Black Swan by Pretty&Polished- Wow!

Hello Ladies!
My Glitter Giveaway is open for 5 more days, so don't forget to enter!
 For Monday I have this gorgeous polish from Chelsea at Pretty&Polished, and wow! This is probably my favorite Pretty&Polished polish that I have just because of how holographic and fabulous it is.
 I don't usually wear black polish because I didn't think it was my thing, but this polish has definitely changed my mind. It is a very holographic nail polish, one of those nail polishes you can still see that it's holographic when you are indoors or it's not sunny out. I am very impressed with it, it is way up there with the rest of my holographic polishes. I wore it for 4 days before I took it off too, it held up very well. I have pictures with and without flash for your consideration. I will show you the non-flash ones first!

All pictures are 2 coats of Black Swan topped with 1 of Seche Vite.

Thumb close-up!

These pictures are most accurate for indoor lighting. Below are the flash pictures which are accurate for sunshine, this is amazing in the sun.

Flash thumb close-up!

 As you can see, this has a very slightly frosty charcoal metallic base, and it is really pretty.

 I am a big fan of this polish, it was a bit thick but no issues with bubbling. I added thinner after I finished my nails, so it is back to full and at a easier consistency. Pretty&Polished can be found at Etsy and Llarowe, your best bet to find out when restocks are is to like Pretty&Polished on Facebook.
What do you think of this pretty? Let me know in the comments!

 Happy nails!☺

 ♥ ❤ ❥ ,
Samantha

My Yellow Franken Polish Topped With Utopia's Polish Summer Sparkle

Hello Ladies, happy Thursday!
I wanted to show you the yellow franken nail polish I made last week. You can see all franken polishes I have ever made by clicking  the "My Frankens!" Tab above.

 I should have put more glitter in it, just not quite enough for me. This is 2 coats over Witchcraft Durable Base Coat. Here is a thumb close-up:

Pretty! Let me know what you think in the comments!
















I then topped it off with a coat of Utopia's Polish Summer Sparkle on a whim, which makes it look like it has a lot going on haha! I will have to wear it over something else too.

 Fun fun fun! I love the fine silver holographic glitter in this polish, and well everything else! So much fun matte glitter. What has been your favorite color this summer so far? Mine is glitter! Haha I know that's not a color, but my answer stands!

Happy nails!☺

 ♥ ❤ ❥ ,
 Samantha

*Summer Sparkle was provided to me by Utopia's Polish, I did not purchase it. My opinions are my own.*

Recent Indie Polish Arrivals!

Hi everyone! I just wanted to show you the indie polishes that just randomly showed up in my mail box last week... *shifty eyes* Kidding! They are all gorgeous, and I can't wait to wear them.
My China Glaze Safari Collection has just shown up on Monday, so I am pretty excited about that. No one has said anything about how amazing I'm Not Lion looks in the bottle! Holo fest! Not as good on the nail, but still pretty good.

There are a couple ORLY in this pic, some polishes line up to their swatches on the wheel,and some don't have a swatch on the wheel. The ORLY are.. Well I just checked the pink one, and the label was removed, must have been someone in the store. It was on sale for $4.99. It's a super hot pink. The one beside it is Total Eclipse of the Heart which is a pretty funky shimmery duochrome.

Kumbaya nail polish kumbaya...

 I ordered polishes from Sunny at 365 Days of Color through her BigCartel Store, and Some polishes from Kae at TheHungryAsian on  Etsy.

Here are my Hungry Asian ones, I'm not going to name 'em off because you can see the names. I am most excited about Cookies&Cream (so excited actually, it looks like fine vanilla bean ice cream in nail polish form) and then Sneeze Breeze and Mint Condition. Sneeze Breeze looks gorgeous with all the matte glitter, and I know a lot of people have loved this nail polish, I can see why!

Here are my 365 Days of Color polishes:

They are as straight as I could manage to get them, the first 5 are Sunny's Candy Shoppe Collection in mini's, and the next 2 (Birthday Bash and Summer Dream) are ones I picked up on the side because they look super gorgeous. I haven't worn any of these yet, but will update with pictures if I do!
 Leave a comment if there is anything you want me to wear first, or just to let me know how your Wednesday is going! The man and I went to go see the matinee of The Dark Knight Rises today and it was pretty good. Long, and a teensy bit cheesy, but good. I love Anne Hathaway!

Happy nails!☺

 ♥ ❤ ❥ ,
 Samantha

Utopia's Polish Bubble Gum

Happy Saturday! I wanted put up another post right away, as I missed the middle of the week. I haven't checked my mail for Friday yet, so here's to hoping my China Glaze Safari Collection is here for the weekend! I still have to show off some indie nail mail I got (actually not Utopia's Polish, surprising, I know!) So I may do that later today. Bubblegum is a fun pastel pink polish, full of purple, pink, yellow and white large hexagons. It's the perfect fun, care-free polish for summer.

