One Lovely Blog Award

I was tagged by the lovely chocaddict from Mon Coin a Moua
Thank you so much dearie for this tag

The rules for this one is pretty simple:

1) Place the award picture on your blog and name the person who tagged you as well as a link to his/her blog.

2) Tag 15 other blogs that you have recently discovered.

erm... I can't come up with 15 other blogs at this moment,
so I'll tag anyone who'll like to do this then =)

p/s: I'm sorry guys for the lack of posts recently, and I'm unable to post a tutorial for this week either.
It's been a crazy week and I'm dead tired from 4 days of pole workshop.
I've got Nubar Moonshadow on currently but the sun ain't being helpful.
Will get shots up as soon as I can k

Dancing Queen

Just a quick post as I'm rushing outta the house for my dance workshops.
Did the rainbow mani for last night's performance
(which went quite well)

Sorry the colours look a little off in this pic,
was taken at night with artificial lights.

Polishes used (painted in order from pinky to thumb):
OPI Need Sunglasses?,
Colour Club Tangerine Scream,
Colour Club Electro Candy,
Colour Club Wild Child,
and Essie Mesmerize

NOTD:

Sunlight.

They remind me of colourful candies!
And I got tons of compliments on this too.
Someone on the train even asked why I didn't do it for the toes! =)

Daylight, Indoors.

Artificial Lights with Camera Flash.

Kreativ Blogger Tag

gildedangel from Naive Nails tagged me for this one =)
Rules: You have to list 7 facts about yourself and then tag 7 others

here goes:

1) I loved running and marathons.
Have to give it up now though because of my knee injury.
In fact, I'm supposed to be doing only "safe sports" like swimming.
My doctor has since given up trying to convince me to stop pole.

2) I love watching old cartoon re-runs like smurfs, care bears, my little pony.

3) I'm constantly on a diet.
"I need to lose weight" is my constant mantra.

4) The other mantra I try to live by:
"My life is my message" ~ Gandhi

5) Been planning to head to Cambodia for vacation with my best friend Gerry for the past 2 years.
And there was ALWAYS something that stopped us from heading there.
2010 is our target.
Thank you dear for sticking it out with me
*hugs*

6) My current fave song: Fire by Bruce Springsteen.

7) I just bought my 1st 2 MAC lipsticks last night!
The only other lipstick I owned was a bright red one from Clinique and even that was a result of yet another pole performance.

and I tag:
1) Deez Nails (I'm sorry I don't know your name or nick)
2) miss nono (I really love calling you this way!) from Black Nail Polish and Lip Gloss
3) Liz from Iceomatic's Nails
4) Diana from Painted Lady's Fingers
5) The Princess of Polish
6) Chocaddict from Mon coin a moua
7) Toni from Toni's Nails

Purple, Teal and Pearl

okay, apparently there are awareness colours for November as well:
Anxiety Disorders - Teal
Epilepsy - Purple
Lung Cancer - Pearl

Well, at least there are 3 colours for this month
I was getting pretty bored with rotating between pinks and greens in October
So this time round, I'm not going to say that I'll just stick to the 3
but instead, I'm saying that I'll try to do more of those for the month =)

anyway, I bashed my nails yesterday after yet another clumsy accident
thankfully, no nails broke but mani got chipped

unfortunately, I was super tired and cranky that night
and I couldn't make up my mind which colour I wanted
so I ended up with this instead:

Sally Hansen Magical Nail Makeup in Purple Potion on thumb, middle and pinky,
OPI DS Exclusive on index and ring fingers.
2 coats on all tips

Artifical light and camera flash

Well, I'm a little (tinnie-weenie bit) disappointed with Purple Potion
I was actually hoping that it would be more purple than the blurple it is,
and its way less holo compared to Exclusive
The OPI had a better application than the Sally Hansen;
had to be careful of drag marks with Purple Potion.
Also, Exclusive dries a tad more glossy than Purple Potion.
In fact, I thought Purple Potion looked kinda matte until topcoat was applied over it.
It's a lovely colour
but I won't be going around hunting as hard for the other Magical Nail Makeups now.

And guys, I need some opinions/help from you.
We've got another pole performance coming up on friday,
and we're doing a routine to ABBA's Dancing Queen.
It's supposed to be 60's, cheesy, totally outrageous and ridiculous.

