Sunday, June 28, 2015

Nailing The Book: A Court of Thorns and Roses Nail Art

Hey guys! How are you all doing? I'm doing really well because my cousin is staying with me for a few weeks. She is like my best friend and we are having a lot of fun.

Today I'm doing another addition to the nailing the book series. Today's addition is inspired by A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas. She is the author of the Throne of Glass series and her new series called A Court of Thorns and Roses. She is personally one of my favorite authors! You can find the Goodreads page for A Court of Thorns and Roses here.

My base for this nail art was Rimmel London Red, Steady, Go. I drew all of it free handed with a nail art brush. The silver is O.P.I. Push and Shove. The black is NYC Black Lace Cream. I finished it off with Nicole by O.P.I. Fast Drying Drops.







Friday, June 26, 2015

Tutoral: How to Make Sheer Black Polish + Sheer Outline Design


I can't even remember the last tutorial that I did. It has been far too long. So today I want to show you guys how to do this fun, gothic design! I'll show you how to make a sheer black polish and how to do this polka dot / outline design.

Supplies You Will Need: 


  • A dotting tool: if you don't have a dotting tool you can use a bobby pin, a pen, or anything small and circular!
  • Nail art brush: it's best if you have one like mine where it is long and thin. You could use a tooth pick but it will be much harder. 
  •  Black sheer polish: continue reading to see how you make one!
  • Black polish: I'm using Rimmel London Hot Black to Go.
  • Matte top coat: this is optional but I like this design best with a matte finish!
How To Make a Sheer Black Polish: 


 Making a sheer black polish is a really easy thing to do! You will need a bottle of top coat and some black polish. All you need to do is drip the black polish into the top coat like I did shown above. Every 5-10 drops of black polish you drip in, you should put on the cap and shake it. Continue doing this until you have to black to clear ratio that you want. I didn't count but I think I put around 30 drops of black into it. 

Sheer Polish Design:

Step One: Paint your nails two coats of your new sheer polish. You may want to do more or less coats depending on how sheer your polish is.


Step Two: Take your dotting tool and make dots on your nails. A good idea is if your nails have stains on them that the sheer black polish didn't cover up, then cover the stain up with a dot!


Step Three: Take your brush and outline around your nail. This part takes a lot of practice. You can see that I messed up a lot and painted on my cuticles instead. It's okay though because that is really easy to fix! You just take a small angled brush with acetone to clean up the excess.


Step Four: Clean up your cuticles with acetone and finish with a matte top coat! Like I said before the matte top coat is optional but I really like the smoky effect that it gives the design.

I hope you liked this tutorial! Let me know if you guys want tutorials more often. If you recreate the look share it with me on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram! Use the hashtag #apolishedbookworm. Have a great day!

Sunday, June 14, 2015

Some Free Hand Flowers For You!

Hey guys! I hope you all are having a great weekend! I have been really lazy this weekend and that is how I like it. I am currently reading A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas. It is perfect.

Today I have some free hand floral nail art for you! I did these a few weeks ago. While they aren't perfect, and they are really messy I love them anyways. I was inspired to do a floral by Wondrously Polished's beautiful florals! This design wasn't inspired by one of her designs particularly but scrolling through her designs made me inspired to create some flowers of my own. I used a ton of polishes for this design so I won't bore you and name them all. If you want to know about any of the polishes, please ask me in the comments!




Thursday, June 11, 2015

So Many Books to Review, So Little Space #3

Title: Pretty Little Liars
Author: Sara Shepard
Series: Pretty Little Liars #1
Trigger Warning: N/A
Rating: 4/5 Stars
Bookshelves on Goodreads:  2014-reads, books-i-own, read, romance, so-incredibly-cheesy, ugly-covers

 “I'm still here, bitches. And I know everything." -A”

So if I believed in guilty pleasures, Pretty Little Liars would be one of them. Sure, it does have flaws, and lots of them. But I love all of the characters and really enjoyed this book. I did watch the TV show before reading this, so that might have had something to do with it.

Pretty Little Liars is about 4 girls: Aria, Spencer, Emily, and Hanna. The four girls used to be best friends with Alison. Then Alison went missing and they fell apart. Suddenly they all start to get threatening texts and emails from A. All of them think and hope it might be Alison.

I'm have to talk about the cover. It may be the worst cover I have ever laid my eyes on. Its..just..so...bad.

This book did have plenty of writing flaws and it was so cheesy. But it was still so fun to read and the mystery of A grabbed me in from the start. I'm currently reading the second book, Flawless, and I am enjoying it so far.

Title: Harry Potter and The Sorcerer's Stone
Author: J.K. Rowling
Series: Harry Potter #1
Trigger Warning: N/A
Rating: 4/5 Stars
Bookshelves on Goodreads:  2014-reads, books-i-own, have-high-hopes-for, read, witches-and-fairies

 “It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live.”

I feel like I'm reviewing a legend. I don't want to say anything terrible or else I am going to be swarmed with haters. Good thing I don't really have anything bad to say at all. I had high exceptions for this book and it didn't let me down. It was so fun! A great read.

