Breast Cancer Awareness - Pretty Pink French

  I have gotten some really amazing comments from all of you who have entered my giveaway so far, thank you so much!  I look forward to receiving many more suggestions on how to improve the blog.  I am definitely taking your comments into consideration and planning on adding some things to the blog in the near future!

  Today I have a french mani that I wore earlier this week.  I wanted to do a pretty light pink mani in support of Breast Cancer Awareness month this October.

Outdoors, full sun, no flash

  For these nails, I started of with a basecoat of NailTek followed by two coats of  Sephora by OPI A True Romantic.  Then I used Konad plate m19 using Konad Special White polish twice on each nail.  I topped this off with a coat of Seche Vite.

  From there, my original plans changed a bit.  I had been planning on using a darker pink polish for the embellishment, but I realized that my K-State Wildcats were playing our biggest rival, KU, in football the next day.  I have a superstitions belief that my nails must be somehow purple for us to win.  I don't really believe this, but it is fun and I usually try to do something purple for games.  So I used OPI Funky Donkey and Konad plate m35 to put purple hearts on the nails.  We completely crushed KU, if you are interested.  :)  After that, I decided the mani needed a bit of sparkle so I layers one thin coat of OPI Princesses Rule! and topped it off with one more coat of Seche Vite.

Outdoors, shade

  Unfortunately, I was not able to take pictures right away and some damage happened to the mani before I was able to get pictures for the blog (like a polish smudge on my ring finger and a bit of a chip on my index finger).  But it was still pretty and I actually wore these for three days afterward - a combination of loving the nails and being too sick to change them, heh.  I did have some issues with using the Konad french tips, since they have to be fairly perfectly straight to look right, but I am pleased with the overall outcome and will be excited to use the plate again in the future!

  Please take the time this month, and all year, to think about those people who are fighting, have beaten or have lost the fight with breast cancer.  If you are interested in donating money to the cause, here is a link to the donation page at SUSAN G. KOMAN FOR THE CURE.  They are a fabulous organization that funds a lot of brilliant research into treatments for breast cancer.  Coming from a cancer researcher, thank you so much for any donations you are able to give.  They are very much appreciated!

Giveaway Time!

 Giveaway is now CLOSED.  Thank you for entering! :)

  I have had these sitting around for awhile, and I was originally planning on waiting until 150 followers to start up this giveaway.  But... I figure I am close enough. :)  I couldn't wait any longer to do this to thank all of you who visit and comment, I am coming to really enjoy this community!  One lucky winner will receive these two sets.

Polishology's Second Giveaway Prizes

  Included is LA Colors Color Craze Metallics LE Series, which I have swatched and reviewed HERE.  This set includes four shiny metallic polishes in magenta, deep purple, green and steel gray.

LA Color Craze Metallics

  Also included is the ULTAProfessionals Cocktail Hour Minis set, which includes five fabulously shimmery polishes, perfect for fall and for the holidays!  These include Raspberry Mojito, Cranberry Mojito, Sangria, Blue Kamikaze, and Black Russian.

ULTA Professionals Cocktail Hour Minis

  This giveaway will run until 11:59 pm, Central Time, on Friday November 5th.  I am giving you all a LOT of extra entry options in this one!  Please try to submit all of your entries in one post, it is really helpful!  Here is the entry form!

Mandatory:
1) You MUST be a follower to enter; old and new, international included!  Please tell me the name under which you are following and include an e-mail address I can contact you at!  This is worth 1 entry.

Optional:
2) Blog about this giveaway, either in a post, on your sidebar or on a separate giveaway section (1 entry).  If you include a picture, this is worth an additional entry (2 entries total).  Please leave the link where you blogged, and mention if you used a picture.

3) Add or already have Polishology on your blogroll.  Please leave a link to your blog (1 entry)

4) Follow Polishology on Twitter!  You can find my profile HERE.  Please tell me the name you are following under (1 entry).

5) Tweet about this giveaway.  Include @polishology in your tweet, please!  Leave me a link to the status update. (1 entry)

6) Please tell me what you would like to see me do with this blog in the future.  This may include things like more or less: nail art, swatches, comparisons, personal narrative, posting frequency, brands of polish/types of polish covered, tutorials, pictures of my kitties (haha, of course everyone wants more of those!) etc.  Basically, tell me where you would like to see this blog go in the future.  What will make you enjoy it more?  I want to make sure it is both fun for me as well as my readers, so I would love your feedback!  This is worth 3 entries.  I really want to encourage this one, because I want your help making Polishology great!

  That is a grand total of 9 possible entries.  Please make sure to leave your e-mail address for me, or I will not be able to contact you if you win!  The winner will be chosen shortly after the November 5th deadline by Random.org, in the same manner as the last giveaway.  The winner will be notified by e-mail and given 72 hours to respond; if I do not hear back from them a new winner will be chosen.

  Thank you all so much for following, for entering this giveaway, and for being such a great community!  You guys are awesome! :D

Zoya Cheryl vs OPI DS Jewel

  When I first received my Zoya Cheryl in the mail, Becky was over here and she was wearing DS Jewel.  Instantly we noticed that the two seemed very similar.  I looked for a comparison between the two and didn't find one, so I decided to go ahead and do one for you all!

  You can see that in the bottle, the colors do seem to look quite similar.  Even here you can tell that DS Jewel looks just a touch more pink, but it is really hard to tell if there is much of a noticeable difference or not.

