Happy Valentine's Day! Wait...

I don't know why, but I keep wanting to write that! Sorry I have been a bit absent, but I have been really busy the past few weeks. Today I have for you some water marbled St. Patrick's Day nails. This is mt second attempt EVER at doing water marbled nails. The last time I think was back in 2012, and that was a disaster. One big hot mess. This time it helped that I taped my fingers off this time! All in in I think this is a REALLY good attempt, especially considering the last time I tried was 3 years ago. Maybe that's why I was thinking about Valentine's Day, my subconscious just doesn't want to shake off that fail.

Polishes I used were Sinful Colors Hey You and Barry M Majesty on my index and pinky. Then In addition to Hey You I used Barry M Blood Orange, China Glaze Stoked to be Soaked, Sinful Colors, Pull Over and Sally Hansen Pacific Blue.

What do you think of them?

Revlon Enthrall AND a comparison post!: Cold feet

A lot of the times I consider my body to be in a state of permafrost.  Well mainly my extremities.  I'm always cold, and for the most part it doesn't bother me.  I can actually do this cool thing in the winter mostly where I'll put my hand against a clothed person and you can slowly feel my cold.  I like to pretend I'm a short Frost Giant :)  The only time is kind of get's annoying is my feet at night.  They take FOREVER to warm up.  I find when your feet are uncomfortable cold(or hot) it just makes your whole body feel gross.

So today I have something requested by Robyn.  Revlon Enthrall.  It is indeed a beautiful colour!  It's a dark olive green base with golden-olive shimmer.  It was a simple two coats.  My brush was a bit uneven, but I paid pretty much nothing for it at a warehouse sale so I'm ok with it.  Just have to take a bit more time.

When I was looking at it it reminded me an awful lot of China Glaze Cast a Spell, so I decided to compare the two(a first for me!)!  In the bottles you can immediately tell that their bases are different with Revlon being lighter.  You can also see that the Revlon is a lot less sparkly.  When you put them on the nail they look a bit more similar then when in the bottle.  The big difference is Revlon as a whole is more olive toned and the shimmer is all the same.  Where as Cast a Spell is a bit less olive and the shimmer varies from green to gold and has much smaller pieces as well as more.  Overall I think I like the China Glaze more.  For me it just has a bit more depth to it.  That being said they are both BEAUTIFUL colors and I wold not kick Enthrall out of the bed(Unless Enthrall was being a douche).  They are pretty much cousins.

Which do you like more?

F4 - Hocus Pocus: Well worth the wait.

Well Halloween has come and gone.  And I'll be honest with you guys the one thing I will be missing will be the horror movies that are always on the television.  I love a good(or hilariously bad) horror film.

This polish that I wore today was part of F4's Halloween line last year.  I didn't wear it last year so I decided that this year I was going to wear it on Halloween for the first time.  I wanted my first time to to be special guys.  So I have been sitting on this polish for over a year and that day has finally come.  Let me tell you it was well worth the wait(OMG she used the title of the post in the post...like in movies).

I decided to go with the obnoxious look.  My base was a bright orange by Orly(I could not find the name on the mini bottle), and I used one coat of Hocus Pocus over it.  Hocus Pocus is tiny matte black glitter and pink glitter, as well as larger pieces of green and yellow glitter.  Formula was super easy to use and you could probably get this to be opaque on its own in 3 coats or so.

So do I do Christmas stuff now?

Have you tried F4 polishes?  Do you think this was worth the wait?  Do you like scary movies?  Which ones?  TELL ME!

Zombie French! My bloody spin on something cute.

So this manicure was inspired by 2 things.  One thing really good, and one thing a total fail.  The good would have to be these Franken French nails over at Claws Up!  I really liked it and thought it was really cute, but I wanted to try a non cute sort of version of it.  That leads me to the second thing that inspired me.  Almost a year ago I actually tried to decute a different Halloween manicure, and it just turned into one big mess.  It was one of the rare times I posted a fail.

