I Love Fall: My Fall Favorites!

Love For Lacquer tagged me in her I <3 Fall post about all her favorite fall things, so I decided to follow suit and share all of my favorite fall things with you guys!  Fall is my favorite time of year so I can tell you that it is going to be very hard to pick my favorite things about the season!

Favorite Fall Lip Product

I have been going through a huge lipstick/color phase lately so I picked three of my favorites that I think are great colors for fall.

Benefit - Bene-tint

Revlon Lip Butter - Berrie Smoothie

ELF Matte Lip Color - Rich Red

Favorite Fall Nail Polish

I picked three once again.  I wanted to keep it even! Haha! I have been really obsessed with the Zoya Glossy collection this fall so I picked two of those colors and one of my all time favorite OPI's

Zoya Katherine

Zoya Frida

OPI Take The Stage

Favorite Fall Starbucks Drink

For this one I am going to have to go with the Pumpkin Spice Latte.  It is one of my all time favorite things about fall.  I have to say that the Salted Carmel Mocha was a close second though.

Favorite Fall Candle

This is a hard one for me since I do not buy a lot of candles, but I did recently smell the Yankee Candle Apple Cider Candle which was really nice, so that is my pick!

Favorite Fall Scarf or Accessory

I would say that my Ray Ban Aviators are my favorite fall accessory. I wear them every day and their green lenses look really cool with many of my fall outfits.

Haunted House, Haunted Hayride or Haunted Corn Maze?

I would have to say Haunted Houses, but real haunted houses.  I used to go to Salem, Mass every Halloween and I love going on ghost tours and seeing houses and sites that claim to actually be haunted.  They are really cool and I highly recommend them if you ever get a chance to go there!

Favorite Halloween Movie

I'll be honest I can't really think of many Halloween movies, and I am not a huge fan of scary movies so I guess I will go with the only Halloween movie that I know which is the classic "It's The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown".  It is such a cute movie and it has such a sweet message.

Favorite Candy to Eat on Halloween

Orange Kit Kats! They are white chocolate Kit Kats that are dyed orange and they are awesome!

What Are You Dressing Up As On Halloween?

This year I will be dressing up as a grad student who has a Public Relations Midterm.  Unfortunately I not only have class on Halloween but a Midterm, so I will not be dressing up as anything fun this year. :(

What is Your Favorite Thing About Fall?

If I had to pick just one thing it would be the leaves.  I love how they change colors and look so beautiful, but I also love how they crunch beneath your shoes after they fall.  I used to love jumping in the leaves when I was a kid and to be honest I still love doing it today!

And that is it for all of my fall favorites!  Thank you to Love for Lacquer for creating this! Feel free to share your fall favorites in the comments section below or with me on the Polished Paradise Facebook Page!

Halloween Trick or Treat Giveaway!

Hello all! I am very excited to be participating with a bunch of amazing bloggers in the Halloween Trick or Treat Giveaway hosted by DIY Polish!  Halloween is one of my favorite holidays, and fall is one of my favorite seasons, so I am very excited to be able to celebrate it with an awesome giveaway with awesome people! There are 27 bloggers participating in the giveaway so that means there are 27 chances to win some fun prizes that include Halloween polishes, nail art supplies and indies!

Blogs Participating:

Polished Paradise (That's Me!)
DIY Polish
The Jedi Wife
Jilltastic Nail Design
Love for Lacquer
Taneja's Bride
XO, Noelle
Nails by Ms. Lizard
The Lacquerologist
Munchy's Nails
Nail Polish Anonymous
Demi's Nails
Set in Lacquer
College Polished
SoFlaJo
Beyond Beauty Lounge
Princess Polish
Polished Cousins
Cosmetic Sanctuary
Sweet Surcee
Mandie's Manicures
Tall Girl in Heels
You Had Me at Makeup
365 Days of Color
Manicurator
Beauty Gnome
Peace Love Lacquer

Make sure to check them all out! They all have great blogs and deserve some love for participating in this awesome giveaway!

