Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day and I have a love/hate relationship. I cannot completely hate a day that gives me an excuse to cover my nails in cute colors and hearts. Who can?

This particular manicure is a Barielle polish explosion. Seriously. All Barielle shades. Six, in fact.

Barielle Enduring (white), Smarty Pants Pink (light pink), Eli's Magic (hot pink), Vivacious (red), Grape Escape (purple), and Black Rose (blackened burgundy).

There is quite a bit going on. Hearts, dots, gradient, and stamping (using plate BM-317).

Boogie Nights for Audrey

Behind again. Shame on this blogger.

The first of many manicures to come is this simple little cutie. China Glaze For Audrey with an accent of Ulta Boogie Nights. I love blue and gold together!

Very Belated Birthday Manicure

When I say belated, I mean belated. My birthday was back in August. Better late than never I suppose.

I started with Pure Ice Wild Thing, the closest polish I had to my birthstone. On my index and pinky, I have OPI Rainbow Connection. Not only is it colorful, its a dupe for Deborah Lippmann Happy Birthday. How perfect?! The glitter on my ring finger is a little less colorful with ICING Glitterati. Some cute cupcakes topped it off with the use of stamping plates BM-H19 and BM-H20.

Essence Cotton Candy and French Glam

I hope you are enjoying your Friday! As you probably know by now, I am obsessed with Essence cosmetics. I own so many of their polishes (nearly an entire drawer in my melmer) and a ton of their makeup. I just love them. So is it really a surprise that today's manicure is all Essence?

A rare peek of my right hand. :) Essence Cotton Candy is a sheer very light pink creme. This is three coats. It has a delicate feel to it, and would be perfect for french manicures. I added French Glam Nail Stickers from Essence to glam this polish up a bit. The stickers are black (some with clear stones) on clear.

Barielle January Sweepstakes (Coming Soon)

Barielle is kicking off the new year with a bang! In the form of a giveaway, that is. This amazing event starts January 8th. More details to follow.

Get Into It (imPRESS nails)

I hope you are enjoying your Thursday! First post of the new year. Today, I have some super cute press on nails to share with you. I usually do not go for fake nails. I used to obsess over them when I was a child and they always popped off. I'm happy to say, that's not the case with these lovely nails.

Aren't they adorable? I love the mix of french tip, animal print, and floral. Its eye catching in all the right ways. imPRESS nails stick on with adhesive tabs, so there is no nail damage, which I love. They apply fairly easy and last several days. The nails are on the short side. My natural nails were nearly as long as the fake ones.

Overall, I love these! They have a natural feel to them. Most people thought these were my real nails with either nail art or stickers.

2014 Is Finally Here!

I have not been a good blogger this past year. Its been a difficult year and polish was shoved to the back burner. We buried my grandma one year ago today. We were very close. Many other losses occurred as well. My other grandmother passed away as well. Its been a depressing year to say the least.

Now that 2013 is over, I plan to start the new year off right. I will get blogs up regularly and throw myself back into polish. For those of you that stuck around during my blogging slump, thank you!

I cannot wait to share 2014 with all of you!

Breast Cancer Awareness Manicure

I hope you are enjoying your Monday! I know its not quite October yet, but Ulta started their Donate with a Kiss yesterday. And I needed a manicure for the occasion. 

I used OPI Strawberry Margarita, Color Club Blushing Rose, and stamping plate BM-321. The plate makes it easy to create awareness manicures in every color.

Diamond Candles Giveaway Winner

Drum roll please... :P

Skye Kiloh you are my Diamond Candles Giveaway Winner!

Thank you to everyone who checked out my review and entered. I have so many new posts in the works, as well as a Barielle giveaway for sometime next month.

Barielle Well Fall Sweepstakes

I have an awesome giveaway to share with you!

A total of eleven winners! Ten winners will receive a set of Barielle products worth nearly $100. They are amazing items! Two Fall packs of Barielle shades (Nude & Naughty and Sophisticated Lady), Nail Rebuilding Protein Base, Nail Strengthening Cream, and No Chip Speed Dry Topcoat. One grand prize winner will receive the set, plus a Cole Haan tote bag. Barielle always has amazing prizes!

