Some Sparkly Holiday Nail Art

This I thought would be a nice sophisticated holiday mani that you could wear to a nice holiday get together. I had done this one for my Mom and liked how it turned out so much that I decided to try it on myself. This one is super easy to do and doesn't require a lot of tools to create it.

I started off with a base of Cult Nails Let's Get Dirty from their "In The Garden" collection. This one has such a gorgeous shimmer when you add a topcoat and it's the perfect nude for this color combination.

Once it was somewhat dry I added Cult Nails Blaze to the tips, all I did was just take the brush from the bottle and with a small amount of polish on it I dabbed it on the tips. Then once I was finished with putting Blaze on the tips I took Zoya Trixie (a gorgeous silver) and my small striping brush and added a thin strip just below (but touching) this line of Blaze. This is so simple and easy to do that if you need a mani but don't have a lot of time to create some nail art, just try this. It's a nice alternative to a traditional french mani with a sparkly twist just for the holidays.

I love the combination on silver and gold on the tips to give you that perfect amount of sparkle on your nude/neutral base. I bet you could do this with any color combination you wanted so that you can coordinate with your outfit or color theme of your holiday party.

So give this a try and have a little fun at your holiday get togethers. Let this mani be a nice little accent to your holiday outfits! Stay tuned for some more holiday nail art to come!!

Cult Nails Enigmatic

Today I am re-visiting Cult Nails Enigmatic. I haven't used it in a while and when I was trying to figure out what to do with my nails the other day I grabbed this one because I was in the mood for something warm and dark. Enigmatic is a warm purple/plum color with shimmer. Depending how the light hits it and what kind of lighting the shimmer takes on either a gold shimmer or a purple shimmer.

This color is so beautiful and it is such a perfect fall color. I know it isn't fall yet but lately we have been having a bit of a cold snap and it's been in the 60's and low 70's during the day and getting down to the 50's and upper 40's at night so I was looking for something a little warmer on my nails. This one did the trick and it was exactly what I needed!

Shown here is 2 coats of Enigmatic over my base coat and then topped with Out The Door for added shine. I think I probably could have put a third coat on and gotten a nice deep shade of this on my nails. It's nice here with 2 coats but now looking back, 3 coats would have been really nice. All pics were taken indoors with artificial lighting and no flash.

You can purchase Cult Nails lacquers here and as always they are 5 free, vegan friendly, and cruelty free!! They retail for $12 for a full sized 0.5fl oz bottle.

Simple Nail Art with Cult Nails

Things have been super crazy out at the Midwest Lacquered Momma farm and household so I've just got something super simple for you today. I did this because I needed a mani but didn't have a lot of time to do something more.

I started out with a "clean slate" and used Cult Nails Tempest. This is an amazing white that Maria created. If you do it right it can be a one coater, it's also self leveling so you don't get those nasty streaks. I always do 2 coats just because sometimes I'm a little shaky and I like that second coat to smooth things out for me. Since I was in a hurry I added a topcoat of Cult Nails Wicked Fast fast dry topcoat. This stuff is awesome and I'm sad I'm almost out and can't place an order yet. :(

I wore this beautiful white as is for a couple days, nice and crisp and clean. But then after a couple days I was getting the itch to add to it, unfortunately I was at my Mom's out of town and didn't have my mani supplies with me so I dug around in her stuff to see what I could find.

I found some really cute star nail stickers and some rhinestones. AH-HA!!! Something to work with!! I applied the cute stars nail sticker to my pointer fingers and then took some Cult Nails Nevermore and added one single dot on each of my ring fingers. I then proceeded to arrange some teal and hot pink rhinestones around the dot to create a flower. Once I had everything arranged I added a top coat of Wicked Fast again to seal everything in and added it to the other nails as well as a shine refresher. Voila!! A simple easy nail art fix!!

Cult Nails polishes and treatments can be purchased here.

A Cult Nails "Converse Sneaker" Mani

Here is a mani I did for my daughter recently. We were browsing Instagram and she seen these "Converse Sneakers" on someone's nails and asked if I could do that. I did some searching and found a tutorial for them (I think I got the tutorial from @thelittlecanvas on Instagram). I had never tried them so I thought that I could give it a try, I'm trying to build my free-hand nail art skills so I thought this would be a good test.

