Aussie Nails Monday - Black and White

Okay, it's not Monday, its Thursday...and I am super late with this post. This mani for Aussie Nails Monday was Black and White and because I have been sick for the last 2 days with fever, cough and just generally dying (swan-like!) I wasn't super creative. So today for my Black and White I did a gradient...

For this look I used a base of Ulta3 Lily White, then a gradient of Ulta3 Lily White, Nubar Citadel and Nubar Silver Sword and Ulta3 Satin Black

Then, because I couldn't leave well enough alone I did a coat of Sparkles by Julie Sugah!

I think perhaps I should have stamped on top of the gradient? Although I was pretty happy with this when I added the bling of Sugah! It was just what this needed to complete the look :) Hope you catch the what the other participants did..probably more creative than mine!

Nail Gun XS - Marie’s Manicure Madhouse - Shatter Me Claire - A Polished Prance - Shades of Phoenix - The Epitome of Superficiality - Lacquer Dreams - NananaisNails - Enamoured With Enamel - Adelle1985 - Kelly's Kolors - Polished Peripherals - Every Little Polish - Mel My Issta - Walk In My Eyeshadow - JennLojko - Erinzi’s Nails - Lovessweetas - Jas’ Blingtastic Nails - Mckfresh - Maedaynails - Lili_Bete - The Reluctant Femme - Jibber Jabber - Messy Mansion - Nailovelogy - Ronda - It's All About The Polish - Pretty Polish Please

Layla Black as Ebony Stamping

Hi There! I was going to do the whole Australia Day mani thing, but I ended up stuck in Sydney on Saturday when we were due to fly back Friday. So, I didn't end up getting it done, nor was I particularly in the mood after attending a family funeral :(  Tomorrow the Aussie Nails Melbourne girls are meeting up and I will post what I have created for that tomorrow, well, after I finish creating the mani! Tonight, what is better than Layla Black as Ebony? Layla Black as Ebony tricked out with stamping and glitter.

For this look this is Layla Black as Ebony 2 coats, with accent nail of Black Cat Lacquer Sanitation Twins and stamping with Gals plate in China Glaze Liquid Leather.

Mani in the Shade

 Full sun

 Up Close and Personal of Black Cat Lacquer Sanitation Twins in the shade, full sun

 Gunmetal Grey

 Blingy Silver!

As you can tell from the pic spam I really loved this stamping glitter combo! Can I just say that I love, love, love Black Cat Lacquer Sanitation Twins. I love the combo of glitters, the bar glitters and the micro glitter through out. This was one coat of Sanitation Twins and it was super easy to apply. I would definitely file this under "tough" looking as far as manis go, rather than pretty and I love it! I bought my Black Cat Lacquer from the Etsy store here and shipping was fast.

What are your thoughts? Do you like Sanitation Twins? What do you think of the stamping combo?

Layla Black as Ebony

I'm having a week! My sister had a baby yesterday and I was present (at 2am) for the labour and the birth. Little Vincent was born finally at 6.35am and gee he's a cutie! Happy Birthday little man :) It seems the cycle of life also deems it necessary that we lose someone and on the same day my husband lost his uncle :( I thought he was a great guy and definitely gone too soon. We will say our goodbyes tomorrow, but I wish we didn't have to :( Yesterday was busy and I also booked my flight for a grand American adventure in September! I am one of those people who love having something to look forward to and a month in America hopping from coat to coast is going to be awesome. I can't forget to mention that Disneyworld is on the cards and there is NO place happier in the world!

Anyways, today I have for you a swatch of Layla Black as Ebony from the Mirror Effects range. These polishes are just so shiny and blingy, but not what I would call a true mirror finish like you can get in nail foils. Having said that I really enjoy wearing these polishes as they dry fast, are not brush stroke-y.

