You're Just Like a Dream

Today I am featuring Lush Lacquer Dreamsicle, a beautiful shimmery baby blue polish jammed backed with shimmery flakies, bar glitter, light blue hex glitter, micro glitter and some holo glitter too!

I was surprised that it was completely opaque in only 2 coats, usually such a light color wouldn't be.  Each time I shift my hand a different way and it catches the light?  I sigh.  It is so pretty and delicate.  So shimmery and unique.  I own nothing like this in my collection.

I felt the shade photos really showed off more of the polish than the sun photos.

My cuticles are a freaking disaster and will probably remain this way throughout the summer due to being constantly in the pool with my boys.  Forgive me!  

Here is the shade:

 

Here is it in the sun:

You can purchase Lush Lacquer through her Etsy Shop.

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It's Play Time!

Today I share with you the gorgeous Dandy Nails Come Out and Play.  This is three coats, I could have done 2, but I really wanted to bring out the depth of the jelly base, so I went for three.  I absolutely loved this formula.  I went perfectly on the nail, was very controlled (i.e. very little clean up!) and is this beautiful jelly base with white glitter.  I got tons of compliments on it when I wore it. 

It dried a little dull, but a layer of Essie Good to Go shined it up perfectly.  I really loved this manicure! It quickly jumped to the top of some of my favorite manis (especially since it was a dream to apply and looked fantastic on). 

I think that dark spot in the middle of my ring finger was an errant piece of dark glitter, not sure if it was in the bottle or I somehow had it on my tools and it came onto the nail, but it also happened on the other hand.

Sorry for no bottle shot.  I had put it away and just grabbed the first thing close by to take the photos in the sun!
 

These are in the sun:

 This is in the shade so you can see the depth of color here!

You can purchase Dandy Nails through her Etsy Store!  (And I recommend you do when she re-stocks, I've been very pleased with the polishes I have purchased from her!!)


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Dazzling

Well, my beautiful Lynderella manicure was not meant to be, as it started peeling off in sheets the day of the big event!  Which, let me say, is quite embarrassing when you are putting out food and next thing you know, oh look, there is my entire nail of nail polish right there on the table all shiny and blue.  That's me, always classy...   

Today I went with two coats of Girly Bits Razzle Dazzle. It dries matte, but a nice layer of top coat had her all prettied up and ready for her debut!

Let me tell you, dazzling is the perfect name for it.  It just sparkles under the lights.  It is one of those you keep looking down and smiling at your nails.  It reminds me of why I like having my nails polished in the first place.  It makes me happy.  It makes me feel better about myself in some small way.

I've already gotten a lot of compliments on my nails today, so this is definitely a winner!

Look at the sparkle in the sun!  (Warning picture spam ahead!)

This is Razzle Dazzle in the shade, still very pretty!  You can see all of the colors that show up in it here.

Girly Bits can be purchased through her big cartel store or Llarowe.

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Baby Blues

This manicure is in honor of my baby boy - he is graduating preschool tomorrow! 

His favorite color is blue, so I lined up all of my blue polishes and told him he could pick any of them.  He chose  Lynnderella Mlle. Violette de Blue immediately - my boy has taste!

I was lucky enough to snag this during the last online sale at Llarowe and I was really excited to finally see if the hype of Lynnderella lived up to my expectations.

It did.

I started out with one coat of OPI Ink.  This is more of a purple-blue, but I thought it would go well with the multi shades in Violette.  I put two coats of Mlle. Violette de Blue on top.

Now, if Sticks and Stones was what I referred to as a hungry bastard?  Violette is a ravenous bitch.  Seriously.  This baby has THREE top coats on it (1 coat SV and 2 coats Essie Good To Go) and you can still feel the bumps.  But who cares.  That bitch can eat however much top coat she wants because she is gorgeous. 

I can't stop staring at my nails.  They are like glass they are so shiny.  The photos lean more blue than this looks.  I'm staring down at them under the fluorescent light in the office and they look much more blurple.  And shiny.  And oooh pretty.

 
Lynnderella can only be purchased through Llarowe.  She will be taking wish lists again in mid-to-late June.  She also has stated that there will be some stock put online periodically.  Hear that sound?  That is my wallet openly weeping because I know I'm going to want a lot more of these polishes after this.

