Christmas mani #2 featuring Candy Lacquer "Rudolph's Treats"

This is three coats of Gelish "Runway for Your Money" with a coat of Candy Lacquer "Rudolph's Treats". Accent nail is a taped Christmas tree using China Glaze "Winter Holly" for the tree, Candy Lacquer "Dippin' Dots" for the ornaments and a fished out giant piece of glitter as the topper from Kleancolor "Afternoon Picnic". All topped off with two coats of Poshe top coat.

As soon as I saw the Candy Lacquer polishes with all round dots, I *had* to have them. They are really fun! They are something that is a lot cuter to me and in close up pictures than anything else, because you can't tell the difference between the round and hex unless you're really looking. (As I'm typing this, I can't tell when they're at keyboard's length.) Also, I had a bit of an issue with the glitter separating from the base in the round glitters. I own several other Candy Lacquer glitters and haven't had this issue with any of the others, so I assume it is related to the round glitters. A little shaking and everything is back to normal, so no biggie!

I didn't like this as much as my other Christmas mani, but it would be pretty hard to beat that one! I'm not sure what it was, but something about this one just didn't "click". I'll try "Rudolph's Treats" over another base in the future and see how that works. (I'm getting all kinds of ideas now, but it's after Christmas! Day late; dollar short.)

Happy New Year! New Year's nails coming soon.

Christmas nails! featuring the Hungry Asian "Candy Cane"

This is three coats of Gelish "Black Shadow", with one generous coat of The Hungry Asian "Candy Cane". Accent nail has one coat China Glaze "Twinkle Lights". All topped with one coat of Jordana Quick Shine top coat.


"Candy Cane" is a clear/slightly shimmery base with small red and white matte hex glitter and small green matte square glitter. It spread very well. I used the dabbing on method to apply it, because it is somewhat thick but that helped get maximum glitter on the nail.

"Twinkle Lights" is a clear base with tiny red, green, and gold glitter.

This was my first time using any of the Hungry Asian polishes I have, even though I've got a few minis. (I'm not sure why, because they are almost all colors that will go great over gel, but that's another subject entirely.) I can't recommend it more enthusiastically! Not only are her polishes very cute and quite often stuff that you don't just see everywhere else, she adds personal touches to every order. The labels are hand-drawn and every order has a cute little handwritten note inside. I adore stuff like that! It will keep me coming back over and over more than anything else. Plus, the quality of the polish is wonderful. And you know being TartanHEARTS and all I don't have to say that I adore the heart-shaped bottles because it's too obvious but I will say it anyway! I know I would be justified buy full-sizes of any of her polishes because they are so beautiful, but I can't get over how cute the heart-shaped minis are.

I'd also been sitting on China Glaze "Twinkle Lights" for a year or so. I was surprised at how much I liked it on the nail! I wasn't sure, because it seems a little muddy in the bottle. Not so on the nail! The red and green stand out from the gold very distinctly.

Over-all, I wanted to put this back on after a week. I didn't so I could wear more Christmas-themed polish but I would have been happy putting this right back on.

*All polishes featured here were purchased by me. 

Sally Hansen Lustre Shine 'Copperhead'

Sally Hansen Lustre Shine 'Copperhead', a photo by TartanHearts on Flickr.

This is CND Stickey as base coat. Three coats of SH 'Copperhead' and a coat of Jordana Quick Shine top coat.

I hated this. I didn't even bother to do much clean up. There is a gorgeous green shade in the bottle that doesn't show up on the nail at all. It ends up being a rose gold or copper color most of the time that shows purpley-brown at extreme angles. It would be MUCH better with the green. I like most of my duochromes to have the DUO part!

I've only swatched one other Lustre Shine (Scarab) and it was great. This one was not. I still have a couple more, so the jury is still out on the collection as a whole.

With all the awesome duochrome/multichrome polish out there, don't waste your time with this one.

Candy Lacquer 'Midnight Gems'

Top photo: Three coats of Red Carpet Manicure's 'My Inspiration' with CND Stickey as base coat plus regular Gelish base and top coats. 

Bottom photo: Above PLUS a coat of Candy Lacquer 'Midnight Gems' and two coats of Jordana Quick Shine top coat. 

