Announcement.

I've decided I'm going to take an official break from the actual Blogger part of this blog. Somehow, I can post to Tumblr, Facebook, Pintrest and whatever else just fine but coming here to write the actual entries causes me anxiety and stress I just don't need right now. This has always been the least popular version of Toad-ally Awesome Nails, and maybe I can figure out why that is while I'm not using it. Maybe I'll transplant the whole thing to Wordpress, or maybe I don't need the blog portion at all. I just don't know at this point.

Neutral with a flash and a sparkle.

 I love it when a neutral has a hidden something that just makes it pop. A shimmer, a flash, something. This brown, Warm He-art-ed by Finger Paints has a subtle red flash that you can only see at certain angles. I caught it a little bit in my middle finger and pinky, right around the light reflections. Love that. Anywho, then I decided it needed an accent so I added a coat of butterLONDON's West End Wonderland to my ring finger.


Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Seven Deadly Sins: Wrath

 The last sin I have to show off is Wrath. The challenge on this one was to show off something goth, vampy, or otherwise dark. I'd never done a ruffian mani before, and I'm not sue I really achieved it now, but I do like it. The gold is Bite Me! by Pure Ice and the main color is called WTF F 32 14 by Vivid Lacquer, or as I've nicknamed it Vamp Stamp. The WTF line by VL is one-offs and colors that didn't make it into production. This one is a burgundy/purple jelly with purple shimmer and purple/blue flakies as you can see on my middle finger there. I'll have to try this look again sometime.

Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Seven Deadly Sins: Gluttony

 For Gluttony, the key is layers. On some of these nails, there are 13 or 14 layers counting base and top coats. It's supposed to be a goldfish bowl, but the goldfish is so hard to see!! The background blue is Zoya Liberty, the gravel at the bottom is Finger Paints Kozmotology, then the plants on my thumb and pinky are stamped in Sally Hansen Parrot using Vivid Lacquer's Christmas plate VL016. The snail on my index finger is Essie No Place Like Chrome and the plate is Cheeky CH43, the goldfish on my middle finger was stamped in KleanColor Metallic Orange using plate CH43 plus a few bubbles of Zoya Monet. On my ring finger, the treasure chest is stamped in Orly Buried Treasure using CH49, then each nail got a touch up of the Finger Paints and a thin layer of Zoya Frida to give it that "looking through water" look. There are also MANY layers of SV in there.


Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Seven Deadly Sins: Lust

 This lovely polish is Chyna by Zoya, my take on Lust. The challenge was to make everyone seeing your entry immediately decide they needed the polish in question. Chyna is a deep ruby red texture polish with tons of sparkle. I can't handle leaving the texture polishes alone though, so this has a generous helping of SV on top which just added to the depth.


Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Seven Deadly Sins: Sloth

 For Sloth, the challenge was to show off a palette cleanser mani of some kind. Either just an "I don't feel like doing much" look or a color that would pass the most stringent of dress codes. This met both ideas I think, then I took it one step further by meeting sheet marks and dings before I got my pictures taken with a hearty "Meh." This beautiful polish is Buy Me A Cameo by Essie, a rose gold metallic that blended quite seamlessly with my skin tone in the right light.


Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Seven Deadly Sins: Greed

The challenge for Greed was to show off your "bling" (I hate that word!) nails, so anything sparkily. This is butterLONDON Lovely Jubbly with Zoya Juno as underwear. What I didn't realize about Lovely is that she stands all on her own, no unders needed, you can't even see Juno through under all that glitter! It just takes one coat of Lovely to do this too, I'm wearing one coat everywhere but my ring finger and there's barely a noticeable difference in person.

Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coats are Gelous & Seche Vite.

Seven Deadly Sins: Pride

I can't believe it's been a month since I posted! Here I was thinking it was like two weeks or something. You wouldn't believe the backlog of manis I have to post!

This is the next in the Seven Deadly Sins series, Pride. The challenge for Pride was show of the art technique you've always wanted to try, that you're best at, or just something that promises to make the Nail Muggles think yer a wizard. This is 2-3 layers of Zoya Ray, then a dabbed layer of China Glaze Luxe and Lush, the stamp I used is Vivid Lacquer's VL022 with Zoya Dove. There's a layer of SV after each layer following the last layer of Ray, and one layer of Gelous after the flakie. Then to top it all off, I added a layer of matte top coat. It came out pretty cool, I think, but I'd go lighter on the flakie if I do it again. The thumb came out pretty prefect.

Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coats are Seche Vite and NYC Matte Me Crazy.

Seven Deadly Sins: Envy

With my nail group, I'm taking part in a Seven Deadly Sins manicure challenge. This mani, before the stamp, is my entry for Envy. Our Envy entries simply have to be green in some way. With the stamp, I also entered it into a small "beta" type contest Anni from Vivid Lacquer is holding that required the use of one of her polishes and a stamp from this specific plate.

I started with a single layer of Zoya Midori, which is a lovely apple green. Then I dabbed on a layer of Vivid Lacquer Waltraud, which is truly one of my favorite VLs. It was one of the very first polishes she released when she opened her shop, so I don't think it's available anymore. The base is a beautiful yellow-green shimmer that goes on fairly sheer, and it's packed full of hex glitters in lots of springy colors. As you can see, it's like a Monet painting on your nails! The stamp is from VL010 and was done with Zoya Monica.


Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Stamping: Wood Grain

These came out so fun, but *super* subtle in natural light. The base brown is Zoya Cheryl, a dark mahogany color with tons of secret shimmer, which I then stamped  with KleanColor Coffee Addict, which is a golden toasted brown that's not quite metallic and VL019 from Vivid Lacquer. The stamping on my left hand gave me some problems, but in the middle of the right hand I stumbled on a new-to-me way to pick the polish up off the plate and after that, they came out stronger and not as stretched out. Win!

Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Reminder:

Toad-ally Awesome Nails is on hiatus this week as Mother's Day takes all of my time & brain cells.

Limited Edition Loveliness - A Polish From Vivid Lacquer's WTF Series

 Anni over at Vivid Lacquer started a new thing recently called her WTF series. These are small batch prototype or error bottles that she sells at a discount. There may be only one of a certian polish, or there may be a few, but when they're gone they're gone. I've purchased several WTF shades, and they've all been just beautiful, just for whatever reason they weren't what Anni was going for at the time.

This pastel beauty is WTF 18 14, or as I like to call it Birthday Celebration. I wore it to my Goddaughter's birthday gathering, so I thought the nickname was appropriate. It's a remarkable greyed-out pink that's almost lavender in some light, with TONS of pink, blue, and purple matte glitters in it. It's almost like when you make a smoothie and you can see all the strawberry seeds in amongst the goodness.

There are still quite a few WTFs available in Vivid Lacquer's Etsy store (link above), and keep watching here for several more to make their debuts!


Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Dark Beauty and My First Video!

 This beautiful polish is Zoya Payton, a dark cranberry purple color that's full of holo sparkles. I love this line of polishes so much. Dream, Storm, Aurora, Payton, Blaze, the whole group with the holo glitter is a must have for me, they are SO YUMMY!!

Payton however, being such a beautiful deep color was hard for me to photograph so I made a video to capture the loveliness.

 What do you guys think?

Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Burnt Orange Beauty

 Isn't this polish gorgeous?? This is Sunbaker by butterLondon, a rusty burnt orange that's packed full of shimmer. It almost makes your finger tips glow.


Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Color Shifts and Glitter.

After coveting this color shifter for quite awhile, I finally pulled the trigger and I am SO happy I did! This is Essie's For The Twill Of It, which  is something of a gray base, but on the surface it shifts through pink, purple and even green! It reminds me a lot of Wet N' Wild's Gray's Anatomy, only Gray's is super sheer and needs to be built up or worn over unders.

Then on the tips is Rainbow's End by Vivid Lacquer from last years St. Patrick's Day Duo. It's gold "coin" circle glitter and lime green holo glitter in a clear base. I need to find more reasons to wear this one, it's beautiful!


Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coats are Gelous and Seche Vite.

Bubbles Under Water?

