China Glaze - Agro: Holo Layering

Just a quick post today.

(sun)

(shade)

China Glaze Agro and HITS Hefesto

This is China Glaze Agro with one coat of HITS Hefesto over the top. As you can see, Hefesto kind of mutes whatever color is underneath. I love the bright holo effect it creates, but wish it didn't grey out the base color so much. Oh well, the sage green holo it turned into was still pretty awesome.


Here are a couple pictures of Agro on its own:

China Glaze - Agro

Agro is a sage-olive green shimmer that has a bit of that "glowy" appearance. It gains a lot more depth with a top coat, and is on the edgy side of chic.

Agro was part of the China Glaze Hunger Games collection in spring 2012, but as of now it's still available on Transdesign. HITS Hefesto is available at Llarowe and Ninja Polish.

4th of July Nails

Happy 4th of July!

Right now I'm missing my family in Michigan because we usually have a huge party that lasts all day/night with tons of beer, food, and fireworks. I LOVE family parties!

These are the nails I did to celebrate (I DO get to go over to my grandparent's and have a little party with them and my aunt and uncle). I used Revlon Royal for my left ring finger, China Glaze Phat Santa for my right finger and OPI You Callin' Me a Lyre? for the base on the rest. Then I layered All That Glitters Glitter Glory over the ring fingers and sponged it on in a gradient French over the others. It is very easy to apply with the brush, but I had a little trouble sponging it. I do love the result, though!

I bought Revlon Royal in a drugstore a few months ago, so I think it's readily available. Phat Santa was part of the China Glaze 2010 Christmas collection, but there are a lot of red creme/jellies like it. Glitter Glory was purchased from the All That Glitters Etsy shop, but it doesn't seem to be in stock at the moment. Hopefully it will return!

China Glaze Prismatic Chroma Glitters: Skittles over Black

This is my FAVORITE way to wear the China Glaze Prismatic Chroma Glitters: as skittles over a black base. While they're also gorgeous on their own, I love how the black really brings out the colors in the duochrome glitter base on each of these.

(natural light)

China Glaze Prismatic Chroma Glitters

All of these are shown at one thin coat over one coat China Glaze Liquid Leather. All of them are made up of a duochrome micro glitter base sprinkled with multi-colored medium glitters. These are the colors I see in each of the bases:

Full Spectrum (thumb) - lilac lavender that shifts to pink and gold
Prism (index) - periwinkle that shifts to pink and orange-gold
Liquid Crystal (middle) - sky blue that shifts to blue to purple to pink (most prominent color shift)
Optical Illusion (ring) - bright seafoam teal that shifts to purple
Ray-diant (pinky) - golden chartreuse green that shifts to green and teal


The next three pictures I took in my new tabletop studio light box with artificial lights.  I'd like to know your opinion on which pictures you like better.  I know I don't want to rely on the sun anymore (I like swatching at night!), but now it's a question of whether I should get a couple daylight lamps to use for my pictures.  What do you think?

(artificial lighting)

Part of why I wanted to revert to artificial lighting is so that I can set up the lights in a position that will show the duochrome nature in some of my favorite polishes (including these).  I thought the next two pics showed the multiple colors a little better than my natural light pics.

(artificial lighting)

(artificial lighting)

So what do you think of my new photography setup?  Do you like how the pictures look overall?  Or how they catch the duochrome a little better?  Let me know what you think because I'm still deciding on some daylight lamps!

I haven't yet seen the China Glaze Prismatic Chroma Glitters yet in stores.  I was frantically searching for them and found my set on Phoenix Beauty Lounge.  They are based in Canada but shipping was reasonable and super fast!  When I ordered, one of them showed out of stock, but a few hours later they emailed me to say they did have it and asked if I'd like to add it to my order before it shipped out!  Seriously, GREAT customer service!  They are also available on Transdesign, and Wet n Wild has come out with a Coloricon set that are dupes to these.

