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Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Nicole by OPI Holiday Glitters - Swatches and Review

  In the next couple of weeks, prepare to see several recent winter polish collection swatches.  Since my nails have been so peely and ugly lately, it has taken me awhile to get to some of these collections, and I know you have all seen them by now from others, but it can never hurt to see polish on as many different types of hands as possible when trying to decide if a color is right for you!  All swatches shown are 2-3 coats, no base, with top coat.

 My Sleigh's In The Shop

Natural light
Gorgeous fuchsia and silver microglitter.  This one dries fairly smooth.

Artificial light
Orna-ment For Each Other

Natural light
 Beautiful cherry red mixed with scattered gold glitter.  Similar to the one above, this one dries fairly smooth.

Artificial light
Glitter In My Stocking

Natural light
 The counterpart to Orna-ment, this is a yellow-gold with scattered red glitter.  It is slightly larger glitter and dries just a tad more bumpy.

Artificial Light
Snow-Man Of My Dreams

Natural Light
 This one is a light blue with multi-colored glitter.  It is also a bit larger glitter and dries a bit bumpy.  It is also a fairly close dupe for last year's OPI Simmer and Shimmer from the Burlesque collection - if you missed out on that one, I would highly recommend this!

Artificial Light
Overall Review

I was really pleased with this small collection of glitters.  All four colors are absolutely gorgeous, and the formulas were very nice for glitters.  I was a little sad that Snow-man turned out to be a dupe of last year's Simmer and Shimmer, but other than that there was nothing disappointing about this collection!  Hard to pick a favorite or clear winner here, as all four of them are stunning.  I highly recommend grabbing these if you haven't yet, before they are gone!  Also, check back later this week for a chance to win this collection!

I hope you all had a great Christmas!  Nova sure did enjoy her very first Christmas - Santa left quite a few fun toys and treats in her stocking.  Her favorite was her giant candy cane bone, which she attacked with pure joy.  Happy Holidays!  :)


DISCLOSURE: The polishes featured in this post was provided to Polishology by OPI for review purposes.  This is an honest and independent review and was in no way influenced by the company.

Saturday, December 24, 2011

Merry Christmas!

  Hope everyone has been having a fabulous Christmastime week!  I know I have been having a lot of fun with family coming into town and present wrapping and decorating... not to mention my committee meeting at work that went pretty well.  I have actually been so busy with that I spent two whole days with naked nails.  Now I finally have them decked out for Christmas!

Natural lighting
  For these Christmas nails, I stared off with two coats of OPI Glitzerland on all but the ring finger, and for the ring finger did three coats of China Glaze Twinkle Lights, a gorgeous gold, red, and green glitter from their 2011 Let It Snow collection.  Then I added water marbling of the same colors to all of the other nails, using OPI Glitzerland, OPI Affair in Red Square, and Zoya Holly.  I really like how the colors on the marbled nails are just about the exact colors found in the glitter - it really ties everything together nicely!  I got a lot of compliments on this one at the family party last night, which is always fun.  :)

  Hope you all have a great Christmas Eve today and a Merry Christmas tomorrow!  As a heads up, next week I will be giving away the Nicole by OPI Holiday Glitters collection for a "New Year... New Polish!" giveaway - so be sure to come back and enter!

Monday, December 19, 2011

Wintery Christmas - Free Hand Style!

  I finally did it!  I took the plunge and decided to try my luck at free-hand nail art!  I am very proud of this, since I have been shying away from it for so long, assuming it would turn out terrible.  And while it is not totally amazing, it is at least a start - and still fairly cute, in my opinion.  :)

Natural Light
  For these nails, I started off with two coats of OPI What's With the Cattitude? as the light sky blue base.  On all but the ring finger, I stamped snowflakes using Konad White and plate m59.  I also sponged white onto the tips in a fluffy gradient to give the look of snow.  Finally, I painted the reindeer on the ring finger.  I started off with OPI Suzi Loves Cowboys for the dark brown, then OPI San Tan-Tonio for the muzzle and antlers.  I did the eyes with a dotting tool and added the red rhinestone for his nose.  Finally I attempted some mouth-lines with black, but they came out a bit thicker and fuzzier than I had hoped.

  Overall I am very pleased with my first attempt at free-hand nail art.  The reindeer came out looking just a tad bit like some other sort of animal (his face is a bit too round, I realized)... so whether he looks like a reindeer to you, or he looks more like a dog/monkey/walrus/seal/otter with antlers, that is not the point.  The point is that I finally took the plunge, and whatever species he is, he is still pretty cute.  So you can expect to see me playing around with freehand more often on here now, yay!  If you have any ideas or suggestions or anything, let me know! :)

Saturday, December 17, 2011

Holiday Gifts

  I knew I was going to have to use the gorgeous green Nfu Oh 55 for something Christmas-y, and I thought these cute little present stamps made a perfect match!

Outdoors, shade
  For this manicure, I started off with two coats of Zoya Ivanka as a shimmery green base.  I then layered on two coats of Nfu-Oh 55, and the result was pretty much exact bottle color with jut two coats of the super-sheer Nfu-Oh.  I added the cute presents using Konad Special White and Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Rapid Red using the Bundle Monster plate BM205.

