KB Shimmer Midsummer' Night and Party

Happy Sunday lovely polish people! I don't know about how the weather is where you live, but here the humity is enough to smother you. I've been taking pictures of when I get in my car after work and taking pics of the temperature on my phone. So far I have 107, 108, 111, and 117 degree!! Holy Schnikes!! So, I haven't been spending that much time outside unless I have a pool close by:) I'm working on getting my husband to get us a pool by devising a wonderful win-win situation: I go walking and get all hot (my biggest problem when I work out is cooling off!) So, I go walking and then jump into the cool water and continue my exercise by swimming while simultaniously cooling off! How are you staying cool this summer or warm in the winter?

So, I have a lots of pics to share today. Last week I received my order from K.B. Shimmer, a new indie brand that has just taken off- which has really awesome products besides nail polish. I just figured out how to upload and edit my pictures in Google+, which is the old Picnik.com- my fav photo editing site that closed in April. Well, now I have them saved but not on my hardrive, so my pictures haven't really been consistent lately...or maybe at all, but I'm working on it and getting good advice from those blog pros. I think I have come to the conclusion that I need a better camera, also.

Well, I was lucky enough to get to choose from ANY of KB Shimmer's polishes they had, but unfortunately couldn't spend a lot of money, so I only got 2 for now and a pack of 6 sampler soaps (which I will show later cause they're so cool!) , but as soon as they open up I want more polishes. I got KB Shimmer's Party and Midsummer's Night. I tried to get ones that I hadn't already seen swatches of- like The TraceFacePhiles has like ALL of them, but I really want Vegas Bomb, but she did such a great post on it, I wanted to try something different.

Direct sunlight, no flash

Here is Midsummer's Night, which I had to have when i saw the star glitter in it! I love purple to begin with, but this color is phenomenal. I used Gelous basecoat to give me a good thick start. I expected this to be a very sheer being hard for the brush to grab the glitter, but that wasn't the case, quite the opposite! I first tried it out on a wheel using other a base polish to help add color, but this polish doesn't need it. This was 2 coats along with a thick coat of Seche Vite. This neon jelly-like purple is infused with big hexo blue and silver glitter, blue microglitter, and of course the big silver stars, which give it the perfect name- Midsummer's Night. Love it! I was going to just swatch, remove and swatch my other KB polish, but I loved this so much I kept it on for 2 days (which is what I normally do). It chipped, but not anymore than any other polish. I was VERY pleased with this polish:)

Closeup of KB Shimmer Midsummer's Night

The second polish I swatched is Party, which is a white jelly filled with all colors of square glitter. I'm not big on glitter and I'm not big on white polishes, but this just clicked and I thought I'd try something different...this polish doesn't disappoint!

Direct sunlight, no flash

 Just as with Midsummer's Night, I tried it out with different color base polishes to see what would bring out the best of this polish. I tried a dark blue, bright blue, coral, and white, then by itself. The white looked the best to me. Again, i used Gelous basecoat then I used one coat of Pure Ice Platinum, which is a white kind of sheer, shimmery white. I used 2 coats of Party with Seche Vite, of course. This white jelly like color had so much glitter in it that I actully had to wipe some of it off or back into the bottle. I liked that it wasn't hard to grab the glitter, but it kind of make it goopy and thick and left my manicure kinda clumpy (as you can see on my thumb in the picture below). But, overall I like it. It's unique with all colors and sizes of glitter. Some of the square glitter turned up as you can see on my middle finger, which I didn't like, but overall it's a neat combination- so this polish is like a Party!! Heeeyyy!



Closeup of KB Shimmer Party

Hope everyone has a super week, as we head into the 4th- which is a national holiday we are so blessed is a government holiday, so I will not be working that day:) yay!

 

Valentine's Day Nails- Day 2

Happy Sunday to all! Yesterday I was so busy and tired I didn't get a chance to do another look, so I'm going to change what I said yesterday...SO, today, February 12 is Day 2 of my Valentine's Day Nails, and yesterday being the first (not Friday like I had originally said).  Kade woke up with a bad cough at 2 a.m. and needless to say I'm very tired and still getting ready to begin again on Monday...yay! That' quite a note- I spend my weekend getting ready for the following week- guess that's life, huh?
So, without further ado, my second look:

To create this look I started out with Color Club Stuck On You basecoat. I think I like it better than Orly Bonder. It does that same job, but Orly seems to  be more rubbery and CC looks shinier and not as sticky if that makes sense. Then I used one coat of Color Club French Tip, which is just an opaque white. I then applied 2 coats of Revlon Popular (formerly known as Starry Pink- was released with Whimsical and a few others), which I bought a while back, but haven't used yet.  I saw this and knew it was out of season, but I just couldn't get my mind off of it, and there were only 2 left in the ULTA where I saw it, and knew if I didn't get it, I would regret it.  It's a light sheer pink with silver hexagon glitter and some silver mini glitter.  I wanted to use white so it would bring out the light pink in Popular. The first time I tried this I failed and it was so sticky and clumpy that I had to start over. I had to be more patient this time and let this sit for like an hour- so I thought it would be a opportune time to take a short nap lol.

So, I knew I wanted to try using my dotting tools and paint something simple.Well, what's easier to draw than a heart! So, I picked out my colors- first I outlined the heart with Sephora by OPI Queen of Everything, then using the same size dotting tool, I then used Color Club Hot Like Lava to paint the inside of the heart. I love this color, as you can see in the above pic, it's a foil color (part of the CC Foiled Collection), and has a bit of pink shimmer in it. Finally, I let that dry and took some light pink rhinestones and put on the edge of each heart. I topped it all off with 2 coats of Seche Vite top coat, of course. Voile!

Stamping With ULTA For Bitten and RA-104

Wow, this has been a long week! I have been dying to swatch and photograph, but the weather has been horrible all week! Storms Thursday through Saturday afternoon. I don't mind swatching inside, but my camera seems to work best on macro when I'm outside without the flash, so I don't argue with it.  Doesn't matter how awesome my nails look, if I can't get a good pic, then I can't share :(

So, last this past week I ordered a lot of goodies from Amazon that I've been picking out for a while now- Red Angel Plates, MASH dotting tools (as shown below), MASH plate holder, some Konad special polishes, nail art rhinestones and tweezers for them, Konad plate, and a MASH crystal/glass file, and finally some empty polish bottles so I can make Frankens! So excited!! I got half of my stuff, but still waiting for the rest. I love getting packages! Oh, and I ordered some Bootie Babe polishes! (will post when I get those!)

I was really inspired and wanted to use just about everything I got all at the same time, but it's not as easy for me as it looks.  I was so excited and started out with a look I thought would look great, but it turned out crappy, so waited until this morning to try something else.

I started off with Color Club Stuck On You basecoat, then two coats of ULTA For Bitten, which is a beautiful deep red/purple/gold duochrome, shimmer that I have bought a few weeks ago, but haven't used yet. I think I will try this again soon without stamping, which kind of hides its beauty.

ULTA For Bitten

I then used my new Red Angel stamps, which I found I like a lot more than the Bundle Monster plates I have, as they are larger- BM has 6 on one plate while RA has 4 and RA was a bit cheaper. The Nailasaurus made put all the plates side by side with their size in this review. I think they only have that one set, though, so I'll be watching to see when they make more! As shown to the right, I used the stamp highlighted on plate RA-104. I used Konad Special Polish in White, which  I understand aren't necessary to use, but I wanted to see for myself. Since I've only used it this once and I haven't been stamping for long, I don't know how much my opinon counts, but I like the special polishes...this is why:

1. As shown on the left, the brush is shorter than regular brushes (compared to Sinful Colors brush), which makes painting the stamp faster and easier so polish doesn't drip.

2. All the colors are very opaque, since they are made for stamping, you don't have to spend time testing polishes, which I will still do...

3. The stamp picks up the polish very easily, without hardly any pressure picking up and applying to the nail.

4. The price of the polish runs anywhere from $3 to $6 a bottle...yes, they are simply for stamping, but in my opinon it's worth it, especially when using white and black, since I will probably use them the most.

5. They dry very quickly and I can still use a regular top coat after a short time.

I finished it up with 2 coats of Seche Vite topcoat.  I tried to get different angles to show the polish in different light, although I didn't have much light to work with as it was overcast for like the 20th day in a row...I just couldn't wait to swatch. I do still need some work as far as my stamping, but I suppose everyone has to start somewhere.  I don't really know how crazy I am about the white over this color, but I went with it, but might try again with a darker color for stamping.
I am excited to get the rest of my loot in, so I will try to get another post or two in this week.

And, to end today, here's my little helper that loves to grab my polish and drop it in the trash thinking he's helping me pick up:)