Sally Girl Being Discontinued?

So it appears that spring has come back around again. No more Winter in April please!

This is actually a polish I wore around Easter but didn't feel the need to post with the weather the way it was. This is Sally Girl, Zing a Ding. I was lucky enough to find this on clearance, which the rest of the Sally Girl products looked to be on as well. It looks as though they may be discontinuing this brand, anyone know for sure?

Zing A Ding, what a name by the way, is a pastel lavendar creme with various sizes of matte white glitter suspended within. The formula was creat and easy to apply needed two coats for full opacity.

I don't think I have actually ever purchased a Sally Girl polish before. There was once instance I purchased the glow-in-the dark topper because I needed to add an extra $1 to my purchase to get a coupon or free gift or something!

That being said, I decided to try this polish out since it was cheap and pretty. I'm actually pretty impressed, both with the quality and amount needed for a full mani, however I do prefer the old bottles which held more product (5.3ml/.18 fl oz, compared to the new bottles, 4ml/.13 fl oz). that being said if they happen to be discontinuing this line I will have a closer look at what is available during my next Sally's visit.

Confetti Snow!

I was inspired by the snow this past week for my current mani, I was thinking something soft and white. Sitting right there on my desk, in front of me at the time, was Funky Fingers Jawbreaker. Jawbreaker is a multi-glitter base up of various sizes suspended in a sheer milky base.

I layered Jawbreaker over a white base so I could get away with minimal coats for full coverage. My white base of choice is Sally Hansen Ghost, a basic white creme. It was not fully opaque in one coat but it gave me the base I needed. I then applied two coats of Jawbreaker over Ghost to add depth between the layers. The milky white base also made the shiny glitter appear softer, almost pastel in some cases. 

I cleaned up the cuticle area and added a topcoat to seal the glitter and add some shine. I am loving this look right now, white nails, anything but plain or boring!

Fra-gee-lay!

Today I have my Christmas eve/day mani to share with you. The last few days have flown by in a blur! I have been wanting to pull out I new Christmas glitter from last year, Funky Fingers Fra-gee-lay all of December but wanted to get the most out of a gel mani I was wearing. Once I decided what I wanted to layer beneath it I rushed to get it on my nails!

Fra-gee-lay is a glitter topper made in a clear base with shiny red and gold hexes of a few sizes and white matte hex glitter. I wanted to get all the glitter pieces to be visible on whatever base I used. I originally thought a plain would be a nice base but then the matte while glitter pieces would blend in. I then remembered a favorite holiday polish of mine, China Glaze, Frosty!

I layered one coat of Frosty over a thin layer of a standard white creme polish (Sally Hansen, Ghost) and then layered one coat of Fra-gee-lay overtop. It worked out perfectly! Frosty has a glassflecky shimmer and a slight ivory base which gave the subtle contrast to the matte white glitter I was looking for.

This was a super festive mani that I will now be removing today in favor of something a little more sparkly for New Years Eve!

Sprinkle Jelly Doughnut

...At least that's what my boyfriend called them! I kind of agree, I mean if they were super radioactive sprinkles or something.

I wanted to use my neon glitter toppers from China Glaze's Electric Nights collection before summer was over. I am hoping the bright glitter pigments do not bleed in to the base like the previous one I purchased, Point Me To The Party. To recreate the look of this polish, I layered Can I Get An Untz, Untz, with Let The Beat Drop. For the creamy "icing" base polish I used Essie Marshmallow.

So here is what happened, I applied two coats of Marshmallow to my nails, let them dry for a few minutes and blobbed on some glitter from each polish. The result looks great from afar.... however when a closer look is taken you can see a pink haze from Let The Beat Drop (Doh!) and BUBBLES, BUBBLES, everywhere!

The next day it drove me to the point of removal and reapplication! I know, crazy right? Not like me at all, but bubbles seriously annoy me! Can you see a difference below?

So, what did I do differently?

