MDJ Creations - Valentine's Duo (swatches and review)

Hi guys! Today I have MDJ Creations' Valentine's Duo to share with you. For those that are new to MDJ Creations, it is owned by the lovely Melissa! She creates nail polish, balms, ointments and jewelry!

Glitter or Die - Absolute and On the Rocks collections (swatches and review)

Hi everyone! Today I have a brand spankin new indie brand to share with you! Glitter Or Die is owned and operated by the total awesomeness that is Rosie out of California. I have been following her on IG for quite some time now (@glitterordie) and have loved seeing all of her amazing nail art. Now she is making polish and I am very honored to be one of the lucky girls swatching and review her first collections! All Glitter Or Die lacquers are Handmade, Cruelty Free and 5-Free.

Kawaii Moon Polish - swatches and review

Hi guys! Today I have another new indie to share with you! Kawaii Moon Polish is owned and operated by the very sweet Natsumi! She creates cruelty and 5-free polishes!

Littlenailgirl Lacquer's Awareness Line - Love Annie and Love Deb

Hi everyone! I am honored to have been sent the first 2 polishes from Littlenailgirl Lacquer's new Awareness line to share with you all!

A message from LNG:

Let's celebrate the life of two amazing women!!

We are so excited to have started the Littlenailgirl Lacquers awareness line. Our line will launch October 2014 with our very first breast cancer and domestic violence lacquers.

We select special stories and honor them with a lacquer in their name and a portion of the proceeds go the charity of their choice!! This has been the most rewarding adventure in my heart and we plan to keep our awareness line growing and growing!!

Feel free to share your stories with us at any time via email info@littlenailgirl.com.

Vapid Lacquer - Fall 2014 Collection

Hi guys! Today I have swatches and my review of Vapid Lacquer's Fall 2014 Collection! I am insanely in love with all the polishes I am seeing coming from all the indie ladies this year and Vapid Lacquer is no exception. Krys has been killing it in the holo and creme department lately!

There are 9 total in the collection...let's get started! 
(Be forewarned..I was off my nailart game the days I took these pics. Plus I rely heavily on the sun for my photos, so I didn't want to take too much time with art and not be able to get all the polishes photographed. I also didn't do nailart for all of them, as again..the sun was not my friend)

I,A.M...CustomColor - Invader Zim "Let the Nightmare Begin" Pt. 2

Hi everyone! Today I have a few swatches to share from indie brand I,A.M...Custom Color Cosmetics' Invader Zim "Let the Nightmare Begin" collection Pt.2! In case you don't know, I,A.M...Custom Color Cosmetics is owned and operated by the lovely Ashlie Jade out of California. Their supplies and products are created using organic and fair trade ingredients, cruelty free and polishes are 5 free. They do disclose that they are not vegan, as they use beeswax and carmine (a red pigment) in a few of their products.

Pretty Woman Virtual Back to School Party

Hi everyone!

TODAY Pretty Woman USA is hosting a really awesome Virtual Party from 12-6pm EST, celebrating  Back-to-School! They will be giving away Pretty Woman nail polish, along with some other fun goodies every hour on the hour! You definitely don't want to miss this.

Be sure to join them on Twitter (@PrettyWomanNYC), Instagram (@PrettyWomanNYC) and YouTube (PrettyWomanUSA) for a chance to win! (I'll be hosting their Twitter feed from 4-6pm EST...get ready for some fun! I'll be gosting 2 giveaways while I'm there!)

Signet Nails - "The Stars, Like Dust" Collection (swatches and review)

Hi everyone! Today I have swatches and my review of Signet Nails 'The Stars, Like Dust" collection. For those of you that don't know, Signet Nails was created by the lovely Lauren of @lalanail. She happens to be one of the very first nail girls I ever followed, even before she was @signetnails.

About Signet Nails (as listed on their website)

All Signet Nail polishes are '5 free' and vegan!

