One polish, three ways: Pahlish Pianos Filled With Flames

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I loved Pianos Filled With Flames by Pahlish so much, I ended up wearing it for several days. But since I can't leave well enough alone, I added something simple each day to satisfy my painting addiction!!!


Day 1: Glossy

Pahlish Pianos Filled With Flames

Pianos Filled With Flames is a bright pink toned red with gold holo, red and pink glitter. There's fine squares and hexes and teeny tiny bar glitter and I think some glowing red shimmer flecks? I applied 2 coats of PFWF and 1 layer of Seche Vite for a glossy, smooth and sparkly look.


Day 2: Matte

Pahlish Pianos Flled With Flames with Essie Matte About You

 I love a good old mattified glitter!!! This was with 1 coat of Matte About You. I hadn't used it for months and I forgot how awesome it can make a polish look.


Day 3: Gold Leaf

Pahlish Pianos Filled With Flames with 24k Gold Leaf franken

I added 1 coat of my gold leaf franken and another layer of Seche Vite on the third day. While I liked this look (especially with the glitter peaking through and glowing all around the bright gold), I need to shake my bottle more to break up the larger pieces of gold leaf. I like the tiny flakes, and too many are a bit chunky still. After I painted it on I shook it up some more and I think it has almost reached the right consistency...

I loved that all I had to do to make my mani look fresh was add a top coat each day!

Do you add little embellishments to your manis in order to extend the wear, or do you like to change it up completely every time?

xxx

NPA

Born Pretty Store Rhinestone Ombre Nail Art

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I'm just one week out from starting my vet nurse course!!! Shit's getting real...
I went out today and bought myself a diary (for the first time in a couple of years) so I can keep my appointments and assignments etc on track. I have a knack for forgetting important deadlines :)
 
Got some nail art for you today! I think I'm on track for showing more nail art this year... got a bit lazy for a week or so but it is on my mind now when I feel like I've posted swatch after swatch, so there is some improvement for you!

Born Pretty Store sent me these pastel (plastic) rhinestones for review.

100pcs 3mm Resin Rhinestone Acrylic UV Gel Nail Art Item ID: 5153

They're on sale, 100 pieces (1 colour) for $0.99 or $5.99 for all 8 colours. I really love the softness of these shades compared to regular rhinestones and the reddish ones had me really excited!!!

 I decided to do an ombre mani with the pearl/white, baby pink, bright pink and coral red so you can see what  variety of the colours look like (and they went pretty good together!).

I really love how it turned out!

I painted each nail with the most similar coloured polish I could locate in my stash.
Next, I painted one layer of Orly Calcium Shield (one of my only non-quick dry clears!!) on my pinkie and placed each rhinestone one by one (starting at the tip of my nail, working down the the cuticle).
I repeated the step on each nail in turn making sure I gently pressed the rhinestones into the polish so they wouldn't fall off too easily.
I decided not to add top coat because it can make the rhinestones look dull and odd (well it has in the past with clear rhinestones anyway).

I'm not sure how durable these are without top coat, but I'd definitely wear them to an event or for a night out etc.

My only gripe is that some of the rhinestones are missing the pearl/iridescent coating that makes them shine prettily. The dull ones stuck out like a sore thumb (does a sore thumb stick out????).


The next time you place an order with Born Pretty, you can use my 10% coupon code QHL91. It's on the top of my left hand toolbar too.

Here's a bonus pic of the ombre:

Left - right: OPI I Eat Mainely Lobster, Cult Nails Untamed, Essie Pink-a-boo and Revlon Matte Suede Powder Puff

The coral is more pink in person and there's a shimmer in it like the rest of the polishes I used, it just didn't show up :) How pretty is Pink-a-boo?!!

Would you rock a rhinestone bling mani?


xxx
NPA

Manicure Addict: NOPI Modern Family Collection Review & Giveaway

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Manicure Addict: NOPI Modern Family Collection Review & Giveaway: head over to Manicure Addict for an awesome giveaway - ends March 10th!!!


xxx
NPA

Candy Lacquer LE Valentine's Day Polish Swatches

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I did it guys! I worked really hard over the last couple of days to get my Candy Lacquers swatched. You have no idea how hard it was to remove each one! I wanted to leave them on for weeks!!!!
But I wanted to show you them sooner rather than later, because a few of her LE V-day polishes are still in stock (though I don't think any of the ones I purchased are, sorry!).

