Tag: Sparkles

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SWATCH SUNDAY — China Glaze Ugly Sweater Party

Hello my loves & Happy Sunday! This is the second Sunday of December, so I’m keeping with the Christmas-ish polish tradition, & trying to share shades that are related in some way to the holiday!

This past week I did a poll on my Instagram asking if people would rather see China Glaze Ugly Sweater Party (Holiday 2015) or OPI Bring Out The Big Gems (Holiday 2022) this week, & with an overwhelming majority, Ugly Sweater Party was the winner!

2 coats, No Top Coat

China Glaze Ugly Sweater Party is a pink jelly formula, packed tightly with an assortment of glitters, including holographic. The formula is a tad on the thick side, but with a little bit of patience, I easily covered my whole nail in two coats. You could probably sponge on the glitter for a denser packed glitter effect, but I much prefer it applied this way as I like the overall finish.

Truthfully, I don’t know if I can remember ever wearing this shade as a full manicure like this before. I originally bought the polish because I loved the name, & glitter is my weakness, but I think I’ve truthfully only used it in glitter gradients, or maybe as a single accent nail, which makes me sad.

I was also surprised I had never swatched this shade previous Decembers, so I was happy. to do both for todays post! This is definitely a fun glitter shade, & just screams Christmas party to me! My Christmas party days are long behind me, but to be honest if I were every invited to one — & didn’t have time for a full nail art look — this would be my #1 polish pick for such an occasion.

Do you remember China Glaze Ugly Sweater Party from its original 2015 release? Did you have this sparkly shade in your stash, or do you still have this glitter on rotation? Let me know all your thoughts down in the comments below!

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SWATCH SUNDAY — Glam Doll Electronica

Hello lovelies & happy Sunday!

There is nothing more that I love than discovering a new to me nail polish brand! It’s quite exciting, like finding buried treasure or something. Truly, it’s very exciting to be perusing a store & stumble upon a polish brand I’ve never discovered before.

That’s what happened last week when I stumbled across this pretty bottle of polish while checking out a pharmacy I never go to. & I couldn’t be more excited to share it with you, especially because my Google research couldn’t find much at all about this nail polish brand.

2 coats over a base of Essence Take Me To Heaven

The second I saw those beautiful glittery shade, I was smitten. The formula is pretty a pretty thin cruelly, with a lot of pf glitter crammed in. There are metallic fushica micro glitters, slightly larger neon green & blue glitters, & then larger cobalt blue hex glitters.

I chose to apply it over some baby blue undies, to cut down on coats I needed to apply, but I would assume you would need 3 or 4 coats for full-ish opacity. You could also get away with one coat over a blue base, if you were feeling a less concentrated glitter look. For me, 2 coats over some undies was perfect

This polish seems very Spring-y & fun. It reminds me a bit of the Nails INC Sprinkles collection that was released around 2012. In fact, when looking them up online it is awfully similar to Pudding Lane — which of course was the only one from the collection that I didn’t find back then so I can’t do a proper comparison. But from looking online, I’d say they’re pretty darn close.

What do you think about this polish? Have you ever heard of the brand Glam Doll before? Let me know all your thoughts down in the comments below, & if you’re a fan of this summery glittery polish pick?

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Halloween Glitter Gradient with Sally Hansen x Sour Patch Kids InstaDri

PR Sample/Gifted

Hello lovelies & happy Friday.

It’s officially 2 days until Halloween, & I’m super pumped. I’m really feeling the spooky Halloween spirit. & I just recently received the most amazing PR package from Sally Hansen this week featuring their amazing Sally Hansen x Sour Patch Kids InstaDri line (& about 2 pounds of Sour Patch Kids… my favourite sour candy!) I will have Swatches on Sunday, but I. The meantime I created this fun & witchy glitter gradient featuring a few of the shades.

