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Wednesday, February 24, 2021

Wheel F14: Reddish Orange Cremes

Pretty much whenever I paint a creme nail wheel, like this one with not quite orange not quite red shades, I think "if I never buy another creme polish, I'll be fine". Then I see a new collection or a set I like, and boom, I've bought more cremes. This is how my stash got to be overflowing 11 Helmers by quite a bit. Not sure what I'm going to do about it. I am not going to be able to enter my next stage of life with thousands of polishes, I'm pretty sure.
 

1. Julie G Miami Beach (3 coats)
2. Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure Frutti Petutie (2)
3. Revlon Parfumerie Ginger Melon (3)
4. Maybelline Color Show Rebel Bouquet Rose Candy (2)
5. China Glaze I Brake for Colour (2)
6. L'Oreal Punchy Lychee (3)
7. Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure Kook-a-Mango (2)
8. OPI Aloha from OPI (2)
9. Ciate Play Date (2)
10. Republic Nail Frida Kahlo Vida (2) [I had to look up the name online, as my bottle only has code FKN.38 printed on it)
11. Revlon Copa Sunset (3)
12. Girly Bits Hoop There It Is (3)
13. L'Oreal Sunrise (3) [I still adore these old L'Oreal bottles and probably always will; I used one of them for my wedding mani so there's very high sentimental value for me]
14. Orly Color Blast Warm Hugs (2)
15. Orly Retro Red (2)
16. Barielle Straight A Curve (2)
17. SinfulColors Timbleberry (2) [yep, mine says "timble" not "thimble"]
18. SinfulColors Dragonfly (2)
19. Cover Girl Glossy Days Glosstinis #RavingHot [such a long name for a mini bottle]
20. Dermelect Power Trip (1)

Bottles 1 through 5:
 

6 through 10:
 

11 through 15:
 

16 through 20:
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tuesday, February 23, 2021

Zoya Isti

Still working through swatching the polishes I got from Zoya last last year. Today it's Isti, a silver and light blue Pixie Dust textured polish.
 
Zoya Isti
I used two coats for my swatch and let it dry. It doesn't seem as textured as I recall the older Pixie Dust polishes were. Maybe it's the density of the glitter or the silver reflecting light. I'm not sure.
 
Zoya Isti
Here's Isti with topcoat. It's shinier, yes, but not a dramatic difference that I could see.
 
Zoya Isti
 
Zoya Isti
What I should have done at this point was put the Leopard Spots topper on to see if it looked more leopard-y over texture, but I didn't see it (it got put away with the other crackles from last week's nail wheel). Instead, I grabbed Meredith and did funky French tips (plus slicked on more clear topcoat). I like this combination.
 
Zoya Isti
 
Zoya Isti
I am going to try very hard to do the Leopard Spots plus texture at some point. Maybe I can also do a Pixie Dust comparison between old and new shades. In the meantime, enjoy this pretty blue.

Wednesday, February 17, 2021

Wheel E14: Crackle Polishes

I remember when crackle polishes were impossible to get and old Cover Girl ones on MakeupAlley were on a lot of wishlists in the swapping section (when swapping went away there, I pretty much stopped visiting the site). So when the later waves of crack came out, I scooped them up. And as my recent acquisiton of the Zoya one attests, I'm still scooping. I might have a problem. I'll deal with later. Now I'm going to do this Nail Wheel Wednesday post with 20 crackles (and I still probably have another 20 after this to get on a wheel, not counting the ones that have completely dried out and which I might just throw out rather than trying to rescue, because seriously, I could put crackle on my nails from now until I move into assisted living decades from now and probably not run out).
 

(all one coat over white creme base, except for #8, which is a black creme base)

