Jessica Iridescent Eye with Nicole by OPI Wink of Tink

Hi everyone! Alright, I told you I would show you the base of my last mani in this post and here it is. This is two coats of Jessica Iridescent Eye with a final coat being a mixture of NOPI Wink of Tink and Iridescent Eye.

This is Iridescent Eye by itself. This is the first time I'm wearing this or any of the colors like this. This is a known dupe of the wildly popular Chanel Peridot. It looks amazing in the photos. In real life, it looks good but I liked it even better with the stamping. I definitely had some asking me why it looked gold and then looked green, lol.

Deadly Sins Challenge: Day 8 - Jessica Iridescent Eye Frankened with stamping

Hi all! I published this post then I had to come back and edit it to say, it's my 100th post! I can't believe it! I started this blog not knowing how I was going to maintain it over time. I started it at a time when my schedule was relatively light but just the act of blogging has been so much fun that it hasn't been all that hard to keep up! I try not to let myself feel any pressure about how often to blog and I think it really helps! I also want to thank all the followers I have so far. It's far more fun when the whole process becomes interactive and it's great knowing that there are people out there that are just as into this hobby as I am and actually want to see what I'm up to!

Today's post is kind of a segue from my last post because the base of this manicure is actually a mix of Jessica Iridescent Eye and Nicole by OPI Wink of Tink. Because it would have involved a lot of pictures, I'll show the base color by itself in my next post.

 The prompt for this challenge is "(Only if you want) Create a manicure inspired on your laziness... or whatever... I'm so tired..." For me, stamping is one of the lazy forms of nail art these days. Everything else like gradient, marble, freehand etc all seem to take so much more time than stamping. These days, it almost feels like cheating!! The image comes from the Cheeky plate CH 44.

Deadly Sins Challenge - Day 7: Sloth (Insta-franken tutorial)

Hello lovelies! How are you? I'm writing this post kinda late for me (10:55 pm) so who know what mistakes I'll find when I wake up in the morning. Today's post is yet another installment of the Deadly Sins Challenge. Details explaining this challenge are in this post. This week's theme is Sloth. Day 7 theme is "Don't try too hard but explain everyone how to do something really easy...(tutorial). There are tutorials for a million and one things out there but I wanted to share with you guys something that maybe a lot of you already do, but I haven't really seen being talked about in other blogs. I like to call this insta-frankening. 

The idea came to me when I started wondering one day what would happen if I mixed two very different polishes together. I was curious and I had a fairly good idea that it would work well and be awesome but I didn't want to go through the process of finding an empty bottle, mixing my polishes and then just using it once. It seemed like a waste. So I started insta-frankening and creating single use, one time only polishes. I guess it's my lazy way of frankening. Over time, I've refined my method and wanted to show you guys with a lot of examples of polishes I insta-frankened. In keeping with the theme of sloth, I only swatched on one finger.

I start off by creating a tiny little bowl with tinfoil that I molded over the top of a nail polish cap. Then after having picked out which polishes I want to try to blend, I add a drop or so of each polish into the cup. Remember, this isn't supposed to be fine tuned frankening for multiple use. This is just to experiment and come up with one unique manicure. Of course, if you loved the result, you can always make it again!

I have a lot of empty top coat bottles by now so I just use the brush from one of those bottles, mix the polishes together and use the same brush to paint my nails so that I'm not contaminating any of the other polishes. I usually paint my nails the base color and use the mix as the last and final coat. When painting all ten nails, I find it handy to keep some thinner around to add a drop whenever the mix gets a little thick.

The above on the right is what I get when I mix Orly Space Cadet, Sinful Colors In the Mist and Sinful Colors San Francisco.

Now, again keeping with the sloth theme, I'm going to let the pictures speak for themselves.

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I hope you found this a fun and interesting post. I'm not sure insta-frankening is everyone's cup of tea but it makes me appreciate my stash that much more! Best part is, when I'm done with one manicure, I've barely made a dent in the polishes I used!
Click below to see what the other ladies have come up with for this challenge.

Funky Fingers Primrose (How I figured out how to make pearly pinks work for me)

Hi people! As I'm typing this up, I'm listening to the newest album put out by Penn Masala, one of my favorite acapella groups next to Pentatonix. They are out of University of Pennsylvania and these guys create such wonderful acapella mash ups of popular Indian and American songs. They may not be everyone's style but they sure can sing! I'm not at all affiliated to them. I'm just an acapella geek :-)

The polish I'm showing you in this mani is another Funky Fingers called Primrose. I never thought I'd be drawn to pearly pinks like this but the purple duochrome shift in the bottle kind of decided it for me in the store.

Once I had it on my nails, I once again started doubting my choice. It was sheer, showed brushstrokes and didn't seem to show the duochrome as much. The picture below shows what it looked like by itself. The color was unique enough on my nails that I didn't want to take it off. So, I put my Sinful Colors matte top coat on it. Instant love!!!

