New Year's Eve Pinwheels

Happy New Year! Well, eve still. I was totally uninspired for nail art and I didn't have any firework stamps in my collection, but I still wanted to go with the idea I had in my head of black and holographic polish. It screams festive to me a little louder than black and gold does.

So I decided to go with some pinwheel nails! I started with a black base and then used Color Club Cloud Nine and Over the Moon. This whole thing is stunning in the sunlight.

A more direct shot under my lamp to see the holo :)

I used tape to cut out five triangles and placed them accordingly on my nails. It was surprisingly challenging to get them to equidistant but I think it came out nicely for a first try! The points were a little off centered but that was fixed quickly with a single clear rhinestone. I remembered seeing that idea here on the most perfect blog ever. *bows down* 

What are you wearing on your nails for the occasion? Hopefully it's nice and sparkly. Have a good first start to the year!

Welcome Back + Cosmic Forces

I'm back! Hopefully this time for good. Heller to whoever is reading. I got an awesome new camera for Christmas (Mom is the best) that will be a good incentive to keep me blogging. Bear with me as I get lightning situations figured out. The camera is such a higher quality than I am used to, so I am still playing around with things. But I feel these picture are good enough to share, and I'm all about progress so why not! 

I have a new to me polish to share today. The gorgeous Emily de Molly Cosmic Forces! Took me two attempts to catch this in a Llarowe restock. And it was definitely worth it!

It's a stunning deep purple berry color that leans red, and it's got these amazing small lilac round and hex glitters in it. Most notably are those large holographic circle glitters too! Mmmm those had me sold from day one.

I think what sets this polish apart is that while it's a jelly, it's buildable in 2-3 coats AND still lets all the glitters shine through the layers. Insta buy, right? The polish does remind me of something cosmic. I feel when the light hits certain large glitters it looks like Jupiter or Saturn. But that may be the NyQuil finally hitting in.

What do you think of the new photos? Yay or nay? I hope they look nice on whatever screen you are viewing from. Definite improvement in my eyes and I'm hoping to keep on! Especially with my blog layout. I am such a n00b on graphic design so I'm trying to keep this page eye catching but simple. Excuse all the changes you may see!

Noteworthy: my uncle calls this one Crystal Berry Elegance. Ha! Spot on.

Shop Eighty4! Swatches+ Review

Hello to whoever is reading this :) I was in a rut for a while in the Blogger world. I'm more active over on my IG, but these polishes took me out of my funk and I wanted to post about them!

Fefe Duran from Eighty4 polish so graciously sent me 6 polishes to swatch and review for those inquiring about the brand. So onward to some photos!

P.s All swatches were finished with two coats of Out the Door. 

Dragon Lust: is a gorgeous magenta to plum thermal with a pretty prominent scattered holo for a thermal. It comes out a lot in my photos despite being in a lightbox! This is two coats. The first went on a little patchy (but that could be my error since it was a little cuticle drag) and the second coat leveled everything out perfectly. 

Candy Corn: If USPS hadn't delivered my package to the wrong place, I totally could have had it before Halloween. This is the perfect color! It is a yellow to orange thermal with a scattered holo finish as well. This is quite sheer, and my swatch is at four thin coats. But it doesn't feel thick on the nail at all! And I have pretty visible VNL so it may be a different case for others. I would suggest layering over white as well.

Lobster hands or what?! Oranges make my camera freak out I'm sorry. I promise this is color accurate though. :)

Pink Sugar: Three thin coats of this gorgeous barbie pink holo. My top pick from the bunch. It's so flattering on my skin tone and I can imagine it's one of those pink shades anyone can wear!

 Tang: This is seriously the brightest, most eye-searing orange neon polish I have ever seen. So be aware neons are notoriously hard to capture! My camera is making it come off as a deeper orange than it is. But oh my gosh you could stop traffic with this, I love it! This is three coats (no undies!) It is opaque at two, I just have really visible VNL all the time! My Instagram has a slightly better color accurate photo.

 Galaxy Green: a deep green with a black base with a pearlescent finish. This is two coats, watch out for brush strokes!

Colorfett: Neon. Glitter. Does anything else really need to be said? This fun mix has squares and hexes of bright blue, lie, red, and pink colors. It would look amazing layered over any color but I've chosen to show two coats of Colorfetti over O.P.I My Vampire is Buff.