The giveaway is open to people who live in the US and runs until October 10th! Good luck to all who enter!

  a Rafflecopter giveaway

365 Days of Color: Toxic Love Collection

Over the summer 365 Days of color came out with her Toxic Love collection; which consists of four neon jelly polishes with varying glitters. The polishes are named Dangerously Beautiful, Deadly Attraction, Killer Kiss, and Chemical Romance.  Below I have swatched them all on their own and over a white base to give you an idea of what they look like with more opacity.

First up is Dangerously Beautiful which has a hot pink jelly base with matte teal, black, and blue glitter.

One Coat:

Two Coats:

After two coats the color is beautiful and bright on its own and over the white.  The glitter also distributes evenly and is very easy to work with.

Deadly Attraction easily became one of my favorites from this collection.  It has a neon yellow jelly base with shredded black glitter.  It is very unique and different from any polish I own.

One Coat:

Two Coats:

I just love how bright this polish is over the white base!  It also looks great on its own.  It is just electric in my eyes and I absolutely love it!  Two coats of the polish brings out its color and also puts a lot of the black shredded glitter on my nails.

Chemical Romance has a neon purple jelly base with varying black glitters and also some silver glitters too.  It is a very pretty polish.

One Coat:

Two Coats:

I love how this polish is so bright.  Even after one coat you really get a good feel for the brightness of the color.  I also think that the glitter looks really nice in it and makes for a nice addition to the beautiful color.

Last but not least Killer Kiss.  This is another one of my favorites from this collection.  It has a coral jelly base with varying white glitters in it.

One Coat:

Two Coats:

This is such a beautiful color.  I also think that the white glitters are a very nice subtle addition to the polish.  They look really cool when they are layered between the layers of the polish.

Once again I am very impressed with 365 Days of Color's polish.  They are beautiful creations that are high quality and they definitely do not disappoint.  The four piece mini set retails for $16,  the full size set for $30, and individual mini bottles are $4.50, individual full size bottles are $8.  Make sure to check out her store http://www.365daysofcolorpolishes.com and the 365 Days of Color Facebook Page!

What do you think of these polishes?  Leave a comment here, on Facebook, or tweet me @Polish_Paradise!

Druzy Ring Inspired Nails

Hello friends! I am so sorry that I have not been posting as much lately.  I just started grad school last night and the last few weeks of summer have been very busy!  But today I have a very exciting post for you all!

A couple of weekends ago I went on a weekend trip to Newport, Rhode Island.  It is a very beautiful summer town that has a lot of awesome shops in it.  While looking in one of the shops I found a beautiful cocktail ring that just caught my eye.  It had a beautiful deep blue stone that seemed to have a lot of glitter in it.  I am a sucker for rings and I bought it for myself.  After talking to the woman who owned the store I found out the stone was called Druzy and I have used it to inspire my post today.

For this manicure I used Zoya Frida (from the Fall 2012 Glossy Collection) and Color Club Sugarplum Fairy.  I created the look by using the steps of a typical jelly glitter sandwich.  I started with two coats of Zoya Frida, then I added one coat of Sugarplum Fairy, then I added two more coats of Frida on top.

The bottom two pictures show the ring I bought in comparison to the nails.  The stone is a little darker of a color than the polish that I used, but I still think that it looks really pretty and it has the essence of the stone.  It is a really fun play on a jelly sandwich and I love how it matched my nails.  Usually I am not a matching kind of person, but to me this was really cute.

What do you think of this manicure?  Leave a comment here, on Facebook, or tweet me @Polish_Paradise!

365 Days of Color: Mint Chip

A couple of weeks ago I ordered a bunch of awesome goodies from 365 Days of Color.  One of the polishes that I ordered was Mint Chip.  It is a light green polish with black square glitter in it and it looks exactly like Mint Chocolate Chip ice cream, so much so there were times I contemplated licking my nails!  Mint Chocolate Chip is always my go to flavor of ice cream and this nail polish is a great reminder of it without all of the calories!  Below I have included coat by coat swatches of this delicious color!

One Coat:

The first coat of polish applied nicely.  Also the distribution of the black glitter was great.  I didn't feel like I had to fish them out of the bottle. 

