Born Pretty Store Patterned Metallic Stud Review!

Hey everyone! Today I have a fun stud nail art look and review to share!

I'm getting really excited about my trip to Switzerland, so much so that I'm even looking forward to the long trip there! :O It's just my little sister and I going and travelling without our parents is a first for us! It's all very exciting but I'll quit yammering on and get to the nails!

For these nails I started off with three easy coats of Black Sheep Lacquer Smells Like Teen Spirit. To apply the studs, I applied the third coat of polish and then stuck the studs in the wet polish before moving on to the next nail. The smaller studs are from a random shop on Amazon or eBay, and the larger studs with the striped holographic pattern are from Born Pretty Store (link here, item number 2)!

All of the polish and studs were very easy to work with in this mani! Some of the Born Pretty Store studs we're stuck to other ones in pairs, but since they're not super small they were easy to pull apart. It also comes with plenty (100 pieces) so you wouldn't need to pry two apart until you've used them many times and were starting to run out! One other thing I noticed is that removing the studs with acetone-free remover still took off their holographic stripe design. I thought that was actually pretty cool because now I have some plain silver circle studs in my collection!

The Black Sheep Lacquer polish I used here is a thermal and I've done a review post on it before showing it's transitions (link here). It was so much fun wearing this mani (I wore it for 5 or 6 days crazily enough) because sometimes my nails were a pale jade green like in these pictures, and sometimes they were a much darker teal colour when I was cold!

If you guys decide to pick these studs or any of their other nail art stuff up, be sure to use my coupon code, SKBQ10!

Thanks so much for having a look everyone! Let me know what you think of these nails or these studs in the comments! Happy Friday! =)

Red and Purple Gradient and Half Moon Heart Nail Art!

Yo yo yo my people! Today I have some gradient and half moon heart (?) nail art to share!

So I do this thing where I clean my room every few months and it's a disaster a few days after said cleanings. This time though, I added a real bed to my bedroom (I used to sleep on a mattress on the floor because it's really comfy, quiet if you toss and turn and easy to move around). Now that I have a bed my room feels more like a proper bedroom, and I think it's helping me keep and want to keep it clean. It's like my room had too chill of a vibe before or something.

I'm mostly only mentioning it because it's helping me feel motivated about a lot of other things. I have always struggled with motivation for school, cleaning and anything else really. Now I'm thinking up cute things to put in my room and feeling motivated to blog, dress like I would if I was actually going out everyday, etc. I haven't even been wearing a bra lately because I usually stay home and just can't be bothered. This was supposed to sound positive because it is haha! Anyways, onto the nails!

I started with a base of two coats of American Apparel Poppy and a coat of top coat (because I wasn't going to jazz it up with nail art until the next day)! Poppy can easily be a one-coater but I wasn't being overly careful. The next day I went in with Essie DJ Play that Song for the half moon hearts and Poppy, American Apparel Angeline (a one-coater dark pink creme, swatch and review here) and DJ Play that Song on a wet makeup sponge for the gradient nails! I finished with a coat of Dollish Polish Putting on the Ritzzz! for the gradient nails and a coat of top coat on all of the nails.

What do you guys think of these nails? I'd love to know in the comments!

Thanks so much for taking a look everyone! Does anyone else struggle with keeping their room tidy or motivation in general? I'll be back with a massive swatch spam post very soon! Happy Wednesday! =)

Half-Nail Hearts with Rainbow Honey Lumine Hall!

Hey-lo my lovely people! I have at least a few posts I need to get up and I already want to repaint my nails, so expect more posts from me for a while! This simple look features the gorgeous Rainbow Honey Lumine Hall!

It has been so nice (and weird) being out of school finally, especially after a bunch of finals! I don't know what I'm going to do with myself over this huge break other than paint my and other peoples' nails a lot! :P I will also be applying for scholarships, possibly looking for a job and going on a trip with my sister! As bored as I might get being out of school for four months, I'm scared to transfer to a university from college. It and the class sizes are so much bigger and it's all going to be so different! Anyways, onto the nails!

For these nails I started with a coat of my go to base coat, OPI Matte Nail Envy. Once that had dried, I went in with Rainbow Honey Lumine Hall using just the brush from the bottle! I only used one thick coat of Lumine Hall but two thinner ones would have covered a little better. This polish was almost too thick to work with by the time I got to my other hand, but I totally could have just added thinner before I finished both hands! I have since and it's gotten a lot better!

