Tuesday, October 14, 2014

American Classics Nail Treatments




Hey everyone! Today I have a blog post and review of the American Classics Nail Treatments. This is a really great line of products and I'm excited to share them with you. Let's get started!

First, I'll start with Growth Spurt. This treatment has a keratin rich formula that promotes strong, healthy nail growth. For those of you who don't know, I'm a Registered Nurse at a hospital and I wash and sanitize my hands a ridiculous amount of times per day, which leaves my nails weak and peeling. When I received these products, I had just chopped all of my nails off. I started using this product as a base coat, and while I don't think it particularly helped my nails with their peeling problem, it definitely helped them grow. I'm going to keep using this product as a base coat, maybe in conjunction with some other products to try and find my ideal nail growth combination!

Day #1 of Growth Spurt
Day #10 of Growth Spurt

Bridge the Ridge is actually a product that I've bought before for my mother. She had some really bad ridges in her thumbs from years of biting at them. I bought her this product and it really worked wonders for her. She could apply nail polish and it looked smooth and perfect on her nails. When I received this product, I knew exactly what I would use it for. As I mentioned above, my nails peel like crazy. This leaves ridges in my nails that normally aren't noticeable under most polishes, but stand out like a sore thumb when I use foils or metallic polishes. One coat of Bridge the Ridge and BAM! Perfectly smooth base for foils. I even like the way this product looks by itself. I'm super happy with this product! I used Essie Penny Talk to showcase this awesome base coat.

Bridge the Ridge alone

The smoothness!!!

In a Hurry is an awesome, super shiny, quick dry top coat. I think this top coat is right up there with Seche Vite and Poshe Super-Fast Drying Topcoat (my current favorite) - and the best part is that it's cheaper than both of those products. It's pretty much everything you could want in a top coat - quick drying, super shiny and good protection for your manicure. And, as far as I can tell, it doesn't shrink my manicures like Seche Vite does. I had manicures last for four days with minimal tip wear when using this product, which is awesome as far as I'm concerned. I've already used almost half the bottle and the formula is still as good as when I first opened it. Good job on this one, American Classics. Shown below is one coat of In a Hurry over KBShimmer Shade Shifter.

The shininess!!!

Gealous is an interesting product, designed to add natural thickness and create a gel barrier around your nails to seal in your manicure. I've seen people use this as a base coat, in between layers of color, and as a top coat. I used this product as a base coat, as it is not naturally fast drying (my quick-dry top coats have completely spoiled me). I used one layer of Gealous, two coats of Zoya Payton and then one coat of In A Hurry. The result was absolutely gorgeous - it was so SHINY. I could see my reflection in my nails and let me just say, I was impressed. I really liked the fact that this product adds thickness to my weak nails - it made them feel much more resilient without having to add a million layers of polish. I can't wait to play with this polish some more and find other ways of using it. Another awesome product!

Gorgeousness!


Yellow Stopper is a polish designed to protect against yellowing of the nails. When you apply it alone, it gives your nails a bluish hue. I tried photographing it and failed, so I'll just tell you about it instead. First of all, I would not recommend this product as a base coat if you like to keep your manicure for more than a day. The formula is such that it really makes your polish peel off, so much that I've actually seen some people on Instagram use this as a peel off base coat. Because of the hue that it gives your nails, it's recommended as a clear coat on natural nails or over french manicures, not over color. To be honest, I use this product on my toes and that's about it. I don't have really bad problems with yellowing nails (either that or I'm just so used to my yellow nails that I don't even notice them anymore) and I also don't really like peel off base coats, so I don't see myself using this product very much.

Overall, I'm really impressed with this line of nail treatments from American Classics. Their products are super affordable and high quality. I also heard they are going to be rolling out a new product soon, so keep your eyes open! You can buy these products at Sally's Beauty Supply or online at Amazon.com.

Thanks for reading!

xoxo Maggie




Wednesday, September 24, 2014

OPI Do You Have this Color in Stock-holm

Hey everyone! It's my favorite time of the year - autumn! And with it comes this beautiful polish from the OPI 2014 Nordic Collection. This is Do You Have this Color in Stock-holm, an absolutely gorgeous blue-violet creme. The formula was smooth, buttery, and perfectly opaque in two coats. I can see myself grabbing this a lot this season. I've only had it for less than two weeks and I've alreadt worn it twice! For some nail art, I used Essie Nothing Else Metals, a lavender foil, and Konad stamping plate M64. It's been forEVER since I've done any stamping and I'm really pleased with how it came out. These two colors work really well together.





Thanks for reading!

xoxo Maggie

Friday, September 12, 2014

Colorful Autumn Gradient

Hey everyone! Today I have an autumn inspired manicure! I'm so ready for autumn but it's still pretty warm outside, so I figured this manicure was a happy medium.

I based this manicure off of KBShimmer You Autumn Know, which I painted on my thumb, middle and ring fingers. Then I made a gradient using Zoya Audrina (magenta), Arizona (orange) and Pippa (yellow) over a white base on my index and pinkie fingers. Then I topped it off using American Classics In A Hurry Air Dry Top Coat.



Lay it on me, autumn! Who's with me??

Thanks for reading!

xoxo Maggie