NOTD: Elytra 528

 Hello! I received some polishes in the mail the other day - my much awaited package from piCture pOlish which included Elytra 528, Elytra 528, Reef 506, and Ozotic High Impact Holographic 509. I had to try out one of the Elytra duo chromatic glittery shades first, here is 528!

 I started with a base of 2 coats of China Glaze Liquid Leather, followed with 2 coats of 528 and one coat of SV. 528 mostly reflects purple and green, but I definitely saw some hints of goldish copper too!

 My only critique of the polish is that I have a bit of a hard time pulling off black polish, especially now with the start of summer around the corner. My neighbour saw my nails and said "Hayley, they look very Halloween!"... After hearing that, it was all I could think of! I think that I need to try it out layered over some more colours (purples especially). I still do love this look, but I will maybe consider it more for the fall and winter months. 

Thank-you for reading :) Hayley

NOTD: Laced Up

Hi, long time not post! It's report card time and I am very busy at work getting my students' grades into the system. 24 more days of class until summer vacation! Woo!

I was really happy to see that today, right this minute I have 99 followers :D One more until my first giveaway! I have a few more things that I want to pick up for it, so stay tuned until next week for details. On second thought, this may have to wait until after report cards are completely submitted. Oops, I'm getting too anxious here! The giveaway will happen when it happens, how about that ;)

Speaking of giveaways, I was ecstatic to learn that I won my first! I entered Sweet Sugar's 500 follower giveaway last month and won. I will be recieving my first Catrice and Essence polishes, I am very excited :) Thanks Gwenn! Be sure to follow Sweet Sugar if you are not already.

Now onto my NOTD. I finally got around to trying out the Sally Hansen Salon Effects. Here is Laced Up topped with one coat of SV.

I was searching for Laced Up everywhere! It was the only design that I liked enough to pay $9 for. It seemed to always be sold out. I finally found it at Wal Mart of all places, the only one left! There are some minor imperfections in my application, but nothing that was noticable to anyone but me. I got a lot of compliments on the design, and I really do love it. BUT it's too pricey for my liking. I probably will not purchase them again, unless for a much lower price.

If I improve my stamping skills, I think I might me able to mimic Laced Up using some of my Konad and BM plates... fingers crossed because I love this design! Also, what do you think of my apple ring? Very teacher appropriate, no? ;) $12 CAD, from Aldo.

Thanks for reading

Hayley

NOTD: Blue Jungle

Is it Friday yet? ;) This week is going by too slow for my liking! I’ve had a rough start to the work week, but my mani has brightened it up slightly :) I just received the first Bundle Monster set in the mail, and I did this pattern right away! I’ve been excited to do this design and I love the way it turned out. The base is China Glaze For Audrey with Orly Snowcone stamped on top using the leaves from BM 9. A coat of SV on top and voila! Enjoy!

Hayley

NOTDs: New Beibs

I still don’t get the connection between Justin Beiber and nail polish. I loathe that I love so many of the Nicole by OPI shades that he endorses! Mind you, if I was a 13-year-old teeny bopper I might be thinking differently ;) Here are two of my latest manis, featuring Canadian Star and Coral Denominator.

This is my favourite of the two, Canadian Star. It's a purple/ blue duo chrome loaded with lots of shimmer. I needed 4 coats, but it was worth the hassle! This is gorgeous.

 Shiny!!!

Next is Coral Denominator. It reflects coral, pink, red and gold. I prefer the look in the bottle unfortunately, and it reminds me a lot of Zoya's Rica from the sunshine collection. I think I will still wear this shade, maybe just on my toes though ;) Check it out!

I am wearing 3 coats in these pictures, and probably could have used a few more to avoid the slight visible nail line. meh, I only wore this for a day!

Thanks for reading!

Hayley

NOTD: All You Need is Color

First off - Happy Mother's Day! The weather was beautiful today, the perfect way to celebrate Mom! Sunny, warm, perfect :)

Here are two manis that I wore this past week. First is Finger Paint's All You Need Is Color. I believe that it is a part of a new FP line...? My local Sally had a new display featuring a bunch of Flower Power 1960s themed-colours. This one was my fave!

 The application was very thick and a little difficult to control, but it built up nicely and gave me good coverage in two coats. I probably could have used a third coat, but who honestly likes to remove glitter polish?!

Today I wore Essie Watermelon with OPI Black Shatter on top. I didn't really like the shatter lines on all of my nails, but whatever... you get what you get!

Thanks for reading :)

Hayley

You like me! You really like me!

I would like to thanks Giuditta for passing on the Liebster Blog Award to me! 

The Liebster Award is designed to bring well deserved additional recognition to those bloggers with less than 300 followers. If you receive the award, link back to the blogger that nominated you and nominate 3 more blogs. 

I would like to pass this award on to the following awesome blogs that deserve more followers!

Wuliao Nails

I'm Obsessed With Nails

Oh What Fun!

THANKS also to Ling Ling for giving me the Stylish Blogger Award!

The Rules:

1. Thank and link back to the person who sent you the award

2. Share seven things about yourself

3. Spread the love. Award recently discovered bloggers

4. Contact these bloggers and tell them about the award. 

Since I just recently shared 10 thing about myself (a few posts back), instead I will share with you my 7 favourite nail polishes :)

London Butter No More Waity Katie

OPI Black Shatter

Deborah Lippmann Glitter in the Air

Deborah Lippmann Call Me Irresponsible

Sally Hansen Mint Sorbet

SOPI Mash-Up

Zoya Zara

The 3 people that I want to nominate for this award are...

