A Different Kind of Galaxy

Hi there! I've done several galaxy manicures of this variety in the past, but after wearing Living Water by itself for a day or two, I thought I'd try a different kind of galaxy manicure. I sponged Sinful Colors Nail Junkie and Sally Hansen Laser, then topped it off with a coat of Claire's Starstruck. I did have to place the star glitter from Starstruck, but other than that it was quite an easy manicure, and I enjoyed wearing it for the day.

Sorry for the green glow on my nails in some of the pictures...the top coat was apparently so shiny that I reflected the trees and grass in almost every picture. Other than that, the pictures are pretty accurate.
In other news, I might not be posting a lot for a while...my fingers recently started peeling profusely for no particular reason I can discern. This occurs despite the heavy moisturizing I've been doing over the past couple of days, and it doesn't really make for nail pictures that are pleasant to look at. So, until whatever it is quits or is abated, I won't be taking any new pictures. I do have one manicure left in my archives, but that's it, so...yeah. Hopefully my fingers will be back to normal soon?

Cult Nails Living Water

Aaaaand, it's Friday! I bought Living Water soon after it came out in early 2011 as part of the Cult Nails Inaugural Collection. The first time I tried it, I'll be honest - I didn't like it that much. I was disappointed, and I never got around to taking pictures to post here. I decided to give it another try, and boy, am I glad I did! The picture to the left is a macro of one of my nails. I used two coats of Living Water sandwiched between Duri Rejuvacote (which I'll post about soon) and two coats of Cult Nails Wicked Fast top coat. The second coat of top coat was necessary to make Living Water completely glossy, but it was definitely worth it.

China Glaze Whirled Away

Good morning! It is still morning for a few minutes, right? Today I'm writing about a polish that everyone knows by now - but it's still amazing. China Glaze Whirled Away came out as part of the Cirque du Soleil Worlds Away collection (which my local Sally's still doesn't have - get on the ball!), and it's a black and white glitter topper that positively makes my socks roll up and down. Here, I wore it with Sally Hansen Blue Away.

Unfortunately, my top coat bubbled on several of my finges - oh, the vicissitudes of top coat! However the bubbles weren't as visible in real life as they are in the picture, so I quite enjoyed wearing this manicure yesterday. 

In related news, I seem to be on another blue kick. Before this mani, I was wearing Zoya Blu from the Lovely collection, and as I type this, I'm in the process of applying another (mostly) blue polish, which I'll show you next. Hint: it's nerdy. :)

Have a great day!

Mustachioed

Hey there! Look, it's only been two days since my last post, even though it's midterm - wait, let's not talk about the fact that it's midterm week. *ahem* Moving on...during The Week That Shall Not Be Named (am I the only one who thinks midterms are worse than finals?), sometimes one needs a little something to cheer oneself up. I did this manicure a couple weeks ago, but I'm posting it now because I think it's just about time for something a little silly. And what might that be? Mustachioed nails, of course.

indoors, natural light

There - I told you it was silly. And before anyone asks, yes, I did wear this out in public, and yes, people did comment on it, and no, no one told me I was bonkers. I have to say, I did mess up the pinkie a bit, but it certainly didn't detract from the fun I had wearing it, and other than that, I think it turned out quite well. You see, facial hair is not just for the face! Um. Yeah. I just said that. It's possible that it miiight be a little past midnight while I'm writing this and maaaybe I should be studying for my international studies exam tomorrow and maaaybe I'm just a little tired and it's making me slightly nuts...so. Yup. *whistles* Au revoir! 

China Glaze Capitol Colours: Stone Cold

Helllooo! Today I'm reviewing Stone Cold, one of the colors I received from the China Glaze Capitol Colours collection. Stone Cold is a matte, metallic gunmetal-colored polish, and I have to say, I'm a huge fan. I wish my nails were less nubbiny so they could show off the polish more, but c'est la vie, so here are the nubbiny pictures I have:

 sunlight

indoors, natural light

Isn't she gorgeous? I'm really keen to do some kind of sponge like this...I feel like it would be a really good color to sponge. Then again, I've been on a sponging kick lately, so maybe it's just me. Anyway, to get off my tangent, let me tell you some more about Stone Cold. Not only it is an awesome color with an awesome finish, it's really easy to apply and is perfectly opaque in one coat. ONE coat, people! What can I say, I'm impressed.

