NOTD: a-England Lady of the Lake

This is: CND Stickey base coat, one coat Gelish base coat, three coats of SensatioNail 'Heirloom Lilac', two coats of a-England 'Lady of the Lake' and one coat of Jordana Quick Shine top coat. 

I layer regular polish over gel A LOT, as you guys have probably noticed. This is not a particularly good example of that technique. I've got tip wear as well as the gel still showing at the cuticle. I usually stick to a color that's closer to the gel's color and this shows why! If it isn't perfect, you can tell! I usually have only minimal tip wear, and this combo ended up with a lot. 

All that aside, this was my first wearing of an a-England polish. And I LOVE THEM! I bought three when the £6 promo was going on: this one, Saint George, and Dragon. I anticipate using Dragon for an upcoming St. Patrick's Day mani and I can't WAIT to get Saint George on my hands. (Too bad I'm going to Disneyland next week and DISNEY THINGS will be on the nails! This purple is dark and the holo shows up well in bright light (even bright artificial light). It's rather scattered, which I prefer. (Kaleidoscopes over OMGs any day!) 

Verdict: If you don't own any a-Englands, GET SOME! I know they aren't the easiest to get a hold of, but they are worth it! 

*Some of the products featured in this post were provided to me by the manufacturer. All opinions expressed are my own uncensored, regardless. 

SensatioNail 'Heirloom Lilac' giveaway!

Win yourself a bottle of SensatioNail 'Heirloom Lilac'!


Open to US shipping addresses ONLY. (Sorry, International peeps. Shipping is outrageous right now.)

Two winners will win one bottle each of SensatioNail 'Heirloom Lilac' gel nail polish.  Winners will be contacted via email and if no response is received within 48 hours, new winner(s) will be contacted until a response is received.

Please don't enter if you don't have or plan to get a gel nail polish system because you NEED a UV/LED lamp to cure this polish. It will not dry like normal polish. If you don't do gel yourself but plan on giving it to a friend who does or something like that, that is totally cool. I just don't want anyone disappointed that the polish they won doesn't work right.


a Rafflecopter giveaway

Valentine's nails + giveaway info!

This is CND Stickey base coat, Gelish base coat, three coats of SensatioNail 'Heirloom Lilac', Gelish top coat, stamped with Konad m59 plate and this unnamed love&beauty wine-colored polish.

Stamping over gel is so much fun! It's so easy to clean up any mistakes without having to worry that you're going to damage the base color. I really don't know why I don't do it more often.

This is NOT my typical mani, as I'm sure anyone that has read this blog for any amount of time can tell. The reason for it? Two-fold! One is that I had to to hearts for TartanHEARTS! I spent quite a while looking through plates picking out which hearts to use. The second, and most important reason, is because I'm going to be giving away two bottles of 'Heirloom Lilac' and I needed a way to showcase it!



That's right! SensatioNail 'Heirloom Lilac' will be up for grabs! The giveaway will have its own dedicated post coming very soon. It will be a rafflecopter giveaway!

*Some of the products featured in this post were provided to me by the manufacturer. All opinions expressed are my own uncensored, regardless. 

Zoya "Storm"

This is CND Stickey base coat, Gelish base coat, three coats of Gelish "Black Shadow", Gelish top coat, one coat of Zoya "Storm" and Jordana Quick Shine top coat.

I've been going through a big dark nail polish phase and this is perfect! Black with just enough brightness. This polish isn't as super fantastic in low light, but in the sun it GLOWS. If you aren't into dark polish, this one probably isn't for you. If, like me, you could wear dark polish every day and never get tired of it, you should probably pick this one up.

I was amazed that this only took one coat over the gel. Usually shimmery/small glitter polishes are pretty streaky with only one coat but this wasn't at all. I've done a bit of color-on-color type layering and this stands out of the crowd.

This polish is part of my first ever Zoya purchase- I got this one (Storm), Shawn, and Ivanka. I'm very impressed with the quality of these polishes and I *will* be buying more Zoya in the future. I guess I finally see what all the fuss is about! And with all the awesome promos they have, you can't beat it!

*All products featured here were purchased by me for wear and review.