Friday, March 25, 2011

Silk Wraps + Gel activator.






So for the last week I have been working A LOT. And I haven't been able to post my daily polishes, but I will make up for it in a few posts today. The first order of business is that last week I got a tear in my left thumb and I needed a way to fix it. I googled and saw lots of different things and ways to fix it. I decided to use silk wraps I had.
When I first put the silk wraps I only used glue and polish to seal them. They came off within the first day. I then decided that I should go buy brush-on Gel and Gel activator, which basically is stuff you brush on and it creates a plastic like solid on top of your nail. So i wrapped up my thumb, placed on the Gel and the activator, and it was great. They did not come off for a few days, but my silk strands kept coming through because I was still changing my nail polish EVERY day, so yeah.

When you are putting gel on your nails you need to be careful. I put gel on my nails because it keeps them harder, my nails are very thin and no amount of vitamins has changed that. Gel works great, but you need to make sure you clean your brush when you go from placing it in gel and the gel activator, otherwise your brush, or the liquids in your bottles will harden. This happened to me the first night I worked on my nails with Gel.

I think from now on I will only use wraps If I need to grow out a cut again, I managed to keep it for another week- but every day it seemed like it was hurting, or breaking more, or too "filed" on the cut side so it looked lopsided. I put in pictures of what the bottles looked like, and what a mess my thumb was this afternoon before I cut it short. I also put pictures of what the silk wraps looked like- and I don't like it! When my nails are long and I have clear on, I like the way the actual nails look, thats why I have decided to just put plain Gel and thick polishes on my nails, no wraps, because the wraps move around through washing and changing polish.

Saturday, March 19, 2011

Blue on Blue crackle







So on st. Patricks day I bought myself some rad tights (Hue tights at rickys, they were on sale!) some hair bands and Butter London's Blagger, from their spring Collection. This is truely an Amazing blue, I love it so much. Its a medium hue, bright cobalt. I wore it all day yesterday, and then I got a tear in my left thumb, so I fixed it using a silk wrap, but today I realized that it broke AGAIN. The tear is so close to where my skin meets the nail that I can't let it get the best of my nail length, so i had to fix it again.

Here is what i did

I got a tea bag and cut a triangle, cleaned off my nail with polish remover,
I got Crazy glue, but only bc I didn't have any nail glue, and I glued on the piece of tea bag
I waited until it dried, then VERY GENTLY filed it down.
I put two- three coats of base coat, and I'm fixed!

The only thing is, a solid color will show the little bump of the patch, so I decided to paint my Butter London Blue with China Glaze Crushed Candy on top, and now nobody will ever know..

except all of you, Enjoy!

UPDATE

nail broke again. fml

St. Patricks NAILS






So For the actual day of st. pattys I wanted to do a Glittery green amazing ness, and I wanted to see just how long it would last working 14 hours straight of pushing through drunk people, making loads of drinks, cleaning up nasty plates, tables and washing ones hands over and over again. Yes I waited tables on st. Pattys day, unlike the rest of the world, that got drunk and acted a straight fool.
My nails looked fabulous, but didn't withstand the beating, not that I actually thought they would, I mean, we were really busy and this kind of work doesn't support the dainty girl in me who always wants glossy, unchiped nails. St. Pattys ALSO weakened my nail so bad that I now have a huge tear on my left thumb, which I will show you in my next post how I repaired, but either way, it stunk.
For this mani I used butter London's Thames with Henley Regatta on top(also by butter London) and a green glitter by ColorClub (exact polish name to come). It was really rad and I'll definetely do this green again, probably on my birthday or something. I love green, it always looks good on me with my red hair, and now with my blondish red hair. enjoy

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

St Patricks themed Crackle nails





So tomorrow is st. Patricks Day, Which means I have to work at my moms bar, hang out with lots of friends and family and drink like a fish work my but off and hopefully make some Money!
So in honor of tomorrow, today I decided to do a green with green glitter under white crackle, just to see how it would look. It looks great, except that I always think when I use any of my crackle nail polishes my nails look dirty. I guess I like solid colors and shiney nails more than anything. I put American Apparel's Hunter as a base color, (over my base coat of course!) then I put Butter London's Henley Regatta on top, which is a green glittery amazing polish. And over that I put China Glaze's white crackle nail polish, and Tada!
I must say that although this crackle looks messy, I get complimented on it every day, girls always want to know how I did it, and where to buy the polish, so if your thinking about it but cant find it anywhere, look at sally beauty stores and Amazon. I bought my six pack of China Glaze crackle there.

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

China Glaze Crackle nail polish!





