Brucci's Stephanie wears stripes // my spring mani

Heya people! How are you doing? I'm really tired, I slept for two hours. I had an exam today. I'm so so glad it's done. I don't know if I passed, but just the feeling of having something put behind you, not nagging you constantly is so good, you know what I mean?

I did this mani for the first day of Spring. I wanted something really bright and springy and green on my nails. Stephanie's Go Lime was still on my untrieds table. I think Kris sent it to me in our first swap. I do take my time for some varnish. But this time it really called my name and I really felt like wearing it. After that I had an idea of doing some stripes. You know, my usual stripes, I've done it before, especially with greens. I love this combination. This time I did two fingers, with stripes going different ways. Just for fun. 

And here is my newest crush in bathing suit department. I'm really getting obsessed with green in every way. They look so awesome to me. But since they're Lisca they are also fairly expensive. So if I lose the planned weight, I plan to treat myself with them. :) I took the picture because I saw my colour combination is quite similar to the bathing suit colour combo. :)

And Brucci Stephanie's Go Lime alone. I love Brucci, their colours and formula are awesome. And I love this type of colours! I already did a comparison with it and my other Shrek/lime green colours, if you're interested.

What do you think about the mani? Any clothes lemming you have and can share? :)

Thank you for reading!

Born Pretty Store review m69 plate

Hello people! How are you doing? I'm finally posting this review. I am so late with it I actually feel bad about it. After I got the plate (the package appearantly got lost somewhere on the way and it took longer for it to get to me) I went on my blogging break due to the studies and now that I got back to blogging I still didn't have enough time for my plan on this review. I planned to do each pattern in seperate post, having at least 3 manis done with it. Since now I'm back to my studies, I realize this is not going to happen this year. So let's make this the official Born Pretty Store review with extra linking on every design I'll do from now on with the plate, making them little reviews too, deal?

I'm showing you what I already created with this plate and my experience with stamping. With this plate it's basically the first time I tried stamping and liked it. Since I'm sure you all know your stamping and are admiring the same bloggers simply rocking the whole stamping deal as I am (yeah, I'm looking at you, Ohh Shinies!), you'll immediately notice my stamping is still rookie stamping. 

So let's see some observations of a rookie that just might help another rookie out. :)

• Stamping actually takes a lot less time than full scotch tape mani.
• Practice makes perfect. Seriously, the more you do it, the better will you get.
• Born Pretty Store plates have the design cut deep enough you actually pick up the pattern.
• It's fun! I used to think it's just a lot of work, but it's really fun! :)

All in all, I can only recommend buying from Born Pretty Store. They're really really nice and helpful and their prices are very low. Plus the choice they have of plates is almost endless: click! IMHO they also make a very awesome place for your Chirstmas/NY gift shopping. 

Pictures!

Misa Grey Matters with Brucci Sapphire. My latest mani too, I loved it. :)

Misa Hot Couture with Catrice Back to Black. This is the pattern I don't really understand. What is it suppose to be? Well, Hot Couture reminded me of Winnie The Pooh and the pattern of honeycomb, so this is what came out. 

Finger Paints Give Pink A Chance with Color Club Hot Like Lava and Cold Metal. You've already seen this. I wish I would do the blue pattern on all my nails ... oh well, next time!

Essence Barefoot Thorugh The Moss with BB Couture Clyde. My very first try and I disliked how I couldn't capture the tiny dots.

The funny thing about the whole deal is, I didn't use my favourite pattern on this plate, wanting to do an awesome green combo and ran out of time. That one is waiting for the proper moment, the idea is running in my head for way too long. 

What do you think of stamping? Are you a fan? Did you shop at Born Pretty Store yet? Any suggestions what I should buy when I place my order?

Thank you Born Pretty Store for providing me the plate for the review! 

Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky

Hey everyone. How are you doing today? Did many of you got two extra days off like we did in Slovenia? I have no idea how the holiday systems work in other countires. We had our Reformation Day on 31st of October and today it's All Saints Day, so our regular week starts tomorrow. Sadly I have one of those days that start well and then slowly but surely turn into crap. Since early afternoon it's been a giant pile of guilt, sadness, tears (that come with compulsory migraine) and general bad feeling. Not one of my best days. Even changing nail polish didn't help. So I decided I'll show you something I really like and makes me feel good. I already told you about two projects I was working on last week - one was the Nail Polish Blogger Challenge and the second I show today. I quite successfully combined my two favourite hobbies - nail polish and fantasy world. 

As I already mentioned before, I'm a member of our Tolkien society and as every year we had an art competition this weekend. I was officially one of the organizers this year so I didn't compete, but since winning really isn't the point here, I of course made something for the competition, also because I loved this year's theme so much (Magical objects of Arda). I decided I'll try the nail polish jewellery thing and create the Three Rings of Elves. 

***

If you don't find fantasy/Middle-Earth/Tolkien works/reading interesting you may want to skip this paragraph. I skipped way too much data for my liking, and yet it remains a long one.

A bit of history behind the Rings of Power. Even if you know Lord of the Rings only by movies, you already know Rings of Power exist. All of them are combined into the most famous verse/poem in Tolkien's world:

Three Rings for Elven Kings Under the sky,

Seven for the Dwarf Lords in Their Halls of Stone,

Nine for Mortal Man Doomed to die,

One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne,

In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.

One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,

One Ring to bring them all and in the Darkness Bind them,

In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie

The Rings of Elves are named Narya, Nenya and Vilya. They were the only three their creator, Celebrimbor, made alone, without Sauron's help (all Rings of Power were made with the help of Sauron, that back then could shift his form and decieved the high Elves of Eregion so they didn't recognise him and let him teach them the art of Ringmaking), and their power was in understanding, preserving and healing - hence the magical "islands" of Rivendell and Lothlórien. Since Sauron never got them, they couldn't make the bearer invisible, but they could be used as a weapon against their foe even if that wasn't their purpose. 

Narya ('nar' means 'fire' in Quenya, the Elvish language) is the Ring of Fire. That's the Ring Gandalf is wearing as the last bearer. It's power is to resent the tyranny over the bearer and his despair. It's ring stone is ruby. 

Nenya ('nen' means 'water') is the ring of Water. Throughout the history of the Ring Galadriel was the sole bearer of Nenya, she used it for keeping Lothlórien timeless and safe. It was made out of mithril, the ring stone is white diamond. 

Vilya (the word means "air, sky") is the most powerful ring of the Three Rings. The last bearer of Vilya is Elrond. He used it for keeping Rivendell safe, like Galadriel did with Lothlórien. It was made out of gold, the ring stone is Sapphire. 

The Three Rings leave Middle-Earth with their ring bearers, together with Frodo as the One Ring bearer. With the destruction of One Ring the power of the Three faded and they returned to Valinor. 

***

Naturally I didn't remake the Three Rings. I couldn't even if I wanted to. I wanted to try to create them from what I have, wanted to show how I see their colours through the magical world of nail polish. ;) Sorry for loads of pictures, I like how my box turned out. *blush* Plus, flakie rings always need at least two photos. Right? Right? 

 The letter in the middle is Tengwar "C" for Celebrimbor (although I should write "K", as Tengwar is a phonetic writing *sigh*). 

 GOSH Holographic for Nenya. White Diamond sounded a bit boring. 

 Brucci Sapphire + Nfu Oh 52 for Vilya. My favourite!

Nail System 97 with Nfu Oh 49 for Narya. Probably my next mani combo. 

If you want actual swatches:

Brucci Sapphire, GOSH Holographic, Nail System 97, whole bunch of Nfu Oh combinations.

