Zoya - Lovely Collection - Review & Swatches

Until I started really getting into nail polish I always respected pastels but wasn't overly moved to purchase any. As I've watched my collection evolve and be exposed to more and more brands that I never knew about I've also watched my color tastes broaden. Specifically in the direction of pastels. This year there is no shortage of lovely pastels offered up from our favorite brands. I am very happy to have a review of our favorite Ohio based nail polish company, Zoya, and their spring release, the Lovely Collection.

When I saw a photo of the Lovely Collection by Zoya my interested was definitely piqued. The collection as a whole is a nice set of basic spring staple colors. Those of you that aren't into nail art can enjoy the beauty of a lovely color alone. Those of you into nail art will enjoy this collection as it has some deeply pigmented cremes perfect as a base or use in nail art. I love the duality of the color choices they're offering in this collection for that reason alone. I mean to me that's a major reason to pick up the 6 color set immediately. However, if you need more convincing here are my swatches with reviews for each color in the Lovely Collection.

Zoya - Julie
Light box lighting, 2 coats w/top coat

Julie is by far my favorite of the shimmer set. I like shimmers in general but usually find myself reaching for cremes more often than not. However, I really love this soft lavender shimmer. The only downside for me is realizing it is the same shimmer combination/recipe as Zoya - Zuza. I am NOT a fan of Zuza and was disheartened to see that it was the same shimmer. I wish they would re-work the amount or type of shimmer they use. It is not clean up or sloppy painter (ahem, like ME!) friendly.

Zoya - Piaf
Light box lighting, 2 coats w/top coat 

This is Piaf, a lovely yellow that I would call a soft "mustard" yellow. I don't think it works for my skin tone, but I can see a lot of other lovelies wearing it and totally rocking this sweet spring color.

Zoya - Gie Gie
Light box lighting, 3 coats w/top coat

I really love the soft and dainty Gie Gie. I would love it even more if it was just a tad less sheer. I do not like VNL (visible nail line) and unfortunately on me I needed 3 coats of Gie Gie to reach an opacity that I felt comfortable with. I do love the color though, in fact it's currently on my toes! It probably doesn't hurt that the Mr. & I are hoping for a little girl this time around... so I've naturally been gravitating towards pink in all it's shades and variations ha!

The Lovely Collection's cremes are truly the stars of this collection. They are pigmented enough to easily use in nail art, are good color bases for most any occasion, and alone are simply perfect pastel shades.

Zoya - Blu
Light box lighting, 2 coats w/top coat

Blu is my absolute favorite out of the entire Lovely Collection. It is the most perfect powder blue I've ever seen and is just an easily wearable blue. Some people feel self conscious about wearing blue, but honestly I think even if you're self conscious Blu is a good color to try breaking through those feelings. It is soft enough that it isn't in your face but blue enough to say "Hey! I'm a lovely shade of blue, you should love me!"

Zoya - Neely
Light box lighting, 2 coats w/top coat

I have to say at first I was not excited about Neely. I was afraid that it wouldn't look good on me and might look like a "sick" green not a lovely pastel green against my skin tone. Oddly enough from the first swipe of the brush I knew I was totally wrong. I really like Neely and can see me wearing it this Easter with some cute nail art. Yay! I love when I'm wrong about a color!!

Zoya - Jacqueline
Light box lighting, 2 coats w/top coat

This is another color I was super unhappy about at first. In some of the photos Jacqueline looked like a nude to me. I haaaaaate nudes. I can't stand them, they get on my nerves. I honestly feel like what is the point if you're going to use a nude. However, I know that not everybody feels that way and that's ok too. Either way, once I actually saw the bottle in person I thought, well there's something I like about it but I'm still not convinced. WELL! Let me tell you... I was wrong not only once but twice!! This is soooo not a nude! It is more a very soft yellow or what I'd imagine the nail polish equivalent would be to aged white walls. Very antiqued and soft. It was difficult to truly capture the color accurately but I feel like the above photos are pretty close. This color, oddly enough, lightens up once painted. So don't go by the bottle. I really liked this color and feel like it is a perfect nail art base. It's a very soft spoken and unassuming color. Very lovely for a spring wedding day or maybe a stroll through the park.

I mentioned that these colors are prefect for nail art and here are two quick examples of some nail art only using Zoya - Lovely Collection colors.

