Malted Easter Eggs

Hey guys!

Easter is coming up this weekend so I thought of creating a mani that was simple and easy to create! A friend actually showed me a similar mani and I thought it was really cute and perfect for Easter so I had to recreate it! Easter is all about candy and pastels so this mani is dedicated to the malted easter eggs candies that I love so much :)

I thought I would throw in a picture of my inspiration!

I used several different polishes to create this mani. My thumb was made with Revlon Colorstay Bonsai. My pointer finger was made using Revlon Top Speed Pink Lingerie. My middle finger was made using Revlon Sunshine Sparkle. My ring finger was made with Wet n Wild Wild Shine Rain Check. And last but not least, my little pinky finger was made with Sally Hansen White. Most of the malted easter egg candies I've had have had brown spots so I decided to go with brown for my mani. The brown specks were made using a small dotting tool and Revlon Totally Toffee. To get the dusty look of the malted eggs, I used Essie Matte About You top coat.

I love love love this mani! I think it's so cute and perfectly Easter! The mani is also very simple and super easy to make. All you really need to do to make this mani is find pastel/Easter colors, add some brown or colored speckles, and top it with a dusty finish! I hope you all liked this mani too and I hope that it gave some you ideas for your nails.  

For another idea, take a look at my last year's Easter mani here!

Happy Easter!

31 Day (Week) Challenge - Day 8: Metallic Nails

Hi everyone!!

I have a funky mani for you today to fulfill my metallic challenge! Metallic things always seem to be pretty funky to me so I decided to do something like that for my mani because I couldn't think of something else, hah. I think I could have done something different to it to make it a little better. Also, I could not capture the real colors of the polishes even if my life depended on it. I think i ended up taking about fifty pictures and then gave up. Then tried again a little while later, still with no luck. So please bare with me on these photos.

This mani was made using SEPHORA by OPI Queen of Everything. Then I used a medium sized detail brush and Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Purple Potion to add the purple/blue metallic/duochrome polish on top of the silver metallic polish. It still seemed a little plain so I went back and added the stripes using Sally Hansen Crackle Ink Splatter.

The mani was very easy to make since it only involved striping across the nail. But I really like how it looks! It's so different and "out there" and quirky!

I really hope that all of you liked my mani and enjoyed seeing something different! I definitely had fun creating it and can't wait to show you next week's challenge mani!

Don't forget to stop by at My Life In Turquoise and see my friend's challenge mani for this week.

Woo! 8 down, 23 more to go!!

31 Day (Week) Challenge - Day 7: Black & White Nails

Hey guys!

I can't believe it's already week 7!! Time has been going by way too fast. This week's theme is black and white and I knew just what I wanted to do for this mani. It's the perfect theme to combine my two favorite things. I give you nail art and pandas!

Any one of my close friends can tell you how much I love pandas. They're adorable and definitely my favorite animal!!

The face of the pandas and the french tips of the accent nails were created using Sally Hansen Insta Dri Whirlwind White. The eyes, ears, and noses of the pandas were made with Wet n Wild Black Creme. For the "bamboo" on the accent nails, I used Nubar Nail Art Green Frost and Nubar Nail Art Mint Frost. (And as always, I started off using my favorite base coat, Essie 3 Way Glaze and topped it all off with my favorite top coat, Sally Hansen Insta-Dry Anti-Chip Top Coat).

I'm happy with how this turned and it was super easy to do after I figured out which tools to use. I thought I would be able to make the entire face of the panda using a small detail brush but quickly found out that it was too messy. I ended up using dotting tools in various sizes to get the eyes and nose and then made the ears using the detail brush. I absolutely love how the accent nails turned out and think they look perfect!

The only bad about this mani is probably my habit of not waiting long enough for the mani to dry. I applied to top coat too soon and it kind of smeared the pandas. The bamboo was fine though. 

I think it's really cute and I hope you all liked my mani too!

Also, check out my friend's mani for this week at My Life In Turquoise!

