Happy International Nail Art Day!!!

 Hello Lacquer Luvers and Happy International Nail Art Day! The lovely @nailsbymimi (check out her awesomeness on Instagram) came up with the brilliant idea of having a holiday to celebrate something we polishaholics all love, nail art! You all know that while I very much enjoy swatching beautiful nail polishes, my heart is in the art. I love expressing myself through it and couldn't pass up the opportunity to join in on the festivities today!

Today's look features three forms of nail art that took me so many practice sessions to get right, each earning their very own lane in my nail art world. I absolutely LOVE these types of nail art and think they're all equally fun to do. I've got some gradient/stamping/water marbling goodness going on for INAD and I love how my nails came out for this special day!

I started with a base of Essie Feed Me followed by two coats each of China Glaze Tantalize and Essie Marshmallow on my accent finger. I created a gradient on my accent finger with Marshmallow, Tantalize Me & Gothic Lolita with the help of a makeup sponge. Once that dried, I topped it with Orly's Prisma Gloss Silver for some scattered holo glitter prettiness! 

Next I began to water marble my nails using the colors mentioned above. For those of you who have ever tried marbling, I'm sure you can agree that it is one of those things you have a love/hate relationship with lol! I've always loved the final look of this beautiful art though and don't mind the process of getting it just right because it's so mesmerizing to look at all day!

I went back to my ring finger for the stamping part of my manicure. With the help of MASH-41 & some Konad Special Stamping Polish in white, I went over my holo glitter gradient with this stunning floral image. My mani was complete with a coat of the scattered holo polish over my water marbled nails and a final coat of HKGirl topcoat on all of them.

I had so much fun coming up with this look for International Nail Art Day and am so happy that we have a day to call our own! Nail art has been a way for me to express how I'm feeling through color and is most definitely my favorite "me time". There was a recent rumor going around, someone said nail art was dead. I guess we're proving them wrong today! Don't forget to tag your nails with #INAD on Instagram for those of you joining in. As always, I hope you enjoyed this post my dear Lacquer Luvers and I look forward to sharing my next post with you, xo!

~Jessica

Minnie Mouse Mani & Stamping Plate Review

Hello Lacquer Luvers! Today I have another review and a super cute mani to share with you! For today's mani you will see that I "recycled" part of yesterday's manicure. As I mentioned yesterday, I was sent another item to review from BornPrettyStore, the RuiZ03 stamping plate:

I've always wanted to do a Mickey and Minnie Mouse manicure after seeing Holy Manicures masterpiece a good while ago. Isn't that adorable?! I wanted to do a twist on the normal red/black/white Minnie mani that you normally think of. I was inspired by this picture:

As stated above, I recycled part of yesterday's mani, my ring finger. I removed polish from the rest of my nails and proceeded to begin with a base of Essie Feed Me. I applied two coats of Bettina Vintage to my pinky and middle fingers, 3 coats of Zoya Darcy to my index and 3 coats of L'Oreal Miss Pixie on my thumb. Miss Pixie was a gift from the lovely Keisha of refinedandpolished.com and is part of the Limited Edition Miss Candy collection which includes 8 jellies! Oh, I can't even tell you how excited I was to see that in a very sweet and thoughtful package from her.

The stamping was done with Konad Special Stamping Polish in white along with the images found on stamping plate RuiZ03. I tested these images on paper before applying them to my nails. Each image on the plate is etched perfectly and I had no issues transferring them to my nail art stamper and on to my nails.

I used a makeup sponge and Shimmer Julia on my middle finger. On my thumb I applied one coat of OPI's Pirouette My Whistle followed by another coat of Miss Pixie. I completed my mani with a coat of Essie Good To Go.

This cobalt blue jelly that is Miss Pixie is to die for!

Overall, I really really adore this manicure! It makes me want to start planning a trip to Disney with the kids. I love that it's not your traditional Minnie Mouse colors and the 3D bow went perfectly with my inspiration photo. The RuiZ03 plate from BornPrettyStore is made perfectly and I would definitely recommend it to anybody who isn't great at freehand like myself. Remember that if you do purchase this plate, you can receive 10% off your total order at BornPrettyStore by using the unique code on the right of my blog! As always, I hope you all liked this post my dear Lacquer Luvers and I look forward to sharing my next post with you, xo!

