Paradise Blue Cheetah and Gilty Gold Zebra

 I'm attempting to paint my nails as often as possible during my break from piano. I raided my roommate Ashley's np stash and found two new favorites: "Paradise" by Sinful Colors and "Gilty Pleadure" by Sally Hansen Complete Manicure. Paradise is a bright creamy sky blue which I can only imagine is even more beautiful in the daytime. I sit here admiring it in artificial light and can't wait for the sun to come up. I'll have to update you all with a daytime pic soon. It was two coats to full opacity. The first thin coat was streaky and I almost started to doubt my decision on picking a Sinful Colors polish out of her stash instead of a higher quality. But I was thankfully reassured by a thicker 2nd coat which brought the color to a dreamlike consistency. Gilty Pleasure is a champagne gold I used to make a couple streaks in my last post. I love it and it's so perfect on any skin color. Again it's two coats to opaque but with a light color like this, three should be perfect. I don't like to do three coats because, frankly, ain't no one got time fo that. 

I was a little disappointed in myself for not thinking outside the box and reverting to animal print. I promise my next post won't be something I've done a thousand times over. Hope you enjoy!

Full Sets At School :)

OMG you guys, I've been such a bad blogger!!!! Ironically, it's because I've been super busy with school- I've been taking the manicuring course at Paris Beauty College in Concord, CA and I haven't been able to finish my fall challenge or blog at all! Here are a couple of pictures of the acrylic full sets I've been doing at school the last few weeks. I don't know if I'll have a chance to blog again before school is over but I'm trying to continue to snap pictures if I can! 

This set is my hand model Chrissy's hands. She gets almond shaped nails because she's a vet tech and she wears gloves and has to pick up kitties by their necks and such. She loves 3D nail art of course and got tiny white bows on a few of her nails and clusters of multi colored half pearls on the rest. 

These are DUCK FEET nails. My first set of duck feet actually on someone else. In the beginning of school, I did a full set of duck feet on myself, but these were much better. Also, the girl that got these nails was going to homecoming that weekend so it made it super fun for me to do. I used forms instead of glue on nail tips to get this flared out look.

These are just fun two toned funky french acrylics with cut out stars embedded in the acrylic. I finally had to bring my drill to school because I think I'm getting RSI from hand filing. Sad, but it's so much fun doing acrylics at school. 

That's all for now, you guys, so hope I can get back to blogging once my busy busy schedule dies down a bit! 

Valentines Mani #2: Jungle Funky French

This wasn't what I had in mind when I sat down to do a second valentines mani- it just happened. It's a super sparkly animal print funky French that had tiny pops of pink (it looks purple but it's pink) inside the cheetah print. I used metallic pink hexagon glitter to and outlined it in black to make a cheetah print. Underneath this is a white French tip, covered in Metallica by Wet n Wild, with an unnamed silver glitter on top of the silver part. Then I added a black zebra. It's fun, sparkly and is definitely a contender for actual Valentines day nails.

ELF Matte Finisher Review (and some nail art)

I decided to try out this nail trend and I thought it best to buy a matte topcoat vs matte polish. That way I could make any of my polishes seem matte. I bought ELF Matte Finisher for just $2 on eyeslipsface.com and was pleasantly surprised at the quality. As I have read in reviews, it smells horrible!!!!! I couldn't handle it the first night I tried it out. In the picture that only shows 2 nails, I painted them all with Black Out by Sally Hansen. Then on my ring finger I did one coat of the Matte finisher then striped on regular glossy top coat in a zebra pattern. The difference between the matte and the glossy is subtle but very interesting to look at. Today, I painted my nails with Ash Wangsday, my franken, then did a black and white cheetah print leaving the ing finger solid as my accent. Then I layered a thick coat of the Matte Finisher and I'm not sure how I feel about matte over nail art. It smoothed the seams but not as well as with Seche Vite, so I just layered on Seche Vite on top, and it was like the matte never happened. All in all here's my review key points...
Pros:
Inexpensive
Does exactly what it says it does
Cons:
Horrible smell
Little streaky, unless you apply one thick coat

Hope this review helps you! Try it out if you haven't tried matte polishes or top costs because it's the best deal for its price.