Valentine Schmalentine

Meh. That about sums up my feelings for the holiday called Valentine's Day. Accordingly, I have half-assed some shimmery nails and slapped some hearts on to make it festive.

I started with two coats of Seche, Calla Lily then added three coats of Color Club, Snow-Flakes. It's a very subtle flakey shimmer effect over the white polish. On my thumb I stamped some hearts using Bundle Monster plate BM-317 and Mundo de Unas pink and red stamping polishes dotted on randomly before scraping to give a two-tone look.

4th of July Nails & Chasing the American Dream

Happy 4th of July weekend! So, I kind of took an unintentional month off from blogging because sometimes life happens like that. We've been house hunting over the last two months and it's been a little bit soul sucking for me. Nothing like looking for houses on a tight budget to show you exactly what your place is in society. I've discovered that my place is manufactured homes from the 70's. But that's ok, because just like my dollar store nail polish budget I'm totally going to rock it and find the perfect (old) place that my husband and I can fix up and call our own. Lucky for me I really like painting.

I wanted to do a more abstract flag design instead of the traditional stars and stripes and I've been looking for a fun way to use some crackle polish that's been languishing in the helmer. They turned out so bright and fun and I'm excited to show them off this weekend.

I started by painted three fingers with Sinful Colors, Snow Me White. I added two coats of Wet n Wild, Break the Ice to add some shimmer, then topped it off with a coat of red crackle polish that came in a Wet n Wild Fantasy Makers set. The blue nails are two coats of LA Colors, Reckless and one coat of Color Club, Sky High. I used my new clear stamper from Born Pretty to individually place each star image from Bundle Monster plate BM-206 + Mundo de Unas white stamping polish. I don't have any plates with a full nail image of stars so this was a good test of the clear stamper. It's finicky actually picking up a full, crisp image, but once I have one on the stamper it's really easy to place it exactly where I want it on the nail. I might keep my eye out for a clear stamper that's slightly stickier, but this one is good enough for the low price of $2 and free shipping on ebay.

(More) Magical Unicorn Nails

I had a really bad week and needed something to cheer me up. What can do that job better than a unicorn? A narwhal or maybe a Pegasus?? It's me though, so pretty much any animal will put me in a better mood, but I was hoping the unicorn would bring a little extra luck along with it. I've done similar nails in the past, but wanted to add holo for even more unicorn magic.

Direct light is even more magical. There was no sun to be had this day so you'll have to settle for lamp light.

I don't think I'll ever get tired of the Color Club Halo Hues collection. The purple shade is Eternal Beauty. I also used Miss Bliss, Cosmic Fate, Kismet and Over the Moon for my rainbow nail. The flare is really great on these! I used Bundle Monster stamping plates BM-615 and BM-301 for the images and used the decal stamping method to color in the rainbow colors between the lines.

I'm  not sure if my unicorn has brought me the luck I was looking for, but I'll keep putting out good vibes and hoping for the best.

April 12: Big Wind Day- Wind Gust Inspired Nails

Try to contain yourselves... it's the holiday we've been waiting for all year long... National Big Wind Day! According to this totally official looking website Big Wind Day commemorates the highest wind gust ever recorded on Earth's surface, coming in at 231 mph. Wow. This is exciting stuff. Today didn't happen to be a very windy day here so we're not breaking any records this year, but I have high hopes for next April.

To celebrate I've painted some nails with gusty looking wind inspired stamping. This is two coats of Color Club, Over the Moon. I stamped with Bundle Monster plate BM-312 and Mundo de Unas white stamping polish. Below we have the obligatory holo in the sun photo.

An InLinkz Link-up

Birthday Skittlette with Swarovski Crystals

Happy birthday to me... a couple months ago. I painted these back in December and never got around to posting them. I try to do something that feels like "me" every year. This year (and by that I mean 2015) seems to be a hybrid of the nails I did in 2013 and 2014. It's funny that two years ago I was clearly wishing for pointy nails, but still too scared to try it. I'm glad I've branched out since then. I love trying new things, but it's interesting to see that I still gravitate back to the styles and colors I like the most.

I think skittle or skittlette nails will always be one of my favorite things. It's hard to pick just one color, so I'll take any excuse to combine multiple things. 

