Glitter Gradient

Hey guys! Sorry for not posting in awhile, college is keeping me busy and I haven't gotten around to editing/cropping mostly any pictures until now- even though I should be doing my homework. Yesterday was crazy, I planned on posting but after school I had to go to the doctor for my wrist- turns out I have tendonitis, and my mom made me get a flu shot, which stung like crazy, no other flu shot I've gotten has hurt that bad! And then we went out to try to find an outfit for our Fall Band Concert on the 30th, my first concert at Capital and I get to spend it being in the Symphonic Winds at Capital University- I'm so excited! And I got a 95% on my auditation test- which I was freaking out about because I thought I did poorly on it. woo! And then I got to spend from 7:30-11 helping my brother with his chemistry homework- not exactly how I planned on spending my night.

Now. Onto the nails!

Pictured is two coats of Zoya Caitlin (I think, possibly 3 coats) sponged with China Glaze Skyscraper. 

I really love glitter gradients. They're gorgeous, and just so simple to do. They're now my default way to wear glitter! haha

Pink Glittered Framed Nails

I'm really digging the framed nails trend...and the fact that you can do it with glitter makes it so much more awesome! Especially since I tried it with just regular polish before.I could not get good lines around my nails, it was pathetic.

Pictured is two coats of Zoya Ali and gold glitter from bornprettystore.com 

OPI Jade Is The New Black

OPI Jade is the New Black topped with China Glaze Fairy Dust

Most of you can probably tell, my pictures do Fairy Dust absolutely NO justice. It's so much more gorgeous in real life! 

Black and White Polka Dots

My camera really refused to get a good picture of this! I don't think it liked the GORGEOUS shimmer in Zoya Ginessa!

Base Color- Zoya Ginessa
Dots- OPI My Private Jet (non holo version, sadly.)

I apologize for the blurry pictures, none of them weren't blurry and I really loved the way this looked..oddly the best one was on my phone, see!

Zoya Feifei Studded Accent Nail

I'm going to be putting a couple things in my queue for the next couple days right now, so be prepared for short posts for the next few days! Besides, no one reads all my mumbling, right? hahaha :)

Today's nails are the same as yesterdays....except with a strip of Zoya Feifei down the side of one nail with some round studs on it to hide the line! I was going to do all of them this way, but it was late, and I was tired, so accent nail it was! 

Zoya Meg Swatches

Hey guys1 I'm so sorry for my lack of posts the past few days! Being a music major really is much more demanding than I thought! I just added clarinet quartet to my schedule on friday so now I'm up to 18 credit hours..fun, right?

Today I have a little beauty I got from the recent Zoya promotion they had a couple weeks ago, I got 8 which I'll show you all of them later once I get pictures of them all together, but today I have Zoya Meg to show you! Meg is from the Surf Collection and is described as a mermaid green foil metallic. I would probably describe Meg as a green apple foil, but I guess I could see it as a mermaid green also. Very pretty either way!

Pictured is 3 coats of Zoya Meg (I think!) 

China Glaze Rare & Radiant

Hi guys! How's everyone's days so far? I'm trying to build up my queue so that I won't (hopefully) be scrambling to post after a couple days of not posting- a week into college and I'm already SUPER busy.

Today I wanted to show you one of my newer polishes- China Glaze Rare & Radiant! I usually NEVER pay full price for China Glaze since I buy it online from head2toebeauty instead, and save a ton of money on it. But a few weeks ago when I went to Ulta I was so excited to see this that I didn't even pay attention to the fact that it was a China Glaze until a couple hours after I got home! I was hoping to find OPI's version of this, Just Spotted The Lizard, but there were no bottles left, oh well!

As you all probably know by now, Rare & Radiant is a dupe for Chanel Peridot. I love love love Peridot, I stopped using my bottle of Peridot as much because I didn't want to use it all up, so boy am I glad people have finally started making easy to find dupes! I was going to do a comparison post between the two, but there's so many out there already I decided not to- however if anyone wants to see a comparison post just let me know! 

Formula wise, it was great in 2 coats, but I'm a habitual three coater so I did three anyway. On a couple of my nails it did get a little bubble, but I'm not sure if it's because of the polish or me. Other than that, I give this an A++

What are your guy's thoughts? Are you excited to see Peridot dupes everywhere now or are you getting bored with seeing so many?

