Milani Dressmaker

Today I have pictures of Milani Dressmaker. I received this one in a swap with a wonderful Nail Boarder. This polish makes me want to eat a lot of mint, preferably chocolate and mint! It has a beautiful shimmer which my poor photography skills do not show. I have to get better with those skills or get a better camera. I am looking into both.

I had a great idea to try out the Hello Kitty Image plate from BornPrettyStore that was given to me as an extra in the swap. My vision was this beautiful mint green stamped with Hello Kitty who I would probably stamp in black then fill in her white and pink bow. Unfortunately I was either way too tired or the plate was way too uncooperative but I could not get her stamped in her entirety. I don't know if she is a ridiculously finicky feline or not because I gave up after about 20 attempts. I could either get the top half of her or just a tiny bit but never the entire design. I was quite annoyed by this point and decided on another design from one of my Shany plates. That design didn't want to cooperate either so I picked this fern like leafy design. WELL let me just tell you it was not a good night for stamping because as you can see in the pictures this one wasn't working well either. I was having a lot of trouble getting the entire image stamped. I ended up with my left hand stamped and gave up after my pinky finger on my right hand. I was using Catrice Run Forest Run for the stamping. The Pink on my ring finger was an Ulta color I had gotten on clearance but I have to check for the name.

The polish applied very streaky for me. You can see on the ring finger especially that I had some issues with streaking. This is what I got with three coats. I am not above doing three coats of polish but I get pretty impatient and doing another one wasn't going to happen. I left the streaks and intended on trying to cover it with the stamping but then that fiasco happened and I just gave up.

At least the stamping hides the streaks better on this hand.

This polish is a supposed to be a dupe for Chanel Jade. I only own one Chanel polish and that is because my cousin handed it down to me so I am not sure if it is a true dupe but they look pretty close. I have no problem spending money on good polish but I will not spend THAT much money on ANY polish. It would have to sing and dance and do my taxes if I was to ever pay that much for a single bottle of polish. And here I used to think OPI was pricey. I am somewhat the opposite of a brand snob. I will actually refuse to buy something like that because of the brand and the cost. I may miss out on the real Jade (I have only seen it in pictures) but I can buy even more polish when I buy the dupe instead.

That's all for now :)

Essence Metallics Iron Goddess

Happy Monday! I do not want to be back to work today. It was a long weekend jam packed with long hours and lots of excitement and those weekends always leave me feeling like I didn't have any down time. Is it Friday yet? hehe.

Over the weekend I was so busy I didn't have a chance to actually do my nails until late Saturday night. I was so exhausted and falling asleep but wanted to do something neat for Sunday's competition. The coolest thing I could think of to do was to try the Essence Metallics that I received in a swap from my friend in Holland. I had not tried this polish before as a full mani but I did get so excited to have them that I had done a couple nails to see how it worked.

I was so excited about the cool magnetic polish I made my brother let me try it on him (I already had my nails done but didn't want to play). My brother is easy like that and lets me try my polish on him unlike others of the male species who shall remain nameless *cough cough* my boyfriend *cough cough*. So as I am showing my brother and doing it completely wrong because I wasn't holding the manet close enough he comes up with the brilliant idea to get his super power magnet. Now, I have no idea why anyone would need to own a super power magnet but my brother would be the one who owns one. He grabs his magnet and I paint a nail and when he holds the magnet over the nail nothing happens. There was no pattern, nothing changed except a couple of bald spots appeared in the polish. We tried another nail and got the same result. I was completely baffled until he looked at his super magnet and realized the magnet was so strong that it pulled out all the magnetic particles from the polish on the nail. They were all stuck to his super magnet now and the nail was left with sploches. Then he couldn't get the particles off the magnet. That was my first experience with the magnetic nail polish.

This time I decided to use the magnet that came with it and though it took a couple of attempts I think I finally got the hang of it. All my nails look different and you will actually get to see both hands so I can show the different effects that I was able to make. The polish has great coverage and I used one coat on the thicker side. The polish was great, no streaks no problems. I used my usual basecoat routine but had to do the metallic polish one finger at a time. It dries and becomes uncooperative very quickly so speed needs to be on your side for this one.

I did my left hand first starting with my pinky. I actually had to do two coats on my pinky because I was not fast enough (it was the first nail I did) and it barely showed a pattern. I placed the magnet diagnoally over the nail for a few seconds to create the pattern. There are a couple nails like my middle finger where I actually held the magnet too close and touched the polish which of course caused a dent. I followed up with a coat of Seche Vite.

By the time I got to my right hand I got the hang of it a little more. I think I actually messed up my right hand more by touching the magnet to the polish more times. I redid three nails because I touched the magnet to it and messed up the polish so bad. Even trying the pinky twice I still did not do it right and there is barely a pattern on it. The one thing I did notice with my right hand was the longer you hover the magnet over the polish the darker the pattern becomes. I also noticed that whatever lighting/flash situation this picture was taken in gave me super lobster hands. I have no idea why they look like it but they really aren't that color in real life.

