Favorite Fakes

My apologies for the lack of posts last week. We finally got a good weather window for me and Mr. Karen to go visit his mom in western Washington, so we took advantage of that and were gone all last week. I did take my laptop, but ended up not even taking it out of its bag. Instead, I did some tasks around my mother-in-law's assisted living apartment and entertained her while Mr. K took care of some financial things for her that needed to get done. She was having a good week, so evenings were filled with family dinners over at my sister-in-law's house. It seemed appropriate to come back here with a post about the nails I wore on an earlier visit last year. I didn't include them in my Nails of 2021 post because I couldn't pick just one picture of them, I liked them so well. They're a set of imPress press-on nails. I put them on sitting in the passenger seat of the car on our drive out. The set (called Goal Digger) has mirror finish multichrome nails in green/blue/purple with fine silver glitter accent nails, which I didn't end up using any of since I liked the multichrome ones so much.

 

These were just entertaining to look at as I moved my hand around. From the side view below, you can see the purple coming out, as well as the little hint of gold at the edges.

 

When the sun hit them just right, they looked a lot like magnetic polish. Still not sure how I managed the green/blue alternating colors here.

 

Finally, a range of colors in the hotel room mirror.

 

I have no idea if these are still available for purchase, but I might have to look next time I'm at a Fred Meyer or Walgreens or Rite Aid. Looking at these photos makes me want to wear this look again.

Nails of Days Past

Having caught up with the swatching I did last year, now it's time for a NOTD spam post with the 2017 manicures still in my photo files.

Let's kick things off with some flash: China Glaze Pre-Glued Nails in Silver Chrome. I got these on clearance at Sally Beauty; for $3.99, I figured why not give them a go. I'm so glad I did, because I really liked these. They were thin as fake nails go, and the glue was great—I had no loose nails and none popping off in the five days I wore them. It did take me a couple nails to figure out which end was the base and which the tip, with the ones I put on wrong way round catching in my hair at the base since the glue didn't extend all the way to that end. Lesson learned. The silver coating did start to peel at the tips after about four days, but with the rest of the nail still being crazy shiny, it was hard to notice that. Plus, the nails were very easy to file, so I could just remove the parts where the silver was missing (until I got to my natural nail underneath, of course).



I still have so very many Essie Sleek Sticks to use up (or throw out or do something with), so I wore Embrace the Lace for a few days. They were hard to put on smoothly, and got tipwear almost immediately (at least that didn't show too much since they were close to my natural nail color).



I did another round of fake nails with some purple Smart Girl ones I'd picked up on clearance somewhere. These were labelled "medium length" but they looked long to me. They fit my nails well and were pretty thin, but the adhesive wasn't as secure as the China Glaze fakes (maybe because it wasn't pre-applied to the nails but instead was in the form of tabs that weren't as long as my natural nails in all cases).



Incoco Nail Polish Appliques in Reckless, a black on purple plaid design, graced my nails next. I wait to use Incoco strips until I need to change my pedicure, since then I get full use out of the package (I haven't had much luck re-sealing the package to use the second half later).



Sally Hansen Salon Effects strips in Disk-o Queen followed the Incoco. This gold glitter with wine half moon design was a bit sheer at the tips and the glitter was not holo as shown on the box, but they did sparkle nicely.



After filing away some peelies, I put a winter favorite on next: Sally Hansen Salon Effects in Snow Bunny.



I finished out the year in Incoco strips in Silent Night, a blue and purple glitter mix. I failed to get a really good photo of these; I liked them very much, so it's a shame this shade has been discontinued.



And now that I've caught up, I can think about doing a Top 20 (or 10 or something list). Then I can move on to 2018 swatches and nails of the day ... only a month into the new year!

