Purple gradient and dried flower accent

Hi ladies! Here is a quick post of some purple gradient nails I did awhile back - I'm so backlogged that I really should be blogging more often to catch up. I've actually hit some sort of inspiration lately and I'm doing some freehand nail art! I know, it's so rare nowadays haha.

Anyways, back to the gradient. I applied two coats of OPI Parlez-vous OPI? and then took China Glaze Light as air for the gradient. On my accent nail, I added a dried flower from Born Pretty Store. I finished the look off with a coat of LA Colors Starlight.

I haven't been doing gradient nails in awhile so my application was a little rough. Practice makes perfect though, eh? ;)

Can you believe I still have some nails I did from last year to share?! I think I'll put that in a spam post or something, otherwise they'll never make it onto here. Any blogger ladies who keep putting off posting some old manis? ;)

Thank you for reading!
~Sharon

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Do zebras have black or white stripes?

Hello everyone! I was in the mood for some animal print the other day and it hit me - I always stamp the zebra print image from fauxnad m69 with all shades of colours except black and white. So of course, I had to try it out with them. Except there was a question I had - do zebras have black or white stripes? I did a google search and came across this website. As it turns out, zebras have white stripes but I figured it'd be easier to stamp with black over a white base anyway :P

Still, you learn something new every day! I applied two coats of Ulta3 lily white and then stamped with Ulta3 black satin. My top coat totally ruined the result though so I pulled out LA Colors Star light to cover up the smudged stamping.

And here it is, in all it's smudged glory, pre Star light layering time :P

Despite the smudging, I loved the final look of this manicure! What do you think of it? :)

Thanks for reading.
~Sharon

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Wavy, rainbow pastels

Hi ladies! My posts are becoming rather sporadic due to working life, sorry about that :( I wish I had more energy and motivation to write up posts in the evening but considering I've been in a polish slump recently too, it might remain like this for awhile yet.

Anyways, this post features a rather bright and in your face manicure! :) It's actually been quite awhile since I've worn it so I don't really remember all the polishes I used :P I'll try my best though!

I basically blobbed all the colours onto a paper towel (you can use a make up sponge, if you prefer) and dabbed it onto my nails. I believe I used OPI Suzi's Hungary again, Australis Peek-a-boo, Ulta3 spring blossom, spring fling and spring shower. I then stamped with BM-201 and Ulta3 black satin before adding the LA Colors Star light.

I don't usually wear rainbow nails and especially to work too! A very bold manicure, despite using pastel shades :P Do you like these types of manicures?

Thanks for reading!
~Sharon

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Tiger nails! :)

Hello hello :) Since starting work, I haven't had as much time to post, let alone paint my nails or take awesome pics - I wash my hands a lot at work and as all nail enthusiasts know, this can be detrimental to perfect nail photos :P On top of that, I'm still trying to get through a back log of photos but I'm almost done so expect to see some Christmas themed posts soon!

But onto the tiger nails :) I actually wanted to have citrus themed manicure but the stamping didn't work out well. Oh well, tiger stripes work just as well ♥ I started with two coats of Ulta3 spring blossom then sponged a gradient on my tips with OPI Call me Gwen-ever. I then stamped with BM-223 and a black polish. Finished the look off with LA Colors Sparkling diamonds.

It's been awhile since I've sported animal print nails so I wore this for a few days longer than normal ;) What do you think?

Thanks for reading!
~Sharon

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Going green

Hi everyone :) When I browse through my Flickr account, all I see are green or blue manis recently. Wow, must be really into them ;) Anyway! Today features a pretty green skittle (something I've also been doing a lot recently too!), check it out :)

Index & pinky: two coats of OPI Thanks a windmillion, then applied a glitter gradient with Essence Edward.
Ring: two coats of A-England Dragon.
Middle: two coats of Ulta3 lily white, then stamped with fauxnad m69 and Dragon. Layered with LA Colors Starlight.
Thumb: two coats of Australis Blackmail and applied the dots with Thanks a windmillion. Topped with Starlight.

Sun pics! :)

And in natural light.

I loved the look of this and how well the skittles came together and I really adore skittling ;) ♥ Do you skittle often?

Have you liked my new facebook page yet? :)

Thanks for reading!
~Sharon

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Elegant, blue and 3D nails

Hi everyone! Awhile back my friend had a birthday party with the theme being elegant...that's right up my alley. I adore elegant styles and of course, my nails were totally done to fit the theme :P Here's what I came up with!

I started with two coats of Australis Sky blue. I then did a reverse glitter gradient using LA Colors Sparkling diamonds before placing some rhinestones and pearls randomly onto the nails. I finished it off by sealing my manicure in with a top coat.

I loved it while it lasted. Having not had a 3D manicure in awhile, I kept running my fingers over my nails and finding the feeling strange haha :P Despite this, none of the jewels came off and I had to scrub hard when it came to removal time.