The Essence Magnetic polishes are really fun and give such a cool look to your nails. Essence is coming out with 5 new magnetic polishes and what looks to be a new magnet. I have read a lot of complaints about the magnet that was out with these polishes. I didn't notice too much of a problem with it other than the sides of some of my nails did not get much of a pattern. I think it has to do with the curve of your nails but I don't have any other magnetic polishes to compare magents. I love this polish and intend on trying one of the other two next. I can't wait to see the new ones.

Thats all for now :)

What's in your purse?

I am exhausted! It has been a long but successful and fun weekend. My brother competed in a robotics competition and I spent most of the past three days there. We were watching, supporting him and selling our chocolates there as well. It's been busy and I will probably have nightmares of giant chocolate robots attacking me for weeks. We just about sold out of all of our chocolates and my brother won the professional division of the competition so it was a great weekend. In case you are interested his robot is called Witchdoctor and the next two videos are from one of his matches. The other team accidentally hit the tap out button which paused the match and is the reason for two separate videos. Once they started the match the filming started again.

Now after lugging my purse and everything else around all weekend I realized it weighs two tons and I needed to clean it. I knew I had alot of nail related stuff in my purse but didn't realize how much until I actually cleaned it out. Since that credit card commercial that I constantly see on TV always asks what's in your wallet I figured I would instead answer what's in my purse. Aside from my camera, phone, wallet, pen and normal stuff I pulled out all of this stuff:

As you can see I had quite a bit of stuff in there! I still had the little brown bag which I emptied for the picture. So seven polishes, a franken and empty bottle, two cuticle oils, mango mend, cuticle cream, three lotions, two treatments, nail brush, two files, three little embellishment containers and three cotton balls later there is no question as to why my purse weighs so much. I decided there was no way I could continue carrying this much stuff around. I narrowed it down to just a few items but I am pretty sure if you check back with me in a week or so it is going to be just as full as it was when I took this picture. I might need to think about a smaller purse. hehe.

That's all for now :)



BB Couture Caterpillar

Today I have a picture from the archives. I spent Friday and Saturday at the Bots IQ National Competition selling chocolates and watching robots attempt to destroy one another. (I will post more on that tomorrow though) Its been a long weekend and I am super exhausted but wanted to get something posted. All the chocolate and running around took a toll on my nails since all I had on was a treatment today. Once again one of them has decided it wants to split across the nail well below the white so we will see if the Orly Nail Rescue wants to work for me this time.

This polish was the first BB Couture that I have tried. I love the color and shimmer.

Ah the joys of Macro. As you can see my application around the cuticles is lacking. I am not sure if it was the cleanup or the actual application but thank you Macro for pointing that one out! Luckily it did not look THAT bad in person. Geesh.

I had bought the little green stars and thought they would work with Catepillar. I think they added a nice touch though they were very rigid and didn't last very long. The stars were apparently falling that day because they kept getting stuck on things and eventually lifted to the point where I could not stand it anymore and had to remove them. I think I might try again trying a different technique to get them on there. Hopefully that helps.

Unfortunately my computer is not cooperating with me today and I am completely exhausted otherwise there would be more pictures attached. Tomorrow will definitely be a less busy day so the post will be better :)

Thats all for now :)

Catrice Run Forest Run

I received this polish in a swap from a MUAer and friend in Holland. Since Catrice is a foreign brand and sadly one I had not heard of until the Nail Board I had never tried it. She sent me a few of their polishes and I am so happy she did because they are awesome! They apply very smoothly and the color and shine is amazing.

Run Forest Run is a deep green that looks so creamy and dreamy on the nail. I kept looking at it while I sat at my keyboard typing.

In the direct sun. It was so bright and the reflections on the polish made me think there were some issues with my application when I saw the macroness of these pictures. Most of it is just reflection I think.

Partial sun

In the shade. It is so dark and pretty in the shade. More reflections making me think my skills are even worse then they already are.

It covered great and the only flaws you may see in the polish are from my application skills and not the polish itself. My Seche Vite top coat was a little thick and instead of thinning it I used it anyway so I got two bubbles that I know of, duh for me.

I was too lazy to completely change my polish and I had gotten an idea for an Irish/Celtic theme during the day so I wanted to attempt some nail art over this green. Did I mention I love the color? Unfortunately I couldn't find what I wanted in the way of designs and it was too late to do too much experiementing so I came up with this. I used Milani 3D Holographic in 3D for the fauxnad design. Unfortunately I got a small break/chip on my index finger before I was able to take the pictures.

Three fingers is better than none though. I am sure the neigbors think I am weird since I am always taking pictures on my steering wheel.

Thats all for now :)

Franken FAIL!

Yesterday morning I stopped by a little dusty type beauty supply place that I went to years ago when I was in high school. They used to have the biggest selection of cheap nail polish in every color and type known to man, or more accurately to me. About a month or so ago I had looked up online where to locally buy some Konad stuff and found they were on the list and made a bee line over there. I was happy to see that in the past 10+ years that I haven't been there they have gotten even more stuff. I couldn't help but pick up a few things when a Franken idea hit me.

