On today's installment of "How to Suck at Blogging 101," we'll cover topics such as: disappearing for extended periods of time with no explanation, crappy phoneblogging, lazy manis, poor time management skills, and how to avoid and alienate all the wonderful people you follow.
In short, I am a really bad blogger. I fully recognize how much I suck at being committed to a regular schedule. I really should be able to make this a once-a-week blog, and I don't really have a satisfactory excuse for not being able to do that. I don't want to just abandon this blog, but for some reason it's just really hard for me to keep up with. And it's hard for me to keep up with all of you guys' blogs too, which I hate because I really want to be able to check them all!
I was out of town for spring break (skiing in Colorado!) which was a lot of fun except I had no reception. I'm following 100+ blogs which is a loooot to keep up with if I can't check in every single day, which is getting to be an impossibility. Also, I've heard that Google Reader is disappearing July 1st? Can anyone tell me why and what alternatives are out there?
Anyway, I've got some things from Born Pretty Store to review for you so I'll show you one of them today.
I've always wanted to try those cool dried flowers so I really wanted to review these flowers because they had a nice variety.
I started with OPI My Pointe Exactly which is quite sheer, so I used four coats. Then I topped it with Finger Paints Flecked, a blue-green flakie. Then I put one of the turquoise flowers on my ring finger.
I really like it, I think it looks really nice! Unfortunately I went out grocery shopping later in the day and I think all the layers hadn't dried fully, and I banged my ring finger and the flower tore and it all wrinkled up. :( Which was unfortunate but no fault of the product. So I would give this a positive review! I think it looks really nice.
Here's a coupon if you guys want to use it! They've got lots of great nail art supplies.
I've got another product from Born Pretty that I need to review, so I'll make a Herculean effort to get that up next weekend. I'm really going to try to get on a weekly schedule and I hope I can muster up the commitment to do that! I hate being a fair-weather blogger so I promise I'll try harder if you'll still have me. :)
This is 2 coats of a nice Sephora polish that I got cheap in a 3-pack, I'm not sure what it's called. It's a purple foil that's nearly opaque in one coat, but I did two for good measure. The formula was absolutely lovely, although the brush is rather large and wide and paddle-like which was unpleasant but not impossible.
And then I slapped on two coats of OPI I Lily Love You which I haven't used in a while, so I felt like it could use some love.
Mmm I just love all the flakies and glitter mixed in all together. So pretty!
I don't really have much else to say other than I am obsessed with this song.
Feel So Close - Calvin Harris
And I've probably listened to it at least 20 times today. That is all. I wish you a good evening!
All righty, here is our second-to-last installment of the Hunger Games series! At least everything I got from it. Today's mani begins with Smoke and Ashes, which represents district 12.
Wow I'm really feeling like I should do a reswatch of this because this looks like poop compared to the actual thing. This is two coats of Smoke and Ashes, which is a black polish with loads of blue/green/gold? shimmer. It's very nice and I like it a lot.
Now I also picked up Luxe and Lush so I decided to try it on top of Smoke and Ashes.
Luxe and Lush is the type of flakie topcoat that has the broken mirror sort of look, the edges are more jagged and sharp looking and it doesn't lie as flat as most flakies. The formula wasn't the best and it was kind of hard to get the distribution right but with a little adjustment all was well. I'd like to try this one over a wider variety of colors as well, I'm sure there are many interesting possibilities out there! Have you guys tried any cool combos with Luxe and Lush? Have any suggestions for me? I'm all ears!
Good evening, my beauties. I will first petition you to vote in my franken-naming contest if you have not done so by now. I got more entries than votes which doesn't really make sense to me, so please take the short amount of time necessary and vote! The more votes there are, the more fair the results are. I think. Whatever.
Today I have another beauty from the fabulous A Polished Touch. She kindly offered to get me Revlon Whimsical and Naughty since I couldn't find them, but imagine my surprise when I opened her package and found Joe Fresh Twilight nestled in there!
This is 2 coats of Twilight over 1 coat of Wet n Wild Black Creme. Twilight is a black jelly base with orange to green flakies and it is simply wonderful. I've seen it on blogs a few times but didn't have any hope of every immediately getting my eager hands on it because Joe Fresh is only available in Canada.