Wow! That's seven down and twenty-three more to go!! Stay tuned for next week's METALLIC nails!

Drugstore Haul

Hi everyone! I hope you had a great weekend! I had to run to a few drugstores to pick up some things and I guess it was my lucky day! Of course, I have to check on the nail polish to see if there is anything new or if there are any sales. SALE!!!

I ended up getting 9 polishes in really fun colors!! They remind me of Spring so I'm really excited to try them out and get out of this winter funk. Hopefully, I'll have the swatches for you soon, even though I'm not a big fan of swatches because I think they're boring and I'd much rather show you my nail art. But swatches are great to see how a polish will look before you get a bottle, if you want to make sure you will like it.

Stay warm, everyone!

Hues of Blues Color Block

Hi everyone!

The Crumpet is having an amateur nail art contest this month!! And the theme is BLUE. I haven't really liked any previous blue nail art designs that I have done so I decided to create a whole new mani. There isn't any prize but it's just nice to enter into a contest! Especially because this is my first! There are some great entries already so it's going to be tough!

For this contest, I decided to use as many blue polishes as I could. I settled on four different shades of blues that seemed to go well with one another. I've always wanted to try a color block mani because I've seen some great ones on other blogs and loved the look! So I used the four different blue polishes and made color blocks with them.

For this mani, I started off with my favorite base coat, Essie 3 Way Glaze. Then for the base color coat, I used Sally Hansen HD Laser. I knew that I wouldn't be able to make full color blocks with the separate colors so I decided to have a base color coat and then make the blocks with the other three remaining polishes. The teal block was made using China Glaze For Audrey and the dark blue coat was made using Spoiled The Parking Meteor Expired. The Spoiled polish was a bit disappointing because in the bottle, the polish appears to be a blackened blue polish with lighter blue and purple flecks. While applying it, the polish looked promising but as it dried, the polish lost its blue and purple fleck colors. You can only really see the true color in bright light and only at certain angles. The light blue block was made using Revlon Downtown. This is a glitter polish but since the blocks are so small, the glitter wasn't showing up as much as I had hoped. So I went back and added a layer of Sally Hansen Diamond Strength Glass Slipper to add some sparkly flakies and give it a nice sparkle. I finished off the look by adding light blue striping tape to show the distinct blocks and then put on my favorite top coat, Sally Hansen Insta-Dri.

I had a hard time with the striping tape but I think it all worked out in the end. You can kind of see the blue flecks in the Spoiled polish on my ring finger in the above picture.

** My cuticles look oily because I had used hand lotion a little while before taking these pictures and apparently, the lotion wasn't absorbing

I am sooo happy with how this turned out! I had seen this type of mani on Pinterest and other blogs and really wanted to try it out. This seemed like the perfect opportunity to do it!

I hope you all liked the look as much as I do! Wish me luck for the contest!!

Sally Hansen Review & Swatch

Hi guys!

I'm sure you all have already seen these, but Sally Hansen has an HD collection that has amazing, bright colors to choose from. I only ended up getting one for now just to try it out and see how it would look.

Here, I have Sally Hansen HD Hi-Definition Laser. It's an amazing color and definitely one of my favorite polishes in my stash. It's a vibrant, duochrome blue with some glass flecks in it. I tried the polish over a light base, a dark base, and by itself. In my opinion, the polish looks best worn either with a dark base or by itself (the pictures below show the polish worn by itself). The formula is smooth and easy to work with. Since it is a duochrome, I had to apply two coats to get the full effect (the full effect can be seen better with a darker base coat).

**The pictures have the polish without any colored base coats and with two coats of polish. This is what the polish looked like with the light hitting it at different angles

 

Such a beautiful polish, right? I love it! Have any of you tried any of the other HD polishes from Sally Hansen? What did you think of them? Let me know in the comments section below!

Revlon Review & Swatch

Hey guys!