1. Zoya Leopard Spots Topper
2. SinfulColors Black Crackle
3. Sephora by OPI Blaste Black
4. Ulta Quake Nail Top Coat
5. Maybelline Color Show Carbon Frost [left the clearance sticker on this so I could feel better that at least I didn't pay full price for the eleventy billionth black crackle in my collection]
6. Sally Hansen Big Crackle Top Coat Black On
7. Barry M Nail Paint Instant Nail Effects 311 [black]
8. Barry M Nail Paint Instant Nail Effects 316 [white]
9. Barry M Nail Paint Instant Nail Effects 315 [blue]
10. Barry M Nail Paint Instant Nail Effects 314 [pink]
11. Barry M Nail Paint Instant Nail Effects 322 [purple shimmer]
12. Maybelline Color Show Purple Possibilities
13. Avon Mosaic Effects Plum Illusion
14. Claire's unnamed [I thought this had a name and I just didn't know it because the bottom label was missing, but I looked at my spreadsheet which I fill in soon after I buy polishes and I didn't record any names for any of the Claire's crackles]
15. Sephora by OPI Blasted Purple Glitter
16. Finger Paints Crackle Effect Purple Crackle
17. Avon Mosaic Effects Blue Flash
18. Avon Mosaic Effects Gleaming Emerald
19. Maybelline Color Show Shredded Silver Stunner
20. Expression Crazed Deep Coffee [looks more grey than brown but my spreadsheet tells me it was this color when I bought it so who knows if it was once coffee colored]

Bottles 1 through 5:
 

6 through 10:
 

11 through 15:
 

16 through 20:
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Monday, February 15, 2021

Juicy Flakies from Great Lakes Lacquer

I know Valentine's Day was yesterday, but pink and pink-adjacent polishes are seasonless. Today I have two flakie beauties in that family from Great Lakes Lacquer's Island Horizon collection: The Real Boss and Bug ON.
 
Great Lakes Lacquer The Real Boss and Bug ON
Bug ON is a deep berry packed with shifting flakies: I see pinks, orchid, orange, green, and maybe even gold.
 
Great Lakes Lacquer Bug ON
Two coats of Bug ON were ample for full coverage. I added clear topcoat to add depth and shine. This one is so rich looking.
 
Great Lakes Lacquer Bug ON
 
Great Lakes Lacquer Bug ON
The Real Boss is a pinky coral base with flakies that shift from pink to orchid to orange to gold.
 
Great Lakes Lacquer The Real Boss
I did two coats plus topcoat for my swatch of The Real Boss as well. I know I said pinkks are seasonless, but this one really makes me think of summer.
 
Great Lakes Lacquer The Real Boss
 

I sponged Bug ON over The Real Boss for a subtle gradient, smoothing things over with clear topcoat. I really liked this combination.
 
Great Lakes Lacquer The Real Boss and Bug ON
 
Great Lakes Lacquer The Real Boss and Bug ON
I suspected that the crelly base of The Real Boss was light enough to allow it to be used as a topper, so of course I had to experiment. I first put down an ombre of creme base colors: Color Club You're Making Me Blush (light pink), Sally Hansen Insta Dri Bubble Gum (pink), Sally Hansen Insta Dri Wild Watermelon (coral pink), and Sally Hansen Insta Dri Razzmatazz (deep pink).
 

I then put one coat of The Real Boss over the cremes and added clear topcoat. The Real Boss was powerful enough to make the two lightest pinks into the same color as its own crelly base, but the two darker pinks did change the hue. To do an ombre with this, I'd start with the pink base on my index and work to a deep berry on my pinky.
 
Great Lakes Lacquer The Real Boss
 
Great Lakes Lacquer The Real Boss
These are both delicious colors. And both still available on the Great Lakes Lacquer website last I checked, which was over the weekend when I knew I'd be writing this up for today.

Friday, February 12, 2021

Decent Assortment of Displays

Given the current pace of the COVID-19 vaccine rollout in my state and the large percentage of folks who refuse to act like responsible adults, I'm feeling it's going to be a long time before I can get back to display hunting the way I went about it in the Before Time, ranging far and wide and browsing in multiple locations of the same chains to see what I could see. Now, I mostly stay close to home, go into far fewer stores, and aim to get in and get out of those quickly. I did recently take a field trip to the county next to mine where they have more shopping options. I tried double masking for the first time, putting an N95 under a cloth mask, figuring with so many not masking at all around here, I needed to protect myself more. I didn't go to all the stores I would have in the Before Time, but I still managed to see a fair number of displays. Obviously some were already picked over since I didn't catch them soon enough after they were put out like I can when I'm in the stores every week or so instead every few months or more. That's life in the pandemic. Still, it felt good to do a bit of shopping in person and feel that thrill of turning into an aisle and seeing new polish. At Target, I saw a brand of fake nails that was new to me: Clutch Nails. The package says they're reusable, so I'm curious how that works, especially since they appear to be glue ons.
 

Essie's winter collection was old news by the time I was out and about; I saw this sidekick at Fred Meyer. Left to right: Love at Frost Sight (slot filled with what looks like Licorice), Twinkle in Time, Bonbon Nuit (sold out), In a Gingersnap (sold out), Peppermint Condition, Sugarplum Fairytale.
 

