Watch Your Language, Yoshi

Today I have the last of the beach manis, a great manicure that I kept on forever (and lasted forever at the beach, which is impressive!)  I wanted to cry when I started getting tip wear because I loved it SO VERY MUCH.  

I started off with two coats of Spoiled Watch Your Language.  Great formula, terrible brush.  It is like a dog lapping on your fingers!  Then I applied one coat of Dollish Polish Dino-Mite Yoshi, one of the great polishes from her Mario line.  I loved the blend of colors in this so much.  Then, for fun, I decided to use Hard Candy Matte-ly In Love to matte the entire thing.  The end result I was giddy over.  I felt that this one was really a home run.

As with all of Dollish Polishes, the application on Yoshi was amazing.  I have quite the collection of Dollish Minis and yet I always seem to be able to find more and more to buy!  She is easily one of my favorite indie polish makers.

I originally wanted to put Yoshi over green, but that looked very Christmasy to me, here I think it really brings out the blend of colors and makes them pop!

Prepare yourself for epic picture spam...

Watch Your Language by itself:

With Dino-Mite Yoshi, no top coat:

Matted:

Macro - LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE!

You can purchase Dollish Polish at her Big Cartel Site.  Spoiled polishes can be found at CVS.

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The Girl with the Best Smile is Ba-Roque

Today I have a combo that I was thrilled with how it turned out.  I started off with two coats of Spoiled Ba-Roque, a bronze polish with silver shimmer in it.  The first coat is pretty sheer, but two is all you need for full coverage.  This polish is awesome, but that brush.  OY.  That brush is a crime against polish.  It is so hard to work with!  It is worth it to get some of these great polishes though and a reasonable price.

Then I put on one coat of Windestine The Girl With The Best Smile, a great polish with purple hexes, pink squares and gold glitter in a clear base.  The end result is really breathtaking.  Girl pumped up Ba-Roque just a notch and made me love it even more.   

Gorgeous!

I love the color blends here!

Macro to see all of the colors:

Windestine can be purchased at her Big Cartel store.  Spoiled can be purchased at CVS.

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I Don't Want to Glow Up

Today I have another unique to my collection polish - Sonnetarium Never Glow Up.  This is a soft pastel green polish packed to the gills with flakies.  It is extremely sheer and I wish I had a suitable base for it with me at the beach.

Here you see three coats of polish on the nail, covered by one coat of Seche Vite and two coats of Essie Good to Go in order to smooth it out on the nail.

You can obviously still see the visible nail line, so I think a nice soft green would be a perfect layering polish for this and it would conserve the beautiful Never Glow Up.  

I thought this polish applied like a dream on the nail and was very easy to put on evenly and easily.  Be sure to scroll down through all of the photos to see what makes this baby so unique!  

Macro:

Added bonus - it glows in the dark!  Look how cool!  My kids went gaga over this when I was putting them to bed.

Sonnetarium polishes can be purchased at their Etsy store.

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Kate Loves Sal-Mon

Today I have a newer indie polish to show you, Liquid Lacquer (formerly 2Chix) Not 4 Sal-Mon.  A jelly salmon base with white and dark salmon colored glitters suspended in it.

On its own this polish is very sheer, so I decided to layer it over a white to make it pop.  I chose Julep Kate - a beautiful white shimmer - as the base.  As with all white polishes, it needed quite a few coats (3 I think, I lost track) before it was opaque.  I probably should have just stopped at 2.  Then I put 2 coats of Sal-Mon on top to get the depth of color I wanted.  

This is another really unique polish in my collection.  

Please excuse the white outline, my clean up brush went belly up at the beach and so I was forced to make due with an older one (my "good" one started leaking black paint off the brush and getting all over my nails!  #NailPolishProblems).  

Shade - this is the most color accurate of the final result:

Full Sun - it was not this light, but in the full sun it washed it out a good deal.

 Up close:  I love the distribution of the glitters.  I did this outside, so that is why it is so bubblelicious.  Completely user error!

2Chix Lacquers can be purchased through their Etsy Store.  For a limited time you can use the code GRAND10 to get 10% off your first order on Etsy!

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Aquanet is Charged Up!

Today I have a fantastical polish from Hot Mess Lacquers (the name alone is full of win) called Aquanet.  Being a child of the 80s, I'm deeply familiar with the brand Aquanet, the only hair spray able to allow my hair to defy gravity on a daily basis.

I started off with 2 coats of Orly Charged Up.  Now this was a mini and it blew.  I assume it was because it was a mini polish?  I don't know, but what a giant pita.  Streaky, hard to be opaque, etc.  If I had been home I would have gone with a different base, but I was limited to the polishes I brought with.

