Cadbury Caramello Cuties

So, Easter nails. There are a lot about at the moment, and most seem to have some kind of spring theme. That’s understandable for the Northern Hemisphere where Easter comes from, with new growth, the return of the sun, and associated historical fertility rituals and what-have-you. Down here though, it is of course Autumn; we shouldn’t really be having any rebirth type celebration at this time of year at all. So in light of this, but still wanting to jump on some kind of bandwagon, I decided to go with a theme of delicious chocolate. My favourite Easter eggs are Cadbury Caramello Cuties, small chocolate eggs filled with caramel.  Can’t go wrong with chocolate. Unless you’re allergic to it. And that would be a tragedy.

Bright sunlight.

The base polishes I used were: China Glaze Eyes Like Sapphires (sapphire blue with a silver shimmer), OPI Dear Santa (festive red with small red and gold glitter), OPI Rising Star (a bright, coppery metallic gold), a-England Lady of the Lake (medium purple with scattered holo). For the egg wrapper dots I used Kleancolor Pearl Silver (a slightly blackened metallic silver), and for the ‘Cadbury’ text Orly White Out. The chocolate shell of the partially unwrapped egg is China Glaze Foie Gras (a dark purpled brown) and OPI Over The Taupe (a dusty, greyed milk chocolate). Everything was finished up with two coats of Poshe top coat.

Unwrapped egg! Flash photo.

Grey Glitter Gradient

Grey day, grey nails. I don’t usually go for a large amount of grey and NYX Girls Perfect Gray was supposed to be my base colour for a tape mani, but when I saw it on my nails I fell in love. As my husband said, it’s a really elegant shade. I had to jazz it up a bit though, with a glitter gradient using NYX Girls Spot Light. I did this with the polish brush, it’s easy enough without having to tear up makeup sponges for a true gradient mani (the brush technique is the same as used for doing ‘syrup nails’).

Click all to enlarge.

Perfect Gray was opaque in three coats and the formula was extremely easy to work with. It’s a shade darker on the nail than in the bottle, a dove grey with a hint of blue. Like rain clouds. This is also the first mani I’ve done that’s needed absolutely no cleanup (my practice is paying off).

Spot Light is one of my favourite glitters. The sliver hexagonal and small square glitter pieces flash rainbow holo and are densely packed into a clear jelly base. The holo appears in all lighting conditions, it’s the same on the nail as in the bottle, and it’s really easy to apply. I dabbed a bit but needed no fishing — the brush is covered in an even mix of glitter with each dip. The glitter pieces sit smooth on the nail with very little effort. I almost can’t believe such a great glitter polish was so cheap (US$1.99). This manicure was finished up with two coats of Poshe.

Hex and baby square glitter. In shade.