I then applied a coat of top coat just over top of the polish (not the practically bare nail)!

What do you guys think of these nails? I'd love to hear in the comments!

Thank you so much for reading everyone, I'll have some Born Pretty Store reviews up soon featuring some fun nail art looks! Happy Monday! :)

Above the Curve Valentine's Collection Swatches and Review: UPDATED!

Hey everyone! Today I have swatches of the Above the Curve Valentine's Collection to share!*

I'm just going to start off by saying these all had perfect formulas and consistencies (apart from a little glitter settling) so I don't have to repeat myself throughout this post! Another thing I really love about this collection is that Shawn and Angel (the makers) didn't include a pink (because I don't really like pink on myself and it's my least favourite colour). Purples, plums and browns are definitely more my thing! I loved each and every one of these and didn't want to take them off as I was swatching, but stay tuned to find out my favourite!

UPDATE: I found an easy way to white balance my pictures using GIMP (a free photo editing program) so most of these pictures are now white balanced (it made the Sun and flash pictures worse)!

First up is All You Need is Love! Wine, a lovely plum-coloured polish with holographic microglitter and a bunch of different sized and coloured glitters!

What you see here is two easy coats and a coat of topcoat! I probably got less glitter on my nails than I would have from a perfectly mixed bottle but I love the look of it this way! I think it's harder for glitters to redistribute in small bottles because of the brush and mixing balls in the way!

This is my favourite from this collection! I'd love to know your guys' favourites in the comments!

Here's a shot of this baby in the Sun! Check out all the holographic glitter! Are you guys as in love with this as I am?

Next up is Circle of Love, a clear-based glitter polish with metallic pink and holographic silver microglitter and a bunch of circle and heart-shaped glitters in different sizes, colours and finishes!

This is one thick and dabbed coat of Circle of Love over one coat of American Apparel Mount Royal! Now that there is a bit of product gone from the bottle I think it will be easier to redistribute the glitters when I use this again! Even still, I managed to get quite a bunch of glitter on my nails including some of the hearts!

I was very tempted to keep this one on but I think I have to go on a bit of a glitter strike. Even when I use the foil method and have three or so coats of polish under a glitter topper my nails end up peeling where the glitters were! Then I have to buff my nails smooth and I've been buffing them probably more than is good for them. It's really frustrating, I wonder if I should go on a Nail Envy break and use it as directed for a few weeks. Do you guys have any advice for me? Let me know!

Next up is You Java Me Crazy (love the name!), a warm brown holographic polish!

You know what I said earlier about my peeling nails? Even after buffing them you can see what I mean in these pictures! Since this polish was so opaque (I only used one coat and a coat of top coat) you can really see the places my nails are peeling. Anyway, my peeling nails aside haha, this polish is another lovely Above the Curve one-coater brown polish like Friday the 13th, so naturally I love it!

Unfortunately the Sun went down before swatching these last few polishes so a flash picture and a picture above my light box is the best I could do!

Lastly, we have Truly Madly Deeply, a metallic and holographic warm-toned purple polish! I am actually wearing this right now (as I often do with one polish per swatch fest) and it's definitely unlike anything I own which I love! I've been trying to get a picture of this in the Sun all day but it only came out once and I missed my chance! I hope it comes out again, if so I'll post the picture on my Instagram!

What you see here is two easy coats and a coat of top coat, it was very easy to work with like the rest of this collection!

You can't see the holo effect too well here, but you can see it's metallic aspect!

Thank you so much for reading everyone! What do you think of these polishes? I think you could wear them year-round and that they're gorgeous! Happy Friday everyone!

*These polishes were provided in exchange for my honest review.

Black Sheep Lacquer Swatches and Review: Get Lucky and Lorelei!

Hey everyone! Today I have swatches and reviews of two gorgeous new glitter toppers from Black Sheep Lacquer, Get Lucky and Lorelei!

You may notice I've changed my background to black, do you guys like it better? I think it looks a lot more professional! I got the idea from the lovely Lindsey of Wondrously Polished and the lovely Sarah of Chalkboard Nails! That aside, onto the swatches and reviews!

