Pretty & Polished Cuticle Balm Review: Pink Sugar and Lavishing Lemon!

Hey everyone! Today I have a review of two Pretty & Polished cuticle balms to share!

These two cuticle balms have vastly different consistencies and physical properties due to their different formulas, so I'll talk about their consistencies individually below!

The Pretty & Polished Pink Sugar Cuticle Balm melts easily upon skin contact and is quite greasy (which I love in a cuticle balm). It mostly soaks in within ten minutes of massaging your cuticles periodically, and it's incredibly moisturizing!

The scent is amazing and just as they describe it on the website, "Pink Sugar features notes of cotton candy, strawberry, vanilla and musk. It's a dreamy combination!" I haven't smelled any other pink sugar scent before so I can't say if it's like other pink sugar fragrances, but it smells incredibly lovely!

Next up is Pretty & Polished Lavishing Lemon Cuticle Balm! This one is a lot harder and more difficult to melt, even more so that the Burt's Bees Lemon Butter Cuticle Creme. I actually have trouble melting it if I've been out in the cold prior to trying to put it on. It's easy to scrape a tiny bit off the side to use though, so even if you're too cold to melt it, you can still use it! This leaves a thin layer of hardly greasy balm on your cuticles for about ten minutes without any extra rubbing in or massaging!

The scent is just simply lemon as you may have guessed, super fresh and lovely!

I really love having both of these on hand because either one or the other is great for any upcoming situation! For example, if I have a lab coming up I can use the lemon one because I know it will soak in fast and not be greasy!

Thanks so much for reading everyone! I have some indie polishes to swatch so look forward to those swatch and review posts! Hope you're all having a lovely Thursday! I have a final exam today, tomorrow and the next day (a Saturday!) so I will be the happiest Bailey ever sleeping in Sunday morning! What about you guys? Anything stressful or exciting coming up? :)

Black Sheep Lacquer Under The Bridge: Reswatched and Reviewed!

Hey guys! Today I have a better swatch of a polish I've swatched before, Black Sheep Lacquer Under The Bridge* (old post here)!

I've decided to break up the huge wall of text and the huge wall of pictures by alternating between text and pictures, I'd love to know whether you prefer this configuration or the old one in the comments!

This week and next are final exam weeks at my college, and I'm actually lucky enough to finish my finals this Saturday! So for me, this week is final week and I really want to crack down and study hard! Because of this, I decided to paint my nails with a pretty indie polish and leave it on for six whole days :O. I do have a Pretty & Polished cuticle balm review post to write up, so hopefully I'll still be posting every three days this week! All of my finals are back to back, so I've decided to do a subject a day so as to not overwhelm myself haha. Today's topic is cell biology in case your curious, and it's actually going really well. Quite surprising for a procrastinator like me!

Anyways, onto the polish! Under The Bridge is a gorgeous red jelly polish packed with large and medium-sized dark blue hexes, small matte white hexes, small dark blue squares, tiny silver and dark blue hexes, and who could forget, huge red circles! All of the dark blue glitters that are covered in the red jelly base appear purple and it makes them look so glowy and pretty! The base is darker and pinker in person, it's really difficult to capture reds accurately on camera! Other than having to fish for two of the four circle glitters I have on my nails right now, this polish had a perfect formula (no glitter clumping or anything) and I find fishing for glitters kind of fun anyways! I might have not even had to fish for any if I had let the bottle sit upside down for longer before polishing! What you see here is two coats of Under The Bridge and two coats of top coat for maximum squishiness!

I actually described one of my dream polishes to Erin and this is what she came up with, it's a beautiful take on my description and I absolutely love it!

What do you guys think of this polish? Super pretty right? I hope you're all having a lovely Monday, let me know what you'll be up to this week in the comments! Anyone else about to do some final exams?

*This polish was sent for swatches, though I have already swatched it.

Born Pretty Store Flower Water Decal Review and a Gradient!

Hey guys! Today I have some flower-covered gradient nails to share! I will also be reviewing the floral water decals seen here from Born Pretty Store!

Sorry about posting these late guys, I was crashing while editing the pictures so I decided to write it up this morning instead. I try really hard to post every three days but sometimes life (for me, school) gets in the way! I've been exhausted for the last week or so and I'm so glad today's the last day of school! Anything exciting happening in your guys' lives? Let me know!

A bunch of people from Will Paint Nails For Food's Beginner Blogger's Bootcamp Group Critique commented on my last post saying that my fingers were blurry and that it was a bit distracting, and I had seriously never noticed! When I saw my pictures after that, I realized I looked like some weird alien without any lines or wrinkles on my fingers haha! I increased the depth of field before taking these pictures and I think you can see some detail on my fingers now, what do you guys think? :)

For these nails I started with one coat of Essie Mesmerize, painted on NYX Girls Inkheart and Revlon Espresso, and then patted on mixtures of the two colours where they met! I think the gradient looks better and smoother in person, so I'm excited to improve on my gradient skills so they look good in pictures too! Lindsay from Wondrously Polished always does literally perfect gradients (they look like the ones you can make in a photo editing program) and often puts nail art on top, so these nails were definitely inspired by her! I really think it's an amazing and beautiful idea to use a gradient as a background for nail art rather than a plain creme!

