Girly Bits Smurf Dance

Happy Friday!! No Friday Favorites post this week due to extreme laziness on my part....my next post involves me doing things I don't really understand how to do so I keep putting it off haha. Hopefully I'll get it done this weekend so you guys will be able to see it next Friday!

Today I have a gorgeous Girly Bits polish called Smurf Dance to share with you guys. Before I talk about the polish hows about a little story time with Jen? A million years ago when I was in the 8th grade I tried out for the cheerleading squad at my high school, I made the team...oh yeah!! People who know me in real life never believe I was a cheerleader, I'm pretty much the most un cheery type of person ever! But yep, I was a cheerleader my Freshman & Sophomore year of high school....I would have done it the rest of high school but I switched schools.

Back in the olden days the outgoing senior cheerleaders hazed us when we made the squad...not in a bad way, in a funny way (pretty sure it's banned now though). They came and "kidnapped" all of the underclassmen in the middle of the night and dressed us up all kinds of ridiculous and sent us off to school the next day. My year they dressed us up as smurf's, I was Papa Smurf...they went all out, painted us blue made us hats etc... Since I was Papa Smurf I ever had a beard made of cotton balls. One of the girls was some kind of Farmer Smurf and she had to carry around carrots all day, I remember feeling really bad for her because of that lol! It was so fun, it makes me sad that it was banned because it's one of my favorite memories from high school. The only bad part was walking home painted blue wearing a cotton ball beard. I got some seriously weird looks that day...people even honked at me.

Anyway, back to nail polish....Smurf Dance. Smurf Dance is packed with various sizes of different shades of blue and white glitter with a big old helping of holo goodness.  This is stunning, photos really don't do any justice to how great the holo bits are in person! The formula was great, the glitter payoff was incredible! I used 1 coat of Smurf Dance over Nicole by OPI I Sea You And I Raise You for the photos below. All 3 photos are in direct sunlight.

Girly Bits is available a few places including GirlyBits.BigCartel.com,  Harlow & Co, Overall Beauty (I don't think Kim carries this shade, just FYI), Mei Mei Signatures and Llarowe. The price varies depending on where you buy!

P.S. I think I said Smurf more in this post than I have in my whole life. smurf smurf smurf :D

Ninja Poilsh He Went To Jarred and The Midas Touch

Hi guys! Today I have 2 gold leaf top coats from Ninja Polish to share with you! We've been seeing a lot of gold leaf top coats lately but Ninja Polish also put out a white gold leaf version and I am loving it!

First up is He Went To Jarred which is a 12K White Gold flake in a clear base. I'm having the urge to layer this over everything, I think I might like it even more than I like regular gold leaf top coats! The formula was good, I used 2 coats to get the flake coverage you see in the photos. I have He Went To Jarred over LAQA&CO Bells & Whistles.

Anyone else loving the name of this like I do? haha!

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The Midas Touch is a 24K gold flake in a clear base. This has the larger flakes like the OPI version has, I'll have a comparison up of all the polishes like this that I own soon! The formula was good, I used 1 coat then dabbed on more flakes on sparse spots for the photos below. I have The Midas Touch over Ninja Polish Sapphire Dreams!

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Both of these polishes are available at NinjaPolish.com they retail for $15 each. It looks like they are both out of stock right now but they will be back soon, make sure you sign up to be notified about when stock is replenished so you don't miss them!

Degen's November 2012 BarkBox

Hi guys! Today I have Degen's November BarkBox to share with you guys! In the giveaway I just recently did I asked what you guys wanted to see more of on the blog and a HUGE amount of you said more photos of Degen....so you guys will like this post :D Degen is very flattered by the way, maybe he'll start popping up in random posts every so often, we shall see! He's always out in the backyard acting crazy while I'm taking photos so I'm sure we can make it happen!

In addition to Degen in this post our little friend Biggens came to visit while I was taking photos of the box outside...hope you guys like him (I do) haha!