The shelftop I saw at Walgreens had some of the winter shades and a whole lot of randoms stuck in there. Front row: Love at Frost Sight, Twinkle in Time (sold out), Bonbon Nuit, In a Gingersnap (sold out), Peppermint Condition, Sugarplum Fairytale.
 

Walgreens had a sidekick with the Essie Valentine's collection, Cupid's Beau, and the Not Red-y for Bed collection (no idea what season/occasion that's for). Top row (Valentine's): Glow and Arrow, Heart of Gold, Gilded Goddess, Cupid's Beau, Love is in the Air, Tug at the Harpstrings. Middle row: Pillow Talk-the-Talk (two slots), The Snuggle is Real, Gossip 'n' Spill, Slumber Party-on. Bottom row: Not Red-y for Bed, PJammin' All Night, Sleepover Squad, Wink of Sleep, From A to ZZZ.
 

Rite Aid had Essie Not Red-y for Bed in a shelftop display.
 

Fred Meyer had a shelftop display with Essie Cupid's Beau.
 

I saw the Essie Spring 2021 collection at a second Walgreens I stopped at (I was only going to do one store per chain, but this second one was right there on my way home and I was weak): Get Oasis, Cacti on the Prize, Retreat Yourself, Light as Linen, Infinity Coat, and You Know the Espadrille. Interesting assortment of colors for spring, I'd say.
 

There's a Target-exclusive Essie collection called Keep You Posted (in an annoying backlit section of the nail polish wall. Left to right: Happy as Cannes Be (two slots), Berlin the Club, Madrid for the 'Gram, Rome Around, No Place Like Stockholm (two slots), Been There London That (two slots).
 

There are new shades of Essie Expressie. I saw them at Fred Meyer. Front row: Millennium, Mall Crawler, Dial It Up (slot filled with Binge-Worthy), Up Up & Away Message, Shook. Second row: In the Modem, What the Tech, Turn Up the Century (slot filled with Buns Up), Skip the Track, We Don't Mesh. (Third & fourth rows are mix of new and old shades.)
 

There was a corner cap at Walgreens with Impress Color press on nails on top (a new line, all solid colors, some "creme", some shimmer) and Dashing Diva Gloss strips on the bottom (some solid color sets, some with accent designs).
 

Fred Meyer had an OPI display that once was filled with the holiday collection but now was a mix of empty slots, random OPIs that didn't belong, and some of the holiday colors. I was not going to take the time to straigthen it out what with the infection rate in that county. Top row: Merry in Cranberry (sold out), Red-y for the Holidays, Let's Take an Elfie, Tinsel Tinsel Little Star (slot filled with random grey and some blues), To All a Good Night (slot filled with random blue), Heart and Coal (slot filled with a different rancome blue). Bottom row: Naughty or Ice, Snowfalling for You, This Shade is Ornamental (LA Colors clear shoved in front of slot), Dressed to the Wines, This Gold Sleighs Me, Gingerbread Man Can.
 

Target had PopSockets Nails, kits with fake nails coordinated with a phone grip. That's new.
 

At the next-closest Walmart to my local one (an hour's drive from it), I found a new line from Revlon tucked into one of the makeup aisles. I only went looking there because I'd found a bottle I didn't recognize abandoned on a random endcap where I was looking for displays. It's called Revlon Ultra HD Snap, and is a one-coat quick dry line (also 20-free, which seems ridiculous to me ... at what point are they touting taking things out that were never going to go in there in the first plae, or things that were inocuous?). I thought the fake polish pouring out of the display was eye-catching (just hope it doesn't give the cretins who regularly deface displays any new ideas).
 

I don't know if these were selling fast or just being put out or what; there were several slots that were empty, so it was nice that the colors were shown on the labels below the slots. Top row: Early Bird, Keep Cool (strange name for a warm beige), Birthday Suit (empty), Basic, Marigold Maven, Hot Stuff, She's on Fire, Cherry on Top (empty).
 

Bottom row: Rule the World (empty), Berry Blissed (empty), So Shady, Get Real, Grounded (not here, but no empty slot ... oddly this row only has room for seven shades), Daredevil, Commander in Chief, Under My Spell. (These bottles were covered in what looked like cardboard dust; in the Before Time, I would probably have wiped them off.)
 

