Nail Bloggers Get Together?

I was thinking, there are a lot of blogger conferences, but no nail blog related conferences. I would love to start by putting together a small conference/get together in the Orlando, FL area. Because these things take time to put together, it would have to be about 6 months out, but if anyone is interested, let me know and I can start putting something together for us. If anyone wants to help out, let me know. Here are my thoughts so far:


Session – taking color accurate photos
Session – promoting your blog
Session – What is coming up in “nail world”. Future trends.
Allowing area techs/company reps applying Minx/Shellac or other popular nail products
Trying to get sponsorship from some polish companies. 


I would love to hear others ideas, and how we can make this a reality. Anyone interested?

What Are You Doing This Weekend?

I am dreaming of a weekend where I can just lay on the couch and watch TV and maybe surf the web, and just do NOTHING. But that just does not seem to be in the cards right now. It seems there is always something to do. Last night we started our weekend by taking the kids to see Grown Ups. I have to say this movie is wicked funny! You have to see it. It cracked me up. I loved seeing Adam Sandler, Chris Rock, Kevin James, David Spade and Rob Schneider together. They were the perfect cast. I am telling you, if you need something to do this weekend, go see this movie.


Today one of my husband’s friend’s is in town, so we are meeting them at the beach and then coming back to our place. Juan was stationed in Greenland with this guy. It is all good except, come on girls, the last thing any of us girls would want to do is meet someone’s wife at the beach! Are you kidding me? I have no idea what this girl looks like? I have given birth to 3 kids. My body looks great  – CLOTHED! But I by no means have a bikini body anymore. I guess if I looked like Gisele I wouldn’t mind meeting someone at the beach, but since I am not – ugh! 


Doesn’t that just make laying on the couch all day sound so much better? HA! I would say I could just lay on the couch tomorrow, but I have laundry to do, and truth be told I have some stuff to do for work too. Booo. Maybe next weekend? 


Well let’s get to the nails. Actually as I write this, two of my daughters are laying on the floor with about 20 bottles of polish frankening. They are mixing colors together and creating new colors. It is the cutest thing ever. Could that be cause the polish I am wearing today is one that I frankened? It is a slate blue/grey with the most subtle shimmer. I am loving it. Unfortunately for you guys, I don’t feel like getting the camera and taking a picture and downloading and water marking it and trying to remember what I mixed together. I know I suck! Maybe I will take a picture with my cell and tweet it. Does that sound fair? Cool – I’ll do that then.


Instead I am going to show you a color that I thought I was going to wear today until I decided to play around with my polish. This is Essie Pretty Edgy from the Summer Collection.  It is a true green. I thought the name was pretty funny, since this is a pretty edgy color for Essie. I wasn’t sure how I was going to feel about this color, but I love it! It is the perfect summer beach color. Unfortunately like many other Essie polishes, this required 3 coats. But still gorgeous.

Have a great weekend everyone.

Paradoxal vs Ulta Amethyst Comparison

Blogger PrettyinDayton was wondering if she should break down and get Chanel Paradoxal. I am not one to say since I did break down and get it. I love the color. It is a dark purple/grey with some purple and pink shimmer peaking out. But while at ULTA yesterday I came across a 4 pc mini set of polishes: ULTA Beauty Gems. One of the colors, amethyst seemed to be a very close match to Paradoxal minus the shimmer. I decided since the mini’s were on sale for $5 I would grab the pack and see how the colors compared to one another. I have to say it was VERY close, but not a match. 

Once I had the two bottles side by side, I thought I must be crazy to think these two are close. But then I remembered how different Paradoxal looks once on the nail.

Index & Ring Finger: Chanel  Paradoxal. Middle & Pinky Finger: ULTA Amethyst. Inside they are close, but not quite the same. Amethyst seems to be a true purple/grey and a bit darker than Paradoxal. I asked my husband to point out the two that were different standing about 3 feet in front of him and he said they all look the same. This coming from the guy with better than 20/20 vision. But my “Professional” opinion sees the difference. 

Outside Paradoxal’s amazing shimmer shines through, but if you look closely, the base appears to be the same color. 

