My Collection in Swatches # 5:Purples Part 1

Good Morning! (or whatever time of day you are reading this) Today I am continuing my collection swatch series and purple seemed like the perfect, fun color to chase away those Monday blues! :-)
Purple is one of my favorite colors (I just realized I say that a lot, LOL. I guess every color is my favorite, haha) and I have a lot of them so I had to split them into 2 posts. Although all pictures taken featured a basecoat, I did not topcoat every color as I wanted some of them to stand out with their natural finish. I'll let you know as we go along though. Ready to jump into it? Let's go!

*NOTE: The quality of pictures will vary a little. I photograph mainly in artificial light and had to keep switching between my digital camera (point and shoot, nothin' fancy) and my phone's camera. The lighter colors looked grey in my digital camera and good on the phone, but the mid to dark purples looked pink or black on my phone and truer to color on the digital. It sounds funny writing it, but trust me, I was anything by amused while trying to take pictures!

The first polish today is from Kleancolor. It is # 140 'Pastel Purple'. This is, as the name implies, a soft, pretty, pastel purple creme. The formula is a little thick, but applies well. It is pictured here with 2 coats and a topcoat.

Next is from NYC, # 147 'Lexington Lilac'. This is a new polish that my little sister gave me for Christmas. I liked it when she gave it to me, but I loved it when I started swatching it for this post. This is a gorgeous, dusty mauve-y purple creme. The formula was awesome. It applied very thinly and evenly and dried to a glossy finish. Pictures are 2 coats with a topcoat. 

The third polish is Sinful Colors # 1184 'Tempest'. This is another lilac creme polish, but it is a very purple lilac as opposed to the dusty, mauve effect of the NYC color. It has a good formula, applies very smoothly and dries to a nice glossy finish. It is pictured with 2 coats, no topcoat. I wanted to show off the natural finish of the polish. 

Then we have # 72 'Purple'. This is a light purple with a shimmery finish. The first coat goes on a little sheer, but builds to nicely opaque in only 2 coats. It finishes looking slightly metallic, but doesn't show brush strokes. The picture is 2 coats, plus a topcoat. 

Please excuse the smudge on the thumb; I didn't let the polish dry enough before applying my topcoat :-(

The last polish today is another Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear.It is # 190 'Posh Plum'. The application was flawless, very smooth and even. It is a very vibrant shade, almost more magenta than true purple. I have another shade to show you in the second half of my purples that is almost the same color, but this one dries to a nice subtle shimmer finish and the one I'll show you Wednesday is a flat, glossy creme (which to me means there is absolute justification for 2 of the same color, LOL). The pictures are 2 coats, no top coat. I wanted you to get the full effect of the natural finish on this one :-)

Whew! You made it! I was really inspired doing all of these many purple polish swatches so on Friday, after you have seen them all, I will do a nail art featuring some of these colors! So, do you have a favorite so far? Or maybe there is a polish you are hoping to see in part 2? Let me know in the comments, I love hearing from you guys! That's all for now -- I'll see you Wednesday! 

Collection in Swatches # 4: Browns

Happy Friday! I hope you all had a wonderful week. Mine was busy. I work from home and had taken about 3 weeks off for Christmas and New Year's due to trying to finish up knitted Christmas gifts and then traveling for New Year's. The time off was wonderful --- trying to catch up on everything I missed, not so much, LOL. Somehow I thought I had made things easier on myself by doing collection swatches during my busy season around the holidays, but I found out swatches take a lot of time so kudos to you bloggers out there doing a lot of swatch and reviews! Today I will be showing my brown polishes; all polishes will be shown with a base coat of Nutra Nail Strengthener and a top coat of Seche Vite. Brown is one of my favorite colors, but I have a hard time finding polishes that I like and that are still pretty, good for my skin tone, and a little bit unique. So, if you have any you love, leave them in the comments, please!

Individual swatches after the break! *NOTE: This will be another picture heavy post!

Collection in Swatches # 3: Oranges!

Hello Lovely Readers! Sorry for neglecting you for another week, but I had a wonderful visit with my parents, brother and his wife, 6 month old nephew, and my uncle! It was some much needed down-time with loved ones. I hope you all had a great New Year's as well!

Before I left, I had started swatching my polish collection for y'all, grouped into color families. So today we are continuing that trend with the orange family. (Just a heads up that this will be another picture-heavy post.) I thought it might also show off the color variations to see them all together. Also, you will no doubt notice in the pictures that I cut my nails way down. They were starting to curl they were so long, LOL. So I cut them fairly short and also re-shaped them from almond to squoval.

