A Year In the Life of Megan

Happy New Year ladies! I wanted to review the last year with you in my life and in my blog. Most of the pictures have more to the story, so click the links for more info.

I volunteered a homeless shelter doing nails, and I'm doing it again this January!

My best friend Marian passed away. Her parents bought a piece of land with a waterfall Marian and I used to play on. It's now officially named Marian Falls. How amazing. (LtoR: Marian's mom and my mom, Marian Falls, her most beautiful gravestone, Jeremy and Me at the falls)

I spent a year working with Ginny. She loves having her nails done. 

Jeremy went on deployment for 186 days...but we survived and became stronger!

 Then he came home and proposed to me :D. We're getting married in June 2012.

You get two pics cause we're cute :P. And thank you to Jen for editing these pics for me.

I did a practicum (and survived another year of college) at an elderly home and they loved having their nails done. I organized a polish donation and the ladies ended up getting loads of polish, treatments, manicure tools, and all sorts of things!

For a little taste of each season we have:

Spring - Zoya Gemma

Summer - My awesome splatter pedi

Fall - Pumpkin patch nail art

 Winter - Freehand snowflakes on Zoya Kennedy

I made a blog Facebook page and finally joined Twitter. I blogged 206 posts, got 52,349 page views, and my blog has been around for 352 days. I have 544 followers on my blog and 731 on Facebook. 

So much in a year...I'm so thankful for each and every one of you ladies. Thank you so much for sticking with me and I can't wait to see what the new year brings!
Happy New Year!

Guest Post: UD Polish

Here is a guest post from an awesome Twitter follower (yes I'm totally on Twitter now) Dana. This polish is super yum! Can't get over that shimmer!

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This is Dana from over at PolishedClawsUp! Today for my guest post I have a vintage lovely to show you from Urban Decay - Exhaust. My collection is steadily growing and I think my heart my actually stop if I ever got my hands on any of the original UD polishes. I've loved their polishes since I was a teenager and it's been fun getting re-acquainted with old friends. Exhaust is a sheer polish that I use primarily for layering. This is three thin coats over one coat of OPI's What's With The Cattitude? Enjoy! :) Happy  holidays!

Well Hey There Sailor

This is really a blast from the past. I'm away visiting family for Christmas, so I'm digging through my old picture stash. This is months and months ago lol. Apparently I thought taking 6 pics of a mani was good enough to get some awesome pics lol. She's pretty good for December though, right?
This is China Glaze Hey Sailor.

Hey Sailor is a very bright true red creme. I might call it candy apple red. Definitely pin-up worthy. She's from the Anchor's Away collection for Spring 2011. Did you know Anchor's Away is the Navy theme song? Since new recruits to the Navy are called Seamen, he always jokes with me about running around with "seamen" or getting in trouble with "seamen" lol.

Christmas Haul!

What did you get for Christmas? I got all sorts of lovely things this year, but I snapped a picture of my makeup haul for you girls.

2 glitter nail files, Urban Decay 24/7 eyeliner in Bourbon and Zero, mini Urban Decay lipgloss in Wallflower, MAC eyeshadow in Retro-Speci, Kat Von D lipstick in Lolita, and 3 Sugar lip balms in Passion/Honey/Plum

Exciting! What kind of fun stuff did you get for Christmas?

Merry Christmas and Mistletoe

Merry Christmas my lovely readers!

I used China Glaze Mistletoe Kisses with a penguin accent nail.

I got the idea for the penguin from Samarium's Swatches. Isn't it cute? I just used a tiny brush for each color and took a picture so you can see the comparable size.

Here are some swatches of Mistletoe Kisses by itself.

It was a great formula with two coats and the glitter wasn't gritty at all. The color is a lighter than true green jelly base with silver glitter. The base makes some of the glitter look green, but I'm pretty sure it's all silver.  

Moose enjoyed Christmas this year, sporting his Cookie Taster shirt :D.
Hope you all had a lovely Christmas and continue to enjoy the family time. 

Christmas Lights!

I did my fiance's mother's nail for Christmas. I did Christmas lights on her nail last year and she loved them so much she wanted the same thing this time. The lights took hours, so I did every other nail to save time and holly on the other nails.

Cute!

I didn't have my teeney paint brush with me so the holly leaves and things were hard. I did the lights with a dotting tool and made a point on one end of the dot.

She already had her base color on and liked it. It was Sally Hansen Crystal Chrome in Lilac Crystal. It's actually a really nice pearly color.


Here are the polishes I used, most of which she already had because I've gotten to where I only bring 10 or so in my little togo thing. She did love my Nail Envy though. Everyone does!

Guest Post: Frosty the Snowman

My friend Liz from Nothing But Nail Polish did a guest post for me! Isn't it cute?!?

Since Christmas is almost here I wanted to do a wintery mani. The first thing that popped into my head was frosty the snowman and that gave me a reason to use China Glaze Blue Years Eve and Snow Globe again.

Blue Years Eve is an awesome blue glass flaked polish and depending on the light you can see a hint of purple.

Snow Globe is a clear jelly base with different sizes of hex glitter that are iridescent pink, blue, and yellow.