Indoors, artificial light
   I love Nfu-Oh flakies, they are so amazing.  This polish was perfect for the season and looked great.  I don't often wear all green, but this is a great time of year - and a great polish! - to do it with!

Wednesday, December 14, 2011

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

  Finally, a week and a half before Christmas, I have a festive mani for you.  With trying to baby these nails, the busy schedule of work/school, and being sick, I feel like I haven't had time to do half of the holiday nails I wanted to have done by now.  There is still time though!  I would prepare for quite a lot of holiday manicures in the upcoming week and a half.  :)

Natural Light
  For these nails, I started off with OPI DS Bold, followed by a heavy sponging of the tips with Zoya Ivanka.  Finally, I topped it off with silver swirls using Zoya Trixie and Konad plate m64.  The overall effect was very sparkly and festive.  I took this manicure off on Friday... and I haven't painted my nails again yet.  :(  Still sick, but I will paint my nails today - sometime in between studying for my final and sleeping on the couch.

Monday, December 12, 2011

DS Bold

  I have been sick the past couple of days... so not cool, especially considering that my final is Friday and I need to be studying.  I slept from 8:00 pm last night until 3:30 the next afternoon with the exception of maybe 2-3 hrs.  Crazy.  I also haven't gotten around to painting my nails in about 3 days because of this, so they just have a couple of coats of a clear base.  But I am proud of myself, I haven't bit them, or even been tempted - yay! :)

Outdoors, shade
  Today I wanted to share with you OPI DS Bold, the second newly released DS shade from OPI.  This bright cherry jelly is packed with pink and silver glitter.  This is two coats, which went on nice and smooth.  It is a really nice polish.

Sunlight
  That being said, I really have a hard time justifying this one being labeled as "DS" with the price bump.  As I am sure many of you guessed or have read, it is a dupe for China Glaze Mrs. Claus from last year's holiday collection.  It just doesn't have that extra... something... to justify the DS price tag, in my opinion.  Gorgeous?  Yes.  $4 more expensive gorgeous?  Probably not quite.  Temptation was a hard enough stretch for me, but this one, while very nice, probably doesn't quite fit in with the DS line.  Lets hope that next time we see new DS polishes, they really earn that price increase and the designation "Designer Series."

  I am curious as to what you all think - do you agree that the new DS releases aren't quite worthy of the title?  They are still very pretty though.  On Wednesday I will post a fun Christmas mani I did with this one!

DISCLOSURE: The polishes featured in this post was provided to Polishology by OPI for review purposes.  This is an honest and independent review and was in no way influenced by the company.

Friday, December 9, 2011

How many times can I Break til I Shatter?

  In my quest to grow out these peeling, unhealthy nails, I suffered another setback last week when I had a bad break and had to cut them all back.  Good news?  I think they are FINALLY starting to get a bit stronger now... but I hated losing the bit of length I had grown back.  I guess I would rather them be short and strong for now though.  Hopefully I can achieve long and strong soon!

Natural light
  After the break I went with something simple.  This is Meep Meep Meep from the OPI Muppets collection, topped off with a coat of OPI Black Shatter.  I love the contrast between these two colors and the finish on Meep Meep Meep is incredible!

Sunlight
  This weekend I am finally going to get around to doing some swatching!  I think my nails should be able to handle it by now, even if the swatches will be a bit short.  So expect to see a lot of the more recent collections soon!  Also, I will have a (slightly late) holiday giveaway coming up.  Hope everyone is having great end of the year!

Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Polka Dots and Bows

  Here is a cute and girly mani I put together using polka dots and bows.  Becky's comment was "This is really cute.  I should be wearing it, not you."  Hm... thanks Becky. :P  Surprisingly, this was not done for a K-State event, haha.. although it would have been good!

Natural light
   I started off with Zoya Kendal from the Feel collection on all but the ring finger, and Sally Hansen Xtreme White On for the ring finger.  I then used Zoya Mira for the polka dots (Kendal for the dots on the ring finger) using plate BM-211.  Finally, bows were added in Konad White (Malia for the ring finger) using plate m59.  I like the design a lot, I will have to remember it for the future perhaps with some different colors as well.  The big bows are cute.  :)

Friday, December 2, 2011

Beyond the Mistletoe

  Okay, I will be completely honest, I have no idea what this color has to do with mistletoe.  That being said, this is an amazing polish.

Outdoors, sunlight
  Color Club Beyond The Mistletoe is a dazzling light blue holo glitterbomb.  This is three coats, and application was fairly decent, for a chunky glitter.  Like most chunky glitters it had some chipping problems, but I am totally willing to put up with it.  Look at that holo effect!  This polish is just totally and completely stunning.  It is the only one I got from this collection (darned budget) and I am glad it is the one I picked.  So wintery and fun!

Outdoors, shade
  Gorgeous even in the shade, with light blue and holo rainbow glitters.  I am sort of wishing I had gotten some more from this collection... maybe I will have to order a few next time I order online... :)