Blue Ombre Nails

I've seen lots of photos of ombre manicures. Maybe this isn't a TRUE ombre since I didn't just use different shades of the same color, but I like how it turned out!

The colors I used for this one were Essie Go Overboard, Revlon Chic, Ulta Bam-blue-zled, China Glaze For Audrey, and a light blue Petites polish I picked up specifically for this.

Go Overboard and Chic are two of my favorite polishes in my collection, so it's always nice to get a chance to wear them!

Blue Water Marble

I recently did my second water marble, and I tried out some blues!  This time I got some distilled water to use instead of the bottled water, and I felt like it made a huge difference with getting the polishes to spread better.  I have had a lot of trouble getting those nice loopy shapes that show up in most water marbles, and I had a better time this time.  Here it is!

 

My thumbs turned out two of my favorites, nice loopies!  But I still wasn't getting as many rings of color as I would have liked, so the sections of color are thicker than I would have liked.

For the base, I used Ulta Bam-blue-zled. The colors I used for the marble were Bam-blue-zled, Pure Ice Oh, Baby!, Pure Ice All Night Long, Ulta Dance Teal Dawn, and Ulta Alter Ego.

Zoya Bevin

Today I have some good old fashioned swatches for you. Zoya Bevin was on my wishlist for a while, and I finally picked it up last month.  It's a super pretty kind of minty/dusty green.

 

Love it!

Bottle Spam!

Sorry for the sudden absence from this blog!  I got to the end of my scheduled posts and then I got sick and had bare nails for over a week because I had to blow my nose every 5 minutes and couldn't have wet nails!  It was crazy.  So, I have some fun stuff coming up that I've been wearing and hopefully that will get me back on my regular schedule! 

Today I have some fabulous bottle spam... stuff I've gotten recently!  I got my hair cut last week at Hairmasters, and the location I went to had a bunch of OPI polishes 60% off AND buy 1 get 2 free... what?!  How could I resist?  I got Skull & Glossbones, I'm Suzi & I'm a Chocoholic, and Jade is the New Black.  I didn't have any idea it would happen, but I am in LOVE with Skull & Glossbones!  I will have some swatches of that coming up.

 

The other day I was in Big Lots and decided to check out the beauty section for polishes, and they had a whole bunch of two packs of Revlon polishes including the glittery scented polishes.  I got Grapefruit Fizz, Colada Fizz, Pineapple Fizz, and Apple-tini Fizz.  Each pack of 2 was only $2!

 

Lastly, I picked up one of the polishes from my wishlist - Zoya Ki.  Look how pretty that duochrome is!  And a boring old white from L.A. Colors since I didn't have one.

I was also shopping at Fred Meyer the other day and started looking at the Essence display there.  I did not have any Essence polishes, but I have heard they're not bad.  Then I realized that they have a bunch of nail art stuff.  It's super cheap, and I haven't really had a chance to try it out, but I thought it might let me see what things are like even if it doesn't work as well as the really quality stuff.

I picked up a gem-placer/dotting tool, a magnetic polish and magnet, two stamping plates and a stamp, and some stencil stickers with stars.  I'll post more about these as I use them!

 

In closing, here is a random shot of my polishes where I keep them now... I may need a new system soon, it's not very organized and the bins are getting full!

 

Ice Queen Glitter

Just a quick one today, I'm about to hop in the shower then head down to Seattle for a (hopefully mostly dry) visit to the zoo with friends.  Spring Break!  So, today I have some shots of Sally Hansen Ice Queen glitter.  It's a clear base with large silver and turquoise glitter and small silver and holo microglitter.  It looks really pretty in the bottle, but I found when I put it on my nails it was more sparse than I would have liked.  Here I have it layered over Pure Ice Silver Mercedes.  It's pretty, but less impressive than I originally hoped.  

Nubar 2010

I'm not sure where I first saw Nubar 2010, but as soon as I saw it I knew I HAD to have it.  I added it to my wish list, and the next time I ordered from Amazon I added it to my cart.

I was so excited when it arrived!  The first time I wore it, I put it on over a deepish red - Sally Hansen No Chip 10  Day Color in Endless Claret.  I was slightly disappointed by my choice at first because the Nubar didn't stand out as much as I'd hoped.  But when I went out in the sunlight the next day, it popped!

Love!

The second time I wore it I did a little Google search to look for ideas, and saw it over some blues and purples.  I decided to go with a really dark shimmery purple - OPI Russian Navy.

It really stood out!  I even got a shot of the range of colors - the flakes really morph between red, yellow, and green.

I recently wore it on it's own, which can also be cool for a bit of quick sparkle if you don't feel like doing a whole manicure.

I love the look of flaky holos, and I am totally coveting the Finger Paints Special Effects Collection that came out in Winter of last year.