Twinsie Tuesday: Mix and Match

The theme mix and match is pretty broad, so I tried to pick several polishes with different finishes in colors that I thought would be kind of unexpected and edgy together. That was the idea anyways. Instead, I think they just came out...well, I don't wanna go so far as to say ugly, but...it wasn't quite what I was going for. See and judge for yourself.

Index and pinky fingers: OPI DS Coronation
Middle finger: OPI Did It On 'Em with KBShimmer nail vinyls
Ring finger: OPI Metallic 4 Life
Thumb: Illamasqua Scorch with KBShimmer nail vinyls

The nail vinyls are by far my favorite part of this mani. They're a great nail art cheat--super easy and fast--and I love the variety of designs KBShimmer has to choose from. My main issue is with Did It On 'Em. I thought it'd be an interesting pop of color but it seems like it threw off the cohesiveness of the rest of the mani.

Anyways, I'm overanalyzing this. This mani had some hits and some misses, but I guess that's the nature of mix and match! ;)

Alaina at The Little Canvas

Alice at Nail Art in Wonderland

Amanda at Amandalandish

Amanda at Fashion Footing

Amber at Nails Like Lace

Bridget at A Painted Nail

Chelsea at Nailed Blog

ChiChi at I'm Just Me...ChiChi

Claire at Kerruticles

Jessica at Blue Velvet Lacquer

​Lisa at The Polish Playground

Marisa at Polish Obsession

Marisa at Polish Those Nails

Megan at A Beauty in the Business

Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les

Sara at The Call of Beauty

Sarah at Cloudy with a Chance of Lacquer

Savannah at Addicted to Polish

Sharon at Behind Green Eyes

Steph at Lovestruck Lacquer

Tiffany at Polished To Precision

Essie Striped Mani

I saw this adorable striped mani on Essie's Instagram account last week and I just had to put it on my own nails!

Source

Cute, right? I love the bright, summer-y shades they used. I busted out the exact same Essie polishes used in the original mani (Geranium and Bikini So Teeny) to re-create it. I didn't have the white polish, Essie Blanc, but honestly white is white, so Illamasqua Scorch was a perfect substitute.

This is one of my favorite manis I've ever done! It was my first time working with striping tape and I was pleasantly surprised how easy it was. The design came out very crisp and clean and I love how the colors play off each other. I wore this all weekend as my 4th of July nails and it could not have been more perfect for the occasion!

Twinsie Tuesday: Pond Manicure

It's the first Twinsie Tuesday post of 2015 and we are back with some all-new Twinsies in our little group! So I want to give a big welcome to Amanda, Beckie and Savannah! :)

That's the good news. Now for the bad news: this week's pond mani theme was a huge exercise in frustration for me. I did a whole pond mani and it took me about an hour. It actually came out pretty nice...until I accidentally hit my hand against my polish table and two fingers of my still-wet, still-unphotographed manicure got completely dented and smeared. Gah!!!! I was so mad!

After I'd invested all that time and effort into the mani, I honestly didn't want to try again. I made another attempt, but my heart wasn't in it and before I was even halfway done with it, I knew it wasn't going to look as nice. But rather than give up completely, I cut my losses and used the pond effect as an accent nail.

Aside from the fact that it's time-consuming to wait for all the layers to dry, this is actually a pretty easy technique to do--and if I say it's easy, then it's something just about anyone can do! For the hearts, I just drew little V-like shapes using Illamasqua Scorch and a Born Pretty nail art brush. My base was OPI Too Hot Pink To Hold 'Em, a hot pink jelly. I'm not a huge fan of jellies (too sheer for my taste) but this is a really gorgeous pink and I love that it can be built up to complete opacity without losing that squishy shine.

After our holiday hiatus, we're returning to our regular TT schedule, so hopefully I'll see you back here next week!

