Go Pink Wednesday and Male Breast Cancer Awareness!

In the past few weeks we've talked about why it is so important to be aware of how fatal and real Breast Cancer can be and the statistics involved. We also gave you step by step information on how to do your own self breast exam and how to be the most supportive person you can be to an affected loved one. Today we're going to discuss something you may or may not have known about; Male Breast Cancer.

The Mayo Clinic defines Male Breast Cancer as cancer that forms in the breast tissue of men. Though breast cancer is most commonly thought of as a woman's disease, male breast cancer does occur.

Furthermore, did you know that male breast cancer can occur at any age, though is most common in older men. The Mayo Clinic also noted in their definition that men diagnosed early have a good chance for a cure; however many men delay seeing their doctors if they notice a change, unusual symptoms or symptoms such as a breast lump. Because of this wait and see mentality many male breast cancers are diagnosed when the disease is more advanced.

That's right... our male loved ones are at risk too! Breast Cancer is already scary enough with a statistic of 1 in 8 women will be affected, but to add to that the men in our lives is just that much more tragic!

Through research I found that, according to breastcancer.org in 2011 there were 2,140 male breast cancers diagnosed. Which means less than 1% of all breast cancers occur in men. So from a statistical point of view a man's chances of male breast cancer are 1 in 1,000.

That statistic may seem more comforting against the 1 in 8 chances for women, but stop and think about how many men you come in contact with. I bet you've known or will know at least 1,000. Think of all your school buddies, friend's husbands/boyfriends, co-workers, neighbors... These numbers are very real and very scary.

So... what have we learned from the previous posts? EARLY DETECTION!!!

The Mayo Clinic lists these as symptoms:

• A painless lump or thickening in your breast tissue
• Changes to the skin covering your breast, such as dimpling, puckering, redness or scaling
• Changes to your nipple, such as redness or scaling, or a nipple that begins to turn inward
• Discharge from your nipple

Just like the other posts.... be aware and help your loved ones stay safe by asking them to examine themselves, stay alert to their body and be informed.


Now... on to this weeks Go Pink Wednesday Breast Cancer Awareness manicures!

It's seems that Dom went a bit CRAZY with the rhinestones this week, but it is all E's fault! She made a suggestion and Dom just ran with it. The base color is China Glaze Hang-Ten Toes which was a great pink for summer as well as Go Pink Wednesday! For the added sparkle she went a little drag queen-esq with the jewels. We like the final product and hope that you do as well!

China Glaze - Hang-Ten Toes

China Glaze - Hang-Ten Toes

This week E went pretty casual and cool with a dusky toned pink from Revlon called Cafe Pink and a pretty, sparkly holo glitter from Studio M called Magic Attraction. The ribbon stamping is from Vivid Lacquer's plate VL001 stamped with OPI Kiss Me on my Tulips.

Revlon - Cafe Pink & Studio M - Magic Attraction
stamped with OPI - Kiss Me On My Tulips, indirect sunlight

Revlon - Cafe Pink & Studio M - Magic Attraction
stamped with OPI - Kiss Me On My Tulips, direct sunlight

xo,

&

Polka dot dreams with Cult Nails Feel Me Up

In the three months that I've even bothered to keep track of my lemmings I am already feeling like I'll never acquire them all. But! I will say this... I have always heard good things about Cult Nails and after my first visit to their webpage I knew I needed to join the Cult! 

My chance was finally here when Cult Nails had a replay of the $5 sale that was originally a promotion/thank you from them reaching five thousand Facebook fans a little while back. Congrats again! What an accomplishment and endorsement of your product, wow!! 

I saw that they were going to include colors that sold out the first time and while some of the Cult Nails colors that I've been lusting after are either discontinued or haven't made it back into stock, I still had plenty of lovelies to choose from! 

I must say that originally Feel Me Up wasn't on my list to buy. I mean, I am always in search of my perfect yellow and I've been wrong before so I figured eh, maybe another day. But then a day or two before the sale I happened to be on my Instagram scrolling through the feed when I saw MartaWarmuz's Instagram picture of her mani with Feel Me Up. I knew instantly that I needed this yellow... and that it might just be THE ONE! 

Let me just say... I was NOT disappointed with my last minute addition! The formula is amazing, it cleans up easily, dries quickly and does so with a beautiful ultra shiny gloss finish.