I LOVED this. The moment I saw Midnight Gems, I knew I had to have it. I love holographic glitter, so when you add many colors of holo glitter plus regular glitters, it is a wonderful effect. (CL's description: "Gunmetal holographic glitter mixed with lots of other holographic colors including red, blue, orange, pink, gold and lavender.") I loved it over the grey, and it really reminded me of a pendant I made. Holo over medium grey is a good look, all around! This look was perfect for a Christmas party my sister put on. Just enough sparkle to catch your eye, without being IN YOUR FACE! 

(All products reviewed were purchased by me. I'll have a post pretty soon where this won't be the case, so I figured I'd better start specifying!)

China Glaze Winter Holly

Above is three coats of China Glaze 'Winter Holly' with CND Stickey as base coat and Jordana Quick Shine top coat. (This ATE top coat, and I'd recommend Seche or Gelous!)

I found this beauty at CosmoProf, and it was the only one in the CG Holiday Joy collection that I picked up. I'm relatively sure they didn't have 'Glistening Snow' because I couldn't have passed that puppy up. Anyway, 'Winter Holly' is a nice, mossy green glitter with gold and (possibly?) a few holo glitters in the mixed. You can see the glitter better in the slightly blurry second picture.



This is WH without top coat. ... I LOVED it that way! It was kind of suede-y and really nice. This leads me to believe this would be great mattefied, but I haven't tried it yet. I liked the texture of it without topcoat, as well. I actually liked it better without top coat than with!

The CG Holiday Joy collection is available all over the place, including Head 2 Toe Beauty for $3.25.

Lustre Shine 'Scarab'

This is two coats (!) of Sally Hansen Lustre Shine in 'Scarab' with CND Stickey as a base coat and Jordana Quick Shine top coat.

One word for this: LOVE!

I don't know why it took me two months to wear this bad boy, because it's absolutely gorgeous. Sure, it's not very duo-chromey but I am more than okay with that. Now, I know I wear lot of blue polish. I have more blue nails posted than any other color. But I don't wear a lot of shimmery polish. For some reason, this one just spoke to me. I love the silkiness of Scarab. The downside? It chipped like cuh-razy! Chrome-y polish never lasts very well on my nails. I'm not sure if it's body chemistry or what. We'll see if it's the same for some of the other polishes in this collection.

Have you guys succumbed to the lure of the Lustre Shines? Which ones are your favorite?

RCM 'Dress For Success' over black

Shown above is Red Carpet Manicure 'Dress For Success' over Gelish 'Black Shadow', with one, two, and three coats.

Thanks to whomever requested this! I know it's how it was intended to be worn, and it looks fantastic! My favorite is just one coat.

Black Friday black nails.

Gelish 'Black Shadow'. Once again I used regular base coat (CND Stickey this time) and no dehydrator. I still use the Gelish foundation gel. This seems to work great! I get no chipping but it's still very easy to remove. (Using the dehydrator and no foundation gel let to chipping on the edges but still hard to remove gel in the middle.)

This is the first time I've done plain black nails since early high school, ten-ish years ago. I love it! It's not very interesting in terms of blogging, but plain ol' black cremes are my favorite nails to do. As great as stamping and glitter are, sometimes you need some simplicity!

Simple Election Day nails. (plus how to scrub in glitter)

Election Day nails, a photo by TartanHearts on Flickr.

(late to post them, I know. I put them on facebook and nowhere else.)

This is two coats of RCM 'Midnight Affair' with Wet N Wild Fantasy Makers glitter scrubbed in on my ring fingers. I used Nailtiques 2 as base coat and did not use the nail dehydrator. Removal is so much easier that way! No scraping.

If you are doing gel and have not done scrubbed in glitter DO IT NOW! I mean, unless you hate glitter or something. Which is fine, no judgement. (more for me!) If you do gel and like glitter and haven't done this technique, let me tell you: IT IS SO EASY!

I was thinking I'd have to ... do something complicated to achieve this. Nope! Let me go through the steps for scrubbing in glitter:

1. Choose a relatively jelly-like gel color. Most gel is fairly jelly-ish, so this shouldn't be hard.

2. Do your nails as usual, stopping before you apply the gel top coat. After curing gel color for the last time, get your glitter.

3. Using small paintbrush, pat glitter onto nail. It will stick to the cured gel, which is tacky.

4. Paint over glitter layer and cure that layer in the lamp. You can use a colored gel here or just clear coat/top coat. I've seen suggestions to wipe off any glitter that sticks or have a specific clear coat just for glitter. I am not that particular. You may be. Proceed accordingly.

