Fall Leaves

Ever since I saw the Nimbus nail tutorial on the Nailasaurus' blog,  I've wanted to give it a try. It's a technique where you soak a q-tip in acetone and then thin out polish and dab it on. You can view her tutorial here.


I haven't done any fall seasonal looks yet,  so here was my grand opportunity. I used a butt ton of colors here.  Base is OPI My Vampire Is Buff. The leaves are Essie A-list,  Zoya Flynn, Zoya Darcy, and Sinful Colors Clementine. Since it was so fall-ish, I added a tree!

And of course, it was pretty windy and all of the beautiful leaves that we had are now on the ground and the trees look all haunted house-y. I typically love fall, but this year the seasons were all jacked up and fall was super short. We went from beautiful weather to snow and in the teens. Gotta love it in Iowa.

Whatcha think of my little tree?

April

It's Very Purpley

I totally fail. I have an excuse though.  My Hawkeyes won on Saturday so now we are bowl eligible! I may or may not have drank for 13 hours straight that day.  Hmm.

Anyways,  you all know I have a thing for purple polish.  I'm not sure what inspired me to mix it with gold,  but I LOVE it!

I've got so many purples here that it's probably better for me to start with the gold.  It's Maybelline Bold Gold... I saw someone else using this as their preferred stamping gold,  so I picked it up. I agree.  It's a great stamper.  Get it.

My middle finger has Pueen plate #42 with a base of OPI Do You Vant to Bite My Neck.  Vant to Bite is also the base for my pinkie finger. The gold glitter on the pinkie is Zoya Maria-Louisa.

For the ring finger,  that is OPI I'm Feeling Sashy and then I cut scotch tape with chevron scissors and it's colored in with Bold Gold.

On my pointer and my thumb (even though it's not pictured) is OPI Pamplona Purple... Which has turned into one of my new favorites. The glitter on top is an old Sephora by OPI that I got when they closed out the collection.

I'm such a nerd.  I wore a purple sequined top today that matched my pointer fingers perfectly.

Thoughts?  I think I'm getting better at stamping,  but still need some  practice.
Did I mention we got snow today? Snow. Ugh.  So it begins...

April

Ahoy, it's Dark Outside!

Boo.  Thank you Daylight Savings Time,  I now feel like I need to stay home every night and bake millions of cookies.  It's time for hibernation and hot chocolate. I'm not quite ready for this yet,  so I wanted to reminisce about the days of sunshine and sailboats.


I love nautical looks.  I'll say that again.  I love nautical!  I wanted to do a slightly different color scheme than your typical red white and blue. Navy and lime green,  ok!

You have to have an anchor and stripes.  Anything else I think is free game.  I wanted to do some polka dots but meh,  I'm OK without them.

Here's a close up of the anchor

Alas,  as I write this my damn cat is curled up on me,  I have on my warm pj's, and my fingers are frozen. How much longer until spring?

April

Zoya Winter Zenith Collection

I had a coupon for Ulta and I knew I needed to use it for nail polish since you could use it on the good stuff.  I had eyeballed some of the different winter collections that I saw and picked up a few that I liked.  (side-note,  it was extremely shocking that my Ulta had these,  since it took them months to get the fall collection in.)

I only chose two of the batch because I'm not too keen on the textured polishes anymore,  and the others looked like ones I already have.

First up is Belinda,  a GORGEOUS royal purple with a magenta flash.  This is so incredibly pretty.  I have a weakness for purple polish as it is,  and this one does not disappoint. The formula is almost  a one-coater,  but I did two to make it completely opaque. It just looks so regal and rich.

Lighting : shade

The other one I purchased was Mosheen,  a holographic bar / feather glitter with holo specks too.  This was a surprise for me,  since I've tried the feathered polishes and they were just  Ok... I think I don't care for how the little flakes peak out along the tip of the nail. This one does the same,  but I forgive it because it's so unbelievably stunning.

We're lucking out today with some lovely sunshine,  and it picked up every little holo speck flash...  Just beautiful. Please forgive all of the pictures,  but I was capturing so many pretty ones!

Lighting : shade

I also really wanted Dream,  which is a deep blue with a scattered holo,  and Payton is a nice burgundy with light holo sparkle... But I figured I wouldn't wear them as much as these two.


I picked up one of Essie's new Luxe Effects polishes as well,  so I will swatch that one out to show you. It's shockingly beautiful also.

Too early for holiday collections? I'm torn.  Now that I am out of the retail sales world,  I enjoy the holidays. Although my birthday is around Christmas time and I'm always a little bitter about that... Too many cheap relatives!

Have you gotten any of this collection?
April