Nail Layering with Sally Hansen and NARS

I REALLY need to get better about the timing of my posts- I took these pictures last fall. I guess that would be fine, but the two Sally Hansen polishes I used were limited edition and no longer available. I suppose a few may be floating around on eBay if you get desperate enough.

I LOVE layering. It's rare these days for me to wear just one polish by itself. Some times the layering experiments are huge fails and some times they turn out awesome. This was one of the awesome times. I layered Sally Hansen All Aglow, a purple foil-y polish, over NARS Midnight Express, a dark blue jelly, and slapped Sally Hansen Crystal Beading, a sheer multichrome that flashes from teal to blue to purple to pink, over the top. My pictures didn't manage to capture the best duochrome actions, but it was fabulous. Trust me.

Zoya Swatches

Sooooo... I got the makeup counter job I wanted. The one I only had a million interviews for. Well, 4. But still. The last one was a "structured phone interview" where they fire questions at you and don't give you any feedback at all. Nor can they clarify anything. It was kind of weird, but my boss said I passed with flying colors. Apparently 2 other people from other stores made it all the way up to the final phone interview like I did but they failed to get the job. Unlike me! It's nice to know that other people believe in me. It just makes me want to work extra hard to prove myself. I'm not sure I'm allowed to say what the company is. I don't see why it should be a problem, but when the lady comes to train me I'll ask her about it. It will probably be pretty easy to figure out eventually anyway seeing as most of my paycheck will go right back to them and I DO have a makeup blog. So yay me!

Well, this is SUPPOSED to be a makeup/nail blog. Although recently it seems to mostly be nail polish. And continues to be such with today's post.  I have swatches of the 7 nail polishes I picked up during Zoya's Earth Day sale. I'm excited because I loved them all. Usually there is at least one that disappoints me, but not this time!

From left- Kennedy, Wednesday, Zuza, Skylar, Lotus, Tru, and Rory

I guess I was in the mood for blues and purples!

All of the following swatches are 2 coats with no base or top coat. Sorry for the messy swatches. I still need to get a new clean-up brush.

Zoya Kennedy in the sun

Surprisingly this is one of my favorites. I hesitantly added it to my cart after really falling in love with swatches and I'm so glad. I LOVE it. It's a pink based nude while most others seem to be yellow based. I have my good friend Maribeth of Obsessive Cosmetics Hoarders Unite to thank for my recent foray into nude polishes. If you don't already follow her, you should. She's amazing!

Zoya Kennedy in the shade

Zoya Wednesday in the sun

I can never get enough of this type of color. With creme finishes I usually have the urge to slap some glitter over them, but this one is pretty enough to be left alone. In case you missed my last post, I found a dupe of this one from Sinful Colors.

Zoya Wednesday in the shade

Zoya Zuza in the sun

This color was the one I was most excited for. It's a teal foil and completely different from anything in my collection. I love it.

Zoya Zuza in the shade

Zoya Skylar in the sun

Skylar is a dusty slate blue with multicolored shimmer flecks- mostly gold, pink and blue although they can tend to look silver. It is ridiculously pretty too.

Zoya Skylar in the shade

Zoya Lotus in the sun

I've been wanting this one forever! It has the same size shimmer flecks as Skylar, but they are pink.

Zoya Lotus in the shade

Zoya Tru in the sun

This is a similar concept to Lotus, but different enough I had to own them both. Tru has a more saturated red-violet base versus the dusty purple of Lotus. And instead of the pink shimmer, this one looks more reddish gold.

Zoya Tru in the sun

I guess I forgot to get a picture of this one in the shade!

Zoya Rory in the sun

Rory is another one that isn't my typical nail polish. I don't wear pinks that often, but when I do I prefer a bolder, more in-your-face color. This is a more delicate pink, but it's a foil and another that is completely unique in my collection. I'm so glad this one didn't disappoint.

Zoya Rory in the shade

And of course I could pass up an opportunity to assault you with cute pictures of my pug. She's sleeping in my mom's bed. My mom and her always take naps together; it's so cute.

So did you guys pick up any polishes during the Earth Day sale?  If you don't already have an account with Zoya you can use my link here. If you sign up using my link we each get a coupon for a free polish. If you use this coupon and add 2 more polishes to your order, you will get free shipping, too. So 3 nail polishes for $16 when with shipping would normally cost you about $30. Zoya always has the best deals. I love them!

The Miracle of Magnetic Nail Polish, How Does It Work?

First of all, if you get the reference in the title, props to ya. I'm not one to throw around memes lightly. If you don't get it, here ya go. You probably still won't get it, but that is the glory of memes.

