Pure Ice Heartbreaker over Nicole by OPI The Grape Debate

Happy Sunday everyone! Hope you are all having a nice, relaxing day and not being forced to watch football like I am (unless, of course, you enjoy that sort of thing). Anyways, today I have for you a manicure that I have done many times because it is so awesome.

Pure Ice Heartbreaker may be one of my top 25 polishes of all time. It is a green microshimmer in a sheer blue base. Slap Heartbreaker over pretty much any polish, you've got something amazing. The idea for this particular manicure came to me because I wanted to combine my two favorite colors in a manicure - green and purple. I thought that the green shimmer in Heartbreaker would make an interesting contrast with the dark grape color of The Grape Debate, and man did it ever!

I'm not too crazy on the formula of NOPI The Grape Debate, but it's the only color I have like this so I just kept on trucking. As always, Pure Ice Heartbreaker was a dream to apply and I had no problems with it whatsoever. I put a coat of Seche Vite over everything and I was good to go!

These first few pictures are outdoors, then the rest are all indoors with flash to show the awesome sparkle that Heartbreaker gives to this manicure. Enjoy!

Thanks for stopping by!

Rescue Beauty Lounge No More War - Swatches and Review

Good afternoon my lovelies! Today I have for you my very first RBL polish for you. I ordered in October from the BiB pre-order and ended up ordering 8 polishes! Now, for those of you not yet in the know, Rescue Beauty Lounge is a boutique polish company whose polishes are highly coveted in the nail world. Most of their polishes are limited edition, meaning that once they are sold out they are gone forever. Or, until Bring it Back comes around. Bring it Back is when RBL fans (or ReBeLs, as they are called on Facebook) vote on which colors they would like to see available for sale again.

No More War is still available for sale, and as far as I know has not sold out yet. It is one of those ugly-pretty colors that I just love so much! It is a murky, brown-leaning olive green cream. In some lights the green sticks out more, and in some lights (such as direct sunlight) the brown undertones really shine. I just LOVE this color. I have tons of olive/army greens in my stash, and not one has the baby-poop undertones that No More War has. There's probably some of you out there who are thinking "FUG, would never wear such a color," but I can't get enough of those baby poop colors.

As far as the formula goes, I wasn't in love. I know, I know, there's people out there that would swear up and down that RBL has the best polish formula out there. But for me, it was a bit too thick. It was kind of hard to get even, thin coats. Out of the bottle, I would have guessed that it was a 3-coater, but during application, the polish was so thick that 2 coats were enough. I do have to say that it was incredibly self-leveling, which meant that it there were no visible bumps due to the thickness.

Overall, after trying only one RBL polish, I'm still not convinced that the forumla is all that it's cracked up to be. However, I adore this color so I'll keep it in my stash and give all my other RBLs a chance to wow me with their formula.

Here is No More War, 2 coats, with topcoat, in various outdoor lighting conditions.

Thanks for stopping by!

Sally Hansen Arabian Night

Hello my lovely readers! Those who know me may know that I have a penchant for old, vintage polishes. The older it is, the better it is in my opinion - especially if it is a drugstore brand. Sure, I enjoy vintage OPI polishes just as much as the next girl but if I come across an old Maybelline or Cover Girl polish then I get pretty damn excited. I think it's because these aged drugstore polishes remind me of my childhood. I had SO MUCH awesome nail polish as a kid, which sadly, I eventually threw out because I did not know the wonders of nail polish thinner. I weep a little thinking of all those old Hard Candy, Urban Decay and Sally Hansen polishes that went to waste.

So today, I have for you an old-ish Sally Hansen polish. It is from their now-discontinued Salon line and it is called Arabian Night. Arabian Night is one of my most favorite polishes that I own. It is from 2008, so it's really not THAT old (heck, I have polishes in my stash that are nearly as old as I am) but since it's from a discontinued line, I like to lump it together with my old polish collection.

Arabian Night is a STUNNING deep blue-based purple with amazing golden shimmer throughout. In some lights, the shimmer even has a pink tinge to it. Ack! It's amazing! Application was very straightforward; two coats and I was good to go. It's one of those "hidden shimmer" polishes that I love so very much. When you are looking at it from far away, it just looks like a nice deep purple color, but once you're up close you can see the amazing golden shimmer in there.

So here she is, Sally Hansen Arabian Night. Hope you enjoy! (Oh, and please excuse the nasty gash on my ring finger!)

Have a fantastic Friday everyone!

Pink Wednesday: NYX Girls Kinky Pink

Hi everyone! I promised you that I would be back, and here I am. Just wanted to throw out a quick Pink Wednesday post today. Again, I apologize for my absence and I hope to be blogging back to full swing here very shortly.