I applied slightly thinner layers of Marshmallow and allowed some extra dry time between coats. When applying the glitter to the nail I used a cosmetic sponge wedge to soak up excess base and get good coverage of glitter on the nail without adding extra polish. The result was much better!

The one thing that always bothers me about using cosmetic sponges in nail art is that for some reason it likes to attract dust. Does this happen to you too? Other than that I am pretty happy with the outcome of this look (finally). A little disappointed that Let The Beat Drop has started to bleed a bit in to the base, but I am happy I was able to remedy that with sponging on the glitter instead.

I really love these glitters and would suggest getting these two over Point Me To The Party. Not only do you get the same look of this polish when they are layered, but you can use them on their own as well! I think I want to try this over black next, I can see it making the neon glitter really pop.

Nail Fail

It may not appear to be a"nail fail" exactly, however I do pride myself on great photography and editing...

I wanted to do a simple mani refresh with Color club, Pardon My French and Bundle Monster plate BM-423. From afar it looks great, maybe even in the first two photos I have displayed as well.

I have a feeling it may have been the actual plate that threw me off with this one. The design may have been too deeply engraved and with the stamper being squished on top, it created the weird texture with in the design. You can see more clearly in the photo below.

Not the worst nail fail, but it still bothered me to the point of removal for a different Easter mani. I'll have the play around with different stamping polishes to make this pattern work because I really love it and want to get a nice clean image the next time I decide to try it out.

Have you had problems with this design as well?

Merry Easter!

Was anyone else's Easter reminiscent of Christmas morning? SNOW in April? When will this winter end! Luckily the weather was warm enough to melt the fluffy snow by the next day and the sun was shining brightly again Monday morning.

I wanted something light and bright for Easter so I chose China Glaze Dandy Lyin' Around. Little did I know it would also match the snow! Dandy Lyin' Around is a soft white crelly polish with a beautiful glass fleck shimmer that shines throughout. I used two coats in my photos below. It provided decent coverage at tow coats, however some people may be fore comfortable with three. It appears slightly more sheer in the photos than it does in real life.

I decided an accent nail of chevrons would be a great pattern for Easter. I chose a soft pink, Sally Hansen "Chrome Nail Makeup" in Amber Chrome. It's been a while since I have used my nail art plates or a chrome polish. I'm not sure if it was my lack of practice or the plate it's self but the pattern was not 100% opaque, it looked like it had a texture running throughout. Luckily it was not completely visible to anyone but me, However, in a test mani I tried out before this one it bothered me to the point of removal! That post to come next week.

For the accent nail I used Bundle Monster plate BM-423. I have to get back in to stamping, so much fun :) Maybe once my China Glaze Road Trip polishes arrive in the mail I will be inspired with some spring printed nails.

Mint Blizzard!

I saw Funky Fingers Elsa online late last year and knew I wanted it! Not for the movie reference, I have got to be the only person who has NOT seen Frozen at this point lol. Elsa is a pretty and delicate glitter made up of various shapes and sizes of matte white glitter and baby blue glitter with some white snowflake glitter scattered throughout. My mani was not lucky enough to get some of those snowflake glitters :(

I applied one generous coat to each nail trying my best to get the most glitter on each nail. I love the look but think I would get the specific effect I was going for had I layered it over a pale blue shade. Either way, the white glitter pieces are very blizzard like on nail.

Due to recent snowfalls last week I have been inspired for snowy and frosty nails. I am a little behind (again). I am hoping to have my Valentines themed mani up soon!

Happy Halloween ^_^

Happy Halloween!

I just love the whole month of October because to me it is basically a whole month centred around Halloween. I mean, who didn't love halloween as a child? Dress-up and free candy? I would be down for that every day of the year! 

It's funny though, ever since going vegan I have rethought a lot of my food choices and aside from the obvious (meat, dairy and eggs) I don't include white sugar or high fructose corn syrup in my life and if it's presented, I try to avoid it as much as possible. That being said I have still found so many fun ways to create delicious and healthy Halloween treats that I enjoy even more that my old favourites! So many things to love about Halloween, horror movies, PUMPKINS and of course, fun nails.

