I almost typed Always Willing and realized what I was doing! Boy am I tired! Always Winning is my first attempt at a true layering polish. This is a very unique polish, it can be buildable, but in about 4 coats depending on your application techniques. But as a layering polish I love the uniqueness of this one. I have to admit this one makes me a little nervous. It is completely off trend, but I couldn't help myself. My worry is that this is a definite love or hate color. I don't think there is going to be a middle ground here. I'll give a sneak peak, but I warn you now, because we have been in this lovely monsoon like weather, the pics just do not pick up the magnificence of this polish.

Here is one coat of Always Winning over bare nails

Here is one coat of Always Winning over Cruisin' Nude

Do you want to see 4 coats of Always Winning by itself? As most of you know I am not a fan of using 4 coats of polish, but for you I did. I would rather use this as the layering top coat I made it as. I really need to re-take these pictures when the sun it out - I just couldn't really capture it on the nail. But here it is with 4 coats.

I recently did a paint splatter manicure with the konad plate M70. I used a rejected nude for Cruisin' Nude and then I added pink paint splatter using Devious Nature and then more paint splatter in black. I love the way the manicure turned out! Check it out!

I decided to do a half moon mani or as it was commonly referred to in the 1920's & 1930's a Gatsby manicure since it went with the Winning Wednesday trivia question. Of course I had to use Quench for the manicure. That is the answer I was looking for - although wrong or right, if you answered, you were entered. And the randomly selected winner was from the blog www.handmadereviews.net. Congratulations!

Here is my gatsby mani: (Sorry about the poor quality - we had a heck of a storm brewing, so the lighting was terrible!)


Even after filing my nails down a bit, I am realizing that these talons are just too long. Juan told me tonight that they are intimidating looking. Not to mention typing and texting is starting to get a little difficult. I think it is time to trim them down! I still have a few mani pics at this length to show you and I probably won't get around to trimming them until this weekend, so you may see a few more pictures at this length, but soon they will be a bit more reasonably filed.

Also, for those of you who are not on Twitter, hang tight, I will be posting another give-away soon. I will actually be doing one for Facebook, one for Twitter and one for blog followers,(so three give-aways) so everyone will have a chance to win. The benefit to Twitter is that it is quick and easy, so most small give-away's will most likely be on Twitter, but I won't leave the rest of you high and dry - I promise! I will post the news soon - I promise!

I'm giving away at least 1 of my new glass nail files today on Twitter around 5pm EST today!!!

Follow on Twitter and RT your answer before this tweet:

RT with your answer for your chance to win an @ glass file:The half moon mani was also known by what name in the 1920's?


A hint: the answer is not Reverse French. The answer will fit with the character limitations!

Thanks to everyone for all your name suggestions! We wrote each and every one of them down and went over all the different options and combinations. We started and stopped all weekend. I figured I still had time, then the email came... We can't get production started until the color is named! WHAT? NO!!! That means we need a name NOW! So back to work we went and for realz this time. The problem - Juan is dead set against any names that use the color name in it. So Give Me a Coral Some Time or anything like it was out. With the exception of Kelliegonzo's suggestion for Coral Me When You're Sober. He chuckled every time we re-read the list and that one made it to the finals. From there anything that sounded to "nail polishy" was out. He is such a picky man - so that meant all the Tequila Sunrise, Tropical Sunsets and the like were out. Every time I liked a name - he looked it up and responded with "There's already a ton of polishes with that name" Grrrrr. So we were left with Solar Flare, which we both liked, NMNE - which would have been a play on the anemone references and something to do with volcano's. We started writing down words that went with each of these things: dormant, fiery, release, phenomenon, fire pit etc... Juan thought we should name it Eruption. Yeah right! Then we came up with Dormant Lust. Looks like a winner, then we thought more on it and felt that it just wasn't right. We also received a tweet from who kindly reminded us that this polish is not dormant, so based on her suggestions we tried to incorporate one of her descriptions of the polish: Pulsating, effervescent and vital. We just had to add Pulsating Lust to the list! Ha! Like school children we giggled at that one. But really, I can't name my polish that! So after another short break break, we went back to work and had 4 names in a hat. Yup that is how the name was chosen! We pulled a name out of the hat 5 times and the same name was picked every single time! OK seriously, is that a sign or what? So the name is Captivated. WAHOO!!! We have a winner!

Now that that is over with, I wanted to thank everyone for the help in naming the polish! It really was a great starting point for us in getting this named! I also wanted to comment on a comment that asked if the polish was chunky. Hmmm, I had to try and figure out what the commenter was saying. I think that could mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people. So I am going to try to answer it as best as I can and I hope this is what you were asking. By chunky, I took it as is the polish thick? or is it smooth? or is the glitter bigger than most other glitter polishes? Or does the glitter lay flat? I tried to take some comp pictures to hopefully answer all these possible scenarios. So here we go...