Chrome Nail Comparison

I was looking for the perfect design to do on my nails for my Disneyland trip this weekend when I broke my middle fingernail... dang! The break was so far down is was barely even on the free edge, so I decided to try out some chrome false nails I got from Dashing Diva a while back. So while I'm doing the wear test on the falsie to see whether it will last for my vacation, I figured I'd do a little comparison of various "chrome" nail looks.

Chrome Nail Comparison

Obviously, the fake nail has the smoothest, brightest shine and the most "true" mirror-like finish, but it also has some drawbacks: it's thicker and less natural than the others, and the wear time on it is next to nothing since it just has the adhesive tab on the back. There's an another brand at Sally's that comes with adhesive tabs but you can also use glue (that may last a bit longer).

The silver foil (ring finger) actually looks more like the Dashing Diva chrome from a short distance. The wrinkles are not as prominent if you're not viewing it as an extreme close up. If my nail hadn't broken, I'd probably be opting for this method this weekend. It provides an ALMOST mirror finish and the foils are relatively inexpensive while enough to do MANY manicures.  A lot of the "flaws" that appear here are my own fault for not waiting for the foil glue to dry enough before sticking it on, btw.  The part towards the cuticle is more of an accurate representation of the shine.  I think this is my favorite of the four pictured.

It amazes me how dull the two polishes (China Glaze Millennium and Zoya Trixie) look compared to both the foil and the fake nail. Neither actually has a "mirror" appearance at all, but they both have the ease of regular nail polish.


The false nails are from Dashing Diva, but I don't see the silver chrome on their site right now. Like I said, there's an alternative available at Sally's by a brand called Nail Bliss (though it doesn't appear to be on their site).

The silver foil I bought at Dollar Nail Art. They have a $25 minimum purchase online (or you can order by mail with a check), but they have so many awesome foils, beads, glitter, etc. it was easy for me to find plenty that I wanted!

Zoya Trixie can be ordered from their website, and I'm not sure if China Glaze Millennium can be found easily anymore (it was from their Khrome collection a couple years ago).

Revlon Rain Forest & China Glaze Glittering Garland Comparison

When I saw Revlon Rain Forest in the new displays at Walgreens, my first thought was "Ooooh!" but my second thought was "I bet it's a dupe for Glittering Garland." I was kinda right. They ARE very similar, but have a couple little differences:

Revlon Rain Forest (index and ring) and China Glaze Glittering Garland (middle and pinkie)

First off, both have very nice formulas and cover very well in two coats, so I suggest getting whichever looks better to you. They both have slightly duochrome gold glass fleck glitter, but the base color is where they differ the most. Rain Forest has a darker, more yellow-toned base than Glittering Garland's emerald green. For this reason, the glitter seems to "pop" just a tad more in Rain Forest, but it shows up more densely in Glittering Garland.

Overall, I say they are similar but not dupes, and it's up to you whether you want both. I like different aspects of each of them, so I don't think I have a favorite of the two.

Revlon Rain Forest is now available in most places that carry Revlon like Walgreens, Walmart, Target, and Ulta.  Glittering Garland was part of the China Glaze Holiday 2011 collection and is still available on some sites like Trans Design.

On a side note, I was super excited when I realized that the sparkles in these appeared to be duochrome in the bottle (I can even see blue and purple!), but sadly, it really doesn't translate at all on the nail.  Oh well.

The 12 Days of Christmas: Day 9 - Night Snow

This is a variation of some nails I did a while ago, for the first snow.

Night Snow: China Glaze Up All Night with Nubar White Polka Dot

I liked it so much over grey that I had to try White Polka Dot over a navy blue. China Glaze Up All Night is one of my FAVORITE dark blue polishes because it always looks blue and not black, but it's nice and deep and dark. This reminded me of when it snows at night and you can see all the snowflakes against the dark night sky. I prefer it with only one coat of glitter (shown), but two looks nice as well.

