Paint splatters can be FUN!

You know, I admit it. I am totally a child of the 80s. I love neon, I love wild prints, and I love paint splats. This set of nails reminds me of a sweatshirt I had in grade school, only the shirt was white instead of black. But what better color than black to make colors pop?

You can see how vivid the colors are. I can't lie, I want to keep these all for myself! So much fun, but at least I can redo them if I decide to!

This set of nails is made with a custom-mixed rainbow of acrylic paints, so that they have the same level of intensity. I love the black base, and the topcoat makes the colors so intense and glassy!

I won't lie, I can see doing this design with shimmers, metallics, glitters... monochromatic colors, analogous colors... I think it'd be fun no matter HOW I mixed it up! It's just downright FUN! Oooh, imagine white splats on a black background, with the occasional splat of red! There are so many ways to do this, and I don't know if any are better than the others. You'll definitely see this pattern again, if only on Etsy! Speaking of Etsy, these will be going up as soon as I finish this post.

I'm so excited to add that I've got some surprises coming up soon! I'm planning some videos, both of some of those dramatic, color-shifting polishes in the sun as well as some technique videos. If you have anything you'd like to see, feel free to leave requests in the comments!

And oy, I've just looked at the clock to see that once again, I'm catching 7:30am from the wrong side. I think I need to go to sleep. Man... one of these days I'll get my internal clock set right again.

...maybe. :D

Heaven Nail Lacquer is waiting for you...

I got so many questions about where, exactly, I bought my Heaven polish. I felt a little guilty, because I was waiting til I could get there and snap a few pictures to tell. What can I say, I wanted to share all the colors, not just one! So... the big secret is out. If you're looking for lots of fun colors at completely affordable prices, go to . . .

You read that right. Go to the cosmetics department at your local Albertsons grocery store and pharmacy. I bet you didn't know they had an extensive cosmetics department! The only way I knew is because I have a family member who used to manage the cosmetics department in her local Albertsons. She would bring me the most wonderful things all the time.

The interesting thing is that the Albertsons cosmetics department isn't managed by any old grocery store manager. No, they realize that cosmetics are important to women, so their departments actually are staffed by cosmeticians! So you really should stop by and look to see what's there... you might be pleasantly surprised.

Oh wait, I did that for you! Now, let me preface this by saying that just because these were found at my local store doesn't mean they'll be at all stores, but I know that this is a concept Albertsons is proud of across the board, so I bet you might have more luck than you might expect. So, your mileage may vary, keep your seatbelts on, and let's see what I found!

CoverGirl LashBlast Fusion Mascara Made My Tiny Lashes Visible!

Ok, we're getting away from nail stuff today, I hope you guys don't mind. But I simply had to share this. If you hated it, tell me, and I'll try not to do it again. :D

So, some women are born with amazing lashes. You know the ones- long, curled, sexy lashes that frame their eyes beautifully. I always wanted lashes like that. Instead, I have tiny, fine lashes that are hard to see, and I also have a fat face with deep set eyes. This means that my lashes are all but invisible, unfortunately. I dream of the day I could get lash extensions... or just visible lashes!

So I was provided with a sample of CoverGirl LashBlast Fusion Mascara from BzzAgent. My first action was to run to the web to check it out. There I found that it's $10 at WalMart! $10, for drugstore mascara... for COVERGIRL drugstore mascara? This better be something special...

Well, I got it. I tried it. It's not perfect... the brush for it is weird. It's thick and stubby, and seems hard to control to get your corner lashes covered. And yet, this stuff really IS special. It's buildable, so you can put on as much or as little as you need. It's amazing, in that it both thickened my lashes and lengthened them, visibly. It even curled them a bit! I mean... look at this comparison!

Pardon my big scary head there, but really... do you see the difference? No smudges to clean away, no clumpy ickiness, and holy crap, you can see my eyelashes!!!

It also isn't waterproof, which makes me want to cry. Because even though it makes my eyes look this awesome, my eyes are deep-set, and this will wear off between my laughter and sweat in no time. I cannot wear non-waterproof mascara. But still, if you can? This stuff is a dream.