This post is photo heavy so click the Read More button to see the swatches and review

What I've been wearing lately

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Hey guys,

My nails had been short an uneven over the last couple of weeks thanks to some annoying breaks and splitting. I don't like to swatch when my nails look all fugly so instead I used the time to wear my untrieds as full manicures.

In the end I snapped some very average photos of a couple of them, so here's some mini-spam:

Orly Pure Porcelain stamped with OPI Roadhouse Blues & BM 204

I wore this for my cousin's wedding. Just before we left for the ceremony I snapped a few shots in my light box, but I accidentally deleted all but one!!! I was wearing a navy dress with a lace upper section so I was trying to go for a matching thing. Not sure I pulled it off.

 Sea Lore Attina over China Glaze Peachy Keen

 Attina is such a gorgeous light coral sheer flakie. I paired it with Peachy Keen because they were pretty close colour wise. In the sun it glistens like crazy!

Pahlish Lonesome Ocean

 Lonesome Ocean is a dusty teal blue jelly with purple, blue and gold? glitter. I thought it was going to be a really dark navy based on the listing and the bottle, but after 2-3 coats it's still quite teal. I used 2 coats of Seche Vite to smooth it out. Not sure if I really like it. I think once you have so many glitter polishes they can start to look a bit blah.

Pahlish Sullen Girl

Sullen Girl needs to be RAVED about!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It's incredibly gorgeous, a charcoal jelly packed with gunmetal holo and glowing blue iridescent hexes! You get a real 'oil stain' rainbow from each piece of glitter, especially in the shade, it's unbelievable. The formula is also quite pigmented for a jelly too. Two coats was enough to eliminate VNL. I did need a few layers of Seche Vite to smooth SG out though and don't mind the bubbles, it was just my top coat. This has to be one of Pahlish's BEST LACQUERS EVER!

Now you know what I've been wearing lately, how about you?

My nails are short again, but they are all level and shaped, so I'm back to swatching some of the pretty polishes I got during January!!!
Should have some more nail art coming your way soon too. I really have to catch up on the BATTLE challenges, yikes! None since December!!!! I want to get lots of that stuff out of the way before I start back at school Monday week. I'm soooooooooooooo nervous!!!!!!!!!!!!! I hope I can wear polish in class, doubt I'll be allowed to on placement :( But all the animals will make it worth naked nails :)


xxx
NPA

Elevation Polish Liana - must have!

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I got Liana last year sometime. It's part of the permanent collection and I think I only bought it because all the other Elevations I wanted were sold out (as they too often are :(!)
But I'm so glad I threw it in the cart because it is 1000x more impressive in person than it looks in the listing swatches!!

Elevation Polish Liana

 Liana is a creamy milk chocolate with traffic light shimmer!!!! Glowing red, green and amber shimmer make Liana so so so so so awesome in sun or direct light! I love that it's a classic chocolate creme - perfect for office wear - but there's still some killer edginess to it! This is going to look best on warm toned skin. I'm wearing 2 coats without topcoat in these pics so you can see it's pretty darn shiny!

Elevation restocks today around 3pm NZ time so keep an eye out for any of the older collections you have missed out on. I didn't get to buy Mount Carmel (the Pahlish Collaboration) and I'm soooooooooooo bummed it looked AMAZING! I hope Lulu re-releases it alone!!!

xxx

NPA

Lemming Quashed: Kleancolor Holo Chrome

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I'd been lemming after Holo Chrome ever since I discovered Kleancolor polish; so probably two years all up! It was never in stock at any of my Kleancolor retailers though and I never ended up buying it online, probably due to laziness!
Then my second Secret Polish Elf got me a bunch of Kleancolors including this one!!!

I actually thought Holo Chrome was made with holo particles but it turned out to be a sugary purple glitter with some fine holo/iridescent glitter for the rainbow sparkle. I still like it, and it's probably more versatile but a small part of me was a wee bit disappointed. I probably should have looked at more swatches online...

Kleancolor Holo Chrome

This was 3 coats with 1 layer of Seche Vite and there's VNL. Holo Chrome has a sheer lavender base with small blue/purple hexes and ultrafine holo and iridescent glitter but it's not so packed that it becomes opaque. I think it'd be great layered over other purples, but it is very pretty by itself too.
The formula is sort of gel like in consistency and easy to apply. I love staring at the glowing larger hexes in the close up photo!!!!!


