Here's a shocker for everyone: me wearing taupe! This is Zoya Pasha, three coats. It's a soft mushroomy, cool, taupe with a slight silver frost. The application was very nice and I had no problems with streaking (but was fairly cautious and careful).

I looks slightly cooler toned in most lighting, and I think these pictures make it look slightly warmer than it really is.

I had a hard time deciding how I felt about this one, but overall I think I like it. It was nice for a change and felt sort of fallish to me.

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I did a Konad last week and it was pretty wild and crazy. I started with Claire's Neon Burst and did three coats. Then I used a design from plate S06 with Konad Princess Gold Black polish. It's a bit smudgy and I didn't get the placement spot on, but I thought I'd share anyway. It's not always about perfection, right? :)

Truthfully, I had a really hard time making this one work! I ended up scrapping my first attempt when I was all done save for one nail. I thought that I would be able to do much, much better on my second attempt. Not so much!

It kind of reminds me of hallucinogenic smudgy tiger stripes.

Or hypnotic neon tribal shields.

I get really annoyed with certain full plate designs that don't really fit my big thumb nails. Sometimes I can double stamp them partially and make it work. With this one I couldn't see how to do that.

It was fun and a learning experience, so I'm totally glad I went for it. I'm trying to build up my Konad skills because I want to become an ex-pert, yo!

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For this mani I started with two coats of Milani Radiant in Purple. It's from their new Welcome Back Color collection. I was able to find a few that I wanted in CVS, but because the display only has spots for one of each color, I couldn't get all the ones I had wanted. I'm still on the hunt!

Radiant in Purple applied perfectly and was so pretty that I was tempted to leave it be.

Instead, I added a coat of Color Club Too Violet, a Japanese limited edition color.

It's awesome!! I wish Color Club would do a whole collection of vibrantly colored holos or even holo glitter sheers, like Too Violet.

I hope you have a nice day! Stay dizzy. :)

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For this manicure I started with two coats of Wet & Wild Black Pearl. It was super nice, I have to say. Then I added one coat of....oh dear, oh dear! Was it one coat or two? Two!! I added two coats of Color Club Wild and Willing. It is way cooler than I had hoped it would be!!

It's blindingly sparkly (you'll see in a few pics)!

The shimmah is perfection.

Check out the duochrome!!

Even though these colors are not my most flattering I lurve this so, so much. It's very Autumnal.

The picture above almost makes it look like I had bubbling. I assure you that other than an obnoxious bubble or two on my middle finger, I really didn't have any trouble. I think it's the way the shimmah is shining that makes it look bubbly somehow!

As an afterthought, I had used Orly Bonder under this. The polish peeled off like stickers within 24 hours! I was really unhappy about that. The jury is still out on Bonder, but best I can tell so far, it performs differently depending on the brand of polish I wear with it. I don't think it plays well with W&W or Claire's polish.

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Hi! Behold the loverliness of China Glaze Meteor Shower! It's one of the new colors from their super exciting Glitters, Shimmers, and Cremes collection. I got my grubby paws on about five of these beauts and cannot wait to get more. I believe there are to be 50 in total. So many of them look just awesome!

I did two coats here. The formula on this one is quite thick and a bit difficult to work with.

Thank goodness the pictures lie! You'd never know, probably, huh?

I did two coats of Poshe on top and it was still bumpy from all the glitter!

I really love it, despite its flaws. What do you think?

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I got tagged! I've never been tagged before, so I guess this is cool and an honor. :D Thank you, Lacquer Laine, for thinking of lil' ol' me. I'm supposed to share 10 facts about myself and then tag 10 other blogs. Oh man!

1. I'm a Christian and was raised in a conservative, loving home. My beliefs in God form a core piece of who I am and affect many facets of my life. While I don't follow religion as strictly as I did in my parents' home, I have grown into my adult spirituality rather comfortably and still follow many practices that I am accustomed to. I hope that others who come in contact with me have a greater sense of God and His love because of knowing me.