Zoya - Julie as a base with Zoya - Blu polka dots
I was feeling very Mod and thought large dots would be cute lol

Zoya - Jacqueline as a base with Zoya - Julie, Blu & Neely fan brush marks
I didn't want to do another polka dot design and felt like adventuring a little with the fan brush in my MASH brush set. This is my first fan brush mani, definitely not great but you can see how pretty the colors look together. 

I hope that you enjoyed my review and swatches of Zoya's Lovely Collection. These colors are available for purchase on Zoya's website or direct link to the collection HERE for $8ea.

xo,

This product was provided to me for free and in no way impacts my review.

 The views and findings expressed are my own and to the best of my ability.

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...

Studio M Skittles Style

Why is the Meijer store so close to my house???  My husband has been asking the same question, I am sure!  I mean, it just sits on the corner full of nail polish... needless to say, we HAD to run to Meijer the other night for some random non-essentials.  I left the store with a few "absolute-essentials" in perfect little bottles!

A Studio M display full of amazingly bright colors caught my eye on the way out of the store and I had to grab a few!  So I picked up Orange Sunset, Psychedelic Scene, Neon Caution, Glitter Envy and Energy Star.  I don't know about anyone else but, when I get home with new polish I cannot wait to try it all on.  The lighting in the store is never quite right!

So, I did exactly that!  I tried on all of the polish at once and it ended up being a pretty cute mani of sorts.  The Studio M polish line is really growing on me the more I use it!  The formulas are great and there is really no streaking issues at all.  Most of the colors that I have picked so far have been a one and done.  This shopping trip was a bit different because I ended up with several neons.  Neons are known for being thin and needing some sort of underwear to make the color pop fully.

With this mani THERE IS NO WHITE BASE!  Yes that's right.  These neons did not need a white base coat!  I did paint three coats with these for full coverage but I think they stayed really true to color on there own!  LOVE THEM!

So here it is... my Skittles Style Neon Mani!  All Studio M Nail Lacquer in order from thumb to pinky: Energy Star, Glitter Envy, Neon Caution, Psychedelic Scene and Orange Sunset!

Base + 3 coats of each polish + Northern Lights Top Coat + Flash 

Base + 3 coats of each polish + Northern Lights Top Coat + Flash

P.S. Glitter Envy is really awesome in person and has a bit of a Floam like texture.  The glitter in it appears almost white!  

I hope you like it!  Let me know what you think. 

Gradient nails with a fizzy POP!

Hey guys! So sorry that I have been a bit MIA (missing in action) lately. Life got a little bit nutty with appointments, errands, and a 15 month old teething. Add all that to Mother's Day and my husband's submarine surfacing for a day... what do you get? A crazy craaaaazy last few days!

At any rate, Dom and I were on Skype and I had just reorganized my entire stash. I remember looking at the cam and saying to her "do you ever feel so overwhelmed with what you want to do that you actually don't do anything?" That was my last few days. I have all these beautiful colors, glitters, art supplies, art ideas, stamping plates and all I could think was "I can't decide what color to use".

Well this is just one tiny reason why Dom and I are such good friends. She said very simply, "yes" she felt like that at times but that she had just watched a tutorial on a different way to do Ombre and I should try it. Don't you just love that? *I* should try it... not *HER* lol. Unfortunately she couldn't locate the video she watched so she explained what the artist did and I sort of just did whatever and made up my own way as I went from her broken account of the video lol.

Finished product!

                                 

                                        Items needed:

• Base Coat & Top Coat
• Paper towel (or anything to wipe polish on)
• piece of paper/tray/card stock/plastic plate (to put your dabs/lil pile of polish on)
• make up sponge (these can be purchased for about $2 for a whole bag of them, I prefer the triangle shape)
• orange stick or toothpick or other pointy item (to poke/mix polish with)
• at least TWO polish colors in differing shades (I like a light/dark contrast)
• nail polish remover
• q-tips or brush for clean up

L to R: Orange stick, make-up sponge, scrap piece of card stock, Ulta - Sun-Sational, Ulta - Limelight, paper towel

For this mani I wanted something bright and cheery, so Dom and I decided that yellow and green might be fun. I never thought anything else about the color combination before embarking on the journey.

Step 1: Start with a clean nail and apply your base coat. Then put a little pile of nail polish down on the card stock. I feel that doing the darker color first is best. I have no concrete proof as to why, just that I feel like the color blocking and bleeding of the two colors together is easier. Next put the second color down right up against the edge of the first pile. you want them to sort of bleed a little into eachother.