Let's put some music in here too. My favourite song about Tolkien world ever. It's not for everyone taste, mind you, but I'm sure some of you will like it, and I honestly believe that if you like music, you have to like the melody . You'd be surprised how much Tolkien lore is used for metal! Summoning - The Legend Of The Master Ring

Making nail polish rings is fun! What do you think, did I do a good job for a first timer? :) I feel so much better after writing this down, yay!

Do you like nail polish rings? How about Lord of The Rings and fantasy in general?

Thank you for reading! 

My day just got 230 times better

Hey everyone! How are you doing? Yes, I know, my blogging sucks lately. But you know why and I think we can all agree that family comes first. My mom is doing well, but she got ill right after the surgery, so I'm still on full duty, which usually means I get home after my classes, cook, clean, run to my dance classes, come home, clean the rest of the house, take a shower and fall dead on my bed. The days are literally flying past me, I can't believe my last post was posted on Sunday! 

But anyway ... I want to post this one, because you stuck with me when I was whining my keyboard off about all the studies I have and how sick and nervous i am about it, and now I have to share the good news. As from yesterday I'm officially in my last year of studies. It feels incredibly good, my studies mean a lot to me, so all in all it was a wonderful day just with that. I decided I'll celebrate the sign up with a gift that my wonderful swap buddy sent me a while ago, but I waited for a special occasion on wearing it. That's right, Clarins 230. Kris (My Lucid Bubble) sent me a decant of her bottle. How geneours can one get anyway? I was *so* surprised adn honoured she actually thought I deserve something like that. Come on, we're all nail polish junkies here, we all know how much that can mean to us! I would otherwise never got the Clarins, I can't afford to give so much money for a nail polish nor do I want to feed the ebay scalpers with my money. And now I have this beauty and I'm trully thankful. Kris, you've gone beyond awesomness with this one. 

Some facts. 1. This is two coats of Clarins 230 over two coats of Brucci Sapphire. I like how the blue shimmer adds to the Clarins gorgeousness. 

2. Unfortunately I'm extremely disappointed with my photo skills (and my camera) with this beauty. The photos will be all sorts, blurry, weird finger angles, just everything in order to show you the most colours of 230 and yet I still feel I failed to accomplish that. Even the videos didn't turn out as I wanted them. As you all know multichromes look their best off direct sunlight, 230 looks marvelous in softer light, but my camera doesn't work properly in that conditions. Sad face. The best photos of all the colours Clarins 230 shows, has Fashion Polish, her work with this baby is amazing, check that out, if you haven't already! 

3.A lot of pictures! Duh! Excuse the quality of some, again, for the most perfect review of 230 colours, check Sam's post!

I decided I'll show you just one video, all the rest were too poor of a quality and I really want to show just how sparkly this actually is! We all rave on the multichromness of it, but what really greatly surprised me was how unbelievably sparkly this baby is. The combination of both makes this really the best polish ever.

I usually don't see the point in the "famous" lemmings, I'm always positive I can get something better or at least similar and cheaper. You all know I don't see the point of lemming Nars Zulu, same goes for OPI Rainforest, same goes for La Boheme and others. But Clarins 230 ... here I can understand the lemming. And I think this is one of the rare polishes worth the hype they're getting. Still, if you think this is just too much, you can get Nfu Oh 51. I recognized the fraction of the look 51 gets in a fraction of the look 230 gets. Both really different, but in a certain light they will get a similar look. So you can have a fraction of 230 right there in the Nfu Oh bottle. 

Personally I can't imagine getting tired of my mani. Today it still feels new and fresh. It's like having 6-7 different amazing polishes at once on my nails. Yesterday on my dance classes it felt like the polish was dancing with me, it was insane. Yes, this baby does make you stare at your nails every second you can. Maybe I look like an idiot doing it, but heck, I love it! 

What do you think about Clarins 230 and the HTF lemmings in general? Do you think 230 is worth the hype?

Thank you for reading! 