What do you think, are you a fan of this manicure style?

Thanks for reading.
~Sharon

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Saran wrap and fail stamping

Hello hello :) With this being my second time trying out the saran wrap technique, I was really pleased with the outcome of it. I started with a base colour of OPI Do you lilac it? and letting it dry before taking OPI My very first knockwurst and applying a thick coat of it over Do you lilac it?. I then used my cling wrap to dab over the nail, taking away bits of My very first knockwurst to create the marbled look.

Awesome looking, no? ^^

But because I can't leave the good alone, I just had to stamp over it using fauxnad plate m64.

Which actually wasn't such a bad idea, the final glitter layering just ended up being too much and I promptly removed the manicure. The glitter was LA Colors Starlight.

It totally would have looked okay without the glitter :(

Have you overdone a manicure before and how so?

Thanks for reading!
~Sharon

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Review: Born Pretty Store fimo canes

Hello everyone! I swear, these are the most beautiful fimo canes I've had the pleasure of trying out. Born Pretty Store offers a variety of nail art products and today I will be showing you some fimo canes. I'm sure you've all heard of these before, and probably seen the sliced fruit fimos around the most. The sliced fimo pieces originally come from a cane piece, and Born Pretty Store sells a set of 100 (!!!) assorted canes along with two empty containers to hold your freshly sliced fimo pieces in, as well as a box of ten cutters and a glue. You can find this from the online store under the name of 100 pcs Cane Nail Art Fimo Fruit Shaped Stick w/ Cutter.

Here are some of the canes I sliced up - I have around 6-8 pieces in each tray and I've barely made a dent on the cane! Of course, this comes down to how thinly you slice the pieces (personal preference) as well as how many mistakes you make :P

With so many choices to choose from, I did feel a little overwhelmed. I decided to play safe and start with some fruit fimo for a nail art idea. For my index and pinky nails, I applied two coats of Sportsgirl Baby elephant before layering a coat of China Glaze White cap over it. I applied two coats of China Glaze IDK onto my thumb and fourth finger. On my middle finger, I applied two coats of OPI Passion to hide my stained nails :P Then I sponged on Baby elephant at the tips and applied a coat of LA Colors Sparkling diamonds. Lastly, I added the fruit fimos, rhinestone and pearl.

Having previously used fimo pieces only once before this, I encountered a curling problem from the pieces. Learning from that experience, I made sure to press my pieces down with a dotting tool occasionally after I had applied my final topcoat to ensure it stuck fast on the edges. (You probably won't have to do this much if your topcoat is fast drying though) The fimo pieces held on really well for the entire time I had this mani. It took a bit of scrubbing to get off once I decided to remove it! :P

Considering pre-sliced fimo pieces may cost you around $3 (since the last I checked on ebay), this set really is a bargain. You get 100 designs to choose from and you get sooooo much more than the 120 pieces you'll get from pre-sliced options. I found the slicing part really fun once I got the hang of it too - is it weird that I find it soothing? :P If you're still hesitating, Born Pretty Store offers free international shipping, no matter how much you buy and plus, you can use my 10% discount code PIJ61. Just enter it into the corresponding box when you check out!

Ladies, have you tried fimo nail art before? Do share your experiences please :D

Thanks for reading.
~Sharon

Products provided for consideration. For more information, please view my disclosure policy.

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Swatches and review: Did you 'ear about Van Gogh?

Hello everyone~I have for you today my first nail polish from OPI's Holland collection! Did you 'ear about Van Gogh is a lovely neutral crème and totally work appropriate. I found the formula a little thicker than I am used to from OPI but it wasn't too bad. Application was nice - I love the pro wide brushes hehe. Here, I've used two coats.

I love crème polish (in fact, they're one of my favourite finishes) but I did find the polish a tad boring after awhile. I decided to add a little nail art and glitter to make my mani more interesting and fun :) Since the shade of Did you 'ear about Van Gogh looked similar to a burberry pattern background, I decided to take a leaf out of Emerald Sparkled's post and drew on a plaid pattern onto my accent nails. I layered on one thick coat of L.A. Colors Starlight onto the rest of my nails.

I love that the polish is so work appropriate, especially since I don't own many :P What do you think of it?

Thanks for reading.
~Sharon

A product was provided for consideration. For more information, please view my disclosure policy.

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A sponged rainbow

Hi ladies~ Awhile ago, I saw this mani over on Let them have polish and knew I would one day have to recreate this look. I loved the gradient shift of colours on the nail and hey, more leopard print. Why not? :P (Yeah...this is my third one in less than a month? Hehehehehe.)

I really love the way this turned out. I'm into day 3 of wearing this! Such a record haha, since I normally change my mani every 1-2 or so days.

I used so many nail polishes I'm just going to post a photo of the bottles used. If you want to know more, just ask :)

Hmmm, I might try a crackle polish over this next time. What do you think?

