Halloween 2016: Midnight "Holo-ween"

Happy Halloween! Or Holo-ween, hahahaehhhhhhh :) For my final Halloween look I was all set to go orange and green, pumpkins and green chevrons, so basic! I even had it sketched out and polished pulled. But I changed my mind last minute and wanted to do something totally different. This is the mani I wore all weekend and will wear until tomorrow! I figured I didn't want to be stuck wearing orange for several days, and when I was looking around my indie drawer I landed on Bliss Polish Flashlight, a gorgeous midnight blue holo polish inspired by the movie Pitch Perfect 2 :) I'm not as crazy into holo's as most of the nail community is, but this one is gorgeous!



I did a tiny bit of stamping with my Pueen Halloween Party 01 plate (aka the only Halloween plate I own) and China Glaze Check Out That Silver Fox, which is super opaque metallic polish I thought might be good for stamping and it was! I don't have any stamping-specific polishes. On my ring finger is Zoya Imogen and my pinky is OPI It's Frosty Outside. I'm pretty happy with how these turned out, given I didn't have a lot of time. I don't normally do nail stuff on the weekends, usually that's family time. But I didn't have time on Friday so I did these Saturday morning after my son's football game. :)



Here's one last shot of these in the sun because you can really see the holo on my thumb! AAAAND both my hands match, that doesn't happen very often but has twice this month! I'm finding its much easier to have matching hands with stamping!



Halloween 2016: purple ombré graveyard....sort of!

Today I have a not so non-traditional look....I've been wanting to try this purple ombré gradient look so many people do for Halloween for years! I decided this was the year to try it, and at the same time make it not-so-graveyardy.



For the ombré gradient I used Lucky Lucky Lavender, Funky Dunky (bottle shown) and Lincoln Park After Dark.

I took a couple quick pics of the process! I used white liquid latex to protect my fingers from the mess....I'm still not that great at gradients because I don't practice it enough! The latex definitely helps with the mess which really discouraged me from doing them in the past. 

I left it on while I was drying and waiting to stamp. I used This Gown Needs A Crown for the silver stamping. I wanted to use the OPI chrome but it just wasn't picking up! Frustrating! 



You can see all my little practices on the mat. I just sort of chose a few designs to go on top. 



I also used a little bit of Pirouette my Whistle (glitter topper) but it covered too much of my partial castle on my pinkie! Dangit! I used a much lighter hand on the rest of my nails. I also wanted to see what these looked like matte! 



Halloween 2016: Textured candy corn look

Even when doing non traditional Halloween nails I can't escape the candy corn motif! This is my favorite color combo for Halloween. The little bit of Halloween decorations I have in my house are candy corn themed!

I used Zoya Purity for the white base, then stamped with Darcy (yellow) and Cam (Orange). I also tried out a textured gradient for the first time and it came out ok! I used Solange (yellow) and Beatrix (Orange). I also used a tiny bit of OPI Solitare for the white tip. 



I did try to take a few pics of the process...this by far not a tutorial! I'm the last one to me making a stamping tutorial....yet haha. I just blobb the colors around on the engraved image...



And then use the scraper to blend the colors as I scrape...



Basically I just practice a few times till I get a good image picked up. I've been having a problem with my new clear stamper not picking up very well... I figured out that it's because the jelly part is not staying in it's little recessed area, if that makes sense. It's slipping further  into the holder. I guess I need to put some tape or super glue in there to keep it where it need to be? Any one know what I'm talking about? So in the mean time I'm using the other little one with the pink handle that came in my kit. It's gonna have to do for now!



 

(Exhibit a)



In case you are wondering what mat I use... I bought a cheap baby placemat made out of silicone at Walmart like a year ago! I don't have one the fancy "nail" mats a lot of people have. I'm just starting to use it and it's working fine so far! 





Halloween 2016: pink and brown graveyard

Hello and Happy FRIDAY! I knew when I set out to do non-traditional Halloween mani's I wanted to do pink and brown. One of my little Halloween vinyls from Twinkled-T is a little grim reaper dude, so he's the one that inspired this mani!



