Not Quite Right...

Disclaimer:  In my mind it somehow worked, on nail...not so much.  But hey, nails are all about the good and the not so good right?

All photos taken under a "natural" lamp

I started off with Peachy Parrot from the Orly Birds of a Feather collection.  It's a peach shimmer that I loved it in the bottle, but once I put it on I realized that grandmas were wearing this back in the 80's.  I't s pretty, but On me at least it has a really dated feeling, and it's almost too close to a frost for comfort and has the same tendency to show brush strokes that a frost does.

In an effort to escape the 80's if you will, I thought I'd mix things up with one of my top coats, This is where I think I temporarily lost my mind because with two bins of top coats, I grabbed Kleancolor Party Fever a blend of sky blue, fuchsia, purple and light orange hex glitters in a rather murky base with a fine red glitter.

The look I ended up with is a bit on the clashing side but you know what, it is rather fun.  I don't go flashing them for everyone to see, but I do tend to look at them and smile.

Have you ever done a not quite right mani that you actually liked?

Payless Shoes Now has a Beauty Line

It's been a crazy week, I've worked every day, had school and been getting my daughter ready for school.  Of course this means shopping.  So imagine my surprise when I walk into Payless Shoes and the first thing I see are a shelf of fragrances, makeup and body care.  Wow, everyone is jumping on the beauty bandwagon, 

From what I gathered the line is called Unforgettable Moments and includes several scents of perfume, body wash and lotion as well as foundations, eye makeup and yes, nail polish.

The polish was my main focus so you'll forgive me if I can't tell you much about the skin and body care items.  Most of the colors of polish were pinks, reds and corals, and too traditional to pique my interest, but one did capture my attention.  Oh, and I didn't see (look for) any 3 free information and it's not on the bottle as you can see so if that's a concern, you may want to investigate that.

Sparkling Turquoise is in my opinion less turquoise and more of a dusty marine type blue with a lot of shimmer.  I don't have anything quite like it in my collection and am quite pleased to have it.

I would almost say the shimmer has a pewter cast to it, it isn't as brilliant as silver and I feel that it's this pewter or whatever you'd like to call it that gives it the somewhat dusty feel.

Application was great, the brush is rather small, especially when one is used to using the Pro Wide brush, but the polish flows well, much better than I expected from an out of nowhere brand.  There was no problem with streaking and I had complete coverage in two coats.  Dry time seemed fairly standard, all these pictures are without a top coat.  Truth be told I was much more impressed than I was prepared to be.

I've seen a lot of specialty shops get their own beauty lines which turn out to be flops for whatever reason.  I can honestly see this being the case with this line from Payless.  I can understand getting nail polish at a shoe store,  but not a full makeup line.  That's just me though, what's your opinion on it? 

Pink Wednesday - Orly Flirty

I decided I needed a little break from the Miss Universe Collection.  I don't usually participate in Pink Wednesday, and anyone that's read my blog for any amount of time knows that  pink just isn't my color so I don't wear it that often.  This however is an exception and is so very, very pink that I thought it warranted it's own day. 

This is Orly Flirty from the Happy Go Lucky collection and holy cow is this pink. Yes, I know, statement of the obvious...  I have to admit that when I first got it, I put it on my toes first.  After wearing it a couple of days it had really grown on me, it was so fab on my toes that I decided to give it a whirl on my fingers.  I like it better as a toe color, but it is seriously fun either way.

I haven't seen a lot of Orly polishes in the blogs that I follow and I don't know why, I love most of their colors, they're very affordable and the formula is great.  Flirty could easily be a one coat wonder.  It's very thick but not goopy and it flows from brush to nail amazingly well considering how thick the polish is.

I did do two coats just to make sure there weren't any thin spots but in a time crunch could have gotten away with one. It dried to a soft but not quite satin finish that has a rather interesting feel to it, and perhaps because it's so thick, it took longer than I'm used to to dry so I recommend a quick dry topcoat like Seche Vite which will add the trademark shine like you see here and eliminate the texture that I can't quite describe.

