Some OPIs

Here are some OPIs my sister-in-law gave me. She's fantastic!

I'm pretty sure all of these were two coats.

Soho Nice to Meet You:

Apple Of My Eye:

I Don't Do Dishes:

Nomad's Dream (which was much more opaque than I was expecting!):

And DS Vintage (!!!):

And here's a picture of my kitten, just for some extra "aww!" factor:

OPI Blue Moon Lagoon

So, I bought this one off of eBay. Evil Bay. You know. But it was SO PRETTY I HAD TO HAVE IT!

Nice light blue holo. C'mon, OPI, do more holos! And not this DS crap -- those are way overpriced and aren't even holo anymore! GOSH!

And now for your standard ending...

Also! Don't forget to click here to enter my Giveaway!

And! Click here to check out my stuff on my blogsale!

OPI Ski Teal We Drop w/Revlon Star

So I bought one of those new-ish Revlon glittery topcoats. It was... underwhelming. I got the one called Star. I didn't buy the base color to accompany it because it was plain and underwhelming.

Here is the result of my layering!

Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure in Gray by Gray

Sooo... I also found this color on clearance at a random Walgreen's in August. It's weird -- there were a few clearance colors. I only picked up this one and Naked Ambition. And now, at some drugstores, these colors seem to be gone. But at other drugstores, they're still there. What is this I don't even...

I also think I'm going to attempt to do 31 days of Halloween-ish colors for October. I need to go home and raid my stash to see what I have. I'm thinking any black w/shimmer, black w/glitter, or vampy should do it. I LOVE OCTOBER! And Halloween! And Fall!

Speaking of Fall, it finally actually feels like Fall here in Georgia! Hooray! The 90 degree days were KILLING ME.

Anyway, on with the show. I apologize for the tipwear in these pics. I wore this for several days, because I absolutely loved the color, but the tips wore down something fierce.


I was still too lazy to redo my nails, so I just slapped some OPI Significant Other Color on top. Check it out!




I liked that combination, even though it was a bit odd. :)

OPI Ski Teal We Drop

Y'all, this is really the only color that appealed to me from the OPI Swiss collection... but I LOVE it!

It's awesome, beautiful, well-pigmented dark teal that was nearly perfect with 1 coat, and completely perfect with 2. Any dings you see are the fault of the manicurist and not of the polish. :)

2 OPIs and a Zoya

I'm trying to update every day... again... Hee hee.

So today, I have, from my vault of unposted pictures, 2 OPIs and a Zoya. I THOUGHT I'd posted all my Zoya, but I actually hadn't. Maybe it's because I have too much nail polish. Nah, perish the thought.

This is OPI Here Today Aragon Tomorrow Suede. It's nice enough, typical OPI Suede (matte with shimmer). Dries very fast, but not so fast you can't get your nail covered first.



This is one of those shades, though, that I really prefer with topcoat. The shiny makes it pop!
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And here is an OPI I picked up on impulse because it was on clearance. No Room For The Blues! It's very dupe-y with Zoya's Yummy. I'll do a comparison sometime.


And here is my lone remaining Zoya, Kalista. It's a beautiful shimmery dark red/brown. I am really digging these types of colors lately. I guess it's cause I know fall is on its way. :)

OPIs and Topcoats and blather, oh my

I bought the OPI Summer Flutter minis several, several weeks ago and I'm finally going to post them today. Hooray!

But first! I want to whine about topcoats. When I first started using quick-dry topcoats, I thought Seche Vite was the end-all, be-all. I could even overlook how it would get all gloppy in the middle of the bottle. But then it started causing shrinkage of the underneath layers of polish, usually within just a few hours of application. So I moved on. Quick-dry topcoats I have tried:

Poshe - Meh. It works as well as Seche with less shrinkage, but the brush is weird and awkward.
CND Air Dry - This is probably my favorite, really, but it's expensive and difficult to find (for me.. the only place I've found it here is at Trade Secret and it's like $9, and I go through a LOT of topcoat).
Orly In A Snap - This sucked. Only after I purchased it did I realize that only the topcoat itself dries quickly. It does NOT dry the polish underneath.
Sally Hansen Insta-Dri - Same as In A Snap. Don't waste your time.

