Cult Nails - 2nd Anniversary Collection

YAY! Cult Nails!

The Cult Nails 2nd Anniversary Collection was released last week and I couldn't resist. To celebrate, they are also including a free gift while supplies last! You will either receive a pair of cubic zirconia earrings, OR 3 lucky people will receive real diamond earrings. Visit the website HERE to order!

The colors in the photo below are, from left to right: Tempest, Blaze, & Fetish.

Clicky clicky!

As you can see, I wanted to use all the colors at once, so I did. There are no rules!! (Did anyone else think of the Little Caesar's commercial? I watch too much t.v.)

On my thumb and pinky: 2 coats of Tempest.

On my index finger: 2 coats of Fetish and 1 coat of Blaze.

On my middle finger : 2 coats of Fetish.

And on my ring finger: 3 coats of Blaze. 

Each finger has a base coat and is topped with Cult Nails Wicked Fast Top Coat (except for on my middle finger there is no top coat). 

Blaze is a gorgeous mixture of fine copper and gold glitter. It is densely packed, so it is easy to get full coverage. It looks great over black, but it also looks beautiful by itself. 

Fetish is a black polish that dries to a waxy finish. What I love about it is that it lasts longer than your typical "matte" finish polish. Every matte polish I have used chips within hours of it drying. This lasted two full days before showing any major wear!

Tempest is described as "a high gloss, self leveling, pure white polish perfect for manicures and nail art". It is practically perfect in one coat, but photographing for my blog shows ALL the imperfections, so I did a 2nd coat just to be safe. :)

ALL of these polishes are fantastic, in true Cult Nails form. I also discovered that the "special request" section on your order form brings out the creativity in the Florida-based owners and their daughters! (If you didn't know, I'm a dental hygienist and I have a thing for teeth). 

Thanks so much for dropping by! Let me know what you think about Cult Nails' most recent release. 

--Dixie

Tweet

Zoya - Envy

Hello!

Below are photos of another one of the Zoya polishes I purchased a little while ago. This one is called Envy. It makes sense... it's green. Unfortunately, it is SUCH a dark shade of green that it basically looks black once on the nails. I don't have a problem with black nail polish, not one bit, but I purchased this because it was green! Oh well, I'm sure I'll live. :)

Above is a photo of one coat of base coat and two coats of Zoya Envy. There is no top coat. Also, I tried out something new on my accent nail. Well... it's new to me. The first person I ever saw use this technique with loose glitter is Sam on The Nailasaurus. She is VERY good at nail art... you should absolutely check out her blog. 

The first time I saw her do a fingernail with glitter like this, my jaw dropped. Not only is it super gorgeous, but it looked like a tremendous undertaking. I mean... WHO actually takes the time to place loose glitter on a fingernail one-by-one until the whole nail is covered? Apparently Sam does, and once she did a tutorial on how she does it, I realized I could too. And it doesn't take that long! It took me a total of 2-3 minutes, which I think is quite fast.

Per my husband's suggestion, I added a coat or two of Hard Candy's Mattely In Love to the nails without the glitter. He is typically very helpful when I am trying to be creative, and this time was no different. It was a nice touch for sure. HOWEVER, I was reminded how much a matte topcoat can shorten the life of a manicure. :( The glitter nail could have lasted for quite a while, but the other nails started showing wear within a day. 

This is a photo of the pot of glitter I purchased recently. It is going to last me FOR-EV-ERRRR. Unless I spill it. Don't say that! You'll jinx me! :O

I purchased this glitter along with some other nail art supplies from The Born Pretty Store. This is where Sam from The Nailasaurus purchased her glitter, and I wanted to get the same stuff she used. PLUS... that pot of glitter only cost me $2.38. And although this store is located overseas, the shipping is free.

Although I was disappointed with the shade of the polish, I think this is one of my favorite manicures so far. I'm impressed with how the accent nails turned out and I will definitely be using this technique a lot more. I hope you enjoy!

--Dixie

Tweet

Sephora by OPI | Traffic-Stopper Copper & Finger Paints | Paper Mache

I have some sparkles to show you!