For this manicure I've used Zoya, Cosmo, a glittery silver/white holo Pixie Dust. I stamped over the middle finger with Mundo de Unas black polish and Bundle Monster plate BM-417. The ring finger is Sally Hansen Triple Shine in Slick Black. I used super glue to stick on Swarovski crystals that I got at Michael's. I love the color of these crystals and the quality is so much nicer than the plastic/acrylic gems I'm used to. They stayed bright and shiny the entire time unlike the fake gems that dull when covered with topcoat or get the finish rubbed off after a few days of wear.

Do you do special nails for your birthday?

Snowflake Gradient Nails

I love winter! It's even better here in Oregon where actual weather happens. Last weekend we got our very first snowflakes of the year, but they all melted as soon as they hit the ground. I got to spend the whole weekend inside all cozy making these snowflake cookies. I gave away a lot at work, but it didn't prevent me from eating way too many this past week. At least my nails won't make me fat.

For these nails I started with a base of Sally Hansen Complete Manicure in Ion. Over that I layered Lost Soul from LA Colors. This one is a really pretty shimmery grey, but it's very sheer so the creme base was needed for opacity.

For the snowflake stamp I used Bundle Monster plate BM-323 and grey and white stamping polish from Mundo de Unas. I swirled the grey and white together in the middle with a toothpick on the plate before scraping to blend the colors together and create the gradient effect with the stamping.

I can't believe Christmas is next week! Are you ready yet?

Keep Calm Lip Balm- Review and Giveaway

I don't know about you guys, but I always have a hard time keeping calm around the holidays. Every year I get the idea that frosting sugar cookies with royal icing is a good idea and that this time I won't get tired and bored after the third cookie even though I know I will and the recipe makes about four dozen million. I've gotten the itch again and just ordered 7 new cookie cutters from Amazon so I'm pretty much committed now. Between that and trying to shop while absolutely everyone else in the city is also out shopping it can be tough to have a relaxing holiday. Luckily this year I've already finished all my shopping so I'll just hermit up inside and bake for the rest of the month. Here's a present idea that might help keep your shopping list a little calmer this season.

Rimmel has come out with these adorable Keep Calm lip balms just in time for Christmas which I think would make really cute stocking stuffers for people who are addicted to lip balm. I already have about 20 different kinds hiding out around the house, but I'm always more than happy to get a few more. If I have to move more than 3 feet to get to my closest balm I become the opposite of calm so I make sure I'm stocked up. I received a couple of these balms to review so read on to see what I thought (these are a press sample, but opinions are my own/honest). I also got an extra set and wanted to do a holiday giveaway for all my favorite readers. Enter at the bottom of this post.

The colors I got to try are Keep Calm and Rock (berry blush) and Keep Calm and Party (violet blush). There are five varieties total including Keep Calm and Shop (clear), Kiss (pink blush), and Play (rose blush). They aren't scented to match the colors, but all seem to smell the same. To me it's a mix of rose water and baby powder which I actually rather dislike. I'm not a big fan of most scents in general and especially not so close to my nose. I could only manage to wear these for a few minutes before I had to wash it off due to the perfumey smell. If scented products don't bother you then I'd say go for it, but if they do you might want to skip this one.

The Keep Calm Lip Balms claim to increase lip moisture by 22% vs bare lips. The texture was nice and felt pretty moisturizing, so I could agree with this claim. The tints are nice as well. This is something I'd probably throw in my purse for when I'm too lazy for lipstick (which is about 98% of the time). The packaging is probably my favorite part though. I love the bright colors and Keep Calm theme. These are sold at most major drugstore chains for $2.50.

I've swatched these on my arm to show the colors. The top is Keep Calm and Party (violet blush) and the bottom is Keep Calm and Rock (berry blush). I think the tint is just enough to give lips some color and still look pretty natural.

And here are the obligatory nails.

I'm glad I finally had a valid excuse to use my Keep Calm and Polish On stamp (Bundle Monster plate BM-619). I painted each hand with colors to match the balms so you get to see the mythical right hand this post. For the Rock nails I used LA Colors, Static Electricity for the base and stamped with Mundo de Unas #15 with Bundle Monster plates BM-610*, BM-320*, BM-411 and BM-423 (*also used on the other hand). For Party my base is LA Colors, Hysteria (a white base is highly recommended to make this yellow pop) and MdU #21 with plates BM-414 and BM-202. When I took these of my cotton balls looked like neon cotton candy.

