Happy Halloween! Feat. Stamping Plate from KKCenterHK

Happy Halloween everyone! I typically don't celebrate Halloween anymore, but who can resist a chance to do some cute nail art and sit around eating candy? Not me! I got this stamping plate from KKCenterHK during the summer since it had some unique seashell stamps on it, but it just so happens to have cute Halloween designs too.

I used Wet N Wild Black Creme for my black base and for the stamping on my ring nail. The orange is Sephora by OPI Paisley Attention to Me and the white is Konad stamping polish. This plate is nicely etched and stamped very well. You can view this plate and others here. What do you think? Have a happy (and safe) Halloween!

*Products in this post were provided for my honest review and the above photo was provided by KKCenterHK.*

Zombie Nails for Halloween!

Hello everyone! I hope all of you in the hurricane's path are staying safe and dry. My classes have already been cancelled for today and tomorrow, so we shall see what happens. I'm glad I don't have to leave the house though. Today, I have for you some zombie nails inspired by Sarah at Samarium's Swatches. I don't like mine quite as much as her's, but I'm still happy with how they turned out!

I started with a base of Essie Sand Tropez and painted/sponged with some dark purples, reds, and oranges. I covered that in two coats of a sheer pink; I wanted to use more of a nude shade, but I didn't have any. I will say that they do look much better in person rather than in these photos. They don't look quite as pink in person but I couldn't capture it properly.

I applied Esse Matte About You over the sheer pink before I started painting the blood using a dotting tool and striping brush. It took forever but I'm so happy with how it turned out. What do you think?

Contrary Polish Purple Smoke & Gilded Oak Swatches/Review

Hola! I really love the polishes I have to show you today and I'm excited to share them with you all. They are both from Contrary Polish and the first is called Purple Smoke.

Purple Smoke is a gorgeous gray shade with blue and purple shimmer. This kind of shimmer is my absolutely favorite polish finish. I needed two coats for opacity.

Gilded Oak has tons of gorgeous golden shimmer packed into an almost faded-looking rust shade. Contrary Polish sure knows how to pull off shimmer!

Here is a macro of Gilded Oak. I need two coats here for full opacity as well.

Contrary Polish can be purchased at Llarowe for $11. Which is your favorite? Do you own any others that you would recommend?

*Products in this post were provided by Llarowe for swatching purposes.*

Tough As Nails Swatches/Review/Photos

Hey all! I have some really cool indie swatches for you today. These polishes are from Tough As Nails and are so awesome! The first one I have to show you is called Go Sit on an Egg, which is a mix of yellow and orange glitter in a milky white base. I layered two coats here over white.

The Baconian Method is sold in a set with Go Sit on an Egg and is a mix of red, pink, brown, orange and black glitter. I layered it here over black.

I included a macro shot of The Baconian Method because of how neat it is. It has a lot of depth to it when layered over black. I love the concept behind these first two polishes!

Spacing Out is a gorgeous mixture of blue glitters in a black jelly base. This can be worn on its own, but I'm not very fond of jellies, so this is two coats over black.

Lastly, this is The Great Butter Rebellion. I layered two coats over a plain red creme. This is a very nice gold layering polish.

Tough As Nails offers two bottle sizes, full size for $9 and "shorty" size for $5.50. You can view and order Tough As Nails polishes on Etsy. Which is your favorite?

*Products in this post were provided for my honest review.*

OPI Skyfall Collection Swatches/Review

Good morning everyone! I hope you all had a fabulous weekend! Over the weekend, I swatched the newest OPI collection, Skyfall, for you. Please enjoy!

The Spy Who Loved Me is a very holiday-esque shade of red with tiny red and gold glass flecks. The formula on this one was very good; it needed two coats for what you see below.

Die Another Day is a shimmery glowing red, opaque in two coats with a great formula as well. It seems very similar to one of the Germany shades from the fall release, but I will have to compare them to be sure.

You Only Live Twice is a beautiful berry with glassfleck (!!) particles. I'm not typically a fan of pink, but this one is truly stunning. Once again, great formula and two coats were used for opacity.

Skyfall, the namesake of this collection, is a warm, brownish burgundy creme. It's very wearable and appropriate for the upcoming winter season. This one was a bit on the thick side, but covered great in two coats.

Goldeneye is stunnnnnnning! Seriously... I don't know if I'm just craving sparkly holiday goodness or what, but I'm really excited about this one. Its only downfall is that it is a little on the sheer side. I needed three coats here and there are still some spots that aren't completely covered, but you could always layer this one.