I know a lot of nail bloggers are obsessed with black glitter, and I wanted to be too (as it turns out, I don't really like it much... but I love the new charcoal grey glitter from Deborah Lippmann... i think that's what I always WANT black glitter to look like). Instead, I'm so in love with white glitter. All of the white glitter I've seen is a silvery pearl white, and it's SO pretty. This one and Lynnderella's Snow Angel are perfect examples of awesome white glitters!

The 12 Days of Christmas Nails: Day 8 - Christmas Glitter

So I decided to go crazy and combine my two favorite Christmas glitters: China Glaze Twinkle Lights and Party Hearty!

China Glaze Twinkle Lights w/ Party Hearty

I LOVE this combination so much. It is SO blingy and blinding! It's not quite as yellow as it shows in the pictures, because they were taken in very low lighting. It's more of a soft gold color in person, and super shiny and sparkly. Needless to say, this was the biggest pain in the butt to take off... glitter EVERYWHERE!

The 12 Days of Christmas Nails: Day 3 - Spice Drops

This was a manicure I had in mind since Mrs. Claus and Mistletoe Kisses came out last year in China Glaze's holiday collection. I wanted them to look like various flavors of spice drops (you know, the ones you decorate gingerbread houses with?). So here they are!

Spice Drops - CND Sugar Sparkle over various bases

For the bases, I used CG Grape Juice, CG Mistletoe Kisses, CG Mrs. Claus, Ulta Sun-sational, and Revlon Powder Puff, then I topped each with two coats of CND Sugar Sparkle.  This is what I was going for:

I love these candies, but only the ones that are flavored like spices (not fruits).  If you haven't had them, you should try them!  Some of the flavors are anise (purple), spearmint (green), peppermint (white), and cinnamon (red).  I can't remember what the orange and yellow ones are...  ginger might be one?


Do you have any favorite Christmas candies?

The 12 Days of Christmas Nails: Day 2 - Frosty Night

This is my second holiday manicure for the 12 Days of Christmas Nails (check out all of Sammy's designs so far here)!

I think this one looks like a snowy winter night.

Snowy Winter Night - Misa Dance Fever sponged over China Glaze Little Drummer Boy

I've never been too successful with sponging, but I think it all depends on what kind of polish you use for it. This glitter, Misa Dance Fever, was the perfect density for the sponging and it was actually pretty quick and easy! Also, I've heard that this type of gradient has a killer cleanup, so I put Liquid Palisade around my cuticles. I basically had NO cleaup at all! It worked so well! I've never been able to create neat design using Palisade, but it does seem perfect for avoiding cuticle cleanup from messy types of manicures (if I ever try water marbling or splattering, I will SURELY use this again!).

I topped it all off with China Glaze Fast Foward top coat, which has some shrinkage issues like Seche Vite, so that's why the blue shows around the cuticle edge and there's a bit of shrinkage at the tips.

I love this and want to try in in different colors now! I think a glossy black base with gold glitter would look really classy!

The 12 Days of Christmas Nails: Day 1 - Christmas Tree Nails

I'm borrowing an idea from Sammy over at The Nailasaurus called "The 12 Days of Christmas Nails" (hopefully she doesn't mind, but I just love it)! The idea is to create 12 different holiday themed manicures between now and Christmas. Since there are 24 days left 'til Christmas, that's about one manicure every other day, which seems pretty reasonable to me!

So here it is! Day 1: Christmas Tree Nails!

Christmas Tree V2.0 - China Glaze Emerald Sparkle and Milani Gems

I actually did a Christmas tree-inspired manicure a year ago (almost to the date!) which you can check out here. I loved that one, but this time I wanted more of a "shiny ornaments" look. I used China Glaze Emerald Sparkle as a base (2 coats), and put one coat of Milani Gems over it. This bottle of Gems has the purple glitter in it (I will actually have a comparison post tomorrow for you on the Milani Jewel FX polishes).

You know what I think would make this even better?  A layer of Zoya Rina to look like pine needles!  Unfortunately, my Rina is at my parents' house right now, so I didn't have it for this.  I DO plan on doing a "snow and pine needles" look with it once I get it back though!

