Birthday Giveaway Winners Revealed!

Thank you to everyone who entered my Birthday Giveaway...and thank you to everyone who has waited oh so patiently for the results (or maybe impatiently and were just to polite to say anything!! lol) The votes were reviewed, tabulated, and then entered into the appropriate giveaway of your choice...or choices as in the case of a lot of gals.

Here's the results: Giveaway #1 (Nicole by OPI - Biebers) - Precious Pearl

Giveway #2 (Icing Sheen Polishes) - Kejal

Giveway #3 (LA Girls Glitter Addict) - Riikka

Giveway #4 (Oops! Jealous Polishes) - Olivia Nobody

Giveway #5 (Oops! Jealous Polishes) - Oana

Congrats!!!! Emails have been sent out and those who had their names drawn will have 48 hours to reply or another draw will occur for that applicable number(s).

Thanks too for everyone who took the time to comment....this was an easy extra vote and it was interesting to see that only about 50% added a comment...and some gals really put some thought into it....I thank you for taking the time to do this if you did. There were a lot of requests for posts and whatnot along with suggestions; I'll probably address in a future post.

And here's a mani I did recently....while I've been chomping at the bit to start Halloween mani's, I had a funeral visitation to attend recently and couldn't very well go with ghosts and goblins on my nails, but my next mani should be Halloween related (I hope!). In real life, the flaky isn't so obvious and this was actually pretty subdued; it just looks so glowy because of the intentional angle of my hand pose.

Started with two coats of SpaRitual Spirit Child.


And ended with a coat of Sally Hansen Hidden Treasure.

Another look.


Congrats again to Precious Pearl, Kejal, Riikka, Olivia Nobody and Oana!!!

And as always, here's my super sophisticated selection process!





*for some reason, I can't get it to load, so will edit post or repost another time but don't want to delay any more on posting this...so at this point, you'll just have to trust that those were the names drawn!*

Edit: October 24, 2011: Unfortunately, I did not hear back from Riikka and its been well over 48 hours and she hasn't replied to my email; I hope she's doing something fabulous like being on holiday to miss out on the prize! Anyway, I did double check I sent email to the address she had requested and I had, so the bad news for Riikka is I had to draw another name for Prize 3; the good news is that Lulu (@ greeklulu) has had her name drawn and will have 48 hours to reply. The other 4 gals contacted me within the 48 hours as required.

Welcome if you are a new follower-I had a few of you start to following after the giveway ended so thanks for checking out my blog! Please don't be disappointed if you didn't enter this giveaway....another one is in the works thanks to a generous etailer! Details to follow soon!

Thanks for looking!

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month

Well, it's Wednesday...while I don't participate often by having pink mani's on Wednesday, I thought that I could detract from doing fall and Thanksgiving manis...(and before I go full force into Halloween!!!) for a very worthwhile cause and do a Breast Cancer Awareness mani as October is Breast Cancer Awareness month.



Here's mani is progress; started with three coats of OPI Pink-ing of You.



Then stamped using fauxnad D08 (this is the middle image that also includes Michael Jackson's feet; I just didn't polish or scrape that portion of the plate). I can't recall any other ribbon available like this on image plates (I know Sdp plates has a similar ribbon, which I have, but it's not exactly the same and I prefer this ribbon to the other plate); so let's hope that Konad or someone else will do a ribbon stamp (and in different sizes) as there are so many themes that I could think of to use it. Until then, at least this stamp is available. D Series plates can be obtained from Chez Delaney.



I actually didn't do too bad of a job of lining the image up but the middle finger was slightly off so decided to do a second stamp beside it to fill in the gap. The stamping polish I used is from Beautiful Scratchers. I have a sample bottle from when the colour was being developed but believe the colour is Metallic Ice Pink.


Lastly, added a few random dots using CND Raspberry Parfait and OPI Bride's Bouquet.



This pix was taken the next morning in daylight...only shown as you see the stamping a little better.


I don't think I need to go into great details why its necessary to promote the need for Breast Cancer Awareness as I'm sure we all know of at least one person who is or has battled this disease. If you need more information, please go to the Canadian Cancer Society or browse the internet for more information in your area.



Last but not least, I should soon have the post ready that will announce those who had their names drawn for my Birthday Giveaway. I'm terribly sorry that it has taken this long and wish I had a better excuse other than life got in the way but that's the case. Between working incredibly long hours, dealing with the family, closing my weekend place and everything else in between that goes along with life, I just haven't had as much time as I wanted to tabulate everything...but I will do soon!

Thanks for your patience...and thanks for looking!

Happy Thanksgiving!

This is the long Thanksgiving weekend here in Canada and this is the mani I've been wearing all weekend.