Alaina at The Little Canvas

Amanda at Amandalandish

Amanda at Fashion Footing

Amber at Nails Like Lace
Beckie at Polished by Beckie

Bridget at A Painted Nail

Chelsea at Nailed

ChiChi at I'm Just Me...ChiChi

Erin at Paint Those Piggies

Jessica at Blue Velvet Lacquer

Lakeisha at Refined and Polished
​Lisa at The Polish Playground

Marisa at Polish Obsession

Savannah at Addicted to Polish

Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les

Tiffany at Polished To Precision

Twinsie Tuesday: Lumina Lacquer Seven Year Witch

With Halloween just around the corner, we're showcasing some manis dedicated to the holiday this week! I originally planned on doing some mummy nails, but when I got some awesome nail mail over the weekend, I couldn't resist taking this opportunity to show off one of the newest additions to my collection: one of Lumina Lacquer's new Halloween polishes, Seven Year Witch!

Seven Year Witch is a matte glitterbomb filled with black and neon glitters in a bevvy of shapes, sizes and colors. Also included with Seven Year Witch is a baggie of skull-shaped glitters in a staggering amount of colors (including a few holo pieces!), for you to place on your nails however you like. Thoughtful, creative touches like this are one of the many reasons I love Lumina Lacquer so much!

The formula here is wonderful--very easy to spread across the nails. This is one coat over Illamasqua Scorch, a white creme. I thought a clean white base would be a great way to show off the huge variety of glitters you get with this polish. As I've come to expect from Lumina, the glitters themselves are well-mixed, so you don't have to fish a ton to get some of the bigger pieces.

I definitely went with something more fun and colorful for my Halloween mani rather than something spooky. While I focused more on "treat" than "trick," I can't wait to see what direction my Twinsies took this theme!

​

Alaina at The Little Canvas

Amanda at Amandalandish

Amber at Nails Like Lace
Anna at Going to the Showing
Bridget at A Painted Nail

Casey at CaseyLane Loves Polish

Chelsea at Nailed Blog

ChiChi at I'm Just Me...ChiChi

Cordia at Seriously Swatched

Elizabeth at Did My Nails

Erin at Paint Those Piggies

Jessica at Blue Velvet Lacquer

Kelly at Tuxarina

Lakeisha at Refined and Polished

​Lisa at The Polish Playground

​Marisa at Polish Obsession

Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les

Stephanie at A Little Polish

Tiffany at Polished To Precision​

Rainbow Honey Lanterns

Rainbow Honey Lanterns is an iridescent, multi-colored glitter topper from the brand's new Summer Mixtape Collection, which is already available on their website. I've reviewed two other polishes from the collection already (Fall In Love and Stolen Dance) and dare I say I saved the best for last! I love not only the rainbow of colors in this polish, but the name as well. It's very evocative and perfectly captures the feel of this polish--colorful,  luminous orbs glowing and glittering as they float through space.

The formula is great, with the various glitter colors and sizes distributing evenly across the nail. There's no need to help this polish along with fishing or placing.

For the mani above, I did two coats of Lanterns over Illamasqua Scorch, a white creme. I thought a white base would best showcase the rainbow of colors in Lanterns and I really like how this combo turned out! My nails look almost like little funfetti cupcakes!


Disclosure: This polish was sent to me for my honest review. For more information, please see my disclosure policy.

Born Pretty Black Swan Water Decals: Review & Swatches

Born Pretty Store's water decals are probably my all-time favorite nail art product. They're so fun and easy to use, plus they make it look like you spent hours on your nails, when really all it took was a few minutes. They work just like a temporary tattoo: cut 'em, wet 'em, then stick 'em on. Cover with topcoat and voila: instant mini masterpieces on your nails!

This time around, we'll be checking out some black swan water decals. I love the movie "Black Swan" and that's what instantly came to mind when I saw these decals. I paired them with Illamasqua Scorch, a white creme, to create a look that's more minimalist and that lets the decals really take center stage.

It just dawned on me that I'm kind of continuing the feather theme from yesterday's post for Butter London Branwen's Feather. It wasn't intentional! Anywho, the decals were a breeze to apply. I only used about half of them for this mani (both hands), so I still have plenty left over for another time. I think next time I'm going to try them over a nice neutral grey. The whole set will only set you back $1.99, so that's just one buck a mani!