The accent nail design is from the Gals plate GA 44 and the dots are done with Barry M Plum. The two pictures below are iPhone pictures in sunlight and in the shade. I feel like the iPhone pictures are good to show certain true to life characteristics that my actual camera doesn't pick up. Plus, it's so handy when I'm out and about!

What do you guys think of pinks like this? I can see myself getting a lot of wear out of this one as long as I don't wear it by itself.

Sally Hansen CSM Trouble Maker with Funky Fingers Prince Charming

Hey, hey! It is a perfect spring day today. Soft morning dew, warm temperature, cool breeze, and color bursting everywhere! Quick post today. This was going to be my last post but I wanted to put up my Deadly Sins Challenge mani too. Decisions, decisions....

This is Sally Hansen Trouble Maker now with a lovely coating of Funky Fingers Prince Charming. One of the places I work at is right across the street from a Five Below and every few months, I mosey on over there to see what new goodies Funky Fingers has come up with. They always feel very unique to me and they are not that expensive!

Just look at it in the bottle. It's a mix of fine blue, purple and I think even pink shimmer particles in a purple jelly base. Looks great over Trouble Maker!

Then I went and, in my opinon, ruined it by adding some stamping. This image is taken from PUEEN Stamp 13. The colors used are China Glaze Harmony and Sally Hansen Chrome Pink Pearl. I also mattified it with Sinful Colors Matte Top Coat. I wasn't too happy with it but I did get compliments. I don't know. What do you think? Did the stamping ruin it?

Deadly Sins Challenge - Day 5: Greed (Dior Golden Light)

Hi all! It's that time again. Another Deadly Sins Challenge mani! This week's theme is Greed. The first of the two challenges says "Go wild and use your most expensive and precious polish." I decided to use a polish that my lovely husband got for me as a spur of the moment gift. I normally don't buy any truly expensive polishes so this was truly a treat. The color itself seemed so amazingly pretty in the store (oh those department store lights). This is Dior Golden Light.

I have stamped it with Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Wined Up. The image comes from the Cheeky XL plate D. I just want to take a minute to express my love for the soft XL stamper as well. This was a perfect combination of plate, polish and stamper.

This is Golden Light before any stamping. It's a pretty sheer polish on it's own. The index only has one coat, the middle finger two, the ring finger three and pinky sort of a fourth. I went with three coats on all fingers for the mani.

Not my most exciting polish and I'm not sure how long it would have taken me to actually wear it if it wasn't for this challenge. It is really pretty though and now that I know how sheer it is, I think it would work well over other polishes. 

Sally Hansen Trouble Maker

Hi everybody!

I am in the state of California for the first time in my life and I like it! It sunny, warm but not hot, and actually not too humid. My skin loves the sun! It's been missing it for months now. I've got a few minutes before dinner so I thought I'd get this post up.

The major color in this is Sally Hansen CSM Trouble Maker. It's a nice dark plummy grape color without being so dark that it looks black. The formula was great. This is two coats. I love the paddle brush that comes with this line. The brush with the formula gives me a great line at the cuticle with very minimal clean up. It doesn't drag because of being too stiff.

The accent nail is done with Savina Dolphins. It's a brand I've found at Nordstrom Rack. It's a medium grey polish that dried to a rubbery matte finish. I've already topcoated it here but I need to wear it alone someday to see if I like that finish. The stamp came from Cheeky XL plate E.

This picture was taken after I took the accent nail off and repainted it in preparation for something else. You can see the scratches on the older paint! What did I do next? That's for the next post!

Seven Deadly Sins Challenge Day 3: Gluttony

Hi all! Ok, so you might be wondering, she did a day 1, and now it says day 3....where did day 2 go? The way this challenge works is that you can do one or two challenges per week and each of those challenges are numbered. I can only probably do one challenge a week and depending on which challenge it is, I'm probably going to be skipping days here and there.

So, on to this week's challenge, Gluttony! Day 3 guideline is, "Delight yourself with a Sugar Spun inspired manicure". I had done a sugar spun mani before but had been less than pleased with those results. When I started playing with some of my Barry M polishes that I purchased on my trip to London, I realized that the creme/jelly consistency that a lot of them had really lent itself well to creating thin sugar spun lines. I also really wanted to do sugar spun over a gradient so this was the perfect opportunity!

The polishes I used for this are Barry M Prickly Pear, Bright Purple and Plum. After the gradient, I used Plum to create the sugar spun design. I really tried to make the lines as thin as possible and I think I did a better job than with my last attempt. My hands were a mess afterwards though. It took me four episodes of Parks and Recreation to get both hands done! I got into a good rhythm after a while of dripping polish on one nail, then replenishing the drop on the foil and cleaning up the skin around the nail while waiting for that drop to thicken. The sparkles come from INM Northern Lights topcoat. I love the density of the holographic glitter in this, perfect for a topcoat.

This manicure went through a lot of stages and was a creation built over days. Here it is with just regular topcoat.

Here it is before any topcoat. Love this picture!

Here is it as just the gradient. I wore it this way for a day or so. Not perfect but I knew I was going to cover it up so I didn't stress.

Click below to see what the other ladies part of this challenge have been up to.