Wheel B14: Light Blue Cremes

Today for Nail Wheel Wednesday I have light blue cremes, many of the kind I think of as "mint blue", since some lean ever so slightly green.

 

1. Orly Color Blast Forget Me Not (3 coats)
2. L'Oreal Royally Yours (2)
3. L'Oreal Blue My Mind (2)
4. L'Oreal Hit the Waves (2)
5. L'Oreal Blissful Blue (2)
6. Sephora Formula X Infatuated (3)
7. Sephora Formula X Ding Bat (3)
8. Zoya Lillian (3)
9. LA Girl Ombre unnamed (2)
10. Ciate Ferris Wheel (3)
11. Bonita Salon Fairytale Dreams (3)
12. SinfulColors Tidal Wave (3)
13. Sally Hansen Insta Dri Vandal Eyes (2)
14. SinfulColors Wonder Mint (2)
15. Cover Girl Outlast Stay Brilliant Skylight (3)
16. Nails Inc. Chelsea Physic Garden (2)
17. Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Wet Suit (2)
18. Essie Sea the Sights (2)
[such a pretty finish on these Cashmere Matte colors] 19. Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure I Do Blue (2)
20. Bonita Salon Juvia (2)

Bottles 1 through 5:

 

6 through 10:

 

11 through 15:

 

16 through 20:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Zoya Avi with Leopard Spots Topper

One of Zoya's special deals hit me at just the right time late last year, and I got about a dozen polishes along with my big refill bottle of Remove+. Today I've got two of those polishes to share, starting with Avi, a creme that the Zoya website describes as "a smoky greige cream with a hint of red-brown". My swatch is two coats.

 

Avi seems to be something of a chameleon. On me, it pulls toward a greyed out purple. I've seen other swatches that look way less grey and way more purple. I don't see any of the red-brown the description mentions on my nails.

 

Because I have some odd desire to own as many crackle-type polishes as I can, I included the Leopard Spots Topper in my order. It's a black crackle that Zoya says gives "an edgy leopard spots effect". They also say to use it over a textured polish but you know I didn't listen and put it over this creme called Avi. I did a thick coat on my index finger with thinner ones on my other fingers. None of them especially looked like leopard spots to me, so I guess I will have to try it again over a texture at some point.

 

 

Wheel A14: Drugstore Glitters, Part 4

Today on Nail Wheel Wednesday, I have the fourth and final installment of the Drugstore Glitters mini-series (part three is here). This is all the colors that didn't fit on the other wheels due to space or other reasons. There's some red and pink and purple along with blue and green and multis and black.

 

(all have clear topcoat in addition to glitter coats noted below; some will need more/thicker topcoat if I decided to wear these in a full mani) 1. Sation Summer Night Sparkle (3 coats)
2. Mardis Gras unnamed (3)
3. Princessa Sparkle Pink (3)
4. Sation Sandy Glo (3)
5. XOXO unnamed (3)
6. Princessa Cinderella Sparkl (3)e
7. Pincessa Magic Esmerald (3) [I don't even know what that name is; I don't think this polish was green when I bought it, so doesn't seem like "emerald" is right]
8. Black Radiance Girls Rock Pretty Girl Rock (3)
9. Black Radiance Girls Rock Violet Couture (3)
10. Sation Prettiest Player (3)
11. Sation Periwinkle Princess (3)
12. Sation Let's Mingle and Jingle (2)
13. Sation Tall Dark & Has Some (3)
14. XOXO unnamed (3)
15. Sation Most Hue-nique (3)
16. Sation Class Clown (3)
17. Sation Band Beauty (3)
18. Sation Holiday Spirit (3)
19. Sation Videogame Vixen (3)
20. Princessa New Eve at Vegas (3)

Bottles 1 through 5:

 

6 through 10:

 

11 through 15:

 

16 through 20:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Great Lakes Lacquer Olive Succulents

Even though I didn't have anywhere to go, I took yesterday off blogging for the MLK holiday (I also took it off skiing since I wanted to avoid all the visitors who came up to the mountain for the long weekend). Today I'm back, not with the swatches of the polishes I used in the Northern Lights mani that are now at least a week overdue from when I'd hoped to get them up, but with a quick look at a polish from Great Lakes Lacquer that I picked up last year: Olive Succulents. It was a custom done for a Facebook group, which generally I try to pretend I don't see because I can't keep track of every group and every box and every collab, but I saw a swatch of this one in the GLL fan group and it just grabbed me, so I joined the Olive Polish group so I could buy it. It has a dusty green base with shifting shimmer and some scatteered holo pigment.