2. I am a crazy animal person and love animals erm probably more than people (in general)! Oh that probably sounds terrible. I just adore animals, especially my two baby dogs. I'd love to have two Siberian Cats (my hubby is allergic to cats and this breed is hypo-allergenic). I could also go for a few more dogs, little ones, I should think. And I want a cockatoo! Animals show us the most unconditional love and innocence. They keep my heart big and full.

3. I'm very sentimental. I get really nostalgic about all kinds of things. I can live in a place that I think I hate, for years, and then after I am gone I will dearly miss many things about the place! I can't seem to help myself.

4. I love to eat. Mm mm mm food! There are too many things I like to eat, so I will share with you some that I do not care for. Raw fish or meat of any kind, shellfish, pork, beef (except in certain circumstances), octopus/squid, basically any creepy non-mainstream animal, eggplant, okra, radishes, beets, walnuts, kimchi, green olives, greek olives, spicy food that's hotter than "medium," butter pecan ice cream, and I can't even think of other things so you know I like a lot of types of food!!

5. I've never met anyone famous. I'm sure that if I did I would start shrieking incoherently, and/or drooling, and/or become stunned and utterly silent. Normal stuff, really. My parents saw Oprah on the street one time and apparently couldn't conjure up anything at all to say. Figures, right?

6. I took some really crazy aptitude tests in Academy that said I should become a pickler or an eyelet machine operator, among some other random things. I showed them wrong!! I've worked in healthcare, mental health, and am currently a makeup artist extraordinaire. Can you really imagine these talents wasted on pickles or eyelets?!

7. I have several vices, but I can never see myself going for cigarettes or alcohol. It's probably partly my upbringing, but I suppose I'm just lucky for not liking those things (and I mean no offense to those of you that do!). I have alcohol maybe a few times a year and often find myself regretting it, either for the disgusting taste or a wretched migraine.

8. I really want to travel lots. I want to see so many places and experience different cultures and environments. Some places I really want to visit: England, Scotland, Ireland, Norway, Sweden, South Africa, France, Italy, Greece, Australia, China, Japan, Vancouver, more of Hawaii, Fiji, Thailand, New Zealand, Germany, Switzerland, oh the list goes on and on. For all the traveling I hope to do, I really am quite a home-body!

9. Speaking of traveling, I rather dislike flying. It makes me unreasonably anxious and uncomfortable. I've done it plenty and I just don't care for the experience, over all. I might be slightly more into it if we were talking about first-class or a swanky private jet...but that's not likely to happen any time soon! I also discovered that I need to be able to see out of the plane while flying or I have a massive panic attack (oh, such a not cool memory). Let's hear it for my primal brain!

10. I have blonde hair. It's not super light but it's definitely blonde and it's mine and people seem to like it. It's pretty long and wavy. I don't really care if people color their hair blonde or what. It's kind of cool to think of myself as special, though, I guess.

Here are the blogs I am tagging: The Kronicles of a Konad-er, polish-lounge, Polish or Perish, Polish Mayhem, Sasse's 'nad Stamping Stampede, Enamel Coated, Nail of the week, Sterling Nails!, Neglelakkmani, and Nail Juice.

Thanks for reading and please continue to enjoy the polish!!

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OPI DS Mystery, as promised! Three coats. I adore this - I can't even quite say why.

The shimmah is almost like tiny little flakies that flash from yellow gold, coppery gold, to a green gold! That part is mostly in the bottle.

On the nails it looks like rich, deep, varied tones of gold.

While the polish itself is deep, deep purple, it reads more of black.

Also, I just thinned out my Poshe quick-dry top coat and now it's behaving very nicely, as you can see! No more shrinkage! YAY!