I put one coat of Aquanet over top (at least I think it was one, it may have been two, being a beach bum has fried my brain). What a beauty this baby is, look at those large squares and hexes.  It is suspended in a purple jelly base, but I wanted some underwear to conserve this beautiful polish.

I had no application issues with Aquanet.

I'm definitely a fan of Hot Mess Lacquers!  I plan on more of their polishes being part of my polish family very soon.

Close up!

Hot Mess Lacquers can be purchased at their Etsy store.  I have also seen a few of them on Copious! Orly can be purchased at Ulta or Sally Beauty Supply.

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Lannisters - The good (Tyrion), the bad (Jamie) and the ugly (Cersei/Tywin)

Today embarks the first of many of my "beach manicures", which is those I did while I was on my beach vacation with my kids.  I was lacking most of my stash and clean up tools.  

I let my kids pick out the polishes for these and they picked out Metametics Lannister Gold, a really cool orange jelly polish with various gold glitters suspended.

I think this one may have looked better with underwear (you know I'm not a fan of a VNL), but it was so unique and gorgeous, I loved it anyway.  Plus, this way you get to see the beauty of the polish by itself.

As with my other Metametics, it applied perfectly, no issues getting the glitters to distribute well.  It is really set apart from almost anything else in my collection.

Sun:

Shade:

Macro:

Speaking of the clan Lannister, can I profess my undying love for Game of Thrones?  I love it.  Tyrion is the absolute bomb in both the books and the show.  I love him so very much, I think what I love most of all is he is imperfectly perfect.  He is cast to perfection by the magnificent Peter Dinklage.  Jamie, who I have to admit is growing on me with his jaunt with Brianne of Tarth, is that perfect mix of bad boy who you think you can somehow "convert".  Cersei and Tywin, on the other hand, are assholes.  Although I will say both are also cast to perfection.  That scene where Cersei gets hammered during the battle of blackwater and lashes out at everyone?  Ouch.  

Having read the books I know that justice will come to one of the Lannisters but soon.  I can't freaking wait!  If you love Game of Thrones as much as I do I'd love to hear about it on the comments!

Metametics can be purchased at their Etsy Store. 

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Bottoms Up with Rum Runner

Today I have an amazing jelly polish - Aphrodite Lacquers Rum Runner.  This is a raspberry red jelly with multiple types of glitter suspended in the base.  

This is absolutely stunning on the nail.  It applied like a dream and you see two coats below with no underwear at all.  I loved the formula on this polish so much I bought two more from her.  If you love jelly based polishes, run to her Etsy store to pick them up!

Shade:

Sun:

Aphrodite Lacquers can be found at her Etsy store.

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Reserved Party Girl Cuts Footloose

Today I have a two-fer for you.  The first is OPI DS Reserve.  Sigh.  I want to love this, but this color on me is crap.  It just blends in too much with my skin tone.  Not.a.fan.  The polish itself is very pretty though.  I have decided to send this baby off to a new home with someone who may appreciate her more.

Shade:

 Sun

Macro:

**Caution - Foot Photos Ahead**


For my toes I went with Deborah Lippmann Footloose (hahaha) with Candy Lacquer Party Girl on top.  It seemed beach bum appropriate.  Unlike its mate - Almost Paradise, Footloose was a great polish.

Candy Lacquer I'm over the moon for, great polish and easy wear to it.  I loved it!  My pedi application techniques suck, I know this, but I do the best I can!

Candy Lacquers can be purchased at their Etsy Shop.  OPI can be purchased at Ulta.  Deborah Lippmann can be purchased at HSN.com or Nordstrom.

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Cherry Blossom in Paradise

Sorry for the delay in blogging, I've been on vacation and haven't had time to get a post together!

Today I have a stunning polish to share - Amy's Nail Boutique Cherry Blossom over Deborah Lippmann Almost Paradise.

I knew I wanted to do a green base for this polish to really show off the softness and beauty in Cherry Blossom.  Cherry Blossom also imparts a stunning shimmer to the polish below.  

Sadly, Almost Paradise wasn't even close to paradise.  It was a disaster.  It went on streaky and chalky and this is three coats and it STILL had bald spots.  UGH.  But the finished product is pretty, so I guess that is all that matters.

Cherry Blossom, like all of Amy's Nail Boutique polishes, goes on like a dream.  It is very easy to get from bottle to nail.  Cherry Blossom is easy to spread along the nail and distribute the glitter.  It has several shades of pink and white hexes in a shimmery base.  I loved this.  I can see this working over lots of different bases (I want to try red next)!  I finished it off with my standard glitter topping top coats - 1 coat of Seche Vite and 1 coat of Nails, Inc Kensington Caviar.

