Saturday Mini-Challenge: Cling-Wrap Mani

Hey everyone! Happy weekend! I'm so so so glad that it's the weekend, work has been nuts lately and I love my breaks on the weekends now.

Anywho, a few of my twitter buds and I decided to challenge ourselves to do a cling wrap mani... just once. My fellow challengers are Nicole, Wes, and Fitzy. It's a one-time challenge - right up my alley! haha! I've never actually done one before this so I was having a lot of trouble deciding what color combination to do... and then I had an epiphany. ALL THE COLORS!

Magnetic Radiant Red, Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure Shrimply Devine, OPI Atomic Orange, Zoya Pippa, Essence Bashful, Essence Sleepy, A-England Tristam, Color Club Pucci-licious

I heard that putting dark colors over light worked best and it just so happened all my light and dark colors alternated so I could do every other for my base coat. We have Sally Hansen Shrimply Devine, Zoya Pippa, Essence Sleepy, and Color Club Pucci-licious as my base colors:

I waited for them to dry (a tough feat since I'm impatient). I only did one coat even though they have some bald spots because I knew they'd get covered up :) Then I added the remaining colors (Magnetic Radiant Red, OPI Atomic Orange, Essence Bashful, and A-England Tristam) on top, and used the Saran wrap to dab it away while it was still wet.

 

Here are a close up of the nails I liked better:

There you have it - I managed to use all of the colors of the rainbow. Even indigo! (Which after intense twitter debate, it was discovered can be one of 4 shades and I just chose the darker blue version of the definition.) I really like this method and I loved the results! The Magnetic brand one is a scattered holo and it came out really pretty, it kind of looks like the glitter crackles earlier this year.

Anyway, HOOOOOOOOLYYYYYYYYYY chattiness this post. Sorry about that! Kudos if you made it through and I hope you enjoyed ;)

xoxo,
Amanda

A-England Lady of the Lake

Hello! I'm back, back again, Shady's back, tell a friend... sorry for the earworm. I had to! When it came time to go back to work, I needed a slow transition back from glitterbombs to work appropriate. My job doesn't have a work appropriate rule per se, but as someone's therapist I'd feel strange having super glitterbomb nails, especially since they usually think I'm in high school anyway... Okay, back on topic.

I decided to go for A-England Lady of the Lake for my back-to-work polish. It's a gorgeous deep purple with subtle holographic sparkle to it. Even without the sparkle, it'd be gorgeous but it felt a little rebellious to have some holo in there somewhere ;) Below is two easy coats, no topcoat yet (so shiny!).

Natural light



Flash

 Sorry for the lack of sunlight pictures lately. Unfortunately, there hasn't been much sun! I'm thinking of making a light box but those of you who talk to me on twitter might have caught on that I unfortunately still live at home so I'm working with one 14'x11' room, which is barely holding all my stuff in it anyway, nevermind a lightbox and good lighting. So for now, this is what you get :(

Also, excuse the messy cleanup, I think I was a little too excited about this one. Sigh.  I hope you liked Lady anyway!

xoxo,
Amanda

Work Inappropriate #7: A-England Merlin

Hey there, how's everyone doing? This is my last Work Inappropriate polish :( After this one, it was back to work for me. I thought I'd go out with a bang, so I ended with A-England Merlin.

Let me first, again, gush about how much I love A-England. Adina is the most spectacular person and she interacts with her customers, she makes a great product, and now she offers worldwide free shipping. She makes a great polish and she does it with class and a genuine love for what she does, which really shows. Oh, and she has this adorable kitten Tristam who is the cutest thing ever. (Shh, don't tell my grown-up cats I said that.)

Below you will see Merlin, which is a silver glitter polish (duh) that can be built up to be worn alone. I can't really see this as a topcoat, it's much too dense and I like it that way. This is three coats and some fast dry topcoat because it dried to a slightly gritty texture.



Here's a close up for texture purposes. You can see, it's a little Grit-ney Spears, but no biggie ;)

 I enjoyed wearing this one. I felt very regal the whole time I wore it, thinking of knights and queens and chivalry. :) Thoughts?

Some More Hauls

Hi ladies! Do you guys like seeing haul posts? I post them pretty often but I'm just wondering if they are of interest or if it's better if I just stick to manis and swatches.


These are bottle pics then the quick and dirty swatches immediately below them in the same order.

I got these five mini glitters from etsy from a seller called Windestine. These were $8 including shipping and definitely worth it!

Above and below: Summer Love, Sunset Glow, Fireworks, Surf's Up, Pansy (one coat of each over a nail wheel painted half white, half black - to show them over both conceivable options)

Then, I finally ordered from a-England! I must say, this company is amazing! Adina is an incredibly kind person who takes an interest in her fans, and I'm definitely glad to support anybody like that. She's announced recently worldwide shipping is now free indefinitely! So go take advantage!

Above and below: Lady of the Lake, Tristam, and Merlin (two coats each)

And now.... drumroll please! Wet n Wild On the Prowl! (Confession: no, I didn't actually find these. It didn't look good for my area since we never get limited edition products, so I bought these off eBay)

Above and below: Ink Well, Buy Me a Drink, Ready to Pounce, Jungle Fever (one coat each)

And the glitters...

Above and below: Cougar Attack, Behind Closed Doors, Correction Tape, Tangled in My Web (one coat each)

And finally (for today) I ordered from Cult Nails when she had her Labor Day sale. Shipping was SO FAST. I ordered Friday and had them Tuesday, on a holiday weekend! Wow!

Above and below: Living Water, Let Me Fly, Awakening, and Iconic (two coats each)

 So, that's all for today! I'm still waiting on my Models Own order, which is annoying because a) I placed the order on August 23rd and they confirmed it then on the 28th told me I had to re-do it and b) because it's shipping from the same place as a-England, yet I got a-England a few days ago and they shipped days after Models Own. Hmph!

Which of these would you like to see as a mani, in a different combination, etc.?

xoxo,
Amanda