Mas Fina

Good morning polish friends! I hope you're all having a great week so far. Saturday I had a swatch-a-thon and I am really excited for the next few posts that I have for you. 

Today's post is the one that I am probably the most excited about, it was so hard to wait to share this. In fact I shared a sneak peak on my Instagram Saturday because I just couldn't wait. 

This beauty is Pipe Dream Polish Mas Fina. Mas Fina is part of April's "Just a Girl" collection. All of the polishes are named from song lyrics by female artists with "girl" in the title. This one is from Madonna's Who's That Girl. According to Pipe Dream's Etsy listing, "this polish is made up of blue-green and purple iridescent with teal and lilac in a violet base with a hint of turquoise shimmer". I have looked at dozens of pictures of this on taken by many people, and while every picture is beautiful, I haven't seen any that are truly color accurate in real life. April and I talked about it and she put it perfectly when she said the iridescent shimmer kinda makes the camera freak out a little. I don't know how to describe it other than to say that the violet base is much more vibrant in person. Maybe deeper would be a good word. It is seriously one of the most beautiful color and glitter combos that I have seen. April's iridescent glitters just blow my mind. Oh who am I kidding, all of her polishes have been blowing my mind. I have the BIGGEST crush on Pipe Dream Polish. So I hope you don't get tired of hearing me dote on them, because I won't be stopping anytime soon. I'm already planning to order all 6 of her fall collection. (She's been posting sneak peaks on Instagram but I CAN'T WAIT to see them in person!)

So, on to some pictures. 

Full Sun (LOVE these bottles!)

 

Full Sun

 Light Box

Bottle Macro

Nail Macro

SERIOUSLY, those macros. This polish is just so so pretty. Application is flawless, it glides on just where you put it, no glitter placement needed. The first coat is a little thin, but it builds nicely. I used 3 coats here but you could probably get away with 2. (I have this thing for 3's... yeah, I'm a little crazy. But not too much.)

This is 3 coats of Mas Fina topped with one coat of Glossy Glam.

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

Glossy Glam (the best top coat EVER, especially over indie glitters) can be purchased on Etsy here. Looks like she's out of stock right now, but watch her Instagram for restock updates! 

I hope you all love this one as much as I do! 

**The polishes in this post were purchased by me for my own personal use. The Pipe Dream Polish was purchased at a discounted price in exchange for an honest review.**

Freckles

Good morning everyone! Happy Sunday to you! I hope everyone is having a nice weekend so far. 

Today I have a fabulous indie polish for you. It's no secret that I love indies, and my love for them started with Lush Lacquer. The first indie I ever purchased was their polish Clowning Around. It is a fabulous neon glitter in a clear base with varying sizes of hex glitter in all different colors. I fell in love with it the very first time I saw it, and I remember how excited I was when I finally decided to purchase it. Once I got it on I still loved it, but large hex glitter isn't my favorite. I love the way it looks on others, but I think because my nails are relatively small it just doesn't always lay right on me. Plus it is a little trickier to work with. 

So, when I found out that Lush Lacquer was releasing Freckles, the little sister to Clowning Around, I was ecstatic. Clowning Around has 6 different sizes of hex glitter, Freckles only has 2; and they are all small. This polish is amazing. If you are on the fence about trying an indie, I highly recommend this one because it's really versatile. I bought it for myself as my "birthday polish gift" to myself. Sounds weird, I know. I've been planning a birthday manicure since my birthday last year, and this polish is perfect for what I've got in mind. 

Freckles is densely packed with neon hex glitters, there is no need to place this baby. It flows on all by itself in a nice, dense, layer of colorful goodness. For this manicure I decided to layer it over my favorite blue, OPI Can't Find My Czeckbook. You don't see a lot of people layering these neon glitters over color, and I have no idea why. The result is fantastic; it totally changes the look of the glitter! They are such chameleons, I can't wait to try it over many more. 

For this mani I used 2 coats of Can't Find My Czeckbook and 2 coats of Freckles. I could have left it at just 1 coat of Freckles, but really the only thing better than glitter is more glitter... So I couldn't help but add 1 more. Then I topped it off with my beloved Glossy Glam. I've had this one for 3 days and it is still just as shiny and bright as the night I put it on. 

Here are some pics. I'm going to apologize here because I feel like I need to. I'm still working out how all of this works and I feel like my lighting isn't always the best. Sometimes I have lobster hands and other times my fingers look like ghosts. I think I'm getting better, but it's a learning process. But, even with lobster hands you can see how awesome this combo is! 

Light Box 

Light Box

Light Box Nail Macro

Light Box Bottle Macro (look at all that glitter!!!)

I took these light box photos the night I painted them, but then the sun didn't show up much the next day. So this picture is after a full day and a half of wear, including my usual routine which USED to really scuff my nails. Check out how great Glossy Glam holds up! It's amazing stuff, I can't say enough good things about it. 

What do you all think? Isn't this glitter fun? I can't wait to incorporate it into my birthday manicure. Or maybe birthday manicures, because I'm getting so many ideas that I might have to do them for the whole month of September. 

Lush Lacquer can be purchased on their Etsy store here. 

Glossy Glam can be purchased on their Etsy store here. 

OPI can be purchased at salon retailers, Ulta, and many other online retailers. 

