Nail Of The Week: Essie Mink Muffs

under natural lighting

For this week's nails I am wearing one of Essie's classic shades, Mink Muffs. I would describe Mink Muffs as a glossy chocolate brown with a hint of taupe. This shade is a prime example why Essie is my favourite nail polish brand because of its rich, creamy and glossy finish. I am wearing 2 coats of the polish for the pictures in this post.

What are you wearing for this week?

under artificial lighting

Nail Of The Week: Blue Swirlies

Hey guys!

For this week's nails I decided to create a summer inspired design as summer is fast approaching. I have said many times before that I love winter and snow but right now I'm looking forward to the coming months because that means a vacation. These past couple of weeks have just been stressful and kind of exhausting so I really can't wait for a vacation. Anyways, I used Essie's Turquoise and Caicos as the base and Nicole by Opi's Khloe Had a Little Lam-Lam for the design with the use of Konad's m65 nail plate.

What do you have on your nails for this week?

Nail of the Week: Soft Pink Hearts

under artificial light with flash

Here is a simple nail art idea for the upcoming Valentine's Day that I thought to share with you guys. I used Essie's Ballet Slippers for the base, added a layer of Wet n Wild's Hallucinate and topped 2 hearts per nail using Kleancolor's Twinkly Love.

under artificial light without flash

What do you have on your nails this week?

Nail Of The Week: Festive Gingerbread Man

Hey guys!

For this week's nails, I decided to create a gingerbread man nail art to express my love for gingerbread! One of the things I enjoy during the holidays is anything gingerbread flavoured from donuts to hot drinks. I used Essie Mink Muffs for the base of the design and for the gingerbread man himself, then used Sally Hansen Cherry Charisma for the buttons and Sally Hansen White for the gingerbread man's clothing pattern. I really like the design I did but I made a little mistake of giving him a frown instead of a smile! I only noticed it now while writing this post. Oh well, I guess he's not as excited as I am with christmas. Lol

What do you have on your nails for this week?

Nail of the Week: Christmas Tree Nail Nart

Hey guys!
How's your week going so far?

I can't believe it's December already! I'm getting excited for the Christmas Season because it means snow, holiday shopping, Christmas parties, and just some good 'ol quality time with the loved ones! For this week's nails I did an easy christmas tree nail art design to kick off the Holiday Season. The shades I used for this nail art were; OPI Don't Pretzel My Buttons as a base, Essie Mojito Madness for the tree, China Glaze I'm Not Lion for the glitters, Essie Bikini so Teeny, Kleancolor Neon Yellow, Sally Hansen Cherry Charisma for the dot ornaments and Kleancolor Aurora for the star.

What do you have on your nails this week?

Nail of the Week: Essie Penny Talk

under artificial light with flash

For this week's nails I am wearing Essie Penny Talk. This shade is included in Essie's Mirror Metallics that came out a few months back but is still available at some Walmart and Shoppers Drug Mart. Penny Talk is a gorgeous bronze-y, rose-gold metallic shade. The application can be quite difficult as the formula is somewhat inconsistent and streaky. Also, the brush strokes are visible on the nails which is common with metallic polishes but a gorgeous shade nonetheless.

under natural light

under artificial light without flash

What do you have on your nails for this week?

Nail Of The Week: Dotted Essie Recessionista

under natural light

For this week's nails I did a simple nail art using Essie's Recessionista as the base, Klean Color's Pastel Purple for the first line of dots and Essie's Pilates Hottie for the second line. Essie Recessionista is a creamy dark magenta/deep plum shade with 2 coats. Klean Color Pastel Purple is more of a bubblegum pink than pastel in my opinion but a pretty shade nonetheless. And Essie Pilates Hottie is a beautiful muted lilac shade that I think is appropriate for fall. 

under artificial light

What do you have for your nails this week?

Nail of the Week: Nail Art for My Mexican Vacation

I wanted to do something festive for my trip down south so I did a little nail art on my tips! I couldn't decide which colour to put on my nails so I used both colours that I liked the most from my recent Essie nail polish haul. For the upper half I wore Essie Turquoise and Caicos and for the lower half I used Essie Pilates Hottie. And for the pattern, I used my m65 Konad Nail Art Plate with the white polish from the Konad Kit. 

What do you have on your nails this week?

Nail of the Week: Pink Nails for Breast Cancer Awareness Month

Hey guys!

How was your thanksgiving?

As you may know, October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month so I thought to do a simple pink french tip in commemoration of the campaign. I am fortunate enough not to have anyone in my immediate family battle the disease but I think its still important to know about the campaign to help spread awareness. To learn more about Canada's breast cancer campaign called the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation's 'Run for the Cure', click here. 

For this week's nails I used Essie's Off the Shoulder from the Summer 2012 Collection and Sally Hansen White polish for the tips. 

Here is a swatch of the base polish alone with 2 coats under natural lighting

When I was painting my nails, my little cousins arrived early for thanksgiving dinner and wanted to play dress up so here is what they did on my nails. Totally blinged out nails.

What do you have on your nails for this week?

Latest Essie Nail Polish Acquisitions

Happy Thanksgiving Canada!

