Shark's Cove chevrons

Hello lovelies!  Awhile back - too far back, I'm ashamed to admit - a dear, sweet blogger buddy sent me a total surprise package with not only one of the Julie G Gumdrops polishes I'd been desperately wanting, but also Julie G Shark's Cove! :O  I could NOT believe it!!!  Melissa (a la Lacquer Reverie) is seriously amazing - and so incredibly thoughtful! :D

Ever since I received that sneaky surprise package, I'd been wanting to use both polishes as they're seriously beautiful, but you know how it goes...we addicts are constantly getting nail mail and sometimes without an inspiration to use a certain polish, it gets lost in the stash!  Well, I finally had some sort of epiphany last night, because I decided how to use both Julie G's AND Julep Nan which I just got off eBay.

Ta daaaa!! :D  It'd been awhile since I did some legit nail art, so it felt really good to do this.  And I really love this combo, if I may say so myself.  I did two coats of OPI Nail Envy (the original stuff?) that was a gift from another friend who no longer uses it, two coats of Shark's Cove, a thin coat of Seche Vite, and then I used scotch tape to make the "main chevron," and finally, freehanded the tiny bottom and side triangles.  Thanks to Liesl, I seem to have a thing for double accent nails, so I showed the chevrons some lovin' with hearts using Julep Nan & a bobby pin. L♥ve 'em!! ;)

The bottle didn't really catch the light in this pic (shoulda paid more attention, Emily, tsk tsk), but Shark's Cove minty green base is positively packed with silver microflakie shimmer!  Yummm.  The first coat was quite sheer and had a tendancy to get bald patches (at least it did over the Nail Envy base), but a second coat covered everything quite nicely.  I really can't speak about the dry time, because the humidity here is still  making every mani take a million years.  For real.  It's a good thing today was Sunday & I had no plans, because I did this at a snail's pace.  -_-

No offense, teensy tiny nail snail!

Julie G Gumdrops Blueberry Fizz is positively amazing in my book!  I like it much better than any of the other blue texture polishes I've seen, and I really love that it has so much silver sparkle and even small silver hexes in it.  The name is quite perfect, I think. :)  Like most texture polishes, it dried within about 5 mins, which was a nice change from waiting and waiting and waiting for SC. (Shark's Cove, that is...not Santa Clause)
And I actually managed to get a good bottle shot in the sun to showcase all of that happy sparkle! ;D

I did put another thin coat of Seche Vite over the pinkie and ring fingers, but opted (for now) to leave Blueberry Fizz in all its textured glory.  I might decide to SV it in a couple days because I've never done that before, but have seen many swatches that show them both ways, and they're sometimes more amazing with a top coat.

I really need to start doing tutorials for my nail art...then again, there are SO many already out there!  I actually used this one, not because I had no clue how, but because I usually do better with a visual aid as a reference.

Ohhh Julie G (by Jesse's Girl Cosmetics), how I wish you were available in drugstores near me!  :(  I live in NW Minnesota, and apparently this brand is moreso in SE and NW United States regions/drugstore chains like Rite Aids and such.  Ahh well...that's what our amazing fellow bloggers are for, right?!  I think we'd all go to great lengths to help eachother get polishes we're not able to get ourselves. :)  I know I would be willing to help a girl out!

As you can probably tell, this is in the shade. ;)

And finally, we have Julep Nan.  I don't know exactly why, but this Nantucket brickey terracotta orange-toned red just spoke to me from the moment I laid eyes on it here.  Reds are usually something I shy away from because of their horrible tendency to stain and simply because they don't do much for me.  It's like, oh, a red...meh. ;)  But I REALLY like this one!  I'm SO glad I found it on eBay with the make an offer option, because I got it still sealed for half the price, shipping & all.  My momma taught me to be a bargain shopper whenever possible! ;)

At the moment, I can't say much about the application nor the dry time of Nan because I just dabbed & spread it on with a bobby pin.  I assure you, I will be wearing it as more of a full fall mani very  soon!   

Well, since I can't seem to get snails off my mind, I give you the requisite parting humor photo:

BAHAHAHA! :P  Hopefully you'll be thinking of this guy while getting up for work tomorrow & he'll make your Monday much more tolerable. ;)

~ ♥ Em