Giveaway Time!
The prize is one Keep Calm and Rock and one Keep Calm and Party as pictured above.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Rules:

1. Must be 18 or older.

2. Must be a resident of the US.

(Sorry, still too poor to afford international shipping.. someday though)

3. No giveaway accounts- these will be disqualified.

4. Giveaway ends 12/12/15, 12:00 am PST

5. The winner will be notified by email and will have 48 hours to claim their prize. If the prize isn't claimed within 48 hours a new winner will be chosen.

6. Other legal stuff I forgot/don't know about? So official, these rules.

Magical Moving Day Unicorn Nails

 So, this whole moving thing.. It sounds like a really great idea until it's 100 degrees out and you're trying to shove your cat into a crate in the back of your car which is stuffed to overflowing with various computing equipment and house plants. And then at the hotel the cat finds the one tiny hole in the box spring cover and spends half the night bumping around under the mattress whine/growling. And then you get to the new apartment and spend the next week living in a box maze to rival the one in Maze Runner (btw, look at these awesome Maze Runner nails I did here and did you see the next movie is coming out soon?). Moving makes me rambly, I think. It also makes me really bad at blogging. I didn't plan any posts ahead so I took a few weeks off to get resettled and I should be back for good now.

The good news is I'm really enjoying my new job and living in Oregon. It's beautiful here and the weather has been perfect. I'm looking forward to the cooler winter months spent cozied up in my new office with all my nail stuff.

Now, let's talk about these nails. I needed something very magical for moving day and what better than unicorns and pastel gradients? The purple is China Glaze, Plur-ple and the pink and blue from the gradient are UV Meant To Be and Glow With the Flow (all from the Electric Nights collection). It also needed a very special sparkle nail. I used Cosmo from Zoya for this one. I can't say enough how much I love this polish! It's one of the Pixie Dust polishes and I expected it to be gritty, but it's not at all. The texture is subtle, and it packs a ton of sparkle. I did top coat it because I didn't want it snagging on anything while I was packing. One coat of top coat had it completely smooth. I also used stamping plates BM-615 and BM-406 for the unicorn and swirls. I topped off all the non-sparkly nails with China Glaze, Ghoulish Glow for a hidden surprise.

Cosmo is amazing in the sun. I'm definitely going to need a full set of these nails soon.

Surprise! Glow in the dark unicorn! I did the stamping over the glow in the dark polish and you can just see the outline of the unicorn on top. These nails were really fun and helped keep my spirits up though many long and tedious hours of packing and driving.

Here's a rare sight: the saddest unicorn nails ever. It was almost two weeks before I had time to paint again and my nails and cuticles were looking awful... except for Cosmo. That polish wore like iron! It has barely any tip wear in the wake of the utter destruction of the other nails. I'm happy to say I've been thoroughly oiled, mani bombed and polished back into shape. I'm looking forward to getting back into my routine and showing you what I've been up to all these weeks that I haven't been posting regularly.

Summer Stripes

Moving day is quickly approaching and I can't wait to get back to a more normal blogging schedule (and of course hug my cat). Without my desk and nail cave I've been less motivated to blog as much as I'd like. It's going to be a toss up... set up my nail stuff first or the bed? I'm definitely going to need a nap. I might be MIA for a little longer while we get things settled, but I hope to be back in full force soon.

My love of matching nails and clothes inspired these nails. I stamped stripes over colors matching the ones in this cute summer dress. My stripes came out a little wonky though. The stamping image wasn't wide enough to cover my long nails so I had to double stamp it and didn't have the best luck lining up the stripes. I don't have it in front of me right now, but the plate is from one of the newer Bundle Monster sets. I stamped with white Mundo de Unas. My base colors are as follows: 

Tan- ?? ugh.. moving sucks.. I think it was Finger Paints, Don't Make a Scene

Red- Sation, Sparkling Ruby

Teal- Finger Paints, Art Dealer Teal-er

Yellow- Sally Hansen, Expres-so Yellow

Blue- LA Colors, Reckless

Looking On the Bright Side

If you've been keeping up with recent posts then you've already read all about my adventures in moving and getting a new job. I was so relieved to find out I could keep painting my nails any crazy way I like so I celebrated with this super bright skittlette. Things are finally starting to look up after going through a lot of stress. I was able to schedule some time off work to go back and help move my husband and cat and incredible amounts of stuff. The U-Haul is reserved and I'm so glad I only have to wait another week and a half. It was starting to feel like I may never see them again, but then I am kind of dramatic.