Currently I am using Out The Door. Even though CND Air Dry works better and makes my nails shinier, the cost is prohibitive. I actually bought the huge ass bottle of Out The Door at Sally Beauty Supply because it was like $9 and is 2.5oz compared to $9 for probably .5oz (I threw the bottle out, apparently, so I'm unsure of the size) of CND Air Dry. Out The Door doesn't shrink my polish, but it also doesn't dry quite as quickly as Poshe, Seche Vite, or Air Dry. However, it works well enough and is cheap, so it's my current favorite.

What's YOUR favorite quick-dry topcoat? I'm open to trying new products that work well that I haven't already tried!



Anywho, here are the OPIs I promised! I believe I used two coats of each of these. I may have used three coats for the glittery ones.
Flit A Bit - A medium orange that I actually LIKED on me! I never like oranges on me!


Flower-to-Flower - A nice bubblegum pink with some silver shimmer in it. I didn't like this one as much as I was anticipating -- it was actually the color from this collection I thought I'd like the most.


Wing It - Ok, this was a weird color. It shifts from pink to orange and has all that glass fleck-y sparkle in it, but the color is kinda butt ugly.


Catch Me In Your Net - I like this, but I already own Zoya Charla, so I'd never buy a full size of this. I have seen several bloggers point out that Charla and CMIYN are dupes, so I'll spare you all the comparison. If I didn't already have Charla, this would be the one full-size I'd HAVE to have. Since I do already have Charla, I didn't buy any full-size polishes from this collection. :)

I'm hoooome!

Wow, I've barely had time to post here for the last couple of weeks. My dad had cancer, and had to have his kidney removed, so I had to drive down to Florida to be with my mom, since we have NO family there and I couldn't have my mama going through this alone, you know? My dad was in the hospital for six days, but he's recovering amazingly, and the doctor thinks that they've got all the cancer. So we're cautiously hopeful right now.

Anywho, I hit up Ulta in a BAD, BAD way while I was down there (I actually hit two Ultas... jeez). Holy cow, I'm glad that we don't have an Ulta in this town. I'd always be broke. I found SO MUCH STUFF I'd seen online and had been lemming and HAD TO HAVE. I got the Essie Fall Collection minis, I got the Urban Decay Naked Palette, I got the one color I wanted from the OPI Swiss collection (Ski Teal We Drop, it's the only one that appealed to me). I picked up two of the Orly Cosmix polishes, which I thought weren't coming out til September, but I walked into Ulta and THERE THEY WERE. Maddening!

But I'm not posting ANY of that today! Instead, I'm going to dump a whole bunch of photos that have been sitting in my Flickr for weeks. I'll get to the new stuff, uh, like when I have real photos and they've been uploaded to my Flickr. :D

Enjoy the photo dump! I am going to nix the commentary, unless something was particularly awesome or particularly terrible.

Zoya Heather:


Zoya Kalmia:


Zoya Barbie:


Zoya Annie (I gave this one away. The formula was fine, but this shade of orange is NOT for me):


OPI Ink (Why have I never purchased this before? I love it! It's FABULOUS!)


Essie Pretty Edgy (Oh look, it's the day I shortened my nails):


China Glaze Sacred Heart (found for $1.99 at Sally, woot):

Hey you guys!!!

Guess what!
Tomorrow is my birthday, and I'll be 32. Holy CRAP, how did I get to be 32?!


Some other stuff...
I'm trying to do the Dave Ramsey thing, so I suppose that means I should quit buying nail polish. Curses. Or at least not buy it ALL the time, huh? I need to rediscover some old faves, anyway.


And pics! Just some randoms in my Flickr.
Rimmel Play Fast in Street Wear. Pale taupe with shimmer. Pretty, but not as pretty as I'd hoped.


Neon orange! Not really my color, but fun anyway. :)


OPI - Parlez Vous OPI.


China Glaze Orange Marmalade. Another one I didn't like as much as I'd hoped. It just looked so JUICY in the bottle!


Essie Midnight Cami. Holy smurf fingers, batman! This is pretty on, but removal kinda sucks.





ENJOY!