One of the reasons I think I like this pink so much, is the barely there shimmer that keeps it from being just another bright pink creme but doesn't take it as far as "Oh hi, I'm wearing an outrageously bright and shimmery pink, just call me Barbie."

 

As far as pink polishes go, this one has my vote and I recommend it for being fun and unique.  

Congeniality is My Middle Name.

Photo credit HERE

Ok, you know I had to do it at some point so better to just get it out of the way first thing.  Seriously though, I could totally see Sandra Bullock rocking OPI's Congeniality is My Middle Name. 

 

Meanwhile, I'm totally rocking it.  I'm really glad that I took my unopenable bottle back and got a new one because I really love the color.  While this bottle doesn't seem as bad, it still has a lot of the separation of the shimmer from the base color as you can see in the photos.  I didn't have the bubble problem I thought I would from all the shaking to mix it up though, so that's good. 

Congeniality is My Middle Name is a lovely, OPI describes it as a "berry-wine shimmer"  The shimmer is lovely with hints of fuchsia and purple that glow under full sun.  In the shade the color turns a deep Merlot that is very sexy and elegant.

This was the thinnest of all of the polishes in the collection and goes on a lot lighter/brighter than the bottle color.  It took me four coats to get the coverage and depth of color that I was happy with. It dried fairly quickly though so it wasn't all that bad.  I did however, finish it off with a top coat of Seche Vite for added durability and shine

This is one of those great colors that I think will look equally good on long nails as it does on short.  The shimmer keeps it from being too vampy on long nails, while the depth and richness of the color makes it exceptionally flattering for shorter nails.

Shade

I'm going to have to put this as my third favorite of the collection, coming in behind It's My Year and Swimsuit...Nailed It!

So, one more from this collection and we're done.  Hope you aren't sick of it yet.  This really is a great one, I'd recommend it to anyone who can get their hands on it. 

Crown Me Already!

So Check out this bling, isn't it amazing?!

 Crown Me Already has three or four (I can't really tell for sure) different sizes of silver hexes that are suspended in a clear base with even more silver glitter. 

 I applied only two coats over Swimsuit...Nailed It! and achieved almost full coverage.  This is quite easily a stand alone polish.

 Being that the glitter so very thick I don't think this would work well as a top coat unless you were looking for the heavy on the glitter look.

 These pictures were all taken under artificial light so you can't get the full effect of a full sun pic but trust me, it is truly dazzling! 

 The thing that really amazed me about this polish is how smooth it is, the hexes lay really flat and the silver glitter is very fine, these things, combined with a nice base formula makes applying this  easy and quick. 

 The clincher on this is that it is amazing to remove.  I did use pure acetone but no foil.  I only let the cotton ball sit for a

Swimsuit...Nailed It !

To start my swatching of the Miss Universe Collection.

While this isn't the most unique polish in the collection of four that makes the Miss Universe Collection it is absolutely beautiful.

 This gorgeous blue foil is a gem to wear, the formula is smooth and applies beautifully.  The color is what I would call a "true" blue and doesn't lean towards any other shade.

 Some of the other blogs have said that this has potential as a one coat wonder, but I used my usual two.  The color is very highly saturated though so one thick coat would do the trick if you were in a rush.

 I was amazed at how quickly this dried as well.  I didn't even need to use my Seche Vite top coat on this. 

 My favorite part...how easy it cleaned up.  Usually a color saturated polish will stain my cuticles like mad at cleanup, but this one didn't.  It left a little hint of the blue in the hard to reach spots, but for the most part it was just a dream.

Would I recommend this?  Totally. 

