Zoya - Faye

Hello everyone! Here's another swatch for you. This polish should have gone up the other day but I just couldn't get enough sunshine to show it off properly until now. Faye is a new summer release from Zoya and it is GOOOORGEOUS. So sparkly! It's a pretty grape-ish purple base loaded with gold flecks of shimmer. Zoya always does these kinds of finishes the best. It went on really nicely in 3 coats and is perfect for summer because it has to be seen in the sun to be fully appreciated. Sometimes I'm wary of micro-glittery polishes like these because they can be tough to remove but Faye came off easily with my normal non-acetone remover. It did leave my fingers covered in gold glitter though, but that can be washed off.

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A look at the base color.

Orly Nail Rescue Saves The Day!

Hi everyone! Sorry for the late post, Florida is still being all soggy and cloudy so I decided to do a post that doesn't need sunshine to be shown off. Orly Nail Rescue is a simple but tremendously useful system that will save your cracked, broken nails. I can directly credit this with letting me keep my long nails for as long as I did. Without it I'd have had to trim down much earlier. Here's what you get in the box (minus the instruction sheet):

On the left is the nail glue. As far as I know it's the same as any other nail glue you'd get off the shelf, the bottle says you can use it for applying fake nails too so it's not limited to just fixing your nails. The key component here is on the right in the little round container. It's full of a very fine, white powder that, when combined with the nail glue, hardens into a resin that holds together the broken part of your nail and protects it. It's easy to use. All you do is brush the glue onto the broken section and then dip the entire glue-covered part into the powder. Then you can lightly dust off the excess powder and use the included file to smooth out the repair. I usually buff it with a finer file just to make it extra smooth. I've tried using tea bags and silk wraps in the past to repair cracks and tears but nothing has worked as well for me as Nail Rescue. The only thing you need to keep in mind is that to take it off you will need pure acetone to dissolve the glue-powder mixture so you might want to avoid using acetone-based remover to keep from weakening the patch. I use non-acetone remover all the time anyways so it's not a problem for me, but just a heads up. I hope this review is helpful to any of you who have fragile nails like me!

Orly - Lemonade

I am SO VERY HAPPY to bring you this post today! This color satisfies a long-time desire of mine: an opaque and easily applied pastel yellow. Both pastels and yellows are noted for being difficult, so when you combine the two you generally get disaster. This was true for the first pastel yellow I tried, Sinful Colors' Unicorn. Streaky mess. I looked around on the internet for a good while and found some contenders. I picked this polish up at the store the other day and came home to put it on with some trepidation. Heck, I was even getting angry in advance expecting it to apply awfully. The first, very thin, coat was somewhat streaky but not too terrible. I decided to do a rather thick second coat after waiting about 5 minutes to prevent the first layer from dragging and SUCCESS! That's what you see here, pure buttery sunshine perfection. I really sort of don't want to take it off but I will, of course. At least I know I have a little bottle of pretty pastel yellow waiting for me. :)

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China Glaze - Towel Boy Toy

Hi everyone! Today's update is a great summery color. Towel Boy Toy is a bright aqua-ish neon with pretty blue shimmer. Looking at this polish makes me think it would taste like blue raspberry. It's a really pretty color but I was sort of dismayed when the first coat went on streaky and thin and dried matte. Why? It clued me in to it being a neon! Neons are notorious for being thin, streaky, and drying to a matte finish. This was definitely thin, requiring 4 coats to get what you see here, and somewhat streaky, and it did dry to a semi-matte finish. However, it wasn't terrible, just unexpected! Overall this is a good polish, it definitely feels bright, summery, and fresh. Please note that this is slightly greener in real life, my camera didn't quite pick that up.

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Zoya - Harley

 Hey, look at that, I'm on time! Harley is a real winner and I love it so very much. I wanted a nice neutral but something cool so I grabbed Harley.. with a little trepidation. I tried out Marley from Zoya a few weeks ago and took it off almost immediately because it was streaky and dragging and just applied like a mess. It's similar to Harley in that they're both light colors with shimmer so I was concerned about how Harley would behave. So before the polish even touched my nails, I thinned the heck out of it! It applied PERFECTLY. Smooth, even, pigmented, no dragging, no problems. 2 quick coats and I'm done. It's not just grey, either. The shimmer seems to be a mix of silver and teeny bits of pink and blue that make it pull ever so sliiiiightly lavender. It's like pretty shimmery fresh concrete to me and I'm a big fan.

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Sally Hansen - Coral Fever

Hi everybody! Sorry again about the late posting, it's been tough getting sunshine to snap pictures in lately. This is Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure in Coral Fever, part of the limited edition Spring collection. I wasn't particularly excited about any of the shades from swatches I saw but I ended up getting this, Model Behavior, and Delphinium when I saw the display at a local store. I generally like the SH CSM polishes, they go on smoothly and have a BIG WIDE BRUSH which is great for my wide nails. Coral Fever was a good example of SH CSM quality, pretty well pigmented and went on nicely in 2 coats. The drying time on its own is pretty fantastic, too! Just maybe 5 minutes after I painted my last nail and finished cleanup but hadn't applied topcoat yet, my mom wanted me to help her take out and play with my rats. I had her open the cage so I wouldn't dent anything and stood there playing the 'my fingers are made of lava, don't touch anything' game until one of the girls went tumbling onto the floor! I scooped her up quickly and I know my nails brushed against her, the carpet, and a wooden bed in the process but when I went to examine the damage.. there was none! My nails were perfectly glossy and unblemished. High-five, Sally Hansen.