Quashed any lemmings of your own lately?


xxx
NPA

Girly Bits Indian Summer

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Indian Summers are the best! I remember hearing that term when I was in Science class at the age of 11. And TRIGGER going through my head right now,

Remember the days in the old school yard
We used to laugh a lot
Oh don't you remember the days in the old school yard

Cat Stevens for life!!!!!!!

Anywho....

Girly Bits Indian Summer over Essie Cocktail Bling

Indian Summer is a glitter topcoat with rose pink, sky blue, bronze orange, periwinkle and purple glitter in a translucent light blue base with orange/gold/pink shimmer. It's quite beautiful even with the slight reflective curling. I layered it over Cocktail Bling (horrid name!!!) a muted and greyed periwinkle blue which looked to be a perfect match with Indian Summer's blue hued base. It's hard to see the shimmer in the light box pics so I added the macro bottle shot. Application was breezy and I think this was only 1 coat (but truth be told I can't remember, 2 is a possibility) with a layer of Seche Vite for a smooth finish.
The shimmer adds a haziness to the manicure that reminds me of looking out to the horizon on a hot summer afternoon and seeing the heat radiating in waves!

Looking at those photos makes me wish the end of Summer wasn't nigh!!!!!!!

Girly Bits is available HERE, Llarowe and Harlow & Co


xxx
NPA

Femme Fatale A tisket, a tasket

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The first Femme Fatale lacquer that caught my eye was A tisket, a tasket. And for good reason!

Femme Fatale A tisket, a tasket over Elevation Polish Mount Yu

A tisket, a tasket is a sheer soft minty green shimmer with green, aqua, pastel blue and green and pink glitter. On its own you need about 3 layers for semi-decent coverage but it ends up looking quite bumpy and messy with all that glitter. I opted to layer it over Mount Yu which is very nearly the same shade of green. I used 2 layers for a good dispersion of glitter, then topped it with 1 layer of Aqua Daisy Glitter Gloss for a glassy finish.

I freaking LOVE LOVE LOVE the way ATAT looks!!! The formula isn't the amazing, but it's not a PITA either. I definitely think it looks best layered over a base though and this would be killer for Easter or Spring!

I also love it because A tisket, a tasket is the name of a Gilmore Girls episode where the men of Star's Hollow bid on picnic baskets made by the women and win a date with the lady who made the basket! Lorelei begs Luke to bid on her's and Jess outbids Dean for Rory's. And I always envisioned (and still do) those two couples ending up together! Come on Gilmore Girls film or reunion show with Lorelei and Luke married with babies preparing for Jess and Rory's wedding!!!!! Hmmm, that would be the very best ending for GG!


xxx
NPA

Dandy Nails Bathed In Light & Float On

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My heart beats for Dandy polishes!!!
These are a couple of Sandy's earlier releases. I drooled over Bathed in Light for most of last year but alas, it was always sold out on Ninja Polish. Float On conversely had me on the fence. I had a few fine matte glitter top coats already and I didn't think it looked too special. Fast forward about 6 months and I realised it was way more complex than just some blue and purple glitter plus a few larger white looking hexes!!!

Dandy Nails Float On over Milani Orchidia

Float On turned out to be a mix of fine white, pink, purple, blue, lavender and teal matte glitters plus medium ultra pale purple matte hex glitter in a clear base. I cannot believe how much I underestimated FO. It definitely pays to find a macro swatch before you decide to buy! I used 1 coat over Orchidia and got a great mix and distribution of glitter. The formula was great and it only required 1 layer of SV to be glassy and smooth.
I ADORE Modest Mouse too and Float On is one of their first songs I heard so it has a special place in my heart and on my polish shelf!

 Dandy Nails Bathed In Light

Bathed In Light does not photograph well! It is less pixelated and more vibrant in person, I promise! It's a multichrome of odd colours with fine holographic silver glitter. It sort of shifts between pinky-brown, taupe, greenish, greyish and orange/gold hues. A wee bit like a pink sunset fading in to night? The formula was a solid 2 coater, for more depth you might even want 3. The glitter makes it dry slightly textures, but 1-2 layers of top coat (depending on thickness) sets you right. I have nothing like BIL but I spotted a Ludurana that looks to have sort of similar colours in it so that's on my wish list!


Did anyone manage to pick up some Dandy Nails V-day polishes? The couple I wanted sold out so quickly on Ninja Polish! I wish international shipping was easier, or that I lived stateside so I could buy off Etsy!!!!!!

I hope your weekends were great. I did 2 movies and 2 meals out! So the diet went to the wayside but I'm absolutely back on it today!!! It's working too, woop woop!


xxx
NPA