The polishes I used for this manicure are: 

  • Base Coat: Essie First Base
  • Top Coat: Seche Vive
  • Sally Hansen InstaDri Ghouls Night Out
  • Sally Hansen InstaDri Hallo-Queen
  • Sally Hansen InstaDri Fab-BOO-lous
  • Latex Free Make Up Sponge

I know I already said it, but I absolutely love how witchy these feel. I will have full swatches coming soon, but this glitter topper — Hallo-Queen — is so pretty. I love the combination of the multi coloured black, orange & holo glitters. It makes for such a perfect gradient. I also used a bit of the glow-in-the-dark polish overtop, although I haven’t really had the time to test it out properly. It’ll be fun for Halloween night though!

What do you think about this witchy gradient? Is this a Halloween nail art look that you were the rock for the big night? Let me know down below all your thoughts on this combination!

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Tribal Stamped Accent Nail

Good Morning! & happy Saturday. ♥️ My Saturday is starting off pretty good because we actually got a sprinkling of snow last night, so things are looking pretty festive & Winter-y. It’s also starting off pretty good because I have some new nails to show off.

I wore this nail art design the other night when I was invited to a Mark’s Well Worn Media Event–the first blogger event I’ve ever been invited to! It was pretty exciting & obviously I needed to wear something fancy on my nails for the occasion. & what is more fancy than some holo glitter & a little stamping accent nail. ✨

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The polishes I used for this design were:

  • Base Coat: Nailtek 2 Foundations
  • Top Coat: Seche Vive
  • Finger Paints Piece De Resistance
  • Essence We Will Spock You
  • ACO by Ardene Style Icon
  • Sally Hansen Hard As Nails Black Heart
  • Edge Perfection Cuticle Barrier
  • Born Pretty Store Stamping Plate m100 (no longer available)
  • Latex free make up sponge

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I just love how this design turned out. Honestly I never thought I would enjoy stamping so much, but it’s kind of become an obsession! I ordered a bunch of new plates from Born Pretty Store, so those should be here sometime in the New Year. In the meantime, I’ve been rediscovering old stamping plates I bought in the beginning of my nail art journey. I think the combination of a good liquid latex & polishes that work well for stamping has made it more fun & much less of a frustration. Also how pretty is ACO by Ardene Style Icon? I sponged it on for full glitterocity & the sparkle is hard not to stare at. Again thank god for Edge Perfection because trying to clean that glitter off my cuticles would have made me cry.

What do you think of these nails? Let me know in the comments below. ✨

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31 Day Nail Art Challenge — Day 10: Gradient nails.

So you’ll recognize the base of my gradient from my swatch post of Rimmel Salon Pro in Reggae Splash.

I’ve just started doing gradients in the last little while. I got discouraged because I’ve never been the best at getting my colors to blend the way that I want. But I’ve been working on getting better at the technique, and my blend between colors seems to be getting more seamless.

gradient

gradient3

gradient2

The polishes used were:

  • Rimmel Salon Pro in Reggae Splash — my lighter peach base color.
  • Relvon Nail Enamel in Siren — the darker orange gradient.
  • Layla Soft Touch Collection in Golden Touch — gold polish layered on accent nails.
  • Sally Hansen Diamond Flash top coat.

Not only am I really impressed with how my gradient turned out, but the colors totally remind me of a sunset–especially with the added gold on my accent nails. I thought about adding the gold to all the nails, but the boyfriend told me I should just leave it as accent nails. (He may, or may not, have just said it so I would come to bed haha.)

These were the perfect burst of color on what was a dreadful, grey day. It may have been raining like heck outside, but I just had to look at my nails and I was instantly somewhere warm and sunny. It makes me even more excited for what will (hopefully) be a gorgeous summer, full of bright colorful manis! Plus I love wearing orange–it brings out my Olive under tones, and instantly makes me look SO tanned.

So what’s your technique for getting gradients just right? I’m always looking for tips and tricks, so I’d appreciate any wisdom the internet has to offer.