Pretty & Polished: Galactus and Party on my Yacht

Today I have swatches of the first two polishes from Pretty & Polished! I showed you my haul from Chels' Etsy shop a little while ago. She makes some great creations, so be sure to check out her Etsy shop (linked above).

I wanted a simple, quick mani since things have been busy around here. With that in mind, I figured the perfect combination would be Galactus and Party on my Yacht. No stamping or nail art required.

Mini bottle shots

I decided to do a mani of Galactus, which is a purple polish with very subtle holo shimmer. I love purples and I can safely say this will be added to my list of favorite purples. I used two coats and a top coat of Seche Vite to give it a glossy finish. The application was great, easy to work with and opaque. I would have liked a bit more holo in this one, but maybe it was just my bottle or I didn't shake it enough. 

Then I put three coats of Party on my Yacht on my ring finger as an accent nail. Party on my Yacht is a white creme polish packed with hex and bar glitter in pink, purple, gold, green and blue. It's probably one of my favorites from Pretty & Polished that I own. It actually reminds me a little of Mardi Gras in a bottle. I had a little trouble with the application on the first ring finger, but then I got better with the second nail. I think the trick is waiting a little for the coats to set. 

The last two photos show the holo a little bit more. It was hard to capture since I didn't have sunlight to work with, but it's there. I love this mani (and pardon my short nails) and I'm definitely looking forward to trying out more of Chels' creations. And stay tuned because I should have a savings code for you in upcoming posts!

What do you think of this mani? Do you own any creations from Pretty & Polished? Do you plan on picking some up? 


*The products in this post were provided to me at a discount for consideration. Please see my disclosure page for more details. 

Nail Mail: Pretty & Polished

First, I want to say a great big hello to my new blog followers! Thank you for following my blog and I hope you've enjoyed the posts so far!

I'm going to keep this post pretty short. Today started with me forgetting to set an alarm and waking up a whole 40 minutes late. Me waking up that late has never happened. I was so confused and frazzled trying to get out of the house on time. I skipped my shower and coffee in the morning, and the whole day I just felt so out of it. I still managed to get to work on time though.

And on top of all that, my cold that stopped two day ago decided to come back today. Yay me! 

But that doesn't matter, because the other day I got some nail mail! Chels from Pretty & Polished makes some awesome polishes that she sells through her Etsy shop. She recently provided me with some at a discount for review and they arrived earlier this week!

I don't have swatches just yet, but here are some bottle shots for you to enjoy!

From Left to Right: Nova, Martian Salad, Cryptid, Galactus, and Party on my Yacht.

I can't wait to wear them all! Most of them are holos and Party on My Yacht is a glitter polish with a white base. My reviews and swatches will be coming in the next few weeks! 

Do you own any from Pretty & Polished? Do you plan on picking any up from Etsy? What are your favorite Etsy shops?

*These products were provided to me at a discount by Pretty & Polished for review.

Swatches: Rolling in the Deep and Rumor Has It

Today I have more swatches for you of the remaining two polishes in my Adele Collection! For all swatches below I used two coats of polish with one coat of Seche Vite.

Rumor Has It is a shimmery golden green. All of the colors in this trio seem to be hard to capture in photos.

The picture above is the most color accurate to what it looks like in person.

My cat Ripley also wanted to get in on the action.

Above is Rumor Has It in natural light. I don't normally get to use natural light in my pictures, since by the time I get home on weekdays it's already dark out. Lucky for me, I had Monday off and it was sunny out (despite the below 30 degree temperatures.) 

This last picture is with flash, to show off the shimmer in the nail polish. I don't usually like green nail polish, but I'm a fan of this color. (And not just because it's my own.) 

Next is Rolling in the Deep, which is a dusty purple with a hint of grey. 

The last picture is Rolling in the Deep in natural light as well. I've place an order for supplies and hopefully within the next few months I'll have a shop up and running!

Again, I hope you enjoyed these swatches of the Adele Collection. Let me know what you think in the comments section. I'd love to get some feedback!

First Frankens: The Adele Collection

Happy Sunday everyone!

I've recently been experimenting with frankening. Although, is it still considered frankening when using polish bases (with no color) and adding pigments and glitter? Either way, I'm going to refer to it as frankening to make it easier for everyone. Anyway, I've been trying a few different combinations, but yesterday I finally came up with three concoctions that I absolutely love. This collection (if you can call it that) has been in my mind for a while and I'm glad I finally was able to make it happen.

I've called the trio of nail polishes that I've created The Adele Collection. For some reason the colors reminded me of the titles of Adele songs. The three colors are titled Rumor Has It, Rolling in the Deep, and Set Fire to the Rain. Each color was handmade with clear bases and different pigments, 100% made by me and not using existing nail polishes. I hope you enjoy them! (Very pic heavy post!)

First up is Rumor Has It. I've noticed that unique greens were some of the most loved polish colors of 2011. I can't even count how many times I saw butter LONDON Wallis and Chanel Peridot on everyone's Top Nail Polishes of 2011 lists. Rumor Has It is inspired by these colors, although of course not a dupe. It's a green with a hint of gold shimmer (I suppose).

I mixed all three of my frankens in empty Manglaze bottles that I got for Christmas. They're perfect for frankening because of the wide mouth, plus the labels are just so cool.

It turns out that Rumor Has It is difficult to photograph. The above picture was taken with the bottle in a light box, which turns out more golden. In person, the color in the bottle is more green, not gold. 

Above is Rumor Has It in natural light, which is a lot more accurate to what it looks like in person. I wouldn't call it a duo-chrome, but it definitely likes to shift a little. 

Next is Rolling in the Deep. It's a purple shimmer creme that leans a little silver (I still don't know how exactly to refer to them, they're not quite creme, but not 100% shimmer). To me, Rolling in the Deep goes with the aesthetic of Adele's 21 album cover. This was the color that helped to set off the rest of the trio. 

Here is Rolling in the Deep photographed in a light box and the pictures below were taken with natural light, which is the most accurate.

Last in the trio and personally my favorite color (although I love them all), is Set Fire to the Rain. It's a mix of three different micas that just went together so naturally. Set Fire to the Rain shifts the most out of the three colors. It's a coral with golden shimmer. 

Again, the above is the lightbox photos and below is natural light.

The natural light shows the golden shimmer. Gorgeous if I do say so myself! I also compared Set Fire to the Rain to Wet n Wild's Waves of Enchantment from their Mermaid Cove collection. On the nail wheel at least, Waves of Enchantment didn't cover as well in 3 coats and Waves is more pink with larger shimmer particles, so it is still not an exact dupe. (I wasn't going for a dupe of Waves, but when I swatched Set Fire, I couldn't help but swatch Waves too.) 

I wasn't able to do swatches on my nails yet. Today I was preparing for the upcoming week, which was hard on my hands and I don't think my poor nails could have handled it today. So I did swatches on a nail wheel instead. Each swatch is 3 coats, with no top coat. 

I hope you enjoy these frankens as much as I enjoyed creating them and seeing the outcome. Please share your feedback in the comments section. I would love to hear what you think! 

I hope to have more frankens for your viewing pleasure in the future!