Here is a close up of Paradoxal (left) and Amethyst (right). The base is so close. I definitely think that you can get away with the look using Amethyst. Perhaps mix it with a pink shimmer? But I think if you must have the shimmer, go for the Chanel. If you actually prefer a creme, then Ulta Amethyst just might be for you. The downside is that I never see ULTA take these mini’s and make full size colors out of them. But I bet this is just the beginning Paradoxal alternatives.

I decided I would throw in a comparison of Chanel Paradoxal with Sephora by OPI Metro Chic. I keep seeing so many comments asking how they compare, and even though they are not close, I thought I would post a picture of the two together so you can see just how different they are.

Side by side in the bottle, it appears that they may be a bit closer than I thought.

Index & Ring Finger: Chanel Paradoxal. Middle & Pinky Finger: Sephora by OPI Metro Chic.

But once on the nail, the difference really stands out. Look how light Metro Chic looks next to Paradoxal. Talk about a big difference! What more can I say? Same color family, but totally different than each other.

Are you still debating on getting Paradoxal? What do you think of ULTA Amethyst as an alternative? I can’t wait to wear it more this fall, but right now I am still enjoying the summery colors!

400 Followers! YAY!

I can’t believe I logged on last night to 400 followers! How amazing that feels! I just need 100 more to reach my goal of 500! Now how do I convince another 100 nail polish fans that they NEED to read my blog on top of all the other amazing nail blogs they read? hmmm… I can only imagine me calling each one up and convincing them that they should read my blog too! HA! I can’t believe I even have 400 amazing followers! You guys are awesome!

So I went back to Old Navy and grabbed the black and silver version of those cute sandals I wore in yesterdays outfit of the day post! So now I have all three colors! YAY!

 I am so excited! I also found a shirt with two rows of layers that comes close to the style of the yellow shirt I posted yesterday and it was on sale for $9.99. Except the one I got is in a beautiful coral color.  Here’s a picture of the shirt from the NY&CO website:

 I also got a great black leather belt for $2.99. (no pic of the belt, sorry) What great bargains though! 

Although admittedly I should not have bought anything since I just spent almost $600 on the iPad for my daughter’s 11th birthday present! Someone please shoot me now! Can you imagine receiving something like this for your 11th birthday? What parent spoils their kid like this? I mean honestly! Does it count if I justify it this way? I spend $300 on Birthday presents and $200 on party. Total $500. She is giving up all other gifts and the party to get the iPad. My mother is sending some money as well and we grabbed the case for it too (hence the almost $600) and we are calling it a joint gift. My daughter is aware of this and has agreed that this is what she wants. So does it seem like I am spoiling her any less? Nah – I didn’t think so either. I am such a sucker for my girls! HA! The sad thing is it may not get here in time for her birthday! Juan went to the Apple store to pick one up and they are sold out! Best Buy is also sold out. I thought I had plenty of time and in the end had to order it from Apple on line. Her Birthday is Sunday! My daughter said she doesn’t care if it doesn’t get here by Sunday – she’s just totally psyched she is getting one. How sweet.

Well in light of my big expenditure, I am obviously on a no buy for polish right now. Which is why with the exception of Paradoxal you haven’t seen many new colors from me lately. Do you know how hard it is to not get some of the new colors when they come out? Well I guess fortunately for me, I have trained my daughters to love polish as much as I do. My 14 year old came home yesterday with the OPI Summer Flutter Mini’s that she bought with her babysitting money. So since the in-laws are gone, I took some time to swatch the 4 mini’s. Today I bring you the ever so popular Catch Me in Your Net.  WOW! I mean I have seen the pictures, but nothing comes close to seeing this in person! It is stunning! It glimmers from blue to green depending on how the light hits it. Unfortunately it took 3 coats for full coverage on my short new nubbins. That was a little disappointing, but I forgot all about that once I saw the end results. 

Isn’t it gorgeous?! On a side note, My cuticles are a hot mess right now. I finished the Mango Mend I had and went back to CND cuticle oil, which usually works like magic on me. I wonder if my cuticles are adjusting to the change? Either way it is frustrating. Hopefully they get better in a few days. Hope you all have a great day!

Are You Ready For Another Outfit of the Day Already?