This is a glitter polish, so it will behave just like any other glitter polish. The only difference is that instead of a clear polish suspension, it has a colored polish suspension.

I first compared it with OPI Mad as a Hatter, RBL Look Good Be Cheap and China Glaze Atlantis. Atlantis being the closest finish to Captivated. Here is a comparison with just one coat:


 Here is three coats:

If you follow me on or , you have already seen this new color. If you don't follow me at those locations, you're missing out! So come join the party and follow me. :)

In the meantime, I just approved a fifth color for the next collection. Like I said, the more I sell, the more colors I will make, so we have now sold enough to add a fifth color! YAY! Hopefully it doesn't turn into the 4th color, since the 4th color has yet to be finalized. UGH! Fingers crossed that it isn't just 4 colors!

But after working with the lab for a coral glitter, I finally have it! I think I say this with every color - but this one is my favorite! HA! The down side is that this color has no name yet! I need to come up with one fast! It is a true coral jelly polish with intense amounts of gold and coral glitter that flash in the sun like nobody's business. It is buildable to wear alone or it can be used over another color. Here is a sneak peak:

The finger on the left has two coats and the one on the right has three coats

Top to bottom: 2 coats, 3 coats, 1 coat over Devious Nature and 1 coat over black

Left to Right: 1 coat over black, 1 coat over Devious Nature, 3 coats and 2 coats

Shell on the beach

My friend Tara and I will walk the beach whenever life allows us to. We chat along the way and we always find something to take a picture of. I mean we really take our walks seriously! Ha! So today I decided forget the beach walk - we are walking the bridge! See technically we live on a barrier island off the coast of FL. So everyday on my way home from work I have to come back over the bridge. I love seeing the island stretch out in the distance in front of me. AHHH home. But I have to go through the torture of seeing all the people dedicated to working out running, walking and biking the causeway. So instead of our normal  3- 4 mile beach walk - we did the bridge twice for a little over a 4 mile walk.

I changed my polish back to Quench since now that I have a perfect red I am LOVING red on my nails. But I realized today just how long my nails are getting! I thought this nail shape would make it harder to grow, but so far so good. I am debating on cutting them though. It is getting a bit hard to type and text at the moment. I even had a little difficulty putting my hair in a ponytail.  Check them out:

I love the end result of this manicure! I think it came out so amazing. Although I keep getting asked if my nails are fake or told they look fake by people who know these are really my own nails. I felt like I was wearing a pre done design. But either way, I am loving it! Unfotunately it comes off after just doing my nails yesterday. It chipped already! Only one nail too, but I banged it and at least it is just a polish chip and not a nail break! (I better go knock on some wood!)

As an added bonus, my daughter B used the top middle design on same plate to do her nails. I thought I would show you her nails as well.

My friend's birthday is today and we are going to a good ol' fashion Irish Pub to celebrate her Birthday & St/ Patty's Day. I figured I would give myself a cool manicure for the occasion. the problem is that I worked a 10 hour day, then went shopping for a gift for my friend (Hey I've been another busy, so last minute shopping it is!), then I came home ate dinner and met up with a neighbor for a bit while the kids played outside. Now back in the house, the kids are in bed and I have a chance to put a manicure together. I am exhausted! I just want to go to sleep, but I figure I can push through. Needless to say the idea of this manicure was cool, but the execution is shody at best. I really need to get my act together. If I was looking at another blog seeing this, I would wonder why the girl even posted it. But since I am tired and just want to get to bed, you get to see my bad work. Even though by the time you see this I will be at work busting my behind. Oh well, such is life sometimes. Not everything can be perfect and neither is this manicure.



the obligatory Charlie's Angel's shot when posing in 70's attire...except I am missing two angel's! :(

I have been trying some more Nail Art lately. I thought I would show you another attempt. I saw somewhere an oil slick type of design. I can't remember where I saw it and when I tried to find it again, I couldn't find it. Basically it is created by dropping one color of the CND effects on your nail and while it is still wet applying an opposite CND effect into that one and then just moving your hand around while it dries to create an oil slick look. It almost looked like a water marbling technique without the mess. I tried it using CND effects in Jade Sparkle (I think that is the name of the green one) and an old pink Sally Hansen Prism polish. But I wasn't getting the effect I wanted, so I painted my nails with a Navy polish and then dropping these colors on my nails and patting on them. I think the end result came out pretty good, not what I set out to to, but pretty cool none the less.

Here is the Navy polish on it's own. These were done late at night so I only had the OTT light to use.


Here is with the polishes dabbed over the top. It looked like a night sky. Loved the look!