To see all of Degen's goodies along with some wiener dog photos and to meet Biggens click the read more button below!

Candeo Colors Rock Steady

Hi guys! Today I have a glitter from the Candeo Colors Winter Collection to share with you called Rock Steady. I'm not sure of the inspiration behind the shade but I'm just going to pretend it's named after the No Doubt album, lets be real...that's kind of why I bought it!

Rock Steady is a light grey base with gold, silver, blue and burgundy glitter of varying sizes. I love this combo, it's unexpected but it works really well. I layered 1 coat of Rock Steady over LCN Tokyo Expression, however you really don't need any undies for this one...it completely covered the base polish. The formula was not my favorite, I found it to be thick and goopy, hard to apply etc... I haven't thinned my bottle yet but I'm sure it will help with the formula issues once I do.

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Candeo Colors is available at CandeoColors.com for $9 each and also at shop.llarowe.com for $11 a bottle!

LCN Fall 2012 Urban Expression Collection Swatches

Hi guys! Hope you all had a great weekend! Today I have LCN's Fall 2012 Collection called Urban Expression to share with you. I've tried a few of LCN's magnetic polishes in the past but this is my first time trying any of their regular polishes. The Urban Expression Collection is 4 creme polishes that are great basics for any collection, check out the swatches after the jump!

NOTD: No Doubt Concert!

Hi guys, quick post today. I posted these nails on Instagram and my Facebook page yesterday but I wanted to post them here also for those of you who don't follow me on either of those. Last night I went to see No Doubt in LA, there are doing a residency at the Gibson Amphitheater though the beginning of December. Normally I would go to all 7 shows they are doing but I decided to only go to 1 this time around, so of course I had to do my nails all fancy for it.

I knew I wanted to do a black and white color scheme but I couldn't pick out a design so I ended up with a mish mash of different things. My nails ended up being pretty appropriate because the entire band was wearing black and white on stage until the encore haha! I only used 2 polishes for all the nails, OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls and OPI Black Onyx.

I have tutorials for how you can recreate the pinky, ring and thumb here in case you're wondering how I did them, they are for different manicures but it's the same basic concept!

Thumb! 

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Here are a few photos from the show also. I had amazing seats but most of my photos turned out crappy because of one stupid light that was shining like directly towards me :( Also Gwen was wearing like a whole sparkly outfit so she mostly just looked like a sparkly blob of awesome in 99% of my photos.

Stephen, Gwen & Gabe during Hey Baby!

For the encore Gwen changed into an awesome sparkly red outfit. These photos aren't great I just wanted to post them so you could all die over her abs with me...I swear Gwen does not age.

Cirque Objet d'Art Collection Swatches

Happy weekend! Anyone have big plans? I sure do, I'm going to see No Doubt tonight! If you know me in real life you'd know that No Doubt is pretty much my favorite thing ever. I've seen them live probably 30 times by now, I've lost count after all these years. I even have 2 No Doubt tattoos...I think I've proved my fangirl-ness is in full effect over here, right? haha!

I have a brand new collection from Cirque to share with you today. If you've never heard of Cirque you are in for a treat! The collection I have for you is the second release from Cirque, it's called the Objet d'Art Collection. Cirque's website says that the polishes in the Objet d'Art Collection are inspired by works of art such as, Hirst's "For the Love of God" and McQueen's "Savage Beauty" exhibition. When you go to the Cirque website there are gorgeous photos for a few of the shades showing their inspiration!  There is truly something for everyone in this collection, it includes 11 shades in a variety of colors and finishes. I hope you all love it as much as I do!

To see swatches of this entire collection please click the read more button below.

Friday Favorites #2: Foil Method for Glitter Nail Polish Removal

Hi guys! Hope you all had a fantastic Thanksgiving if you celebrated it! Anyone partaking in Black Friday today? I usually do but I'm not this year, I bought a few Sigma brushes I had on my wish list since they are doing free shipping but nothing else is calling to me so I'm saving my money for now!

