Happy Monday Kittens! Today's manicure was inspired by the awesome nail blog Chloe's Nails. She always does amazing things with her nails and one idea that I got from her was the concept of the matte flakies. Up until a few days ago I was struggling with my inferior matte top coats. One wasn't matte enough while the other cracked apart while drying. I finally caved and bought Essie Matte About You. I seriously am smacking myself for not buying it sooner. I saw it at Duane Reade for a few dollars cheaper than anywhere else, so that must have been a sign. I FREAKING LOVE IT! I don't know what about fall makes me want matte nails more, but I'm sure you'll be seeing a lot of matte mani mondays in the fall.

Now, don't get too put off by the amount of layers on this particular manicure. It evolved over a few day span.
1. I started off with GOSH, Fix Base Coat
2. Then applied two coats of Sally Hanson Hard As Nails Extreme Wear, Purple Pizzazz, a jelly finish purple with specks of golden pink micro flake.
3. Then topped it with a coat of Seche Vite, Fast Dry Top Coat
4. Followed by another coat of Sally Hanson Hard As Nails Extreme Wear, Purple Pizzazz.
5. One more coat of the Seche Vite, Fast Dry Top Coat
(Geez, that's a lot of coats, eh?) I wore that for a few days (no chips baby!) before I added...
6. INGLOT, 205 Flakies
7. One coat of Essie, Matte About You.

Flakies and I were taking a break after a whirl-win romance about a year ago. But when I saw their beautiful duochrome and fiery glow the spark in my glittery heart came rushing back. Oh flakies, how could I have ever let you go!?

Do you like matte nail polish?

I don't know what it is about hot weather but it makes me want to stick to more earthy colors in my makeup. I am excited to do a FOTD post since my skin is finally back to normal  after a few weeks of rediculousness. So enjoy, kittens...

For list of products used

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Happy Thursday kittens! I haven't posted a look of the day in ages. I had a few extra minutes this morning to really take my time on my makeup so I also took the time to shoot it.

Products used:

Kevyn Aucoin The Sensual Skin primer
Kryolan Dermacolor Concealer Palette
MAC Prep+Prime Highlighter: Radiant Rose
Nars Sheer Glow Foundation, Mont Blanc
Smashbox Halo Powder, Halo Yellow, Halo Bronzer
Kevyn Aucoin The Pure Powder Glow: Shadore 
Kevyn Aucoin The Sculpting Powder: Medium
Kevyn Aucoin The Celestial Powder: Candlelight powder

Two Faced Shadow Insurance
INGLOT eyesshadows: matte 351, amc shine 08
MAC Eyeshadow: Brun
Lancome Colour Design Eyeshadow: After Dusk
MAC fluidline: Blacktrack
MAC Eye Kohl: Powersurge
Lancome Definicils mascara: Black
MAC Brow Pencil, Dirty Blonde
GOSH effect powder, Gold Dust

MAC kissable Lipcolour, Super

Two of my favorite nail colors for the summer are peachy orange and girly pink-purple. When I sat down to do my nails for the week I couldn't decide between the two colors so I did them both! The two colors I used were GOSH, Peachy and ZOYA, Areej. I switched up the way I usally do stripes and did a half and half pattern. Dual personalities, both love summer. Enjoy! (ps. I had to help Areej out in photoshop a bit to get the color to look correct.)

Indian culture has some of the most amaizing colors and embellishishments in the world. This nail design was inspired by beautiful Indian textiles. I started out with just two coats of Zoya, Areej but of course I had up the drama ante by adding some more goodies. I added a 2 sheer layers of Petites, Universe (a sheer gold shimmer with gold flakies) I deepend the gold at the cutical end with GOSH, Gold. To finish it up, I added a couple layers of Sally Girl, gold glittler (unnamed) which has with small and large hex glitters. Then I topped it all off with a layer of Seche Vite, Fast Dry Top Coat.

Pictured: top with all the embellishment and bottom without.

This past couple weeks my posts have been a little GOSH-centric, but I am just excited to incorporate the brand into my life. Today's manicure is GOSH, Holographic. I can say with absolute certainty that this is the coolest polish I own. However, it's a fincky little sucker. I tried it with my usual base coat Nailtiques, #2 and it did NOT work. I had to wipe it off and start over with GOSH, Fix Base Coat. You must shake it like crazy to distribute the particles evenly throughout the base liquid. It dries pretty quickly so I was able to apply two medium coats fairly quickly. I tried a top coat on one nail to test which dulled the effect a little. The rest of my nails I left top coat-less. I had to shoot it from tons of angles and light levels to really show the rediculously amazing effect of this stuff. Enjoy! 

You can see in the bottom, left picture the dull thumb with top coat.

I was so excited the other day when I read on Miss Whoever You Are that she had spotted GOSH in nyc. At the time I dropped what I was doing at time time and ran to the Duane Reade in union square to see for myself. Unfortunatly all that running (I didn't literally run, come on now) was for nothing since they had not gotten their GOSH stuff yet. However, I made a trip the the Herald Square Duane Reade this afternoon to see what they had since I had comfirmation that they had GOSH at that location. I was so excited to see GOSH's very own display kisosk gleaming like a beacon of hope to beauty junkies all over NYC. We've been watching Europe and Canada have all the fun with this brand. It's our turn now!

I actually didn't haul that much since I actually picked up a bunch of stuff a few weeks ago when I found some GOSH at a random airport store. (werid right?) I picked up the Fix Base Coat and Holographic nail polishes and two effect powders in Greeny and Azure. I've been lusting after the Holographic nail polish for so long and I'm so happy to finally have it in my collection. It was the last one there but hopefully they'll be getting more in stock soon. While you're at Duane Reade, take a few extra mintues to check out some of the other amazing brands they carry.

Add it to your foursquare here:

Have any GOSH in your stash? What's your favorite product?

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I am really excited to show off my first successful half moon manicure. I have always had a hard time doing half moon manicures. This is mostly due to not having proper brushes. Since I got my nail art brushes back in November, I have been able to create much better nail designs. I used two coats of CND, Anchor Blue as my background color. Honestly, this stuff is so opaque that you could get away with only using one coat if you're in a hurry. I then used a short and wide nail art brush to carefully apply the half moon pattern with GOSH, Gold. I then topped it all off with Seche Vite, Fast dry top coat.

Well kittens, it's been a whirlwind of a year full of ups, downs and some just plain crazy times. I can only hope that 2011 will be even better for me and for all of you! For my last nail post for 2011, I wanted to share my new years nails. I created these by applying 3 coats of CND, Studio White. Then, using a clean makeup sponge, I applied Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure, Evening Fog in two sheer coats. Its going to be hard to see a difference with this color on top of the white, but trust me, it helps the ombre effect in the end. Using a clean side of the sponge, I then applied two sheer coats of Gosh, Gold. To finish it all off apply a coat or two of your favorite top coat. As usual, I used Seche Vite Fast Dry Top Coat.

HAPPY NEW YEARS EVERYONE!
What are you wearing for your new years nails?