So there. If you're looking for high-end performance from a drugstore mascara, add this one to your list of ones to try. It won me over. It won me over so much that I'm abusing exclamation points. :D

Heaven Nail Lacquer, Ruby

There are polishes that absolutely everyone knows about- China Glaze, Orly, OPI, Nfu-Oh, the list goes on and on. They're fabulous polishes, don't get me wrong. But sometimes, it can be fun to find something new, something that hasn't been talked to death already. What can I say, if something's been shown on every other blog already, it makes me think maybe I shouldn't bother showing it?

Then there's the stuff no one talks about. I won't lie. I've been googling myself mad, looking for someone, anyone talking about this stuff. I wondered if the company squeezes live kittens into bottles, or tests their polishes on penguin beaks, upsetting their natural feeding cycle and killing millions every day. Because surely, if a polish was this good, someone would have blogged it by now?

Maybe not. Maybe I'm just lucky, and happened to wander into a place no one has thought to look for interesting new inexpensive nail polishes. If so? AWESOME!! I mean, do you see the polish on my thumb, here? And that, my friends, is without the benefit of a topcoat. This polish is something special, and I cannot say enough good things about it.

This polish is from Heaven Nail Lacquer, in the shade Ruby. You're looking at two coats, no topcoat, shot with a flash. I'm stunned, because honestly, this doesn't capture the beauty of the glitter, the depth of it. This stuff sparkles, with a depth that is absolutely insane. Add a topcoat to it and it's absolutely impossible to stop looking at it.

This bottle of polish cost a grant total of $2, give or take. I think it was $1.99, but I can't swear to it. I'm planning a blog fieldtrip soon, in which I take you all with me to the cosmetics department in which this sweet little beauty lived before it came home with me. This one is my precious, and I think it may be my favorite polish, at least for today.

Now, clearly this one isn't big 3 free. No, it's about as fulla 3 as you can get, but for $2, can you really complain? I wish I could compare it in RL to China Glaze's Ruby Pumps. From what I've seen, this could be very similar to it. It's a rich jelly polish with dense silver microglitter that shines up through the jelly for super depth and interest. I'm serious when I say that when I wear this, I can't stop looking at my fingers. Every time they catch the light, I get a wave of giggles inside, and I feel like I'm wearing Dorothy's ruby slippers on my fingertips!

Of course, I'm also a bit sappy, so it doesn't hurt that my husband got this for me for Mother's day. It's a long story, but a sweet one, and so it makes this polish just that much sweeter. Nothing like a bit of romance to make a great polish even greater!

Take care, lovelies. I've been up all night, and I think I need to curl up with my husband for the few minutes I can and appreciate how lucky I am. Give your honey an extra-loving hug this morning while you can, just because you can. :D

♥, Laynie

A quick picture post...

I took these photos tonight and just had to share them before I crash for the evening. I hope you like them, they're going to be the subject of a post very soon... You know, once they're finished.

Mmm, how I love the smell of giveaways in the morning!

If you love giveaways, then you'll like this post. If not, I'm putting it behind a cut, so you don't have to spend too much time on it. Don't worry, I'll have a new post up soon enough.

Now, follow me for giveaways out the wazoo!!

Fail Nails- or why not every experiment is successful...

The problem with being experimental is that sometimes, despite your best efforts, the experiment is going to turn out AWFUL! Experiments can be great, and lead you to great things, or they can end up being a learning experience. Unfortunately, this experiment was a total failure!

See, I'd found an acrylic paint I was in love with. Still am- this stuff is downright magical. I did a test nail with it that turned out amazingly pretty. The problem is that I didn't actually wear the nail. I left it on its cute little stick and admired it for weeks. Finally, I decided to do a full set like it.

This would be where the problem showed up. I used a different application method for this, and unfortunately it just didn't work. Once I'd built the paint up to an opaque level, it was thicker than I realized. Adding two coats of topcoat to smooth out the surface didn't help, either. I left them up on their sticks for three days to dry, and then took them down, sanded their edges, and dropped them into a small ziplock bag for jewelry. I figured I'd photo them when it was time to put them on Etsy, if I ever did that.

When I pulled them out of the bag much later, I was absolutely horrified. What had gone in smooth as glass came out lumpy and gouged to the bare nail in places. The "polish" wasn't sticky. No, it was worse.

It was stretchy.

I couldn't do anything to save this one. My gorgeous turquoise glitter nails ended up being a giant fail.