Polka Dots!

Hello everyone!  Today for you I have polka dots. I went through a phase where I hated polka dots but I don't anymore!  For this mani I used one of those tiny Sally Girl polishes in no-name lavendar as the base color (which was opaque in 1 coat!) & for the stamping I used the Bundlemonster "fauxnad" plate bm21 and the stamp color was also a Sally Girl no-name polish in a dark(er) purple.

Tie-Dyed Freehand Mani

My most favorite music era is the 60's & 70's, with my most favorite band of all time being Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young (and don't forget Taylor & Reeves). 

All of that hippie, tie-dyed stuff is my fave so I have to share with you today my tie-dyed nail art.  My inspiration comes from a Nail Art youtube video by Dollface22772 which can be found here:  http://www.youtube.com/user/Dollface22772#p/search/3/NN08dNoUuGg
And here are my results:

This was a lot easier than I expected it to be. 
I just picked out polishes with a creme finish: 
     Red - unknown
     Orange - Wet n Wild in Sunny Side UP
     Yellow - Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear in Mellow Yellow
     Green - Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear in Green with Envy
     Blue - Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear in Blue Me Away
     Purple - Finger Paints Amethyst Atelier

I painted each nail one-by-one & did the colors in rows like they would be in a rainbow.  While they were wet, I ran a toothpick through it starting with the red going out through to the purple.  I topped it off with Seche Vite and there you have it!

Skin, Cuticles & Zoya Kelly

I have horrible cuticles & dry skin.  I also don't drink enough water & that's probably the problem but I just can't drink it - ugh!  I bleed Dr. Pepper.  I've recently discovered 2 new things that are working on my skin and cuticle.
First, this wonderful lotion here:

I love Carmex lip balm so you know that I freaked out when I found out about this!  It says that it's non-greasy & it's actually true!  A little goes a long way & that lotion-y feeling is gone as soon as you rub in the lotion.  I now swear by this stuff!

Next is a tip I found on the laquerista's blog where you take an emery board and file the skin on the sides of your nails.  I tried it & found that it made a difference instantaneously!

Just so that this post isn't without nails, here is Zoya Kelly which is an awesome dark grey creme with a purple tone to it.  I absolutely love this color!  It is opaque in 1 coat & I've seen on Zoya's facebook that fans have used it to stamp with.  I can't wait to try that - maybe this weekend!  I only did an accent nail, using the leopard print from Konad plate m57 with Rimmel 60 Seconds in Grey Matter, which is awesome for stamping!

Until next time, have a grey(t) day!  :)

Matte-fied Monday with Avon Mirror Shine

Hello all & Happy Monday to you!  I know everyone hates Mondays & I do too so I try to think of Monday as a person, you know the underdog that is very nice but no one likes & it's for a reason that is out of the underdog's control?  So I try to give Mondays a break.  Sorry for going so off-topic - back to the nails!

Today for you I have Avon Mirror Shine in dark purple (cannot remember the name but will update w/it later) & I stamped using Avon Mirror Shine in silver (will also update this later w/the name) & I used Konad image plate m78.  There's two awesome things about these Avon chrome polishes:  they are 1-coaters & they stamp.  I've learned that usually if it's a 1-coater then it will stamp, I haven't found one yet that won't!

So here it is in it's shiny chromaticness (and I think I just made up a word!):

And here it is mattefied:

It's kind of hard to tell but both of these pictures were taken in the same amount of sunlight - indirect through my kitchen windows.

Which way do you like better?

Funky French Friday

I apologize - I know a lot of nail bloggers out there do a Funky French Friday but I just can't help myself!  So I was thinking I could do something different though - I thought about doing a theme called "Matte Monday".  What do you think?

Anyways, today I have for you the Petites Raspberry Ice for the french tips using Konad plate M19.  For the base coat I used Artificial Nails that I purchased at Sally Beauty Supply.  Enjoy, have a great weekend & see you soon!

A few different mani's...

This post is going to be a little pic heavy with a few mani's I've done for my mom. 

For the 1st one here, I can't recall what the base color was but it is a gorgeous vampy red.  I used Konad plate m64 and the white special stamping polish for the design.

For this mani, she wanted to try tone-on-tone so we decided to go with a sheer white nail polish by Wet 'n Wild that I borrowed from my husband's niece - it didn't have a name & for the design I used a fauxnad plate made by Bundlemonster, bm19.

And the final one for now, I used an old nail polish I have in my stash, Almay 'One Coat' & the color name is Cashmere.  This polish smells awful but on the plus side, it is a 1-coater (& it also works great for stamping!).  For the design I used Konad plate m78 & special stamping polish in black.

Enjoy & have a great day!

Base, Color & Top Coat Mis-Match...or is it the weather?

Over the weekend I did mine & my mom's nails but 1st, let's look at my mom's:

I used CND Stickey as the base coat with 1 coat of Petites in Raspberry Ice.  I love polish that is opaque in 1 coat but they are so rare!  I have come to realize that the opacity is not based on brand as I initially thought but basically it's based on the pigmentation of the color itself. 

Anyways, this color is a hot pinkish-magenta with some shimmer & I love it!  I'd gotten some inspiration from Scrangie (who I consider to be one of the top guru's in the nail polish world) http://www.scrangie.com/2011/01/cover-girl-iceslicks-anti-freeze.html.  For my mom's mani I put 2 coats of Cover Girl IceSlicks Anti-Freeze on top of the hot pink and it is fabulous!  On a nail wheel I tried Anti-Freeze over China Glaze's Goth & it looks amazingly awesome (like outer space) but I just don't think black would be appropriate for my mom - she would feel very out of place.  This isn't the best pic because it was so hard to photograph but the blue glitter gives off an aqua/purple shimmer & I love it!  It took absolutely forever for the 1st coat to dry but once we got the 2nd coat on, we topped it off with Seche Vite.  You may ask, what's the problem?  Well, in less than 24 hrs after giving her this mani, it started to chip & there was shrinkage at the tips.  I even buffed her nails to get the shine off so that the polish would adhere better!  I think I'm going to start keeping a list of base coats, polish brands & top coats that don't play nice because after all this hard work, I don't want it to happen again.



So after I did my mom's nails, I did my own.  I used Nailtek Foundation II for the base coat & China Glaze Bahamian Escape (also a 1-coater!).  I added Konad to it from plate m50 using the Konad special polish in purple & topped it off with ole faithful Seche Vite.  And guess what - mine started peeling off within 3 hours!  That's just ridiculous.  My sweet husband even washed the dishes for me & I was in church most of this time so it's not like I was doing some type of manual labor that would ruin my mani.  Ugh!  I was so aggravated!!!  I was able to touch up most of it so thankfully it was hard to tell but then it started peeling again within just another few hours! 

Later I added a purple rhinestone to the ring finger as an accent.  This pic was taken after I'd touched it up for the second time & this time around the touch-ups are definitely more noticeable (see pointer finger in the top corner).  Btw, all pics are clickable so you can enlarge for more detail.

So I have a few questions for you:

Which do you like better, with or without the rhinestone?

What do you think caused these issues?  The interaction of these polishes, the weather, the user? ;)

Have you experienced anything like this?