 I had her pick out the colors she wanted and she went through my stash and picked out Cult Nails You're My Dandy Lion for the base color. Then I Cult Nails Tempest and Nevermore for the white and black. Grabbed my brushes, dotting tools, and other supplies and got started.

I put down a base of You're My Dandy Lion, once that was dry I took a striping brush and dipped it into the Tempest and did the tips of the nails for the sneaker tops. Then I took my dotting tool and dipped it into Tempest and created two rows of three dots to create the "lace holes" of the sneakers. Then I took a smaller striping brush and criss-crossed lines going to and from the "lace holes" the create the "laces". Once I was finished with the "laces" I dipped my next dotting tool (just a tad smaller than the previous one used) in Nevermore (black) to dot on top of the white "lace holes" to give them dimension. Then I grabbed another small striping brush and dipped it in Nevermore and drew my half circles on the white tips to give the sneaker tops definition. She only wanted the sneakers on two accent nails on each hand.

On her remaining nails she wanted to add rhinestones in the shades of the birthstones of the people most important to her. Then we let everything dry so that when I added the topcoat it wouldn't smudge the nail art. Once dry I added a topcoat of Out The Door to seal everything in.

I think they didn't turn out too bad for my first ever attempt but I'm definitely going to practice to make them better. I love trying to improve on my skills!! What do you think? Have you tried this type of nail art before? What is your favorite type of nail art??

Cult Nails polishes can be purchased through their site here.

Cult Nails Midnight Masquerade Collection

Today I have the entire Midnight Maxquerade Collection from Cult Nails for you. I know I've already shown you swatches of one of these shades but I am including it in this post because it is part of the collection.

I have to say that these are some unique shades that I did not already have anything like them so I was pretty excited about them. I was especially excited for Masquerade because I was digging the duochrome.

So here we go with all 3 shade from this mini collection.

First up we have Masquerade. Masquerade is a green jelly base packed with duochrome that shifts from purple to copper. I've even seen a green pop up in there inbetween the purple and copper. Shown here is 3 coats because it is a little more sheer than the others. That is because of the jelly base (in my opinion). This was another one that was hard to photograph and catch the shift of the duochrome.

Next we have Midnight Mist. Midnight Mist is a taupe with a gold glow/shimmer. The gold glow was a little harder for me to capture in pictures on the nail but you are able to see it in the bottle in the pictures. Shown here is 2 coats of Midnight Mist.

Lastly we have a beautiful vampy color that I am loving right now (I'm loving the vampy colors right now). This one is Ms. Conduct. Ms. Conduct is a taupe leaning brown creme. On my skin tone I think this looks nice and dark and vampy. Like a nice chocolate brown, something I didn't previously have in my collection. Shown here is 2 coats of Ms. Conduct.

On all of these the formula is great, smooth application and an average dry time. I have not added a top coat to these for any of the pics so that you can see just how nice and shiny they are on their own.

This was a Limited Edition Collection so I believe that the collection is not available any longer. Don't fret though, Cult Nails has so many more polishes in their collection that I'm sure you'll find some you love. Plus there is more coming out this year. Currently the Passionate Dreams collection is available for pre-sale until 1/31/14. Then if there is some remaining it will be available individually. You can check all their colors out on their site here. These retail for $12 for a full sized 0.5fl oz bottle.

Cute & Sparkly Skittlette

Here's a cute skittlette mani that I've been sporting for a few days. I thought I'd share it with all of you! I seen something just like it on Instagram by someone else and thought it was so cute that I had to do it myself.

I started out with Essie's Naughty Nautical on my thumb, pointer finger, and pinky finger.

Then I added Cult Nails Nevermore to my ring finger. BTW, I LOVE this black, it is the perfect one coater black. It's so shiny and glossy too, just the perfect black and for someone like me who loves dark colors, this is the holy grail of blacks!

Then I wanted some sparkle, I added Pure Ice Beware to my middle finger. This is a fine silver glitter and I used 3 coats to achieve the desired look. Also just to let you know how fine it is, I only had to add 2 thin coats of topcoat to get this one nice and smooth! Amazing!!

