May's Mini Mani: Aili's Violet Dream

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Hey, bloglovin followers, I have something special planned for my current followers in celebration of reaching 50 followers. GFC followers, I know, but if you follow via bloglovin, I don't know who you are. If you would be interested in participating in a little contest I have planned, either comment on this post and tell me you're a bloglovin follower or send me an email, if you'd prefer. Please let me know by Thursday, May 24. Thanks!

Now,onto the manicure. My daughter Aili, loves and I mean absolutely adores the color green. The brightest green you can find and she's smitten. Recently, she has voiced a passion for purple too. I created this polish as a tribute to her. I figured that I'd let her little fingertips show off the polish.

Aili's Violet Dream is wonderful as a one coat topper to liven up another polish or by itself with two coats as you can see here. It has a shimmery sheer blue base with silver holographic glitter, dark purple, and lime green opaque glitter finish it off.

I painted the ring finger with Sinful Colors Irish Green and topped it with two coats of the glitter polish. Unfortunately, my little girl did not sit still for the several minutes necessary to prevent major smudging, but hopefully with some imagination, you can see what the glitter polish would look like on top of a bright green polish.

Give me a little while and I'll try out the polish myself, ideally a little less smudged up.

Tuesday Treats: Badger Cuticle Care

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Hello, darlings. This is my cuticle cream love. It is Badger Cuticle Care. I used to use Burt's Bees Lemon Butter Cuticle Cream, which smells and works wonderfully, but it does not have as smooth a texture as the Badger cuticle cream. The Badger cream melts into my skin much easier and faster.

I love that the first ingredient is shea butter and that I know what all the ingredients are, basically healing oils, beeswax, and some essential oils. There are no weird chemicals. The cuticle cream has a slight fragrance of geranium for the first couple of minutes after application, kind of like a green, slightly peppery rose scent.

And the last thing that I love about Badger Cuticle Care is the packaging. When I open the container, I can nest the container inside the cap, making it a lot easier to apply while I'm on the go.

What do you think of Badger Cuticle Care? Do you have a different favorite cuticle cream?




Check out the other treats on Frances's link-up. During last week's link-up, I found a whole load of lust-worthy products.

One Lucky Momma: Lex Cosmetics

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Happy Mother's Day! I hope all the wonderful mothers out there are feeling as special as I do today. Last night, I drastically modified the brioche recipe from "Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day" to create a Belgian waffle recipe. My husband cooked them up today and oh, my, it is great. I felt like I was back on the streets of Brussels while eating them, perfectly caramelized sugar, buttery, bready goodness. They didn't need toppings of any sort; they were so good.

My husband and daughter also gave me these three nail polish beauties from Lex Cosmetics. Jessica at Nail Polish Anonymous posted about Lex Cosmetics Tuilleries earlier this month and it was love at first sight . . . I mean c'mon, it's like the nail polish was named for me! From left to right, you see Cayman Cabana, Lucky in Love (which I'm wearing on my toes and it applied like a dream), and Tuilleries.

Must go now. We are going to an amusement park for the first time this season today and I must get ready for our day of family fun.

Have a great day!

~Alexis

China Glaze Optical Illusion

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indoors

outside

Hello, lovelies! Welcome to my sparkly, shimmery, glittery post. Allow me to introduce you to Optical Illusion from the China Glaze Prismatics collection. This is a very sweet blue green holographic polish packed with hot pink, orange, yellow, green, silver, and baby blue metallic glitter. Once applied, it looked like a blue-green foil basecoat topped with tons of multicolored glitter. I own several glitter polishes, but none of them are anything like this.

Application of Optical Illusion was unbelievably smooth and even. I topped the polish with one coat of Gelous and one coat of fast drying topcoat. When I use this polish again, I will top with two coats of Gelous for a more glass-like finish.

Optical Illusion stayed on my nails much better than I thought it would. I did have to repaint one small chip two days into the manicure, but more severe chipping only took place after four to five days wear. On the plus side, the polish patched really smoothly. The patched area looked just as smooth and even as the rest of the nail polish.

Check out week 19 of the Nail Files. Do you have a great manicure or polish to show off? Then join the Nail Files link up too!

What do you think of the Prismatics collection? Any favorites?

Next week I'll show you a green ombre gradient manicure with some stamped art. Have a good weekend.
~Alexis

Tuesday's Treats: JASON Hand and Body Lotion

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I have been looking for a great, petroleum and paraben-free hand lotion for years. I had given up and been using Gold Bond Ultimate Healing Aloe lotion, which smelled nice, left my hands feeling good, and was reasonably priced, but it contains both petroleum products and parabens.