5. Finish manicure as you usually would with top coat and then wiping/spraying with alcohol.

6. PROFIT!

Basically, let me sum this up: tap glitter onto your cured gel sometime during your mani.

This will not be the last time you see this technique from me. I love glitter, and I love that the removal for this is just as easy as regular gel removal (which rivals removing normal glitter in terms of time). I'm considering doing some pretty cool stuff with this technique for Christmas. Maybe that tape mani to make a tree with multi-size glitter scrubbed in as ornaments. How neat would that be?!

the final Halloween manicure

This is one coat of Sinful Colors 'Black on Black' with a coat of twee & honey 'Viscera' over it. Base coat was Nailtiques 2 and top coat was Jordana Quick Shine Top Coat.

I love this. I loved it enough to actually take off one nail, after it chipped, and replace it with the exact same thing. 'Viscera' is amazing and the best part was that it had teeny little hearts! I didn't see them in the bottle and they were a wonderful surprise! There aren't words to describe how awesome this was. And it was perfect for when my GIANTS WON THE WORLD SERIES!

Also, this gorgeous mani matches my blog! I didn't plan it, but it's perfect!

Halloween/Giants manicure!

China Glaze Riveting stamped with BM-221 and Sinful Colors Black on Black. Two coats of Jordana Quick Shine top coat, one before stamping and one after.

I LOVE THIS! I hadn't stamped anything since around St. Patrick's Day. Somehow the stars aligned and I didn't have to re-stamp anything! And miraculously, my right hand looked better than my left. The bottle of SC Black on Black that I use for stamping is a couple years old now, and it stamps like a mofo! As good a Konad special polish, for sure. (I will probably replace it with a bottle of the Konad special polish, but for a starter stamping polish, you can't go wrong with it.)

We all know how fantastic China Glaze's 'Riveting' is. I don't have to reiterate that. It is even more amazing when you stamp over it. I love stamping over creams, but stamping over this micro glitter/shimmer was fantastic. It gave a lot of depth. (I have a gorgeous pendant made with it in my shop now.) And this is one of the few oranges that works pretty well on my skin tone. The gold shimmer really helps with that.

This has inspired me to do a little more stamping. Or maybe do some leopard print freehand. Or both!

Pretty & Polished 'Candy Corn' color change polish

This stuff is amazing! I think I'm going to have to get some more of Pretty & Polished's color change polishes because it was so much fun to have this on. Every time I'd look at my nails, they would be different. Especially great this time of year because the temperature is all over the place.

The one downside to this polish was that it wasn't totally opaque. I HATE hate hate VNL and had I realized I would have it (somehow I didn't think I would; wishful thinking!), I'd have done it over white or nude gel or something. Next time! Because I *will* be wearing this again. It would be very cool to stamp over.

Pretty & Polished polishes are available on etsy here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/PrettyandPolished 'Candy Corn' is in stock at the time I'm posting this.

Halloween mani #2

Three coats of Revlon Sparkle Aplenty with Pretty & Polished Pumped Up Pumpkin accent nail.

I LOVE the Sparkle Aplenty. It's the kind of thing I'd use any time, not just for Halloween. It's hard to tell, but it has both silver glitter AND black glitter in a black base. Gorgeous!

I also love the Pumped Up Pumpkin. It's got red and orange glitter (mostly orange) and I think some holo/silver micro glitter. Perfect for Halloween.

However, I didn't love the combination. I think Sparkle Aplenty is enough by itself and Pumped Up Pumpkin would be better over a cream.

What do you guys think about this combo?

Halloween/NLDS manicure

Halloween/NLDS manicure, a photo by TartanHearts on Flickr.

China Glaze 'Ick-a Bod-y" with Kleancolor "Chunky Copper" accent nail. Two coats of Jordana Quick Shine top coat.

LOVE THIS! And it has worked so far. Fingers crossed for tomorrow. I'm not sure whether I should change it or keep it the same to keep the mojo going.

Orange is one of my least favorite colors, and isn't the best on my skin tone, but it is my favorite team AND Halloweentime! I have to wear it. Ick-A Bod-Y is my favorite of the CG Halloween polishes that I own. I'm really lemming the new Orly orange and black Halloween polish, R.I.P. Reminds me of China Glaze Fortune Teller, which is amazing.

I also have a pendant that matches this mani in my shop! https://www.etsy.com/listing/107975007/los-gigantes-nail-polish-pendant Perfect for Halloween.

