Instagram Update December 2013

 

It's December! Wow time flies.  Halloween, Thanksgiving, now on to the holiday parties and Christmas!  If you follow me on IG, you probably have a decent update of what I've been up to, but for those that don't, here's a collage!

1.

I was on a makeup pause, classes/shop my stash only deal until I went into a store and decided a lipstick was all I needed. I'm late to the MAC Retro Matte formula greatness, but this Relentlessly Red has me all giddy inside. Bad pic of me wearing it and the pic doesn't do it justice, but believe me, the formula is greatness and impacts the color in a fab way. The formula is matte and comfortable. Win!

2.

 It's been all about lipsticks for me lately. My only purchase from the MAC holiday collection, Divine Nights is this Exclusive Event lipstick.  It's a satin, grey, odd color and is probably the lipstick baby of Stone and Cork lip liners.

3.

  OPI The Living Daylights polish from The Skyfall collection has me in a holiday party mood. It reminds me of the night lights of a party.  I've been getting designs and jewels on my nails and have neglected my love for glitter. 

4.

 What's the point of pics if they don't capture the beauty of the subject? SIGH. This is my Christmas tree. It doesn't look special, but I love it when I walk through the door. It has a silver and light turquoise color scheme. 

5.

 An oldy, but goody and new to me. Since I've been a MAC fan, the limited edition items keep you wrapped in a frenzy and I haven't had the opportunity to experience everyone's favorite permanent lipstick next to Ruby Woo...DIVA! I paired it with Currant lip liner and I'm loving it! Thanks to my girl Ro for putting me on.

6.

 Hey! The Corporate Beauty is in my town now and not just in the blogosphere! A new beauty buddy!  Good times!

7.

 For Thanksgiving, I wasn't responsible for an entire dinner, but I did try my hand at a new dish (for me) Shrimp and Grits Dressing. Turned out pretty tasty! A nice twist on two of my favorite dishes.

8.

I've been into designs lately since polishes haven't tickled my fancy in a long while, but I looked around in the drugstore and saw some new glitters and textures that caught my attention! Two of these are Essie polishes from the Encrusted Treasures collection and the other two are from L'Oreal's Textured polish collection.

9.

In November, I went to NY to see one of my favorite makeup artists, AJ Crimson.  This NY stop on his beauty tour focused on clean, beauty makeup during a live photoshoot with model @rayuanaaleyce and photographer @harryfellows.  Seeing the pros in action was sweet!

How have you guys been?  Life has seemed a little different without Google Reader. I've tried keeping up on Bloglovin', but I never got my feed to transfer over. 

My neon border nails

Merry Christmas! Happy New Year!

Hey guys! I guess I took a holiday break. I totally intended to share my holiday festivities and looks, but they happened quick and fast and often times I didn't feel my looks were anything to write home about.  If they were, they ended up on IG ;-p   Follow me on IG @yummy411.   How was your holiday?

To start off 2013 posts, I want to share my new nails I'm excited about! I wanted to try border nails. I was turned down by one salon, but found another that was up for the challenge. The nail tech was awesome.  We both ogled over nail art pics on IG! You have to love that!

See my photos below:

 

The tech based my nails with Famous Brand polish's Baby Purple, a nice pinky lilac.  Then, outlined the nail with an electric orange.  (I don't know the brand or color name.) 

I like that the base color looks pink at times, then lilac and then other times a mother of pearl sort of color.  It's a cream polish, but to me it can look different in different lights in contrast to the bright orange.  

I want to try this again.. I'm cooking up a different color combo..hmmmmm.  Maybe some Winter colors since it is still Winter?

Have you tried border nails?

Halloween Nail Designs

Super-Easy (and Super-Cute) Halloween Nail Art Ideas

Even if you're the Halloween Grinch of the office, these 8 festive manis are so chic (and easy to pull off) they might put you in the holiday spirit

This is a TotalBeauty.com nails article Halloween is the one day of the year when you can get away with completely over-the-top hair, makeup, and nails. But if aren't ready to completely transform your look, try one of these eight Halloween nail art ideas. From candy corn nails to glow-in-the-dark ghosts, we've got the tips you need to get you in a spooky mood now. Get Halloween nails

Olympic Nail Art

(photo credit: Newsone.com; updated as I cannot have a pictureless post :p)

I'm up early to watch the Olympics womens' tennis match: Serena Williams vs. Maria Sharapova.  Not coming from a sports fanatic household, tennis was one of the only sports my dad encouraged.  Can I admit that Maria Sharapova was such a household name that I had no idea she was Russian? Don't kill me, applaud her marketing and talent.  So here I am, watching Serena serve aces like donuts (she's fire! Williams 40-Love) and like in any situation, her nails catch my eyes.  Yes, during her 117 mi/hr serves, white tips (or the like) catch my eyes.  I'm sure there will be info on the net later, but meanwhile we see that many of the female athletes keep the spirit sporting colorful patriotic nails.

