Julep Margit & Chatoya

Happy Mani Monday! Over the weekend I received my Julep box for January and knew right away which two colors I wanted to wear for the beginning of the week.

I started with Margit, which Julep describes as a mushroom with rose shimmer. I can see the color shift when I look at the bottle, but it seems to disappear on the nail. I still love this shade and the formula was so easy to work with that I got away with one coat. I used Chatoya, a platinum glitter, as a topper for my ring finger nails. It is super sparkly and fun as an accent!

I hope everyone had a good start to the week! (Especially you teachers like me who are coming back after a long break. You can do it!)

xoxo,

   Brooke

Julep Chrysalis Collection January 2015 Unboxing

Hey everyone! Hope you have all been having a great weekend. Sadly my two week winter break is coming to end, which means going back to work. I hate how fast time flies!

Today I have a Julep unboxing for you all. This is the January 2015 Chrysalis Collection. Here are all of the papers that came with it. I love that quote in the top right corner because I'm a huge Harry Potter fan! "We do not need magic to transform our world. We carry all the power inside ourselves." -J.K. Rowling

Here are all of the products I received in my box. The polish colors from left to right are Zelda, Shelly, Margit, and Chatoya. Zelda and Chatoya are from previous collections.

In the orange bag is one of the three Metamorphic Top Coats, which came free if you took your box and confirmed through an email that you wanted one. I got Bjork, which has a blue hue. Tilda has a green hue and Tyra has a purple hue. I am really excited to try this over a dark polish!

The next product in my box is the Luxe Lip in Sheer Fig. This gloss is meant to be a lip conditioner and has a cooling metal tip to stimulate circulation. Now I don't know about all that, but I will say that the metal tip feels amazing. I like the formula of the gloss. I didn't find it to be sticky or thick. The only thing I'm not a fan of is the smell, but I can get over that.

The holographic chevron stickers were one of my add ons, in addition to Shelly and Chatoya. Sadly the sheet only has 20 stickers on it, but they're really pretty and I'll just use them for accent nails. I love that they put instructions with the stickers!

The Glycolic Hand Scrub was the free gift for taking three add ons, which I am super excited about because I had been using a very small sample and love it so much that I rarely bust it out. Now I have a full size!

Julep also threw in a little box of Junior Mints, which I thought was a nice touch. Overall I am absolutely thrilled with this month's box! I even got it earlier than the estimated arrival date.

xoxo,
   Brooke

2014 Favorites!

Happy 2015! How was everyone's NYE and New Years Day? The BF and I stayed in and watched the ball drop on TV with a bottle of wine.

I decided to do a big 2014 favorites instead of just December. I'm going to start with favorite foods. I chose my all time favorite savory and all time favorite sweet dishes I had last year. This was a very difficult selection process for me because I obviously love food and I'm a huge foodie, but here we go.

First up is my favorite savory dish of 2014. I went to the Culinary Institute of America in early November with the BF because, as I mentioned, I am a total foodie and I had been wanting to try one of their restaurants. The butternut squash soup definitely topped my list of favorite foods that I ate this year. It was so darn good!

Now sweet was really tough because I am a total dessert person. On my recent trip to Marco Island I had a key lime cheesecake with strawberry sauce and fresh strawberries. It was the lightest, fluffiest, most wonderful cheesecake I've ever tasted. Hands down best dessert of 2014.

Let's briefly talk about my favorite book of the year. I am a total book worm and I'm constantly reading something. During my vacation I brought Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? by Mindy Kaling to read on the beach. This book literally had me laughing out loud. Highly recommend!

I bought a bunch of cute clothes this year, but my favorite fashion item that I got was a pair of Steve Madden combat boots. I have been wearing these things to death. They are so cute and comfy and they go with almost anything!

My favorite skincare product of 2014 was the Aveeno Eczema Therapy hand cream. This stuff was and still is a life saver for the mild eczema I get on my hands. It's not greasy at all and absorbs quickly so I can go about my day after using it.

My favorite makeup product surprisingly ended up being a lipstick. This is the Maybelline creamy matte lipstick in Touch of Spice. Great color, great formula, great packaging. Just all around wonderful!

Now what we've all been waiting for...my favorite manicures of 2014! I decided to choose twelve total, one for each month (even though I've been blogging for less than that).

Lastly I wanted to share my favorite moments of 2014. Looking back I really had an awesome year! I got a real teaching job as a kindergarten and first grade art teacher and I am absolutely loving it. The BF and I spent lots of time together! We went to the Top of the Rock and saw amazing views of NYC. We went to the Cherry Blossom Festival in DC. I took him to his first concert ever (bonus, we saw Beyonce and Jay Z!). We went to the Culinary Institute of America and had some amazing food. I got to go to Florida twice in two months, once with the fam and most recently with the BF. 

What is really incredible to me is that I started this blog in 2014. I have really been enjoying it and I'm looking forward to continuing this journey with you all!

xoxo,
   Brooke

NYE 2015 Manicure

Happy NYE everyone! It's that time of year where we accidentally write the previous year's date for like four months. Does anyone else have that problem? Anyway, I can't believe we're entering 2015. I had so much fun creating this festive manicure to celebrate!

I knew I wanted to do gold and black, the ball drop, and 2015 on my nails. This was one of those times where my mani came out exactly the way I pictured it in my head. I love it when that happens! I used SquareHue Sampokeskus as my gold base and Zoya Willa for the black. The rest is really all glitter placement.

