Obligatory St Patrick's Manicure

Today is St Patrick's Day, therefore, I have to wear green nail polish. It's a rule. Maybe. I thought I'd try to do some nail art then I laughed at myself and remembered that I am not artistic at all. So I just grabbed butter London Tart with a Heart and slapped it on over Sinful Colors Rise and Shine and called it good enough. I can very much see the gold in Tart with a Heart but I couldn't capture it with my camera. On to the pictures!

with flash

 

 

My birthday was on Friday and I went into Birmingham with Gary. Selfridges has the outside of their store lit up for St Patrick's Day!

I hope you have a great day and can get some corned beef and cabbage. Unfortunately, I can't get it here and it makes me super sad.

Mardi Gras and Valentine's Day Mash Up

I was trying to figure out if I actually wanted to do a Valentine's Day manicure since I don't really give one little crap about Valentine's Day. I tried to make some hearts with a dotting tool and I just couldn't do it so I opted out of a Valentine's mani. Then I was looking at some ideas for a Mardi Gras mani, trying to figure out if I would be any good at doing some beads with a dotting tool. I decided it wasn't really something I wanted to do and be annoyed with because it wasn't coming out how I wanted it to. So, even though I'd just done gradient glitter tips, I decided that I was going to do them again with China Glaze Glitter All the Way (which I added specifically to my wishlist, and was gifted over Christmas, just so I could use it for Mardi Gras!) with Dior New World Purple (which I ALWAYS call New World Chocolate in my head because, ya know, it looks nothing like purple) because that's what I was wearing and didn't feel like taking it off because it's beautiful. While I know little to nothing about Mardi Gras, I don't there's any brown colors associated with it but it does make a great base with Glitter All the Way. So how many polishes does it take to create a Mardi Gras/Valentine's Day mani?

The answer is 5.

Sinful Colors Let's Talk and San Francisco, butter London The Full Monty,

Dior New World Purple and China Glaze Glitter All the Way.

My cuticles look horrible again. And my hearts are not that great at all. And there's shrinkage from all the top coat I had to apply to get the glitter smooth. And the blue heart? That's actually a royal purple. But you get the idea.

These two taken in really dull light, next to the window.

With flash.

I actually really like how this came out despite the fact that it's not anywhere near perfect. Happy Mardi Gras (from a Northerner and current UK resident!) and Happy Valentine's Day (even though I don't really like it haha). Do you have any plans for either day? And please post your MG and VD manis in the comments!

Halloween in the Vines

Today I have for you Sonoma Nail Art Halloween in the Vines (HITV) over Sinful Colors Winterberry. When I got HITV a few weeks ago, I was trying  to figure out what to layer it over and I couldn't decide, so I left it. I put on Winterberry (that my friend Ana sent over to me!) and after I'd had it on for a day, I realized it'd be awesome with HITV and I was completely right. FYI, this was after 4 days. The wear on Sonoma polishes are amazing. They last AGES on me. I probably could have gotten away with a couple more days but I banged my thumb somehow and ended up with a break :(

*click to enlarge!*

Winterberry is amazing and I'm really upset I didn't get a picture of it but the sun wasn't out the couple of days I had it on without HITV, so no picture for you :( HITV was a little difficult to work with but not as bad as other indies. I had to use the "dab" method. That's what I call it, not sure what it's really called. It's basically just laying the whole brush of glitter down on your nail, instead of just the end of the brush, and then moving the glitter around. This way you end up with more glitter at once and you don't have to use 123397 layers. I topped it with 2 coats of Seche Vite.

My Most Expensive and Least Expensive Polishes.

For this group collaboration we're featuring our most expensive and least expensive polishes. I knew right away what my most expensive polish was. That was Dior Shadow that I purchased from my friend, Bénédicte, over at I'm Anaa. She lives in France and was able to get it for a few of us when it first came out there in February or March instead of having to wait until July in the states (some ladies might have waited until July but there was no sign/news from Dior as to when or if it'd be available in the states). Not sure if even came out here in the UK or not. On to the pictures!

*click to enlarge!*

Not sure what's going on with my ring finger. Oops.

For my cheapest polish, I went for Sinful Colors (as I think most people will since they have a fantastic formula and a HUGE range of colors). But then I remembered Pure Ice Heart Breaker. And then I thought I'd use both because I'm a cheater like that! :) So here is Sinful Colors Amethyst and Pure Ice Heart Breaker. I had a really hard time with this. I think it was the top coat. Almost all my nails had bubbles on them and looked absolutely horrible. I only got one good picture and I HAD to take it off ASAP because I just couldn't stand the bubbles. I used the NYC Grand Central Station top coat and I've heard wonderful things about it but it was nice the first couple of times I used it but I'm not sure I'll use it again. It's back to Seche Vite for me because that's what I have at the moment! 

Dior Shadow was a LE polish, I really don't think you can get it anywhere online anymore unless you want to pay a crazy price on ebay. Sinful Colors can be purchased at a few different drug stores in the US for anywhere between $.99-1.99 (or $6 on Copius, if you're dumb). I know you can definitely get Pure Ice (for $1.97) at WalMart in the states, I'm really not sure where else you can get it though.