Zoya Gemma + Zoya Chloe: Gorgeous Green Layering.

I Bought This

I haven't used Zoya Gemma much since I bought it about 3 years ago, despite it being such a beautiful shade. It's a gorgeous dusty green, with a subtle blue/pink shimmer that's more obvious in the bottle than on the nail. It reminds me of water lilies and morning dew (excuse me while I wax poetic) and although I'm not a huge green polish fan, this one is just perfection.

Zoya Chloe over Gemma in indoor natural light

Zoya Chloe over Gemma in indoor natural light

Zoya Chloe over Gemma in indoor natural light

Zoya Chloe over Gemma in outdoor natural light

For this mani I did 3 thin coats of Zoya Gemma, then because the shimmer wasn't as evident on my nails I decided to jazz it up a bit using one coat of Zoya Chloe which is a flakie topcoat. Both polishes have a wonderfully smooth formula and applied like a dream. 

I am absolutely enamoured with how this turned out, it's not your typical girly pink but it's still soft and pretty. I'll definitely be using Gemma more often! 

Zoya Frida Glitter Sandwich

I Bought This

Short post, just wanted to show you this pretty mani...

I bought Zoya Frida a while ago when Zoya had the 3 free promo and this is the first time I've used it! I have been meaning to do some glitter sandwiches with it and for my first, I layered it with NYC Starry Silver Glitter.

This is 2 coats of Zoya Frida, 1 coat of NYC Starry Silver Glitter and 1 more coat of Frida.

I think Frida is a fun colour for Summer and can't wait to do more with it! I want to try a syrup mani :)

Did you pick up any of the Zoya jellies yet?

My Easter Nails: Sweet Purple Candy

I Bought This

Easter is just days away! I don't celebrate Easter religiously, but I like to celebrate holidays with my family and good friends. It's another excuse to get together, spend quality time and eat good food. In the past few (4) years basically since I moved to the states there have been numerous dramas surrounding the holidays, due to an inability to see eye to eye with certain people. I'm determined to pass this Easter peacefully.... This means I need pretty things to look at. That always keeps me calm.

Soooo I pulled out this gorgeous purple combo to put on my nails, Revlon Girly & Zoya Marley.

I did one coat of Marley and two thin coats of Revlon Girly. Girly is opaque on it's own, but it tends to have a LOT of glitter and I wanted the glitter to be a little more sparse. The result was this purple candy confection:

My camera freaked out a little on the purple and wanted to show it as more pink than it is. I tried to colour correct a bit, but it is slightly more purple toned than it looks. It's pretty true to what it looks like in the bottle in the top picture. I love both of these polishes so much! Marley is slightly streaky and can be a bit thick, but I think a drop or two of nail polish thinner might fix that. Girly tends to get a bit muddy looking if it's applied too thickly, that's why I prefer to layer it :)

Ok, so now I'm set! Now I can stare at my pretty nails all day and not worry about anything else. Easter is for chocolate!

Holographic Hearts Tape Manicure

It's February! The shortest month of the year and also the month of my favourite holiday. Ah, Valentine's Day. I love hearts, pink, chocolate and giving/receiving gifts, and V-Day is all that rolled into one! My husband isn't as much of a Valentine's Day enthusiast, I think he needs to take a crash course in date planning or something. Last year he actually got me a gift (after I complained about me being the only one to buy gifts the year before ), but I planned everything, dinner, babysitter etc etc. I would love for him to just surprise me with a completely planned date one of these days, but I think he's afraid that he'll do it and then I'll complain because I don't like what he's planned lolol. Anyway, in order to once again psych myself up for my favourite holiday, I'm going to be doing a series of V-Day themed nail art! Today I have for you this ridiculously blingy, in your face with glitter tape manicure.

My camera freaked out completely trying to capture the dazzling gloriousness of holographic glitter, so it's hard to see but the red polish (Zoya Kimmy) has a gold shimmer and is actually quite sparkly. 

For this manicure I used painter's tape instead of scotch tape and I feel like it gave a cleaner line.

• First I did 3 coats of China Glaze Glistening Snow.
• Then 1 coat of quick dry top coat so they would be fully dry when I stuck the tape on
• Then cut out the heart shapes in the painter's tape.
• For the index finger, I made a heart shaped cut out in a piece of tape, stuck the tape over my nail and then did one coat of Zoya Kimmy.
• For the ring finger, I cut out a piece of tape shaped like a heart and then stuck it on my nail and painted over with one coat of Zoya Kimmy.
• I then did another coat of top coat.

CG Glistening Snow is a lot thicker and gloopier than Zoya Kimmy, so it was easier to use Kimmy on top of GS instead of the other way around.

Look out for more Valentine's Day manicures from me, as well as a couple of makeup looks :) I'm going to be trying to do a couple of videos as well!

The only Christmas Tree we have this year is on my nails.

This year we had planned to get a live tree, since we're in our own house which has nice high ceilings. Unfortunately, with the craziness surrounding the birth of my newest baby boy, time totally got away from us and we didn't end up getting any Christmas tree! So to console myself, I decided to put one on my nails for tomorrow :)

These are my Christmas Nails!