I thought I would post another outfit of the day. This one isn’t all that great. But I haven’t had much time to do any swatching with my in-laws visiting. Maybe tonight I will be able to get to some of it. I really should have planned better.


On Monday we drove the two hours to one of my favorite places here in FL, St Augustine. My husband took a few candid shots of us and I cropped myself out of some of them. I am still wearing Chanel Paradoxal with this outfit. Talk about too much purple! I normally would wear a white or yellow top with these shorts, but because I wasn’t sure if it was going to rain, I wanted to wear a dark top. It is too matchy matchy for my taste though. And because the shirt is a cross between fitted and a little loose it just makes my shape less curvy looking. Definitely not my best look – but what the heck, I love the shorts and the sunglasses and my purse and the sandals. OK so I like everything except how much it all matches.

 

I am wearing two tank tops that I bought at Target for like $5 a piece. The shorts I got at Charlotte Russe for about $12 or $13. The Sunglasses are Michael Kors which I scored for $20 at Ross. I think I got the earrings at Claire’s but who knows. The purse is my Louis Vuitton Speedy 25 which I think was like $560 when I got it. (Yes I do spend money on some things!) And my favorite part of the outfit are the sandals. They are rubber like flip flops and just as comfy, but they have some style. I got them at Old Navy for about $9 thanks to a military discount, but they still only retail for $9.50. I am thinking of getting these in a few other colors, since I love them so much. 

Not much in the way of nails for this post. But how about more pictures of Paradoxal instead? I know lame – but hey as soon as my in-laws leave I promise I will get back to posting some awesome nails pics! But so it isn’t the same old Paradoxal pics, here are some I took outside on a cloudy day. You could barely see the shimmer in these pictures at all. It also looks more grey with a hint of purple here. It did look like this in person too. 

                                       

Oh and one more thing, do any of you ladies know where I can score the top in the picture below? I saw this top and knew I had to have it. If someone comes up to me to ask me where I got something, I gladly let them know, but this girl did not seem so glad, she just said “Greenville, KY”. Not helpful at all I tell you.  But I made Juan take a picture so I can ask you girls. Maybe I will be lucky and one of you knows? Anyway I really want to find this top, so if any of you happen to know, I would totally owe you one! 🙂

The Red Franken Project

I have been trying to create a red holo franken without much success. I wish I took a picture of the paper plate I have been using to franken. Basiclly what I do is mix my colors in a small batch and then apply the franken to a fake nail. If it looks good, then I proceed from there. I think I created at least 10 frankens trying to get this to work. It keeps coming up too pink. Then this weekend while on MUA, another blogger I love, Lextard mentioned the perfect dream polish would be a tomato red holo. Yeah join the club! But I was thinking red when I was creating – once I read tomato it hit me, I needed an orange red polish, not a straight red polish! DUH!

Since my Chanel Paradoxal chipped, after a long day out with the family, I decided to try again. The results are not as holographic as I would have hoped, but since it was so late I made enough to wear as my mani. I think I will try this again and just add more of the holographic polish I used to see what happens.

Right now this is a 50/50 mix of Zoya Maura and Sally Hansen holo in Diamond. Unfortunately the sun was not out, so the pics are not the best. Plus I was in a hurry when I painted last night and when I took the pictures this morning. You try frankening while your house is full of guests and you’re having fun and still need to do your blog before you leave for work in the morning! HA! So, what do you think, am I on the right track?

Outfit of the Day & Chanel Paradoxal

I am doing my post from my phone in the car, so hopefully the post comes out ok. My in-laws are in town and we are heading to St Augustine which is about 2 hours away. I didn’t have time to do the post before we left, so my awesome MIL offered to drive so I could do my post. How nice is that?

So today’s post will be somewhat short in terms of words since i’m typing on my phone. Nails are Chanel Paradoxal. Two coats. Love the color, but will wait til the Fall to wear again. Application was a bit thick and streaky, but after the second coat it was fine. The color definitely changes depending on lighting. My pics are indoors since it gives the truest depiction of the color. I am on day two of this mani & it has already chipped though. I am going to have to try different base/top coat combos which is frustrating for the price I paid for this polish.