Two Coats:

The second coat really brings out the mint color of the polish.  I also like how you can still see the black glitters from the first coat through the second coat of polish.

Three Coats:

After three coats the polish is completely opaque and it is beautiful!  It really looks like ice cream!

I absolutely love this polish! In fact it is making me want to go out and buy some ice cream!  If you are interested in buying this polish check out 365 Days of  Color on Facebook, on her blog, or on her store page.  Mint Chip is $8 for a full size bottle and $4.50 for a mini bottle.

Do you own any polished from 365 Days of Color?  Which ones are your favorite? Leave a comment here, on Facebook, or tweet me @Polish_Paradise! 

Tutorial: Roses

I have been in a real nail art mood lately, so I decided it would be fun to try out a design that I have had brewing in my head for a while... a play on a floral denim pattern.  I really love using flowers for nail art.  They are so feminine and dainty

For this design I used OPI I Don't Give a Rotterdamn!, Color Club Poker Face, Ulta Noel, China Glaze Holly-Day, and Kiss Nail Art Paint in White.  I also used a large pointed and small pointed dotting tool to create the roses.

I did the tutorial on a nail wheel so that it would be easier for me to photograph step by step.  

Step 1:

I started out with two coats of OPI I Don't Give a Rotterdamn!

Step 2:

Using the small dotting tool and Kiss Nail Art Paint in White I created a polka dot background.

Step 3:

Using the large dotting tool and Color Club Poker Face I painted 3 large red dots on the nail.

Step 4:

After wiping the large dotting tool clean; I then used it and Ulta Noel to add 3 large light pink dots to the nail.

Step 5:

Using the small dotting tool swirl all the pink and red dots together.  Try and swirl the colors inwards so that it looks like a rose bud when you are finished.  Make sure that you do this quickly after you make the dots.  You will not be able to swirl the dots if they have already dried.

Step 6:

Using the small dotting tools and China Glaze Holly-Day I added two smalls leaves, one on each side of the rose.

Step 7:

Finally I added one coat of Hong Kong Girl top coat which smoothed things and made the flower blend together nicely.

I really love how this came out!  It is just how I imagined it!  Also I can't believe how simple it was to create.  I think this is one of my all time favorite manicures that I have ever done on myself!  I also really love how the color I chose for the background looks very similar to the color of denim to give it that similar look.

Have you ever done a flower manicure?  Leave a comment here, on Facebook, or tweet me @Polish_Paradise!

Marina and the Diamonds Nail Art!

Hello friends!  I know it has been a while since I last updated but that will all be changing soon as the summer starts to slow down.  I have been a very busy bee with work for the past few weeks but things are finally starting to wrap up be for September when I start my first semester of Graduate school.

Anyway... I am a huge fan of the band Marina and the Diamonds!  She is a Welsh singer who is quite awesome.  Recently she came out with her second album called Electra Heart and was touring.  I got lucky and I am able to see her twice during this time period.  Yesterday was the first of two!  I got to see her YouTube Presents performance live in the studio with around 200 other fans!  She was so close I could almost reach out and touch her!  She played a really awesome acoustic set that featured 5 songs off her new album.  Tonight I am going to see her at a larger venue in NYC which I am extremely excited about!  In honor of all this excitement I decided to paint my nails in a Marina and the Diamonds theme!

I started out with two coats of Zoya Kimber on all my fingers except my ring finger where I used 3 coats of Barielle Starchild.  Marina is all about being a pop icon that is why I chose pink and the glittery accent nail kind of looks like diamonds from the distance.  The Diamonds are not actually Marinas backing band; Marina considers The Diamonds to be her fans,  that is why I decided to use it as my accent nail concept.  Then using a Bundle Monster stamping plate that had a small heart design on it and Essence Black is Back, I stamped two hearts on each nail.  Then I added Nails Inc. Electric Lane holographic top coat on top of each of the hearts to give them an electric look making them Electra Hearts!

Here are some pictures from the show:

And if you are interested in hearing what Marina sounds like I have included a link to a YouTube video of her doing an acoustic performance of one of my favorite songs off her new album called Lies.