~Jessica    

3D Polka Dot Bow Review for BornPrettyStore

Hello Lacquer Luvers! Today's post is a review for the 3D Polka Dot Bow from BornPrettyStore. I have been wanting to try a 3D accent nail for a while now but have never gotten around to getting a set. When BPS contacted me to review for them I was really excited! I have long been a customer of their site and always check out the new things they have to offer.

Front of 3D bow packaging

Back of 3D bow packaging

I decided to go with a skittlette to review these since there were only 9 of them and I want to use these again for another mani I have planned. I began with a base of Essie Feed Me followed by a coat of Cult Nails Tempest on my ring, middle, and thumb nails and two coats of Bettina Vintage on my pinky, index, & thumb nails.

After applying a coat of Essie Good To Go to my ring finger, I carefully picked up the 3D polka dot bow with tweezers and applied it to my nail. The packaging says to use glue to adhere it but since these are my natural nails I didn't want to chance ruining them with glue. However, if you wear acrylic or gel enhancements or overlays, glue would be perfect to adhere your 3D bow.

I proceeded to use a variety of stamps for my skittlette once the bow was adhered and the top coat dried. For the white stamping I used Konad Special Stamping polish in white. The blue stamping is Bettina Vintage. On my pinky is Konad M79, middle is Konad M71, & Cheeky CH11 is on my index finger.

Overall, I really like these bows. I was hesitant to try 3D art because I thought that they would fall off easily or snag on everything. I'm typing up this post 4 hours after completing this mani and the bow is still in tact and hasn't gotten caught on anything. I love the polka dots on these, so cute!

The kind people at BornPrettyStore were nice enough to share a unique code with me just for my followers. You guys can purchase these or any other item at BornPrettyStore.com and receive 10% off your total order using the code UKL91 (click on the coupon code on the right to go directly to their site)! BornPrettyStore always offers FREE worldwide shipping and usually takes 3-5 weeks for your items to arrive. I can't wait to show you guys the other item I have to review from BPS! As always, I hope you all liked this post my dear Lacquer Luvers and I look forward to sharing my next post with you, xo!

~Jessica    

Celebrating Earth Day 2013 With Zoya Josie, Rocky, & The Earth Day Exchange!

Hello Lacquer Luvers! Today is Earth Day and I'm celebrating with a few of the beauties from the Zoya Stunning Collection that I shared with you yesterday. My manicure today was totally inspired by these colors and the earth itself and I am really happy to share it with you!

I began with a base of Essie Feed Me followed by two coats of Zoya Josie. Josie is described as a grassy green cream which made her quite appropriate for today. I then applied one coat of Jordana Cosmic over Josie. Cosmic's blue, green, and silver glitters are like putting the earth, sky and clouds in a bottle, amazing!

My favorite flower images from BornPrettyStore's M72 plate and Konad Special Stamping Polish in White were stamped on all of my nails. I used Zoya Rocky and BM312 on my accent finger. Konad white and my new W104 plate by Winstonia  were used for the words "Earth Day."

Gotta love the macro shot!

How beautiful is that vibrant hibiscus? It's my absolute favorite flower and looked even more stunning (cheesy pun intended) than my manicure next to it.

Zoya is giving us polishaholics a way to do our part for Earth Day. By joining in the 2013 Earth Day Exchange you get to rid your old toxic nail polish in an earth-friendly way and exchange them for brand new Big5Free Zoya polishes! Please click on the link here for full details and hurry as this offer ends April 26. As always, I hope you all liked this post my dear Lacquer Luvers and I look forward to sharing my next post with you, xo!

~Jessica    

It's My Birthday!

Hello Lacquer Luvers! For my 29th birthday I have a short and super sweet post to share with you guys. I wanted to try something that I'm sure we've all seen before - the birthday cupcake mani! Here's my twist on these cute festive nails that are so easy and fun to do..

For my mani I used Essie Feed Me as the base coat followed by two coats of Zoya Yummy on my nails and two coats of Zoya Blu on the accent finger. That gorgeous glitter is Shimmer Polish Julia, love! The cupcake was done with Zoya's Yummy & Blu, Bettina Marshmallow, Shimmer Julia & a cute heart shaped rhinestone from born pretty store.

