I moved away from home and followed my fear

well well well....

This past month has been definitely a busy one for my self. I moved away from home. Here's my journey:

Back in January 2014 after I had finished my time at high school (since I had gone back for one semester to upgrade some classes even though I didn't really need to, I just wasn't ready to leave that part of my life yet to be honest) I had literally no idea what I wanted to do in college but I did know that university was not for me. All through high school my love for nail polish and related things grew and grew. I never saw esthetics as an option as a career for me because I felt like it was mindless work and wouldn't provide me with a great future so I looked into other courses I could take in college. I never could find something I could see myself doing for potentially the rest of my life.
After the college application deadline had passed on February 1st, 2014. I felt like such a failure. I felt like because I never submitted an application to a program that year, I would never find a program that I could see myself in. The weeks following I channeled my feelings into my nail art because it is something I was and still am passionate about. And that was that, an epiphany. Why not follow my passion and go to school for esthetics even though I thought I wouldn't be happy with the money aspect afterwards once I started my career. Now I just had to find a school that I wanted to go to.

When I was looking into other programs I came across a massage therapy course at Humber College in Toronto, Ontario. If you were to ask my friends if I were to live in any city, I am so sure they'd immediately say Toronto. I have such love for this city and have so many great memories there. So I just felt like Humber College was the right place for me to be. So when I had finally decided to pursue esthetics as a career I looked if Humber had any related programs and there it was, Esthetics and Spa Management. I knew instantly that this is the program I am supposed to take since I have always wanted to work for myself and own my own business. I knew this school would be the place that I start my career.

Within a week of finding out about this program I decided I would apply for the following January (2015) intake date instead of the coming September so could work until then since I figured out financial aid wouldn't cover all of my expenses. As January grew closer and closer, I did not feel ready to move away to school and I did not feel like it was right timing within my personal life. I decided to wait once again. This time I was so sure that I was doing the right thing, I knew by the time school came around in September (2015) I would be ready to make this huge change.


So here I am today, sitting in my rented room away from home looking back at how this past year and a half has gone for me. I moved to Toronto on September 1st, 2015. I just finished my first week back at school. I am so flipping excited to start this new stage in my life.

Being as excited as I was about finally going back to school that only thing I felt appropriate was to obviously paint my nails to reflect so.


Here are some pictures of my design:

Free hand painted the Toronto skyline

Added some acrylic paint for a water colour effect

This little three word quote has been a driving force in keeping me
inspired and motivated within this whole process.
I feel like if you aren't afraid of what the outcome of a risk you are
about to take you aren't going to progress and grow from the
experiences that challenge you in life. Yes moving was very scary and
challenging for me but I knew that I had to do so to become a better me.

I was so busy the week leading up to my move I didn't even have time to take off this design, so I actually had this on for a bit over two weeks.

no chipping, no touch ups in two weeks *heart eyes*

Since I'll be working with my hands in school in my practical classes we need to have short nails so here are some before and after pictures from chopping my nails off.

Before

Just clipped, and still too long for school

Nail length as of today

I would love for you to join me on my journey through school and life as I update my blog hopefully more frequently than in the past.
If you ever feel stuck in a place throughout your life, please do not be afraid of taking chances and following your fear, it will only lead you to bigger and better things. ♥


xo
- Kassie

Gradient Sunset Nail Art

This is by far my most successful gradient attempt. I love this so much *heart eyes emoji*

In today's design I used: OPI Natural Nail Base Coat, SinfulColors Snow Me White, and I believe I used China Glaze Escaping Reality for my pink, Stoked to be Soaked, and the newer formula of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Mellow Yellow. Seche Vite as well as Essie's Matte About You.

GRADIENT Palm Tree Sunset nail art

Instagram Post :)

"I love the way this gradient turned out! so thankful for peel off
base coat, you all know how much I hate clean up lols"

Share your recreations with me on instagram using the hashtag #inspiredbykass

EASY Half Moon design | NO TOOLS NEEDED // nailsbykassie

Hellooo! I'm back with another post. Two in one month, this has got to be a record for me. 

I definitely did not start out this mani to do a black and pale pink half moon. My original plan was to dry out little tiny flowers I found on some local trails where I live but the didn't turn out the way I needed them to so this is what I came up with instead. I have actually never attempted a half moon mani before but I really do like the look of them some of the time. 

In today's design I used: OPI Natural Nail Base Coat, Seche Vite, Wet n' Wild "Black Creme" and E.L.F. Nail polish "Wedding Bells".

