31 day challenge begining with Mavala Madrid

I runned into this post on Wacky Laki's blog and I really liked the idea. I usually come to my lacquer boxes and then spend half an hour just picking which mani to do next (not that it's a bad thing, it's sort of like meditation to me). This challenge tells me what to do next and it will be something different for me.

As the other bloggers, I tend to stretch 31 days into at least 93 days since I don't have time nor energy to paint my nails everyday. That wouldn't be a pleasure for me, as it is now, when I do my nails every three days and take a little time just for myself.

So, here's the challenge and the rules:

RULES:

• Reblog this post if you’re gonna accept this challenge
• One post per day
• If you miss one, pick it up the next day
• Post a picture of each mani
• It would be nice if you listed/linked to what polishes you used
• For the inspiration prompts, SHOW US YOUR INSPIRATION/SHARE LINKS
• BE CREATIVE
• TRY NEW THINGS
• HAVE FUN!!!

Day 1.

Red polish.
Looks like it's gonna be the hardest thing for me, since I don't find red polishes attractive and I hardly own any. Not that I don't like them, it's just that 99% women have red polish wherever I go and it starts to bore me terribly.
So I went through my stuff and find this ancient polish my friend gave to me long time ago.

I expected it to be sticky, thick and too old to apply, but was I wrong.
This may be the ode to Mavala polishes, but I fell in love with this brand after just one perfectly smooth coat. Color was completely opaque after one coat and I can't remember when I applied some polish that easily.
After that I started to take interest for this brand and googled for swatches and I was very pleased with what I've seen.
Bottom line: I definitely want more Mavala polishes.
Altough they seem pretty expensive to me (5$ fo 4.5 ml?) the shades are amazing (new ones especially) and there's the dreamlike application. I like the bottle shape, too.

Do you own any Mavala polishes? Which shades do you like? And are they worth the money?
I love next shades: Bronze Green, Marron Glace and Cyclades Blue


Bye
Stickers

Green holo franken!

I always wanted to buy Nubar Reclaim, but somehow I never ordered it: there was always some new great collection to buy and Reclaim always waited for me to get it.
But now it doesn't have to wait anymore, I don't want it anymore: I made my perfect green holo polish!!!

I was so happy when I got my package from More nail polish with Spectraflair, or magic dust as I like to say. Basically it's holo powder that you can make holo polishes with. It's pretty expensive, but worth every penny.

So this is my green franken, and my best franken so far. I made purple and greyish blue frankens but this is my greatest success.

And few photos in the shade:

This holo effect was so strong I didn't have to 'chase' for it. Usually when I buy a 'holo' polish, the effect is so weak that I spend 10 minutes and 100 photos to get it right for the blog photo, but this time I was done in a minute.
Here's the bottle and the recipe:

Recipe: buy 5 ml clear nail polish
            pour out about 0.5 - 1 ml of polish
           add few drops of China Glaze Jolly Holly
           add about 4 straw spoonfuls of Spectraflair

And that's it!
Just one funny detail: I didn't have small lead balls to mix my franken so I used my dad's air gun bullets instead. They work great! :)

I'm so happy I finally have my green holo that I wanted since I started blogging. Spectraflair has made my wishes come true :)

Bye
Stickers

Butterfly effect

Hello!

I dedicate this post to my lovely dog, Timmy, who's been with me for over 17 years (!).
I feel really sad because she's starting to get more and more weak, and seems like it's time for her to go. But I can't let her. Not yet.
This is the photo of the two of us together, today.
I have to share it with somebody, and I guess my readers won't mind. Plus, I know many of you nail bloggers are also animal lovers. :)

Now, I would like to share this pretty mani with you.
As a base I used Catrice Sweets for my Sweets, the polish which I used to hate because it took three coats for full opacity. But every time I put it on, I like it more than the last time. Barby pink color is the reason for that.