So I ordered all six of the crackle China Glaze polishes because after seeing swatches online I knew I had to have at least four of them- but they ended up being cheaper if I bought them all. I must say, maybe its because i'm exhausted from a long boring day, but I was disappointed! I don't like the way the polish crackles- Although its much easier to manipulate than Barry M or OPI. what I mean by this is that you can make it look different depending on how much crackle polish you put on. If you put on a thick coat of crackle , there won't be too many cracks, but they tend to be slightly bigger, revealing the underlaying color. If you put a scarce amount of polish, you will have more cracks throughout, and both colors will show almost equally on the nail. So yeah, i'm not really disapointed, i'm just exhausted. Here are some swatches, enjoy!

Saturday, March 12, 2011

Black Shatter vs. Barry M review





So my Saturday ritual has turned into making a big breakfast, then sitting around and attempting a fancy Water Marble or Konad Manicure. eventually I get tired and bored of repeatedly cleaning up and changing polish due to my extreme perfectionist demeanor. That being said, today I tried and tried to work a water marble and I did fairly well on my left thumb and index finger. Then I lost the magic. I REALLY need tips in doing this because I would do it every day if I could. I love water marbling so much. ugh. I also want to buy the proper Konad plates and polish so I can do a proper Konad design manicure. But alas I am broke.

So I decided that I would do a review comparing OPI's "black shatter" and Barry M's "Nail effects".Both have the same idea, black chunky crackle nail polish that allow for your base color to really come through. I put Barry M on my left hand and OPI's black shatter on my right. I used China glaze's electric blue called "Sexy in the City", and Finger paints electric blue glitter "Laugh my art off" as a layered base color. It looks AWESOME.

The result? well they are not the same polish by any means! Barry M's Nail effects give a chunky, almost fat square like chunks of the crackle, while OPI's black shatter gives longer squares, making your nails look longer because its like vertical stripes. The chunks in OPI aren't as fat, they are thinner and run up the nail.
Anway, enjoy!

Friday, March 11, 2011

Vegan version of my Favorite color- Violet creme




When I was younger I would spend fifty dollars a week to get my tips filled and painted a creme violet color. A few weeks ago, I found the same color for $5 at a beauty store by me in Queens. My boss a few weeks before that day bought a few Spa Ritual nail colors, nail polish that is completely vegan, with no animal gelatin or anything like that. My boss keeps nail polish in her guest bedroom and this is one of the colors, its called Thunder Road. Its similar to my favorite Essie polish color - name to be updated- but its a slightly darker shade. Still a great creme that can be worn all day during the office, and can be spiced up w a shimmer or glitter on top, or even a crackle nail polish. Enjoy!

Matesse Lapis- one of my fav Blues




I love Matesse. I love Rickys. And I love this color. This color really stands out on my nails and makes me feel pretty in one of the girliest ways I can think of. I like its color, tone and especially how it mutes shine slightly, which makes it a great, unique creme.

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Leprachaun & Watermelon nails






Today at work I loathed the mani I had on. I'm not going to say what brand it is, but its a reputable brand and last night in my exhaustion I failed my nails and didn't give a proper manicure, leaving my nails all smudged and polish everywhere. So I cleaned them up and realized I had some of those Love and Beauty stickers in my bag in GREEN. I will definitely rock this on st. Patricks day, but I had an hour to kill at work, so I went ahead and put them on. I know that they are three dollars, but they peel so easily and move around on the nail. Later on tonight I literally peeled them off and gave myself a watermelon manicure.

Watermelon mani- I saw this on some website somewhere but cannot find it for the life of me- but you can find different watermelon demos all over the internet so don't worry. Here are my simple instructions.
1. clean your nails, then put two coats of base coat. Then take a pink color ( I used OPI's too hot pink to hold em, because well its perfect). Paint this pink color on half, or on the tips of your nails if your blessed with long ones. Let dry completely
2. Take a nail art pen in white and draw a line underneath the pink you applied. Let dry
3. Take a nail art pen in green and draw a line underneath the white line you applied. Let dry
4. Take a nail art pen in black and draw a bunch of dots on the pink part to make them look like seeds. let dry
5. Take an acrylic or strong top coat and paint 2-3 coats, letting each coat dry completely. and your done~ Enjoy

Konad Failure, Nail Tips






So the other day I tried, and tried, and tried to create a cool design using my ghetto konad image plates and stamp. I never seem to be able to get the polish quite right, so I'm seriously considering purchasing some things from their site, but I don't want to break the bank. I must have done my nails at least five times each, but I wasn't focused and by the end of it I was so tired I didn't know where my nails ended or began. Anyway, I googled some easy designs after that and decided to create a two color design, one side glitter and one side my favorite violet Essie shade. I painted my nails the whole color, then drew a diagonal line and painted from that upwards, diagonally dividing the nail into two colors, then I put glitter on the top color, and it actually didn't look that bad based on the fact that it took me five minutes.