March 22, 2013

My First Frankenpolish!

You're probably saying hold on a second, you are the Lazy Laquerista.  Nothing about frankenpolish sounds lazy to me.  I have to go buy suspension base and pigments and solvent resistant glitter.  But  wait! What if you didn't have to do all that.  What if you just went to the store, picked out polishes with elements you like and mix them together.  Sounds too simple doesn't it, but it works!  I took a shimmery cream base and thinned it out with clear nail polish to make a more sheer jelly-like colour.  I then added sparkly polish that had micro teal glitter and sparkly polish that had small holograhic glitter.  Shook it all up and here's what I got.


Isn't it pretty?!?!  I'm so happy that my first attempt was this successful.   Here it is on my nails.  I did three coats.  It's so bright and blue! The sparkles really pop when it catches the light just right too.




Built in Sparkles for a Faux Jelly Sandwich Manicure

I love the look of jelly sandwich manicures.  Basically, sparkles encased in between two layers of a sheer jelly polish.  However, I don't always have time to sit there and apply like 4 different coats of polish and wait in between for them to dry a bit so that I don't smudge colours together. This is why I like Revlon Popular.
It is a sheer pink cream with small silver glitter and larger hex silver glitter built right in.  The sparkles remind me of OPI's Pirouette My Whistle.  In the picture about I did two coats on my nails and then a top coat.  (Please excuse my dry cuticles)!  While it still doesn't have quite as much depth as a true jelly sandwich manicure, I was able to do this whole thing in about 15 minutes including base coat, top coat and drying time.  One coat was a bit sheerer but still look great as well (no streaks!).


If pink isn't for you, Revlon Whimsical gives the same effect.  It is a sheer blue cream with multicolour pink and blue sparkles from the same collection.


March 14, 2013

Spongeless Glitter Gradient

Love glitter gradients?  Don't have tons of time to sponge on each layer or put individual sparkles in the perfect spots?  Here's a simple technique I figured out to avoid all that but still get great results.



What you will need:
  • An opaque cream polish
  • A sheer shimmery polish 
  • A glitter polish that contains multiple sizes of glitter.

I wanted a blue glitter gradient so I chose similar colours for all three polishes, you don't have to though if you want a multi-colour gradient.

Left to right I used OPI Ski Teal We Drop, OPI Austin-tatious Turquoise and China Glaze  Water you Waiting for.

Here I've done a single coat of each so you can get a sense of how opaque each of the polishes needs to be.


Step 1: Put on a base coat of your choice.  I like CND Super Stickey.

Step 2: Cover your entire nail with the opaque cream polish.  It took me two coats of OPI Ski Teal You Drop to get rid of the streaks.

Step 3: Put one coat of the sheer shimmery polish on the top 3/4 of your nail.

Step 4: Put one coat of the multi-sized glitter polish on the top half of your nail.

Step 5: Put one more coat of the multi-sized glitter polish on the top 1/4 of your nail.

Step 6: Put on a top coat of your choice.  I used CND Super Shiney.

And you're done!


March 02, 2013

I went on a shopping spree

I am a statistician by day and thus am good with numbers.  This, however is a downfall when shopping online due to wonderfully enticing combined shipping.  My logic goes something like, well, the more items I buy, the less the shipping cost per item is.  Therefore, but ALL the polish!  It's bad.  On their way to me are:
  • China Glaze Atlantis (which I have been lusting over)
  • China Glaze Skyscraper
  • China Glaze Below deck
  • OPI Cuckoo for this colour
  • OPI I have a herring problem
  • OPI Pamplona purple
  • OPI Road house blues
  • OPI I brake for manicures
  • OPI Suzi skis the pyrenees
  • OPI Teenage dream
  • OPI Divine swine
  • OPI Casino royale
  • OPI Metallic 4 life
  • OPI Pirouette my whistle
  • OPI Dutch ya just love OPI
That's 15 new colours to try!  I have a problem.  I can't wait to try them all out and show you the results.
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