As for the decals (link here, they're the BLE422 ones), I was completely silly at first and applied one like a tattoo, and of course the design was upside down and all black and white (see my left hand's thumbnail). I asked my boyfriend if he thought it'd be possible to slide them off and on to the nail so the designs would show, and he ended up trying it for me and it worked! I just wetted a reasonably soft brush (my cleanup brush), let the decal soak in water for 15-20 seconds and slid it off of the paper carefully and onto my nail! You can move them around once they're on your nail for a period of time (especially if you wet your nail first) so you certainly don't have to get the perfect placement right away! I decided to place two decals on top of each other on some nails and I think they look really nice layered! I accidentally crumpled and folded one up, and I was still able to flatten it back out and put it on my nail which really impressed me! The only negative thing I have to say about these is still totally avoidable; top coat can smudge the decals a bit but as long as you apply it carefully (as you would on top of nail art) they won't smudge! I was being very careless when applying my topcoat because I didn't think they would smudge, and they still hardly did! :)

Off-topic, but do you guys think I should spread my text out between the pictures so it's not a huge block of text and then a huge block of pictures? I think I'll start doing that so let me know if you'd prefer I didn't!

Onto the nails!

Here's the gradient I started with as a base!

My right hand!

If you're looking for any other nail art stuff Born Pretty Store is a good place to check! Here's my coupon for 10% off!

Thanks so much for reading everyone! Have any plans for the weekend? I'll be studying for the three back-to-back finals I have coming up and finishing a biochemistry assignment! :)

Born Pretty Store Shell Studs Review and Beach Nail Art!

Hey everyone! Today I have a review of some super cute shell studs from Born Pretty Store to show you all!

I was recently contacted by the lovely Daisy from Born Pretty Store and asked if I would like to review some products from them, and of course I said yes! I've bought from them before and everything's always packaged really well and lovely to work with! I was sent three items of my choice so stay tuned for two more Born Pretty Store reviews and nail art using those products!

The adorable gold shells featured in this post can be bought here, there are slightly bigger ones and silver ones in both sizes available, I chose the 3mm gold ones. They are curved slightly to sit flat on the nail, so one coat of top coat is all I needed to cover them and hold them in place! I tested these charms to see if they were reusable by scrubbing one with non-acetone remover for approximately a minute, and they seem to be! The stud was the same gold colour and a little less shiny after the scrubbing, but a coat of top coat would easily fix that.

And now, how I did these nails! I started with one coat of Essie Sand Tropez for the sand, then dotted on some thinned out Sally Hansen Wet Cement and finally, smeared some thinned out OPI My Vampire Is Buff on top! For the water I used Essie Go Overboard, some thinned out smears of Essie Going Incognito, and lastly, a mixture of Go Overboard and My Vampire Is Buff for the waves! I then applied dots of top coat in the places I wanted the shells to go and stuck them in! A coat of top coat and some cleanup and I was all finished :).

I'm playing around with some hand positions that I've never tried before, but I'm trying to use most of the other ones I recently decided on too! Bear with me as I figure out which poses I like best haha!

Onto the pictures!

Be sure to check out their site for other nail art stuff if there's anything you're looking for! They have an amazingly huge selection of products so there's bound to be something for everyone! Also, don't forget to use my coupon for 10% off! This picture is also in my sidebar, so it's really easy to find from any of my posts!

Thanks so much for reading everyone, I hope you're having a lovely Monday! I'll have some indie polish swatches coming your ways soon, so keep an eye out! :)

Mod Lacquer Swatches and Review: Mothman, Loup Garou and Misfit Masquerade!

Hey y'all! Today I have some beautiful Mod Lacquer polishes to share with you!*

I was so excited to get this package you guys, and I have to say, my already high expectations were definitely exceeded!

One of the reasons I was so excited is because of the bottles, they have the cutest shape to them! The top of the handle/brush part is rounded so if you like to store your glitter polishes upside down a few minutes before using them, do what I did and just pop the bottle inside a roll of toilet paper upside down to hold it! The brushes are also lovely, similar to Essie ones but thicker and a bit longer. I had absolutely no problems with application for any of these polishes!

By the way, Jennifer (the shop owner) is running a fall sale until December first, so you can use the code FALL15 for 15% off any order over $10 until then! She also added a retired sale section to her shop so you can pick up polishes from her older collections for reduced prices! Lastly, she has two awesome limited edition polishes available for purchase right now, Breaking Mod, a light blue jelly with different sized pearly white hexagon glitters, and Vault 24/18, an 18 and 24 carat gold topper in a clear base! I'm very tempted to buy both of them though I'm supposed to be on a no-buy! :P

Anyways, onto the pictures and individual reviews!

