Essie Naughty Nautical from Essie Summer 2013 Collection... Nubar Star Sparkles Detail... POLISH AND PACKAGING Swatch / Review

I picked up Essie Naughty Nautical from their Naughty Nautical Collection Summer 2013. It was the stand out color of the collection that I had to have as soon as I set my eyes on it. I also picked up The More The Merrier, which I will be posting soon. I was going to do a mani with them together, but when I started... it just was not working for me. So I switched to an awesome sparkling detail nail using Nubar Star Sparkles.

THE POLISH
Essie Naughty Nautical is a marine blue-green based, silver shimmer polish. The simmer is very subtle. You can not really see it if you are not looking for it. I absolutely love the color.  Application was on the thick side and dry time was slow. The formula was a let down for me. My entire manicure was ruined within two hours. I had to remove it all because it looked like a total nightmare! And it wasn't like I did my nails and went out to play a game of football either! If I were to use this polish again I would make an extra effort to apply very thin coats and plan tons of time doing nothing during dry time. I applied 2 coats.

I applied 3 coats of Nubar Star Sparkle to my ring finger. I just love this polish with Essie Naughty Nautical. It seems like a perfect accent polish to complement this color. It has amazing sparkle and I included a blurred picture to try to get across the true sparkle-liousness of this polish. Love it. :)

THE PACKAGING 
The bottle is square with rounded corners comes with a labeling on the top of the handle. This makes it easy to see the color without any obstructions of a label on the body of the bottle. The handle is of the shortest and smallest diameter in a standard size bottle that I own. Holding on to the brush is a bit more of a challenge. The brush is a smaller size, narrow brush. Contains 15ml of polish.

THE MANICURE
For this manicure I applied the following:

• OPI Nail Envy...as a treatment coat, 2 coats (applied previous day)
• Milani Smoothe Base Coat....1 coat
  
• Essie Naughty Nautical...2 coats
• Nubar Star Sparkles (detail nail)...3 coats
• Out The Door...as a top coat, 1 coat

THE REST OF THE STORY  

View more Essie Polishes

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Happy Friday and have a great weekend! 

Memorial Day Manicure... Nicole By OPI If The Blue Fits... Sinful Colors Sugar, Sugar... Stamping

Happy Memorial Day ladies! Hope you all had a great Memorial Day weekend and got to participate in some fun since this weekend is the unofficial kick off to the Summer. Barbeque, picnic, pool parties...what did you do this weekend?

I also wanted to take a moment to thank those in the military who died serving our country. This is a day to honor all those that gave up their lives for our freedom. Thank you for your sacrifice for the rest of us!

So for todays manicure I did a Memorial Day theme. I wanted to incorporate a patriotic feel along with a summery, fun feel we all tend to have this weekend every year. So that explains the star stamping image, the BBQ stamping image and the red, white and blue colors. So, what is with the pink in the BBQ stamping? Good question because I stamped it using a white polish!

This mani was one of those that just fought me tooth and nail! I had to redo that ring finger three times! It was just meant to be imperfect from what I was trying to achieve. So this was the least screwed up this looked and I was not will to give it another go and risk another horrendous outcome. I suspect what happened is... because I didn't topcoat the base color before stamping this nail like I did always do. So I think the red bled through the white stamping after I top coated the finished stamping.

For this manicure I applied the following:

• Milani Smoothe Base Coat
• Nicole By OPI If The Blue Fits...2 coats
• Sinful Colors Sugar, Sugar...2 coats
• Out the Door Top Coat...1 coat
•  For All Stamping Sinful Colors Snow Me White was used
• Nail Plate W107 Winstonia
• Seche Vite Top Coat...1 coat

 Have a great week and thanks for stopping by!

Wet n Wild Megalast Private Viewing... POLISH AND PACKAGING Swatch / Review

I am loving this nude. This is up there on my favorite nudes list...at least for my skin tone. I will be reaching for this one again when I am needing a good nude!

Today I have Wet n Wild Megalast Private Viewing. This is one of my favorite lines of polish and I will be posting more colors in this line upcoming postings.