The outfit of the day was my 4th of July outfit. I had intended on putting a red flower in my hair to make it red white & blue, but never got around to it. These pics were taken late at night & I had been wearing it since the morning. The shirt I got at Wal-mart on clearance for $1! The shorts are a must have in my opinion & I got them at Target for $17.99. I am debating on going back for the khaki ones. The necklace I have had for years and I may have paid $10 which is typical for me. The shoes I got at a beach store for $25 last year.

For my hair I did a messy & loose french braid horizontally across the back of my head & then I put it in a side ponytail. I then used those new Goodie Twists for the messy bun. Love these things. The directions say you don’t need a ponytail holder, but since I had the braid I used one. In the pic you can see the Goodie twist. Since I can’t see the back of my head I relyed on Juan to tell me if it was visable. He said it wasn’t & as you can see he was wrong.

I also included a pic of me with Juan. Hope you enjoy my phone post. I blame all spelling errors on my phone! Have a great day everyone! 

I Love Saturdays And a Shellac & Minx update

I love waking up before the rest of the house and starting a pot of coffee and then sitting back and catching up on all the blog posts I have missed. There are so many amazing nail blogs out there, that I can’t possibly read them all every day. So I enjoy my quiet Saturday mornings to go through the ones I missed and getting inspired before I do my own swatching for the week. I know a lot of people that enjoy sleeping in on the weekends, but I enjoy the early morning silence. aaahhhh….


Well unfortunately I have to cut my enjoyment off early today since I brought work home for the weekend. I know, I know, blah work! But hey it’s got to get done, and I feel like I can’t get it all done in the office. I probably could if I stayed late more often, but being a mom, that isn’t always an option, so I bring it home and do the work while everyone else sleeps. The joys of motherhood!


I wanted to post an update on Shellac & Minx. I hate to say it, but the Shellac made it 5 days on my hands! That is it! It started peeling on day 5. I noticed it peeling after my fun “surfing” incident I posted last week. So I am attributing it to that. My toes however are still looking perfect! I can’t believe how perfect. The Shellac is not budging and neither is the Minx! I put Solar Oil on nightly and it really looks like I just got the pedicure still. I think I am going to continue to use Shellac on my toes, and pass on my hands. Amazingly enough, I am testing a new polish right now(more details on it soon) and I have had this manicure on since Monday and it is not budging. No chipping or anything. I want to keep testing it, but I am dying to change it!  Chanel Paradoxal is just sitting there calling my name. I was going to change it last night, but then my family wanted to play cards and so I joined them instead of doing my nails. Maybe today. We’ll see.


Anyway here is my Shellac Manicure on Day 1

And here it is on Day 5

Removal was a piece of cake. I drenched my cuticles in Solar Oil and then I soaked a cotton ball in acetone and put it on my nail and then wrapped it in Aluminium Foil and waited 10 minutes. When I removed the foil the Shellac was in pieces and I just had to wipe it off. Amazing.


Here is a picture of my Minx & Shellac pedicure on Day 1 

And here it is today – a week and a half later (Sorry for the crappy phone pic on this one)

Isn’t it amazing how good this still looks? I have been to the beach so many times since getting this. I am so impressed. Just a bit disappointed in the manicure. I guess I will just have to give myself a really good manicure before going home for my brother’s wedding and hoping for the best. Happy 4th of July weekend everyone!

What Was I Thinking?

First – a word of advice. DO NOT EVER UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES cut your hair right after you wake up, especially if it is still dark outside! Yup, that is what I did this morning! I have lived here in FL for two years now and have not been to a salon in the entire time. I know, I need to find a stylist, but that is not an easy task for someone as picky as myself. But because I am a walking contradiction, I have been cutting my own hair for the last two years. I feel like if I make a mistake, at least I didn’t pay anyone for it. With YouTube, there are so many videos out there to show you how to cut your hair. I think I am OK at it. Well I have been thinking I need to touch up the layers, but I just haven’t had a chance. Well after staying up too late with my in-laws who are visiting(because they are awesome), and being exhausted this morning and not being able to get my hair to cooperate. I pulled out some layers from the front and chopped. OMG! I cut them way to short! They might as well be bangs now! WTF was I thinking? I had no time to sit there and fix it since I had to get my post up and get to work. The sun isn’t even up for crying out loud! What was I thinking? (I must have said this 100 times this morning!) I think I made them work for the day, but with my in-laws in town, I don’t know if I am going to have the time to fix this until after they leave. Aaaaahhhhhh! Here is what I did this morning. Excuse the disappointed & tired early morning face.