 This delicious blue is The Long Wait by Vivid Lacquer. As far as I know, only two bottles of this color were ever made as a mea culpa after a shipping delay. It's a true, primary blue full of large holographic circle glitters, and tons of depth. I can't leave well enough alone however, and added a top-down gradient of China Glaze Golden Enchantment. Enchantment is gold micro glitter, a fraternal twin sister to Fairy Dust, which is of course is silver. I can't decide if I like it with the extra glitter on top or not, I may have ruined it. It kind of looks like bubbles rising up from under the water. What do you all think?

Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Spring Green Holo!

 

Phew! Lots happening here at home! Had a death in the family back in February, which led to a new housemate arriving the week of St Patty's Day. We're slowly getting our feet back under us, but there for awhile everything was upside down, know what I mean?

To the nails! This utterly fabulous spring green holo is Hi-Tech from Milani. So sparkily! This is actually my only Milani polish, but if it's any indication of their quality, I'll be keeping my eyes peeled for more.

Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coat is Seche Vite.

St. Patrick's Day Stamped Jelly Sandwich

 Holy Cow, I'm on time with a holiday post?! Get Daryl Dixon on the phone, I think this is a sign of the apocalypse! And if it's not, he can still come help me with a few things. ;) *Ahem*

Anyhow, this beautiful jelly sandwich is 2 layers of Zoya Frida, then I stamped with Wet N' Wild French White Tip using some leaves off of Pueen plate 55 from their Stamping Buffet set, and then another layer of Frida. It turned out so amazing!

Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Is It Spring Yet?

Please excuse the lack of cleanup here, this was just before adding the half moons.

Here in Oregon, the weather can't quite decide what the hell it's doing. One day it's freezing, the next we're seriously thinking about turning the air conditioners on. Then the next day it's back to freezing. Welcome to Oregon - if you don't like the weather wait 10 minutes. Hehehe. I was seriously in need of some Springtime one recent gray day, so I pulled out Perversion of a Butterfly by Vivid Lacquer and went to town.

Perversion is pretty sheer, so first I laid down a coat of China Glaze Sweet Hook which is a wonderful lavender cream. Then two coats of Perversion of a Butterfly, a sheer lavender base with purple and bronze round glitters, purple and silver shimmer, and fabulous purple butterflies. The I added half moons (wonky as they may be) in O.P.I.'s Can't Let Go. I think the bronze glitter in the VL polish is just the right touch to set off all the purple, don't you?


Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Playing with color and stamps.

 This is a grouping I've had set aside for awhile now, but something was always more pressing so I'm excited to finally show it off. The glitter accent is Marshmallow and Lilypad from 365 Days of Color's How I Met Your Mother collection. It's green glitter with smaller pink glitters in a milky white base. I paired it off with Butter London's Snog and Hunter by Zoya. Then, being as addicted to frogs as I am, the logical next step was to stamp with vl012 from Vivid Lacquer. There are actually lotus flowers on the green nails, if you look just right, done with a filled in stamp instead of just the outline. I wanted the glitter to be the star on the accent nail, so I used the outline there. I love these. Anything that lets me put frogs on my nails makes me super happy.


Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Palette Cleanser: Vivid Lacquer Theoretically Nude

 This absolutely gorgeous polish is Theoretically Nude by Vivid Lacquer.  It's a perfect nude that doesn't lean orange or overly brown or yellow or whatever, it's just a wonderful sand color at first glance. However, it also has this evenly distributed dark brown or black matte micro glitter in it that keeps it from being dull. THEN there's a subtle pink shimmer at certain angles that just makes the whole thing pop. Anni from VL actually just put some more bottles of this up, I'd jump all over that if I were you.

Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Bonder. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Fun French: China Glaze It's A Trap-eze and Sci-fly By.

 This is so fun, I can't even handle it. The main polish is China Glaze It's A Trap-eze and the color on the tips is Sci-fly By, also by China Glaze. Trap-eze is a white base with every color of the rainbow in it, but we decided that the blue was one of the most prominent so I went with Sci-fly By for the tips. I can't resist a white polish with colorful glitter in it, must be all the jaw breakers I ate as a kid. :)



Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Bonder. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Late Valentine's Looks!

Sorry to have been gone for so long! Things have been crazy busy around here with Valentine's Day at the flower shop, a break-in, a death in the extended family, all kinds of thing piling up on top of each other. I do have two manis from Valentine's week though and a couple more to post later in the week.

