Essie's Wedding Collection

Yeah I'm a little late to the game, but I found this awesome mini set of Essie's Wedding Collection at TJ Maxx. At 9.99, it was an obvious buy as these are my first Essies! Woo! Isn't it cute?

 I just wanted to quickly swatch these as I was excited to see how great this formula is that everyone is always talking about. First up is Better Together a sheer light pink.

I really love the color of this in the bottle. Maybe I needed more coats? It didn't hide the color of my stained nails after 4 coats. Perhaps this would be the perfect french manicure accessory? Pretty shady, couldn't wear it on its own. I do think some glitter would look great over them though so that's definitely an option!

Next, Made to Honor and Borrowed & Blue

As far as Made of Honor, again it is VERY sheer, but I can see it being a great base for layering or glitter. I really really really enjoyed working with Borrowed & Blue. It's a chalky baby blue that really pops with my skin, I think. These were both very easy to apply with quick drying times. I even hurried between drying times with the sheerer colors and didn't get any bubbling. Always a plus for the impatient lacquerista!

Lastly, my favorite of the bunch, First Dance

At first I thought this was basically just a dupe of Sinful Colors' Ruby Ruby (which actually applies just as well First Dance), but after the second coat I realized I had found a much brighter and almost orange-toned red. I wouldn't say the orange is super obvious, it's more just a hinting in the background.

I really enjoyed all of these polishes and am very glad to have found them. The application was wonderful with all of them (even on my crippled middle nail..ugh).

I still have a NOTD to write up - I now know what everyone means by Nubar ALL THE THINGS! Thanks for reading!

Skull stamps (possible fail)

Stamping isn't as easy as it looks, nor is it as hard as some people make it out to be, but it is definitely something that takes PRACTICE. I imagine I will be covering all of my old manicures with stamping practice ^.^

I really only have two colors that I know for sure stamp: Black and white. So, I went with those and tried to do a black and white skittles set featuring skull stamps from the Bundle Monster 25 piece set.

I'm sort of satisfied with it in that I know what areas I need to improve to get better results. For one, I need to really pay attention to ROLLING the stamp across the nail (in all directions, really). I rolled top to bottom, but not left to right. I zigged when I should have zagged, ya get me? Anyway, the readers can be the judge I suppose! I used Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Black Out and White In, and Konad's special stamping polish in black.

I'd like to note that I take all of my photos in direct sunlight when possible as my camera isn't exactly great and that's when I can get the best photos. I'm actually thinking of returning it so if anyone has any recommendations for good digital camera under 100 dollars I'm all ears! Or.. eyes, I guess! Hah

Obviously the weather wasn't as great today so the photos are as close to natural light as possible. 

Thanks for reading :)

Nubar has a new customer for life! (Or, F YEAH RECLAIM!)

I seriously am enamored with this polish. In dim lighting it just looks like your average sparkly green, but get it out into the sun light and it really is a stunner! I took many pictures trying to get just the right angles to show off its truly awesome color. I hope some of them can do this amazing polish justice.

I have to add that not only does it look absolutely fantastically amazing (in any light, really), but it was the easiest time I have ever had applying a polish. I am more than impressed. If I had the money, I'd buy every polish Nubar has! Anyone have any other favorites from them I should check out? Thanks for reading!

Just some essentials...and a HUGE birthday haul!

My hands are not as soft, smooth, or cuticle tear free as I'd like them to be. So, I have made it my mission to pamper and care for my hands as much as possible. To do that, I picked up some awesome tools recently. Bath and Body Works had a sale going on plus I had some coupons so I grabbed this wonderful sugar scrub and the paraffin lotion (3/$10) they suggest to go along with it. Even after the first use, my hands were immediately softer and had a more even look to them. Add on my recent purchase of Sally Hansen Green Tea cuticle oil and Burt's Bees Lemon Cuticle Butter, and my nails and hands are feeling much healthier. I still have a ways to go, but it's a start. OH - and I must recommend everyone give that Revlon buffer a shot - it's the bee's knees! My nails look like they have a clear coat on even when they are completely naked!

Most of the purchases I have been able to make recently have been due to recent birthday monies I received, but this next haul was just a gift in itself (not pictured: MASH brush set, acrylics, and Fauxnad (BM) stamping supplies)!

