Saturday, February 18, 2012

Spoiled: Designated Driver

I've noticed a lot of bloggers don't seem to like yellow much. I'm not sure if it's the color or the applications that causes this dislike. I happen to LOVE yellow. It's such a cheerful color that I always like to wear it when I'm feeling down. (Or just whenever! haha) My local CVS finally put up a display of the Spoiled polishes so I grabbed one. Today I have Designated Driver to show you. 

I think it's more of an orange-yellow color than just a straight yellow, but I loved it! I thought application was flawless. All the pictures below are three coats and anyone who is good an applying polish could probably get away with two. (I'm NOT good at it, so I usually need to do an extra coat to even out my shoddy application.)

Anyway, pictures!




As I said, it's a orangey-yellow creme polish. Maybe a smidge more orange in person. I really liked the brush. I have a lot of issue with the super wide brushes like on Sally Hansen polishes. My pinky is such a thin nail that the brush always gets polish ALL OVER my skin too, no matter how careful I am. This brush, and other Wet n Wild polish brushes seem similar, but thin enough that I can get my pinky covered in a single swipe without getting my finger messy too. Since these are $1.99 at my CVS, I will probably be picking up more! I also grabbed one of the few box sets of Color Club polishes that our Walgreens sells since they were one on sale! Those will be coming up too. Lots of fun colors. Yay!

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Orly Nail Rescue

Well, I guess this will be my first official review of a product! Bear with me since I've never done this before. 

(Disclaimer! I JUST took off my last mani so my hands look dry and gross. And the mani was red so yeah...  Sorry!)

I have thin, brittle, peeling nails. To this day I envy my mother because she uses her as tools, chews on them, and over all just doesn't do anything to CARE for them.... and she could easily grow talons. -_- So, my nails are a rather prideful area of mine since they take work to keep up. You can imagine my dismay when I found a small crack on the side of my right thumb. It was really small so I didn't worry. I usually just paint over them (so I don't have the urge to pick at it) and wait for it to grow out. Well. This one didn't want to stay small. Today it turned into THIS monster:


(Yikes! Again, sorry for zombie hands.)


Horrible right? My nails do not love me for Valentine's Day, do they? I was pretty panicked for a moment since it's below my nail line. Ouch! Then, I remembered reading Sarah from Chalkboard Nails post about Orly Nail Rescue! I was out to Sally's in a snap! (She has a pretty good step-by-step for a much nastier dent, if you want to look at that HERE!) 

The Orly Nail Rescue kit is $7.99USD at Sally's. It comes with a bottle of nail glue, a pot of nail powder, and a small buffing file. You brush the glue over your nail (the whole thing or just the damaged area is up to you), quickly dip your nail into the powder, let it dry, and then buff it down so it's even with the rest of your nail.

This is my after picture. You can see that the crack is still there, but you can't lift that portion of the nail up any more! Yay!


(I didn't bother as much with making it look pretty.)

It was super easy to use. One major thing to note though is that this DOES come off with Acetone so you'd either want to not paint your nails until the damage grows out or use non-acetone remover. I'm going to look funny until the end of the week (payday!) with my unpainted thumbnail! 

Anyway, to sum everything up, this is a product I would DEFINITELY  recommend to any nail friends! It was a life saver for me! (Well...not really, but I didn't have to be sad at the idea of a little nubbin-nail on my hand!)

P.S. If anyone reads this and happens to have some tips on dealing with thin, brittle, peeling nails, let me know! Between nail treatments, base coats, cuticle oil, and lotion I'm at a loss. Hah, or I just have truly terrible nails. 

(This product was purchased by me.)


Saturday, February 4, 2012

Polka Dots - Matte!

Right, so I think I said yesterday that I don't usually like the matte look? Polka dots are definitely an exception! They are cute glossy or matte! Behold!


Although, I did learn that you should scrub your hands very well after making bread.... I got flour under my topcoat. Oops! (From the cleanup, no less. I was DONE making the bread and had washed my hands once already.)

(See the line of white? Flour.) 

Polka Dots!

One of the things I am not very good at yet is polka dots. I run a little OCD and tend to over-dot to the point of silliness. I also have a hand tremor which makes it HARD to get those cute little round dots. So I practice. This didn't turn out too bad! (That's Amy-code for "I think it looks awesome!") Haha

I have been playing with OPI Planks a Lot. I picked it up because purple is my favorite color so I can never have too many purple polishes, but I hadn't really used it. The teal is OPI Fly from the Nicki Minaj collection.I own a couple different teals, but this one is by far my favorite! The formula is fantastic, and it covers in two easy coats. I used a large dotting tool for the dots.


Sorry for the nasty dryness around the edges of my nail. We just got snow and the cold killed my hands a bit. Ick!

Friday, February 3, 2012

Photos

I think I am going to try and build myself a light box this week so I can take better pictures.

Thursday, February 2, 2012

Icing: Mood Swing Stormy/Serene

I have finally gotten a decent camera! Maybe I can start getting more pictures on here now.

The other day I stopped by Icing to pick up some of their magnetix polishes. I don't live close to a retailer that carries any of the other brands and these seem to be the most cost effective, plus they had a decent magnet. Anyway, while I was there I grabbed a bottle of their color-changing polish! It looked like it might be a duo-chromeish purple/blue color (which I LOVE) plus I don't yet have a color-changing polish. On the nail it isn't really a duochrome, but that's okay because it is GORGEOUS. I can't get it to change colors yet, so it's sitting at almost a teal shimmery blue with maybe a HINT of purple to it. I'm thinking it turns more of a pure blue when it's warm? I guess I'll find out. (Hopefully!) Anyway, here are the pictures!

I don't know if I should be sorry for my cuticles or not. Haha. I didn't do much cleanup though. I can't find my usual brush for that. :/




And a closeup for the shimmers!


These actually dried with a matte finish. It is pretty, but I don't really like the matte look a whole lot unless I am in a mood so I didn't take any pictures of it. I'm using Orly Sec'n Dry for the top coat here.