My Birthday Nails!

Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me, happy birthday to meeeeeeeeeeee!  Yeah, I always make a big deal out of my own birthday.  Hey, it's the best holiday there is!  I have been out and about most of the day, doing regal routine things but also some fun things!  I also got some amazing nail mail from some of my amazing friends!  Watch my Instagram page if you want to see those pictures!  For now let's just take a quick look at the mani I created for my birthday!  I am very pleased with the outcome!
Enchanted Polish: Shop, Mei Mei's Signatures, Facebook, Instagram Lynnderella: Shop, Blog, Facebook, Instagram

Alright alright...I started this birthday mani with Enchanted Polish April 2014.  It's a beautiful, soft linear holo that sits somewhere between cornflower and periwinkle.  April 2014 applied like a dream, so creamy and opaque.  If you are heavy handed you could get away with 1 coat.  I used 2 coats since I used lighter coats when I paint.  I then used April 2014 and April 2013 to create a gradient on my accent nails.  I put both colors on the sponge and applied about 3 coats.  April 2013 is also on my pinky nail and the color is a beautiful medium toned grape purple with a strong holo effect.  It seems to be a tightly scattered holo.  April 2013 was a thinner formula and I used 2 coats to get it opaque, but there were no formula or application issues to report.  I topped the accent nails with 1 coat of Lynnderella Blue Rogue, "assorted periwinkle and lilac glitters with pink shimmer."  On top of that I added Lynnderella Forget You Not, a blend of satin periwinkle hexs in different sizes with pink and blue shimmer.  The combination of the glitters really brought some wow factor that I didn't expect.  All the colors played well together and I am totally happy with the way it turned out.  I finished all nail with 1 layer of topcoat.  

Lumina Lacquer The Snow King and Colors by Llarowe Woman from Tokyo

Good evening dears!  I have a lovely mani to share and just didn't want to wait!  It still has a holiday feel but it's not red, green, white or blue - GASP!  It's all about the purple, silver, gold and HOLO!  I quite like how it turned out.  I used some of my favorite brands for this mani - ones you've seen plenty of before on my blog so I'll skip introductions and jump into the online links.

Lumina Lacquer: Shop, Facebook, Instagram

Colors by Llarowe: Shop, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter

China Glaze: Website, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter

I started this with 2 coats of China Glaze Gothic Lolita.  Gothic Lolita is from the 2012 Electropop collection and is a very lovely medium purple with some gorgeous shimmer.  It had a fabulous formula and great application.  I topped it with Lumina Lacquer The Snow King.  I love this glitter mix.  It's full of gold, silver and 2 shades of purple holo glitter in fun shapes - circles, snowflakes, stars, hearts and snowmen.  Sadly I didn't get any snowmen out this time.  But the nice thing is you can avoid pulling those glitter shapes out and this can be a year round color!  The Snow King had great formula and application.  Loads of glitter came out with each brush dip and it the glitter laid nice and flat on my nails.  I finished this with Colors by Llarowe Woman From Tokyo, a deep purple linear holo.  It's a very pretty color and it had a fantastic formula.  Application was a breeze.  I used 2 coats for full coverage.  I only used topcoat on my glitter nails.

Super Black Lacquer Fall 2013 Collection

Good morning!  Sorry for going MIA again.  This month has been pretty busy and I've had to put blogging on the back burners to what happens in life.  But thankfully it's nothing serious or bad, just alot going on.  Dern holidays getting in the way of my blogging.  LOL.   Well I have some really fabulous holos to show you today.  You know I am a humongo fan of holos so I literally squealed when these arrived in my mailbox!  These beauties are the Super Black Lacquers Fall 2013 Collection and they are amazing.  I have reviews Super Black Lacquers before and you can check those posts out HERE, HERE and HERE (there are a few more and you can do a search for Super Black in my search bar).  I have been impressed with every SBL that I've tried and these are no exception.  Actually I think they may be my favorites!  You can purchase Super Black Lacquer HERE and can follow them on Facebook and Instagram!  So let's delve in to the pictures!