I've located two slide shows to share!

Styleist: Olympic Nails

E! Online Olympic Nail Art

By the time I began to wrap up this post, we now have a new Gold Champion!
Singles Gold Champion: SERENA WILLIAMS (31 years old)
Serena's happy dance: the crip walk, lmao yes she took it back to 2000.
Whatever, she's amazing!!

Too bad my manicure isn't patriotic. I'm currently sporting Rare and Radiant by China Glaze.  What about you?  Are your nails patriotic for the 2012 Olympic games?

Glitter Love

I thought I was sort of over my glitter phase since I have quite a few that I haven't worn, but here is more glitter love that I've acquire over the past week:

Glitters: LA Girls Nostalgic, Spoiled by Wet N Wild Jewelry Heist, Milani Hot Pink and Sephora by OPI To the Glitter End!

Swatched the same as above

Let's try descriptions: Nostalgic is a sea foam green, turquoise that  has small glitter mixed with huge hexagonal glitter of the same color.  Jewelry Heist grabbed me because it was a twist on rose pink glitters. Huge rose pink and gold hex glitters, tiny multi colored square and hex glitter. Milani Hot Pink is huge hex hot pink glitters mixed with fewer 3D silver hex glitters... silver but depending on what angle it reflects blue,green, yellow,etc. and lastly Til the Glitter End! is a dark silver, pewter glitter.  I have a black glitter and the glitters don't shine, so this for me is an alternative.

These are all better used as layering glitters.  Nostalgic is on my current mani and Hot Pink looks like a great Vday mani for the win!

Two gripes here:
1- Sephora by OPI retails for $9.50.  I can get OPI retail $8;  online for cheaper.  I'm over it already.  This may be my last polish by Sephora by OPI.  I love the collection mini sets though.
2- I think the Spoiled by Wet N Wild collection is solid.  It covers neutrals, brights, glitters, grays and blackened/deepened colors, cool names and all with an affordable price tag. BUT.. this brush for the glitter is ridic and ugly.  I don't polish my own nails often or think much about the brush, but when even trying to swatch the glitter this brush caught me by surprise.  While it's supposed to be tapered, the end of the bristles looks unruly giving the brush a thicker spread at the bottom. It was really awkward when trying to place the glitter. I seriously hope the brush in the regular colors are not like this.  Is this a problem for you guys???

See what I mean?

Are you in glitter love right now?  What are your favorite glitters?

What we are wearing on our nails

I some how captured all of our (my sisters and my) recent nail looks. Take a peak!

Toni goes short and chic for her current mani.  She's wearing a simple, traditional French with her gel manicure (no acrylic).  Very office and interview appropriate.

Kay, TeenYummy411 gets sassy with leopard nail stickers.  I scored these from Hot Topic ($10), but passed them to her.  Since I took this picture, she's mixed up her look by polishing her nails with a solid color and then using a leopard sticker to accent a nail or two. 

Jessica has her pointy nails back and true to her personality and nail tech's creative flare, she has an amazing design complete with glitter, neon, swirls and a tribal stone print.  I WANT her nails!

My tips (supposed to be pointy) are covered in Deborah Lippman's Across the Universe Lady Sings the Blues and accented with L.A. Girls Nostalgic glitter (a pretty seafoam green glitter). I saw JillianDanica with a accent stripe of glitter on her nails and wanted to try it.  I love the effect using glitter on glitter. I curved my stripe though.  I love this mani. Just when I thought I was over glitter. Glitterlicious! It has calmed my desire to want my sister's nails, for now, hehe.

What are you wearing on your nails?  What color do you want to try on your nails.

Milani Purple Gleam and Gold and Black Glam

Just wanted to share a couple things because it's been a minute... If you follow my blog via Facebook, you probably have heard about and seen some of this stuff!