Ahh I really love this one. I don't think my pictures do it justice... I'll have to do a reswatch and get it outside in the sun. I am very happy to have this beautiful gem in my collection!
This wraps up all my goodies from A Polished Touch, and I want to say a
So I've showed you this baby before but wowza I think this time it looks even better. I decided to layer it over NYC Midnight Amethyst to give it more purple-osity and I think it was quite a successful experiment.
This is one coat of Fowl Play over two coats of Midnight Amethyst. How freakin' sezzy is this, guys... OMG. It's too good. IT'S TOO GOOD.
So today, as a reward for you guys being so ridiculously fantastic, I have decided to share with you more adventures from flakie-land.
I started with 2 coats of the wonderful Essie Mesmerized, a very nice blue creme. I followed that with one coat of Essie Shine of the Times.
Then I added two coats of Finger Paints Flecked.
And after that, I added a coat of Essie Matte About You.
This was really freakin' cool! It's like a flakie party all up on my nails. Since I don't have any of the multicolored flakie topcoats i.e. Cult Nails Unicorn Puke, I decided that this would do the trick. I love it! Kind of reminds me of this:
Come on, that's adorable.
Oh right, and also about the giveaway. OK, so I want it to be at least some sort of contest since giveaways are too easy, and most of you said contest as well. But I know not everyone has equal abilities when it comes to nail art and the like, so I think what I'll do is make a franken, and then everyone can submit names for it. I'll let everyone vote on the names (they'll all be anonymous so that people can't lobby for votes from their followers, so that way people with more followers won't necessarily win) and whoever's name gets chosen will get the prize (including the franken they named, and maybe I'll make a custom franken for them too). I was going to go out today prize-hunting, and hopefully I'll get the contest together within a few weeks!
Phew! It's been what, like a million years since I last posted? But I have a wonderful mani to show you in order to try to make up for being flakier than a freshy-baked croissant.
We will start with Savina Purple Reign.
2 coats. Purple Reign is a deep red-based purple lacquer with a heavy dosing of blue shimmer. It's really pretty, and it provides the perfect background for awesomeness.
The formula was very nice, it's the first Savina I've ever tried, I'd seen the brand a few times before but never in person. It was a good first impression!
Then, because I couldn't leave it at that, I did a reverse gradient with Essie Shine of the Times.
It was surprisingly easy to do. I just blobbed some down near my cuticle and then wiped most of the polish off the brush, then used it to drag the flakies up my nail. With a nice layer of topcoat, it's shiny and smooth! I love it, it's so pretty.
Anyway, I have quite recently passed the 300 follower mark so I think a contest/giveaway is in order! I'll go out looking for some prizes that are worthy of you guys' awesomeness, and hopefully get something together soon. Would you guys rather do a contest or a giveaway? I personally think contests are more fun but I know giveaways have their benefits too because they're not dependent on followers. Let me know which you'd prefer! And thank you guys so much for being freakishly awesome.
Today's post is courtesy of the wonderful Nailderella. She features so many wonderful polishes and has such beautiful nails! I love seeing her posts every day.
"Hello!
Laura contacted me at the begining of February to ask me if I wanted to do a guest post on her blog! How sweet is that! I felt so happy and honored she asked me! I had no other choice but to say yes!
Thank you very much, Laura!
I decided to use one of my Nfu Oh flakies to celebrate it! I picked Nfu Oh 54 wich is a transparent blue base polish packed with gorgeous green and blue shifting flakies. It looks so mermaid-like! I used 1 coat of Nfu Oh 54 over A-England Order of the Garter. To see my review of the Order of the Garter, click here.
Thank you Laura! I hope you'll be less busy soon! Nailderella - sending a lots of love!"
Purchase info:
A-England polishes can be purchased from A-England website. It is interesting to note that shipping is free worldwide. You can visit A-England on Facebook. A-England polishes can also be puchased from Llarowe. This is the US stockist for Glitter Gal, Ozotic, A England, Hits, Lynnderella and Ludurana polishes. They sell internationally (except Italy). You can visit Llarowe on Facebook.
Thank you very much, Nailderella! I am so jealous, what a gorgeous combination of two amazing polishes! If I was a mermaid, my tail would definitely look like that. I want Order of the Garter so badly, it's awesome!