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We've Got Spirit Yes We Do!

Today is yet another black/red combo in honor of my son's spirit day at school.  If you have never been blessed to be in a gym with 550 children screaming at the top of their lungs, consider yourself lucky.  My ears are still ringing!  The things you do for love!

I chose to use a England Camelot as the base.  This is THE most perfect black.  One coat, smooth, shiny, pure perfection.  I need to buy 2 more the next time I make a purchase at Llarowe I love this polish so very much.  Then I put one coat of Nostalgic Lacquer Angela on top.  Angela is named after the lead character on My So Called Life and it is evocative of the "crimson glow" hair dye she used in the first episode to remake herself.  Sort of like a pheonix rising from the ashes that used to be her dull life.

Angela had a really great mix of glitter, orange mini hexes, red squares, purple thrown in there.  It was really specatacular in the sun.

My nails got trashed pretty quickly decorating my boy for spirit day.  I spray painted his hair red and black, which caused it to stick to my cuticles worse than glitter.  But this mani was too pretty not to share!  I think it would be better over an orangey-red, but I needed red and black and I was running out of combos!

As an added bonus, I painted my son's nails red and black.  I used a England Camelot and Orly Sweetheart.  I used Hard Candy Matte-ly in Love to matte them so they dried quicker.  He was so excited to have painted nails!  There were 2 other 3rd graders (another boy and a girl) who had the same combo and the other kids in the class were so jealous so they proceeded to paint their nails with magic marker!  <3  My son is a nail biter, so his nails are a MESS and it was hard to do.  (And this is why I spared you of the horror that would have been a close up.) Part of me wishes I could paint them more often as a deterrent to bite them, but his school does not allow nail polish (for either gender).

You can purchase Nostalgic Lacquers at her online store,  a England can be purchased at Llarowe, Orly can be purchased at Sally Beauty Supply or Ulta and Hard Candy can be purchased at Wal*Mart.

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Neato Mojito

I was in Target the other day and I spotted this lovely about 20 paces away and I knew I HAD to have it - Essie Mojito Madness.  It was on an end cap display and I hadn't seen it before anywhere (I've been neglecting blog reading lately, too much going on at home!).

The color just popped for me.  I imagine the name came from this color being lime green, but it is lighter than a lime.  Mojitos aren't this color either, I should know, I practically had an IV hooked up to my arm when we were in Miami last year of mojitos!

Speaking of which -

Dear Mid-Atlantic Region,

  Learn how to be make a descent mojito.  I'm still having withdrawal from not having a good one in almost a year.

Regards,
Shannon.

I also purchased a huge lemming of mine during the last Ninja Polish sale, Cover Band Sticks and Stones.  This is a very well known rip off of Lynderella Connect the Dots.  I believe there are some differences (I think CtD has more small glitter bits maybe?  Side by side you can tell they are different), but I won't be able to get my hands on CtD until probably July at the earliest, so desperate times call for desperate measures.   I will get CtD as well when the wish list rounds start up again at Llarowe.  Sticks and Stones is a hungry little bastard.  This has one coat of Seche Vite and one coat of Gelous and I can still fell the bumps.  Any more top coat and I know my mani would have been ruined, so I went with the bumps.  Next time I'll try 2 coats of Gelous. 

I have to say, I freaking love this combo.  I've been staring at my hands non-stop.  The green is the perfect background to Sticks and Stones and it really just pops.

I actually thought my right hand looked better (a first, believe me), it got a bigger set of the "big" glitters.  This is not a close up because let's just say the clean up on my right hand leaves something to be desired.

Essie polishes can be purchased at Ulta or Target.  Cover Band can be found at http://www.ninjapolish.com/ 

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Once Upon a Time

Once upon a time there was a woman walking through Nordstrom trying to figure out what to get the mothers in her life for Mother's Day.  She passed by the Deborah Lippmann display and thought to herself "Screw it, I'm going to buy MYSELF a gift too".  Now this woman has a husband who is fantastic in the gift giving department and she has no complaints on that end, ever, but she also knows he'd sooner stick a fork in his eye than drop $20.00 on a bottle of nail polish.

