And we have a winner!....Er..Winners!

Okay, bear with me here. I'm dealing with the slowest internet on the planet at the moment. But finally have tallied up all the entries, going by every tweet, blog, blog roll, etc. It took many many hours but here is the winner of our 1st grand Prize, randomly picked by Renee - (original entry here)

Olivia's Nails!

and for our second prize, randomly picked by Erika -

Nikki!

Thanks again you guys for entering, and please remember we are having another giveaway very soon.

XOXO A Polished Life

Happy Easter Purple And Hello Kitty Brand Decals

Just thought I'd throw in a quick little mani I did this morning. I got these really cute hello kitty brand mani strips and gave them a shot. I love the look! I'm wearing Grape Pop by China Glaze, with Hard Candy on my ringfinger.

The strips are a little tough to stick on and don't stay down. Maybe I will try them with nail glue next time. I also think I attached them upside down! Still cute.

A Secret Bunny Exchange

I belong to a really freakin amazing community called Purseblog.com, and I obviously spend most of my time in the sub-forum for nail junkies such as myself.

I noticed there were occasionally these "exchange" posts, organized by a really awesome girl, where you sign up, and become a secret santa of sorts for another person on the board. You can participate to send internationally, that way you can get goodies from any part of the world. And you never know what you're going to get. You just brief the organizer on what nail polish finishes/brands you like/dis-like, etc, and the rest is up to whoever gets to buy for you.

And this is what my Secret Bunny (Easter!) put together for me! People can be SO awesome and thoughtful. I am so happy to have found that forum, and so grateful for this amazing gift!! Keep your eyes out for swatches of these!

 

Left to right:

Sephora for OPI - Havana Dreams
Sephora for OPI - Traffic - Stopper Copper
Milani - 530 Gems
Illamasqua - Ruthless
 

I see this Illamasqua perfecting a great outfit. Black tank, my 7 For All Mankind Roxanne skinnies in Beverly Glen, my red ruffly spike pumps....red on fingers and black on toes. Oooh! SO going to do that!

Well, HOLO There!

I've had this semi-fascination with holos, but always felt that they just don't work with my skin tone. Not sure why. Anybody else feel this way? I do remember buying these by the armload back when Sally Hansen released the prisms collection, and thinking it was the greatest thing since triscuits. I just had a swap with a super awesome chicka and she sent me so many extras, and was actually able to dig up some DS holos by OPI in a beauty supply store, so she got me two! One is DS Sapphire, the other is DS Original. I swatched one, and wow I just fell in love. Screw bad skin tones, there is no way on earth anybody could not be drawn to this nail polish. These are just as the Sally Hanson Prisms collection were, with even prettier colors IMO.

This is OPI's DS Original-

Click me!

You MUST click this one to see full size! I insist :)

Also we want to keep you updated, we are still working on getting all the entries together so we can announce our winners, and we are going to start working on our next giveaway, which we will inform everyone of once we've reached 500 followers. We were going to do 300, but we just don't have the time to do a giveaway following so soon after we've just completed our last one! We sure wish we could! But we hope 500 comes soon, and spread the word! We are going to do THREE prizes this time around, and first prize winner gets to choose from all 3. Stay tuned!

Winners will be announced ASAP!

Hey ladies, hang tight. We are getting everything together, and will have our winners announced as soon as humanly possible. It's been a complicated last week for the Polished folk here, but we are right on top of it, and promise to deliver the results soon.
Thanks SO much for participating, and helping in spreading the word about the blog! Many hugs!!

I don't care if it's spring!

Okay, I do. But it's been raining like crazy and I well, I wish the whole April Showers would hurry so we could get some dry land! Okay complaining over..

I had my friend Tarah visiting and we decided to do our nails (when I say "we" I really mean "Tarah, lets do our nails.."Not now.." "Now?" "nope" "Now?" "Nooo" "How about now?" "Okay...sure.."

 I knew I wanted to break out Zoya Faye, and I also knew when I got the email for the bogo that I needed to get this color. I also came to the realization that I have way to many nail polishes. Of course I got the email about 2 minutes after this decision. But yeah.. that didnt last long. (Tarah, also did Faye on her nails, she also said she wished she had nails like moi..)

But I digress..I saw a recent post from Nails by Chloe, where she layered black nail polish and Faye, and got this amazing color. Well I knew I had to do the same! Here are the results:

I wish I took better pictures! This is one of the most insane combo's. It's like a pink chocolate shimmer on one side, but then a bronze like orange on the other side. Over all, a very simple and very gorgeous combo. Just make sure you make the black opaque. I had to use 4 layers of black to get every streak out. But then again that could be the fact that it's NYC. 99 cents, can't complain!


Don't forget today is the last day for the contest! Enter before 11:59pm to be counted.

My favorite RED - What's Yours?

Hands down, Ulta Professional - Revved Up Red. I bought this (in Ulta...no way!) for .99 during the after the holidays mark-downs.

I have about a dozen bright blood reds, but this one takes the cake! 2 coats for opaque, and it's super shiny without a top coat, it dries fast, and doesn't stain with removal. The color is so bright and pretty! A true definition of red.

Which red is your favorite?

Ulta Revved Up Red with Nfu Oh GS-14 French Mani:

And from a few months ago when my nails were nice and long: