Ridiculously late Halloween manicure! Frankenstein!

I've been slacking so bad, that I'm posting a Halloween manicure I did on the 7th of November.  Eek. Enjoy anyways, hehe.

I did Frankenstein! So cute, so simple.  I used Essie Mojito Madness for the green and WnW Black Creme for the black.  For the thumb, I painted my nail green and waited for it to dry.  I used unique shaped nail guides and painted over and then removed the guide.  I dotted on some eyes and pupils as well.  For the stitched nails I used more nail guides and then painted over the meeting point of the green and bare nail with a black striper. It took all of 10 minutes! So easy, so I loved it.

Wet 'n' Wild - Wild Shine - Jezebel

Not sure what drew me to this polish; I'm not a huge fan of reds and the shimmery finish, while pretty, isn't usually a favorite either.  I looked at this a few times before finally picking it up.  I've become a lot more picky with my polish purchases the past year or so - a lot of ones I think are pretty don't seem to make it into my collection anymore, but I'm glad this one did!

Jezebel is a darkened red shimmer polish; shown here is two coats over Orly Bonder and sealed with Out the Door.  It was opaque in two, big plus!  Formula was good, a teeeensy bit thick but totally workable.  I forget sometimes that 99c polishes can be good!

 

Zoya Arizona and Wet 'n' Wild Sunny Side Up Comparison

I kept hearing that Zoya Arizona was a dupe for Wet 'n' Wild Sunny Side up, and since I own both I decided to do a swatch comparison.We appear to have what seems to be a dead on dupe!

My bottle of Sunny Side Up is a bit worm but you can see the color similarity in the bottles alone.

"Natural" Light

This is three coats of each over Orly bonder and sealed with Brucci Nail Dryer.  You really can't tell the difference, can you?

"Natural" Light

Flash

As one might expect, Zoya had a much better formula.  It should also be mentioned though that my Zoya was brand new while my Wet 'n' Wild is not.  It was a bit goopier which could've been from air exposure, use, etc.  Aside from that though, Zoya was more opaque which I'm not really sure is affected by use.

Galaxy Nails!

I wanted to give galaxy nails a try after seeing so many wonderful examples.  Mine, unfortunately, look uh, much better at a distance.  They're not awful but I hope to do better next time.

"Natural" Light

I used a previous mani to build on, click HERE to go back and see it.  That explains what I built on, since it was also a layered manicure.  It can be seen below.

"Natural" Light

Upon that manicure I used a couple different things to create the effect.
-Hits Zeus (sponged over)
-Hits Demeter (sponged over)
-WnW Black Creme (sponged over)
-Finger Paints Asylum (sponger over)
-Acrylic paints in various colors (used to make the "galaxy" design)

I used paint brushes with the acrylic paint and a make up sponge for the nail polish.  I knew I wanted it to contain orange for contrast reasons.  The dots were done using  a dotting tool with paint, not polish, to make them irregular.

"Natural" Light

Flash

Have you done galaxy nails? I'd love to see your examples!

Funky French with Gems and Pearls

I knew all day I wanted to do a funky french but didn't know how, I had my white tips painted on for a few hours before I finally settled on an idea. For tips on how I do my french manicures, click HERE. I did the same process for the white tips: Konad Special White on bare nails.

"Natural" Light

I used my dotting tool and WnW Black Creme for the dots and then the pink gems and pearls are a nail sticker I got from my sister for Christmas.  I applied the black and clear gems with a dot of top coat; top coat holds it on just fine.

I put on one coat of Instant Artifcials and then one coat of OTD and that's it! It was easy and fast, no drying time for anything, even the white.

Thanks for reading! (=

Beyonce Countdown Inspired Manicure

Sooooo Beyonce is probably one of my favorite singers ever.  I've been wearing her new album out and when I found out Countdown was going to be a single I got really excited at the prospects of what the video could be. It's such a fun song and the video really lives up to that.  I love the colors and patterns in the video so it inspired me to design a manicure.

And this is what I came up with :D

 I took some still screenshots of the video so you can see where I pulled the inspiration from. I used a ton of different polishes for this manicure so I'm going to list them accordingly.

Thumb

China Glaze Four Leaf Clover

China Glaze For Audrey

China Glaze Lemon Fizz

Sinful Colors Verbena

WnW Black Creme

Index Finger

Funky Fingers Platinum Record

Funky Fingers Stage Dive

Middle Finger

Ulta Sweetheart Pink

Orly Green Apple

Ring Finger

China Glaze Snow

WnW Black Creme

Pinky

 Sinful Colors Cloud 9

Phew! That was a lot! I used CND Stickey as a basecoat and OTD for a topcoat.