For Halloween I decided I wanted something classic, meaning black and orange. I used an unexpected favourite of mine from last year, China Glaze Bump in the Night. This is an opaque black textured polish. I love how it looks like dirt or asphalt. I applied this to my pinky and middle fingers. I did the reverse of this on my right hand.

To the rest of my fingers I applied 2-3 thin to medium coats of Maybelline Color Show in Dotty. Another unexpected favorite! My boyfriend talked me in to trying this one out. I told him I was going to leave it and he said, and I quote; " you can't leave it, it's so cool i'm going to get it for you". What a guy :)

In the bottle, Dotty looks like a rusty orange, but on the nail it is the perfect pumpkin orange. The orange jelly base is thin and the black and white matte glitter is dense. I had no issues with application, but I must warn you to be patient with application. I was getting impatient and decided to add thicker coats to a few nails, and although not very visible, it did cause some small bubbling to occur.

All and all I am super happy with this mani and my October. Lots of fun was had this month at haunted houses, watching scary movies, making awesome treats, hay rides and a pumpkin patch!

Fave Halloween Polishes 2014

Halloween is quickly approaching, I just can't wait for Friday! Today I  have a short list of my all time favorite Halloween themed polishes... this year anyways! Every October I go through my stash and go through all the Halloween shades I have. Here are some of the polishes I cannot get enough of in the month of October. For previous swatches of these polishes, click on the polish name in the title.

China Glaze Its Alive

A deep green jelly base saturated with bright lime green glitter in various sizes. The deeper base makes the glitter appear to be darker. Such a great shade, China Glaze has amazing green polishes for Halloween.

Sally Hansen Pumpkin Spice

The perfect Halloween shade must include orange and black! Pumpkin spice is made up of a murky black jelly base and coper orange glitter. At first I didn't see the hype over this polish, but I was in love the first time I wore it. And yes, I have two bottles, it's that awesome! I needs about three thin coats for full opacity, but it is well worth it for the final outcome.

Orly, Monster Mash

A slimy green jelly base jam packed with green and holo glitter of various sizes. This polish is so awesome! My favorite of Orly's Halloween collection from 2012. I actually layered this over It's Alive for Halloween in 2012!

China Glaze Boo-gie Down
This is the newest favorite to my list, I purchase it last year at the end of the Halloween season.
I just recently wore this as an accent in a Halloween themed mani last week. There is a lot going on in the bottle, matte black (various sized hex and bar glitter) and white glitters with a sprinkling of gold and copper hex glitter. Such a great mix for Halloween. I love it over a sheer nude, super classy, and the formula is awesome! Super easy to apply with great coverage as a topper at one coat.

What are your favorite colours and polishes to wear during the month of October?

Boo-gie Bats

Happy Friday! Halloween countdown: 1 week left! There is also only 1 week left to enter my Halloween giveaway here.

I finally pulled out my Bundle Monster holiday plates and created a simple but fun mani with a full nail bat design and Halloween themed glitter!

For this mani I used the following:

Base - Revlon Peach Nectar

Ring and thumb fingers - China Glaze Boo-gie Down

Bundle Monster plate - BM-H08

I applied two coats of Revlon, Peach Nectar over my base coat. Once that was dry I stamped some bats in black polish using Bundle Monster plate BM-H06 on three of my nails. For my ring finger and thumb nails I applied  a generous coat of China Glaze Boo-gie Down, a gorgeous mix of black, white, copper and gold glitters.

Boo-gie down is such an awesome glitter, I love it over the nude base. The colours remind me of sophisticated candy corn with yellow and orange replaced with shiny gold and copper. This is such a subtle and easy mani. I really love bold stamping over a nude base, especially when most nails are stamped, it's not so in your face or tacky.

DONT FORGET TO ENTER MY GIVEAWAY! It runs until the end of the month! You get to pick which set of nails files you like should you prefer a different colour

October = Halloween!