So I'm not going to even give a description for this book, because if you haven't heard of Harry Potter, where have you been and what have you even been doing with your life?

One of my favorite parts about this book was the characters. I loved each and every one of them (Besides the people that I'm not supposed to like of course)! My favorite characters were Hermione, Harry, and Hagrid. The beautifully flawed characters made this book what it is.

So overall I really enjoyed the first book in the Harry Potter series and can't wait to read the second.

Title: The Bane Chronicles
Author: Cassandra Clare
Series: The Bane Chronicles #1-10
Rating: 5/5 Stars
Bookshelves on Goodreads: 1800s, 1900s, 2014-reads, books-i-own, favorites, read, romance, vampires, werewolves

"You told us to leave you in the desert, because you planned to start a new life as a cactus," Catarina said, her voice flat. "Then you conjured up tiny needles and threw them at us. With pinpoint accuracy."

"Well," he said with dignity. "Considering my highly intoxicated state, you must have been impressed with my aim."


I find myself never disappointed by Cassandra Clare. Her writing is a always beautiful and hilarious, and this bind up was not an exception. The person that gave this 5 stars was Magnus Bane. Of course. Magnus is my second favorite character in the TMI / TID world right behind Will Herondale. He never fails to make me laugh out loud.

The Bane Chronicles is a bind up of ten short stories about Magnus Bane. You also get an extra very short story called The Voicemail of Magnus Bane. Some stories are set in the TMI world, some in the TID world, and some stories were set in neither. I want to say that you should read The Mortal Instuments and The Infernal Devices first because spoilers. So many spoilers. I read both of the series before then I read this bind up and it added so much to my love for Magnus. If you have read both of the series I would totally recommend picking this up.

One thing that I loved about this bind up was that each short story started with a little comic of the story. The art so beautiful and added to my excitement. My favorite stories were probably What Really Happened in Peru, The Midnight Heir (WILL HERONDALE!!! <3), and The Course of True Love (And First Dates). But I enjoyed all of them.

I really really loved this book. I would recommend it to anyone.

 Title: Gone
Author: Micheal Grant
Series: Gone #1
Rating: 3/5 stars
Bookshelves on Goodreads: books-i-own, 2014-reads, dystopia

  “One minute the teacher was talking about the Civil War. And the next minute he was gone. There. Gone. No 'poof.' No flash of light. No explosion."

You know how a lot of kids dream about a world without adults with their rules? They could eat cookies and ice cream whenever they wanted. Well that actually happens in this book. But the kids realize that they were wrong, a world without adults is complete chaos. There are also no cookies. A world without cookies obviously sucks.

Gone is about a city of kids dealing with the aftermath of a serious disaster. They are just sitting in their desks when every single person over 15 disappears. Sides form, fights break out, and everyone risks going hungry. On top of that, children start to develop weird powers and nobody really knows how to control them.

So while I was really intrigued by the plot of this book, it was too slow for me. It took me a long time to get through. But I still did really like the characters and the action in this book. Hence the 3 star review. The really liked the beginning and the end, but the middle was just so slow. I think the book could have been better with 100 less pages.

While saying that I still do recommend this book. I tend to get bored with too much world building. But if you like that go for it. I will probably still continue on with this series eventually because it got a lot better at the end.

Monday, June 8, 2015

O.P.I. Nail Polish Haul


So my local Sally Beauty Supply had a sale on some O.P.I. polishes. The whole clearance section of the store was also 50% off the red sticker price. So I got all of these for $2.25 a piece!! Needless to say I picked up a lot of them. Enjoy the swatches below!

My Paprika is Hotter Than Yours!
 
My Paprika is Hotter Than Yours is a hot coral color with some shimmer. I totally missed the shimmer until it dried because its barely there. I think this is a really great color for summer! Shown below is two coats 
 without top coat. (Its a little bit more red and shimmery in real life. This polish was really hard to capture!)


 
Suzi Has A Swede Tooth

Suzi Has A Swede Tooth is a beautiful light pink creme. I think this one is really delicate and pretty! Shown below is two coats without top coat. 


 
OY-Another Polish Joke!

OY-Another Polish Joke! is a behind beautiful shimmery gold topper. I say its a topper because its thin but can be built up. This is one of my favorite polishes of all time! Its so beautiful!! Shown is two coats over it over Sally Girl Canary.



OPI...Eurso Euro

OPI.. Eurso Euro is an indigo creme. This is really nice! It reminds me a lot of Essie Butler Please. Shown is two coats without top coat.



Incognito in Sausalito

Incognito in Sausalito is a dark navy creme. I really like this one but I may be biased because I tend to love all dark blues. Shown is two coats without top coat.



Vant To Bite My Neck?

Vant To Bite My Neck? is a dark purple creme. I really love this one as well! Shown is two coats without top coat.



Muir Muir On The Wall

Muir Muir On The Wall is probably my second favorite polish of this haul. It has a light jelly black polish with tons of purple and gold shimmer. This is perfection. Shown below is three coats without top coat.



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