Tag Archives: Sansan

02 Dec

SanSan Warm Blue with Icy Ruffian

Hi ladies!

Just because it is Monday doesn’t mean we should feel blue. Of course, that is easy for me to say because Monday is my hubby’s day off, and we went out today, had a grand time with the kids, and got most of our Christmas shopping done. Win! Plus it is finally December 1, which means Christmas everything. Bring on the holiday nails!

Warm Blue Glitter Ruffian snowflake

I’ve got a quick and easy look to share with you today. All it takes to do this is a pretty icy blue shade and some glitters. I started with couple coats of this lovely, light, icy blue polish, ironically named Warm Blue (by Sansan). I added a glitter ruffian flair with the pearly glitters from the hexagonal glitter set sent to me by Born Pretty Store. After applying the second coat of Warm Blue, I used a damp orange wood stick to pick up the glitters and place them where I wanted them. Then I finished with topcoat. Easy peasy!

Warm Blue Glitter Ruffian

This was easy to do and ended up looking so pretty! I will definitely be doing this type of look again. The glitter adds just the right amount of sparkle. The colors I chose are definitely winter appropriate. I had a couple of people tell me they looked like “Frozen” nails. I can totally see Elsa rocking these babies and singing, “Let it SNOOOOOW”! Haha!

Well, I hope you liked these. If you want to order the 12-color glitter set from Born Pretty Store (or anything else for that matter) you can use my coupon code for 10% off your entire order!

BornPrettySore Coupon Code TEAW10

I hope you have a great start to the week! Keep smiling!
Hugs,
Rach

01 Oct

SanSan Tea Rose with Foil and Stripes

Hello, fabulous people!

I have had migraines showing up and ruining my plans for posting.  After I started feeling better, I got so involved at home doing school with my two little ones, just having fun, and trying to slow time down to enjoy them longer. I love being a mom. Anyhooo…  I am happy to be able to post something this evening. I’ve been excited to share it for a while.

Sometimes I like to go out of my comfort zone with nail art. Especially when I see a design by someone else and think “I could barely probably pull off that look.” I saw this look by Haus Of Lacquer on their Instagram a couple of weeks ago and I really liked it, so I put my own spin on it.

SanSan Tea Rose (bottle shot)

I filed my nails more pointy than usual and started with two coats of SanSan Tea Rose. I love this polish! It’s a light-pink jelly with a pretty shimmer to it.  Then I used clear coat to add some silver foil and applied a topcoat. When that dried, I used a striping brush and black acrylic paint to add the lines. Cool huh? I imagine this style on a chic business woman. It’s classy but still edgy, and it totally reeks of self-confidence! I really enjoyed wearing these.

SanSan Tea Rose with Foil and Stripes

Do you follow any Instagram accounts for nail art ideas? Please share your favorites for me to check out. I always love finding fellow addicts new inspiration! I’m on Instagram too if you want to pop over and follow me.

Have a wonderful day/evening!
Hugs,
Rach

27 Jan

San San Tea Rose Reinvention

I’m showing you my submission for the Lacquer Legion theme for today which is “Reinvention”. This mani applies in two aspects because:
1. I used a polish over some decals to make it work for me.
2. I  am wearing a look I have NEVER worn and NEVER EVER thought I would. Would you just look at that visible nail line (VNL)? And would you believe that I LOVE it?!?!

This is two very easy coats of San San Tea Rose. I think this may be the only exception to my severe case of VNLphobia. But I will definitely be more open minded from now on and give a polish a chance to win my heart like Tea Rose did. The accent nail is a full nail water decal I purchased from My Online Shop on Facebook. I added a coat of Tea Rose to make it match the other nails.
The combination of my nail shape, the floral pattern and the dusty pink just screams vintage romance. Don’t you think?

I also added a pearl accent to the accent nail. These are from Blooming Nail Cebu.

San San polishes are available at HBC branches and retail for 37 Philippine Pesos per 12 ml bottle.

How do you feel about VNL? Are you getting in the mood for some romantic nail art for Valentine’s Day? I’m looking forward to some extra girly looks in the coming days.

Have a fabulous day!
Rach

26 Dec

Review of Chic Shadow Crystal and Blooming Nail Cebu Water Decals

Merry Christmas!

I hope you had a wonderful day filled with much love and laughter and that you got to spend it with people that you love. We enjoyed a Skype date with my hubby’s folks in Texas and we enjoyed a lovely lunch with my parents and siblings here in Cebu. Among other yummy things, we had some awesome mashed potatoes for lunch. Mr. Nailinator found this recipe from the Pioneer Woman. The secret ingredient? Cream cheese! Best mashed potatoes I have ever eaten!

On to the nails… I planned to post this a couple of nights ago but I got hit with a bad migraine and it just didn’t happen. I was too busy yesterday preparing for guests today and just hanging out with the kids and Mr. Nailinator, so I’m posting it now.
Chic Shadow Crystal with "ugly sweater" water decals

Sometimes a girl needs some nail art that is easy and super speedy. This was just that. I applied my polish ahead of time (I’ll talk more about the polish in a bit) and had planned on doing a lovely free handed design, but due to time constraints (seriously, I’ve got two very active kids and a household to run) I chose to use the Hot016 Christmas themed water decals (should have taken a picture) that I purchased from Blooming Nail Cebu a while back. It doesn’t really get much easier than water decals, gals. The Blooming Nail decals are great quality. They are so easy to work with. They have vibrant images, and they are thick enough that I was able to use my tweezers to position them, mumble under my breath at my lousy attempt at centering the design, and reposition it several times. Then I applied topcoat to seal it and smooth it out. I forgot to make sure the decal was completely dry before I placed it on my ring finger, thus you can see I experienced a bit of bubbling. Hopefully the next time I do decals I won’t forget that step and they will all be smooth.

