Begging, Pleading, and RBL Swatch Spam!! Please Vote For Me!!

Good afternoon everybody! I have some really exciting news and a favor to ask today! I was voted as one of the top 10 finalists in Rescue Beauty Lounge's contest to choose three new nails bloggers to review for them. The voting opens right now at noon EST and last for only 24 hours. Only the top three bloggers with the most votes win the contest, so could I ask a huge favor of all of you loyal readers? Could you please head on over to blog.rescuebeauty.com/rbl/vote-vote-vote/ and vote for me? I'd appreciate it so much!!

In case you need some convincing, here's a collection of RBL swatches that I've done! 

Aqua Lily

Mismas

Santa Fe

Faraway

Square Pants

Bikini Bottom

Bella

Kellie Gonzo

Liberty

Thank You 

Rescue Beauty Lounge Kellie Gonzo & Liberty Swatches/Review

Good morning everyone! I have great news: I have posts scheduled for this whole week and the beginning of next week! I'm starting a new job tomorrow, but I still have some extra time to blog now that I'm finished working on the book. And speaking of the book, I was told that it will hopefully be released late next spring! I can't wait to see it completed!

Today I have swatches of two shades from Rescue Beauty Lounge's Blogger 2.0 collection, Kellie Gonzo and Liberty. Kellie Gonzo is a gorgeous juicy coral with gold flecks. I was hesitant to buy this one even though it's gorgeous because I was worried that I would need three or four coats for opacity. What you see here is two coats and I'm perfectly happy with the coverage. The formula was a little on the thick side, but it dried quickly.

Here is a bottle comparison of Kellie Gonzo on the left and RBL Coral on the right. Coral is a bit brighter and pinker and obviously doesn't have the gold flecks that Kellie Gonzo does.

Liberty is a pale mint green with silver shimmer. I used two coats here as well and the formula was pretty normal.

RBL polishes retail for $20 and can be purchased here. I'm not sure when the public release of this collection will be, so keep updated with their Facebook page for more info. I'm very happy that I got both of these and can tell you already that I'll probably have Kellie Gonzo on my toes for the remainder of the summer! Did you pick up any shades from the preorder of this collection?

Rescue Beauty Lounge Thank You Swatch/Review

Hey guys! I had a little bit of time earlier this week to swatch, so I should have some stuff coming for you within the next week or so (hopefully!). The book project is going well (albeit a little stressful) but I'm so excited to see the end result! But today I have swatches of one of Rescue Beauty Lounge's newest shades, called Thank You.

Thank You is a very soft faded pink with purple shimmer and I used two coats here for this mani. I love almost every single RBL shade that I own and this one is no exception. The formula was good, but frustrating. You see, RBL has a different formula than most other polish and doesn't play well with any of my regular base coats. It requires some patience. RBL makes their own base coat (which is rather expensive for me to justify at the moment) so I purchased Essie's ridge filling base coat, which I've heard is similar. It works much better than my regulars, but still not perfect. Just a little FYI!

But anyway, there you have it. Although this shade isn't something I generally would wear, I'm a huge fan of it and will definitely wear it often.

What's your favorite RBL shade? Do you have issues with the formula too?

Party Hearty Glitter Gradient Nail Art

Good morning! I have some more festive nail art for you all today, this time featuring one of my very favorite Christmas polishes: China Glaze Party Hearty. This super easy mani started out with two coats of RBL Bella and ended with Party Hearty sponged from the cuticles to make a gradient. I love that this combination is festive, but kind of fancy too! Do you like it?

Snowy Winter Tree Nail Art

Well, it's December! How about some winter nail art? I knew I wanted to do a winter version of the autumn tree mani that I did and this turned out just like a imagined.

I started out with two coats of RBL Bella, followed by sponging with Konad white on the tips of my nails to create a snowy ground and very lightly on the rest of my nail to simulate falling snow. I also sponged Zoya Sparkle Gloss all over, but it's subtle and hard to see in the photos.

I drew the trees with a thin striping brush and Milani Dark Coffee. They didn't turn out as good as the past ones I've done, but oh well. They look great at a regular viewing distance ;) I used a small dotting tool to add some snow to the branches and then stamped some small snowflakes using MASH plate m50. What do you think?

Autumn Leaves French Manicure

I guess that I should have named this week Festive Fall Nail Art Week! :P Today I have a festive french mani for you to enjoy. I always forget how much I love fun french mani designs like this; I did one around the holidays last year and swore to myself that I would wear them more often, but alas, I never did.

