The Fancy Side: February 2014

Dot Pyramids

Thursday, February 27, 2014 2/27/2014 12:26:00 AM

Ok so the truth is I have no idea what to actually call this mani. Like I legit am clueless and I have nothing clever to call it. If you have a better idea, please tell me. Anyways, keeping things short and sweet, lets get to it.

I stole the idea for this manicure from my sweet friend Jessica so she gets all the credit for the design. She posted a mint/gold version on Instagram and I knew I'd steal it from her, because look how awesome.

The colors used are OPI Live. Love. Carnival a gorgeous pinky coral creme. Love love love this color, and I seem to be using all my versions of it lately. The glitter is Floss Gloss DimePiece an amazing full coverage holographic silver glitter. Ugh, makes you want to puke it is so pretty.

What do you think of this look?

Enjoy & until next time, Amy Lee

*all polishes featured in this post were purchased by me

Zoya's Magical Pixie Dust

Monday, February 24, 2014 2/24/2014 09:38:00 PM

It isn't often when I will pre-order something. But occasionally ..very occasionally, something comes along that I can't resist. As soon as I started seeing promo shots from Zoya about the Magical Pixie dusts, I knew they would be mine. (Is this where I insert my evil laugh?)

But seriously...look at how freaking amazing just the bottle shots are. Look at that holographic sparklieness (totally a word, I don't care what spellcheck says). Ugh...it's so amazing.

Before we talk about the colors, I want to discuss formula and application. All of these swatches are two easy thin coats, that dried rapidly, just like all the other Zoya Pixie Dusts. They dry down to a nice texture that isn't bothersome at all. I've heard some people complain about the big hexes making them too chunky and the texture being really thick, but I think those people are crazy, like legit don't know how to apply polish crazy. The formula is to die for and I LOVE them.

Up first is Lux. Lux is a pale baby pink, that looks great on my skin tone. I suspect that it would look fantastic on all skin tones. This color has me dreaming of wedding manis already.

Next is Vega. A pale baby blue. This one makes me want to meow with pleasure. ;-) Seriously, did you see it?

Finally we have Cosmo. The name is spot on because this polish is out of this world. The silver pairs perfectly with the blue and pink.

My overall verdict is LOVE. I cannot wait to see if Zoya comes out with some brighter more vibrant shades of these for the summer. That would be amaze-balls, so I'll keep my prettily polished digits crossed.

What do you think of these? Love or *gasp* hate?

Enjoy & until next time, Amy Lee

*all polishes featured in this post were purchased by me

Stamping Saturday: Gold Snakeskins

Saturday, February 22, 2014 2/22/2014 03:53:00 PM

Stamping Saturdays is back!! I think this is like our 7th installment. Gosh, that's really flown by huh? For my base today, I started off with a base of Floss Gloss Tanlines. I'm sure it was some kind of NYC fluke, but I found this polish at TJ MAXX. A FREAKING INDIE POLISH AT TJ MAXX! Can you all just appreciate that for a moment? I about died in the aisle.

Tanlines is a creamy tan that borders on a little sunburnt and I love it. It looks really great on my skin tone and applied easily.

Now those of you that know me, know that I despise (i.e. HATE) snakes. They give me the willies hard core, I can't stand them. However, turn them into a nice belt or a pretty bag, I'm in. I love the print, so for Stamping Saturday, I stamped on gold snakeskin using China Glaze Passion and BM-418. It's definetly a subtle look, but it is AWESOME.

What do you think? Snakes, yay or nay? You know where I am.

Enjoy & until next time, Amy Lee

*all products featured in this post were purchased by me

An InLinkz Link-up

Zoya Godiva

Wednesday, February 19, 2014 2/19/2014 04:34:00 PM

Hi All! I'm going to keep it pretty short today. I've been sick with crud all week and I'm struggling through it to be a functioning human being. If I can just make it through tomorrow, I have a flight home, which means wedding appointments, family time, friend time, and general happiness.

Today I have a Zoya Pixie Dust to show you. This is Godiva, from the original release of the Pixie Dusts. I really like this color, but for some reason, I could not get it to dry. Hours later I was still getting smudges in it. I did apply it in a hurry before running out the door, so I'm guessing I didn't give each layer enough time to dry.

What do you think of the nude Pixie Dust colors? Yay or nay? Personally I love the more vibrant colors myself.

Enjoy & until next time, Amy Lee

*all polishes featured in this post were purchased by me

Deborah Lippman Cosmic Love

Monday, February 17, 2014 2/17/2014 06:55:00 PM

Hello All! I hope you had a wonderful weekend, especially those of you that got an extra long one because of President's Day. I myself was not so lucky, but we had short hours at work, so I got to come home at a nicer hour than normal.

Today I have a crazy insane full coverage glitter polish to show you. This is Deborah Lippman's Cosmic Love. It's from the Starlight Mini Set. I got these as a gift from my Reddit Secret Santa, which was pretty exciting.

