Matte Floral for the First Day of Spring!

The day has finally come… it’s the first day of Spring! Well as of 1:05pm or something. It’s definitely been a long Winter, even if we didn’t have a super snowy Winter this year. I am so absolutely excited for Spring days & floral dresses & warmer days. So in honour of Spring finally arriving, & to encourage Mother Nature 🌸 a little, I figured some more floral was in order.

I’m not going to lie, these nails took me a while. A whole episode of Vanderpump Rules & then some. What’s the saying? You can’t rush perfection? Well these are definitely perfection to me.

For this manicure, the many, many polishes I used were:

  • Base Coat: Quo by ORLY Kiss Me, I’m Kind
  • Top Coat: Seche Vive
  • Matte Top Coat: Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure Matte Top Coat
  • Wrenn Polish Passionfruit Pink
  • China Glaze I Got A Blue Attitude
  • Wet N Wild Haze of Love
  • China Glaze Life is Rosy
  • L’Oréal Jardin des Roses
  • Essie Flowerista
  • YSL Beauty Vert D’Orient
  • Quo by ORLY Second Hand Jade
  • Sally Hansen I ♥️ Nail Art pen in Green
  • Sally Hansen I ♥️ Nail Art pen in Turquoise
  • Sally Hansen I ♥️ Nail Art pen in Purple
  • Nail Art brush from Bundle Monster

It’s definitely the matte top coat that makes these nails so perfect. They were pretty shiny too, but they were just another floral. Adding the matte just brought this mani to a whole other level that I’m quite honestly obsessed with. Also this is my first time matte-ifying Wrenn Polish Passionfruit Pink & oh my god! It completely transforms it to a whole other level. I’m kind of obsessed.

So who else is so excited about the first day of Spring? I’m choosing to ignore the fact we have a snowstorm apparently coming tomorrow/Thursday & chiding to concentrate on the fact it’s going to be sunny today & I’m going on a thrift store adventure today to expand my Spring wardrobe.

What do you think of these florals? What are you doing to celebrate the beginning of Spring today? Share you thoughts in the comments below!

💗

St. Patrick’s Day Shamrock Nails ☘️

Happy Saturday Lovelies… & happy St Patrick’s Day! It’s been quiet on the blog this week, & if you follow me on Instagram you’ll know I had a bit of an accident involving my son where he scratched my cornea with his nail leaving me temporarily blind Wednesday. It was a little difficult to try & do my nails & write a post so I took a bit of a hiatus but I still wanted to try & do something fun in honour of St. Patrick’s Day, so I can up with a fun shamrock design.

Green is not a usual colour choice for me. I own quite a few greens, but I usually save them for either Christmas or St. Patrick’s Day so I was excited to pull a few out to play with.

The polishes I used for this design were:

  • Base Coat: Quo by Orly Kiss Me, I’m Kind
  • Top Coat: Seche Vive
  • Wrenn Polish I Know Quac is Extra
  • OPI That’s Hula-rious
  • China Glaze Be More Pacific
  • Essence The Green & The Grunge
  • YSL Beauty Vert D’Orient
  • URSugar Nail Vinyls — shamrocks (item #AUB39877)

I started off with a dry brush base using all my greens but YSL Beauty Vert D’Orient & let it dry completely. Then I added the shamrock vinyls over top my design & painted over the whole nail with Vert D’Orient & immediately removed the vinyls revealing my dry brush shamrocks. I think it was a cute way to use a whole bunch of greens & a great design for St Patrick’s Day!

What do you have planned for your St Patrick’s Day? Mine will be spent working & the only green things I’ll be drinking with be green kombucha & matcha lattes… but that’s okay with me! Hope you have a fun (& safe!) St. Patrick’s Day whatever you get up to. 💚 Also head over to my Instagram later on for a bonus nail art look featuring these Shamrock vinyls from URSugar! 🍀☘️🍀

Negative Space Stripes (Again!)

