Neon Leopard

Quick post for today..I did this last night at like 12am, and I can't say that I was really happy with it, but I decided to post it anyway. I don't know who came up with this design but I've seen it floating around for a while now. I just used a base of Sinful Snow Me White and made the spots with China Glaze Lemon Fizz, Sinful 24/7 and China Glaze For Audrey. I actually ended up taking this off the same night...one of those nights where you aren't happy with anything. I'll have a 4th of July mani for you guys soon though :)

 

-Amanda

Birds can fly so high..

I had to use a Kate Nash lyric to title this... it's just so appropriate!!

I started off with 3 coats of Petites Electric Indigo. The first coat was really sheer and the polish leaves some brush strokes, but besides that it's a pretty color. I don't see why these polishes are $3.99 though because I can get drugstore polishes for much cheaper, and I can get China Glaze polishes for about $4. I wouldn't say this is worth $4....but it works for this mani.

 

For the clouds, I sponged on white acrylic paint using an old eyeshadow applicator. It worked perfectly because it was so small! Then I used a tiny dotting tool to make the little birdies... some of them look better than others ;)

-Amanda

A note of thanks

Amanda and I want to publicly thank Kayla at Beauty by Kayla Shevonne for naming us June's featured blog.  We are both very honored and humbled that she spotlighted us, as we both think her work is truly outstanding and have been followers of hers for quite some time.  Most of the credit should go to my beautiful daughter, Amanda, for her hard work and dedication to our blog.

If you haven't checked out Kayla's blog then click on the link <<< and go see what fabulous work she does.

An oldie but a goodie

Hello! I have something unusual for ME today... it's just a swatch of a China Glaze I own. But it's special because it's the VERY FIRST China Glaze I ever got a few years ago! Ahh, memories. It's none other than... Purple Panic! And it's glorious and wonderful and I forgot how much I loved this until I put it on today. It's a neon so it dried matte, but application was actually pretty easy for a neon. I love that they dry fast :)

My camera freaked out at the neon-ness of it... le sigh. Why are neons so notoriously hard to capture? It's purple-r than this picture, but if you have this beauty I'm sure you know what it looks like :) My Photoshop skills are still at the noob level or else I would've tried to make the color more accurate...which probably would've messed up my skin tone, but whatever :)

 

Look how worn the bottle is! The writing has almost all been worn off... I'm gonna need a new bottle of this soon!

I don't know if I can stand to put anything over the top of this beauty! I just keep looking at my nails...they're so bright and purple and shiny and glossy... but I'm sure when I get bored I'll try to salvage this pretty color by adding something to it :)

Seriously though, whenever I look at this one I just get all happy. There's only a select few colors that make me do that! Haha

-Amanda

Revlon Sweetly Seductive scented polishes

Today I have for you swatches of Revlon's new summer scented nail polishes called Sweetly Seductive.  They advertise these as being scented jellies.  All of the polishes have the corresponding color glass flecks in them giving them a shimmer and I used 3 coats on all swatches.  Amanda said they reminded her of Skittles - literally.  And my fingers smelled like a fruit basket!

First up is Apple-tini Fizz.  Apple-tini is a moderately sheer yellow-green or lime green color and the bottle color translates well to the nail.  Coverage and application were both good.  The fragrance reminds me a little of Jolly Rancher apple candies.

Next is Watermelon Fizz.  This was probably my favorite of the collection.  It's an orangy red color with red glass flecks.  Coverage and application were excellent and it was probably the most opaque of the collection, being more of a semi-sheer.  The smell - again - reminded me of a watermelon Jolly Rancher candy.

This one is Orange Fizz and it does indeed smell like orange candy.  It's also more opaque than the others and coverage and application were excellent.  It's probably my favorite fragrance of the collection.



Here we have Grapefruit Fizz.  It's a pink jelly and I don't think it smells that much like grapefruit. Application is good but it's very sheer - expect to use multiple coats.

Pineapple Fizz is a bright yellow jelly.  I expected this to be very sheer, but surprisingly - it's one of the more opaque in the collection.  Application and coverage are excellent but I'm not feeling the 'pineapple' scent.  This color might look a little more pure and bright on someone whose nails aren't stained quite as much as mine.  It's also one of my favorites of the collection.

