OPI Alkatraz Rocks - Liquid Sand

Today I'm sharing OPI Alkatraz Rocks. I think this is a great colour for fall. I used 2 coats of this OPI Liquid Sand with no top coat. 

I haven't used any of my "texture" polishes in a while. I'm really drawn to the deep colour and intense glitter of this one. It was hard to capture the colour and I think it comes off more blue than in real life. To be completely honest, I chose a sand because I dropped my top coat and had to clean it off the walls the other day...

   


I did get a lot of compliments on this colour at work. Maybe I should use my liquid sands more often. I don't tend to wear glitters unless it's a special occasion, but these sands are subtle enough for me to wear anytime.

--Kim

Anna Sui Minnie Mouse Nail Polish

Check out these amazing Anna Sui Minnie Mouse nail polishes! They are part of a limited edition Anna Sui collection. Aren't these Minnie Mouse bottles beautiful? As always, you can click photos to enlarge =)

Anna Sui Minnie Mouse Nail Polishes

A few things you need to know about Anna Sui polishes: 
- The bottles are amazing! Aren't they cute? I didn't think it could get better than the regular line's dress mannequin bottles!
- The packaging is also gorgeous. You won't be throwing out these boxes.
- The polishes smell amazing! They are lightly rose scented. 
- On top of all that, they are great quality, only 2 coats were needed, the dry time is quick and the brushes are nice and full. 

Anna Sui Minnie Mouse ~ Snow White

Snow White 002
A gorgeous white with pink shimmer, and subtle silver glitter. Surprisingly opaque and smooth!

Anna Sui Minnie Mouse ~ Midnight Purple

Midnight Purple 200
A deep shimmery purple with subtle pink and blue shimmer.

Anna Sui Minnie Mouse ~ Neon Pink

Neon Pink 300

A bright shimmery pink with a subtle blue shimmer!

Swatches of Anna Sui Minnie Mouse Nail Polishes - 2 coats

My favourite colour is Snow White. I feel like it's the most unique. I'm not a huge fan of pink and I'm on the fence with the purple, but I think everyone needs these polishes just for the Minnie Mouse bottles!

Where to buy? There are 5 polishes in this collection, (click here to see the rest) but these three were the only ones available at my Murale. I've heard these are also available at some Shoppers Drug Marts as well. For you US girls, you can get Anna Sui online at Beautylish. They also had the lip balm and mascara, but not the full make up collection (click here for photos of the full collection). 

These were $15 each, but everywhere else they are listed as $16. YAY for Canada being cheaper for once =)

Are you planning on getting any of these??

Why don't I have more MOOD polishes???

Ah it's been so long since I last posted! I've just been sooo busy lately. But I have something awesome to share with you today... 

BYS Magenta

This is an awesome colour changing/mood polish that I got from Australian brand BYS. 

They also make really cool "cracked" polish which I'll show you eventually!" 

This is my first and only mood polish and I NEED MORE!! They are just too cool!

(please ignore my messy nails, these pictures were taken a week after I applied the polish!)

BYS Magenta shifts to a bright jelly-like pink when it's warm, 

and a dark eggplant purple when it's cold.

This is what the polish looks like when my hands are warm. The tips are purple because the free edge of my nail is cooler.

It's like a cool instant gradient!

 Here I dipped my middle finger and pinky in hot water, and my ring and pointer in cold water!

I think one of the reasons I've waited so long to try these mood polishes is because people say the effect is only cool if you have long nails. And most of the time I do not have long nails... While having longs nails creates an awesome effortless gradient look, most of the time my hands are so cold that the polish was always purple.

Even if you have super short nails, this polish is still AMAZING!! For those of us who are easily amused, you can spend a good amount of time changing the temperature of your nails and watching them change colours...so what are you waiting for??? Go out and get some mood polish!

--Kim <3

31 Day Challenge ~ Day 11: Polka Dots

Today's Challenge is: POLKA DOTS!

I didn't necessarily do POLKA dots, but I did do DOTS! Well dot-shaped blobs lol...

I'm just starting to try and figure out the technique of using a dotting tool. As you can see I'm having some issues with making my dots actually round...

I really do love how this turned out though! In person, the purple is so deep and the golds are so sparkly! It looks super fancy-shmancy.