Layla Mirror Effect Black as Ebony

 Quite Silver in this light

Also appears dark grey depending on light reflection

Black as Ebony in sunlight

 Black as Ebony in Shade

What do you think? I love the gunmetal finish that this polish gives. It makes sense that a "mirror" effect polish would have a silver as a base to achieve the mirror look..in this case Black as Ebony becomes more Grey as Gunmetal in my opinion. I love that it's easy to apply, no brush strokes and no base coat required. Having said that, the downfalls are your nails have to be smooth otherwise ridges and imperfections are easily seen. My number one complaint that a top coat kills the mirror effect, but without a topcoat by the end of just one day this polish chips like crazy *Le sigh* I still love this polish despite it's peculiarities.. but there isn't much out there I don't like!

What do you girls think? Do you own this polish and how do you rate it?

Aussie Nails Monday - Skittles

Today is Monday and it's a good day for me as I have the day off..woohoo for long weekends. It's the only upside of shift work. Today's Aussie Nails Monday's challenge was skittles. I chose to do stamping skittles :) I have had a bit of a cuticle fiasco on my swatching hand so please don't look too closely and I have used my right hand for pics which isn't that easy to position. Oh the first world problems!

For this look I used FNUG Fantastica as a base which is a holo pale green polish which is only slightly tinted green in the pics. I then stamped with Gals Princess Plates Number 34 and using the 4 images on the plate, one on each finger with L-R China Glaze Happy Go Lucky, Essie Jag-u-are, OPI Swimsuit, Nailed It! and China Glaze Harmony.

Photo in the Shade

Full Sun..note, crooked stamping on ring finger on Left Hand

Not crooked stamping Right hand :)

 You can see the pale Green of the Fantastica in the individual pics :)

 The best for last, holo, green and stamping :) 

As you can tell from the lots of photos I took I really loved how this turned out. The base of FNUG Fantastica was lovely as always and the stamping was easy with Gals "The Princess set" plate. I purchased mine from Amazon.com and found the international shipping option which was a little tricky to find. I hope your monday went equally as well!

Check out the other lovely ladies participating in the Aussie Nails Monday Manis :)

Nail Gun XS - Marie’s Manicure Madhouse - Shatter Me Claire - A Polished Prance - Shades of Phoenix - The Epitome of Superficiality - Lacquer Dreams - NananaisNails - Enamoured With Enamel - Adelle1985 - Kelly's Kolors - Polished Peripherals - Every Little Polish - Mel My Issta - Walk In My Eyeshadow - JennLojko - Erinzi’s Nails - Lovessweetas - Jas’ Blingtastic Nails - Mckfresh - Maedaynails - Lili_Bete - The Reluctant Femme - Jibber Jabber - Messy Mansion - Nailovelogy - Ronda - It's All About The Polish - Pretty Polish Please

China Glaze Surreal Appeal

I have a really quick and really late post for you today...China Glaze Surreal Appeal plus stamping plus glitter equals mani fail! Ugh! Just to show you what happens when polish and stamping and glitter gets ugly I wanted to show you the end result. Each polish component on it's own are lovely, together..not so much.

So, this is 2 coats of China Glaze Surreal Appeal, stamping with Ulta3 Pale Dahlia and accent nail with Black Cat Lacquer Just Like Heaven and THEN China Glaze Fairy Dust slapped on top. Pretty good example of more isn't always better, LOL!

 Ooh look, coral mess!

 Erk!

 I don't completely hate this shot..the glitter accent nail looks nice :)

 This combo just doesn't work for me. I don't know if Surreal Appeal just wasn't bright enough or the contrast stamping didn't contrast enough. I just DON'T like it!! Needless to say I took this off pretty damn quickly. I did wear it for a day..but didn't enjoy it. Blerg. Too bad, in my mind the colors went together nicely..my mind was playing tricks on me clearly. Again, let me stress on their own, all these polishes are great..just not thrown together!
What do you think about my mani fail? When have you got it completely wrong?

Glitzology My Viking Boyfriend

Hello All! I am watching the tennis and eliminating my cuticles at the same time..yay for multi-tasking :) Each year it gets to January, and the Australian open, and I watch it on TV with fascination and think to myself  "I should really go to the Tennis next year" and during the year I somehow forget how much I really like  it, and so the cycle continues. After that tangential thought I'll move on to the real purpose of this post..polish!