Casino Royale is my type of a shade; a yummy berry purple shade that will always look purple and is perfect in two coats.

This is one coat of The Living Daylights over Casino Royale. This is a gorgeous and unique combination of teal, copper, gold, and silver glitter suspended in a clear base. The great thing about this glitter is that it doesn't eat top coat; it will feel smooth to the touch with only one coat of top coat.

Ah, Moonraker. In a collection with so many winners, there has to be a loser, right? Moonraker is the loser here. I'm not entirely sure how this polish even got OK-ed. The color itself isn't that bad, but the formula is absolutely awful. It drags terribly no matter how long you let the previous coat dry for and actually seems like there are little chunks in the bottle. What you see here is three incredibly patient coats.

The World is Not Enough is a multidimensional shimmery brown with a gorgeous metallic finish. There are many different colored shimmers packed into this one, including copper, pink, and green. This one is pretty sheer and I ended up using four thin coats.

On Her Majesty's Secret Service is similar in finish to The World is Not Enough, but in a blue/gray shade instead of brown. It has more of a colored base than its brown counterpart, with silver, blue, green, and pink glitter. Because of the base color, it needed only three coats for opacity.

Live and Let Die is my favorite from this collection. This smooth, creamy shade of dark pine green is packed with gorgeous gold shimmer, making it easily one of the most stunning shades in this collection. I used two coats here.

Tomorrow Never Dies is a very unique shade of blue/purple (or blurple, as some say) in my collection and my second favorite out of these twelve shades. I used two easy coats for the shimmery beauty you see below.

Overall, I'd say this collection is definitely a winner. I would definitely recommend almost all of these shades, with Live and Let Die, Tomorrow Never Dies, and Casino Royale being my top picks. OPi nail polishes retail for $8 and the Skyfall collection should be available for purchase now!

*Products in this post were provided for my honest review.*

Pixi Swatches/Review/Photos

Hey guys! I got an awesome package from Pixi full of beauty products to review and share with you, so please prepare for a decently long post. :) The first product I'm going to show you is called the Tinted Brilliance Balm and the shade I received was Baby Bare, a peach/pink.

The Tinted Brilliance Balm is really neat because it works with the pH of your lips and it will appear slightly difference on everyone! I really loved the texture of the balm and how the color looked on me. It has a really great smell as well! These twist-up balms retail for $16.

I also received the double-ended Lip & Line Primer, which has a clear lip liner on one end and a lip primer on the other. This has been one of my favorite products that I got from Pixi. I don't own any lip liners other than this, but the beauty of this one is that you can use it for any color at all.

The primer works just as well as the lip liner does. These two lip products have helped me become much more comfortable wearing lip sticks and colored lip glosses. Pixi also make colored Lip & Line duos. Both the colored and the primer sticks retail for $18.

Flawless & Poreless is a pore-eliminating primer that I absolutely love. I put quite a bit on my hand and rubbed it in so you can see what it looks like on the skin. It looks like it has a very, very slight shimmer/pearly finish to it, but this is very flattering on your face. I actually end up wearing just this primer some days! The Flawless & Poreless primer retails at $29 for a 30mL tube.

This next product is really fun. The Bronze Bloom Trio is an over-sized (and I mean HUGE) blush/bronzer trio. I'm so psyched to have this "compact;" not only are the powders great, but the mirror inside is huge and a lifesaver to have around!

These are swatches of the powders on the inside of my wrist, no primer. Corresponding with the first photo of the palette, the largest section is swatched on the far left, followed by the small bottom section (that says Pixi) in the middle and the top blush on the right. The Bronze Bloom Trio retails for $28.

These are the first Pixi products that I've ever tried and I have to tell you, I'm totally blown away by this brand. I loved every single product that I tried and I've incorporated almost all of them into my daily beauty routine. You can check out all of Pixi's fabulous products on their website: www.pixibeauty.com. Do you own any Pixi products? What do I need to pick up next?

*Products in this post were provided for my honest review.*

OPI Pink of Hearts 2012 Duo Swatches/Review/Photos

If you didn't know, October is Breast Cancer Awareness month and OPI released this special edition duo to support BCA. The set includes two shades: I Think in Pink and You Glitter Be Good to Me. I Think in Pink is a sheer, soft baby pink shade. I used three coats for the swatch below and the formula was great.

