China Glaze On Safari

I was by my local beauty supply place yesterday.  Low and behold sitting out on the shelf was the new China Glaze On Safai collex.  While I've reallllyyyy been trying not to buy every polish from every new collection, especially when the colours don't look terribly unique, at $3.50 a bottle, it was too good of a deal to pass up on, so I caved.

Here's some pix of the collex.

Bottle pix.

Paper swatches.

  

These pix aren't the greatest as taken outside in overcast skies but thought I'd share.  

My two faves were definately the two glitters...it seems a little odd to be picking up fall colours this time of year and other than the mani I did last night, I can't see that I'll be wearing them for a little while.  I'm sure I'll get a lot of use of these colours as bases or stamping mani's closer to fall, but for now, they seem too dark, especially with so many other brights I'd rather be wearing during the summer!  

Do you plan on picking up any of the collex?  What are your faves?   

Thanks for looking!

Sharing My ROAK

My fellow Canadian nail pal, nailXchange, spent a few months in various countries in Europe.  Her and I met up a few days before she left Canada last year for a swap that we had in progress (maybe even the night before? I can't remember now - it was half a year ago!).  Anyway, when we parted ways, she mentioned that she'd send me polishes that she thought I might like.  I told her no, she didn't have to, but she insisted.   

If you follow her blog, you'll know she has found some absolutely amazing polish finds in her travels.  (If you're not following, I'd suggest you check it out as she does beautiful stamping.)  I was thrilled that not once, but TWICE, she sent me packages while she was away.  The polishes have been sitting at my nail station, patiently waiting while I figured how out to use them  (it took so long cause I'm not really that great in visualizing how the layering of polishes will turn outand what goes well over that...I'm just not that creative as you can tell from the layering combinations I do, if that makes sense! Most of the time, I need to do test swatches just to make sure the end result is somewhat decent! lol). 

So not too long ago, I decided to use one of the new Mash plates for a mani; this is what I came up with.

Started with a base of two coats of Essie Raspberry.  This pix has no topcoat.

Layered gradient with Glamour glitter nail polish.  I'm sure it has a name but nothing I could really pick out specifically to be a name as I don't read Polish.  I called it Glamour Raspberry Glitter in my notes, lol!

Bottle pix of 'Glamour Raspberry Glitter'.

Closer to the tips for a futher gradient look, added Midie 08, which is a holographic glitter in various sizes in a clear base.  Topped with SV.

Stamped using white Konad special polish using Mash-46.

I wasn't terribly thrilled with the bare spot left on the middle finger where I didn't line the image up too well, so I isolated one of the flowers from the plate and stamped it at the base to cover.

Topped with SV.  As usual, its still not too creative in the polish layering but the two polishes accented Essie Raspberry well....at least, I thought so!

Here's bottle shots of the first package I received.

Bottle shots of the second.

Close up of three of them.  The middle one, I'm dying to use but haven't quite figured out what base to use and haven't had time to do any sample swatching.  It and the far left bottle just seem so unique and unlike anything I have in my stash. 

Thanks again nailXchange for your amazing packages!  :)  You really shouldn't have, but I love them all and appreciate your thoughtfulness!  I hope to use the other polishes soon...if only I can come up with something creative enough to do them justice!

Thanks for looking!

PS:  I just remembered nailXchange is having a giveaway; if you are interested in checking it out, please go here!



Goth Nails

I'm about as Goth as Betty White (but not quite as old!), but this past week, the FB AiS was Goth Nails. This is the mani I came up with.   

Started with a base of two coats of Manglaze Fuggen Ulgy and accent of Manglaze Hot Mess, three coats. 

Stamped using black Konad special polish and  Fab Ur Nails Red Wine. Image plates used were Hot Topic (skull on index, skull music notes on ring, stars on pinky), T48 (roses on middle), fauxnad E (single rose on index), SdP 76 (bats on thumb), SdP 77 (graveyard), SdP 19 (spider on pinky),  Konad Q1 (random silver stars - which were stamped with Nicole by OPI Give Me The First Dance).  Seems I forgot to jot down the cross plate, I'll update the post later.  (Edit:  cross on ring ringer is T07.)

