Halloween Water Marble

Happy Halloween! Are you guys doing anything special for Halloween today? I'm doing the usual, going to university, but I think I'll dress up to hand out candy tonight, maybe! Today I have a water marble to show you, which I'm actually really proud of. I personally think these are great Halloween colours, but a couple of people I talked to didn't agree - what do you guys think?

I used a base of OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls, and then I marbled with China Glaze Kiwi Cool-ada, OPI A Grape Fit, and Quo by ORLY Little Black Dress. I think this is one of the best water marbles I've done, in the sense that all of my fingers ended up with a nice pattern.

This green looks radioactive to me, I wish it glowed in the dark, that would be the only think I think I would change about these nails.

To be honest, I'm sort of happy that Halloween is here, I'm bored of seeing so many Halloween manis, including my own. Bring on November!

Don't forget to check out my ongoing giveaway, you only have until Friday night to enter, that's 2 days!

You can follow this link and enter via Rafflecopter here.

Zombie Nails + Tutorial

Hi everyone! Today I have another Halloween look to show you guys. I was chatting with one of my best friends, Anisha (of The Chaddabox), and I asked her if she was planning on doing any Halloween nail art. We both decided that we're not really the biggest fans of holiday-specific nail art, which is why the ones I'm showing you in this Halloween series aren't filled with pumpkins and witches. I wanted to try a look that I've seen around a few times, which is zombie nails. I tried to make these look like there was dried, crusty blood around the cuticles and I think I pulled it off. Let's take a look!

I've included my very first attempt at a tutorial below, so keep reading if you need a last minute how-to for Halloween tomorrow!

I used OPI Did You 'Ear About Van Gogh for the base colour as it's a close match but a little sickly-zombie tinted. To make the dried blood I used the new OPI Skyfall and a tiny bit of Quo by ORLY Little Black Dress to get a couple different colours of crimson in there.

What do you think of these? My boyfriend actually told me he didn't really like looking at them because they creeped him out so much, that's success in my opinion.

So here is the photo tutorial I tried to do. I just used a little part of a makeup sponge to cake on the blood. The addition of top coat really evens it out.

Thanks so much for reading everyone, I will be back tomorrow with one final Halloween look.

Don't forget to enter my giveaway which ends on Friday night, that's only three days left! As a reminder, the prizes include a LYNNDERELLA, a CrowsToes, some Fantasy Makers, and some custom indies which are exclusive to my giveaway! Come enter right here!

Blood Splatters

Hi everyone! Welcome to my first Halloween manicure for this year, I actually have three manis prepared and this was my least favourite, so I thought I'd give it to you first and let you appreciate the other two closer to the spooky day itself. To create this look, I used the splatter technique, where you drip a drinking straw in polish and blow through it onto your nails.

I used a coat of China Glaze Liquid Leather as the base coat for this, and OPI The Thrill of Brazil and China Glaze Ruby Pumps for the splatters. They don't show up as well as I had expected on the black background, but this kind of adds to the creepy look in my opinion.

Here's the aftermath of my splatters, I actually did mine inside an old Tampax box. Eh, whatever works!

Bonus photo of my hands pre-cleanup, I feel like someone with a nosebleed sneezed all over my hand - gross!

If you haven't yet, make sure you head over to my very first giveaway featuring a Lynnderella, CrowsToes, and some beautiful one-of-a-kind custom indies! Yes, this is INTERNATIONAL!

Cutie-cles' First Birthday Giveaway!

Hello everyone! The day has finally arrived when I get to present to you all the giveaway I've been planning since August! As some of you may know, Cutie-cles turned one this past September and to celebrate one entire year of blogging I wanted to do something special for all my readers. I have collected an assortment of polishes that I really hope you guys like! If you're anxious to enter, scroll on down to the bottom of this long post.