The sweepstakes starts runs from September 12, 2013 through June 30, 2013. You must reside in the United States and be over thirteen years of age to enter. Remember to "like" their Facebook page and click here.

Diamond Candles Review

I'm a girly girly at heart. Obviously, I love nail polish. But I also love hair, makeup, jewelry, candles, art, decor... basically anything feminine. So when I was approached about reviewing a Diamond Candle, I jumped at the chance. I had been staring at them for weeks.

When my candle arrived, I could smell the deliciousness from the moment I opened the box. It was safely nestled to ensure it arrived intact.

The candle is enormous at 21 ounces and the outside is precious. Each scent has a different label. Gingerbread Latte has a cute little gingerbread man taking a dip in a nice warm latte.

Diamond Candles are a unique product. Each candle comes with a ring hidden inside. The ring is worth between $10 and $5,000. You can either burn your candle and wait for the surprise, or dig ahead and fish it out yourself. You can see where my ring is positioned within the candle.

Their candles are all natural soy from US soy beans. Definitely a good option is you love all natural products.

I wish I could send the smell of this candle throw the computer! It is amazing! Diamond Candles describes it as "Ever wondered what it would be like to sit in a hot tub of overpriced fancy latte coffee drinks? This sweet gingerbread and coffee-inspired indulgence will make you want to grab your keys and drive on down to the local coffee shop." It really does smell like what I imagined when I read this. The smell fills the whole room. Its even lovely when not lit. 

How beautiful is this ring?! I am unsure how much is it worth, but regardless, it is a gorgeous ring. The sizes vary. I would guess this is about a size seven. Its a little tight on my left ring finger which measures seven point five.

Overall, Diamond Candles are well worth purchasing. You get an amazing all natural soy candle to bring wonderful scents into your home. Plus the bonus of a surprise ring inside. I was honestly skeptical about purchasing a candle online since you cannot smell it beforehand, but all my doubts have melted away.

Each candle retails for $24.95 at Diamond Candles.

If you are interested in trying a Diamond Candle, check out my giveaway.

Diamond Candle Giveaway

I hope you are enjoying your Wednesday! I had this giveaway up before, but I think Blogger ate it. The post isn't there anymore and it got zero entries, so... I'm going to assume Blogger ate it.

Diamond Candles and I are giving away a beautiful candle to one lucky person! Their candles are amazing! Seriously. I'll have a review up on my own personal candle later today.

Diamond Candles are all natural soy candles with a little surprise inside. Within each candle hides a beautiful ring. The rings are valued between $10 and $5,000. They literally combined three of my favorite things all in one. Candles, surprises, and jewelry.

The candles come in a variety of scents and retail for $24.95 each. I'll link my review once its up. Now on to the fun part. All you have to do is fill in the entries below and you could win a Diamond Candle of your choice.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

You can follow my blog via GFC or Bloglovin', just leave the info within the entry. Good luck!

Where I have been this year

This year has been tough. We buried my grandma on New Years Day. That was incredibly hard for all of us. We were very close, and I miss her everyday. I could not seem to get back into life. Things I loved lost my interest. I was lost.

Not too long after that, we had to put our nine year old dog DeeDee to sleep. Her organs were shutting down and letting her go was the best thing for her. Pets are like family. It was heartbreaking to watch her slowly slip away.

The year seemed to get better for a small amount of time. My brother got married; I started dating. But 2013 was not done throwing curve balls. In late August, my aunt contacted my dad. My aunt is not a nice person. She put my grandma in a nursing home far from us and would not allow us contact. She had power of attorney, so it was within her ability to do so. On the phone she told my dad that his mother passed away last month. Sadly, it was true. After some searching online, he found the obituary. My grandmother, my last living grandparent, had passed. I didn't get to attend her funeral or have a proper goodbye. My aunt denied us that. As you can imagine, I've been deeply grieving. This year has been hard on me and the rest of my family.

So things have taken a back seat to my feelings. I've neglected my blog. I'm going to make a serious effect to get back into the swing of posting. I think it will help. I've got a pile of things to review and so many new polishes to share.

Take a Peek at My Storage With Me

I hope you are enjoying your Saturday! I've been slacking on my posting again. 2013 has not been the kindest year. There have been good things. But those good things are also time consuming. So here we are...