First Halloween Mani of the Season!

Yay! It's that time of year now, finally! I love the autumn air so so so much. I'm also singing into my brush Beyonce's "Best Thing I Never Had" feeling all these womanly empowerment feelings.  Some of you may know I am going through the break up from hell, more of you may not. I'm healing.  Still hurt, but healing.  Ok I need to stop singing so I can type easier.

FIRST HALLOWEEN MANI OF THE SEASON! YAY!

I'll explain how I got to that picture above now, it was quite fun wearing it.  I wore FOUR coats of WnW Sunny Side Up. Holy hell, that was a pain to apply. It needed four coats. Streaky streaky.  I couldn't reach opacity until I did the fourth coat.  Once I did though, it was smooth and pretty.

Four coats. OTD TC.

Sunny Side Up aka Bic Lighter Orange

Such a happy color!

I'm glad this polish evened out.  I was about to through it across the room because I didn't think there was much hope for it.  This is four coats over Nailtek II Foundation with Out the Door topcoat. And now the fun happens:

Two coats pumpkin polish + one coat WnW Tangled in my Web

The pumpkin polish I got at Rite Aid for $1.99 - it has black and coppery-orange bar glitter.  I put WnW Tangled in my Web over that. Click to see the details of the glitters.

Ah! My right hand!

I never use my right hand as my swatch hand for obvious reasons but I had to this time around.  I destroyed my left hand's mani with some bad ideas and streaking from a bright idea I had.  The photos are strange, weird angles, poor lighting.. I couldn't photograph these nicely with my left hand, at all. I tried my best though!

And now some completely unrelated girl-getting-over-her-ex-lyrics-that-hopefully-help-because-they're-somewhat-relatable!

Beyonce:
Thank god you blew it
Thank god I dodged the bullet

 Pia Toscano:
This time, this time I'm gonna do it my away
This time, I'm finding out the hard away
This time, I'm gonna go back to the girl I was on the night you found me

Don't worry girls, I got this. I think..

WnW "Behind Closed Doors" + accent nail

HALLO LADIES.

I wore this mani this weekend and looooved it.  I shy away from vampy dark colors because they do nothing for my hands but I couldn't resist after swatching them for you.  I used WnW "Behind Closed Doors" from the On the Prowl Halloween collection.  I also work at a daycare and we're not supposed to wear black nail polish (or lipstick...LOL) so I tend to obey that rule since I always get yelled at for wearing flip flops.  Just choosing my battles haha.

4 Coats of WnW "Behind Closed Doors"
1 Coat of WnW "Red Red" on the accent nail.

For the stamping I used my new BM plate 224 and used WnW Black Creme.  It was monsooning all weekend here so outside pictures was not an option.  We've gotten like 6 inches of rain in the past few days which is a lot for us, even our basement got some water -_-

Oh my rhinestones!

I've always always wanted a wheel of these but couldn't bring myself to pay the Amazon or craft store prices.  I got these from the bornprettystore for a sweet price.  They have a flat back which is perfect for nails and I secured these with a tiny drop of clear TC by using my dotting tool.

The tiny glitters were SO HARD to clean up I finally said screw it and just left them.  I mean really, how many times are you supposed to attempt clean up before giving up?  All the acetone was doing was turning the red glitter into silver glitter.

WnW On the Prowl Swatches

It's mid-August. So what does that mean? Halloween, of course.  Christmas in July and Halloween in August, I suppose. I saw swatches of these earlier this week and was immediately "on the prowl" for On The Prowl!

Only four from this really interested me, and luckily they were four that were still on the display.  I bought them at Harmon's for $1.79 each - a little cheaper than most places.

LEFT TO RIGHT:
Cougar Attack - Correction Tape - Tangled in My Web - Behind Closed Doors

I swatched these four polishes either over bare nails or over black or over colors I thought were suitable underwear. All polishes used were WnW brand.  The red is "Red Red", black is "Black Creme" and the orange is "Sunny Side Up".  Each of those are only 99. cents! All photos here are without BC and TC.