Then I took the Pure Ice Beware, Essie Naughty Nautical, and Cult Nails Tempest (which is an amazing almost one coat self-leveling white) to make the dots on my ring finger. And on the thumb I used Tempest, Nevermore, and Beware to make the flower. So here is the finished product. I hope you love it as much as I do!!

Cult Nails "Passionate Dreams" Collection Press Release

Hello and Happy Friday everyone! I wanted to share this press release for Cult Nails' new collection "Passionate Dreams" that is being released for pre-sale today! I personally can't wait for this collection and I am hoping to purchase it before the pre-sale ends because these colors are TO DIE FOR!!! I promise that as soon as I get my hands on a set I am going to share pics of these lovely beauties with all of you. :)

 

Here is the press release from Maria's desk...

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Passionate Dreams Press Release

Before we get to the press release, I wanted to talk about a few fun little changes. When we started Cult Nails, the idea was to create a stock of "Cult Classics". Like in fashion these classics would be the ones every girl or boy would need as part of their collection. Think of the classics as the T-shirt & Jeans of your polish collection. We also wanted to introduce seasonally a fresh set of limited edition polishes that would change out each season. We veered a little to the left of our original vision, but not to far off. We are now going to reel back in to stick with our original vision with some more fun changes along the way in 2014. Instead of seasonal collections, we are going to do smaller monthly collections that have 3 - 4 colors per collection. These will be available in much more limited quantities as previous releases. We will still launch each collection with a pre-sale event and after the pre-sale as long as there are still colors available, we will then sell the colors individually.

Another exciting change is that each collection will come with a story that you can read here!

It all started with the Masquerade collection. John wrote a very brief ad story for that collection and the subsequent Crypt Opening sale. As he sat to write the ad story for the Passionate Dreams collection and emailed it over to me to read, everything changed. I read it while out with a friend and so I wouldn't be rude sitting there reading an email when I was supposed to be spending time with my friend, I read it to her. When we finished reading what he wrote, we were both left with a "And then what happens!?" So John wrote it into a short story of sorts. He left it a bit open. Is it a chapter of a story? Or a short story to be left standing on it's own? We're going to let you decide! Based on feedback, John will continue this story with each chapter, or he will write several short stories for each collection. Are you ready for the story? Well, how about a little teaser first! Stay tuned for tomorrow's blog post for the rest of the story!

PRESS RELEASE from Cult Nails™

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

…She dreamed of the day when she would find him, the one. And find him, she did. He passed her in the park on her morning walk. She'd been watching him as he approached. With his head down and his hands in his pockets, he hadn't given her so much as a glance. But there he was, the absolute man of her dreams. His stride was flawless and graceful, but manly. His build was average but he carried himself with confidence, not cockiness. And his eyes. Oh his eyes! When he looked up to apologize for almost bumping into her, she could feel his eyes looking deeper into her soul than she ever thought possible. His stare was intense. Heart stopping. Lethal. That was the moment. The feeling his gaze left her with was enough to ignite her passion. Then she felt it. The pounding in her heart. Her breathing became shallow and quick. Her senses were exploding at the thought of him simply speaking to her. Then, it happened. She looked back at him and their eyes met once more. It was undeniable; but as quickly as he approached, he continued on, blending in with the background until he was eventually out of sight.

CULT NAILS™ brings you the PASSIONATE DREAMS collection. With names like LETHAL, IGNITE, ANGEL WHISPERS, and KISS, this collection brings emotions of desire, lust, and passion, and the colors are no exception.

Passionate Dreams

ANGEL WHISPERS: A soft, pale pink crème provides the base color for this texture polish. Even though the finish may feel slightly rough, its color and signature Cult Nails™ shimmer create a softening effect reminiscent of an Angel's wings.

Angel Whispers - No Top Coat



Angel Whispers - No Top Coat



Angel Whispers - With Top Coat

LETHAL: Like staring into your lover's eyes, you won't be able to look away when this silver foil is on your tips.

Lethal



Lethal

IGNITE: Blending a black jelly base with silver glitter, it's like closing your eyes for that first kiss, and seeing stars. Ignite is pure passion fuel.

Ignite - No top Coat



Ignite - With Top Coat

KISS: No love story is complete without a kiss. Crafted to invoke emotions of lust and desire, Kiss is a vibrant red that dries to a wax-like finish.



