NOTD: Avon Cotton Candy

Hey all!  Just a quick post for tonight.  I decided to paint my nails a conservative colour tonight -- Avon's Cotton Candy.

This colour is very light, and unfortunatey isn't like the original Avon Cotton Candy that I have.  The "original" that I have is more of a bubblegum/cotton candy pink.  This bottle is more of a dusty pink.  Not that I'm complaining, but the original Cotton Candy was my youngest sister's favourite colour, so she was slightly disappointed in this new bottle that I got for her.

What do you think of this colour?  Would you wear it?

NOTD: Water Marble

Well I made it through today -- how about you guys?

Jill over at Jilltastic Nail Design has weekly nail art challenges on her Facebook page and this week she chose water marbling for her fans.  I have tried this technique twice before and have found that it's a very tricky technique and you have to hold your tongue just right in order for it to work ;P  I decided I would participate in the challenge so tonight I did some water marbling.

First, I painted my nails white with L'Oréal I Will! so that the colours I used to water marble would pop!  Then did my water marbling with Jessica Black, Avon Loving Lavender and Aqua Fantasy.  I LOVE the way this turned out even though there were some spots where I mis-aimed and didn't get any design on my nails but that's OK because the white adds extra character with the unique designs :)

So what do you think??  Have you tried water marble nail art?  Share pictures with us on my Facebook page!

Some tips and tricks --

• Use room temperature bottled water, not tap water
• I use a plastic shot glass (Jell-o shooter glass) that I got at my local dollar store
• Apply chapstick on the skin around your nail and up your finger so that when you dip your nail into the water and polish it is much easier to remove the polish that gets on your skin.
• Check out these videos to get a visual on how to accompish this technique -- Jilltastic Nail Design and cutepolish

The thing I like about water marbling is that every nail looks different :)

NOTD: Sally Hansen Endless Claret

Sunday evening.. that means the weekend is over and back to work tomorrow.. *sigh*  Oh well, for most Canadians, next weekend is the Civic Holiday weekend and we don't have to work on the Monday!  :D

Tonight I have for you Sally Hansen's Endless Claret.  This polish claims to be a 10 day no chip polish, but to be honest, I probably won't have it on long enough to test that out ;)  What I like about this colour is that it was complete coverage in 1 coat (I did 2 just to make it a more solid colour), and it's quite Christmasy :D

This is one of my oldest polishes and it's still in a perfect application state :)  It is slightly shimmery/metallic so there are very slightly visible brush strokes.  This polish is very shiny, even without a topcoat, but these photos all have Revlon Quick Dry Topcoat applied overtop.

Even though this is a bold red colour, it's pretty "toned down" and "normal" compared to what I have been wearing in the recent months :)

What do you think of this beautiful red colour?

*Update* -- 15 hours after painting my nails, and there is already a chip! :O  Guess this isn't 10 Day No Chip polish :(

I know it's only a baby one, but it claims no chips for 10 days and any chip, big or small, is still a chip in my books.  I haven't even been hard on my nails today :(  I work at a computer all day at work, but this is my thumb on my right hand, on the inside (finger side) so it's not even the side that hits the space bar.  There are no chips on any other nails as of yet though.

NOTD: Get a Life! ;)

Hey everybody!  I hope everyone is enjoying their weekend so far :)

I have for you today the nail art I was going to do on Thursday but due to nail staining (which is still there) I put it off, but decided to do it anyways.  This is for all you video-game junkies out there!

I was able to cover the staining with white polish, then added a nude sheer to it to give it an almost natural nail look.  It's a lot better than what this design would have looked like without the white coat because my green stained nails would have been peeking through the design.

Anyways, without further ado, here is what I have for you today.  I saw this nail tutorial on cutepolish's YouTube channel and just had to try it!

This was a little more difficult than it looked in the video, but I used the nail polish brush rather than a smaller art brush, so that made it a little trickier.  Next time I would definitely use a smaller art brush.

I also knicked my thumb nail while I was waiting for the nude colour to dry, so please ignore that  :)

So the colours I used -- Avon Electric Green, L'Oréal I Will, Jordana Pop Art Black and Sally Hansen Nearl Nude Natural Colour from a French Tip kit.  In the sunlight pictures you can see the shimmer of the nude colour, it's very pretty on its own too :)

What do you guys think?  I would also like to try the design with red for the "grow-up" mushrooms from Super Mario Bros.  Super Mario Bros. is my favourite video game, but I don't know all the "technical" terms for the magic mushrooms in the game :P

So the next time your boyfriend or husband tells you to "get a life" because you paint your nails too often, paint this for him then see what he has to say ;D

NOTD: Bright and Shiny

HOLY FAIL - so I had a big long speal on my blog and with typing on my laptop somehow selected all the text and, without knowing what was going on, continued typing and it completely erased everything ... and there's no "undo" button on blogger... *hangs head in shame*

So anyways, as I was going to say!  You're going to need sunglasses for this one dudettes, as you will be encountering some neons and shiny polishes joining forces.

And by the way, HAPPY FRIDAY!  I would have had this blog up earlier, but I had to work today.  Then when I started to do my nails for the blog, my fur-baby Owen, who is a 40 pound Chow/Jack Russel cross, decided it was snuggle-time with mom.  Because Tyler and I both still live at home with our parents, Owen lives full-time with Tyler, so he's always so excited when I come over and he feels the need to be underfoot the whole time, just in case I leave the room without him.  So I snuggled with him for a bit, then before he clawed my legs to shreads I told him to get down so mommy could keep painting her nails, then we would be able to go to bed earlier (yes, he understands what "bed time" is :D  Owen is very smart!) and snuggle while I read my book.  Then I deleted everything I HAD typed, so I had to start over .. so glad it's Friday, lol!

