Nail Fail! Sephora by OPI: Blasted Opalescent

Good morning! It feels a little odd getting a post out before noon. Usually I'm on in the wee hours of the morning, like 1 or 2 am! Had to take Juneau to the vet for another round of kitten shots. She's a trooper!

Anyway, last night I decided to try a random combo. One of the crackle polishes I REALLY like is Blasted Opalescent from Sephora by OPI. It's a shimmery white with purple/blue/pink sparks in it and I like the way it changes personality depending on what you layer it on. I realized I had never used my bottle of Stone Cold from the Colors of the Capitol collection by China Glaze, so I decided to use that as my base. The end result was pretty neat, although because of the matte finish it liked to eat my topcoat. Odd for a non-glitter polish! I added two coats of topcoat and figured I would add a final coat in the morning before work.

BUUUUUUT (you saw that coming, right?) when I woke up this morning, this is what my pretty mani looked like!

Bad picture, courtesy of my phone! 

T_T  The color came off!! My ring finger is what it looked like when I went to bed. My pinkie is what it looked like when I got up, and the rest of my nails are in some stage of colorlessness. :( I was a little bummed because I got the polish on sale! I don't have any other Sephora brand polishes because none of the colors speak to me so I can't justify paying $9.50 for a bottle. I got this for $5. Odd thing is, it didn't do that the first few times I wore it. Just this time! Major bummer.

Does anyone else have this polish? Has anything like this happened with your crackles at all? I'll probably try it again just to see if maybe this was a fluke with the polish. I sure hope it is.

***Update/edit*** I'll have to test this, but I realized that my first layer of "topcoat" was my Nail Magic nail treatment. I didn't have that the first few times I wore the polish, so maybe that's what caused the shimmer to fade. Judging by the smell of the nail treatment, I'd say it's a definite possibility! (But it hasn't had any effect on my other polishes, and I've been using it for over a month. huh.)

China Glaze: I Herd That

Ha. Ok, so I guess I lied yesterday when I said I was going to do a layering combo for today. I DID do a layering thing, but the nail polish fairy must be out to get me. I did a jelly sandwich with OPIs Care to Danse and Nubar 2010/Fingerpaints Asylum. It looked really neat but for some reason it just didn't want to stay on my fingers! Over lunch today the polish on my pinky nail just completely fell off. (like if you paint your nails and don't let all the layers dry, then rub your finger against something. It just kind of shears off the nail.) This was weird because it was hours and hours after originally painting them! So, that's a bummer. Lucky for you all I have a plan B!

I picked up a few of the Safari Collection China Glaze polishes when I was at Sally's the other day. This pick is sort of odd for me because normally I do not like glitters. Not one bit. I own very few and the ones I do I got because they were cheap or I wanted to try them out because I *hoped* I would like them. It never works! Haha Anyway, I saw a swatch of I Herd That and just fell in LOVE. I don't know what happened, but I think we might get married (Ha, not really! But remember those grade-school taunts? If you love it then why don't you marry it!) So.... check it out!

I had a really difficult time getting the true contrasts of the glitter to come out. There seems to be a mix of holographic glitter, gold glitter, and some darker coppery glitters. The effect is truly amazing. I didn't want to take it off! The formula on this was beautiful. My pictures all use topcoat, but this polish dries to an interesting matte finish. It does have texture to it, but not as much as a lot of other pure glitter polishes. All I needed was a coat of Gelous and one of Seche Vite and it was smooth!

If you like glitter, this is absolutely a must-have polish! The fact that my glitter-despising self likes it should say a lot! Like I mentioned, I found the collection at Sally's and they would probably have it at Beauty First as well. (Although, Beauty First in my area is slow at getting stock in.)

I hope you all have a good night and happy Friday! 

Girly Bits Hocus Pocus (aka the best polish ever if you love holos like me!)

Hey everyone! Today I've got for you what is probably one of my new favorite polishes! Girly Bits Hocus Pocus! Hocus Pocus is a really simple holographic top coat that can be used with any base polish. I wanted to try and show you all exactly what that means with a bunch of before/after-type photos!

First though, this is what I actually ended up wearing for a few days. Unfortunately, I wasn't quite genius enough to take any pictures of Zoya Yasmeen before I added Hocus Pocus. Oops.

Over Zoya Yasmeen

Over Zoya Yasmeen

Over Zoya Yasmeen

Over Zoya Yasmeen

 If that wasn't enough to make you swoon, check under the jump here for more pictures with different colors!

NOTD: China Glaze FYI

Hello everyone! It's been awhile since I've been able to put a post together. I've been super busy.

I recently started my first full-time job. I've had assorted jobs for years but never anything career worthy and never anything full time. I'm so excited to see where this goes! I think I'm going to enjoy the work, which makes it even better. But goodness, working is tiring! My schedule also got a major shift. I'm not a morning person. Never have been, so being up and across town for work by 9am is a giant change! It's taken some getting used to.

Today I have for your one of my favorite polishes: FYI by China Glaze. Neutral, holographic glory in a bottle!

This polish is a gorgeous beige-colored holograph from the OMG collection. I think my pictures make it look a little more yellow than it actually is. It's really quite neutral in color and tone. Holographic polishes are some of my favorite polishes in general, but this one is one I keep going back to and never get tired of. The formula on this one is lovely. This is three thin coats and it goes on perfectly. No clean-up here.

How pretty is that! I can't stop looking at my fingers!

Hopefully, now that I've adjusted to my new schedule, I can find more time for my nails! I want to practice on my nail art. Recently, I stumbled across this gradient tutorial HERE that is way easier than how I was doing it before! (And I wasn't very good at it!) I've got a picture on my phone of my results, but I want to try it again and get better pictures. The result is beautiful just as a gradient and absolutely stunning when stamping is added. Also a rainbow gradient is much easier to do.

I also am going to take a stab at water marbling. I have seen a few wonderful pictures of water marbles with a gradient base layer and then a black and clear polish to marble with so the base still shows through. I want to try it when I have time! Anyway, there you go!

Have a good day everyone!

-Amy

(P.S. I'm excited to have a follower, by the way! Although, I see I am also a follower of myself. I'm not sure how that works since last time I checked I was still me and follow my own blog just by default! O_o )

Halloween!

I figured I would get in gear and actually post some picture stuff! This is what I did for Halloween this year. I KNOW I saw this done somewhere else when I was busy just looking over other nail blogs, but I can not remember where it was. (If you happen to read this, please let me know so I can mention it?)

Anyway, being new to this nail-picture thing, I did the simplest design I could find. So here is what I ended up with!

Candy corn! I started with OPI Nail Envy for Sensitive and Peeling nails as a base coat, then started with Sally Hansen Whirlwind White. I taped off that color with scotch tape (P.S. there are some awesome tape mani designs HERE) and then used a coat of China Glaze Solar Power, followed by a coat of Papaya Punch, also China Glaze. For the dots I used a dotting tool. I topped everything off with a coat of Seche Vite!

As a general disclaimer, please be nice for the horrible pictures and probably glaring issues with my nails/cuticles/clean up efforts! ^_^ This is quite a lot harder than it looks! I hope to do swatches of things someday, but until I get some finer points down I think I will stick to random nail art!

Hopefully there is more to come!