No H8!!

 

Here is my post in support of today.  I am home sick today, and this is not a current manicure, I pulled it from the archives.

For those of you who aren't familiar with the significance of Nov 8th and the purple manicures being posted in honor of it, Amanda from www.amandalandish.com created this message which I fully support:

Bullying is not funny.  It is not cool.  It is not right.  And more importantly, it is not okay.  

Most of us are thankfully residents of countries that support tolerance and many of our families have settled in these places simply for that reason.  Generations later, it is our responsibility to perpetuate that message of tolerance across our new social platforms, including the internet.

As members of the nail polish community, we all share a love of beauty, color, and lacquer.  Other than that, we are remarkably different: from our race to our religion to our hair color and even to our polish application techniques.  To look down on anyone because of those differences is completely unacceptable and today I take a stand against that.  I refuse to allow other people's view of "normal" dictate how I behave, believe, and blog.  

In solidarity with a multitude of bloggers linked below, my purple manicure represents my proud commitment to the No H8 movement.  Today, November 8, I dedicate my post  to ending bullying of any kind and to encouraging diversity and imperfection among our colorful community.

 

This manicure was done with essence a lovely secret as a base, and then Cult Nails Spontaneous sponged over topped and used as an accent on the ring finger, then a coat of NYC Starry Silver Glitter over top.

 Please note that Llarowe will be donating $2.00 of every purple polish sold on her site from 12am Thursday, November 8 through 12am Friday, November 9 to Pacer.org, an organization devoted to anti-bullying education.

If you or someone you know suffers from bullying, there is help.  Please visit the following sites for support and encouragement:

StopBullying.gov
Report Cyber Bullying
National Suicide Prevention Hotline - 800.273.TALK (8255)
Eradicate H8

Fall Inspired Mani ...

Howdy Polish Junkies!!

This was one of those manicures that never seemed satisfactory or finished, and ended up being one huge big fat FAIL!  It started off beautifully with Julep's Jodie and Felicity.  They are gorgeous and I should have just left them be the stars of their own show...have a look for yourself...

  

Jodie is a Berry color with gold shimmer, it is opaque in almost one coat, but I always apply two.  Felicity is a Gold Chrome and also is almost opaque in one coat, however I applied two.  

These colors go very well together, and now looking back at these pictures I should have maybe done some stamping with Jodie over Felicity, but NOPE... I had to ruin it by doing a saran technique (if you have a weak stomach or get squeamish by horrific sights, look away now)...

I thought maybe it might photograph better with the flash on...

But it's still ugly!!  I then tried to cover up the mess with Orly Flash Glam So-Go-Diva, which is a coppery brown chunky glitter which just made everything worse... I won't even offend you all by posting a picture...  it is a great polish and I hope to try it over a Robin's egg blue in the very near future.

Julep makes the best polishes and I should have known better to try and get all fancy with them!  I feel incredibly awful that I created such a mess with these polishes... I should be sent to Maven jail for committing such a horrendous nail polish crime... look at them, they look so innocent and sweet...

If you would like to become a Julep Maven and receive one of their Introductory boxes for a Penny, click HERE and take the quiz to find out what style you are and then and use the code PENNY at check out.  You won't be disappointed!  But if you are, you can cancel your subscription before the 24th day of the following month and not get charged a PENNY more :)  I don't think I have heard of anyone doing so. 

I promise to be back shortly with a much prettier mani.  Tell me about some of your epic fails ... I would love to know I am not alone in this!

Nail'd It Unique's Candy Corn

Well it's getting to that time of year where the furnace kicks in, blankets are brought out from the closet and stew's and soups are simmering on the stove!  In light of the new Season I decided to try and get in the spirit with a fabulous Fall inspired mani.

This is Nail'd It Unique Nail Polish's Candy Corn....

It really looks like Fall on your nails.  It consists of small glitzy copper glitter, white and black matte, larger orange and yellow glitter in shapes of bar, hex and round.  It also has larger white hex glitter and even bigger black dot glitter.  I'll stop talking and let the photos speak for themselves...

I layered Candy Corn over Quo by Orly Coffee & Cream...

This polish was so easy to apply, I didn't have to dig for glitter or try and strategically place it on the nail.  All Nail's It polishes are so amazing, and jam packed full or glitter!  You can keep apprised of all her restocks and shop announcements on her facebook page.

I will be doing more posts featuring more of her polishes... as soon as work slows down a bit.  I am a travel agent and this time of year motivates people to start thinking and planning their winter vacations! Its a great time of year for me, however, the realization of the looming winter that accompanies all the travel bookings isn't so great!  The joys of living in the Great White North!

