Bear Pawlish: Awww! You Guys Made Me Ink!

You know how much I love a good holo!!!  So when I somehow stumbled upon Bear Pawlish last month, I knew a couple of Tennessee's pretties had to be mine.  I picked Maleficent (which will make an appearance as soon as Dani - aka From Polish, With Love - and I can plan our twinsie post) and Awww! You Guys Made Me Ink!  This polish was inspired by none other than the adorable octopus, Pearl, from Finding Nemo which is one of my all-time favorite movies.  :D
Perhaps it's worth mentioning that she's the only  octopus I find adorable; they quite honestly freak me out almost to the point of a phobia.  Not kidding, I've had "nightmares" about swimming in the ocean and getting one stuck on my leg!  LOLOL

So check out this awesome and sweet pink holo:

I still cannot get over the dreamy formula!  Two easy coats with fabulous dry time and no bubbling!!  And by no means does it turn into a silvery holo like the Color Club Halo Hues in the shade, BECAUSE...
If you think you detect a hint of fuchsia/pinky shimmer in the middle of the holo rainbows, I would say you are most certainly correct; the BASE is actually a micro flakie pink shimmer!  Imagine THAT!! :D  It's just so pretty!
The accent nail, as you can see is Shimmer Polish Sonia at three coats.  'Twas a lovely pairing in real life, but unfortunately, I have not yet figured out the trick to capturing the true beauty of Shimmers. :(  Gonna have to work on that because I got two more recently.

Here is my first-ever attempt at an underwater shot in hopes to really show that pink micro flakie.  I think it might've worked okay... obviously not the best quality ever, but you can see it!  And even some totally unexpected golden shiftiness! hehe
Oh and added bonus: a hint at the beauty of Sonia with her gold, iridescent, pink, and lavender hexes and micro glitters. :)

This being my very first experience with a totally new-to-me indie, I would rate it as a 10 out of 10!  The polish is amazing (totally worth the $10!), shipping time is very reasonable, and you can actually interact with the maker as she is very active in the Bear Pawlish Facebook group, as well as Swatch - tastic. :)  Definitely check out her Big Cartel, ladies and gents!!!!  And prepare to hold onto your nails as they just might be blown away!

Challenge mani #2: Sparkles

Well well, the challenge & I meet again!  And again, I was not entirely sure what to make of the theme for today...  I mean, obviously, glitter, but since this is an ART challenge, I couldn't really just do a bunch of glitter skittles & call it good...

I immediately settled on using some Shimmer Polish since I'd recently acquired Leslie & Julie from yet another Pinterest sale.  Gosh I love those things!  They're like the garage sales of the polish world! hehe  

For the rest of the nails, I had two different ideas & ended up going with the one I thought  I could execute the best. ;)  So without further ado:

I give you Shimmer Julie as an accent, coupled with Revlon Parfumerie Wild Violets (which I FINALLY procured just yesterday at Target in the biggest "city" - roughly 15,000 people - near my hometown), and of course the requisite "sparkles."  P.S. I also scored Autumn Spice and China Flower, but they'll have to continue to hold their caps & wait in the wings for their debut on Must.Stash. ;)

Knowing 2 coats of Julie would be a pain to remove - although I probably should've done 3, I decided to forego a base coat and apply a medium layer of Elmer's glue straight outta the bottle & directly to the nail in hopes that I can use an orangewood stick to "scoot" it all off like I've seen in various tutorials.  I'll keep you posted on whether or not it works.  I'm thinking not, because it didn't even start lifting in the shower this morning.  So I must be doing something wrong, or I need to break down & buy Nail Pattern Boldness's Glitter A Peel!

The OTHER HAND.  Nope, no nail art sparkles, just a smattering of Set in Stones.
...ain't nobody got time for that!

Anyhoo, I used my recently acquired Duri Rejuvacote for the base on my other 8 nails.  It dries to quite a smooth & glossy finish, and I'm starting to wonder if that's why my new Zoyas and now this Revlon did not behave very nicely on the first coat... Lots of pulling and streaking and general unevenness.  The second coat however, righted all previous wrongs and wonder of wonders, miracle of miracles; I had no polish acne!  So either this scented stuff cures faster or I just had a rare good polish night. :D

Most of the time, WV looks darn near black on the nail (as you see in most of my photos), but this is the beauty that lies beneath!!  Oh, and the blurred out accent shows its many fine rainbow glitters. :)

Speaking of the scent, for me it was rather sweet & fresh with a hint of fruity, a bit strong for the first few hours and then I went to bed and I kept noticing it while trying to fall asleep.  I could still smell it at work today after adding Rejuvacote as a top coat, but much more muted.  Now (24 hrs later) it's completely gone.  I'm super excited to discover the scents of the other two I got!  Of course I've read other blogger's descriptions at length, but it's a different story to experience something for yourself. 

Ok, so I suppose I should actually talk a bit about why/how I did this mani for the challenge! lol  Umm the first thing that came to mind were the cartooned "sparkles" you see when light hits something shiny, or for example, the glint in someone's eye.  So using dotting tools and Pure Ice Silver Mercedes, I drew the body of the sparkles and then hex by hex, I added my ever so useful Essie Set in Stones.  Voila!  It didn't look as fabulous as I'd envisioned, and I couldn't get my camera + daylight bulb combo to actually make them sparkle and capture it, but oh well.  I do like it enough to show you, and that's saying something!

Goodnight my dear readers!  Sleep well!! :)