Sally Hansen Triple Shine

Hey guys,

So I totally lied about keeping this blog updated, I am a total fail sorry!  I guess I will just post when I feel like it at this point... Anyways I picked up two of the new Sally Hansen Triple Shine polishes yesterday and I knew I had to post about them.  I grabbed Wavy Blue and Hypnautical.  The colors in this collection all look super awesome, there were some glitters that I will definitely be going back for soon but I wanted to see how I liked them first.  Wavy Blue is a pretty blue with a slight purple shift it has like really micro glitter in it, it is almost looks like a foil but I wouldn't call it that.  Hypnautical is a blue to green shifting glitter with blue to green shifting Mylar shards in it.  I got this one because it is seriously a gorgeous polish but I was worried the shads were going to stick up and that it was going to be awful to work with.  To my surprise the shards are thin and lay really flat to the nail!  I am so happy about this I have had horrible experience with these kind of polishes before.  Also I apoligize for the not so great pics these bottles are super awkward to hold and I am out of practice with my nail posing haha.

Wavy Blue on its own

Hypnautical over Wavy Blue

Hypnautical is really hard to capture it is really glowy in real life!

Mystic Lilac

Hey guys,

Long time no see, sorry I haven't posted in forever!  I kind of lost my passion for blogging for a bit but hopefully that is back and I will be back to posting more regularly.  Today I have an oldy but a goody for you all.  Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Mystic Lilac was released in the Fall of 2010, at the time it was crazy popular on Makeup Alley and I tracked a bottle down after searching several places.  To my dismay I could never get it to look as amazing as everyone else seemed to, my bottle of polish was really thin and even after four coats the color still looked patchy and blah.  Well I was shopping my stash the other day and I came across Mystic Lilac and another color from this same Fall line called Concrete, which is somewhat similar to the base color of Mystic Lilac.  I decided I would try layering these two to see if I would be able to get Mystic Lilac to look good for me finally.  Well this worked great and I am super happy with this combo, the blue/green shimmer is so pretty against the purple/gray/taupe base color!

Update

Hey guys,

So sorry I haven't posted in almost a month!  My work schedule is a little redic right now and my kiddo has just gone back to school so I have been super busy.  I am hoping to get a few posts up early next week, one being the fan brush watercolor tutorial.  But for now I can post a couple phone pics I have taken of some recent mani's.  Sorry the quality is not awesome on these, I really wish I had taken the time to get proper pics of them!


First up is a mani I got from this tutorial by MrCandiipants on YouTube.  I used Maybelline Canary Cool as my base, my watercolor colors are Essie Tart Deco, Finger Paints Lemon Sour, Sinful Colors Orange Cream, Orly Terracotta and my orange pastel neon franken, and the dots are also Canary Cool

Second is Wet N Wild I Need a Refresh-mint (new version I will do a comp soon) and Revlon Whimsical, this is pretty similar to several mani's I have done before but I am a sucker for Whimsical over pastel mints and blues!

Pastel Matte Galaxy Nails

Hey guys,

So sorry I have not been posting much lately, I am going to really try to get some stuff up really soon!  Today I have some nail art inspired by The Nailasaurus yet again, she just has the cutest nail designs I am a little obsessed with her nails at the moment.  She posted a Pastel Galaxy Tutorial about a week ago and I was I knew I had to recreate this mani.  I like the finished design but I was terrible at painting the little stars so please forgive me for how horrible they look.  I hope you enjoy!


Colors used:  Essie Navigate Her (base), China Glaze Lemon Fizz, OPI Do You Lilac It?, China Glaze For Audrey, Zoya Charla, China Glaze Fast Track, white acrylic paint, and Hard Candy Matte-ly In Love

Fan Brush Tie Dye Nail Art

Hey guys,

So I am not really sure what to call these nail at the moment but I am going with fan brush tie dye for right now.  I am in love with this look and it is so simple it is not even funny.  I got the inspiration for this nail design from a dress I had bought for an event at work.  It had a really pretty blue and pink watercolor look in parts of the fabric and it made me want to try for something like it on my nails.  I started with and off-white base and did two coats of that and top coated it.  I let it dry for about ten minutes then I grabbed a pastel neon blue and pink polish, a fan brush and some pure acetone.  I just placed a big drop of the polish color on a paper plate and then I dipped my fan brush into the acetone and thinned out the polish till it got a watercolor look to it.  I then just randomly dapped the thinned polish onto my nails.  I will probably do a more detailed picture tutorial on these soon so I can explain better how I got this look.  I hope you all enjoy!

Colors used: OPI My Vampire is Buff and my past blue and pink neon frankens

Sally Hansen HD Blu

Hey guys,

I am back!  Sorry for the lack of posts, still trying to get settled into my new job.  Today I have a freakin awesome polish combo to show you all.  I have had several of the Sally Hansen HD polishes for a while they were discontinued last year I think and I never use them.  So I thought I would try a layering combo with Blu which is an amazing shimmery blue with a very slight purple duo-chrome.  I went with the lovely Sinful Colors Endless Blue as my base coat, I only needed one thickish coat to get it opaque, and layered one coat of Blue over that.