My 2014 favorites will probably be posted on Friday, so keep an eye out for that! I hope everyone has a safe, happy, and healthy new year. Cheers!

xoxo,
   Brooke

SquareHue December 2014 Review/Swatches

Hey everyone! I've got December's SquareHue box (a little late) to share with you all today, which they kindly sent me to review. It costs $19.99 a month and you get three new shades in each box. You can pause your membership at any time, which is great if your nail polish collection is piling up and you need a little break. But let's be real, who really wants a break from polish?

December's SquareHue box is from The Passport Collection. Side note, starting in 2015 they are introducing the decades collection. Um, there's going to be a 1920s box and if you know me you know that I am obsessed with the 20s. So that's happening. Anyway, the destination for December is Rovaniemi. Apparently Rovaniemi is Santa's hometown in Finland. You learn something new every day! Here is what came in my box. I love the simple and modern packaging! Great design.

First up is Joulupukin Pajakyla, a beautiful red micro glitter. Application was fantastic - the polish went on nicely in two coats. I love a good red, and this is definitely a good one.

Next is Sampokeskus. This is a gold micro glitter and as you can tell by the pictures it has a textured finish instead of glossy like the red polish. I absolutely love this color and I think I may incorporate it into my NYE mani!

Below are pictures of Sampokeskus with a top coat. On the left my index and middle fingers have a top coat and the ring and pinky fingers do not. On the right I applied the top coat to all of my nails. Which do you like better, with or without a top coat?

The last color in the collection is a gorgeous green called Revontuli. This has a suede finish and was the most difficult to apply. You kind of have to work quickly because matte polishes tend to dry pretty fast. Here I used one coat.

Below are pictures of Revontuli with a top coat. On the left my index and middle fingers have a top coat and the ring and pinky fingers do not. On the right I applied the top coat to all of my nails. I think I actually prefer the matte finish.

This is my first time trying SquareHue polishes and I am seriously impressed. The packaging and labeling is simple and modern, the formula is on point, and the colors are gorgeous. I love that all of their colors are created in house and that each box has a theme. (Once again, Decades Collection for 2015 coming up. 1920s. Yes please) Even more awesome is that SquareHue donates a portion of all sales to charity! Pretty cool, huh?

If you're interested in giving SquareHue a try or you just want to get some more information you can check them out at http://www.squarehue.com.

xoxo,
   Brooke

Disclaimer: The products in this post were provided for my honest review. All opinions are my own.

Snowflake Mani

Hey everyone! I'm back from vacation and I'm seriously missing the warm sunshine of Florida. BF and I had a fabulous time and perfect weather. We went shelling, saw dolphins, and had a ton of seafood. And ice cream. And daiquiris...Yeah, the diet starts now. Or after New Years.

Here are a few pictures of my favorite foods from the trip. On the top left we have my signature drink, a raspberry mango daiquiri. YUM. To the right of that are tuna tatar tacos with mango. The fish was so fresh. On the bottom left is salmon with vegetable risotto and string beans. I think that was my favorite meal of the trip. Next to that was the dessert I had that night. Key lime cheesecake with fresh strawberry sauce. The lightest, fluffiest, most fabulous cheesecake ever. Did I mention how much I ate on this trip?

We saw some gorgeous sunsets and these were two of them. Below those photos are a picture of a live starfish we saw on the beach (BF threw it back into the water) and the amazing shells we collected when we went shelling. I was actually able to get all of the shells and most of the sand dollars home in one piece!

Btw, I ended up not changing my manicure during the trip. My Zoya Blu & Aurora mani actually lasted the whole vacation except for one tiny chip!

You can see the chip on my index finger.

Onto today's mani! Have you ever had one of those days where your nail polish is just NOT agreeing with you? I wanted to use Julep Isla for a snowflake mani and I had so much trouble with it. Over 30 minutes after putting on my fast dry top coat my polish was getting dents in it and one nail totally smudged. I got so fed up that I removed it all except my accent nail on my left hand. I was in no mood to do anything fancy so I pulled out Zoya Loredana, a fast drying matte velvet polish. Two coats and completely dry in ten minutes.

I'll have a fun NYE mani coming up on Tuesday or Wednesday. Happy Mani Monday!

xoxo,
   Brooke

Zoya Blu & Aurora

Hey everyone! My Mani Monday post is coming a day early because the BF and I have an early flight tomorrow morning to Florida! So excited that the big vacation is finally here. We have a lot of fun activities planned for the week so you probably won't see another post from me until next week. I will be posting a little on social media so if you'd like you can check out those accounts, they're all on the right side of my blog.

So for my vacation mani I chose Zoya Blu, which is a soft baby blue with a glossy creme finish. I had a little trouble with the formula at times, and I admittedly had to do several nails over, but the end result is really flattering and pretty. I achieved opacity in two coats. I decided to pull out Zoya Aurora for some chevron accents. Man, I am blown away by this color every single time I use it. Aurora is a full coverage sugarplum purple with micro fine holographic glitter. Two coats, absolutely stunning. For the chevrons I used the mini chevron vinyls from http://vinylitup.storenvy.com. She has a wide range of vinyls to choose from so check her out!

Sent this snap to a friend. I think the caption says it all. 

A little blurry but I love the glossyness! 

I took a picture in natural light but I wish the sun had been out! I'm sure I'll get some good shots of this mani while I'm on the beach though ;)

I may change this mani mid week if it's not holding up. I'm bringing a little manicure kit with me. I put in those Nicka K nail polish remover pads, my Sephora glass file, Essie Urban Jungle, and the Essie All in One base and top coat. Oh and I threw in a few q-tips for clean up. I'll see you guys in a week with a new mani and a glowing tan!

xoxo,
   Brooke