Meet Dude =)

Just a little fun in the snow:

 

 

I'd been trying to make a vid of Dude all week & he was not cooperating & didn't want to play - acting like it was too cold out, but now that we have snow he is all playful!

 

Thanks for reading.

~Colette

NOTD: Newspaper Nails - Round 1: QR Codes + Tutorial

I don't know how it got to be almost a week between posts.  I know I am having a bit of trouble getting back in the "groove" but I honestly didn't realize it was that long ... I'll never get actually caught back up at this rate LOL.

 

I've seen newspaper nails all over - and pretty much all trying too look like newspaper, with a light grey background &  newsprint that ends up being backwards on the nails.  I decided to go for a little bit of a different look & while I'm not 100% happy, they still turned out pretty cool.  Base color is Revlon Blue Lagoon:

 

My favorite was my left thumb, it got the clearest design.  I've had lots of helpful suggestions in the comments for the tutorial & I'll be giving it a 2nd go soon with some Chinese characters that I think will look really cool & not obviously backward even though of course they will be.

 

Here's the tutorial:

 

 

Upcoming posts include:  China Glaze Icicle with Bundle Monster stamping, China Glaze Reggae to Riches TOTD, a couple manis (a fail & the mani I actually wore) using Sally Hansen Lady Luck & Butter London The Black Knight, Icing Thunderstorm on Mom's nails, & maybe even the fruit tart vid if I have time to finish it =)  Thanks for reading.

 

~Colette

NOTD: Anise Pearls for the Devil

This almost got one of my "evolution" titles, but I think that requires at least 3 versions of the mani, and this was only 2.  I'm impressed so far with this Anise brand, which as I mentioned I picked up at DSW - & if you're wondering if I went to DSW & left with no shoes, I did buy some but my shoe hauls lately have all been incorporated into my vlogs on my other blog, if your interested =)

Anise Pearls for the Devil is very dark & does come off as almost black in many lights, but a closer look shows purple & turquoise layered over the dark grey base.  I love vampy colors so no surprise I guess that I liked it on its own:

After a day or two I decided to stamp it up - I used China Glaze IDK & Bundle Monster image plate bm224.  This is an interesting, kind of snake-skin pattern, and I switched it up a bit between my two hands.  left hand the end with the smaller scales is matched to itself, right hand the end with the larger scales is matched to itself - and on my thumbs the design is stamped sideways, again opposite sides on the different hands.  Hope all that makes sense LOL but you can see the different look that it makes depending on how you double-stamp.  My favorite placement is my thumbs:

Didn't get as much catching up done as I wanted this weekend, but that's pretty par for the course I think LOL.  I'm going to try & post a few more things today & get closer to current =)  Thanks for reading.

~Colette

Meet Frisky =)

Well, I think most of you have already met her on the blog, but I've been getting a lot of requests on YouTube.  I'm telling you, that evil little inclination to name this vid something naughty - I'll let you use your own imaginations - was strong, but I kept it G-rated:

 

 

Maybe Dude will get a vid next =)  Thanks for reading.

~Colette

Early Christmas Haul ... And A Rant on Video Formats

The rant has to come first.  Because I have been SO PISSED OFF for like 3 days.  Partly I can only blame myself, but mainly I'm blaming Canon & Microsoft.

 

SO - I did just enough research, in looking into my new camera, to know that it shot videos in a different format than my old camera, and that Movie Maker does not support that format.  OK, so I'll have to switch to a new program, Live Movie Maker was supposed to support it.  SUPPOSED TO.  So I shoot, not one or even two but three different vids - a tutorial, a haul & a vlog - & I download Live Movie Maker ... and then, THEN I find the ugly truth:  If you can actually get it to work with .mov files, you have serious luck & have won the codec lottery.

 

Everywhere I look online are people having the same problems.  First it imports the video but I get no sound.  I updated my codec pack, and then I get nothing!  No sound OR video.  So I try converting it using my normal video converter - one format was half-crap with the sound unsynced, the other was total crap quality although the sound mostly matched.  WTF.  Canon, why would you do this to me & everyone else who's not running a Mac that will actually accept this format without a fight?

 

Eventually, after digging around online & searching forums, I found a work-around solution.  Turns out ZoomBrowser - which is Canon's software - actually has a feature I never had cause to use before, and can convert .mov's to .avi's.  After my first attempt I wasn't to optimistic but I gave it a try with crossed fingers.  Wonder of wonders it mercifully worked.  However, I thought I'd then be able to use them in trusty old Movie Maker - nope.  Denied.  So I still had to learn Live Movie Maker. 

 

I still hate it so far - it's all icons & no real (apparently now "old-school") drop-down menus, much like Office 2010.  But I managed to fumble my way through editing this haul vid together.  I hope you guys like it because it's made of blood & sweat & tears!  I'm still not 100% happy with how the quality ended up after conversion, and I'm still working on lighting & stuff, but ... here's my first vid with the new camera (I do recommend checking it out actually on YT if you can since the widescreen is a bit more of a smoosh than the 4:3 was):

 

 

 

On to the bottle pics - like last time, I didn't try to keep every shopping trip separate for the pics, I just sorted them out by brand.  First up are these gorgeous Sally Hansen Gem Crush glitters, several of which look like dupes to my eye for colors in the China Glaze Eye Candy collection:

 

Top row:  Showgirl Chic, Cha-Ching, Big Money, Bling-tastic (Best polish name EVAR!  You guys know that's my word LOL)  Bottom row:  Glitz Gal, Lady Luck, Razzle Dazzler, Be-Jeweled.

 

On to the China Glaze - as a side note, I don't remember if I mention in the vid but I only found the Eye Candy collection at one Ulta, so it may be more widely available now, or you may have to search it out:

 

Top row, from the Let it Snow collection:  Glittering Garland, Ring in the Red, Blue Year's Eve, Tinsel Town, Icicle.  Bottom row:  Marry a Millionaire & Some Like it Haute (from the Eye Candy collection) & CG in the City (from the Metro collection).

 

Next OPI:

 

Top row, from the Muppets collection:  Gettin' Miss Piggy With It, Designer ... De Better!, Warm & Fozzie.  Bottom row, from Ulta's selection of colors that are being discontinued:  Ali's Big Break & Gargantuan Green Grape Matte.

 

From the Color Club Scent-suos collection, that I was shocked to find at Sallys:

 

 

Orna-minted, Kiss Me Mistletoe, Sugar Plum Yum.

 

One lonely Orly, from the Holiday Soiree collection:

 

 

Androgynie.

 

L'Oreal, from the Birds of a Feather displays:

 

 

Raven's Strength & Amazon's Flash.

 

Butter London, from the absurd Dressing Table box set ... I tried, I  really did, to resist - I left them behind once but the second time I just gave in to the contrast of dark & light blings:

 

 

The Black Knight & Tart With a Heart.

 

Elf - there was another set of 5 at Big Lots, but the colors were more boring to me than these:

 

 

Blue Mist, Purple Pleaser, Lilac, Fuchsia, Mango Madness.

 

And finally the Revlons:

 

 

Carbonite, Silver (which is not ... it's seriously just grey) & Pink Again.

 

So, I'm all set for a while I think ... until I give in to that urge for more magnetic polish, hmmm... =)

 

As a side note, huge wide screen vids take eons to upload.  I prepped most of this before bed, but the vid took like 3 hours so that's why it's getting posted in the morning before work.  I'm really hoping we're in good enough shape I won't have to do 10 hours today - if I get home at a reasonable hour, I'll be catching up my posts &, if you people would like, posting the tut for the manicure I'm wearing in the haul vid.  Thanks for reading

 

~Colette