Full Sun:

Shade:

Argh, ignore the stupid bubbles.  I think those were from Seche.

Macro to show off the shimmer:

Amy's Nail Boutique polishes can be purchased at her Etsy store.  The entire floral inspired line is absolutely stunning!  

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Hard as Granite

Today's post is another one of my new swapping babies - NailVenturous Granite.  I had never even seen this one much at her Etsy store, so when it was offered up to me, I jumped on it.

What you see below is 2 thick coats of Granite by itself, followed by one coat of Seche Vite.

As with all of the NVL, it went on like a dream.  The copper hexes didn't always want to come out and play, but I honestly didn't want to fish too much for it because I liked it was sporadic.  I was impressed with the coverage on the nail.

Sun:

Macro Shot:

 

And for fun, the colors in this semi-match the colors in my granite counter tops (obviously I had more cleaning up to do)!  

 

 The only place you can get NailVenturous lacquers is Ninja Polish and they only have a select few available. 


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High Functioning Sociopath

Today's swatches are from the great new indie company called Metametics.  I was drawn to them because of their Game of Thrones themed polishes and I saw this beauty and I KNEW I had to own it!

Here you see two coats of Metametics High Functioning Sociopath.  A deep blue jelly with square and hex glitters.  It is so deep and rich!

I was easily able to get polish from bottle to nail and it applied very easily and evenly.  I followed it up with one coat of Seche to lock in that amazing shine you see the photos.

I don't really feel that any of my photos do this justice because it was so much more in person, but it is fantastic.  If you are a blue polish lover, go run and pick this baby up!

Shade:

Sun:

Metametics polish can be purchased through their etsy store.




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The Liebster Awards!

Yesterday and today I was nominated by two others for a Liebster Award!  

Thank you so much to Jen @ the Polished Zombie and  Klutzy Hands at Klutzy Hands Nails!

My precccciiiiioooouuuuussssssssss.

The Liebster Award is for relatively new bloggers with less than 200 followers.  It is a great way to share the love and give some of the new bloggers on the block some recognition.

The rules are:

1. Each person must post 11 things about themselves.

2. Answer the questions that the tagger set for you plus create 11 questions for the people you've tagged.

3. Choose 11 people and link them in your post.

4. Go to their page and tell them.

5. No tag backs!!!


Soooo 11 things about me:

1. I swim in a sea of men, I have 4 older brothers (no sisters), 3 younger brothers-in-law (DH had no sisters), 7 nephews (only 1 niece) and 2 sons.  As such I'm ridiculously competitive and have a mouth like a damn sailor.

2. I have a weakness for tv shows about the supernatural.  Supernatural, Buffy, Angel, Teen Wolf (stop laughing), True Blood, Vampire Diaries, The Walking Dead, you name it, I loooooove it.  It is hard for me to hate a show about the supernaturals. And before you ask (Dean, Spike, Wesley, Scott, Eric, Damon and Darryl). 

3. Pre-nail polish my obsession was reading.  I've read about 175 books in the last 3 years.  (Mostly about the supernatural, naturally).  My favorites were the Divergent series, the Hunger Games, the Sookie Stackhouse books, Anna & the French Kiss, The Fault in Our Stars and probably 100 more so I'll just cut myself off here.  Yes, I like books written for 15 year old girls (and 10 year old boys because I love the Percy Jackson and Harry Potter series too!)

4. I am an Olympics whore and I watch it pretty much 24/7.  When I'm at work and can't watch it?  I check the live feeds all.day.long.

5. I am a soccer mom and damn proud of it.  My DH is the coach and my son amazes me every time I see him on the field. 

6. I am a former mathlete.  Yes, I competed in math competitions.  Feel free to point and laugh.  I have a BS in Mathematics.  I played lots of sports growing up too, but I've always had an inner math nerd that I was proud of. 

7. I love my old alma mater (University of Maryland at College Park - GO TERPS), so much that I recently contacted the amazing ladies at F4 to make me a custom polish named "Maryland Pride" so I can wear it to the games.  It is red, white and yellow glitters in a clear base to be worn over black.  The MD flag is so freaking tacky and yet I'm unbelievably psyched to show my Maryland Pride at games.  F4 rules!

8.I have over 600 nail polishes.  O - M - G.  When did this happen?  How did this happen.  Houston, I have a freaking problem.

9. No one cries alone in my presence, ever.

10. I'm a published author in several scientific journals and I've been acknowledged in about 30 papers and one book.   I love it when in the NP community people say "I mean come on, it is just nail polish, devote your energy into curing cancer" because then I can come back and say that is what I do all day every day, so clearly I'm free to bitch about whatever I want.

