31DC2014: Day 4

Hi everyone! Today is green day. Not to be confused with the band.

I was sitting at my nail table for like 20 minutes staring at some green polishes and some plates and it took me forever to decide on something but then I saw this teeny lil' leopard print and went for it!

I used China Glaze - Re-Fresh Mint as the base color.
I stamped the tiny leopard print from Winstonia plate W101 with Sally Hansen Insta-Dri - S-teal a Base (which is a really lovely color for stamping.)

To enhance the manicure a little, I also added a bow! I used to add bows to like, everything. This cute one is from Sugar Bubbles plate SB011 and I stamped with Konad black special polish.

I'm really digging how they turned out! And I actually got to wear this manicure to work today and got a bunch of compliments on it.

What do you think of these cutesy mint nails? Hope you like 'em!

Now take a walk down memory lane and check out my previous Day 4 designs:

• 2013: Camo
• 2012: Green Mix 'n Match
• 2011: Ivanka

OPI - AmazON... AmazOFF

Here's a shocker. I only bought ONE polish from the OPI Brazil collection.

I've noticed a trend recently at my local pro store that with collections like Brazil that consist of a lot of cremes, they don't really get bought up quickly. And usually will end up on the $2 clearance rack. Sooo... I might do some damage then. But for now, only one needed to come home with me!

OPI - AmazON... AmazOFF
This gorgeous green has a perfect formula and really pretty shimmer which helps bring the color to life.

I love greens. Can't help myself.

Now please excuse me while I go bake a single serve cookie for my lunch. Maturity at its finest.

Zoya - Giovanna

Leave it to me to break three nails just as I start blogging (almost) every day again. My nails are shorter right now than ever!! And oh man they are painful too. They're not used to being stubs. Sad face.
So until they grow back in a little I'll have to round up some photos from the past few months that I haven't posted yet!

Today I've got swatches of a pretty green polish from Zoya.

Zoya - Giovanna
I have a total soft spot for greens, especially emerald green. So naturally I love this shade!
I got this bottle in my Ipsy bag for October and I was totally pumped that I got the green and not red or blue.

The formula is flawless, just two coats to cover evenly and I had no issues with staining.

I wore this color alone for a couple of days, and then I added some green glitter!

Adding Shimmer - Linna on top was like the magic touch! It was so pretty. But the reflective nature of Giovanna made it impossible to capture how good the glitter looked on top. It blended in great and I had wonderful sparkly green nails! Just how I like it.

piCture pOlish Collab-Fest 2013

Hello everyone and happy Monday! (Even though it is only 1:00 am for me right now...)
Today is piCture pOlish Collab Fest! A day for all of us lucky ladies who had collaboration shades released this year to post them all again for your viewing pleasure. I was going to schedule this post for the afternoon but decided to just go ahead and post it now!

Unfortunately for me, this came at a really awful time for my nails. I am in the middle of final exams, I'm doing more hours at work for the holidays, plus Christmas preparations around my house, PLUS spending the rest of my time doing holiday nails for my friends and family... My nails and hands have taken a serious beating. Worst nails ever!
I had an awful break last week and I tried to hide it by rounding my nails off but I just don't like that look.
So you're getting no new close-ups from me today! But I did manage to take some festive photos and I will include an older one just to show off my purdy polish.

Wouldn't you like to find this under your tree?

Of course I never get sick of seeing my beauty! Siren Song is my pride and joy. It fills me with excitement every time someone posts a picture of them wearing it. I'm ecstatic when my friends buy it, and even some of my friend's moms have bought it! I couldn't be happier about this whole experience and I truly do love wearing my polish.
It's one of those shades I could wear again and again and I am really delighted about that.

I love when people ask me what polish I am wearing and I get to tell them that it is mine!
At first I was always carrying one around to show off. HA! 

You can find Siren Song at picturepolish.com.au or from many of their international stockists.
Be sure to follow PP on Facebook and Instagram because they post lots of great manis!

My pals at Nail Polish Canada are still offering free shipping on any order within Canada! Check that out, Canadian chums.