So let's jump into it. All pictures shown today will have a base and top coat. The first color I have for you is Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear #405 'Coral Reef'. I used 2 coats for full opacity and a level, even finish. This polish is a lovely creme coral with a glossy finish.

Polish number 2 is Sinful Colors #1197 'Anchor's Away'. This is an odd shade for me because when I try to put it with yellows it seems too orange and if I put it with oranges, it looks more yellow, LOL. Here it is pictured with 2 coats. I have to admit, I prefer this polish more when I use it for water marbling since it has a great, thin formula that lets it spread well in the water. But for painting application, that thinness made it streaky and uneven. The topcoat did go a long way to smoothing it all out though. 

Up next is #150 'Sunkissed' from Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear. This is a gorgeous tangerine creme polish with a good formula. It does tend to separate in the bottle if it has been sitting around for a while so may need a good shake-up about 30 minutes before you plan on applying it. The pictures here are with 2 coats, and again a base and top coat as well.

Polish #4 of my orange series is #1214 from Sinful Colors, 'Feel the Vibe'. This is another great creme polish. It is similar to the 'Sunkissed' but a bit brighter and bolder. I used 2 coats with base and top coat for these pictures. This was a good formula and if applied with care, wasn't patchy.

Next up is Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear #170 'Hot Tamale'. Not too much to say about this one. It applied well, has a great formula, and is a lovely creme with a glossy finish. This makes a good Halloween color :-) The pictures are 2 coats and like all the others have a base and top coat.

Last but not least is Sally Hansen Hard as Nails # 430 'Die-Hard Fan'. This is the only one of my oranges that has a shimmer and that makes it my favorite (not because I love shimmer, LOL. I actually prefer cremes, but the shimmer makes it unique among my oranges and that's why it is my fave). This is 2 coats again. And I do love the formula on this polish as well. It seems like you might need more coats when you put that first one on, but it layers so well that 2 coats brings it to full opacity. This is another good polish for the Fall/Halloween seasons. 

So, which polish was your favorite? Let me know in the comments. On Friday we will look at my brown polishes. And I'm still deciding if I should show my blacks? I have four of them because I do not think all black polishes are created equally, but that is more about finish and application then what they look like on the nail. Do you want to see them? Let me know!! See you on Friday :-)

Collection in Swatches # 2

Happy Wednesday! As promised, I have swatches of my collection for you today, specifically yellows and greens. Actually, when I break it down I only have 1 yellow. I have used another as a yellow orange before, but standing it alone today I realized it really belongs with the oranges, so I'm saving it for that post. Be warned that this is another picture-heavy posting.

Up first is my 1 lonely little yellow, LOL. This is Sinful Colors 1442 'Yellow Spotted'. Just looking at the bottle you get the impression of a bright, sunny shade. The pictures here are 5 coats with no topcoat. This is still not fully opaque, but I didn't want to keep layering because the polish was getting gloopy. The formula was nice for 2 or 3 coats so I would suggest layering this over white or something.

 It does have a gorgeous shimmery finish. As far as the color it really is a beautiful spring or summer shade. I am not a huge fan of yellow myself so I probably wouldn't wear it alone, but I love what it brings to a fun water marble design.

My second offering brings us into the green family. This is Sinful Colors 944 'Innocent'. I don't think I could say enough good things about the formula of this polish, it really was that good. And, it was a one-coater! In my experience, most lighter colors need 2-3 coats for full opacity, but not this one. I will say though that these pictures are 1 thick coat, no topcoat, so if you prefer thin layers of polish, you may need 2.

 Another beautiful Spring or Summer shade and this one I would wear on its own. It has a gorgeous cream finish and no streak-y-ness :-)

The next polish also comes from Sinful Colors, # 946 'Happy Ending'. This color reminds me of leprechauns and pots 'o gold! The pictures here are 3 coats, again no top coat.

 The formula was nice and thin. It does need the 3 coats because I found that 2 left it a bit patchy-looking. There is a subtle shimmer to this polish as well. Overall, I really like it.

Last, but actually my favorite of the bunch is Sinful Colors 1398 'Pine Away'. The pictures are 2 coats, no topcoat. The formula was perfect and very easy to apply.

 You can see on the bottle pic that there is a silver shimmer running through the polish. The effect that has on this beautiful, Christmas-green color is an almost foil-like appearance. However, unlike an actual foil polish, it doesn't show the brush strokes and unlike foils applied with glue, a topcoat won't wrinkle and destroy the shine. I heart this polish!