As soon as I saw these hearts...

And these flake pieces ...

And Orly Fifty Four it was on!

I have Stars that are similar to the hearts that I tried using by placing them on top of nail polish then covering with top coat. That worked well enough but they are so rigid and stuck up so much that they would catch on things and started to lift. They didn't last very long so I figured that putting them IN the nail polish might soften them a little and make them friendlier. Unfortunately not so much.

As you can see I took the picture of Fifty Four after I poured some into another bottle for frankening. I added the hearts and flake things with high hopes. I know Fifty Four is so sheer I had planned on adding some pink to it to darken the base a little but I was at work and everything else is at home. This is what it looked like soon after the mixing.

Its hard to see but the flake things and the hearts and the shimmer oh my. I was excited already. Unfortunately that lasted all of an hour. When I checked on the polish I noticed the hearts and flakes started to loose their color. Some of them were faded out and others were completely iridescently clear. NOT GOOD! The color of the polish was a little darker though. I checked on it later and the situation was worsening. I figured ok, clear hearts are cool and the flakes can be clear no problem. UM...PROBLEM! When I attempted to put some on the nail the hearts crumpled in a gooey mess. The polish didn't just discolor the hearts it melted them. As my son would say EPIC FAIL!

You can see some of the clear hearts in the top picture. It looks really pretty but only in the bottle. In my mind it was beautiful though. The funny part about the whole thing is I don't really like pink, at all, but I was very excited about this.

On a happier note this is the rest of the mini haul:

 Cute little flowers

 Oh I saw this on the back of the rack but imagine all the gold sitting at the bottom of the bottle. I was curious so I picked it up and shook it and OH MY

 Look at all the glittery goodness! I love it!

 I bought this for myself last time I was there and picked this one up for a friend. Pretty purple hearts.

Got two of these for frankens. Unfortunately it has all that writing on the bottle which annoys me. I must figure out how to get it off!

 I felt like I was leaving a liquor store when they put it in a little brown bag!

Better than Captain Morgan by far!

Thats all for now :)

The Beginning

To blog or not to blog has been the question I have been wrestling with for awhile now. Obviously to blog is the way that match went. I am excited to finally make an official place to store all my nail polish talk and pictures. Truth be told I am thinking my boyfriend is just as excited because he thinks this will end the polish madness he constantly hears about. Unfortunately for him and my son who both tire of the endless polish babble I doubt that is the case. 

I have always loved nail polish and can remember being very young and having little Tinkerbell Nail Polish. I never grew out of it though I have had a love/hate relationship with my nails my entire life. I love them and they love to hate me. When I was young I was quite a biter and my nails were not in good shape. I finally gave up on biting but my nails would not grow. I tried everything including fresh garlic in clear nail polish that left me prepared for any vampire strikes I might encounter but alone because I always reeked of garlic. The friend who suggested that idea to me was not very excited when I actually tried it. My nails were not impressed and maintained their growth strike.

I have pretty much followed the same cycle with my nails until recently. I would do everything I could think of to stimulate nail growth and get excited when they started to grow alittle. I would paint them and buy polish after polish until very shortly after they would break. After trying and trying I would get upset and give up. I attempted those glue on nails for awhile because it offered me nails and a great canvas for nail art which I loved. Unfortunately for my nails I also had no patience and ripped those babies and several layers of nail off when it was time to change them. I have twice accrued glorious, wonderful collections only to get mad at my nails and give up. I always ended up purging my entire collection to random people and kicking myself in the rear later when I hopped back on the polish bandwagon. I am still kicking because I KNOW I had some good stuff back then.

These days my collection is taking on rabbit form and multiplying like a Gremlin in the ocean. I still have problems with my weak, peeling, non cooperative nails but I no longer care. They will be polished no matter what the length. I am also a peeler. I can't help it, if the polish chips I have the overwhelming desire to peel the polish off. It is not good for my nails and I know this but I can not help but do it. I am hoping to use this blog to help discourage me from that bad nail behavior.

Ok, enough of my rambling! I have tons of polish that I will be posting about and I love to Konad and do other nail art so that will be posted here too. I want to keep a record of the colors I try and the things that work and do not work and this is the place. I won't buy every new collection and probably won't purchase the whole collections but I will get the things that appeal to me.

I have so many exciting ideas to post about. Coming up will be my first real franken that will either be really pretty or really really really awful. I am hoping for the pretty. I will also have pictures that actually go along with the post but since this was one of those I am jumping in blindfolded and hoping there are no rocks below moments I didn't come prepared. Luckily I still have some pics I can share.

One of my favorite polishes China Glaze Atlantis in a gradient over Barielle Coalest Day of the year.

Wet N Wild's new Fast Dry polish in 9.0.2.1.0range with Piggy Polish Shake your Blue-ty Konaded over it.

Thats all for now :)