Category: Nail Art

Of Life and Lacquer > Nail Art

Born Pretty Store Review: Red Flocking Powder

Posted on by Cynthia

I got past hump day! Woot! Tomorrow is Thursday which means that the weekend is upon us again. I’m probably going to have another swatch-a-thon and get my posts all lined up for the week. It’s just so much easier to do that than to try to do individual posts each night. I really admire all my fellow bloggers who work (or go to school–or both!!), have time to post almost every day and still follow up with other blogs. I am so bummed that I don’t have enough time sometimes to visit my favorite blogs daily to comment and support them. I am going to have a lot of catching up to do this weekend! One of the manis that I worked on over the weekend is this velvet man that I’m going to share with you today. I was super excited to get the opportunity to review the red flocking powder from the Born Pretty Store because I had been wanting to do a velvet mani for ages. Let me show you how it turned out.

Born Pretty Store Red Flocking Powder

This is the bottle of red flocking powder. It’s a very generous size!

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These are the three products I used to do my velvet mani.

Jessica Velvet Fantasy

As my base color, I decided to use my favorite bright red: Velvet Fantasy from the Jessica Glamarama Holiday Collection. This red is perfection in a bottle. It’s the absolute most perfect one-coater!

Velvet Mani Red Flocking Powder Born Pretty Store

 

Now, this is what my mani looked like after I applied the red flocking powder. Let me tell you that it was definitely messier than I anticipated because the red flocking powder will get EVERYWHERE if you are not careful.  I think that the most important step of applying the flocking powder is that you make sure that the top coat is still  fairly wet or else the powder won’t stick. Because of that, you have to do one nail at a time.  To tell you the truth, I love how this looks way more than I thought I would, but it’s not a manicure that you can wear for long. I wore it for a few hours and then I had to do dishes and stuff so that didn’t work out so well. It’s a “going out” mani that you can wear for the night if you’re not going to be doing anything crazy with your hands.

Velvet manis may be old news to you, but this look is 100% new to my nails and I’m super happy that I finally got to try it out. If you’re interested in getting some flocking powder from the Born Pretty Store, you can click here and see all the different colors that they offer. Don’t forget that if you use my discount code, JGL91,  you will get a 10% discount off your purchase. If you head over to the Born Pretty Store, make sure to look around because it is a nail art heaven.

Let me know what you think about velvet manis. Would you wear it? Have you tried it out before? Thanks for stopping by today, and I will talk to you soon.

 

 

Disclosure: The products featured in this post were provided to me by the manufacturer or their PR firm (except for the NYC Top Coat). For more information, please see my disclosure policy tab here.

On ne voit bien qu’avec le cœur…

Posted on by Cynthia

The very first book in French that I ever read is Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s Le Petit Prince. I was 14 years old and my French teacher was trying to slowly introduce us into reading something a little more complicated than our grammar books.  If you’ve never read this deceptively simple little book, I strongly recommend that you go out and get yourself a copy. Although it is a “children’s book,” it speaks to us adults on a different level. Even the most jaded and hardened amongst us will see that the story and ideas behind The Little Prince will remind us that too often we let ourselves get wrapped up in things that don’t really matter in the grand scheme of things. Sometimes the most simple of things are truly the most important. Before I show you my mani, here are the polishes and items I used to create my manicure:

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The polishes I used are all from Sation: Dance With The Drummer, Down and Dirty Flirty, Strumming My Nails and Lemon Pearl.  I am going to have to do a review of all of these polishes individually because they are gorgeous. I think I have found my new favorite white…it was seriously perfection.

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I also used three stamping plates and Konad stamping polishes in yellow, red and green. I used the black stripping polish for the details in drawing The Little Prince as well as the Winstonia nail art brush. The plates I used are: Konad M84 for the stars, Mash 36 for the rose and Mash 33 for the shooting stars.

collage1

I started out by painting my nails with the base colors. As I said before, these colors are amazing–super buttery and smooth. Second, I stamped my three nails with the star designs and the rose before I moved on to my middle finger. I seriously redid that nail about 4 times–I just could not get The Little Prince to look right which kind of shocked me considering how simple the drawing is.

collage2

I took these pictures out in direct sunlight so the colors warmed up a bit, but I liked how they turned out nonetheless.  I think that out of all the manicures I have done over the past year, this is the one I am most proud of not only because of the cuteness factor but because I adore The Little Prince.