I have been meaning to do this post for months. I'm always curious about peoples storage, so why not share my own? I recently added some new pieces and did a little rearranging, so it seemed like the perfect time for pictures. First off, let me start by saying "ignore the mess". I'm not a neat freak. More like organized chaos queen, so there is a lot of junk going on by my storage.

Behold the tower of polish! LOL... I have six melmers. Yes, six. If you aren't savvy with the polish community lingo, melmer is not the real name. We call them melmers because they are similar to a helmer from Ikea, and can be found at Michaels. Take the M from Michaels and add it to part of helmer. :)  Depending on where you get them, they are called different things. Hobby Lobby sells JetMax 3-Drawer Storage Cubes. Mine are from Michaels and is a Recollections Drawer Cube. They are all the exact same thing (as far as I know), except the drawer pulls vary from brand to brand. Mine have filing cabinet type pulls.

As you can see, I have three drawers stacked on top of each other. They are designed to stack. Three is as high as I've ever gone. The front of the drawers are covered with scrapbook paper (from Michaels), which was placed on with modge podge. I recently bought two of the cubes you see here and did not have the energy the get the scrapbook paper on after assembling. So I left them blank and rearranged the drawers. I like the break of white.

On top of the cubes, I have my little Recollections Desktop Carousel (from Michaels), a decorative "Paris" box, and a bag.

A closeup of my carousel. I have so much stored in this thing. Suspension base, bottles, rhinestones, nail polish pens, toe separators, nail art brushes, my giant 4 ounce bottle of Seche Vite, my nail wheels, and much much more. It spins for easy access to everything. How fun?!

The "Paris" box is from Hobby Lobby and stores all of my backup polishes. Yes, I need an entire box for them. I love anything French themed. Blame it on my Louisianian heart. The bag on top of the box is my manicure bag. It has practically everything I need to do my nails. I pull what I need from my drawers and put it in a specific pocket of the bag then go to wherever I'm doing my nails. The bag contains a lot. Polish thinner, cotton balls, q-tips, cuticle oil, base coats, top coats, cuticle remover, stamper, scraper, nail clippers, lotion, polish remover, and a whole bunch more. Now to take a peek inside the drawers...

An example of two drawers for you guys. I do not fill my drawers to full capacity. I used to and I hated rearranging every time I got a new polish. So now I leave space for new addictions. The top picture shows a drawer lined with basic no slip drawer liner. I need to replace it. It ruins the labels on the bottom of polish. Makes them all weird and oily. In the second picture, you can see my new lining. Fleece. Easily accessible for purchase and keeps the bottles from moving around.

As you can see, my drawers are not full. So I do not have six melmers full of polish. I have five semi full of polish, with space for new polishes. One is for supplies.

Oh, and for the curious people: I know I would be staring on these pictures wondering what all the stuff in the background was. I'm curious like that. You can see my Renoir print, faux gumball machine, wire jewelry mannequin, basket, boxes, and fleur de lis rug.

Wow... I think that basically covers everything. If there is anything else you would like to see, let me know. :)

Mint Manis for Talia Joy (featuring Funky Fingers Mrs. Mint)

Tuesday July 16, 2013 the beauty blogging realm (and ultimately the world) lost a very talented young woman. Talia Joy Castellano was only 13 years old and battled two forms of cancer over half of her lifetime. She accomplished so much and inspired so many people in her short life. Its always sad when anyone is taken too soon, but especially at her age.

Her last Instagram manicure was a mint polish, thus Mint Manis for Talia was born. Today many of the people she reached are wearing mint manicures in her honor, including myself.

For my mint mani, I chose Funky Fingers Mrs. Mint, a mint green creme filled with subtle gold shimmer. Mint with a little something extra (just like Talia).

She will be dearly missed. In her life she accomplished so much. Her family and friends plan to see all of her dreams fulfilled.

Talia's Youtube Channel and Instagram can be found here.

F4 Mint Chocolate Chip

I'm still here! A week behind, but I swear I'm still here. I've been a busy little bee. Work (aka insanity lately), family, and my new budding relationship. Yep, dating. :) I've had a lot on my mind blog wise, which I'll cover at the end.

