Swatch-It-Up-Saturday Jan 18

Good morning!!  I have a pile of swatches for you guys this morning that I have been stashing since the end of November...  Yeah...  *sheepish grin*  Anyways, let's get to it, shall we?

Holiday Nail Art Challenge Week 2

Hola readers!!  I know I said that I would be on the ball this week with Nail Polish Canada's Holiday Nail Art Challenge, and I wasn't.. FAIL!  I did have my mani done a few days ago, I just was being lazy and didn't get the post up.

This week's theme was Decorations.  My idea came into my mind immediately when I saw the e-mail, and this is what I came up with!

Swatch-It-Up-Saturday Nov 30

Evening!  I almost forgot to post this today!  Well, here we are on the last day of November, the Christmas season will start in full swing tomorrow, and I will be able to plug my Christmas lights in :D  YAY!  Tyler and I put the outside lights up a few weekends ago, taking advantage of a warm day, but I haven't been "allowed" to turn them on until December 1st.

It's Swatch-It-Up-Saturday and I have a LOT of catching up to do.  This is going to be a picture-heavy post, so let's get right to it.

X is for X-plosion

Happy Friday everyone!  I can't believe the change in temperature between today (barely 10°C) and this past Tuesday/Wednesday (30-35°C, felt more like 40°C)!  Fall is definitely in the air!

Today I have for you my X mani for the ABC Challenge!  It's the 3rd last week this week ... wow!  Time is going by way too fast!

X is for X-plosion

V is for V-Gap

Howdie readers!  Does everyone have exciting plans for this long weekend??  I don't, lol!  I'm going to use it to relax and catch up on some sleep ;)  Can you believe it's the end of August, and back to school time already??  Were has this summer, and the entire year gone?!

Today I have for you my "V" mani for the ABC Nail Art Challenge!

V is for V-Gap

P is for Pinterest-Inspired

Good evening my lovely ladies (and gents - do we have any gent readers?)!  I hope you are all surviving!  I don't know if I will make it to the end of the week :(  We are going through a heat wave here in South-Central Ontario and it's killing me already; today was the first day...

Today I have for you my "P" mani for the ABC Nail Art Challenge!

P is for Pinterest-Inspired

G is for Gradient

Afternoon ladies and gents!  Happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there!  Hopefully your babies (human or fur-baby) are treating you to a day of rest and relaxation!  Tyler and Owen just left, but I was just happy to have them with me for the morning, and this whole weekend :)

Today's post is for the ABC Challenge.  It's "G" week :)

G is for Gradient

Julep Claudette and Tip Top Nails Smashed

All polishes are purchased with my own money unless stated otherwise.

HAPPY FRIDAY!  The weekend is finally here!  I was supposed to write my final exam this morning, but due to in-climate weather and hydro outages, the place I was writing it was closed.  So I have to reschedule for next week.

Yesterday I posted Julep Claudette and told you to come back to see what I did with it!  Check it out!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Happy Sunday lovely readers!  How are you celebrating St. Patrick's Day?  Me, I'm not a drinker, and while I am of Irish decent, I don't normally celebrate St. Patrick's Day.  I thought I would do my nails for today though :)

I know lots of other nail bloggers had their posts up a lot earlier today, but I'm lazy and have been procrastinating all day, lol!

Dollish Polish The Koopa King

I hope everyone has been having a good week!  It's getting cold here again and there is snow in the forecast for tomorrow, so I'm pretty excited!

Today is the 2nd last day for the Dollish Polish Super Mario Bros collection marathon, I can't believe it's almost over!  Although, my nails have almost had enough of glitters for a while.  Have to stick it out for another 2 weeks, then it will be all cremes and nail art for the month of February.  Today I have for you The Koopa King.

Dollish Polish Toad-ally Awesome

Good evening lovely ladies and gents if we have some :)  I can't believe it's Sunday night already :(  I'm not ready to go back to work tomorrow.

Tonight I have for you the 5th polish from the Dollish Polish Super Mario Bros collection - Toad-ally Awesome.

Christmas Wreath Half Moons

Well, looks like we all survived December 21, 2012!  Who wants to make t-shirts?!  ;)  And to top it off, we got some snow last night so *breaks into song* it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Today I have for you a Christmas twist on half moon nails - I have turned them into Christmas wreathes :D  I can't believe we are only 4 days away from Christmas day!  This month has gone by way too fast!  I remember when I was younger, December would always drag by so slowly because I was so excited for Christmas!  Christmas Day and Boxing Day also seemed to last forever too, but now it seems you do all these preparations for Christmas and then before you know it, it's all over.  Maybe we should do Christmas nails all through the year :D

Anywho, onto my wreathes...