Sadly, his frugality has yet to rub off on his wife after 19 years of coupledom.  I think he has resigned himself to this being a lost cause at this point. 

In keeping with the fairy tale that is her life, she decided to purchase "Today Was a Fairy Tale".

As an aside on my fairy tale life - trust me on this, if Cinderella lived in a house with three men?  She would have ran away long before her prince ever arrived after cleaning the bathrooms on a regular basis.  That bitch had no idea how lucky she was to not have to be concerned about aim (or in reality, the complete lack thereof).  I used the following phrase (in a fit of despair) a few months ago "Why is it I am the only person who lives in this house who doesn't pee outside of the toilet and yet I'm the one always cleaning it up?"  This was greeted with the standard "That's Not FAIR!" response (from the king of course, the princes know better than to speak when mommy is cleaning the bathrooms).  

However, I have been blessed with many things from those three men in my life.  They have taught me how to love, how to be loved and how to enjoy life, which is why I can overlook such aim issues.  

I decided to celebrate Mother's Day with my present to myself.  I started off with 2 coats of OPI Light My Sapphire, a dark blue and then finished with 1 coat of Today Was a Fairy Tale.  As with all Deborah Lippmann polishes, it coated beautifully with a single stroke with a metric ton of glitter.  No fishing, no worries about coverage, perfection.  I regret picking such dark underwear and will try it with something lighter, but I got crazy amounts of complements on this though, so it was still a win in my book.

Deborah Lippmann can be purchased at Nordstrom or hsn.com.  OPI can be purchased at ULTA.

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A Quattro Mustang Mani

Another week, another black and red manicure to cheer on my favorite U9 boys soccer team!

I got my inspiration for this from Nail Polish Wars blog, she used 4 polishes for this amazing gradient that I loved.  Seriously, check out this blog, she has OUTSTANDING ideas.  I always use her ideas for inspiration.

So the colors I decided to use were 2 coats of HITS Ares - a red holo, then I sponged on of China Glaze Ruby Pumps - red sparkly goodness for the transition, then I painted on the tips in a sort of haphazard way HITS Zeus - a deep gray holo.  Then as she did I topped it with a coat of HITS Hefesto - a silver holo.

I tried sponging on Zeus, but it came out looking very light and so I went with the painting instead.  In hindsight, I should have only done one coat of Ares, because you can't see the transition between that and Ruby Pumps very well under the Hefesto.  I also think I should have stuck with sponging on the Zeus, it shows up darker under Hefesto than it did in person.  

All in all though, I kind of love it!

Final Product (I know, the cuticles, disaster).

2 coats of Ares (pre-clean up).

This is what it looked like before Hefesto came on, you can see the transition much better, I also love the way you can see the shimmer of Ruby Pumps through Zeus.  This may be another future Mustang Mani on its own. 

You can purchase HITS from Llarowe:  http://shop.llarowe.com/ be sure to check out the sale section because these are on sale quite often.  China Glaze can be found at Ulta and Sally Beauty Supply.

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The Promise

Sorry so long between posts.  We had a bit of drama at our home this weekend - baby boy took a header into some playground equipment that resulted in an ER visit and what looks similar to a unicorn horn protruding from between his eyes.  All is fine other than the bruising and the bump, no concussion!

I needed a soft and safe work manicure for a meeting so I decided to go with Girly Bits Promise Me, the February entry from the Calendar Girls Collection.

I went with this one because it made me think of my baby boy (who at 5 1/2 is no longer a baby).  The promise I made to his father, the promise I made to them the day they were born.  That I will love them, forever, with everything I have to give.  This has meant countless hours of sleepless nights cuddling with them and it doesn't matter how old they are, they are still my babies.

Sadly, Promise Me didn't live up to what I wanted it to.

I think baby pink just isn't my color first of all.

Second of all, the first time I put this on (3 coats of Promise Me over 1 base coat with a top coat)?  I was in carpool line and I was messing with my cuticles (stress reaction behavior for me).  Then next thing I know the entire nail polish came off in one clean sheet (nothing left behind on the nail).  WTF?  So then I tried it with the other nails.  ALL of them, same thing.  One perfect sheet.