Let me know what you think about this mani…and it better be positive or else we’re going to have some problems. 😛 Just kidding…sort of. I’ve been in a very bad mood lately, and I think I just realized that it’s due to all the bottled up anger coming from the situation with the mooch. Have you read The Little Prince? Anyway…thanks for checking in with me today, and I will talk to you soon!

P.S. In case anyone was wondering, the title of this post comes from one of my favorite lines in this book: “Voici mon secret. Il est très simple: on ne voit bien qu’avec le cœur. L’essentiel est invisible pour les yeux.”

“Here is my secret. It is very simple: One sees clearly only with the heart. What is essential is invisible to the eye.”

 

Disclosure: All Sation polishes and the Winstonia Store brush were provided to me by the manufacturer or their PR. All other products featured in this post were purchased by me.  For more information, please refer to my disclosure policy tab.

 

Happy 4th Of July!

Posted on by Cynthia

I was not feeling any kind of inspiration for a 4th of July nail look. None at all. I’ve been posting like a machine lately, and I’m trying to slow down. The thing is that I am working really hard to keep myself occupied. I have not been feeling very motivated lately, and I’m afraid of my anxiety getting worse. I thought Prozac was supposed to help with anxiety as well, but it’s not working very well lately. I’m having problems sleeping regularly and have started the stupid cycle of nightmares. It seems that my nightmares always center around my worst insecurities so they seem even more intense and leave me completely emotionally overwhelmed when I do wake up. I hate feeling like this but there isn’t that much to do about it right now except to keep my head above water and not let it get the best of me again.

As far as being patriotic, I don’t think I’ve ever been crazy patriotic. I am grateful for living in a country where I can say and write whatever I want without fearing persecution. We enjoy many freedoms that we take for granted so it’s worth taking a moment to be thankful for all that we do have. I always try to put things into perspective because in the grand scheme of things, we are almost living in paradise compared to other places in the world where war, extreme poverty and hunger are just something that is in their every day reality. I’m not trying to be preachy or anything; I just think it’s nice to have a day to spend with your friends and family even if you’re not all hyped up on Independence Day.

So back to nail stuff…

I used Adventure Red-y which is an amazing one coat red from the China Glaze On Safari collection as my base color and then used Man Hunt, also from the same collection, for the chevron tips. Using Konad plate M84 and their white special polish, I stamped the stars over both colors. Simple, right? This was actually the second look I tried today. The first one was a complete disaster–better as an abstract idea because it was horrid once I tried to execute it. Oh well…you live, you learn.

If you’re in the States, do you have anything fun planned for today? Stay safe whatever you end up doing!

Nails Inc. Tate

Posted on by Cynthia

Tate is the color that I imagine Roxanne wearing: a beautiful, glossy harlot red that she would wear before going back to her “home on whore island.” Sorry ladies, I just couldn’t help myself. I am a creme finish lover (wow, that sounds inappropriate), so of course I adore Tate. It’s bold, glossy, creamy and absolutely gorgeous. I love to wear red nail polish because it’s so LOUD and immediately commands attention. I am very animated when I speak, moving my arms and hands all over the place, so I love to have strong colors on my nails for dramatic effect. Ready for some swatches after I have babbled on and on about prostitutes, whores, and creme finishes? Ok!

No, I wasn’t lying. This is gorgeous and it’s a one coater!!!! I used two coats because that’s what I’m used to, but you can definitely get away with one coat.

GASP! Glitter!!!! I know, I know. I keep saying that I hate glitter, but I’m starting to think that maybe I’m just lying to myself. I can almost guarantee that I will *never* pay over $5 for any glitter but I am open to anything under that price point. I just hate how hard glitter is to remove most of the time and the thing that bothers me most is that rough feeling that it usually leaves on my nails. I really do like sponging–even though I still can’t get the gradient sponging right–so I mixed two glitters to sponge on my tips: OPI Servin’ Up Sparkle and Wet N Wild Rockin’ Rubies.

How do you like Tate? Do you love wearing red on your nails or is it just too loud for your taste? How do you feel about the glitter mix on my tips? Let me know! I love to hear your opinions.

Color Club Almost Famous

Posted on by Cynthia

How do you feel about yellow nail polish? I think I have maybe 3 yellow nail polishes in total and I rarely use them. My mom always used to dress me in yellow when I was a kid because she said it was her favorite color on me. She used to dress me up so girlie: matching dress, shoes, purse, accessories.  It was brutal and I pretty much rebelled at the age of 7 and started wearing whatever I wanted. Wearing this yellow color also reminded me of a childhood story.