Have any of you tried polishes by Nail'd It Unique?  If so, which is your favorite?

10 day nail art challenge Part Deux!

Erica's Nails and More's 10 Day Nail Art Challenge flew by!!!  Here are the remaining entries I submitted:

DayFive-Gradients:

I LOVE doing gradients, I do them all the time and I always get tons of compliments on them.  This was done using the paint directly onto the make-up sponge method.  I started with a base coat of Avon nailwear pro in Jade (2 coats) then I painted rows of Avon Jade, Daphne by Julep and Walk on Air by essence onto the sponge and lightly dabbed.  I repeated the process on each nail twice.  Then I topped it all off with NYC Starry Silver Glitter.

 

Day Six-dotticures:

The polishes used for this dotticure are:

Pink-Island Girl's Big Island Magic-its a gorgeous bubble gum pink
Brown-Jessica's Glamorous Gladiator-a medium brown with fine micro gold glitter (a perfect shade for fall)
White-Julep's Kate-my "go to" white shade.

  Day Seven-Flowers:

I used a dotting tool for the flowers, base color is NYC Times Square Tangerine Creme, yellow petals are Joe Fresh in Butter, the center is Jessica Glamorous Gladiator and I sponged Wet n wild Hallucination on the tips for some sparkle.

 Day Eight-Galaxy Nails:

The base is Finger Paints Where Art Renoir?, sponged with Color Club Take Me to Your Chateau and China Glaze Desert Sun. A dotting tool was used with white polish for 'close up' stars, and China Glaze Fairy Dust was strategically placed randomly for the millions of stars in our universe.  

Day Nine-French Tip Variant:

For this french tip variant I decided to honor my Husbands love for the New England Patriots.  I started with a base coat of just base coat and then sponged the tips.  Blue is done with China Glaze Dorothy Who? and then along the very tip I used Cult Nails Living Water.  The red is done with NYC Broadway Burgundy Frost and along the very tip is China Glaze Lubu Heels.  The white accent nail is Julep's Kate (of course) and the awesome glitter is Lacquer Conventions Mondrian. I then topped it all off with China Glaze Fairy Dust.  I know this is sort if in between a gradient and a french tip variant but I wanted to do something non-traditional.

 Day Ten-Recreate your favorite:

All good things must come to an end I suppose.  I decided to re-try a french tip variant for my last submission as I wasn't 100% happy with my original entry.  The polishes I used for this mani are Loreal's French Tip White (I thought it was appropriate), Julep's Daisy and Leah, and essence Walk on Air and Ultimate pink.  This was my first time doing a paint drip manicure.  I hope you like it! 

Erica is having a contest for Day 10 entries, and the one who gets the most votes will win a prize. Voting will start tomorrow, Tuesday September 25 and will be open until this coming Friday September 28th at 11:59PM EST.  The link to vote for my entry is HERE.  I hope you all will help me win!!  

I will most likely re-post the link in a fresh blog post and on my face book page daily.

Do you like entering Nail Art Challenges?  Erica will be hosting another one which I will post about as soon as I have the information.  She did a wonderful job hosting this one... I can't wait to see what she has in store for the next one!

First nail art Challenge Entries!

I have been MIA as of late... working 2 jobs and having the need to change my nails so often really takes a lot of time!  Below are my entries for Erica's Nails and more 10 day nail art challenge.  This is the criteria:





Day 1-Favorite Color 

...is sadly Black but my second is pinky/purple, so this is Quo by Orly Purple Daydream, and wet n wild black creme stamped over Julep's Kate.
 

Day 2-Favorite Animal

...is my dog Jersey, she's a reverse brindle boxer, however, I do not have the skills to create her on my nails so I have chosen my favorite animal print.  This was done with Arabella's Raspberry ice (its a brand a local salon uses and its great)-a rust shimmer, the white is Julep's Kate, and the leopard spots were done with Cult Nails Nevermore and Raspberry Ice. 

 Day 3-Favorite Season...

is the Christmas season, and in my house it runs from the 3rd week in November until the first week of January.  My color theme is red, white and silver...this manicure represents that and the stamped star looks just like my tree topper.  The Red polish is a local Hawaiian brand that I picked up in Honolulu last year called Island Girl and the name is Old Lahaina, and the shimmery/silvery white is CHI Ceramic Nail Lacquer's Snow Angels in Central Park (I needed 4 coats for this color to be opaque. I also added a red rhinestone in the center of the star.

