Freehand Ocean Waves

I had a little fun the other day. It was quite rainy so I decided to do some nail art.

No tape used, just freehand waves. That is why they look so bad, haha!

Base: Sally Hansen Barracuda

Second layer: China Glaze Flying High

Third Layer: China Glaze First Mate

Last Layer: Sinful Rainstorm

April showers bring May flowers :)

NOTD: Windestine Girl With the Best Smile

It is a gorgeous early spring day here in Central Indiana! Time for some finger-jewels :)

I fished in my mini polish box the other day because I have neglected them, ultimately. I found a franken I had made, inspired by OPI Thanks a Wind-Million and Zoya Bevin (the latter of which I have now) which is slightly more blue than those two.

I added Windestine Girl with the Best Smile on top (just one layer). If you have never tried a Windestine polish, what are you thinking?!?! Seriously, Jeweled Sand is a Holy Grail Glitter. It is amazing. So is this one, which is similar to Jeweled Sand but with pink, purple, and light green glitter.

Windestine's small glitter mixes look AWESOME over greyed colors. 

BONUS: Photos of Windestine Jeweled Sand over RBL 360, taken in August!

RIP Big Almonds :(

Anyhow, I <3 Windestine so much. I really want to buy her new polish called Wish Upon A Star which is a charity polish for the Make-A-Wish Foundation. This charity sent my husband and his family to DisneyWorld when he was little. His brother received a liver transplant at 5 months old. I think they do wonderful work, lifting kids out of the gloomy world of medical problems and giving parents peace, knowing their child can forget about their problems for a little bit and enjoy themselves. 

I am proud to be a Windestine customer. She has wonderful polish that applies perfectly. It is also very well designed and feminine. 

Review: CrowsToes Orion - Pleiades Collection

Orion is a constellation that appears just above the horizon here in the Northern Hemisphere during the winter months. CrowsToes nail polish is made by The Polished Crow and she discusses the Greek mythology story behind her collection here: 

http://thepolishedcrow.blogspot.com/2012/12/blog-post.html

NOTE: I purchased this polish myself from llarowe.com with my own money!

Bottle shots

Orion the constellation has personal meaning to me. When I was growing up in San Diego, our family would sometimes take a trip to IHOP to eat breakfast for dinner. I always got the chocolate chip pancakes! When we were out doing this one night when I was around 10, we all went outside to wait for my mom who was using the restroom after eating. I looked up in the sky and I seriously thought I had just discovered a constellation (because I had never learned it). It was Orion but I saw the main rectangular shape with the "belted waist" and I called it the Hunter Daddy constellation because my dad was a hunter (gun AND bow). I was a bit of a daddy's girl at the time. When I found out later that week that I had not made it up myself, I was devastated---until I learned that it was named the Hunter, too! I was right about something at least :)

Onto the polish! 

This is a really sparkly multichrome that goes from a green-gold to green to blue. It is not a drastic multichrome like, say, Ludurana Show but it is noticeable. I am wearing it over black in all the photos. 

Wearing a multi or duochrome over black is the best way, in my opinion, to bring out the range of color. This polish is fairly sheer and I hate wasting multichrome so one layer of Wet n Wild Black Creme and one layer of Orion means I get to wear it many more times!

This photo shows how blue it can get. Open up the image in another window to see it better!

See, I have been on the hunt for a multi or duochrome polish that has a base color of green (hunter green in this instance) and changes easily in the light. I think I have found it, which makes me so happy! No diss intended but the shots of this polish on The Polished Crow were not promising.

Open this photo in another window to see the particle sizes and the changes in color better.

The bottle does that thing that a lot of duochromes in rounded bottles do; they appear to be a MUCH more complex multi-chrome. Don't be fooled, this one only has about 3 distinct colors as far as I can tell.

I added the constellation Orion to my ring finger using Sally Hansen Gold Chrome and Petites 24k Gold

Now, I compared it to the only other two greenish duo-multi-chromes I have; Scherer Chameleon in Fandango and MISSHA HGR01

Bottle Shots

Reverse order from the above photo

Correct order

Correct order

As you can see, the MISSHA is a more dramatic multichrome but it never gets to the deep golden or forest greens of the CrowsToes. Fandango really only has two colors and it is a muddied and sort of frosty color.

How would I rate this polish on a scale of 1-10?

Uniqueness: 10

Do you see many forest green-based multi OR duochromes out there?! No, seriously, if you know any more, tell me! This is very unique to me!

Formula: 10

Like other duochromes, it has a really smooth formula and applies rather sheer. It is opaque in 3 coats but I don't like to use that much. I recommend it over a black nail polish like I recommend most other duochromes :)

Payoff: 7

I am only saying 7 BECAUSE...it is not a dramatic duochrome. That may bug some people. The other polishes in this collection seem to be a lot more dramatic. I think it is probably because of the pigment used in making a green duochrome and the type of pigment used. Maybe one day, I will get my wish of a wicked awesome, super dramatic and flashy green-based multichrome!

ORION rates a 9 for me by those standards

I really like this polish a lot!

Again, this was purchased by me (Nat) using my own money! No one knew I was going to review this polish or asked me to :)

Stampicure of the Week: Blizzard

I had a hankering to try Zoya Kristen this week because (as you may know) the Midwest was pummelled by a blizzard the day after Christmas. I thought that Kristen would be the perfect wintery weather blue and I was so right. I knew there was a reason I bought this a long time ago!