 Class & Sass: A pleasant mix of white, turquoise, and lilac hex and square glitters. I've layered one coat of it over Wet n Wild Teal Slowly and See. I'm imagining this looking pretty over mint as well!

Class & Sass at 1,2, and three coats

Colorfetti at 1,2, and 3 coats

 And everyone loves macros! I thought these looked too cool not to share. Especially Colorfetti!

Overall I am very impressed with the quality of all of these! I can't wait to try more of the thermals I didn't get my hands on. I also really loved working with the glitters. My top picks are Candy Corn, Class & Sass, and Pink Sugar!

Eighty4 polishes can be purchased here, and they run $8-$9 which is a pretty good deal! :)

Thanks for reading! Hopefully this post gets me back into the swing of blogging. Especially since I rebuilt my lightbox! Bare with me as I adjust.

*Products provided in exchange for an honest review

A-England Fated Prince

I was tempted to just name this post "perfection," because that's seriously what this shade is. I don't know how Adina does it but her polishes are absolutely gorgeous AND they apply like a dream. Sorcery I tell you!

Fated Prince (Burne Jones Dream Collection) is the most stunning light charcoal grey color with a surprising holographic addition that flashes olive green. I swear I was staring at my hands all day when I was wearing this. How can a polish have so many different color elements in it yet still blend together so flawlessly!?

 *trumpets and fanfare* DAT HOLO. If I haven't convinced you to buy this... you should after seeing this photo. This is definitely one of my top favorites now. Oh A-England, I love you!

Also. My topcoat. TOO. SHINY. Thanks Glossy Glam!

Quick post: Halloween Nails!

Hi! Wow. It's been a little too long for posting and I feel like I should have a big fabulous post to welcome myself and whoever reads this blog. But I promise I have some good things in store coming up! Lots more swatches and I play on doing more simple art in November. So for now take this!

Some simples monster of Frankenstein stitches, and chevron accents. I love love the way this came out! 

The green is Barry M Key Lime, which is a gorgeous color and an amazing formula as always! 

Here's a swatch of Key Lime before I started the manicure. So pretty and shiny on it's own! 

Also did my mom's nails. She wanted everything different actually so I went to town! It was nice because she works at a preschool so I'm sure that'll be fun for some kids to see. 

Guess this wasn't much of a quick post! Sorry if this post seems wonky, I am posting from my phone!

O.P.I - Alcatraz...Rocks

Below I have a swatch of one of the liquid sands from the new O.P.I San Francisco fall collection! I am so in love with this liquid sand. At first glance it looks like just a dark glitter but there are so many colors in it it's amazing. Even if you aren't into liquid sands you sure will need this!

indoors

 Alcatraz...Rocks is a gorgeous dark navy/purple (dare I say blurple?) color with tons of gold shimmer in it. At different lights I catch lighter purple, pink, dark blue, and even some green shimmer. It was too much for my camera!

These two out of focus photos show the other shimmer colors hidden in there a little better. 

Definitely one of the prettier liquid sands in this new collection! I got this at a discount store luckily, but I'm hearing people have to do some store hopping for this hot item! So go get yours. Like now. Yesterday even.

Quick Post: Greenberry + Water Decals

Base: two coats of Barry M - Greenberry which is more green toned in real life, it's difficult to capture on camera! But for the life of me it wanted to look aqua.

Flowers are these decals from the Born Pretty store. Becoming obsessed with these. Putting them on is super easy and they have so many patterns and give your manicure a complicated look without doing much work! Now that's my type of style. What do you think? Do you like this combination as much as I do?!

Happy Saturday!

Quick Post: Bold Water marble!

So another nail art August challenge was bold. So I decided to (very nervously) try another water marble! I wish you were able to tell that it was more of a pattern instead of wavy stripes but regardless, I am proud of how clean it came out! 

Colors used:

China Glaze - Flip Flop Fantasy (newer more orange formula ): )

Wet n Wild - Teal Slowly and See, Stand the Test of Lime, Who Is Ultra Violet

UGH. Darn you neons for being so hard to capture. This is seriously so bright and in your face. I actually got a couple compliments on em!

Hope you enjoyed this! Btw, the WnW Pop Art Craze polishes are AMAZING to marble with. Look at me sounding professional!

You've Got A Friend In Me!