Today I have another Friday Favorites for you! This is one that I wish I had known when I started getting into nail polish. For a long time I hated glitter because as we all know it is a nightmare to remove, I passed on some seriously amazing polishes because of my aversion to getting it off. After I started blogging I heard about something called the "Foil Method" and it changed my life, now I love glitter because getting it off is easy! I thought I'd share it today in case you are looking for an easy way to get glitter off without too much hassle and have never heard of this.

Click the read more button below to read the rest of this post!

China Glaze Water You Waiting For vs. Nicole by OPI Kendall On The Katwalk

Happy Thanksgiving! Hope all of my fellow US lovies are having a good turkey day so far! Today I have a quick comparison for you! It's China Glaze Water You Waiting For vs Nicole by OPI Kendall On The Katwalk. This was requested by quite a few people. I can't believe I didn't think of this when I was swatching the Cirque du Soleil Collection!

These 2 polishes are not 100% dupes but they are very very close. The only really slight difference is that the Nicole by OPI has purple glitter that the China Glaze is missing. I couldn't tell the difference between these 2 in person when they were on the nail. In photos you can see the difference better, especially in the shade, because macro is awesome like that. You definitely do not need both of these, in my opinion. Formula wise I liked them both equally, they both go on easily and have nice opacity. I used 2 coats for each polish.

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NOTD: Thanksgiving Nail Art!

Hi guys! Today I have my Thanksgiving nails to share with you, I know Thanksgiving isn't until tomorrow but I'm impatient and want to post them now haha! I've seen this kind of cloud look all over the place and it looked easy enough to do so I gave it a shot!

I used Eyeko Military Polish as my base, it's an awesome murky army green. This was on my wishlist for literally, like 2 years. Eyeko stopped making polish a while back so I thought I'd probably never own it then Jess from Polish Insomniac surprised me with it, how awesome is that?!? Thank you Jess!

The "clouds" are Zoya Arizona (orange) and Zoya Codie (brown). I really like how this turned out, it's far from perfect but shoot...it's freehand. I'm impressed with myself that it even looks anything like I intended for it to look.

The tutorial I used for this look in case you want to recreate it can be found on Nailside!

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Zoya is available at Zoya.com for $8 a bottle. Eyeko unforuantely does not make nail polish anymore :(

Jindie Nails Candy Land

Hi guys! Today I have an indie polish from a new to me brand called Jindie Nails to share with you. I saw a photo of this somewhere, I think on Facebook and I HAD to have it. I posted a bottle shot on instagram the other day and a lot of people wanted to see this swatched (myself included of course lol)!

Candy Land is a milky white jelly-ish base full of different sizes of neon hex glitter. The formula was a bit tricky, it was a little patchy going on but with some patience and a few minutes between coats it was perfect at 3 coats! When this came in the mail there was a nice note on my order form from Jen (maker of Jindie Nails) saying that the glitter had a tendency to sink and to put the bottle upside down to redistribute the glitter. I let it sit upside down all night before I applied it. The glitter was easy to get out, I didn't have to fish for it or place it where I wanted it, that putting the bottle upside down trick is a real winner!
 
I believe this polish is sold out at the moment but it looks like it will be back once Jen gets the glitter back in stock according to the note in her etsy shop. 

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Jindie Nails is available on etsy, you can visit Jen's shop by clicking here, Candy Land retails for $8.75.

Holiday Giveaway: Win The OPI Bond-ettes Mini Set!

Hi guys! Hope you all had a great weekend! Today I have a giveaway for you, yay! I teamed up with Planet Beauty to giveaway 3 of the OPI Bond-ettes Mini Sets! The polishes in the mini set are 4 of the standouts from the Skyfall collection OPI recently released for Holiday 2012, it includes Goldeneye, The Spy Who Loved Me, The World Is Not Enough and Live And Let Die (Pictured Below!)