When I was a little kid, before starting school, we used to live in a really crappy part of town. In fact, it was outright dangerous so my mom would keep my brother and I locked up in the house. That is like the worst torture for a kid so we felt like little caged animals. Whenever we would go out anywhere, my brother and I would run around like crazy completely relishing being out of the house. In fact, whenever we went shopping we would just disappear and we almost would have to go up to a store employee to page my mom because after a while we were lost. So my mom bought us a set of matching neon yellow/orange sweat pants suits. I swear it was radioactive bright like crazy velveeta cheese, and I hated wearing it. I don’t know if it was her way of making us easy to spot or what, but I still kid her about that.

I am not so sure that I like yellow polish on myself, so you let me know.

As far as yellow polish goes, Almost Famous was not terrible to work with. I did find that it got streaky and I created bald spots if I wasn’t careful. I usually try to stick with two coats, but I felt that I third coat would help to make the color more even. This is a very bright and sunny yellow for sure, and I can’t imagine wearing this any time except summer.

 

I don’t know why I did this design because I hate it. It reminds me of a NASCAR checkered flag. This is just barfalicious and I took it off immediately after taking these pictures.

How do you feel about yellow nail polish? Is there a color that you really don’t like to wear on your nails? Thanks for visiting!

Blue Balls or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Da Bomb

Posted on by Cynthia

I doubt that the title of my post will make much sense to anyone, but I guess that will just keep my blog in the same vein of nonsensical ramblings. A while back, I purchased some mood changing polishes but I hadn’t gotten around to trying them out. Since I have a pretty blue that is supposed to change from blue to neon blue, I decided to try out it today for my Blue Balls Manicure. (:P Ciaté.) I wasn’t expecting much from this polish since it is supposed to change from one blue to another blue? LAME. However, I really liked it despite the kind of atrocious formula. It’s super sheer so I had to apply 4 coats. Yes, 4 coats! It dries matte and I didn’t attempt to apply a top coat because I was afraid I might ruin the color changing effect…and after applying that many coats, I was not about to take a chance. I just burst into song after typing the last sentence: If you change your mind//I’m the next in line//Honey I’m still free//Take a chance on me.

It was hard to take pictures of this polish because as soon as I exposed my nails to hot or cold water, by the time I dried them and went outside to take some pictures, they were already fading back to another color, so that explains the water on my hands.

 

These are pictures of my nails at room temperature or outside temperature, rather. You can see some of the darker color on the tips of my nails before the heat of the sun started to change them to the neon shade.

 

This was the result after running my hands under hot water: a more neon blue.

 

And this is the effect of cold water. It’s supposed to be a darker blue, but it starts to change almost immediately to the neon blue because it’s kind of hot outside.

 

And finally, la pièce de résistance, the thing you have been waiting for: My Blue Balls Manicure or MBBM.

 

I hope you’re having a nice Friday. Do you have any plans for the weekend? What do you think about my Blue Balls Manicure? I hope it was all you had hoped for. 😉

 

Sation Jock Juggler

Posted on by Cynthia

When I first purchased this bottle of polish, I thought the name was Jockstrap Juggler. Besides it being one of those blues that I drool over no  matter how many similar shades I may have, I also got it because I thought the name was hilarious. As someone with a wickedly overactive imagination, I won’t even mention what images danced around in my head. I would also like to warn you not to google images for jockstrap juggler because you will be scarred if you see a few of the image results. I’m not saying that you won’t see a lot of nice, uhm, packages, but you will also see things that will sear your eyeballs to a crisp. So don’t do it. Please. Just don’t.

The actual name if this polish is obviously Jock Juggler. Is that any better? When I photographed this polish, it looked sooooo much like China Glaze Bahamian Blues but Jock Juggler has green in it that makes it look a little aqua. I’ll need to compare it side-by-side to For Audrey, Gumdrop, I Need A Re-fresh Mint…ad nauseam…to see if it is truly a dupe of any of those colors. Although it looks like a full on creme, in the bottle it has the slightest flash of blue shimmer, and I really mean slight because it doesn’t show up on my nails at all. I applied 3 coats in order to level out the polish. This one was slightly thick so it was a little difficult to get this to apply smoothly right away.

 

I then sponged Wet N Wild Cost Is No Issue on my tips. This glitter is so freaking pretty.  Do you think it’s a good combination with Jock Juggler?