And Today is Day 4-Saran Wrap

This was done with Julep's Leah as a base, 2 coats for opaqueness and then CHI Ceramic Nail Lacquer in Subway to Wall Street, a concrete grey creme color, was brushed on and a scrunched up ball of saran wrap was used in a dabbing method to remove some of the grey so the green shows through.  I love how it looks marbelized (yup, that's a new word I just created :)

 This really has been very fun so far... Everyday I look forward to heading over to Erica's blog to check out all the entries!  Head over there by clicking here, let me know what manicures you like and perhaps are inspired by to try on your own nails!

Ouch! Damn salad spinner! And Lacquer Convention!

I'm going to start this post with a picture....

Yup... that's my pinky on my left hand...the salad spinner got away from me and ripped off my nail way past the point they are suppose to be! Its very painful... and what's worse...it happened right before a nail art challenge is scheduled to begin! 

So I figured why not turn this situation from a negative to a positive.  Rather than being bummed out about  all the nail art I am no longer able to do, why not just swatch some polishes that have been burning a hole in the proverbial nail polish pocket (or to you fellow nail polish junkies... the helmer!)

This is Pop Tart from Lacquer Convention...

Pop Tart is a light white jelly with multi-colored, multi-sized round and hex glitter. It truly looks the top of a strawberry pop tart! 

Look at my poor pinky! :(

I love this polish... its a great "palate cleanser" after numerous nail art manicures... I like to think of if as a taupe/natural with a little bit of bling.

You can find Lacquer Convention on etsy by clicking HERE  Right now they are closed for some re-vamping, but keep an eye out for when they re-open... its a must have!!

Please send positive thoughts for my poor poor pinky...I am hopeful it will grow out in time for Erica's nails and more's challenge. 

How many nail art challenges are you taking part in right now?  Feel free to include pics!

High School Reunion Mani!!

Wow... where did that weekend go???  And it was a long weekend yet!

I had my 20th year high school reunion this weekend and it was definitely something to remember!  There wasn't an overwhelming turn out, but in terms of quality not quantity-it was a home run!  So in honor of our school colors-black and gold-here was the manicure I was sporting for the occasion!  (See what I did there! :))

I used the following polishes (in no particular order) Essie-as gold as it gets, Julep-Daisy, Pretty & Polished-Valentino, Cult Nails-Nevermore

Again, I didn't have a lot of time to take a lot of photos and by the end of the night I had some chipping on my nails... yup, it was that kind of reunion.  I can't remember the last time I had a tequila shooter!

 As always... click here to sign up to be a Julep maven and receive gorgeous nail lacquers delivered right to your door!  Use the code  COLOR2012 at check out and get your first intro box for one penny!

Also click here to purchase Cult Nails polishes and officially join the cult!  If you are looking for a one coat true black, then Nevermore is for you!  Also, click here to visit Pretty & Polished on etsy! The shop is closed at the moment but is scheduled to re-open on Sept 5th.

Hope you all had a great Labour Day long weekend!

Julep Daphne and Mila

Howdy fellow Polish Junkies!

This is just a quick post to share one of my top 5 Julep shades thus far.  Daphne is an amazing shade of blue.  When I first saw the polish bottle shots of the July It Girl Maven boxes I was over the moon about the sea foam green of Daphne.  However, when other It Girl's received their boxes there was a huge controversy about how muddy and more grey of a blue it was.  I was a little bummed out... until I received it!!  The pictures will speak for themselves...

This is Daphne with an accent nail of Julep's Mila... also from the July It Girl box.

 

Excuse the mess, this pic was taken prior to clean up.... I was running late for work, as usual... but I wanted to get some pics just in case I ruined my mani throughout the day.

Just like all Julep polishes, the formula is amazing and is almost opaque in one coat, but I always do 2, and then topped off with SV!

If you would like to join the Julep party and become a maven click HERE and use the code
COLOR2012 at check out and get your first intro box for one penny! Yup... 0.01 dollars!!  It truly will be the best decision you ever made!

Finally... a Manicure Post!!!

Morning fellow nail junkies!!

What better way to shake off the Monday Blah's than with a polish that brings back memories of riding your bike to the store with your friends, a dollar burning a hole in your pocket, just knowing all the candy you will be able to purchase with that buck!  I think I just totally aged myself .... but who cares...I'm old! There I said it :)

Now onto the nail mail I received a couple weeks ago which will help explain what I just described.....

 I have become a Indie polish stalker.  I wait on facebook for announcements of restocks and then I pounce!  When Chelsea from Pretty and Polished restocked her shop on etsy (you can shop for her goodies HERE) I just knew these 3 beauties would be mine....

The one I am referring to today is Jawbreaker!  It truly looks like those delicious jawbreakers we ate as kids!  Do they even still sell them?