The glitter I am sharing today is a glitter that caught my eye quite some time ago. I can't even remember... maybe 6 months or so? Anyway, I passed it up because I didn't want to spend $9 on a glitter, much less a glitter that makes me fish it out of the bottle. HOWEVER, I couldn't stop thinking about it. If you're not a HUGE fan of nail polish like I am, that will sound nuts, but I'm serious. So I finally purchased the glitter... and I don't regret it. Thank you very much. 

Finger Paints - Paper Mache

The first photograph is of the base color that I decided to use. I swatched this glitter on about 9 different colors to see which one would show it off the best and I ultimately decided to go with a clean, crisp white. The photo above is 2 coats of Finger Paints Paper Mache on top of 1 coat of base coat. No top coat. Application of this color is pretty easy, however, it seems to dry very slowly. I ALMOST decided to just stop at this step because the plain white nails were quite pretty. If you keep reading, you'll notice that I couldn't resist the sparkles.

Sephora by OPI -- Traffic-Stopper Copper

What you see above, as well as all of the photos that follow, is an attempt to show how pretty this glitter is. Of course the name Traffic-Stopper Copper indicates that the glitter is a copper color, but it also looks like a rose gold shade to me. As you all have likely noticed, rose gold jewelry has become quite popular recently, and I LOVE it. I may as well have some nails to match my jewelry, right? Yes.  

Sephora by OPI -- Traffic-Stopper Copper

As I mentioned at the very beginning of the post, you have to fish this glitter out of the bottle. It is not very densely packed, so it is a bit of a pain to get on the nail. However, once you get the hang of it, you can get a decent amount of sparkles to cooperate. In all of the photos, there are two coats of the glitter and one coat of fast-dry top coat. 

Sephora by OPI -- Traffic-Stopper Copper

You'll see better in the macro shots above and below that there are two different sizes of glitter: larger hexagonal glitters and smaller micro glitters.

Sephora by OPI -- Traffic-Stopper Copper

Sephora by OPI -- Traffic-Stopper Copper

I took photos at several different angles with various amounts of lighting to show you the color of the sparkles. What do you think? I quite like this glitter. :)

Later Gators

--Dixie

Tweet

OPI & Wet N Wild Jelly Sammich

Hello, lovely people!

I'm quite excited to share this manicure with you all today. It's just perdy. The kind where I can't stop staring at my nails. 

I used two polishes: OPI MonSooner or Later & Wet N Wild Glamorous from Fergie's collection. Thanks to my awesome coworker and friend, Heathen, for the gift of the lovely gold glitter!

Click to enlarge! 

A lot of you have likely heard of a jelly sammich manicure. I suppose you could also say "sandwich", but I prefer the term "sammich" because it is fun to say. Anyway, for those of you who are NOT aware, a jelly sammich simply consists of a jelly nail polish and a glitter. You paint a coat or two of the jelly polish, followed by a coat or two of the glitter, and then one last coat of the jelly polish. Hence the term "sammich" because you've sandwiched glitter in between the jelly polish. 

You must use a jelly-type polish because they are fairly sheer and this allows the glitter to peek through. Each jelly varies on its level of sheerness, and the one I chose was not as sheer as I would have liked, but it still worked well enough.

I tried to take several different shots that might show the glitter a bit better, but unfortunately the photos do not do this justice. It was a lot easier to see the glitter in person.

I REALLY love the shade of MonSooner or Later. It is a shiny orange/red jelly that is fully opaque in two coats. This is the first OPI polish I ever purchased, and I bought it over 6 or 7 years ago. It is such a versatile color and has the typical great formula of OPI polishes. I can't believe I haven't used this polish more, I just forgot how awesome it is. 

All of these photos have a base coat, two coats of MonSooner or Later, two coats of Glamorous, one more coat of MonSooner or Later, and one coat of a fast-drying top coat. Believe it or not, all of that wasn't terribly thick on my nails. And since these polishes dry fairly quickly as it is, there were no major smudging issues. 

This last photo shows the glitter the best, I think. So pretty! And the best part is that the combination possibilities with jelly sammiches are endless. I can't wait to do more. :)

--Dixie

Tweet