Miss Universe Collection by OPI

I've been working for nine days straight and am a wee bit out  of it really.  What made those nine days interesting was the fact that my beloved Jeep broke down.  I was nigh unto inconsolable, I love and adore my baby. 
With everything that has been going on in my life for the last couple of months, I almost missed OPI's Miss Universe Collection, but I'm glad I didn't. I went into my local nail supply, saw it, and promptly had to have all of them.

Aren't they just pretty!

This collection is fairly small, just four polishes but I think it's well thought out, the colors are well suited.

 It's My Year is the most unique of the four.  It's a lovely rosy mauve with lots of champagne shimmer.

Oh yeah baby, bring on the blingy blingy!!  Crown Me Already has three or four different sizes of silver hexes in a clear base with even more silver glitter.  The amazing part is how smooth the application is, but more on that in the swatches posts.

 Swimsuit...Nailed It! Probably the least unique of all of the colors in this collection but is a very pretty blue foil in it's own right.  The shimmer on this is amazing.

 Congeniality Is My Middle Name... This polish I can't really say much on, why?  Because apparently some person decided to open it, smear it around the top and close it up again so now I can't even open it.  I've seen beautiful pictures of it on other blogs though so I'll be taking it back to trade for a new, unopened bottle.
I do have one concern though.

Do you see the two different layers?  That's all the shimmer that settles after sitting just a short period of time, and it settles very densely as well, so it takes a LOT of shaking to mix it up and we all know what shaking creates...  BUBBLES!   So, I'm rather hoping I got a bad bottle all together and that isn't the case for all of them.  We shall see. 

So have you tried the any of the Polishes from the Miss Universe Collection?  If so, which is your favorite?

Thanks so much for reading, I'll try to get back in the groove not that my work schedule has eased up.  Until next time, take care.

Adding Stripes

I wanted to add an additional element to my acrylic paint mani.  I thought that it would offer a great background for some stripes.

I wanted to keep the acrylic paint theme going though.  I thought that black would be too harsh but didn't have a dark brown so I blended my own using a lighter brown with a bit of black and then added some of the dark copper to give it just a bit of the metallic effect, not a lot though.

I already had a clear top coat over so didn't stress over messing up knowing I'd be able to wipe it off if I didn't like it.  My mixture came out a little muddier than I would have liked but it worked.

From there is was just a matter of painting on the stripes, I alternated them originating from one edges then the other and did some small "floater" stripes as well.

On the ring finger I added just a tiny sift of a gold holo glitter.  I wish I had put it under the stripes rather than over though.

I finished it all off with a clear top coat.  It gave the whole look a very African/safari feel which I just love!  My middle finger turned out the best.  Can't you just see the tiger slinking through the tall grass?  Watch out, it may get you!

Nails Courtesy of Acrylic Paint

I don't have a lot of acrylic paints, and mostly basic colors that I got for simple flowers and dots. You know the ones, yellow and white  for daisies, some greens for leaves etc.

Not too long ago though I picked up some metallic ones, a gold and two shades of copper.  I've not known what to do with them really but I decided to play a bit and experiment with a whole nail look.

So this mani involves no nail lacquer at all, save for the clear top coat it's exclusively acrylic paint. I had my doubts as to how it would turn out, but was pleasantly surprised.

Using a small brush I started on the nail edge with the gold and feathered it toward the center on both sides, for the center I used the  light copper in the same way and feathered it out towards the edges overlapping slightly then took the darker copper and did it just down the center blending it out toward the edges as well.

The combination of the three colors and the feathering blended the edges really well, giving a rather seamless gradient effect.  The effect can be achieved with sponging as well, but is more difficult when working from the edges because you have less room to work with than when sponging from the base to tip.

The metallic paint has a really lovely finish when you use a light touch, resembling actual metal, and any surface irregularities are smoothed out with the top coat.  Since most colors of acrylic paints are available as nail lacquer it won't ever be a replacement, but I think that for an occasional, unique look it is very effective don't you? 

So, what do you think, will you be trying an acrylic mani any time soon?