3 coats of Zoya Tori on my thumb, 1 coat of Zoya Jules and 2 coats of Milani Gems on my index, 3 coats of Zoya Jules on my middle and pinky fingers, and 3 coats of Zoya Tori on my ring finger. The Christmas Tree was done with dots of Jules and Essie Good As Gold and a dab of Gems for the star on top.

Pretty easy, but pretty gorgeous and festive! I love the colour combos :) It feels like Christmas. We aren't Christian, so to us Christmas is really about family time, good food and presents for the kids. I hope you have a great day tomorrow, whether you celebrate Christmas or it's just an extra holiday you get to spend with your family :)

Pink Wednesday: Eyeko Nude Polish #BCA manicure

October as we all should know, is Breast Cancer Awareness month.

I don't have anyone in my family with breast cancer and hope I never do, but we have been touched by other forms of cancer and really, cancer is cancer. We all should be aware of how devastating it can be when it affects us or someone close to us.

Today I decided to do my part in spreading breast cancer awareness for October and do a pretty pink mani.

This is 2 coats of Eyeko Nude polish with a coat of Zoya Chloe over it. The butterfly on my ring finger was done with a Kiss nail art stencil and Sally Hansen HD Nail Color in Hi-Res.

Hope you all take part in going pink for October! I'm posting some new circle lens reviews soon, along with a video, so keep your eyes peeled!

Essie Van D'Go w Zoya Chloe

Essie Van D'Go is a beautiful peach shade that I haven't worn enough. I may just be clinging stubbornly onto Summer with this shade, but it's definitely hot enough around here to warrant it! It's a perfect warm peach that suits my skintone, leaning more on the yellow side of peach than pink. I topped 2 coats of Van D'Go with one coat of Zoya Chloe, to give it a shimmery glow.

Essie is a great brand that I don't have enough of. I only own a few shades, but I absolutely love the ones I have. This is a really pretty combo, I love Zoya Chloe over almost everything! I am digging my new nail shape too :D

Hope you all had an awesome weekend!

Polish Days - Geometry themed nail art

Hurrah for my first Tape Mani!!

I've been wanting to try out a tape mani for a while now, so this Polish Days theme of Geometry gave me a perfect excuse :)

Here's a list of the polishes I used:
Essie Van D'Go
Zoya Chloe
Sinful Colors Open Seas
Spoiled by WnW Designated Driver
Kiss Nail Art Paint Gold Glitter

I had a lot of fun doing this mani and learned what NOT to do when using tape...... Mainly, don't assume after 5 minutes that the polish dry enough to put tape on top of.... it's not =_= You might have noticed I changed my nail shape. I'm REALLY loving the 'stiletto' shape right now, it's super fierce! What's your favourite nail shape?

Check out some of the other Polish Days - Polish Geometry posts!

Polish Days: Polish Olympics! What the Olympics mean to me.

Honestly, I'm not the most sports crazy person. Usually I couldn't give a darn about sport and really, at the moment I still don't. But there's something about the Olympics that stirs something in even the most lackadaisical and at the very least I like to check on the Australian medal tally and watch some of the swimming events.

So when I heard the next Polish Days theme was Olympics, I had to pay homage to the only things I really care about in the Games. The Aussies and the swimming! Check it out:

Too many polishes to list, but I do remember using Wet n Wild French White Creme, Spoiled by WnW Designated Driver, China Glaze Fairy Dust, Nubar 2010, Zoya Jules, OPI Simply Smashing and some Color Club polishes among others. 

Index finger is a gradient which represents water/swimming, my favourite event! The swimming events are always huge in Australia, probably since we usually do pretty well. The middle finger is my take on the Olympic rings, the ring finger is a gold medal and the pinky is the flame from the Olympic torch. The thumb is my homage to Australia, a gradient of our green and gold sports colours and my attempt at a Southern Cross. See below for a close up!

Side view of the mani, check out the lovely glitter on my water gradient, and the flakies on my pinky flame!

A close up of the pinky. The flakies in Nubar 2010 really give it more of a flaming look.

I hope you enjoyed my take on the Polish Olympics! Thanks to Hannah from Polly Polish for organizing Polish Days.

Check out my previous Polish Days post here: A Delectable Jelly Sandwich!

And check out the other bloggers' posts on the Polish Olymics theme :) (List will be updated with more links and thumbnails shortly).

A Lacquered Affair Alexis – Glitter Tips Chiro – Nail of this Week Cuti-CLUE-les Hannah – Polly Polish Heidi: Pretty Painted Nails Inky – Inky Polisholicious Ishah – Ishah X Beauty Jen:The Nail Polish Project Jenny – Beauty by Jenny Jessica:Sparkles&Shine JoannaTheTreasureChest Kat – Hooked on Polish Kate – Polish CART Keisha:Refined &Polished Maria – So Marvellous Melissa:The Crimson Petal Mihaela – Lacquer Buzz Nail Tart Nicole – Nearly Nailed Pris – Pris Nails Sabine – My Polish Stash Samantha – Polished Art Sammy – The Nailasaurus Sophia – Unhas a Trois Sincerely Stephanie Wendy’s Delights