Category: Essie

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Simple Geometric Nails Featuring Essie Watermelon 🍉

Do you remember what your first was? Nail polish I mean! Do you remember your first Essie, first China Glaze, & first OPI? What were the polishes that started the obsession? I was looking through my stash the other night, trying to find a colour to paint my nails, & picked up my bottle of Essie Watermelon which was the very first Essie I ever owned. I can’t ever remember the last time I put it on, so it seemed like a good day to pull it out. 

For this manicure, I used:

  • Base Coat: Perfect Formula Pink Gel Coat
  • Top Coat: Cutex Quick Dry Top Coat 
  • Essie Watermelon
  • Essie Strut Your Stuff
  • Essie Mint Candy Apple
  • Xroma Polish & Vinyls ‘X’ stencil (I used the inside part). 

I love how these turned out! I wanted a simplistic design to compliment this juicy pink, without overpowering it. I though the blue tones of Strut Your Stuff & Mint Candy Apple complimented it well. 

I really enjoy how Summery these ended up being. I decided to use the inside angles from my X stencils from Xroma Polish & Vinyls because they were a sharper angle than my other Chevron Vinyls. They worked really well to create these little blocks of colours. 

Do you remember what your very first nail polish was? I don’t remember what my very first polish was, though I can guarantee it was probably white. I do remember what the polish that was the beginning of my nail polish addiction was though! Claire’s Evil Queen.

Let my know your first in the comments below. 

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SUNDAY SWATCH POST: Essie In The Cab-ana

First off, Happy Mother’s Day to all the Mums out there! 🌸 

Continuing my Swatch Sunday trend with one of my all time favourite blues! You might remember last Summer I had a bit of a love affair with Essie In The Cab-ana & used it frequently (if not, check out the end of this post for a refresher haha). But it occurred to me I had never swatches the polish on its own so I knew I needed to!

Originally from the 2013 Resort collection, In The Cab-ana is the prettiest vibrant blue cream than leans slightly turquoise. It also has a great formula that only requires 2 squishy coats for full opacity.

But most importantly it’s just so pretty! I mean, I love blue in general when it comes to nail polish, but In The Cab-ana is extra special. You can bet I’ll be wearing this polish a lot again this coming Spring/Summer.

And a few more manicures featuring In The Cab-ana:

What do you think of Essie In The Cab-ana? It is part of your nail polish stash? What polish can you not live without? Let me know in the comments below!

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Tribal Print Gradient Nails

I know I say this every time I do my nails, but these have to be one of my favourite gradients I’ve ever done. Seriously–just look! It turned out so pretty. I’d never claim to be a gradient expert, but damn if I don’t feel proud of how these turned out! & what does better with a gradient than a little stamping? I don’t think I’ve done any stamping since before the Lil Bubs was born, & I didn’t realize how much I missed it. 

For this manicure, I used:

  • Base Coat: Perfect Formula Pink Gel Coat
  • Top Coat: Cutex Quick Dry Top Coat
  • Essie Lounge Lover
  • China Glaze Glow With The Flow
  • China Glaze Plur-ple
  • Essie Butler Please
  • Yves Saint Laurent Noir Brilliant
  • Born Pretty Store Peel Off Liquid Tape
  • Born Pretty Store Stamping Plate (QA66)
  • Latex Free Make Up Sponge

Why don’t I stamp more often, seriously? Well mostly because I only have the same few stamping plates. But hopefully I can change that soon because it just makes for sure an intricate manicure. I would never freehand this design (at least not without a lot of crankiness & frustration!) 

For my gradient, I started off with a basic sponged gradient & then went back over the gradient dry brushing my colours for a bit of a rustic look. It lead to an interesting blend that I really, really like. 

What do you think of this mani? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below! 💜

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Spring Drip Marble decals


Have I mentioned enough how much I’m loving my silicone mat? I’ve been having a blast creating fun decals with it. I can’t believe it took me so long to get on the silicone mat trend. That’s me–always behind on the times! But now that I’ve caught up to modern times, I’m having a blast playing around & can’t get enough.

This drip marble is from a few weeks ago. I had decided to pull out a few more Spring-y colours for another drip marble. These are kind of similar to the Earth Day drip marble I created colour wise. I don’t often reach for green shades, but I’m starting to find myself craving them more. They’re great shades for Spring!

For this manicure, I used:

  • Base Coat: Perfect Formula Pink Gel Coat
  • Top Coat: Cutex Quick Dry Top Coat
  • Color Club Almost Famous
  • Essie Strut Your Stuff
  • Essie First Timer
  • OPI Angel With A Lead Foot
  • Silicone Craft Mat

I wanted some fresh colours (& an excuse to wear use my new bottle of Color Club Almost Famous!) I had originally planned to do a yellow to blue gradient with these colours, but decided at the last minute to make these decals instead. & application definitely gets easier with practice.

So what do you think of this manicure & colour combination? I think it looks so fresh! The colours just meld together so well, I’m completely obsessed! 💛

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Splatter Nails with @xromapolishandvinyls!

Happy Monday everyone! 

I was recently sent some nail vinyls to play with from @xromapishandvinyls & as soon as they arrived I couldn’t wait to pull them out & start creating. You know how much I LOVE my nail vinyls, & Xroma Polish and Vinyls have a ton of awesome creative designs available on their site. 

First design I grabbed to play around with was the splat stencils! 

For this manicure, I used:

  • Base Coat: Perfect Formula Pink Gel Coat
  • Top Coat: Cutex Quick Dry Top Coat
  • Essie Butler Please
  • ACO by Ardene Ice Mist
  • Quo by ORLY mini unnamed pink
  • Quo by ORLY mini unnamed mint 
  • Xroma Polish and Vinyls Splat Stencil 
  • Small dotting tool 

Isn’t this pattern so much fun?! I’m sure I’m not the only person who loves splatter nails but hates the clean up. Plus even with filling in my splats individually, this manicure was easy & surprisingly quick to do! 

These were so much fun to do & even more fun to wear! They even matched my OOTD. I’d definite recommend checking out Xroma Polish And Vinyls site yourself, & all the amazing patterns available. They ship world wide from Australia, & mine arrived super quick! I think it took only 6 business days & I live on the other side of the world in Canada so I though that was really impressive. 

What do you think of this manicure? Let me know in the comments below!