If you would like to purchase anything from Born Pretty, they offer 10% off for Nailed readers:

Disclosure: This product was sent to me for my honest review. For more information, please see my disclosure policy.

Twinsie Tuesday: Grunge Mani

I'll admit that I totally had to Google this week's Twinsie Tuesday theme because I wasn't sure what a grunge mani was. But that's part of what TT is all about is introducing us to things we otherwise might never try or even know about, right?

If, like me, you are unfamiliar with grunge manis, how they work is that you start with a base color and then thoroughly wipe down your polish brush before streaking another color over top of it. You can layer as many colors as you like and the intent is to create a distressed or grungy look--almost like a shatter-type effect without the shatter polish. Hopefully I did an okay job of explaining that...? I feel like my description sucks but I can't think of another way to explain how you do this technique. It's easier to show than tell.

So anyways, for my grunge mani, I used Illamasqua Scorch as my white base then streaked on Spoiled by Wet N Wild Did I Dye It Too Blonde?, China Glaze Sun Of A Peach, China Glaze Pool Party and Rimmel Black Satin (which came out kinda weirdly brown-looking with this mani). I wasn't quite sure what colors to use, since this is my first time doing a grunge mani, but I knew I wanted to use some neons to really emphasize the color contrast. The color palette I used turned out to be a little 90s roller rink-esque but I am totally okay with that, hahaha.

I'm really bummed that I broke a nail Monday afternoon, forcing me to chop down my nails to nubbins, because I think this would be an especially cool-looking design on long nails. But this is the first break I've had in ages so I can't complain too much

This mani was a ton of fun to do and it's actually a super easy technique! This is one of only a few Twinsie Tuesday nail art themes that didn't involve a bunch of botched attempts and swearing on my part. I'd like to try doing another grunge mani sometime soon and I'm looking forward to seeing if my Twinsies enjoyed this challenge as much as I did!

Alaina at The Little Canvas

Amanda at Amandalandish

Amber at Nails Like Lace

Anna at Going to the Showing

Anne at Grape Fizz Nails

Casey at CaseyLane Loves Polish

Chelsea at Nailed Blog

ChiChi at I'm Just Me...ChiChi

Elizabeth at Did My Nails

Erin at Paint Those Piggies

Heather at Peace, Love, & Polish

Kelly at Tuxarina

Lakeisha at Refined and Polished

Maribeth at Obsessive Cosmetic Hoarders Unite

Marisa at Polish Obsession

Rachel at Top Coat It

Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les

Stephanie at A Little Polish

Tiffany at Polished To Precision

Traci at DrinkCitra

Twinsie Tuesday: 2nd Anniversary Post

I can't believe it's already been two years of Twinsie Tuesday! Time has really flown and I am continually honored to be a part of this amazing group of ladies! I owe them so much and you would be hard pressed to find girls who are more creative, caring and supportive.

So to honor our second anniversary, we're doing a special post today where we've paired off with another Twinsie to try to re-create or do a manicure inspired by their first Twinsie Tuesday post. My Twinsie for this challenge is Kelly!

Sadly for me, Kelly's first post with us also happened to be one of my all-time least favorite TT themes: fishtail mani. Gah! Kelly created a gorgeous look for this theme...

Source: Tuxarina

...and I knew right away there was no chance in hell I'd be able to do it justice. But what better way to mark the anniversary of TT than with some sub-par nail art by me? ;) Twinsie Tuesday has always forced me to push my nail art abilities and try things I would otherwise be too intimidated to ever attempt. I struggled majorly with my fishtail mani for our original TT post! But I went the "inspired by" route and tried to come up with something relatively presentable. My freehand line skills are pretty crappy, so it didn't turn out all perfectly, but here is my attempt. I tried, Kelly! :)

Light blue: Lime Crime Once In A Blue Mousse
Dark blue: Pure Ice French Kiss
Silver: Essie No Place Like Chrome
White: Illamasqua Scorch

I altered the fishtail design a bit to make it easier for me to try and do. It kinda came out a little chevron-esque, which was not my intention. But I stayed as close to Kelly's original color palette as I could.  If nothing else, this manicure did serve as a good reminder of how utterly gorgeous Lime Crime Once In A Blue Mousse is!