The next color I have from Capitol Colours is Dress Me Up, so you'll be seeing that soon (though I hope to get a few more when they come out for sale - *cough* Riveting *cough*), though I may have a post or two in between. Also, midterms are next week, so I may have to slack off a bit on the blogging. I'm determined to get good scores on my midterms, so I'll be hitting the books hard (at least, that's what I think now). Until next time, have a good day!

Stone Cold was received by me from China Glaze for review. For more information, see my disclosure policy.

(Late) Day 18: Half Moons

I meant to post this last night, but I completely and entirely forgot...whoops. I did, however, actually do this manicure yesterday, so I think it still counts. I did black over Zafirah and lined the edges of the half-moons with Orly Luxe.

natural light

As you can see, I have a bit of tipwear and dry fingers, but other than that, I think it looks quite classy. I'll hopefully have my galaxy nails done and posted later today, so I'll chat more then. In the meantime, I have way too many papers to write, so I'm out - hope you're having a great weekend!

Day 17: Glitter (Franken: Zafirah)

Okay, so I'm guessing this was supposed to be glitter nail art, because this is the ten days of nail art, but since it didn't say that specifically, and I really wanted to use a franken I made a few weeks ago, I just used the franken. I used Wet 'n' Wild Black Creme, clear, Jordana Silver Jewel, Wet 'n' Wild Fantasy Makers glitter in Glitz, NYC Starry Silver Glitter, and China Glaze Fairy Dust. You really can't see most of the hexagonal glitter, but I'm quite happy with it as it is. Unfortunately, I didn't think of the fact that I should really take sunlit pictures since there's holographic glitter in it, but you get what you get. I'm going to be layering over this for the half-moon manicure tomorrow, so hopefully the sun will be out then (though it's supposed to be cloudy, so I doubt it).

 indoors, with flash

 indoors, with flash

Sooo pretty...I wish I had taken pictures in the sunlight so you could see it in its full glory. I used two coats here, and I named it Zafirah, which is an Arabic name meaning "successful." I'd say Zafirah was a success, wouldn't you?

Here are the other lovely ladies doing the challenge with me:

Aly Loves Lacquer
Manicure Addict
Dees Polish Endeavours
Bright Lights, Big Color
Life and Polish

Day 7: Black & White

Hello there! Today's theme was black and white, and once again, there were so many possibilities. Eventually, however, I decided to do something easy, and something easy ended up being a nail art technique that I don't think anyone has done before; at least, I've never seen it anywhere else. Can you guess what I did?

indoors, flash

Any guesses? Okay, I'll spill. I used the very sophisticated technique of...straws. I used a white base, then painted a bit of black polish on an index card, dipped the end of the straw in, and dabbed it on my nail (lather, rinse, repeat) to create a sort of abstract circles pattern. They're not perfect circles, but to me, that's not the point - and it's very easy to do. The streakiness is due to my impatience and the fact that I had to go to class, so sorry about that, and the flash is due to the fact that it gets dark outside really freaking early now, and my dorm lighting sucks. So, again, sorry. Hope all your Mondays went reasonably well!

Day 6: Violet - Layering with Orly Love Each Other

I have a feeling this is going to be the month of long post titles...ah well. Today, like yesterday, I had a really hard time choosing what manicure I wanted to do. I had originally planned on Wet 'n' Wild Back Alley Deals, but after yesterday, I didn't really want to take off another glitter after only wearing it for a day. I vacillated for a while before finally settled on a layering manicure with Orly Love Each Other, which I picked up at Ulta on clearance a little while back. I decided to layer it over black, but to add Nubar 2010 in there for some extra oomph. So, I used one coat of Wet 'n' Wild Black Creme, one coat of Nubar 2010, and four (I think) coats of Orly Love Each Other. The result:

natural light

natural light

 natural light

sunlight

sunlight

Sorry for being a bit picspammy, but I really wanted to show this off - it deserves it. Love Each Other is a purple/pink duochrome glass flecked shimmer in a ever-so-slightly milky base, though as you can see, the pink doesn't show up in this manicure. I'm curious to see if it would over other colors, so perhaps you'll be seeing quite a bit more of this lovely polish before the month is up. I still can't figure out why I'd never heard of it before, as it's a truly lovely polish. Perhaps a few more people will learn about it from this post - at least, I can only hope!

