Monthly Mani Favs

The One with the May Monthly mani Favs

9:00:00 AM

Good morning polished world!  How are you all doing today?  Happy Memorial Day!  I was going to do a festive red, white, and blue manicure for today, but I ran out of time.  So I will save my idea for the Fourth of July, and today share with you all a Monthly Mani Favorites post!

I cannot believe that May has already come and gone.  I feel like it was just a week ago that I drafted and posted my April Round Up Post.  I know I'm not the only one either who thinks this month went fast.  Everyone I talk to lately doesn't know where the time went.  Hopefully time will slow down in June.

Let's take a look at my favorite manicures from this month!

  1. The One With ILNP Float On - Can we talk about how GORGEOUS Float On by I Love Nail Polish is??  Ignore the daisy art, the swatch alone is a reason to make this one of my favorite manicures.  I need to use this polish on my toes for a summer pedicure.  The color is perfect, the holo effect even more perfect.  I just love it!
  2. The One With the Floral Manicure for Mother's Day - This manicure was inspired by BadGirlNails on Instagram.  I love the layout of this manicure so much and it's not anything I would have thought of myself!  I'm also falling in love with this negative space floral look.  I think I'm going to start doing a lot more of these all summer.  How cute would a negative space floral look for a pedicure also?
  3. The One Inspired by Fabric for Twinsie Tuesday - I love this manicure because it goes along with my new favorite dress.  It's a white dress with black polka dots and red poppies all over it.  How much cuter can you get?  When I wore it to a Gala, I had to match my nails, and this is the manicure I came up with.  It went perfectly with the dress!
  4. Two Year Anniversary of Bestie Twin Nails with Fashion Footing!!! Two Manicure Celebration! - That's right, two years of the Bestie Twin Nail feature with Fashion Footing!  For our celebration, we shared two manicures, one a recreation of our favorite, and a new one.  The new one we did was a neon rainbow gradient with a black splatter.  I LOVE how this manicure turned out.  It was so fun and bright, and the splatter added a neat look to it.
Now, time to take a look at my favorite manicures by other bloggers!

  1. Hearts by The Base Coat - I love this manicure Alicia came up with.  It reminds me of the heart gradient manicures I did when I first started blogging using my whole punch and painters tape.  You know, before the creation of vinyls.  Alicia makes the vinyl she used in her manicure, so take a look at her page to see how to order some!  I love the color combo in this one.
  2. Water Marble by DSetterfield74 - Look at how perfect Dianna's water marble is!!!!  I'm loving the pattern and the pastel colors used!  Dianna has some amazing designs on her page.  Her smoosh manicures as she calls them are perfect, and I was going to share one of those, but this water marble really is perfect and needs to be seen by every one!
  3. Vintage Floral by Magically Polished - Ana creates some gorgeous manicures, and this is one of them. I love the look of this floral manicure so much.  The dots, the look of the doily with the roses on top.  Then, add that blue base...this whole manicure is just lovely!  I'm going to try to re-create it.
  4. Neon Gradient by Fashion Footing - Of course the other half of my rainbow gradient needed to be featured here.  I love Amanda's BTN manicure as much as I love mine.  I think I like her splatter a little more than mine. Regardless, both manicures are lovely and I have a feeling we are going to be re-creating these ones at another anniversary.
What do you think?  Fan of any of these looks?  Have you recreated any of mine or any of the others?

I hope that everyone has a Happy and Safe Memorial Day!!!!  Let's all take time at some point today to remember the lives lost to protect our freedoms!!

Until next time, <3.

Animal Print

The One with the Zebra Gradient

10:31:00 PM


Good morning polished world!  I'm sorry, I forgot to post this earlier today.  I don't know how it slipped my mind, but here is my blog post!!! :)

It's been awhile since I posted any form of a zebra manicure.  I used to do them all the time because I loved them so much and I truly don't know why I haven't done one.  I guess I've been dot and flower obsessed lately.  Might need to start doing more animal prints in the near future because I miss doing them!

Let's take a look!