I love the macro shots! They really show how gorgeous Julia is. You can expect to see more Shimmer Polish on my blog in the very near future. I love that these were so easy to do and that I kept them blue for Autism Awareness month! As always, I hope you all liked this post my dear Lacquer Luvers and I look forward to sharing my next post with you, xo!

~Jessica    

Tropical Manicure with Hummingbirds & Hibiscus'

Hello Lacquer Luvers! If you guys follow me on Facebook, you know that the past few days nail polish just was not feeling like being my friend. I decided to let it be for a while and come back to it a couple days later and guess what? It loves me again! Yay, lol!

I'm in a group on Facebook for nail art stamping and every Sunday there is a challenge. Today's theme is "The Sky's The Limit." For this theme, you can use any images you want to create a manicure that showcases anything you would see in the sky (planes, butterflies, birds, stars, etc). While going through my stamping plates I was inspired by images of hummingbirds. I Googled images of hummingbirds and was captivated by these two photos which also happened to include my most favorite flower:

Photo Credit: http://hoosiergardener.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/hummingbird-hibiscus-steve-byland-a-Fotolia_15250719_S.jpg

Photo Credit: http://shenthreedees.blogspot.com/2010/10/hummingbird-hibiscus-interaction.html

My manicure today began with a base of Essie Grow Faster. I used 3 polishes by Bettina to water marble all of my nails and used the same 3 polishes to do a gradient on my accent nail. The polishes I used were Peppermint, Ocean, and Marshmallow. I chose these colors to symbolize the grass, sky, and clouds. I know that Ocean isn't really green-green, it's more of a aqua/green kind of color but I liked the way this color combination worked better than when I tried it with a true green (Bettina Mojito).

Next I used M72 from a set of plates I purchased from BornPrettyStore and Sally Hansen Color Quick pen in Fuchsia for the hibiscus image. Then I used my Sally Hansen Color Quick pen in Green to stamp on the hummingbirds which were on the H26 image plate by Chez-Delaney. I completed this manicure with a coat of Good To Go topcoat by Essie.

I really do love the way my manicure came out today and am glad that I had the patience to wait out a couple days for nail polish to once love me again. I like the chrome/metallic in the Sally Hansen pens and how it gives the hummingbirds that bit of sheen that you see in their feathers. This manicure makes me want to take a trip to Hawaii! What do you guys think of this manicure? What would you have come up with for this Sunday's theme for the challenge? As always, I hope you all liked this post my dear Lacquer Luvers and I look forward to sharing my next post with you, xo!

~Jessica

Birthday Cake Inspired Mani

Hello Lacquer Luvers! I would love to send out a huge hug to you all for your sweet birthday wishes yesterday. It made me smile to read all of your lovely comments and I love that I got to share something special from my day with you. I am still so shocked and amazed at the Bettina Birthday Cake my husband got me for my birthday yesterday. So much so that I wanted to translate the custom color, which he created and appropriately named Birthday Girl, to my nails (well try to, at least).

Above is a piece of fondant from the cake (which cracked as I lifted it, oops!). It is a bit more purple than what my camera shows. I love that he gave the color some flair by adding iridescent glitter/sparkles to it. I took the picture half in the sun, half in the shade in an attempt to show you guys how it glistens. Isn't it pretty?! He told me that he took my bottle of Bettina Grape when he met with the designer. When she asked if that was the color he wanted the cake to be he said he wanted it to be a little more purple since Grape is a blue based and he wanted it to be more of my favorite color.

I began my manicure with a base of Essie Grow Faster followed by two coats of Bettina Grape. I layered a coat of an unnamed color by L.A. Colors. It is a clear base full of iridescent glitter. Once that dried, I stamped on the large heart design using Konad Special Stamping Polish in white and Red Angel image plate RA-110. Next I used plate M66 from BornPrettyStore to stamp on the word "love" and the random hearts. I decided on this design for the accent finger to symbolize how much I loved the cake! This manicure was topped off with a coat of Good To Go by Essie.

I seriously love this mani! Although my base color isn't the same as the custom color he created, it's pretty close. What do you all think of this manicure? I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments below. As always, I hope you all liked this post my dear Lacquer Luvers and I look forward to sharing my next post with you, xo!

