Favorite Polish: Essie Ladylike

So my polish collection has grown impressive as of late.  Where I used to have a couple pinks and purples, I now have a whole apothecary jar full.  Yet despite all these options, I keep going back to Essie's Ladylike.

It's a great neutral shade with a hint of purple.  I don't know if it's come up on this blog yet, but purple is definitely my favorite color.  I didn't actually realize it until someone pointed out to me in college when I was wearing a purple sweater, carrying my purple backpack, and wearing purple nail polish.  

Ladylike is the perfect way to get a little bit of purple into my day.  

What's your favorite polish shade?  

Wants / Needs

Some of the things I'm currently lusting over:


Adorable fox pillows from Maxwell's House:

Fancy nails, really wish I had the patience/skills to accomplish this.  

Sparkle dress from LC Lauren Conrad.  Perfect for holiday parties! 

Hysterical beer coozies (oh, I'm sorry, Skuuzis).  Reeeeally could have used these at the tailgate last weekend.  DIY project?

Chevron urn from Target.  Actually, just everything chevron.  

What are you dying to get your hands on? 

October Birchbox: Essie Powder Clutch

So I promised myself I would never write a Birchbox review, mainly because there are enough reviews of Birchbox out there every month.  I'm not great shakes at beauty products, so my review probably wouldn't mean much anyway.  This month, however, my box came with a full size bottle of Essie's Powder Clutch.  I may have peeked at the site before my box came to see what was inside, and was hoping to get this lovely dark gray.  It has the edge of black but is still soft and feminine.

Don't know what Birchbox is, say whaaaaat?!  It's a cute little box that arrives at your door once a month full of beauty samples.  I love getting packages and mail, and I love samples, so Birchbox is perfect for me.  Learn more/sign up here.

Oh and just an FYI for you apartment dwellers who can't get FedEx to deliver packages, this is delivered by the mail carrier so it always gets to my door.

PINK

Essie Watermelon.  Yummmmmmmm.  Just looking at my nails makes me happy.  This is the perfect summer color.  Yes, it is still summer, despite all of the fall fashion on the horizon.

I also just purchased a new topcoat from Essie - Good to Go.  I had been using their no-chips version, but the drugstore confused me this morning so I came home with the quick dry instead.  I absolutely love it!  Usually after I paint my nails myself, I'm like, eh.  But today they really look like a pro did them.  And they've managed to hold up despite going to the gym and scrubbing dishes with a brillo pad (forgot I did my nails - whoops!).  New favorite!

Glitter Gradient Nails

Tonight I'm going to a wedding of two people I don't know.  In case you don't know me, I. LOVE. Weddings.  Doesn't matter who's getting married, doesn't matter where it is or what food they're serving.  I love them all.  If I had a little more nerve, I would have totally hung out with Vince Vaughn in Wedding Crashers.

In honor of the occasion, I thought I'd try painting my nails with a glitter gradient, something I've seen floating all over Pinterest.

Their way:

Oooh, Shinies! 

via Pinterest

My way:

It turns out this look is really easy.  I used Essie Lady Like as the base color and then Milani Disco Lights for the glitter.  To make sure they would look good layered together, I first painted them both onto a sheet of paper (I also then held the paper up to my dress to make sure everything would match).  I keep reading about sponging, but frankly, I didn't have any sponges and Walgreens is a whole two blocks away, so I painted on the gradient instead.  

First I did base coat (again, Essie, which is my favorite) and then two coats of Lady Like.  I let this dry for about 10 minutes, and then started the gradient.  I took the Disco Lights and wiped the brush so there was very little polish on it, and painted starting about three quarters of the way down the nail.  Then I went back with more polish on the brush and did another coat from about halfway down the nail.  Then I painted just the tips again to really cover that section, and finished with Essie top coat.  You can see in the picture that I got a little bit of glitter on my skin on my ring finger, after washing my hands once or twice that went away.  

This look overall took about 20 minutes (or one rerun of The Hills) to finish.  Now I just need to do some hair and makeup and I'll be ready to go!  Alternately, I could continue laying in bed and watch another episode or two of Lauren and Heidi fighting...