I used China Glaze Don't Mesa With my Heart for the pink base, then a nail vinyl and Wood You Wanna to fill him in. The glitter is Dancing and Prancing....my ring finger is supposed to look like glitter in the tree....but I'm still practicing ok? Haha! I stamped with Chrome is Where the Heart Is on my pointer finger for the grave site. Stamping is done with Pueen Halloween Party 01 (aka the only Halloween plate I own). I'm fairly happy with the way these came out, considering!

Halloween 2016: blue and purple spider motif

Today's non-traditional Halloween design features 3 of the new Zoya holiday collection! I'm waiting to swatch  them all until my nails grow a little-I had a crazy day on Monday and broke my pointer finger nail corner clean off! I haven't had a break like that in a while because I've been keeping them pretty short. But life happens! So that collection I hope to have up next week!

I chose Saint as my base color-it's a gorgeous periwinkle polish with a strong pink shift you can really see in the sun! Shimmers aren't my favorite but dang! The way it looks where the sun hits! Wow!
 

I used nail vinyls from Twinkled-T to make the slider web and spider. I used Zoya Alice to make the web-it's a periwinkle pixie dust! And the blue pixie is Waverly and OH HOLY CRAP is it awesome! I normally never out topcoat over my textures but I did here because I topcoated the rest. Dang yall, it's awesome! 

I am really happy with the way these came out! I was planning a web on my pinky too but I wasn't able to reuse my web vinyl and I only had one...so I had to improvise! 

Lush Halloween Collection 2016: Sparkly Pumpkin bubble bar featuringZoya Dhara

Hey guys! Today I have the Lush Sparkly Pumpkin to review. This was part of my first ever Halloween Lush order a few weeks ago. I have lots and lots to say about it, let's dig in!

I had a HECK of a time holding this time for a picture. And, really every time I had to move it around here or there. There's so much glitter on it I always got super annoyed!! I think its supposed to have a piece of cinnamon stick in there for a "stem", mine didn't, but it might have fell out during shipment and I didn't see it in the box.

First up, I chose Zoya Dhara to match! It's a bright reddish orange pixie dust (texture) with a really strong gold shimmer-it went perfectly! The Halloween designs are made with OPI Black Onyx and my new (purchased also) Pueen Halloween Party 01 stamping plate. I'm still digging in and going right for the stuff I consider slightly advanced, like stamping on texture! 

I was really nervous to use Sparkly Pumpkin because of all the glitter. I even considered washing some off before I used it so I wouldn't be completely covered in glitter when I got out of the tub. But then I decided to go ahead and use it as it is and just give it a chance. I will say it does smell really, really good. I ordered two of the pumpkin bath bombs and didn't really love the scent that much. You can see in the video I had a little bit of a hard time cutting it – it did seem like it was a little bit drier than the rest of the bubble bars I have cut up. The main scents are Juniperberry oil and lime oil and I didn't really pick up either of those! To me it smelled more of a like more of a cinnamon-vanilla cupcake  type smell. I had it sitting right next to me when I was painting my nails for this post and I really noticed how good it smelled for the first time. And then when I used it in the tub the smell stayed the entire time and I never got any much too much of a spicy smell--other than the cinnamon. Maybe my nose is broken? I don't know why it kept coming off so much like a vanilla sent to me!

Either way, it's quite lovely. I wound up using half the bubble bar because I really wasn't expecting to like it, normally I only use a third or a fourth of one. And it did make a ton of bubbles!

 

Look at all the bubbles! wow!

The bathwater did turn a bright shade of orange which you can see in the video. I'm not a huge fan of that but I could tolerate it more for a product that smells good like this one and not so much for the pumpkin bath bomb.

 

And the absolute best part is I was not covered in glitter – at all. I mean, I really didn't have any glitter on me. Which is crazy because after the Twilight bath bomb I was covered in silver glitter for like two days. So now I have a dilemma – I really really like the smell of this product but it's orange and it's covered in glitter and it's really messy to deal with. I think I will probably just find another product that has the sent. I would definitely recommend this bubble bar though which I am really surprised to say! I guess I have a year to decided if I'm going to buy it again....if it gets released again :)

Halloween 2016: 80's inspired neon

Happy Halloween week guys! I'm not a fan of Halloween too much, in particular all the gory and gross stuff people so and wear, zombies and all that. Not for me! So for anyone else in my boat, I'm going to be doing as many non-traditional nail art designs as I can fit in before Halloween!