Are you ready for these? They are a bit in your face. Here we go!

It took 3 coats and some minimal glitter placement to get full coverage with this polish. The base is a very light pink jelly and it is jam packed with all kinds of glitters. Like wowza, thats a lot of glitter.

I tried stamping over these, because I wanted to use these for a Stamping Saturday. The glitter was too overwhelming for the stamping, but I thought I'd still show you. (Don't ask me what stamping plate, I don't remember.)

What do you think? Crazy amounts of glitter right?

Enjoy & until next time, Amy Lee

*the polish featured in this post was given as a gift

Stamping Saturday: Mango and Pink

Saturday, February 15, 2014 2/15/2014 01:12:00 PM

How is everyone today? Are you excited that Stamping Saturday is back? I know I am. Except that my stamping mani looks like trash today. :-( But my base color is GOOOORGEOUS! So I'm cool with it.

To start off I applied OPI's Where Did Suzi's Man-go? This is the prettiest, uniquest orange polish I've ever seen and I'm absolutely in love with it. It took 3 easy coats to get this pretty finish. Love love love!

Next I stamped on some designs using my MoYo Explorer Plate 01 and Born Pretty's Stamping Polish in Pink* (#5). It stamped very well and worked well as a transfer.

I was just playing around with my stamping plate since it's a full image so there is no real uniformity to my look, but I enjoy the color combo.

It's not my favorite stamping job ever but it's pretty okay. What do you think?

Enjoy & until next time, Amy Lee

*denotes a product sent to me for my honest review

**all other products featured in this post were purchased by me

An InLinkz Link-up

Heart Tips for Valentines Day

Saturday, February 15, 2014 2/15/2014 12:45:00 AM

Hello All! Happy Valentines Day or Single Awareness Day, depending on what you choose to celebrate. The future hubs and I both have to work today so we are going out for dinner tomorrow evening. What plans do you have?

Because I need an excuse to paint my nails (hahaha, I don't really) I chose to do a simple mani celebrating the holiday. To start off I applied a base color of Jessica Enchantress. Enchantress is a orange leaning light coral. This is 3 easy coats.

After Enchantress dried I applied tips with Jessica Atomic Red in the top shape of a heart.

Atomic Red is an orange-red that pairs perfectly with the coral of Enchantress. What do you think? My freehand isn't that amazing but I really like the way the turned out.

Enjoy & until next time, Amy Lee

*all polishes featured in this post were purchased by me

I Love Nailpolish Admire Me

Wednesday, February 12, 2014 2/12/2014 07:28:00 PM

There is something about a holographic polish that makes me insanely happy. I can't be alone on this. Please tell me I'm not! When you combine those holographic rainbows with a beautiful base color, I pretty much get the biggest polish boner ever. I bet you are all "polish boner? ewww!" right now. Let me change your mind.

Admire Me, from I Love Nailpolish, requires that you do just that, admire it. It's a lovely teal holographic polish. It applies like butter, only taking two easy coats. Now, enough talky, more looky.

What did I tell you? Polish boner inducing. It really doesn't hurt that teal is my favorite color ever so I'm fully on board with this polish.

Enjoy & until next time, Amy Lee

*all polishes featured in this post were purchased by me

Queen Majesty Tips

Monday, February 10, 2014 2/10/2014 12:04:00 PM

Do you ever get an idea in your head that you think will be SUPER awesome, but then you do it and it's kinda meh? That was this manicure for me. I realized after I'd done it that I should have done the glitter on a light purple. That would have been freaking awesome. As it was, I still wore this mani for a good chunk of time because glitter (we all know taking off glitter polish was invented by the devil).

The base is two coats of OPI Glints of Glinda. Glints of Glinda is so insanely close to my skin color that it is a little freaky. Seriously tell me it isn't? I then sponged on tips using Cirque's Queen Majesty. Queen Majesty is a full coverage micro glitter that while predominately purple has these flashes of blue glitter that is amazeballs. Sadly I don't think I accurately captured those blue flashes, but trust me they are there.

Do you think the glitter tips would have looked better over a different base color? Which one?

Enjoy & until next time, Amy Lee

*all polishes featured in this post were purchased by me

Stamping Saturday #5: Valentines Pink & Gold

Saturday, February 8, 2014 2/08/2014 11:57:00 AM

It's that time again, Stamping Saturday. I know you al have been waiting anxiously to see what I would come up with. Not to mention what the other ladies who participate will come up with.

For my base, I started off with Orly Miss Conduct. This is a bright pink jelly polish that is filled with silver holographic particles. It's actually very similar to Zoya Aurora and Dream.

Pretty, huh? I then stamped on some fun designs using Bundle Monster Plates BM412 and BM416 with China Glaze Passion. Passion is my go to gold polish for stamping. I wanted to do a Valentine-sy type manicure without being over the top. Is this over the top? It probably is. Ah well!