Born Pretty Store Review: Pink Rhinestones & Wax Picker Pencil

**press sample**

Hello everyone! Today I have another Born Pretty Store review for you, of 2 things. One is a decoration one is a tool. 

For this post I have Pink Rhinestones and a super handy little wax pencil. Click read more for more details, pictures, and a coupon code for 10% off!

My First Twinsie Tuesday Post!

Good morning everyone! Today I have some very exciting news. A couple of weeks ago I was asked to join the blogger group called Twinsie Tuesday! For those of you that don't know, Twinsie Tuesday is a group of about 20 nail bloggers that post together every Tuesday following prompts.

I've been following this group for a while, and had become friends with some of these lovely ladies already. I can't tell you how excited I was when I saw that email from Marisa asking me if I would be interested in joining. Lately I've been doing so much swatching that I haven't done much (if any) nail art. I love following prompts with a group of people too, seeing all the different interpretations is so much fun.

So, for my first Twinsie Tuesday post the prompt is Favorite Color Combo. I saw this and was immediately stumped..... I have way too many favorite color combos to pick just one! So I decided to go with one that I see a lot but haven't done much of on my nails. And since it's been so long since I've done nail art, I went with a "mix-n-match mani": one of my favorite nail art techniques.

More pics and details after the jump!

She's a Thriller

Good morning everybody! 

Today I have another Pipe Dream Polish to show you. If you're tired of seeing these, well, I'm sorry. You are just going to have to find another nail blog to read because I'm not done with my collection and I plan to buy many many more! 

Today's polish is She's a Thriller. This polish is part of Pipe Dream's Rob Zombie Halloween collection, and it is still available! I think this type of polish can be worn anytime of the year though, so you definitely need to go buy a bottle. 

Natural Light, Shade

Natural Light, Shade

Natural Light, Sun

For this manicure I started with 2 coats of Wet-n-Wild Lavender Cream (which is really very pink, that name confuses me...) and I topped it with 1 coat (YES, that says 1 coat!) of She's a Thriller. I topped everything off with 1 coat of my favorite top coat, Glossy Glam. 

Now I know everybody and their brother has put out a black and white glitter these days. Even main stream brands are putting them out... which they should be. Black and white glitters are FANTASTIC. But this one still manages to be unique in that crowd because it mixes large circle glitters with varying sizes of hex glitters. I love the combo! It's dense but you can still see your color through the glitter. I don't think I'll ever get tired of these types of polishes. 

She's a Thriller can be purchased on Pipe Dream's Esty store here. 

Glossy Glam can be purchased on Just Ricarda's Etsy store here. 

I hope you all love this glitter topper as much as I do! I can't wait to use it more, it's going to be so versatile! 

Have a great day!

~casey

**The polishes in this post were purchased by me for my own personal use. Some of the polishes were purchased at a discounted blogger rate in exchange for an honest review.**

Believe In Believing

Good morning everyone! Sorry I haven't posted in a few days. 

Today I have another Pipe Dream Polish for you. This is Believe In Believing from the Like The Weather Collection. (All of the polishes in this collection are named after lyrics in songs about the weather.) Believe In Believing is taken from Paula Abdul's Blowing Kisses In the Wind. 

Believe In Believing is a gorgeous blood orange base packed with glitter. I mean PACKED. It's so packed that you can hardly look directly at it for all the sparkle. (Any polish lover worth their salt will know that this is a good thing!) According to April's Etsy listing it is full of fuchsia and raspberry glitter with pink and fuchsia micro flakies. (Fuchsia... there's that word again. I don't like that word! The spelling!!!! Ugh!)

This polish feels very holiday-ish to me. It's the color of glittering cranberries.... how perfect would it be for Thanksgiving and Christmas? I love it. 

Direct sunlight.

Natural light, shade. 

Natural light, shade.

Light box.

Light box.

Light box.

See what I mean about all the glitter??? It's fantastic. This is 3 coats of Believe In Believing topped with one coat of Glossy Glam. You can see in the macros how nicely GG smooths these glitter polishes out. 

So what do you think about this polish? I love it, as I love all of April's polishes. (I think we've been over that a time or two.) This one was a bit thicker than some of the others, but that is to be expected with a polish this packed with glitter. It was thicker but it was easy to work with, I just had to be careful to use thin coats. It leveled out nicely and I had no issues. It was a complete pain to remove, but again, that's a glitter polish thing. I would be really worried that April had sold her soul to the devil if she'd made polishes this packed with glitter that glided off the nail as easy as a cream. ;) 

Pipe Dream Polish can be purchased through their Etsy store here. She just put up some Halloween lovelies that I'm getting sometime soon, I can't wait to see them and share them with you!

Glossy Glam can be purchased through their Etsy store here. Ricarda also has some great polishes in her shop along with this awesome topcoat. 

I hope you all had a great week! I'm going to try to get back on my posting schedule. 

From 9/27 to 10/5 I am going to be MIA, but I have some amazing guest posters lined up so keep an eye out for that!