"Cougar Attack":

1 coat - 2 coats - 2 coats over black - 1 coat over black

I was so pleasantly surprised with "Cougar Attack"!  I was super close to passing on it after seeing it in the bottle, but decided since I was saving 60. cents "Hey, why not."  It's only 2 coats for opacity which is incredible for a glitter.  The dark jelly base certainly helps.  I like it best on its own.

"Tangled in My Web":

1 coat - 2 coats over black - 2 coats over SSU - 2 coat over red

 First off I apologize for the mess that is my ring finger and pinky.  I did not wait for them to dry, so there was streaking and smudging but it really didn't effect the outcome.  One coat doesn't look -that- different from two coats.  A bit of fishing is needed for this one; you need to try and load the brush up with as much glitter with avoiding all of the goopy clear base. (Which is hard to do with a black brush)  The possibilities of this one are really endless though.  Between frankening and using as-is, there is lots to be done with "Tangled"!

Also, this polish over black looks like Deborah Lippmann's "Funky Chunky".  And that being said - don't use it over black, lol.

"Correction Tape":

1 coat - 2 coats - 2 coats over red - 2 coat over black

Such a party glitter.  I have Milani "Gems" and WnW "Party of Five Glitters" so I really didn't need this one but it does bring a little something different to the table.  I'm confused by the name though, correction tape to me = dry white out on the rolly things.

"Behind Closed Doors":

Thumb is 3 coats.
From Left to Right:
1 coat - 2 coats - 2 coats over red - 2 coats over black

 LOVE this one.  The hex glitter was a little difficult to fish out. There is almost none on my fingers, but you can see it on my thumb.  I also prefer this one without underwear.  The dark gray jelly base creates depth!

Over all, these were great.  Drying time was nice, they're fun colors and versatile as well.  Their price makes me happy.

NOTE: There is A LOT of depth and detail to these polishes, I recommend you click to enlarge.

jelly sandwich mani with stamping

Hello everyone! I have a super fun mani for you to look at today. I hope it excites you as much as it does me.  A popular recent trend all over the Nail Board over at MUA is the "Jelly Sandwich" manicure.  This is one fad I will certainly indulge in as it produces beautiful results that last!

This is what I did, details further down (=

A "jelly sandwich" is a paint-job done by doing a few coats of a jelly, followed by a coat or two of a complimentary glitter and then that is sandwiched with another coat or two of the same jelly.  It makes your nails look like they've got a thick layer of delicious sparkles all over them.  My first attempt was a pleasant surprise.  This style of manicure is pretty goof-proof.

I used the second one from the left, "The Berry Minimum"

An adorable little set of jellies from Ulta made choosing my colors difficult because I wanted them all, but I finally decided on "The Berry Minimum" which is a bright magenta-y berry jelly.  After two coats of that, I put one coat of China Glaze "Bad Kitty", then one more coat of jelly followed by one coat of Out the Door.

It was more difficult for me to photograph this than a neon!  I haven't been able to take pictures in daylight so I have to work with what I've got.  This is pretty true-to-life.  If you click to enlarge you can see how the glitter is buried, or "sandwiched" under the jelly.  Such a pretty effect!

I wanted to add something else after wearing this for a full day so I decided to use my new Bundle Monster plates.  I used plate BM-225 and WnW Black Creme for the stamping.

I didn't do a perfect stamping job, and the bare spots really
showed, so I used my dotting tool to add some dots in the
areas that needed a little "something".

Please click to enlarge, the detail is amazing. The BM plates
are so crisp!

I hope you enjoyed this as much as I did - What do you think?!

Saint Patrick's Day Mani

Alright, I braved the green for this mani.  Not a fan of full green manicures.  I don't like it on my hands.  Teals and such, OK, but green green makes me squirm.  Even though this isn't 100% green.. well I don't know.  I only did one hand and removed it ASAP. :D

Actually kind of cute right? Please ignore pinky smudge :D

Ingredients:

Funky Fingers "Mint Monatauk" - base color
China Glaze "DV8" - triple shamrock
Funky Fingers "Tribal" - individual shamrock
Wet n Wild "Sunny Side Up" - dots
Art Deco "White" - dots
BM03

3 coats of "Mint Monatauk" No BC or TC.
What a bright, beautiful color! A minty neon.

Little darker image here so you can see the details.
I couldn't get a picture without a glare )=

I thought it looked pretty decent considering I went into this mani with NO idea of what I was doing.  The single shamrocks are sort of in the "background" and can be seen very faintly if you click to enlarge.  They were more noticeable in person.