Metallics Collection!

Mermaid Mani!

Hey lovelies!

Today I'm going to be showing you a mani I did a few weeks ago, But I thought I'd make a little post to show the process of how I did it. :)

It's Mermaid Mani Time!! 

So, I loved these nails. A lot. I kind of wish my fishtail pattern had turned out a teensy bit better but... Well, you know what they say. Flippin' your fins, ya don't get too far...

I digress. :p

First step to all nail art for me, my pretties!

 My M.A.S.H. Nail Art Brush Set!

Then I painted a nice simple, white base coat.

I used Konad's White Stamping Polish.

(on my DIY acrylics, because sadly my natural nails do not look this pretty right now.)

Then I went for the gradient & accent nail...

Lookit that mess! Aah, gradients. They give a whole new meaning to "finger painting" LOL.

For the gradient, I did the handy-dandy make-up sponge technique, 

& I used Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear - Celeb City, 

Sally Hansen Color Foil - Minted Metal,

& I Love Nail Polish - Washing Ashore

For the accent nail I used Zoya PixieDust- Dahlia

Now for that Mermaid fin...

For the final steps, I used Konad's Black Stamping Polish and my trusty ol' striping brush, and attempted a freehand fishtail pattern. I could do better, but I also could(and have...) done much much worse, so overall I was happy with it.
I topped it off with 2-coats of Zoya - Opal (3 over Dahlia on the accent nail) and Sally Hansen Diamond Shine Top Coat.

& there we have my Mermaid Mani!

My question of the day for you guys today is: What's your favorite mythical creature?

For me, it will always be mermaids. It started when I was three and busted my VHS tape rewinding and watching The Little Mermaid over and over (and over...) again, and continued all the way into adulthood when I discovered that they totally make mermaid tales and give you lessons on how use your core to swim like a mermaid and you can get paid to be a mermaid, and OMG guys I gotta go the ocean is calling me...
Seriously though. If and when scientists discover a way for us to breathe underwater, I am so peacin' outta society and heading for the Pacific. I need to be part of that world... :p

So do you guys have any mythical creatures you're obsessed with like me? Let me know in the comments!

& as always, have a great day, and I will see you next time my lovelies!!

Gem Experimenting!

Hey lovelies!!

So I recently got a few gem wheels on Amazon, and I've been playing around with them & have a couple manis to show you! :)

So, keep in mind that neither of these are perfect, considering that A: my nail skills are a tad bit rusty and B: I've had a head cold and was hopped up on cold medicine when I did both of these LOL. Also C: These are shoddy iPhone camera pics, sorry. I'll be getting back into using my camera soon, I promise!

So here we go! :)

First Mani:

 I did a base coat of Sally Hansen Color Foil - Minted Metal (Which, btdubs, I am in looove with. but more on that in another upcoming post. ;) ) And a top coat of Zoya - Opal. 

Then I topped it off with some Sally Hansen - Diamond Shine and used the cute little silver triangle gems. I was going for sort of a mermaid-y type look. :)

Second Mani:

This one I'm very excited about. Mainly because that gorgeous pink is one of my lemmings that I finally found thanks to my awesome cousin hunting down a link for me. This is Zoya - Lolly (Which I will definitely be swatting on it's on for you soon, no worries.) with Zoya - Domiva on the accent nails. I realized that I couldn't get the little silver heart gems to stick with my matte top coat, (it dried too fast and would't stay tacky long enough for me to place them) So I ended up having to shine-ify it with the Diaomd Shine.
Which, I'm ok with. This mani didn't turn out perfectly how I saw it in my head, but I was still pretty in love with it and have had it on for almost  week now.

So there's my Adventures in Gems so far! I have a bunch more ideas, so stay tuned for that.

Have you guys ever tried gems? Let me know what you think in the comments! Personally, anything that I get to bedazzle is A-OK in my book. ;)

Seeya next time lovelies! :)

Outline/Zebra-Print Nail Art!

Hey my lovelies!

I know I haven't posted in awhile, sorry about that! :( 

But I have some pretty nail art that I did over the weekend to show you! :) 

My nail-spiration for these actually came from Pinterest, I saw a lot of people mixing bright colored outlines and animal print, so I decided to give it a try! And of course, that leads to pink and zebra stripes obviously! ;p  

 

This was my first real try at outline nails, (other than my playstation nails) and I like how it turned out!  

