Halloween nail art with scrapbooking rub-ons

One of my favorite nail bloggers is Another Bottle of Polish. I love how she frequently uses non-traditional materials in her nail art (by non-traditional I mean things that were not made specifically for nail art). For example, she creates beautiful manicures by using rub-on transfers--the kind you can find in the scrapbooking sections of craft stores. I finally got around to trying some of my own rub-on nail art. Of course, I chose a Halloween theme because from now until October 31st I'm rockin nothing but spookyness on my nails. Anyway, here's how my mani turned out:

Please try hard to ignore my terrifying cuticles. You know you just don't realize how bad your hands look until you blow them up a million times and macro-fy them... sigh...

I used my mani from yesterday (L'Oreal Project Runway 'The Temptress' Touch'), cut out some web and spider rub-ons, trimmed them to fit, placed them on my nails, gave them a good rub, did a little clean up with the ol acetone + ELF concealer brush and then sealed it all with a coat of  Out the Door topcoat. 

Here are the rub-ons I used. I found them at Christmas Tree Shops (an oddly-named bargain shop here in New England). 

So, are you feelin my rub-on mani? Thank you to ABOP for the inspiration! I see many more manis like this in my future!

Also, stay tuned for lots more Halloween nail art. I got a whole list of manis I'm planning to attempt!

The Temptress' Touch, AKA the most STUNNING chartreuse polish I have ever met

Lime green, yellow green, chartreuse-- whatever you call it, it is one of my absolute favorite colors and, therefore, every time I see a new polish in this shade, I must track it down and buy it. When I saw the promo shots for the L'Oreal Project Runway 2012 collection (check 'em out here), I KNEW I had to have The Temptress' Touch (which, incidentally is erroneously referred to as "The Temptress' Power) in the promo pics)...well, I finally tracked down a brand new Project Runway display and, of course, I Ninja grabbed me up some lime green goodness and let me tell you I am SO glad I did!! INSTANT new favorite here!!

outdoors on a depressing & dreary gray day

dreary outdoor shot with flash 

Ok here is why Temptress' Touch has stolen my heart:

• SUPERB formula--practically a 1 coater though I did 2 because I'm excessive like that
• the base is a yellow-leaning lime green but it is filled with this amazing emerald and orange micro shimmer that I of course could NOT capture with my camera
• the above-mentioned shimmer actually shows up brilliantly on the nail
• There's a gorgeous golden flash to this shade that makes it all the more awesome

The one and only thing I dislike about this polish is the brush--it is super stiff--almost like painting your nails with a little paddle or something. It requires you to have an extra light touch to make sure you don't accidentally create streaks or bald spots by scraping. Other than that, I am in LOVE and am seriously contemplating buying a back up bottle of this little bottle of gorgeocity (oh yea, you KNOW something's fierce when I invent new words to describe it!!)...

Have you spotted the new L'Oreal Project Runway collection in your area yet? Anything caught your eye?

AWESOME DEAL ALERT!

Just discovered that ALL Revlon, Physicians Formula, NYX and Almay cosmetics are 40% off on Ulta's website!

If you are obsessed with hoarding Physicians Formula Healthy Wear powder foundation like I am (it is my holy grail face powder and Ulta is one of the few places you can still get it), well it's now $8.99!

If you do decide to take advantage of this awesome deal, be sure to use their coupon code for $3.50 off any $10.00 purchase (the code is 70715)!

Also, with Revlon Lip Butters at $4.49, I think it is finally time for me to complete my collection (shoot, I have 16 out of 20 shades, might as well get the other 4, right?)......oooooh and the Just Bitten Kissable Balm Stains are only $5.39!! YAY!

Oh and if your haul ends up getting a little out of control, remember you can get $10 off a $60.00 purchase by using the code 89776 and, of course, then you will also qualify for free shipping!

Yea that's right I am all about enabling fellow makeup fiends and I am not ashamed! :)

Happy shopping!!

NOTD: Can't be Decoded

S'up peeps. Look at me posting twice in the same week! You'd think I was, like, a good blogger or something O_O...

Today, I have another nail of the day post. I just wanted to mention that despite the fact that my posts have been nothing but nails lately, I have NOT switched to polish-only blogging. It's just that, when I get super duper rushed like I have been for the past few months (when will it END), pretty much all my makeup habits fall by the wayside, except for my nails. Nail polishing is the one thing I never lapse on because 1) my nails are absolutely FRIGHTFUL when nekkid and 2) polish is my one true original cosmetic addiction--therefore, it's the one form of self-pampering that I absolutely refuse to give up, so even if I'm bumming it in sweats and flip flops and no makeup and bandanas tied to my head to hide the birds nest underneath, my nails are still always impeccably polished. It's just how I roll.