Not my picture.

It reminds me of bubblegum ice cream, if it were pink! I have never seen any other color of bubble gum ice cream here other than bright blue. I've never thought about it much before, but that is a little weird. Post any insights you may have in the comments!

Around 2-3 coats (some chipped in the day before pics so they were recoated) with a coat of clear to even it out, and then one of Seche Vite.

I did not have much luck with this polish in regards to chipping. It could have been my Nutra Nail Triple Strength base coat, which I have realized makes nail polish more likely to peel. The hexagons are large, which makes for a messy application because of the creamy base color. I recommend to dry one side of the brush inside the bottle before application. I added an extra clear coat before Seche Vite, just because I knew it would need it, and if you double coat Seche Vite you can get polish shrinkage.

A pretty one, isn't she? Like all Utopia's Polishes, the glitter is plentiful. The creme finish polishes would benefit from less, because it can make them a bit hard to apply, and most of it gets coated with polish anyways. This polish is not currently in the store, but I have seen it show up a few times previously before I got to snag it.
What are you wearing on your nails this Saturday? Leave a comment and let me know!

Happy nails!☺

 ♥ ❤ ❥ , Samantha

My Yellow Manicure with Utopia's Polish Square Dance

Hello Ladies! This is just the yellow manicure I did with Utopia's Polish Square Dance (This is now in the store!) It is over 2 coats of the yellow with slight gold shimmer (no name) in The New Black Runway Set. Topped with a coat of Seche Vite.

One coat of Square Dance. So Unique!

Gorgeous! I really love square glitter, I just can't help myself!

Close up on the other thumb nail.

 What do you think of this super fabulous manicure?  Don't forget to enter The Glitter Giveaway!
Utopia's Polishes are $4.50 for a mini 5ml, and $9 for a full size.

 Happy nails!☺

♥ ❤ ❥ , Samantha

Julep Daphne With Flowers for Try it On Tuesday!

This Try it On Tuesday, I wanted to try on one of my new Julep Maven box polishes, Daphne. Daphne is a beautiful darker seafoam green, and it was one of the polishes I added on to my Julep box for July because I didn't have anything like it in my collection yet, surprisingly. 

 I wanted to try to do dotted flowers because I had just received my dotting tools last week, so this is my first try at it. I can see myself doing lots of  designs with them in the future!

For the flowers, I used the navy blue from The New Black Runway set, and the yellow and metallic green. They don't have  any names. I hadn't used this set before this manicure either.

I got these dotting tools in an auction on Ebay for only $1.80. You can use buy it now and buy your own set here for $2.02. I haven't purchased from that seller, but I have never not received anything I have ordered from China.

What do you think of this look? Did you try anything on for Try it on Tuesday? You can leave a link in the comments if you did.




Happy nails!☺


 ♥ ❤ ❥ , Samantha

An Amazing Gift From Virginia at Utopia's Polish!

Hello Ladies!
I just wanted to do a post and show you what Virginia of Utopia's Polish sent me. I was so amazed opening the box, and these polishes are so gorgeous they made my week! It was an unexpected and such a kind gift. ☺

2 coats of each.

From the left is Summer Sparkle, Square Dance, Tiger's Roar and Toxic Rainbow.

 Summer Sparkle is one of the neatest nail polishes I have ever seen. It has so many types of beautiful glitter, but the crowning glory is the random shapes and colors, and the super fine silver holographic glitter in it.  I actually bought the full size bottle yesterday and was surprised to get this one today. This polish is so amazing that you need 2 bottles of it though, haha! The second I saw this on Utopia's Polish Facebook page, I knew I needed it. I don't know where Virginia gets all these great ideas and glitters from, but I would love to interview her on her creative process sometime!

Square Dance is amazing! Its like Virginia read my mind while making this one. It has square glitter of pastel and darker colors, in all colors of the rainbow. And of course some of it is matte! There is smaller metallic green and matte white smaller squares, and orange and white bar glitter. This is a stunner. This has never been in the Utopia's Polish store, and I don't know if it will be, so sorry for the tease!

 Tiger's Roar is a polish that I sent the idea for to Virginia for one of her Rafflecopter contests on her Facebook Page. The contest was to name a polish and say what would be in it.She captured my idea exactly, and even better than I had imagined!
Here is the exact message I sent her:
"Polish Idea for the contest!
It would be called Tiger's Roar and it would have matte black and orange hexagons, with shiny copper hexagons and maybe silver. It would also have black and white bar glitter, and orange if they make it.
I would totally buy that!"
And here is the polish description for the ones she put in the shop:
This polish has a Clear base with lots orange and black Hexagons, white, black and orange bars, copper hex and square, holo hex and fine orange glitter.

