"Dragon" & Lacquistry Fall Polishes (lotsa pics)!!!

So last night I finally tried out my dusty A England "Dragon".  It's sooo beautiful IRL, these pics don't do it justice:

Super-smooth, this is 2 coats of holo gorgeousness!  Totally reminds me of dragon scales, which is cool because I'm on Book 3 of the Game of Thrones series "Song of Fire & Ice", in which dragons have returned! :-).  My nails remind me of Daenerys's dragons, and I love them!!!

When I got home after work tonight, I discovered my Lacquistry Fall Collection polishes in the mail!!! YAY!!  I was lucky enough to snag all 6 polishes when Jenna re-stocked her shop, so I am a super, super happy girl!  I immediately picked out 2 of my faves and I smothered the "Dragon" in spectacular autumn-ness:

 Goes great w/Pumpkin Ale!

 Playing in the leaves Jenna included in the envelope!

These are "Pickin Punkins in the Patch" and "Corn Maize" <---clever name!!  2 coats of each totally coated each nail in glittery goodness!  I topped 'em with Gelous and then Seche Vite to make 'em smooth & shiny!  You have eyes, so there's really not much more to say about these fantastical autumn glitter bombs!  I'm soooo excited to get these Lacquistry polishes inspired by my favorite season!    

I know I sound like a total broken record, but Jenna is a polish genius!  She's an amazing person full of integrity and chock-full of talent, and she truly cares about her art and her customers.  I'll gush all day long about her & her polish...just try to stop me! ;-)  Unfortunately, her Fall Collection has sold out, but keep an eye on her FB Page for an announcement on when her Halloween Collection will be released.  I. MUST. HAVE. THOSE!

Shifty "Facets" by Ninja Polish

I had been seeing all the awesome pics and reading the raves about Ninja Polish's "Facets" polishes, and I was intrigued.  They are gorgeous multi-chrome polishes with multi-chrome glitters in them!  How can you go wrong?  At $11 each, they are above my usual "per polish" price limit, but they seemed like magic, I couldn't resist the influence of the insane blog pics, and I ended up buying all 3!!

I tried out "Color Changing Garnet" and "Alexandrite" in this mani, which started with a black base of China Glaze "Liquid Leather".  I cut strips of painter's tape with a pair of scrapbooking scissors for a bit of design, stuck it diagonally across each nail, and painted each polish on either side, swapping the placements on my ring finger:

A thousand curses on the limitations of my stupid camera for not being able to capture the amazingness of these color shifts!!!  "Garnet" changes from an autumn-red, to gold, to green..perfect for fall!  "Alexandrite" shifts from emerald green to purple.  And something else amazing: there's pink glitter in "Alexandrite", but it only shows up when the polish shifts to purple.  AWESOME!!  There is so much going on here with all of the color changes, it's hard for me to stop staring at my nails.

Unfortunately, the "Facets" collection is sold out right now, but when you hear about a re-stock, you had best RUN to get these.  Keep tabs on updates on the Ninja Polish FB Page.  These are TOTALLY worth every penny!!  

Scales on NOPI "Mer-maid For Each Other"

I read a review of Nicole by OPI's limited-edition, only-available-at-Target duochrome polish called "Mer-maid For Each Other" on Nailblog.net.  And after seeing the pretty pictures, I ran out to the local Target and snagged the very last one they had!

I didn't leave it on alone very long, and only snapped a few camera phone pics:

At the beach (oh, so appropriate!)

 With Pumpkin Spice Latte:

If you look closely, you can see the duo-chrome effect from green to aqua blue.  It's much cooler in real life.  This is 2 coats of MFOE with a top coat.

So what to do to spice up a mermaid manicure?  Add scales, of course!  

With flash (you can see a little of the aqua blue here):

And it goes perfectly with the yarn of the scarf I'm currently knitting:

 With flash:

 

Look at how different the MFOE looks here than it does in the first pics!!  Awesome color shift!

I used Sinful Colors "Hot Spot" to stamp on the scale pattern from Mash plate #39.  It stamped wonderfully, but the design wasn't wide enough for my thumb, which is why it looks a little wonky on the edge.  I absolutely could not capture any of the color shift with this lighting set up, so you'll just have to take my word that when the MFOE shifts to the aqua blue, it also goes really well with Hot Spot too.  This manicure makes me happy! ;-)

KB Shimmer "Elle"

I have neglected my polish-posting this week, so I am ALMOST behind on my Alphabet Challenge with Lustrous Lacquer.  We're on the letter "E" this week, and today is the last day of the week, so I'm barely making it!

I looked through my "untrieds" and actually saw a few "E" polishes.  But "Elle" from KB Shimmer has been languishing long enough, and today is her day:

 With flash:

Very pretty and subtle...well, as subtle as a glitter bomb can be!  This is 3 coats topped with Seche Vite.  Each coat applied smoothly and was super-packed with glitter, as per usual KB Shimmer perfection.

Elle is part of the "Circus Collection" and is inspired by performing elephants.  You can order it HERE.  I think it's very elephant-y!

Revlon's Scented Polish & NoHolos Limited Edition "Black Hearted Love"

After reading THIS POST from Nailblog.net, I got curious about Revlon's scented nail polishes.  I had actually seen them before, but passed them up since it seemed such a crazy thing, to intentionally inhale all the chemicals polish is made of.  And anyway, how good could they get a nail polish smell?  Turns out, pretty good!