P.S. I should have a shipment waiting on me when I get home. Paradoxal. I hope I love it as much as I love everyone else's pictures of it, not only because it's going to be my birthday mani, but because it may be the last nail polish I buy for a WHILE!

Nail Art!

Here is some nail art I did recently.


I keep seeing these strawberry nails everywhere, so I decided to do this myself.
I used China Glaze Cherry Pie for the berries, OPI Jade is the new Black for the leaves, and I dotted on black and white with a toothpick for the seeds. I REALLY liked how this turned out. :)



And this is some stamping I did in preparation for a fun weekend. Sadly, this chipped like... three hours later. :( China Glaze OMG stamped with Konad Special Polish in Black with the arrows and stars design from a Bundle Monster plate.

Happy Fourth of July!

Also, happy 10-days-til-my-birthday! If I'd been born in France, my birthday would be a holiday.

So, here's my July 4th manicure. I wore this to a get-together my husband and I went to last night. We came home with a new kitten. I'm a sucker for baby animals. Our other two cats are... lukewarm towards the new kitty, at best. But we're working on it. We have sweet kitties, so I feel sure that with some patience we'll have them all hanging out together in no time!

Oh wait, I was gonna show you a manicure. Here you go! I used Zoya Blair for the red, unnamed Goldie blue for the blue, and I stamped the stripes from one of the Bundle Monster plates and the stars from another Bundle Monster plate using Sally Hansen Whirlwind White. I had to go back over the stripes with my Art Deco nail art polish in white, because the Sally Hansen wasn't opaque enough.


And check this out. This is OPI No Room for the Blues, which I found on clearance at Trade Secret. ALL of the bottles were marked with this price. I had to ask the cashier, "So, how much is this nail polish... REALLY?" (By the way, it was $4.99.) I should try to sell this on eBay for like $75. I mean, it was ORIGINALLY $120, so clearly $75 is a deal, right?!



And because I can't resist... here's a picture of our new baby. I've yet to choose a name. I really like Jezebel. I also like Dobby because she reminds me of a house elf, and the other HP house elves had stupid names. Also, Dobby was awesome. :)

Random swatchery

Yo! Sorry I haven't posted in a week. I've been, uh, busy. Yeah, yeah, that's the ticket. Busy.

Lately I've been on a search for the perfect coral and the perfect off-white polish. I have no idea why. Those aren't usually "my" colors, but to be honest, coral is totally growing on me.

Sooo... today I just have some photos of some random polishes. There is no rhyme nor reason to this, just stuff I've worn lately and have never posted here. Enjoy! Hopefully tomorrow I'll have more... I'm backlogged once again!

So I finally got around to wearing the last Zoya Sparkle. This is Gilda. Color me underwhelmed. To be honest, the only colors from this collection I NEEDED were Charla, Ivanka, and Mimi. The pinks and reds were just meh.


OMG. This was another polish I didn't like at all. This is OPI Fiercely Fiona from the Shrek collection. Okay. A) Terrible color for me. B) Three icky coats. I put this on, took a picture, and immediately took it off. Like, before it dried. Thank god it was only a mini.


This was an unexpected surprise. First of all, it's orange. Second of all, it's Petites, which is hit or miss, but you can deal with a miss if it only cost $1.50, right? I LOVED this color on me. I think this is what set me off in search of the perfect coral. As you can see, despite the fact that this is called "Passion Orange," it's really more coral than straight orange. I think this was three coats.


This was my first attempt at finding the perfect off-white. This ain't it. This is Sally Hansen Insta-Dri in Beige Blast. Three coats, I believe.


Beige Blast alone was boring as hell and a little too sheer, so I Hidden Treasure'd it up.

Recent Fauxnadicures

Wow, Fauxnadicures totally gets the red squiggle underliney thing.

So, I've been having a ton of fun stamping lately since I ordered the Bundle Monster plates. I really prefer the full-nail stamps. I do hate that the Bundle Monster full nail stamps are so narrow. I have fairly narrow nails, but they don't cover my entire nail width. I bet these things would be really horrible for the ladies with wider nail beds than mine. STILL, I've been stamping away. Here are some of my recent looks. I'd tell you what plate the images came from, but I'm way too lazy to go look. However, all of the stamps came from the Bundle Monster plates, and not my Konad or other Fauxnad plates.