Today I have F4 Mint Chocolate Chip to share with you. I'm a sucker for anything mint chocolate. Its my favorite flavor ice cream. So when I saw this polish, I had to have it! It looks as good as mint chocolate chip ice cream tastes. That's really saying something! Mint Chocolate Chip is a mint green creme filled with brown micro glitter. The creme is just sheer enough to see the glitter of the coat beneath, giving it amazing depth. The application was great.

F4 polishes are sold in their Etsy store and retail for $8 (15ml).

Edit: What blogger forgot the stuff she was going to cover at the end? This one. I've had so many ideas circling around in my head. Should I do weekly stuff? Like Nail Art Wednesday or something like that. A couple of weekly installments. Also, should I attempt vlogging? The thought of being on camera scares me. But it could be fun. Maybe I'll post a test video and see how it goes.

I really want to do things other than nail polish too. But right now, I'm leaving my blog nail related. I'm going to post all other stuff on my Instagram. Makeup, jewelry, and such. Hopefully I can get better at makeup shots. So far, mine suck. So please tell me what you want to see! Tell me here, or on one of my many social sites. Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and Instagram. Plus there's Youtube and Pinterest (but I suppose those aren't great places to tell me something, just wanted to throw them in.) And as always, there's email.

Bright Skittles

I hope you are enjoying your Thursday! Most of the pictures you will see over the next week or so are old-ish. This particular manicure is from February. Poor thing is happy to see the light of day. Or at least the light of the blogosphere.

These bright skittles were fun and easy to do. From thumb to pinky: Cosmetic Arts Limelight, Zoya Pippa, Color Club Poptastic, Ulta Blue Streak, and Julep Anne. Each is two coats. The little design on my ring finger is an Essence French Glam Nail Stickers. Each sheet has several designs.

Colorful Leopard Print

I'm back! If you want to know why I was gone, see this post. Its too much to summarize again. Oh my goodness, I missed you guys so much! To all of those who stuck with me during my absence, thank you! To those who left, I hope you come back soon. And to those who are new, welcome!

So many of the upcoming posts are old-ish manicures. However, this one is brand new. I hit the blogs for inspiration and ended up wanting to recreate this gorgeous leopard print by Chalkboard Nails. For mine, I used Zoya Pippa, Essence Let's Get Lost, and Sally Hansen Black Out. Leopard print is an easy design, even for the nail art challenged. I love it!

I'm trying out a new watermark technique. Let me know what you think.

Barielle Nail It Sweepstakes

I have another Barielle giveaway to share with you. Yes, another!

A total of eleven winners! Ten winners will receive a set of Barielle products worth nearly $100. They are amazing items! Two Summer packs of Barielle shades (Summer Brights and Brilliant Colors), Nail Rebuilding Protein Base, Nail Strengthening Cream, and No Chip Speed Dry Topcoat. One grand prize winner will receive the set, plus a DKNY blue leather handbag. How amazing is that?!

The sweepstakes starts runs from June 10, 2013 through June 30, 2013. You must reside in the United States and be over thirteen years of age to enter. Remember to "like" their Facebook page and click here (computer) or here (mobile phone) to enter.

Barielle Brilliant Colors Collection

I have an awesome Summer collection to share with you today! Normally, I swatch each color separately; however, when I saw this one, I knew I had to do them all together. They just screamed skittles.

The Barielle Brilliant Colors Collections consists of five creme shades perfect for all the Summer days to come.

Barielle Smarty Pants Pink is a bubblegum pink creme. Literally the perfect bubblegum pink. Not too bright, not too pastel. The formula is perfection and opaque in two coats.

Barielle Straight A Coral is a red toned coral creme. I love corals for Spring and Summer! The formula on this one was just as great as the last.

Barielle High Marks Purple is a grape purple creme. Describing the formula will get redundant. I can tell you right now, they were all amazing. High Marks Purple looks a little uneven on my nail, but that is my fault.

Barielle Magna Cum Laude Turquoise is a bright aqua creme. Puts me in the mood for a fun day of playing in the water.

Last, but definitely not least, we have Barielle Head of the Class Green, a seafoam green creme. I cannot say enough how much I love this collection. I wore it for days on my fingers. So many people randomly questioned what polish I had on my nails. It was a big hit!

This collection retails for $8 individually, $25 for the whole set at Barielle.

Disclosure: The products in this post were provided to me for consideration. All opinions are mine and honest.