Just wanted to share with you some nail polish I purchased from a great sale from Rexall Pharmacy.

They are currently having a $3.00 off on Essie Polishes that is running until Oct. 11, 2012. I took advantage and purchased the shades Mink Muffs, Recessionista, Peach Daiquiri, Turquoise and Caicos, and Pilates Hottie

Price: $6.99 CAD from $9.99 CAD

Place to buy: Rexall Pharmacy

Nail Of The Week: Nail Stamp Fail?

I wanted to have a fall themed nails for this week but I can't decide if I like the outcome of my nail stamping or not. Since I'm a novice when it comes to nail art I opted to use my nail stamping kit for the pattern I used. I used fall colours like dark brown, neon yellow and an orange for this look but the yellow and orange were not striking enough to pop out of the dark brown. I first stamped with the yellow then added the orange afterwards. 

I took some photos while I was doing my nails because I wanted to share how gorgeous the dark brown is by itself. This shade is called Hard-Kourt Fashionista from Nicole by OPI's Kardashian Collection which looks black from afar but is really a dark brown. 

2 coats under natural light

2 coats with flash

Nicole by OPI's Hard-Kourt Fashionista, KleanColor's Neon Yellow, and Essie's Fear or Desire

Nail stamping, yey or ney?

Nail of the Week: My First Ever Nail Art!

Hey guys!

For this week's nails I decided to try doing nail art! I know the design that I did is not the most creative and is not perfect at all but I was excited to create it. The polishes that I've used for this polka-dot themed nails are Essie Eternal Optimist (a dusty rose shade, 2 coats) and Klean Color Concrete Gray (a cool blue-gray, 1 coat). 

What do you have on your nails this week?

Nail of the Week: Essie Bikini so Teeny

Hey guys!

Since it's still pretty hot here in Ontario, I thought to rock out one of the shades I have from the brand's summer collection. 

 First of all, I'm already sold with the name Bikini so Teeny as it's so cute! hehe. This shade is officially described as "a sparkling, cornflower blue" in Essie's website. I would describe this shade as a gorgeous periwinkle blue that is very fitting for the summer. In the bottle, you can see shimmer but I didn't see it translate on my nails and I think it's cute-r that way. This shade has better formula than the shade I wore last week Ballet Slippers from Essie as well, it took me 3 coats to achieve opacity and applied evenly.

What shade are you rocking out this week?

Nail of the Week: Essie Ballet Slippers

Hey guys!

For today's post I would like to share one of the new shades of nail polish I recently bought. Since my nail polish collection has a lot of bright and dark colours, I thought I would change it up with something pale and nude-y.

Ballet Slippers is officially described as a "classic pale pink with sheer finish." It's a gorgeous light and girly pink but since it has a sheer finish, I needed 3 coats to get full opacity. This is one of the first Essie nail polishes that I have tried and I was quite surprised with how it applied. The application was somewhat streaky and uneven, and it took quite a while for it to completely dry.

Sephora and Essie Haul

Hello lovely people!

I've had a stressful week at work so I decided to go to the mall yesterday and indulge in some retail therapy by visiting Sephora, Walmart and Winners.

Here are the items that I picked up!

From Sephora

Too Faced Prime and Poreless Pure Oil-Free Skin Smoothing Face Primer for Sensitive Skin. 

Price: $38.00 CAD

Whew! That was a long product name! Hehe. I haven't read much reviews about this product from beauty blogs as its fairly new still but I'm really excited to try this out for my oily skin. 

Too Faced Shadow Insurance

Price: $24.00 CAD

I have been perfectly happy with my E.L.F. Eyelid Primer for the past few months but when I started wearing makeup for longer hours because of work I noticed that after about 8 hours my eyeshadow creased. I decided to try this out and see if this product is worth the hype.

Benefit 'How To Look The Best At Everything' Set

Price: $36.00 CAD

I have been lemming for Benefit products ever since I got into makeup but their prices are not really budget friendly. So when I saw this set on Sephora's website I decided that I had to have it! This set includes; the POREfessional, Hello Flawless Oxygen Wow Foundation, Boi-ing Concealer in shades 03 and 04, and Hello Flawless Powder.

Benefit 'Go Tropicoral' Set

Price: $32.00 CAD

This is another makeup set from Benefit that I was really excited about. It includes; mini Chacha tint, mini High Beam, Coralista Powder Blush sample size, and Coralista lip gloss sample size.

From Walmart

Essie Nail Polish in Penny Talk

Price: $8.96 CAD

This shade is included in their Mirror Metallics Collection that recently came out. Its described as "an authentic copper metallic" 

Essie Nail Polish in Ballet Slippers

Price: $8.96 CAD

I think this shade is in their permanent range which is described as "classic pale pink with a sheer finish"

Essie Nail Polish in Eternal Optimist

Price: $8.96 CAD

This may be in the permanent range as well and it described as "a spiced tea rose with a dash of cream"

From Winners

Essie Summer Collection Mini Set

Price: $12.99 CAD

This mini set includes shades in Bikini So Teeny, Mojito Madness, Off the Shoulder, and Fear or Desire

Have you done some shopping lately too? Do share!

Victoria