Ruffle Manicure

Good morning :)  This is something that's been sitting around in my "to do" folder forever, so since I thought I had nothing to do, I decided it was about time I gave this a try!  

For this look I followed this tutorial from Sarah at Chalkboard Nails.  I saw this picture that she posted to Instagram and I decided to follow those colours, since I felt it was more "me" than the greens and blues she used in the tutorial.  

Since there's so many colours, I'm going to stray from my norm and make a list. Here they are, from top to bottom as they appear on my nail:

Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Lacey Lilac

L'Oreal Yellow (can't find a name)

NYX Matte Teal

Essie Watermelon

Essie Mojito Madness

OPI Mod About You

Essie Mesmerise

Island Girl Color Changing Polish Pink/Coral

Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Mint Sorbet

Seche Vite (2 coats)

As you can see, the sun finally decided to come out!  I hope we'll finally get some summer weather around here.  

Once again, if you live in Canada or the US, please enter my 100 Follower Giveaway!! 

My sister says that my nails look like a cozy knit sweater... not exactly what I was going for, haha!  I'd love to hear what you think! :)

Peter Pan Collars

Hello :) I hope you're all having a good day.  I got really excited this morning when I went to check the mail and there were THREE packages; I thought it was all the overdue nail mail I've been expecting!! Needless to say I was extremely disappointed when it turns out there were two packages of junk mail for my grandpa ("I don't know why they keep sending me this stuff!?!") and my sister's order from Etsy which is probably some Harry-Potter-related piece of clothing.   

Anywho, here's the nails I've been wearing the past two days.  I took photos after I did them, but the lighting was god-awful, so I re-did a few of them this morning.  Please excuse the two-day wear.  

I did this mani following this tutorial from The Beauty Department.  Black is Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Black Out, white and yellow are acrylic paint.  Two coats of Seche Vite, as usual.  The first time I did this was actually before I started blogging and was only posting my pictures to Instagram (@emmaclarem).  That picture is at the bottom of the post... proceed with caution. 

Here we go...

Yea... those were my nails before I started blogging.  Not even gonna make that photo the same size as the others.  Ew.  Sorry you had to see that :P

Also, I did my mom's nails the other day.  I never really do anybody else's nails because they usually don't turn out as good, but I thought of this and had to try it right away, and my sister's nails were already painted. This is a gradient with Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Lacey Lilac and Zoya Savita, topped with scattered holo-ish microglitter from an unnamed brand.  Pretty, right? 

You may have noticed that I've added a Born Pretty Store coupon in my sidebar; I've got some stuff coming up with their products, so feel free to use the coupon code for 7% off your order!

And don't forget to enter my 100 Follower Giveaway! :)

Vegas Showgirl

Happy Canada Day to everyone! :)

If you missed yesterday's post with my Darling Diva Polish swatches & reviews, you're missing out on some amazing stuff.  While you're at it, go enter my 100 Follower Giveaway, open to Canada and US! 

So here's what I decided to wear for my full Darling Diva Polish mani.  Let me tell you, it was certainly not an easy decision; everything looked so amazing!  

I decided to go withe two-finger-accent-nail I've seen around lately but haven't tried yet, so I did my middle and ring fingers with 2 coats of Zoya Savita, topped with 2 coats of DDP Vegas Showgirl.  The other three nails are 1 coat of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Black Out topped with 2 coats of DDP Vegas Showgirl.  Two thick coats of Seche Vite to smooth it all out.  Take a look!

This polish was very difficult to photograph because it was SO DARN GLITTERY!  The mix of glitters in this polish makes if very unique and I love it!  I'm super excited to wear it over just about every single colour I own.  I'm only exaggerating a little bit.  But seriously, this looks awesome over so many different colours! 

You can buy Darling Diva Polish on Etsy, and get updates about the shop on Facebook.  I believe the shop is opening today, so make sure to grab yourself as many polishes as you can! 

Side note: I won the Bee Polished Sassy Lacquer giveaway!! I'm so excited :D

Darling Diva Polish: Swatches & Review

 Fair warning: this post is picture-heavy and full of an insane amount of glittery awesomeness. 


I've got three polishes from Darling Diva Polish to show you today; Dusky Sky, Tiny Bubbles, and Vegas Showgirl. 

Fist off I've got Dusky Sky, a gorgeous sky-blue holographic polish.  Holos aren't normally my cup of tea, but holy cow, this is gorgeous!  It applied like a dream, three thin coats and no top coat.  The formula on this was so perfect and easy to work with that I didn't need to do any clean-up at all!  I honestly wasn't expecting to love this one as much as I do!

Sunlight

Artificial light

Artificial light

Next up, we've got Tiny Bubbles; a mix of small hex, medium hex and square, and large hex white matte glitters and medium light blue hex glitters in a teal-blue jelly base with micro holo glitter.  Phew, that's a mouthful.  (Who's with me on the "Hooray for matte white glitter!" bandwagon?) This one did require a little bit of fishing and placing glitter, but I think that's to be expected when you're dealing with glitters like this.  I did manage to get out two of the large hexes without trying too hard. 