You Glitter Be Good to Me is the winner of the set, consisting of small light pink glitter and larger magenta glitter. I used two coats for the coverage you see here. I love this combination. The Pink of Hearts duo retails for $14.95 and is available at such stores as Ulta, Regis, and JCPenney.

*Products in this post were provided for my honest review.*

Pirate Mani feat. Cheeky's Summer Plates Photos/Review

Hey everyone! I have a really awesome review for you today courtesy of Cheeky. They were kind enough to send me their summer collection of stamping plates and I'm really excited to share them with you! For my review, I decided to use some of the designs from the pirate plate (CH49). I used Milani Fast Dry shades for this mani: Rapid Cherry, Black Swift, and White on the Spot. And I also used Darling Diva Polish Chrome Job on my pinky nail.

I'm really, really impressed with these plates and I'd venture to say that they are the best ones I've ever used. The designs are etched nice and deep so that you can get a crisp stamp every time and the plates/designs themselves are larger to accommodate those with larger nails. The main reason I wanted these plates, however, was due to the awesome and unique designs that they had! I mean really, where else can you get not only one pirate image, but a whole plate full? The plates come in this awesome little storage box that closes magnetically. Cheeky definitely out did their competition as far as overall presentation is concerned!

When you open the box, the plates are contained in a plastic cut out and you will find a "Nail Artist License" that you can fill in with your name and use as a scraper if you don't have one handy. Overall, I would definitely recommend picking these up if you enjoy stamping as a form of nail art. The Cheeky plates are a fantastic product and very high quality. You can view all of the designs and purchase the plates here. Do you stamp your nails? What do you think of my design?

*Product in this post was provided for my honest review.*

OPI So So Skullicious Review & Giveaway!!

Good morning and happy Tuesday all! I have some quick swatches of the OPI So So Skullicious mini set for Halloween to show you today. From pinky to index, the colors are: Candlelight, Mourning Glory, A-Rose From the Dead, and Hi, Pumpkin!. Each shade applied well and required two coats, with the exception of Candlelight, which needed three.

The mini set also comes with adorable water slide decals of sugar skulls. The photo below shows some of the designs that are showcased on the back of the package. I was really excited to see that these were water decals too; I think they look so much nicer than regular stickers. 

So do you want to hear the best part? I have a So So Skullicious set to giveaway to one lucky reader! The giveaway will end on October 23rd so that I can hopefully get it to the winner before Halloween. Please see the "Terms & Conditions" in the Rafflecopter widget for more information. Good luck!!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

*Product in this post were provided for my honest review*

Check me out!

My Girl on Fire nail art tutorial was included in the creation of this handy nail resource table. Check it out under the "Beginner" box!


Click image to open interactive version (via Diamond Designs Uniforms).

Zoya Ornate Collection Swatches/Review/Photos

Good morning and happy Monday everyone! I have swatches of the new Zoya Ornate holiday collection for you today, please enjoy!

Aurora is a gorgeous purple scattered holographic polishes. As a side note for all of these scattered holos, they are much more sparkly in person; it is very hard to completely capture them in a photo.

Blaze is a crimson-red scattered holographic. This one is going to be perfect for the holidays!

Storm is a black scattered holo and is absolutely stunning. Wearing Storm is like wearing galaxy nail art but without all the work!

Here is an out-of-focus photo of Storm to hopefully show the sparkle better. 

Logan is a fantastic pine green shade with gold shimmer.  I've been really into darker greens lately and I can already tell that this is going to be one of my favorites over the upcoming months.

Ziv has a really neat name and is also one of the nicest gold polishes I've ever used. I'm not nuts about gold, but Ziv is very wearable for me and actually pretty unique. I would definitely recommend it if you're into metallic shades!

Electra rounds out the collection as a silver holographic bar glitter topper. It definitely reminds me of tinsel and therefore fits in perfectly with a holiday collection.

The formula on this entire collection was fantastic. I used two coats for all of these swatches and they flowed evenly and smoothly. But let's talk about the holos for a minute; I know a lot of people were bummed that these weren't going to be linear holos, but I personally am a huge fan of these scattered shades after seeing them in person. I'm never disappointed by Zoya and I think that they pulled off another fabulous holiday collection. Zoya nail polish retails at $8/bottle and you can purchase the Ornate collection at www.zoya.com. Will you be buying any? Which shades are your favorite?

*Products in this post were provided for my honest review*