Challenge Week 10 & 11: Polka Dot Mani and St. Patrick's Day Mani (picture heavy)

So there seem to be a trend forming now: I have very little time to post, so I do two challenges at a time :D. Well it works for me this way at the moment so I won't beat myself up about it more than necessary...

I love doing dots on my nails, it is a very simple design that looks very intricate and as if you used a lot of time on it. It can make a manicure go from good to WOW depending on colour choice, which is something right up my alley, haha.

Recently I did my first polish swap with Sheila from Pointless Café and was lucky enough to get my little hands on the two Dior Spring 2012 colours Waterlily and Forget-Me-Not. They are rose scented, but not heavily so, and I have been able to enjoy the awesomeness of the two colours.

According to some people in the know, Waterlily is a close dupe to Chanel's Jade so if you have been wanting that for a long time you may feel satisfied with this one. I myself don't own Jade so I can't say for certain. I love my Waterlily I think it is ABSOLUTELY stunning. Forget-Me-Not is close in colour to Dior's own Purple Mix, but F-M-N is lighter and less dusty in tone. If any of you feel like it, I'll be happy to do a comparison post...

I had something in mind with the polka dots, but it didn't manifest itself the way I'd pictured it.

The application was a little bit tricky with Waterlily, it is surprisingly thick, but I managed ok with two coats, and it is worth the hassle in my opinion. Forget-Me-Not was a dream to work with in the usual top notch quality of a Dior creme.

Waterlily is almost colour correct in these pictures even though they are taken with flash, please note the awesome shimmer in it:

In my mind's eye it made all sorts of sense to mix small and large dots, but when I got to my middle finger it just looked messy and not at all cute!!

Unfortunately I was not as lucky with Forget-Me-Not, it photographs darker than it really is:

The minute I realised the small dots weren't working, I dropped them, haha.

Then the other hand looked like this:

This looks much more composed and elegant somehow...

I actually have gotten remarks on this mani, a guy at a ticket booth thought it looked very complicated...I hearted him so much in that moment :D

I need to make a light box or flash reflector - I am getting annoyed with heavy shadows and colour incorrect pictures ;)

I was really pleased with this mani since I got a great design out of very little effort, something that looked really good and noticeable. And the colours are to die for!!

For my Week 11 mani, St. Paddy's day, I have chosen two lovely colours in a layering combo. One is a dusty, dark, forest green polish from GOSH's LE collection called Forest Floor and Lynnderella All Hallow's Eve, a "transparent" green base with golden shimmer, green, gold and black hex glitter in different sizes and square gold glitter. At least that is what I have seen so far...

Recently Lynnderella announced All Hallow's Eve will be discontinued which I think is such a shame. This is green gorgeousness in a bottle and really shows off what is so great about her polishes: Deep, complex and filled with an incredible amount of different glitters in all shapes and sizes. Feast your eyes on these relatively okay pictures:

Hopefully you enjoyed watching these pictures, I sure enjoyed doing these swatches.

What do you think about glitters and Lynnderella? And more importantly, what did you do for St. Patricks Day?