Polish All the Nails

Hi, not dead, just busy with Halloween party that was totally awesome, and then my computer making burning smells.  Still not sure what's doing that.... Anyway, I have something unprecedented to show you today - a third version of the same mani!  This one is particularly special to me as it was my first post to really take off and is still my second highest viewed post of all time.  I'm talking about my Electric Mermaid Nails , and Electric Mermaid Nails 2: The Mermaidening .  Let's take a look at the Electric Mermaid Strikes Back, shall we? 

I'm going to do my normal intro but I have to tell you about Saturday just gone.  I'm sure a lot of you will understand that it can be hard finding real-life people to go nail polish shopping with.  Rarely can you state polish as your sole shopping goal because most people just don't understand.  Not this Saturday!  I took a chance and posted to Instagram about going polish shopping at the Eaton Centre here in Toronto.  I was so excited to have two awesome ladies show up, Lindsay  and Kristin .  We had the most fun afternoon shopping for polish, culminating in actually being able to buy the 22 mini set of Sephora X polishes because we could split them three ways!  Of course I had to do ridiculous glitter nails, I had to maximise the attention I can get in real life!  Let's take a look at my sunset mermaid nails, shall we?

One of the first polish brands I became obsessed with was Nfu-Oh.  They had the most fabulous holo and flakie polishes in unique bottles and the only place to get them from was a questionable site.  I eventually couldn't stand it any longer and had to order 61 and 51, the holo and flakie, respectively.  I've had both of them proceed to sit in my drawer for 18 months because I could never do them justice.  Every time my base colour would be wrong, or not smooth enough and it would be unsatisfactory.  Finally, finally, finally I found a way to make the multichrome flakie 51 match the brilliance in the bottle, and all is right in the world.  Let's take a look at one of the most breathtaking single polishes I own, shall we?

Do you know how hard it is to write another glitter intro?  Like, sure, I haven't used this glitter before but you've seen this with different colours.  You know, this might not be a bad time to just talk a little about my camera setup and how I'm happy I've finally found a way for the holographic rainbow in my glitter to show up.  I have quite a complicated setup for my photos.  I have a Canon T3i DSLR with a matching 60mm 1:1 macro lens.  This means I can get realllllly close up photos, like the ones I take of my thumb.  What this also means though is that I have to get really close to my nails with a big camera, something that's super difficult to light.  So I have a lightbox .  That's fine, but it gives out really even light which eats sparklies.  To compensate for THAT, I have a ring flash on my lens.  Until recently, when I put fresh batteries in it, I didn't realise it was cranked way down.  So I put it on full brightness. ...

So I got some glitter in the mail last week from Glitties.com .  In it, was a bunch of glitter colours small square glitter in a mixture of metallic and holo finishes.  You surely know what's coming right?  With a long weekend of not much happening because I'm Australian and have no family in Canada?  That's right.  ALL.  THE.  FREAKING.  GLITTER. I posted a picture of this on Instagram earlier this morning and the response was predictable: awesome, but who has the time?? I DO.  I will sacrifice as much time as I need to to show you maximum sparklies!

Can I ask you guys a question?  What do you like to see here on my blog?  Do you like swatches, glitter placements, taping, acrylic free-hand painting, dots, watermarbling or a general mixture?  Cos I do a lot of glitter placements, obviously, because that's what I like.  Do you like them too or should I make an effort to do other things?  I'll <3 you forever if you leave a comment below.   With that being said, let's take a look at another glitter placement! At least it's with a holo base colour, and half moon chevrons!

I was contacted by someone from Glitties.com recently, offering to send me glitter to review.  Of course I'm up for that!  My jam is making patterns with glitter so I was super happy to see so many different glitter colours in the same size and shape.  I'm like a crackhead for holo glitter, so the gold, silver, turquoise and light blue 3mm hexes were of course going to be my first choice.  SO SPARKLY. Let's take a look at my latest mermaid nails, shall we?