Virginia totally nailed it, and it is so unique and gorgeous. I mix polishes for myself all the time (as you know if you view my blog regularly) but it is definitely something having someone else bring your dream to life so well.



Toxic Rainbow has matte neon glitter in green, yellow, pink and blue along with holographic glitter the same size. This was a polish I totally wanted to buy, but missed out on, so it was so such a treat having it arrive here. Nail wheel is 2 coats.



Here is another picture of the bottle backsides.

 I hope you enjoyed this massive essay, thanks again to Virginia for sending me this amazing gift!

Happy nails, awwwe yeah!☺

 ♥ ❤ ❥ , Samantha


*Disclosure- These polishes were given to me, I did not purchase them. This did not affect my opinions in any way, all opinions provided were my own and not based on anything other than honesty to my readers.*

Nail Polish Frankens I Made Today!

The freshly cleaned, empty bottles waiting to be filled with whatever polish fantasy I have next!

Hello Everyone, I hope your days are going well! I just wanted to share the 5 frankens I made earlier today, and was telling you about on Facebook.

 On the left we have a pearly rainbow glitter nude, in the remainder of my Pretty&Polished Equal Ground bottle, which I have been using for frankens a lot since I wasn't too keen on it by itself, but it looks awesome mixed into everything else.
 The two pink and blue creme polishes next both have the same amount of the same glitters, I wanted them to be the equal except for the colors.

Next we have a polish similar to my Pants On Fire! Polish in my Glitter Giveaway, I used the same mixed orange base, and topped it up with similar glitter polishes. I loved Pants on Fire! So much I had to make one for myself too!

Then we have a pastel yellow creme polish with lots of different glitters, at least 5-6 different glitter polishes. I didn't finish a whole bottle of silver shatter, I swear! Haha. I must have left the lid not screwed on fully, and the next time I looked at my OPI bin, all the polish was completely dried to the size of a small gumball. It was so weird. I didn't feel like putting half a bottle of seche restore in it, so I just cleaned it out

Here is a bit of a closer look at everything:

Now for some swatches:

2 coats of every one, except orange which is 1.

Please let me know what you think, and what your favorite one is in the comments! Thanks for looking!

Happy nails!☺

 ♥ ❤ ❥ , Samantha

My Purchases From the Last Month or so! Polish Haul

Hi Ladies!
I just wanted to show you what's been arriving over at my place in the last 30 days! Mostly all of this was purchased online or at my local Rexall, also included are some polishes I won. Let's get to it! All pictures can be clicked for a large close up.

 All the makeup to the left side I purchased a few days ago so I haven't formed an opinion of any of the items yet. I have been wearing the Nutra Nail Triple Power a lot lately, but I think it might be making my nail polish peel off sooner, and usually in one solid nail piece, I have switched to another base coat to see if it was just that one. Nars polish in the mix is Kismet. Here are some closer pics of everything:

I wanted a mineral foundation that wasn't pressed, harder to find in Banff then you would think. This was the cheapest one at Rexall, at $13. Ouch. Under it is NYC Sun 'n' Bronze, and I have only used it once. It was under $6. I used old bronzers from last year to make bronzing lotion for summer, I just broke them up in to a powder and put one full bronzer per 250ml of The Body Shop lotion. It worked really well actually, and I love the sleek look with slight shimmer, but no sparkles.

We also have OPI Just Spotted the Lizard, which I would like to wear with the Ardene ACO black crackle polish I  got recently. Looks like a great combo on my swatch wheel.

Almay Smart Shade Perfect & Correct primer, I mostly got this because it looked cool and I liked the tester in the store. Doesn't really seem to do much, and if you use too much, you will have little left over green pieces on your skin that don't absorb. Not impressed, good prep for powder as a light moisturizer for the summer. I wouldn't put it under or over moisturizer, you will probably feel to dewy or greasy. That's about it, and there's no SPF, So why bother? $16.00

The Maybelline Dream Fresh BB Cream is really nice, it makes a great foundation if you don't have any acne or major skin imperfections, which I don't. I like to top it off with powder for a great, smooth look. I definitely recommend this. Plus, it has 30 SPF.  $9.99 30ml

The polishes on top are Buffy the Violet Slayer by Wet n' Wild, and Revlon Royal. Haven't worn either yet but I like em! I hope the formula on this Revlon doesn't suck. I have stopped buying Revlon polishes because of the formula, but I loved this color, and how it is a good dupe for RBL IBK:2012.

Then we have Essie Picture Perfect and Aruba Blue.  I have wanted AB forever so I am so glad to finally have it in my collection.

Wow, I didn't mean to make this post so hefty! Click through the break to see closer pictures of the rest of the items, including 5 Utopia's Polishes (Gumdrop!) and what I won in a giveaway.