~Jessica

Girly-Girl Nail Art Challenge Day 1

Hello Lacquer Luvers! Today is the first day of the Girly-Girl Nail Art Challenge! This challenge was created by Lindsey of Neverland Nail Blog and was designed to last a month (4 weeks) with 2 challenges per week (Tues & Thurs). I am so excited to do this challenge and join the other bloggers who are participating. Let's get on to my Day 1 nails, shall we?

Today's challenge is Think Pink: wear your favorite pink polish and nail art. For my favorite pink, I chose Zoya Barbie. Barbie can best be described as: "Soft, warm medium baby pink with very subtle hot pink shimmer. An adorable girly shade to accent any outfit."

I began my manicure with a base of Essie Grow Faster. Next I applied 3 coats of Zoya Barbie. The formula and application for Barbie was, as with all Zoya polishes, amazing! Though it was a little sheer, I didn't mind applying the 3 coats that were needed to reach full opacity.

It is no secret that my one of favorite types of nail art is stamping. I chose to use my absolute favorite designs which comes from BornPrettyStore's M72 image plate. I stamped on the design using Konad Special Stamping Polish in black then topped this manicure with Essie's Good To Go top coat.

I really like how this manicure turned out. I love this pink and I love these flowers! I would like to thank Lindsey for the open invitation to join her and the other ladies doing this challenge over the next month. Please go and take a look at what they have in store for today's challenge:

Lindsey of Neverland Nail Blog

Ashley of Follow The Yellow Polish Road

Stephanie of A Little Polish

Kelly of Polish Enthusiast

Jodi of Captivating Claws

Danielle of Lacquer Lover

Elly of Polishable

Olivia of Unprofessional Nails

Kate of This Charming Kate

Bethany of  A Plethora Of Nails

Lizzy of The Do It Yourself Lady

Eugenia of Talon-ted

Johanna of Neues vom Kellerkind

Amanda of Nox Nails

Ashley of Smashley Sparkles

Sarah of See Sarah Swatch

Emily of The Lacquerologist

Tressa of O' Natur Nail

As always, I hope you all liked this post my dear Lacquer Luvers and I look forward to sharing my next post with you, xo!

~Jessica

Christmas Candy Mani

Hello Lacquer Luvers! I have a cute and festive manicure to share with you all today but first, I want to say a huge THANK YOU to Nikki! Nikki and I are in a nail polish group on Facebook. I love that group as I have met so many great people with the same love for polish as me. I was lucky enough to do a swap a month ago (maybe two?) with her and she spoiled me rotten! Around Halloween, a bunch of the girls were posting the most adorable looking pumpkin shaped polishes that seem to be found only in stores like RiteAid & Meijer, neither of which are in South Florida. Long story short, I wanted to try one and she was looking for a specific image for stamping that I just so happened to have,  so we swapped. I was expecting just one of them and to my absolute surprise I received 6! She sent me 3 pumpkin and 3 snowmen polishes and I was ever so grateful that she did since I cannot access these myself! So Ms. Nikki, thank you again!

Today's manicure begins with a base of Nail Envy Maintenance by OPI. I used two coats of Matte by Bettina for my white base. This polish has a really great formula. Although the first coat is a bit streaky, it evens out nicely by the second coat. I'm glad to have this one in my stash. I don't know if it's just me, but I have a hard time finding a really good white cream polish. They always are either super thick, ridiculously runny, or way too streaky.

First, how freakin' cute is that bottle?! The top hat brush handles are absolutely adorable! These polishes are unnamed but as you can see, this one contains red and green hexagonal glitter in a clear base. I applied one coat on each of my nails except my ring finger. Application was nice on this, the glitter dispersed evenly and I did not have a problem with placement. I quite love the way it looks over the white. It reminds me of sprinkles on top of holiday cupcakes!

On my accent nail, I stamped on a candy cane design from BornPrettyStore image plate M37 using the polish from my red Kiss nail art striper. I have attempted to use various reds for this, however, none were opaque enough and they all turned pink over the white. I used scotch tape and Bettina Mojito for my green funky french tips. I topped this manicure with fast dry top coat by Seche Vite.

Though I like this manicure, I think I liked it better before the stamping and green tips. Something about the white with the red and green glitter is just so pretty to me. What do you all think? Like it, love it, or hate it? As always, I hope you all liked this post my dear Lacquer Luvers and I look forward to sharing tomorrow's post with you, xo!

