Shopping Day! WCW & Nail Polish!

Chloë and I were on the go yet again today. We paid our bills and did some nail polish shopping, had lunch... You know how it is. I grabbed a few new polish brands to try- specifically Sinful Colors, and Barelements. They were about 3 bucks a piece and at that price, if they suck I'll just use them on Chloë's toes. They're too small to really chip or show streaking. I gotta say, I needed a little shopping trip. I could go again, actually... but I'm going to buy even more groceries first because I love nothing better than a house full of food. Except my kids, of course!

My daughter looking gorgeous in her pink and red Baby Phat embroidered tracksuit. (Look at those adorable quilted pockets!)

Chloë's new Carter's romper. I want a matching one! For whatever reason, this picture didn't save my rotate. I am too lazy to fix it :D

These are our new polishes. We've swatched them and we are very happy!

 And for reasons unknown to myself, I decided to photograph what I could find of my growing nail art collections:

O.P.I, Sephora by O.P.I, Nicole by O.P.I

Random other good quality stuff- Gosh, Essie, MAC, Seche Base, various magnetics. I love those little Kiss paints 

Some more "affordable" products. 3rd in on the bottom row is my "Frankenstein" polish that I made with clear polish, pigments, and glitter. I will say more about it in an upcoming post

Sally Hansen & Random other glitters

Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear. I love these so much! The quality is fantastic and the price is even better. These can often be found for about $2 CAD (and that says a lot, because they rape us on the price of cosmetics in this country)

Stick ons, glitters, stencils, rhinstones, dotting tools, nail art brushes galore!

 Now I get to do something I've been putting off that I actually really enjoy. Budgeting! I rock with money. I get to figure out how much I have, my expenses, the balance, and the fun we can afford to have <3 I know two boys who are in need of some serious spoiling!

-H.Cat

NOTD: "Cloud" Manicure & Ramblings

Okay. So I think the term "Cloud Manicure" only really applies to a certain colour scheme and certain way to hold your hand. Therefore, I think the name is stupid. But whatever. This is mine. The colour scheme has been done to death, but this was my first attempt and I'm pretty satisfied.

I used:

• Seche Base
• O.P.I Red
• O.P.I Positive Energy
• Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear "Black Out"
• O.P.I Drying Drops
• ORLY "Won't Chip" topcoat

Now for the rambling!

I did it again, dear readers. I've been trying to look the other way and save face for someone for a very long time. My thought was that if it looked like I was by their side they'd have some credibility as a decent human being and maybe their friends would come back to them, eventually they'd see their kids again, and they could have some sort of normalcy. I sacrificed my own happiness for this. I always do. Annnd they burned me again. I was actually thinking for a second that maybe things could turn around for this person. I was seeing truthfulness for the first time. Even when it was ugly... and it was incredibly ugly. But I appreciated their honesty and the effort they were putting into keeping me in the loop, knowing full well I would be upset most of the time. I've been adamantly against what they do, and I've even tried to be supportive and take the "harm reduction stance." No matter what I do, this person is destined to suck the life out of everyone close to them.Oh well.

I'm rarely serious, and I don't like it. Here are some pictures of Chloe's little paws from the other day!

NOTD (Nail of the Day): Strawberry

The pictures I took aren't the best quality, but this is my easy-peasy nail of the day (evening, actually.) STRAWBERRIES! Chad is lucky I was ready to switch up my peacock nails or it would have been his paws modeling this look. 

• Wet 'n Wild Base Coat
• O.P.I "Red"
• Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear "Green with Envy"
• Sally Hansen Insta-Dri "Beige Blast"
• Fing'rs Top Coat
• Some toothpicks

First I raided my arsenal of reds. Glittery red? Pinky red? Blue red? Orange red? I chose O.P.I Red. A classic red that leans sliightly pink with a very slight silver shimmer. Perfecto!

I free-handed the green onto the tips. I had a more elaborate scheme that involved cutting tape, but it was tedious... sticky. The colours I used have decent coverage so I only used one coat of red, and two sort of coats of the green. It was a coat and some spot touching, actually. 

