Today I wanted to take a look at glitter nail polish. I myself used to have a love/hate relationship with glitters and would shy away from them.  I love the way they look but hated the removal. That changed once I got my peel off base coat, though.

      Glitter polish is considered the flashiest of the finishes and has the largest variety of looks with the variety of glitters available. There's multi glitter, two-toned glitters, single glitters, bar glitter, round, square, hex, and even shaped glitters. The base used to contain little to no color and the "color" is formed by the glitters used.  However, more and more indie polish makers are adding glitter to a pigmented base.



Fickle Fairy Potions Quit Your Clownin'

     You will sometimes hear someone refer to a glitter polish as being "top coat hungry" which means that the polish has a very rough texture. All glitter polishes have a rough finish but some are worse than others. Micro glitter polishes, for example, are the smoothest of glitters but even those have a slight texture to them.




Cover Girl Scalding Emerald

      Overall I feel that glitter polishes are an essential part of any one's collection. They can spruce up a day old manicure, change the look of the polish, or just make you sparkle. But save yourself the headache of removal and invest in a peel-off base coat.

     Thanks for stopping in, I hope you enjoyed this post. I'll have the last post in this series for you next Monday. Happy Polishing!

     I'm Back!! Sorry for my quick and longer than expected absence. I needed to take a step back from blogging and the nail polish community in general. There was so much drama going around there for a bit about clean up, and cuticles that it started to feel like bloggers and makers were being pitted against each other. I needed some time to think, figure out where I wanted my blog to go. If I wanted to continue with this as a hobby or turn it into something more. I still don't have all the answers but I missed my blog and all of you. So as a thank you for sticking around I decided to do a giveaway.

     I have decided that I'm not going to highly promote this giveaway because I want my true followers to have a fair chance at winning. There is however an option to share the giveaway if you choose. There will be only 1 winner but this giveaway is open to everyone!

     Now, what am I giving away? I've put together a little nail art kit so to speak. The prize includes a set of dotting tools, 10 rolls of stripping tape and, 12 little pots of multicolored rhinestones.


       The giveaway will run from today until Sunday, June 15th. Winners will be announced Sunday night here and on my Fb page. Good luck and thanks for sticking with me!


a Rafflecopter giveaway

     Today I have another opportunity from Brand Backer to share with you. This time around I have the Smokey Eye pallet from BA STAR.

      "BA STAR is the #1 Performance Makeup! Sing, Dance, Strut, Perform- Shine Like a Star! These affordable Palettes contain 5 High Pigment Eye Shadows + Eye Shadow Base for All Day Hold! Available in 2 color combinations: Midnight Smoky and Natural."
                             

A pallet in Midnight Smoky

     Today for the whats in a finish series we take a look at specialty polishes. There are many different types of specialty polishes but the most common are Crackle, Magnetic, and Spotted. While these seem to be passing trends, you still see them pop up every now and then.

     Let's start off by taking a look at the crackle finish. Crackle nail polish is a layering polish that cracks to create different patterns. This is the most user-friendly of the 3 polishes we will be looking at today. The polish cracks all on its own without the assistance of anything else, and from my limited experience with it the thickness of the coat doesn't play a factor.

     Now let's take a closer look at the Magnetic Polish. Magnetic nail polish doesn't require anything underneath for it to work, but I always recommend a base coat. You then put down one layer of the polish but on the 2nd coat you hold a magnet (usually provided in the cap) over the polish for 10 seconds and a pattern is created in lighter and darker parts on the nail.

Fing'rs Get spotted over OPI Die Another Day

     There are other types of specialty polish out there also. I know Barry M has one that is very similar to the crackle finish. I'm sure there are more, but these are the ones that I am familiar with. If you know of another one I'd love to hear about it in the comments.

     I hope you have enjoyed this post, and found it helpful in some way. Thanks for stopping by and Happy Polishing!
     

     Today I'm sharing with you a nail polish that has been patiently waiting in my stash for almost a year! Sinful Colors Tidal Wave is part of the Pool Side Collection, summer 2013. Why I let this pretty pale Robin's egg blue polish sit neglected for so long I have no idea.


     Oh wait, I know why. The formula is kind of iffy. I didn't have as many problems with it as other bloggers seemed to. I've read that people had problems with it being running and goopy at the same time. That it would move around on the nail during application, and that it just all around sucked. I didn't have quite those issues but my bottle was pretty runny and I was surprised at how sheer this polish is. I don't know if I had fewer issues because my polish was older, or because I tend to apply thicker coats than most, but I'm glad that I didn't have as many problems.

Tidal Wave. 3 coats plus top coat

     The first 2 coats were on the patchy side, but everything evened out after the 3rd. Tidal wave dries to a nice semi-gloss finish.  I wouldn't say that the formula was so bad that I'd never use it again, but it was more work than I'm used to doing with nail polish.

   
     I do really like the color. It seems to have just the right amount a blue for me, and it made a great base for some failed nail art recently.  I have a few other polishes from this collection that I have yet to use. I  hope they don't have the same application issues that this one did. I should have posts up on those in the coming weeks.

     Do you have this polish in your collection? Did you have the same issues with it being spotty or goopy? Id love to hear your feedback. As always thanks for stopping by and Happy Polishing!

   
     Application of Dare to Bare is easy with its smooth formula, cream finish, and no streaking. Here I've shown Dare to Bare here in 2 coats without topcoat. As you can see I still have a faint VNL after 2 coats. I would assume that would be covered with the application of a 3rd coat, but didn't try it to be sure.

     Well, that's all I have for you today. Thanks for stopping by and Happy Polishing!

     Happy Easter everyone!  I've got a quick post for you today so I can go celebrate with my family. It's the last day of the Spring Renewal Nail Art Challenge. Like many of the challenges I've participated in the last day is freestyle. I decided to go back to the Pastel prompt and do Pastel Galaxy nails. This was one of the techniques I was seriously considering for day 2 of the challenge.

     I actually really like how this turned out and I got a ton of compliments at my softball practice yesterday on them. I hope you enjoy them just as much.

   Today is day 3 of the challenge and the theme is Spring flowers. I thought I'd take this opportunity to try out a few different techniques and see what I could come up with. While yesterday was a nail art triumph today is a different story. What can I say, you win some, you lose some.

     I started out with a base of Sinful Colors Tidal Wave. The pretty Robin's egg blue reminded me of a clear sky on a fresh spring day.