Ahh, fucking magnets. While I don't think we will ever know how they work (if you really want to know, read a little further into the post), they do make for a pretty cool effect on nail polish. I've been wanting some magnetic nail polish pretty much since my nail polish obsession began almost 3 years ago. Luckily more and more polish companies are starting to release them. While they're still pretty expensive (The cheapest I've seen is about $15), I think they're worth. I picked 2 up from the brand Layla ("You got me on my knees...") on Ebay and love them to pieces. I know people have complained that it can be difficult to get the pattern the same on each nail, but I didn't have too much problem with it and I'm incredibly clumsy. The magnets on the Layla bottles have a line on them so you can see exactly which way the pattern will face.

The formula is pretty thick, but still flows well. You might get away with just one coat, but I did two. I first painted all of my nails. Then I went back, painted a nail and immediately after put the magnet up to it. At first I didn't think I liked the effect and felt a little "that's it?" after my three years of anticipation, but it grew on me. I want ALL THE COLORS now.

So, how it actually works. There are tiny metal pieces in the polish (they don't affect the texture of the polish. It mostly feel like a "regular" nail polish). The lid of the polish has a magnet in it with a design and when you place the magnet over the wet (It has to be wet! It's better to do one nail at a time) polish as close as you can without touching the nail, the magnet pulls the metal particles in the polishes together recreating the design. The lighter parts in the pictures below are where the metal particles concentrated due to the magnet.

Layla Magneffect in Purple Galaxy

Layla Magneffect in Purple Galaxy

Layla Magneffect in Purple Galaxy

Available:

• Just search on Google and you can find these polishes from several places. I bought mine for $15.50 on eBay from here, because they had free shipping. I received my order quickly and it was packaged well.

Thank you for reading and have a great day/night/whatever!

Wet n Wild Limited Edition ColorIcon Ice Baby Nail Color Collection Swatches

I was so excited to find these nail polishes along with the baked palettes and the matte palette at my local Walgreens. The drug stores near me NEVER carry any limited edition collections. Instead they have ugly gift sets of cheap cologne and rock hard eyeshadow palettes. The display was missing two of the colors, 24 Carats and Give Me A Price, but I'll post pictures of those as soon as I can get my greedy little hands on them. I absolutely love these glitters! Apparently a few of them are dead on dupes of some Nails Inc polishes (see Scrangie's comparison here) and a few look like the limited edition mini set of Deborah Lippmann polishes from Nordstrom (see swatches here). Of course I prefer Wet n Wild's because they're cheaper!

I used three coats to get full coverage with all 6 polishes. Some you could probably get away with using 2 coats. The formula wasn't terrible for being opaque glitter polishes in a clear base, but some thinner might help the thickness a bit. And these do dry very... textured. You will need a few coats of top coat to get that glass-like finish I'm obsessed with. Some thicker glitters don't layer well, but I found that one coat looks amazing over black. I'll show the layered swatches at the end. Also, those are the only ones with top coat. All others are left in their natural, gritty glory.

Sorry for the bad clean up on my nails. That's what i get for doing swatches while sick.

Rockin' Rubies in the sun

Rockin' Rubies in the shade

Cost Is No Issue in the sun

Cost Is No Issue in the shade

Believe Me, It's Real in the sun

Believe Me, It's Real in the shade

Back Alley Deals in the sun

Back Alley Deals in the shade

It's All In The Cut in the sun

It's All In The Cut in the shade

Diamond In The Rough in the sun

Diamond In The Rough in the shade

From left- Rockin' Rubies, Cost Is No Issue, and Believe Me, It's Real over black

From left- Back Alley Deals, It's All In The Cut, and Diamond In The Rough over black

What do you guys think? Do any stand out to you, or do you plan on picking any up?


Available:

• These retail for $2.99 and are limited edition. Check out this interactive map by Nouveau Cheap to see if the collection has been spotted in your area.

Thank you for reading and have a great day/night/whatever!

Purple Color Morphing Franken- So Awesome!

This post is pretty pic heavy (9 pictures!) for a post about one nail polish. Like I mentioned yesterday I bought some color morphing powders from More Nail Polish and they are fabulous! I know people always say this, but I can't stop staring at my nails. I even make my boyfriend look at them several times a day. "LOOK," I say, waving my fingers in his face. "Look at all the colors it changes to!"

Enough talk, MOAR PEEKSHURS!  Make sure you make it the end, I saved the best for last!

In the sun

This is pretty, but it's by far the least impressive picture.

Oh, and here is what I used, just in case anyone is curious. I used a 5 ml bottle I bought from TKB Trading. This is actually 2 polishes. A purple base and a topcoat. They both have the color morphing powder in them. The purple polish is 2/3 Milani Totally Cool, 1/3 Wet n Wild Eggplant Frost and 3 to 4 tiny scoops of red to green color morphing powder. If I had to do it again I would use some clear polish instead of so much of Totally Cool. The fairly opaque base ate up the color morphing powder and the effect wasn't as strong. So I had to use a top coat which was just 1 or 2 scoops of the same powder in TKB's Glamour Base (a clear polish for suspending glitter/larger pigments).

In the shade

Macro of my huge thumb nail

Thank you for reading and have a great day/night/whatever!