New Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure Shades for Spring 2013 Swatches/Review

Good morning and happy Monday! I have some pretty blues that Sally Hansen sent me to share with you guys today. These are new releases from SH for Spring 2013 and are part of the Complete Salon Manicure line. This first one, a light aqua blue called Barracuda, is a re-release from a limited edition collection. I needed three coats here and the formula was temperamental but I absolutely adore the color!

Watercolor is a great medium sky blue. The formula was great on this one and I needed two coats.

Please Sea Me is a medium-toned teal shade that needed three coats for opacity.

Jungle Gem is a deep shade of teal. This one was perfectly opaque in one coat, but of course I did two out of habit. ;)

These shades should be available in drug stores now and retail for $7.99 each. The Complete Salon Manicure polishes have very wide, mop-like brushes that take some getting used to. I find that I make a total mess for the first few nails, but eventually I get used to using it and am able to just about paint my whole nail with one swipe and minimal mess. Do you have any of these shades? What do you think about Sally Hansen?

Products were provided by the company for my honest review.

Sally Hansen Salon Effects in Rock N' Roar

Hello everybody! Today I have another set of nail appliques for you, this time from the brand Sally Hansen. They are releasing a set of nail polish strips to coincide with the release of the movie "Rock of Ages." The design I have to show you is called Rock N' Roar, a metallic silver and gold design with leopard print.

These are the best nail strips that I've tried as far as the overall finished look. They are thin and stretchy, so you can pretty much match them up perfectly for each nail size. However, they are really sticky, so you need to make sure you line it up perfectly on the first shot! I messed up a little on my ring finger and you can tell that it's a little wrinkly near the tip. Once applied correctly however, they are super smooth and just like polish. These wear great and the Rock N' Roar design is seriously fierce! Salon Effects retail for $9.99 and can be purchased at most major drugstores.

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

Sally Hansen Calypso Blue

This polish always caught my attention in stores, but every time, I convinced myself that I had too many blues as it was and that I didn't need another. I was wrong on two counts: 1) You can never have enough blue polish and 2) Calypso Blue was one that I needed!

  
Calypso Blue is a gorgeous ocean blue polish with a flash of green shimmer within it. I used three coats here and I was able to do them very quickly thanks to the wide brush in the Complete Salon Manicure bottles. I decided to do some quirky nail art with the SH nail art pen that I also received. I love these pens; they make freehand designs so much cleaner and easier to accomplish. I had two issues with this one: it was a little thin, I should have gone over a couple spots a second time to get better coverage and it cracked in a few places. I'm not sure if this is a result of something I did wrong or if it was a defect with the polish in the pen, but regardless, the pens are useful little tools for anyone who is interested in creating their own nail art and I will definitely keep using them. 

*The product(s) in this post were provided by the company mentioned for my honest review.*

My First (successful) Water Marble!!

How exciting is this?! I was finally able to do a decent water marble! One of my friends was learning how to do water marbling at beauty school last week and she asked if I wanted to get together and practice, so we did this past weekend. Here is the result:

I used Zoya Mira, Sally Hansen Caribbean Coral, and Essie Absolutely Shore for this marble. Caribbean Coral photographed WAY too bright and red; it is very bright in person, but it's more pink-toned than red. The nails that aren't marbled have three coats of Absolutely Shore on them. I was pretty happy with my first three nails, but my thumb (below, which I did last) was definitely the best! I can't wait to try this again now that I've gotten the hang of it!

Here is a photo of the fake nails that my friend practiced on. I'm thinking that I have to try the gray and purple one next! 

Happy Halloween! :)

I hope you all are spending the day stuffing your faces with candy! I'm sure that's what I'll be doing... :D

I have something really special for you today! In my package from Sarah at Samarium's Swatches, I found a pretty little franken (my first!) that Sarah had made. She calls it Pumpkin Patch and it's a pretty little orange polish packed with glitter. Here's a photo of the bottle:

Isn't it lovely? Since it's a tiny bottle and I want to treasure it forever and ever, I used it sparingly and just layered it over OPI Chop-Sticking To My Story on my ring finger nail. I stamped a pumpkin over it with Wet 'n' Wild Black Creme and added a green rhinestone to the stem. For the rest of my fingers, I used two coats of China Glaze Midtown Magic under one coat of Sally Hansen Pumpkin Spice (<3<3<3). 

Now to start working on the Christmas/winter holiday manis! Eeee :)

China Glaze Midtown Magic

If you're reading this post, I'm sure you may have noticed that The Nail Network got a major makeover this weekend! I'm pretty sure I love it, but I want your opinions! Is it easy to navigate? Are the fonts a good size/style for reading? Along the same vein, I also wanted to introduce my new watermark! Ta da! I hope it's not too intrusive! :)

This is Midtown Magic from China Glaze's fall Metro collection. Hands down, this is one of the best polishes from that collection. Midtown Magic is a brownish burgundy base with gold shimmer pieces that change between gold, red, and orange in certain light. Absolutely gorgeous. First coat was a little streaky, second coat was perfection.

I had a bottle of OPI Espresso Your Style sitting on my desk and thought for a second that these looked kind of similar. I must not have had my glasses on since they are very obviously not... at any rate, I compared them below.

ANNNNNND here is Midtown Magic with one coat of Sally Hansen Pumpkin Spice! I've been absolutely dying to use Pumpkin Spice and I think it looks totally perfect over MM! I love how you can still see the gold shimmer underneath the orange glitter! I can't wait to wear this as a whole mani.

China Glaze 108 Degrees

This is the lovely China Glaze 108 Degrees from the Island Escape collection. This color is almost too beautiful to describe, but I'll give it my best shot ;). 108 Degrees is raspberry/hot pink-toned glass-fleck shimmer that is PERFECT for summertime! The shimmer seems to drift back and forth from light pink to hot pink to purple as the light hits it at different angles. I did two coats for the photo below, but I think that a third would have been perfect. By the way, the formula on this one is fantastic. Check it out: 

I added Sally Hansen's Crackle Overcoat in Fuschia Shock over 108 Degrees since I got it for my birthday and have yet to try it. It looks lovely, but I don't think it cracks as much as the other shatters I have from OPI and China Glaze. Regardless, I still love the color and can't wait to play around with some crazy combinations...

Sally Hansen Gunmetal

This is Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear in Gunmetal. Gunmetal is a dark grey, metallic-ish color with a bit of microshimmer. Unfortunately, since it is kind of metallic, I had a serious issue with brushstrokes showing on my nails. They aren't very noticeable from a normal viewing distance, but I know that they are there and it bothers me. I did two coats of Gunmetal, but I don't think three would have made a difference.

To spice it up a little bit, I added an accent nail with China Glaze Turned Up Turquoise. I know that it looks nothing like TUT in my photos, but I swear to you that it is. My DSLR just really hates neons. I saw a mani similar to this a few weeks ago (on Glamour Beauty, I think) and really wanted to try it. Since it hasn't really been very warm and summery lately, I decided that now was the perfect time. Turned Up Turquoise is an awesome color... perfect in two coats and dries super fast. I can't wait to throw some Black Shatter over it...