*PRESS SAMPLE*

This is Guilty.  Guilty is a metallic yellow-gold color with a soft linear holo.  It had an amazing, buttery formula that was so easy to apply.  No problems with patches or streaks, just flawless formula and application.  I used 2 coats for full coverage and upon the recommendation from Natalie on her product description, I didn't use topcoat so the holo would be at it's strongest.   

*shade

3rd Degree is the only polish in this collection that isn't a holo, but I love it!  It's one of my favorite color families and the glowy shimmer is perfection.  Natalie describes it as a "pearlescent persimmon" color with "superfine gold shimmer."  The juicy red-orange color is spot on for the Fall and the shimmer will completely steal your breath!  I tried to do my best at capturing the shimmer so hopefully you can see how gorgeous it is.  I used 2 coats for full coverage and again it was an amazing formula and application was perfect.  I finished this with 1 layer of topcoat.  

*shade

I love the name and color of Spanked.  Spanked is described as a "shimmering cranberry red in low light, with a prismatic holo effect in sunlight."  I'm not sure I see the cran, but I definitely see the berry!  Or maybe this is the shade of a freshly spanked behind.  Whatever the reason or meaning behind the name this is a gorgeous color with a beautiful soft linear holo effect.  Just like the other 2 from the Fall 2013 collection it had a buttery formula with lovely application.  I used 2 coats and no topcoat.  

*shade

And lastly is Heather.  Heather is a purple polish with a soft linear holo effect.  It's the perfect shade of purple...a perfect in between color.  The holo effect is also really lovely.  Keeping in line with the others, application and formula were both wonderful.   I used 2 layers and no topcoat.  

*shade

Just because I thought it would be pretty I did a little gradient mani with Spanked and Heather!  They were so pretty together.  I like how you can see the differences in holo effect on the 2 different polishes.  I did use a layer of topcoat here to smooth out and gloss up my gradient.  

World Lupus Awareness Day

Today is World Lupus Awareness Day.  This cause is important to me because my grandma suffers from this disease.  She is sick frequently, medication only works for a short period of time before it stops working all together.  She has her good days, but her bad days are really bad.  Before we knew what was wrong she had been sick for so long, she basically weighed 80 pounds.  No one knew why she was ill.  It's upsetting that so many, including doctors, are unfamiliar with Lupus.  Even with treatment today she catches every little cold and virus that is going around.  I don't even take my kids (her great grand children) over to visit if one is remotely showing signs of having something because I don't want to pass it along to her.  So this post is just my small contribution to help spread the word about Lupus.

You can go over to the World Lupus Day website to read more about the disease.  I've pulled this informative paragraph from that site if you don't have time to check it out.  "Lupus is a chronic, autoimmune disease that can damage any part of the body (skin, joints, and/or organs inside the body). Chronic means that the signs and symptoms tend to last longer than six weeks and often for many years. In lupus, something goes wrong with your immune system, which is the part of the body that fights off viruses, bacteria, and germs ("foreign invaders," like the flu). Normally our immune system produces proteins called antibodies that protect the body from these invaders. Autoimmune means your immune system cannot tell the difference between these foreign invaders and your body’s healthy tissues ("auto" means "self") and creates autoantibodies that attack and destroy healthy tissue. These autoantibodies cause inflammation, pain, and damage in various parts of the body.  Every day, more than 5 million people worldwide struggle with the often debilitating health consequences of lupus, a potentially fatal autoimmune disease capable of damaging virtually any part of the body, including the skin, heart, lungs, kidneys, and brain."  The Lupus Foundation of America website is also a great site full of resources and information. 

Purple is the official color for Lupus awareness.  The butterfly is the symbol for Lupus.  I chose to wear Color Club Eternal Beauty (2 coats) and I stamped a butterfly with a plain black creme over each nail.  No topcoat.  And please go to the end of the post to see other bloggers that are also supporting World Lupus Awareness Day!