For this mani I used several of the China Glaze Lite Brites collection: I'll pink to that (pink), None of your risky business (Orange), Whip it good (yellow), and Lime after Lime (green). I blobbed them all on to the design on the Pueen Halloween Party 01 plate and scraped twice to blend! 

My base is OPI Alpine Snow and the black texture is OPI Emotions. I just used a lightning bolt nail vinyl to make the bolt :)

Annual Birthday Nails with Picture Polish Frosting

Hey guys! Today I have a little more info on the  nails I wore last weekend on my birthday! I have a little tradition of always wearing Picture Polish Frosting (now discontinued) on my birthday. Four years ago, I ordered it for myself as a birthday present and it was my first Picture Polish. Since then I always wear it, while still trying to change it up a little every year! I also juuuuuuust started stamping, like for real like 5 minutes ago. I ordered myself a few quality plates (*key*) and a clear stamper and just jumped right in with the big kids. So far, it's going really well!




I wore Frosting on my 2nd and 3rd finger as a base, and Cherish (also PP) on the rest. Then I stamped with New York (the lighter pink) and Bonkers (maroon) using the Pueen Nature Lover 01 plate. I found it not super complicated!



Here's a look at my past years manicures!

 In 2013, I wore just Frosting. Baby newbie nails! I wasn't posting nails yet on my blog yet :)

In 2014, I used striping tape and color blocked with Shocked and Shy Violet. 2014 Blog here!

In 2015, I opted for a mix and match with Bonkers and OPI It's Frosty Outside! 2015 Blog here!



I wonder what I will do next year?! I'm open to suggestions!! Does anyone else have a polish they save for special occasions and wear regularly on them??


Lush Halloween collection 2016: Boo bath melt plus matching nails

Hello! Boo! haha. Today I have the Boo bath melt from Lush. This was my first time using a bath  melt! I read mixed reviews on them because while they moisturize your skin, they can make your tub a slippery "death trap" one person said. That made me laugh! I'm clumsy enough as it so I don't need any help in that department. So this Boo melt is my guinea pig and will help me decide if I ever buy any again!

Obviously I knew this would be cute for matching nail art! I used ole' reliable OPI Black Onyx and Alpine Snow. The glitter is International Crime Caper, which showed up fairly well over the black!
I used a dotting tool and wobbled it around for the Boo! (which isn't hard for my shaky hands)

This was also super hard to hold while taking pictures outside, it was warm this day! I felt like it was melting in my hands and getting harder and harder to hold with every second. Note to self, put the next one in the freezer first!

In the video there's a clip of how I cut it up, I think it is intended to be used all at once, but I wasn't taking any chances. I cut it into 4 parts and just used that little bit. I did use a bubble bar also (the Green macaroon, coming soon here!) The Boo is supposed to create some bubbles on its own, but since I used the Green bubbleroon first it's hard to tell which bubbles came from which. I just hold the cut piece of the melt in my hand and make a loose fist, then let the water run through my hands until it's mostly dissolved.

As for the scent, I feel like it didn't really smell like anything. Cocoa Butter is a fairly neutral smell when it doesn't have any perfumes added to it. It does have some other oils in it but none stood out to me. This won't clash with any other bath products!


Check out the little video for a little cutting action! Poor little guy!


ALSO.... my fellow nailie friend Colleen and I thought it would be fun to do a matching mani to some of our new Lush goodies! I haven't done a matching mani with someone in forever! It was fun!


In conclusion, I was pretty impressed with my little bath melt. It did help my skin stay soft and moisturized after the bath (well, the Green bubbleroon has a little bit of cocoa butter in the middle so that probably didn't hurt either). I didn't put lotion on afterwards and my skin never felt dried out. I think I might use this type of thing as a nail/hand soak during the winter! The skin around my nails is already getting super dry no matter what I do. Its just part of life here in the TN winters. Bleh!


Lush Halloween Collection 2016: Monsters' Ball bath bomb review and matching mani!

Hey guys! Today I have another member of the Lush Halloween 2016 collection for you, Monsters' Ball bath bomb. I ordered this primarily because I knew it had so much nail art potential!! I mean, how cute is it! It reminds me of Sully from Monster's Inc. :)

On my nails, I chose OPI Lucky Lucky Lavender and Can't Find My Czechbook to coordinate. I also used Black Onyx and Alpine snow for the dots and eyes, and the glitter is Muppets World Tour. I'm really absolutely terrible at free hand nail art, but I was pretty happy with how these turned out!



