Category: Holiday

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Candy Corn Gradient Nails!

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Tis the season… for Halloween nails!

Halloween is one of my favorite holidays, and has been since I was a kid, so I always look forward to Halloween–especially because there is nothing better than a Halloween manicure! Last year, I made my first attempt at Candy Corn nails—except I did the colour in the wrong pattern! I wanted to give them another go, and figured the best way to do so was in a candy corn gradient.

 

The polishes I used for the manicure were:

  • Sinful Colors Easy Going — white/cream base.
  • Essence Color and Go Polka Holga — orange gradient.
  • Essence Color and Go Wake Up! — orange gradient.
  • China Glaze Metro Pollen-tin –yellow gradient.
  • Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Mellow Yellow — yellow gradient.
  • ACO by Ardene Meteorite — glitter.
  • Essie Good to Go Top Coat.

I absolutely ADORE how this gradient turned out. Sometimes gradients can be a hit or miss for me, but I was absolutely in love with this one. It really looked like little candy corn on my nails, and it was super easy to do! (Please ignore the boo-boo on my middle finger–I’m such a klutz sometimes.) Also, I’m really loving the new graffiti top coats that ACO by Ardene has just released–they have them in a whole assortment of different colors, so I had to try them out! This one (Meteorite) really complimented my candy corn gradient, and I think brought the whole look together. =)

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Do you have a favorite Halloween manicure you love to do?

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Happy Canada Day Nails.

Just a quick post today.

So here in Canada we’re celebrating our country’s birthday. In honor of that, I painted my nails for the occasion. I wanted to try and create some maple leaves, but I was short on time as we were heading out to the boyfriend’s brother’s house for pre-Canada Day drinks, so I went with polka dots.

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 polkadots

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The polishes I used for these holiday nails were:

  • OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls
  • ACO by Ardene Strawberry Blush
  • Essie Go to Go top coat.

These were right the right amount of red and white for my Canada Day. =)

I look forward to starting on the OMD2 Nail Art Challenge tomorrow with Coral nails. =)

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Mother’s Day Mani.

Yesterday, as I said in my previous post, was Mother’s Day. I worked all day, but afterwards we headed to my parent’s house for a Mother’s Day barbecue, so I wanted to paint my nails for the occasion.

I haven’t been doing a lot of nail art lately–a combination of being busy with work, and tired, and also wanting to re-wear old polishes I haven’t worn in a while. But I couldn’t pass up a chance to do something fun for Mother’s Day–that’s my favorite part of holidays… all the nail art possibilities.

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For this manicure I used:

  • Sally Hansen X-treme Wear in Coral Reef — my base color.
  • Stripe Rite Striping Brush in White — my lettering.
  • OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls — polka dots.
  • Sally Hansen X-treme Wear in Mellow Yellow — polka dots.
  • Kozmic Colors nameless blue — polka dots.
  • Sally Hansen Diamond Flash Top Coat!

I hope all the Mom’s out there had a wonderful day! I made sure to spoil my Mom as much as possible. ❤

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(This is a super old picture–taken on my 25th birthday, but it’s okay because we both look fabulous!)

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Happy Easter!

Taking another pause to share some Easter nail art. I wore these the other night for an Easter shindig we had. I really wanted to do something festive with my nails as I had taken my speckled egg polish off. Looking at them now I kind of wish I had done each one a little bit different, just to switch them up slightly, but I do think they turned out well (especially for something I’ve never tried to do before!)

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The polishes I used for the manicure were:

  • Sally Hansen Hard As Nails Xtreme wear in Twisted Pink — Pink base on thumb, and pinky. Inside of the bunny ears and nose.
  • Essence’s Dive with Me to the Island (from the Ticket to Paradise  collection) — Turquoise base on pointer, middle and ring fingers. It showed up more green on the finger, but it is more turquoise in the bottle.
  • Stripe Rite Striping Polish in White & China Glaze White on White — Bunnies.
  • Flaunt Beauty in Jet Black — The eye’s of the bunnies.

Hope your Easter is going well, and involves lots of chocolate (if you’re into that kind of thing) and time spent with your family. I’m looking forward to an Easter Egg hunt at my parent’s house, and competing with my nephew on who can get the most eggs!

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ACO by Ardene nail polish in Bow Chicka Wow Wow and Tea Party

With it being Easter this upcoming weekend, I thought I would take a pause from the 31 Day Nail Art Challenge. I’m actually going to review some polishes by Ardene which I think are the perfect colors for Easter. For those who don’t know Ardene is a Canadian Clothing and Accessories store (similar to Claire’s). However in the last couple years, they’ve recently been expanding their nail polish collections, now including Sugar Effect polishes, and feather polishes.

I’ll be upfront and honest before–I work for the company. However, I’m not going to let this make me bias in my review. They have not provided me with the polishes–I went out and bought them on my own. That’s the reason why you see a lot of the ACO polishes in my manicures. I’ve accumulate quite the collection over my years with the company on my own accord. I’ve also found in the last year or so they’ve REALLY upped their nail polish game, with fantastic colors, and different effects.

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The polishes I’m going to talk about today are two speckled polishes–Bow Chicka Wow Wow which is a baby pink polish (on my middle, and ring, fingers) with tiny matte black glitters, and Tea Party (on my pointed and pinky fingers) which is a baby blue polish with tiny matte black glitters. Unlike some of the speckled polishes I’ve seen online by Model’s Own and Illamasquathe glitters are all uniform size and shape.

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Bow Chicka Wow Wow

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Tea Party 

The first thing I noticed about both polishes is that they are very sheer. It took me three coats to reach opacity on each nail and I still feel like it’s not fully opaque. My guess is that they are so sheer so that when you apply multiple layers, you can still see the black glitters underneath. However, because the polish is so sheer each coat dries quite quickly, which is a bonus. I had no bald spots with application, which is always something I like in a polish (nothing worse them having to go back and fix spots on your nail where it didn’t smooth out properly.) The black glitters do leave a little texture on the nail, but that is easily fixed with a coat of top coat or two.

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I was quite impressed with these polishes. They gave me the speckled egg look I was coveting, at a very reasonable price. (You can pick up ACO by Ardene polishes at Ardene locations, 3 polishes for $10.)

I can’t say anything about wear, as I’ve only had my polishes on for a couple of hours, but from experience Ardene polishes tend to hold up pretty well for me without chipping for 2-3 days–and I use my hands at work A LOT so chipping my manicure is always a fear. I’m also not sure how removal is going to go–Glitter is always a pain to get off. But with the foil method, I’m sure it will be no issue.

So if you’re looking for a fun, but not too expensive, polish to wear for your Easter festivities, I’d recommend hitting up your local Ardene and picking these up. I can’t wait to apply a matte top coat to these, and really upping the level of my mani!