Win the Dermelect ME Core Collection!

Polished Professionals: Minimergency Kit

Hello, everyone! As we kick off the work week, I thought it would be appropriate to bring back my Polished Professionals series with a product that I've been testing for a few weeks now. It is currently replacing my old standby survival pack.

The product is called the Minimergency Kit by Pinch Provisions and it's a 3.5" x 2" x 2" case with seventeen items that any woman might need "in a pinch." The Snake Charmer (snakeskin) bag was just released for Spring and comes in four colors: Mint, Cherry Blossom, Blue Raspberry, and Tangerine. I received Tangerine!

Swatch & Review: Color Secrets Amelie and Moulin Rouge

Hey, everyone! Thanks for sticking with me this week... I appreciate it! I'm so glad to be back!

Today, I have two polishes to show you from a new brand called Color Secrets. One of the really cool things about their polishes is the fact that every single one is named after a movie, most of which are chick flicks. Some of my favorites used are Casablanca, Miss Congeniality, Clueless, She's All That, Tangled, Notebook, Pretty in Pink, Never Been Kissed, Dirty Dancing, Devil Wears Prada, Love Actually, the Breakfast Club, Breakfast at Tiffany's, Night at the Roxbury, and Across the Universe!

I received Moulin Rouge and Amelie! How Academy Awards appropriate, right?

Disclaimer: The product(s) in this post were provided to me by the manufacturer or their PR company for consideration. For more information please visit my Disclaimer page.   

First up is Moulin Rouge, a juicy strawberry polish with electric pink glass flecks.

Milani Reveals All New High Speed Shades!

Milani is excited to announce the launch of shade additions to its High Speed Fast Dry One Coat Nail Lacquers! There are 6 new shades in total: 24 Quick Teal, 25 Flaming Race, 26 Rapid Orchid, 27 Instant Pearl, 28 Pink Express, & 29 Move on Mauve.

To check out the new shades, as well as the existing collection, visit Milani's official page!


Thoughts?

Sally Hansen Nail Art Contest Announcement

THINK: Be your own nail artist for the chance to win.

WHAT IT IS: I Heart Nail Art is a 5-month campaign where consumers will be challenged to create nail art based on monthly themes. As the nail authority, Sally Hansen has trend setting colors women can use to express their creativity and individuality through vibrant, vivid, bold nails. Now, Sally Hansen is asking American women to show off their nail art skills with the I Heart Nail Art Contest. Each month, Sally Hansen will post a new nail art challenge on Facebook and encourage fans to post photos of their inspiring, intricate and ingenious nail art looks for a chance to win.

Monthly winners will receive $500 dollars and a trip to New York City to participate in the I Heart Nail Art Grand Finale, where competitors will be asked to create nail art looks on the spot. An expert panel of fashion and beauty experts and nail art enthusiasts will select the grand prize winner, who will earn the title of Sally Hansen Nail Art Sweetheart and win $2000. The grand prize winner will also be featured on Sally Hansen promotional materials, showcasing her nail art.

Sally Hansen’s own nail ambassador celebrity manicurist, Tracylee, will serve on the panel of judges choosing the winner. “I constantly take inspiration from fashion, architecture, events and pop culture in creating my nail art,” reveals Tracylee. “I’m so excited to see the kind of creative submissions we get and find new inspiration in my own work.”

So, if you think you’ve got what it takes to be the Sally Hansen Nail Art Sweetheart, visit facebook.com/sallyhansen to enter. You can also enter on Instagram and Twitter with #iheartnailart.

Swatch & Review: a-England Elaine

Hello, lovelies! I'm still recovering from coming home at 1:30am from the Maroon 5 concert last night. I hope everyone enjoyed my Instagram feed. I was, at many points, only a foot away from Adam, so you can imagine the level of recovery I require today!

Well, that and the fact the speakers were right under his feet/the stage, so I think I had some major temporary hearing loss. But it has come back!

Truthfully, now that the sequin nail art from yesterday is off of my nails and has stopped snagging on EVERYTHING, I'm also rather happy! Hehe.

Today, I'm bringing you a much simpler manicure: a-England Elaine! I purchased this as part of the a-England deals last month, also picking up Dragon, Ophelia, and Princess Tears.

 a-England Elaine is a gorgeous smoky violet creme. It went on like a dream, smooth and even as butter in just two coats. I LOVE how it looks against my skin tone.

Just... to die for!

I own a ton of the holo shades from the lovely Adina over at a-England, but I'm so glad I came over to the creme side of things. Not disappointed in the slightest!

Are you on board with a-England? What's your fave?

Maroon 5 Sequin Nails

Happy Saturday, everyone! Thank goodness it's the weekend, right?

Tonight, I'm heading to see Maroon 5 in concert for the 56th time and of course, needed to rock some awesome nails. I've actually be wearing these since Thursday because they doubled as Valentine's Day Nails. The lead guitarist's name is James VALENTINE, so they were twice as appropriate for this reason.