Let's take a look at the prizes:

Prize 01: Lynnderella When the Moon was a Star, Fantasy Makers Go with the Glow, mini bottle of Glimmer by Erica Gioielli

Prize 02: Fantasy Makers Once Upon a Time, Glimmer by Erica Gioielli, Joe Fresh Twilight

Prize 03: Sassy Lacquer Ashes & Embers, CrowsToes Absolum - your potions master, mini bottle of Glimmer by Erica Gioielli

What's that? You don't recognize some of these polishes? That's because I had two very special indie polish makers create custom polishes that are exclusive to this giveaway at Cutie-cles! 

I contacted Erica from Glimmer by Erica quite a while ago and she generously agreed to make me a gorgeous custom glitter bomb. Gioielli means jewels in Italian, and that's exactly what this reminds me of. There are two different sizes of hex glitters, square glitters, and diamond glitter in holographic gold, gold, purple, red, and green. Erica and I noticed that Gioielli (pronounced joy-ellie) is similar to a polish in her permanent line Treasure Chest, which you should check out if you fall in love with this as much as I have. Erica was sweet enough to sponsor this giveaway and provide me with three bottles of Gioielli to give away, one full size and two minis! She let me in on a secret that she had a couple of bottles left over which she's planning to sell in her etsy stop..so check that out! Glimmer by Erica polishes sell for $10 USD and she ships internationally for an additional cost.

In order to show off this polish, I have layered one coat over China Glaze Secret Peri-wink-le.

I must emphasize that this is one thin coat, you could definitely build this up.

Erica was such a pleasure to work with, we had great communication and she is such a sweetheart.

Here's a gorgeous bottle shot, doesn't this just remind you of emeralds, rubies, sapphires and gold? I think this polish is fit for a queen.

The second indie-polish-goddess was Carrie from Sassy Lacquer, who listened to what I wanted and created me exactly what I had envisioned. I told her I wanted a polish in a milky white base that reminded me of Ashes & Embers, which turns out to be the name of the polish. This polish features three different sizes of hex glitter and one size of square glitter in white, black, gunmetal gray, orange, and red. Sassy Lacquer polishes sell for $9 USD but she only ships within the US and now to Canada. If you like her page on facebook she is always putting up new deals, it is definitely worth a look. Carrie was generous enough to provide one full size bottle of my creation for this giveaway, and I bought my own bottle because I could not resist.

To showcase the beauty of this polish I have layered it over one coat of OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls. I used two coats of Ashes & Embers for these photos. I had no problems with the glitter, in fact, there was much more glitter on each brushstroke than I was expecting!

I am completely in love with this polish, what do you think of it?

Next time, I think I'll layer it over gray. The white base isn't too opaque, and I haven't tried it on its own yet, so I'm not sure if there is VNL. 

Here is a bottle shot showing you all the types of glitter in this masterpiece!

The rest of the polishes included in this giveaway should be familiar, or at least easy to google. Just in case, here are some links to gorgeous photos of them: Lynnderella When the Moon was a Star, Fantasy Makers Once Upon a Time, Joe Fresh Twilight, Fantasy Makers Go with the Glow*, and CrowsToes Absolum - your potions master. I know that some of these are "Halloween" polishes, but I am excited to have glow in the dark polish any time of the year. Unfortunately due to how slow Canada Post can be, I just got the last prize in the mail yesterday, but I hope those of you who win Fantasy Maker polishes will be okay with having them a little "out of season."

*This actually shows the 2011 version of a Fantasy Makers glow in the dark polish, but it should be the same.

Are you guys anxious to just fill in the Rafflecopter widget already? Sorry about all the talking, but I'm sure you wanted to know what you were entering to win!

All the information about eligibility is in the disclaimer on the Rafflecopter widget, but just because I know it will be asked at least once, YES! This giveaway is open internationally!

Don't forget that of these options, tweeting the giveaway is something you can do once per day for extra entries!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

EDIT: I did a little tweaking on the widget as I realized that my options for sharing the giveaway were limited mostly to bloggers, I've added an option to share the giveaway wherever you like: facebook, Google +, you name it!