Kiss

Each color is part of the "Passionate Dreams" Collection, released January 2014. Each bottle is 0.5 fluid ounces / approximately 15ml.

PRE-SALE DATES: January 17-31, 2014. The 4 piece set will sell only as a collection during the pre-sale time for $35.00. Remaining colors, if any, will be sold individually beginning February 15, 2014 and will retail for $12.00 each.

 

 

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Head on over to Cult Nails' site and get yours today!!

Cult Nails Masquerade

I have one of the polishes from Cult Nails' Midnight Masquerade Collection. This one is Masquerade. Masquerade is a green jelly packed with duochrome that ranges from purple to copper. This one is one of my favorites from this collection. Even though this is a mini-collection it is as gorgeous as all of Maria's collections.

The formula on this was smooth and applied like butter but I wasn't surprised by this, Cult Nails has an amazing formula that is consistent throughout their entire line. I haven't one single issue with any one of the Cult Nails polishes I own.

I used 3 coats to achieve the opacity that I was looking for because it is a little bit thinner than most of the others but that is because the base of this one is a jelly. Jellies are thinner and do require more coats to achieve full opacity. The 3 coats that I used were thin coats.

It was a little difficult to photograph but all photos were taken indoors with no flash. You can see in the photos the nice shift from the purple to copper. The photo above was the one that captured it the best.

All Cult Nails polishes can be purchased on the Cult Nails website here. They are $12 for a full sized 0.5fl oz bottle. I hope you enjoyed this one as much as I did and I can't wait to bring you the rest of the Midnight Masquerade Collection!

Cult Nails Grunge with China Glaze Fairy Dust

I was drawing a blank when I was trying to think of something to do on my nails this week. I was trying to figure out some nail art I could do but just couldn't think of anything. Then I decided that I was just going to have a simple mani this week. I reached for my Cult Nails collection of polishes and pulled out Grunge. Grunge is a beautiful green and shifts from an army green to a lighter grayish green depending on your lighting. On myself it tends to stay the army green which I LOVE!!

So I applied 2 coats of Grunge over my base coat. For my base coat I am using the Sally Hansen Maximum Growth nail treatment. I am really loving it because I was having problems with my nails peeling but since I've been using this treatment, I haven't had a big problem with that.

Once I applied my 2 coats of Grunge I applied a nice coat of Cult Nails' own fast dry shiny topcoat, Wicked Fast. This stuff is exactly what it says, Wicked Fast! I love it and I am almost out so I am going to have to place a Cult Nails order soon so I can get more. I have to say that I love this green cream color! I wasn't sure how it would look on me with my skin tone but it is gorgeous! Maria over at Cult Nails knocked it out of the park with this one!! (As she does with all of her polishes cause they are all so gorgeous!!)

Then as I was putting away all my stuff from doing my mani I ran across China Glaze Fairy Dust. I had completely forgotten I had this stuff and decided to throw on 1 coat of Fairy Dust over my Grunge mani just for a little bit of sparkle. Not bad! It was almost like I had little droplets of frost or something on my nails (kinda thinking in winter themed mind frame here, lol). I may have to figure something out for a winter/Christmas themed mani to use Fairy Dust again.

Cult Nails Lacquers can be purchased here on their website. They retail for $12 for a full sized 0.5fl oz bottle. Wicked Fast retails for $10 for a full sized 0.5fl oz bottle or if you want to try out their base coat Get It On, you can get both Wicked Fast and Get It On in a package deal for $18, both are full sized bottles. You have to get them fast because in my experience, they sell out pretty fast, but not to worry, Maria restocks them fairly quickly!

China Glaze lacquers can be purchased at Ulta stores, Sally Beauty stores, and many other beauty supply stores and salons.

Happy Halloween!!!

One day I was browsing through Instagram and came across a super cute Halloween themed manicure and figured I wanted to recreate it for my own Halloween mani. I don't normally do anything for Halloween but this was too cute to pass up.

I started out my base with some Cult Nails polishes. I used Tempest on the index finger, Grunge on the middle finger, and Nevermore on the thumb, ring, and pinky fingers.