My pictures today are quick, not cropped or edited and show the absolute disarray my nails and cuticles are in at the moment. My cuticles are dry and unmoisturized and my poor nails are all in different shapes. They are really in need of some TLC, that's for sure!

Today I decided on Kinky Pink from my last NYX Girls order. I love this polish! It is a hot pink shimmer with blue and gold glass flecks throughout. It took a good three coats to reach opacity (and cover the stains that my last blue polish left me with) but it was pretty easy to do thin coats so no problems with bubbling or anything like that. Overall, a pretty smooth application.

The glass fleck is very subtle, and lends the hot pink just a bit of a silvery-blue sheen, depending on the light. I couldn't capture the blue flash very well in the pictures, but rest assured that it is there.

So here she is! It started raining when I was taking the pictures, so that is why you see the occasional water droplet in them =)

I appreciate you all coming back and visiting after my hiatus! Nothing crazy has been going on, just school and life have been super busy lately =) See you all again soon!

-Jacqui

I'm still here, I promise!

Hello all my lovely readers! Before I hit the hay tonight, just wanted to let you all know that YES, I AM ALIVE! Things have been crazy busy lately but are starting to wind down and go back to normal again so expect some new posts very, very soon! I apologize for slacking on the blogging lately. Forgive me?

Xoxo

Lynnderella She Lived in a Swamp over Wet n Wild Jungle Fever

Hi everyone! So sorry that it has been so long since my last post. Had a few midterms and papers due this week so I was pretty swamped with schoolwork. I have more midterms next week and the following week (ugh) but since it is the weekend I have some free time to share with you my latest nail of the day!

I started out with two coats of Jungle Fever, yet another polish from the extremely hard-to-find Wet n Wild On the Prowl Collection. Jungle Fever is a pretty yellow leaning olive green-ish foil with a tiny bit of brush strokes showing through. It was pretty thick and runny, so it was a bit of a PITA to apply. Thank goodness for my handy dandy clean up brush! Despite it's annoying application, it's a very pretty color and will safely reside in my collection =)

Then I did two coats of Lynnderella She Lived in a Swamp over Jungle Fever. She Lived in a Swamp may have been my absolute favorite from the first Lynnderella batch that I ordered, but there's a slight flaw that is keeping it from that spot. Unfortunately, the bar glitter in this polish has begun to curl. I haven't had this problem with any of my other Lynnderellas, so hopefully this polish is the exception. She Lived in a Swap is an absolutely stunning mix of light green and dark green multi-sized hex, micro and bar glitter in a clear green base. If only it wasn't for those darn curling bar glitters!

Here is Jungle Fever with two coats of Lynnderella She Lived in a Swamp, one coat of Gelous, and one coat of Poshe quick dry topcoat. Sorry, these pictures aren't the best because I had to take these at night:

And here's Jungle Fever alone (2 coats):

She Lives in a Swamp is the last of the first batch of Lynnderellas that I ordered. I hope you guys aren't too sick of them though, because I have another batch that should be arriving any day now =) As I have said before, Lynnderella is truly a genius when it comes to making glitter polishes and I am so excited to finally be able to get my hands on them. You won't be disappointed when you see the rest of them!

Blood Splatter Manicure with Essie and Illamasqua

Hello everyone, happy Monday!! Today I'm continuing right along with my Halloween manicures. I did a manicure similar to this one at the beginning of summer for the True Blood season premiere. I was inspired by this:

Image Credit

In the spirit of Halloween, I decided to recreate this for you guys today. I can imagine several types of Halloween costumes that this manicure would be perfect for! To do this manicure, I used Jen @ The PolishAholic's awesome splatter tutorial here. Definitely check it out if you are feeling so inclined, it is a great, simple method to get the splatter effect on your nails.

I used two coats of Illamasqua Load for the base. Load is a funny color. It is a yellow-ivory-whitish creme. Usually, I'm a huge fan of Illamasqua polishes, but I had a bit of trouble with this one. It's pretty streaky and gloopy, pretty much like every other yellow or white polish out there. But, I don't have any other color like this in my stash so that is why I allow it to stick around. However, if anyone knows of an awesome yellowy-white out there that applies better than this one, please let me know!

For the blood splatters, I used Essie Bordeaux which is an awesome burgundy red jelly, a good match for a blood effect. To do the splatters, I would dip the end of a straw in nail polish and blow out the other end onto my nail. Very simple! Clean up was a bish with this, so please excuse my reddish cuticles. I think it just adds to the effect here though!

Enjoy!

See you all tomorrow for another Halloween NOTD!

-Jacqui =)