I used the un-named pink for the Kiss - Nail Artist Paint & Stencil Kit, and the White and Black Konad Stamping Polishes. I've found that stamping polishes have a really good formula/consistency for nail art! (I still need to practice my actual stamping, so far my attempts haven't been very picture-worthy. :p) 

That's all for today! What do you think about the Animal Print + Bright Colors trend that's going around? Let me know in the comments! I like it, I think you'll probably be seeing more manis along those lines from me! :) 

Super Mario Bros Nail Art!

Hey lovelies!

So over the weekend, I did my little sisters nails for her. She loves all the Mario games, she's always on her DS playing "Mario Kart," so she asked me if I could do some Super Mario Brothers nail art for her! :) 

So here's the result! 

(Note: it's a little bit messy. Art and cleanup are very difficult on small little child nails LOL! So sorry about that. :p) 

Comic-Con Geek Week, Day 1!

Hey lovelies!!

So today is the beginning of a super-duper fun week! I'm participating in a nail art challenge! I'm super excited, I have done a challenge in a while, and this one is so awesome and fun! :) 

It's Geek Week!! The Comic-Con themed challenge that's being hosted by the awesome Kelly from Peace Love Lacquer! 

So todays theme was inspired by a book, or a video game. 

We all know I'm a geeky gamer girl, so of course I went with video game! :D 

There were sooo many ideas I had for this one, too many good games too little fingernails LOL! But I decided to go with my absolute favorite game of the moment, the one I'm completely obsessed with and play 24/7/365... 

You guessed it, MINECRAFT!! 

Woooo!! I love these so much it kind of makes me want to cry nerd-tears. 

(In case you didn't know what nerd tears are! ;D)

I'm not a huge fan of how my zombie nail came out, but I'm super proud of Creeper nail and my Steve nail! I don't think my dirt block nail came out too shabby either. LOL! ;D

What do you guys think?! Let me know!!

And of course, don't forget to check out the other ladies awesome geeky manis! 

:) 

Peace Love Lacquer
Dipped in Lacquer
Galactic Lacquer
Rachos Nail Love
Kate Kreatez
Seriously Swatched
Makeup and Nails not War
Glitter Me This

Fun With Holographics, and a Nail Art Contest! :)

Hi lovelies!! :) 

Today I'm showing you some pretty holographic polishes, and the nail art I did with them! :)

These holographic beauties are: 

Layla Hologram Effects - Mermaid Spell 

and 

Zoya - Storm.

This all started because Jen's Nail Files  just hit 2k likes (congrats Jen!! :D) and is having a nail art contest to celebrate! 

The theme of the contest is to pick a name of one of the polishes from Darling Diva Polishes
, and translate it into nail art! 

So for my entry, I chose the name "Blue on Black" and I thought to myself, ooh I should use my blue and black holographic polishes!! :) 

So here's what I came up with, holographic Butterfly wings!  

I gotta credit my cousin Sarah for this too, when I told her about the contest she suggested doing Butterfly Wings! So thanks Sarah!

You can check out her blog here ! :) 

I also did this one, but I wasn't all that happy with how it turned out. I definitely liked the butterfly better, so I submitted that one for the contest. :) 

These were supposed to be the interlocking dots design, like this one I did earlier this year. It didn't work out quite so well this time though LOL. 

I think it was mostly because my nails are short little nubbins right now, so I didn't have much room to work with. 

So, it came out kinda more like an abstract design. Oh well. :p 

My cousins husband said it looks like footprints, and now I can't unsee that! LOL :p 

 

Here's the up close of my failure. LOL :p 

So make sure to go check out the contest, it's still going and there are going to be 12 winners, So you have a pretty decent chance at winning! 12 people will win a bottle of Darling Diva Polish that was custom designed just for Jen's Nail Files! It ends on Tuesday. I can't wait to see who wins, I'm sure it's gonna be a tough decision for Jen because so far all the entires I've seen are amazing! :) 

Rainbow Glitter Gradient Tutorial Video!

Hello my lovelies!! 

I have something really special for you guys today, 

A brand spankin' new video tutorial!! :D 

In this tutorial, I show you how to do my Rainbow Glitter Gradient that I did for Flip-Flop February! 

I hope you enjoy, let me know in the comments what you think! 

:)

(If the embed doesn't work for you, click/copy&paste this link: http://youtu.be/lzUjw8tvoyY)

I hope you guys like it! I think it's my favorite one I've done so far! :)
<3

My SUPER DUPER LATE Easter Nail Art!! (Oops! :p)

Hello lovies! As you may or may not know, I was SUPPOSED to take part in an Easter Nail Art Challenge hosted by the lovely Corrine over at Galactic Lacquer, buuuut I was a gigantic fail.
I did the art for it, but I never got around to posting them because life got kinda crazy around Easter time, and then my editing software was being a pain in the pa-tootie, but now I'm FINALLY posting it for you guys! LOL

So here's the Easter Nail Art, 2 months later. xD
Enjoy!

