Category: Pictures

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My go-to: Revlon Whimsical.

Does anyone else have a favorite polish they go to whenever they can’t think of how to paint their nails, or are short on time for nail art?

Personally, I have a couple. But one of my favorite go to polishes is Revlon’s Whimsical.

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I fell in love with this polish about 3 years ago when it first started popping up on the nail blogs I followed, but for some reason I didn’t end up buying it until last Summer. It makes me sad I waited so long to jump on the bandwagon because oh my god I love this polish. Whimsical has a milky blue base which contains multi-sized hexagon glitters. The base is very, very sheer–I’ve never tried to build up opacity with multiple layers, but I can tell it would take a few. Instead, I always paint another blue-based base color before applying Whimsical.

For this NOTD, I applied Avon’s Vintage Blue as my base color.

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Vintage Blue on it’s own is a very, very pale baby blue color. I bought this color specifically because of my Buffy the Vampire Slayer pale polish obsession. (I’m a dork.) It’s the perfect pale base for Whimsical though–it brings out the blue milky base, and doesn’t affect the end result any.

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As you can see above, the two colors work really well side by side. They look even better when you apply Whimsical over Vintage Blue.

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See what I mean? So pretty! I applied two coats of Whimsical over Vintage Blue followed by my NutraNail top coat. I could have applied another coat for a denser glitter application. However, (1) I was short on time–I did these about 2 hours before I had to leave for work, and needed them dry before getting ready and (2) I liked how it looked already, so decided it was perfect.

Like I said, this is my go-to solution for “I can’t figure out how to do my nails”. This is a very “me” polish (though I’m sure a lot of people say that haha.) I can’t help but love myself some glitter, and these just feel very girlie to me. Too bad the weather is so wretched outside (again! Bah!) because they would pair perfectly with a cute little Summer dress.

So what is your go-to polish?

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Pure Ice — Wild Thing.

Even though I seem to own a lot of different green polishes, I never seem to wear them as a full manicure–with the exception of the obvious holidays like Christmas and St. Patrick’s Day. Lately, though, I’ve been trying to wear other colors than my usual fall pinks, purples, and coral. So what better time that to chose a color completely out of my comfort zone!

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I picked up Wild Thing by Pure Ice at my local Wal-mart for $1.97. I don’t own very many Pure Ice polishes, even though I always find myself staring at the display. However, this color couldn’t help but catch my eye the last time I was visiting. I’m not even sure what to call this color. It’s bright green, which leans yellow. I’ve seen other bloggers describe it as a “Shrek” green, which seems pretty spot on.

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Application was pretty good on this one–I only needed 2 coats for full opacity. Dry time was also pretty good–I find that’s the trick with polishes that have a tricky formula. Before I applied it, I went online and checked out swatches on other blogs to see what the polish was like (I pretty much do this with every polish after I buy it) so I knew people had some problems with patchiness, so I applied thin coats and let it dry a bit between applications. I also applied my Nutra Nail Speed Dry top coat, which gave it a great glossy shine.

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I like this color. It’s very different for me, but sometimes it’s nice to change things up a bit. I don’t think I’ve worn a straight green manicure outside of Christmas or St. Patrick’s Day since I was probably 15. But it does remind me of green, green grass which makes me think of Summer, so it’s a win in my books. Although I probably won’t wear it everyday (just can’t do it), I think it would make an perfect pedicure color.

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A Peek into my Stash — Part One.

Warning: this post is going to be VERY picture heavy.

So I’ve been thinking for a while of going through my polishes, and actually documenting what I own. With it all packed away in it’s storage unit, something I forget what polishes I actually have. When I saw Confession of a Nail Polish Addict‘s pictures of her own stash, I was inspired to take the work to document my own. I’m going to be breaking it up into a couple posts, just because it would take a crazy long time to take pictures of everything, and then put them in all one post (that would be a lot of pictures!) So instead I’m going by my drawers — today we have the bottom two drawers of my storage uni.

So without further ado, here is part one of my stash post. =)

Continue reading “A Peek into my Stash — Part One.”

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In love with Spring, Coral and Floral.

Happy first day of June!

Oh how happy am I that Spring is in full bloom. Summer has always been my favorite season–I love the heat. So in honor of Summer being all that much closer, I did a pretty floral manicure. There are so many floral/rose and polka dot manis floating around I felt inspired. I’ve been working on perfecting my roses and with my new tiny nail art brushes I got not that long ago, I feel like my technique has definitely improved.

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The polishes I used to create this floral manicure was:

  • Sinful Colors in Island Coral –pinky coral on my nail art free nails.
  • ACO by Ardene in Bridezilla — off white/nude background color of my nail art.
  • Claire’s Neon Purple –roses
  • Unnamed Claire’s Pink shimmer polish –roses
  • Bourjois Paris in 1938 Mais Oui —roses
  • Boujois Paris in 2002 Effect 3D Lip Gloss — roses.
  • ACO by Ardene in Green Peace — darker green of leaves.
  • And another brighter lime green I can’t remember the name of.
  • Nutra Nail Top Speed Top Coat (with green tea.)

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As you can see from the close up of my flowers, they actually (kind of?) resemble roses–or at least I think so. Thanks to my new, and much smaller, nail art brushes creating the swoops of different colors really makes a big difference in how these flowers turned out. I also really like the color combination of the pinks and purples and this Sinful Colors coral. It all makes for a wonderful Spring-soon-to-be-Summer manicure.

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My nails are so happy to soak up the sunshine and increasingly warm weather. I have a feeling that I’ll be creating a lot of floral manicures. Now I just have to find the perfect complimentary spring dress to match, and I’ll be all set for the day.

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From the forgotten stash — Icing’s Romantic/Relaxed.

Today I have another polish from my forgotten stash with you–and another “mood” polish! Like I stated in my other Claire’s mood polish, I was quite obsessed with these when they first came out, as I had never witnessed a thermal polish before so these left me in awe. Now that I have my Mood polishes back, I’m definitely going to have to go on a search to find more for my collection.

Today’s polish is Romantic/Relaxed from Icing’s Mood Swing polishes.

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Romantic/Relaxed is a pink metallic polish with is scattered through out (while cold) which transforms into a gold polish when it is hot. I’d call the darker version of this polish (which I believe is the “romantic” part) almost a blush. The color is very pretty, and subtle and the gold shimmer scattered through out is gorgeous. It also dries to almost a satin finish, but I added top coat to help the polish last longer (and cause–I top coat all my manicures.)

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Romantic/Relaxed while cold.

The magic happens, though, when you hands start to warm up. (And this is why I love this polish SO much) Suddenly your polish goes from a blushy pink to a full on pale gold shimmer. I know I’ve heard some people online in swatches of this polish say they weren’t too keen on the either color, but I think both are beautiful.

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Romantic/Relaxed — while hot (index and middle finger) and cold (ring and pinky).

I was so much more impressed with the change on these as opposed to my Claire’s Mood polishes which I didn’t see as much of a difference while swatching. Icing’s Romantic/Relaxed seems completely unaffected from it’s time spent in a box in the attic.

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Romantic/Relaxed mid-change.

Overall, I really, really love this polish. My only complaint is neither Icing nor Claire’s carries any of their Mood polishes anymore. I really wish they would bring them back because I can guarantee I would purchase every single color they released.  Thermal polish seems to be a popular trend that isn’t slowing down, and now that I’ve been playing with the few that I have I need MORE!

So what do you think of this “mood” polish?