ChitChat Nails

Nihrida

Nailside

Friday Favourites Round 2

I apologize for acting MIA for the past few days, I am in a bit of a slump with my nails. I removed 3 manis in a row yesterday. I couldn't settle on something I was happy with! And then today at school I was working on a hallway mural all day, my hands and nails got really damaged as a result :/ I cleaned them up and moisturized a lot afterwards, and I'm looking forward to some great NOTDs coming up! Here is what I came across and loved this week, take a look :)


Ivana's Ruffian Manicure - I love this look. It's very sophisticated and classy, plus purple and gold look great together!


Ivana's Mattified Houston We Have a Purple with Prancer - Ivana gets 2 nods this week, because I just discovered her blog! HWHAP looks great with a matte finish (reminder to self - try this!) and the hexagonal red glitters look like they're magically hovering on the nail. Pretty!


The Nail Buff's Block Orange with Flower Accent - Orange is usually NOT my colour, but I couldn't help but love this look. The deep almost-blood orange is nicely contrasted with a cute white flower. Great look!


The Nail Addict's Peafowl Nail Art- success! This full set of multi-coloured nail stampings is so skillfully done, amazing!! 


Brooke's Lightbox Tutorial - I didn't know that making your own lightbox could be this easy, thanks for the tutorial Brooke!


Jane's Lightening Bolt French Tutorial - What I love about all of Jane's tutorials the most is how easy-to-follow they are. This girl has a real eye for design, in both the layout of her blog and the funky nail art designs she comes up with. I will be following this tutorial really soon!


Amy's Forever 21 Times Square Review -  This post made me LOL for real. Do you get the Toy Story reference? ;) Also, I wish I had started to read Gotham Polish before visiting NYC earlier this year! doh!

Gotham Polish

Stilletto Mani by Nails for Fun -  I wish that I could read the language of this blog's author so I could learn some of her secrets! This manicure is SEXY. No other word for it! Check it out!!!

NOTD: C-C-Courage, 2010

Here is a quick NOTD post before I go to bed. Although I've owned it for over a month, this is my first time using Nubar 2010! Here it is layered over China Glaze C-C-Courage. 

 The above two photos were snapped indoors without any direct light. Although they're oddly "glowy", these pictures capture the reflected orange, green and purple from the flakies!

These two photos were snapped using my OTT-Light (Lite? Is the brand-name misspelled? lol) The light from the bulb is reflected more in these pics and overpower the flakies, but the beautiful deep purple from C-C-Courage is seen well!

This was yesterday's mani... I took it off today and put on OPI Sparrow Me the Drama from the Pirates collection. I'm disappointed in the colour :( I love the swatches of it that I've seen online BUT it clashes with my skin tone. I will wear it tomorrow and see if it grows on me, but I think that it's too "dusty rose" for my liking. I need bolder, brighter colours. I will try to take a pic tomorrow, stay tuned!

Hayley

Drumroll please...

I received my first award for my blog! Thank-you to heartNAT for giving it to me, you put a smile on my face :)

As with the conditions of the award, here are 10 random facts about myself:

1. My favourite hobbies are arts and craft-related. I love making jewellery, knitting, painting, drawing, embroidery, etc.

2. My favourite subject throughout highschool and university was art history. I actually liked writing those essays. I also love going to museums and art galleries. I visited the MoMA for the first time in March and could have spent all day there. Seeing Starry Night brought me to tears, I was overjoyed :)

3. I do really stupid things often. But I can laugh at myself, so it’s okay. Like the one time when I worked at Michaels, I called a license plate over the PA system, because someone told me that the car’s lights were on. I found out 3 hours later that it was my car, and I had read out my own license plate.

4. At one point in my life I wanted to be a coroner. And then a homicide detective. And then a forensic ident officer. Then I became a teacher :) Now looking back, I don’t think I could have done any of those jobs!

5. My favourite TV shows are Dexter, Breaking Bad, The Office, Gray’s Anatomy and Criminal Minds. I also get sucked into American Idol every season :/

6. Besides teaching, one of my favourite jobs was working for Lush cosmetics as a factory worker – in the Bubbles department! I hand-made their bubble bars. Working with a fun bunch of people also helped, too! I may go back there in the summer, we’ll see!

7. My next big purchase is going to be an Apple Macbook Pro, if everything goes as planned! Eee!

8. I have an Honours Bachelor of Science in Physical Anthropology and my Bachelor of Education. I am proud of all the schooling I’ve accomplished!

9. I have the best friends in the world :)

10. I am listening to one of my 8 Glee CD soundtracks right now… ahhh, how I love covers of songs, especially by the Glee crew! I’m also going to the Glee concert in Toronto in June! Yayaya!

That was fun! Here is something else that’s fun… a haul!

Essie Watermelon, Bermuda Shorts and China Glaze Cheers to You 

OPI DS Extravagance, I Juggle... Men, Dating a Royal, Planks a Lot, Stranger Tides, Mermaid's Tears, Sparrow me the Drama, and Silver Shatter

I've been looking forward to doing this mani since I saw the collection over a month ago. Mermaid's Tears with Silver Shatter. :)

This should be my last haul for a while. I told myself that after getting what I wanted from the OPI Pirates collection, I would go on a no-buy. We’ll see how long this lasts...!