Signet Nails is a one-woman project by Lauren Nail Swindol. Inspired by signet rings used in days past and present, Signet hopes you will find a hand mixed shade that really represents YOU. All polishes are made in my Mississippi home with love, inspiration, and the buyer in mind. Make your impression with Signet Nails.

Luxe Lacquers August Subscription Box (swatches and review)

Hi everyone!  Today I have Luxe Lacquers August Subscription Box to share with you.

You can also check out my reviews of the June and July boxes, as I believe Roxy has some of the previous month's polishes for sale as singles!

Vapid Lacquer - Thermal Holos (Swatches and Review)

The lovely Krys of Vapid Lacquer has done it again! This time....THERMAL HOLOS! Best of both worlds!

Now , until she made these, I have only ever tried1 actual thermal. Though the one I have changes colors as promised, the formula was horrific! (no I will not say who it was made by) :)

Krys' thermal holos have the same amazing formula as all of her other polishes. They only take 2 coats for full coverage and they shine all on their own without topcoat.

Inspired by - A Border

In keeping with my 'Inspired By' posts, today I have another recreation of a border pattern I found during a google image search. I believe I typed in "art deco patterns" when I found this.

Cookie Monster pictorial

I don't generally do tutorials or pictorials, mainly because I'm not very good at them, haha. But I had recently gained a lot of followers and one of them asked if I could do a tutorial for a Cookie Monster mani. I was in such a great mood that I decided to give it a go! Be nice..lol!

Vapid Lacquer (Swatches and Review)

I was super excited to review more polishes from Vapid Lacquer because everything I've ever used of hers is AMAZING!

She is one of the best scattered and linear holo polish maker I know! They always have amazing formulas, superior coverage and gorgeous colors. This round of polishes is even better than the last ones I've tried!

Picsart Watermark Tutorial (Mobile App for Androids only)

When you first open your picture on the Picsart mobile app it will look like the picture below. Click the "A" to add text to the picture (circled in yellow)

After clicking on the "A", the screen below will pop up. Here is where you change the font type and color. Slide the screen to the left to view the fonts available that are free.

Now follow these steps: (also see the pictures below)

1. type in the text you want

2. choose the font (pick any font you want)

3. pick the text color (I chose black) 

1&2 3.

4. Click on the check mark in the top right hand corner;

The text will appear as seen in the left picture below.

To resize, click on the arrow in the white circle and move is around until you have the size you want. To change the orientation, click on the arrows in the grey circle and move them around until the font is facing the direction you want. You can move the text anywhere on the screen by simply dragging it with your finger/mouse.

To wrap the text, click on the icon circled in yellow (as seen below- pic 1.). A box will appear listing Orientation, Opacity and Wrap. Click wrap. Move the slider bar until the text is wrapped to your specifications (as seen below - pic 2.) As you wrap the text it will move out of place, just simply click and drag it back to where you want it.

To change the opacity, click on the box (as seen in pic1.) and choose opacity. Again a slider bar will appear at the bottom. Slide it until you have the text at the opacity you desire. 

Once the text it wrapped and the opacity is changed you can click the check mark in the bottom right hand corner. 

Wallah! you're done! Be sure to save your work before exiting the application!.

I am no tutorial expert, but I really hope this helps all of you. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks for reading!

Weekly Manis

Hi everyone! Today I just wanted to share some of the manis I did over the past two weeks. This will be post 1 of 2.  I've been really practicing hard to up my nailart game and I think I'm finally getting there! I'm definitely proud of how far I've come in just under 4 months. If you're a new follower, you can check out my very first "nailart" attempt here and my first "swatch" here. At the time, I was super duper proud of them...lmao! Now all I can do is laugh and hope that no one scrolls down too far on my account..haha!

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First up is my Neon Cheetah mani! I really love the way the me on colors pop out on the white base. this was my first time trying to print and I'm pretty pleased with the way it came out! I'm not sure why I was so scared to try before.

I used OPI Alpine Snow as the base and acrylic paint for the cheetah print.

