NCLA swatches: As If! and AM: Beauty Sleep, PM: Shopping Spree

Hello lacquered lovelies! Happy Tuesday :) Hope you're all having a great start to your week!

I've just got a quick post today. One of my favourite shopping sites, Nail Polish Canada, recently started carrying NCLA polish, so here are swatches of two of the pretties from the spring collection!

This is my first experience with NCLA polishes. I wasn't sure what to expect. They retail for $16 - so definitely more of a luxury brand and unfortunately the price can be fairly prohibitive for some of us. That being said, the colours are really gorgeous and chic.

First up is As If!, a "timeless lavender creme." The NCLA website also says it's "pastel perfection" and I must agree. I'm such a sucker for colours like this, they're always so flattering and feminine. The formula was a bit thin and patchy, so this was three coats plus topcoat.

And the other pretty for today is AM: Beauty Sleep, PM: Shopping Spree, a "sophisticated, light mint pastel colour" that is "perfect for every season". MINT. Mint that doesn't give me major lobster hands! Happiness. Again, thin and patchy. Three coats plus topcoat.

You can get these from Nail Polish Canada. They retail for $16 CAD and you get free shipping on orders over $25!

Thanks for reading! Have a beautiful day!

The products in this post were provided to me in exchange for an honest review. For more information, see my disclosure above.

Instagram rehash: recent manicures

Hello lacquered lovelies! Happy Saturday! I know I've been gone for a while... I had some technology issues  and was just feeling pretty uninspired. I'm starting to find my mojo again so I've been working on building up some swatches so I can start scheduling posts like I used to. It won't be every day (it still amazes me to think I used to do that) but probably three times a week. That's my goal, anyway.

So... yeah. Anyway, I've been a bit obsessed with double accent nail manicures recently. And mix and matches because I see them so much on Instagram and I love how they look! This is one I did a while ago but I really liked it. The pink is Zoya Lolly, the white is OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls (I use this polish so often haha). The glitter on my index fingernail is Whimsical Ideas by Pam Eloise (never saw that show but the circle glitter omg) and then I just stamped with a Bundlemonster plate. I failed really hard at doing a frame nail on my thumb so it's not visible except the side haha. Oh and black rhinestones near my cuticle for my pinky because black rhinestones.

Next is a pretty simple manicure. My love Jen sent me OPI The Man With the Golden Gun, so of course I had to try it! I decided to layer it over China Glaze Tart-y for the Party (such a cute name and colour). I love purple and gold together. Sadly, TMWTGG is a bit sparse, which I was expecting but still... boo! This is two coats with a lot of patient dabbing haha. I did love this manicure though! Tart-y for the Party had a great formula though, two easy coats for coverage.

I've been completely obsessed with mint polish for the past couple of months. It's an illness. I just need to hoard all of them. This was a pretty one - NCLA AM: Beauty Sleep, PM: Shopping Spree. Formula was a bit patchy and uneven - I did two thin coats and one thick one to even everything out.

Zoya Vespa. Unsurprisingly (given my love for all things glitter and my general preference of wearing them gritty), I'm loving the texture trend. The Zoya Pixie Dusts are fabulous. They're gritty without catching on everything (sorry OPI and China Glaze,  you know I still love you) and I love how they sparkle. I've worn all the Pixie Dusts from the first set now and I'm desperately waiting for Nail Polish Canada to get the summer ones in because I need. I need all the textures, honestly. Except the pink OPI Bond girl that I refuse to say the name of because it grosses me out. Anyway, three coats.

All the texture pls. I love the China Glaze textures too. Jen said they look like ceiling and I totally agree and I dig that okay. The China Glaze textures seem closer to the Nails Inc leather effects/Milani textures in that they're cremes, rather than the gritty sort of glitter that Zoya/OPI are doing, but still. Hotness. I picked up two from the collection. Index and middle fingernails are In the Rough, ring and pinky fingernails are Of Coarse!. Of course I had to have the green and the blue. Two coats of each but these are quite opaque - I imagine someone more careful could get away with one.

And my  most recent mix and match! Or should I say mix and matte? ;) Yeeeep I am that cheesy. Anyway, I loved this one. I wanted something dark but fun... even though it's spring... because I do what I want haha. I used lots for this one. Index to pinky: Zoya Dahlia, OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls topped with Lac Attack Dementor's Kiss, Zoya Chyna and China Glaze Concrete Catwalk topped with Different Dimension Social Suicide. My thumb was just Concrete Catwalk on its own. Two coats of all of the bases, one of each of the glitters. I left the Zoyas to their own devices, of course, but I did topcoat my other nails.