Ok enough yammering and onto some pics:

This mani was just kind of randomly thrown together but I ended up loving it. This is 1 coat of Orly Can't Be Tamed over Orly Decoded (hence the dorky post title). I got both these polishes for pennies at Sally Beauty Supply's most recent red tag clearance sale (LOVE when they do those...half off already clearanced polishes??? YES PLEASE!)....

Decoded is from Orly's fall Electronica collection. It is a grey creme that seems to lean a little lavender to my eye. Layering Can't be Tamed on top definitely brings out that purply goodness.

.

Now decoded is an absolute dream formula wise. Smooth and buttery and 2 easy coats to perfection. Can't be Tamed on the other hand, not so much. I said it before and I'll said it again, Orly you have GOT to get a handle on this sinking glitter issue. This is the 4th Flash Glam polish that I have used and, so far, all 4 have had this problem. And its a shame because the polishes are gorgeous and it's so nice to see such unique, chunky glitters being produced by mainstream polish makers (not that I have anything against indie polishes--I love them but they are very hard to get ahold of and they are significantly more expensive than your average store-bought polish). 

Somebody needs to let Orly know that there is this amazing thing called SUSPENSION BASE and if you're going to come out with glitter bomb polishes, you HAVE to use it. Can't be Tamed has beautiful purple hexes mixed with smaller gunmetal glitters but it is seriously annoying to have to shake up the bottle every 2 seconds during your manicure just to be able to reach glitter with your brush. (sheesh did I use the word GLITTER enough in this post? I promise I am NOT going for a record or anything)...

So anyway, that's all I got for y'all today. Maybe someday soon I'll be able to get back to swatching, reviewing and even using all the makeup that is currently gathering dust in my bedroom but, for now, I hope you can survive on mani posts only. I know a majority of my followers are fellow lacquerholics, so I have a feeling you won't have a problem with it! :)

I'm back--and I got spam!!

hey, remember me? yep I'm back to blow the dust off this blog and see if I remember how to post. It's funny, I somehow thought I would have more time to post once my kids went back to school. Man WHAT was I smoking?? Between shuttling them to & from places, homework, tutoring, soccer & the fact that their little brother doesn't know what to do with himself when his beloved big brothers are gone (and is therefore very cranky and VERY prone to getting into anything and everything the minute I turn my head), I have my hands more full than ever! BUT every now and then I do get a chance to paint the nails on those hands and when I do, I make sure to snap some pics, so here's some NOTD (nails of the day) spam for yas:

The above little lovely is Legal Assasin by Dandy Nails. It's part of her newly debuted Halloween collection and I picked it up when she did an impromptu pre-sale. It is basically the DREAM halloween glitter I've fantasized about making if I had ballz enough to make my own polish--black, purple and green micro glitters hanging out with bigger orange hexes. I wore it layered over OPI French Quarter for your Thoughts because I wanted the glitter to take center stage. I only needed 1 coat of LA to cover those gray undies up and only needed 1 coat of Seche Vite to make it all smooth. I loves me some dense yet flat glitters!

And next we have R.I.P. by Orly--3 coats topped with Seche Vite. Small gold and large orange hex glitters in a sheer black base (I showed its sibling polish in my previous post). Once again, Halloween in a bottle and I lurve it. I gotta mention the formula was a bit of a pain, though. Orly you need better suspension bases for your glitters!! I had to pick this bottle up and shake it several times during my mani because all the glitters just wanted to sleep at the bottom of the bottle. This tends to be a problem with lots of Orly glitters--Androgenie, and most of the Flash Glams, I'm looking at YOU! 

Here we have a fail art attempt I wore to celebrate the start of Football season. I'm not much of a sports person in general but I'm ALL about the football. I'm a Philadelphia Eagles fan (although I'm reluctant to admit it at the moment--damn, guys did you have to let the Cardinals run ALL over you like that?!) and the closest polish I have to Eagles green is Zoya Suvi. I did a silver glitter gradient with a silver glitter nail art striper polish & a bit of sponge and the silly little pigskin accent nail is OPI Suzi Loves Cowboys with a white Kiss nail art striper for the laces. 