First let me show you my favorite purple, sparkly polish right now.... Milani Purple Gleam.  PG is the jewel purple tone from the one coat glitter formula of polishes.  It took a bit more than one coat to get an even  application, but it's ok.  (This design was based with OPI's Midnight in Moscow.) The dense glitter makes me happy when the sun or candle/moonlight hits my nails!  I'm always on the hunt for an awesome purple glitter and I've found a few... I've been meaning to do a post on that very subject!  This particular glitter brightened my day since Revlon's Facets of Fuchsia didn't strike my fancy much back when I tried it.  It was very murky as the glitters were swamped in the black base. Instead of having ruby slippers to click, I feel like I have amethyst tips to ... idk, stare at!

Next, I have an FOTD I did when I was going out that I liked alot.  Wish I had recorded a tutorial video to go along with it. By the way,  how are you guys liking the youtube channel?  Are the vids helpful?  Enhance the blog?  Let me know!  Anyhoo...  I was excited about going out because it was part of my plan to 'See and be seen'.  You can't meet people and have fun if you don't go out, right? Meh...

(Remember my Nneka Saran purse I got a while back? It's my first time wearing it ...0_o)

My colors of the night were black and gold.  For an easy 'glam-night-out' look I pulled out the trusty old Guilt By Association mineralize eyeshadow by MAC that I mentioned in the October Favorites Vid.  My other favorite product that I should mention is my L.A. Splash glitter liner in Gold.  Love it!  Some times you need a little sparkle to set off a look and the glitter liner was to the rescue!  I use it in my inner corner, bottom lash line and on my lips!  Chunky glitter .... I'm all over it!  Fragrance: Gucci Guilty.. it was the black and gold packaging! LOL Nice fragrance, overall.


=( I will start doing my foundation first, lol

Here's a similar outfit to the one I wore that night:

gold and black by yummy411 featuring enamel earrings

Rachel Gilbert mini cocktail dress, $640
Emilio Pucci blazer, $915
Promiscuous pantyhose tight, $32
Supertrash platform booties, €250
Citrine By The Stones gold citrine ring, €77
ASOS metal jewelry, $18
Givenchy enamel earrings, $45
Bobbi Brown Lip Gloss Trio, $40

Now I'm all excited and want to Polyvore some New Year's outfits!!

Update and My experience with Sally Hansen Salon Effects Nail Strips

About a week ago, before I took off my Sally Hansen Salon Effects Nails Strips designs this was the state of affairs!

My nails were grown out and ready to be refilled! They lasted a good long time and they were always conversation starters. It was funny to have even men notice!

Here are the instructions that came with the set: (click to enlarge)


So I basically 1-found a strip that would fit my nail, 2-pulled off the back and aligned it with my cuticles. In real life, I left the slightest of gap between the strip and cuticle because I didn't want to make it look like I over jumped my cuticles. In photos, it seemed best to fit the strip right up against my cuticles. 3-I pulled the access over my nail and went to work with the buffer and file that was enclosed. The file helped to wear away the access and the buffer helped to smooth out the strips edges on the ends of my nails.

The above scanned instructions or my basic instructions aren't enough? Well, dang!
Brit's got you covered....

Clumps of Mascara's Video Review and Tutorial

Most of the strips didn't fit the width of my nails, so here's what helped and other tips:
-Remember I said my nails had the black glitter acrylic still on them? Well the black peeked out a bit (the glitter wasn't as apparent) so it matched the design and camouflaged the areas that weren't covered.
-I put a clear coat of polish over the strip after I let it set and adhere to my nails (During this time that I let it set, I washed my hands, did chores, etc. just to see if I would get some extreme peeling or something.)
-Try to wrap your nail with the strip as you may do with your polish to prolong the wear, BUT with acrylics, they are thicker than a natural nail and you may find yourself filing away the portion of the strips that you wrapped under your nail.

OVERALL, these wore like a charm, I enjoyed the DIY designs, and even though I had another pack to try, I bought two more packs (hounds tooth and another pack of lace design)! I LOVE THEM!!

Have you tried them? How do you like them?

I'm trying the Sally Hansen Salon Effects Nail Strips on Acrylic Nails

I love the lace nails from Tracy Reese during New York Fashion Weeks past, but couldn't get the look on my own. Now Sally Hansen provide an easy option with the strips. I've hoarded these for long enough. Now it's time for me to put them to use on my nails!

My materials

Starting application
Since my nails still have the old glitter acrylic without the gel, I figured now was a good time to try the strips.

Fully applied!
I'll give you guys an update soon on my experience with these.