For those of you following me on Facebook, you may have read about my disappointing incident regarding Macy's Herald Square and the Adam Levine appearance to celebrate the launch of his 222 Fragrance. To put it simply, I was given bad information when I called the store after the appearance was announced, relied on it, and was unable to get a pass as a result. And, considering I had spent 2+ hours on these nails, plus got up extra early and traveled into NYC on a non-school day, I was more than a little upset.

But the good news is I'll still be heading into Madison Square Garden tonight to see the band play, along with Neon Trees. I'm disregarding the fact that I'll have to suffer through Owlcity for the fifth time. Oh, they are AWFUL live. Rule of thumb: If you need a wind machine and you're a solo artist, there's a problem.

Anyway, this was my second attempt at a sequin manicure. I used hexagonal glitter I bought at Michael's for $10 with a coupon. The set has twelve different colors, but I only used the red, black, and silver.

I painted on coat of Rimmel Black Satin on each nail (two coats on the ring finger). Then I applied top coat in small sections of each nail as I went to make sure it didn't dry before I could stick on a sequin. I trimmed down some pieces of glitter to fit them to the tip and applied a coat of Seche Vite to the whole nail as soon as I stuck on the last piece. Doing the Maroon 5 logo on the ring fingers was the easiest part!

In order to pick up the sequins, I let a drop of top coat on a paper plate dry until it was tacky, pressed the tiniest dotting end I had against it, and used that to pick up/place sequins. Oh, it was a pain!

In the end, I was really happy with how it came out. It was tedious as heck to alternate the red, black, and silver like I did. It needed about four coats of Seche Vite in order to smooth it out to the point where it wasn't snagging on everything I own. Consequently, I had a bit of an issue with bubbles in the top coat, but it isn't noticeable outside of macro shot.

I love how crazy sparkly this is. And the colors are that vivid in real life. It's starting to fade a little now because the top coat seems to eat away at the seal on the sequins, so this won't last much longer than a few days.

I can't imagine doing two full hands again, unless I was guaranteed the chance to meet Adam down the road. But I could easily see myself using this technique for an accent nail!

How about you all? Would you attempt this yourself? Did this manicure "rock" your world?

I promise I'll share some pics on here tomorrow. Be sure to follow my Instagram for all of the photos I take at the concert tonight!

Valentine's Day French Manicure

We did it, everyone! We survived Monday. I know it was hard. And I know you probably looked at the clock more times than you'd care to admit. But it's Tuesday, a VERY good Tuesday if you're in New Orleans, but even if you're not, we're still closer to Friday! Woot!

This is Part 2 of my Valentine's Day nail art series and I think this may be the simplest of them all, but it has just as much impact. This requires a little more attention to detail than Part 1, and a bit more dexterity, but I have faith that you can do it.

For my Valentine's Day French, I used Zoya Gei Gei (from the new Lovely Collection) and my favorite Zoya of all-time, Zoya Sarah! I also used Purity and Trixie to get the heart shape with nail art brushes. The heart was a little bigger than I intended, but I didn't mind it at the end. If you can't draw a heart freehand (I'm not counting myself amongst those who can), you can always use a decal or even a stamper.

I freehanded the French tip. Don't feel bad if you can't... honestly, I finally got the hang of it last year after failing miserably for... oh... seven years. But if you can't freehand it, there is no shame in that. You can use striping tape or even regular old scotch tape for a guide.

If you use scotch tape, just make sure that the base color is completely dry and you stick each piece to your palm once so it won't pull off any polish!

I always loved doing non-traditional French manicure colors, so I wore this all weekend. What colors would you use for a Valentine's Day French?

Valentine's Day Lace Nail Art & Tutorial

Hi, everyone! Today, I'm starting my four-part series of Valentine's Day nail art! I'm going to try and bring you some manicures that are fun and funky, along with classic and sweet. For the most part, you'll be able to do all of them at home!

Monday's manicure theme is lace!

This look was accomplished using two coats of OPI You Only Live Twice and and OPI Skull and Glossbones. But obviously, you can replicate this using any shades you like and two different sized dotting tools! (Or a toothpick and a bobby pin. Seriously, that will work too! It's what I used before I knew what dotting tools were.)

This is really easy to replicate!

Step 1: Paint your base color until opaque, as you normally would.

Step 2: Using your second color, paint a French tip. It doesn't have to be perfectly even because you're going to be covering it up anyway!

Step 3: Take your larger dotting tool and dip it in the second color. Make dots along the outline of the French tip, with the top 1/3 of the dot overlapping the tip.

Step 4: Take the smaller dotting tool and dip it in your base color. Place a dot in the center of each of the large dots.

Step 5: Let it dry for about fifteen minutes before applying top coat to avoid dragging.

Step 6: Go rock it and look fabulous!

So what do you all think? Is this something you'd try on your own?

Until tomorrow!

Chinese New Year Gradient

Hello, lovelies! And Happy Chinese New Year!

Today, I'm going to show you my most recent glitter gradient featuring, what else? Red and gold!

In order to achieve this look, you need a cosmetic wedge and two chunky glitter polishes. I chose Julep Oscar and China Glaze Ring in the Red, the latter of which I bought my junior year at Rutgers and hadn't used up until this manicure.