The polishes are:

Nubar - Black Polka Dot

Nubar - White Polka Dot

Nubar - Reclaim (New favorite!)

Nubar - 2010

Milani - Gems

China Glaze - Westside Warrior

China Glaze - Matte Magic (Works AMAZINGLY)

ORLY - Androgynie

Kleancolor - Black Hole

Kleancolor - Chunky Holo Black

Deborah Lippmann - Across the Universe

There will be a couple more haul posts, but I want to show off a few of these beauties first! Pretty sure I'm already addicted to stamping too, so I hope to have lots of that for the near future! Thanks for reading :)

Revlon's Minted with some extra shine!

Recently I picked up Revlon - Minted at a discount and absolutely fell in love with the color. It applies like a dream and is just the perfect "minted" shade, of course! I also found a pretty cool almost holographic polish at the dollar store called Glacier by Nail Fetish. I tried wearing the Glacier on its own but it took 4 coats and was still streaky as all get out. However, it works great if you just through one or two coats over just about any color. I tried a bunch of different shades, but it actually looks pretty great over Minted!

These pictures genuinely don't do it any sort of justice, the final look was actually quite stunning!

This is probably going to be my last post until I get back from China. Well, aside from the birthday post (around the 27th) and 4 or 5 giveaways I'll be entering before I go! 

Holy crap I made flowers!

I have this white striper (as seen in the last post about watermelon nails) that actually works really well for creating crisp and concise lines. Well, it works great if you don't have shaky hands like me! I've played with it before and am always slightly disappointed with the results. This time, there was no disappointment at all! These nails were inspired by Tartofraises! She is easily the most talented freehand artist I have ever seen. I can only hope that someday I will achieve even half of her awesomeness! I watch her tutorials often and I thought the style I chose to do was simple enough for me not to mess up and nice enough to at least pay her some tribute! What do you think?

Watermelons are delicious...

...And these nails just made me wish it were in season! I had a lot of fun doing these, and I was surprised at how well they turned out. I wish I had used a dotting tool instead of a needle for the seeds. They came out a little wonky. On to the pictures!

As far as colors go, I used Sinful Colors - Timberberry (pink), Sinful Colors - Innocent (light green), and white and green stripers from the dollar store. 

Thanks for reading!

It's gradient time!

I was looking through animal print tutorials and pictures, and I kept seeing artists using really awesome gradients underneath their animal print designs. Pink, orange, and red do NOT sound like they'd go well together (to me, anyway), but apparently they combine for a really awesome and smooth gradient! First, I did a solid coat of Sinful Colors - Courtney Orange. This is a seriously beautiful orange shimmer. Check it out:

3 coats to a beautiful (quite Halloween-y) orange!

It actually matched my lotion bottle ^.^

Now on to the gradient! I don't have a very good camera, but for some reason it captured this manicure exactly how it looks in person. Maybe it's the beautiful desert sun bringing out these truly beautiful colors!

For the red I used Sinful Colors - Ruby Ruby and for the pink Sinful Colors - Timbleberry.

I am super pleased with how this turned out! That little bottle of polish I'm holding is a glitter from a 5 piece Hello Kitty set. It really isn't good quality AT ALL, but the bottle is super cute! The glitter actually washed off the next time I washed my hands. Still, what glitter remained made this an awesome manicure that I was proud to show off. Thanks for reading! 

Zoya - Anja

This little beauty really took my breath away when I finished the application and sat back to admire it. It's a rich burgundy with a definite purple hue. In the bottle it looked like it had a lot more red/purple in it, but mostly it looked like a dark burgundy while I was wearing it. Here are some photos taken in the lovely desert sun!

It took only two coats for this to be opaque - and I paint really thin coats! Really great coverage and super easy application. Smooth and creamy! I am quickly falling in love with Zoya polishes! Now I just need to try their mattes!

Fashion Polish Blogaversary!

Whew! This has been a lot of giveaways to blog about. But really, how awesome are giveaways?! I have yet to win one, but I am holding out hope still!!


Fashion Polish is a fantastic blog with the BEST swatches! Seriously this girly has the best nail photos out there. I imagine her camera is ridiculously amazing.

Here is what you can win

Drooooooool

Click here to enter!