Italian Nails

Hi everyone,

I'm not sure if anyone still reads this, but here's a quick post from my smartphone.

This week is the 16th of July which constitutes a big feast in my hometown. In honor of this Italian feast, I of course did my nails. This design was hand painted, but then I went to my local nail salon to have a UV gel topcoat applied. I really should invest in a UV light!

That's it for now. Drop me a comment if you're still reading!

Italian Manicure!

Hello! Sorry that my absence was longer than I thought! I was burnt out from volunteering and took a couple days to do literally nothing.

Today I have for you a special holiday manicure! The reason I was volunteering last week is because my town has a very long-running (137 years, to be exact) festival to celebrate the feast of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel. Taken from the Mt. Carmel Society webpage, the Mt. Carmel Society, who organizes the week-long festival, "is an independent nonprofit Catholic Organization formed in 1875 by Italian immigrants new to Hammonton, New Jersey, who took time to celebrate their safe journey to America and a successful harvest by giving praise and thanks to the blessed Virgin Mary." The 16th of July, the Feast Day of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, is regarded as a holiday like any other; for example,school and town offices have off!

Since this festival is deeply rooted in Italian tradition and I myself am Italian-American, I did a festive manicure! Lots of layering was involved for this. All red areas are two coats of OPI Color So Hot it Berns with one coat of OPI Animalistic on top. Green areas are two coats of Orly Wandering Vine topped with both China Glaze Glittering Garland and Zoya Ivanka. The white is a no-name white cream topped with Orly Winter Wonderland. Here's the result:

This was a fun manicure and I got a lot of compliments! I hope you all like it as much as I do =] Are there any Mt. Carmel festivals near you? I know there is at least one other in New Jersey.

Thank you so much for reading! Let me know what you think!

Janna

ChG Innocence American/French Mani

LOL. Saw this as an ad on facebook. Thought you guys would appreciate it! What's with this spelling?!

Help spread savvy, colorful nails to your beautiful customers. Start giving mannies and peddies now!

In other news this was one of the best school days I've had in a long time. It was a high of 82 today...which is drastically hot compared to the winterish weather we've been having, and everywhere else has been having as well. I finally could wear flip flops!! I had two canceled classes and got out of my lab almost two hours early! I also got to take two naps! Very painless day, to say the least.

FOUR MORE WEEKS TIL SUMMER!

Just thought I'd share!

I'll leave you with some blurryish pictures of a mani I did a while back. Base is China Glaze Innocence, a sheer pink. Then I created a kind of American or French manicure with freehanded tips in Sally Hansen Polar Bare, a sheer white. I really like how fresh this looked. Hm...maybe I'll recreate this and stamp over it....






Until next time,

Janna<3

Christmas Mani

Hey guys!

I'm slowly playing catch-up...so here's my Christmas mani. I hadddd to use Party Hearty, but I think a true red or true green base hides the glitter a little bit, so I went for a soft pearl white/light gray, Color Club Pretty in Platinum, and on accent nails, Essie Sew Psyched. PiP is a gorgeous color and it was surprising opaque; shown is 2 coats. Sew Psyched, as I'm sure you know, is a dusty, almost-sea foam green with hidden shimmer...LOVE! I bought the Essie mini set for Fall, but I might have to go buy a full-sized bottle of Sew Psyched and Limited Addiction...

ANYWAY. Onto the pictures! The mani was topped with two coats of China Glaze Party Hearty.








Pretty in Platinum and Sew Psyched alone.

Ditto.


I love how subdued the base colors are...makes the glitter really pop!

Thanks for reading everyone!

<3, Janna

Barielle - Elle's Spell

Today I have for you the star (in my opinion) of the Barielle Winter Collection, Elle's Spell. It's my first flakie polish =]


I'd describe this polish as a cranberry-red jelly with "chopped-up-looking" flakies that flash red, orange, yellow, and green, a la SH Hidden Treasure. I did 4 thin coats for this mani, with Avon BC and Seche Vite TC. Next time I'm definitely going to layer it over a red polish.






After 2-3 days, I put some white stripes using an Art Deco striper polish, which turned my nails into candy canes. I tried to make some lines thicker than others, and it came out pretty good! The flakies make the red really look like candy, and these pictures are not color accurate! My camera made the flakies pull orange under the stripes.





I wore this up until Christmas Eve night...I changed my mani right after all of my family left on the 24th! Christmas and other manicure pictures coming soon!

How was your holiday or weekend?

Janna

Random October Manis

Helloooo. Finals are overrrr and I'm home!

How's everyone?! What have I missed?!

Well, I do know a lot of things I've missed, and I definitely missed showing you my October manis! Let the madness begin!





Milani Hi-Tech. I painted my nails this color for Depression Awareness. Amazing green holo! 3 coats I believe.

Next, one of my favorite manis of all time. This is Polar Bare from the Sally Hansen Salon Manicure line. I bought this thinking it was a stark white, but it's actually a jelly, sheer white. I hated it at first and was going to return it, until I realized that just one coat made my nails look really clean and fresh. Here it is with 4 coats:





After a couple of days, I stamped it with BM plate 21 and Design-a-Nail polish in Voodoo. How amazing is this?! I got so many compliments each day I wore it, even from one of my professors!







Finally, my Halloween mani! I kept it simple for this one: 3 (I believe) coats of an unnamed Color Club obnoxiously-neon orange. If anyone has any idea what this is, let me know! I posted this in one of my haul posts, and it might be Wham! Pow! from their Spring '10 collection (EDIT: actually it's more likely to be Orange Revenge!).





