Showing posts with label Seche VITE. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Seche VITE. Show all posts

Friday, February 12, 2010

Laine's Official Valentine's Day Manicure

So this is my final V-Day creation (maybe. We still have a couple days. I could always change my mind...) and I have been wearing it since Tuesday night. I don't know if it'll hold up until Sunday but that's alright. The point is that I get to share it with you.

So I went for a half moon manicure. I mean, are you honestly surprised?! I can't get enough of them!

I started with a base of white creme. I chose Rescue Beauty Lounge - Underwear. Then I used reinforcer stickers to hide the bottom portion and painted the rest of the nail with Color Club - Art of Seduction (fitting name for V-Day!) When I removed the sticker I added the triangular, red rhinestones to the moon with a little dab of top coat. If I had little red hearts, I probably would have used them but I just had red triangles, red circles, or yellow hearts. No match! Then I finished with a coat of Seche Vite top coat. It reminds me of the classic red halfmoon manicure, but with a twist:

Photo Courtesy of Vintage Style Files


Have a lovely weekend and a Happy Valentine's Day no matter what you do!

Monday, January 25, 2010

A Very Merry Un-Birthday


Here is a little something I rocked over the weekend. I started with a base of NYX - Dancing Queen, then I did a glitter gradient of OPI - Mad As A Hatter and a gradient of Lippmann Collection - Happy Birthday. I call it "A Very Merry Un-Birthday"!

The gradient wasn't very difficult to do. I started at the base, and with less polish on the brush than I would need for the whole nail, I made a couple of swipes only on the bottom third of the nail. Then I pushed a little bit toward the tip to get those few loose looking pieces. I did this with both glitters. Once the glitter was where I wanted it, I added a top coat and viola!

NYX - Dancing Queen, OPI - Mad As A Hatter, Lippmann Collection - Happy Birthday

Have a great Monday!
-Elaine

Sunday, January 24, 2010

The Best Nail Tip Ever: Glitter Removal Made Easy. VERY EASY

In light of all the super dense glitter we have gotten recently, i.e. Nubar - Sparkles, Zoya - Ultra Glitter, OPI - Alice in Wonderland, I thought it was about time to post this tip for removing glitter. Some of you may be reluctant to wear glitter polish because you know what a headache it is to remove them. Well forget all that! You can rock the bling, and get it off in a snap. Sound too goo to be true? IT ISN'T!

This is the *BEST* tip I have ever gotten related to nails. It feels like you are a magician.

Necessary equipment:
  • aluminum foil
  • cotton balls
  • nail polish remover: acetone or non-acetone*
  • a clock/stopwatch
  • 10 nails full of glitter!
Step 1: Start out with a rock hard glitter mani. I chose to use my Mad As A Hatter mani for this tutorial when it came time to take it off. Get yourself 10 cotton balls, and 10 pieces of tin foil cut into little rectangles. They should be about 3 inches on each side, roughly.

Step 2: Take a cotton ball and soak it in remover. it doesn't have to be sopping wet. Just get as much as you would for usual removal. Place it on your nail.

Step 3: Take a piece of foil and wrap it around your finger tip in order to keep the cotton ball in place.

Repeat Step 2 and Step 3 for the remaining nails on that hand. I say this because I think it is easier to do one hand first and take them all off before doing the next. It you try to do the second hand with foil fingers, it's a bit tricky.



Step 4: Wait for 5 minutes. 5 is the magic number. I tried this with all different times. 1-3 minutes was not enough, 4 almost made it, but 5 for sure, was when things came right off.
*This is where the asterisk come in. I tried the foil method with non-acetone remover and it worked just fine, however I didn't test it for 5 minutes. It was probably on for 7ish minutes. It may have been just fine at 5, but I don't know for sure.

Step 5: Using a little pressure on the nail, pull the whole foil/cotton ball combo off in one swoop.

Step 6: Marvel at out clean your nail is! There is still some blue on the tip as you can see, but all the glitter is gone! Check it out:

It is all in the cotton ball!

Step 7: Repeat to the other hand.