Colors Used:
  • China Glaze - UV Meant to Be
  • China Glaze - Let's Jam
  • Zoya - Cosmo
  • Orly - White Tips
  • Orly - Liquid Vinyl
How cute is this manicure?  I did something similar a few years ago with a leopard print and a gradient.  On that manicure though I believe I did a blue to purple gradient on each nail versus having a purple to white then white to blue.  I really like the look of this.  Especially the vertical gradient instead of a horizontal one.



Zoya Cosmo is the only one of the Mega Pixie Polishes that I truly love.  The others that I own are either too chunky or have too much of a jelly base that they don't really come together and the textured effect becomes lost.  This one is a true mixture of the original formula with some larger holo flecks.  Gorgeous, but a pain in the butt to remove.


China Glaze Let's Jam is from the new China Glaze Lite Brights collection.  My Sally Beauty Supply didn't get the whole collection in so I picked up only a few that I really wanted.  Still sad that I couldn't get my hands on the blue, green, or yellow, but oh well.  Let's Jam is a gorgeous neon purple with a blue shimmer.  You can't really see the shimmer in the gradient, but you can in the bottle.  I did swatch it for another manicure that I'll be posting soon and you really see it there.

What do you think?  Fan of this look?  Loving any of these polishes!

Until next time, <3.

Dot Mani

The One Inspired by Fabric for Twinsie Tuesday

9:00:00 AM


Good morning polished world!  How are you all doing today??  The weather is GORGEOUS here!  Yesterday it was in the high 70s and today it's expected to be 81 and sunny.  Maybe I can sit outside for a little bit and get some color because I'm pale as a ghost.  Pretty sure I could blind someone if I stand in direct sunlight too long.

Today is Tuesday which means it is time for Twinsie Tuesday.  This week our manicures are inspired by fabric.  My inspiration is this dress from New York and Company:


I wore this dress to a Gala a few weeks ago and I loved it so much.  I paired it with a pair of black patent heels, some black drop earrings, and a black shrug sweater.  Of course, you know me, I had to match my nails to it and have been saving those nails for this prompt to show you all!

Let's take a look!




Colors Used:
  • Orly - Liquid Vinyl
  • Orly - White Tips
  • Zoya - Dahlia
  • NCLA - I'm With the Band

I loved how this manicure turned out.  I knew from the get-go that I wasn't going to do all 10 nails with the poppy pattern that is on my middle nail.  I thought that would take away from the dress and outfit as a whole.  So I pieced the manicure together.  Polka dot index finger to match the polka dots, middle finger with the poppies to match the pattern, sparkly Pixie ring finger and thumb to match jewelry I was wearing, and shiny black pinkie to match the patent pumps.  Love.


Fun fact, I had no clue that I owned NCLA I'm With the Band.  I was going through my reds to find the perfect poppy red to match the dress and stumbled across this one.  It matched the poppies on the dress perfectly, and with the subtle shimmer in it, it wasn't just a typical flat cream.  It truly is a gorgeous polish that I'm still not 100% sure where I got it from.  Amanda from Fashion Footing thinks she gave it to me, I partially think that I received it in an old sub box.  Oh well, I own it and love it.


I just love this manicure so much that I had to share another photo.  I think that accent of Zoya Dahlia really added something to the whole thing.  I was going to do two plain black nails and am so happy that I didn't.

What do you think?  Fan of this look?  Love the dress as much as I do??

Make sure to check out the other Twinsie's posts!


Amanda at Amandalandish
Amanda at FashionFooting
Amber at Nails Like Lace
Chelsea at Nailed Blog
Claire at Kerruticles
Marisa at Polish Obsession
Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les
Savannah at Addicted to Polish

Until next time, <3.

Color Club

The One with Color Club Pucci-licious

9:00:00 AM


Hey all!  How are you all doing on this fine Sunday?  Cannot believe it is already a start to another week.  And that it's the end of the month.  Crazy that time has flown by so fast!  Now that it's the end of May, we are finally getting some Spring-like weather.  Honestly, I think we can call it summer like weather because I think mid week it's going to be in the 80s and storm.  Oh well, at least it isn't snow!

Since I posted two manicures the other day for the two year anniversary of Bestie Twin Nails with Fashion Footing, I'm sharing a simple manicure with you all today.  I did this one a few weeks ago when I had no inspiration what so ever.

I think I'm going to start doing more simple manicures like this to refresh myself.  Always coming up with crazy nails can be a tad exhausting.  Plus there are some nights where I don't want to do crazy nail art and much rather do swatches with a fun accent.  I think this will also be a good way for me to use some of my polishes that never get used.

Anyways, let's take a look!




Colors Used:
  • Color Club - Pucci-licious
  • Orly - Mirrorball
  • Orly - White Tips
  • Orly - Liquid Vinyl
Back a few months ago when I ordered the Color Club Neon Poptastic Collection from HBBeauty Bar, I threw Color Club Pucci-licious in the cart as well.  I never had seen swatches or heard anything about this polish previously, but when I saw the bottle image on the website I knew I had to have it.  Something about the purple color was unique to my collection.

This polish sure is beautiful.  Two coats and I had full coverage.  It has an interesting finish.  It wasn't super glossy, but it wasn't matte.  It almost had a rubberized look, if that makes sense.  I added a top coat and it did become glossy, but I kind of was liking the look without the top coat. 


I like the purple accenting the white and black dot nails.  I really love the simplicity of this one.  I'm telling you guys, you will be seeing more stuff like this.  Who knows, maybe I'll be more creative with simple manicures!

What do you think?  Do you own this polish?  Think I should do more simple manicures?

Until next time, <3.

Bestie Twin Nails

Two Year Anniversary of Bestie Twin Nails with Fashion Footing!!! Two Manicure Celebration!

9:00:00 AM


Good morning polished world!  How are you all doing today?  I'm super excited because it is the two year anniversary of Bestie Twin Nails with Fashion Footing!  Can you believe we have been doing this feature now for two years?!  Where has the time gone?  It really doesn't feel like it has been that long.


Since it is our two year anniversary, we decided to do two manicures today!  So get ready for this super long post.

The first manicure we did is a re-creation of our favorite manicure from the past two years.  Of course our favorite was our pineapple nail art, which was done in September of 2014.  Both of us love all things pineapple, thus our lovely logo.  We also are huge fans of the show Psych, which at the time almost two years ago we were binge watching and got the idea to create a pineapple manicure.  Now, again, here we are binge watching the show painting pineapples on our nails.

Let's take a look at our pineapple manicure.



Colors Used:
  • OPI - Love Angel Music Baby
  • OPI - My Twin Mimmy
  • OPI - I'm Soooo Swamped
  • OPI - My Boyfriend Scales Walls
  • INM - Northern Lights
Still my favorite manicure of all time.  When we re-created it, we switched it up a little bit.  Instead of having a double pineapple accent, we went with a gold accent nail.  I kind of like how it turned out with the gold accent!



My Twin Mimmy = perfect pineapple yellow polish!  To get the pineapple look, I did a semi ruffian design with my yellow brush.  Since OPI has an awesome brush, it was easy to do without using too much polish.  One swipe and I had full coverage for my little pineapple.  I then went through and added the green leaves with a dotting tool.  When they all were dried, I added the details using black acrylic paint.
_________________________________

Our second manicure took some time to come up with.  At first I suggested doing a plain swatch because let's face it, I never do a swatch and that's Amanda's dream that one day I will do a week's worth of swatches.  Amanda wanted to do something bright, and well we couldn't settle on a color which we both liked or had.

So we went down the bright path and started to think of different things we could do.  What's more bright than a neon gradient?!

Let's take a look at the second manicure!



Colors Used:
  • FingerPaints - Neon Base Coat
  • China Glaze - I'll Pink to That
  • China Glaze - That's Shore Bright
  • China Glaze - Too Yacht to Handle
  • China Glaze - Splish Splash
  • Orly - Glowstick
  • INM - Northern Lights
  • Orly - Liquid Vinyl
Originally we were going to do a neon gradient with black and white glitter over the top, but idiot Alaina here forgot that and threw a black splatter on before she remembered.  I still can't believe I did that.  Regardless, I LOVE how the black splatter looks over the gradient!!



 Talk about bright manicure, this for sure is one.  I love my neon polishes, especially for gradients and water marbles.  Earlier this year I received a neon base coat from FingerPaints which I have used once or twice of an accent nail.  I decided to give it a go on all ten nails with this manicure.  It's such an awesome white.  Almost a one coater, a few nails needed to have two because of naked spots.  It dried fast so I was able to do the gradient quickly instead of waiting forever for dry time.

What do you think?  Fan of both manicures?  Which is your favorite of the two designs!?

Don't forget to check out Amanda's two year post!!!

Until next time, <3.

Flowers

The One with ILNP Float On

9:00:00 AM


Good morning polished world!  How ware you all doing today?  It's Monday, the beginning to a new work week.  Hopefully this week will be slower than the last two.  If not, then bring it on!  It's supposed to be warmer too, which will be a good thing.  I think the high yesterday was 45 and it snowed a little bit.  Not cool.

So since I'm hoping for warmer, sunnier weather, I thought it would be a good idea to do a bright, cheerful manicure using a holo polish.  A few months ago I purchased a bunch of bottles of ILNP holographic polishes and have still yet to use all of them.  When I was looking through them I discovered that I purchased Float On and decided to use it.

Let's see what I came up with!




Colors Used:
  • ILNP - Float On
  • Acrylics
Gorgeous, right?!  Wait until you see the bottle shot photos below!  Two coats and pure holo perfection.  The formula on this was just amazing.  The first coat was a bit sheer and I was thinking I was going to need to do three.  It built up perfectly on that second coat so there was no need for the third.  Honestly, I think it would have taken away from the polish if I added a third coat.  This was perfect color, holo, and everything.



Look at that holo effect!  It's so strong!!!  Barbara really hit it out of the park with this polish.  I was kind of nervous that my nails were going to be stained blue after using it because it was so saturated but I didn't have a single stain left on any of my nails.  I think this might be my go to summer pedicure color.


I was going to leave this as a plain swatch, but I felt like I needed to add some sort of art.  I ended up going with simple daisies framing the nails.  In my mind, the daisies were smaller so at first I wasn't a huge fan.  After I added top coat and the acrylic became shiny I was in love.  They're seriously adorable.

What do you think?  Isn't this color drop dead gorgeous!?  

Until next time, <3.

China Glaze

The One with the Neon Poppy Looking Flowers

9:00:00 AM


Good morning polished world!  How are you all doing today?  It was in the 80s here yesterday, and today it's supposed to be in the 60s.  As you can guess, that means I have one nasty sinus headache.  This weather needs to just make up it's mind on what it wants to do!

Since it was super warm out, it's only right that I share a bright, neon, floral design.  This manicure is inspired by Chelsea from Polish and Beyond on Instagram!  I loved the look of these fun neon poppy-like flowers, and since I have all the Electric Nights polishes, I re-created them!

Let's take a look!




Colors Used:
  • Orly - White Tips
  • China Glaze - Plur-ple, DJ Blew My Mind, Glow With the Flow, Treble Maker, and Home Sweet House Music
I love these polishes from last year's Electric Nights summer neon collection.  They're great for all kinds of art, from flowers to gradients to water marbling.  I think that water marbling is my favorite with China Glaze neons.  They always spread so nicely.  My guess is because they color is so highly concentrated....if that makes sense.



Flowers were easy to do.  When my base was dried, I went through with my dotting tool and added the messy little dots.  I then went through with a tooth pick and Treble Maker for the leaves.  Final step was to add the black centers.  Simple, cute, and lovely.

What do you think?  Do you love the China Glaze Neons?

Until next time, <3.

FingerPaints

The One Inspired by my Childhood for Twinsie Tuesday

9:00:00 AM




Good morning polished world!  How are you all doing today?  As you can see from the title, I am back with the Twinsies participating in Twinsie Tuesday.  Instead of posting weekly, everyone will be posting bi-weekly since all of our schedules have become kind of hectic.  I'm happy because this works perfectly with my every-three-day posting schedule which I am able to keep up with.

Today we are all sharing manicures inspired by our childhood.  Now I'm sure you're all expecting some sort of major nail art out of me for today's post, especially with this theme, but alas, you'll just have some swatches.  Swatches though of gorgeous purple polishes.

I did this manicure a few weeks ago because I was missing my great-grandmother.  She passed away nearly 8 years ago at the age of 100, which was rather amazing.  When she turned 100, we threw her a huge birthday party and everything was decorated in her favorite color; purple.  She especially loved lavender.

I spent a lot of time with her when I was a child, and even in my adult years.  So today's manicure is inspired by my childhood memories with her; using not only her favorite color...but mine as well.

 Let's take a look!

Colors Used:
  • Zoya - Stevie
  • FingerPaints - Lavender Love
I love both of these polishes so much.  Zoya Stevie was one of the first Pixie Dust polishes I ever used.  When I first received the Pixie Dust collection, I was unsure of it.  The textured look at the time was just kicking off and I really wasn't a fan of it.  I used Stevie for my graduation manicure which was also inspired by my great grandma because the purple reminded me so much of something she would like.  Plus she would have been jumping for joy that I was graduating with a Masters degree.  Growing up, she always started her conversations with "how's school going? I'm praying for you to get good grades."  I know that she helped me for sure get that Masters!

Anyways, Stevie is an awesome polish.  Two coats and you have a sparkly, textured look.  I rarely used this polish because I was scared it was going to run out and I wouldn't have it for the right occasions, but I recently purchased another bottle so I didn't have that fear.  Also, if you hadn't noticed, I fell in love with the textured look shortly after haven't turned back since.



Lavender Love by FingerPaints is such a gorgeous cream polish.  It is part of the Ashley Tipton collection which is on sale now at Sally Beauty.  I might go pick up a back up bottle because I can see myself using a lot of this color.  Plus since it's one of those limited edition collections, I have a feeling that when it's gone, it's going to be gone.  It's another color my great-grandma would have for sure loved!

What do you think?  Fan of the plain swatches?  Think I should do more swatches on the blog?

Don't forget to check out the other Twinsie's Posts!!  (Might be an old link list, I'll update it if it has changed)


Amanda at Amandalandish
Amber at Nails Like Lace
Chelsea at Nailed Blog
Claire at Kerruticles
Marisa at Polish Obsession
Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les
Savannah at Addicted to Polish
Sharon at Behind Green Eyes


Until next time, <3.


China Glaze

The One with the Floral Manicure for Mother's Day

9:00:00 AM


Good morning polished world!  How are you all doing today?  Happy Mother's Day to all the mom's out there!  Especially mine!!  It's going to be some pretty cruddy weather around here today, so I think that my momma and I are going to stay in and lounge around.  Sounds like an amazing day.

Today's manicure is a super spring floral manicure inspired by Bad Girl Nails on Instagram.  When the negative space manicures first started to become big, I wasn't a huge fan of them.  I figured they were going to look awful on my nails so for the longest time I avoided trying them for myself.  After doing a couple, I started to like them, and after this design I'm in love.

Let's take a look!




Colors Used:
  • Orly - White Tips
  • Sally Hansen - Pink Cadillaquer
  • China Glaze - Treble Maker
  • Orly - Melodious Utopia
Perfect manicure for Mother's Day....right?  I think so because when I think of Mother's Day, I think of flowers.  This design is super easy to re-create.  I started off with my clear base coat.  Since my nail seems to be peeling a little bit, I added a coat of FingerPaints Ridge Filler which is kind of a creamy beige color.  It's super sheer, but when it goes on the nail, it clouds it up a little bit so it's not as obvious that the nail is naked.  That sentence made sense in my head, but as I read it over it doesn't.  Oh well.  When that was dry, with a dotting tool, I added the flowers and all the different details.  I topped it off with my top coat and had my nailed nail design.

I find when I do naked nail designs, the polish dries super fast for the art.  Maybe because it doesn't have two other layers to go through that is still in the process of drying?  Regardless it's great, and the art doesn't smudge.


First time ever using this Orly polish!  Orly Melodious Utopia was part of the Hope and Freedom Fest collection years and years ago.  Notice that it is in the old bottle. I actually think this is the last collection they did before they switched their bottles to the new black cap and black label.  This polish is a yellow with pink shimmer throughout.  I couldn't for the life of me get it to photograph true to color, but you should see this polish in daylight.  So pretty with that subtle pink shimmer.  It really tied the whole manicure together well with that pink nail.


Trying a new bottle shot!  Sarah from 25 Sweet Pea told me to try something different.  I jumped out of my comfort zone and I'm kind of liking it.  The color I'm holding here is Treble Maker by China Glaze.  I used this polish on my thumb and for the leaves and dots.  Two coats, great coverage.  Love this one for water marbling too.  It's such a fun green.  I might need to see of HBBeauty Bar still sells it so I can grab some back ups.

What do you think?  Fun manicure for Mother's Day?  Do you enjoy the naked manicure look?  Fan of the new bottle shot?  If you are I might start phasing out some of my other photos.

I hope that everyone has a great day, especially all the mother's out there!

Until next time, <3.

Animal Mani

The One with the Adorable Panda Bear

9:00:00 AM


Hi everyone!  How are you all doing on this fine Thursday?  Almost the weekend!  Part of me wants the weekend to be rainy and gross so I can stay home and just sleep, but I highly doubt that will be the case.  It's also Mother's Day on Sunday....I probably should go and get my mom a gift.

Time for some cute nail art today!  I haven't done any animal manicures in a long time, so obviously it was time to change that.  I went with a panda design I saw on Instagram (cannot remember who the blogger was who originally did it and can't find the post).  I think that this is one of the CUTEST manicures I have ever done!

Let's take a look!




Colors Used:
  • Color Club - Blue-Ming
  • Orly - Liquid Vinyl
  • FingerPaints - Sterling Sculpture
I have wanted Blue-Ming by Color Club for years.  There were any times I picked the bottle up at the local beauty store, but then I ended up putting it back because I was always convinced that I had colors that looked just like it.  So when I bought a bunch of Color Club polishes from HBBeautyBar, I threw this one in the cart and finally made it my own!  I'm so happy that I did!  This bright mint polish is perfection.  Two coats, full, bright coverage.  While I have dozens of mint polishes, this one most certainly stands out.



Look how adorable that little panda bear is!  I think this is one of my all time favorite animal manicures.  He was super easy to create.  After my base coat was dried, I added the panda head with a white polish.  Then with acrylic paints, I drew on the little details.  He looks so cute on top of Blue-Ming!

What do you think?  Something you would try doing?  Do you love Blue-Ming?

Until next time, <3.


Dot Mani

The One with the Black and White Floral Mani

9:00:00 AM


Good morning polished world!  Hope you are all doing fabulously on this Monday.  Yes, Monday, here we are again.  This week is going to be busy so I'm hoping it all goes fast and today isn't a typical Monday.  Also, welcome to May!

Today I am bringing you a black and white manicure I came up with the other night with help of Sarah from 25 Sweet Pea!  I needed to do something simple because I was attending a work function which I didn't think it would be appropriate to have neon nails at.  Now, most people would just say "Alaina, do a simple swatch." but you know me, I can't do that.

Let's take a look at what was created!




Colors Used:
  • Orly - Liquid Vinyl
  • Orly - White Tips
  • Zoya - Dahlia
I really love how this manicure turned out!  It was just so stunning, in my opinion.  I really love Zoya Dahlia.  I have a huge love for the original formula Pixie Dust polishes, so when Zoya had that get free polishes deal after New Years, I jumped on the opportunity to purchase it.  Much like my other original formula Pixies, two coats and perfect coverage.  I added a shiny top coat, but it was beautiful without one.



I wasn't so sure about the roses when I finished drawing them, but after adding top coat I really liked them.  At first I thought they looked like random splotches and not flowers.  Then when the magical top coat was added everything came together.

What do you think?  Fan of the look? Do you love the original formula Pixies??

Speaking of original formula Pixies, rumor has it Zoya is going to be re-releasing some.  I saw on Instagram someone share a color catalog from Zoya with some new colors in it.  Might have to go look into that further!

Until next time, <3.