So bring on the pictures.....

I hope enjoyed on seeing my Frosty the Snowman mani!!

Freehand Snowflakes

I was going to a Christmas party and didn't have time to repaint my nails, so I wanted to make them a little more festive. I added snowflakes on some accent nails since I knew I wouldn't have time to do them all. 

I tried doing a few different kinds on each nail and filled in the gaps with little dots. The secret is using a tiny brush and starting out with an asterisk shape. If you're curious, I'm wearing Zoya Kennedy. 

Anyone else try cute nail art for Christmas yet?

Secret Santa

I participated in a nail polish etc Secret Santa this year and it rocked. Thanks Jody!

She even wrote it on the packaging lol, so cute.

I got all sorts of things including candy, a nail art wheel, ornament stickers, and nail polish. 

Here is just the polish. 

LtoR: China Glaze Jolly Holly, China Glaze Party Hearty, China Glaze Phat Santa, CoverGirl Pink Twinkle, Nail Fetish Fairy Dust, and a Manglaze franken bottle!

Merry Christmas!

Beauty Sub Boxes

So some people are becoming disenchanted with Birchbox. There has been lots of talk around the beauty blogging world that other sub boxes are coming out now (you pay a monthly fee and get a box of goodies each month). Here are some of the other possibilities:

Myglam
  Price: $10 a month, sells out easily
  Previous items/brands included: 4-5 beauty samples, seems to be the
  same items for everyone, full size Urban Decay shadow, Urban Decay eye
  primer, full size NYX lippie, tarte mascara, oil blotting sheets, blush,
  cute zippy bag
  Reviews: here, here

Cravebox
  Price: $10 a month
  Previous items/brands included: 4-5 items, each person gets the same
  items, chocolate, truffles, pens, OPI Nic's Sticks, full size body balm
  Reviews: here, here

Topbox
  Price: $10 a month, Canadian only, sells out easily
  Previous items/brands included: 4 samples, cake hand creme, full size
  Deborah Lippman polish, eye serum, full size Stila lip glaze, full size Cargo
  lip gloss, face primer, hydrating gel,
  Reviews: here, here

Glossybox
   Price: 10quid a month, England only
  Previous items/brands included: 5 items a month, products differ, shower
  gel, full size Deborah Lippman nail polish, DL nail polish stripping sheets,
  nail strips, lotion, Illamasqua perfume, bath salts, Blink mascara
  Reviews: here, here

New Beauty Test Tube
   Price: $29.95 per tube, 4 tubes a year
  Previous items/brands included: Beauty, seems to be the same items
  for everyone, eyelash conditioner, pore cleaner, anti-fatigue foundation,
  hair spray, macadamia oil
  Reviews: here, here

Eco Emi
  Price: $15 a month
  Previous items/brands included: 5-10 natural and organic products,
  beauty, makeup, household, lip shimmer, full size eye shadow, foot cream,
  face mask, chocolate, shampoo and conditioner, face wash, candle, face cream
  Reviews: here, here

Luxe Box 
  Price: $12 a month, Canadian only
  Previous items/brands included: Products differ, Prada body lotion,
  Prada perfume, hair styling cream, Benefit toning face lotion, Purminerals
  face primer, herbal tea, Olay wrinkle cream, lip plumper, China Glaze
  nail polish
  Reviews: here, here

So what do you think? Have you tried any of these sub boxes or other ones? Do you think you'll try one?

(Disclaimer: I put this information together myself. If you'd like to blog about it, please ask for permission first and then link this post. If you fail to do so, it's stealing.)

Birchbox December 2011

The Birchbox for December was a bit more festive than usual.

It came in this cute snowflakey box, had white sparkly tissue paper instead of pink, silver ribbon instead of black, and the insert came in snowflake card form instead of more postcard-like.

Here is what I got this month.

Harvey Prince perfume sample in Yogini, Jouer Moisturizing Lip Gloss in Birchbox Pink, L'oreal Professionel Mythic Oil, Befine Gentle Cleanser, Prep ShowStoppers outfit tape, and Recharge Eboost energy drink mix.

 As many other women are, I'm getting bored with Birchbox. They just keep putting in things that no one wants. This time it's an energy drink, outfit tape in black instead of nude (as if I'd really use it either way, but black makes it stand out instead of hide like it should), and MORE freaking hair oil. In times before people have received coasters, hair mist, hair oil, hair cream, hair shine spray, and toothpaste. I don't know...Birchbox is fine. It's just not great. Every time I get it I'm like..that's nice. 

What do you think about Birchbox? Are you keeping your subscription?

Christmas Toes with Ginny

I was about to go to work and was hit with the Christmas spirit.

Ginny (meet her here), the girl I've been working with for more than a year, loves it when I paint her toes, so I figured I'd whip out the China Glaze Party Hearty.

This is one coat. It has large red hex glitter, small green hex glitter, and tiny gold square/hex glitter.

As soon as I pulled out the bottle, she shot her foot out at me as if screaming YES PLEASE OMG DO MY TOES lol. It was too cute.

 
Don't they look lovely and festive?