The Lazy 15! Gradient / Movember Moustache manicure

Hi everyone!

Всем привет!

Today's post is sort of a crossover between several blogging activities:

-The 31 Days Challenge I've been doing...well, let's say, not too consistently,

-November Polish Days, which theme is MAN-icure,

-and The Lazy 15! challenge i've signed up for, because i decided to drop the 31DC one. Since I'm not following the rules properly anyway, I thought I'd better redo that one if I ever have much spare time and moral strength to do nail art every day and enjoy it for only a day.

Этот пост посвящен маникюру для Polish Days ноября, тема которого - MAN-icure, поскольку ноябрь - месяц, в который все всячески пытаются привлечь внимание к проблемам мужского здоровья, а еще я читала, что в Канаде в начале ноября мужчины сбривают всю растительность на лице и отращивают весь месяц - оттуда и пошел популярный символ moustache, богатые такие усы. Также, я принимаю участие в меме The Lazy 15!, расписание и список тем которого приводится в конце поста. Ну и тема второго дня совпала с 10 днем месячного челленджа, который я все же решила бросить, т.к. правилам не следую, времени нет, чтобы каждый день делать нейл-арт, да и обидно же стирать так быстро! В общем, наш пострел везде поспел :)) 

Anyway, for this manicure I used Bourjois 18, which is a dusty blue with re-e-eally subtle shimmer running through it, China Glaze Swing Baby - a cool gold foil, a makeup sponge and a nail art brush to draw the moustache. I used a blue polish because my boyfriend once said blue was his favorite color, so this manicure is also dedicated to him :)

В этом маникюре я использовала Bourjois 18, джинсовый синий с едва уловимым серебряным шиммером, который в большинстве случаев почти не виден, China Glaze Swing Baby - холодную золотую фольгу, спонж для макияжа, чтобы сделать градиент, и кисточку для нейл-арта для того, чтобы нарисовать усы. 

Bourjois 18 is a very nice polish and is a one-coater, but the brush is killing me. It's angled and short, how am I supposed to paint my nails with it without flooding my poor culicles with nail polish?? Needless to say they were a hot mess after I applied the Bourjois polish, so I didn't worry about clean-up when I was doing the gradient - nothing worse could have been done to my fingers. I swear I'm going to find/buy an empty bottle for nail polish with a normal brush and pour the polish into it. As for Swing Baby, it's a two-coater, but applies easily and quite evenly.

Подробнее про лаки. К Bourjois 18 как к лаку у меня претензий нет: замечательный цвет, требует всего 1 слоя, сохнет быстро. Но кисточка - это просто орудие пыток. Она короткая и скошенная. В итоге, если на левой руке я еще умудрилась более-менее аккуратно накрасить ногти, то правая после покраса представляла собой худший кошмар лакоманьяка. Хорошо, что 18й не окрашивает кожу, синей кутикулы я бы не пережила. Что касается China Glaze Swing Baby, то это красивая фольга-двуслойник, ничего сверхъестественного, но в обращении приятна, если у вас нормальные отношения с кисточкой чайников.

I sealed the manicure with a coat of INM Out The Door.

На всех фотографиях маникюр закреплен слоем INM Out The Door. 

Accent nail manicure: Estee Lauder Smashed, China Glaze Emerald Fitzgerald & China Glaze Smoke and Ashes

Hey everyone!
First of all, from now on, this blog is going to be written in English and Russian. I was in two minds about it, but Alexis from XOXO Alexis Leigh was very supportive and engouraged me to do that, she said she loved bi-/multilingual blogs, and I love them too, so here we are :)

I was wrong about the Innisfree manicure i posted in thу previous post, it wasn't my birthday manicure, but this was. It also was my first attempt at stamping.

В этом маникюре я встретила свой день рождения, а еще впервые попробовала стемпинг. 

Here's the list of polishes I used:
-Estee Lauder Smashed - a dark purple jelly base with magenta and bright blue shimer. Perfect apprication, medium dry time, quite long-lasting (3 days without chipping). 2 coats applied
-China Glaze Emerald Fitzgerald - a very pigmented emerald metallic. Needs only 1 coat, but I applied 2 anyway. Easily applied, started to chip on me on the third day of wear.
-China Glaze Smoke and Ashes - green-blue shimmer in quite pigmented black base. Used to stamp over Smashed.
I also used a generous coat of INM Out The Door to seal everything.