This bath bomb is part of the Calacas scent family, if you speak "Lush" (which I don't, but I'm working on it!) The main ingredients are Lime oil and Cocoa butter. Which you would think would make it smell more citrusy but to me it didn't. It does however smell really good. Its my favorite of the Halloween collection so far. I can't quite put my finger on what the scent reminds me of.



The "eye" of the monster is the cocoa butter, having a sort of integrated bath melt effect. It stayed intact during the whole process and didn't start melting until halfway through my bath!


Monsters' Ball spun and swirled around a ton, it reminded me a lot of the Twilight bath bomb, releasing lots of blue and pink. It was fun to watch!





It split open rather abruptly after about 2 minutes, into 2 halves and the "eye" off by itself.



Here's the eye starting to dissolve and do its thing. You can see the oil rings floating on top of the water. I did find this bath bomb to be more moisturizing than any I've used so far, I purposely didn't lotion myself up afterward (which I normally never skip) just to see if my skin dried out like it normally does. And it didn't, so yay!



Here's a quick video of Monsters' Ball in action, I did edit it a bit because it took so long to dissolve! It didn't sink either like the Pumpkin bath bomb did.

The water was a gorgeous dark periwinkle color, similar to Twilight but darker. And lots of nice foam stayed on the surface also. I did have a small  amount of staining from the purple bits around the edge, combined with the oil they really stuck on like glue. I have been able to get most of it off so far but not all of it yet.


 

 Over all,  I did really like this bath bomb. Did it oust Avobath from the number one spot? No. Would I buy it again? Yes. Will I buy a ton to stock up on a years worth of product until next year, if it comes out next year? No, probably not. But if a Lush giftcard fell in my lap in the next few weeks yeah, I'd get some more because it's just so CUTE!

 

 

 

Shea Moisture Rose Lotion, Shower Creme and Mud Mask Review

Hello! Today I have a review of some products I purchased at Target a few weeks ago. Shea Moisture is a brand that's been around a little while, my only experience with them is some samples I've gotten in online orders from Ulta, which I haven't even really used! When I heard they came out with a Rose line I definitely started keeping my eyes open. Low and behold, I saw these products at Target! I believe there's a shampoo and conditioner as well but I haven't seen it anywhere yet.



I picked up the Sensitive Skin Crème Body Wash and Sensitive Skin Crème Body Lotion. They also have a mud mask that was in a tub, but it wasn't sealed and looked a little questionable, so I opted for the sealed trial size instead, more below on that. The body wash and lotion weren't sealed either, I don't know if they are supposed to be, but somehow that didn't bother me as much.

On initial smell in the store--these smelled amazing! Very strong rose scent, just brushing on the "grandma" rose toilet spray line but not going over it. I liked it a lot.

I've used both of these several times and I have to say, I'm a little on the fence still. I used the lotion the day I bought it, and it smelled the same in the store and the scent stayed on my skin for a long time. Since then, I feel like the scent has changed a little bit. Its hard to describe, but it doesn't smell the same and it's not that great. Musky is the only way I can describe it. I'm going to keep trying it but I'm not optimistic. I decided not to return it though.

The body wash is what it says it is...a creme body wash. My experience was that it felt like I was washing my body with lotion. There was absolutely no sudsing at all, unlike several of my other "creamy" body washes. Maybe I don't have any other product that is a "creme body wash"? I don't know, it was not a win for me. I will try it again a few times. It too doesn't smell as good as it did in the store, but hasn't changed as much as the lotion. 



On my nails for this review is Picture Polish New York, a really pretty raspberry crème polish with a strong scattered holo  effect. I just love it! It was the closest I had to matching the colors. I dont' have any stamping items (yet) so I couldn't match the pattern but that will be remedied shortly ;)



The winner in the bunch is this little packet I bought of the mud face mask. I opted for this because it was cheaper and sealed.



This is about how much you get in the packet. Dang, yall, it smells good! Very rose-y. If you don't like rose scented things, then don't even bother with this.



What I do with masks that come in packets like this is empty them into a little plastic container. You could use an old moisturizer container also. This is a little salad dressing or condiment container from Sistema that I got at Bed Bath and Beyond. It comes in a pack of 4 and they are quite useful around the house!