For my skittlette I used Key Lime Twist and Mirror Ball from Orly. Key Lime Twist has a pretty good formula for such a bright neon. I used three coats to even out a tiny bit of streaky-ness and make it look super bright. I also used three coats of Mirror Ball for extra holo coverage. My stamped nail is two coats of Sinful Colors, Snow Me White with Mundo de Unas black stamping polish and Bundle Monster plate BM-604. I stuck on an iridescent rhinestone from a pack I got on eBay to finish it all off.

Below is a shot in the sun to show off the holo and how bright this Orly polish is. These were really fun to wear and were almost enough to cheer me up from missing my family and old home. Soon, it will all be worth it. :)

Interview Appropriate Nails- French Pink and Subtle Stamping

It's been a few days since I checked in, and I've been quite busy with my job search. Since my last post I've had one interview and I have two more scheduled for tomorrow and a job fair later in the week. Wish me luck! Even though I know I'll do fine I get super nervous any time I have to talk to people in the outside world for "official" purposes. It's weird, because I'm fine interacting with people in normal circumstances, but add in the word interview and suddenly I'm a wreck. I'm glad that I have blogging to keep myself somewhat distracted.

I think these are going to be my favorite interview nails of all time. Or at least they'll be really hard to beat. I LOVE this shade from Nina Ultra Pro. It's so feminine and perfectly understated. And because it's realllly hard for me to have plain nails with no decoration I added a stamped feather (you know, to symbolize how I'm flying away to bigger and better things). The feather blends in at a distance and my last interviewer didn't seem to notice at all so I'd say it's a pass.

The last time I used French Pink from Nina Ultra Pro I did three coats for more opaque coverage, but this time I only did two. I actually like the faintly visible nail line and think it looks like a very subtle and classy french manicure without the effort of actually painting on the tips. 

The stamping is Bundle Monster plate BM-419 with Mundo de Unas white stamping polish.

I'm hoping this is my lucky feather!

30 Days of Colour: Favorite Brand/Technique

Can you guess what my favorite technique is? Officially I'm going with skittles, but it's just because I could never decide. The best part of doing my own nails is being able to change them as often as I want and pick whatever design seems fun at the moment. I've got a little of everything here and that's the way I like it! My favorite brand is whatever is in my untried pile at the moment. There's nothing better than using a new polish for the first time. I definitely have some old favorites, but it doesn't stop the itch to collect more.

This teal color is Tails of Love from the Finger Paints Mermaid Collection. I'm starting to come around on textured polishes and I rather like this one. It's a little bumpy, but I've added top coat to even it out. The finish was shiny already so top coating it didn't take anything away from this polish. The peach is one of my franken creations. I used Bundle Monster plate BM-423 for the chevrons and BM-401 for the octopus with Mundo de Unas white stamping polish. I got the iridescent rhinestones from ebay recently for $1.40 for a pack of 300. Pretty good deal if I say so myself. It came with both white and black rhinestones and I have a ton of ideas for using them. Which is good since there are 296 more.

Let's see what everyone else has as favorites:

An InLinkz Link-up

30 Days of Colour: Matte/Stamping

I'm a day late on this one, but here's my matte/stamping manicure for the 30 Days of Colour challenge. I ended up being out of the house all last weekend so I didn't get a chance to paint this one until last night and I was too sleepy to post. Plus I needed to read a few more chapters of my book for this month's Polished Bookworms book club manicure. I might have taken on too much nail-wise this month, but I'm loving it.

I used one of my favorite matte polishes- Mentality's Matriarch. It's so velvety! I stamped with Mundo de Unas grey stamping polish and Bundle Monster plate BM-410. This image reminds me of fish heads/skeletons which makes me think of of this brilliant song:

Trust me.. you need to watch it (but you can, skip to 2:16 if you have a short attention span).

I was impatient to get into bed and didn't want to wait for the matte polish to dry so I went ahead with my Sally Hansen Dries Instantly top coat. I thought y'all might want to see what it looked like shiny'd up. I think I liked it better matte which makes sense because that's how the polish was meant to be, but it does have a nice shimmer with the top coat.

For your viewing pleasure- more matte/stamping manicures:

An InLinkz Link-up