China Glaze - Lorelei's Tiara

You may get sick of hearing how much I LOVE every single polish I post about, but that's kinda how my blog works. See, I follow a LOT of nail blogs (you can see them all in the sidebar under "Blogs I Love") and I keep on the lookout whenever I hear about a new collection or polish coming out. I read and research reviews and swatches - A LOT - before I buy my polishes (yes, I buy my own - they are not PR samples). So usually what ends up in my nail polish collection are only those that I really deem worthy, and those are the ones I wear and post on my blog. I have hundreds of polishes and I truly "like" almost all of them and "love" more than half of them. Sometimes I'll end up putting on a "bum" one, but then usually I don't even feel like taking pictures of it.

So there you have it. That's why I gush over almost all of the polishes I post about. Not because I feel an obligation to a company or to advertise for anyone. I write what I honestly think of each and every thing that I post on here. I have received a couple of PR samples, and those too are reviewed honestly in my own words of my own opinion (but that's not what my blog is really about - it's more about just sharing all these pretty things that I really enjoy).

So without further ado, ANOTHER awesome polish! This is Lorelei's Tiara from the new China Glaze Eye Candy collection, and it's sooooooper sparkly! This is how is looks in normal indirect daylight. Very shiny!

China Glaze - Lorelei's Tiara

And then in the sun the sparkle is blinding! Probably one of the most sparkly polishes in my collection, and such a gorgeous icy blue effect.  It was hard to capture the intensity in a still photograph - you HAVE to see it in person to appreciate it!

In the shade, the blue glitter comes out a little more, but it still maintains an almost mirror-like effect.

I feel like my fingernails should be icy cold to the touch with this on them. I like that this is wintry more than Christmasy, so that I can wear it into the new year as well.

I found this at my local Ulta, which has had the Eye Candy collection for a few weeks now.

Milani Ruby Jewels (China Glaze Ruby Pumps dupe)

It may be hard to believe, but out of my hundreds of nail polishes I actually do NOT own China Glaze Ruby Pumps *gasp*! Instead, I had this one already, and it's a dupe for Ruby Pumps. This is Milani Ruby Jewels, and it is just as breathtaking as that "original red glitter."

Milani - Ruby Jewels

For some reason, I could not get my camera to pick up the depth in this polish, and it also shows as a slightly warmer red here than in person. But in my defense, I actually have never seen a picture that accurately depicts this polish (or any of its dupes). It is the epitome of Christmas red. This polish also applies very nicely, taking just two easy, thin coats to achieve this bright cherry red sparkle.

*EDIT:  I had it wrong... it's Ruby JEWELS, not Ruby Gems  :o)

Hawaiian Color Matte and Blitzen

Of course, because everyone loves China Glaze Fortune Teller mattified, I had to try it with Hawaiian Color as well, and here it is! I just hate how matte topcoats make the polish cloudy instead of just matte. This is China Glaze Matte Magic, but I think I'm going to go looking for Essie Matte About You because it looks like it may be a little better.

China Glaze Matte Magic over Island Girl Hawaiian Color and China Glaze Liquid Leather

NOTE:  Seche Vite's shrinkage drives me nuts... but it's the only one I've found that REALLY dries my polish in minutes.  As in, I took two rambunctious German shepherds to puppy school RIGHT after finishing my nails once and didn't get a single ding!

Oh speaking of, here's a bonus pic of my little white shepherd boy, Blitzen.  I adopted him from the White German Shepherd Rescue here in Phoenix last November and I consider us to be each others' Christmas present last year.

 Blitzen (White German Shepherd)

Isn't he smiley?  He's ALWAYS smiling, where my little girl dog always has sad puppy dog eyes.  It may not show in the picture, but this guy has a HUGE HONKER.  It's a diabolical nose that knocks over anything and everything.  Also, he's the shedding-est dog EVER, and I wouldn't give him up for anything in the world.