Rimmel ~ Night Before is the base, and the dots are 
OPI ~ Designer De Better and Orly ~ Luxe. 

This look kind of resembled some sort of an animal print too, but I can't quite pinpoint what one...

Check back tomorrow for Day 12: Stripes=)

Also check out everyone else doing this challenge with me:

31 Day Challenge ~ Day 6: Violet

   Today's challenge is VIOLET!

This polish is one of my top ten favourites!!!
China Glaze ~ IDK

JUST LOOK AT THAT HOLOness! I promise you that this is not photoshopped! I just took this picture under a kitchen light! 

IDK is from the China Glaze OMG collection. Out of all the holographic polishes I've seen, none compare to the OMG's. 

   

The holo effect in these polishes is so smooth. Not all the colours in the collection are this holo though, some of my pink shades are barely visibly holographic =(

This one however is amazing!!! I love purple holographic polishes =) 

This is what it looks like in the shade --->

...and I'll leave you with one more photo of this gorgeous polish!

oooooh btw, if you haven't heard already, China Glaze will be relasing new holos in 2013!! Boy do I hope they will be similar to the OMGs!

Check back tomorrow for Day 6: Black and White =)

Also check out everyone else doing this challenge with me:

Antique Stamping

Hello Everyone! I decided to stamp on Wet n Wild ~ Disturbia to liven it up a bit! My friend Anissa suggested I use gold! Gold was a lovely choice and the gold and purple together look very regal!

I used an image on the stamping plate BM-214, and I stamped with China Glaze ~ 2030. A beautiful chrome finish polish from their 2009 Khrome line! I aligned the stamps differently on each nail so it wouldn't be so uniform.

I wanted to also use BM01 but the image wouldn't pick up for me. The images didn't transfer cleanly (and I think that may have had to do with me trying stamping outside for the first time with sun and wind affecting dry times...) but I like how it gives it an antique-y look. It reminds me of some of the filigree ring settings I ordered to make polish jewellery! (More on that later)

Hope you enjoyed! Thanks Anissa for the fantastic idea!

Wet n Wild ~ Disturbia

Here is Wet n Wild ~ Disturbia. I picked this polish up on sale in the states! It was $2 and I think it was a steal =) I've never seen wet n wild in these bottles here in Canada. 

Purple is one of my go to colours, but I have so many that look gorgeous in the bottle, but apply extremely dark (or maybe I'm just crazy and think the colour only looks bad when it's on my nails...). This colour was one of those, but recently darker shades have been growing on me and the shimmer that appears when Disturbia hits the light is amazing!

The polish applied very easily and smoothly. I used 2-3 coats. It also has a nice flat, wide brush with a rounded edge, perfect for lining the polish around the cuticles. 

The brush is 20934832084023984029384029348 times better than the Wet n Wild Fastdry polishes...just sayin

I took a picture with flash so you can see the shimmer!

The bottle is really cute and I think it makes the polish look more expensive =)

Maybe I need to give all my darker purples another chance...

OPI Super Bass Shatter

Here are 2 different looks I did to try my new OPI Super Bass Shatter from the Nicki Minaj collection.

Here I used it over an accent over my previous nail design, which you can read about HERE.

Then, I used it over all my nails and did an accent with OPI Save Me, also from the Nicki Minaj collection. Save Me is an amazing silver, bar, holographic glitter! I'll do a separate post on it!

Have you tried shatter over shatter? Any tips??

Barielle ~~ Buddha-ful

Here I have for you a Barielle polish, Buddha-ful! I recently found it at Winners in a set of 5 polishes. 

The other polishes I got were Decadence, U-Concrete-Me and Slate of Affairs (and another Buddha-ful for frankening!).

      

Buddha-ful is a nude based polish with green-blue flakes. It is sheer and here I have on 2 coats topped with Revlon Quick Dry. I don't mind that this polish is sheer. It's like a jelly-creme. It kind of gives the look of a soft french manicure with a subtle exotic hint of sparkle.

In most lights the flakies appear green like here...

...and here...

...but at extreme levels and just the right lighting, you can see the blue.

**Note: This polish is not meant for layering over dark colours. It has a very milky base and will most likely look streaky. However, I have tried it over the 3 other Barielles I got and it looked good! Just make sure you do a really thin layer!