I started with two coats of Confetti Pink Paradise and used Milani Chocolate Sprinkles to create my french tip by painting it right on the tips of my nails. I didn't use any kind of tape or anything since I knew the edge would be covered by the leaves anyway. After that was totally dry, I stamped some leaves randomly with a bunch of different colors: Essie Very Structured, Milani Rapid Cherry, Orly Luxe and Rescue Beauty Lounge Santa Fe. I think I'm going to do this again as my Thanksgiving mani! :)

Festive Autumn Tree/Foliage Nail Art

I know I mentioned this in Monday's post, but I was really inspired this past weekend to do some nail art. I realized when I was working on my guest post for Let Them Have Polish that I have done barely any nail art recently and it made me sad! So to remedy the lack of nail art situation, I looked at some of the recent photos that I have taken and drew inspiration from them! This mani was inspired by a photo of the fall foliage at the lake behind my house; you can see that photo at the bottom of this post.

I started out with two coats of Rescue Beauty Lounge Bella for my base and sponged the "leaves" with Rescue Beauty Lounge Santa Fe, Zoya Elisa, and Illamasqua Scarab. Once I was satisfied with the color variety for the trees, I drew the actual tree on with a thin brush and Milani Dark Coffee. I thought the design was missing something, so I sponged Shimmer Tracy on the rest of the space. I'm glad I did; the gold glitter reminds me of leaves blowing around in the wind!

Lastly, here is the photo that inspired these nails! I took it with my iPhone and added a filter to make it a bit more pink so that it would match my phone case when I used it as a background. I hope you guys enjoyed this mani; I know I did! :)

Shades of Autumn Water Marble

Hey everybody! I was just thinking over the weekend how I haven't done a water marble in a while, so I worked on one yesterday with some seasonal colors. I'm pretty happy with it considering that I haven't practiced in a long time.

For this marble, I used Rescue Beauty Lounge Santa Fe, Milani Dark Coffee, Zoya Elisa, and OPI Don't Pretzel My Buttons. This marble wasn't as easy as some of my previous ones; Elisa did not spread well at all and Don't Pretzel My Buttons was temperamental, but Dark Coffee and Santa Fe worked great.

And here's a little family photo of the colors I used for this mani. So what do you think? I hope you guys like it! I have a couple more fall nail art manis to show you that I'm really excited about! :)

Essie Stroke of Brilliance & RBL Bella Glitter Sandwich

Soooo I finally got around to trying a glitter sandwich and guess what? I totally regret not trying this sooner! This is three coats of RBL Bella, one coat of the new Essie Luxeffect polish Stroke of Brilliance, and one last coat of Bella to top it off. Stroke of Brilliance is an awesome periwinkle blue shade with multiple sizes of glitter.

And here's a swatch of three coats of Rescue Beauty Lounge Bella. This is such a gorgeous and simple color. Just another RBL that I'm absolutely in love with, no big deal...

*Essie Stroke of Brilliance was received as a perk from Klout.com*

Rescue Beauty Lounge Coral

Happy Monday again everyone! I thought I'd start this week off with my new favorite polish ever, Rescue Beauty Lounge Coral. I used three coats of this buttery smooth perfection, though two probably would have been fine. I wanted to make sure that I got maximum color payoff though. Coral is part of the RBL core line and will supposedly be back in stock at some point, though no one is quite sure when. It's pretty hard to find right now, but thankfully, the lovely Amber at GlamTrotter came to my rescue and agreed to swap her bottle to me! Head on over and give her some love for me! <3

Rescue Beauty Lounge Bikini Bottom

A while ago, Rescue Beauty Lounge created a collection of Spongebob Squarepants-themed nail polishes consisting of this squishy turquoise beauty, Bikini Bottom, Square Pants, and Starfish Patrick (which I'm still trying to find, btw!). Since I just discovered RBL relatively recently, I've been scrambling trying to snatch all these gorgeous polishes up.

Now, I'm normally not a fan of sheer-ish polishes like this, but how could you not love this color? It's so fresh and calming! This is three easy coats of Bikini Bottom. Luckily, this polish is still available on the Rescue Beauty Lounge website.

Rescue Beauty Lounge Cuprum

Good morning everyone and happy Friday! Today I have a stunning metallic blue polish with copper shimmer flecks, Rescue Beauty Lounge Cuprum. I'm not shy about my love for RBL and Cuprum is definitely one of my favorites. This beauty is still available on Rescue Beauty's website.

I wanted to experiment more with the lighting on these shots since the blue is so reflective and seems to wash out the copper flecks a bit, but the sun was not cooperating so these are the best I could get. This polish truly is much more incredible in person.

Spongebob Decals over RBL Square Pants

Good morning everyone! Today I have only the coolest nail decals in the history of the world to show you. I got these Spongebob Squarepants water slide decals to review from KKCenterHK. (Psssst! You can get 10% off your order at KKCenterHK if you use code nailnetwork). They have tons of different designs and I love that they are water slide decals instead of normal decals.

To apply a water slide decal, all you do is peel off the plastic cover, soak it in water for a few seconds, and then slide it off the paper and onto your nail. It also helps if your fingers are a little bit wet as well to help it slide better. See? They are super easy and they look fantastic!