Step 2: take your orange stick (tooth pick etc) and from the light to the dark color pull a little bit of light into dark. JUST A LITTLE!!! You aren't mixing the two colors so do this step carefully and slowly. **Remember you are doing a blend of the two with your technique- not brushing on color**

Step 3: Do the reverse of step 2. Slowly and carefully pull the dark into the light

Step 4: take the orange stick and very carefully and lightly blend just a SMIDGE where the two colors meet. If you do this too much you won't have much of an ombre effect, it'll look more like you mixed two polish colors... so do this slowly and carefully!

Take your make-up sponge and lightly dab the paint pile. I like to use the corner edge when doing an ombre. I feel like it helps with accuracy and the general ease with which to apply the color.

The last part is the most fun but also requires the most critical eye of the whole process. It does take several applications depending on how opaque you'd like the colors to be. Mine took 4 as you can see from the photos. 

**The critical part is this... if you aren't achieving the amount of one color you'd like you have to go back with what I call "corrective shading". What that means is you take a clean spot on the make-up sponge, again I personally like using the corners for precision, and dab in ONLY the color that you'd like more of. With this mani I did corrective shading on both colors to get a more precise and defined ombre of green to yellow. If you look closely and critically at the pictures you can see where I went back and added some green specifically. Doing the corrective shading really requires you to be critical and slow. If you get in a rush and add too much you'll get a big blot of color that won't look as blended and pretty as the rest of your nails. There is no do-over cover ups for this mani if you wear it alone like I did. Top coat does not smooth out any little errors you might've had in color either as it does at times with regular polishing. 

CLEAN UP: this mani is a little bit of a mess but clean up isn't too bad if you've got some nice pointy Q-tips or a brush. I personally use an angled brush from my MASH nail art brush set to do clean up. I just dip the brush into the nail polish remover and carefully run the brush along my nail to clean away any stray polish. Once you've cleaned up any little booboos add your top coat. 

It isn't a terribly difficult process and goes fairly quickly once you figure out what you want and how to repeat the effect. I did a full mani (both hands) in less than 30 mins from start to finish, and that includes clean up. I think the mani turned out pretty cool and my son's pediatrician was particularly interested in how I did the effect, which made me laugh of course. 

Image from Google

I think this mani turned out looking like Mello Yellow pop cans.... Might have to re-do this mani and add the Mello Yellow logo! Plus.... I really love the Mellow Yellow Song by Donovan! So it wasn't too horrific to walk around with this mani and hum the song for a day or two!

I hope my tutorial helps and if there are any questions or steps that seem un-clear leave a message or email us and I will do whatever I can to help!!

xo,

*This post name has been edited due to the fact that I was apparently referring to the technique incorrectly and it grates on some people's nerves. Good to know... *

NAIL MAIL!! May's Julep Maven & Target Beauty Bag!

Hello hello hello! Sorry this post is so out dated and past due but I felt like maybe someone might still enjoy seeing it so on with the show!

May the FOURTH be with you!!! 

Yes I am a geek and proud of it! Love today, it's so corny but who cares!! Life is too short NOT to be silly in my opinion! (obviously NOT May 4th anymore but still cute :D )

I received my May "It Girl" Julep Maven subscription box came a couple days ago. Sorry I didn't post it sooner but I've been busy with Deployment stuff for my husband.

This box I wasn't that excited about initially so I actually meant to skip, but like quite a few things lately it was forgotten until I received the notification that it would be arriving soon! Imagine my face- yup... totally gobsmacked. Then of course there was the requisite look of argh from my husband.

May Julep Maven "It Girl" box L to R: Make up bag, Ashley, Nessa, and the magnetic polish, Kylie (with magnet in back by card)

At any rate... this box held a cute little black make up bag with the Julep Maven insignia sort of pressed or quilted into the fabric and three polishes. The Julep Maven subscription box is $19.99/mo, according to the website you'll receive at least $40 worth of product in your box. Each bottle of nail polish is $14ea, except for Kylie and she is $18, so the total for my polish alone is $46 plus the make up bag which retails $18 but is marked down on the site to $14.40 currently. So for the month of May my product retail cost is $60.40 if I would've bought it all without a subscription. Not too shabby!! I really like the colors this month, they're very shimmery and fun for a day out and about in the lovely spring weather.

L to R: Ashley, Nessa & Kylie with magnetic key

Index to Pinky: Ashley, Ashley, Nessa, Nessa

The magnetic Kylie is cute and a very nice shimmery and dusky lavender. The magnetic effect that I got was a sort of squiggle.

