NOTD: Mosaic Snowflales

This is the manicure I did as part of the Let it Snow collaboration on YouTube back on the 5th.  If you'd like to see some of the other amazing entries, check out my Let it Snow Playlist HERE.

I kind of knew everyone would expect a marble from me, so I wanted to do something completely different.  I stumped myself until I decided to play around with some small sequins.  I couldn't remember exactly where I got them but I went back to look & finally figured out I'm pretty sure they're part of the 10 wheel Bundle Monster rhinestones from Amazon.  The black base color is L'Oreal Raven's Strength.  I was really, really happy with this manicure, the sequins give such a different look in different lights:

The only thing I would change, in retrospect, is that I would have put 4 points on my index finger, and I think it would have been a bit more balanced than it was with only 3.  Relatively minor in the grand scheme of things LOL.

Here's the tutorial:

And here are a few shots of my experimenting, trying to figure out what exactly I was going to do with the sequins & if I wanted to include any rhinestones or glitter polish over the black base:

Thanks for reading =)

~Colette

Test Skittles for Nihrida

Well, I wasn't going to post these up because they're far from my best work, no topcoat & a few of them pretty smeary and/or crooked, but Nihrida commented that she'd like to see Love 'em Leave 'em with some Konad, so here we go:

 

 

 

I was doing another Konad for my aunt on New Year's Day, and since I was taking this off soon I just did some random french tips on one hand & some random full-nail designs on the other to show her some of my other plates.  Hope you like Nihrida =)

 

Thanks for reading.

 

~Colette

2 Quick Things

Just a quick post because I'm almost done with my tutorial but I want it to have it's very own separate post. Here's the vampy french in the sun:

And here are the test skittles that I did over it - green is Misa Toxic Seduction, the dark red is Color Club Slow Jam:

I don't think I'm going to use any of those exact combinations, but I haven't quite decides what I am going to do.

Thanks for reading.

~Colette

5 Excellent Things

Thursday, I finally got some pics of L8r G8r in the sun. It was hard to part with, but at least I got these before I took it off (this starts us off with Excellent Thing #1 - a holo in the sun):

Then, today (well, it's after midnight so I guess yesterday if you want to get technical) has, seriously, been an awesome day. I really don't think a single thing went wrong, and so many things went right! Starting with the mani I wore today & did last night (Excellent Thing #2 - a fresh mani).

I really wanted to do some fabulous Konad. I've seen plate m73 used recently on a couple of blogs, over at The Nailphile & La passion des ongles, so I decided to try out the cascading squares pattern with some (very messy) test skittles. Unfortunately, none of these combos were quite what I was looking for:

Another day I might have gone with one of those, but I ended up going through my unworns, looking for ... something. I really wasn't sure - until I found it. Savvy Golden Mauve, which I decided to Konad with China Glaze Passion & plate m36. This dusty mauve has a great golden shimmer, click to enlarge & check it out =) This is 2 coats of polish w/ Seche:

This really turned out well & although I certainly do love some bling on my nails, this subdued mani kept me smiling all day. Among other things - I had to work late Tues & Wed to get caught up after the holiday, but that meant I got to leave early today - at 12:30! & on a sunny gorgeous day also (Excellent Thing #3 - leaving work early for any reason).

As if I wasn't already having a great enough day, I totally lucked out at Big Lots! Which just goes to show they're always getting new stuff, since it had only been about a week since I went to this one. They didn't have a lot of these, but more of a selection than usual. Revlon Sweet Nothings & Dark Pleasures:

Right to left: Satin Sheets(720), Barely Blush(730), Rendez-Blue(745), Scarlet Letter(790), Talk Dirty(780), Midnight Affair(785), Steel-etto(800). Going from the way these are numbered, there must be some in the middle there, so I'm going to try & hit the other Big Lots again tomorrow & look for them. I also picked up some star-shaped glitter at the Dollar Tree next door to the Big Lots, but it's being too reflecting to cooperate taking a pic, so you'll just have to take my word. One bag of multicolored, one bag of silver & gold. (Excellent Thing #4 - a cheap polish haul)

Which brings us finally to Excellent Thing #5 - FREE STUFF

I got home from my grandparent's & checked the mail & almost tripped over a medium sized box on the front steps. I didn't remember placing any orders lately ... what could this be? I had totally forgotten that I requested one of the "limited number of samples available upon request" until I saw the return label - & I've got to give a huge thanks to Lisa Cocuzza of It's a Glam Thing for the opportunity to try & review this Hana Salon Mini Ceramic Flat Iron & Shine Shield hair serum:

Is that cool or what! I hope I'll have time to review it this weekend, but I've got a lot of other catching up to do, so I'm not going to make any promises (like I broke last time...). I know I've also talked about some things recently that I intended to post up that I haven't & honestly I haven't forgotten, I just haven't gotten around to everything yet. But I have no plans this weekend aside from a trip to the library, so hopefully I'll be able to get caught up with:

• Review of the Hana ceramic flat iron
• Review & comparison of the Mary Kay Satin Hands Sets
• I'm very behind on my Books List - even when I don't have much free time, I still go through a lot of books just from reading at work
• New NOTD & TOTD this weekend. I really like this mauve but I've got a couple chips already. I don't know if I was a particular klutz or what I did, but it's bugging me. And I'm sick of my toes being so freaking bright; I think I'm going to paint them dark again.

Thanks for reading =)

~Colette

Test Skittles & Stuff

So, I had a few ideas of what I wanted to do with my nails next, but I wasn't sure how they'd turn out ... so I did some test skittles over my existing mani & after being severely dissapointed I am now clueless what I'm going to do. These are so ugly I almost did not post them, but I figured hey, share the learning experience. Let me show you my dissapointment ... but first let me give a general disclaimer that these are all very sloppy, both on the base color application & the Konad. I didn't do any cleanup since it's obviously coming right off.

Right to left colors are: Push Upon It (Konaded with FL & DP both in the tip pattern), Dreamy Purple (with PUI (top) & FL(bottom)) & Forbidden Lust (with PUI & DP):

Which turned out crappy enough, but after top coat, which I hoped might help, I thought they were all actually worse, barely visible at all!:

Here we have DP (with Devotion & special Silver) & FL (with Passion). Wasn't horribly enthused with any of these combos either:


So, that all kind of bummed me out ... which came after a lot of bum-outs at work today. The main issue was power went out at work ... we were running on the backup generator ... and then something else broke & half of what was still working quit, including my computer. The boss said I could go home after I finished my stuff that didn't need a computer, mostly filing ... but just as I was finishing, she came with the "good news" that she'd found a computer I could work on, someone who was out of the office. But! I buried my sorrow in a brownie-cookie:

Brownie cookies were, ironically enough, brought in by her husband, who also works in a bakery. If you've never had one of these before, it's just what it sounds like - brownie+cookie = brownie cookie. Chewy, chocolatey, yummy-y.

Also, one last thing for this post: My Nails Look Like ... my friend Sam's sweater:

So, that was my day. Well, in reverse order, since I found the MNLL this morning & the test skittles just happened.

Now off to remove the horrible test skittles & pick a new color ... I think something totally different until I get over my irritation with these shades. Thanks for reading.

~Colette