Have you picked up a bottle of Siren Song? Share photos with me!

31DC2013 - day 16

Hey everyone! Today is my last day in Chicago so this is my last scheduled post for this week. Thankfully. Because doing this challenge in advance was really difficult!
Today's theme is Tribal Print. 

Tada! Tribal!

I didn't plan for this manicure to become my tribal one, but the base didn't turn out as I was expecting so I slapped some tribal on top to save it! Haha!

I started with a base of China Glaze - That's Shore Bright and using the blot-off method, I added the jelly polishes from CG: Isle See You Later, Keepin' It Teal, and Are You Jelly?
These were supposed to be my green nails earlier in the challenge but they just didn't look as green as I had hoped on camera.

So it became tribal print using Bundle Monster plate BM-315.

OMG, now starting tomorrow I will be doing live posts again. Good thing tomorrow is an easy one! GLITTER!

31DC2013 - day 12

As this post goes live, I will be on my way to Chicago!
I am the most excited human in the wooooorld. I am going to Riot Fest, a 3-day concert festival with seriously almost all of my favorite bands.

This will be my third time taking a trip to see blink-182, and I am more excited now than ever because I am so healthy and happy and I will finally be able to fully enjoy myself!
Seeing blink would be enough, but throw in all the other bands I love (Fall Out Boy, Taking Back Sunday, Brand New, Say Anything, Against Me, Rancid, the list goes on) AND put the concert on my birthday weekend, PLUS put it in Chicago, the home of my other obsession - the Stanley Cup champions, The Chicago Blackhawks, and basically I could not ask for anything better.
It's like the universe said "Hey Rebecca, you're finally in remission, here's your dream come true!"
So exited. OMG.

So. After that little happy outburst, let's get back to the challenge!
I am keeping my challenge going despite being away this week.
Day 12 is Stripes.

Didn't wanna do regular ol' parallel stripes so I went for something a little different. I started with the center stripe and just let my imagination do what it wanted.

It's kinda like a blue stripe sunburst!

I started with a base of Essie - The More The Merrier from the Naughty Nauticals collection (which I will swatch sometime soon!) and I did the stripes with a blue striper from Art Club.

Love this shimmery green!

I think these were a nice take on the stripe prompt! I'm looking forward to seeing more stripe manis :)

31DC2013 - day 4

Hello! Day four is Green.

I had to think a lot about what I wanted to do for my green nails and I settled on my original idea.

Camouflage nails in honor of one of my favorite shows, Duck Dynasty!

I think I could have done the camo a little better but hey, I was in a rush.
I started with American Apparel - Hunter as my base color.
I began adding the pattern with Nicole by OPI - My Jay Or The Highway and a brown stamping polish. As well, I mixed some of the browns and greens together to create other shades.

I did an accent thumb...

Hey Jack!
Uncle Si is my favorite of the Duck Dynasty crew so I had to add a little somethin' for him.

 Don't they look cool with the new camouflage Toms we have at my work? Might have to get them...

So far I'm really happy with my efforts for this challenge! Now I gotta come up with a blue design for my first day of my final semester of my undergrad degree... Hmm!

Cheeky Week - Day 1: Dolla Dolla Bills, Y'all

Press Sample

 Hey guys, and welcome to Cheeky Week!

The lovely people at Cheeky Beauty offered to send me two of their sets of plates for review and of course I accepted. How could I ever turn that down?! (However now I have more plates than my storage book can hold...)

I'm going to do a week of looks using only the Cheeky plates I was sent, and then of course there will be more in the future because there are so many images I want to use!

The first set I'll be showing images from is the Summer Collection. This set retails on their website or on Amazon for $24.99 and it has 26 plates. And actually, it is $5 off on Amazon right now!

The plates come in a cute little box (so they're easy to store if you don't have a method of storing your plates already) and there's also a cute card inside that is a "Nail Art License." Hehe!

And that card can also be used as a scraper which is good because I'm sure we all misplace that thing once or twice.

When I received these plates I was wearing First Timer by Essie and I decided to stamp right on top of it with a cute image of dollar signs from plate CH-55.