Have you ever done nail art based off of music?  Leave a comment here, on Facebook, or tweet me @Polish_Paradise!

Olympic Fever!

I don't know about you guys, but I have been totally obsessed with the Summer Olympics the past few days.  I love watching swimming and  gymnastics and I have been so happy to see so many talented American athletes take home metals.  It is so excited to watch someones dreams come true right before your eyes! Seeing the America girls gymnastics team take home gold the other night inspired my manicure today.

For this manicure I decided to focus on themes of the Olympics not just the USA.  I painted my pointer, middle and ring finger on each hand with gold, silver and bronze to represent the Olympic metals and on my thumb and pinky I painted the 5 Olympic rings using large and small dotting tools on a white base.

For the gold, silver and bronze fingers I used Julep Oscar, Zoya Trixie, and OPI Take The Stage; and for the rings I used Wet n' Wild French White Creme, Essence Walking on Air, Wet n' Wild Black Creme, China Glaze Poinsettia, China Glaze Solar Power, China Glaze Holly-Day.

To create the ring design I used the large side of a dotting tool to make 5 dots, one of each color featured in the ring design then I used the smallest size dotting tool that I had to add white dots inside the color dots to create the illusion that they are rings.

I am really excited with how this design came out and I have been getting complements on it all week! I also love how simple it was to get the olympic ring look.  Also on a side note this is probably the most bottles of nail polish I have used in one manicure!

What are you wearing for your Olympic mani?  Leave a comment here, on Facebook, or tweet me @Polish_Paradise!

Review: Essence Cosmetics Fall 2012 Polishes

Today I am very excited to be reviewing some of the new Essence Cosmetics Fall nail polish, and also their new polish bottles!  I am a huge fan of the Essence Cosmetic brand and all of their polishes and the newly designed bottle definitely do not disappoint.

I was sent an old bottle of Ultimate Pink to compare with the new bottle of Ultimate Pink, Modern Romance, and Stuck on You.

First I will start off with the bottle comparisons of Ultimate Pink.

The new bottle is on the left side of  each of the pictures.  It has a different shape and holds more polish. The old bottles held 0.16 fl.oz / 5ml, and the new bottles hold 0.27 fl.oz / 8ml, which means that the new bottles hold 0.11 fl.oz more.  The new bottles all still have the great color coded caps and they also have a new and improved brush.  The brush its curved at the top and it is wider, which helps with even color distribution on the nail.

Now for  a comparison of the polish in the old and be new bottles.

One Coat:

I painted every other finger with the old and new polish bottles and the formulas are very similar and coloring is exactly the same.

Two Coats:

Ultimate Pink is a beautiful bright pink color and after two coats it is completely opaque.  It is also beautiful and shiny without a top coat.

Next polish up is Modern Romance, which is light peachy pink  with a slight pink-purple shimmer in it.

One Coat:

Two Coats:

Three Coats:

I really love this color.  It is very soft and pretty.  It looked pretty good after two coats but I used 3 to fill in a few thin spots I had, and it looked great.  The shimmer in the polish was very hard to photograph because it is very subtle, but when it catches the light it looks very nice too.

And last but not least is Stuck on You, which is a slate gray-blue color with silver shimmer. Also it is a one coater!

One Coat:

After one coat this polish is completely opaque with a beautiful color.  It went on evenly and smoothly. Also the fact that it goes on in one coat and dries quickly is really nice too!  Perfect for a manicure on the go!

As always I am very impressed with Essence Cosmetics.  The new bottle and updated formula are great and they have 18 new trendy colors in their collection.  Their polishes are also free of harmful ingredients like formaldehyde, toluene, and emollient phthalate.  Their polishes retail for the very affordable price of $1.99 a bottle and can be purchased at ULTA, Ulta.com, HEB, and Fred Meyer.

What do you think of the new Essence polish bottles?  Leave a comment here, on Facebook, or tweet me @Polish_Paradise!

*Products in this post were provided for review.  All views expressed are my own. See my Disclosure Tab for more info.*