Talk to you soon!

~casey

**All polishes in this post were purchased by me for my own personal use at a discounted rate in exchange for an honest review.**

Arabella & Tomoko, Show Us Your Heart

Good morning polished friends! I hope everyone is having a great week! :)

I'll warn you now, this is a picture heavy post. But I can't help myself sometimes. And macros of PixieDust polishes make me so so happy. Hopefully they make you happy too.

Today's manicure is something that I posted on Instagram a couple of days ago. The lovely Mrs Lochness and Ethereal Lacquer paired up to do a contest called #showusyourheart. The only rules were that you had to incorporate a heart into your design, and you had to say something nice about someone in your comments. Well, I had to enter. I don't really care about winning (although it would be awesome) but I am a big fan of positivity and being encouraging to others, especially in my little nail art community. No, not everyone does great manis every time... but even manis that don't look spectacular take a lot of time and effort. Plus it takes guts to post this stuff on the Internet. So we should be building each other up, always. 

For my something nice about someone I chose the lovely Elena from Ecklipsed by Color. You should go check her out, she's on Instagram and has a great blog. Elena is always so positive and encouraging no matter what is going on in her life, I admire that a lot in a person. I just had to call her out for it! Go check her out, you won't be sorry! (plus she's got an drool worthy indie collection... it makes me swoon...)

I wasn't feeling like doing anything too complex, so I kept it simple with some Zoya PixieDusts. The base for this mani is 2 coats of Zoya Arabella. Arabella is a rich fuchsia pink (straight from Zoya.com) and I agree. It's a rich, deep, beautiful pink. And sparkles... oh my. You know how I feel about these PixieDust polishes and how I rave about Zoya's ability to somehow capture texture, matte, sparkle, and shine, all in one bottle. It's baffling. Once Arabella dried I took a nail art brush and painted hearts on my ring fingers and thumbs in Tomoko. Tomoko is a beautiful silvery gold. I'm not sure I'll ever wear this by itself, but I love using in it manicures for nail art. I'm just not a huge fan of gold on my own nails by itself.

Full Sun

Full Sun

Full Sun Macro

Full Sun Macro

Natural Light, Shade

Natural Light, Shade

Light Box

Light Box

Light Box, close up of my thumb. She felt left out. :) 

What do you think? I really love this one. I wore it for a few days, I just couldn't take it off. PixieDust polishes are so great for nail art. It's crazy but they level out into each other, so you don't even miss having a topcoat to smooth things out. 

Zoya nail polish can be purchased on their website here, in some salon retailers, and in some Ulta stores. 

You should also check out Mrs Lochness on Instagram. Her swatches and nail art are AMAZING. 

Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed these as much as I did! 

~casey

**The polishes in the post were purchased by me for my own personal use.**

Pretty and Petite

Good morning everyone! Happy Labor Day! Here in the states Labor Day is a holiday on the first Monday in September that is supposed to celebrate the workers of America. So in theory we are all supposed to get the day off to relax, BBQ  whatever we like. But, just like all other holidays in this country, it's mostly just a day off for those of us with office jobs and a ton of extra work for people in retail because everything goes on sale on holidays here. Go 'merica.

Today I have another Pipe Dream Polish for you. I have 8 of these polishes, and I love all of them. They aren't all polishes that I will probably wear much, but the formula and color combos are just so incredible. I love them. 

Today's polish is Pretty and Petite. April describes this polish on her Etsy listing as is made up of various sized holo glitters in purple, blue, and silver in a bright barbie/bubblegum pink base. I LOVE this polish. This is one of my very favorites so far. I'm a sucker for pink, and glittery pink just kills me. There are different shapes and sizes and colors and sparkles. I just can't. It's so pretty and girly and perfect. You can see the glitter through all the layers as usual, and the pink is on point. It's a true pink, not orange or red or coral, it's PINK. :)

Here are some pictures so you can see just how great it is. It does look a little coral-ish in the pictures, but that is just my pasty skin and how it looks in pictures. Trust me, in person this is PINK PINK PINK. 

Daylight, shade

Daylight, shade

Daylight, shade, MACRO!

Light Box

Light Box

Light Box MACRO! (look at the glitters!!!)

Bottle MACRO!!!! :) This one is the most true to life color.

This is 3 thin coats of Pretty and Petite topped with one coat of Glossy Glam.

There are so many different shapes and shades of glitter in there. (to my eye) And there are a lot of holo sparkles in it too. It's a great, girly, polish. If you love sparkles and pink, you need this in your life ASAP! 

Pipe Dream Polish can be purchased in their Etsy store here. 

Let me know what you think! 

Until next time!

~casey

**The polish in this post was purchased by me for my own personal use at a discounted price in exchange for an honest review.**

Flip Fantasia

Good morning everyone! Happy Monday! 

