Holiday Half-Moon Mani

I saw ThePolishAholic's post of her Gwen Stefani inspired manicure just when Snow Bunny was biting the dust. It looked very festive, but simple, so I decided to go for it. I started with 2 coats of Wet n' Wild Shield, then used french tip guides at the base for my half moons. I preferred a sharper curve, so I had to pull the ends to fudge the lines a bit. I painted 1 coat of Zoya Sooki over Shield, and carefully pulled the tip guides off as I finished each nail. I absolutely loved the effect and plan on trying this look with other color combos.

2 coats WnW Shield, 1 coat Zoya Sooki

ETA: I posted this over on Twitter for the Glamour Magazine #wkndmani contest, and won! I'm pretty sure it was a random choice, and I think I won the Zoya Gems and Jewels holiday collection and a bottle of Remove+. Yay!

butter LONDON The Black Knight

The Black Knight is the first up in my Christmas Gift Extravaganza. I got so. much. polish. Love it! The Black Knight is one of butter LONDON's Holiday 2011 collection. It is a black jelly that is chock full of pink and blue glitter and a finer gold glitter. The first coat is pretty sheer, but it is nicely opaque with a second coat. The picture below is the second day of wear with 1 coat of Seche Vite. It stayed pretty gritty, but it didn't bother me enough to add a second coat.

Day 2 - 2 coats polish and 1 Seche Vite

I noticed that I began to get awful chips pretty quickly. Some quick internet trolling showed me that I am not the only one! Apparently glitters (not just this one) are prone to chipping. I imagine it's due to the grittiness. The polish on my index finger began to lift after the 4th day, so I decided to throw a coat of Sally Hansen Hard as Wraps over it. This is a very thick polish, so it smoothed the finish nicely when topped with another coat of Seche Vite. All in all, I absolutely love this one and am thrilled Bestie got it for me! :)

2 coats The Black Knight, 1 coat SV, 1 coat HaW, 1 coat SV

Merry Christmas to me!!

Bestie came into town and we are currently at Steak n' Shake exchanging Christmas gifts and this is what I got! How much does she rock? Tons, I tell ya! Tons!

ETA: I had Christmas with DH's side of the family, and got some fab polishes from them too. Abbie got one of the HITS No Olimpio polishes I wanted, so that one will be showing up here soon.

Sally Hansen Salon Effects Plaid for You

I was texting Abbie an realized that I haven't written a post about this pattern! I was thinking it was a red and green plaid, but it's really red and black. Wear time has been better with this set than Snow Bunny, but I'm not going to make it 10 days. My nails must be growing really fast. I've got to take them off, because it's driving me nuts!

ETA (12/29/2011):

Removal on this one was so weird. The black came off in rubbery pieces that lodged into the sides of my nails and had to be picked out with a toothpick and orange stick. I had to use pure acetone. Blech. I'm wearing Prep's Cool now and am kinda dreading taking it off.

Zoya Morgan *Now With Sparkles!

So, I love my Zoyas. They're all great, but sometimes I like to switch them up a little. I found this top coat by Finger Paints (Sally's Beauty Supply) and have lived it over all my colors so far, even the already sparkly ones. It's just called Sparkle Top Coat (how original). It's iridescent, And leans mostly to the pink and green side. I've put it over Zoya Sooki and Marina and loved it with both. It looks great with Morgan too! It's difficult to capture to real sparkle & iridescence of it. The best part us that each if the 3 times I've used it I've gotten 4 days of wear with no chips! Yeah!!!! You can get Finger Paints on sale for less than $4 so totally worth it!

Sorry for all the typos. My iPhone typing skills are lacking.

Sally Hansen Salon Effects Snow Bunny

I'm going to try to make it through all of December with only my Salon Effects. This is the first set, Snow Bunny. I had a different picture ready to go, but couldn't not use the one with Kitty in the background!
As per usual, the strips are easy to apply. I used some cuticle remove first, because that is usually where I get the first bits of the sticker lifting from the nail. This set seemed more thin than usual, and the end of the supplied cuticle pusher was pretty rounded, so I got some irregular tears near my cuticles.
I wasn't as excited about this pattern as I thought I would be at first, but it's really grown on me and I've gotten some fantastic compliments! Next up will be the green and red tartan plaid.