Julep January 2016 Swatches, Comparisons, and Nail Art

Hi everyone! I’m back with new material today: a subscription box post! Instead of going through the backlog of subscription boxes that I didn’t get around to last year, I decided to skip ahead to this month’s Julep box to keep it current (well, sort of current, since it’s not January anymore). So today I have my January 2016 Julep box (New Year, Fresh Look) to show off on the blog, replete with swatches and nail art!

This month’s collection was full of gorgeous cool-colored shimmery shades that immediately caught my attention, so I was very taken with the polishes this month since those are right up my alley. For this month’s box, I just stuck to my favorite three shades from the collection, but there were so many other lovely polishes. I used the three colors plus Julep Mahima to create some eye-catching peacock feather nail art, which came out so very nicely. Read on to see all the polish!

Nail Art – Muted Pink Florals

Hi everyone! I’m back with some new nail art that fits into the summer-to-fall transitional category, since it’s almost autumn. While I’m not ready to let go of summer (I never am, really), I know that I have to move on into the new season eventually – why not with nail art? Fall is definitely the best season for nail art anyways. So I did these elegant, muted pink florals with the beginning of autumn in mind.

Julep August 2015 Swatches, Comparisons, and Nail Art

Hi everyone! Today I’ve got my picks from the Julep August 2015 Collection (Muse Montreal) to show off on the blog! I know it’s been a while since my last post (and it’s no longer August), but I thought I should write my August subscription box posts eventually. Seriously, I feel like I’ve been fighting exhaustion all the time now that my commute is now 2 hours every day instead of 5 minutes. Lesson learned: if you can help it, don’t move an hour away from work.

Anyways, I almost didn’t take a box this month because I just wasn’t feeling the particular polishes that made up the collection, despite the fact that I liked the color palette overall. While I eventually convinced myself to take a box using up some of my store credit, I don’t think I chose very well and ended up disappointed with most of my selections. The plus side of taking a box, though, was that I received a set of super fun metallic temporary tattoos as a freebie and I LOVED them! I’d been contemplating getting a set before, and Julep sent some for free! So I used them to create some cute, geometric mix-and-match nail art.

Julep July 2015 Swatches, Comparisons, and Nail Art

Hi everyone! I’ve (finally) got another post out for you, which I really should have done a looonnnnngggg time ago. I apologize to all my readers for not posting as much as I wanted to in July (seriously, I only wrote like 3 posts last month…). Last month I was just all over the place physically and mentally because of my move, and I was in a pretty bad funk for the remainder of the month. Acclimating to a new way of living takes me an extremely long time; this time is especially difficult now that I have to adjust to having a much longer commute than before. It got to the point where doing anything felt like a chore – even things I wanted to do – so I postponed nail art for longer than I should have. I’m trying to force myself out of my “funk” by pushing myself to do more, and I think it’s working. It’ll just take some time, and then I’ll be back to normal. Anyways, again, I’m sorry. I didn’t want to leave my blog for this long, but I ended up feeling semi-crazed for pretty much the whole month.

This post is all about my Julep July 2015 Maven box (Drenched Collection), which I really should have gotten around to before it became over a week into August. The Drenched Collection was rather interesting because it had a huge variety of polish finishes – Julep said that this collection had the most different finishes out of all collections ever – and the colors were all quite lovely. I settled on four polishes from the collection, including two special finish polishes, which I used to create some super fun butterfly wing nail art. Read on!

Julep June 2015 Swatches, Comparisons, and Nail Art

Hi everyone! First up, I have an announcement: my giveaway to celebrate my one year blogiversary has ended and I have picked a winner! Congratulations, Cheri M!!! Thanks to everyone for reading my blog, and entering my giveaway – I really do appreciate all of you awesome readers ❤

Today I have my picks from the Julep Maven June 2015 Collection (The Deep End) to show off on the blog! This month’s collection, like the last two, was full of fun brights and mostly cremes, with a few other colors and finishes thrown in. While I loved the color palette and overall look of the collection, I limited myself to my three favorite polishes from the group, one of which has been my dream polish for a LOOONNNG time. As usual, I swatched the polishes, compared them, and did some fun summer nail art with all of them. Read on!

