Purple Shimmer Mani

This is not a gel mani...I'm giving my nails a break from gel this week, and they desperately needed a trim.

 Anyway, I got two China Glaze Shimmer Crackle colors a few weeks ago, and I was looking forward to using them.  I was let down by the HUGE lack of crackle, however its a beautiful shimmer.

I started out with Salon Sciences Instant Artificials...this is an awesome bottom coat.  I only use one coat, but you can use two, it makes your nails a lot stronger!  Make sure to always seal in the edges of your nails with EVERY coat of polish!  This is the key to lasting mani's!!!  Trust me!!!

I then painted two coats of Sinful Colors Amethyst...I really love this line of polish, its cheap, and they have a ton of really fun colors.

I then added one coat of Seche Vite, the miracle top coat!

Just an FYI...I was doing my nails (thinking I had longer to get ready to go out with the hubby) I had just added the top coat of Seche Vite, and hubs says "You gonna be ready in 5 min?"

Thanks to this miracle top coat I was able to run upstairs, change, do hair and make-up, and not mess up a single nail!! 

(BTW...I got ready in 10 min...yeah, I'm awesome)

When we got back I added one coat of China Glaze Crackle Latticed Lilac.  I can see why this color was on sale....no crackle!!!  Now, I did a thin coat because with China Glaze's regular crackle you get thin cracks from a thin coat, and thick cracks from a thick coat....so its possible that I would get some crackle if I used a thicker coat.  No problemo though!  I really like the final result!  The purple shimmer is really pretty, even though it didn't turn out the way I thought.

And of coarse my toesies match my fingers (don't they kinda have to)  :)

BTW...I've been wearing this mani for 4 days (in fact these pictures were taken on day 4)

Just goes to show that sealing your nails is the key!  It's a must do!

The products I used:

- Salon Sciences Instant Artificials

- Sinful Colors Amethyst

- Seche Vite

- China Glaze Crackle Latticed Lilac

Dry Shampoo Miracle

I am a huge fan of dry shampoo!!!

Below is a picture I took of myself over vacation, my hair hadn't been washed in 5 days....some may say "gross" (sister)...some may say "go you!" (me)!

I've used a few different kinds of dry shampoo, and I finally found my favorite!  I've posted this shampoo on my blog before, but not with a picture of how my hair looks with it.  Just spray, wait a few min (I usually do a quick blow-dry for added volume), brush and re-curl hair!  

I used to have thin, greasy hair - in high school it looked dirty by the end of the day.  As I've gotten older my hair has gotten a little bit thicker and dryer.  However since I stopped washing it everyday its gotten a little bit thicker and dried out a bit more.  I used to have to re-wash just my fringe...but since the discovery of this awesome dry shampoo I can go more days without washing, and don't have to re-wash the front!
This shit is awesome!!!  I would highly recommend it!

Experimenting with Gelish polish :)

I know I haven't blogged in a while, I was on vacation, then I just got busy, and kinda forgot to :)

Anyhoo....I've been doing some experimenting with Gelish polishes.

Here are my results...

Below is a mani I did at the beach.  In order to use a Konad stamper with gel nail polish just do your bottom coat and coats of color, (as you normally would) then use the nail cleanser (which is basically alcohol) to get rid of the sticky-ness, then stamp as you normally would, let it dry, and add the top coat, put hands under the light, and DONE!  :)

Here is a mani I did on my brother's girlfriend, Ashley.  I used a gel top and bottom coat, but used a regular polish with the Konad stamper.  It's called a Gelish sandwich.  Her nails started chipping the next day.  However the nails that I stamped had Seche Vite on them, and they didn't chip....I however had better results...keep reading....

A different mani/pedi....I did this design free hand!  Go me!!!

This mani however was a disaster.  I did Gelish bottom coat, 3 coats of color, 1 coat of Seche Vite, and Gelish top coat...I don't think I let the colors dry long enough and that's why it rippled...not pretty at all!

I tried to fix my screw up by trying a straw mani I saw on Pinterest (I think I use too many colors...it wasn't good either)

I should have stopped here with two colors...well next time :)

Yuck!

And yuckier!

I decided to go ahead and remove this disaster of a mani and start over.

This is my current mani which I love.  I used Gelish top coat, 3 coats of Sinful Colors Cinderella (love this color), 1 coat of Seche Vite, Konad stamp each nail...let dry for a while (very important step), and finish off with Gelish top coat.  I have been wearing this mani for 5 days!  I think its pretty safe to say that for the most part you can use regular polish in-between Gelish top and bottom coat and get the same (or at least similar) results!