I apologise for yelling at you yesterday.  I was super frustrated that all my pictures came out a different colour.  Today is better because I used glitter.  Everything is better with glitter.  Especially massive holographic circular glitter that is not only sparkly but so big it actually goes rainbows in all lighting conditions.  Shall we?

Brace yourselves, I'm quite a mix of strong emotions today.  Ahem: WHY DO YOU HATE ME RED POLISHES.  I LOVE YOU AND YOU MAKE IT LOOK LIKE MY HANDS ARE BLEEDING AND THAT I TOOK PICTURES WITH A POTATO THAT CANNOT REGISTER COLOUR PROPERLY.  THIS RED IS BEAUTIFUL AND DARK BUT IT LOOKS THREE DIFFERENT SHADES HERE AFTER I SPENT 20 MINUTES TRYING TO FIX IT.  ONE OF THE SHADES IS BLEEDING.  THIS IS A LOT AND I WISH YOU WOULD BE NICE TO ME.  Also, studs are pretty cool, and I kiiiinda made it on the popular page on Instagram and I'm really excited about it :D

Ok so I did t his mani last weekend.  It was good, but it could be sparklier.  I know that was a lot of glitter last time but JUST NOT SPARKLY ENOUGH.  So realising I now have the full rainbow of holo colours in my small hexes, of course I'm going to do proper.  Sparkly.  

Sometimes things done turn out how you planned.  I've been doing a lot of glitter lately so when I sat down to do a mani that wasn't glitter, I decided to follow suit with jessuhhkuh on Instagram and do a girly, soft rainbow mani with Color Club Halo Hues polishes.  I did that but instead of being flowery and soft it came out really grundy.  Turns out that's ok too!

I swear I'm a bit broken.  I get home from my weekly Tuesday movie (yay /r/torontoevents!) and have my exciting Dollish Polish package waiting for me.  Eleven polishes!  Including the gaming collection I've been lusting over for, like, a year!  But no, midnight is a silly time to do just a simple glitter swatch, it must be sparklier!   And more time consuming!

I don't even know how to introduce these any more.  It's a lot of glitter.  Like, a lot.  I was showing off my glitter stash to instagram yesterday and realised I had more holo glitter than I thought, in the smaller size that fits with my matte and metallic rainbow glitter.  So of course I'm going to do something excessive with it.  Cue the pictures!

I've had this little bag of gold holographic square glitter sitting on my desk for a little while now, taunting me.  "I'm not that small!", it says. "You can totally start a mani with me now, at 11.45pm, and you'll totally be done by 1am!".  IT'S A LIAR AND I SHOULDN'T LISTEN TO GLITTER.   I was talking to my new friend Antonia and she had the great idea of doing an art deco mani with glitter instead of tape.  See how these two things came together?  Yeah, well, I love the idea and hate the glitter.  And my execution. 

For the longest time, I've admired Sarah's work over at ChalkboardNails.com.  Her technique is flawless, her photography is flawless and I basically hate/love her for being so amazing.  So I was just casually reading Tumblr last night and I see a post of hers, a gorgeous mani with holographic charcoal glitter for her 17th day of the 30 day challenge.  I squee-d a bit then once recovered I clicked through to her site.  There, right at the top, is this: If there's one day to tackle a glitter placement manicure, it's the "Glitter" day of the 31 Day Challenge. So I put on my big girl pants and said a prayer to the god of glitter placement,  Polish All the Nails . Like, just kill me now.  I was so excited I fluttered a couple of laps around my apartment, woke up my boyfriend to tell him then tracked down all the places she posted it and gushed praise all over everything.  It's so excited, I can't really words good right now.  It was already 11.30p...

My favourite thing about the nail art community is that every single person is just about the nicest person I've ever met.  Everyone is so encouraging, so supportive, it just makes me so happy.  I'm not so rosy-glasses about myself.  I know I can't produce masterpieces every day so let's take a look at a mani I'm not so happy with, for a multitude of reasons.