Использованные в маникюре лаки:

-Estee Lauder Smashed - темно-сливовая желешка, в которой в изобилии плавает теплый ярко-фиолетовый шиммер, приправленный разбросанным по нему шиммером же, но синим. Нанесение беспроблемное, сох со средней скоростью, держится 3 день без сколов, и даже кончики не особо затерлись. 
-China Glaze Emerald Fitzgerald - изумрудный металлик, очень пигментированный, не просвечивает уже в один слой. На фотографиях в 2 - на всякий случай. Наносится очень легко, но к 3 дню пошли мелкие сколы у свободного края. Из-за него завтра перекрашиваю.
-China Glaze Smoke And Ashes - достаточно пигментированная черная база, в которой плавает зеленый шиммер, который еще и слегка дуохромит в синий. Им я стемпила поверх Estee Lauder Smashed.
Сверху все покрыто щедрым слоем INM Out The Door.

Nails of October

Hey everyone! 

I'd like to start this post by saying i've been featured on Alexis' blog Xoxo Alexis Leigh as Blogger of November. This made my day, since Alexis' blog is among my favorites, and she deserves a ton more readers than she currently has! I'm telling you, this British beauty's going to be a celebrity in the blogger community in no time! If you don't follow her blog, do it and you won't regret it, since her photos and designs are eyecandies, she also does beauty- and hair-related posts, and she's also a loving eldest sister, who does her little siblings' nails. I wish I had a sister like that, but I'm the only child in the family. I cheer myself up by reminding myself that at least I got all the ice-cream :D

Enough with the rambling, now :) This post is a compillation of how my nails looked in October. It doesn't contain every single manicure, because sometimes i got home too late, and the days are short now as the winter's coming (totally feeling like Eddard Stark here :) Any fellow Game of Thrones fans?), so I couldn't get decent photos due to poor lighting, and sometimes i merely had time to eat at least one time a day and sleep some 4-5 hours. 

Innisfree 84 were my birthday nails, by the way :)

I also wore OPI Russian Navy Suede, Zoya Frida with Nfu Oh 60, and I'm currently in Zoya Petra and Zoya Neeka, but my nails are in a terrible state, so i didn't take any photos so as not to traumatize you :D 

In case you're wondering where my Halloween nails are, i didn't do any, because we don't really celebrate Halloween in Russia, and, well, I just didn't feel like it! We're having a sort of an after-Halloween party on 10th of November, though, so i might come up with something for that occasion..

So, what do you think? Which manicure is your favorite, and what did you wear this October? I'd say my favorite definitely was the black, white and gold manicure :)

PS I also wanted to say that I'm going to start writing each post in two languages, English and Russian,   since I think I use take advantage of my knowledge of languages. When my French gets well enough for me to be able to write in it, i may even go trilingual!  

31 days challenge. Day 9: rainbow nails

Here're my nails for day 9! I'm not completely satisfied with those, I with the gradients came out smoother, but they're fine for the first time...gotta work on my skills!

List of used polishes:

Red - Sally Hansen Rapi-Dri Racey Rouge

Orange - Dance Legend 304

Yellow - Zoya Creamy

Green - Essie Pretty Edgy 

Blue - Rimmel Blue Eyed Girl

Indigo - Rimmel My Denim

Violet - Zoya Pinta

Everything topped off with a coat of INM Out The Door.

If you want to know how to do gradient nails, this tutorial by TheNailasaurus is out of this planet!

31 days challenge. Day 8: metallic nails

Hey everyone!

So i went straightforward with this day's theme. Plus, i needed to swatch this polish i got when i was in Malta. And here we are, silver nails with Gabrini 322.

Gabrini 322 is an average silver foil/metallic opaque in 2 coats. It lasted 3 days on me with minor chipping.

Shown on the photos with a coat of INM Out The Door.

