Stylish Blogger Award!

I was tagged for the Stylish Blogger Award by the lovely PrncessNails. Thanks so much for this award!!! It is very sweet of you :)

The Rules

Thank and link back to the person who sent you the award.

Share seven things about yourself.

Spread the love. Award recently discovered bloggers.

Contact these bloggers and tell them about the award.

Since I was so recently tagged for another award, I'm not going to bore you with repeating things about myself. Hope that is okay with everyone... In case you missed it, here you can read all the juicy (or boring) facts about me!

I will however spread the love an pass this on to 7 blogs I have recently found :)

Liquid Jelly

Maricza.com

Nails + Whatnot

Notes on Nails

Pazurkowy Pamietnik

Solensdanserinde

The Clumsy Kiwi

Thanks again to PrncessNails for this award! :)

Anutka

Essence Colour & Go Enchanted Fairy

Today I'm wearing Enchanted Fairy from The Essence Colour & Go collection. It is one of the few collections that are available at my Ulta. Enchanted Fairy is a muted grayish lavender with a hint of shimmer in the sun. It went on really smoothly and was fully opaque in just two coats. The photos below are two coats plus a top coat. I accented the ring finger with an Essence nail art floral sticker.

It is a bit brighter and has some shimmer when it is out in the sunshine...

What surprised me most was that this tiny bottle had a wider, flattened brush. It is not as wide as some of the double brushes out there, but wider than the average ones. I know there are people who have really narrow nails and don't like these types of brushes, but personally I find them easier to work with. Do you have a brush preference? What is easier to work with for you?

Overall I really like this color, application was easy, coverage is great. Wish Ultas around here would get more of the Essence brand of polishes. Anyone know what other stores in the States sell these?

Brand: Essence Collection: Colour & Go Color Name/Number: 36 Enchanted Fairy Toluene, Formaldehyde, and Dibutyl Phthalate (DBP) free!

Thanks for looking :)
Anutka

The Perfect Ending...

I just have to say that after having a pretty crappy day (feeling sick + work was extremely busy) I came home to some pretty great things. First of all there are 51 lovely ladies that are now following my blog! WOW! Thanks so much! I'm so excited that you have found the blog and choose to read my ramblings and look at my photos. Hope you enjoy it. Please let me know what you would like to see more/less of and any comments are always welcome.

Second, the back ordered Zoyas have arrived. I finally gave up looking on the Zoya website thinking that they will be back ordered for a while, but went to check my mailbox and there they were!!! Loredana Matte and Ki. Aren't they pretty? I can't wait to try them :)

And finally, also in my mail box were these adorable Hello Kitty stickers from the Born Pretty store. They sent this one for free just for liking them on facebook. Something about that kitty that is just so darn cute.

Thanks again to the 51 lovely ladies following this blog and everyone else that just stops by anonymously now and then to peak :)

Anutka :)

Sinful Colors - Let Me Go

I have to start out by saying that Sinful Colors polish Let Me Go has confused me since the moment I saw it. As I twist the bottle it morphs from green to lavender and back. I knew I had to try it. On the nail it seems to pick a color and stick to it depending on the light. Indoors it was mostly a very sheer and shimmery pale minty green. Outside in the sun it showed the lavender side more. This is 3 coats + a top coat with a clearly visible nail line.

Outside in the sunshine, the lavender comes out to play...

I like the color, but not particularly the sheerness of it. I decided to try this over black. Black and I have a love & hate relationship. I love how it looks, but I hate to clean up the cuticles after it... anyone have tips on a good way to do it?

I put on one coat of Wet and Wild Black Creme and one coat of Sinful Colors Let Me Go on top. Yikes! It is a metallic green, no lavender in sight. Like it vanished... got sucked into the black? Not sure what happened, but I'm kind of digging the green... next St. Patty's day??? :D

No lavender even in the sunshine (just a camera blinding shine)...

This is in the shade because my camera had the hardest time with the sunshine photos...

Any ideas why the lavender vanished? :)

Brand: Sinful Colors Collection: Main line Color Name/Number: Let Me Go, 322 Toluene, Formaldehyde, and Dibutyl Phthalate (DBP) free!

Thanks for stopping by :)
Anutka

Ulta Princess

On my latest trip to Ulta I decided to give the store brand a try. I was drawn to the dark and creamy colors, but instead I convinced myself to get something light and spring-like. Among a few others, I got the Ulta (Salon Formula) polish named Princess. Princess is a very sheer, pearly coral color. I expected it to be more opaque, but maybe that was just wishful thinking. This is three coats plus a top coat, the nail line clearly visible.

Outside, overcast:

Compare the next two photos and you can see how depending on the slight light change it goes from pearly/shiny to very transparent. An aspect of pearly colors I really dislike :(

I decided I would try layering it since I was not to keen on how it looked by itself. Sinful Colors Soul Mate was still fresh on my mind from yesterday's post and happened to be a similar coral color. I decided that just maybe they were Soul Mates :D

This is one layer Sinful Colors Soul Mate and two layers Ulta Princess.

Actually caught some sun this time around!

