Ridiculously late Halloween manicure! Frankenstein!

I've been slacking so bad, that I'm posting a Halloween manicure I did on the 7th of November.  Eek. Enjoy anyways, hehe.

I did Frankenstein! So cute, so simple.  I used Essie Mojito Madness for the green and WnW Black Creme for the black.  For the thumb, I painted my nail green and waited for it to dry.  I used unique shaped nail guides and painted over and then removed the guide.  I dotted on some eyes and pupils as well.  For the stitched nails I used more nail guides and then painted over the meeting point of the green and bare nail with a black striper. It took all of 10 minutes! So easy, so I loved it.

Cartoon Inspired Nails

I keep seeing this pop up on the Reddit nail polish board and decided to finally get them a whirl.  I also keep mistakenly call them comic book nails, which I guess technically works; but they're supposed to look like cartoon nails, like the nails of a cartoon, drawn!

For this manicure I did one coat of Finger Paints Black Expressionism and then two coats of Essie Mojito Madness.  I wasn't able to do a straight line along the free edge wit the green so I went back and used a nail art brush with the same black polish to finish the edge.  This is over Orly Bonder, sealed with OTD, and then I mattified it afterwards.

What do you think? Better mattified or shiny? Goofy or clever?

Zoya Bevin and Essie As Gold As It Gets

I got this Zoya from a promo a few months back but didn't get around to wearing it until now.  Sometimes I know there are certain polishes I'm interested in but they don't scream out to me once I get them, then they sit until I finally wear them and then.. it's love! I've had this on for three days which is unheard of for me. I either pick it off or get too bored of it and remove within 48 hours. This combo has staying power.

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Shown is two coats of Zoya Bevin topped with Essie As Gold As It Gets, all over Orly Bonder & sealed with OTD. Zoya describes Bevin as "a dusty, medium sage green color with teal tones and a creamy opaque finish", which I think is a perfect description!  Essie's AGAIG is slowly inching its way into my Top 25 at least. Not usually a fan of gold anything, but this polish is so delicate and pretty.

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Hope everybody has a safe and happy holiday!

Essie Cantaloupe

I've wanted this one for a loooong while and one of my very kind, generous friends found it at a TJ Maxx recently and gifted it to me.  I wish there was a rhyme or reason to why certain polishes showed up at that store, but there really isn't. At least not one I could figure out.

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Cantaloupe is a jelly-like creme that is sort of a weird orangey, salmony, pinkish mauve sorta color. It's a bit of a chameleon and changes colors depending on the lighting. I also hate, hate! to show pictures of wear and tear like these but I didn't want to add a refresher coat because it would distort the facts in regards to the amount of coats and its opacity.  These pictures were taken after a nine hour shift of daycare work.

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The formula on this one was kinda, it kind of sucked to be honest.  Some Essie polishes are so hit and miss in terms of opacity and streakiness, this isn't the first one I've owned that has behaved this way.  It was really runny and pooled into my cuticles a few times before I even had a chance to prevent it.  It didn't build as nicely as I hoped - this is three coats. Two thin coats and the final coat was a thick one to even it out.  This is over Orly Bonder and sealed with Pro-FX top coat, which actually bubbled pretty heinously on my thumb.

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I am biased towards this polish, though.  Even though the formula left a lot to be desired, I've wanted it for so long that I can forgive that.  I love the color, and the formula doesn't affect that, fortunately.

Brucci Kathy's Baby Blues vs Essie Something Blue Comparison

I had this as an untried for a while so decided its number was up and put it on. I just love pastel cremes, they're so "Me!" and I love see them on my nails.

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As usual, not a bad thing to say about Brucci. I'm always impressed with their formulas and price.  This was about $2.35 at my Rite Aid, you can get them online too, ImageBeauty sells them for sure, as I've bought a few from them.

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This is two coats over Orly Bonder sealed with Out the Door. It went on smoothly, and opaque in two coats! Yay!

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Then I thought it looked a bit like Essie Something Blue, so I did a swatch comparison.

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Brucci has more green in it, Essie is more of a powder blue.  But pretty, but not dupes!

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Which do you like better?

Seaweed vs. Da Bush vs. Stranger Tides Comparison

I noticed I had a few of these murky, washed out greens so I decided to do a side by side swatch comparison only to realize they're really almost identical.  The pictures really do speak volumes so the comparison is between Sinful Colors Seaweed, Essie Da Bush and OPI Stranger Tides.

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This is three coats of each over Orly Bonder and sealed with OTD.

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 The OPI and the Essie appear to be dead on dupes; Seaweed appears to be the slightest more green. Maybe. I can't tell what the difference is but it comes off more.. vibrant?  If you own one, you don't need the others. All three formulas were fine; they needed three coats but my coats were thin. Hope this helps!