Chic Shadow Crystal swatch

The polish I used as my base is Chic Shadow Crystal (PHP 34.75/US$ 0.78). It is one of the 5 shades in their Grainy Collection. The polishes in their Grainy Collection dry to what I would describe as a slightly textured semi-matte finish. This is two thin coats of Shadow Crystal over one coat of San San Cloudy Gray. I think Shadow Crystal would need 4 coats for it to be opaque on it’s own so I decided to use undies again. I really love this polish. It dries fast and I love the finish and the little sparkles. It reminds me again of glistening snow except with a grayish silvery tint. I received several compliments when I wore the polish on it’s own. If you look closely at the pictures with the decals, you will see that there is no visible tip wear. I had already been wearing it without topcoat for 2 full days when I added the decals so it wears quite well also. Cleanup was very easy for me. A few sparklies were left behind, but they came off easily when I washed my hands. This is another perfect holiday shade in my opinion.

I’m still getting used to doing actual reviews on polishes. I would really appreciate if you would tell me if there is any lacking information in this review that you would like me to include in future review posts. Or feel free to tell me what I did right. 😉

Mr. Nailinator convinced me to take the plunge and file my nails to a sort of pointy almond shape so the next time we meet I will be sporting a different look. I’ve had a lot of positive feedback so I hope you all love them too.

Christmas Lantern - Merry Christmas to you!

I’m singing off for bed now. Again, I hope you had/are having a very merry Christmas. May God bless you and yours.

Hugs,
Rachael

15 Nov

Philippine Flag Nail Art (and a plea from my heart)

Hello friends,

I mentioned in my last post that we were hunkering down for super typhoon Haiyan or Yolanda as it is locally called. Unless you have been living under a rock somewhere, you have heard about the catastrophic damage that the storm has left in its wake. Those of us in Cebu City were spared the brunt of the storm but many, many others in this beautiful country were not and they are suffering unimaginably. Thousands have lost their homes. Many are literally starving and suffering dehydration as relief goods are difficult to deliver through blocked roads. Clearing roads of fallen trees and buildings and other debris takes much time and there are many people in many places that need help badly! Many people have been evacuated to Cebu City and Manila and now the government is scrambling to find housing and daily sustenance for the thousands of people with nothing left! The casualty count is getting higher and bustling cities are now in ruins. It is absolutely heart breaking.

Needless to say, with all this going on, I find it hard to bring myself to do my nails. But I decided to do these to honor the strength of the Filipino people and to raise awareness of the situation here.

Philippine Flag Nail Art

These nails were inspired by the Philippine flag. I used two coats of Caronia Tea Rose (red) and then added San San Blue Sapphire to half the nail. I added gold studs I bought at Blooming Nail Cebu. These “flag nails” could have been more detailed as I could have added stars and the sun you see in the picture of the Philippine flag (below). But, I have been busy doing other things that mean more to me and I don’t have the heart to spend much time on my nails at all lately. I hope you can still see how it is inspired by the flag. One day I will do another design inspired by our flag.

Philippine Flag
Photo Credit: Mike Gonzalez
The nail art community is jam packed with AWESOME people. Seriously, you gals have hearts of gold and I feel like I can ask you to please PLEASE consider donating some money via any organization you feel comfortable with. You can donate through the Philippine Red Cross, UNICEF or another  big organization like that. You can also donate through many smaller organizations that are doing wonderful work and are effectively and QUICKLY helping people. May I suggest the non-profit organization Lilia’s Place? I know Doug and Lisa, who run this organization, personally. They are a great couple who have huge hearts for helping others. They gave up their comfortable lives and jobs in the US and left all their family behind and have been working with street families in Cebu City for over 4 years. Now they are working to help those affected by the typhoon as well. I can assure you that they will use your money immediately to purchase relief goods and take them to those in need. Just yesterday they brought a truckload up north of Cebu and provided food and water to a village of 300 families that hadn’t had a bite to eat in 4 days (pictures on their FB page)! Can you even imagine?!? Please consider sending some money through them if you would like to fund a smaller relief effort. If you choose to donate, please include a note that the funds are for typhoon relief.
I want to assure you that every dollar counts! Just one US dollar can buy 3 pounds of rice or 3 cans of sardines or 4 liters of drinking water. Do you think you could have PB&J or ramen for dinner just once this week or drink water instead of soda or  hold of on a polish lemming for a while and send a couple (or a couple hundred) dollars to help get some food to someone in dire need? Please?
If you are in the Philippines and want to help by volunteering but don’t know where to start, please contact me via email (rdrobins84@gmail.com) and I will do my best to find a place in your area where you can help in some way.

I don’t know how often I will be able to post in the next few weeks as my priorities right now are spending my free time volunteering packing relief goods. But I will be back and I hope you will stick around. Please pray for this country as we mourn and try to pick up the pieces and help those hardest hit as much as we can. Thank you for reading all this. I’m sorry for such a heavy post but I hope you will understand.
Hugs to you all!
Rach

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