Outdoors, sun

  On the nail, there is definitely a huge difference.  Cheryl is a much darker color, with Jewel being lighter and again, pinker.  Another huge difference was opacity - Cheryl took only two coats, while Jewel took four coats to achieve full opacity.  However the drying time on Jewel is decent, so the extra coats didn't bother me that much.  Cheryl did have a small amount of bumpiness going on that I wasn't really expecting (which you can see a bit in the close-ups, especially around the shade-to-light zone), while DS Jewel was totally smooth.  However Zoya definitely wins on application between these two with its high pigmentation and two coats.

Zoya Cheryl

OPI DS Jewel

  In the close-up photos above the differences are very apparent.  In addition to having the overall more burgundy-brown look, DS Jewel also has rosy pink microglitter, as well as some gold that is hard to capture.  Cheryl instead has coppery, metallic glitter.

Indoors, artificial lighting

  So as it turns out, these are very different.  Both are fabulous fall (or winter) shades, and I really like them both a lot.  Zoya Cheryl belongs to me, and OPI DS Jewel belongs to my sister Becky, so I will definitely be borrowing DS Jewel again at some point for a full mani using it.  I love both the more bull brown/coppery look of Zoya and the rosy effect of the OPI DS.  Which is your favorite?

Multicolor Konad on Zoya Cheryl

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  When I first saw swatches for Zoya's Wicked and Wonderful collections, I knew that I needed Cheryl.  First off because it is completely gorgeous, and second because it is my Mommy's name!  I was thrilled when I got it in the mail last week and even more so to try it out.  I also tried something a bit different with Konad this time - I used two colors on one stamp pattern, and I think it turned out very pretty.

Outdoors, partial sun, no flash

  For these nails, I started off (after base coat) with two coats of Zoya Cheryl, which is a gorgeous chocolate-bronze polish with a sparkly almost metallic finish in the sun.  It is simply stunning, and coverage was great - one coat was almost opaque but I needed the second for just a touch of bare spots here and there.  Application was fairly smooth, dry time decent and it is beautiful!  I have included some pictures of Cheryl by itself near the end of the post.

Materials Used

  I decided to try something a bit new with Konad as well this time.  Using plate m54, as well as Konad Special White and Ulta Lilac Chrome, I stamped a multi-colored tulip pattern onto the nails.  I was a bit worried whether I would be able to pull it off or not at first, but it worked out really well.

  With the Konad polish is so thick I was able to apply it only where I wanted it on the plate, even though the lilac expanded where it wanted to go when I placed it on the main tulip. This was a fun technique and I will definitely be trying it more in the future!  I did have a bit of a problem picking up the full design on several of these, and I am not sure why.  It may in part be because the design is so delicate and thin?  I have seemed to have the most issues with those in the past.  Whatever the reason, it still looks fairly good I think, even if I did manage to smudge it a bit again when I applied top coat of Seche Vite.  You cannot really see these smudges in reality, just on these pictures, so that is good.  Even with these few errors, I am very pleased with how these nails turned out!  :)



  Here are a couple of pictures of Zoya Cheryl by itself.  This is a seriously beautiful color!

  Have you ever done multi-color Konad designs?  If so, I would love to see them!  Post a link in the comments below if you'd like to share! Also, I will be starting up a new giveaway very soon, so be on the lookout.  Hope you have a happy Monday.

Jessica Funkytown Toes - And Kitty Pictures!

  Several days ago I ordered Jessica Funkytown from the Paint The Town collection online.  It looked really pretty on swatches and I loved the bottle.  I received it yesterday, and was dying to use it - but I wasn't quite ready to take off my fairytale bubbles mani yet.  So... new pedi time!

Outdoors, partial sun, no flash

  I know that some of you are not the biggest fan of toesies pics, but this polish is too pretty not to share!  It is an absolutely gorgeous purple/pink/blue chunky glitter polish that is super sparkly; the pictures I was able to get simply did not do it justice.  The downside to this polish is that it is very sheer - this is five coats of Jessica Funkytown for full coverage!  In the future I may choose to use a base of a darker purple and try for less coats to see what that looks like.  However it was worth it, as it is totally gorgeous.  Not too bumpy either, a coat of Seche Vite smoothed this out to perfection.

Up close and personal with the glitter

  The polishes from this collection come in little paint can bottles, how cute is that?  Overall very pleased with this polish, it will probably stay on my toes for quite a while!

The cutest bottle!

  UPDATE: After a long day (which is why my toes are even more nasty, so sorry!) I noticed tonight at 2 am that the lighting in my room right now gave me a nice photo of this polish.  This gives just a slight feel for how sparkly this polish is, and also shows a bit more of its true color; it is a bit darker than the original picture, and a bit more red toned those pictures show (they are very blue).  It is still impossible to capture how pretty this is, but this may help for those who are interested in the polish - which you should be! :)

Indoors, artificial light, no flash

 I figured this might be a good time to show a couple of kitty pictures, to make up for only having pedi pictures to share today.  And because they are just so adorable!  Here are my two babies!

Leo, chilling on my couch in my study

Luna outside

  Luna loves being outside on her leash.  Leo hates it, which is funny because Leo probably enjoys looking outside the most out of the two (of course they both love staring out windows).  I just realized today that I hadn't shared any kitty pictures with you all other than Luna up there on the banner so I thought you should see the crazy babies!  Hope you have a great weekend and I should have new nails for you very soon!