I had to add some snowflake stamps to it! I used the Bundlemonster 2012 set's full nail snowflake design and HB23, a cheapie plate I got from a Chinese company awhile back. 

I stamped all but the ring finger in Konad White and then did the ring with Pure Ice Silver Mercedes. I used the HB plate to add little snowflakes in the opposite stamping color over the full nail design. 

I am pretty darn proud of this one. My nails have been really suffering from my job and the holiday season (even before Thanksgiving) has been suuuuuuper busy and totally crazy. I hope to have more time to devote to my nails and blogging again!

butter LONDON 2 Fingered Salute

I wanted to show you all a mani that is...well, not artsy in any way. I bought this polish from nordstrom.com awhile back (before it was sold out, apparently!) and just wore it last week. I LOVE IT. 

All photos are 2 coats with one coat of top coat. It is not gritty polish at all.

I thought it was copper glitter in a seafoam base but it is large shimmer like in RBL Halcyon in a seafoam base. Which is why it isn't gritty.

The shimmer is a rose/copper duochrome, kinda like Orly Space Cadet but in reverse. The copper is the most prominent color with the rose shining at odd angles. 

See, I don't always franken-dupe everything! I also buy a lot of polish!

The base also has a very very subtle shimmer. I am so happy that it is PACKED with large shimmer particles because in a milky/pastel base, you really need a lot of them to make it a real shimmer. I think this is why so many people were frustrated with Halcyon; it is subtle. 2 Fingered Salute is but also is not. O_o

See, it is subtle here.

And takes a very dramatic turn in low light. 

Flash

With the flash photos, you can see the contrast! This is why I had thought it was glitter going by early swatches.

Flash

Low light

Low light

I love the low light photos best. I think the subtle intensity of the polish really shines here. It almost looks as if I used a color changing top coat on it. A true chameleon of a polish.

Review: Rainbow Honey -The Yokai - in Kawako

Rainbow Honey's The Yokai Collection

October 13th it goes on sale at the above link!

Yokai are spirits in Japanese folklore, which is a WONDERFUL theme for a Halloween nail polish collection from your favorite otaku indie, Rainbow Honey! Well, they are my favorite anyhow :D

Each represent a particular kind of Japanese spirit.

This is a limited edition set of GORGEOUS shimmer/glitters in golden brown with golden flakies and pink/purple sparkle (Oni), maize camel with orange glitter (Kitsune), and a deep navy shimmer with intense silver and rainbow sparkle and flakies (Kawako)

LAST ONE!!

Here is KAWAKO! 

From Rainbow Honey's press statement:

"KAWAKO: the mischievous river child"

Of course, this is a GORGEOUS medium blue polish. I wouldn't call it a midnight blue, it seems more of a navy to medium blue. Very gorgeous. It is lighter than Essie Starry Starry Nights and I think it is a lot more complex and sparkly. The shimmer in this polish is traditional small-particle silver shimmer as well as silver micro-glitter and dark blue super micro glitter. 

What makes it really cool are these glass-like shards of indigo, blue, and purple. I would call them flakies but they seem to be made of actual glass! They cause the polish to be chunky. They also give Kawako a really neat reflective quality but are impossible to photograph with my camera!

Here, you can see the blue shimmer easier.

The formula is much like ONI has; it wasn't nearly as chunky as KITSUME but it was still very textured without top coat. I used only one coat of GELOUS though. That is not bad at all. It probably needed another coat of top coat but I did nail art so I left it at one. GELOUS is a thick clear polish (meant to be a base coat) that helps even out glitter nail polish, by the way!

I decided early on to do a little river-creature for this one. I tried to make "stars" out of the shimmery white I used for the moon here but they are hard to see in photos. I used Barielle Blackened Bleu for the water and Zoya Wednesday, China Glaze Exotic Encounters, and OPI Cuckoo for this Color on the creature. I tried to do a subtle black jelly division to keep the same color for the water but it was TOO subtle then it was TOO contrast-y. So hard to do nail art with jellies sometimes!

KAWAKO really does look like a full-moon night sky out away from the city. The kind of sky that has more stars in it than the ocean has fish! KAWAKO is shimmery, sparkly, glittery, and gorgeous. It is like a beefed up, non-jelly version of Sinful Colors Neptune Essie Starry Starry Nights. Stay tuned for a comparison post with some of this collection's stars and other polish!

So, my creature looks like the cactus thing from Yo Gabba Gabba---I think it is cute, hehe! I like the moon part, too, and the reflections on the water. 

Mattified!

Close up. I mixed some Wednesday with EE to get the splotchy texture on the monster!

How would I rate this polish on a scale of 1-10?

Uniqueness: 8

It is unique in that it has the flake-shards in it but the medium blue with silver glitter has been done before. I do like the upgrade on this one, though. I also love the addition of blue microglitter because it helps the blue to become something more than just the base color, especially in the sun. Sometimes silver is overpowering, after all.

Formula: 7

Same as with ONI; clumpy but only takes a few coats of top coat to even out. You don't need GELOUS with this, really. Application was a little clumpy due to the flake-shards.

Payoff: 8

This is my least favorite from the collection but I do think it is a very pretty polish, indeed. I have a couple similar polishes but nothing like it. I may purge those for this one if it came down to it because I do love how this polish looks not only in the light, but with matte over it. The matte doesn't get rid of the shimmer but subdues the intensity of the blue base. Makes it a velvety night sky.

KAWAKO rates a 8 for me by those standards

All 3 polishes were sent to me for my honest review.