And I saved the best for last. Behold the majesty of Nicole by OPI Just Busta Mauve:

(PLEASE enlarge these pics and scope all those gorgeous bitty flakes)

full sun

full sun

partial shade

full shade...be still my little heart!!

Just Busta Mauve is part of the Fall 2012 Target exclusive collection (yes that means you can only get it at Target--but it's also available on their website. This beauty is made up of tiny  blue, purple, copper, red, and gold metallic flecks and the amazing thing about this polish is that all the individual shades are actually discernable--it's like gorgeous cosmic multi colored tv static or something!! LOVING it! Nice job, Nicole. Now if you just ditch those ugly, awkward saggy boob-looking bottles, you'll be golden! (oh yea, and this is 2  perfect, easy coats of JBM over Nail Life ridge filler base and, as always, Seche Vite is on top!)

So I hope I made up for my absence with this spam...now I gotta run and get my kids ready for school (yep I woke up extra early just to write this post cuz I love you guys that much ;)...I'll be back soon, I promise! 

I'm already rockin Halloween polish, early September be damned!

OMG, you guys!! I don't know if you've heard but the peeps at Orly have glittered up Halloween something fierce! Check out Monster Mash:

DEATH by green glitter. LOVE!! Monster Mash is big green holo hex glitter, gold  micro glitter & gold bar glitter--all in a slightly tinted chartreuse base. I've never seen glitter quite like these big hexes. If you enlarge the photos, you can see there is actually a cross-hatch pattern on the glitters--probably has to do with their reflectiveness. It's STUNNING!

Formula wise, this polish is a little thick--of course--because they STUFFED this bottle full of as much glitter as physics would allow. The glitters spread out well and they are DENSE. My swatches are 2 coats of Monster Mash over black, but the black can barely make its presence known under all that bling!

I topcoated this mani with 2 coats of Gelous and 1 coat of Seche Vite to smooth everything out....and then I proceeded to STARE at my hypnotically twinkly nails for 2 days straight.

Monster Mash is part of a glitterfied trio that Orly has released for Halloween 2012. The other 2 polishes are R.I.P. (BIG orange glitters in a black base) and Right Amount of Evil, which looks to be the orange version of Monster Mash. The only thing I love more than Halloween themed stuff is SPARKLY halloween themed stuff so, of course, I got all 3 polishes and will be posting the other 2 soon!

NOTD: Revlon Sparkle Aplenty!

The other day, I was wasting money time in Walgreens and stumbled upon Revlon's latest runway polish release, Sparkle Aplenty. I first learned about this little pretty via Nouveau Cheap and I was SO excited to come across it in person. I have a black glitter polish obsession and this one is instantly my new favorite.

come a little closer

closer

closer

ok that's close enough.

This is .5 ounces of fabulocity!! Sparkle Aplenty is a sheer black jelly polish with large black, matte silver (think OPI Pirouette my Whistle) & translucent greyish hex glitter mingling with silver micro glitter . LOVE LOVE and LOVE some more! 

Formula wise, it was a bit runny, but not impossible. The above swatches are 3 coats of Sparkle Aplenty on its own with Seche Vite on top. I love the look of the layered glitter suspended in all that black jelly awesomeness! I also love that these glitters are nice and flat. No tacos and no pokey bits sticking up here. 

Now usually the Revlon Runway Report polishes are dupes of much more expensive polishes, but this particular polish doesn't seem to have an obvious high-end twin. The closest anyone could come to pinpointing a match is OPI's Metallic 4 Life (part of the Nicki Minaj collection from earlier this year), so I thought I would include a side by side comparison of Sparkle Aplenty and Metallic 4 Life.

Sparkle Aplenty on the left, Metallic 4 Life on the right

No dupes here! Sparkle Aplenty's glitters are larger, more sparse and, of course, Metallic 4 Life only has silver glitters, whereas SA has black glitter & grayish glitter, too. Also, Metallic 4 Life's glitters are much shinier. If I had to pick one over the other, I would definitely go for Sparkle Aplenty. I think it has much more depth and interest to it. But really, in my mind, the polishes are so very different that pitting them against each other doesn't make sense to my polish hoarding brain. 

 After a day of wearing Sparkle Aplenty as my mani, I decided to bust out the crack. It's been forever since I used any of my crackle polishes. For some reason, I suddenly got the urge to play with one and I chose my Barry M pink crackle. I love how you can see the large glitters peaking through the cracks--almost like the eyeballs of some creatures lurking in the dark lol....ok maybe I'm the only one who would ever make that analogy. My point is, it's a cool effect.