For this manicure I actually used a lot of the same polishes and paints as it did last time with the exception of the OPI and red Essie.  I decided to still stick with a more zombified version and leave out the stitches.  I achived the finished look by painting 3 coats of Essie's Sew Psyched, then covering it with Seche.  Once the Seche was dry to the touch I would make a tiny hole maybe 5mm from the tip of my nail, and then pulled down gently so it tore, and looked like the skin was pulled back.  Next in and around the tear I blotted some black acrylic paint, then over that some bright red acrylic paint.  Then to make it a bit more real looking I added some Cult Nails Quench and Barry M Red Black. (Note:  I didn't clean my brush between colours like I normally do). Finally I smudged some red polish and brown paint of the rest of my nails to give them a dirty look.

This year I am really pleased with how my decuteting went.  Hope you like :)

China Glaze - Cast A Spell: Let's have a serious chat about ghosts, and Christmas.

First of all unlike aliens I can't say if I believe in ghosts or not.  They may be real, they may not be.  I don't know.  I do know one thing though, if ghosts do exist they are creepy.  Not in an "Eep that's a dead person" kind of way, they are creepy in a sketchy kind of way.  When I think of ghosts I think "Oh, so are you watching me do stuff...that's weird".  Think of how many people have died.  I sometimes wonder is my room is filled with non threatening sketch ghosts.  Are they lurking during special cuddles time?  I wonder at times if ghosts are invading my privacy.  This is something that troubles me.

Now the polish is from last years China Glaze Halloween collection.  I actually bough it last year in December.  I found it and I thought it would be perfect for my friend as part of her Christmas gift. Then the minute I brought it home I immediately changed my mind and decided it was mine.   It does not count as taking back a gift if they never got it.

Cast A Spell is a black base full of olive/gold shimmer.  It went on like a dream in almost one coat.  But I did need a second for a bit of patchiness.  It is soooooooooooooooooooooo pretty in real life.  Had the sun come out for a bit longer today I would have had to have taken photos outdoors.

If you can still find this, I suggest you all go out and buy it!  It's such a fantastic shade.  I'm so glad I decided to keep this :)

 Flash *A-AH*

Pumpkin Half Moons! - I hate pumpkins!

Soooooooooooooo I actually did these nails over two weeks ago and started this post maybe 10 days ago.  I ended up pushing the post back and finishing it now.

Let's start with some hard hitting truths.  I actually don't like pumpkin.  I've had one pumpkin soup that I've liked and that was it.   Actually had a pumpkin spice latte the other day.  I was in the mood for a fall drink, which generally means something apple.  But since the place I was at didn't have any apple goodness I decided to try the latte.  Wow.  The only way I can describe the flavour was a cross between horrid kids medicine, and vomit aftertaste.   No, it tasted like I had thrown up horrid kids medicine.  Ill stick to my apple cider next time.

UNLESS I don't have to ingest it.  I think that is why I ended up loving these nails.  They were super easy to do as I didn't have to be exact with them *HUZZAH*.  For my base I used China Glaze Glittering Garland, and for the pumpkins I just used acrylic paint.

Again I was super pleased with these.  What do you think?  Also does anyone have a pumpkin recipe that can convert this pumpkin hater?

With Flash, *A-AH*.

 Without Flash, *A-AH*.

LynBDesigns - Frogs Breath: I've made a huge mistake. But frogs make everything better!

Today I have another LynBDesigns!  This is also from The nightmare begins collection.

I sort of wanted to put this and Deadly Nightshade together, but I didn't want to overload the post.  The reason I wanted to put them together is because along with Deadly Nightshade, Sally also put Frogs Breath into Doctor Finkelstein soup.

Frogs Breath is a bright green, jelly polish.  It kind of reminds me of murky water.  The polish is filled with matte black hexogonal and bar glitter.  As well as black matte shards.  Application was really easy and was 3 coats.  This is not a polish you'll ever get light impenetrable opaque and in my opinion, that's just fine.

Here is where I made my mistake.  I layered it over Orly's Lucky Duck.  I honestly don't think it worked.  Don't get me wrong they didn't look bad together they just kind of fell flat.  SO I ADDED A FROG WITH 3D EYES!  And everything was better...minus the blah nails that weren't the frog.  I would have loved the accent with the polish on it's own.  If you are going to layer this you need to find the right colour.  Or you kind of just destroy the magic of the polish.

