Butterflies, glitter and fauxnad flowers

Hi Kids!
Expecting me to jazz up yesterday's mani, Avon Glisten Scintillant with snowflakes?...NOT!
We got our first snow here in Southern New Jersey, so the last thing I wanted to wear on my nails was a winter theme.
'Tis the season for my whining and complaining about the cold. I hate winter. All those warm and fuzzy TV commercials with everyone gathered around the fireplace sipping hot chocolate and toddies does nothing for me. It's a sham...it's freaking COLD outside, and no kind of household heat can rid me of the radiant cold I feel creeping through the floorboards and through windows.
My husband is planning on retiring to the Mid West within 10 years. He will be going alone, I'm afraid. I'm going South, to get as close to the Equator as I can.
Anyway...
Cold, first snow...bad. Butterflies, flowers...good.
Yesterday's mani, Avon Glisten Scintillant topped off with body tattoo glitter butterflies and fauxnad flowers stamped with WnW Nocturnal using Essence plate from Ulta. I also accented the butterfly bodies with small hex glitter in several colors for some extra flash. Sally Hansen Hidden Treasure and Nfu-Oh #50 also used to accent butterfly wings. 2 coats Seche.
I like this...
You'll have to click on these to get a better look at the pretty sparkle.

Out of focus

Here's the body tattoos I used. They're applied using water, just like water nail decals. The only drawback I have found with this type of glitter tattoos is that after they're on the nail, the surface feels sticky. Within a day, this sticky-ness will work its' way up and through topcoats. I'll be adding Barielle Extender to this before I leave for work to see if it helps with this issue.

Glisten Scintillant, Avon Mirror Shine

Hi Kids!
I am not a huge fan of chrome polish on my nails for anything but stamping. The iciness of a chrome is too harsh for me...makes me feel cold, and I can't stand the cold. That said, I'm really surprised that I liked Avon Mirror Shine, Glisten Scintillant, enough to wear it as a full mani.

The difference of this chrome, from all the others in my collection, is in the frosty texture of the pigment/particles. This texture helps to reduce harsh iciness, making for a very pretty, soft, satiny, diffused chrome with a bright and large, glowing halo.
The formula of Avon Glisten Scintillant is quite remarkable. This is a 1 coater! The polish had a nice consistency, not too thin, not too thick and flowed smoothly on the nail without any brush strokes. What I liked best...although this dried quickly, it wasn't too fast...just enough time to go over and get even coverage.
I'm not too sure about Avon's choice of bottle, though...cheap, lightweight and plastic.

I'm wearing this sans top coat... click to make 'em bigger...

Very glow-y, even under low light...

Next pic is for texture comparison... NOT color accurate!

Ruby Pumps with gold holo sequin tips

Hi Kids!
'Tis the season for Bling!
My NOTD

 Yes...that's a Pizzelle I'm holding.
China Glaze Ruby Pumps and gold holo sequin tips. Second coat of Seche not quite dry as evidenced by lumpy pinky tip. I can't stand thick or lumpy tips, so I taped my mani off and removed Ruby pumps from the area...

I used a bit of Color Club Abracadabra (orange jelly with the sparkliest gold glitter ever) to fill in bald spots. I believe this was from a mini Halloween collection. I'd love to have a full sized bottle...soooo sparkley!

I used loose, large hex and small hex holo sequins and applied them with a dotting tool.

 Ruby Pumps

Orly Winter Wonderland (over underwear)

Hi Kids!
I can't believe I almost didn't buy this polish...It's beyond gorgeous!
Go figure, although I love and gravitate to dark and bold lacquers, Orly Winter Wonderland easily takes the #1 spot in my top 20 list if layered over my choice of underwear, Avon Ballerina. 

I have been searching for a wearable polish in the white family forever, and I am beyond ecstatic that I found *the one* that looks good on me. I know this sound silly, but- I'm having a terrible time looking away from my nails long enough to type this post. My mind is twisted up in a tumble of stamping ideas for this glass flecked mani. (Jellies are going to look amazing stamped over this!)

Anyway...although my pictures are decent, the Macro setting sees the glass flecks in this polish as more grainey and lumpy than they really are. I think it's because the flecks have a silvered reflective coating and the setting sees this as opaque. In real life the glass flecks are more like a frosted sugar coating. Imagine the inside of a seashell but pulverized. I can't tell you how much I love this layered combo...neutral, soft and ethereal, sprinkled with bold.

I don't very much like my hands, or the fact that I have no other choice than to wear acrylics. With this mani, for the first time, ever, I'm not bothered by this. Winter Wonderland/Ballerina is magical for me...I feel like a Goddess.
I can't think of a single polish or layered combo that makes me feel this way.

Mani;
1 coat Orly Winter Wonderland 
1 coat Avon Ballerina (soft, sheer, neutral pink jelly)
1 coat Seche
As far as formula is concerned, Avon Ballerina is amazingly streak free and super shiny at 1 coat, and is build-able to opaque in 3 coats. I recommend a thin first coat and each succeeding coat be applied thicker than the last. Brush was excellent!
The formula of Orly Winter Wonderland was goopy and thick. It's the type of polish that gets thicker the longer the brush is out of the bottle. Even after adding thinner, I had to be careful when wrapping my tips. As thin as I made it, by the time my nail was covered, the polish thickened too much on the brush to get a nice smooth tip. I had to re-dip the brush for the right consistency.

Funky French, The Show Must Go On!

Hi Kids!
Be prepared for a lot of pictures... The color shifting pigments in OPI The Show Must Go On! are amazing!

Before I go on, I have to say that this Funky French was not a planned mani, but a back-up for a fail. I was thisclose to finishing an awesome layered fauxnad (on a turquoise base), when a slip up cost me the whole mani. Any other day, I would be very disappointed in losing the time invested into a mani- but not today...
The Show Must Go On is so striking and interesting, I don't even care about my fail!

Pictures taken under several lighting conditions. Clickable...
(cuticle area in a bit of a mess...the turquoise polish I had on prior to TSMGO pooled in some spots and was extremely difficult to remove)

 2 coats OPI The Show Must Go On! over 2 coats 10 Professional Nail Lacquer Cocolate Kiss
Freehand chevron tips, 1 coat QingYu #57 black
Fauxnad H20 stamped with QingYu #57 black
Bundle Monster BM11 stamped with a gold franken over tips
Gold Holo dots from Jones Tones
2 coats Seche

Lilac foil

Hi kids!
After the trouble I had removing my layered mani from a few days ago, it's going to be a very long time before I wear glitter and flakies together!
Removal was a time consuming, 3 step process; 1.) non-acetone remover to dissolve Seche top coat, 2.) nail drill to grind off glitter, flakie and crackle polish, 3.) and non-acetone remover to dissolve the Milani polish.

So, after all that work, I wanted to wear an easy to apply, quick dry, 2 coat polish, and being in the mood for something in the purple family, I chose S-he Stylezone #436, a pretty lilac foil. I think this polish makes my nails look elegant, and is the very type of mani I could wear for days if I had to.

Weird layered mani

Hi Kids!
I have a weird layering mani for you today.
I started off with 2 coats of Milani Pink Out Loud, which I didn't like. Instead of removing my mani, I chose to cover it up with a purple crack polish I got in an old swap with Thriszha.
Unfortunately, I wasn't to keen on that combo and proceeded to add 1 layer each of Nfu-Oh 49 and 50, and then topped the whole shebang off with Love My Nails Dazzling.

The end result of this layered mani looks really cool, but I'm still on the fence on whether I like *this* many layers of polish on my nails.
Tons of pictures under all lighting conditions. Make them bigger to see all the detail!