Today I have for you Glitzology's My Viking Boyfriend, which was sent to me along with polishes I purchased from Stacy's Etsy store. It's a lovely mix of blue and silver holo glitters, dark blue hexes, and holo silver squares and hexes in a clear base. I chose to layer it over a contrasting color rather than complementary to see all those lovely glittahs! This is My Viking Boyfriend over Essie's A Crewed Interest.

Essie A Crewed Interest with Glitzology My Viking Boyfriend

This is one coat of My Viking  Boyfriend, great glitter payoff!

 So sparkly!

My Viking Boyfriend is a lovely blue multi-shaped glitter with some holo bling for added measure. It was on the thicker consistency side (which I must add I do prefer) and I only needed only coat to achieve the above look. I liked the color combo, but didn't love it, which was my fault....so will have to try it again with a different base. For those who like their glitter blue and blingy, this one is for you. You can purchase Glitzology from Glitzology Beauty's etsy store and at the moment Stacy is having a buy 3 and get one free sale! There is something for everyone in her store and her bottle are jammed-packed full of glitter goodness :)

OPI Is it Silva?

Hi all :) Hump day today and I must say I am really feeling it..it's not quite 10.30pm and I am thinking it might be bed time. So tired! I work 10 hour days and some days I feel like I have worked 2 days....with the morning feeling like a distant memory by the afternoon. 

Annnnyways, today I have for you one of the OPI James Bond Magnetic polishes, Is It Silva? I will preface this post with a. I wasn't going to buy any of the magnetic Bond polishes but, its holographic, so how could I not??? and b. I have never used the magnetic polishes despite owning one of the Layla ones for about a year. I have just not been enthralled by the magnetic pattern finish which has trended and gone really..the new Liquid Sand trend..love, have, must have! This is my first attempt at the magnetic finish polish, so be gentle. Each of the 3 polishes came with a different magnet and I tried them on different fingers using Is It Silva? polish.

L-R, Morning Money Penny Magnet on first finger, Bond,James Bond Magnet on middle finger, Is It Silva? Magnet on ring finger and Morning Money Penny Magnet on pinky.

The actual magnet patterns you should be able to achieve

 The holographic loveliness is great in the sunlight

 The effect seems quite dull to me in the shade :(

 Patterns or polish bald patches? Hmm...

 The ring finger is the best pattern result which happens to be the one it came with.

I purchased the magnetic polishes without expecting too much from them. I liked Is It Silva? for the holographic effect and think it will looks pretty good non magnetized as well. The matching magnetic shape that came with the polish appears to work the best but I am going to have to try the other polishes to let you know! I think the polish might need to be a bit thicker, so will adjust for the next go at the magnetic polish effect look, but overall I quite liked it. Even if I am not a super fan of magnetic polish, I will give it another go :)

What are your thoughts on magnetic polish? Is it a trend that will fall by the wayside or will they always have a place in your collection?

Aussie Nails Monday- Fishtail

It's Monday! You know what Monday means..it means Aussie Nails Monday challenge and today it's Fishtails :) Fishtails could be like, here fishy, fishy..but I chose the braided fishtail mani which were quite popular a few months ago. For my take on the braided fishtail mani I did a half nail which started out chevron in shape and evolved it into the braid.

For this mani I used 2 coats of Nail It! Moonlight Sparks which I purchased from Sportsgirl (for those in Australia) and the braid with Moonlight Sparks, China Glaze Millennium and Nail It! Love Potion (a lovely green/blue duo). This polish reminds me of both Butter London Wallis and A-England Beauty Never Fails which I think would be it's darker cousin.  There is a bit of pic spam here because I really loved how this turned out :)

 Dark Green/Gold sparkly flecks! Loooove :)

 All pics were taken in the shade..I image greater blingyness in the sun :)

This was 2 coats of Moonlight Sparks which applied really well. I very much enjoyed this look and really want to replicate it with all nails with the half braided chevron tips again! I also picked up a red version on this polish called Volcanic Sparks to show you later on in the week. What do you like or not like about this look? Hope your week is starting off great :)