I picked up 4, one of which is "Passion Fruit", a pretty berry creme.  Now, I'm not sure what a passion fruit smells like, but I liked the color.  I paired it with Zoya "Raven", and got a simple little mani:

The polish had the normal chemical polish smell while wet.  But when it dried, it had a sweet, candy-like scent!  I could smell it even without putting my hands close to my face!  Even hubby was impressed!  I love quirky polishes like this!

A week ago, Nati from NoHolos Frankens & Nail Art Blog posted on her FB Page  that she had made some Limited Edition frankens, and was putting them up for sale.  I was instantly intrigued by "Black Hearted Love", which she describes as "Berry purple jelly base with red shimmer, like exposed viscera in the noon sun. Purple, red, and black glitters of varying shapes and sizes (including black hearts) float in this sea of rotten love."   LOL!  Love it, so of course I had to buy it!!

I got it super-quick, and it seemed perfect to go over my boring little scented mani:

 In the shade:

Wow, how pretty is this???  2 coats, and it's so blingy in the sun.  My only regret is that I didn't have a glue base coat, so removal is going to bite :-(

Nati still has some frankens left!  I had the high honor of being her first customer!  YAY!  Check out her FB page for the details! :-)

Sakura Matsuri

I don't know why it is so hard for me to remember "Sakura Matsuri".  As in the gorgeous polish collection recently re-released by the awesome Rainbow Honey.  I have recently bought a bunch of Rainbow Honeys, and you should too!

So one of my recent acquisitions is the "Sakura Matsuri" namesake.  It's so super-cute and full of girly sparkles and flowers!!  

First, I polished on my untried Zoya "Skylar", and used Zoya "Lotus" for an accent.

Sooo gorgeous!!  This is 2 smooth coats of each.  The shimmer in these is amazing in real life!  Zoya is my fave polish ever!!

Then I smothered it in 1 1/2 coats of "Sakura Matsuri".  1/2 just because I wanted 2 flowers on each nail, and 3 on the thumbs.  The flowers came out very easily, though, so minimal fishing was required:

You don't need me to tell you how beauteous this is!  I mean, you DO have eyeballs! ;-)

Rainbow Honey sells their fantastical polishes for $10 full size and $5 minis.  They are absolutely worth every single penny!!  They arrive in professional super-cute packaging, and the 2 I've used so far have literally been 1-coaters (click HERE for Koi Pond).  Visit the SHOP now!!! 

BTW, I used the Elmer's glue basecoat for this.  2 days later, I popped the nail polish right off with no damage to my nail.  I'm ecstatic with this painless glitter removal technique!! :-)

Glue Base Coat, Iguanas, and Jenna!!

When I was in grade school, I remember taking my bottle of white Elmer's glue and spreading a thin layer on my palm.  When it dried, I grossed my friends out by peeling the glue off my palm in skin-like layers.  Ah, those were the days!!

Now some 30 years later, when I saw THIS POST by Nails by Ms. Lizard, I had an epiphany, the angels sang, and a ray of sunshine burst through the clouds!  Use a coat of Elmer's (PVA) glue as a base coat directly on the nail, paint on your glitteriest Indie, then peel it off when you're all done!  Crazy lady say what?!  No sticking acetone-soaked cotton on your nails, no wrapping your fingertips in foil, no rubbing with felt until your fingers cramp, no waiting every other week to do a glitter mani because you don't want to deal with removal?  It was almost too good to be true!

So I tried it for myself.  I got a bottle of plain ol' Elmer's glue, and squeezed some into an empty mini franken bottle.  Then I painted on 1 full-coverage coat:

Then I let it dry completely till clear.  Took about 5 minutes:

When the glue is dry, it's smooth and not the least bit sticky.

Then I applied "Brash" polish which, although very pretty, did not win my heart since it took 3 coats to get to this opacity.  I got this at Payless Shoes, of all places.  

Now for the fun part:  Lacquistry's "Donald Trump's Iguana" on top:

Gorgeousness!!  But I figured it was a little too blingy, bright & fun to wear to work (I'm in Human Resources - blah!).  So I took my wooden cuticle stick, pushed gently against the polish around the cuticle edge, and it came right up, easy as pie:

I kept pushing till it got right to the end:

The leftover residue washed right off with soap & water.  No acetone was used at all in removing this glitter-bomb mani.

Is this not AMAZING!?!  I feel like Princess Jasmine, cuz I just found a whole new world where I can paint on glitter polishes without the ever-present "just remember you're going to have to remove all this" voice nagging me.  Glitter is not just for accent nails anymore!!  I can't tell you how excited I am!

And just one more thing about Jenna at Lacquistry.  If you don't already know by now, not long ago Jenna announced on her FB page that she was aware that some of the glitters in polishes she had sold MONTHS before were bleeding.  So, she took it upon herself to make replacements for EVERY one she had made, and mailed them out to her customers.  Amazing integrity, and definitely someone who has my unflagging loyalty.  If you've been a follower of mine, you know how much I love me some Jenna...she's an awesome person!  Not to mention she mixes up a mean glitter bomb!!

I got my package a couple days ago:

THANK YOU JENNA!! <3