~Jessica

Have A Hello Kitty Christmas

Hello Lacquer Luvers and Happy Monday to you all! Today I have a super cute holiday mani that I am so excited to share with you! I had posted my Pink Snowflakes nails over in a nail polish group on Facebook and the ladies really seemed to have loved my girly twist on a traditional holiday manicure. I loved that one alot, too, and it got me to thinking of what other girly design ideas I could create for a seasonal manicure. While going through my image plates I came across one with the perfect design on it and thought "ooooh! I've got it!" So get ready for super cuteness my dear Lacquer Luvers as I bring you a festive manicure with the always adorable, Hello Kitty!

Today's manicure begins with a base coat of Nail Envy Maintenance by OPI. I used two coats of Bettina Onix as my base color and three coats of Snow White by Zoya on my accent finger. The formula on these creams are fantastic and both were very easy to apply.

To bring on some sparkle, I layered one coat of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear VIP Pink over Bettina Onix. VIP Pink can best be described as a pink sheer (perhaps jelly) polish full of pink micro-glitter with pink and silver shimmer. This one is best used for layering since she's so sheer (and sadly discontinued). I am in love with this over black! Now, on to the cuteness!

Isn't that adorable?! Let me share with you how I did it. First I used Bettina Pink Bikini and BundleMonster image plate BM14 for the two pink snowflakes. The Hello Kitty image is from BornPrettyStore plate M71 & originally comes with a bow in front of her right ear. I used my orange wood stick to get rid of the bow while it was still on my stamper. You have to do this quickly as the Konad Special Stamping Polish in black that I used for this dries really fast. Hello Kitty got a pretty pink Santa hat using Bettina Pink Bikini and BM-214. A toothpick was dipped into SHXW VIP Pink and was used for detail around the rim and top of her hat.

Although my Hello Kitty is not directly centered on my nail (stamp placement can be so hard sometimes) I am extremely happy with this unique Holiday manicure! Do you ladies love it? HK looks so cute rocking her pink sparkly Santa hat & the pink snowflakes help to tie in with the holiday theme. Who said Christmas nails couldn't be pink and black and absolutely adorable? As always, I hope you all liked this post my dear Lacquer Luvers and I look forward to sharing tomorrow's post with you, xo!

~Jessica

10 Day Challenge: Day 8

Hello Lacquer Luvers & welcome to Day 8 of the 10 Day Challenge! The theme for today's manicure is Favorite Movie or Inspired by a Movie. This manicure was inspired by my son and one of his favorite movies, Madagascar 2! Tyus loves the animals in this movie, & he especially likes the "I like to move it, move it!" song. We all have a great time watching this together =)

There were quite a few polishes used for this mani but as usual, I began with a base of OPI Nail Envy. I wanted to do a nail for each of the main characters in the movie: Alex (the lion), Marty (the zebra), Melman (the giraffe), & Gloria (the hippo). For Alex, I used one coat of OPI Rising star and sponged on E.L.F. Chocolate at the tip of my nail using an eyeshadow applicator. For Alex's pawprints, I used Chocolate again and image plate m35 from BornPrettyStore. Marty was done using 3 coats of Snow White by Zoya & konad special stamping polish in black. I used a design from BundleMonster's BM223 image plate for the zebra stripes. Melman began with 2 coats of China Glaze II & the giraffe print was stamped on using Chocolate by E.L.F. along with a design from BundleMonster's BM215 image plate. Gloria was freehanded and began with 2 coats of Grey Area by Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear. I used my dotting tool as well as E.L.F. Champagne, Zoya Snow White, & WetNWild Ebony Hates Chris for the eyes & used my striper brush for her eyelashes and eyebrows. Once everything dried, I topped this mani with fast dry top coat by Seche Vite.

I love how my Madagascar 2 inspired mani turned out so much! It was really fun to do and I hope you all like it just as much. What is your favorite movie? Let's all go see what Ms. Kelly from Posh For Polish was inspired by for this challenge! I'm sure she did something amazing! As always, I hope you all liked this post my dear Lacquer Luvers and I look forward to sharing tomorrow's post with you, xo!

~Jessica