I also want to try perhaps thinning this polish out and also frankening it into tinted shades. Hence the backup I got =)

Here's my layering: 

I like it best over the grey

Have you had success layering or frankening with Buddha-ful? 

If so, let me know your combos!

MPJ... Purple Flash!

I think the pictures pretty much speak for themselves...!

Here we have
OPI My Private Jet!

For those of you who are new to holo polishes, there are MANY versions of MPJ. The current version is brown with a faint scattered holo. "Black" linear holo, "brown" linear holo, and "teal flash" are just some of the versions known to exist.

See how this one has a hint of purple? Well, here is my
PURPLE FLASH MPJ!

LOL... Puple Holo!

Here is China Glaze - LOL. It is part of the OMG collection and it is a purple holographic polish! I got this one off my friend Ginger!

My favourite polish colours are puple and teal, and I'm glad there are so many purple holos!

I have OPI - DS Original // Sand-erella, China Glaze LOL // IDK // Visit Me in Prism // Octa Gone Wild, Color Club - Fashion Addict and Wild at Heart. Now if only there were more teal holos!




This is 2 coats with no topcoat. I used OPI Nail Envy as a base. I had no streaking or bald spot issues. I don't experience these with the China Glaze OMGs. The polish was a bit thick, but for being old that's understandable. I just threw in a few drops of  thinner and shook it like crazy!

Although shaking polish is not recommended (you should roll to prevent bubbles) it is FULLY NECESSARY TO SHAKE THE HECK OUT OF HOLOS BEFORE YOU WEAR THEM! This ensures all of the holo goodness is equally distributed in your bottle =) this also means that most used dusty holos are SUPER-HOLO! due to lack of proper shaking technique! LOL...

The only issue I had with this one is that the sides of my brush strokes created not holo lines. So it was very difficult to have a smooth holo finish. I kept having to polish over the lines... Also note, it dries a bit more red than it shows in the bottle. You can see the difference in my picture.

Hope you enjoyed another holo post =)

***What's your favourite holo polish colour??***

Dusty Hunting Down the Rabbit Hole!

Short post today! Here we have:

China Glaze // TTYL x2, It's My Turn, GR8

OPI // Absolutely Alice, 

and finally the highly coveted Mad As A Hatter!

Absolutely Alice // Mad As A Hatter

 AA has tiny blue glitter with some gold glitter.

MAAH has a base of tiny silver glitter and then slightly larger glitters of purple, blue, orange, pink, green, gold, red, silver...

This was the first time I've ever seen MAAH! I wasn't that into the hype, but seeing it in person, it is quite lovely!

Something in the way she moves...

Here is my latest franken! It's a purple flakie/shimmer/glitter polish and I named it Something, after the Beatles song <3

I used a franken fail for the base colour... then added over 20 other polishes... isn't it lovely when something beautiful comes out of something ugly?

Swatches to come soon!

Subtle with a Chance of Sparkle~~~

Here is the mani I wore last week! It's
Joe Fresh Storm 
with an accent of

OPI Lincoln Park After Dark Suede

(with topcoat).

Joe Fresh is a Canadian Brand of Polish, famous for producing the flakie, Twilight... What I like about these polishes is that they come in 5ml bottles, so I can try a lot of different colours I might not normally buy. They also have a really nice flattented brush that doesn't leave streaks!

Storm is very hard to describe... I'd say it's mainly a neutral brown with purple and grey tones. It resembles the colour of chocolate milk, but a little more purple... and yes, I did compare it to chocolate milk (luckily there was some in the fridge) I just forgot to take a picture...

I wasn't going to do a post about this, but I was intrigued by how different Storm looks in different lighting. I apologize for the messiness and scratches...I took these pictures a few days after I applied the polish. 

Take a look at Storm under various lighting sources and watch how it transforms!

From Brownish...

...to less brownish...

...to more greyish...

...to more purplish!!!

I really like Storm...and I hardly ever wear cremes!

Lincoln Park After Dark Suede is also amazing! I found it dusty hunting and this is the first time I've used it. Here it is without top coat.
Click to enlarge -------->

It is just stunning! It's one of my new favourite polishes!

Look how LPADS sparkles with top coat!

Do you like Lincoln Park... better with or without topcoat???
Do you have any favourite neutral colours???
Do you like suedes or mattes???