Hello Lovelies & happy Monday! I hope everyone had a fantastic week. I’m getting prepped for a busy week ahead–it’s March Break week which means that it’s going to be busy busy busy for me at work! I’m still getting used to being back to work but that’s why they invented espresso, am I right? I’m also getting used to fitting in doing my nails to my daily routine on top of working & being a Mom–it definitely takes practice! So I’ve been leaning more towards easy nail art looks.

Today’s nails were done using some striping tape from Born Pretty Store (Item #40423) that I recently bought. I picked up a three pack of different sizes that I thought would be perfect for achieving different sized stripes. Plus it’s pretty & purple… & I love purple!

For this manicure, the polishes I used were:

  • Base Coat: Quo by ORLY Kiss Me, I’m Kind
  • Top Coat: Seche Vive
  • Essie Cashmere Bathrobe
  • Essie Where’s My Chauffeur?
  • Born Pretty Store Aurora Rainbow Nail Striping Tape (item #40423)
  • Small detail brush from Bundle Monster

These were so simple to do & I love the pop of colour against the dark grey polish. All I did was apply my different sizes of striping tape over my completely dry base coat, & then painted over top with Cashmere Bathrobe. Then I took my small detail brush & added stripes of Where’s My Chauffeur? freehand. Definitely one of my favourite Spring polishes & it works so well with Cashmere Bathrobe because it stands out so much! You can never go wrong with a good turquoise nail polish.

Also negative space makes me so happy. Like–it’s such an easy way to make your nails look fancy without a lot of work. & I’m all about quick & easy while still looking fancy.

What nails are you rocking to start off your week? What do you think of this negative space look? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below!

SWATCH SUNDAY — Sally Hansen Salon Chrome in Holographic

Good Morning! I hope Daylight Savings time didn’t throw off you too much. Our little guy was up at 5 am, so today is going to be an extra espresso shot kind of day. Before that though I have a fun Swatch Sunday post to share with you! Today I’m sharing this Salon Chrome kit from Sally Hansen.

You might remember these kits popping up on Instagram when they were released back in early Fall 2017! This was right around the time powders were hitting peak popularity, so naturally Sally Hansen came up with their version featuring their Miracle Gel polishes. I was super curious about them when they first came out, but sadly the price ($38 at my local Pharmacy) was just a little too much to splurge on. Luckily, I was shopping for groceries at Superstore back in late February & found a few of the kits in the clearance section, so obviously I had to pick it up to try!

Continue reading “SWATCH SUNDAY — Sally Hansen Salon Chrome in Holographic”

Tropical Leaves! 🌿

Happy Friday loves! Still feeling like Winter here in Halifax (yesterday was the worst) so I’m feeling like embracing Spring on my nails as much as possible. Tropical leaves have been popping up on my Instagram feed a lot lately (shout out to @nailsbyharlig & @thebasecoat for each of their pretty designs!), so it felt like a good time to pull out my tropical leaves stencils from What’s Up Nails.

For this manicure, the polishes I used were:

  • Base Coat: Quo by ORLY Breathable Kiss Me, I’m Kind
  • Top Coat: Seche Vive
  • OPI My Address is Hollywood
  • YSL Vert D’Orient
  • China Glaze In The Limelight
  • What’s Up Beauty Tropical Leaves Stencils
  • Edge Perfection Cuticle Barrier

The green against the pink base is such a pretty combination. I adore the look of tropical leaves, but I could never imagine trying to freehand them… yet! Thankfully, nail vinyls makes it way too easy to create the look. 🌱🌿🍃

Anyone else love the tropical leaf look that’s been so popular on Instagram lately? I’ve been obsessed with all the greenery (a reaction to the lack of Spring in my life, I’m sure) so it’s fun to see everyone’s version of the look! Also it gets me excited for a month or two when it finally feels like Spring is really here.

What’s your favourite Spring nail art look right now? What are you obsessed with? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below!