We've got neon and tinsel wigs (that's my hot pink tinsel one!),
and we're decked out in feather boas, sequins and stuff.
A friend saw the crazy photos we took and commented that we looked like the powerpuff girls gone totally wrong! =P

erm... I was thinking that I'll do a neon rainbow skittle mani,
so that's 5 different neon colours.
I thought that would come across as loud and silly-fun.
What do you guys think? Would that work?

Farewell Nailphile

I was going through my rounds of the nail blogs
and I came across this announcement that Siobhan at the Nailphile is closing her blog

I thought my eyes were playing tricks
but no, when I checked the MUA
it's really true

Really sorry that we're going to lose one fantastic blog
The Nailphile is one of the 1st blogs that got me started on this polish addiction,
and she's one of those who inspired me to get started on blogging.
Her nails are beautiful, her swatches amazing and her konads legendary.
Really sorry to see it go,
but I sincerely wish her all the best.

Don't you just love giveaways?

Just a quick update on some giveaways that are happening around:

1) Macodvisnica is having her first giveaway. This is one blog that I just recently discovered.
Contest ends 5 November, 22:00 hrs Slovene time. Followers only.

2) Konadomania is celebrating 100 followers. Her konads are amazing and put mine to shame. Prizes include some polishes that are available in Europe (and not in Singapore!)
Contest ends 20 November, midnight Slovenia time. Followers only.

3) Polish-Lounge is also celebrating 100 followers, with not 1 but 3 contests! That's wonderfully generous right!
Contest ends 15 November. Followers only.

4) Helen from Helen and Sheenie's Nice Things is celebrating her birthday this week! Happy Birthday!
Contest ends 16 November, 9 am GMT.

5) Natalie from Nani's Nails is giving away 6 lip balms from My Lip Stuff.

6) Mary from Body and Soul is giving away a set of the much awaited China Glaze's Wizard of Ooh Ahz Returns collection!! I don't know about you guys but I would seriously love to get my hands on this set!
Contest ends midnight, 15 November. Followers only.

7) Allya from Painted Tips is doing the 100th post giveaway! And she might just reward you with 3 polishes of your choice! How wonderful it is to get a lemming fulfilled. Unfortunately, its not international *sigh*
Contest ends 15 November, followers only.

Lastly, not a contest or giveaway, but I just wanted to share with you guys about another nail blog, Toni's Tips

Toni 1st contacted me via MUA and I've really enjoyed reading her quick posts since she started with her blog.
It's like swatches in a nutshell =)
Do drop by her blog for regular swatches!

Sally Hansen Nail Quencher Hydrating Base Coat

So I said I'll do a review when I 1st got this in a goodie bag from a Sally Hansen workshop.
That was quite a while ago, and since then, only half of my bottle has been used.
This is seriously great mileage for me.
I don't know about you guys, but I can run through a bottle of a Poshe Top-coat in like 1 month, maybe 1 and a half months max.

So I've seen some mixed reviews about this particular product.
Those who love it, rave about it and got multiple back-ups.
Then there are some who are indifferent.
And of cos those who detest and slam-dunked it into the wastebasket.

So here's a pic of how my naked nails look like after half a bottle usage.

Ring and Pink are shiny with a coat of the base coat.
Unfortunately silly me didnt think to take a "before" picture.
Well... either that or subconsciously, I didn't wanna let you guys see yellow-stained, dry and peeling nails.
Since doing pole, I have been using alot of grip powder/ chalk powder to keep my hands dry and the stuff is terribly drying for hands and nails.
Whenever I remember, I try to moisturize my hands and nails. I've bottles of hand cream everywhere.

I don't have an issue with application initially.
The base coat is kinda thick, like how the Poshe and Seche quick-dry topcoats are but it applies evenly.
However, I noticed recently that my bottle seems to have gotten a little goo-py.
Not a big deal though, since its something that a little thinner would cure.

The base coat dries quickly and shiny, so that's a big plus for me.
The other plus I noticed recently is that my nails seem to have peeled less, so I guess the hydarting part works well enough for me.

Other than that, I don't see any other difference with my Poshe Basecoat.
I've read some reviews that says the Sally Hansen has helped to strengthen the nails but I don't see any significantly stronger nails myself.

I can't report much about durability or chip-ability since I pretty much change my nail colours every 2 - 3 days.
If this is any indication, I wore the winter nail art for 5 days straight using the Nail Quencher and there was tipwear by the 4th day, but it didn't chip.

And as you can see from my naked nails, they're still yellowish.
The Nail Quencher doesn't provide any extra barrier against staining.
Then again, I haven't found any base coat that has been able to do so,
and that would be something I would totally rave about.