The Touchstone Inspired

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I read The Touchstone, by Edith Wharton earlier this year for the challenge, "A popular author's first novel." It was technically her first novella. The House of Mirth is one of my all-time favorite books, so I was happy to hear another of Edith Wharton's stories.

Where the Mountain Meets the Moon inspired

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I read Where the Mountain Meets the Moon, by Grace Lin out loud to my 7 year old daughter in February. It kept her attention, was full of lovely, magical stories, and made a teary mess of me before the end. It is an uplifting story with a message that we all need to be reminded of from time to time. I think my girl will want to and be able to read it independently soon too.

a-england Briarwood Skittlette

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Hello all. No challenges today, just a fabulous polish. This was my first true autumn manicure of the season.

Ursula manicure

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This will be very short. I actually forgot to write a quick post about this last of the October Disney villains inspired manicures.

Maleficent inspired manicure

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Hello. I am back after the 31Day Challenge slump. This manicure turned out a lot more Halloween than I expected, but I guess that makes sense since it was inspired by a Disney villain.

31 Day Challenge: Delicate Print

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Half way through the challenge and here I am with another manicure. This is the most often I have ever painted my nails and I even do the cheat of transforming a previous day's mani whenever I can. Is that frowned upon? If so, I apologize, but it is the only way I could to this while maintaining my sanity.

Pahlish Chemical Swirl

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Happy Friday! Today I'm showing you a manicure that I wore last month. One of my favorite polishes, Cult Nails Disciplined and a couple of previously untried polishes.

Glitter Daze Birthday Cupcake with Stamping

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Hi everyone! I wanted to show you a really fun polish from Glitter Daze, but only have a few moments for the post. So, here it is.

Love Manicure with Orly Guilded Coral and Stamping

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Last Love Manicure for Valentine's Day, but of course I'm not done with love. Lulu of Lulu in Greece requested that I show Orly Guilded Coral from the Spring 2011 Precious Collection. Thank you so much Lulu; I forgot how much I like this polish.

Love Manicure with Revlon Hot for Chocolate

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Two days in a row with posts. Crazy for me, I know. I want to get my last couple of Valentine's Day manicures in before Friday. We'll see how that goes.

Stamped Love's a Beach

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I didn't want to miss this week's Nail Files, but I haven't been pleased with my last two manicures, so there are no photos. I did however have these pictures collecting dust, waiting to be posted. I think that I wore this manicure in August or September!!

Polish Days: Back to Nature

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It seems like January Polish Days just happened. The month just flew by! It is now February's Polish Day and here is my nature inspired manicure.

Polish Days: First True Saran Manicure

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 So much fun!!! I love Polish Days!!! And this is a technique that I have been dying to try out, but hadn't gotten around to yet. Yippee!!! Sorry about the excitement, but did I mention how much I love Polish Days? . . . Yup, I sure did; well it bears repeating. Thanks to Hannah for coordinating the fun! All right, I'm going to try to avoid using exclamation points for the rest of this post, because if one more appears, I don't think that anyone will take me seriously ever again.

Last Christmas Mani of 2012

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Hello lovelies! I have to get my house in order for family who will be over on Christmas, so I'll keep this short. I wanted to share with you my last Christmas manicure. I hadn't used China Glaze Ruby Pumps for any holiday manicures yet and in my book, that is a Yuletide crime. So, here is my Ruby Pumps Christmas mani. Sadly, it did not last long. I used Elmer's glue as the basecoat, hoping to get 2 days of wear and it began to chip in less than 24 hours. You can see my messy patches on the index and middle fingers.

Cult Nails Flushed Skittlette

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Hello, lovelies. I had such a good time creating this skittlette manicure. The skittlette is a like a cross between a true skittles manicure and a manicure with an accent nail. It can have two or three accent nails.

Silver, Gold, and Precious Memories to Trim the Tree

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Happy Friday! What I have here is my last manicure for Nail Polish Canada's challenges. This is my entry for "Trim the Tree Nails" (be sure to check out the other manicures and vote for your favorite! If my mani is your fave, thanks and vote for "Other" and specify "Mangling my Manicure." My site was supposed to be added to the pulldown menu, but I think that it got lost in the shuffle). Here is my inspiration from my very own Christmas tree.
I LOVE my Christmas ornaments. My parents gave my sisters and I a new ornament every year, culminating with a tree topper for the Christmas of my senior year in high school. The wooden bell was a souvenir that my parents brought home from a trip to Israel. I have started the same tradition with my own daughter. The crystal Winnie the Pooh hanging a snowflake was her very first Christmas ornament and the penguin ringing a bell was from her second Christmas. Every year, we pull out each of our ornament boxes, and she looks at the ornaments in her collection while I look at those in my box and remember all the Christmases I have spent with those I love. I am so excited for her to be able to do the same thing when she is an adult (but I don't want to rush to those wonderful days in her future).

Bubo Nails: The Most Bling Owl Ever

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Hi everyone. I am participating in Polish Days for the first time ever today! So exciting! When I saw that the theme for this Polish Days was Bling, I don't know why, but my mind went immediately to Bubo the owl from the 1981 film, "Clash of the Titans."

The perfect Surprise Gift: A manicure

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 Hello ladies! I know that this manicure is a little unusual; I hope that it tells you a story about gifts, which is the theme for Nail Polish Canada's holiday challenge this week. I was trying to think about what the perfect Christmas gift would be for me this year and then I realized that there was nothing that I really wanted. However, to me, the perfect gift is born out of someone realizing what I want before I do, keeping it secret (while saying, "You are going to love this!"), wrapping it beautifully and then when Christmas morning arrives, seeing that beautiful wrapping paper scattered all over the floor, and being filled with gratefulness (and giving hugs and kisses).

a-England Ophelia for my aunt

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I know that November is nearly over, but if you didn't know, it is pancreatic cancer awareness month. Pancreatic cancer affects over 40,000 people a year and unfortunately at this time, there is less than a 10% five year survival rate. It is wonderful that so many strides are being made in the fights against other cancers. Now is the time to be even stronger in our fight against pancreatic cancer. Check out the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network for more.

In 2006, my aunt, one of the most vibrant, unique people I have ever known was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. She fought the cancer for only a few short months before it took her life.

Cult Nails Bitten with Stamping

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Hello, ladies. Look at how delicious this nail polish is! Cult Nails Bitten, from the Behind Closed Doors collection is like a sparkling raspberry syrup poured all over my fingers. It looks slick and somewhat liquid on my nails. It is everything that I love about China Glaze Riveting, but dark reddish pink with fuchsia flickers instead of flame orange with gold flecks.

Bitten applied smooth and even in 2 easy coats. I love to decorate my manicures with stamping, but this polish looked beautiful without any adornment, so I decided to just add a small flower. Zoya Raven worked really well as a stamping polish.

I used Born Pretty Store plate m77 for the little daisies.

One word of warning: Bitten is a very frisky nail polish and while it is a beautiful color to wear on any occasion, just looking at it may make the wearer feel more bold than usual. It is very fun!

Here are a couple more views. Do you want to get Bitten too? What is your favorite shade from the Cult Nails Behind Closed Doors collection?

Thanks for reading!
~Alexis