Please excuse the insane dryness of my cuticles in these two pictures - I started a new medication in the last few months that is making me extremely dry and apparently I forgot to moisturize my cuticles that day. Ha!

 
I love this design and I really wanna use it over black too with gold stamping! Add a gold glitter accent nail and it would be fierce... Yeah, definitely doing that.

I had absolutely no problems with any of the Cheeky images I have tried out so far and I think that they are a great brand of plates to add to your collection.
Not only do they sell the standard-sized plates in sets but they also offer jumbo plates! I don't own any of those sort of plates yet, however, I have my eye on a few...
Cheeky also carries other nail art tools and accessories like dotting tools and rhinestones, etc.

Check out all the Cheeky products on cheeky-beauty.com (with free worldwide shipping!) and be sure to keep up with them on Facebook!

Press Sample

Essie Resort Collection 2013

Yoooooooo.

I love Winners. They provide me with multiple nail polishes at a reasonable price.
(...They provide me with way more clothes and shoes and accessories than I'd like to admit also. And an occasional giant cupcake holder...)

I got this Essie Resort Collection 2013 cube for $14.99. I wasn't planning on picking up any of these colors at the usual Essie price, but hey, a cute cheap cube I can go for.

Swatchie!

Essie - First Timer
I think this one is my favorite of the set - a spring green creme.  Nice formula, I'm pretty sure this was just two coats, and it was opaque in person but I can see some streaks in the photos.
A weird thing happened however:

 no topcoat vs. with topcoat

It might be impossible to see in this photo if you aren't me... But it changes color a little when you add topcoat (or Seche Vite, at least.) It made it just a bit more yellow-toned and that annoyed me because I liked it more before it changed. Haha!

Essie - Under Where?
Hehe, I love this name. Nothing special about the polish, just a nice lilac with the usual nice Essie formula.

Essie - In The Cab-ana
I love this bright sky blue. I did my nails in a major rush when I used this color, so my application isn't perfect, but that was my fault and not the formula. If you're being more civilized with your nail painting, you can do two easy coats.

Essie - Come Here!
This is a hot red-coral that really pops. I don't think it really goes with any of the other colors in the collection - another pastel would have been more cohesive. But the color iself is pretty great! Nice and vibrant for summer. Great formula, practically a one-coater.

________________________________

I'm pretty pleased with this offering from Essie! Nice springy colors (and one more summery.)

Have any of my other Canadian ladies found Essie cubes at Winners? I'm hoping to find the Naughty Nauticals cube there too because holy crap I want that whooooole collection. And not at regular price! Haha!

sunsational gradient with - wait for it... LEOPARD

Holy crap, this week flew by and I didn't even notice. I thought it had been maybe three days since my last post... But it's been over a week!! CRAP.
I do have a few posts lined up for the next week though. :)

Today's post is yet another gradient leopard. I die for gradients with leopard prints. You probably already know that.

Turquoise. Gradient. Leopard. China Glaze Sunsational Neons. It doesn't get much better.

I did this manicure with four polishes from the Sunsational collection (plus a black, of course.)
This is not a typical sponging-gradient, you just do this by adding layers of the very transparent jelly polishes to build up the color. Check out my last Sunsational-jelly-gradient here for a bit more detail if you need it.

It started with a base of China Glaze - Too Yacht To Handle, the brightest blue.
I first began the jelly-gradient with China Glaze - Keepin' It Teal, the teal jelly (obvi.)
I deepened the tip of the gradient with some China Glaze - Isle See You Later, the blue jelly.
Then I added dots with the light green, China Glaze - Highlight of My Summer, and used black to finish off the print.

For some reason, my camera didn't want to really pick up the gradient. I think the colors are just too bright! Too Yacht To Handle in particular is like BAM and my camera is like NO.

Here's the gradient before the leopard. Mmm, so beachy and summery.

It matches my new phone case! Haha! (Which I scored for just $2 at Michael's, by the way!)

Hope you guys like these nails! See you tomorrow with some Essie swatches...