About three months ago, when I most recently needed more hand lotion, I couldn't bring myself to buy the Gold Bond. I looked through the natural skincare aisle at the grocery store expecting to pay a bit more. Surprisingly, these JASON lotions cost less per ounce than the Gold Bond lotion (JASON lotions cost me a little less than $8 for an 8 oz tube) . I could not choose between the Natural E.F.A. lotion and the Softening Cocoa Butter lotion, so I brought them both home.

After three months, I love them both. The Natural E.F.A. lotion is a thick, white creamy texture. It has a slightly citrusy floral scent, more like smell of soap than flowers. The scent dissipates pretty quickly. The lotion leaves my hands just the slightest bit tacky for about two minutes after application and then my hands feel very smooth and well moisturised.

The Natural E.F.A. lotion contains both black current seed oil and evening primrose oil (EPO). Black current seed oil is reputed to increase skin's elasticity and EPO is high in antioxidants which help to protect the skin from environmental toxins.

The Softening Cocoa Butter lotion is the same texture, but it is beige. It has the typical cocoa butter lotion odor. This lotion feels a little tacky after application too, but it smooths a little bit faster than the Natural E.F.A. lotion. Cocoa Butter is know to absorb really quickly into skin, and like EPO, it has antioxidants that can help to protect skin. It is also a wonderful lubricant.

Both lotions have sunflower seed oil, which even in small amounts increases moisturizing and the skin's ability to ward off dryness. Avocado oil, in both lotions can be healing to both aging and sun damaged skin.

Like I said, I love both of these lotions. I only feel the need to reapply lotion after washing my hands with dish soap.

So, which one of these lotions sounds the most appealing to you? Have you tried either of these? What is your favorite hand creme?

Check out other bloggers' "treats" at Spot of Tea.





Finally, I'd like to take a moment to thank Puja of Cute nails for nominating me for the Sunshine Award. It was so very kind of you. It makes me feel wonderful to know that you enjoy reading my blog!

Take care.
~Alexis

Untested Polishes

Pin It Hi again. I know, two post in as many days! I just wanted to show you my load of polishes that haven't been used. . . Let me clarify: These polishes may have been used as minor accents for nail art and I think that one was used for a pedicure quite a long time ago, but they have never been highlighted by themselves on my fingernails. Which one or ones would you really like to see? Any special layering of these polishes that you want to check out?

L-R:  Revlon Timeless, Popular, Royal, Bare Bones, Rich Raspberry, Nfu Oh 51

L-R:  Sonia Kashuk Golden Ticket, Fairy Princess, Hard Candy Beetle, China Glaze Fast Track,  Prism

L-R:  Julep Eva, Sofia, Emma, Kelly, Melissa

L-R:  Sinful Colors I Love You, China Glaze Harvest Moon, Dorethy Who?, Trendsetter, Zombie Zest

L-R:  China Glaze Cling On, Drawn to You Liang QiEr  NL001 (bornprettystore magnetic), China Glaze Cracked Medallion, Finger Paints Twisted

L-R:  Revlon Midnight Affair, Sephora by OPI Under my Trenchcoat,  Trendy gold nail foils, gold nail foils from bornprettystore

Check out the Nail Files-Week 18 to see some stunning colors and manicures.


Have a good weekend.
~Alexis

INM Out the Door vs. Julep Fast Drying Topcoat

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Hello there. I promised to give a comparison of Julep Fast Drying Topcoat and INM Out the Door (OTD) Fast Drying Topcoat, so here it is. Both topcoats are thin, almost watery (My bottle of OTD is a little thicker because I've been using it longer). They have a similar odor, although Julep's topcoat smells the slightest bit like skunk in the bottle, not on the nail.

The Julep brush holds a lot of polish, so it was necessary to wipe it off several times before applying it to the nail. I have a 2.5 oz bottle of OTD, so the brush is very long and hard to handle. I actually use an old Revlon topcoat bottle for OTD instead, because it is smaller and the brush is a little wider; I think it prevents the topcoat from thickening too quickly too.

Both topcoats were dry to the touch within 2 minutes. OTD seemed to cure against dents slightly faster than the Julep topcoat. The major difference between these two topcoats was in terms of shine. If you look at the pictures above, you can clearly see the window grille reflected in the nails painted with OTD, whereas you can only make out the shape of the window in the Julep coated nails.

Let me show you pictures of my nails after 4 days very tough wear (I actually broke 2 nails over the weekend). If you are sensitive to chippy nail polish, please read no further.

First, a disclaimer, that terribly chipped left middle finger was mostly the result of a silk patch falling off my nail. Overall, the two topcoats performed about equally in protecting the manicure from damage. That said, I will continue to use INM Out the Door Fast Drying Topcoat. If I need a bottle, I can just hop in the car and go to Sally's to pick one up and I love a shiny topcoat.

What is your favorite topcoat? What do you like about it?

My next manicure is China Glaze Optical Illusion. I'm wearing both topcoats again to see if there is any difference with the glitter, but I don't think I'll have anything to report on that front.