Kylie magnetic polish

I wanted to show you guys how pretty it can be as just a regular ol' polish, so my index and middle finger are not "magnetized" but my ring and pinky are. I can see this color being a nice "business" color for those that have dress code constraints.

Overall I still love the formula of the Julep polishes but for some reason this month's polishes had weird, bushy and slightly flared brushes. I checked my other Julep colors and none of them had this style of brush... so I don't know whether I should exchange them or keep them and deal with the weirdness. Unfortunately this wider brush is NOT helpful for a clean application lol I had a lot of clean up to do.

You too can try Julep Maven subscription service and if you use the code SHAREONMAY you'll receive your first box for $0.01! Yup ONE CENT! Follow the link, click join and go through the style quiz. Whether you like the results or not you can choose the box that you'd like. I honestly got a different style than the "It Girl" I receive every month but I liked the colors that are coming from that box so I chose that and started my service. However, you can change to a different box if you see something previewed in the boxes that you'd like better than the style you're signed up for... just go through the account options and click around... Any questions feel free to ask!!

Target Spring Beauty Bag!

So for those of you that weren't able to get in on the free sample beauty bag, here's a peek at what was inside! Hopefully next time they offer the beauty bag you'll be able to jump on it!

Target Beauty Bag 2012

peeky peeky inside!

L to R: Pantene Conditioner, Neutrogena Visibly Bright facial cleanser, Simple cleansing facial wipes,
L'Oreal Magin Lumi Light Infusing Primer, Nivea lotion

And the most important part of the beauty bag in my opinion.... THE COUPON BOOK!!!

$2 off with purchase of two CoverGirl items

$1 off Jergens skin care item

$1 off L'Oreal face cosmetic item (foundation or primer)

$1 off Maybelline NY Volum' Express Falsies mascara

$1 off Neutrogena facial skin care item

$3 off Nexxus Frizz Defy hair care item

$1 off Nivea body skin care item

$2 off Olay facial skin care item (moisturizer, treatment or cleanser)

$1 off with purchase of two hair care items (Head & Shoulders, Herbal Essences, Pantene, Aussie)

$2 off Pixi designer cosmetics item

$2 off Revlon cosmetics item

$1 off Sally Hansen magnetic nail polish

$1 off Simple facial skin care item

There you have it! The bag was definitely fun to get and the coupon book makes my lil heart go beep beep beep lol. All coupons are good until 5/31/2012 fyi. So if you know anyone that doesn't want there beauty bag- snap that mofo up!

Happy hunting!

Easter copy cat attack!

So this is just a quick post to show my daughter's Easter nails... I promised her I would lol. Basically when Julep posted their DIY Nail art of the day on April 6th I had an epiphany! Finally a cute Easter nail that I could do on my daughter's very very tiny nails!! YAY!! You can see their post here just scroll down a couple. Below is my finished copy cat version.

Pinky to Thumb: Essie - Play Date, NYC - Lexington Yellow,
 China Glaze - Rose Among Thorns, Revlon - Coastal Surf

In between and not so pretty! LOL Updated art, Pinky to Index finger: China Glaze Luxe & Lush, Sally Hansen - White On, China Glaze - Liquid Leather, NYC - Spring Street, Sally Hansen - White On & China Glaze - Fairy Dust

Finished!

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!

Pointillism... not just for canvas!!!

I love all things art!  I love all things rainbow!  I love all things mani!  Put them all together and you get my attempt at a really artistic nail design.  After several hours spent trying to get a stamp mani done that I liked, I gave up and just started playing with polish.  It's nail play time like this that I usually do some of my best manicures.  I knew I wanted to do something super interesting and something using a rainbow color set.  I started by choosing my polish palette.  This is by far largest number of polishes that I have used on one mani to this date.

From Left to Right: OPI - An Affair in Red Square; Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear - Sun Kissed; Ulta - Sun-Sational; Sinful Colors - HD Nails; China Glaze - Sexy in the City; Wet n Wild FastDry - Buffy the Violet Slayer; Sinful Colors - Snow Me White.  I also used my MASH Dotting Tool Set.

This mani evolved by accident ... I was chatting with E via Skype all the while dotting away.  I think my husband and I even went to grab dinner in the middle of the process!  At any rate, I think what I came up with was pretty cool though! (excuse the shiny shiny cuticles lol I forgot I had oiled up when I took the pics)

So, there ya have it, my attempt at a pointillism mani.  I don't think it will be my last!