This is one coat over Julep's Kate.   I think Jawbreaker would be opaque on its own after 3 coats, but I wanted to conserve as much as I could!

I forgot to take a pic of the second coat the day of the manicure, but I remembered before I removed the manicure.  So this is what it looks like with 2 coats.. excuse the wear on the tips...

Putting the second coat on masked some of the brighter glitters and gave it more of a muted chalky look which contributed to the jawbreaker feel of this polish.

I can't wait to try the other polishes!

If you haven't had a chance to check out Pretty & Polished yet, do so!  She does not have Jawbreaker in stock at the moment, but you can also follow her on facebook for updates on when she will be doing her next shop restock, click HERE for her FB page. Plus she is coming out with a pretty amazing Halloween line!

I really need to start using my actual camera rather than my iPhone... these pics are definitely not the greatest!

Enjoy your day!

Julep Haul!!

Good afternoon fellow polish junkies!

What a great start to the weekend! Well, in spite of having to clean the house and working!  I knew I was in for a treat when the Canada Post truck pulled up!  Look at what was delivered to me!!!

First up... the "It Girl" August Maven Box which includes Sienna, Harley and Melanie. For those of you who aren't yet a Julep Maven... the It Girl box comes with polish only, other beauty profiles will have 2 polishes and a beauty type product such as creams, mascara, polish remover etc etc.

You can also "add on" 2 additional colors from other profiles so I chose Kim, a Gunmetal grey metallic.

Now for the best deal of the century!  My August It Girl Mystery Box!  Hold on to your hat ... All this for $19.99!

The top row is base coat, fast dry top coat, and nail therapy base coat!
The bottom row is Hayden, Sasha, Sandra, Rachel, Jessica, Megan, Daphne, Leah, Diane, Mila and Oscar!

Sasha, Daphne, Leah and Mila are all dupes (duplicates) for me but there is a Facebook page called Julep Swap that allows you to swap your dupes with fellow Mavens for other shades you don't have already.

I was originally going to include individual pics of all the polishes but then realized it would be one lonnnnggg post!  If you would like to see a close up of any of the polishes let me know and I will add it.

If you are not a Julep Maven and would like to become one click on the link blow:

 http://julep.com/?r=21880223
 

I know I said my next post would include a mani... but I was just too excited not to share this Julep Nail Mail with you.  There will definitely be a manicure post tomorrow from some Nail Mail I received a couple days ago.

Until then... have a good day :)

PS. I just heard the mail carrier so I checked the mail box and there is a package from Cult Nails waiting for me! I will share those goodies at a later date.

Julep American Beauty Mystery Box!

Hope you all are having a good day thus far!

I came home from work to some exciting Nail Mail!  Tucked in between the outside door and inside door was my American Beauty Mystery box!  I did order 2, I am an "It Girl" so naturally I ordered that one, and a couple days later I felt the need to expand my horizons a little bit so I ordered a second one.  I have to admit, I was a little bummed out that my American Beauty box was delivered by standard mail... and therefore a smaller box...but then I thought about it a little and realized, I ordered my It Girl mystery box BEFORE my American Beauty box.... so could this mean its delayed because it is being delivered by parcel post???  Time will tell.  So without further adieu.. here is my American Beauty Mystery Box:

I know its hard to see... I took it with my iPhone...but inside is Amy, Pippa, Natalie and Glycolic Hand Scrub, Age Defying Hand Brightener, and Vanilla Mint lip balm.

Here are some closer photos of the polishes:

This is Pippa:

Natalie:

Amy:

I am so happy with the colors I received, none of them were dupes for me, and I desperately needed a nude shade in my collection that wasn't pink based!

I have grown to love Julep nail polishes, and the company itself.  They have such a unique subscription service!  If you are not familiar with Julep, click here to sign up to become a Julep "maven".  It truly is one of the best decisions I have made.  Its SO much better than getting a magazine in the mail!


If you need to read more about Julep's maven program, you can read about it here

Thanks for dropping in :)

Welcome!

Hello to all my fellow nail polish addicts!

Today is my very first post... I am extremely new to this blogging thing so I am sure there will be many learning curves, and many mistakes made along the way.  I welcome all of you to provide tips and tricks to help make this blog more interesting! 

Unfortunately my current manicure is at the end of its life... but if I don't start supper within the next 10 minutes, I will have a grumpy husband... and no one wants a grumpy husband.  So instead of a glossy picture of a brand new mani.... Meet Jersey :)  She comes everywhere with me, including work! 

I hope to have a mani post within the next couple days... and HOPEFULLY some nail mail to report about!

Thanks for dropping in :)

Jodi