I also happened to have the perfect polish to apply these decals over: Rescue Beauty Lounge Square Pants. I am one polish away from completing my RBL Spongebob collection (Starfish Patrick, you will be mine one day!) and I have to say, they are really awesome. I don't even mind that they are a bit sheer. I used three coats of Square Pants for this mani and you can see it swatched alone below.

Rescue Beauty Lounge Faraway Nearby

Faraway Nearby is the second (and last) color that I pre-ordered from the Georgia on My Mind collection. It's a beautiful sky blue with very faint green shimmer. I'm kinda of disappointed that the shimmer is so hidden to be honest; it really would be stunning if it stood out like the shimmer in Aqua Lily or Santa Fe Road does. I can't deny though that it is a beautiful color and definitely a shade that Rescue Beauty was missing.

You can see the green shimmer a bit better in the close up shot below. As I mentioned above, I participated in the pre-order for these colors, but I imagine they should be available to purchase for the general public very soon on www.rescuebeauty.com.

Rescue Beauty Lounge Santa Fe Road

Oooooh goodies! Today I have one of the polishes from the new RBL collection, Georgia on My Mind, called Santa Fe Road. This is a gorgeous faded light orange shade with gold/green changing shimmer. I didn't fall in love with this one until I went outside and saw all the shimmer in the sun. 

See what I mean? It's just stunning. One thing I need to note for you guys: if you don't have the special RBL base coat, you should definitely pick up some type of milky ridge-filling base coat to use under your RBLs (I use Essie Fill the Gap). I've found that these apply so much better over a smooth, milky base rather than a sticky one.

Born Pretty Steel Ball Nail Art

Good morning! Here is yet another trend that I am behind on, the "caviar" mani. Yeah, I know I'm not supposed to call it that, but whatever. How about the microbead mani? Alliteration FTW! Okay so today I have a couple microbead manis to show you using some steel nail art balls that I received from the Born Pretty Store to review. I got twelve different colors and they all arrived in their own little container. The containers are closed really tight and everything arrived safely with there was no spillage.

I decided to use my two favorite colors for the review, so I started looking through my stash for a purple and a turquoise polish to match. For the purple, I chose RBL Mismas and the lighter shade of purple microbeads. Mismas is amazing. I had some base coat-related formula issues with my RBLs, but I bought a bottle of Essie ridge-filling base coat and used it this time and it was incredible. Mismas applied so smooth and easy. Anyway, after two coats of polish, I dipped my ring finger nail into the little container of beads. I didn't get total coverage, but I like that some of the polish is still peeking through.

I decided to use Essie Turquoise & Caicos with the turquoise beads. This was my second attempt, so I was able to get better coverage when I dipped my nail in the beads. I actually really like this look. It's not convenient for every day wear, but it would work great for a fancy one-night mani.

This steel ball set retails for $5.41 and you can purchase them here. Don't forget that you can use the coupon code over there in the right sidebar, ZR5X31 for 5% off your order!

*Product(s) in this post were provided for my honest review.*

Rescue Beauty Lounge Piu Mosso

Mmmm another RBL! Today I have Rescue Beauty Lounge Piu Mosso for your viewing pleasure. Piu Mosso is a gorgeous deep blue with copper/red shimmer. Great formula, great wear, what else is there to say? Oh, Piu Mosso is currently sold out on rescuebeauty.com, but will be coming back in November, so mark your calendars! :P I know today's post is short, but I'll be back next week with some more indie glitter awesomeness!

Rescue Beauty Lounge Scrangie

I have a new-found obsession with Rescue Beauty Lounge polishes. There, I said it! Ever since I purchased and wore Aqua Lily, I have been on an insane quest to track down other precious RBLs to add to my collection. My persistence has paid off and I have managed to add 5 more RBLs to my collection, which I will be swatching and posting throughout the coming weeks. For today, we have Scrangie...

Scrangie is a stunning purple shade with intense blue/green shifting shimmer. Not only is Scrangie a gorgeous polish, but it's also named after one of my all-time favorite nail bloggers, double win! The formula here was great, though a smidge sheer, so I used three coats for this mani. I will leave you with a pretty macro shot to enjoy! :) 

Rescue Beauty Lounge Aqua Lily

By some stroke of fabulous good luck, I was able to get myself a bottle of Rescue Beauty Lounge Aqua Lily, a very limited-edition shade part of the recent Fan Collection. After seeing the first swatches of Aqua Lily, I fell absolutely in love with it and knew that it needed to become part of my collection. I'm always looking for the perfect turquoise and my search is finally over. The pink shimmer in Aqua Lily is just the icing on the cake.

The formula of Aqua Lily was just what I'd expect from a high-end polish: awesome. I used two coats and it practically applied itself. I'm going to have a hard time not wearing this for the entire summer... I can't wait to see what gets picked for the next fan collection!