Luck of the Irish Challenge: Day 3!

Hi lovies!! Today is Day 3 of the Luck of The Irish Challenge, and today's theme is Leprechaun! :)

So here's my little leprechaun, I was going for something sort of like the guy from the lucky charms box, but I think I kind of ended up with an Irish Amish guy. Oops. LOL.

Then for the other nails I was going for his little gold belt buckles. Because in my mind leprechauns have belt buckles? Maybe he's an Irish Amish Pilgrim. I don't know LOL.

Don't forget to check out the other bloggers leprechauns! :)

Dipped in Lacquer

College Polished

Kate Kreates

Galactic Lacquer

Makeup and Nails, Not War

Seriously Swatched

Tes Did It Nails

Jilltastic Nail Design

My Vanity Basics

Peace Love Lacquer

I’m Just Me…ChiChi

XO, Noelle

MORE Nail Mail! :D

Hey again lovies! I have even MORE Nail Mail to show you! These came the other day and I love them sooo much!

The only reason I haven't posted until now, is because these literally came on the same day that all the crazy crap was happening with my iPod LOL, so now I'm finally getting caught up posting it all! :)

So I ordered these last weekend. I had been in the market for some nice quality, affordable nail art brushes for awhile now (all my previous nail art had been done the ghetto-fabulous way with make-up brushes, bobby pins, cuticle sticks, pins, whatever I could find LOL) so I was very excited to find out about these.
Quite a few other nail bloggers have blogged about this particular set recommending it, and all of the reviews on it on Amazon were great, and the price was a steeaaal so I bought it! :)

(I just wanna say right now, I'm not at all endorsed by this company, or amazon, I wasn't paid for this review at all, I'm just a very happy customer!! :D)

This is the MASH 15 piece nail art brush kit, it's soo amazing!! You get 15 brushes which includes 2 different sized fan brushes, a dotting tool, an angled brush (there's an important disclaimer on the sales page that is bent because its angled, it is NOT broken), plus all different sized striping brushes, etc. All the brushes come packaged with protective plastic caps so they won't be damaged, and best of all, it comes in this super nice black fold-up case!
All the brushes are very good quality, something that I really love about them is that not only do they vary in sizes, but also in softness. Which is really great because for certain designs its better to have a soft brush, while for others its better to have a firmer brush. I really loved that, I love them so much, I've only used them about three times now but I'm already in love!! xD

I got this for $10.99 plus $5.00 shipping, so it was only about $17 with tax! Such a great deal, and I definitely recommend this if you are in the market for some good quality, affordable brushes. This is the link to the page I bought it from: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005BG02BU?ie=UTF8&force-full-site=1&ref_=aw_bottom_links

As I said, I wasn't endorsed by anyone or paid for this review, I'm just a very satisfied customer, and I definitely recommend this to my fellow nail polish addicts! :)

Flip/Flop February Day 24: Tissue Paper/Rainbow

Hi lovies! It's time for Day 24 of Flip/Flop February! We're really nearing the end here now! :)

Today's Flip/Flop was Tissue Paper/Rainbow, and surprisingly, I actually didn't choose rainbow! :p
I've been wanting to try the tissue paper technique for awhile now, so I gave it a shot!

The way I did it was, I cut out small pieces of the tissue paper with the design I liked, then put a coat of clear polish (I used Seche Vite top-coat) on and stuck the tissue paper to it. I smoothed it out and held it for a few seconds until it stuck. Then I used a cuticle stick and a file to get off the excess paper, then sealed it with another coat of clear polish. :)

Make sure to check out the other bloggers manis as well! :)

Flip/Flop February Day 22: Plaid/Mustache!

Hello Lovelies! I'm all caught up on this Challenge, and now it's time for Day 22! :)

Today's Flip/Flop was Plaid/Mustache and... I did both! I did plaid with a mustache accent nail!

For the plaid I used:
Sephora by OPI - What Aura Gonna Wear?, I'm Wired, and Read My Palm.
For the mustache I used: Zoya - Storm (because why not have a sparkly mustache?! If I could grow one I'd totally cover it in glitter all the time. :D)
Then I sealed with Seche Vite top-coat. :)

Make sure to check out all the other bloggers manis! :)