Recent NOTD: Ministry of Beauty Ultra-Reflect Artificial Nails

I know it's Wednesday, which should mean a nail wheel, but since we in the U.S. had a holiday on Monday, it's effectively Tuesday, so there is no wheel this week but instead the post I planned to do yesterday but didn't because I had a lunch meeting and left earlier than usual to try and beat a big rainstorm (which I didn't quite manage, but at least I only had to deal with sheets of rain for the last third of my commute instead of the whole thing).

I included Ministry of Beauty (MOB) artificial nails I saw at Meijer in a display post back in April. I didn't buy anything from that display at the time I spotted it, thinking about all the Maybelline Nail Falsies I snapped up when they went on clearance which have been sitting in my stash untouched. My resolve lasted until I stopped at Meijer near the end of April on my way to visit my mom in Illinois (I figure I might as well combine a restroom stop with nail polish display hunting, since not all Meijer stores have the same stuff at the same time, and most Meijers also have gas so it's like three birds with one stone if I'm due for a fill up as well). I'd been too busy to do my nails before I left, so was extra susceptible to the lure of the fakes when I saw the MOB display again at this store—I could go from plain to fancy nails in almost no time by just sticking these on. Thus I found myself back out in my car with a box of the Ultra-Reflect nails in the purple/olive/gold multichrome colorway (I didn't see any names on the boxes for any of the designs, though it's possible I missed them).



I went ahead and put them on right there in the car. Like the Maybelline ones, the nails are numbered on the underside so it's easy to keep the sizes straight and make sure that the nails on one hand are the same sizes as on the other hand. Unlike some of the Maybelline ones, I didn't notice any burrs on the edges of any of the nails that I needed to file off.



I think I could have chosen better sizes in some cases, but that's not the nails' fault. In most cases, I was able to get a good fit, though the base curve of the fake nails was more square than my own base curve, which left a bigger gap than I liked (the sides of the nail touched before the center when I was snugging them up to the base of my nails). Still, they were so shiny and distracting, I don't think the gap was especially noticeable in anything but macro photos.







The adhesive tabs that came with these were quite low-profile; combined with how thin (but not too bendy) the nails themselves were, this meant they were quite flat against my nail. (Also, look at this color shift below—these are the same nails, in the same light, just at an angle that makes them mostly blue.)



These very nearly were the shortest-lived NOTD ever when at my next stop, I broke a bottle of nail polish at at Sally Beauty and got bright pink all over my fingers and nails (it was the OPI anniversary creme, for the record).



Since I happened to be traveling with a full complement of removers and tools, I was able to clean up with minimal damage to the nails, though I did end up removing bits of the shiny finish in some spots along the tips. No matter, they were still pretty, and pretty distracting what with the shifting colors.







I'd intended to just wear these for the weekend but liked them so much I kept them on for most of the workweek, too. The adhesive on these tabs was different than other nails I've used before; when it failed, it didn't let go all at once leading to nails popping off, but rather let go gradually, so I'd have a loose nail, like a loose tooth. That was good, since it let me remove and replace the sticky bit before I actually lost the nail. (The pack came with three full sets of adhesive tabs, so there were plenty of extras.) In the five days I wore these, I had to re-attach three or four nails. The shiny surface of the nails held up pretty well; by day five I noticed some very thin scratches and some spots at the tips where the caoting seemed to be peeling away, but some of that could be due to exposure to the remover when I was cleaning up the polish spill days before.







I got a lot of comments and compliments while wearing these; they are quite eye catching. I loved the adhesive tabs that came with these. Even though I feel like I had to re-stick more nails than with other brands, I thought it was worth it for the lower profile look and the gradual way they came off. When it was time to remove them, they came off easily with no damage to my nails. Depending on how well the glue was holding, I either tugged the nail off by sliding it down toward the tip of my finger or used a metal cuticle pusher tool to loosen and remove the nail. Any adhesive left after the fake nail was gone just rolled off my natural nail like rubber cement. Based on how well I liked these, I wore a different design shortly after I took these off, but I'll save those for another post. Apparently not everyone liked these as much as I did, as when I went back to Meijer to get more, they were already on clearance.