Studded Neon Half Moons

Good morning everyone! I hope everyone is having a fantastic Monday morning so far, I know I am! Sadly once I finish queing a few posts I'll have to start on my pile of homework, which I should have started already. Yay procrastination! And then once that's done, it'll be practice time! Yippe practice time! My first solo piece I get to work on in college with my AWESOME professor is the Weber Concertino . I am beyond excited about this! Now enough yapping, on to the polish!

I know this is blurry, but I feel like it portrays the true color of Pool Party the best, so I'm showing you all anyway. :) Actually, if I tilt my laptop screen more the top looks accurate too. So you know what, judge for yourselves, I guess it depends on your screen haha

For today's mani I started off with my new basecoat, Essie First Base Basecoat (watch out for an upcoming review!), two coats of Sally Hansen White On, and then a coat of Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Topcoat. Once that dried I placed reinforcement labels (those little circular ones to reinforce holes in paper) in the spots I wanted, and painted on three coats of China Glaze Pool Party, and attached some circular studs from bornprettystore.com to hide any imperfections in my half moons, and finished with another coat of topcoat. 

I really love neon with studs. It's summery, it's fun, but the studs just made it badass..in a girly neon kind of way. 

A little note about the studs: I used nail glue to apply them here. I DO NOT RECOMMEND THIS. The only reason I used nail glue was because of my previous experience with the little steel balls. However I used the studs on my nails a couple days ago for a different mani and used regular clear polish, and 2.5 days later, I've only lost one, and that was because I picked it off myself. Unless you do a lot with your hands, I think clear polish would work just fine. The nail glue was just a pain for me to remove since I only wore this a couple days.

NOTD: Floral Stamping

Good morning!! Guess what! My Zoya package came in the mail yesterday, finally!! 8 new beautiful Zoya's, I'm so excited! I'll show you guys them in a couple days, I have i think 4 more nail posted piled up that I haven't gotten around to posting yet, then I'll do that. :)

Anyway, I broke out my stamping plates again the other day, and of course I had to try two of my new polishes I picked up at Ulta the other day.

Colors Used

OPI French Quarter For Your Thoughts

Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Purple Haste

BM-221

My "First week at college" mani!

First I'd like to apologize for these poor quality pictures. My camera was spazzing out because of the glitter. I tried..i really did! These were the most "non-blurry" out of them all! :(

Anyway, as you may know by now...I started college this week! Well, orientation started last week: conservatory orientation on Wednesday and University orientation on Thursday. So of course I had to use my lucky polish for these! My "lucky polish" is actually Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Rockstar Pink. For the past almost two years I've worn it for every band concert, audition, and anything else major, such as starting college! College has been WONDERFUL so far- Capital University is marvelous. And the Conservatory of Music is fantastic, I'm so happy there, I never thought I'd be this happy in a school! I'm proud to call myself a Music Education Major at Capital University. :)

Now for the polish. I started off with three coats of OPI Pink Friday, then once that dried I sponged Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Rockstar Pink on the tips. I got so many compliments on these! And they lasted from Tuesday night to Sunday with minimal chipping!! The only reason I didn't redo them was because I wanted to have my lucky polish on for my audition on Sunday.

OPI Black Spotted!

Hi guys! Sorry I haven't been posting as much- like I said before, I just started college so I've been reaaaaally busy! and guess what, I MADE 5TH CHAIR IN THE SYMPHONIC WINDS BAND! AHHHH! The symphonic winds is the top band at Capital University for those who don't know, I REALLY didn't expect to get in it! Especially since I'm only a freshman! So far classes are good, I've had to change my schedule 3 times already! I never really understood why they always said "music is one of the most demanding majors"....until this week. It's only been 3 days and I'm INCREDIBLY busy. 17.5 credit hours. crazy. In the long run it'll be worth it though! :)

Onto the polish- I have just something simple to show you today..but it's something I really really like! I enjoyed the jelly sandwich I posted previously, however for my taste, it was a little..dare I say boring? So I decided to kick it up a notch and added a coat of OPI Black Spotted to it! I absolutely love OPI. I wish I could say I acquired this in a swap with a friend from France, but unfortunately I don't have any acquaintances in France...so I bought it on ebay! $50ish. crazy, right? But soooo worth it. 