That's all for today! Let me know which one was your favorite down in the comments. Thanks for stopping by :-)

P.S. I will be out of town celebrating a belated Christmas and New Year's with my extended family so there will no new posts until next Wednesday. Stay safe this New Year's Eve and I'll see you in 2015!!

Collection in Swatches # 1

Hey Y'all! You might remember in my last post I mentioned being fairly busy til after the New Year, but I don't want to neglect my blog either. So, I looked through my list of blogging ideas and decided now is the perfect time to show off my polish collection swatches! I have a video on YouTube that shows off the collection as it sits prettily on my wall shelf, but I had some requests for swatches. I think the best way to do that is going to be by color family. Today we will look at grey polishes.

First up is #330 'Grey Area' from Sally Hansen's Xtreme Wear line. These pictures are 3 coats + topcoat.

No flash

With Flash

No Flash

This is a warm grey cream polish with a hint of brown. The formula is very nice and smooth. It did need 3 coats to avoid streaking, but that could have been poor application on my part.

Number 2 is also from Sally Hansen's Xtreme Wear, #310 'Gunmetal'. This is one of my favorite in my whole collection. It is pictured with 2 coats and topcoat.

This slightly blue tinted grey has a lovely soft shimmer finish. The first coat goes on very sheer and you think you will need 3-4 coats, but it is fully opaque in 2, which was a nice surprise when I first starting using it.

Next is another favorite of mine (can you tell I really like darker colors?) and is also Sally Hansen. This is from the Insta-Dri collection, #300 'Grease Lightening'. Pictures are 2 coats with a top coat.

This is a beautiful dark grey creme with a satin finish. The formula is magic! The only downside, in my opinion, is the brush. All of the Insta-Dri polishes have a wide, flat brush that I just don't care for but maybe I just need practice.

Last but not least is NYC's Long Wearing Enamel # 145 'Rock the Party!'. This is a beautiful shade, in the bottle at least. But I was very disappointed actually using it. This polish is so sheer I'm not sure you could ever achieve opacity without layering it over another color. The pictures are with 5 coats plus a topcoat and you can still see visible nail lines.

This polish does have 2 nice qualities despite of the lack of opacity. First is the dual iridescence. It looks grey in some light, green in other lights, and even purplish at the right angle. Second thing I really like is the nice shimmer finish. I am going to have to try layering this over another grey or black to see if that resolves the opacity problem without losing the iridescence.

That is all my grey polishes. Next will be green and yellows so come back on Wednesday to see those! Thanks for reading and have a Happy Monday!

It's a Quickie!

Hi Everyone! I hope everyone had a fabulous Christmas! I had a wonderful, quiet Christmas with my hubby and brother-in-love. We'll be spending New Year's out of town with the rest of my family and I'm super excited! Of course, that means I also have a ton of things to get done before then and between that and Christmas I did not have time for a long, involved manicure. But I wanted to do something quick, easy, and fun!

I used Sinful Colors 'Clear Coat', Sally Hansen Magnetic 'Graphite Gravity', and Sinful Colors 'Let Me Go'. I also used black micro-bar glitter. I started with my base coat and then a single coat of the magnetic polish on each nail except the accent nails. On the accent nail, I used 4 coats of the 'Let Me Go' which is a really soft, iridescent polish with a purple tint. It still wasn't completely opaque after 4 coats, but since I was putting glitter over it, it was enough for what I wanted.

Then I applied another coat of the magnetic, one nail at a time and used the magnet. Now I have a confession to make here. There will be a full video review going up to my YouTube channel after the holidays, but I purchased 2 magnets from the Born Pretty Store that were supposed to give my magnet polish a different shaped effect than the magnet that came with it. One was star-burst shaped and the other was chevrons. I tried both of these new magnets several times, but they just did NOT work. I got either NO movement of the polish or extremely little. I finally just gave up and went back to my original magnet, which worked like a charm.

Then I put some of the bar glitter (which were matte glitter, by the way) on a piece of parchment paper and added a few drops of the 'Clear Coat' from Sinful Colors. I used that as the glitter coat on my accent nails. Then I covered everything with a coat of Seche Vite and voila! Quick and easy, but pretty manicure!

Sorry for the messy look. I had smudged the polish and had to reapply. Since I was in a hurry, I forgot the clean up :-(

As always, thanks for reading and I'll see you soon! Have a wonderful weekend!