I have a Revlon swatch for you all today. Grape Icy is from their Scented Collection and actually smells pretty good! It has a sweet scent that is not harsh at all. The color is bright but not too bright, which is perfect for adding that little bit of Spring during this snowy winter. It looks like a royal purple with a softer touch to it. The formula wasn't that great. My swatch shows 4 coats and 4 coats were required to not have a VNL. I'm not a big fan of VNLs so I needed the 4 coats, but if you don't mind it, 3 coats is good enough. If you don't mind using a bit more polish every time, this polish is good, but you'll have to decide that.

Revlon's scented polishes are available at Revlon, Ulta, Walgreens, and CVS.

Have any of you tried any scented polishes that you really like? Let me know in the comments section below!

Cherry Blossoms

Hey everyone! My mom needed to get her nails done again so I, of course, used the opportunity to try out some more looks! Her nails are REALLY long so I decided to make some cherry blossoms on her nails because there's more than enough room to work with and I can easily create some small blossoms and lots of branches. And since both of our nails are skinny (but long) I figured cheery blossoms would look good too.

I love the color of cherry blossoms so I had to find colors that matched them to create the look. For the base coat, I used China Glaze Poetic, a very soft pink that went with the theme perfectly. The color is so simple but beautiful and I'm so glad that I found it in my stash! For the branches I used a nail art pen, Nubar Black. For the blossoms and the centers I also used nail art pens, Nubar Fuchsia Frost and Nubar White respectively.

I'm happy with how this turned out and my mom loved the look as well! I'm definitely going to be making some more cherry blossoms in the future.

Thanks for visiting!!

31 Day (Week) Challenge - Day 6: Violet Nails

Hi everyone!! I'm so excited to show you all today's challenge mani!

Originally, I had planned a completely different mani for today but it didn't work out so I decided to go with this look instead. I will definitely show you all the other look that I had mine sometime soon because it's a great idea and looks awesome!

Ikat print!! For the base coat, I used Revlon Scented Parfume Grape Icy. It's a very pretty purple and really smells like grapes!! The color is almost like a royal purple but with a softer look to it soI thought it would be perfect for this print to soften it up a bit. For the black and white parts of the print, I used some nail art pens, Nubar White and Nubar Black. The blue/green color that I used in the print is Sinful Colors Mint Apple, which has a nice sparkle to it.

I've been wanting to try this one out for a while and what a better opportunity to do it! It was fun making this mani and I was pleasantly surprised at how it turned out because I thought I would mess up badly. But I like it!

My friend at My Life In Turquoise also has her challenge mani for all of you so make sure to stop by there.

I can't believe week 6 is already done!! Next week is black and white and I already have something in mind for that. Let's hope that it turns out well.

6 down, 25 more to go!!

31 Day (Week) Challenge - Day 5: Blue Nails

Hi everyone!

This week's challenge theme color is BLUE!! Since I had a somewhat complicated mani last time, I decided to go with a very simple look for this week. I used a color that I used in last week's mani but I love the color SO much that I just had to use it again this week! You'll definitely see me using it again sometime soon!

The base polish that I used was Revlon Scented Parfume Ocean Breeze. (This color is amazing! First of all, it's scented. And I actually like the scent! Second of all, the color looks different in different shades of light. Right now while I'm sitting here writing this post, the color almost looks aquaish but then in bright light it looks like a light blue/turquoise color.) I love it. Also, I only used the base color on half of my nail and the other half of the nail doesn't have any polish on it. I then used a nail art pen (Nubar Silver Frost) to create the dots.

I kind of wish that I used a darker color to make the dots but I didn't think of that while I was creating this mani. Next time I create a mani like this I will definitely be using more contrasting colors.

Overall, I'm not exactly sure how I feel about this look. I know I would have liked it better with darker dots and maybe that's why I'm having mixed feelings. But I do love the color!

Be sure to check out My Life In Turquoise's week 5 manicure!! She has a really cute look for all of you.

Week 5 is done!! Next week is violet and I have a great idea to show all of you!!

5 down, 26 more to go!!