OK, so this picture doesn’t make the hair look bad. (crappy cell phone pic) This seems to make it look pretty nice actually. Which only makes me sound bad. But this was after much styling. Believe me! It does not look this good in person. If you look closely, The “bangs” should not be bangs. They are suppose to be just below the nose layers. Um yeah, apparently I have no clue where my nose it since these came out just below the eye instead! The next set of layers are around chin length, so it is like these short bang like layers, then nothing until my chin. I’ll have to shorten the rest of the layers to match, which is so not what I was wanting right now. Oh well.

So I was going to post a Shellac update today or a tea wrap repair, but I guess those will have to wait since I just spent my blog time talking about my hair. But I won’t leave you nailless this morning. How about this cute 4th of July manicure my daughter did. I found the pictures on my camera. She is so cute taking pictures of her nails now just like her momma! Unfortunately I don’t know what colors she used. Sorry.

                           

Hope you all have a great hair day and Friday! By the way if you haven’t entered my “Cleaning Out My Polish” give-away, don’t forget to enter. I will post a link to it in my side bar this weekend. Right now my behind needs to get in gear and get to work! Later!

Cleaning Out My Polish

My polish stash is getting out of control. I am not one to save things, so why I started saving all this polish is beyond me. It is time for me to get rid of some of this polish. So there are two things I am doing. 1st I added a sidebar column for any polish I have for sale. Check it out and if you are interested in any of the polish, leave a comment or email me. 2nd I figure I will do a Cleaning Out My Polish Give-Away! Most of these are used. If it is anything different I will let you know.

So what are the rules of this give-away? You must be a follower for 1 entry, If you tweet about it, you get 1 entry for each tweet, If you post it on your blog you get 1 entry and if you post it in your sidebar you get 1 entry, and mentioning the give-away through another web medium will get you 1 entry as well. Easy enough right? Just fill out the google doc at the bottom of this post. Comment entries will not be accepted.  International entries are accepted. Because I will be fairly busy over the next few weeks, this contest will run through the entire month of July. I will end the contest on July 31st at 11:59PM EST.

Now on to the prizes!

1st Prize will receive 25 polishes!

The polishes are as follows:
Superstar: It Girl Orange, Walk the Red Carpet, Guccie Green, Golden Globe & Park Ave Purple
Isadora: Colibri
KM: Purple Bloom
Sinful: Tokyo Pearl
Sally Hansen: Fire Opal, Star Opal & Pardon My French
WNW: Copa, Bora Bora, Barbados, Shield
China Glaze: Code Orange & Matte Magic
Rimmel: 660 Climax
Revlon: Red Hot Tamale
Nina Ultra Pro: Purple X-ing
Maybelline: Crimson
NFU-Oh: 12
Goldie: 2 unnamed polishes
Zoya: Reece

2nd Prize:

Studio M Purple Medallion, China Glaze Watermelon Rind, Matte Magic Mini and a brand new CND Cuticle Eraser

3rd Prize:

                           

Borghese Glitter mini, Essence Top Coat (new), Essence Break Through, Essence Pool Party and a brand new CND Solar Oil mini.

Edited post  to add:

Dashing Diva is having an awesome sweepstakes on their website!

You have to check it out. Entry ends on July 4th! The Sweepstakes is called: “Who Made You a Diva?” and you can nominate up to 3 nail salons in your area and each nomination gets you a separate entry. There is one grand prize ($500 worth of Dashing Diva polishes/nail treatments), 2 first place prizes ($250 value) and 50 second place prizes ($50 value). WOW! Can you imagine winning one of these prizes? To enter go to the Dashing Diva website: http://www.dashingdiva.com/ or straight to the entry form at http://216.128.24.10/sweepstakes/. While your at their site, check out their polish collection and start plotting what you’ll get if you win! Good Luck!