Now, onto the nails.  As I was packing my bag to come to Tyler's mom's for the weekend, I decided I would only bring a few polishes rather than my entire collection, which is how I usually travel because you just never know what you're going to feel like wearing.  I had to come up with a couple things to do so that I could continue my blog posts over the weekend.  I know, I should be doing something for the Olympic Games, but I'm not a Summer Olympics fan.. I prefer the Winter Olympics.  And to be honest, if it wasn't for it being all over the news and radio I wouldn't have even known they started today...

Now is when you need to put your sunglasses on :D

Inside, with flash

Inside, without flash

Natural Light, cloudy sky

Natural Light, bright sunshine

Hopefully you weren't blinded and you can continue reading ;)

So, first of all, I put on 2 coats of L'Oréal I Will on so that it would bring out the neon of the yellow, which is China Glaze Yellow Polka Dot Bikini.  With this you have to make sure to completely cover the white or it looks a little funny with the white sticking out around the edges.  This colour makes me SO happy, it's hard to contain myself!  This is seriously the definition of "highlighter yellow", but brighter!  I have worn this colour before and when it's out in the sunlight, your may burn the backs of your eyeballs, that's how bright it is.. and I LOVE it!  :D  I will try to get pictures tomorrow in the sun and update this post - so make sure to come back :D

The other colour, the purple, is my beloved Julep Morgan.  If I could only have one polish for my entire life, this would be it.  Purple is my favourite colour and there is something about Morgan that just makes my heart flutter every time I look at it :D  Words can't describe the love I feel for this polish, lol!

Then I took a black nail art polish from Jordana (found at my local dollar store) to paint a black line between the 2 colours to give it a finished look.

So what do you think?  Bright enough for you?  :D  I love this colour combination.  I knew from the moment I got Morgan that they would pair up beautifully and have only now had the chance to try it out, and I'm happy to report that I do not think I was wrong :)

NOTD: L'Oréal Mango-Get-Em

Hey everybody!  Wow, I have to get my blogs done earlier, lol!

So I had an awesome nail art planned for today, but when I took off Julep Emilie tonight, this is what my nails looked like :'(

The glitter came off great wih the tinfoil method (see Ms. Lizard's tutorial), but I was left with a mess of a stain on my nails, even though I put a base coat on :(  This happened the last time I wore Emilie too.  Guess I will have to try to put a couple coats under the colour to try to prevent the staining...

Anyways, so because I figured I should put an opaque polish on to cover the staining rather than the nail art I was going to do, I put on L'Oréal Mango-Get-Em.  Then, to dress it up without going too overboard, I did a couple polka-dot flowers on my thumb and ring finger as accent nails.

L'Oréal Mango-Get-Em is a really pretty pinky-coral colour.  I had to put on 3 coats, but that was mostly because you could still see the green stain underneath.  I got this colour a few years ago because I thought it would match a coral dress I was going to wear to my cousin's wedding.  Turns out the dress was more orange-coral and the polish more pink-coral, so they didn't match, and the dress didn't fit anymore :(

What do you do when your nail polish has stained your nails?  Ms. Lizard also has a nail whitening tutorial but I didn't have time to do it tonight and do a blog post.  I did soak my nails in a bowl with warm water and lemon juice to try to make the stain a little lighter.  It helped a little bit, but they are still fairly green under my new polish colour.  I hope it comes off with the next polish change.

TOTD: Avon Aqua Fantasy

Ahhh... painting your toenails while it's pouring rain and thunderstorming outside.  Haven't had much opportunity to do that yet this summer as it's been SO dry!  Finally everything is getting a long over-due drink of water.

So, I left my Julep Reveal Nail Growth Revitalizing Serum in London last weekend, so I have to postpone my updates to the post about my toenails while using it.  I probably won't be going down there again for another month at least, so I will do a new post, starting over with the treatment.  I was so mad at myself for forgetting it there :(

I made myself feel better by painting my toenails this very summery teal shade from Avon.  I love this colour, it's perfect for summer toes :D

Then I decided to bling it up a little bit and used my Nail Art Pen in White to create dots around the whole perimeter of my big toes and just the free edge of my other toes.



Please excuse the "piggy toes", I am working on getting them straightened out, maybe I will do a blog about how I'm trying to achieve this later on :)

P.S. - my big toenails look so much painted over, don't they?!  :D

NOTD: Julep Emilie with Glitter

Evening everyone!  Sorry this is so late being posted, there have been distractions tonight.. mostly Big Bang Theory on TV, lol!

I have for you tonight Julep Emilie, a beautiful forest green polish.  This is one of my other favourite colours from Julep because I don't have anything else like it :)

Even though I love Emilie by herself, I thought she was a little "boring" for me tonight, so I topped her with Jordana's Crystal Glitter to give my nails a beautiful glittery shine :)  I used 2 coats of the glitter.  I feel like this made my nails look like mermaid nails :)

I just love this look, and it was such a simple addition to Emilie that I will be using this glitter more often to bling-out my nails :D

NOTD: Braided Nail Art

Happy ManiMonday everyone!  I decided, after seeing this nail art around the web that I needed to try it.  Then, Mary over at Swatch and Learn did Braided Nails twice (Fishtail Braid Nails and Summery Fishtail Braid Nails), and cutepolish posted this tutorial video on YouTube, I knew it was time! :D

I used Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Celeb City, Julep Morgan and Jordana Black for this design.

What do you guys think of Braided Nails?  Have you tried Braided Nails?  If you have, share them with us on my Facebook page so we can all see :D