Long Time No See: O.P.I. Who The Shrek Are You with lime green comparison

Oh, the title is so long. I hate when that happens. Who The Shrek Are You? is probably one of my favourite OPIs ever. I love the green. My BF hates it, but I love it, hehe. I saw the colour on a blog and immediately thought to myself "it's about damn time I wear it again!". Hence the Long Time No See label. As my stash is gettting bigger and bigger I'm starting to forget about the seriously cool and loved colours in it. Sad.

Since it's my kind of green I do have a couple that get close to it too, so I did a quick comparison for ya.

• Index and pinky: O.P.I. Who The Shrek Are You?
• Middle finger: Brucci Stephanie's Go Lime
• Ring finger: Sinful Colors Innocent

As you all know, Who The Shrek Are You? is a part of O.P.I. Shrek Forever After Collection for Spring 2010, but I told you that once more anyway. What you probably don't know is, I'm a big Shrek fan. And that's because of Shrek himself. "Ogres are like onion." I love his grumpy yet loving attitude, you know. And, although it's almost a cliché now not to love clichés, I love the unusual heros in the stories. I hate blond princes who save the so-passive-it's-already-insulting ladies. Well, bond guys were never my type anyway. ;) 

Ok, now that I've gone completely OT on you, how about a few info on polish? Shrek is a three coater for me, I cannot get rid of bold spots otherwise. It's insanely glossy and dries fast.

His cousins are not dupes, as you can see. Stephanie's Go Lime (what's with that name??) is much more yellow, and Innocent something in between. I love SGL better, since it's more different form WTSAY? (as you know I don't like having dupes) and also the forumula is much better than of Sinful Colors. While SGL needs three coats and Innocent only two, Innocent has the worst brush of them all. 

I advise you two coats of base coat for this type of green, if you don't like your nails stained. Otherwise you'll have seriously yellow nails. I checked. -.-

What do you think about this kind of green? Too fugly for you? Did you get any colours from Shrek Forever After collection?

Thank you for reading!

Brucci - Blue Sapphire (with Nfu Oh magic)

Hey everyone! How have you been? I know, it's been a while. Basically I'm only posting lately on the days I have my exams or am too tired for studying. I'm afraid it's going to be like this until October. It sucks, because I miss blogging so so much. And the nail polish blogsphere. I try to read as many blogs I can, but frankly, there isn't much time for internet lately. Today I had I really important exam and I don't have a very good feeling about it. I hope it's just nerves. The traditional after-exam headache is here too, but I'm getting used to it by now. 

Right now I want to show you what's probably the best dark blue shimmer I have. It's a stunner. I have it on my nails right now and I love it. My swap buddy rocks for sending me this one. Today I put some Nfu Oh flakies on, just to spice it up a bit, but to tell you the truth, I almost regret it. Not because I wouldn't love flakies, because you know I do, it's just that Blue Sapphire is utterly gorgeous on its own. 

 Natural light, but grey and cloudy.

What impressed me greatly with Blue Sapphire (aside from its GORGEOUS colour) is the pigmentation. You know by now my nails are fairly wide. At this point also quite long. Not the longest I ever showed, but they're getting there. So in average I need one coat more than most bloggers that show the same colour. Well, people, this is one coat of Blue Sapphire:

If I can make this a one coater, everyone that has nails shorter than 5 inches can. I was amazed. I did two coats just because I can and because I wanted to see how much depht the colour gets with the extra coat. But this is officially my go-to colour. It's gorgeous, one coat and we're off. I love it.

The brush is awesome, I have no troubles with Brucci, so is the formula. I put once coat of SH Insta Dry on top and that was it. The colour reminded me of Illamasqua Phallic, Blue Sapphire feels like a bluer or less blackened sister. For those of you who were disappointed in how blackened Phallic is, this just might be it. I love them both, naturally. ;) Holy crap, I haven't shown you Phallic yet! Must fix that.

Today I added Nfu Oh 52 on top, since it was too gorgeous base not to use it. I haven't worn flakies in a while, so I said why not.