First up is Mothman, a black crelly polish with medium-sized red and holographic charcoal hexes, and small holographic silver microglitter! I honestly believe it's impossible to own too many black crellies with glitter like this beauty! I love the red hexes because they keep the polish interesting when viewed in the Sun or the shade. In the Sun there are constant red glitters while all of the other glitters are changing colours, and in the shade it looks like a gorgeous black, red and silver blend! Shown here is two coats plus two coats of top coat (it only needed one, but I've never double top coated a glitter polish before and I wanted to see this polish at maximum squishiness)! The formula was great, though it was a little tricky to get a smooth line while cleaning up (solely due to it being a glitter polish). I was studying for and worrying about a midterm the evening I painted these, so that could have also been a major factor for me painting sloppily and needing more cleanup!

Since my lightbox is where holographic glitters/polishes go to die, here is an Instagram video I took of this beauty!

Next we have Loup Garou, a clear base packed with red, orange, yellow and black bar glitters! This polish just screams Thanksgiving to me and I could definitely see it being perfect for turkey feathers in some Thanksgiving nail art! I had a hard time deciding what polish to layer this baby over, I really thought an olive green would be nice but I don't actually own an olive green creme (gasp!). I decided on a pale nude colour to create a Thanksgiving-ish mani! Shown here is one coat (with slight dabbing on two nails) and a coat of top coat under two coats of American Apparel California Trooper!

Lastly we have Misfit Masquerade, a glitter topper containing tiny, small and medium-sized blue, yellow and purple matte hexes! This one is just so fun and cute, I put it on both hands and I'm wearing it right now! I think this would be really cute over a pale version of one of the three colours of glitter in this, I almost did it over a pale purple and I probably will one day! Shown here is one coat plus one coat of top coat over one (yes, one) coat of Revlon Espresso (from the fairly recent Revlon Parfumerie Collection). I found a one-coater black guys!!! Anyways, onto more pictures!

Thanks so much for having a look everyone, happy Friday! :)

*These polishes were sent to me for swatches and an honest review.

Contrary Polish Westport and Hex Nail Jewelry!

Hey everyone! Today I have a swatch of Contrary Polish Westport and some Hex Nail Jewelry charms to share!

I was so pressed for time and so busy studying (read: cramming like a mad women) this week, that I'm posting these right before I take them off and redo my nails! I also only did one thick coat of Westport (which isn't quite enough for an opaque look as you can see) but it was late and I was tired :P. I still love the look of these and the whole mani only ended up taking me twenty minutes, which is a real bonus during midterm weeks!

Almost every week of the semester starting about a month ago or more are midterm weeks (every week but two), so I'll try to work on not having midterm cuticles in the future! Let's call them that, shall we? Sorry about my midterm cuticles in these pictures guys!

Both Westport and the Hex Nail Jewelry charms were perfect to apply (I love the Contrary Polish brushes!), but the crab charm was a little too curved for the nail I put it on. I'm sure I could have positioned it better or maybe even bent it backwards to make it a bit more straight, but instead I just double top coated it (and the other charm-covered nails)! The plain nails have just one coat of top coat on top!

I fell madly in love with Westport when I saw it on my nails, it's an olive green crelly with gold and orange shimmer! I will definitely be wearing this again so stay tuned for proper two coat swatches!

Anyways, onto the pictures!

What do you guys think of Westport, it's gorgeous right?! And I can't wait to try my Hex Nail Jewelry charms over different polishes and incorporate them into nail art! I have two others, an ice cream cone and an owl!

Thanks so much for reading guys! I'll have some more labour-intensive nail art posted in two days for those of you who prefer nail art to swatches! Happy Friday! :)

More Northern Star Polish Swatches: Smuldering, Ki-Ki Ma-Ma, Storybook Love, Inconceivable and Drop Your Sword!

Hey everybody! Today I have five more Northern Star Polish polishes to show you all!

I was a total swatching machine on the weekend, can you believe I swatched seven polishes (these five and my two Emily de Mollys) in two days? I'm actually not very surprised because I should have been studying for my upcoming biochemistry midterm and doing my organic chemistry assignment :P. I am a horribly efficient procrastinator!

All of these polishes had really nice formulas that were a bit thick, but I should note that Storybook Love was a little too thick for my liking, though still totally manageable! All of the pictures seen here are of three coats and no top coat except for the first polish, Smuldering, which is of two coats and no top coat!

The last three polishes featured in this post are from Kristen's As You Wish Collection which makes me super happy! Does anyone else love the movie The Princess Bride? I've seen it so many times and just talking about it makes me want to watch it again!

Anyways, onto the swatches!

Smuldering- two coats, no top coat

Ki-Ki Ma-Ma- three coats, no top coat

Storybook Love- three coats, no top coat

Inconceivable- three coats, no top coat

Drop Your Sword- three coats, no top coat

Thanks so much for taking a look everyone, let me know if any of these polishes are calling your names in the comments! Happy Tuesday! =)