Floral Nail Art

Hey guys,

So I am super happy today, I just got a new job!  There may not be as many posts coming up since I am starting my new job tomorrow, but I will try and post at least three times a week.  Anyways, today I have some another floral nail art design, I used the same technique as my Hawaiian Style Flowers post.  I love this nail art because it is so easy and requires very little skill to do and it looks really pretty.  Hope you all enjoy.

Colors used:  Orly Pure Porcelain, neon coral, pink and red frankens, Color Club Twiggie, and Orly Lucky Duck

Watermelon Nail Art

Hey guys,

So I tried to do some watermelon nail art the other night, I thought it was going to be much easier to do than it was though.  I first used tape to do the triangle shape and then outlined the entire thing in black but I did not like the finished look.  I removed it and tried out something different on my thumb with less black and added white, I liked it much better so I started on my other nails.  I did not use tape this time, but just used a striping brush to paint out the triangle shape then filled the triangle in.  I added the tips of green, then the stripe of white.  I then outlined the watermelon shape with the black and added some seeds.  It was time consuming but I thought they turned out pretty cute.  Hope you enjoy!


Colors used: Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Twisted Pink, Orly Green Apple, and white and black striper polish

Hawaiian Style Flowers

Hey guys,

I have a super cute flowers to show you all today, these are really pretty and super easy to do.  I used the tutorial my MrCandiipants to do this mani you can find the video  here. Oh and seriously if you have never watched her videos you need to she is super funny and her nail art is kind of epic!  I hope you enjoy


Colors used: OPI Skull and Glossbones, Revlon Top Speed Violet, my neon purple franken, Revlon Top Speed Luxe Laque, Orly Ancient Jade and Avon Nail Wear Pro Olive Green

80's Inspired Nail Art

Hey guys,

So some of my favorite bloggers have been doing some awesome nail art and I have become so inspired by them!  This mani is loosely inspired by Chalkboard Nails Hipster Mix and Match post, I really loved the color combination she chose and the little overlapped 3-D looking dots she did were so cool looking I had to give them a try.  Also I hate how my pinky turned out, I really should have redone it but I was too lazy to do that.

Colors used: Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Coral Reef, Color Club Pucci-Licious, Essie In the Cab-ana, and a white striper polish

Waterfall Nail Art Inspired by The Nailasaurus

Hey guys,

So The Nailasaurus has posted a few of these Waterfall Nail Art and I loved the blue one that she posted so I decided to give it a try myself.  She hasn't put a tutorial up for it and this was so my first time trying this out so mine is not near as perfect as hers, but I still like how they turned out and I think these will be easier to do the second time around.  Hope you all enjoy!


Colors used: China Glaze Bahamian Escape, Gothic Lolita, Fancy Pants, and Secret Periwinkle and Wet N Wild Hallucinate

Tutorial: Madeline Poole Inspired Flowers

Hey guys,

So I posted my Madeline Poole Flowers mani about a week ago and I thought I would do a tutorial on them for you all.  It is a great nail art design for beginners and they look so cute!   The only supplies you will need are a few polishes a dotting tool, and a nail art brush.


Colors used:  Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure Without a Stitch, Essie In the Cab-ana, First Timer and Mojito Madness, China Glaze White On White and Sally Girl Get Out!

Step One:  Paint your nails a base color, I would suggest a white, off-white or a nude.  Pick two colors for your flowers, a white for the middle of the flower and a green for the leaves

Step Two:  Give your base color 30 minutes to dry or apply a quick dry topcoat and wait about 5 minutes. Pick one of your flower colors place a drop on a piece of paper and grab your dotting tool.  Make little half circles in a two to four spots around your nail, make sure you space them well so that you can fit the other side of your flower on in a minute.

Step Three: Grab your other flower color and do a half circle on the other side of the half circles you just did to make a little flower shape.  These do not have to be perfect looking.

Step Four:  Grab your white and with your dotting tool place a small dot in the center of your flowers

Step Five:  Get your green polish and your nail art brush and paint small leaves around your flowers, I did two leaves for each flower.  These again don't have to be perfect, I am not great at drawing leaves as you can see.

Step Six: Wait about 5 minutes and apply a quick dry topcoat, I would recommend Seche Vite because it will not smear your design

Oh and I did an accent nail as well, this is a coat of In the Cab-ana and Sally Girl Get Out! (fyi in love with this glitter!)

Dupe Alert!