To see all my swatches and thoughts on the Skyfall collection please click here!

For all the rules for the giveaway and to enter the giveaway please click the read more button below!

China Glaze Running In Circles vs Zoya Ivanka vs Zoya Apple

Hi guys! Sorry for the lack of Saturday Spam and the super late post! I had a big old spam post planned but then I accidentally deleted the entire folder of photos and didn't realize it until after I had already emptied the recycle bin on my computer :( Hopefully that's the first and only time I do that, a rage tear may have been shed when I realized what happened.

Today I have a comparison quite a few people requested. It's China Glaze Running In Circles from the Cirque du Soleil Collection vs Zoya Ivanka and Zoya Apple. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately depending on how you look at it) no dupes between these 3 polishes. Ivanka is darker and much more blue toned than Running In Circles, it's also a lot more sheer. Apple is much lighter and more golden toned...it also has more a foil finish to it. If I could only pick one of these to have it would easily be Running In Circles, the shade of green is my favorite out of the 3 and the formula is the best, by far! I used 2 coats of Running In Circles, 4 coats of Ivanka and 3 coats of Apple for the photos below.

Both photos below are in the shade, no sun here today....it's actually raining in California, WHAT! haha! Have a good weekend everyone!

Friday Favorites #1: Manicure Basics

Hi guys, TGIF! Today I'm starting a new series on the blog called Friday Favorites. I've been toying with idea for a while, this will not be a weekly thing but more like a when I have time thing. Hope you enjoy!

For this first installment of Friday Favorites I'm sharing my manicure basics. The three things I get asked the most are 1. How do you paint your nails so neat? 2. How do you get your cuticles looking nice? and 3. What products do you use on your nails?. I have a whole video and whatnot planned for #1 so that will happen sometime in the future but for now I thought I'd tackle the other 2 questions in this first Friday Favorites post!

To see all my favorite products click the read more button below!

Nicole by OPI CVS Exclusives!

Hi guys! Can you believe next week at this time it will be Thanksgiving? I looked at a calendar a few minutes ago and had a mild OMG moment about it. Mostly because I haven't planned any shopping yet for Black Friday, that is so unlike me...usually I have a whole plan of action by now lol! I need to get working on that.

Today I have 7 new Nicole by OPI polishes to share with you, all 7 of these new polishes are exclusive to CVS and launching this month! These new shades are a mix of cremes and shimmers in some nice basic colors! Check out the swatches after the jump!

To see more photos and reviews of each shade click the read more button below!

NOTD: Baker Street + Pinkerbell for World Diabetes Day

Hi guys! Today I have another quick NOTD for you, a bunch of other bloggers and nail polish lovies are posting blue mani's for World Diabetes Day. I have a few family members (and even a cat) affected by this disease so it's something that is close to my heart. For more info about World Diabetes Day you can check out this website!

If you follow me on Instagram you might have already seen this mani, but if you haven't seen it already I hope you like it! This was my nails of most of last week, I wore this because I had 2 dentist appointments so I needed something to cheer me up through that ordeal! I used Nails Inc Baker Street (I am obsessed with this polish...OBSESSED) as my main polish and the accent nail is 1 coat of Nail Venturous Pinkerbell over Baker Street. I love Pinkerbell, it's such an epic multi colored matte glitter. I had a bottle a while back but I dropped it one day and it went to nail polish heaven (RIP), I'm so glad I was able to get another bottle last time Ninja Polish re-stocked it!

P.S. I wish Baker Street would photograph as vibrant as it is in real life, this was so much better in person!

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Nails Inc can be found in the US at Sephora and on Sephora.com. Pinkerbell can be purchased from NinjaPolish.com!

To see some other gorgeous blue manis for World Diabetes Day check out the links below!