And that's it! Hopefully I'll be back and starting the posting on Monday or Tuesday. We have a lot of stuff going on over the next couple of days but I aim to find time to sit down because finishing up this post has reminded me of why I always come back to blogging. :)

What do you lovelies think? What have you been wearing lately? Are you on board with the texture trend?

Thanks for reading! Have a beautiful day!

piCture pOlish spam!

Hello lacquered lovelies! Happy hump day :) I apologise for my absence once again... I've really lost my blogging mojo lately. My nails are still always polished and I'm still reading and lurking and stalking for new collections, but lately the dread of the amount of work it takes to edit photos is outweighing the joy I get from actually posting. I was feeling inspired last night so I decided to take advantage of it (swatchathon while listening to the Spice Girls... yeah baby) and swatch a bunch of my piCture pOlishes that I haven't shown you guys!

I know I've shown a few lately but I really love piCture pOlish. Such pretty colours and I absolutely adore the blogger collaboration shades - it's so cool to see what lacquerheads come up with! Not all of these are collaboration shades but I'll note which ones are. :)

WOW there's a fair amount of photos. Under the cut, as usual!

OPI chevron manicure

Hello lacquered lovelies! Happy Monday :) I hope you all had a good weekend!

Just a quick post today - I'm partaking in a nail art challenge on instagram (if you want to partake, the tag is #nailartmar). One of the prompts was chevrons, so I did my first ever chevron manicure!

I used OPI Samoan Sand as the base... two coats since I wasn't worrying about vnl. I can't believe it took me so long to get this polish - I always held off on it because I thought it would be too brown for me, but it's actually quite flattering (I think anyway)... then I used OPI You're Such a Budapest for the tips.

The first photo is with topcoat (CND Air Dry) and the second photo is mattified (using Essie Matte About You). I loved this manicure but I loved it even more matte!

What do you lovelies think? Have you ever done chevron tips before? I think I need more practice with them... I really like the way they look (is it weird that I thought this manicure was unusually classy for me?) but it took me waaaaaaaaaaaaay too long to do them. I won't be trying again unless I've got a few hours haha!

Thanks for reading! Have a beautiful day!

piCture pOlish Tiffany and Gene Doll

Hello lacquered lovelies! Happy Sunday (almost Monday)! I'm sorry I didn't post for a bit - I had a... well. You know when you settle on doing something and it seems like a perfect idea but then you do it and regret it immediately afterwards? That was me last weekend. On Saturday I was removing my manicure and I noticed that I had a crack pretty far down on my index nail. At first I was going to just let it grow out, but then I remembered how that worked out for me the last couple times I decided to wait (torn or broken before said growing out actually occurred) so I decided to just bite the bullet and file it down.

Except for that thing where I actually am the worst type of person to have square nails in that it's hard for me to do anything in a straight line. So I was watching Saw (yeah) and not really paying attention... and ended up filing way more of my nail off than I intended. Then I was depressed about it because my nails have never been this short... and of course when I'm willing them to grow they don't seem to be growing at all. And yes, I know I'm exaggerating like woah here but that's just how I roll.

They're finally not so ugly that I'm embarrassed to show them, so I'm combining two piCture pOlish posts into one!

First up is Tiffany. I die for colours like this. I could have a million of them and it would never be enough. They're flattering, refreshing and I always feel happy when I look at them. Tiffany is more balanced than some of the other colours I own in this family (a lot are much more blue) so it's a welcome addition to my stash. These photos are from when I wore Tiffany as a full manicure, which is why my nail length is better different. Sadly, I had some issues with the formula. It was a bit patchy and streaky, so it took three coats to get it even. I don't mind three coats, but application did take a bit of skill and patience... I ended up doing two thinish coats and one thick one to even it all out. So three coats with topcoat.

Then I decided to layer Gene Doll over Tiffany because I thought it would be a cute combination. It was, I dig it. Gene Doll is two sizes of fuchsia glitter in a clear base. Perfect for jelly sandwiches! I layered one coat of Gene Doll over Tiffany plus topcoat.

What do you lovelies think? Aren't you so ready for spring?! I need some nice weather asap, we've been having some weirdness lately here.

You can get piCture pOlish from a variety of places, including the piCture pOlish website, Harlow & Co., Nail Polish Canada, Pshiiit Boutique, Llarowe... check out the piCture pOlish network to find an etailer for your country! You can also keep up with the piCture pOlish girls on Facebook and Twitter... they have an Instagram account now too!

Thanks for reading! Have a beautiful day!

The polishes in this post were provided to me in exchange for an honest review. For more information, see my disclosure tab above.