Have you spotted this polish yet? 

Nina Ultra Pro neon glitter awesomeness

During my last trip to Sally's Beauty Supply, I couldn't help but notice the Nina Ultra Pro polishes have gotten a makeover. The bottle shape and the logo's print are different now and it seems they released a few new shades (they're new to me, anyway). There was one shade in particular that absolutely HAD to be mine: Electric Slide. Check it:

outdoors, full sun

outdoors full sun

outdoors full sun

outdoors shade

Electric Slide is a neon green sheer jelly polish full of translucent yellow gold and lime green glitter. GAWD I love this! Put glitter into neon ANYTHING and I am a happy girl...as far as I am concerned, everything needs a little glitter.

The above swatches are 2 coats of Electric Slide over a base of China Glaze "I'm with the Lifeguard." This combo just sent me into a state of neon polish Nirvana. These pics don't even come close to showing how retina-seering and sparkly these nails were. 

The formula was easy enough to work with. It was thin enough to spread the glitter out evenly but not watery and just thick enough that you got a good amount of glitter out on the brush (I hate when glitter polish bases are so wimpy that the glitter itself gets left behind in the bottle). Also, this polish dried surprisingly smooth--no Gelous needed, just my typical Seche Vite topcoat and I was good!

Nina Ultra Pro polishes are available at Sally Beauty Supply stores and typically retail for $4.19-4.99.

How do you make OPI 'Every Month is Oktoberfest' even more awesome??

You layer Ozotic Elytra 529 over it, that's how!

ugh tip wear AND messy cuticles :(

Awwww yea! It's a match made in polish heaven. The shifting blues, purples and oranges in the Ozotic just harmonize so well with Oktoberfest's inky vampy gorgeousness! Mwa! Bellissima! 

 Every Month is Oktoberfest, in my humble opinion is the absolute STAR of OPI'S Germany collection. To see its amazingness on its own, I refer you to every polish addict's swatch bible, the one and only Scrangie.

Ozotic 529 is  now discontinued and becoming harder and harder to find. Ninja Polish still has it in stock if you want to snatch a bottle up before it's gone for good. 

I'm afraid that's all for today. Gotta run but have lots of other photos and swatches coming up, so stay tuned! :)

Don't Talk Bach to Me but DO glitter me up!!

Here's a bizarre, fugly layering experiment for your perusal. This is OPI Don't Talk Bach to Me with Love & Beauty "Crystal/Pink" layered over top of it. 

Unless you live under a rock, you probably already know that Don't Talk Bach to Me is part of OPI's newly released fall 2012 Germany collection. It is an awesome super yellowed out green creme polish with a whisper of silver shimmer and I freakin LOVE it. 

I did 3 coats of Don't Talk Bach to Me to make everything opaque and streak-free and then I put 2 coats of the Love & Beauty polish over top. Yes this is the same polish I just talked about in my previous post. See I told ya I'd be getting swatches up! I'm not gonna lie. As with a lot of shredded glitter polishes, this one was a little pointy & pokey, but a coat of Gelous and a generous topping of Seche Vite took care of that. 

So what do you think of this combo? I can't decide if it is awesomely ugly in a funktastic edgy way or just plain "ew that hurts my eyes" ugly...

If you're a fan of shredded glitter, then get thee to Forever 21!!

OMG, YOU GUYS!! LOOKY WHAT I FOUND:

LOTS of shredded glitter polishes to be had at Forever 21 courtesy of their house polish brand "Love and Beauty!" 

From left to right we have:

lavender, teal, orange, and gold shredded glitters in a clear base. Forever 21 is always so lazy about naming their polishes, so this one only says "Crystal/Multi" on the back. However, on the website, it is listed as "Confetti Crush"\

The middle polish is a rosy pink shredded glitter in a clear base. On the back, the name is "Crystal/Pink" and it is listed as Crystal Pink on the website.

The last polish is purple, green, silver, gold, red and royal blue shredded glitter in a clear base. This one says, once again, simply "Crystal/Multi" on the back. However, on the website, it's listed as Festival (why you tryin' to confuse us, Forever 21??)

I'll have swatches of all these up soon. Each bottle retails for $2.80 and is available both in stores and online. 

I am so happy to have these gorgeous little crushed gems in my clutches!