Thanks for reading!
~Sharon

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Why so blue?

Hi everyone! After two weeks of naked nails, I'm back with a mani :) My applying skills have deteriorated, lol - application was a little messier than normal. I decided to go with a blue mani since I was in the mood for a navy blue. Of course, China Glaze First mate fits this criteria only too well. I love this one coater crème <3.

I applied two coats of First mate (only out of habit - you can totally get away with one coat if you're careful!) and then layered OPI Last Friday night onto my middle finger. Two coats of Maybelline NY Colorama Electric blue were applied onto my accent nails, with one coat of L.A. Colors Starlight layered onto my thumb.

This is simple, but I love how simple and pretty it is :)

What do you think of layering with glitters? I can't seem to stop using them, hehe. They make plainer nail polish finishes like crèmes and jellies so much more interesting.

~Sharon

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Simple but pretty

Hello~ This nail art design has been done and shown before on my blog, but it's so simple and pretty that I can't help but use it again :). As you can see, I'm still very into layering haha. Sorry, I'm not feeling talkative today. I'll let the photos do the work then :P.

Glossyblossom nail art striper in white
China Glaze Light as air, White cap
L.A Colors Starlight
Ulta3 spring shower
OPI Last Friday night

~Sharon

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Metallic purple

Hi everyone~ Yeah, that's a pretty boring title, but I didn't know what else to name this post :P. Apologies for the lack of posts. Prac has been taking up so much of my time and I come home dead tired every day. I can not wait for weekend to arrive!

This is two coats of L.A. Color Metallic purple which I picked up from a dollar shop last year. I was really into foil finishes back then, which is why I bought it, but I'm not such a huge fan any more. The polish is still nice though, and I love how it looks extremely foily :). It's not really a purple, more like a light mauve shade. I like it all the same though.

Macro shows how foily the polish is.

~Sharon

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Who blue this pretty over?

Hi everyone~ ^^ Ahh, such a lame title, I know. I really like how my current mani came out though, it's definitely blown me over by the prettiness, hehe.

Indoors, under natural light.

I first applied two coats of Ulta3 spring shower. On my pinky and index I layered one coat of China Glaze White cap. I used Glossyblossm nail art striper in white to paint the stripes and added one coat of L.A. Colors Star light for the glitter. Two coats of OPI Last Friday night was layered on my fourth finger. It's such a pretty blue glitter polish! Love it <3. Finally, I added some rhinestones on to my thumb.

And in the sun. I wish I was able to capture how gorgeous Last Friday night looked under the sun.

You may have realised I changed from the Blogger commenting system to Disqus. This makes replying to comments much easier so hopefully it works well for everyone. Do let me know if you have any trouble with it and I'll try to fix it :).

~Sharon

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Wedding nails

Hey all~ :D No, it wasn't me getting married, I was just attending a friend's wedding :P

The mani was inspired by Jasmine's over at Preposterously's Nail Blog. I had previously attempted this mani and failed miserably but I was adamant for it to work this time. I love how it's sparkly and blingy with the glitter but also not too eye catching and suitable for a wedding ^^

The following polishes were used:
Ulta3 antique copper
Color Club Magic attraction
L.A. Colors Sparkling diamonds
mwah Magnetic

Just fyi, Sparkling diamond is a PAIN to remove! Even with the foil method. Besides that though, I adored the mani <3.

~Sharon

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Tutorial: Rainbow nails

Hello :) Awhile back, I posted about my rainbow nails. The mani was inspired by a Korean blog but I did my nails a bit differently to what the photo tutorial shows (I can't read Korean :P) and since Freshie requested for a tutorial, I thought I'd give it a go :) This is my first tutorial so please let me know what you think!

Here are the polishes I used:

Ulta3 lily white, spring blossom, spring fling
China Glaze Light as air, Re-fresh mint
L.A. Colors Star light

step one Apply one coat of white polish as a base colour. Wait for the polish to dry before moving on.

I don't own any make up sponges so I just cut up a piece of normal kitchen paper towel and used it instead.

step two Paint a line of each of the polishes you're going to sponge on to the paper towel. The thickness of the lines depend on the length of your nail and the number of colours you want to fit onto your nail, so there's a bit of trial and error involved. I then used the toothpick to quickly run it between each line of the polishes to prevent it from spilling into each other.

step three Sponge on one coat on to your nail then wait for it to dry before doing it a second time. This is what it looks like after sponging two layers on to the nail. It looks super messy (and it's a lot messier here than in my previous post) but the next step fixes it all :)

step four Just look at what a coat of glitter can do! :D It's so good at hiding imperfections.

And the final result~Yeah errr,  my top coat kind of streaked :(

I hope you found this tutorial useful! Rainbow nails are definitely not hard to do but they are a little time consuming. I reckon the final result really makes up for it though ^^

~Sharon

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