 If you would like a bottle of this you can head over to LynBDesigns Etsy shop.  Polishes retail from between $8-$10USD.  And if you order now through Sunday, and use the code CHICAGO you can get 50% of your purchase of $16 or more. 

Do you think it looks better with the undies I chose or without?

 *Product sent for honest review

LynBDesigns - Deadly Nightshade: VHS??????

This polish is from LynBDesigns The Nightmare Begins collection (It's inspired by The Nightmare Before Christmas for those of you who have yet to catch on).   If you don't know about her brand most of the polishes are fandom related.  I'm 97% sure she has the largest collection of Doctor Who polishes :)

Now back to this polish.  I'm going to be honest with you guys.  I do love this film, but I haven't seen it in YEARS.  I'm going to blame it on the fact that I own a copy of this film on VHS*.  I have a VHS player but it's annoying.  Woe is me.  But I really want to watch it again in the next few days.

Hail Yeezus and bless the interwebs.

So Deadly Nightshade is what Sally put into Doctor Finkelstein soup in order for him to fall asleep and her to escape(He made her, she a rag doll).  The polish is a purple pink, with super fine green shimmer.  In the bottle it reads more purple than pink but when you put it on your nails you for sure get purple pink.  It was also more sheer than what I expected looking at it in the bottle, but at the same time it surprised me by only needed 3 coats for opacity.  I also layered one coat over a dark purple(China Glaze Urban Nights).  When you layer it over a darker colour the green for sure takes center stage.

If you would like a bottle of this you can head over to LynBDesigns Etsy shop.  Polishes retail from between $8-$10USD.  And if you order now through Sunday, and use the code CHICAGO you can get 50% of your purchase of $16 or more.

Onto the photos!  I actually found the green to be the hardest to capture.  You can see it in the photos but it's a bit more green in real life.  And the last photo is over the purple.  Not only that but I used flash to show you exactly what the shade of green looks like.  Know that the flash makes all those streaks pop out. It does not look streaky in real life.

 

*VHS™

abbreviation for

(Electronics) video home system: a video cassette recording system using ½″ magnetic tape

 *Product sent for honest review

Copper Lady Liberty - This is a science post...but not really.

Just a bit of simple nail art for you guys this weekend.  It's a combination of the last 2 polishes I swatched(Bondi Lady Liberty and Barry M Copper).  I actually had a very good reason for putting these two colours together. 1) I just liked how they looked and 2) While The Statue of Liberty currently has a green-blue colour to her, she is copper.  So she originally looked copper but then the copper began to oxidize which is why she looks the way she looks now!

Barry M - Copper ft. Creepy men

If I had a copper penny for ever creepy man I've encountered I would have quite a few.  A few days ago I was at a train station, sitting by myself, and a guy approached me.  Mind you the station wasn't busy, but it was also far from dead.  Anyways he stood sort of in front of me for a minute trying to get my attention, but I was "doing things" on my phone.  I then briefly looked up, and apparently that meant "Yes, take a seat, and start talking".  So he sat down, and said "Hey girl I was just-" and that's when he started stroking my arm.  I immediately got up and said "Nope" and walked away.  Almost as soon as I got up and started walking away he sprung up and was borderline jogging away.  I think he thought I was going to call for security.

Anyways on the topic of copper here is Barry M Copper.  There is nothing creepy or sketchy about this colour.  Depending on how you look at it Copper can either be copper, lean more towards brown, or gold, with hits of green and pink.  It has a foil finish and it is beautiful.  It came out last summer and I have had it for quite some time.  This is another why didn't I wear this before polish.  And on top of that it had amazing wear.  I had it on for 5 days(no basecoat) and all I had was a bit of tip wear.

Now I have heard this is a dupe for OPI Warm and Fozzy but since I don't own it I can't say for sure.  But I can say that from photos I've seen they are pretty close. Either way I am glad I have this!

 

Natural light

Note:  Sorry this took so long to post.

Bondi New York - Lady Liberty: The lemming I never knew I wanted.