I think I actually like Spotted better than Shatter. I love my shatters, don't get me wrong, but this is just so....AWESOME! I almost don't want to use it because I don't want to run out!

Pink and Girly Jelly Sandwich!

I'm back! I'm sorry that took SO much longer than I anticipated. I thought I'd be able to post these once I got back from orientation and before I went out of town for a day, but I was just too exhausted after walking around campus for 12 hours at orientation on Thursday, and Wednesday and Friday once I got back I decided to practice for my audition which was this evening, which didn't go too well, maybe it went better than I think it did? Who knows. I'll find out Tuesday. Long story short, I've been super busy with college and my best friend's mom's wedding that I haven't had a chance to post these!

Here I decided to FINALLY try a jelly sandwich! No, not a sandwich with some jelly on it, a jelly polish jam packed with layers of glitter in between! Awesome, right? Not too shabby for my first one :)

excuse the sad looking cuticles. I apologize :(

Colors Used

OPI You Callin Me A Lyre?

OPI Divine Swine

Sephora by OPI Only Gold For Me

China Glaze Fairy Dust

This kind of reminded me a little bit of OPI Teenage Dream, but not really. Having Fairy Dust on top made it holo looking in some lights and doesn't Teenage Dream have holo glitter in it? And just being pink and glittery and holo I automatically thought Teenage Dream. Maybe not super close, but more like a second cousin twice removed type deal haha

Sorry for not posting in a couple days! :(

I've been super busy with conservatory orientation and now conservatory AND university orientation and practicing for auditions on Sunday AND my laptop is refusing to connect to the internet, so without that I can't post! My instagram has quick previews of what my upcoming posts will be so you can follow me there at jk602. I have pictures to post, I promise!

Saran Wrap Nails= Complete Nail Fail

Hi guys! I wasn't planning on posting this because I wasn't pleased with how they came out, but I figured someone out there might enjoy seeing people's failed mani's. I know I do! It kind of reassures me that I'm not the only one who messes up new techniques and such.

Anyway, after seeing multiple pictures and checking out a couple tutorials, I decided to give the saran wrap nails a try. Maybe it was just my color combo, but either way it just looked...odd. At least it did to me. I used OPI Sparrow Me The Drama as the base color and OPI Mermaid's Tears over top of it, which is the polish that the saran wrap is supposed to pick up and create a "marbled effect".

"Why on earth is there music in the background?" someone out there is thinking that and I can feel it. Reason being I was practicing clarinet for auditions on Sunday and took a quick break and decided to just snap a couple pictures to show you the failure of a mani this is. I disliked it so much that I didn't even bother to try to take a normal, decent picture. I screwed up the ring finger by waiting too long to touch it with the saran wrap and had to start that one all over and it turned out odd looking. And to me, every other one looks like I did my nails then accidentally touched them on objects and messed them up. Maybe a different color combination would work better? I'm not really sure. 

Does anyone have any good tutorials or tips for the saran wrap nails? I thought it looked simple enough, but this doesn't even look good to me. I have to be doing something wrong. 

Blue and Silver Glitter Gradient

Good morning! How is everyone today? This morning I have my first try at a glitter gradient using the sponging technique to show you guys! Now I've done glitter gradients before, but always just by using the brush in the bottle and hoping that i don't add too much. Since I've started doing gradients in non glitter colors with the sponging method, I thought I'd give the sponging method a try- and I don't think it turned out too bad! MUCH better than how I was doing it before.

I'm really sorry that the non-flash photos are blurry, my camera saw the glitter and spazzed out I guess, because out of the 30ish photos I took, these were the best. Pathetic, right?

and for a flash one, just to show how sparkly it is! 

Colors Used:

Dots Atomic Blue

China Glaze Lorelei's Tiara

To do the gradient I cut a normal kitchen sponge into a tiny square and dipped it in some water, this helps prevent the sponge from just sucking up all the polish. Then I took the glitter and made a line on the edge of the sponge about the width of my nail and started dabbing my nail with it, starting at the tip and going down to create the gradient effect.

As for the Dots polish, I picked up two the other day when I went clothes shopping. I've only tried this one so far, but I'm pleased. It's a bright blue, brighter than all the other blues in my collection, but not quite neon. It dried a tad darker than in the bottle. But application was good, three coats and it was perfect. Plus they were cheap! Only $2.80 a bottle! And buy one get one half off too. 

Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Anti-Chip Top Coat Review

Good afternoon everyone! Today I don't actually have any swatches or nail art to show you. I tried saran wrap nails and failed at it, so I haven't taken any pictures. I may take some later just to show you guys my nail fail.However, I do have a quick little review to share!

About a week and a half ago I decided I wanted to try a new topcoat. Why? Because my Seche Vite is a bubbly mess with glitter particles and such stuck in it from using it so much that it's just picked up unwanted particles along the way. I have been refilling this bottle since before last Christmas, so that may be why! Either way I decided to try out another Sally Hansen topcoat. My first topcoat ever was a Sally Hansen one, and I loved it! So I'm giving Sally Hansen a shot, and it wasn't actually that bad!

The instructions on this topcoat say to wait two minutes after applying nail color and then add a coat of this topcoat. 

According to Sally Hansen's website, it "Keeps manicures beautiful up to 10 days! Exclusive Acrylic Polymer Complex helps get you out of the door in a flash — just 30 seconds to set! High-gloss superior shine."

The Pros:

• It doesn't shrink the tips when applied over dry polish
• It does dry rather quickly- 30 seconds is probably a stretch, but it's drying time is definitely up there with other popular quick dry topcoats.
• Good consistency- not too thick, not too thin. Definitely thinner than Seche Vite though.

The Cons:

• Since it's rather thin, it's not good for evening out nail art like Seche Vite is
• It's not quite as shiny as other topcoats
• It seems to get air bubbles in it very easily. Almost every time I've used it it's had quite a few air bubbles. However the air bubbles in this seem to be easier to brush away, unlike in thicker top coats
• This may not be a con for everyone, but I'm not a fan of the red bottle, I prefer top coats to be in clear bottles.While you can see through this bottle, the red kind of masks the air bubbles and you have to look closely to see the topcoat in it. Better than the first Sally Hansen Top Coat I had which had a silver bottle that wasn't even see through! 

I can't comment on the lasting ability of this top coat, since I haven't had it on for more than about 2.5 days, but in that amount  of time it didn't chip, it did get a bit of tip wear and scratches on it though.

I'm going to be completely honest. This is an alright topcoat depending on what you're using it for, and that's about it. Is it my favorite? No. BUT it's only about $5 and since I don't usually keep my polish on for more than a couple days, it works well enough for me. I still prefer my seche vite though, I think it's just more shiny.

Subtle Studs

Good morning! This morning I have something subtle to show you. It was late last night and I wanted to try out those square studs I got the other day. So I started placing them on, then realized I was way too tired and it was way too late to do as many as I had planned on each nail. But I think one on each nail like this is plenty! I love the red and gold together, kinda...dare I say sexy? haha. 

Pictured is three coats of China Glaze City Siren with Sally Hansen Insta Dri Anti-Chip Top Coat

To attach the studs I used my dotting tool to make a large dot of nail glue near the bottom of my nail, and then used the smaller end of my dotting tool to attach the stud. I have to say though, if you only plan on wearing it for a couple days, try using a clear coat or top coat instead of nail glue. I wore it for about 2.5 days and none of them fell off, and the glue was a little difficult to get off-it required lots and lots of acetone!

Playing with Striping Tape!

Good morning guys! Well, I guess it's still night since it's only 2 am, but I wanted to post this before I go to bed since I'll be very busy tomorrow.

Over top of I Vant To Be A-Lone Star from yesterday's post, I decided to try out the striping tape I recently got! Not to shabby for my first try! I definitely need to make sure the tape is down all the way though, there's some spots where it started to come back up and I didn't push it back down before painting. Oops!

I used 2 coats of OPI How You Blue-In'? over top of OPI I Vant To Be A-Lone Star.

And, because I thought it was weird looking, what my nail looked like with the striping tape on and after painting How You Blue-In'? over it. It reminds me of a spider. A weird, oddly shaped, possibly dead, spider haha

What do you guys think? Are you a fan of using striping tape in this way, or do you prefer to just cut the tape to the length of your nail and leave it on to create stripes?

Personally, I prefer using it as a guide to do stripes, I can only imagine that after a little while of wear the tape would just peel up and drive me insane!