Julep May 2015 Swatches, Comparisons, and Nail Art

Hi everyone! It’s past the end of the month, but I still have my monthly Julep Maven box post for you! Today I have my picks from the Julep May 2015 collection (Set Sail) and some really adorable chintzy nail art that I made using the polishes. This month’s collection was very creme-heavy, but I did find that I liked a number of the polishes and, luckily, was able to fill some gaps in my collection. While the collection overall seemed to have a nautical theme, I instead used the polishes I got to make some nail art that had been on my to-do list for a long time: floral china patterned nails! You know, like fine china that people serve afternoon tea in. Kinda kitschy, kinda girly, very cute.

By the way, if you haven’t yet entered my 1 year blogiversary giveaway, it’ll be open until the 21st of this month! Follow the link!

Emi’s Manis Turns One! Part Two

Hi everyone! I apologize for keeping you all waiting for longer than I expected, but I got kind of burned out for a few weeks and didn’t feel like I had enough energy for blogging. Now that I’m feeling better, I present to you: the second installment of my first blogiversary! In the first part, I talked about how much the past year has meant to me with this blog, and in this post, I want to do a couple of commemorative things to really celebrate the personal significance of this occasion.

And what better way to do that than with nail art? Since I figured this was supposed to be a post commemorating the first year that I’ve been blogging about my nails, I decided to do some nail art styled after the very first mani I blogged about. I didn’t want to do exactly the same thing, just mimic it. Plus, as a bonus, I’ve got a special something for my readers – a GIVEAWAY!!! My first one ever! I hope you like it 🙂

Nail Art – Pink and Rose Gold French Tips

Hi everyone! I’ve got another nail art post for you before I move onto the big stuff coming up soon! I know I haven’t gotten around to doing the second part of my blogiversary posts yet, and also my Julep box post from this month (most likely that won’t make it in by the end of the month unfortunately). But at least I’ve got something going in the meantime!

This weekend I went to an AMAAAAZING gem and jewelry show that had so many fascinating sparkly and shiny objects that the whole experience bordered on sensory overload – it’s THAT glittery. Of course, when you attend a jewelry show, it’s best to keep your outfit as plain and simple as possible in order to make the jewelry stand out more, and so I made a conscious effort to keep my nails on the toned-down side for the show. I’ve been feeling the muted pastel peach/pink colors in the past few days (my taste in nail polish really changes with my mood), and so I ended up doing very dainty French tips in a super feminine pink/rose gold color combo, which was absolutely perfect for the show: simple with just a little shine.

Nail Art – Dark Gradient with Metallic Greek Key Pattern

Hi everyone! Sorry about my absence in the past two weeks; I’ve been feeling some “burnout” and felt too exhausted to do nail art/write posts. Anyhow, I’m back with some nail art that I was originally going to post after the second part of my blogiversary thing, but  I’ve been procrastinating on getting that post done so I figured I might as well put this up first.  I’ve been in a rather glum mood recently and the weather’s been nasty, so I’ve been drawn to a lot of dark, moody colors (Julep Elise is my <3) and ultimately decided to try one of the dark-colored nail art ideas that I hadn’t gotten around to. I was inspired by Julep’s metamorphic topcoats to create this (undesirably) subtle dark blue-to-green gradient that I accented with a bit of shiny gold polish in a Greek key pattern. While it didn’t turn out like how I originally intended, I’m still drawn to its dark glamor.

Swatch – Julep Dawnelle

Hi everyone! Before I get going on the subscription box posts for this month (I REALLY want to finish both of them by the end of the month this time!!!), I’ve got a quick swatch of Julep Dawnelle. This insanely sparkly microglitter polish was originally released in the St. Patrick’s Day-themed March 2015 Mystery box (this polish is basically the reason I bought the box), but has since become available for individual purchase. If you’re into dense, full coverage microglitter (I am after I discovered Different Dimension Antheros!), this is definitely a polish to consider because it is SO gorgeous!