I didn't do a great job stamping the index finger; of course, it's an image that must be stamped perfectly or its sooo out of place, but it was late when I did this and I couldn't remove the mis-stamp with some remover and do again as it was a matte polish and any attempt to remove it would have wrecked the polish underneath as there was no topcoat.  So I lived with it.  A crooked cross would have to do.

Topcoated with SV just before heading to bed as otherwise, I'm sure it would have been chipped by morning, lol!

This mani isn't something I'd wear everyday but it was fun for the challenge.  (Anyone just checking out the blog will be going how did she go from cute bees to Goth? lol!)  

Not terribly sure how *Goth* it is, but it was fun trying! 

Thanks for looking!

Buzzzzzzz!!!!!!!

New plates arrived earlier this week.  As sick as I was....and considering vision was a little iffy with eye infection in both eyes, I couldn't wait to use my new plates....this was what I came up with.

Started with a base of two coats of China Glaze Lemon Fizz and FingerPaints Black Expressionism.

Stamped with black Konad special polish and FAB UR NAILS Magno Shake using Apipila G04.

Apipila G04 plate looks like this....how cute is this, eh?

Isolated the smaller beehive and bees from the full size nail design and added them to a couple of the nails as seen on the index and ring finger here.

Added random dots using same polishes here and there for interest.

I'm loving these stamping polishes from FAB UR NAILS.  One of my stamping wants has always been colours that stamp well over dark colours and these polishes work well.  For comparison purposes, below is FAB UR NAILS Mango Shake on the left and Konad yellow on the left. Really impressed with the colour pigmentation on Mango Shake and how bright it stamps on black.

My Apipila order, all cutely packaged.....my first Jade, which was a kind extra!!!

Couple pix of the plates.  I've tested 50% of the plate and so far, the ones I've tested stamp well. 

Another pix.  See Pink Panther?  Sandwiched between Snoopy and Woodstock and Lisa Simpson? For that image alone, I bought this plate...the rest were just an added bonus (pondering a mani to make use of the Pink Panther image...hmmmm!)

Apipila is available here.  I emailed the gal because I found the website a little challenging even with translation.  The email address is:  atendimento@apipila.com.br  

FAB UR NAILS here.

Thanks everyone for your well wishes.  I'm feeling better but judging that my daughter has had this nasty bug for three weeks, and I'm confident I got it from her, I think its going to be around for a while.  The worst is the sore throat and the eye infection; if they went away, I could deal with the dry cough.  But I'm sure I'll be back to normal, whatever that may be!, soon!

Hope you're having a fantastic weekend.  Off to do a Goth mani for the FB AiS challenge....I think it's going to be a challenge for sure!  Thanks for looking! 

Finally Getting Around to Posting My Father's Day Mani

These are the nails I was wearing on Sunday, which was Father's Day.  Unfortunately, I'm late in publishing this post because I don't have reliable internet service on the weekends and by the time I got home on Sunday night to do the post and had reliable internet, I was was terribly ill.  Sicker than I've been in a long, long time.  Eye infection in both eyes, sore throat, dry hacky cough along with a  fever. I quickly posted a pix to FB AiS for the Sunday challenge being glitter (hence the small amount of glitter under Dad to make it challenge appropriate!) then headed off to bed to try to rest.  Four days later, I'm still not feeling the best, but did want to get this posted before it's so long after Father's Day it's not appropriate! 

This is the tribute mani I did for my dear ol' Dad.

Polishes starting with thumb and working clockwise are SpaRitual Indigo, Billie Electric Blue, Essence Walk on Air, Maybelline Color Show Shocking Seas, and GOSH Limited Edition Attitude. While these aren't necessarily the colours I would have chosen if I was at home as they don't really go together that well, they are an assortment of blues I happen to have with my on the weekend and had to do.  I now keep a supply of random polishes, plates and nail supply stuff at my weekend place versus hauling everything back and forth every weekend and holiday like I did last year.   