11. I really love so many of the wonderful ladies I've met in this community and I'm really proud to be a part of it!

The 11 questions I received (well 22, since I got 2 sets)

From Polished Zombie (Jen).

1. Who?  Me?

2. What? you talkin about Willis.

3. When?  A long time ago in a galaxy far far away.

4. Where?  Here, There and Everywhere (my wedding song)

5. Why?  Because we like you.

6. What is your silliest, most irrational fear?  Spiders.  So much so that once I wandered into a bathroom on a camp ground and it was COVERED in them and I freaked out so much an adult had to come in and get me.  *shudders*

7. What drives you?  My children, my reasons for everything.

8. So the zombie apocalypes is upon us.  I, being me, am their zombie queen.  Would you shoot me or let me unlive, seeing as I'm totally cognizant zombie and have no interest in eating you.  I'd shoot you faster than Rick shots little girls in the head.  Sorry, love, the queen dies and the hive falls apart.

9. What gives you peace?  My children's laughter, my husband's smile, floating in the pool, booze and lots of it.

10. If your life was, or could be a movie, which one and why?  Can't Hardly Wait was so much like my high school.  No comment on which character I'd have been.

11. Toilet paper roll, over or under?  This is not even a question.  OVER.

From Klutzy Hands.

1. What started your nail polish obsession?  I had a friend always posting pics on Facebook.  Then I found the Polished Perfectionist blog and she had a nail clean up tutorial.  I tried it and managed to give myself a halfway decent manicure.  Next thing I know I have 600 polishes and a nail blog.

2. What is the manicure you are most proud of and post a picture of it please.  This one, that I did for the CG Safari collection.  

3. What mythical creature do you must identify with, and why?  Vampires.  I've always loved vampires ever since my older brother handed me a book from Anne Rice.  Why I connect with them?  I have no idea, probably the whole dark brooding thing.

4. What did you want to be when you were a kid?  A doctor. 

5. If you had to give up one of the five senses, which one would you give up and why?  Taste.  Maybe I'd be thin.

6. What song would you choose to sing at Karaoke?  We Found Love by Rihanna, just so I could go nuts at the chorus.

7. If you could jump into a movie or a book, where would you go?  I'd go to True Blood and shag Eric Northman like there was no tomorrow.

8. What is your superpower?  Snarkasm.

9. What tatoo do you have or which you could get?  Have none, want none.  It just isn't me.

10. What is your favorite tongue twister?  "Sunshine City" (repeated multiple times), how else are you going to get your sweet and innocent friends to say shitty?

11. What supposedly cute thing do you find very creepy?  Ventriloquist dummies or clown dolls.  I could never EVER sleep with one of those in the house for fear they will come alive and kill me in my sleep.

My 11 Questions:
1. If money were no object and you could get any polish from all of time and space, which one would it be?
2. What do you like most about this community?
3. What was the last book you read?
4. Kill, Fuck, Marry - hot supernatural TV show stars edition - Damon Salvatore (Vampire Diaries), Eric Northman (True Blood), Dean Winchester (Supernatural)?
5. Which alternative supernatural reality would you most want to live in out of the following and why?  True Blood, Walking Dead, Supernatural, Vampire Diaries?  Which would you want to live in the least?
6. Apple products - yeah or nay?
7. Where do you purchase most of your polishes?
8. What color are your eyes?
9. If you could only read one nail blog for the rest of time, which would it be?
10.  Favorite polish maker?
11. Favorite quote?

tagging other bloggers (in no specific order!)

1. http://www.narcissisticnails.com/

2. http://meimeisignatures.blogspot.com/

3. http://legallynailed.blogspot.com/

4. http://rubysnails.blogspot.com/

5. http://nailpolishlane.blogspot.com.es/

6. http://crazynaillady.blogspot.com/

7. http://www.polishpixelle.com/

8. http://liesllovesprettythings.blogspot.com/ 

9. http://lacquertracker.blogspot.com/

10. http://jolienskingdomofpolish.blogspot.com/

11. http://nailpron.blogspot.com/

Gah, that was exhausting!

Dazzling Sapphire

I participated in a swap recently and in my box of goodies was this beauty - OPI DS Sapphire.  I've wanted this one above all others because sapphire is my birthstone and I've always loved it.

This is two coats of DS Sapphire on the nail, it covers very well and the holo effect is nothing short of spectacular!

It is a subtle, soft blue, but I love it for a nice understated manicure that is work safe, but still outstandingly beautiful!

OPI can be purchased at ULTA.


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