Happy Halloween - Island Girl Hawaiian Color Swatch

Happy Halloween!!

I know this looks like China Glaze Fortune Teller, but it's actually Island Girl Hawaiian Color. I wanted so bad to find Fortune Teller a while ago, and when I finally got this polish while in Vegas I was so happy! I don't have both to compare them obviously, but I understand that they are close anyway. Good enough for me! The base color in this is a little brown so I layered one coat over black (China Glaze Liquid Leather, 2 coats) to get a nice black and orange for Halloween.

Island Girl Hawaiian Color over China Glaze Liquid Leather

Fire Kitty and Nails!

So maybe you didn't know this, but I love World of Warcraft. My two mains (nope, I can't pick just one) are a gnome warlock named Whatsit (Chief has a gnome rogue named Whoosit... aren't we cute??) and a feral druid named Zyrah. Last night, Zyrah brought down the 6th boss in Firelands for the third time and Fandral's Flamescythe dropped!

All of my combat is in cat form, and this staff makes my character look like this:

I was so excited that all night I dreamed of ways of putting these flames onto my nails, and here's how it came out. I'm pretty happy with it, though I might do it again with a little more orange next time (less red). I used Zoya Kimmy for the base (2 coats), then lightly brushed Zoya Tanzy over it starting a little farther towards the tips each time, then added just a hint of China Glaze Lighthouse on the very tips.

I'm still so incredibly excited I can't stop squeaking now and then :o)

EDIT:  By the way, all of my Wow characters or on the US Doomhammer server.  Let me know if you have a toon there or would like to try playing and I can send you an invite for a trial account!

Most Underrated Polish from Anchors Away: Knotty

I mentioned in an earlier post that I thought Knotty might be a suitable match for my skin. In fact, this polish is the most perfect nude polish I've found yet. It's got that glass-fleck sparkle (which is fine by me... the more sparkly the better!) and more yellow/tan tone that most of the nude polishes out there. Just look at how BEAUTIFUL this is!  This is two coats and it's still a tiny bit sheer, but I actually like it that way.

China Glaze - Knotty

In my opinion, this is one of the most underrated polishes from the latest China Glaze collection, Anchors Away. It is my favorite just because it matches my skin so perfectly. Although somehow my camera managed to find a slight color difference, I assure you that in person it's a perfect match.  I know this probably won't work on those with pinker, cooler tones in their skin, but if you have more olive tones, you should give this one a shot!  It's quite sparkly in the sun, but it has a nice clean pearly appearance in lower lighting.

On a side note, how do you like my new blog colors? I thought black and grey were a bit boring (although I liked the neutrality contrasting with the colorful polishes) so I tried green and gold. What do you think? Should I keep it or change it back?

Happy New Years!

I hope everyone is having a great New Year so far! Here are some of the colors my family and I sported for the beginning of 2011:

This is one coat of Zoya Trixie with two coats of China Glaze Nova on top. This is probably the most blingy mani I've ever worn. Check out that rainbow-y sparkle!

I got my sister some of the Sally Hansen Salon Effects for Christmas in Frock Star, and she decided to use them for NYE. These are really cool (very much like Incoco), and I will be doing a review post on another design from this line very soon. This one looks like a dupe for Lippmann Happy Birthday, but I don't have it, so I can't compare.

And these are my Mama's NYE nails. I used Barielle Berry Blue (2 coats), then used Nova to create the glitter gradient.

What's your favorite polish for New Year's Eve?

Black Comparison and a New Way of Mattify-ing

I love black nail polish... I don't know what it is, but it looks so classy in an edgy sort of way, and I just love it. So here are two of my black polishes swatched normally with not top coat, just glossy all on their own. On my index and middle is Orly Liquid Vinyl, and on my ring and pinky is China Glaze Liquid Leather.