 

Though this wasn't sold as a topper, I had to try it as one since I'd seen swatchers using three coats (or even four thin ones). So I put Essie Exposed, a dusty olive green creme, on my index and middle fingers before I opened my bottle of Olive Succulents. I left Exposed alone on my index for comparison purposes, then added a coat of Olive Succulents over it on my middle finger. My ring finger and pinky got three coats of Olive Succulents by itself.

 

Tipping my hand just slightly got the shift in the shimmer to show; where once there was blue, now there was lilac. It was more visible over the darker olive base, but still showed on its own.

 

 

 

In direct light, the holo particles added some sparkle, but the shifty shimmer was still the star.

 

I'm glad I grabbed this one. The green base makes it more interesting than if the same shimmer had been put in a more mainstream color. I've been tempted by some of the other group customs since I joined the olive group, but haven't gotten them since they haven't been from brands I like as well as Great Lakes Lacquer.

Wheel Z13: Yellow Shimmers

There hasn't been much sun on my mountain the past several days since we're in a storm cycle where it snows and snows, but I've got sunny yellow shimmers for Nail Wheel Wednesday. In many of these, the shimmer is nearly invisible out of the bottle; it may be there just to help the color apply better (why shimmer helps that, I do not know, but it seems to).

 

1. Sally Hansen Insta Dri Glow With It (2 coats)
2. Cover Girl XL Nail Gel Haughty Lemon (2)
3. Chanel Mimosa (2)
4. Kit Sunshine of My Mind (3)
5. NYC In a New York Color Minute Copabanana (2)
6. Essence Colour & Go Be Your Sunshine (2)
7. Elf unnamed (2)
8. Rimmel 60 Seconds Get Your Shades On (2)
9. Rescue Beauty Lounge Yellow Fever (2)
10. SinfulColors Firefly (3)
11. Sephora by OPI Cab Fare (3)
12. Pixel Yell Ooh (3)
13. L'Oreal Tweet Me (3)
14. L'Oreal Yellow Seahorse (3)
15. Cover Girl Outlast Stay Brilliant Glosstinis Lemon Drop (2)
16. Nicole by OPI Hit the Lights (2)
17. Nicole by OPI One Voice (2)
18. Milani Canary (3)
19. Hoof Hands unnamed (2)
20. Wet 'n' Wild unknown (2)

Bottles 1 through 5:

 

6 through 10:

 

11 through 15:

 

16 through 20:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More from Kokie

Samples provided for review

 

Last month, I shared a trio of cremes from Kokie and mentioned that I was saving the other three polishes from the package they sent for another post. This is that post. The three shades for today are Honey Nectar, Iced Out, and Girls Night.

 

I started swatching with the lightest of these, Iced Out, a white shimmer. In the bottle, this reminded me of an old school frost so I was worried about it showing brushstrokes, but on the nail, it's almost sparkly, not frosty at all. I used three coats, and there's the merest hint of visible nail line, which doesn't bother me as the polish looks clean and bright.

 

Just look at this pretty shimmer:

 

I tried using Iced Out as a topper over two of the cremes from my December post. My index finger has the dusty rose Chill Seeker as a base, while the other digits have the rosy tan Café Ole; all are topped with one coat of Iced Out. It definitely works as a topper, transforming the cremes into shimmers that are a muted version of the base colors.

 

 

Next up was Honey Nectar, a dark orange almost foil-like glowy shimmer. Two coats of this was plenty opaque.

 

 

I left Girls Night for last. I expected it to be a simple classic red creme, so I was pleasantly surprised that it had a bit of "squish" to it. It's not a crelly or a jelly, but it's got a touch of depth and shine to it that I didn't anticipate. Two coats were ample.

 

 

I could not resist doing a bit more experimentation. Left to right below: Girls Night alone, one coat of Girls Night layered over Honey Nectar, one coat of Girls Night layered over Iced Out, Iced Out in a French mani with a white tip. I really liked the way the different visual textures of the two shimmers subtly show under Girls Night and subtly shift the hue. I definitely did not expect to be able to use Girls Night like that, and now that I have, I want to try it over more things.

 

 

These are available along with the rest of the line of shades on the Kokie website. If you prefer to shop in person, Kokie is now in Sally Beauty stores, too.


The polishes shown in this entry were provided free for review purposes. The content of the entry was not dictated by the provider, and I get to keep the polishes for my own use.