Here is Essie Splash of Grenadine with Konad Violet Pearl on top.


China Glaze Flip Flop Fantasy with Konad Special Polish in Black. This one got me a LOT of comments. The neon-y-ness of Flip Flop Fantasy is really hard to capture in photos, but this was BRIGHT.


This was OPI Who The Shrek are You with Konad Violet Pearl for the checkerboard tip pattern. This was my first attempt ever at stamping tips, and let me say... it is NOT easy to get it straight. My right hand was pretty crooked, but I wore it anyway. My pointer finger was a casualty of my job.


This is Essie Lapis of Luxury with Sally Hansen Insta-Dri in Whirlwind White for the stamp. I think I'm going to have to break down and buy the special Konad white polish because I cannot find a white that stamps decently to save my life.


I didn't have adequate sunlight to capture this one, and it was very, very subtle, but I liked it. It reminded me of, say, curtains in a funeral home. LOL. The base is Rimmel Hard Edged stamped with Nina Ultra Pro in Viva La Velvet.


This is what I'm wearing today and I LOVE IT. It may be my favorite one yet. Then again, I love the color combination of aqua and dark brown. This is a base of Orly Gumdrop stamped with Kleancolor in Dark Brown. OH... Kleancolor. I had no idea where to get this stuff, but I went to an asian beauty supply store close to my house, and they had a TON of it for $1 apiece. This is some GOOD STUFF. I actually have another post planned about my trip to the asian beauty supply. :)

Green, Blue, and Purple comparisons

So I woke up early this morning and sat in bed with a glass of mango iced tea, watching Saved By The Bell and then Zoolander and doing nail polish comparisons. It's nice to be a lady of leisure. :)

Anyway, there are colors in the OPI Shrek minis and in the Essie Resort Collection minis that reminded me a lot of other colors I already had, so I decided to do some comparisons. Unfortunately, it's super cloudy today, but I think I got some decent pictures.

First up, the greens... well, blue-greens. Turquoises, if you will. Pardon the bottle shots, they were all taken on my bed. :)

From left to right: Essie Turquoise & Caicos, China Glaze For Audrey, Orly Gumdrop, Revlon Minted, Essie Mint Candy Apple

The polishes are on my fingers in the same order, from thumb to pinky.

The greenest ones are Turquoise & Caicos and Minted.
I still say Gumdrop and For Audrey are dupes, or at least near dupes. For Audrey may be a TINY bit bluer.
Turquoise & Caicos is actually a jelly. I thought it was a creme til I put it on. Nope, it's a jelly. It's also three coats. Minted is also three coats.
Gumdrop was opaque in one coat.
The rest of the colors are all two coats.


Now on to the blues!

From left to right: Orly Snowcone, Essie Lapis of Luxury, L'Oreal High Tide, Finger Paints Blissfully Blue, OPI What's With the Cattitude.

The polishes are in the same order on my fingers, from thumb to pinky.

Snowcone was opaque in one coat.
Lapis of Luxury is another jelly, another three-coater, and I think it may be a jelly dupe for Snowcone, which is a creme.
High Tide is completely different from the rest of them.
Blissfully Blue and What's With the Cattitude are similar, but not dupes. Blissfully Blue is way more stark, while WWTC is a deeper blue. Blissfully Blue was opaque in two coats, while WWTC took three coats.
Here's Snowcone on my thumb and Lapis of Luxury on my pointer. They are SUPER close.



And now for the purples!

From left to right: Essie Lilacism, China Glaze Light as Air, OPI Rumple's Wiggin.

On my hand, they are in this order:
Pointer - Rumple's Wiggin
Middle - Light as Air
Ring - Lilacism
Pinky - Rumple's Wiggin

Light as Air was opaque in one coat.
Lilacism took three coats. Rumple's Wiggin took two coats.
Light as Air is considerably lighter and grayer than the other two. To my eye, Lilacism and Rumple's Wiggin are absolutely dupes. There may be a tiny difference between the two, but you'd have to really be looking for it to see it.


So there! I hope this is informative and helpful. Now back to Zoolander. :)