 

What are you wearing on your nails today? Oh, and did you google jockstrap juggler? I knew it!

Gradient Attemp # 2

Posted on by Cynthia

The fact that my last gradient attempt turned out so crappy made me fixate on trying it again so here I am with another post. I feel like I’ve been on a roll lately when it comes to posting so I’m going to try to keep the wind in my sails. I used two China Glaze polishes: Bahamian Escape and Man Hunt. I’ve swatched Bahamian Escape before but I added some swatches to this post again because this polish is so darn pretty.

I used a different type of sponge this time so I do think it created a slightly different effect. I am still not happy with it, but this one looks slightly better than my first attempt so I will keep practicing until I’m a gradation fool.

And just for shits and giggles, here is my favorite psychotic Kelly moment from The Office:

I am looking forward to my salad from Cafe Rio–yum!–and catching up on my favorite blogs. I have tons of reading tonight! 🙂

Father’s Day & My First Gradient Attempt

Posted on by Cynthia

Today being Father’s Day, we took it upon ourselves to use that as an excuse to get together, watch movies and eat as if it were our last meal. My brother and sister-in-law came over and we just hung out all day with my parents. My other brother had to work so he missed out on the fun. Why does celebrating always have to involve being gluttons for my family? I don’t know why, but we ended up watching Rocky movies on Netflix…omg…how cheesy yet entertaining. Who doesn’t like an underdog movie anyway?

Since I was wearing a purple top today, I decided to finally try a gradient nail look. I had seen the Nailasaurus’ tutorial linked on Nicole’s page so I went to check it out again before starting. Well, I am a gradient loser and I have never been able to do it properly so I was excited at the prospect of finally being able to do a decent gradient. It didn’t quite turn out the way I hoped. I used a foundation sponge and it seemed to soak up tons of the polish and not leave any on my nails. I even tried wetting the sponge in hopes that it wouldn’t absorb so much nail polish but that didn’t work either. I wondered if it would work better if I used a different kind of sponge so I tried it with a foamy sponge and that seemed to work slightly better. I am still not really happy with the way this looks because Sammy from The Nailasaurus makes it looks gorgeous and effortless and mine just looks…botched? Anyway, here are some pics. I used OPI Do You Lilac It? for the lighter color and China Glaze Grape Pop for the darker tip color.

And this is what I HOPED it would look like:

(Photo Source)

So what do you think? Maybe I just need a little more practice before it looks the way I want it to. Thank you Sammy for the awesome tutorial and thanks to Nicole for blogging about it!

Oh, I have a question for all of you nail polish addicts out there: Are you at all worried about the health risks of the chemicals in nail polish and acetone? I try not to use pure acetone too much, but non-acetone removers just don’t work. Are you concerned at all? I know for most people it’s not a big deal, but for those of us who blog and change our polish like we change shoes, I feel this is an important question. I sometimes wonder if the concerns are completely overblown and you’d have to basically drink acetone in order to get sick from it. Anyway, I’d like to hear what you think so share away!

One Eyed One Horned Flying Purple People Eater

Posted on by Cynthia

When I was in 8th grade, my choir teacher had us perform this song during one of our assemblies. I remember that she had one kid run up and down the aisles of the auditorium pretending to be the monster. It was kind of ridiculous but really fun. I was a choir geek from elementary school through high school so maybe that’s why I love singing so much. Believe it or not, that was the first thing that came to mind when I used Power To The Purple.

This color is in the same vein as OPI Dutch Ya Just Love OPI, Zoya Tru, Jessica Witchy Wisteria…except that I think this version is way brighter and more re-toned. I am in love with this purple because it has that smoldering quality to it. The formula was perfect and I only needed two coats. Sorry about the cut on my middle finger; apparently I wasn’t careful enough with the cuticle clippers. 🙁

I did a quick design on my nails afterwards. I wasn’t super careful so you can see where the dotting could be cleaner but I still like it. Most people don’t grab your hands and hold them up to inspect your nails–notice that I said most because this has happened to me quite a few times. I like that people are curious and compliment my nails, but get your hands off me, please. kthanks.

This nail polish is a big winner in my book because it’s purple and because it’s so vibrant. Purple is my favorite color and yes I have worn purple shoes, clothes, glasses and make-up…all at once. It was my Barney Chic phase. Are you a purple lover too?

****These items were sent for review. This in no way influences my review and opinion of the product.****