**The Lush Lacquer in this post was purchased by me for my own personal use. I did receive a blogger discount in exchange for an honest review.**

Small Talk

Good morning everybody! Happy Friday! I know Friday isn't the end of the work week for all of you, but it is the end of the work week for me. And today I'm leaving work a little early, so I'm extra excited. I love my job and my hospital, but there is something about having a Friday afternoon off. 

Today I have my first Lac Attack polish for you. Lac Attack was one of the first indie polishes that I found and started stalking. I'm not sure why I hadn't bought any before now, but a few weeks ago Anastasia posted that she was having a sale before she changed sites so I jumped on. 

This is one of two polishes that I purchased, and as part of the sale she threw in an extra mini. How sweet is that? 

This is Small Talk, it was part of her Candy Hearts Collection from earlier this year. I would call this a shimmery mint green base with dark and light pink hex glitter pieces in large and small sizes. There's also an interesting dark shimmer to this. I'm not sure how to describe it, at first I thought it was pigment that didn't get mixed in, but no matter what I like the look. 

I had some minor application issues with this. I think it would behave better if it was layered over an opaque color. I did 3 coats for these pics and had a little drag. But I was a little rushed. Overall I think this is a really pretty polish, I just don't think it's as easy to work with as some of the other indies I've tried. I love the dark and light pink pieces in it, it makes me think of kiwi strawberry candy or something. It's a sweet polish. 

My middle finger got bumped and a little smudged in the process, I'm sorry about that. I didn't see it until after I had already taken the pics and removed the polish. 

The sun wasn't playing nice on the day I did these, so all of my pics are in my trusty light box. The macro shot is really the one that does it the best justice. :)

This is 3 coats of Small Talk topped with 1 coat of Seche Vite. 

What do you think? I think this color will be perfect for spring and I think I'll create some fun Easter looks with it. 

Lac Attack polishes can be purchased through Anastasia's online store. However the store is currently closed while she changes hosts. I'm not sure if Small Talk will still be available when she reopens, but she has a lot of amazing polishes to choose from! Including the Magical Musings collection, which I've been drooling over for a long time.  Check her site and Instagram for store updates. 

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

Waterfall Mani

Hello friends! I hope you're all doing well this morning!!! I've had a long week so far, but we're halfway through it!

Today I have my very first attempt at a waterfall manicure. If you've been around the nail art world for any amount of time I'm sure you have heard of Sammy from The Nailasaurus. If you haven't heard of her, go to her site. Go now. I'll wait. Trust me, you want to spend an hour or 7 browsing through her beautiful pictures and helpful pictorials. Sammy was one of my very first nail crushes, and she still amazes me with every single manicure and post. 

Now, back to my mani. Aren't you glad you went and checked her out? You should be. This one is dedicated to her, since it was in fact inspired and based on her fantastic pictorial. She posted this back in mid July and I knew I had to try it.  

Yesterday I went on a mission to find all of the Wet-n-Wild Pop Art Collection Polishes. I love hunting for stuff like this, it's a fun challenge for me for some reason. 4 Walgreens and 2 Kmarts later, I had them all. (and maybe a backup or two of some of the colors) When I got home I had them all lined up (because that's what I do with new polish, don't you?) and just looked at them. Then it hit me, perfect colors for my first waterfall mani! 

I started with a base of Wet-n-Wild Blank Canvas. I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised with this white. Whites are tricky, but this one doesn't disappoint.  Just two smooth coats to get full opacity, it flowed pretty well and was self leveling. For $0.99 I wasn't expecting much, but this was nice. My only complaint was that it was pretty slow to dry, but not unbearably so. 

Once the white was dry I took my striping brush and went to work. I dabbed a bit of colored polish on my palette (a piece of paper), then dragged my brush through the color. Then starting at the cuticle I painted a solid line, slowly lifting from the nail. This creates the smaller wispy look at the end. I love this technique. I need practice, badly. But for a first try I think I did pretty good. Once I got through all of my colors I went back in with a Stripe Right silver glitter striper and added a little sparkle. Then I topped it off with a thick coat of the best topcoat ever, Glossy Glam. I'll list all the colors below the pictures. 

Full Sun

Full Sun

Full Sun

Light Box

Light Box

Colors Used, L to R:

     A Blank Canvas

     Teal Slowly and See (no idea why this has teal in the name, it's all blue and beautiful)

     Stand the Test of Lime

     Who is Ultra Violet

     The Clock Strikes Orange

     Listening to Blue Reed

     Stripe Rite silver glitter

I really love all of these colors, they are really vibrant without being neon. Which is good for me because I'm not a huge fan of neon on myself. I'm looking forward to doing a lot of nail art with these. (which is why i bought a backup or two of some of them. :)) 

Wet-n-Wild polish can be purchased at most drugstores. The Pop Art collection is a limited edition collection. I know here it is available at Walgreens and Kmart, but other stores probably have it too. It is selling out quickly so if you see it and want it you should grab some! 

The Stripe Rite Striper is from Sally Beauty Supply. 

Glossy Glam topcoat is available from Rica's etsy shop here. Watch her Instagram (@justricarda) for restock information. 

The tutorial for this mani is available here, on www.thenailasaurus.com. Please go check her blog out, her manis are flawless and simple and beautiful. Sammy coined these "waterfall mani", and I think it's a great description. Other's have done their own versions, but her version and her pictorial are the best in my opinion. 

Let me know what you think! Have a happy rest of the week! 

Until next time, happy polishing! 

~caseylane

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

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.**