My camera has a really hard time picking up the pink tones in Wedding Bells, it makes it look like it's leaning more on the brown side of an opaque nude polish. If you want this polish but don't have E.L.F. near you a nearly perfect match is SinfulColors "Easy Going", this does lean more to the brown side but is still very pretty pale pink nude.

EASY Half Moon design | NO TOOLS NEEDED // nailsbykassie

Instagram Post :)

"Simple little half moon from last week. This is the first time I
have ever done a half moon before, I really like it"

please please please share your recreations with me on instagram @nailsbykassie and using the hashtag #inspiredbykass

Pink and Gold

oh my gosh, remember me?

it has definitely been waaaaay too long.

I wanted to do something simple but really pretty and saw something like this floating around online for quite some time so I gave it a shot. It's super easy to achieve.

In today's design I used: OPI Natural Nail Base Coat, NYC Base Coat "Strip Me Off"

Sally Hansen Extreme Wear "Giant Peach"

L'Oreal "The Statement Piece"

Pink and Gold Summer Time Mani

Tips: 

1. You MUST topcoat before placing the tape on the nail. It will make the polish dry quicker and make it easier to pull of the tape. 

2. As seen in the tutorial I used scotch tape on my index and middle fingers to create the triangle, make sure you put the tape on the back of your hand and peel it back off the get rid of some of the stickiness. This helps in helping prevent your nail polish pulling off from your nail and ruining your design. 

3. Make sure your polish is completely dry before lay the scotch tape down. As you could see my polish pulled up from the tape. I waited about 20 minutes but since it was so hot where I live this day the polish stayed tacky longer than expected. 

Instagram Post :)

"cute little design I did last week. I love love love this gold polish!"

Easy Floral Nail tutorial

Hey ladies

I finally filmed another tutorial! :)
check it here or on my youtube channel "Kassie May"

Instagram Post :)

"simple floral design I did this week. I'm not too into fall nail art trends, but I've
been loving micro floral designs."

Bonus Blog Picture :)

Hope you enjoyed the video.

And remember to share you recreations with me on instagram using #inspiredbykass :)

Covergirl XL Nail Gel Swatch & Review - Rotund Raspberry

This is going to be my first review blog post, and I'm not so sure how to start or what to include, but here it goes!

I used my OPI Natural Nail Base Coat before applying this polish to protect my nail. 

The bottle shows the colour to be more pink than the deep red that it turned out to be. 

This is as true to the colour that I could get.

PROS:

• So smooth and easy to work with. 
• Pretty opaque
• Needed two coats to even out.
• Dryed fast
• An initial high shine with out top coat

Since this line claimed to have the "gel nail effect", I decided to not top coat the polish,

to keep the finish like a gel nail. Personally, I do not think that it had that finish, although it was shinier than most other polishes. 

I wore this polish for 4 days. I use may hands a lot and I am always jamming my nails into things at work so polish tends to chip on me quite easily. While I had this polish on, I managed to rub my nail on my bathroom counter, and you could see where I had dragged my nail because it left colour behind. I'm just assuming this is because I didn't have a top coat on. 

Here are the chips I had after the 4 days of wear....

CONS:

• The shine dulled after the first day of wear.
• Colour transfer when rubbed against another object.
• Chips if you use your hands a lot.
• Will not last the 2 weeks it claims to.
• Very, very slight staining (this could have just been personal to me. I usually get stained from deep red colours)

I still really like this polish despite the cons since I think a lot of them can be fixed with a top coat. They also have really nice colours in this collecting!

alright, I guess that's enough of me rambling about this polish! 

Hope you have a great day :)

xx - Kassie

♥ ♥ ♥

Watermarble!!

Wooo! finally a successful watermarbling try! :D

I absolutely love how this turned out *insert heart eyes emoji*

What I have found that works the best is using room temperature distilled water. The polishes also have a lot to do with the out some of the marbling, some don't spread as well as others. You just have to try out the ones you have to see what works best for you!

In todays design I used:

OPI Base coat, China Glaze Fast Forward Top Coat, and DISTILLED water.

SinfulColors in Snow Me White

SinfulColors in Black on Black

ColorClub in Pucci-Licious

Instagram Post :)

"Was I successful? I THINK SO! So Happy with the outcome of this water marbling :)"

Blog Bonus Picture :)

Here are two pictures of what the polish looked like on the water, I just thought it looked uhh-mazing! but then again, I am easy impressed ;)

I'm not sure is you can tell but my favourite polish is Pucci-licious. Love everything about it, it is literally the most perfect nail polish ever, but I haaate the name.

I hope you liked my watermarble!

I hope you have a splendid day :)

♥ ♥ ♥