Here we have Grape Fizz and my reaction was the exact opposite of with Pineapple Fizz.  The bottle color is a deep violet and I expected this to be a rich deep purple but it is much more sheer than it looks.  I used 3 coats and still could have used another.  Fragrance on this one was nice - it did smell like grapes.

Last but not least I have Colada Fizz.  It kinda smells like coconut I guess.  A more chemical-ly coconut.  This was the most sheer of the bunch.  After 3 coats it was still quite sheer.  It's a lovely icy blue color.

There was one color I didn't pick up - a cobalt blue color.  Not because I didn't like the color (it was one of the prettiest ones I thought) but because I knew I wouldn't like the frangrance and didn't want to waste my money.  It was mint scented.

So there you have the Revlon Sweetly Seductive line.  My overall impression was favorable.  They all applied very nicely and dried fast.  The glass flecks give them just the right amount of sparkle.  I'm looking forward to experimenting with these shades by layering them over other colors and textures.

Editor's post note - I applied 3 coats of Orange Fizz for my regular manicure at 9pm and by the next morning the scent had completely dissipated, even with no top coat.  *disappointed face*

Fourth Of July Series - Tie Dye

Hello! We've decided to do a series of nails for Fourth of July. We thought we'd start now as the holiday is about 2 weeks away and this gives us a chance to get out designs out before it comes around!

This one is *supposed* to look like tie dye, but I'm not sure I accomplished that goal. Oh well, it's colorful :)

I started with two coats of Sinful Snow Me White. I hate whites so much, by the way. Then I sponged Zoya Sooki (the most perfectest of perfect reds ever...) and China Glaze First Mate with an old eye shadow applicator. I drew the little lines on the tips with a white striper polish, and finished up with a coat of Revlon Belle.

-Amanda

Guess we're on an animal print roll...

I started off with 2 coats of Wet 'n' Wild's Inferno. Inferno is part of the brand's Craze line. They're in the wee little bottles! Application on this one was a BREEZE... I love it when $2 polishes act like $8 polishes :) I didn't get any pics of just the base color...stupid me. But then I sponged Wet 'n' Wild's Everybody Loves Redmond and 9.0.2.1. Orange on top of the base color...an idea I saw on Emily's Nail Files! Go look at her tutorial, it's awesome. I only applied the tiger stripes to the tips of my nails though.

 

Then I decided to put some matte top coat over it, because I thought it would make it look like fur (? ... I don't know, it made sense in my head) and all I can say is, someone really needs to teach me when to use matte top coat because everytime I decide to pull it out and use it I end up putting it on something that doesn't need it. BAH!

That's all for today, have a nice night :)

-Amanda

Sinful Unicorn Errr.. Giraffe

Oh yellow nail polish!  You are so lovely and summery yet so temperamental and streaky!  I want to love you, but you do not return my affection.

I started with...  get ready for it...  4 coats of Sinful Colors Unicorn.  I knew I was going to need multiple coats so I waited till I could really take my time with the application.  Unicorn is patchy and streaky - pretty typical for most yellow polishes.  If you're planning on using Unicorn, be prepared to invest some time into it as it's going to take multiple coats to become opaque.  Even after 4 coats I still had some dragging and patchiness.  The pics make me look like I have lobster hands.  My camera was doing some funky color correct as it focused - my hands are not red as the pics make them look.

There is a BM plate that is a giraffe pattern, but I measured it and discovered that it's so small it only fits my pinky fingers.  So I knew I was going to have to free hand this design.  I decided to go with an acrylic paint for the giraffe spots because I knew it was going to be tedious work and I wanted something that would cover completely and dry fast.  Plus, I didn't have any dark brown polish.  I just made little random geometric shapes with a small nail brush and brown acrylic paint.  Sorry for the pic spam!

Blog appreciation day

I'm in the process of finishing a new mani to post but in the meantime I wanted to share 2 blogger awards we have been given

Thanks go to Varnish Me Up for awarding us the Top 10 Blogger award

And to Lyndsey at Pixie Polish who presented us with the Kreativ Blogger award.  This is the second time Lyndsey has beaten us to the punch when we've had our eye on presenting an award to HER blog. 