OPI I Vant To Be A-Lone Star Swatch & Review

 Today I just have a quick little post for you guys. Last week when I went to Ulta I picked up again. Every time I've gone to Ulta in the past few months I'd always pick this one up and say "ooh this is pretty!" then put it back. But this time was different- it was on clearance! It was only marked down to $6.49 instead of the usual $8.50, but hey, that's still enough to make me finally buy it! It didn't disappoint either.

Pictured here is three coats of I Vant To Be A-Lone Star with one coat of Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Anti-Chip Top Coat (review of which is soon to come!)

I Vant To Be A-Lone Star is is a light blue with a hint of grey. It has some silver shimmer in it too. The shimmer in this reminds me of a frost, it's not though, which is good because that means no brush strokes showing! Application and consistency were pretty good. Three coats and it was perfect, and it wasn't too watery or runny either, I can honestly say this is now one of my favorite polishes I own!

Unrelated to the color, but I had to trim my nails down because I will be starting college in about a week and a half and since I'm going to be a music major I have to take a keyboard class. If any of you guys have tried playing piano with longer nails, you'd understand why I cut them, playing piano with long nails is not only hurtful but really difficult when your nails just slide around on the keys and get stuck between the keys!

How do you guys prefer your nails-short or long? Personally, I prefer this length but just get too lazy to cut them and let them just grow!

China Glaze For Audrey and Loose Glitters From bornprettystore.com

Hi guys! I decided to try out those loose glitters I got a few days ago for this. Inspired by thenailasaurus and the outline/border mani, I did this! 

Attaching the glitters wasn't that difficult, but it was a tad time consuming since they would stick to each other and then instead of picking up one glitter I'd be picking up five. Other than that application was easy and anyone can definitely do this. 

I absolutely love For Audrey. Isn't it just gorgeous? And application...flawless. Two coats. That's it. LOVE. Probably one of my favorite China Glazes ever. 

First Attempt at Using Nail Art Microbeads!

As you may have seen in my post from yesterday, I ordered some microbeads off of bornprettystore.com to try, and couldn't wait to try them! It took me about 4 tries to get this right. I tried it first with the technique of just using clear polish to hold the beads down and sealing with a topcoat. The first time I screwed it up when I put a topcoat on it. The second time I opted to not put a topcoat on, which was okay...for about an hour, then they started falling off at the slightest touch. So I put a topcoat on and screwed them up. The third attempt I tried with a different topcoat (OPI topcoat instead of my Seche Vite, which was really bubbly.) It got rid of the air bubbles, but I didn't wait long enough and ended up just dragging the beads off when I tried putting the topcoat on.

As you could probably guess, I got frustrated, my mom actually had to calm me down and look it up online about how to do it. After my little freak out session, we concluded that nail glue would probably be the best option for me. So the next day when I went out I stopped by Sally's and picked up some nail glue and tried it. And it worked! And I don't think it looked too bad either. Take a look! :)

For this I used three coats of China Glaze Urban Night and a coat of Seche Vite over all nails excluding the one with the beads. For that I just did three coats of Urban Night, applied nail glue, attached the beads, waited about a half hour, and applied a coat of OPI Topcoat. You could use Seche Vite over the beads, but mine has a ton of air bubbles in it so I only used it on the other nails. Top coat with a ton of air bubbles really shows through over the beads, even if it doesn't show that badly over regular polish. 

This actually lasted about 2.5 days before I started popping the beads off myself! I probably could have gotten another couple days of wear out of this if I hadn't of popped them off myself. The nail glue I used is the one pictured below, which worked well. Instead of applying small drops of it I put a big glob on and then spread it out with the large end of my dotting tool. I imagine using brush on glue would have been better, but I didn't think of that at the time. Oops!

The nail glue I used.

I used this end of my dotting tool to put the beads on. I dipped it in a little tiny bit of glue and wiped it off so that it was still tacky. You could also use a toothpick, but I imagine that'd be much more difficult.

And now, just to show my failed attempt, the first time I tried it, pre topcoat.

Do you see how much of a stringly, ugly mess that was? I used seche vite instead of a clear coat so that contributed to it being really really stringy since it dries so fast. So I definitely do NOT recommend using Seche Vite to try to apply them.

Also, like I talked about in a previous post, do you see how these microbeads aren't the same size? It's really noticeable in close up shots like this, but it's not that noticeable otherwise, unless you get the largest bead and the smallest bead next to each other.