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This second mani was done using all 

of the colors from @whimsicalcolor's ( Liquid Sky Lacquer) Jordan Almond collection. 

This was my first purchase from Liquluid Sky Lacquer and I have to say that Carol makes amazing cream polishes. I added a small design using acrylic paint just a shade darker than each polish.

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This mani was created using OPI Alpine Snow as the base and black acrylic paint.  Not really sure what I was going for but this is what came out. One of the girls on Facebook mentioned that it 

reminded her of the storm troopers from Star Wars. hahaha. I totally agree!

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A lot of times when I'm having trouble coming what up with an idea, I just do a google image search for something random. For this one I searched swirls and grass and the picture on the left came up. My recreation of this is on the right. I really really like the way this one came out, very abstract!

              

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This final mani was the product of my very first pupurchase from @winstonia_store (Winstonia). I had never used nail studs and was pretty excited when they finall arrived!

I used a base of Essie Sand Tropez and...you guessed it, acrylic paint!

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I have been chosen to swatch for a couple new indie brands, so expect to see those post in the coming months!

Hope you enjoyed reading!

Weekly Manis

Hi Everyone! Whew! I've been so busy this past week or so. I've been working really hard on swatches and reviews for some wonderful indie brands, as well as some personal things going on in my life. But I'm here and back with more weekly manis!

First up, I did my first attempt at the "dry brush" technique. Basically I put on a coat of Sally Hansen Espresso and let it dry completely, or almost completely. I'm a little impatient..haha. Then I dry bushed Elf Cosmetics Mint Cream, Wet n Wilds Black creme and OPI's Alpine Snow. Dry brushing is so simple, I don't know why I hadn't tried it before. You basically just wipe off as much excess polish on the polish bottle top and brush it onto your nail. (hope that makes sense, I'm horrible at giving instructions). You don't have to give any dry time in between colors, as the amount of polish you brush on is so minimal. Once I got them how I wanted them I just topped them off with Glisten and Glow's HK Girl topcoat. Wallah! Easy Peasy!

Weekly Manis

Well, I was defeated in trying to get this post up this past weekend. I had a few other blog posts I needed to get done. In addition to the recreations in my last post, I also did a lot of my own designs. Counting them up....wow! I did a lot of manis last week! Haha! Enjoy!
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First up, I used Mango Madness by Elf Cosmetics as my base and acrylic paint for the design. My goal was to design some artsy flowers towards the base of my nail with some abstracty polka dots. I though they looked great until my husband asked if they were strawberries!?! Haha. I hate to admit it, but he was right. So here are my flower/strawberry nails.

Inspiration Recreation

This week, I have some manis that I'm really proud of. I did a few entries for contests where you recreate a mani you are inspired by. I generally get a lot of my inspiration from other nail lovers already, but this was fun to try to recreate them exactly! Hope you love them!

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This first mani was a recreation of one done by @nailartbysig a long time ago. I loved it! I started with a base of Sinful Colors Snow Me White, then free handed the blue, green and purple stripes with acrylic paint. I used a dotting tool and black acrylic paint for the polka dots.

Weekly Manis

So I've decided to start sharing more of my manis on a weekly basis. Every weekend I plan to share all of the manis I did that week! In order to catch up, I'm going to share my favorites from last month and this month so far!

First up is my very first attempt at roses! I used Maybelline ColorShow in Bare Escape as my base and acrylic paint for the art. I was really proud of these and think they came out great!

                   

Missing in Action

Hi everyone! Just wanted to let you all know that I am still alive! Sorry I've been MIA this past month. We've had a lot going on. My son started some new therapy classes and we are finally in a smooth groove..haha!

I've recently been given the opportunity to swatch and blog for a new collection made by a wonderful Indie brand! Not saying who just yet, it'll be a surprise!

Anyway, now that things are calming down, you can expect a lot more posts from me!

Thanks for sticking around. Remember, you can always check me out on Instagram and Facebook. Just search for LacqueredMama!

♡♡♡♡♡