That's all for now! Thanks for reading!


Janna

PHD Song Inspiration Challenge

Gooood afternoon/evening/morning, depending on when and where you're reading this =]

This challenge was really tricky for me and I spent literally 3 days thinking of a song, and having my family and friends help me think. I was browsing on a list of the top songs, as voted by the site's viewers, and I think I reached song 300-something by the time I made a decision. I'm so picky =p

I not only wanted to pick a good song that translates to pictures or images, but I wanted a song that fits my personal taste. I really love music from the 60s, 70s, and 80s, as well as other genres, and this fits =]

(The gallery will be linked HERE when it's posted.)

Can you guess what it is? Here is what I submitted:



This played out pretty much just like I envisioned it, which was surprising because I'm super picky, and a perfectionist =P

Another:



This is one of the best songs ever, such a classic. How can you not love her voice and emotion?

Okay here's the super long list of what I used:

Tools: double-sided dotting tool and nail art brush.

The blue background is NYC Skin Tight Denim Creme. Moon: Avon Nailwear Polish in French Tip White. Stars: Avon Nailwear in French Tip White, Rimmel Polish in Insolence, Cover Girl in City Lights. Train Outline: Art Deco in Silver. Train: Ulta Black Lace (Glam Goth collection). Smoke: Art Deco in Silver and Ulta Black Lace.

Thumb Background: Avon Speed Dry in Creamy Coral (Peach, get it?). Georgia: Color Club Art Club polish in Mint. Lettering: Color Club Art Club polish in Midnight Blue.

Other stuff I used was Seche Vite topcoat, Avon adhesive base coat, and LA Colors Base/Top Coat.

Whew =] Here's what it is, if you couldn't guess =] Of course I listened to this while singing along on repeat while doing my manicure.




Hope you enjoyed this as much as I did!

Janna

Sinful Colors Swatches

Hellooooo.

I'm slowly trying to organize my stash into 5 clear plastic shoeboxes. Hopefully they'll fit after all the buying I've been doing. So I'm going to start showing you guys some of what I own little by little til I can show you everything all neat and organized =]

This is my collection of Sinful Colors polishes as of today, 8/10/10. (or 10/8/10, depending on where you live.) August 10th =p No topcoat or basecoat (or clean up) unless specified.



First Row: Snow Me White, Gogo Girl, Dumpling, Bamboo
Second Row: Hottie, Lang Lang (purple), Love Bite

And now for the swatches. I didn't swatch Snow Me White, cause it's...well, white. But if anyone is looking for a review or a swatch, leave a comment. I've heard it's a pretty good white, not streaky or anything. We'll see.

Gogo Girl. I did my swatch on one of my hands, admired it, and then took it right off! I forgot all about pictures. It was my tenth swatch of the day, so I think I was losing it a little. I redid it, but only did one nail. Sorry =\




Second picture is with flash, as you can probably tell. It looks red in the bottle, but I did one coat and all I could see was pink. So disappointed. Buttt then as I kept putting coats on, it got redder, obviously. The picture is 3 coats, but there's still VNL. It's a pretty cherry red though. Cream finish, applied well.


Dumpling. Here's a photo from my NOTD post of Dumpling, from the recent Shanghai Nights collection. (Original post HERE)



It is suuuuper sheer. This picture is 5 (yes, FIVE) coats, along with Sally Hansen Nail Protex (pictured) as basecoat and topcoat. I'm probably going to use this for layering mostly. It is rather pretty though. Also applied well and it has a nice subtle shimmer.

Bamboo. This one caught my eye because I thought it was similar to Jade is the New Black, but now that I own JITNB (YAYYY!), I can tell you that they're quite different. This color is much more blue toned and has a shimmer finish.



Second one is flash (again, stating the obvious).

This is also from the Shanghai Nights collection. Two coats. It has a really subtle but pretty shimmer to it. It dried pretty fast, and was close to matte, definitely needs topcoat. The only thing I don't get is the name, or any of the names from this collection really. . .

Hottie. It's a glitter polish with a (sheer) purple-toned blue base. It has some chunky purple and blue glitter and also a ton of fine glitter.



Ooooooh, pretty.

I only did one nail so I wouldn't have to get all that glitter off. I really like this, but it's going to be for layering. Two coats, and as you can see, it's far from opaque. Definitely pretty and unique though.

Lang Lang. See what I mean about these names? Shanghai Nights collection. This polish is NOT for the faint of heart.


Looks like an innocent purple...


BAM!

This color is electric. That cobalt blue flash is a lot more noticeable in person. This is two coats, slightly shimmery. I'm wearing this in a Ruffian right now, and in some lights it seems more blue, some purple. It photographed really blue in the bottle, but not in this swatch. Aside from the name, this is one of my new favorites.

Love Bite.This is the last of my Sinfuls. I bought this polish cause it looks black, but it actually has green, blue, and purple/magenta shimmer in it, at least in the bottle. Only the teal color showed on the nail =[

Bottle Picture:

Crappy picture, but SEE? The colors are there!




Alright, I guess the purple's there in the first picture if you look for it. . . but I didn't see it at all in person. This is three coats, very pretty.

So there are my Sinfuls. I'm pretty new to this brand, but I'm liking it so far. Application was consistent. The only disappointment was Dumpling, with 5 coats, though I love the color. I think my favorite thing about them is the bottles; they're really cute! And at $1.99, I think they're worth a shot if you can find them. I purchased all of mine at Rite Aid, and I know they sell them at Walgreens, too.

Thanks for reading! Do you have any Sinfuls?

Janna