Now, for those of you that are yellow enthusiasts you know they are usually streaky or require 4 million coats... NOT THIS BABY!! As you can see in my photo I did three coats. Honestly, it was fine in 2, but the 2nd coat for me had a couple tiny spots of bleh and that was most likely due to my crappy painting skills. So yeah, a 2 coat opaque yellow... I'm dreaming right? Somebody smack me, quick!

While I loved, loved, loooooved this yellow, I had horrible insomnia and was convinced that maybe I should do something on it... ya know since I wasn't doing anything else. The problem with a beautiful polish is that sometimes the beauty alone makes it nearly impossible to choose something that will accompany it in such a way that they don't compete. 

L to R: Julep - Anne, piCture pOlish - Abyss, Revlon - Passionate Pink, Cult Nails - Feel Me Up
baby food jar lid palette and MASH dotting tools

I sat contemplating for at least half an hour. I pulled out nearly a dozen different polishes for at least a dozen different ideas. I just couldn't get the feeling of rightness until I looked at my dotting tools... BAM! Epiphany... random polka dots!

I hope you enjoyed my bright and cheery insomnia driven polka dot mani! 

xo,

Has insomnia driven any of you to do something crazy? I know this isn't my first time...

Skittles and Stamping... eat them up YUM!

Last weekend I was practicing stamping with my new Bundle Monster stamping plates and accidentally did a somewhat cute mani lol. I say somewhat because I'm still learning and some of the stamps didn't quite come out as clear as I wanted. But ya live and learn and I'm determined to not only conquer this but find out which of my "regular" polishes are good for stamping!

L to R: Sally Hansen - White On, Revlon - Passionate Pink, Revlon - Rich Raspberry,  Essie - Play Date, Revlon - Coastal Surf, Sally Hansen - Lickety-Split Lime, Seche Vite Fast Dry Top Coat
Bottom Row: Konad Stamper, Bundle Monster Plate BM - 208 and Konad Scraper

First I put down 2 coats of Sally Hansen - White On as a base coat on both hands. Then I put the colors in the order that you see them in the photo for my Skittle color look. I don't believe there is any real order but I put the colors usually in some sort of gradient arrangement because I'm OCD lol.

LEFT HAND

So I stamped my left hand first with the stamp design at the top of the plate if you hold it so the number is at the bottom. I thought it looked cool but pretty much everyone I showed it to had a luke warm sort of "ehh it could be better" reaction. Oh well... sometimes what you like isn't the popular choice!

RIGHT HAND

On my right hand I used the stamp design at the left if you hold it so the number is at the bottom. This hand is the hand that stamped crapily. Yup I said crapily lol. I don't know if it was my choice in design or my abilities or both but I was kinda bummed. Now, I will say that everyone I showed this to liked it a lot lol. So I guess there's no accounting for taste amongst my friends *wink*

I've been trying to make some healthier eating choices and cutting out candy has been one of the hardest choices. Not that I eat candy all the time or anything like that, but I have a couple that I just love. They are sort of just- part of my history? Does that make sense? Skittles are one of them, M & Ms of course, Now & Laters, Starburst, and then chocolate as a whole lol. I love color and am one of those weirdos that will separate things into color groups or make pictures with the colored candy. Dom used to give me so much hell when we worked together lol. Anyways, doing the Skittles manis are fun, cute and well, I guess you could say I'm still having my candy and none of the side effects!

 Hope you feel inspired to try your own Skittles mani or even check out some stamping- it is definitely a fun and creative way to show some individuality in your everyday look.

P.S. Can ya spot the big boo-boo in my stamping colors? lol

Revlon FLAKIES?! Whaaaat?? YAYNESS!!

So I am minding my own business this early morning and sort of floating around the interwebz... looking at some nail art tutorials, lusting after some Indie and Import polish... you know... a typical morning LOL where I STUMBLE onto a blog that has this little gem of an announcement. So I follow her link to the PRESS REVIEW. I am SOOO EXCITED!!! I can hardly contain myself! Seriously I am barely holding on by the skin of my teeth! (such a gross euphemism but it gets the point across!)

Photo courtesy of imabeautygeek.com's Press Review

So! Tell one, tell all! Tell your friends, mother, father, brother- whomever! Shout it from the rooftops but seriously- pass the word because this is exciting!

Let me just go on to say WHY it is so exciting... 1. Revlon has been doing A LOT better with their formula, brushes and colors. 2. Flakies- GOOD flakies have been a little hard to find lately IMO. 3. Revlon is EASY TO FIND (usually lol see Whimsical). Therefore in conclusion I say this, I am excited that more people are going to get exposure to fun and easy nail art that never had that chance before!