Essie Pink-A-Boo

I'd like to apologize real quick for my absence lately. I've been in a funk and haven't wanted to do anything lately, blogging included.  I won't make myself blog as I know that wouldn't genuine, but forced. I don't know what has gotten into me but a general aura of dumpy crankiness has been hovering over me for weeks.

I went to Harmon to pick up a magnified mirror and this Essie caught my eye.  Anything pink kinda does to be honest, but this one is very pretty, I'm glad I decided to get it! I took some pictures in sunlight to show the full effect of this beauty.

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Sunlight

Sunlight

Sunlight

All photos seen here is 2 coats of Essie Pink-A-Boo over two coats of Revlon Powder Puff over a coat of Orly Bonder and sealed with OTD.  It's a jellylike pink sheer with blue shimmers!  It's so delicate and ladylike, I really love it.  Layering with Powder Puff really helped but you can still see some VNL. Formula was great as always with Essie, just a little sheer.  I love this, do you?

Essie Navigate Her & Lynnderella Attitude Adjust-Mint

Essie Navigate Her photographs a lot more green than it really is.  In a side-by-side bottle comparison to Da Bush, they look really very similar.  It appears lighter to me as well, but when photographed it leans much more green and less like a pastel.

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This is two coats over Orly Bonder sealed with OTD.  The formula was really good on this Essie, no streaks as you might expect with such a light color.

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I figured it would be a perfect match for Lynnderella Attitude Adjust-Mint. I put Glitter Tamer over Attitude Adjust-Mint.

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I had a difficult time capturing this one.  The glitter is mostly iridescent, which I didn't know actually. You can see on my ring finger a HUGE hex glitter.  I love that, I really like the unpredictableness (not a word) of this one!  I did have problems with this combo chipping within a few hours though.

Essie Tart Deco & Hello Kitty Stamping

I'm dealing with a bit of an anomaly here.  In the bottle, Tart Deco looks quite pink and did it on my nails until I put on my topcoat.  Then it leaned very orange.  The sides of my nails where I missed with some topcoat, looks more peach, too.  I used NYC Grand Central Station and I'm not sure if its that topcoat in particular or what, but it really changed the hue of this polish.

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This is two coats of Tart Deco over Orly Bonder, sealed with NYC GCS.  If you google swatches, only a few appear as orange as mine.  It's supposed to be more peach.  I also took a ton of pictures of this color and I'm not sure why but lucky you gets to look at them all. Whooo!!

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Even in these pics, some nails appear more orange and others a little more peachy. WTF. Whose fault is this?  It's a pretty shade regardless, but it's trying to be too many things at once!  The formula was really nice on this one and it wore nicely on me, too.  I don't usually have any issues with Essie.

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I used plate KD1 which I ordered off of Ebay for $5.  I used Zoya Demi and Konad Special White for dots and stamping. And I'm incredible peeved I didn't see that piece of hair over my nail. Urgh.

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Essie Chinchilly

Not much to say about Essie Chinchilly.  It's so pretty, applied like a dream and wears incredibly well. Made it through dishes and hairwashing, etc. I dented my thumb while it was still wet, oopsie.

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This is 3 coats over CND Stickey, sealed with OTD. I love it!

Essie Lapiz of Luxury & Finger Paints Motley

I revamped my previous mani with Essie Lapiz of Luxury by removing the popbeauty accent nail and added Finger Paints Motley.  Such a pretty combination!

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This is 3 coats of Lapiz of Luxury over one coat of CND Stickey sealed with Out the Door.

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Lapiz of Luxury wore really well!  No chipping, nice dry time, wonderful formula.  This is one coat of Motley.  A less dense flakie, but still very pretty.  It adds a subtle sparkle.  It also looks amazing over black.

The whole effect is really subtle and understated, but I like that.  If you're looking for something eyecatching I'd suggest Motley over black or red, even. I can't wait to play with all my new flakies!

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 Thanks for reading! (=

Gifts from a BFF & Essie Lapis of Luxury

My dear BFF Britty sent me a lovely package for Christmas full of nail polish and lots of other thoughtful goodies!  I am so fortunate to have such generous friends who not only love me but support my bizarre obsession.

From Left to Right:
Frozen Solid
Profound Pink
The Real Teal
love & beauty coral with gold shimmer
love & beauty purple/silver glass fleck (I think?)

Not pictured is another Sally Hansen in Loyal Lavender.  One of my kitties knocked it out of the package under the tree.  I'm pretty sure it was Frank.

Britty also sent me popbeauty Aquatic Glitz, Essie Lapis of Luxury and two adorable little Bon Bons.  They're so ittybitty!  I while back I had mentioned that I liked that particular popbeauty but it was out of stock on Bloom.com - so what does she do?  She stalks it until it comes back in stock.  How thoughtful!

I couldn't wait to wear some of these so I have a mani incorportating two of them!

Three coats of each over CND Stickey and Gelous, sealed with more Gelous and a coat of OTD!  I love it! Thanks so much Brittany :D !