My Christmas in July nails for Jen's Nail Files Contest

Hello Ladies!
I just wanted to show you my Christmas in July nails! Jen's contest is open until the 14th of July, and you can check it out on her Facebook here, as well as see the other entries.

Click for full size.

My Thumb is a snow man enjoying the sunset, My pinkie is a gingerbread house with a Santa Claus sun. My ring finger is enjoying a candy cane martini outside, My middle finger is Mrs. Claus on the beach, and my pointer finger is a Christmas tree with a hibiscus as a star, to remind me of how much I love Hawaii!

If you are wondering what any of the polishes are, leave a comment and I will get back to you as soon as I see it.

What do you think of my entry?

Happy Christmas in July!☺

♥ ❤ ❥ , Samantha

The Glitter Giveaway!

Hello everyone, I am happy to announce the start of my new Glitter Giveaway! If you love glitter, you will want to stay tuned to this post. This giveaway is open internationally this time, so everyone can enter! Please keep in mind any customs policies your country may have for nail polish/cosmetics.
There will be 2 prizes/2 winners, this is the first prize!

Click for awesome full size pictures. The first prize consists of:

1.   A custom Floam dupe made by myself. You will not be receiving the one in the picture, that is just an example, instead you can choose the ratio of each color (green, yellow, blue) so you could get all these colors, or just blue and yellow, ect. The glitter will be suspended and awesome. Here is an example of the one I made for myself with all the colors.

2.   A six pack of matte neon glitter, this is almost totally solvent resistant. I have had all the colors in a base for almost a week, and the base is very slightly purple, but barely, it may just be the blue or purple.

3.   4 nail polish frankens I have mixed personally. They are made with polishes I had already. They are:
Pants on Fire! has a shimmery orange base with small flakes and blue, white, holographic and black hexagon and square glitter.
Lacey at the Luau has a pastel teal base, with holographic, pink and blue bar glitter, rainbow hexagons, fine holographic glitter, and small and larger fuchsia glitter. It also has a slight shimmer.
Deep Blue, See? has a shimmery, bright ocean blue base. It has small rainbow hexagons, and features red and gold metallic glitter.
Stuck in my Hair has a pink base, it is metallic and slightly holographic. It features finer rainbow glitter, and larger sliver, green and purple hexagons. Fine metallic baby pink glitter throughout.

To see more pictures of these polishes, click here.

The second prize is:

1.   A six pack of matte neon glitter, this is almost totally solvent resistant. I have had all the colors in a base for almost a week, and the base is very slightly purple, but barely.

2.   A super cute cupcake note pad! See my cupcake inspired nails with the polish I made with this neon glitter, click here.

 To enter, see the Rafflecopter form below. If you share this on your own blog, you can click here to get the code to add the Rafflecopter to your post!
 If you have any questions at all, please leave a comment, or email me at shenailigans@hotmail.com
If you submit entries without doing the task, your entries will be deleted. Remember you can always go back and edit your entries if you click enter accidentally.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
Happy nails and good luck!☺

 ♥ ❤ ❥ , Samantha

Though the Weather Outside is Frightful... Zoya Kennedy + Julep Kate For Try- it on Tuesday!

 Hello everyone! It is so so hot out here, not that I mind because it is finally summer! I wanted to do a frosty take on the french manicure to distract myself from the heat, and I really like how it turned out.
I used Zoya Kennedy(2 coats) for the base (my first Zoya!) and Julep Kate for the tips. I put Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear  Disco Ball over Kate for a twinkly look.

How I did the tips was just to wait until kennedy was mostly dry, then I dried off Kate's brush on the insides of the bottle, and just streaked it on at the tips.

Here is my thumb!

I used Nailene Designer Collection Expressions Nail Art decals in Fashionista. Wow, that was a mouthful! Could they have found a longer name for it? Haha. Here are the sheets I used:

These are not my pictures, I got them from here.
What are your favorite activities to keep cool in the summer? I like rafting, cold drinks, and cold showers!

Here is the link to everyone taking part in Try it on Tuesday, go check those ladies out too!

Happy nails!☺


 ♥ ❤ ❥ , Samantha

The 4 Polish Frankens I have made for my Glitter Giveaway!

I am super happy with how the polishes I mixed for the Glitter Giveaway turned out. Personally I think they are so so cool! All of these polishes were made by mixing polishes I had already, a few of them were indie polishes I used for the glitter. The bottles with white caps are 6ml, the teal polish is 10ml.

Each polish is one coat, except for Deep Blue, See? Which is 2.

I have gone to the liberty of giving them names!

Click the above picture to see in it's full size glory! You are missing out if you don't.

Do you have a favorite? What do you think about these? Let me know in the comments! The Glitter Giveaway should be up later today, around 6 PM Mountain Time.

Happy nails!☺

 ♥ ❤ ❥ , Samantha