The Black Knight

Howdy!

I recently had the opportunity to crush a MAJOR lemming, butter LONDON The Black Knight, from Ashley of Ashley is Polish Addicted on her blog sale.  I must say, it is the most mesmerizing black I have EVER seen.  I knew I would love it from reviews on other blogs, but I had no idea that I would be spellbound by it in person!  The pictures below do NOT even BEGIN to barely capture the beauty of this polish.  It applies without flaw, but did need a couple coats of Seche Vite to get a smooth finish on it (I'm not a fan of feeling the texture when I touch my nails), which only makes it even more gorgeous.  A guy friend of mine likened it to a custom paint job with a heavy metallic flake and super high gloss finish, obviously he liked it lol

If you get the opportunity to obtain this beautiful, sexy lady, DO IT!  You will not regret it!

Thanks & Gig 'em!

A Diamond Jubilee!

Howdy all!

In honor of Queen Elizabeth II's 60 year a few of us nail bloggers decided to celebrate on our nails!  We all used different combinations of British brand nail polishes to create a British Day Jubilee Manicure.  For mine, I started with butter LONDON Slapper and then sponged on a gradient of a-england Princess Tears.

I started out liking it a great deal, but as it set and dried the Princess Tears changed colors! It ended up looking more like Princess Sabra/Tristam's Tears.

Then I got the bright idea to add a bit of art... I used Konad plate m40 and Konad Special Polish in White to put a crown on my left ring finger.  Of course, I only had one crown, because there is only one Queen ;)  But, again, I couldn't stop there.  I added a little square rhinestone that had an AB finish (kinda hard to see in the picture :/) that I applied in a fashion that we in the jewelry industry would call kite set to the center point of the crown to mimic a diamond ;)

I must admit, I'm not in love with this manicure.  What do y'all think?


Thanks & Gig 'em!

P.S.  Make sure to check out the rest of the fabulous bloggers celebrating the Diamond Jubilee!

World Autism Awareness Day, Monday, April 2, 2012-...

I know a super special little boy that also just happens to have autism, and I hate that people think that he's stupid or something.  He is HIGHLY intelligent, he just communicates differently than we do.  I will be doing this, will you?

Ashley is PolishAddicted: World Autism Awareness Day, Monday, April 2, 2012-...: This coming Monday, April 2nd, is World Autism Awareness Day. This is a special cause for me because I know a VERY special little boy who happens to have autism. Those of us in the polish community have pulled together before for other causes and I fully believe we can do it again. 

On Monday make sure to paint your nails blue! It's as simple as that. Is it going to change anything? Maybe not. But it might just help raise awareness, even if it only opens one person's eyes, it's worth it.  Someone else suggested adding in puzzle pieces with the blue. I think this is a wonderful idea! I will attempt it, even though we all know how I fail at nail art. I want to see YOUR blue manis! If you paint your nails blue on Monday, with or without the puzzle pieces, I want you to upload a picture to my Facebook page. I will share it on Facebook, make sure to link your blog if you have one! 

From Autism Speaks: "Autism statistics from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) identify around 1 in 88 American children as on the autism spectrum–a ten-fold increase in prevalence in 40 years. Careful research shows that this increase is only partly explained by improved diagnosis and awareness. Studies also show that autism is three to four times more common among boys than girls. An estimated 1 out of 54 boys and 1 in 252 girls are diagnosed with autism in the United States." 

My First Water Marble!

I know that it isn't perfect, but for a first time...  I am so proud of myself!  I must thank Collete from My Simple Little Pleasures for all of her wonderful tutorials.  I must say that she the queen of water marbling, IMHO at least.  You can check them out on her You Tube page.  

When I was working on this manicure I noticed a few things.  First, borh work well in the water, Shine especially, but Goth dries more quickly and can leave bald spots when you draw your design. So, I would recommend possibly finding a different black, or letting Shine be your primary color, like Collette did here. If you really want to use these colors as I did, go for it! Just know that you'll have bald spots in your design where you draw your petals and you might struggle to get your flower drawn in time depending on how quickly you work. On my first hand, my left one, I used Shine as my base (like Collette) and you can see the "holes" in my design. In some of the nails I sort of liked the effect, but not all. So on my right hand I used Goth as my base color and LOVED the effect. The colors were bolder and NO bald spots :D  It really just depends on the look you want.

So overall:  a fun and educational mani!