Red And White Snowflake Christmas Manicure

Hi friends!


I'm getting in the Christmas spirit this year.  We're decorating the house this weekend and after years of refusing to help out with decorations at work,  I rolled my sleeve up and pitched in.  What's gotten into me?  I don't know,  maybe the Grinch kindly gave Christmas back.  Now I just need to give to Toys for Tots and the Salvation Army Santa and I will have officially become Mrs Clause incarnate.  Just one last thing... Christmas shopping!  Lucky for me, I have Amazon Prime. I don't do the whole crowd scene.  The hard part is figuring out what to get my kids.  You would think that would be easy,  but my middle schooler can't think of anything but a League of Legend gift card. Then he wanted a $300 computer program before changing his mind and deciding he just wants a big birthday party this year and that would be his gift.  But he's getting a party anyway so I'm back to square one.

My teen is more decisive,  at least.  He wants one of those remote control flying things that cost enough to rent a private jet.  But I'm not complaining because at least I have a starting point to go on.  Of course since he's a teen he also wants cash, that's easy.  So, what do I do?

While I ponder over that,  let's talk about this manicure.  Snowflakes over a shimmery red jelly polish and a white glitter crelly accented ring finger.  This one bring Christmas home.  The polishes come in a set and can be found here.


Ciao bellas!

Holiday Gift Box Preview

Hi friends,
Last week you got a peak at one of the polishes included in the 2016 holiday gift box by Little Black Dress Nail Lacquer.  Today you get to see the whole shebang!

The gift set includes one red jelly polish with gold glitters and flakes.  The second polish is a shimmery white crelly with red and green glitter.  The gift set also includes a 15ml cuticle oil, glass nail file, and a four-sided nail buffer.

The gift box will be available on December 1st in the Little Black Dress online store . Use the coupon code for ten percent off holiday gift boxes.  HOLIDAYGIFTBOX16 through January 5th.  The gift boxes are in limited supply.

Another coupon code is currently available in the shop for orders over $35

And here it is.

Ciao Bellas!

Vinyl Stripes

Hi ladies!
What colors are you into right now? For me it's blue and purple.  Today's manicure is a combination of the two. I wanted to do stripes so that I could try out some vinyls I ordered. Love them! They were only stripes, nothing fancy, so I used them both vertically and horizontally.

The purple/fuchsia is a raspberry jelly, and the blue is a metallic true blue.

I really like the vinyls.  I think I'll order more. But for now, I'll use my stripes.

Till my next stripy manicure,
Ciao Bellas!

Jelly Sandwich

Hi there ladies,
I'm on the mend and looking forward to real food. Yummy food. Fattening food. Like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. There's no peanut butter for this manicure, but there's plenty of jelly. To contrast the squishy jelly, I used a bit of matte black polish and black charms to accent the look.
Hmmm, I think I'm in the mood for another jelly sandwich, perhaps tomorrow.
Ciao for now.

It's a New Year, Who Says You Can't Mix Metals?

Well, my friends,
Today is the 30th of December, and we're facing a new year. We've come to the end of an epic era. No, I'm exaggerating a little. It's just the end of 2015. I don't know about you, but I'm looking forward to the new year. 2015 was a challenging year for my family, beginning with the loss of my husband/best friend. Challenging is a nice way of saying traumatic. But, with time, love, and support comes healing. And in one year, my boys and I have come a long long way. My little guy is doing very well in school again, and has returned to playing sports. My big guy is looking forward to taking the S.A.T. next month, and is at this very moment a couple hundred miles away from home playing in a tournament with his school team. As for me, much healing has come from starting this blog and interacting with other blogger friends and readers. Without knowing it, you've been more helpful to me and a bigger blessing than I can express. So, to any of you who have left me a comment, responded to my comments, returned my emails, given me advice and guidance, sent me polish to review, or just been with me through this journey, I thank you from the bottom of my heart. Big hugs from me to you!
Without further ado, here is my last post for the year.

You guys know that I'm a glitterholic. Of course, I couldn't end the year without donning the fun shiny stuff. Glitter was a given, but the choice of polish had me in a quandary. Silver or gold? I decided not to choose at all, but use both? Less might be more, but more is better.

For this mani, I used a silver multi-glitter topper over a black gold flakie jelly polish. I think I'm all set to bring in 2016. How are your nails bringing in the new year?

Till next year, Ciao Bellas! and Have a Happy New Year.

O.P.I. Paints review

It seems that everyone is jumping on the blendable nail polish band wagon. First, O.P.I. came out with their Color Paints collection, then Sephora with Formula X Infinite Ombre limited edition set.  Now, Morgan Taylor has Laquer Chrome Collection. What's next, China Glaze Silver Chromatic Backdrop Collection?


What's similar about these sets?  They're all two-step processes that start with a silver color base coat followed by one or more sheer polishes.

I purchased a mini set of O.P.I. Color Paints because I'm not so excited about the polishes.  I didn't want to commit to full size bottles.  The concept is nice, but I didn't look forward to testing them out.  But, test them I did, because I wanted to give you guys, my wonderful readers, a bit of information about them.  The O.P.I. Color Paints set has a silver base color called Silver Canvas Undercoat.  Then there are 5 color polishes-- Primarily Yellow, Chromatic Orange, Pen & Pink, Purple Perspective and Turquoise Aesthetic (what, no Green Screen?).

It started off simple enough.  The silver applied smoothly, and looked nice enough to wear on its own. Then I continued to make two failed attempts at creating colorful designs before I was satisfied with a wearable manicure.  I would like to show you the fails....no, I really don't want to show the fails. As a matter of fact, I didn't bother to take a picture of the second one.  But I can reveal my final attempt.  I was satisfied only after I stamped over the polishes with Konad Blue Pearl (I think that's the name).

I plan to continue to use the polishes, but probably as a single color over chrome and a simple stripe or two.  Then I'll throw a bunch of glitter over the whole thing and you won't see any of it anyway.  Glitter covers a multitude of ...errors

Unfortunately, I'll have to work with the multi-colored paint over chrome design concept one more time.  I accidentally purchased the Sephora Formula X Infinite Ombre set.  I placed a ridiculously low bid on EBay assuming that I wouldn't win, and by fluke, I won the bid.  So to be fair, I have to review it as well.  However, after Formula X I'm done with the base chrome concept and Morgan Taylors Chrome Collection won't be crossing my threshold.  Sorry Morgan.