Polish Us Pink: Heart Tree

October is Breast Cancer Awareness month. 1 in 8 U.S. women will develop invasive breast cancer in her lifetime, and even men can get this cancer. To the survivors, the people struggling with it today, and the people whose lives have been touched by it, this is for you. Read my first post for more about how cancer has effected my life.

 Another Monday mani for Breast Cancer Awareness! Yea I know it isn't Monday anymore...whatever...I got distracted :P. This is kind of a nail fail so forgive me, but the idea is cute so I still posted it. Feel free to laugh.

 I used Barielle Big Apple Red for the base, with one coat each of Barry M Pink Iridescent and Color Club Fame and Fortune. The accent nail is a base of Milani white with Barry M Dusky Mauve for the tree. The hearts are stamped in white, Orly Pixy Stix, Barielle Big Apple Red, and Revlon Electric Pink.

This image was my inspiration for this mani. I was searching for images about breast cancer awareness and this cute pink heart tree with ribbons in it came up. I didn't add the ribbons as I thought it would be too much detail, but this is what I was going for.

I swear I waited a good amount of time before the topcoat....but it never seems to matter. The hearts weren't really showing up over the red, so I decided to double stamp them over white. I've seen loads of people do it even with full nail designs. Line em' up...BAM! Fail...lol.

But ooh that glitter! I love Pink Iridescent and those big flakies from the Color Club are pretty cool.

 The flakies give off a dark color at some angles. This one isn't so bad, right? The little tree is at least ugly pretty :D. So this mani isn't predominantly pink, but it's the thought that counts!

Feel free to join in the fun this month as we post a mani in support of breast cancer every Monday in October. Don't forget to tag your posts on Twitter/Instagram with #PolishUsPink!

Birthday Cupcakes!

 Happy birthday to me! My 23rd birthday was actually a couple days ago, May 4th. We've been busy doing fun stuff for my birthday weekend, so here are my birthday nails!

Cute cupcakes! I wanted to use my wedding colors because I've got wedding on the brain lately.

The polishes I used: Catrice Sold Out Forever as the base color, Zoya Cassi for the cupcake icing, Revlon Mystical raspberry jelly for the cupcake liner lines, Lynderella Love Lace and Lilacs for the sprinkles, and I use StrideRite white for the liners.

Here are closeups of my accent nail cupcakes. I also did my thumbs, but they bubbled really bad because I did the topcoat in the car and obviously didn't do it well.

As I was taking pictures, a lady bug landed on me :D. They are very sentimental to Jeremy and me. Today is one year since my best friend Marian died, so this was really special.

Here is Moose playing with his personal catnip plant in the sunroom while I was taking pictures. You can see his little kitty mouth :P.

We went to the Botanical Gardens for my birthday. The rose garden was at its peak.

We took the boat ride and saw the resident eagle that has nested in the Gardens. I love seeing them wild like this!

We picked our own strawberries!

And we had fun at the gardens. Smile! :D

Happy Feet With Ginny

As I told you ladies last week, I had to quit my job with Ginny (if you haven't met her, read our first post) for my internship. It was really sad, but we had a good time polishing one last time! I used the color that you all voted for!

Revlon Grapefruit Fizz won by far!

It is a sheer pink jelly with pink glass flecks and shimmer. This is two coats applied to a moving child lol. 

Aren't those pretty pink toes?

Happy feet! I asked her to show me her toes haha. I love this pic! You can still see the pink toes in the excited blur. 

Here we have the dainty foot model pose :P. 

This is the last time we held hands. It's one of her greatest forms of affection.

The only thing better...

...is when she puts her face close to mine for a kiss on the cheek. She has only done this for me maybe 3 times in over a year. I'm so happy she wanted a kiss on my last day with her. A lovely kiss goodbye :). It's bittersweet. I love her and will miss her. Thank you so much for loving Ginny :). 

My First Glitter Sani!

I haven't tried a glitter sandwich until today! In case you don't know what a glitter sandwich (/sammy/sami/sani) is, it's glitter layered between coats of a jelly polish so you can still see the glitter through it. I picked up 3 of the 4 Revlon Just Tinted polishes because they're all jellies and I don't have enough jellies :D.

This is Revlon Dawn from the Just Tinted collection.

This is the glitter I used, two different ones. The left is a tiny round/irregular/flaky pink iridescent glitter, and the right is a small pink iridescent glitter. I got these on super discount from Michael's for 50cents a bottle. Typically, you would use a glitter polish in a glitter sani, but I wanted to use some of my dry glitter just for fun.

Here it is on my first nail after two coats of Dawn. I sprinkled it on really quick after I painted the second coat on so it would still be wet, so I didn't get a pic of her on her own. The pics give you a good idea though, just minus the glitter. Squint :P.

Here are my other nails after the glitter, before the next coat of jelly polish. You can see in this one and the thumb pic that Dawn (and assumedly the others from this collection) dries to a somewhat suede finish - in between matte and glossy. I believe this is what we call a sorbet finish.

Here it is after one coat of Dawn on top, three coats total. You can see the glitter more in real life because the iridescence catches the light more.

Isn't she lovely here? Dawn is quite corally, leaning towards a juicy berry pink. I really can't decide which. I love her jelly feature. I keep thinking it looks like I just stuck my fingers into a ripe strawberry! With three coats there is a still a bit of vnl, though it's diffused by the glitter. I really don't mind some vnl with polishes like this, just not a ton.

Link your glitter sanis in the comments if you've done one!! :D

Revlon Facets of Fuchsia

 I'm loving all these Deborah Lippmann dupes lately. $3.99 Revlon vs $18 DL. Hey I'm sure the DL is better, but we all like cheap. This is Revlon Facets of Fuchsia and it looks like Deborah Lippmann Bad Romance.

This is two coats. It is a black jelly with small round and medium hexagonal hot pink glitter that leans towards purple. So I guess fuchsia glitter is more appropriate lol. 

 Pretty pretty right? I love the style of a black polish, but it's a little too much for me on its own. This makes it perfect by adding a little girly flair.