The base colours used were Essie Barbuda Banana layered with one coat of Savvy Femme Couture Banarama (yellow nails); D2W Red Chic 2 Volcanic Lava layer with one coat of Savvy Femme Couture Orange You Happy (orange) and Miss B Rainbow unnamed brown colour.



I searched my plate stash and couldn't believe that there are no turkey image plates so during the week, I sourced all my local supply places and finally, at one store, found a couple of old packs of water decals. Stamped with Konad special polishes in Cool Red, Deep Jungle, Pastel Orange and Yellow using SdP D20 (maple leaves), fauxnad F (other leaves) and T41 (pumpkin and leave swirl above the turkey) image plates along with the water decals.



I've been having a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend...the weather all weekend has been absolutely beautiful. I had my Thanksgiving turkey dinner on Saturday as we are in the process of closing up our weekend place for the season so wanted to have Sunday and Monday free to do the things we need to do (not that we want to do it because the weather has been so awesome!). Both my parents and my in laws joined us for dinner and everyone seemed to have a wonderful time.

Happy Thanksgiving to my fellow Canadians....and hopefully you will enjoy this mani even if you aren't celebrating!

Sampling My Franken!

I frankened a stamping polish!



I've been thinking about manis I have kinda tucked in the back of my head and was looking for a stamping polish that had the glow of Nicole by OPI Give Me the 1st Dance, but a darker, more charcoal colour. I couldn't think of polish in my stash that had the look I was wanting (maybe Chanel Graphite, but do you really want to be doing a whole lot of stamping with a $30 bottle of polish? And speaking of Graphite..I'll have to check my bottle to see if I accidentally duped it...hmmmm.....) So anyway, I decided to attempt a franken. It's in the bottle I'm holding in the pix below.

I already knew I liked the sparkle of the stamping from Nicole by OPI Give Me the 1st Dance and knew it stamped well, so poured about a third of a bottle into an empty one. Then added WnW Black Creme a few drops at a time until I got the desired colour I was looking for. Voila! A franken stamping polish is born! I was pretty happy with the results. And while I was at it, I decided to attempt a red version....my first attempt looks a tad darker than I'm wanting, more raspberry than red at this point, so its still a work in progress. I bought more polishes to use for frankening to see what else I can come up with....also switched the silver base to SH Celeb City as it has the same glowy sparkle but a fraction of the price....it doesn't stamp quite as well as Nicole by OPI, but the results are decent enough...especially when you're only wearing your mani for a day or two!

Because I spent half most of my free time making the frankens, I quickly did this mani to test drive my stamping polish. Started with base coat of OPI DC Charged Up Cherry; two coats.

Stamped using Big SdP C with my charcoal franken (I'll call it Franken #1 as I'm not terribly creative!). Its a plate I've used before but was mainly just wanting to do a mani quickly to see how the franken looked for stamping.


Lastly, jazzed it up a bit with some dots using Konad black special polish.


The next morning at the crack of dawn, I took this pix. This is pretty much how it looks IRL. I love how sparkly and glowy the stamping polish is....can't wait to use it again!


I know this is pretty simplistic compared to the beautiful polishes that more serious frankeners come up with, but it seems like it will be perfect for what I have in mind for stamping...and I hope I can replicate the glowy results in other colours!

Thanks for looking!

China Glaze Velvet Bow from 2011 Let It Snow Collection

I have a swap pal in the Netherlands...we're in the middle of getting polishes together for our 4th swap. She messaged me a week or so ago saying she's been looking for a classy looking brown/red polish...not to lean too red or too brown. Unfortunately, I don't have a lot of these colours is my stash as I'm just not a fan of these dark, vampy colours on me....I made a couple suggestions like Essie Mack and Essie Masquerade Belle. Then I remembered I just picked up the China Glaze Let it Snow Collex and thought one of the polishes from it, Velvet Bow, may fit what she's looking for so I swatched it for her.



While this is appropriate for the fall weather we've been having, this isn't a colour I wear on a regular basis, especially on its own, so I started looking through my stash to see what I could layer it with....then I remembered picking up the CND 2011 Fall/Winter set that included 24K Sparkle and thought it may funky up Velvet Bow at bit. This is one coat.



It still looked kinda dark so I decided to stamp over top of it...and this is more my style of what I would wear if I had to wear a dark vampy colour!



Used CND Gold Chrome polish for stamping using fauxnad IP's SdP B10 (trailing rose and french tip roses) and SdP D19 (single rose on pinky and index). I funkied it up (is funkied a word? lol!) by placing the rose image upside down and right side up....I think if I was to redo this, I would place all images right side up like the thumb but don't mind how this looks at all. I shortened my nails recently and filed them more square than I usually do as I'm wanting to try some more funky french mani's so did a french tip with a band of roses on IP SdP B10 to practise my french tipped placement.