And here are the lovely ladies doing this challenge with me (I forgot to do this yesterday and didn't realize I forgot until this morning...fail):

Aly Loves Lacquer

Manicure Addict 

Dees Polish Endeavours

Bright Lights, Big Color

Life and Polish

My Friend Frankie: Halloween Nail Art

Hey-ya! Sorry I haven't posted anything (PR doesn't count) for over a week...I blame midterms. But fortunately, they're over now, and I'm back to tomfoolery as usual, though I still have a crapton of papers and stuff to work on. I know you don't want to hear about that, though, so on to the nails!

After I took off the manicure I wore before the one I'm showing today (which I'll be showing you after Halloween's over), I knew I wanted to do something Halloween-y, but I didn't know what. There have been so many inspiring Halloween nail art posts recently that I just didn't know what to choose. Eventually, I settled on the one and only Frankenstein because I figured it was a good way to ease into the Halloween spirit - after all, I don't want to freak people out by whipping out a vampire manicure like the one I did last July (sorry for the cuticle flooding and bad pictures) right away, and these Frankensteins are pretty darn cute in my opinion. I did mess up on the right and pinkie fingers, but as always, it's much, much more obvious in the pictures than in real life.

natural light

Aren't they adorable? Fuzzy wuzzy wittle Fwankensteins... *ahem* ANYway. This was actually a pretty simple design to do, and it would've been even simpler had I not been hungry at the time I did it, which caused my hands (especially my left hand) to shake. Fun times. I used Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Green with Envy for the base, my Nubar nail art pen in black for the hair and mouths, and Wet 'n' Wild White Creme and Black Creme, along with an orangewood stick (because I can't find my dotting tool...grrr), for the eyes.

In unrelated news, because I'm in a rambly mood today, I got my first job! It's a one-time thing, so I don't have to make a long-term commitment, but I'm going to get paid around $150, so I'll be able to buy a new iPhone before my old one completely craps out. It's been slow and crash-prone lately, and it's even sprouted a "buttcrack" - there's a small, one-inch-ish crack in the middle of the bottom of the back of the phone that seems to have come from nowhere. In other words, my phone is now a plumber. 

...I'm not sure how to transition from that, so, until next time!

P.S. I have a potential swap in the works that I am super, super, SUPER excited about, so I can't wait to tell you guys about that if/when it comes through! Yippee!

Splatter on Black

I was originally going to do a water marble with these colors, but for some reason it just wasn't working for me. Instead, I decided to go for an easier option: the splatter mani. I used a base of Wet 'n' Wild Black Creme with OPI A Good Man-darin is Hard to Find, Nina Ultra Pro Salsa, OPI Jade is the New Black, and Color Club Overboard.

direct sunlight

indirect sunlight

At first, I wasn't too happy with this, but it definitely started growing on me after I put top coat on. Unfortunately, it's chipped now, so I'll have to take it off soon. I'm not sure when that's going to happen, though, as one of my best friends, Francis, is visiting this weekend. This is Francis:

I really like how the focus turned out in the first picture, even though it was completely accidental. Anyway, that's about all I have to say now...have a great weekend!

Purple Stripes

Hello there! I wore Zoya Malia on its own for a couple days this week, then I added some black stripes with my Nubar nail art pen. I originally intended to do a taped chevron stripe mani, but I didn't have the time or patience, so I just did some random freehand stripes. My right hand is the same as my left except that the designs are on different fingers.

outdoors, cloudy

This definitely is not my best nail art ever - and it looks much worse in macro, as usual - but in real life I'm happy with it. If I'd had more time, I definitely would've gone with the tape option, as the lines turn out much cleaner. Maybe next time!

