Stripey Power!

Now I have the stripey power!!!  Now I wield the stripey power!!!

How fun, right?  This is after 4 days of wear.  But still not horribly bad!  My favorite nail is my thumb in this pic.  A sort of diamond/ harlequin pattern.   I even got that last strip in the lower left corner!  I was tickled pink that that came through!  

Oh the things that thrill a nail polish-aholic, right?

I tried a mani I found on-line last winter.  It used tape like this but I didn't have any then.  I tried cutting strips of scotch tape.  CRUDBALL mani! :p

So I'm so happy I finally ordered some on Amazon. 

There is definitely a technique to this.

You must wait a bit for the stripe nail polish to settle or the color will bleed onto the base color when you pull the tape up and off the nail!

I look forward to doing some more with my new found knowledge 

AND do less fixing after pulling up the tape!

Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Mellow Yellow and Coral Reef and Seche Vite were used.

Goodbye August, Hello September!

Greek Bubblegum

She-who-shall-not-be-named came over the other day and we both tried on nail polish after nail polish.  I just procured this gorgeous palest lemony whisper-of-yellow polish that I was dying to use.  So I put a coat on in exacting detail.  Then since that coat was waaaaaaay streaky I put another on.  And the Seche Vite.  That's when the smudges started to happen for no reason.  The dings made by the summer breeze.  

The top coat wrinkling up cuz the stuff underneath wasn't dry yet... simply by looking at it wrong I swear!  Oh I was so bummed!  

 

Voldemort was having no luck either.  So she just grabbed a polish and I grabbed my new Sally Hansen's Xtreme Wear Bubblegum pink and carefully put that on there and without further embellishment as we are so wont to do, we called it done.

Not bad for a mani done a few days ago right?  Yay, Xtreme wear!  I wanted to play today!

I ♥ me some konad action!  

Btw, I just found out the other day that, GASP, I think I bought FAKE Konad plates on Amazon!  Not real ones that I was led to believe I was buying!!!!   Oh I would have had someone's co-nads in a vice if I knew at the time!  My nail polish friends and I always wondered why some designs, clearly meant for the entire nail, were too small...  

insert emoticon with smoke coming out of ears here.  ...and a vice.

So the faux-nads have been doing pretty well by me.  

The ones that are big enough to use...  Isn't this pretty?

I had much fun this afternoon using the dregs of my ancient bottle of OPI's It's All Greek To Me. I'm going to see if I can find another bottle of this stuff.  

It's been such a fave over the years.

I put some Seche Vite, Bottle #3, on there after the photo shoot.  

I want to look at this mani for at least a couple of days!  

I hope you're having lots of nail polish victories this summer!!!  :)

Flowers for Sarah ♥

My nail polish fiend friend Sarah came over the other day and we had a jolly good time!

♫   Flowers everywhere!   ♪  

She took her nails to the florist and back again!   I love the art she creates. 

She was inspired by some Sally Hanson nail polish strips.  

One of them is on her pinky here.  

Btw, the strips were extras and had been out of their original packaging for a month or two.  Well the sticking power was completely gone even though the backing and clear plastic top cover of the nail strips were perfectly intact.  They would not stick to her nail for anything.  Just so you know, you'll have to use glue like she did if you want to use polish strips that have been out of their packaging for a while!!!

Here is the lovely artist herself on my deck...  She didn't know I was taking a pic at that very instant.  The look on her face suggests "What's happening out here?  What are you doing down there?"  Wonder if she'll be irked at me for posting this....  We'll see if this pic is still here tomorrow!!!

And the little flower gem stones on her thumbs complete the cute.  She's fearless!  I don't think I'd every try this!  Love the color combinations!

Guinevere's Diamond Dreams

*sigh* I'm having a love affair with Guinevere.  But more about her later...

Sally Hanson's shimmery Diamond Strength Diamonds covers this spongetastic mani!  

I rather like this one!

This is the last pic of the mani and the bottle of Diamonds before...

gravity snatched the bottle from my fingers and my glorious purple flowering clematis gobbled it up...  the black eyed susans snickering the whole time...  :p

It turned out to be easy to find but from this view looking down from my deck I thought I wouldn't see it again til springtime!

So a-england's Guinevere has made off with my heart! It's the antique pale mauve that you see.  Isn't she beautiful?  I've done my best to sponge it together with the blue Revlon's Dreamer.  I wish I knew how to make a really awesome gradient between the colors!

Just yesterday I looked at an air brusher in Michael's art supply store.  But it's a little too spendy.  I also envisioned how I'd work the airbrush with my left hand...  not pretty!  ha ha!  My sponging technique will just have to improve.  :)  Ciao!

Addendum:  OMG I just found this gradient tutorial and it looks so awesome!!!
Can't wait to try it!!!

try a little... kindness

Am I in heart with Rainbow Honey's new Equestria line or what!  I took delivery of one nail polish and having thoroughly examined the pictures of the other polishes I've decided I heart them all!  So here's what happened with this one...

Woooo, all those crazy sparklies are so pretty, right?  Rose, white, gold, and soft green glitters float in a delicate and sheer yellow base with an iridescent pink shimmer.  Broad daylight and no sunshine don't do the color enough justice!  

I have been on the hunt for a high quality soft pink polish with no iridescence but the drugstores have yielded no luck right now.  

The soft pink polishes are all too sheer it seems! 

Anyone have a non-sheer soft pink with no sheen or iridescence that they love?  