The Orly is more pitch black than the ChG, which is much more of a charcoal jelly that builds to a black in two coats. Honestly, I CAN tell the difference in person, but I doubt anyone else would notice. The ChG looks deeper, like you're looking into a black pool, while the Orly is darker and looks more like a shiny black surface like patent leather or vinyl.

Now here is my new way of mattify-ing polishes. Honestly, I never got into the matte trend much, but I like it sometimes. Usually I'll take an existing color and use ChG Matte Magic over it, but I hate how it always seems to lighten the color or make it cloudy looking. I got this new buffing block that feels like the buffing surface is just the foam, and not a separate piece of "sandpaper" like on some. I just lightly buffed the topcoat (in this case, Seche Vite) once it had dried in long sweeping motions. Here is the result:


I REALLY like how it comes out. Yeah, it doesn't come out too matte - more like a satin finish, but I think I prefer that anyway - and it shows a bit of buffing stroke lines, but the best part is the lack of cloudiness! I've been considering getting Illamasqua Scorn because of how gorgeously dark it is for being a matte (or satin) black, but I may have found a new way to satisfy the craving.

Here is a picture of the buffing block I used:



What do you think of this way of mattify-ing a polish? Have you ever tried it before? Do you have a favorite matte topcoat?

Another Holiday Manicure

Here's a quick post of a holiday mani I did last week. I saw a similar manicure by All Lacquered Up using Orly's new holiday collection here and loved it, so I figured I'd recreate it as best I could. I used China Glaze Phat Santa and CND Sugar Sparkle to get this look.

China Glaze Phat Santa w/ CND Sugar Sparkle

I love the effect Sugar Sparkle gives - I think it makes it look like a sugary Chrismas candy! I'm thinking of making a "gumdrop" mani with CG Mrs. Claus, Mistletoe Kisses, and Grape Juice. Are there any other colors you think I should add into the mix?? This over each one might give them an even more sugar-coated appearance.

Any holiday mani ideas that you'd like to see?

Emerald Sparkle and Christmas Tree Mani

First up is the beloved Emerald Sparkle from China Glaze. I know this is a favorite among nail polish bloggers, and I understand why. It is just STUNNING. Pictures just don't do this one justice. It is such a rich beautiful green glitter, and it makes the perfect holiday manicure. This could definitely have used a topcoat, but I wanted to try all sorts of stuff on top of it so I didn't use one for this pic.

China Glaze - Emerald Sparkle

Now I have a whole LIST of holiday manicures to try before Christmas, and today I was looking for a perfect "Christmas tree" manicure. I wanted it to look like a green Christmas tree with lights/ornaments on it. Here are the combinations I tried out. I originally had CG Nova on the ring finger, but it covered up the green WAY too much (that one is OPAQUE, let me tell you! Two coats would make a completely opaque mani, I'm sure!) so I redid the ring finger in just Emerald Sparkle so I could compare it with FingerPaints Evergreen Dream.



My favorite ended up being the Hot Topic stars (doesn't have a real name) minus the actual stars (haha) because it has just a smidge of iridescent glitter that doesn't "take over" like the Color Club Si Vous Please did. It's hard to see in the photo, but it adds just a bit of multi-color to the green. I thought the CC and Fairy Dust were just too much.

Notice that I did my thumb in FP Evergreen Dream. This is such a wonderful alternative to Emerald Sparkle when you don't want to have to deal with the painful glitter removal. It's actually a green shimmer, but looks SUPER sparkley in the daylight and sun. It's not quite as deep or rich as ES, but it's still freaking gorgeous. Anyway, I decided to save the glitter hassle of ES for when it is closer to Christmas, and opted for the easier Evergreen Dream this time.

FP Evergreen Dream w/ Orly Prisma Gloss Gold

And here is my Christmas Tree mani! I used Orly's Prisma Gloss Gold over Evergreen Dream, and HOLY GOOSES I love it! It has the perfect amount of "colorful lights" glitter!

Are you excited for the holidays? Have you been doing holiday manis? What do you think of the Christmas Tree mani?