31 days challenge. Day 7: black&white nails

First of all, I'm officially of age now! Can't buy strong alcohol like vodka or tequila 'till i'm 21, but as for the rest it's a carte-blanche :)

This day's been preventing me from going on with the 31DC for too long. For some reason I found it so hard to create a black&white look, though I love the way these 2 basic colors look together and there are so many nail art ideas out there. But when my BornPrettyStore order arrived, I knew I couldn't keep putting it off anymore.

First I wanted to stick on some lace, then stamp (yes, my stamping plates from Llarowe've arrived!), then do stripes...this is what I ended up doing - a look inspired by one of Lucy's Stash manicures. 

I started by painting on 2 coats of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear White on, then, using dotting tools of different sizes, dotted 3 black dots in descending order (i'm using Sophin Ceramic 02) and, finally, applied golden round studs in 3 different diameters from BornPrettyStore with a pair of tweezers. I finished the manicure with a generous coat of INM Out The Door to seal and prolong it. You need to be really careful with this step, because there's a change of smudging your pretty nails if you're not.

Thoughts: I want to touch my nails all the time :D And I received a ton of comments from men today, which means success to me :)

7 down, 24 to go!

Karma Duty series. Comparison of teals: Nubar Stylish Peacock vs. Orly Sapphire Silk vs. OPI Ski Teal We Drop

Hi everyone!

I was supposed to post a black&white nail art, but I kind of messed that up so I'm going to redo it, and for now I have a comparison for you. Personally I love this kind of posts, so I hope you'll enjoy it, too.

So this was actually inspired by a lady from a Russian LiveJournal nail community, who requested a comparison between Nubar Stylish Peacock and OPI Ski Teal We Drop. It was actually so long ago even I don't remember. As my 18th birthday is approaching (it's tomorrow!), i'm cleaning up all my karma duties :)

The moment I pulled out the bottles out of my stash, I knew they were nowhere the same or even similar (well, to us, polish addicts, that is). So i decided to compare them to another teal I have in my collection, that is Orly Sapphire Silk.

By the way, I couldn't believe my eyes, but I only have 3 teal creams in my shash! The advantage is that that means I can order more without feeling ashamed of it :D

Onto the comparison, here's a bottle comparison pic.

More photos and some text under the cut :)

31 days challenge. Day 6: violet nails

Ok, so i kind of failed the 'paint your nails every day' challenge, but as the pattern part is coming it's getting challenging enough for me, since i have really unsteady hands. Plus the law school and social life - now i actually have some, the leadership camp has brought me a new boyfriend! Anyway, i decided to take it easy and repaint my nails at a usual pace and actually enjoy the nail art i'm about to do. Now that supplies from Born Pretty Store have arrived, i can do some looks i've been looking forward to.

As for now, here are my violet nails. I did them the day i returned from the leadership camp i was a staff member at, having slept only 2 hours that night, so imagine how exhausted i was and please forgive the not-the-most-accurate way i applied nail polish that time.

I used 2 coats of Orly Fowl Play from Birds of a Feather collection. It's a gorgeous purple jelly base filled with copper and blue flakies and silver glimmer.

I had to use flash to take these photos 'cause it was already dark outside, and i don't have a lightbox yet, but this way you can see best just how gorgeous this polish is.

Please click on the photos to enlarge them and appreciate the texture.

 6 down, 25 to go!

31 days challenge. Day 5: blue nails

Hi everyone!

Tomorrow i'll be back and will post myself instead of using scheduled posts, but for now you'll have to deal with the blogger robot :D

I'm using my last backup on blue nails (who knew i wouldn't have the opportunity to paint my nails specially for my favorite color's day :( ) and that is a polish i bought in Malta, Gabrini 337, although i believe it's a Turkish polish, not a Maltese one.

It's a wonderful teal jelly that is leaning more blue than green (it does look like it has a strong green hue, but it only looks like that in the sun - in most types of light it's definitely more blue than green), and it contains sparse small silver flecks that look light bluу because the base color tints them. 3 coats for full opacity, anв the wonderful squishy feeling remains. Topped with a coat of INM OTD for longevility purposes.

5 down, 26 to go! Stay tuned for tomorrow's violet nails!