For this I used 2 coats of Julep Alyson as my base colour.  Then with hole reinforcements, I created my half moon curve a little further down the nail than you normally would with a half moon and painted Avon Ruby Slippers on the tip.  After removing the reinforcements, I used Zoya Logan and my dotting tool to create the bottom of a wreath along the half moon line.  You probably could just do your nails half and half because the bottom of the wreath is what creates the half moon look in the end anyways.

Then using Julep Delaunay and my dotting tool again, I created little berries on the wreath :)  After all that, using Julep Felicity and Konad M71 I stamped bows on the bottom of the wreath.  It didn't stand out as much as I had pictured in my mind, so if you want it to stand out more, it would probably be best to freehand a bow rather than stamping.

I love the way this turned out!  Except for the bow not standing out as much as I hoped, it looks exactly how I pictured it in my head :D

Are you excited that we are so close to Christmas?  What is the favourite Christmas mani you have done so far?

NOTD: Julep Felicity

Happy Sunday everyone!  By show of hands, who is ready to go back to work tomorrow?!  ... Yeah, me neither :P

I thought I would try out Julep Felicity by herself today rather than using her to create an antuqied look over other polish.

Julep describes Felicity as a yellow-gold metallic chrome, and they are right on the money with that one!

Natural Light, without flash

Natural Light, with flash

This is a beautiful gold colour :D  With the flash it looks like Crayola's version of "golden rod" with a shimmer :D  I think this colour will be perfect for Christmas manicures (only 19 weeks and 2 days till the big day!!) and stamping :)

Did you get this colour in your August Julep Maven Box?  What do you think of it?

NOTD: Marble with Julep Felicity

Morning sunshines!  I hope you're enjoying this dreary day!

So I wanted to try out my other polish from my August Julep Maven Box, Felicity, but I couldn't bring myself to take off Alfre just yet.  So I decided I would attempt the marbling look that is achieved by using seran wrap to "sponge" polish onto the nail.

I am in love with this look.  I would love to try this with more than one "sponge" colour.  I think this would be great to try over white with light pastels for Easter, it would give an Easter Egg look so easily :D

I like how the gold of Felicity gives the purple of Alfre an antiqued look, and this is SO easy!  A lot of people do the "sponge off"method where you paint your top colour over your entire nail than use seran wrap to sponge some of it off to bring out the colour underneath, but I think the "sponge on" method is easier to control the amount of colour you cover your base colour with, and it uses less polish.  I did all 10 nails with 2 drops of polish on a styrofoam plate and a little piece of seran wrap.

What do you think of this marbled look?  Have you tried it before?  If so, post a picture to my Facebook page, I wold love to take a look :D

August Julep Maven Box

It's HERE!  My August Julep Maven Box is here!  I'm so excited to show you this, I'm excited for these colours :D

Julep released metallic and chrome colours this month, as you got a sneak peak of in my August Maven Box Add-Ons page.  Let's see what I opened :)

Julep was celebrating their 1 year anniversary/birthday for the August Maven Box, so we got to celebrate with them!

Everything was wrapped in this lovely reusable bag, Julep's gift to all the Mavens in celebration of their 1 year anniversary! :)

I went with the Classic With a Twist Maven Box for August, so I got Felicity and Alfre, again because I'm a sucker for purples :D  Felicity is described as a yellow-gold metallic chrome, and Alfre is described as a royal metropolitan purple with a hint of shimmer.

Julep also introduced their new nail polish remover that is moisturizing and acetone free.  I was excited to try this because it's in one of those fancy schmancy pump bottles (again I live a sheltered life, lol).  This remover works pretty well, and it smells wonderful.  I don't know that I would be willing to pay for it (even with the 20% Maven discount) when I can get twice as much Sally Hansen acetone remover at WalMart for about half the price.  But the bottle is refillable, so I can always buy other remover and still use the pump bottle :D

So of course I chose Alfre for my first colour to try from this box.  I love how this looks, even though it's an "older" colour in the Julep collection.  It's not a bright grape purple, it's a beautiful grey/silver-ish purple that is pretty neutral even though it's a darker colour.

What do you think of these colours?  What August Julep Maven Box did you get?  What was your favourite product and/or colour from the August Julep Maven Box?