I love girly stuff and I search for excuses for buying silly things like Hello Kitty lip balm (I really need another lip balm, I own only 20) or pink pen (my other 20 pens suddenly ran out of ink). But with this polish, I have no excuse: I love it because it's so girly and so lovely.

For the butterflies I used some no name franken that was just a bit darker than Catrice so the final effect wasn't that visible from the distance, but it was subtle and gentle, just like a butterfly.

I love this mani! Makes me think of that old Aqua song... Yeah, you know which song!  :)

Bye
Stickers

Mint green comparison

Yes, I know, I said I'll post it tomorrow, and that was almost a week ago!
But I took an unplanned trip to the seaside. I passed my Math 3 exam on tuesday and just packed a bag and asked my friend to come with me!
And it was perfect! Altough it's 5 days untill the beginning of the autumn, the sea was warm and the air was hot.
That's why I haven't been posting my comparison.

Now here it is. Polishes used:
OPI Gargantuan Green Grape - thumb, 3 painful coats
Essence A Hint of Mint - point finger, 2 coats
Yolizul 189 - middle finger, 2 coats
Maybelline Minty - ring finger, 3 coats
Orly Gumdrop - 2 coats, but it could have been 1

I can't say any of them are even close to dupes.
I like Essence A Hint of Mint and Orly best because of the smooth application and the color. Minty and Gumdrop have more blue undertones than the rest of the mints.
I don't have much to say about this comparison, I believe that the colors are pretty accurate and you can see it for yourself from the photos.

I would just like to say that if you're even thinking of buying this OPI, don't!!!
It was my first OPI. I wanted to see what's the fuss about that brand, and then I got this. Streaky, runny polish with lousy application. And I didn't buy another OPI for a long time...

Since I'm mint green lover, can you recommend some other mint greens that I must have?
Can you tell me which minty polishes you own and what do you think of them (color, application...).
Thanks

Bye
Stickers

Swap lista

Sorry this post is in Croatian, only for swapping polishes with Croatian gals.

Vjerojatno svaka od vas ima doma neki lak koji je kupila jer ga je u tom trenutku mooorala imati, ali nakon jednog nošenja nije joj bilo jasno zašto ga je kupila i sad taj lakić stoji i vjerojatno nikad neće dočekati novo mazanje...
Ne znam za vas, ali ja takvih lakića imam dosta.
Dajte prijedlog u komentarima ili na forumu koje bi lakove htjele mijenjati (otprilike iste cjenovne kategorije, ali sve se možemo dogovoriti), a ja ću vam se javiti što prije.
Bezveze je da bacim te lakove ili da stoje dok se ne zgusnu. Bolje je da dobiju priliku kod neke od vas, a ja mogu isprobati neke druge vaše neželjene lakiće koje još nisam imala prilike kupiti. U obzir dolaze sve vrste lakova, od 'kineskih' do opće poznatih.

Samo se javite!

Dakle, lista je sljedeća:
S desna na lijevo
She 305
Deborah 161
Yolizul 079
Quori mini ljubičasti
Essence The one and only
Essence Purple diamond
Color Club Uptown girl
Golden Rose 220
Smart girl get more 94
Milani Purple gleam
slika
Maybelline Minty
Catrice I sea you
Essence Crazy me
Essence Choose me
Golden Rose 217
Milani Blue Flash
Maybelline Lime Aluminium
slika
Essence Always Hippie
Essence Crni Crackle
Deborah matt 03 (tamnoplava)
Essence Denim Wanted I love my jeans
Milani Silver Dazzle
Milani Gold Glitz
slika

Light blue comparison

I'm a big big big fan of blue and green polishes, if you didn't notice already! :)
And as I was going through my stash the other day I realised I have so many light blue and mint polishes that looked alike in bottles. So I decided to do my first comparison.

I love comparison posts, do you love them as much? I always want some new polish based on the swatches online and then I order it and realize I have pretty similar shade already. That's why I love comparisons. They really show how different or alike the polishes are next to each other.

So today I will show you light blue swatches and tomorrow minty shades.