Pink Wednesday: Cracked Pink Dots

I know, it's a terrible post title . . . however, it's a pretty good mani, if I do say so myself. It's a pink version of a manicure I did back in April, while I was on a choir trip. This time, however, I added the crackle right away instead of wearing the dots on their own for a while. I've forgotten precisely what pinks I used (I've been really bad about writing this stuff down lately), but I think I used Essie Exotic Liras, Love My Nails Tropical Fruit, Sinful Colors Beautiful Girl, and Sinful Colors Pink Forever. I used a base of Wet 'n' Wild White Creme and added China Glaze Black Mesh on the top.

indoors, artificial light

This ended up looking a bit like pink camo, which wasn't what I intended, but it makes me want to try it with green. For that matter, I'd like to try it with just about any color combination - I imagine silver and gold dots with black crackle would look cool as well. I really like the idea of covering nail art in crackle in general, too; I think it's a good strategy for people who are new to nail art, for a quick mani refresher, or for when you want to do something that looks complicated but don't have much time. At any rate, I think Regina would approve, don't you? Have a great day!

Fawkes the Phoenix

I know I told you I was going to show you the nail art I did over Green with Envy today...but then I changed my mind. With the last Harry Potter movie coming up, I've been re-reading the books like mad, so of course I had to do a correlating manicure. I've been making a list of ideas as I've read the books, and one that I couldn't wait to try was a Fawkes manicure. If you don't know who Fawkes is, well, Google "Fawkes the phoenix," and also, really?! Anyway, I knew that painting a non-cartoon bird on my nails would be pretty much hopeless, so I just did a feather on each nail. I used one coat of Wet n Wild Black Creme for the base (over base coat, naturally), then my red Nubar nail art pen, OPI Red My Fortune Cookie, China Glaze White Cap, and Nubar 2010 (sparingly) for the feathers.

 indoors, artificial light

 outdoors, sunlight

 outdoors, shade

Honestly, this manicure did not turn out as well as I would've liked, which I think is partly due to the fact that the reds I used are not perfectly opaque in one stroke over black. This meant I had to go over and over the lines I made to make sure that the red showed up vividly, and that compromised the cleanness of the design. I kind of saw this coming and would've tried it over white, but I knew that black would set the red and gold off so much better that I had to try it anyway.

That said, I cannot wait to do more Harry Potter manicures, and you'll probably be seeing them past the 15th, so be warned. :)

Unoriginal Crackle

This is pretty much the least original crackle manicure that I've done - black and gold. I tried it out quite a while back when I first got my crackles, and unoriginal as it may be, I really like the combination. I used Orly Luxe and China Glaze Black Mesh.

indoors, artificial light

I know you've probably seen this look ten zillion times by now, but I figured I had worn it and might as well post it. So, now you've seen it ten zillion and one times! :) Sorry this is such a short post, but there's really not much to say about this combination except that I really, really like it - which I already said. Until next time!

My Musical Manicure

Yay, alliteration! Anyway, today's brain tumor fact is: "Pituitary tumors represent 13% of all primary brain tumors." - American Brain Tumor Association My grey manicure to go with that fact is the one I did for my final choir concert this past Sunday. I actually didn't get the manicure done until Sunday evening, but I'm glad I did it anyway. I used Dr.'s Remedy Healing Heather Grey for a base, drew the music notes with a black Sharpie pen, did one coat of Wet n Wild Clear (because it smears the Sharpie much less than Seche Vite), and finished it off with Seche Vite.

 indoors, artificial light (left hand)

indoors, artificial light (right hand)

Even though the Sharpie smeared some and the clear top coat faded it a little for some reason, I'm still very happy with this manicure - you couldn't see most of the imperfections from a distance, anyway, and the result is much better than what it would have been if I'd tried to do this with actual nail polish. If you have any questions as to what any of the musical symbols are, please leave them in the comments and I'd be happy to answer.

On a different topic, tonight is FINALLY my high school graduation! I'm going to miss choir, a few friends, and a few teachers, but all in all I am beyond ready to get the heck out of Dodge. In accordance, I did my nails for graduation, and you'll be seeing that manicure tomorrow on grey-free Friday. Maybe now that school's completely done with I can get back to posting on a regular schedule! And with that, I really ought to go take a shower...

First Water Marble!