First up we have Get Lucky, a clear-based polish with fine green shimmer, small gold holographic hexes, small and medium-sized dark green hexes, medium-sized green holographic hexes and large green circles!

This polish had a perfect consistency and formula! I didn't get any circle glitters on the first go, but that's the idea with this polish (I talked to Erin, the owner, about it and this is what she said). It doesn't have a lot of them in it so it's a fun accent, and so the circle glitters don't overpower the rest of the gorgeous glitters! I fished for the one you see here so you could see the polish with a circle glitter in it!

I tried to match a creme to this polish, and the closest in my collection was Essie Mojito Madness. So what you see here is one coat of Mojito Madness with one coat of Get Lucky on top! That's another thing about Erin's new formula, neither of these glitter toppers needed a coat of top coat to smooth them out. Like, what? That's how smooth and shiny they are on their own!

Do you guys love her new bottles as much as I do? I think they're just the coolest!

Next we have Lorelei, a clear topper stuffed with tiny gold flakies and hexes, small dark aqua (or slightly greenish blue) hexes, medium-sized holographic aqua hexes and large iridescent pale green and rose gold hexes!

Again, this polish had a perfect formula! I didn't have to fish for any glitters and they spread out well on the nail (i.e. the glitters didn't clump together at all)!

The best creme I had to match these glitters was Nyx Girls Hot Blue, and I used one coat for undies here! Be careful, I only wore this for about thirty minutes or less with base coat and Hot Blue stained the edges of my nails! I then put one thicker coat of Lorelei and no top coat on top, because again, these babies dry so smooth and shiny!

What do you guys think of these gorgeous glitters? I love them! You can check out videos of the holographic glitters on my Instagram, here! Thanks so much for reading everyone, happy Saturday!

Black Sheep Lacquer Fire & Ice Swatch and Review!

Hey everyone! Today I have a swatch and review of a new Black Sheep Lacquer thermal called Fire & Ice!

How are all of my lovely readers doing today? I'm actually doing quite well despite the sad stuff going on in my life right now. It has been harder for me to focus lately (on school and on blogging) and I've been procrastinating even more and studying even less than usual. Somehow, I managed to get A's or even A+'s on my first three midterms (one for each of my non-elective courses; Organic Chemistry II, Spectroscopy and Genetics) and I've never gotten an A on an organic chem test before! It's the class I struggle with the most, but now that I know I can do well in it (i.e. get better than an A-) I might actually put in some more effort :P. Getting my marks back was a very welcome and happy surprise because I was worried I wasn't doing well and that I'd started off the semester badly.

Anyways, onto the polish! Fire & Ice is a clear/grey to lightish blue to purple/burgundy thermal polish stuffed with varying sizes of iridescent glitter! The iridescent glitter in this polish is such a lovely addition because it shines different colours when the base is different colours!

These first few pictures are of the polish in it's normal/warm state, or at least my normal/warm state!

Another cool thing about this polish is that the temperature of my house is warm enough to make it blue, so I got to see it warm up before my eyes when I took it out of the package!

This is what this polished looked like after I had stuck my hands in the freezer to grab a few ice cubes (to stick in a cup of water to cool my nails in for the rest of the pictures)!

The formula on this baby was amazing! I used three coats and each one dried insanely quickly, I don't think it would be possible to paint the coats too quickly and create bubbles! The glitters were perfectly suspended in the base and it was the perfect consistency for easy application! 

This polish did dry slightly matte (which looked really cool) but after top coating it it became extremely shiny! Like, shinier than my top coat ever makes things. Also, one coat of top coat is all you need for a glass-like finish because the polish is sheer enough that you don't need a crazy amount of glitter to see it all!

See what I mean about the iridescent glitters? They glow like crazy when this polish is cold!

Up close the tiny iridescent glitters almost look like holographic ones because of all the different colours they shine, so pretty!

Here the polish is in all of it's states at once so you can really tell how dramatic the changes in colour are!

I know I've bombarded you with pictures, but this is the last one, I promise! Here are macro shots of the different states all together so you can really see how the glitters change based on the base!

Thank you so much for reading everyone! Like I said above, I'd love to know how you guys are doing in the comments! I'd also love to know your thoughts on this polish! If you'd like to see some videos of this polish in action you can find some on my Instagram! Happy Friday!