Well sort of.  For the longest time I wanted a polish that was the same colour as the Statue of Liberty(as it is now).  Not only that but I REALLY wanted the polish to also be inspired by the her.  I know another brand had a polish based on the statue a few years ago, but I missed out on that.  So when I saw Bondi New York had one I jumped on that faster than a monkey on a bed.

I've actually been to the Statue of Liberty once when I was maybe 10 or so.  I was visiting family with my mother.  And at the time she was having some work done so we couldn't climb her. I've been to NYC quite a few times since then but I have never gone back to the Statue.  I'm not actually much of a touristy person.  Despite the fact that I have spent weeks in that city I've never even been inside Central Park, I don't have a photo of myself in Times Square, and I don't have any intention to go to Madame Tussauds wax museum.

Lady Liberty is the oxidized blue green colour of the Statue of Liberty.  The formula was fantastic as like the first Bondi New York polish I tried NYPD.  Like that one I only needed 2 coats.  Although I will say this one bubbled a tiny bit.  Once I put on top coat all was forgotten.  And can I just say(well of course I can say it.  It IS my blog) I think colours like this look fantastic on me. I was sad when I had to take it off earlier than planned after my botched attempts and nail art.

Femme Fatale - Spindleweb: Choosing nail polish undies is EXACTLY like choosing a wedding dress.

You know how they have those TV shows were we get to watch people choose their wedding dress?  And the moment they find their wedding dress they start sobbing. Well when I was trying to figure out what was the best base for Spindleweb was tried 4 different bases, the last one being Barry M Racing Green.  And that's when I understood what it was like to be a future bride... but not really. I saw them together and I thought "This is perfect".  I then wept... but not really. They just played so well together!

Femme Fatales Spindle web is of course a glitter.  It has a green tinted base full of green shimmer.  It is also totally composed of hex glitter ranging from tiny to large. They come in blue, green and lavender(although these pieces only come in tiny). And they range from matte to iridescent.  The formula on this was a tad tricky at first, as it was a bit thick.  But a couple drops of thinner cleared all of that up.  Either way I only ended up having to use 1 coat.  So far this is probably my favourite colour I have tried from them.  It reminds me of a murky but pretty swamp.

If you would like a bottle full size bottles are 12ml and you can find them online at Llarowe (USA), Harlow & Co (Canada),Shoppe Eclecticco & Beauty so Fly (Singapore), Ledouxnuage (France) and Norway Nails (Norway).  They are $13 USD but of course that price will vary slightly depending where you get them. And if you are in Australia you can order straight through them!

Ps.  Don't mind near my cuticles.  The Seche started to shrink the polish :(

 Sunlight/natural light

 Lightbox

*Product sent for honest review

3D Lego Nails!

Ugh As soon as clicked on the new post button, the new post page loaded and then my internet immediately cut out!  It obviously was down a few days ago when the power went our but for the past few weeks it's been finicky in general.  Anyways I hope you had a great few days.  I had a new first!  A man followed me the other day!  Luckily is was by a busy road, and when I lost him I went and hid in a store for a bit.

Now onto things that aren't creepy men!

I've been wanting to do 3D nails for a while now but wasn't sure what I wanted to do.  I knew I didn't want anything too over the top, or something that would interfere with me doing things.  So a few nights ago I was looking at The Daily Nail's site, and I came across these Lego nails.  Not only did I think they looked nifty, I thought I could do something like that but actually make it 3D.

First I painted my nails the base colour of whatever the block was going to be.  Next I placed between 2-6 pieces of KKCenterHk gold circular glitter down depending on how many bumps the block was going to have.  After that I got out some nail glue, placed a tiny bit on each piece of glitter, and stacked another piece of glitter on top of the original piece.  Then I repeated that step so each of the bumps consisted of 3 pieces of glitter.  When that was done I got out my acrylic paint and painted over just the bumps, focusing on the sides.  Following that I went over the entire nail with the acrylic paint (you may need to do this more than once if the base colour of polish is slightly different than the paint).  Finally I topped it of with a couple thin coats of top coat.

Note:  My pinky finger was done entirely with polish because I didn't have the shade of green I wanted in paint.  While you can do this entirely with polish I found it much easier with paint.  Not only that but I found the bumps were more more defined with paint.

What do you guys think of 3D nails?  Thoughts on creepy men?