Do you have a favorite orange (or black) polish that I haven't mentioned? There are some great ones out there.

giveaway winners' custom pieces are fantastic!

These are what the giveaway winners chose, and they are great choices if I do say so myself! On the left is China Glaze's 'Kaleidoscope Him Out' and on the right is the Buchanan tartan. Two of my favorites! (Although any holo and any tartan with yellow are automatically in the favorites running.) These are now on their way to their new homes and I can't wait to do another giveaway. They're so much fun! 

150 facebook 'likes' giveaway!

To thank you guys for 150 likes, here is a little bit of fun! I love doing giveaways, even though I never win. Good luck to you all!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Vending! Like, in person!

Last night I had my first experience vending at an event rather than online. It was pretty neat, even for a introvert like myself. And I made enough to cover the entry fees, so I consider that a success! (And considering that it was a pretty low-key event, that was good!)

My major failure was forgetting my cellphone. It's pretty hard to use one's really cool Square credit card reader on your phone if your phone is twelve miles away. This also meant that I was unable to take pictures of my final set-up. :( To add insult to injury: I thought about bringing my camera but didn't because I'd be able to take pictures on my phone. Next time!

Here are a couple of pictures from while I was getting things together in the living room.





Final set-up was different than both of those, and it's sort of amazing how much jewelry I actually have!

Nfu-Oh Gelist 'Twinkle Gold Silver Black 08'

This is three coats of Nfu-Oh TGSB08 with Gelish base and top coat.

This stuff is really pretty. If you're into dark colors (obviously I am!) and you're into gel, I highly suggest this one. The only drawback is that it's a little goopy, and that makes the super-thin gel layers thing harder to do. I can't decide if the glitter is holo or just iridescent or what. It's one of those polishes that I end up just staring at my hands with, watching the colors change. (I swear, I'm not on drugs!)

And because there is large glitter, sometimes you get pieces of glitter hanging over the edge of your nails. One of these was the reason that my pink ended up "chipping" (i.e. lifting up and then being broken off), because it caused the edge to un-seal.

Nfu-Oh Gelist polishes are available in the US here: http://www.fabuloustreet.com/

Where TartanHearts Jewelry has gone domestically.

Where TartanHearts Jewelry has gone within the US.

Make yours @ BigHugeLabs.com

I hope some day I can get all 50 states! (I think if I do, I'll have a 50% off sale!) That would be really freakin' cool. 

Where TartanHearts has gone, worldwide!

Where TartanHearts has gone!

Make yours @ BigHugeLabs.com

Pretty neat! I wish the Luxembourg showed up on the map because I thought it was pretty flippin' cool when I got that order.

http://tartanhearts.storenvy.com/
http://tartanhearts.etsy.com/

Fourth of July mani!

Fourth of July is my favorite holiday for manicures! I love the creativity that's involved; you can go a lot of different directions with it.

Okay, let's get into the nitty-gritty. This one used a lot of polish!

Two coats RCM 'Midnight Affair'
taped corner/diagonal French with Milani One Coat Glitters 'Red Sparkle'
ring finger accent nail with Pretty & Polished 'Freedom Calling'
touch-up on red with LA Colors red striper
white dots with dotting tool and LA Colors white striper

The blue is darker and more opaque in person. The red isn't see-through in person. (It's interesting what the camera picks up!) Overall, I love it! I'm considering doing an opposite thing on my toes, which currently have China Glaze 'Ruby Pumps' on them.

Happy (early) Fourth of July to any other Americans, and happy Tuesday to anyone who isn't.

This is last year's mani for July 4th:

RCM 'Dress for Success'

This gorgeous polish is from RCM's new Shimmering Nights collection, which is amazing. I checked out all four at Ulta and settled on 'Dress for Success' initially. Filled a void in my small but growing gel collection, and is now my only green.

(photo from RCM's facebook)

RCM calls this color a yellow, which I completely disagree with. I'd call it chartreuse, sure. These colors were designed to wear over black, but I don't have a black gel (yet), so aren't super opaque. I wore this over two coats of ProGel 'Trophy Cup', which is an opaque gold glitter. It covered it quite well, and on a couple of edges where the green doesn't totally cover the gold, I get a real idea of the opacity of the green, which is much better than what I expected. I'm left wondering whether I could have just done 3-5 coats of 'Dress for Success' with no VNL.

