Tuesday, May 5, 2015

Seize The Sparkle's "Blog Every Day in May" Challenge - Day 1

I decided to join Seize the Sparkle's "Blog Everyday in May" challenge! Hey, why not? It's fun to mix things up a bit, and I've been doing nail blogging since December.

The first prompt is "Introduction and Recent Photo"

Ok, I can handle that...here goes!

Hi, my name is Amanda, and I am a nail polish addict.

*cue the peanut gallery saying "Hi, Amanda" in mono-toned voices*

Well, I am more than just that. I am a mother of four. My oldest is 17 and my youngest is 9 months. I am currently a stay-at-home-mom.

I am engaged to a handsome Japanese man who is currently living in Japan, while we are in the United States. We are working on a fiance' visa so he can come here and meet his little boy in person for the first time.

I have many passions. I love dancing, blues music, hippy festivals, nature photography (anything photography), collecting tea cups and tea pots, Hello Kitty, organic gardening, farmer's markets, going to the mall with my kids, fashion magazines, jewelry making (especially with semi-precious gemstones), chasing butterflies and bees, sniffing flowers, smiling, giggling (a lot), wine tastings, studying anthropology (cultural studies), natural and alternative medicine, taking rides in the countryside, grocery shopping at natural markets...

I started this nail art journey to help myself combat depression, postpartum depression and to become more connected with other women. So far it has been an amazing journey! I have learned so much about nail art and I have started a Facebook page which acts as a daily creative outlet that I can share with old friends and new friends.

You can check that out by clicking the tab on the right -hand column of this blog. :)

So I guess I have to include a recent photo. I have a couple I can add here.

This is me and my son, Josiah Satoshi. It's just cell phone picture from Instagram, but I love it. This was taken two days ago at one of our local plants nurseries. We LOVE plant nurseries. :)


This is me with my daughter, Willow Crystal Isabelle. It was taken at our favorite local park next to the pond with the tribute to our town's Japanese sister city.


If you would like to join this challenge, you can hop on over to Seize the Sparkle's blog and get the low down.



So that's it for now.

It's May 5th so I have 4 more days of this challenge to make up for.

Bye for now...

Sunday, May 3, 2015

Oceanic Water-Spotting Manicure

I had the pleasure of doing another water-potting manicure. I say it was a pleasure because once you get the hang of it, meaning once you find the right body spray to use, it really is fun. This is my contribution to Crumpet's Nail Tarts 52 Week Challenge for April 27-May 3rd.

The base color I used is a beautiful China Glaze color called "Sex in the City." It's a seriously gorgeous blue with a green shimmer to it. I'm in love!


I really loved this manicure. the gold coin sequins turned out perfect on both hands. I have to thank my sweetie in Japan for sending them to me.

After I did the water spotting technique, I added a coat of my Seche Vite fast drying top coat, and then I applied the gold decals. Then I topped it off with one more really thick coat of Seche Vite.


I love the way it looks in the sunlight...


I especially love how my index finger turned out...


I also wanted to share this silly picture of me squeezing my baby's cheeks! It's totally relevant since I have my oceanic manicure going on in the picture. ;)



I am thoroughly enjoying this challenge, even though I am jumping in part way through the prompts. I need to work on doing an "outline"manicure next. No clue how that will turn out!

Friday, May 1, 2015

Cover Girl Lip Lava Review

I was pretty excited to try these. I try a few new lip glosses and lip sticks every month. The colors of these are so beautiful and vibrant. I wanted to love them!

Just to make this short and sweet....they suck. The color stayed on my lips for MAYBE 20 minutes? Possibly 30 minutes. The formula was very thin and just wore off after just taking like one sip of water.

Totally not worth the money in my opinion.

I'm sorry I don't have swatches of them them on my lips, but I'm not willing to show my ugly mug quite yet.

I bought the two middle colors at Walmart for between $6-7.

If you're just wearing them for a photo shoot or something, you could, but don't expect to get ANY wear out of them.