 

THE POLISH

This color is a nude/brown, shimmer polish...in person it is a creme. You can see the very slight shimmer in the photos, but in person I can not see any trace of a shimmer...and I don't wear glasses! I was able to get full coverage with 2 coats. The formula was very easy to work with, not too thick or too thin. Wet N Wild Megalast polishes are 3 free... Toluene, phthalate, and formaldehyde free. It is calcium and mineral fortified to rebalance and prevent nail discoloration. Dry time was very good. It has a faster than average dry time. 

THE PACKAGING

The square bottle is unique and makes a nice presentation. The handle is of good length and makes application easy. The brush is a full brush, which allows polish application in one or two strokes. I personally love the full brush and it works extremely well with my nails, but it may not be ideal if you have narrow nail beds.

THE MANICURE

For this manicure I applied the following:

• Nailtiques 2 Plus...as a base coat
  
• Wet N Wild Megalast Private Viewing...3 coats
•  Nailtiques 2 Plus...as a top coat, 1 coat

THE REST OF THE STORY
See all Wet n Wild Megalast Polishes posts...
The entire line of colors are amazing!

Thanks for stopping by and 
I hope you are having a great week so far! :) 

 

Fig Jam... Revlon Scented Parfume Polish

I was drawn to this color the second I stepped in front of all the Revlon Scented Polishes. It is a warm coppery, peachy, brown color with a lovely gold shimmer. I really am loving the Revlon polishes. They have great colors with good formulation and decent brushes. I have achieved complete coverage in two coats with all the Revlons I tried, except for the Sunshine Sparkle which was a fairly pale yellow...I applied 3 coats. I bet that would have looked just fine with two coats.  I am going to have to try that one using only two coats.

I don't know what in the world that huge bump is in my pinky nail...how annoying! 

Anyway, I avoided these polishes like the plague in the past because they were scented. I thought that would annoy me, but this actually smells pretty good. It is a kind of sweet smell. I have only had this on now for a few hours, but of what I have read the smell wears off after a day. I will update this posting after I find that out first hand.

For this manicure I applied the following:

• Sache Clear Base Coat
• Revlon Scented Parfume in Fig Jam...2 coats
• Out the Door...1 coat

The only slight con about this was the brush. And this is just my personal preference because I like the fatter, fuller brushes. This one is on the skinny narrow side, but that will not stop me from getting more of these. This was over all a good purchase and I will be buying more. : )

And now for the ridiculously cute (IMO) cat pics. This is what it is like at my house when ever I do my nails...it is exhausting apparently!

This is Howie and he always passes out when I am doing my nails. He certainly sleeps hard because he did not even think about opening his eyes...and boy, oh boy does he not care about sprawling out and taking up the whole bed!

Oh what it must be like to be living the good life!

Sassy Cat & Finger Paints... Grape Gumball Style

I loved the last fun, little frog image I used  so much I wanted to do another similar stamping. When I was going through my collection of nail plates I knew I had a sassy little cat image I wanted to use, but finding it among all the various images was the real challenge. I searched and searched and could not find it...had me thinking... well maybe I don't have it and maybe I saw it on someone's blog...it's possible. As I went on to find a different idea,  I finally came across that very cute sassy cat image...yeaaaaah! I got so excited... you would think I won the lottery. I had to calm my self down and remind myself...it's just a nail plate, Kelly! 

Oh the things I get amped up over these days...it does not take much! LOL :) So here it is...I am finally getting around to blogging it. I did it a few days ago.

Hope you like it! I think it is a cute little image of a sassy little cat. I love cats (and all animals) :)

I am really having fun with stamping...I love it!

For this manicure I applied the following:

• Milani Smoothe Base Coat (applied previous day)
• Finger Paints in Grape Gumball...2 coats (applied previous day)
• Out the Door...1 coat (applied previous day)
• Nail Plate RA 113 
• Konad Special Polish in White For Image Color
•  Sache Vite...1 coat

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Finger Paints... Grape Gumball

What I have on here is Finger Paints in Grape Gumball.  I never tried this brand before, so I bought just this one bottle in this brand. I got this polish a while ago because I loved the shade of purple, it is a blue-purple, plus it had a nice silver micro shimmer to it. 