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This was a fun and unexpected look! I layered a bunch of Nfu-Oh Flakies to see what would happen. I'd love to take credit as having this idea originally, but I saw a picture posted on MUA last week where the person layered several flakies and I thought, "OOoooo! Why didn't I think of that?" Whoever you are, out there, brilliant thinking! This brings about more ideas for virtually limitless looks. I started with Zoya Ibiza, a rich, deep, jewel-toned navy. I applied one coat and it was nearly opaque and perfect.

Then I added a coat of Nfu-Oh #51.

Then a coat of #53.

And a coat of #54.

And finished with a coat of #50.

It was fun to see the look change after each coat of Nfu-Oh! In retrospect I wish I had taken pictures at each step. Also, I apologize for a lack of truly decent pictures. I struggled with the lighting a bit due to a very overcast couple of days.

My new Color Clubs are arriving today - Joy! Stay tuned for pictures of the new OPI DS Mystery tomorrow.

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I made an excellent combination this week with OPI Midnight Blue Glitter and OPI DS Sensation. I didn't really have a feel for how it would look when finished, but I knew I liked both on their own and I was hoping for a spectacular combo. Here is three coats of MBG.

I like this but don't feel like it's anything all that outstanding on its own.

Now that's pretty ridiculously sweet, huh?! One coat of OPI DS Sensation added.

Together, it reminds me somehow of one of my favorite polishes, OPI DS Royal. Only it's more metallic and opaque looking. All of these pictures are fab and yet somehow don't fully capture the amazingness of what it looked like on my nails for over two days.

Now I'd like to rant for a short moment. I've heard a lot of talk lately about how people think of Designer Series as being full of gorgeous holos. Even some are disappointed with the two newest releases that are not holo. I don't know why, but I got all defensive feeling inside thinking of all my glorious non-holo DSes that I love, love, love! I know, I'm a little crazy.

So, for the record, I love all Designer Series polishes, pretty much. There are amazing holos and there are spectacular glass-flecked shimmahs! Check them out if you can. Off the top of my head they are Treasure, Royal, Sensation, Dazzle, and Jewel (one I thought was ugly on me, so I gave it to a friend), and Mystery.

In any case, I can't fault anyone for loving and wanting more holos. I'm right there with ya! As for Designer Series, I'm happy with the majority of what they put out. Of course, brighter, more vivid and unique colors would always be appreciated! ;)

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Here I did Urban Outfitters Green 4, an army-green sort of jelly.  I needed three coats.  The brush was fairly awful - big and fluffy like with one long wonky piece sticking out.  The application wasn't really terrific either, but I made it work.

This shade of green is definitely not very flattering on me, but hey, I do what I want!!

Then I added a coat of CND Okie Dokey Artichokey.  Oh it was so purty!  Applied perfectly, too.

Unfortunately some bubbles were coming up and apparently could not be stopped.  Oh the tragedy!!

A really terrific gal from across the country sent me this polish out of the kindness of her heart!  Thank you, Kris!!  I love, love, love it.

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Okay, so this polish applied just gorgeously.  And my nails in fact did look perfect.  Perfect, I swear!  But by the time I took these pictures the next morning, they somehow looked slightly less than perfect.  I'm not sure why or how.  Please forgive me, Chanel.  Forgive me, peeps.

Two coats.  I think the sun was too harsh for this delicate Russian baby.  Evening sun would have been just divine.  

Here are some more gorgeous and perfect Russian babies.  Varekai and Georgia, my two Borzoi baby dogs!  They are among a very small group of persons and things that I love even more than nail polish.

Here they are fighting like crazy lions.  This picture is beyond hilarious since Varekai (on the right below) is the most docile, gentle, cream-puff sweet creature you could ever imagine.  I think Georgia just takes her to a dark, dangerous place.

This one is from almost a year ago, just after we got Georgia.  Look at their pretty little heads and Vare's adorable little rat feet!

My dogs are perfect.  I cannot lie.  *sigh*  That is all.

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