27 Dec

Caronia Tea Rose Christmas Nails (and My New Nail Shape)

Hi Gals!

I finally did it! I have been wanting to try a different nail shape for such a long time. It has taken me months to work up the courage to take the plunge and file away, but I finally did it! When I initially finished filing these I had them pointier than this, but I wasn’t quite ready for that yet so I filed the points down a bit. These are definitely an easier transition point. Tadaaaaaa!

Caronia Tea Rose with green rhinestones and foil
I do like them a lot, but I think I will like them even more when I get the shape just right. For this look, I started with just one coat of Caronia Tea Rose for my base. I have said it before and I’ll say it again… I LOVE this polish. How many reds are there out there that have this kind of coverage in one coat? Do you have one? Or a red that is a creme? All the other reds in my collection take 3 coats and are jelly-like or shimmery and thin. This is practically a one-coater. The formula is on the thick side so it makes application a bit tricky, but using a little care and taking your time makes all the difference. After Tea Rose dried, I took out my clear coat and after wiping most of the polish off the brush, I applied some over the red with random, splotchy strokes. Then after just a few seconds, I applied nail foils (#32-green on the accent nail and #17-red on the rest) that I purchased from Blooming Nail Cebu. I added some green rhinestones I purchased off Amazon quite a while back.
Caronia Tea Rose swatch
What do you think of my new shape? I’m not sure why the middle finger ended up looking so round compared to the others. Perhaps it’s due to my very limited skills in shaping nails. Here is hoping I will soon have perfected the shaping, and they will all look the same. A girl can dream, right?
These are the nails I sported on Christmas Day. They were perfect for the day, and my new nail shape was a big hit with the family. I wanted to share a couple of nail related gifts I received over the holidays too.
Colored feathers, glitter, and pearl studs
I was given these lovely nail art goodies by Blooming Nail Cebu. I am especially excited to try the feathers! Thank you Blooming Nail Cebu!
Nail polish racks built by Mr. Nailinator

Check out my new polish rack on the left! Mr. Nailinator was so sweet to make me another one since the one he made me in February was all filled up and even my overflow baskets were overflowing and cramping my style. As soon as he mounted it on the wall I filled it up and only had room for 2 more bottles. I bought my sister-in-law two polishes for Christmas, and she had them both already, so I let her trade them out for two polishes from my back up stash. I didn’t own either of the colors I picked for her so now my polish racks are completely full! Yikes! Believe it or not, those two are the only polishes I acquired for Christmas. I think I fit the category now where my friends and family don’t buy me polish because they don’t know if I already have a color or not.

Did you get any polishes for Christmas? I would love to hear what your favorite gift was that you received or gave to someone. I love getting little gifts, but I also love giving gifts.

I hope you have a blessed 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

20 Dec

Swatch This – Cinderella by Sinful Colors

Hi all!
I hope this quick swatch post finds you gearing up for a relaxing weekend with family and friends instead of stressing out about last-minute shopping to do before Christmas day. Our family draws names each year for gift giving, so we don’t have a lot of shopping to do, and I was able to get my shopping done without too much stress. Now to bake goodies and wrap the gifts!

If you follow me on Instagram, you have probably already seen this swatch. Here is Cinderella by Sinful Colors (with San San Warm Blue for undies… ya know… because I’m a VNL-aphobe and Cinderella is what I would call a jelly). I love the shimmer in this polish. Pretty isn’t it? It is another perfect shade for the winter season. Despite spending my whole life in the tropics where temperatures are FAR from freezing, I still dream of a white Christmas and to see snow glistening on the ground. Cinderella’s glistening glow just has to suffice for now. Oh well! I’m off to finish some baking. I’ve got chocolate chip pumpkin bread in the oven right now. Yum! Mr. Nailinator even fired up the A/C so we are baking in comfort. Have a great day! Don’t forget to make someone smile. 🙂

20 Dec

Christmas Tree Accent Nail with Bobbie Star Gazer

Nothing says Christmas quite like a pretty tree filled with lights and sparkly baubles and topped with a glittering star. Right?