Halloween themed products came out WAY early this year (Halloween displays for polish, costumes and candy between July and August?!), but hey, I am soooo not complaining because it is one if my favorite times of the year. For the month of October I will be wearing Halloween themed polish and nail art!

To start off the month I have  a gorgeous "vampire" shade. I love neutral cremes! They are so sophisticated on the nail and act as a great base for nail art. Today I have OPI, My Vampire is Buff. This is the palest peach neutral I own.

I required two coats for full opacity, the first was a bit streaky but the second evened everything out nicely. The formula was easy to work with and didn't cause any problems during application.

Not really too much more to say about this shade, I guess I will let the photos speak for themselves today! My lamp light leans a bit on the yellow side so the polish does appear to be yellow based, however in person it has a slight hint of peach/pink which really remindeds me of pale vampire skin. I would have preferred it to wear a bit longer so I could do some nail art over top but it chipped after a few days unfortunately.

Marshmallow

If you recall from earlier in August, which has been is now a WHILE away, I had a pedi done of Funny Bunny on my toes. At that time I applied a similar shade to my fingers to match. In my opinion these are pretty much dupes of one another. 

Essie Marshmallow is a sheer and creamy white jelly shade. I love that this shade of white is a jelly, it softens it up a bit and doesn't appear as if I have white out on my nails... not that that is a bad thing, but sometime I just want something a bit softer. 

Marshmallow applied well. Since I applied it a while back I can't recall for certain whether I used two or three coats for full opacity. I do remember the formula was nice, I didn't run in to any issues there.

Funny Bunny

I have another fun pedicure!! I think I have gotten more pedicures this summer than I have ever! It figures, I get the opportunity to get so many pedicures and hardly get to show them off due to the weather. Luckyily the weather has been good lately, which is good because I have this great pedicure to show off!

Three coats of OPI Funny Bunny were applied to my toes for maximum coverage, plus I was offered some surprise nail art, yes please! Simple and elegant. The nail tech used OPI Lincoln Park After Dark and China Glaze Strike Up A Cosmo with a stripper brush. I love it! I don't think I have ever had pure white on my toes, but I love it. Funny Bunny has a jelly formula so it is softer than a straight up white creme polish.

Glitter Matters!

Happy Friday! I have a quick mani refresh today that I absolutely love. I layered an awesome matte glitter over my previous mani of Fresh Paint Guava.

Funky Fingers, Glitter Matters, is a densely paked glitter made up of various sized pink, yellow and white glitters. I find the yellow pieces of glitter have a slight opalescence to them in the sunlight that makes them appear golden against the coral base. It is pretty awesome.

I love the contrast between the bright coral base and the matte glitter pieces. I only needed one coat for the distribution of glitter I was happy with. I used a dabbing motion to help apply the glitter evenly to the nail, and swiped upwards to distribute it evenly.

A Hot Mess Indeed

Happy Friday!

Today I have my attempt at covering up OPI, I Theodora You from my last post. I have this awesome milky sheer jelly polish with iridescent glitter and irregularly shaped gold glitter pieces that I knew would look perfect over this pink jelly. I was hoping the milky white base in Wet n' Wild's  Mountain High (collaboration polish line with Fergie) would blend in well with the slight streakiness of I Theodora You.

I have tried out Mountain High on it's own but it it way to sheer unless you want total visible nail line. It is quite pretty on it's own, and I know some people can pull it off, but my nails are just brutal this winter, not good to look at au natural at the moment! Anyways, this is one of those glitters you really have to dab on the nail to get a good amount on the nail. So I blobbed on one coat for each nail, and I love the outcome!

Super girly and pretty and it covered up the imperfections from the base polish... That is until it started to bubble! No luck with I Theodora you this time, such a shame. At least I had a day with this look, the bubbles kind of mixed in with the glitter, but it just bothered me to the point of removal.

It was pretty while it lasted :)

One last note before the weekend, inspired by Mardi Gras and St. Patrick's day, for the Month of March I will be sporting green and purple on my nails exclusively. I am doing this on my own but if you'd like to join me let me know, I'd be happy to link your blog in my March posts if your are interested.