I hope you'll enjoy today's anniversary manis across the Twinsie Tuesday blogs. Here's to two more years of TT!

Alaina at The Little Canvas

Amanda at Amandalandish

Amber at Nails Like Lace

Anna at Going to the Showing

Anne at Grape Fizz Nails

Casey at CaseyLane Loves Polish

Chelsea at Nailed Blog

ChiChi at I'm Just Me...ChiChi

Elizabeth at Did My Nails

Erin at Paint Those Piggies

Heather at Peace, Love, & Polish

Kelly at Tuxarina

Lakeisha at Refined and Polished

Maribeth at Obsessive Cosmetic Hoarders Unite

Marisa at Polish Obsession

Rachel at Top Coat It

Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les

Stephanie at A Little Polish

Tiffany at Polished To Precision

Traci at DrinkCitra

Ke$ha-Inspired Evil Eye Nails

The decor of my boyfriend and I's apartment is fairly eclectic, especially the living room. Our walls are a mish-mash of random stuff we like, from a vintage Billy Joel poster to signed comic books to a picture of Catherine Palace in Russia that's made entirely out of thread. There's really no rhyme or reason to it but I dig it. One of the things we have up is an evil eye that hangs over the front door. A friend of ours who lives in Turkey brought it back as a gift. Fun fact: Evil eye in Turkish is "nazar."

Anywho, I was looking at it the other day when I thought it might be fun to try an evil eye mani. I went looking for inspiration and came across this interpretation of it worn by Ke$ha (this is the one and only time I will conceed to typing the $):

I liked the design and the colors, so I figured I'd give it a go. I opted out of the fake eyelashes though, 'cause they strike me as kinda impractical...and a lil' creepy. So here's how my version turned out!

Base: Deborah Lippmann Let It Bleed
White: Illamasqua Scorch
Iris: China Glaze Bahamian Escape
Pupil: Sally Hansen Black Out

I freehanded the eye using a striper brush and a dotting tool. Kesha wears her nails more rounded at the tips than mine, so I had to adapt the shape of the eyeball a bit to make it work for my squoval-shaped nails. Getting that shape right was the hardest part. It didn't come out perfectly, but I had fun with it! :)

Born Pretty Pikachu Water Decals: Review & Swatches

What child of the 90s doesn't have a soft spot in their heart for Pikachu? From trekking to Veridian City together in Pokémon Yellow to huddling around the N64 with my cousins to hurl verbal abuse at him in "Hey You, Pikachu!" (Am I the only one who remembers this game?), the electric rat and I go way back. So I might have squealed just a little bit when I saw these adorable Pikachu water decals on the Born Pretty Store website.

The decals are super easy to use. Just wet them, peel off the paper backing and place them on the nail. The decals themselves are yellow and shaped so that you could wear them as a funky French of sorts, but I had a little trouble getting them to lie flat around my tips, so I decided to paint my nails to match the decals.

I started with a white base of Illamasqua Scorch, then layered Deborah Lippmann Yellow Brick Road (which is a bitch and a half to work with--any lumpiness or unevenness you see here is because of Yellow Brick Road's difficult formula, not the decals) over top. Yellow Brick Road may be a pain in the ass to apply, but it matched Pikachu perfectly!

Aren't these cute? I love his little winky face best!

If you would like to purchase anything from Born Pretty, they offer 10% off for Nailed readers:

Disclosure: This product was sent to me for my honest review. For more information, please see my disclosure policy.

Halloween Manicure: Nails Inspired By The Punisher

I would be hard-pressed to come up with two things more diametrically opposed than The Punisher and nail art. But I like polish and I like comics, so in my world, they kinda sorta go together.