Hey guys,

So I popped into my local Sally's the other day to grab some acetone and I looked at there display of Sally Girl polishes.  I had seen a post on MakeupAlley about a few new colors they had in the line I wanted to see if any of them were interesting.  First off if you have never checked those little polishes out then you really should even though they are tiny there are some really nice colors and formulas.  I found several new ones a pretty turquoise glitter which you will see in another post and a dupe for Deborah Lippmann Mermaid's Dream are the two that I picked up but there was also a pretty black with some gorgeous glitter in it that I want to go back and get too.  Now I do not own Mermaid's Dream but from swatches this one is pretty dead on, and I actually think I would prefer this one because it appears to be a lot smoother than the Deborah Lippmann one. I used a light mint base so I didn't have to do too many coats but I don't think that changed the final color of the polish .


Colors used: One coat of China Glaze Keep Calm Paint On and Sally Girl Brainy

Tutorial: Multi-Colored Water Spotted Nails

Hey guys,

So I did a multi-color water spotted mani a week or two ago and when I posted it on Beautylish someone suggested that I do a tutorial for it.  I thought this was a pretty good idea because I haven't seen any out there for using more than one color in a water spotted mani.  If you have never done a water spotted mani or would like to see a video on how it is done then please visit CutePolish on YouTube.  I hope you all find this helpful!


Colors used: Orly Pure Porcelain, Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Pacific Blue and Twisted Pink, and Wet N Wild On A Trip

Step One:  Paint your nails a base color, I would suggest a white or off-white for this.  Also apply a little Vaseline or some tape around your fingers to help aid in clean up later.

Step Two: Get a cup a fill it to the top with room temperature water, make sure it is a cup you are not going to be drinking out of again. Oh and do not use a Styrofoam cup the nail polish will melt it! Pick three  colors for your water spots.  Now take one of the colors drip a dot of polish onto the surface of the water.  Spray it with some kind of alcohol based spray about 4-5 inches away (you can use body spray, anti-bacterial spray, hairspray).  I usually spray between 1-3 times, it depends on how well the polish start to separate.

Step Three: Repeat step two with your other two colors.  

Step Four:  Remove the tape or wipe the Vaseline and nail polish off your skin and clean up any other polish with a q-tip or brush and some acetone.  Top coat your look and you should be done!

A couple of tips if you have never done water spotted nails before.

1.It can be a bit tricky to do at first, I find that I like to only work with one drop of polish, especially when doing more than one color for the spots.  I also find that when I do more than one drop it seems to not want to separate once I spray the body spray. 

2. And on the topic of body spray I would highly suggest you do not use aerosol hairspray, I have tried it once and the spray was too powerful it pretty much blew the nail polish out of my cup of water.  

3. It is important that the water you use is room temp, if it is too cold the polish dries very quickly and you will have issues with getting it to spot.

A Few Random Mani's

Hey guys,

So a have several mani's that I never got around to posting or that I didn't really like how they photographed,  looked etc.  I decided I would do a little spam post for you all with them.  I hope you enjoy!

Watercolor nails with a glitter cross accent, I hated how this one photographed the colors were not showing up well at all

Oklahoma Love mani, I used Gumdrop as the base and acrylic paint for the Oklahoma outline and the heart

Tribal mani, trying to do something inspired by Mr. Candiipants but I totally did not fill in that middle finger very well at all and I didn't see it till I took pics. I used Sinful Colors Bikini and a black striper polish

China Glaze Keep Calm and Paint On with little gems as and accent

Orly Royal Navy, this one is impossible for me to photograph good, it always shows visible nail line and in real life it was not noticeable at all

Orly Rage and Cotton Candy tape mani, I just wasn't sure how much I liked this one, I do love the color combo though

Salon Perfect Shocked over Sinful Colors Bikini, I kept forgetting to post this one and it also is not photographing very color accurate it is a lighter pink

Pastel Neon Orange Franken

Hey guys,

I am wearing another one of my neon franken's again today, I just love these and this orange one is probably one of my favorite next to the purple one that I did.  This color did not one to show up right when I photographed it though!  Really frustrating but it is not a mac and cheese orange, it is a little lighter and leans a tiny bit coral than what is showing in the pics.


Colors used: neon orange franken and Essie As Gold As It Gets

Flash, this one is way off on color accuracy

Natural light, closer but it's brighter and not as coral as this is showing

Natural light again this is closer than the first pic but it photographed way darker hear than in real life

Madeline Poole/Pshiiit Inspired Flowers

Hey guys,

So I was browsing Pshiiit's blog the other day and I saw her post about Madeline Poole's nail art book and one of the looks she had done from it.  I instantly knew I wanted to recreate this look, it was just so cute and looked really simple to do.  I didn't have the exact colors that she used but I tried to go with similar ones because I really thought it was a pretty combo.  Also I may do a tutorial on these flowers because they are very simple and look really cute!


Colors used: OPI My Vampire Is Buff, L'Oreal Sparklicious, my neon pink and orange franken, China Glaze White on White and Orly Glowstick