Fair warning, my nails are going to look SO much longer here than the last few posts because I rocked this gradient long before I chopped my nails down! I like them so much better now!

I used three coats of Oscar as a base and sponged Ring in the Red from the tip of the nail down. I really like how this turned out. I think that using chunkier glitter makes for a better fade. The pieces of glitter start to get wedged between each other creating a speckle effect that lends itself really well to a gradient.

The main tip I have is to do VERY light coats when you sponge with the glitter for a good speckle fade. Leaving too much on the sponge makes for a big blob... and nobody wants that!

What do you think of my Chinese New Year gradient? Will you be rocking red and gold today?

Swatch & Review: My Spirit Fingers Cutie Pie

Happy Saturday! If you live in the Northeast like I do, I hope that you're safely snowed in and stocked up. We only got about 6" or so, but I have friends in Connecticut and Massachusetts whose snow totals are WELL over 30."

Today, I'm bringing you a brand new indie brand called My Spirit Fingers, which makes glitter top coats. The polish I will be showing you is called Cutie Pie.

My Cutie Pie is a clear base with silver bar glitter and varying sizes of hex glitter in magenta, silver, and bright blue. Here, I polished two coats of it over Essie No More film for a fun and playful look.

It applied easily with two coats and wasn't gloopy at all, a common problem with glitter bombs. In fact, I got a large variety of glitter with the first coat, so that was a major plus.

And here it is over SoFlaJo Silverado. I think this was my favorite combination and wore it for three days after I put it on! It has a nice pop to it, but it's a little more subdued and vampy. LOVED this.

Overally, this was a great glitter bomb and I was impressed with the overall formula.

Currently, My Spirit Fingers is taking orders via the invoice method. All polishes, including Cutie Pie, are $8.50 per bottle. For more information, you can email Dona (the mind behind MSF) at MySpiritFingers@gmail.com or visit the MSF Facebook page.

What do you all think of this glitter bomb?

Disclaimer: The product(s) in this post were provided to me by the manufacturer or their PR company for consideration. For more information please visit my Disclaimer page.   

Swatch & Review: SoFlaJo Silverado

Happy Thursday, my lovelies!

Today's featured polish is by the wonderful brand, SoFlaJo! You may remember this awesome indie for Pendragon, Sunset Grille, and Ghost of a Chance. This shade is from the brand new Matte Love Collection, which features seven shimmers that can be worn as matte (which is how they dry) or with top coat for some big time pop!

The polish I'm showing you today is called Silverado!

 Silverado is a matte charcoal polish with holo glitter. Here, it is with two coats.

You all know me. I'm not exactly a fan of mattes. But this one was a shade I could wear without issue all day, every day.

And bonus...

 Look at how gorgeous it looks with top coat! It's a little blacker with gloss, but you can see how much the shimmer pops in this one. I can't wait to two-tone this with a glossy tip French manicure or stripes. Or some other awesome options!

Overall, this was a BIG winner for me. If you're a fan of mattes, this is totally for you. Even if you're not, this one will definitely surprise you.

All SoFlaJo polishes are available on her website. The full Matte Love Collection consists of a yellow (Going Down), magenta (Pink it Up!), amethyst (Involved), solid black (Black Dagger), Silverado, black shimmer (Black Beauty), and white (White Sensation). They are $5 for a mini bottle (5mL) and $10 for a full sized bottle (15mL). The mini set is $35 with discounted shipping.

I LOVED this shade. How about you?

Disclaimer: The product(s) in this post were provided to me by the manufacturer or their PR company for consideration. For more information please visit my Disclaimer page.  

Review: Drybar (TriBeCa)

Hello, my lovelies! Today, I've written about something a little bit different from my normal nail posts.

Back in September, a little sign went up in a previously-vacant window next door to my regular Starbucks, which is across the street from my school. It read: Coming Soon... Drybar.

My curiosity was piqued, so I headed to the Google and received a pleasant surprise!

Announcing: Valentine's Day Giveaway

Hello, everyone! I hope you all did well in your Superbowl pools last night! (Mine was completely messed up by the safety.)

I know we all despite Mondays, so I thought I'd help brighten your day with a giveaway! I've teamed up with the lovely ladies behind nine other blogs for a really fun giveaway filled with great prizes!

The Rafflecopter entry widget is at the end of the post!

Check out what's up for grabs:

Prize 1 - Princess Polish

Criss Cross Striping Tape Mani

TGIF, my lovelies! I'm so ready for this week to be over. Aren't all of you?

Today's post is going to be a bit short. It is my first foray into striping tape and I was pretty happy with the end result. I think with a little more practice, I'll be ready for a how-to post!

I used Nfu Oh 61 as a base with Rimmel Black Satin as the top coat. I like Black Satin because it dries with a rubbery texture that is a nice contrast to the linear holo of Nfu Oh.

I know there's a little jaggedness to some of the lines, stupid macro! They're not this noticeable in person.

Is this something you would try? Would you want to see a tutorial?