31 Day Challenge - Day 11: Polkadots

Yes, I'm pretty crazy about this manicure. Anyone who has been a follower of mine on Instagram (@kimberlymaranan) knows that I'm such a sucker for any pink creme polish. Combine that with glitter? Well, now that is a stellar mani in my books.

I have channeled my inner yogi with this beautiful, universally flattering rosy pink creme from Essie's Fall 2012 Yogaga Collection called Marathin. This polish is so amazing, even though I think that the name perpetuates the "thin is in" mind set, but I digress. Every woman can wear this colour; it's girly and sophisticated, neutral enough to wear every day (which I would if I didn't have so many polishes), and just gives the nails an overall polished look. If the fabulous colour wasn't enough, the formula on this polish is also superb. It's opaque in one beautifully even, leveling coat. This polish also dries very quicky for an opaque creme polish. If you slap some Seche Vite over it, your mani is done in 5 minutes tops.

Now that isn't even the star of this manicure, it's the polkadots of this amazing glitter. Cynthia Rowley brings us this beautiful polish filled with tiny blue glitters with some hot pink and hold glitters thrown in as well. The mix of colours is fantastic and so unique. If it wasn't for the hot pink glitters, this would be a pretty perfect dupe for OPI - Absolutely Allice. The glitters are very densely packed in the clear base, and if applied all over the nail, this polish would be opaque with two thick coats.

For the polkadots, I actually used the rounded end of a bobby pin to dot them onto the nail. It was a pretty perfect tool for the job, giving small even dots. While doing this mani, I found that it is ten times easier dotting with a glitter polish than a creme one. It's much easier to control the amount of polish you are applying to the nail, and therefore you are less likely to get blobs of polish instead of tiny, little dots.

So hopefully you're as swept away by this mani as I am. I know that I'll be sad to have to remove it so I can do tomorrow's challenge, but I'll enjoy it for as long as I can. Thanks as always for reading, and I hope you stop by for tomorrow's mani!

31 Day Challenge - Day 10: Gradient

Since I posted a gradient for a previous challenge, I wanted to change things up slightly. And because I don't think I'm good enough to tackle more than a two-colour look, this is the manicure I came up with.

This angled gradient creates a chevron effect across the nails which I personally have never seen before. Due to my fading lighting (sorry, the sun was going down), I had a ton of glare off the super shiny top coat so please excuse that as it skews your view of the actual design. For this nail look I used Revlon - Posh as an all-over base to start. This is a fantastic bright, summery green with a formula that is to die for. A one-coater, smooth and fast-drying, it's definitely one of my favourites that the brand has to offer.

I then painted some of Posh and some of China Glaze - Smoke And Ashes from the Spring 2012 Hunger Games Capitol Colors Collection onto a sponge. Smoke And Ashes is an almost black green base with beautiful green-blue-gold multi-chromatic shimmers throughout. Obviously these pictures do this polish zero justice to its beauty in real life. I then transferred the polish from the sponge to the nail by dabbing it on the nail at a 45 degree angle, and redoing this step until the China Glaze colour was opaque at the base. I repeated this step for each nail, alternating directions so as to create the chevron. I then finished the look off with a coat of Essie - Good To Go top coat, just to even out the the surface and add a beautiful shine.

It may be that these polishes don't look great together, or together as a gradient, but whatever it is, this definitely is not one combination that I'll be trying again. I do love both polishes separately, so we'll experiment with them in different looks for the future.

Thanks as always for reading, and be sure to check out my post for tomorrow because I'm completely enamoured with it!

31 Day Challenge - Day 9: Rainbow

Darn, and I was doing so well with posting one every single day! Oh well, hopefully this one was worth the wait. I chose to feature a rainbow confetti glitter for today's challenge, and this one is gorgeous.

A shot in direct sunlight

Nancy's Birthday from Whimsical Ideas by Pam is a multicoloured glitter of varying sizes in a cool pastel pink jelly base. There's silver, hot pink, sky blue, kelly green, orange, and sunny yellow glitters in there. This nail polish is basically a party on your fingertips! Application is a breeze, with a tone of glitter in every stroke. You don't need to do some strange dabbing technique for the glitter to be placed evenly over the entire nail, so that's pretty terrific. To top that off, the amount of glitter on my nails is achieved with only two coats! The base colour is still slightly sheer, with a hint of visible nail line showing through, which I personal like. If you want it completely opaque, just add a third coat.

A shot under indirect sunlight

With such large, chunky glitters, you would think that the surface of this polish when dried would be extremely bumpy and uneven. Well compared to some others with this amount of glitter, that is not so. The glitters actually do a good job of laying flat on the surface of the nail minimizing the uneven texture. A thin layer of Essie - Good To Go top coat and the surface is smooth like glass. I think this would be a great polish for many skin tones, because although the base colour leans slightly cooler toned, it's still a very flattering colour on warm skin-toned gals like myself.

Whimsical Ideas by Pam polishes can be purchased through her from her Facebook page, just search Whimsical Ideas by Pam. Shipping only provided for the US. Stayed tuned for my next challenge mani a little later today, and thanks for reading!