Then I took out my brushes and dotting tools to create these. First I used the dotting tool to create the eyes of my "Jack" face and then used a small brush to make the eyes a little more oval, then I used a striping brush to add the nose and mouth. My hands were a little shaky so it didn't turn out quite how I had pictured it but it was pretty close. Then on the ring finger I wanted to add some googly eyes. All I did for these was use Tempest for the white dots and then Nevermore again for the center of the eyes in a smaller dotting tool. Then for something more I added Maybelline Polka Dots in Clearly Spotted to the top of Grunge to carry on my black and white theme. I had to be super careful and make sure that my art was dry before I added my top coat so that I wouldn't smear my work.

Thankfully I took these pictures before I added my topcoat because I did have a mishap. Of course I thought I had waited long enough but ended up smearing a little on my Jack face when I added the top coat. Oh well, next time I will just wait a bit longer. Darn me for being impatient, LOL!

I hope you all enjoyed this Halloween themed mani as much as I do!

Cult Nails polishes can be purchased through their site here.

*all pics were taken indoors in natural lighting with flash (I had to use flash because the sun was not out on this day)

Cult Nails All Access Collection

 

I managed to get in on Cult Nails' presale they had for their new All Access Collection that was just released. I was so excited that I managed to get my order in just before the presale ended. Talk about in the nic of time!

This collection is TO DIE FOR!!! I am loving this and I am in love with it. For those of you who don't know Cult Nails is owned and operated by Maria and her hubby John. They make some of the best polishes I have ever tried. Cult Nails is free of Toulene, Formaldehyde, Dibutyl Phthalate and Camphor.

Now, let's get on to the All Access Collection. There are five polishes in this collection, 3 creams and 2 glitters. They are Grunge, Lamestain, Wack Slacks, Disillusion, and Feedback.

Grunge is described as a moss green that in different lighting can lean grey. This crème is so versatile and can easily pass as a neutral in my books. This is 2 coats but I could have easily gotten by with just one coat. Topped it with Cult Nails' own top coat Wicked Fast (super shiny and dries wicked fast). Lighting in these pics were natural lighting (sunlight).

Next is Lamestain. Lamestain is described as a vampy red (think oxblood) that leans brick red to brown to deep burgundy. This one is a cream but a little bit of a thinner formula than their other creams. It isn't watery or thin but I recommend using 2 coats to get the best opacity. I used 2 coats here and topped with Wicked Fast.

Next up is Wack Slacks. Wack Slacks is described as looking like a cornflower blue but leans purple hued in sunlight. In my pics you can see that in the different lighting the color changes slightly. This is the EXACT blue I had been searching for. I am loving this one so much!! It has the usual Cult Nails cream formula which is amazing and this is a one coater for most. I have on one coat here topped with Wicked Fast.

The first glitter one I'm going to show you is one that I was very excited about because I LOVE black and pink! Especially together! So when I seen the preview pics of this one I knew I was going to HAVE to have it! This is Disillusion. Disillusion is a hot pink mylar flake in a light black jelly base.

You can either wear it alone or put it over a black base (I recommend Cult Nails Nevermore, the best black one coater EVER!). If you wear this one alone you are going to need 2-3 coats and it is very important that you let it fully dry in between coats because with the mylar flakes being heavy in the jelly base they will move when you apply the next coat. I used it alone here and used 3 coats topped with Wicked Fast. I think next time I wear this one I am going to try it over Nevermore just because I am too impatient to wait for the coats to dry again, lol.

The last one in this collection is Feedback. Feedback is described as a gold and iridescent mylar flakes in a clear base. This is a really fun one in my opinion because you can wear it in so many different ways and over so many different colors.

Again with this one you are going to have to wait for drying if you are going to wear it with more than one coat. What I did here is sponged it on to make a gorgeous glitter gradient over Wack Slacks. I can't tell you how amazing this combination is in person. I literally can't stop staring at my nails!! This is also topped with Wicked Fast.

All of these are made with the fabulous formula that Cult Nails uses and I had no issues with any of them. No problems applying and no clumps. Cult Nails is one of my all time favorites and I think it is the one brand I reach for the most. Try it if you haven't already, I promise you'll be hooked!

Cult Nails polishes sell for $12 each for a full sized 0.5fl oz bottle and you can purchase them here on their site. Wicked Fast sells for $10 for a full size bottle or you can purchase the Wicked Fast topcoat in combination with Get It On, their base coat for a package price of $18 for both full sized bottles.