So just to really drive the message home: this manicure was on for several days and it consisted of a base coat, 2 coats of Sally Hansen - Thinking Of Blue, 1 coat of Seche Vite, 2 coats of Mad As A Hatter, and yet another coat of Seche Vite. Seven coats including 2 of a super dense glitter, and this got it all off in. one. swoop. This is not a joke, ladies!! Try the foil method. It will change your life.

I hope this was helpful and will inspire you to wear more glitter polishes!
-Elaine

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Thinking of a Mad Blue Hatter

OPI - Mad As A Hatter

Morning all! I am bringing you a mani I wore over the weekend that I was madly in love with. I called it "Thinking of a Mad Blue Hatter". It is a halfmoon mani with Sally Hansen - Thinking of Blue and OPI - Mad As A Hatter from the new Alice in Wonderland collection. When MAAH came in the mail on Friday I was dying to wear it but wasn't ready to part with my Thinking of Blue mani, so I put them together:


I used reenforcement stickers cut in half to protect the bottom part of my blue mani and painted the rest with Mad As A Hatter. I did two coats of MAAH, pulled off the stickers, and did a coat of Seche Vite top coat over the whole nail.

close-up of glitter *Drool*

Have a great day!
-Elaine

Monday, October 26, 2009

Seche VITE for Breast Cancer Awareness

Hello everyone! I had a nice surprise the other day when I went to my Sally's Beauty Supply to pick up a new bottle of Seche VITE top coat. For the same price, I purchased a bottle of SV which came in a box and included a strip of pink ribbon nail decals and rhinestones for Breast Cancer Awareness Month. I have been trying to support breast cancer any way I can, including joining Michelle from All Lacquered Up in raising money for the Breast Cancer Research Foundation here.

About Seche VITE: I love this stuff. I couldn't live without it. Before I learned that such a wonderful product as this existed, I never used topcoats because to me it seemed a waste since I would just have to wait longer for my manicure to dry. I never used anything that took more than two coats (which excludes plenty of colors that are gorgeous but take at least three coats, and forget about layering combos) and I usually always ended up messing up my manis. Then this baby came into my life and I will never go back. It sets my polish quickly so I can do my nails even if I am in a hurry. I can layer layer layer! I can do anything!! It's empowering!

Back to the decals.... They are super cute:

Here is the mani I did for today with them:It is Sinful Colors - Social Ladder with one of the pink ribbon decals. I had a hard time putting in on. Not the fault of the decal; I just never use them so I was sloppy. I messed up the nail first so I had to take off the polish and try again. Then I put on the topcoat to dry my polish so I wouldn't wreck it, then put on the decal, then I put on another layer of topcoat to seal it in and I instead made the polish underneath do a weird crinkling action over the whole nail. I probably couldn't do it again if I tried! It actually looked kind of cool. It has since smoothed out a bit. It must have been the first layer was still trying to get things set and then the second layer showed up too soon and messed up his plans.

I have never bought Seche VITE in a box so it was interesting to see what they had to say:

"Seche VITE Acknowledged as the world's finest top coat. Its patented formula allows it to penetrate through the nail lacquer to the base coat forming a single solid coating over the nail plate for a much more durable finish which is guaranteed not to yellow. Seche VITE is unmatched as a top coat. Your nails will feel silky, be stronger, and will absolutely not chip. Seche VITE creates the highest gloss and is longer lasting than any product on the market today. Apply thickly, get a nice bead on the end of the brush, then set softly down on the first nail painted and watch how Seche VITE flows over the wet nail polish without dragging of streaking the underlying manicure"

It may be a little hyped up, but it is a wonderful product. I have seen it at Target for about $10, at CVS for about $8, at Sally's for about $7, but with a Sally Beauty Member Card it only costs $4.95. Big difference from $10!

It is however, not completely big 3 free:
Warning: This product contains a chemical known to the state of California to cause birth defects or other reproductive harm.

Butyl Acetate, Toluene, Cellulose Acetate Butyrate, Isoprpyl Alcohol, Trimethyl Pentanyl Diisobutyrate, Benzophenone-1.