Easter Nail Art, A long way to go... but it's a start!

With Easter around the corner I knew I wanted to do a themed nail but hadn't quite decided what. I've seen a lot of super cute stuff in the past month and have really felt the pressure! Well with the arrival of my brushes I was anxious to give them a test drive just that much more... but the question still remained test drive them with WHAT?

It came to me in a flash... of middle finger waving angrily in my direction on Southside Blvd in Jacksonville (FL).

Yup... it was like a lightning bolt made of soft creme colors and easter grass sparkle! I wanted to have 3D grass on my nails, eggs hidden in the grass and of COURSE an Easter Bunny! Yup! So simple... yet how exactly to achieve this and with which polish and in what order. Oh the logistics lol.

I formulated my plan while moving along in the hell that is traffic on that particular road for my 40+ minute drive home and got nowhere. Really and truly nowhere. I just couldn't see it yet. It was like I was mentally constipated or something. I had the idea and I knew I had the colors but the rest was just... stuck.

I went the rest of the day like that and let me tell you it was just as uncomfortable as the real thing! I can't stand being creatively stuck it sucks sour eggs!

The end of the day bled into the end of the night and while on Skype with Dom I just started picking out colors... before I even really realized what I was picking out colors for lol. The next thing I knew I had a base coat and my background of Julep - Leah on and drying!

Dom of course was asking me what I was doing because i looked so intent. I wanted it to be a surprise so I told her nothing and beat around the bush for a bit. The next part were the eggs. Now I knew I was going to do the grass so I needed to put the eggs about mid nail, so I had to sort of imagine the grass already there when picking out space for the different eggs on the other 4 nails. Next up, the bunny!

I learned a VERY important lesson that night... White nail polish (aka Sally Hansen - White On) is just like some paints... the white will pull the color behind it! So what ends up happening (in my case) was I had a verrrrrrrry light LIME GREEN EASTER BUNNY!!! ACK! So, what do I do? I put down another coat of white. And another. And another. And another. AND ANOTHER COAT OF WHITE POLISH! Yes people, SIX COATS of white polish to get a WHITE Easter Bunny lol. Seriously I had so much polish on my middle fingernail, the pile-o-polish was this little white mound as though I had some acrylic on my nail!

Moving on... the next step was the background for grass. For that I mixed a little pile of China Glaze - Holly-Day with Sinful Colors - Happy Ending to get this darkish green shimmer color. It was actually very pretty, but a little bit darker than Julep - Leah to give some depth and what not (or some such artistic blah blah)

Once that was done I very politely asked my husband to go to Wally's and get me some green glitter. Yup, 2am my loving husband said "I will... if you REALLY want me to..." my response? "yup, thanks! Love you!" LOL He chuckled and said he'd be back. A while later I get texts with pictures where he's asking me if I want fine glitter or regular or some such caddy thing. I love that man, he cracks me up.

Pre-Glitter Grass

While Dom and I wait for the delivery of glitter goodness I decorate the little eggs. I should back up and tell you the egg colors lol. NYC - Spring Street, Essie - Play Date, Essie - Turquoise & Caicos, Loreal - Tweet Me, Revlon - Indigo Night, China Glaze - Shower Together. I decorated each egg with glitter since they were so small I wasn't sure that an actual design would be visible, but glitter is! I used the small holos from OPI - Servin' Up Sparkle, Jordana - Blue Bash, Jordana - Celebration and of course, last but certainly not least my new Dollish Polish - I'll have what she's having. I saved that beautious pink confection of sparkle for the most important feature on a bunny- the pink hears and nose! I did try to do the Bunny's face in proportion but the whiskers came out bigger and thicker than I thought they were going to be so that part was poop, but I like his little blue eyes and cutesy ears!  I do  know in the pictures it won't look as though all these colors are represented but I promise they're there lol. Some got covered up with overzealous glitter glass application lol.

L to R: OPI - Servin' Up Sparkle, Jordana - Blue Bash, Dollish Polish - I'll have what she's having, Jordana - Celebration, NYC - Spring Street, Essie - Play Date, Essie - Turquoise & Caicos, Wet n' Wild - Tickled Pink, L'Oreal - Tweet Me, Revlon - Indigo Night, China Glaze - Liquid Leather, China Glaze - Shower Together, China Glaze - Holly-Day, Sinful Colors, Happy Ending, Julep - Helena, Julep - Leah *not pictured Sally Hansen - White On

Alright... the piece de resistance! My glitter-grass! A coat of OPI - Top Coat was applied where I wanted my grass to stick and then copious amounts of fine green glitter applied.

Finished!

TA DA!!

I hope you enjoyed my first attempt at free-hand nail art. It was a lot of fun and while my painting skills are rusty, they're in there... just have to blow the dust off and work out the kinks!

Side note: I wanted to mention that all my photos are done inside and with my iPhone. Unfortunately my camera has been in the shop getting repaired. Hopefully I will have it back soon!

Skittles Rainbow... what does it MEAN?!

LOL I love the video Double Rainbow on YouTube!! The Double Rainbow Song makes me laugh so hard- it's even Dom's ringtone for me on her cell! At any rate...

So this will be a short and sweet post, just enough to show you the colors that I pulled together. They ended up being awesomesauce together too! *insert happy dance*

Natural lighting / Inside

,

From thumb to pinky: Revlon Colorstay - Passionate Pink, Revlon Colorstay - Rich Raspberry, Essie - Play Date, Revlon Colorstay - Coastal Surf, Sally Hansen Insta-Dri - Lickety-Split Lime.

see above for brand & name of color

I don't know what Revlon has done to their Colorstay line, but the formula for these new polishes has been super awesome! It is so smooth and creamy, it spreads on easily and quite honestly I'm A-OK paying $5 for them. Back in the day I refused because I hated the formula but now I really am looking to the line to see what they put out next.

I know my skittle mani might seem a little lacking in art and design department but all I really wanted to put on them was Dollish Polish - Putting on the Ritz and since I don't have my order yet... any other option felt wrong. So I sported this mani for a day or two polish solo and even in it's less than bling appearance everyone seemed to love it!

As always, base coat in Seche Clear and a nice top coat of Seche Vite.

Hopefully you'll decide to give some of the new Colorstay shades a test drive... I think you'll be delightfully surprised!

Like that date you were looking forward to all day but...

Hello all you gorgeous individuals! It's E and this is my first post about a polish... in blog form lol!

While I hemmed and hawed about what polish to blog about first, Dom suggested my brand new bottle of Zoya - Julieanne freshly purchased from Ulta. As soon as I noticed it on the front of the rack heading up a couple other beauties, I felt I had to have her. I just felt this pull toward Julieanne. 

Quietly urging from my bucket o' polish, Julieanne, has a really loud personality once you notice her. I got excited to try out this beautiful polish from a brand I have heard so many good things about. I started by filing my nails down and making them as uniform as I could. I don't like my nails very long at all. I never have and I never will. I know that's not the popular opinion as far as nails and blogging goes but it's mine ;) 

Next, I put one coat of Seche Clear as my base. Now... with the first stroke of Julieanne I could tell that this polish formula is not like any others that I own. The most important thing to impart is this-  It dries super duper extra crazy fast! This polish is not the type that you can be simple, pretty, and clean with your brush strokes, at least if you can't do that fast. For me, as you can see in the pictures, I had to pretty much slap the paint on and hope for the best lol. 

3 Coats

I did 3 total coats of Julieanne and one top coat of Seche Vite. You could conceivably do 2 coats and be fine, but I noticed that I hadn't seen any of the yummy duochrome-y-ness yet. Therefore I did 1 more coat in hopes of seeing that ever illusive complement of green/gold that shows in the bottle...

3 Coats & Seche Vite Top Coat

Total massive let down. While the finished mani is pretty in a grape purple glitter with dark purple background way, it does not show any hint of the duochrome shift unless you're staring hard and in a weird indirect sunlight. 

Much like the date you were amped up and looking forward to all day but he turned out to be a total nose picking dud, Zoya - Julieanne, was a waste of my time and $8. I have other polishes that are more dynamic on (in AND out of direct sunlight) and quite honestly if I could return the bottle I would. 

Outside and the best shot of the illusive green/gold shift

AWESOME ALTERNATES TO THE RESCUE!!

If you have any of these in your stash or if you have access to acquiring them I would recommend these in lieu of the Zoya - Julieanne. I think you'll be infinitely happier and get more mileage out of these rather than Julieanne.

Pictured from L to R: Sinful Colors - I Love You, Rimmel - Night Before, Sinful Colors - Daddy's Girl, OPI - Russian Navy (while a dark blue it has a purple sheen that can be played up with layering or glitter), Revlon - Scandalous (Glitter and a stand alone), Finger Paints - Purple Palette, OPI - Grape... Set... Match