Added a coat of Essence Choose Me! on thumb.  It's more teal/green than the blue as seen in these pix...not sure why its not more colour accurate as the pix were taken in the natural, bright sunlight. 

Stamped using white Konad special polish.  Plates used where CH28 (ties on middle finger), T40 (fish-doublestamped the reeds), SdP D14 (Dad banner), T28 (wolf), SdP 59 (bird), SdP 3 (leaf) and SdP 72 (coffee cup).  In addition to this being for Father's Day, hence the Dad and ties, the rest are tribute to my Dad.  He has love and fascination with nature and wildlife so added the wolf, bird and leaves.  I won't say how many t-shirts and sweat shirts that he has with wolves, loons, etc. on them!  Enjoys nothing better than sitting on his deck watching and listening to the birds around all the feeders he has placed.  Loves to fish and also has his scuba diving license.  (If only there was a scuba diver stamp!  Would be so cool on the thumb along with this stamping! ) And like me, has a love of coffee...in fact, the family joke is that my Dad's vehicle is on autopilot to drive into every Tim Horton's that he passes for a coffee and 10 Timbits. 

Added a few random dots for colour interest and a bit of glitter in the Dad banner just to make it challenge appropriate for the AiS FB glitter mani challenge. 

We took my parents out for brunch and had a great day later just lounging around the deck chatting with them.  In addition to brunch, we gave my Dad a card and a gift card...to Tim Hortons, of course!  My son also gave his grandpa the day off from cutting his grass as he did it for him, which was nice of him too.

Just for something to do, I took a pix of my quasi mani station at my weekend place which I thought I'd share.  Nothing high tech here....just newspaper down on the coffee table.  Looking at it now, it seems like an extraordinary amount of nail stuff so keep on hand just to do the odd mani on the weekend......lol!

My view while I do my nails.  I usually do my nails on the deck but with the humidity over the weekend, decided to stay indoors in an attempt not to have any polish challenges.  Even indoors has air conditioning and fan challenges but they were in the other room so I took my chances.

Thinking back now, I was OK when I seen my Dad on Sunday morning and afternoon and wasn't feeling ill until the evening...looking back, I hope I didn't give him another 'present'....my sickness....I'll have to call him soon to see how he's feeling. (edit:  I did give him a call Wednesday and he's feeling fine, no sickness....thank goodness!)

Thanks for looking! 

models own Hedonistic....

.......aka pylon nails!  OMGoodness!  This is a bright one!  But bright I was looking for when I reached for Hedonistic.  I was wanting to wear something bright, fun and summery for the beautiful sunny weather we've been having...this is what I came up with.

Started with a base of models own Hedonistic, two coats.   The pix below has no topcoat.  It dries matte, maybe even kinda rubbery-like similar to Orly Plastix from a couple years ago.  This really does remind me of those orange cone pylons used in construction and obstacle courses ....

Stamped using Mash-41 using white Konad special polish.  I didn't do too good of a job lining up my thumb as you can see here....

....but that's OK!  Isolated the small flower on the plate and added a couple more of them as you can see below.

Ended up with this.  This was probably one of the few times I was glad I had a mis-stamp as I liked how the flower cluster turned out....even made me wish that all my nails were large enough for the extra flowers!

Mash-41. 

Added a few accents dots for colour interest using China Glaze Entourage.  While I don't have a separate pix of it, the yellow used was Konad pastel yellow as you can see in the first picture.

Unfortunately, when I went to topcoat it with quickdry, the orange and white stamping polish didn't get along too well....my white turned pink!   I did my right hand with SV first and when the white turned pink, did the left with SH quick dry but it did the same.  I've had this happen once or twice before.  It wasn't terribly obvious IRL that it was pink, but everything is magnified in macro....if I decide to use white over Hedonistic again, I'll be sure to topcoat it first just to see if this will stop the reaction. 

Hedonistic is part of the models own Hed Kandi collection; I got mine here at Harlow & Co.

Hope you're have a fantastic weekend....and thanks for looking!