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Essie - Smooth Sailing

Hello everyone! Sorry for the late update, there hasn't been much sun here the past few days so I couldn't take any photos. Florida went from the Sunshine State to the Torrential Downpour State this week. I finally got some sun while I was out running errands so here you go. This photo unfortunately doesn't show off the veeeery subtle pink and blue shimmer in Smooth Sailing but it does show the pretty, almost speckled finish it has. It kind of reminds me of light wash denim. This was a real joy to put on, it covered evenly and fully in 2 coats.

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I have a question about my photos for you all. I see other bloggers taking their photos while holding the polish bottle in their hand to show you the bottle color and color on the nail simultaneously. What do you think of that? Would it benefit you if I took my photos in that manner? Please let me know!

OPI - Hawaiian Orchid

If you're looking for a nice, traditional color with a little kick, then Hawaiian Orchid is for you. It's a semi-sheer salmon pink with a beautiful blue flash that shows up in the sun. The picture you see here is 3 coats and I figure it'd need at least one or two more to be fully opaque so keep that in mind. It went on really smoothly so I have no complaints there. It's a nice enough color but I hate having visible nail so this is going to be put up for swap on MakeupAlley. You can find me there as sqrrlgrl if you want to see what polishes I have to trade!

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I'm still getting used to having short nails but there are some definite advantages I'm seeing. I don't have to worry about banging them on anything or getting caught, for one! I was able to eat juicy, messy ribs yesterday without worrying too much about what got under my nails, too. I still can't wait for them to grow back out to the length I prefer but for now, I think I can handle this. :)

Site Updates

Hello everyone! No swatches here but I would like to tell you a few things. First of all, thank you to everyone who's reading! It really means a lot to me to know that people are getting some use out of my hobby. I started this blog to hopefully be a repository of pictures for anyone who's ever wondered what a color looks like before they put it on and I feel like I've succeeded in that. If you read through the RSS feed this is primarily aimed at you. I've added a Facebook fan page widget so if you'd like to go 'Like' me there, please do! I want to try and use that to talk with you all on a more casual basis, asking questions and taking requests and what not. I've also updated the tags of my previous posts to include the finish so if you want to look at only cremes or only shimmers, you can do that now! I'm keeping it simple and limiting it to the following categories for now: creme, shimmer, glass fleck, holo, and glitter. I'm sure a lot of what I lumped under shimmer could be subdivided further but I think this will work out better in the long run. And if you're an RSS feed reader but not following me through Google Friend Connect, please think about doing so. Once I hit 50 GFC followers I'll be doing a giveaway. :) So come have a look at the site and see what's new. If there's anything else you'd like to see on the site, let me know!

China Glaze - Tree Hugger and Color Club - Object of Envy

Sorry it's been so long since my last post! The past week has been rough and bumpy nail-wise, to say the least. In the matter of a few days I managed to crack 2 nails pretty severely. Thankfully I got them fixed with Orly Nail Rescue, which I'll be reviewing shortly, but that left me with hands as such: 3 nails with patches, 2 nails cut to nubbins and growing out (my thumbnails, which I was wearing fakes over), and only 5 good nails between both hands. It was getting rough. This past Friday I was having breakfast with a friend at Waffle House and as I got out of his car and closed the door, I smacked my hand on something and SNAP! Lost my left pinky nail all the way to the base. It was one of the patched nails so it was already weak, it didn't hurt at all thankfully. So I came home and snipped them all down with only the slightest bit of free edge surviving. It really sucks but that's life, hm? I'm certainly not a fan of having short nails because they make my fingers look stumpy but they do offer some advantages! You don't have to worry about gunk getting under there, you can wear sheer colors, and keypads aren't a pain to press.

So here are my new nubbin nails. I kept on the color I had when they broke because it's really pretty! The friend I ate breakfast with said it reminded him of a granny smith apple and I think he's absolutely right. Tree Hugger is a fresh, lovely green with pearly light green shimmer running through it that really does remind me of a granny smith apple's skin. It applied really smoothly in 3 thin coats.

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When I took off my fake thumbnails (don't worry, no nail glue, just stick-on pads) I decided to do accent thumbs in Color Club's Object of Envy. I've showed this briefly before in a pedicure but here it is on my thumb. I wish this picture was better, sorry! Object of Envy is a nice emerald green glitter that mixes small and large pieces for a more multidimensional shine. Unfortunately for good coverage it took me about 4 coats, even when I made sure to grab gobs of glitter on the brush. It certainly is nice and glittery though!

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I hope I don't offend any of my short nailed friends out there, I think a lot of people have really cute nubbins but it just doesn't work for me! What other benefits to short nails are there? Let me know in the comments, I'd like to hear your ideas for how to maximize these minis. :)