Well my latest soft pink buy was way too sheer so I went to Sally Hansen's Insta-Dry Snappy Sorbet.  There was a bit of a glop fest but it will do.

Sinful's Pink Glitter came next just on the tips.  

Then my latest fave A Little Kindness :)    Look at the awesome glitters of different shapes and sizes!!!   I didn't show step by step because my recent fingertip paintings have had ucky results. :p

But this is ok though!  SV on top.

Can't wait to slowly acquire other Rainbow Honey pretties!  

Happy Black-Eyed Susan season!

 

Pacific Blue Pedi

It's the Sally Hansen 'Pacific Blue' Xtreme Wear takin' it to the extreme all over my toenails!  ...this time during my 5-year-old's playdate!   

On jungle gym equipment no less!

So what if my husband adamantly maintains that he does NOT like this color what-so-ever on my toenails!  As my friend Shawn points out, we can all see how much his opinion means in this case  ;)

Watercolor Mani!

Dig it! :D

Here's the technique from Jen on Polish and Pearls!

The gist is you put droplets of polish on your nails
and smear a bit with a plastic baggie.

Unlike Jen's lovely muted color palette on Polish and Pearls, 

I wanted summertime crazy colors happening!

Uh, I think I captured that whole crazy vibe pretty well. 

But I am a tad dismayed to see how lacking are my clean up skills... 

Wait, there's no CLEAN UP skills in CRAZY!!! 

So these are the colors I used.... hee hee!  Man, there were quite a few and most were from my friend Sarah's collection so I just took a pic of the box she brought :)  But I did add Essie's Shine of the Times over everything followed by Seche Vite!

As per usual, Shine of the Times comes through beautifully in person! 

...not so much here in the pix!

Be well lovies!

♪ Undah Deh Sea! ♫

Sarah just informed me of her adoration for Disney movies sooooooo.....

I'd highly recommend listening to this song while checking out her polish 

for the complete audio-visual experience!!!  ...of a lifetime!!!

    

The fishy that started it all!  Note the bubbles and sparkly sand!

Coral, seaweed, kelp, anemones, etc...  ya know, just what you'd expect to find on nails...

Does this Octopus rock or what?!

Starfish keeping just out of reach of Octopus.

Underwater Castle!  A residence of Atlantis?!

Does Poseidon know his trident is floatin' around Atlantis?

Most of her sea horse!!!!  It was so apocolyptical-ly bright out I couldn't see a thing.  I'm so happy most of the pix I got are of reasonable quality.

Cuz this is one mani I'm going to want to return to see many times!  I just love it Sarah!

Sparkle on my tootsies

I've been having fun doing up my toes in simple ways this summer so I'm finally going to start sharing!

In winter when I look at these pix it will make my snowed-in heart ache for summer.  I just know it.  This pic seems to encapsulate what summer is all about to me!  It's extra perfect that my beautiful little girl's folded under leggie is in the pic.  She's never far away, my little fairy girl.

This is the rare polishing where I knew exactly which colors I wanted!  Sally Hansen's Insta-Dry Lively Lilac, covered with clare's sparkley who-knows-what-the-heck-it-is!

This is the package of bitty polishes I recently got at claire's with nary a name for the individual polishes anywhere! I guess Precious Metals is the collection name.

Lookit!!!!  Isn't that so cool?  I love it!  

 Super duper close up of  the purple sparkly crazy-talk on top of the Lively Lilac.

So that's what's rockin' my toes these days.  All my best, lovies!

French fleur

ooooo, I wanted something pretty today...

basecoat of an ANCIENT Orly Top2Bottom.
Fenchie in my Grammie's favorite: Revlon Cherries in the Snow.  

Konad plate m20 with Sinful Colors Snow Me White.  And last but never least SV!

I posted the camping trip pix about a week after the fact.  

Since that mani I've been in mommy mode running around getting the day to day stuff done with nakey fingernails.  

Today I screeched to a halt to spend some time making my nails pretty again.

It reminds me of a Meryl Streep line in the movie Death Becomes Her....

 "(sharp intake of breath in surprise and delight)   I'm a girl!!!" 

♥

Camping = Manis

A camping trip with a nail polishy friend means Manis!!!!  (My girlfriend prefers not to be named on the blog so we'll just call her Voldemort from here on out.) 

It's doing Mani's outside on lawn chairs while our hubs and kids are swimming!  

What could be better!!!! 

These were the lovelies we chose....  once again Cult Nails My Kind of Cool Aid... essie's Shine of the Times... Sally Hansen's Rockstar Pink... & Sinful's Dream On.

On the way to the camp ground we made a pit stop at Target where I just happened to find myself running through the nail polish collections and I spotted Shine of the Times!  It's reputation preceded it!  I'd never seen it in Target before!  To say I pounced on that last bottle wouldn't be an overstatement!  :D  

Camping was off to a REALLY good start!

 Voldermort was smitten too! What's not to like after all? 
Right over the way cool Cool Aid.

Shoot.  I don't even know how to describe what's going on here!  

Here goes a try: Chunky, iridescent, transparent, dusky loveliness!

Voldemort is rockin' this look, don't you agree?

I was feeling less subtle, more I'M CAMPING AND LIFE IS GRAND!!!    The florescent Dream On was my good start!

 Topped by the crazy little silvery gold, blue and pink sparklies in RockStar Pink!

I love camping, don't you?  

:)