There are some new "Prismatic Shine" shades of Sally Hansen Insta Dri. Walgreens had them, along with a bunch of existing colors, in a shelf top display. Slots for new shades in front: Moonstone (sold out), Cosmic Blu (sold out), Glow Getter, Conjure Copper, Pink Aurora, Purple Prism, The Future is Fuchsia, Celes-tial, Powerslide (these last three seem to be new glitters, not Prismatic Shine shades), Confetti Pop, Twinkle Twinkle (sold out).
 

At the second Walgreens I went to, they seemed to be in the process of resetting their Insta Dri display, and they had new colors missing from the shelftop I'd seen earlier. Twinkle Twinkle is top row, fourth from left. Two slots over is Moonstone. Cosmic Blu is the darker of the two blues on the bottom row.
 

There are also new shades of Sally Hansen Good Kind Pure, which Walgreens had in a shelf top display with many existing colors. I had to wait 'til I got home to Google which new shades made up the Wildflower Collection referred to on the display. Front row: Hardener, White Tea, Frosted Amethyst (new), Pinky Clay, Lavender Haze (new), Pink Sapphire, Crystal Blue, Pink Cloud, Eco-Rose. Back row: Island Coconut cuticle oil (new), Top Coat, Soft Plum, Passion Flower (new), Warm Cacao (new), Honey Harmony (new), Natural Spring (new), Pink Cardamon, Laven-dear.
 

The Valentine's themed Sally Hansen Miracle Gel display I saw at Fred Meyer didn't have any new shades, but it did have six existing colors with special Godiva cap wraps. They're in the front row: Sheer Happiness, Out of this Pearl, Saturn It Up, Can't Beet Royalty, Beet Pray Love, Get Mod.
 

The other Sally Hansen Miracle Gel display I saw at Fred Meyer did have new shades in it, the Rainbow Lights collection. As with the Good Kind Pure, the new shades are mixed in with old ones here. Front row: Sunken Treasure, Saturn It Up (slot is for Once Chiffon a Time, which is new, and which wasn't in this display), Can't Beet Royalty (slot is for Tutu the Ballet, which is new, and is the beige you can see behind Can't Beet Royalty here), Rain-glow (new), One Shell of a Party (new), Get Mod (slot is for top coat), Shiny Top Coat. Back row: Beet Pray Love, Sun-shower (new), Giving Altitude (new), Sugar Fix, Crying Out Cloud (new), Beet Pray Love, Sugar Fix.
 

There wasn't much new to see at my Ulta, but I did spot this almost empty display for Scratch nail wraps (i.e. strips).
 

Neither of the Walmarts I was in this round had any new SinfulColors. For those, I had to go to Target, where the new scented Essenchills were tucked into the nail polish wall. Left to right: Bath Goals, Eucalyptahhh, Low Key Lavender, Chamomile Calm, Beach Vibes, Coffee Drip, Salt Bath Babe, Smoky Palo Santo.
 

In my local Walmart, where I sometimes have to go to get things my grocery store doesn't carry, I saw a new line from Wet 'n' Wild called Fast Dry AF. The display says of these: "Dries in 40 seconds. 5-day extended wear. 1-stroke application". Top row: X-Ray Vision (3 slots), Lovey Dove-y (2 slots), Ballerina Dropout (2 slots). Second row: Throwing Shade (2 slots), Sorry I'm Latte (2 slots), Cotton Candy (2 slots), Heels on the Beach (sold out). Third row: Red Light District (2 slots), Happy Rosy Day (2 slots), Get Stoned (2 slots), Toasted. Bottom row: Southern Belle, Potassium-Rich, Out of Pistachios (sold out), Mermaids Do Exist (sold out), Sin-derella, Putting on Airs, Married into Royalty.
 

I got lucky at the only Rite Aid I've been in in months: they had an untouched display of the Wet 'n' Wild Fast AF. Front row: X-Ray Vison, Lovey Dove-y, Ballerina Dropout, Sorry I'm Latte, Cotton Candy, Heels on the Beach, Happy Rosy Day, Red Light District, Southern Belle. Back row: Toasted, Potassium-Rich, Out of Pistachios, Mermaids Do Exist, Sin-derella, Putting on Airs, Married into Royalty, Get Stoned, Throwing Shade.
 

I look forward to someday being able to roam about at will again; until then, these infrequent forays to limited places nearby will have to do.