Today I have the 4th and final Pipe Dream Polish for you. (Final for now, I have more on the way this week. :) )

This polish is called Flip Fantasia. It is a lovely coral-pink jelly base with just a bit of turquoise shimmer. This polish has circle glitters, teal and silver HOLO circle glitters. Holo teal glitter, yeah you read that right. There are also small silver, teal, and turquoise, hex glitters packed in here. This polish is really very pretty. I'm sure you're getting tired of hearing it, but April's polishes really are fantastic. They are jelly enough to see all the way through the layers, but opaque enough that they build nicely. 

Today was a swatching day, so I didn't wear this for very long. And the sun didn't come out to help me show it's true beauty. I can see myself reaching for this one anytime I need something bright and unique. 

On to some pictures. 

All of these were taken in my light box.This is 3 coats of FF with one coat of Seche Vite. You could get away with 2 coats of this, but I have this thing for doing 3 coats of any polish I apply. I'm not sure if it's an OCD thing or maybe a security thing? Could be both. I can't stand visible nail line (VNL) on myself and I get so mad when I find bald spots the day after painting! :) 

Bottle Macro

Nail Macro

Nail Macro

So what do you all think? I absolutely love it. The circle glitters are unique and really eye catching. The application of this polish was pretty, everything but the large circle glitters flowed and applied easily. I had to do a little fishing for those big pretty circles, but that is completely normal for a polish like this. 

Overall I love it and have zero complains. Pipe Dream Polish can be purchased from their Etsy store here. Please go check it out; April is amazing and her products are just as great as she is. 

Thanks for reading! Have a happy Monday!

~casey

**The polish in this post was purchased by me for my own personal use at a discounted rate in return for an honest review.**

Zoya Miranda

Good morning and happy Saturday! I hope everyone is having a good weekend so far. Ours has been good. This morning we took our cat to the vet for a check up and nail trim. I was pretty nervous about this because she's 11 and this is only the 3rd time she's left the house. And because she tends to be a bit grouchy. But, she did much better than I expected. She didn't try to bite anyone, she only hissed a little, and held mostly still while they trimmed her tender problem nails. So much better than I expected, so I have high hopes for a good weekend! :)

Today I have another Zoya PixieDust polish to show you. I know I've said it before, and I'll say it again and again and again. I love these polishes. I love all of my Zoyas, but these Pixies are so sparkly, the texture is perfect, and the formula is amazing. I could go on and on about them. 

Today's color is Miranda. Zoya describes this polish as a "rose sparkle". It's a lovely pinkish mauve shade, with just a hint of coral. At least that is how it pulls on my exceptionally pasty complexion. It's very pretty and subtle. 

On to some pictures. I'm going to show you this polish both matte and topped with glossy topcoat. PixieDusts are sparkly straight out of the bottle, both matte and glittery. Adding a topcoat changes it completely, and turns the glitteriness a whole new dimension. It's kind of like getting 2 polishes in one. 

This is 3 coats of Miranda on its own with no topcoat. All in the light box. 

Then I added 3 coats of my favorite topcoat, Glossy Glam. Textured polishes are very "topcoat hungry", so it takes a bit to get it all smoothed out. But I wanted a glassy finish on this, so I'm glad I added that extra coat. 

Here is one with the flash to show the extra sparkles. Sorry, I had just used cuticle oil so it's a little greasy around the edges. 

Sparkle sparkle! :) 

So what do you all think of this color? I love it. It's a "safe" color, but still fun with all of the texture and sparkle. 

Thanks for reading! 

~casey

**all polishes in this post were purchased by me for my own personal use.**

Rad Cloud...

Hello polish friends! I hope everyone is having a great Sunday! It is stormy and dreary here, but that is perfectly ok with me. I actually really like dreary weather, as long as it doesn't last for days and days at a time.

I'm trying to get into a routine with blog posting, it's trickier than I thought it would be; coming up with a schedule, deciding what to paint, what to post, getting pics, etc etc. So bare with me while I get into a routine.

Today I have a swatch and review for you. I'm going to go ahead and admit it, I'm addicted to indie polishes. I've only got a few right now, with a few more on the way, but I love them. Something about having something that you know was created by hand by someone with the same love of polish as you... I don't know, I just love it. Plus indies for the most part have a very different look than mainstream brands. Maybe because they are created for polish lovers by polish lovers? Who knows.

This lovely polish is by Hare Polish, it's called Rad Cloud. I bought this at the recommendation of my friend Alysia. You should really check out her Instagram, she posts AMAZING manis and macros. This isn't a color I would have normally picked on my own, so I'm glad she recommended it to me. This is 2 coats over 2 coats of OPI Pedal Faster Suzi and topped with one coat of Glossy Glam. I love the finish on this polish. It's got a milky candy pink base filled with an awesome mix of glitters: green and purple squares with pink and orange hexes of all sizes.

What do you think of this polish? I love the fun mix of shapes, sizes, and colors. 

HAREpolish can be purchased from their etsy store. Follow them on their Instagram to stay up to date on restocks and sales.

Thanks for reading! Happy polishing!

~casey

**all products in this post were purchased by me for my own personal use.