MOTW and more Barbie goodies

Hey y'all, sorry it's been a few days, been busy getting my kiddos ready for Back-to-School. My oldest started his Junior year of high school on Thursday and my younger 2 start 1st and 5th grade today. Yes our kids go back really early here! lol After having them home for a few monthes, it seemed strange for the house to be silent all day. I'll admit I slept for most of the day. I haven't been sleeping well for the last few weeks with my hubby being away at school so I guess I was catching up.

First off my MOTW (which I actually just took off today) was using the next 2 polishes in my first nail wheel. They are both by Sally Hansen. Royal Romance #2 and Lavendar Marquise #3. I started out with 3 coats of Lavendar Marquise which is a sheer pale pink leaning Lavendar. (the weird thing about this polish is there seems to be 2 variations of this color and I managed to get them both! One is distinctly pink while the other is more pearly with just a hint of pink (#4 in the wheel pic) even using 3 coats of each!) I had initally planned to do a french mani with the darker Royal Romance as my tip color. I tried using the curved tip guides and just couldn't get them centered right. So I decided to just sponge over it. While the edge of the tips still showed only up close, so I was really happy with my sponged gradient mani!)

Up next is a few Barbie items. I really should be cleaning and packing and all that good stuff, but I think I'm kind of in denial about this whole moving thing! :-( So I have been playing with clay!
I started out making a peach slice cane. I got the idea while eating my breakfast peach the other day. It took me some foodling and messing about to get the right colors for the peach flesh as well as doing a skinner blend to get the inner red shading you find in a fresh peach. I think I did this cane atleast 3 times before ending up with a color combo I was happy with! I ended up making it a round cane for ease of reducing, but simple cut each slice in half at the red center before gently shaping. I think they look pretty darned good! I spent several hours on Flickr searching for peach desserts looking for the best ways to use my slices. I'm happy to say I found several and look forward to making some yummy desserts eventually!

MOTW x 3

Yeah so I'm a little behind with sharing my nails! Sorry, I'll start with the oldest: my Memorial Day mani. We took the boys camping down at Kolomoki Mounds State Park. It was about a 2 hours drive hauling the camper but turned out to be well worth it. We were situated on Lake Kolomoki and aside from the swarms of gnats it was a wonderful quiet relaxing weekend! We hiked and toured the mounds and museum. (Pics can be seen HERE!)We grilled out, had campfires, roasted marshmallows and just enjoyed quiet time together. For my weekend mani I used 2 coats of Wet n Wild in Waves of Enchantment WoE is a gorgeous pink-y, coral-y gold flecked color. (that really dislikes my camera! LOL) On my ring fingers I added a layer of Sally Hansen Nail Prisms in Pink Pearl, on top of that I added a nail art sticker. I liked the look and all polishes went on very well! =D

My nails went bare for a bit while my husband and I finished up the dollhouse. My next mani was purple. LOVE me some purple! I couldn't decide what color to paint my nails so I asked my facebook pals. Purple was the first color suggested so that was what I went with. I went through my little sample wheel and picked a shade I hadn't already worn. Totally Cool by Milani looks just like it's name in the bottle. It was a bit of a disappointment on the nails initally though. In the bottle TC looks like a warm maroon-y purple with a multi-chrome shimmer. (shimmer that changes shades)
My nails ended up with 4 coats on them as the 1st 3 coats went on ridiculously sheer and with way more of a blue cast to them. It isn't until that 4th coat went down that the maroon-y color really shows up. The other thing that bugged me about this color was the shimmer. In the bottle it appeared to shift from red to orange to green, but on the nail only the red really showed up. While I did like the end result, the fact that with base coats and top coats I had like 7 coats of polish on my fingers bugged me. :-(

I started taking it off last night as I decided to 'bump' up the shimmer a bit by adding a coat of Nubar 2010 over it. 2010 is a gorgeous top coat with iridescent flakes that is just stunning over nearly anything! However I discovered that the 2010 reacted with the TC and caused it to shrink and peel off my nails. :-( Bummer.
But anyway, that cleared the way for todays' mani. When I asked my friends about polish colors, green was the 2nd color suggested. Today I have 3 coats of Nina Ultra Pro (at Sally Beauty Supply stores) in Leaf Me Alone topped with 2 coats of CoverGirls Boundless Color in Ruby Dust. LMA is a nice apple-y green that is a little dusty in coloration. RD has tiny round silver glitters in a sheer pink base, my favorite part of RD aer the larger holographic hexagons. Now of course these hexs are only about the size of a ball point pen tip, but they do pack a nice punch. I actually with there were more of them in RD. My left hand has 2 coats of RD while my right has 3 as the glittle didn't seem to want to cooperate. But all in all I like the fresh crisp look! =D