If you haven't yet checked out these 2 awesome blogs, go give them a look!  And thank you again girls, it's nice knowing our work (and it IS work sometimes) is appreciated!

POSTNOTE:  UGH.  Is anyone else having trouble with blogger's comment application?  If I try to comment with my blogger/gmail account it keeps kicking me back to the log in screen.  Any suggestions as to how to fix it?

Dandelion nails!

 I know what you're thinking. "Dandelions?! But those aren't even real flowers, they're weeds!"

Yes...but what screams summer more than dandelions!!? Plus I did this pretty base color and found myself too unskilled to do any pretty flowers, so I had to settle for something a bit easier. :)

I started with two coats of China Glaze Sea Spray. This polish posed such a problem for me back in February! It was one of the first posts I ever did, and I was a noob. My swatches weren't good and my polishing skills weren't up to par with what they are now. But Sea Spray....why are you so pretty? It's so shimmery and subtle and BOOTIFUL!!

Then I used a dotting tool to make the big...center (?) of the dandelion and a black striper to make the stem. I used a special striper nail brush and white acrylic paint to make the ... petals? weeds? of the dandelion. I just hardly used ANY paint so it came out looking very dainty and see-through...which is what I was going for :) Yay me! The little flying petals were surprisingly difficult to do though -- I don't have a paintbrush THAT small so they turned out a little too big compared to the dandelions, but oh well. Art doesn't HAVE to imitate life :)

I like this because it's subtle...it's not in your face. I almost just left Sea Spray on by itself! But alas....nope.

I'm off to Kokomo for the weekend...

Aruba, Jamaica ooo I wanna take you
To Bermuda, Bahama come on pretty mama
Key Largo, Montego, baby why don't we go
Down to Kokomooooo!

Have a wonderful weekend!

-Amanda

Sally Hansen Coral Fever Dragon Eggs

I picked up another of the Sally Hansen CSM spring 2011 polishes today - this one is called Coral Fever and it's been sold out at many of the places where I've seen the display.  Coral is supposed to be one of the "it" colors this summer - idk *shrug*

I have to say, I was a little disappointed in the formula on this one.  It went on a little streaky - very uncharacteristic of the CSM line.  I needed a full 3 coats to even out the color and still had a little bit of bubbling.  The color is a very light orangy coral creme (think Dreamsicle!) and unfortunately I didnt get any pics of it by itself because it was already dark when I finished my mani.  If you already own SH Kook A Mango, it's a bit lighter than that shade.  I'll have to swatch it on it's own at another time.

I stamped over the top with the irregular dot pattern on BM plate 211.  Amanda says it looks like a dragon's egg.  So I'm going with that today.  :)  I used an old Sally Hansen chrome nail makeup polish for the stamping called Carnelian Chrome which is a bright pink foil.

Formula 3 - 3 free
Application 3 - somewhat streaky
Coverage 3 - a little on the sheer side
Dry Time 3 - average

Ghetto Gothic Fab Nails (Lady Gaga nails?)

Helloooo!

This is an awfully dark mani for summer....but oh, wait! I don't care :) I wanted to do a design based off a shirt I was wearing yesterday, even though it's pretty dark and ... ominous looking. Which is why I'm calling these my GOTHIC fabulous nails! Gothic because they're black, and fabulous because they have rhinestones on them! Oooh, shiny. I guess they could also be Lady Gaga nails :)

I started off with two coats of Ulta Little Black Dress, which is AWESOME! It has a little bit of a shimmer to it so it doesn't look so intimidating. I only had to do two coats of this, and I could've gotten away with one if I'd applied a thick coat. I highly recommend this one... it's like a girly black polish if that makes sense.

Then I stamped over it with Sally Hansen Black Pearl Chroma and plate m63. If you're lucky enough to have any of the Chrome polishes, they're excellent to stamp with. I used round, silver rhinestones on the ring fingers to make the crosses. I generally don't like rhinestones because they get stuck in my hair and I usually think it's hard to make them look good.

What do you all think? :)

Have a wonderful day,
-Amanda