If you're not familiar with Punisher, he was introduced in Amazing Spider-Man in 1974 and went on to star in his own series in the early 1980s. He's been in numerous series since then, from his own books to his current stint in Thunderbolts. Following the murder of his wife and children, Punisher takes to the streets as a vigilante and becomes obsessed with wiping out criminals in the most violent ways possible, including society's greatest threat: litterers.

"Give a hoot, don't pollute, bitches!"

So in honor of Marvel's trigger-happy anti-hero, I did a quick mani featuring the Punisher's skull logo. The matte topcoat smeared things a bit, so I had to do some touch-ups, but other than that, I think it turned out halfway presentable!

I started off with a white base of Illamasqua Scorch for the accent nail and then freehanded the details of the skull using a black nail art striper. The rest of my nails are Rimmel Black Satin, a.k.a. the best black ever (if you ask me, at least). Then I mattified the whole thing using Essie Matte About You, because, I dunno, the Punisher's all edgy and shit, so it seemed like the proper thing to do.

I hope you have a fun and safe Halloween today!

Katy Perry-Inspired Yin Yang Nails

I have been feeling a little more adventurous with nail art lately, so I set out to find a cute design that I thought I might--big emphasis on might--be able to replicate. I came across these yin yang nails Katy Perry sported on the cover of Elle last year and thought they looked fun!

I'm a closet Katy fan and I love that you can tell she's a fellow "nail girl." She always has something fun going on with her manicures!

To replicate Katy's look, I started with a white base of Illamasqua Scorch, then drew the black half of the yin yang in with an Art Club striper. To finish it off, I used a dotting tool for the dots. So here's my version of Katy's nails!

I actually think this design would have been easier to do on shorter nails. By my standards, mine are getting a little long! It was kind of tricky to try and stretch the curves on the design all the way along my nail.

It came out a little messy (I didn't realize until I was going through these pictures that the design on my middle finger looks kinda wonky) and topcoat smeared a few of my dots, but other than that, I'm pretty pleased with this mani. A year ago, I doubt I would have even attempted this at all, so hey, that's progress!

Twinsie Tuesday: Inspired By A Magazine

This week's Twinsie Tuesday theme challenged us to re-create a manicure from a magazine. As a sidenote, one of my biggest pet peeves with style magazines is when they're doing a feature on polish and they have photos of a bunch of different colors spilling out of the bottle. All I can think of is how much polish is being wasted! But I digress.

After a bit of searching around on Google for inspiration, I came across this mani, inspired by artist Ellsworth Kelly, that was featured in Nylon Magazine. The bright colors and the bold lines and curves of the Color Field style caught my eye.

Source

I made some tweaks to my version of this mani, while still trying to stay true to the general idea and color scheme. I think it turned out okay, given my limited artistic abilities. The abstract nature of this mani gave me some leeway for when my lines and curves weren't completely perfect, which is often. ;)

Index finger: Deborah Lippmann Yellow Brick Road (over base of Illamasqua Scorch), Essie Bouncer It's Me
Middle finger: China Glaze Bahamian Escape, Essie Mojito Madness
Ring finger: Pure Nail Lacquer Sunny Disposition, Pure Nail Lacquer Fiesta
Pinky finger: Illamasqua Scorch, Lime Crime Peaches <3 Cream

I really like the way all of the different colors come together here. I always like to play and experiment with brights! I didn't have a good match for the orange used in the original mani, so I substituted Lime Crime Peaches <3 Cream, which I think worked pretty well. I also flipped the blue and yellow on the index finger, because I don't think I have a bright yellow opaque enough to easily cover a bright blue.

I'm very curious to see what looks and magazines my fellow Twinsies chose for their manis today! Have you ever attempted to recreate a mani you saw in a magazine? How did it turn out?

