Day 8: 12 Days of Christmas Nails

Day 8 here we come! Today was Orly - Liquid Vinyl and Sinful Colors - Cold As Ice.

Orly - Liquid Vinyl is my go to black. I use it for just about all black manicures. I only used 1 coat for this. And Sinful Colors Cold - As Ice is a white bar glitter. I used one coat for the glitter. You can see that it applies nicely and doesn't look patchy. 

I loved this combo! Way better than the bar glitter mani I had earlier in the week. 

Day 8: Nail Polish Advent Calendar

Day 8 brings a snowy color. Of course we have no snow in Chicago and ironically today it rained off and on

It's ManGlaze Mayonnaise! It's matte but I unfortunately put top coat on it because I was in a hurry. This is much prettier matte. I used three coats.

I went downtown today with my mom. We stopped at the Chicago Christkindlmarket first. I love going, but it is so crowded on the weekends that it's hard to see everything. Plus with the rain we had to move on to the cover of Macy's. I'll go again next week sometime on a weeknight.

Overall the Christmas Market is really nice. Pretty similar to the ones in Germany. Most of the items you find in Germany you can get here. It's just a lot pricier. Lots of great food and they even have the chocolate covered fruit. Yum!

I love the intricate Schwibboge. This one retails for $269 but it's so beautiful! 

OPI - My Pointe Exactly and Pirouette My Whistle

Hello again. I'm here to show you two new to me polishes. I picked them up at Regis Salon during a buy 1 get 2 free sale! Isn't that a lovely deal!? These are from the OPI New York City Ballet soft shades collection from Spring 2012.

The base color I used for this look is called My Pointe Exactly. It's a very sheer light grey. You will have a visible nail line. I used 4 coats.

The Glitter is called Pirouette My Whistle. It's has small silver glitter and then a white grey hex glitter. Really pretty. I used one coat of the glitter. Would of like to of used more, but I was already at 5 coats of polish an decided anymore was too risky or sheet marks.

Overall a really nice neutral look that's still a little cute and crazy. I'm enjoying wearing this as my manicure.

Catrice - Don't Feed The Birds with China Glaze - Lightning Bolt

I bought this back in the spring when Catrice was switching out the stock. So this color is now discontinued. Don't Feed The Birds is a sheer yellow shimmer which needed four coats. It did dry nicely for the amount of coats. It's a very pretty yellow so I'm glad I got it before it was gone.

The next day I slapped a coat of China Glaze Crackle Glaze in Lightning Bolt. I liked the color combination a lot. Application of the Crackle Glaze was pretty good. I tried to put it on thick for nicer crack.

Glossy shot...

Close up shot...

Fourth of July Manicure

Happy Fourth of July to the American ladies home and abroad! This is my third 4th of July I've spent in Switzerland. I also officially moved to Zurich last year on the 4th. I've never really got to celebrate much year. The first year we grilled out the day before and I wore my flag t-shirt, the 2nd year we were at the Zurifest and watched a bizarre dragon boat firework show, this year I spent the evening alone but ate every usual thing I could. Chicken breast, corn on the cob, blueberry muffins, and coca cola. When I'm done writing this I'm breaking out the watermelon!

Here are the different polishes I used for my manicure.

Color Club - Art of Seduction, MNY 661, Milani - Ruby Jewels, Nivea - White, N.Y.C. White Lights Glitter

First, I used two coats of MNY 661 as the base color. Then I used two coats of N.Y.C White Lights Glitter. I did the glitter gradient with Color Club Art of Seduction. Lots of different coats of glitter for that. I think I had to paint it on at least five times for the gradient.

The flag on my thumb had a base coat of Milani - Ruby Jewels. I used a paint brush to create the rectangle with MNY 661, Sally Hansen nail art pen for the dots, and the Nivea White to make the stripes. Obviously it's not totally accurate, but it's a lot harder than it looks!

I love this shot of the manicure!

You can really see the between coat of N.Y.C. White Lights Glitter in these photos. Which is a lovely color btw. I'm going to need to use it again soon.

 

 Here is the right hand. It's got dented a bit on two nails since the glitter didn't dry to well.

What's your favorite way to celebrate the 4th? Or to celebrate your nation's important holiday? Swiss National Day is August 1st but it's pretty tame compared to American fourth of July.

Cult Nails - Quench with Special Guest Kiko 232

I'm back today with another Cult Nails polish. This time it's Quench a lovely blood red jelly. My favorite color is red so I'm very partial to red nail polish. Quench is so squishy and applied very nicely. This is probably my top red at the moment. I had a problem when I flooded the cuticle on my index finger. Totally my fault but almost impossible to clean up this type of red without staining everything. So sorry it's a bit stained around my cuticles. :(

I've acquired a lot of nail polish recently. I've been wanting to start trying layering over the different colors with Kiko 232. So that's exactly what I did by putting one coat over Quench. Kiko 232 is a white iridescent flaked glitter. Very lovely sparkle finish, but I'm not sure if I like it over red. I think it will look better over pastel colors.

Kiko nail polishes can only be found in Kiko Cosmetics stores in Italy, Spain, France, and Germany. They retail for 3.90 Euros. I wish they had a store in Switzerland.  Milan is about 3 hours away from Zurich and I really think a store like Kiko would thrive, but I guess they have their reasons.


As I said yesterday... Cult Nails polishes retail for $10 and shipping is reasonable. I messed around on the checkout to see shipping prices and for the US 1 polish to ship is $3 and 2-4 polishes were $5. For Europe shipping for 1 polish is $6 and 2-4 polishes are $8. The shipping prices make me happy since companies often overcharge you for shipping.

Maria has expressed that Cult Nails will have a few promos every once in awhile so if you would like to keep up to date with that you should sign up for Cult Nails email updates on the website's front page or keep up with Cult Nails' twitter.