I'm so excited about my first giveaway! One final thank you to the sponsors for my giveaway, Glimmer by Erica and Sassy Lacquer, you definitely need to check their shops out. Thanks so much for following us at Cutie-cles, and best of luck to all entrants!

OPI Euro Centrale First Look

Hi everyone! This is just a quick update because I literally just saw this posted on OPI's official facebook page and I knew I had to share it with you all. It looks as though for Spring/Summer 2013, OPI will be doing a collection centred around the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Romania called Euro Centrale.

This is the photo that OPI posted on their facebook page showing off this 12-piece collection. As you can see, Polka.com is to be a glitter, and A Woman's Prauge-ative (sic, I hope they mean Prague-ative) and OY- Another Polish Joke are to be shimmers. I'm not sure why Hands Off My Kielbasa! is in a bottle labelled Top Coat, it looks to me like it's another pretty creme colour but the bottle throws me off. Maybe it is indeed a top coat? I guess we'll have to wait for further information.

I'm going to go ahead and say that I need Polka.com, Can't Find My Czechbook, You're Such A BudaPest, Suzi's Hungary AGAIN!, Hands off My Kielbasa, A Woman's Prague-ative, and My Vampire is Buff. You know what, maybe I'll just get the entire collection.

EDIT: this site here appears to have BOTTLE SHOTS of some of the polishes, wow!

What do you think of all this? Do you like OPI on facebook, they're always posting preview pics of new collections, you can check them out here!

Lynnderella Inner Space

Hello everyone! Sorry for the little absence over here at Cutie-cles, I was in a car accident this weekend and ended up totaling my (parents') SUV. Nobody was seriously hurt in the accident, but I've had some mild shoulder and back pain, as well as some bruising on my chest and knee. Now of course this hasn't stood in the way of painting my nails physically, but I've been dealing with insurance companies, police reports, rental car companies, and trying to find a suitable new car for my parents to buy, which has kept me pretty busy. The accident was completely the fault of the other driver, so apart from having to put a lot of time into this, thankfully I'm not going to have to pay a tonne of money.

Anyways, that's enough of my lovely weekend, I just wanted to fill you all in and let you know things may be a little slow around here for a bit. Today I have a polish to show you that I actually wore about two weeks ago and never got around to posting for some reason. I am in love with Lynnderella Inner Space, but I really don't like the combination of it with the Essie polish I layered it over, I'll have to pick something better for next time.

So this is two coats of the dynamic and gorgeous Lynnderella Inner Space over four freaking coats of Essie A Crewed Interest. Four coats...unbelievable. If this mani turned out amazing maybe I wouldn't be as bitter, but the formula on the Essie just plain sucks - runny and sheer!

Inner Space on the other hand if just perfection! I love love love all the different glitters going on in this - it reminds me of if Connect the Dots and The Glittering Crowd had a baby.

I really enjoyed the star glitter, although due to the extreme curvature of my nails it wouldn't lay down flat. I managed to make it smooth(ish) with topcoat, but peeled the star off a day later.

I know I've been promising you a chance to win a Lynnderella in a giveaway for ages, and I'm just waiting on one more prize to arrive in the mail to get things launched!

What do you think of Inner Space, do you love it as much as I do? What colour do you suggest I layer it over for the next time I wear it?

OPI Skyfall - Comparisons

Hi everyone! I have a crazy busy weekend and approximately one hundred papers due next week, so I'm not sure how much you'll be hearing of me for in the next little while. Just as I promised when I swatched the OPI Skyfall collection for you, I have some comparisons to other polishes today.
So blue has never really been my colour, until recently. When will OPI stop releasing so many awesome blue shades?! I fell in love with OPI Tomorrow Never Dies and while I couldn't find an exact dupe, maybe these photos will help some of you decide whether or not you need to purchase this colour.