This is how much you get in the packet. I have used this twice now and easily have enough for 2 more applications. Excuse my messy sink! I have recently started using a brush to apply mud masks on the recommendation from Nicole (Young, Wild and Polished) and it works pretty well. I use a small flat paddle shape foundation brush that came in a Real Techniques set that's too small for anything else.




I have used this mask twice and loved it both times! One thing weird about it, it almost dries clear! Most mud masks just get lighter but this one just kind of disappears when it's dry. So strange! I will probably repurchase this mask when I run out, but only if I can find one sealed or I'll just order it online!

Lush Halloween collection 2016: Pumpkin bath bomb plus coordinating mani with Zoya!

Hey guys! Today I have the Pumpkin bath bomb from Lush! This is part of the limited edition Halloween range, and I have several of them coming up here in the next couple weeks for you!

 



Lush Big Blue bath bomb

Hey guys! Unofficial Lush week continues here:) I don't have any new polish swatches because I've been so busy around the house and my skin on my hands is so dry, despite my best moisturizing and oiling efforts :(

Today I have another new-to-me bath bomb from Lush, part of my initial order I made from the UK a while ago. This is Big Blue, and it has actual seaweed in it!! Along with sea salt, Lemon oil (yay) and Lavender oil this one was a no brainer for me to try!

Turns out, I don't have a blue polish that exactly matched it! WHAT! I know, I'm surprised too. The closest I could come is my beloved OPI Can't Find My Czechbook. I believe this polish is in the core collection of OPI now, its a must have for everyone!

Here's a quick little video of Big Blue in action, I sped it up a little because its such a slow fizzer :) It swirls around kicking out little bits of seaweed. It's fun to watch!

Look. At. This. Water. I mean, could that get any more amazing?? The first time I use a new bath bomb I don't use any bubbles because  I want to see what happens to the water. I am seriously in love with this! It did leave strips of seaweed in the tub, some did go down the drain but I think that's ok. I  let the water drain out and then scooped out the rest. I didn't take a picture of that because it was kind of gross haha. There  wasn't any staining either.

This is a definite repurchase for me, and it's really high on the list!

Lush Grass bubble bar plus matching nail art featuring Zoya!

Hello! Life sure got busy last week-I decided to do a bunch of batch/bulk cooking so I was in the kitchen all day every day. I have a lot of blogs to catch up on! This bubble bar from Lush is called "Grass". I bought this from the Lush UK website online and since I don't go into the stores that often I'm not sure if you can buy it here in the US or not. It doesn't show up on the Lush USA app. The reason I bought it is because of my love for the Avobath bath bath bomb and new found love of all things grassy and forest scented (excluding the Tramp scent, ew) This was definitely a gamble purchasing this before I smelled it but it was so cute and I knew I could do matching nail art so I took a risk!



Searching for a matching green with subtle shimmer in my drawers I landed on Zoya Meg. I think it matched pretty nicely! And it's my kitty's name :) I made the flowers with Zoya Purity and Wendy. I'm very artistically challenged and even with using just a dotting tool they weren't easy to make!



Zoya Meg



I have been finding that cutting up the Lush bubble bars into 3 or 4 chunks makes plenty enough bubbles for me. I have been using a knife to try to preserve the integrity of the bubble bar....I want it to stay together as  much as possible and crumbling part of it doesn't exactly do that.



Ok....on to the scent. It smells GOOD! I don't think the smell would be for everyone, but if you remember the days when Yankee Candles were *all that* and there was one called "Fresh Cut Grass" or something to that extent...I had one in my apartment in college and loved it. It was great for summer and wasn't perfumy or frostingy or laundry-y like all my other ones. And it DID smell like fresh cut grass!  This bubble bar smells a lot like that. Its very "natural". Officially the main scents in it are Bergamot and Sandalwood oil. It has Limonene in it so that's a plus for me too.



I just cut off about a third of it and held it under the water. It made a crazy amount of bubbles right away and turned the water a nice shade of light green. The flower (which reminds me of gum paste flowers back in my cake making days) did dissolve. And *obviously* I chose to cut it into 3 equalish parts so each part could have a flower :)



Look at the crazy tower of bubbles!



Overall this is a definite repurchase for me! It's so cute and I love the natural grassy scent!