The color is very nice. It is a nice deep blueish-purple, but not too deep...it's perfect.  The formula is good, but the brush is a bit on the narrow side...not a big deal. Coverage is great. It only took 2 coats for complete coverage. Some may be happy with just one coat. It was very close to being completely covered in one coat. Over all this is a good purchase.

For this manicure I applied the following:

• Milani Smoothe Base Coat
• Finger Paints in Grape Gumball...2 coats
• Out the Door...1 coat

Question for you guys... I have been trying a variety of things on my nails for the peeling and weakness of them, but with everything I have been trying it has been keeping my nails from growing. In the past week or so I have not put anything on my nails and they have have finally started growing again. 

Question is... have you experienced this? Weird stuff...what's up with that?

Sinful Colors... Cloud 9....Weird Name For This Color?!?

I wanted to do an orange today. So I selected one that was a bit different than ones that I gravitate toward. I tend to lean toward and purchase more of the coral oranges. This is Sinful Colors in Cloud 9 and is more a golden-orange. It is a bright orange with lighter orange/gold shimmer. This is a nice bright, glow-y orange...not bad?

Is it me, or is this a weird name for this color? When I see *any* shade of orange, the last thing I think of is "Cloud 9".  :-/

 For this manicure I applied the following:

• Milani Smoothe Base Coat
• Sinful Colors in Cloud 9...3 coats
• Out the Door...1 coat

Zoya - Glimmer... TOTALLY A Neutral!

Well, I wanted to go with something that was neutral or a nude, so I selected this one...Zoya Glimmer. And I can not have picked something that was more of a nude on me because I could barely tell I had any polish on and this is 3 coats.  If it was not for the amazing shimmer in this polish I would not have even been able to see this color with my skin tone! This is not my favorite, but it is what I was going for in this manicure.  I think I just prefer all the amazing colors, glitters, textures and art work in the manicures that I have seen from some of the seriously talented blogger out there.

So here is what I did:

• Milani Smoothe Base Coat
• Zoya in Glimmer... 3 Coats
• Out the Door... 1 coat

So as I said, this is not my favorite I just think I need color...  

Give Me Color !

Nicole by OPI... Kim-Pletely In Love... Pretty In Pink

I have been trying to keep my nail in Nailtiques Formula 2 Plus as much as possible and it is recommended in the instructions to apply it without nail polish over top. So that is what I have been trying to do to get my nail stronger and a bit longer, but I am having a hard time resisting all the nail polish I recently purchased.  I wanted to do something along the line of a springtime theme, so this is what I decided on...

 For this manicure I applied the following:

• Milani Smoothe Base Coat
• Nicole by OPI in Kim-Pletely In Love...3 coats
• Out the Door...1 coat

After the fist two coats of polish I really did not like the look of this manicure, but after the third application it wasn't so bad after all. Not my favorite color out there but not too bad. It is a pretty pink with 3 coats applied.

I am working on basic polishing techniques before trying anything too daring and difficult. I recently purchased a bunch of Nail Plates that I just can not wait to try! Baby step... I am taking baby steps, so that will be in due time!

Revlon Sunshine Sparkle

 I wanted to do something outside my normal comfort zone this go around. So I selected a yellow, which I didn't think I was going to like as much as I do. What kept it in my comfort zone is the shimmer. It does have a shimmer to it, which I tend to like the shimmers, sparkles and glitter more than the cremes. I think this is a really pretty shade of yellow and it looks great on.

For this manicure I did the following:

• Milani Smooth Base Coat
• Revlon Sunshine Sparkle...3 coats
• Sally Hansen Hard As Nails
• I used *Nail Life Aromatherapy Drop On Speed Dry

*Regarding the Nail Life Aromatherapy Drop On Speed Dry, it worked great! It did speed up the dry time significantly, it smelled great and has a moisturizer in it.  So with the excess that runs on to your cuticles you can give your cuticle to a little extra bit of moisturizing treatment. This was a great product and I would buy it again.