NOTD: Glossy/Matte Quilting

Hi guys! Today I have a quick NOTD (nail of the day) to share with you. For once this is actually what I'm wearing at this moment, not only that but I actually have it on all 10 nails. Having all of my nails painted the same color is a true rarity, it's even more rare that I have them painted the same and with some kind of nail art on all of them!

Ever since I did my quilting look a little while back I've been wanting to do it again. I really love the way this looks and it's pretty easy to do, the possibilities are endless with it! I decided to do a matte/glossy look and a glittery accent nail. For the glossy and matte nails I used Nails Inc Black Taxi as my base then instead of using another color polish over the striping tape used to create the pattern I did a coat of Essie Matte About You. The for the accent nail I used the same base polish and OPI Mad As A Hatter for the glitter. For a full tutorial on how to do the quilting effect please check out this post.

Big thank you to the fabulous Liz from Life and Polish for totally blowing my mind a few weeks ago and sending me a bottle of OPI Mad As A Hatter. I had no idea it was on it's way and I almost passed out when I opened her package, MAAH was a polish I thought I'd never own!

China Glaze Cirque du Soleil: Worlds Away Collection Swatches

Hi guys! Hope you all had a great weekend, mine was nice I'm sad it's already over. Today I have swatches of most of the China Glaze Cirque du Soleil Collection to share with you! Apparently this collection is inspired by the Cirque du Soleil: Worlds Away 3D movie coming out towards the end of December. I had no idea they had a movie coming out, that'll be something I'll have to see. I've seen a few of the Cirque shows and they are always amazing, I'm sure the film will be awesome.

I've been waiting for this collection, practically stalking my local supply shop for them. They finally got them in last Wednesday so off I went to hoard them all. This collection brings us 12 new polishes, I ended up picking up 8 of them. The 4 I passed on were all red or pink, they just didn't look that unique to me and those are 2 colors I need no more of. Well really, I don't need any more of ANY colors but I don't like reds or pinks enough to justify buying even more of them lol!

To see all the swatches & reviews of each shade click the read more button below!

Saturday Spam: Layla Hologram Effect

Happy weekend! Anyone doing anything fun this weekend? I'm going to go to a concert tonight, I'm seeing Minus The Bear in case you're wondering. Other than that I'm not up to too much, I can't afford to do anything after my visit to Sephora for the 20% off VIB sale hahaha!

Today I have some holographic spam for you! A little while back Layla was on Hautelook so I decided to buy a few of the newer hologram effect polishes I had been lemming. Check out all the photos after the jump!

Cellairis Nail Art Series #3: Winter Glow Gradient + Giveaway

Hi guys, happy Friday! Today I have my 3rd and final Cellairis phone case inspired nail art look to share with you! Along with showing you what I came up with I also have a tutorial and a giveaway to go along with it, woohoo!

The phone case this nail art was inspired by is from the Elle & Blair Collection and it's called Winter Glow- Aquamarine. I love this case because it's a gorgeous silver to blue gradient of rhinestones! I've had the Rainbow version of this case on my phone for 4 or 5 months and I love it, I'm always impressed by how few of the rhinestones have fallen off since I tend to be a little rough on my phone and it's always floating around in my purse or in my car.

Hope you all like what I came up with, to see more photos along with a tutorial and a giveaway click the read more button under the photo!

Essence Breaking Dawn 2 Collection Swatches

Hi guys! Today I have 3 of the 4 polishes from the Breaking Dawn 2 Collection Essence just recently released. I had heard a little bit about this collection but didn't expect to find it around here, I don't even remember the last time I found a new Essence LE display at Ulta. I was a bit shocked when I walked into Ulta last week and found the display for this collection completely untouched. I'm not a huge Twilight fan but these were too pretty to pass up! The 4th polish that I don't have was a gold, the kind of gold that does not look good on me so it stayed at Ulta. You can see a great swatch of it on Parokeets if you're interested in what it looks like.


To see swatches of each polish click the read more button below!