Sunday night, I decided to attempt my first water marble, which I'd been intending to do for quite a while. I used black and white (Wet n Wild Black Creme and White Creme) because I figured they'd be the easiest colors for a beginner like myself to marble with, and I marbled them over a base of one coat of White Creme. I used Vaseline to keep the polish from sticking to my fingers, and topped my nails with one coat of Seche Vite when I was done.

indoors, artificial light

I'm really sorry about my janky dry fingers and general nastiness in this picture - I took it this morning in a hurry because I was afraid my manicure wouldn't last the day without chipping, and I was right. While there are definitely some things for me to improve on, I don't think this was too bad for my first try, and I was happy to wear it out in public for two days. Have you tried water marbling?

Plaid Nails

Sorry for not posting yesterday - I was out of town and thought I'd be back in time to post, but I wasn't. Maybe the three posts Friday make up for it? Anyway, I've been wanting to do plaid nails for quite a while, but each time I thought about it I was too intimidated to do it because I thought it would be really hard. However, I finally just took the jump! Here's what I did:

indoors, artificial light

indoors, artificial light (w/ matte TC)

 I based the design off of a picture tutorial I saw in a scan of the January edition of Nail Up!, a Japanese nail magazine. I got the scan from this post on I Love Nail Polish. Here's the design I copied (I cropped it out of the scan of the whole page):

Instead of white, I used grey (Zoya Harley), and I used Kiss stripers for the black and red. The red striper wasn't opaque enough to show up over the black stripes, so I covered up the places where they crossed in black. I did have to try twice on a couple nails, but I think it turned out pretty well overall, considering I have trouble drawing parallel lines when I can't erase them and try again. As you can see, I put Essie matte top coat on in the second picture so you could see the design better. Now that I'm looking at the pictures, I think I prefer it matte - and I'm sure I'll be doing more plaid manis in the future, so I may have to wear those matte-ified.

Until next time...I can't believe it's almost Monday! However, it is the start of spring today, so I guess that kind of balances it out. Happy spring!

Pink Wednesday: Pink Panth...No, Leopard

If you've glanced at my sidebar in the last couple of days, you may have noticed a new badge. The girls from Colour Coated and Glitta Gloves started the idea of wearing/posting pink nail polish on Wednesdays in a tribute to Mean Girls...though we're obviously not mean girls. :) Several other bloggers, including myself, have now joined in, and you can see the full list on the On Wednesdays We Wear Pink website. Anybody can join, so if you have a nail blog and you're interested, head on over!

My joining the Pink Wednesdays club happened to be very fortuitously timed, as I had just put on a pink leopard manicure...yes, that's right, just after taking off another leopard manicure. What can I say? Anyway, here it is. I used Color Club Yachty, Yachty, Yadda (possibly my favorite pink) for the base, and Wet n Wild White Creme and Black Creme for the spots.

indoors, artificial light

Whaddaya think? Unfortunately, I did not manage to take a picture of this until the third (or fourth? I can't remember how many days I had this on, and I only took it off yesterday...sad) day of wear, and I had a chip on my middle fingernail. On the bright side, it's not that visible in the picture. I also noticed that I had a little more difficult with the consistency of the polishes I used to make the spots than I did in my previous manicure. I think that's because they're thicker - you can see the places were little strings of polish got where they weren't supposed to be. On the whole, though, I think it turned out well.

I have yet another new nail polish blog for you today:
Digital Design Nails

I'll have a green franken for you tomorrow on St. Patrick's Day. Until then, have a great day!

Sinful Colors Secret Admirer

I seriously considered wearing this for Valentine's Day - it's black, sure, but the name is perfectly Valentine -appropriate, and it's a gorgeous color. I was really surprised with the formula of this one, too. I didn't expect much, but Secret Admirer went on very easily and barely needed two coats. I probably could've gotten away with one if I had better application skills. This is without top coat. Sorry for the blurriness - for some reason, I couldn't get my camera to focus on the shimmer.

indoors, artificial light

I can't wait to wear this as a base for layering, or with a matte top coat - I bet it'd be gorgeous! It's the only black shimmer I have, so I can't compare it to any polishes in my stash, but I can't think of any dupes that I've seen on other blogs, either. My opinion of Sinful Colors is growing with every polish of theirs I get!