Here I've layered two coats of Tiny Bubbles over a few different polishes.  Index to pinky: Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear White On (1 coat), OPI Yodel Me On My Cell (2 coats), OPI No Room For The Blues (1 coat), and Darling Diva Polish Dusky Sky (3 coats).  I didn't use a top coat for the pictures, though I think you'd need two layers of a thick top coat to smooth it out. All of the glitter just blends in over the white on my index finger, unfortunately.  Out of the other three, I can't decide which one I like the best!  Which is your favourite layering combo? 

Last for today we have Vegas Showgirl.  This amazing glitterbomb is a mix of medium green hexes and purple squares, small green squares and purple hexes, and purple and green micro-glitter in a clear base.  The formula on this one was very easy to work with, and I didn't have any trouble with placing the glitters.  A few of the squares curled, but two thick coats of Seche Vite smoothed it all out.  


On my index and middle fingers, I did one coat of Vegas Showgirl each over Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Lacey Lilac  (2 coats) and Orly Jealous, Much? (3 coats).  As you can see, you get pretty good glitter coverage with just one easy coat.  


On my ring and pinky fingers, I did two coats of Vegas Showgirl each over Zoya Savita (2 coats) and Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Black Out (1 coat).  Pictures show no top coat. 


Take a look; how awesome is this?  Which one's your favourite? 

Darling Diva polish is available to buy on their Etsy store, and you can like their Facebook page for updates and lots of polish pictures.  She is restocking and opening her store again this Sunday (7/1) so be sure to check it out and snatch yourself up a few of these beauties! :)

Also, don't forget to enter my 100 Follower Giveaway, open to Canada and the US! 

Any guesses as to which polish/layering combo I put on for my whole mani?  You'll see tomorrow ;)

Disclaimer: The products in this post were sent to me for review and my honest opinion. 

Oranges

Before we get on to today's nails, I'd like to remind everyone about my 100 Follower Giveaway!! Open to Canada and the continental US; just leave a comment with your email address! :)

I've used Essie Action a few times in nail art, but I had yet to use it by itself. I went with my trusted method of adding some studs because I didn't want to cover the colour with any other colours or nail art.  Here I layered two coats of Action over one coat of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear White On.  One coat of Seche Vite, some studs, one more coat of Seche Vite. 

Unfortunately the polish went all bubbly on me and it shrunk a bit with the Seche Vite, which normally doesn't happen with Essie.  Also, let me say that my camera was freaking out and the colour in the pictures is nowhere near the colour it is in person.  The most colour-accurate picture I can find is in The PolishAholic's review of the Poppy-Razzi collection, but it is still much more neon.  In real life this is a true highlighter-orange. 

I wasn't going for literal oranges when I was placing the studs, but I'm definitely getting that look from them and I think it's really cute. What do you think? :)

Summer Water Marble

Decent-looking water marbles have continually evaded me for quite some time now.  Before I started blogging, I had attempted multiple times but the colours always looked muddy or bled together or had billions of bubbles.  Last night, all that changed. 

Since this is the last week of dance for the school year, we're doing some fun stuff this week.  Today all the intermediates and seniors and a couple teachers are going to a friend's house for a pool party (and water aerobics, apparently) so I wanted something fun and summery on my nails.  I have no idea what possessed me to try a water marble again after the failures I've had with it in the past, but I'm so glad I did!  For some of you who consistently do amazing water marbles this may seem like a fail, but for me this is a huge WATER MARBLE WIN.  (Anyone else read that like Tobuscus?)

Moving on; I started with a base of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear White On, and did the marbling with Essie Action, Essie Watermelon, and OPI Don't Touch My Tutu.  My camera was freaking out because the colours were so bright, so imagine the orange as less-yellow-more-orange, and the pink is more pink-y.  Yea. You get it. Two coats Seche Vite.  Pictures!

I swear I re-did my index finger 4 times, but the colours kept bleeding and it refused to turn out like the others.  Oh well.  What do you guys think of my water marble?

Also, don't forget to enter my 100 Follower Giveaway! Now open to Canada and the US! :)

More Stripes & Dots

Firstly, let me say that if I had to choose, Essie would be my favourite nail polish brand.  I don't own an outrageous amount (considering my stash is only around 120  bottles), but my Essies far outnumber the other brands.  With that said, I've got a mani to show you using two Essie polishes: my recently acquired Mojito Madness, and Mesmerise. 

You probably won't believe me, but this is one coat of Mojito Madness.  Yes, ONE COAT!  Without giving it a thought I had expected to have to do 2 coats, but after just one (and not a particularly thick one) I couldn't even come up with a valid reason to add a second coat!  This polish is such a beautiful colour; add  the flawless formula and this one's a huge WIN in my books. 

Anywho, I'm (not really) sorry to say that I loved my stripes and dots so much last time that I couldn't help but do it again.  I did, however, do thinner stripes and smaller dots.  Apologies in advance for the lighting, the sun would come out for two minutes and I'd adjust my camera accordingly, and right before I could take the picture it would go away, so I'd set my camera and then the sun would come back out... you get the idea.  

Is anyone else getting a polo shirt vibe from this? 

I must say that I do like this one better than my previous stripes & dots mani; what do you think? 

Also, don't forget to enter my 100 Follower Giveaway! :)