I so adore the old English roses feel of the cascading of the leaves on the image on the thumb. This pix you also get a better look at how the CND 24K Sparkle looks as it doesn't seem terribly noticeable in some of these pix. I wonder what it looks like on lighter colours? (Plots another mani!)



Do you think China Glaze Velvet Bow fits the description of a classy brown/red, not leaning too red or brown? If not, do you have another suggestion for my swap pal? Nothing too htf as I have to go searching for it!



Thanks in advance for your thoughts and thanks too for looking!

PS: I haven't forgotten that my Birthday Giveaway has ended....I've been busy verifying the number of eligible votes and everything else that goes along with hosting a give way and will announce the results soon!

More Fall Nails

This is what my corner of the world looks like now....the leaves are in full colour almost everywhere you go!



I enjoy this time of year....nothing I like better than going for a long drive with the roof down looking at the awesome colour display Mother Nature gives us this time of year. Unfortunately, the weather was terrible over the weekend...when it was sunny, it was really windy and when there was no wind, it was overcast and raining...but hopefully the leaves will stay around a couple more weeks to see the beautiful fall display.

Base colours used starting from thumb and going left to right are: Optic Lusion Pango Charms, Optic Lusion Skipper Dazzler, Sally Hansen Bronze Ruby, Dare2Wear Red Chic 2 Volcanic Lava, and Nubar Arencia.



Unfortunately, unless you've been collecting polishes for a while, I'm surmising these are pretty hard to find (with the exception of the Nubar), unless you stumble across them at a dusty like I did, or swap for them.



Stamped with CND Gold Chrome using fauxnad IP's HB 21, and SdP 14.



While this looked nice enough, I thought it was lacking something, so added a coat of CND Gold Sparkling topcoat which gave the mani just a hint of holo glitter. It's very faint in the pix and maybe next time, I'll use a second coat.



I know from reading some blogs out there that I'm not the only one who enjoys this time of year. Its a toss up to me between fall and spring which season I like best...I love the fall colours but always look at spring as a time for new beginnings....and summer means swimming, boating and other activities I love to do (just not a fan of the excessive heat some days)and winter...well, I really love the scenery after a snowfall (just don't like to drive in it!). I guess I like each season a little for different reasons but I do think fall is probably the best all around for me! Or maybe spring...or....

How do you like fall?

Minnie Mouse

I've had the idea of this mani in my mind for a while now...along with a lot of other ones!....but sometimes I just have to be in the mood for a certain mani....sometimes its just a matter that I don't have much time to put what I'm thinking about together (actually, this happens more often than not!) or my nails aren't long enough....or they are too long....or I want to wear holo but it's not calling for sunshine....sometimes I have a work function that dictates more tame nails versus whimsical or colourful (although I am pretty lucky that I can pretty much wear anything 99.9% of the time).....in any event, I decided to put together a Minnie Mouse themed mani a couple nights ago and this is what I came up with.



Base colours used are WetnWild Black Creme (1 coat), OPI Red My Fortunate Cookie (red-2 coats) and OPI Kiss on the Chic (pale pink-4 or 5 coats; I lost track!). While I was looking for the pale blush hint of pink for this mani, if I had have known it would take so many coats to be opaque, I would have picked another polish or put a base of a nude neutral on for underwears....and in hindsight after seeing the end result, I would have chosen a white base on these fingers just to keep it with three colours versus four...oh, well...there's always next time!



Stamped using Konad white and black special polishes using IP's SdP 16 (Minnie Mouse face), XL F (flowers in variety of sizes) and CG 06 (full length Minnie).



Added a few dots using Konad white, black and red special polishes. I was pleasantly surprised that the red dot showed up so well on the black base. I'm really digging the look of the nails with red and black bases...the bold look of the red, black and white together...I'm sure will be used for another mani in the future!



As some of the dots were pretty heavy, I waited about 15 minutes to allow them to dry before topping the mani off with a coat of SV as I didn't want to have SV drag. Nothing more disappointing than having polish drag on your newly finished mani because of this...unfortunately, I've been there many times :(



I'm not sure if you can tell from these last two pix, but topping the mani off with a top coat really makes the stamping *pop* (just look at the two Minnie faces on each pix to see the difference with and without SV) as well as smooths out the stamping image. Topcoat also makes the image stamping last longer...I am only pointing this out in case you don't already top your stamping as I never when I first started out!

Tonight at midnight is the end of my current giveaway.....if you have not already checked it out and want to, please do so here!

Hope you have a fabulous weekend....and thx for dropping by!