Ladybird Nail Art

My sister has lovely nails, and she is kind enough to let me paint them at least once a week.

Last weekend I was feeling adventurous and wanted to experiment with some nail art.

My sister, always the good sport, agreed and she happily wore ladybird nails for half the week!

These ladybird nails are super cute and super easy.  My dotting could easily be improved, but I reckon their derpy eyes add character!

China Glaze Kalahari Kiss & I'm Not Lion

I'm still fairly new join the China Glaze bandwagon, but of the few China Glaze polishes I have, I have been quite impressed.

As far as collections go, I have more of the On Safari polishes than any other China Glaze collection.  They are stunning and I am already planning on adding the rest to my stash in the not so distant future.

Today I am showing you Kalahari Kiss with a I'm Not Lion gradient.

Kalahari Kiss is described as a light sand brown, but I would say it leans more towards a dirty yellowy/custard colour.

I'm Not Lion is gold, silver and holographic glitter in a clear base.  It's one of those super dense fine glitters that China Glaze does that I LOVE.

I loved the way I'm Not Lion sparkled and it was a perfect glitter for a gradient.  It was so dense, it only required a few layers and it was not thick at all.

Alanna Renee Tranquil

I have soooooo many untried indies in my stash and lately I have had quite a craving to use them.

While I may seem bias, Aussies sure seem to make the best indies.  I have a few international indies, and they are pretty good, but the quality in the polishes that the Aussie girls make is far more superior and I consider myself very lucky to have easy access to these amazing polishes.

Today I have Alanna Renee Tranquil to show you.  Tranquil is a gorgeous turquoise polish with lavender hex glitters, small light blue and purple hex glitter, large turquoise square glitter and small indigo flakes.

To try to get through my HUUUUUGE pile of untrieds, I decided to pair Tranquil with Essence Dopey from the Snow White Trend Edition.  I considered Dopey to be a light lavender with silver shimmer, though my dad swears it's blue...  Anyway, I thought it would go well with the lavender hexes in Tranquil.  It unfortunately didn't quite go as nicely as I thought, but it was still an okay combo.

I actually meant for my ring finger to be the accent nail, but got carried away and accidentally painted it with Tranquil...  lol

Alanna Renee polishes are available through her website.  They are VERY reasonably priced at only $7.99 a bottle.  I definitely recommend you check out her Harry Potter inspired collection, Magical World.  I plan on purchasing quite a few (maybe the whole collection...) today actually :)

CG Elephant Walk & OPI Which is Witch?

A nice and quick one today.

I am desperately trying to work my way through my untrieds, but for every untried polish I use, 5 more take it's place!  It got so bad, that my second Helmer needed to be built last weekend.  Did I mention that I have acquired over 400 polishes in the last 6 months...

The two untrieds for today are China Glaze Elephant Walk and OPI Which is Witch?

Elephant Walk is from the 2012 On Safari collection and is a light grey with a subtle silver shimmer.

Which is Witch? is from the 2013 Oz the Great and Powerful collection and is the only polish from the collection that caught my eye.  It contains silver holographic microglitter, medium silver holo hex glitters, and tiny holo bar glitters all in a clear base.  Simply stunning and will easily work over a variety of different bases.

I really loved this combo and the holo awesomeness in the glitters left me hypnotised many times. Nothing beats a quality holo glitter topper!

Arcane Willow & China Glaze Angel Wings

Today I have for you another stunning polish from the debut Arcane collection.  When deciding which polish to wear first, it was a toss-up between Ineffable and Willow.  I obviously went with Ineffable, which I blogged about already, and I was itching to wear Willow.

Willow is a pale green creme with fine turquoise and gold glitter.  A colour combination that has been a true favourite of mine lately - both in nails and in my clothes (and make-up!).

To go on my accent nail I decided on a gold to go with the gold glitter in Willow.  I decided on China Glaze Angel Wings from the 2012 Pure Joy collection.  I've had my eye on the dense glitters in the collection and while I managed to get my hands on Angel Wings, I am now majorly lemming Glistening Snow.

Bec sure knows how to make a quality polish.  Willow applied like butter and only required two smooth coats for full opacity.  Angel Wings needed three coats for full opacity and a few generous layers of top coat to get it glassy smooth.

Due to the incredible success of the debut Arcane collection, Bec has very recently released her second collection and it is available on Etsy.

OPI Euro Centrale Half Moons

Well, haven't I been a very bad blogger lately?!

Another two weeks have gone by between posts and I am truly sorry.  Life has gotten incredibly busy lately, and my motivation to blog has been low.  Thankfully my motivation to do my nails has not suffered and I have some lovely manicures to show you over the next few days.

I have made it no secret how much I adore OPIs Euro Centrale collection.  The colours are all stunning - some more original than others - but all very user friendly.  While I don't own the whole collection, I must say it is the OPI collection that I own the most of.

Today's nails use Suzi's Hungary Again! and My Vampire is Buff.  It had been a while since I had done some half moons and as soon as these two polishes arrived in the mail, I knew I wanted to use them for half moons.

Suzi's Hungary Again is a warm pink with a gorgeously subtle shimmer.  My Vampire is Buff has proven to the stand-out star of the collection, receiving rave reviews from bloggers all over the world.  It could be described as the perfect creamy nude, and while surprisingly simple, I can see what all the fuss is about.

I must mention that these photos do not show a colour accurate representation of Suzi's Hungary Again! unfortunately.  The more I struggle with colour accurate photos, the more I think I should just bite the bullet and purchase a lightbox.  I've been checking a few out on ebay, I'm just not ready to take that step - yet.

Because I struggle with just 'plain' nails, of course I HAD to add a layer of China Glaze Fairy Dust.

What are your thoughts on the Euro Centrale collection?  Which polishes in the collection are your faves?