So I don't even know why I decided to put this mani back on again, probably to get photos.  So this time I put the lovely Julep Penelope as underwear.  Penelope was great and two coats were all that was needed.  I've had some really good luck with Julep polishes.  Then I put on one coat of Promise Me on top.  This time it decided to stick.

The other thing I didn't care for with Promise Me is that the glitter seems to look "sunken" almost pock marky on the nail.  This wasn't nail fail on my part.

I don't know.  These nails were not my bag.

The shimmer is pretty, but it was hard to get a good photo of it:

Let me know what you think.

This is two coats of Penelope (pre-cleanup) on it's own (the other finger is up because I goofed that one on the way outside). 

You can purchase Girly Bits through Llarowe http://shop.llarowe.com or through her website http://girlybits.bigcartel.com/ .  You can purchase Julep through their website:  http://julep.com/?r=19795561 Following that link will earn me a referral point if you decide to join the Maven program.  The code SHAREONMAY will get you the first box for only $0.01!

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Glowy Hands of Fail

Another day, another nail fail.  Part of the territory I suppose.

I had such high hopes for this manicure in my head and to be fair, 3 out of 5 nails I was moderately happy with, but the others brought it down to where I gaze down at my nails in disgust.  

I started off with 3 coats Zoya Arizona as the base.  This is one of those polishes that after the first coat you feel a little sick to your stomach because it goes on SO poorly.  After 3 coats, it was very nice, but I think 3 coats for a creme for a middle end polish is a bit ridiculous. 

Then I did nail art with 2 polishes, Zoya Myrta, which I thought (incorrectly) was the "mate" to Arizona.  It isn't really, I don't like them together at all.  Then I also used NailVenturous Orange You Unique.

So for the pinky I painted one stripe of Orange You Unique down the middle.  I really like the look of this.

For the ring finger I did one coat of Orange You Unique, these two colors are pretty perfect together, so another win.  Fair warning though, try not to get the glitter on your cuticles as you need a sandblaster to get them off. 

Middle Finger of Fail  - Myrta and Arizona really aren't compatible.  You want them to be compatible, but they just aren't.  I did two horizontal stripes of Myrta and attempted to do a stripe of Orange in the middle to tie it all together, but my kid bumped the table and it went everywhere.  I couldn't be bothered to fix it because I knew it was coming off the next day.

Pointer Finger of Ultimate Disappointment - Sigh.  Originally I was going to stamp on this finger with Zoya Myrta.  Umm, no.  Too sheer.  So then I did a full nail of Myrta expecting to dot it.  So I got the dots of Arizona on and I just didn't love it, so I dotted with Orange You Unique inside of that, then I really didn't like that so I dotted with Myrta again.  It looks like this finger is diseased.  Not to mention you can see the dents in Myrta.  

Thumb - Dots of Myrta, I like this even though I think the two polishes are somewhat mismatched.

 

Next time I would dump Myrta and use the blue in Orange You Unique for the designs.  My cuticles are a disaster, I know, this is why this didn't come off right away.  My cry "step away from the acetone, Shannon" to me in my sleep.  

So potential, but just not realized.  I do love Orange You Unique though.  I have some ideas of ways to make this fun.  

If you were wondering, I got the term for the title from how some of my friends and I would discuss one of the plot elements that are in the TV show True Blood vs the books.  Sookie's "glowing hands of fail" was one of the plot devices only found on the show and for good reason (it sucked).   This manicure fit really well into this mindset, it had good intentions, but the execution of it was sorely lacking.

You can buy Zoya polishes at Ulta or http://www.zoya.com/  NailVenturous polishes can be purchased at her Etsy Store or Ninja Polish.

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Mustangs a Trois

Yet another Mustang Manicure - I refer my black and red manis as Mustang Manicures because that is the colors of my favorite U9 soccer team!

The name a Trois is fitting because I used Team Salvatore by Dollish Polish as the top coat.  This is a polish I had to buy simply because of my love for The Vampire Diaries and Damon Salvatore.  Since we are discussing Vampire Diaries, here is a little man candy and a stunning woman to put you in a good mood:

Well hello there Damon / Ian Sommerholder (image used from Entertainment Weekly)

Oops, I guess this name is a trois, so I should feature the other Salvatore brother, Stefan (aka the whiny bitch).  See?  Damon is the clear winner even in this photo.