Happy Saturday! I have two swatches to share with yall today. They are both by the indie brand Different Dimension (one of my favorites) and they are based off of Buzz Lightyear and Woody from Toy Story! So they were an insta buy for me! Check out the link above to buy them as a duo (not sold separately because I'm pretty sure that'd be a sin somewhere to separate Buzz and Woody!)

First is Reach for the Sky! a yellow based polish with red small and medium round glitters, medium hex square yellow glitters, and my eyes may be deceiving me but I definitely see some iridescent pieces in the bottle! And literally one lonely bar glitter. Haha! I don't know what's up with that.

Woody looks a little creepy here, sorry. But how spot on are these colors?! Ugh. So in love. This is three coats with Out the Door top coat. I still have really visible nail line, but I am 100% positive that's just me. I always have a lot of free edge even with short nails. You could definitely layer this though!

Ahhh, and second is To Infinity and Beyond! an awesome clear based polish with all sorts of assorted glitter goodies in there. I spy white rectangles, small and large NEON green hexes as well as neon round glitters, and small purple round and hex glitters. *whew* that's a generous amount. Shown is one coat over China Glaze - Tart-y For the Party (probably the most perfect lilac around). You can see the glitter payout is pretty good also. I had to do a little fishing for the rectangle and larger green hexes but seriously just turn it upside down before applying and you're good to go! You'll have so much glitter you won't know what to do.

As another option I layered it over China Glaze - Pelican Gray and I am having a tough time deciding
what I like better.

 Anddd of COURSE Missi is a genius for making it GLOW!!!! Photo below is about a minute under a lamp.

Do I make you want these?! I hope so! I love her polishes so much and these are no exceptions. If I could have every glitter I own be like these formulas it would be perfection. They were thick but the kinda thick you want for glitter. Easily spread and good glitter amount. 

Do you like To Infinity and Beyond over Pelican Gray or Tart-y For the Party? Thanks for reading! I think I'll go find my Toy Story movies somewhere right now..

Pink Ombré

Hey! Today's challenge is ombre nails, and since I've done a purple one before I decided to look for another color in my collection that I have a lot of. Which is surprisingly pink! I forgot how much I love wearing pink on my nails. After purple and blue of course.

This starts the old ombre vs gradient nails argument. Honestly they mean the same thing. Ombre is fading from dark to light or vice versa. And with a gradient you can do the same thing. In the nail world I firmly stand by the belief that ombre nails are light to dark (or vice versa) with a different color on each nail. A gradient is using two or more colors fading into each other on one nail. Get it? Good!

Light to dark:

Thumb: O.P.I - I Theodora You

Index: China Glaze - Something Sweet

Middle: China Glaze- Pinkie Promise

Ring: Barry M: Dragonfruit

Pinky: China Glaze - Sugar High

It's almost a skittle mani with the colors I chose because I don't have ones that fade smoother into each other. But I love it anyways and I hope you do too ;)

Sparkling Garbage!

On my finger nails in this post is the most amazing polish to come into my collection. ORLY - Sparkling Garbage! From the ORLY Summer 2013 Mash Up collection. Funny name for something so pretty right? Seriously. Pictures do not do this justice. It is seriously a holo BOMB. Too bad I got this so close to summer ending! This polish begs to be worn on the sunniest days. 

Put your blinders on and scroll down!

A little out of focus for maximum holo appreciation.

It even looks amazing in low light and when the sun is going down. Ughh can I wear this forever?

Note: This polish is really sheer. It's buildable in about three/four coats, but since the base is greenish blue glitters, these photos above are two generous coats of Sparkling Garbage over OPI - Thanks A Windmillion. I love it. Can you tell?! Yeah. You need this in your life. And I fortunately got it on sale at San Jose Beauty Supply for $5. SCORE.

Slanted Leopard

So I am participating in nail art August! Monthly challenges put together by Instagram user Jasmine at Californails. I love that she calls them the "I Have A Life Challenge" because they're spaced out every few days so it's easier to keep up with as opposed to other daily nail challenges. 

 Today's challenge was animal print. And since I have never posted a leopard manicure on my Instagram or on my blog I thought, "Why not!" I wanted to switch it up and do it slanted down my nail instead of an all over print. And I of course had to use a purple scheme.

For the spots I used China Glaze - Tart-y For the Party and O.P.I - Talk About An Upgrade and a black polish for the outlines.

 How beautiful is My Vampire Is Buff?! I'm not quite sure how well it goes with my skin tone.. but I am in love with it regardless. And it is so so perfect to put nail art on top of.