Now they're ready for the "seeds." My nail art brushes have yet to arrive, so I am still using toothpicks. I unscrewed the cap of the beige polish and held it up just slightly above the lip of the bottle with one hand, and held a toothpick under to catch the nail polish drip. I let the excess drip off that, and when I had a tiny bead sized drop of polish left on the pick, I applied it to my nail with a dabbing motion. Repeat! You don't want too much or it won't dry. Too little and it won't transfer onto the nail. This was my first time and I think it turned out pretty well. The green is slightly less yellow IRL.

 Berry cute!
-H.Cat

Nail: Scale/Snakeskin (Magnetic Polish)

Magnetic polishes have been around for a while, but they’re new to me. I picked up one at Sephora last month and was fortunate enough to find that Rexall had another brand  on clearance for $4. I picked up only one colour, but I’ve been dying to go back and get the rest.

You could achieve this look with a plain metallic polish, but I found the magnetic brought the magic.

For this look I used:

• Wet’n’Wild base coat
• Layla Magneffect in “09 - Golden Bronze”
• O.P.I “Glitzerland”
• Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear “Ivy League”
• Kiss Nail Paint in Black
• Fing’rs Top Coat

Annnd thank you, Chad, for being my lovely model tonight :D If a man truly loves you, he’ll let you paint his nails if you pout long enough. 

After applying your base coat, apply your magnetic or metallic shade. These magnetic polishes dry quickly and you have limited time to achieve your effect, so you’ll need to apply a quick coat and hold the magnet over top for a few seconds immediately after. Take care not to get the magnet in your wet polish.

For the hand that was already finished, I took the pale golden colour, Glitzerland and applied a stripe near the edge of the nail and placed a stripe in the same place in each nail, sort of like a highlight. I did not do this with the green colour, Ivy League, until the “sample nail” for photos because it was quicker. Initially, I had just filled in random scales with Ivy League. To save time for photos I just applied a stripe on the opposite side of the Glitzerland stripe. Does that make sense?

Now you’ll take your black, or your darker colour for drawing on the scales. If you don’t have a polish with a long skinny brush you could try a nail art brush, paint brush, or even a Q-Tip. A Q-Tip will work but you have to work carefully. The pictures illustrate how I drew the scales to be overlapping.

Now you can fill in scales with different sections of colour, shade or detail however you like. You could even use blues and greens to go for an aquatic/mermaid look. Maybe some oranges and golds for an exotic oriental dragon motif. There are about a million colour schemes to choose from. Just have fun <3 

-H. Cat

Nail: Peacock

Update:

This is what they looked like after sleeping on'em and applying a top coat. They tend to clean themselves up a bit, which is why I don't bother.

This is my pilot attempt at Peacock nails. The colours I have are perrrfect. My technique? Not so much, BUT I learned a thing or two. Besides- Nails are FUN.

  

I applied a base coat. Mine is from Walmart and it was cheap cheap. 

Wet'n'Wild Base Coat

I applied two coats of my deep green.

Peacock feather hair clip and first of two coats of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear in "Emerald City"

Because there are so many layers to this look, I thought this was the best solution so that it would actually dry this century. The key, and where I faltered a bit, is to make sure the qtip is saturated in nail polish remover when removing your circular section. That way it will dissolve the polish rather than push it to the edges, creating sort of a well. It's best if you can wait for each layer to dry, but I have 3 children and no time to wait for anything- which is why mine is messy.

I forgot to snap a picture of the 2nd green filled in, but anyway I filled the empty space in the deeper green, and removed an even smaller section of the lighter green. 

Lighter Green is Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear in "Ivy League"

 Fill in with gold, hallow out gold with remover soaked q-tip.

It's repetitive. I'm sure you've had it figured out for a while... I did something a bit different with the lighter blue, but since I did it after the dark blue, wait for it....

Golden colour is Sephora by O.P.I in "Rumba Romance"

This blue is Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear in "Blue Me Away!"

I applied the dark blue (Revlon's "Midnight Affair") in almost a heart shape, but with a more rounded bottom... After that I took the lighter blue and traced a small amount of polish around the bottom of the dark blue shape. I took a toothpick and dragged the light blue out onto the gold in a half-assed feather effect. Just little lines.

And the final result:

It just wouldn't be me if I wasn't too lazy to clean up my the edges <3

-H.Cat