Layering for a Lady

Today is one of my best friend's birthday! She is my lady, and I did a ladylike mani in her honor today. This was the sparkliest girliest look I could think of. I strooongly suggest you magnify these pictures because I found glitters in the close ups that I had no idea were there. After the pics I'll tell you what I used!

Woo! Sparkly! I used three coats of an unnamed miniature Color Club polish. It was a little thick and streaky, but it's the perfect pale pink nude creme for me. I layered a coat of Milani She's So Glitzy on top of that. This Milani is basically just a sheer pinkish offwhite with multi colored pastel glassflecks. Very dainty. Then I used a polish that I scored in a two pack from ... either Big Lots or Dollar Tree: Cover Girl 3n1 Sparklers. This polish is FASCINATING. It has little gold hexes, medium silver hexes, and I didn't even notice until I saw the closeup that it had mini gold bar glitter! NEAT! Too bad in my excitement I knocked over the bottle and spilled a quarter of it. Poop. Anyways, the big gold glitter is from Milani Jewel FX  Gold. Finished it up with Seche Vite and of course this mani bubbled like ridiculously bad, but it actually added to the dainty girliness of this mani, so I don't give a ****.

And my lady loved it so it was a winner!

Color Club Fashion Addict: $3 holo!

Who doesn't love holographic nail polish? It's shimmery, happy, and FULL OF RAINBOWS. I am possessed by a desire to obtain ALL OF THE HOLOS. There are a lot of caps in this post because I just love holographic polish THAT MUCH. I love mythical creatures, and it's a hard love to flaunt. As much as I'd love to cover myself in unicorn memorabilia, it's just not that easy to do. But every time I wear a holo nail polish, it gives me that magical little feeling of bliss inside.

A draw back: most holos are either very hard to find, or very expensive. There are a few easy to find exceptions, like the Milani holographic nail polishes. Today I have for you Color Club Fashion Addict, a light silvery lilac scattered holographic polish. Color Clubs can be bought online or at Bed Bath and Beyond for as little as $2.99, a fraction of the cost of $12.50 Nfu Ohs or $18 Ozotics. Unfortunately, the holographic version of this polish, as well as the other holos in this collection, have become harder to find. When Color Club ran out of holo pigment they just replaced their holos with creme formulas which led to a lot of disappointment in the nail world. Some duds are still hanging around online and in stores. I find the best way to tell if you have a dud in your hand is by walking to the front of the store and finding a ray of sunlight to check for rainbows (this is what I did to determine the Fashion Addict I had in my hand was good, but the Revvvolution they had was a dud).

The formula on my Fashion Addict is opaque and heavenly. I did two coats of Fashion Addict over one coat of Nfu Oh's Aquabase.I really do recommend Aquabase if you use holos often. It makes your holographic polishes way easier to apply, which means less coats, which means you save your polish! Some even say it makes the polishes brighter, more holo-y. I don't have proof of this, but I can't disprove it either!

Not the MOST holo polish, but still dainty and lovely.

Color Club Jingle Jangle

Mmmmm. Sparkles! Color Club Jingle Jangle reminds me of The Last Unicorn, one of my favorite 80's movies. It contains light blue, aqua, and lavender glitter, and just a hiiiint of holographic glitter. Magical! I did two coats of this polish over my previous Chanel Paradoxal mani. Loved the formula of this glitter polish, not too thick, easy to spread, not clumpy. Two thumbs up!

And speaking of holiday magic, my buddy Rach is having a giveaway at her blog! A bunch of fabulous nail polishes, an awesome handmade scarf and some other holiday goodness. Stop by her blog and check it out! Her posts are interesting to read and the pictures are lovely :).

Stuff I (S)watched
Rach's ROYGBIV Holiday Giveaway

And here is another blog giveaway from Fashion Polish, another awesome blog I follow!:

Giveaway 1
Giveaway 2 
Giveaway 3 
Giveaway 4

Happy Black Friday!

... and belated Happy Thanksgiving. Here are my Turkey Day and Black Friday Manis.

I MUST introduce you to my new favorite nail polish. This color just... wow. It is an instant mood lifter. It is Christmas on my nails. It is a beautiful emerald green jelly. So translucent and magical. Filled with so much holographic glitter that it is opaque in two coats. The only down side to this beauty is that it dries lumpy, so I used about 3 or four coats of Seche Vite.

Here is Color Club Holiday Splendor in all its glory:

This one is intentionally blurry to show the magic sparkle:

And here was my Turkey's Day Eve mani, China Glaze Foxy with a sponged gradient of OPI Take the Stage and Orly's Glitz and Glamor. This was another mani that made me happy. It felt like a combination of Harry Potter and mythical Pheonix bird. Love.

Some spammy goodness!

Here are my nails of the last few days! First up is Sugar Plum Fairy from the recent Color Club Beyond the Mistletoe holiday 2011 collection. It's so SPARKLY. SO SPARKLY. Wore it on my off day, then had to spice it up for work.

And here is how I wore it to work, disco nails! With New York Summer Hot Purple french tips.

And Orly Fowl Play. Wore it for less than 12 hours. Pretty, but not pretty enough. Three coats plus some Seche Vite. Would have kept it on longer, but got my packages from the Aveyou.com deal and the Zoya 2fer sale.

And here is what I have on today, OPI Warm and Fozzy. Three coats + Seche Vite. Pretty, sparkly... still just kinda bronzey looking, but I'm hoping it'll grow on me.

Some flakey goodness! and Holiday 2011 Piggy Polish!

So, I recently acquired China Glaze Snowglobe, only to find out that some of the glitter in it is DUD glitter. Silver crappy dud glitter! So when I realized this, I took it back to Ulta, and while I was trying to find another China Glaze to switch it for, I found the Piggy Polish holiday collection! I picked up Moonlight and Mistletoe, a beautiful reddish purple jelly with little pink and blue flakey glitters/glassflecks. It had a nice consistency. I used 3 coats, but I think a fourth would have been better because of the jelly-ness, but it's still gorgeous. And for fun I added a OPI I Lily Love You Accent nail.

Another holiday polish, Color Club Very Merry Berry as an accent nail with Ulta Dance Teal Dawn. This mani I was very "meh" about. The glitter is pretty but not super pretty, and the scent faded really quickly.

And for bonus flakey goodness, here's OPI Shimmery Chic! 3 coats with a coat of Seche Vite. This was a gift from my dear nail board buddy, Rachtotheizzo! Check out her awesome blog, Stuff I (S)watched. This polish is a little strange but in a good way. Very frosty bronze, but there's this shimmer to it that's mesmerizing, and very scattered holo glitter. And flakes!