NAILS | Emerald Christmas Trees #ManiMonday

"O Christmas tree, O Christmas tree" - greetings to the first holiday-themed manicure of the season! I had really wanted to start much sooner, but I honestly haven't been all that inspired. Christmas nails are probably my least favourite forms of nail art (weird, I know considering the type of season it is) mainly because I feel like once you have done one form of Santa or reindeer nails, you've pretty much done them all. I've done Christmas minions and Seasonal Stormtroopers to add some variety to the typical Christmas manicures and I think I may have to do the same this year so any suggestions are welcomed!

NAILS | Happy Canada 150 and Birthday to Me!

Apologies for the blog silence the last three days as I have had some very long work days and then a horrific case of food poisoning Thursday night from a bowl of tuna poke. It was a pretty good bowl too, but an hour later and every hour after that...from 9pm-6am was probably one of the worst things I have ever experienced in a very long time. Thankfully, today is my birthday and I am feeling SO MUCH better so at least now I get to head out and celebrate!

NAILS | Gettin' Hot and Heavy with Purple Holo

Whenever I decide to paint my nails holo one night, it's always cloudy with zero sunshine the next day. I still don't have those glorious daytime bulbs for 24-7 holo lighting, but hopefully the camera flash doesn't kill you all too much. I remember when holo polishes were not only expensive, but hard to find. All I have to do now is go to massive emporium e-tailers like Born Pretty and I can literally get everything I need when it comes to nails and then some! I have had great luck with BP holo polishes in the past and when it came time for me to do some shopping, I immediately went for the holo nail polish section!

NAILS | Power to Purple with OPI for #ManiMonday

I am cheating a little because this manicure was actually something I was saving for a later date, but because I didn't have a chance to paint my nails last night I am jumping the gun. I wore this manicure as a tribute to Urban Decay for their new store in Metrotown Mall last month. It's pretty cute though I wish the taping came out more cleanly. Purple is one of my favourite colours as I always feel empowered when I wear it and is actually a great shade to wear if you have a case of the Mondays because you look down at your nails and feel ready to slay whatever comes your way! 

NAILS | (YELLOW) DAY 3 OF THE 31DC2016 WITH Wavy Taping #ManiMonday

Geez, I am cutting it close with my Mani Monday post again though I did manage to edit one photo for IG this morning and share it with ya'll. Today was my Friday and worked a bit of a long weekend as Saturday was quite the night with my smoke alarm choosing to DIE at 2am. Of course, smoke alarm death = loud beeping. We didn't know how to disconnect it since it was hard-wired into our building and finally at 4am, the building manager came to disable it. I had to be up at 6am for work so that 2 hours of sleep felt like nothing. I actually packed a blanket that morning instead of a lunch because I knew I was going to be using my break to sleep in the basement of the building! I have not slept on the floor of ANYTHING since I was a teenager, but that's pretty much what I did and it was amazing.

The nap was a good idea as it gave me the strength to get these nails done! I wanted to do this colour combination back in August, but then I decided to save it for the nail challenge to maximize both my time and manicures. 

NAILS | Mary Kay Fall Nail Lacquer in Polished Pearls and Berry Stylish

It has been a long time since I have just swatched for you all, but never fear, there is also some failed nail art at the bottom that I am DETERMINED to get perfect, but decided to share how this attempt went! In addition to some city chic eye colours from Mary Kay (here) and making everyone in your house smell amazing (here), your nails are also about to join the fun with three new limited edition nail lacquer shades in: Polished Pearls* ($10.00 CDN each), Berry Stylish* an Gallery Grey*.

Polished Pearls is not my favourite type of nail polish finish as I prefer the smooth finish of a creme as opposed to a pearl. Nevertheless, two coats and opacity was reached!

NAILS | Getting Stencilled with the OPI Brights Collection in “Life Gave Me Lemons” and “Down to the Core-al”

Summer is my all-time favourite season for nail polish because it’s brights, brights and MORE brights! Yes, we start to see repeats of the same colours, but they make us all so happy! Today I chose a colour combination that is, I admit, kind of weird, but I was convinced it would work. Yellow never works with my skin tone, but I was determined to make “Life Gave Me Lemons”*, an absinthe yellow-green, work so I figured it might if I paired it off with a colour that was safe in the form of re-released “Down to the Core-al”*, a shimmery bright coral, from last year’s neons collection.

 
Using the Almaz stencils from TwinkledT, I applied one coat of “Down to the Core-al” on top of 2 coats of “Life Gave Me Lemons” and I have to say I wasn’t entirely pleased with my results. I found the stencil VERY sticky and even though I had waited 24 hours for the base colour to dry, the stencil pulled up polish in certain areas. My nails are quite short for this stencil pattern so I feel like I didn’t get their full effect as there were blank areas on my nail. I really should practice on the right hand first…both polishes were great though. “Life Gave Me Lemons” was streaky on first coat, but corrected itself on the second which is typical of light coloured creme polishes.

What’s your summer go-to nail colour?