Amanda at Amandalandish

Amber at Nails Like Lace

Anna at Going to the Showing

Anne at Grape Fizz Nails

Chelsea at Nailed Blog

ChiChi at I'm Just Me...ChiChi

Cordia at Seriously Swatched

Elizabeth at Did My Nails

Heather at Peace, Love, & Polish

Kelly at Tuxarina

Lakeisha at Refined and Polished

Maribeth at Obsessive Cosmetic Hoarders Unite

Marisa at Polish Obsession

Meredith at Polish and Charms

Nory at Fierce Makeup and Nails

Rachel at Top Coat It

Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les

Traci at DrinkCitra

Twinsie Tuesday: Lush Lacquer Clowning Around

Twinsie Tuesday is channeling "the greatest show on Earth" this week with circus-inspired manis! I really wasn't up to muddling my way through some misguided attempts to make poorly drawn circus animals, so it was indie polish to the rescue! Lush Lacquer Clowning Around not only has a circus-related name, but the bold neon pops of blue, pink, orange, purple and lime green remind me of the colorful costumes and sets that help create the circus' festive atmosphere. At least, that's my story and I'm sticking to it. ;) Ironically enough, I have never liked clowns and I was terrified of them as a little kid. Clowning Around has a clear base, so here it is over Illamasqua Scorch, a white creme.

The formula on this polish was so-so. The base is a bit thick and matte neon pieces don't spread very evenly. I had to do a third coat to try and cover up some bald patches. I would suggest leaving extra time between coats, as I wound up with some little ripple marks on my middle and ring finger where some of the polish got pulled off a bit when I applied the next coat.

Be sure to see what my other Twinsies are up to this Tuesday with their circus manis! :)

Amanda at Amandalandish

Amber at Nails Like Lace

Anna at Going to the Showing

Anne at Grape Fizz Nails

Chelsea at Nailed Blog

ChiChi at I'm Just Me...ChiChi

Cordia at Seriously Swatched

Elizabeth at Did My Nails

Heather at Peace, Love, & Polish

Kelly at Tuxarina

Lakeisha at Refined and Polished

Maribeth at Obsessive Cosmetic Hoarders Unite

Marisa at Polish Obsession

Meredith at Polish and Charms

Nory at Fierce Makeup and Nails

Rachel at Top Coat It

Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les

Sarah at See Sarah Swatch

Traci at DrinkCitra

Twinsie Tuesday: International's Choice

I, once again, must apologize to the entire nation of Canada for the terrible nail art I have done in the name of your nation. You may recall a while back that we did a TT theme called Canadian's Choice, in honor of our Canadian Twinsies, who tasked us with creating manis inspired by a particular aspect of their homeland. Well, we've brought back that theme once more, this time expanding it to International's Choice to celebrate our Twinsies around the globe!

I was on Team Anne--same as last time--for this theme. Anne, our resident Canadian, gave us the assignment of manicures inspired by the dogwood tree, the national tree of British Columbia. It's a beautiful theme and I'm sure my fellow Team Anne Twinsies will do some gorgeous manicures inspired by it, but...well...

I started with a base of OPI Teenage Dream, one of my all-time favorite OPIs, which I then proceeded to deface with some truly awful nail art that I freehanded using a dotting tool. The branches were done with OPI Suzie Loves Cowboys, the petals are Illamasqua Scorch and the cyme (green part in the center of the flower) is OPI Did It On Em. I think the "flower" on my index finger more closely resembles a runny egg, but maybe that's just me.

So there you have it: My dogwood tree mani. I tried, y'all. :-/ I am sure my fellow Twinsies came up with some great manis for this week's theme though and I can't wait to see their (undoubtedly much better) efforts!

Amanda at Amandalandish

Amber at Nails Like Lace

Anna at Going to the Showing

Anne at Grape Fizz Nails

Chelsea at Nailed Blog

ChiChi at I'm Just Me...ChiChi

Cordia at Seriously Swatched

Elizabeth at Did My Nails

Heather at Peace, Love, & Polish

Kelly at Tuxarina

Lakeisha at Refined and Polished

Maribeth at Obsessive Cosmetic Hoarders Unite

Marisa at Polish Obsession

Meredith at Polish and Charms

Nory at Fierce Makeup and Nails

Rachel at Top Coat It

Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les

Sarah at See Sarah Swatch

Traci at DrinkCitra