Not too bad, I like the layering of these two. You get the opaqueness and shimmer, but I thought that unless it is out under direct sunlight, most of the time Sinful Colors just stole the show. So that led me to some thinking, which led to a franken, which lead to a kind of fail...

I thought that by mixing the two colors, I could adjust the proportions and get the best of both worlds in one polish. WRONG! I mixed 1/4 SC Soul Mate with 3/4 Ulta Princess and got... wait for it... Soul Mate with the teeniest, tiniest shimmer. That's right, even with 3/4 of the bottle being Ulta Princess (what a waste), Soul Mate just overtook the whole show.

See the shimmer? I didn't think so :D

OK, so it redeemed itself a little bit outside, but still kind of meh, not what I expected. I still like the color, but maybe if I had not seen the two colors separately, I would have liked this one more...

 What do you think? Is it better alone, layered, mixed, or maybe not at all?

Brand: Ulta Collection: Salon Formula Color Name/Number: Princess Toulene, Formaldehyde and Dibutyl Phthalate (DBP) free

And here is some Wacky Laki math for you:

3/4

+ 1/4

=

Thanks for looking as always :D
Anutka

Sinful Colors Soul Mate

I actually wore this manicure a few days ago, but it was the day Blogger was down so I couldn't post it. I'm feeling a big under the weather today, so it was a perfect opportunity to post it today :)

Soul Mate from Sinful Colors is a soft pink coral color that is just perfect for spring and summer. I got more compliments on this color than any other that I have blogged about so far. One of the skin care specialists at Ulta said she "must" know what color it is. She had never heard of Sinful Colors so she just grabbed my hand and tried to match it to some of the brands they sell. She even got others involved. It was quite funny.

With this one, the outdoors photos are more accurate to the actual color. It is funny how some polishes the camera captures perfectly in the light box and with others only outside. Go figure! :)

I was thinking of not posting the photos taken in the light box as the color is not entirely accurate (the above photos are true to color). In the end I decided to post them anyways, in case you still wanted to see them. :)

The color came out slightly darker/brighter than it looks in the bottle. I have found this to be true of a few Sinful Colors polishes. I think this is because they use pretty thick bottles...

What do you think? Worth the fuss people made about it?

Brand: Sinful Colors Collection: main line Color Name/Number: Soul Mate, 945 Toluene, Formaldehyde, and Dibutyl Phthalate (DBP) free!

Thanks for reading!
Anutka :)

Zoya Nina

So it must be Monday. Know how I can tell (well besides looking at the calendar...)? Because it's just been one of those days already and it is only a little after 10am this morning. I started out the morning with spilling half a bottle of acetone all over myself (mind you I spilled the 1st half a few days ago all over my computer). I'm so glad that I always transfer from the large bottle to smaller ones for daily use... So after cleaning up and actually using the acetone for it's original purpose by removing last day's manicure I swatched Zoya Nina.

Zoya Nina is a rich dark chocolate brown cream. It just looks like I dipped my nails into yummy chocolate (the last thing I need this morning... I would probably burn myself). I applied two coats, and that is all it took for this to be completely opaque and smooth. Application was great. These photos are with no top coat as I had a plan... ;)

I even ventured outside to show some natural light photos (and get my daily shot of fresh air). I completely forgot about the alarm and just opened the door. You should have heard the wailing!!! I think it woke up the whole neighborhood... at least my bf was wide awake after that... :S

It was cold and overcast, so no pretty sunny photos today.

 

What do you think of Zoya Nina?

OK, so here was my plan (why no top coat)...
I got my free Hello Kitty plate from the Born Pretty store last night. I have never tried stamping before so I decided to just try my luck with this free one and see how I liked it before I order any of the plates I see others playing with and have been drooling over... :D

Here is what I got:

So remember I said it is one of those days?
Well I took everything out of the package and put some nail polish on the plate... ran the scraper over it... looks good... put the stamping tool on and nothing transfers. Hmm, what am I doing wrong?

I know! I read on some blogs that you need to file the stamper down a bit so the images transfer better. So out comes my nail file and a gentle filing is done.

Try number two... some polish on the plate, some scraper action.... and... nothing transfers... darn it, I must have a broken plate (grooves are not deep enough??)... so I run my fingers over the grooves and guess what? Yes, that's right! PLASTIC COVER!!! Seriously? Rolling my eyes at myself right now...

Try number three.... polish, scraper, transfer to stamping pad? Yes! Success...
By the way, I used a random gift card out of my wallet instead of the scraper I got (the sound of metal against metal and the scratching just made me cringe...)

Here is what I got (I wanted it to be light), as I randomly tried some some of the designs. Not too bad for my 1st stamping. Now I have to order more plates to play with :D

Hope you didn't have any issues with the extra long post... :)
And please, any tips on stamping would be greatly appreciated!!!

	Brand: Zoya Collection: Vibe Color Name/Number: Nina, ZP451 Formaldehyde, Toluene, Dibutyl Phthalate (DBP) and Camphor free Vegan friendly

Thanks for reading as always :D
Anutka