There, now there is a little something for everyone - even those poor lost souls on Team Stefan. (images once again from Entertainment Weekly)

I've long since been a fan of vampire novels, and usually the books are FAR better than their TV show counterparts, Vampire Diaries is the biggest exception.  I could barely make it through book 1 and yet I'm hopelessly addicted to the series.  If you like vampire shows/books/movies or if you simply are a fan of good looking men, Vampire Diaries should be on your Must Watch List.

Oh wait, this is a manicure blog, sorry got carried away.

I started off with a single coat of China Glaze Stone Cold.  I didn't want black or red as the base since I wanted to show off those colors in the glitter, so I went with a dark grey.  You still can't see the black as well as I'd like, but I do love how these two came together.

I put one coat of Team Salvatore on top, I had to fish around to get the red glitter out of the bottle (and onto the nail) a bit, but it wasn't that difficult and as you can see it is a nice spread on the nail.  One coat was perfect in the distribution of the glitter goodness.

Here is one coat of Stone Cold prior to clean up, this had fantastic coverage and was so easy to put on the nail, a great polish from the fantastic Hunger Games collection (yet another collection I had to own because of the name).

You can purchase Dollish Polish from her online store:  http://dollishpolish.bigcartel.com/  China Glaze can be purchased at Sally Beauty Supply or Ulta.

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Girls Night Out with Rayanne

Thursday night was girls night, so I picked the pretty purple Rayanne from Nostalgic Lacquer.  Rayanne was inspired by the character Rayanne Graff from My So Called Life.  In the show, Rayanne is that fun, crazy friend you wish you could be more like without the whole alcoholic boyfriend stealer thing she has going on.  She is the friend who lightens you and makes you smile.  The fun purply goodness of this polish captures the character's free spirit very well.

I started off with 1 coat of China Glaze Spontaneous as a base.  Then I applied 2 coats of Rayanne.  Rayanne dries a bit satiny, but a good coat of Seche Vite (which you need to put over this hungry glitter) shined it up perfectly.

This is one coat of Spontaneous (pre-clean up, forgive the cuticle pool and mess), it would need 2 coats to wear on its own, but since I knew I was layering, one worked out just fine.  This was taken indoors with a flash, but this turned out to be fairly color accurate.

You can purchase Nostalgic Lacquers through her web site:  http://nostalgicnaillacquer.com/  She is currently sold out, but keep an eye on her FB page to find out when she opens back up!  China Glaze can be found at Ulta and Sally Beauty Supply.

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Up With A Warm, Electrifying Howl

Here is yet another one of my "keep throwing polish on it" manicures.

Day 1:  Applied 2 coats of Spa Ritual Howl.  After the first coat I thought this was going to be a disaster because the brush was stiff and the streaks were insane, but after 2 it really came out nicely.  What was disappointing is how little of that shimmer showed up on the nail.  It is a nice deep brown, sure, but it wasn't what I was expecting.

Howl on its own.  See all that shimmer in the bottle?  No where to be found on the nail.

Day 2:  Applied 1 coat of OPI Warm and Fozzie on top.  This is such a fun polish with so many pretty shimmers.  I was lucky enough to score this polish from the lovely Michelle from http://www.thingsiloveatthemoment.blogspot.com/ during her blog sale.

These show a good bit of the color shift on the nail with Warm and Fozzie on top of Howl.

Day 3:  I really did love the manicure, but I was getting ready to take it off because I had a girls night to attend and I wanted to do a different mani, but earlier in the day I had thought how much the colors in Warm and Fozzie reminded me of China Glaze Electrify, so I sponged some on the tips to see how it would look.

Day 3b:  This was a big bowl of meh so I added one coat of UP Viagem a 2 Flakie, which really changed the look of Warm and Fozzie, I need to try these two together next time.

What do you think?  Which day is your favorite?

Spa Ritual can be purchased at Apothica here: http://apothica.com/ .  OPI can be found at Ulta and various etailers.  China Glaze can be purchased at Sally Beauty Supply or Ulta.   UP Colors can be found at Llarowe:  http://shop.llarowe.com/

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