I'm not sure what on earth happened with the bubbling and Tomorrow Never Dies, but I can assure you that in my initial swatches it did not behave this way. I imagine this was from my rushed application.

I used two coats of each polish for the above photos.

Now it gets confusing because I didn't put the bottles in the same order as I put them on my nails, oops! From left to right, we have OPI Blue My Mind, JOE Fresh Grape, OPI Tomorrow Never Dies, OPI Into the Night, and OPI Unfor-Greta-bly blue. Unfor-Greta-bly Blue was so different it wasn't even worth swatching it on a nail to show the comparison, it's much more teal.

Again, from left to right, we have OPI Blue My Mind, JOE Fresh Grape, OPI Tomorrow Never Dies, OPI Into the Night, and OPI Unfor-Greta-bly blue.

I think JOE Fresh Grape is the closest, but it isn't easy to find for anyone who isn't located in Canada. It's also a smaller bottle and has an awful formula. My pick is the OPI.

The only other polish from this collection that I had polishes similar enough to compare with was OPI You Only Live Twice. Here I have compared it with some other recent OPI releases, from the Vintage Minnie Mouse Collection, the new Designer Series shades for Fall 2012, and a throwback to the Burlesque Collection a few years ago.

Again, these polishes are all similar but there is no dupe in my stash. In my opinion, they're all very different and I'm happy to own all four since pink is my favourite colour, but maybe these are similar enough to you that you only need to own one!

These polishes are in the same order as they are shown on my nails, so from left to right OPI I'm All Ears, OPI You Only Live Twice, OPI The Show Must Go On, and OPI DS Indulgence.

I think You Only Live Twice is the only one of these four that is a true fuchsia colour. I'm All Ears has blue shimmer, The Show Must Go On is a weak, but obvious, orange and pink duochrome, and DS Indulgence is  darker and much too gold.

Did these comparison posts help you decide on any of the Skyfall polishes?

OPI The Man with the Golden Gun

Hello everyone! How has this week been treating you? It's been crazy for me, I have two midterms and I'm trying to ward off a fever. Today I have OPI's real 18K gold topcoat to show you, The Man with the Golden Gun. This limited edition shade is being released this month along with the Skyfall collection, which I swatched and reviewed yesterday. In this post, I have layered The Man with the Golden Gun over a few polishes from the Skyfall collection, but I hope to get the chance to show it layered to you over some other colours soon too!

I couldn't help but show you guys the packaging, because this is beautiful and looks so sleek.

I'd like to thank my boyfriend who stayed home sick on Tuesday and while he was here he helped me set up a faux light box to take these pictures - thanks Dan!

That's Dan's hand right there! What a good sport he was.

Okay, are you tired of seeing packaging yet? Let's show you the actual polish!

Here is one coat of The Man with the Golden Gun layered over two coats of OPI Tomorrow Never Dies. 

Yum. This is amazing. I really like this combination, it reminds me of kings and riches and treasures.

Are you guys as head over heels for this polish as I am?

Here we have OPI You Only Live Twice underneath one coat of OPI The Man with the Golden Gun. I don't know what possessed me to layer these two, but I do like how it turned out.

I think the gold shimmer in the polish looks great with the real gold flakes. This combination reminds me of fire and embers.

Over OPI Skyfall, I layered two coats of OPI The Man with the Golden Fun for a little more dramatic effect. These polishes are honestly perfection together. I don't know what else to say.

The only thing that I think could have been improved would be a little more of the gold flakes in the polish, they're a little thinly dispersed but that doesn't make it difficult to get them on your nails.

Mmm, look at this with the pretty fall leaves behind it!

Which of these three combinations is your favourite? Will you be purchasing this topcoat?

I haven't received an official press release, so I'm not sure of the exact retail price, but from what I have heard it was around $40 CAN. Is that too steep for you to don real gold flakes on your nails?