I wanted to do some Christmas tree nail art this year, but I didn’t really want to have a tree on every nail so I decided to go with an accent nail instead. I started with two coats of NYC Fashion Safari on all my nails and then applied  Klean Colors Military Green with a small brush and small strokes to make the tree for the accent. I decked it out with a dotting tool and a glitter star for the topper. For the rest of the nails, I added one coat of Bobbie Star Gazer over the base. Star Gazer was so pretty in the bottle, but I have to admit I was disappointed when I tried it. By itself, it was so faintly pigmented that I’m positive I would have had VNL even after 3 or more coats. The glitter may have been dense enough to cover everything up, but choosing NYC Fashion Safari as my base gave me the color I was looking for and everything ended up alright. Being a VNL-aphobe means I don’t play with jellies very much, but I will have to experiment more to make use of the pretty jellies I do have.

Anyway, this isn’t my best work and I don’t LOVE it like I did my snowflake nails. I’m not a huge fan of nudes on my nails so, honestly, it doesn’t really stand a chance. That being said, it IS cute and I still learned something important: Elmer’s School Glue Gel (the blue stuff) works as a fantastic peel-off base for glitter polish. I squeezed some into an clean polish bottle, applied one thick coat, and let it dry well before applying my polish. I only sported this look for a day before taking it off, so I’m not sure about the wear time.

That’s it for me today. It’s been a long week for me. I hope you are having a great one. Do you use anything as a peel off base for glitter polish? What polish/es have you used recently that looked the bomb in the bottle but bombed when swatched?

12 Dec

Snowflakes on L.A. Colors Aztec Orange

Hey gals!

This has been a great day. My parents arrived today from their few weeks stay in the US and as if having them home safe and sound wasn’t great enough, they carried some epic nail mail with them from the lovely Jacqui of Craftynail (please do go check out her blog). My first nail swap was officially a smashing success! Thank you soooo much Jacqui! I love the polishes you sent… Especially Alcatraz Rocks! Lemming CRUSHED! 

It sure felt like Christmas opening up my package from Jacqui and I’ve got a Christmas themed mani to share with you today. Snowflakes! I’m so thrilled with how these turned out. What do you think of my artsy photo? I adore this snowflake ornament my wonderful mother-in-love sent me.

Snowflake stamping over L.A. Colors Aztec Orange
L.A. Colors Aztec Orange with snow stamping and dotting
Yeah, I know there are a lot of snowflake designs going around but I just had to do one of my own.
I started with one coat of Caronia Tea Rose which, by the way, I highly recommend if you are in search of  a great red for the holidays. (Note: Don’t confuse Caronia Tea Rose with Chic Tea Rose) I added two thin coats of L.A. Colors Aztec Orange which I received back in July when Pure Beauty came to Cebu for a promotional event. As soon as I laid eyes on it I knew I had to use it for a Christmas mani. Here it is by itself. Isn’t it gorgeous? 
 
Swatch of L.A. Colors Aztec Orange

I used the OB19 stamping plate which is full of Christmas themed images. I purchased mine from My Online Shop and I used the Fab Ur Nails white stamping polish which I won in a giveaway to add the snowflakes. I’m still getting the hang of stamping so it can be hit and miss with some attempts. I used a dotting tool and the same stamping polish to add the dots. With all that has happened in the past couple of months I have quite spaced out about taking pictures of the prizes I won the last few months. I will try to get them up soon. So much to do. 

I’ve also included a shot of the freehanded snowflakes I sported last year. I only have one shot of it as I wasn’t blogging yet at that time. I’m sharing in honor of throwback Thursday. Ha! So please bear with the poor quality photo. It’s nice to see how far I have come in the past year in the photo department. (By the way, I also post old manis and some non nail related stuff on my Instagram account. If you want to come check it out, the link is in my sidebar to the right.)
 

Well, that is it for me for today. I do hope you have a blessed day or evening depending on where you are in this big wide world. Make someone smile today if you can!

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