Category: NOTD

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Kozmic Colors and Margarita Madness.

I’m really excited about today’s swatch post and polish.

I posted before about how impressed I was with my first time trying the Kozmic Colors brand, especially for a polish found at a Dollar Store. I popped into a different Dollarama not too long ago, to see if they had anything new in the nail polish section and was very pleasantly surprised with what I found.

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This polish came in a four park of glitters. It was the only milky base color of the four–the rest of them are splatter and glitter toppers. But when I saw this polish in the group of four, I knew I needed to have them. The first thing I thought of when I saw this polish was Margaritas. These polishes don’t come with nails, but if I had to name it myself I would call it Margarita Madness.

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This polish is gorgeous. It is a milky green-blue base that is filled with large and small blue and green hexagon glitters. There are also tiny holographic glitters mixed into the base which unfortunately my camera flash could not capture. It took 3 coats to cover my nail, but it was well worth it. Honestly, I have nothing like this in my stash. It’s absolutely beautiful and eye catching.

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I tried to take a picture without flash to catch the holographic glitters, but they didn’t show up as much as I wish they would have. Regardless, I’ve fallen in love with this color. And now all I want to do is drink a margarita in the sunshine, and admire my nails. =)

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All about Neon.

So I have a swatch of a fun neon polish to share with you today from China Glaze’s 2012 Summer Neons collection.

What is it about Summer time and neon colors–I just can’t get enough! I was checking out the Chatters by my work recently, and they were had marked down all their clearance polishes to $4.99. Anyone knows me knows that I love a deal, so I ended up picking two polishes– China Glaze’s Pink Plumeria, and OPI’s I Snow You Love Me. The second I saw Pink Plumeria, I knew I had to put it on my nails as quickly as possible!

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As I’ve stated before, I’m a sucker for anything Coral so the second I saw this color I fell instantly in love. It’s a neon-ish Coral with a subtle golden shimmer scattered through out. It’s less pink than the picture above shows (thanks to my camera flash not capturing it properly) but on the nail it comes out a very vibrant coral. I’ve read that some people had problems with application, but I found the formula flawless–honestly it went on so smoothly I was shocked. It was a little sheer, so I did apply two coats with left me with very minimal visible nail line. I could have done three coats for full coverage, but it really wasn’t needed. I had no streaks, or patchiness at all. The polish does dry to a matte satin finish, so I added a coat of Nutra Nail Speed Dry Top coat to give it a glossy finish.

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I can’t not say enough how much I absolutely LOVE this polish. The subtle shimmer is beautiful, and the color is so perfect for Summer. The only issue I had was a tiny chip on my pinky finger this morning, but that could have been brought on by the house cleaning I did before starting my day. Regardless, I couldn’t stop staring at my nails all day. They even perfectly matched my dress that I wore on my coffee date with my best friend today. (Couldn’t have planned that better if I had tried!). Even he noticed how pretty and bright my nails were. =)

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I know this was a limited edition polish from two years ago, so I’m not sure how easy it would be to find now. But if you have a Chatters near you, I would recommend checking out the clearance sale they have on right now because you never know what lost goodies you might find!

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I’m feeling tropical… print nails.

I’ve been feeling floral a lot lately, so I wanted to try something different. At work, we’ve been getting in so much tropical floral print so I was inspired to try mimicking something tropical on my nails.

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The (many) polishes I used for this manicure were:

  • Sinful Colors Cinderella — blue base color. (I also layered it over a coat of Sinful Colors Be Happy because damn… it’s sheer.)
  • Sinful Colors Dream On — flower color.
  • Sinful Colors Coral Reef — flower color & polka dots.
  • ACO by Ardene Ardene’s Secret — flower color.
  • ACO by Ardene Kissed by a Rose — flower color & polka dots.
  • Sinful Colors Strapped — leaves.
  • Pure Ice Wild Thing — leaves.
  • ACO by Ardene Green Peace — leaves.
  • China Glaze Metro Pollen-tin — dots.
  • Stripe Rite Striping Polish in black — flower stem.
  • Nutra Nail Speed Dry top coat with green tea.

 

So what do you think of these tropical floral nails? I think the flower on my ring finger turned out best.

Also is anyone else as excited about iced coffee season as I am?

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Freehand, and sort of abstract, chevrons/zigzags.

After my successful chevron moon manicure last week, I wanted to try another chevron manicure as I haven’t done very many in the past. I was inspired by this pin on Pinterest, and figured with my new small detail nail art brush, I could make a good attempt at freehand chevrons.

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Left hand.

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Right hand.

The polishes I used for this manicure were:

  • OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls.
  • ACO by Ardene Neon Pink.
  • Maybelline Sapphire Siren.
  • Sinful Colors Be Happy.
  • China Glaze What a Pansy.
  • Nutra Nail Speed Dry Top Coat.

I’m calling these abstract because… well… they’re not the cleanest lines. Surprisingly, my right hand turned out better than my left, which is funny because it was done using my none dominant hand! Never the less, I’m proud of how they look! When I first started doing nail art, I never would have been able to create something like this without it turning into a big blobby mess. It’s nice to remember that on days when I see others nail art and feel envious that I’m not that good… all it takes is lots practice.

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Seeing these, I feel so proud of being able to create these freehand. For real first attempt, I think I did pretty good. And the colors just look so great together! This is also giving me an urge to do a “then and now” nail art post, just to show myself how far I’ve come from my first days of doing my nails, to now. It would be fun to recreate my first nail art attempts, just for a personal comparison. Maybe that’s what I’ll dedicate next week to. =)

 

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My go-to: Revlon Whimsical.

Does anyone else have a favorite polish they go to whenever they can’t think of how to paint their nails, or are short on time for nail art?

Personally, I have a couple. But one of my favorite go to polishes is Revlon’s Whimsical.

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I fell in love with this polish about 3 years ago when it first started popping up on the nail blogs I followed, but for some reason I didn’t end up buying it until last Summer. It makes me sad I waited so long to jump on the bandwagon because oh my god I love this polish. Whimsical has a milky blue base which contains multi-sized hexagon glitters. The base is very, very sheer–I’ve never tried to build up opacity with multiple layers, but I can tell it would take a few. Instead, I always paint another blue-based base color before applying Whimsical.

For this NOTD, I applied Avon’s Vintage Blue as my base color.

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Vintage Blue on it’s own is a very, very pale baby blue color. I bought this color specifically because of my Buffy the Vampire Slayer pale polish obsession. (I’m a dork.) It’s the perfect pale base for Whimsical though–it brings out the blue milky base, and doesn’t affect the end result any.

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As you can see above, the two colors work really well side by side. They look even better when you apply Whimsical over Vintage Blue.

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See what I mean? So pretty! I applied two coats of Whimsical over Vintage Blue followed by my NutraNail top coat. I could have applied another coat for a denser glitter application. However, (1) I was short on time–I did these about 2 hours before I had to leave for work, and needed them dry before getting ready and (2) I liked how it looked already, so decided it was perfect.

Like I said, this is my go-to solution for “I can’t figure out how to do my nails”. This is a very “me” polish (though I’m sure a lot of people say that haha.) I can’t help but love myself some glitter, and these just feel very girlie to me. Too bad the weather is so wretched outside (again! Bah!) because they would pair perfectly with a cute little Summer dress.

So what is your go-to polish?