What do you think about Blue Sapphire? How are you with blue shimmers? Can't get enough of them or need a break from them? I personally think you need Blue Sapphire in your life if you're a blue shimmer fan. This is really gorgeous. 

Thank you for reading! Miss ya!

I can't wait to show you this: Brucci - Chris's Green Belt

I guess I need another label on my blog. Because this one is so gorgeous, I have to show it to you approximately 20 minutes after I put it on. It's just ... one of the best greens I have in my stash, and I have A LOT of greens in my stash! 

I have no idea why Brucci doesn't get more love, it totally deserves more publicity and acknowledgement. The brush is fantastic, they are usually two-coaters, the colours are ah-mazing, right up there with the expensive ones, but Brucci is also SO cheap! It's a total win! 

I have a few bottles, thanks to Kris from My Lucid Bubble and the last swap package had this little beauty hidden in bubble wrap too. It has to be the perfect swap package, you'll see why in a few days. But I can tell you also this: it had two fast drying top coats there too!! Woo-hoo, we're back in business! 

But now to this gem. I cannot see a possible way to not love Chris's Green Belt. It's just ... perfect. It's perfect, people!!!

Two effortless coats, I had no trouble whatsoever with this beauty. I finished with China Glaze Fast Forward and so my mani was done in like 10 minutes or so. Chris's Green Belt is an amazing colour, really, look at the shade of the green, look at the shimmer!! I don't get the name, but I don't really care, the colour is beyond perfect. And so is the application. Great one!!! Thank you, Kris!

Oh, my nails are short again, yes. The vacation was wonderful, but a nightmare for my nails. As you can see, I cut myself a bit on my index finger and my cuticles are still recovering from using hand cream only once a day (I usually use it once per hour!), since there was a lot of hand work and I couldn't get my hands all greasy often. So right now I'm pampering them to make it up to them, I hope they recover quickly. Which reminds me, I need to buy a new tin of Badger Cuticle Balm tomorrow!

What do you think of Chris's Green Belt? Do you ever find a polish you love so much you just have to show it to people ASAP? 

Thank you for reading!

Brucci - Black Emerald

Heya guys! I've just had a very big exam today and I feel like I've been hit by a bus. Therefore I've already made a comparison and changed my mani and decided I'll type this entry away! I go back to the books tomorrow, today I'm taking a day off! 

I've read the blogger went all nuts a few days ago, and I noticed a couple of comments were deleted in my previous posts, and weren't restored - I've read them and I thank you for them now here, since I appearantly won't be able to answer them. 

Today I have for you a mani I did a while ago. It is the most anticipated Brucci from the swap box and boy it didn't disappoint. Black Emerald is *stunning*. Pictures were at first taken in really bad weather, rainy and such, but the next day the sun came out, so also sunlight pictures and "natural inside bright room light" picture with a tipwear. :)

 Natural everyday light, inside. 

 See the duochrome play, see it, see it?? 

It's also very sparkly on the sunlight.

This is three coats, as I needed to even it out. Come to think of it ... no wonder I had to, my nails are HUGE on these pictures. Man, I get so lazy with the filing ... one day I'll just cut them off completely, it's not like I have an hour to shorten them anyway. 

But to the polish - it's completely awesome, don't you think? When I took these pictures I kept thinking why Black Emerald, when in fact the duochrome colours are dark brown and emerald, but the next day I saw that in most light brown really looks black, and you get this *stunning* blackened emerald colour, that is simply do die for. I kept playing with my nails for the colours to shift, although I wouldn't mind them being green all the time, just look at that colour, so gorgeous!

I had no troubles with the polish or the brush. Brucci rocks! So does Kris from My Lucid Bubble for sending me this one!

What do you think? Is there anyone out there that acutally doesn't like duochrome? Don't be shy, lets hear it! :) Bloggers, ever look at your pictures of older manis and think "damn, what's wrong with my nail lenght on this one"? :)

Thank you for reading!