Vote for me!

Hi everyone! A bit of a different post today. Have you all heard of Lex Cosmetics? Well, if you haven't, Lex is the owner who founded this company on the basis that we should get to make our own colors. So, you can submit colors you want to see, name them, describe them, and then she sets up a poll. The one with the most votes gets created! Best of all, each color that is created is associated with a charity, and a dollar of the sales of that color go to that charity. Awesome, right?!

Well, yours truly submitted a color back in the day and it's up for voting! It's inspired by my mother, just after I made that post dedicated to her in February. It's called Tuilleries, and I would love it if you would all vote! Currently, I'm in second place, but I only need about 75 votes to catch up to first place. You can vote once per computer, so vote on as many electronics as you can ;)

Oh, you need the link? To vote for Tuilleries? :) So please, vote for my color, post this on your blog if you have one, tweet it, whatever... help me win, please?

xoxo,
Amanda

Vacation Nails: Sally Hansen Don't Get Catty

Hi ladies! I'm back from vacation :( I took a cruise to Bermuda with my boyfriend and it was absolutely incredible. Do you want pictures? Well, okay... if I have to. But first - vacation nails!

As I mentioned before, I knew I would be busy and painting my nails wouldn't really be an option. So I decided to try the Sally Hansen Nail Effects stickers because they are supposedly able to last up to 10 days, and I really wanted to do either zebra or glitter. Well, zebra was sold out, and the glitter looked like it wasn't very opaque, so I decided on Don't Get Catty, one of their new ones - a hot pink cheetah print.

Application was pretty easy, although I must say you have to have a very steady hand to do it - which I did not. I decided to do them on the train ride to the cruise terminal, so application isn't perfect, folks. But they still came out very nice and extremely shiny!

But then, as all these sad stories go, tragedy hit. In the form of lots and lots and lots of salt water. The pool on our ship was salt water, and I was in it often to fight sea sickness (quick side note: when on a cruise ship and sea sick, it may seem funny to go in the pool, BUT the pool flows with the motion of the boat and makes it feel like natural waves in the ocean, which soothed my sea sickness! Hooray!). Then, I was on an island, which some of you may be aware, is surrounded by salt water. So the nails were forced to take some wear and tear:

Here they are on day four or five, I believe. Not too bad, actually! Some chips, some tip wear, the shine is dulled, but overall, they held up well. I wore them until the second to last day of the cruise - but then they were chipping, peeling, and very dull. I hadn't brought any polish and the only topcoat I had was runny and sticky and unhelpful. So, I've had naked nails for about 3 days now (gasp!). Tomorrow morning I'll put some polish on, but for now they will remain naked or they will be covered in sheet marks.

Now on to the real show: Bermuda. Please respect the fact that I took these pictures and they are not stock or officially copyrighted, but please do not steal them for your own use without giving credit. Thanks!

 View of the ocean and reefs taken from the bus window.

 Horseshoe Bay Beach - ranked in the top 5 best beaches in the world.

 View from a boat of the coat and the famous pastel houses.

 View from a boat of an inlet.

 More pastel homes.

So what do you ladies think of the nails or of Bermuda?! The cruise was an absolute blast - so relaxing and so fun. I'd definitely recommend Bermuda. Very friendly locals, beautiful beaches, lots of stuff to do. But now I must go, as I have just gotten home and already my computer desk greeted me with the largest spider my room has ever seen. Goodnight!

Graduation nails

Hi ladies! Life has continued to be a little busy... for a number of reasons. I still had to finish hours for my practicum placement, then I started transitioning to an employee (started getting paid Monday!), I had graduation, and next week, I leave for BERMUDA! So life has been a lot of planning, packing, re-planning, running around, and generally going through the stages of becoming a grown-up. But I'm not going to let this blog die, don't you worry!

For graduation, I really wanted a nude, neutral color because I didn't want my nails to look crazy and unprofessional in the pictures. I searched through my many (correction: three) nudes and was unimpressed. But then I had an epiphany! A nude holo I purchased on a whim when I fell in love with Color Club's holos! And so my graduation mani was born: Color Club Love 'Em/Leave 'Em:

This was two coats with no top coat. To say Color Club does a nice holo would be an understatement. I'm afraid if anyone had noticed the holo (it was cloudy on my graduation) they would have stolen the show ;) Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating. But seriously, this was a gorgeous color and I don't know why I procrastinated so long. I thought it would be boring, but it was really beautiful and totally work-appropriate. Definitely scoop up a bottle of this if you haven't already: it's a great way to made nudes not so boring but still appropriate.

And next is my current mani, which is Bermuda inspired to get me through the rest of this week. This is Sally Hansen Sun Kissed, which could have also been called "Nickelodeon orange". I love it anyway!

Application was a little tough: bald spots, thin areas, the brush kept leaving brush strokes in the polish, but this is about 3-4 coats with Seche Vite and it looks great! I'm a little wary of it being very work-appropriate but... I'm leaving on vacation on Sunday, who cares?!

So what do you ladies think? Was Love 'Em/Leave 'Em the best pick for graduation? What would you have chosen? For Bermuda, I'm planning to try out those Sally Hansen nail sticker thingys, since they supposedly last up to 10 days and I don't want to bring my stash of polishes with me on my trip. So you're either going to have a very favorable or very negative review of those (either way, I'm bringing nail polish remover... just in case).

xoxo,
Amanda

I'm baaaaack!

Hello again! I'm back (again) with my tail between my legs... but I have good news! Those expensive little letters that go after my name are finally here! That's right - I'm all done with school!! :) Unfortunately, now I'll be entering the work world as a therapist and taking my licensure exam, so life is still going to be busy... but much less so. This also means my nails may be a little more boring work-friendly for the most part. But enough about me, how have you lovelies been?!? Any requests, anything you've been missing here or on other blogs that I can help with? Anyway, on to the NOTDS!

Here's Zoya Gloria, which is a nice, almost glass-flecked red polish. I'm not a HUGE red polish fan, but this one was nice and applied well.

Here's China Glaze's Tronica High Def. This reminded me so much of blue jeans, but I did like it. I definitely noticed the holo in this one, even though lots of people with the older holo collections said it wasn't too noticeable. Maybe since I don't have those, it doesn't seem so disappointing haha.

And finally, here's Sinful Colors Mint Candy Apple. This was a gift from my friend Sarah, so if she's reading this - hello! This one was a nice, springy color. I had trouble deciding if it was baby blue or green in some lights. Application was pretty good, although the formula was iffy on whether it would apply thin or too gloopy. Some of my nails are one or two coats, others are four.

So, thanks for sticking by me! If you read this, shoot me a comment! I read them all and will reply to you as soon as I read it. And, if you like what you read, share my blog with a friend - the more followers I have, the more readers I have, the more I'll want to post and I'll start doing giveaways :) Also, vote in my poll to the right: are you for or against pedis of the day?

xoxo,
Amanda