Guest Post

Today I am guest posting for lisas nail obsession.

Go check out her post HERE with all the details :)

TTFN!

XOXO Mandy

2nd Day Nails: Matte

Soooo, I recently shared my review of Copper Waters for BadAss Polish, you can check it out HERE if you missed it.  I really enjoyed the look, but of course, I wanted to change it up a bit.  As I was walking through my bedroom, I saw my matte top coat, so that was that, matte it was!!  I love the look of matte glitters and this was no exception.

Please forgive the tip wear, I used a cheap drug store polish as my base, Wet N Wild Ebony Hates Chris.  I don't think I will be using this one any more.  It always starts to wear off about the 2nd day.  You will notice that my ring finger with Essie Good as Gold has no tip wear or chipping.  

I need a good black, any recommendations?  I picked up Sinful Colors Black on Black, we will see if that one holds up any better.

Glitter toppers are so fun and you can do so much with them.  Right now, I am loving the matte glitters, I am sure there will be more in the near future ;)

Happy Hump Day!

XOXO  Mandy

BadAss Polish: Copper Waters {Review}

Evening ladies!!  I had planned on doing this post this morning, but I go wrapped up in getting Birthday Club polishes put away and re-organizing some baking stuff to make room for more crochet stuff.  Yeah, lots of moving stuff around today.  I am not quite done, but I will prob get to it again after the kids go to bed.  So for now, here is my review for BadAssPolish Copper Waters.  This is a new addition to the core line.  It's a mix of blue holographic glitter with copper glitter in a clear base.  It's quite pretty.  Check out the bottle:

I swatched this baby over quite a few colors and it was hard to choose my base to show you.  In the end I went with black and gold.  I did just one coat of my base colors, Wet N Wild Ebony Hates Chris and Essie Good as Gold along with one coat of Copper Waters.  I topped with a coat of Seche Vite and I was good to go. 

Isn't it pretty?  The formula was great and I definitely didn't have to do any fishing here.  You could do as many coats as you like, but I like to see the base color under this one.

Here are a few more pics for your viewing pleasure :)

I am enjoying all my BadAss Polishes.  

Copper Waters is not yet available, but will be soon in their Etsy Shop

In the mean time, check them out on Facebook, Amy likes to give away a bottle before you can buy it.  Also Facebook is where you will get all updated info, including release dates.

Hope you have a great evening, I am outta here!

XOXO  Mandy

Pretty & Polished: Bashful Bouquet (2 ways) NCC April~Pastel~Week 1

Afternoon everyone!  I am excited to be back into my challenge group again, known as The Nail Challenge Collaborative.  We have done weekly themes for the seasons all through last year.  I unfortunately, didn't finish the last 2 :(  April marks the 1 year anniversary of the group and I am excited to still be here and join the new challenge.  Things have changed a bit, and I quite like these changes.  It will make it easier for me to keep going with the challenge themes.  Instead of having a pre planned weekly schedule, we are going to have a them for each month.  We can do what ever we want each week of that month for the theme.  Make sense?  Ok, so our first ever challenge was a pastel one, wanna see mine?  Click HERE,  little nutty huh?  That was back when I first started blogging.  Any who, since our first challenge was a pastel one, the theme for April is pastel ;)  I have been saving this polish for this challenge cause I find it very appropriate.  Pretty & Polished Bashful Bouquet is a mix of pastel glitters in a clear base.  FUN!  I did my mani 2 ways, glossy top coat and matte top coat.  Which do you like best?

Base Coat:  Rejuvacote

Base Color:  Zoya Shelby (2 coats)

Glitter Topper:  Pretty & Polished Bashful Bouquet (1 coat)

Top Coat:  Seche Vite (glossy)

Top Coat:  Essie Matte About You (matte)

I prefer the matte look.  It's so soft and pretty.  I often forget about my matte top coat.  I think I am gonna leave it next to my Seche Vite so I can see it all the time :)

There are a few of us doing the NCC challenge.  Please head over and visit their blogs, great stuff!!

XOXO  Mandy

St. Patrick' Day

This morning I am going to start off with some Google news.  Google has announced that it is retiring it's Reader on July 1st.  There is an easy solution to this.  Just head over to http://www.bloglovin.com/, sign up if you haven't already and then on the top of the page, there is a notice about Google and a link to transfer all your blogs over to Bloglovin.  How nice of them!  I did it this morning, took about a minute.  I am happy that is all taken care of.  No worries here about losing my blogs in the shuffle.  Hope you do the same :)

St. Patrick's Day is right around the corner.  I did a quick and easy mani to celebrate.  Nothing too fancy, just cute and sparkly :)

Base Coat:  Rejuvacote

Base Color:  Essie Good as Gold (1 coat)

Glitter:  BadAss Polish Go Pack Go (2 coats)

Top Coat:  Seche Vite

See?  Super simple and cute.  Which makes this post short and sweet.  Have a great weekend!

XOXO  Mandy

Essie Power Clutch & Essence Julia

I wanna start off with thanking all of you who have joined me on my polish journey.  When I logged in this morning, I saw that I am up to 299 followers, thanks everyone!

It's also post election day.  I am not gonna get political or anything, but whether your candidate won or lost, glitter is bound to make you smile!

I was able to snag Essence Julia from a blog sale.  It's part of a "twin" set.  But I don't have her twin Romeo, which is a light grey.  I recently got a lovely grey in my Birchbox, Essie Power Clutch.  A full size I might add!  Any who, I immediately thought of my Julia when I opened the box.