Color Club Holiday 2012 Winter Affair Collection Swatches

Hi guys! Has everyone recovered from their election night anxiety yet? I'm so glad they called the Presidential race early so I could move on to creating an ulcer over the local election results. I'm scared to look and see who won those since I'm sure everyone I don't care for got elected to our city council based on the numbers when I went to bed last night :(

Today I have Color Club's gorgeous Holiday 2012 called Winter Affair to share with you guys! This collection brings us 6 gorgeous new polishes, 1 of them being a flakie top coat! Just a note about this collection, you can find this at Sally Beauty Supply (I saw it at my local store last week). However, it seems to be a bit different i.e. a couple of the colors are different but named the same thing. The Sally's version of this collection is also scented, if you buy them elsewhere they just smell like nail polish :(

To see all the swatches & reviews of the Winter Affair Collection click the read more button below!

New piCture pOlish glitter swatches!

Hi guys! Happy Tuesday, hope all of you that live in the US and can vote are doing that today! I already voted via absentee a few weeks ago, I prefer voting that way because then I can take as long as I want to read up on the props and whatnot while I have the ballot in front of me. I'm sure I'll be glued to my tv tonight watching the results, I'll be so glad when this is all over.

Today I have 5 brand new piCture pOlish glitters to share with you guys, they just recently released them and I'm a bit in love! Hope you all love them as much as I do, you can see all the swatches after the jump!

Degen's first Bugsy's Box

Hi guys! Hope you all had a good weekend! Today I have a non nail polish post, I'll be back to normal tomorrow I just haven't had time to edit any nail photos! Today's post is another doggy box, this one is called Bugsy's Box and it's pretty much exactly the same as the Barkboxes I've shown the last few months. Bugsy's Box is a monthly subscription service that gives you 5-7 items for your dog each month. The price for the box depends on how long you subscribe for, it ranges from $17 to $29. You can also get it in different sizes depending on the size of your dog, currently they have a small, medium & large dog box! To see everything Degen got in his Bugsy's Box click the read more button below!

Saturday Spam: OPI, Seche & Whimsical Ideas by Pam

Hi guys! Happy weekend! Anyone doing anything fun and exciting this weekend? I'm going to enjoy the sunshine, it's supposed to be hot this weekend. I'm also pretty excited that we get to turn the clocks back tonight! I love when we get to Fall back, mostly because I love that extra hour of sleep. The only thing that sucks is that now it will be dark when I leave work during the week...I hate that, it always feels like I get robbed of my day (makes no sense, I know).

Today I have a bit of spam for you, mostly OPI but I also have a couple more Seche polishes and a gorgeous Whimsical Ideas by Pam polish to share! Hope you guys enjoy!

To see all the swatches click the read more button below.

Revlon Nail Art StyleStrips: Splatter Paint

Happy Friday! Today I have some nail art strips/decals/StyleStrips/whatever you want to call them from Revlon to share with you guys. I came across a display of these Revlon StyleStrips at CVS a few weeks back and they were buy 1 get 1 half off so I brought home a couple designs.

The first design that caught my eye was Splatter Paint which is a shimmery blue base with black splatter, as someone who loves to do this myself I thought it might be fun to have the look of splatter without the hassle. I also picked up a water marble design but I haven't tried those strips out yet. I found that these were easy to apply, if you like the Sally Hansen Salon Effects you'll like these also since they are essentially the same thing and and apply the same way. I wore these for an entire week and they lasted really well, no issues like the strips peeling off or chipping. Removal was a bit of a pain, the blue came off without any problems using nail polish remover but the black splatter spots required some scrubbing to get off.

My only minor disappointment was that all the good splatter spots seemed to be on the parts of the strips that didn't end up on my nails...fail lol!

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 Below are some photos of the packaging and what comes in the box.

I found the Revlon StyleStrips at CVS, they retailed for $10.50 each....for the price I probably won't be buying these again but I did like them!