The glitter almost looks like a holo, but isn't. The label is a holo, and you can see the difference in the second photo. There is a bit of a range in the glitter that almost verges on being a duochrome. (Maybe like a very light version of 'Zombie Zest'.)

Verdict: in a world where there aren't a lot of green gels available, this is a gem!

RCM 'Who Are You Wearing'

I love glitter as much as the next girl, possibly more, but after the last couple of super glittertastic crazy manis, I was pretty excited to put something simple on my nails. I own a TON of blues/aquas/teals in this color range because I LOVE THEM!

This is three coats of Red Carpet Manicure's 'Who Are You Wearing' from the new Neon collection. (Which, if you're into gel and into neons in the least, you need to check out!) It's a little more yellow (teal) in real life, although the swatch on my nail wheel looks just like the bottle. (I assume this is due to my skin tone and nail actually showing through.) I'd call it a darkened sky blue. This color is very jelly-like, and totally squishy-looking. It looks more see-through here than it actually is, and I'm not sure why it looks like my nails are dirty. They aren't!

I'm starting to formulate a plan for my Fourth of July mani! Everything's up in the air at this point, but I'm really excited for it. (This was one of last year's.) It's my favorite holiday for nail polish! Do you have any plans for a special July 4th mani? I'd love to hear about them if you do.

China Glaze 'Optical Illusion'

China Glaze 'Optical Illusion', a photo by TartanHearts on Flickr.

Via Flickr:
this mani was:
one coat Gelish base coat
two coats RCM 'Midnight Affair'
two coats China Glaze 'Optical Illusion'
two coats Gelish top coat

more sandwiching gel and regular polish. 'Midnight Affair' was the only blue gel I had, so I used it even though it was WAY too dark. Didn't show through, through. There was a little bit of a hot pink duochrome with this polish. I couldn't capture it in any of my pictures.

This is a polish I probably won't wear much, but I LOVE it! I spent a lot of time looking at my nails for the week I had it on. The glitter in this one seemed to show way more than the glitter in the purple 'Prism'. And there was duochrome here, which was absent with 'Prism'.

China Glaze 'Prism'

Wow. These China Glaze Prismatics are pretty freaking awesome. I love the multi-colored glitter in a glittery base.

This is two coats of 'Prism' and a coat of Poshe over three coats of SensatioNail 'Purple Orchid' and topped with a coat of Gelish topcoat. (I wasn't at all happy with 'Purple Orchid', could you tell? I only kept it two days.) Top picture is in the sun; bottom two are in the shade.

Seriously, if you don't have any of these yet and you like glitter, GET THEM. They are super fun. I spent a good chunk of the last week just looking at my nails.

SensatioNail 'Purple Orchid'

Well, this one was a disappointment. In all the packaging, this looks like a nice, dark, warm purple. It's not. It's a cool purple. Very cool. Although the top color shows pink sparkle, it's not visible at all in real life. This isn't what I was expecting, and I probably wouldn't have bought this, had I seen a swatch of it already. However I wanted another dark, non-pink color, and didn't want to wait for shipping.

Possible next addition to my gel collection: OPI Gelcolor Suzy Says Feng Shui. I need a lighter blue. I need some greens, though! And there are very few green gels.

swatches of my gel collection!

1. Red Carpet Manicure 'Midnight Affair'
2. RCM ' Plum Up The Volume'
3. SensatioNail 'Taupe Tulips'
4. SensatioNail 'Raspberry Wine'
5. SensatioNail 'Sugar Plum'
6. ProGel 'Trophy Cup'
7. OPI Gelcolor 'You Don't Know Jacques'
8. SensatioNail 'Purple Orchid'

You've seen my nails already with quite a few of these, but I've got one with #8 coming up!

Trying my own hand at YDKJ.

This is my go at OPI Gelcolor 'You Don't Know Jacques' and I must say that I am happier with it than I was for the version I paid for at a salon. It isn't the best I've done with gel so far, and it seems a little more watery than other brands/colors, but I love seeing it on my nails.

Gel swatches so far!

1. Red Carpet Manicure 'Midnight Affair'
2. RCM ' Plum Up The Volume'
3. SensatioNail 'Taupe Tulips'
4. SensatioNail 'Raspberry Wine'
5. SensatioNail 'Sugar Plum'

Silly me, I forgot to swatch the ProGel gold glitter and You Don't Know Jacques! This is the beginning of my gel collection. No new additions ... yet!