 Conversation Hearts for the first part of the week. From left to right, this is Zoya Stella, Sally Hansen Parrot, China Glaze Sweet Hook, Revlon Lemon Meringue, and KleanColor Sheer Pastel Purple, all stamped with Sally Hansen Rapid Red using Messy Mansion's MM03, then topped with matte top coat. I scraped too much of the red out of the plate when stamping, but I decided I liked it because how often do you see one of those candies with a complete stamp on it in real life anyhow? Hehe.

 This was later in the week and the picture is after several hard days. Zoya Carrie Ann is a beautiful lipstick red, but with a foil finish that makes it super fun. I added heart shaped studs that started gold, but after a few days the gold wore off and they were silver underneath, with I think only someone who was looking really close would notice.


Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Butter London Nail Foundation. Top coats are Seche Vite and NYC Matte Me Crazy on the Conversation Hearts.

Neon Drip Nails: Pick Your Portal by Vivid Lacquer

2 layers of Pick Your Portal over 1 layer of KleanColor White shown on my right hand.

1 layer KleanColor White, 2 layers of Vivid Lacquer Pick Your Portal, drips in Orly Orange Punch and Hedy's Ma.nish.ma. Bolts of Blue

I've had this combo set aside to wear together for months. Vivid Lacquer's Pick Your Portal is orange and blue round glitters floating in a milky white base. I used 2 coats of the VL over one coat of KleanColor White, but you could use more layers of Portal to build up to opacity. Then I added drips in Orly Orange Punch and Hedy's Ma.nish.ma. Bolts of Blue. Orange Punch is oh my wow neon orange - it even confused my camera enough to give me that strange pixelized look. By itself, two coats would be opaque I think, but the glitters peeks through even two layers here. Bolts of Blue is a great medium neon blue that actually dries matte. I coated it in SV for this look, though.

Do you think the colors match well?


Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Bonder. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Raspberry Red - Zoya Sarah

When I ordered the big "Cheers to All" dream box from Zoya, it was so I could get the most bang for my buck. It also has a lot of colors in it that I would never think to order for myself. Sarah is one of those I wouldn't think to order on my own, but I'm SO glad it was included in the dream box!

Sarah is a dark red that looks raspberry in some light and like the color of a Red Delicious apple in some other lights. The finish is a glass-fleck type of glitter that gives it crazy shine. Two coats gave me total coverage. I'll definitely wear Sarah again and again.


Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Bonder. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Stamped on Yellow: Vivid Lacquer Theoretically Pleased

 I love these adorable stamps. The plate I used was MM09 from Messy Mansion and features paper lanterns stamped in O.P.I. Funky Dunkey and the cutest little Geisha girls that I stamped using Zoya Black Swan. The background color is Vivid Lacquer Theoretically Pleased, a beautiful sunny yellow with white, gold and purple glitters throughout that just happen to match the shade of O.P.I. I chose to stamp with. ;)


Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Bonder. Top coat is Seche Vite.

Green and Gold - Vivid Lacquer Fire Swap with Zoya Ziv

I got so. much. polish. for Christmas! A big Vivid Lacquer order came in the day before and I got the Zoya Dream Box deal to actually open on Christmas and four Finger Paints colors with a gift certificate I got from my mom so all together there were close to 50 new bottles for me that week. Both of these colors were included in that haul.

 The green in Fire Swamp by Anni at Vivid Lacquer. It's a wonderful murky oliveish green with a gold shimmer, but when you turn your nails just right, the shimmer turns red! You may be able to see a little bit of the red hit in the pinky up there, at the bottom of the light reflection. It's part of VL's As You Wish trio and you will not be disappointed.

I wore Fire Swamp by itself until I started to get tipwear and then sponged on Zoya Ziv. I'm not usually a fan of gold, but Ziv seems to almost exactly match the tone of the gold shimmer in Fire Swamp, so much so that in real life the sponging was very subtle. Plus, Ziv is the smoothest foil I've tried, so it made even the texture seamless (what you mean to tell me you don't run your fingertips over your nails constantly? Just me? Yeah, I kinda thought so.).



Base coats are Orly Nailtrition and Bonder. Top coat is Seche Vite.