I compared these polishes:
Essence You belong tome (pinky) 2 coats
Essence Speed of light blue (ring finger) 3 coats
Yolizul 186 (middle finger) 2 coats
Astor mikado 06 (point finger) could have passed with 2, but I did 3 coats
Catrice Up in the air (thumb) 2 coats

In the bottles they looked like I was going to do an ombre mani, but one the nails it turned out completely different.
I thought of comparing You belong to me with the mint greens, but it was too blue for them. On the nail it looks even more close to blues. But Catrice's UITH turned out to be the most different on the nail. It is much darker on the nail than in the bottle so my thumb kept bouncing from other nails. No, Catrice relly didn't belong to this comparison, so I did a photo without it.

Now it looks like a real comparison. All the colors are pretty close, except for Essence YBTM. It's too green for light blue comparison, and it was too blue for mint comparison. So, it's a unique minty blue color in my collection.
Speed of light blue and Yolizul look very close. But since I had to do three coats for Essence I declare Yolizul the winner of light blues. Astor has subtle shimmer in it so it differs it from the other polishes, but I really like the shimmer that adds depth to this polish, compared to plain old cremes.

All in all I like Yolizul's application and color, but the true winner in application was Catrice Up in the air. Although the color on the nail isn't exactly light blue, more pale medium blue. I would describe it as a stormy midday sky.

Tomorrow I'll show you the mint greens.
How did you like my first comparison?

Bye
Stickers

Antique mani

Hi!

Lately something's been bothering me, I don't know if anyone else has this problem: on my blog I can't see the followers, I just see the title Followers, but where once were small icons of my followers, now there's nothing!
But today they finally showed up, and I was amazed to see that I have 181 followers!
I was affraid I might lose some of you due to my summer break, but I sure wasn't expecting to gain some more followers!

This is a big thanks to my old followers, and a welcome to new ones!
Please feel free to comment anything, ask whatever you want and share some advices for the blog improvement.

Now, on to the new mani.
As a base I used Smart girls get more Black holo, that I showed you before, but as a  pedicure .
On top of it I stamped a whole nail stamping pattern from BM. Having a bit shorter nails helps in one thing: every whole nail pattern fits my nails, even small BM's.

I really like the result of this.

As these photos weren't taken on direct sunlight, I added this one that is, and shows the true nature of this holo.
Although it isn't some strong holo, and it's scattered, it is still very visible. Unfortunatelly, it maybe even too much: holo + stamping so it looks a bit kitschy.

By the way, looks like my summer job salary is going to melt like the snowman in the sun.
Yesterday I ordered 8 polishes online and bought one in drugstore (new Essence's limited edition Natventurista: Barefoot through the moss, I can't wait to try it!) and today I'm thinking about buying another 6 polishes online from another seller.
Is there a cure for this madness? :)


Bye
Stickers

New Age Blue

New Age polishes are amazing. You can buy them in pharmacies and department stores for 1$, but their pigmentation and quality always astonishes me.
This was one coat! It dried in a second. I added Catrice Up to 10 days top coat (why did they discontinue this product?) and this mani after three days looks just as good as new.

I love this color: bright blue that is hard to capture on camera. It looks a bit washed out on the photos, but in reality it screams: BLUE!
I tried to find similar color since my tiny bottle (5ml) is going towards its end.
Sally Hansen Brisk Blue, OPI No room for blues and Color Club 220 volts look close.

Does any of you girls have some bright blue polish to recommend?

On to the photos:

Bye
Stickers

Love mani

While making new photos of my still short nails, I found photos of my last mani before summer job, where my nails were, I believe, as long as they can possibly be.

So before new pics, I must put this old one for you to see.
As a base I'm wearing Yolizul in color 030: a true red jelly. But since it's pretty sheer on the nails it looks almost pink.

Stamping, as usual: BM old plates with black Manhattan Quick Dry.

Next post comes with shorter nails, probably tomorrow.

Bye
Stickers