I am going to give my opinion of both of these polishes as this is the first time I have used either :)

Essie Power Clutch:  This one is a lovely grey, it's pretty opaque in one coat, but I suggest 2.  It went on really smooth.  I really love the formula of this one

Essence Julia:  She is an awesome holo glitter in a clear base.  There are mico glitters as well as square glitters.  I have to say, I LOVE this glitter polish.  It sparkles no  matter where you  are.  It's constantly showing off it's rainbow glittery awesomeness.  Whether it's a sunny day, gloomy day or you are stuck in doors, this one sparkles everywhere!  One coat is good coverage, at least for me, but you can def do more and get lots more bling :)

Here are the 2 layered together:

Base Coat:  Rejuvacote

Base Color:  Essie Power Clutch

Glitter:  Essence Julia

Top Coat:  Seche Vite

This pic was taken outside in the shade.  You can see how much it sparkles in the bottle and on my nails.  If you love glitter polish as much as I do and you come across some one wanting to get rid of this one, GRAB IT!

Fall into Autumn: Cloudy Days

Sooooo, last night I did the next challenge mani for Fall into Autumn.  I was excited for this one.  I had  a couple designs running through my brain.  A few of the other girls have already shared their mani's and some were very similar to what I wanted to do.  I brain stormed a little more, then went to you tube and did a little looking around.  There were a few cloudy mani's to get inspiration from :)  

Now, when you see the mani, you are only going to see one nail.  I was having a couple issues and then I was having more issues with my kids.  Hubby was working late and I just couldn't hang.  

Here is my lonely finger

Base Coat:  Rejuvacote

Base Color:  Essence Vampire's Love Into The Dark (1 coat)

Stamping Plate:  Mash 37

Stamping Polish:  Konad Special White

Grey: China Glaze Crackle Glaze in Cracked Concrete

Top Coat:  Essie Matte About You

I was very surprised at how well these little clouds stamped.  I think using my plastic Konad scraper is turning out to be much better than my old gift card.  I used the crackle as the grey accent cause I wanted it to be a little different and I wanted to see how much it would crack when using just a tiny bit.  I used a dotting tool to add the grey to the clouds.  Now, I let these dry for at least 15 minutes.  It took that long get my table cleaned up and deal with my little ones.  I chose a matte top coat cause I thought it would be fun and different.  I tested on a nail and liked it.  So I continued.  When I got to my hand I would be photographing, all went to hell :(  My poor little clouds were smearing!  Every finger except my pointer finger was messed up.  That is why you are only seeing one finger today.  I couldn't get a very good shot of my whole hand any way.  Like I said, it was a bad evening.  However, I think this one lonely finger came out great and this is what I hoped my entire mani would have looked like.

How many times have you been trying to do a special mani and everything just goes wrong?

Have you entered my giveaway yet?  You can do that HERE :)

Lazy Days of Summer: In the Garden

We all know that I have been a slacker lately.  But I have some good news, I have a new challenge mani for you :)  I went and got a mani/pedi recently and decided to amp up my otherwise crappy mani to a challenge mani.  Seriously, I am so mad at how bad my cuticles looked when I left the salon.  I thought it was just because she got too close to my cuticles when she was painting.  Not the case.  So I apologize for a not so great polish job.  But that isn't really the star of the show here any way.  I just got some of new Essie Mirror Metallics, which means more stamping polishes for me!!  I had been looking for a good gold and the Good as Gold in this collection is great!  

The inspiration for my mani is my own yard.  I don't have a garden or fancy flowers.  I do have a lot of rose bushes that line the front of my house.  They are so pretty when in bloom.  So I decided a rose garden mani was it. Plus, my nails were already red, perfect!  I have no idea what the brand or name of the red polish is, it was an off brand in the salon.  It does remind me a lot of A England Perceval.  I have a post on that lovely HERE

Alrighty, so here it is :)

Base Coat:  Unknown

Base Color:  Unknown

Stamping Plate:  Bundle Monster BM 306

Stamping Polish: Essie Good as Gold

Top Coat:  Unknown

I took this photo in the shade so the sun wouldn't wash out the gold.  I wore this for a couple days, I really enjoyed this mani :)

ASBMF #8 Matte Magic

It's time for another spring challenge mani.  Number 8 is Matte Magic.  I have to admit, I was a little worried about this one,  I didn't have a matte top coat and every time I hit the store, there weren't any Essie's Matte About You.  Luckily, when I ordered my set of Kleancolor Holos, it came with a matte top coat, YAY!!  What is the best type of matte mani?  In my opinion, a flakie one!  I have just one flakie, Essie Shine of the Times.  I love this flakie.  It looks so different over different colors.  I chose to use blue as my base color.  It's nice and sunny here, a bright blue seemed fitting.  Here is what it looked like

Base Coat:  Seche REBUILD

Base Color:  Sinful Colors Midnight Blue

Top Coat:  Kleancolors Madly Matte

Favorite Color Polish: Mine is Red

I think everyone has a certain color that looks great with their nail shape and skin tone.  Personally, for me, I think anyway, it's red.  I have such pale skin and just looks so perfect.  Especially on my toes.  I can't remember the last time I got a pedicure and didn't have them painted red.

So here is my mani with Essie "Shine of the Times" over Confetti "Rock the Night Away"

Love how the Essie changes color depending on how the light catches it.

Oh and I just learned how to make a watermark today.  Isn't it lovely?  I will make sure not to add it over the nails if at all possible.

Happy Wednesday!!

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