Not Dead Yet - And Savvy Femme Couture- Prince Ala Charm

Sorry for my abrupt disappearance over the past week or so; I haven't given up and abandoned my blog, despite how it may look. I've been having some pretty serious trouble with my internet connection, which, combined with some camera difficulties (mainly caused by me being a bit of an idiot noob about digital cameras) knocked me out of commission for a while as far as posting or commenting goes.

But...I'm back...and I have a beauty of a polish to show you all today. Well, a hidden beauty. Let me explain...

When I saw Prince Ala Charm tucked into a display at Sally's earlier this summer, it was love at first sight - or at least strong like at first sight. Such a pretty, shimmery, glistening blue. I have a weakness for blue...and shimmer. Done deal. I brought it home and tucked it into my untried stash.

And dug it out yesterday and tried it on. And promptly fell right out of love. My prince was a frog! Even though it doesn't look it in the bottle, it's sheer. Extremely, extremely sheer. Seven-desperate-coats-and-still-not-bottle-color-or-opaque sheer. Not at all pretty, just very washed-out looking. So, determined to make this doomed relationship work somehow (yeah, I have relationship drama with my polishes; I said I had a passion for nail polish, and I meant it! ;) I tried layering it over white. No dice. It was a little less sheer, but still disappointingly blah and watery-looking.

I was about to give up and resign it to my small never-to-be-worn-again polish box, when I figured: Well, why not see how it looks over black? And this is what happened:
With the kiss of a layer of black polish, my frog turned back into a prince - a gorgeous, shimmering, almost glass-flecked looking blue prince! It reminds me of the color of a blue morpho butterfly's wings (which I meant to add a picture of for comparison, but I forgot, and now I don't think my internet connection will hold up long enough to add it in.) Here it is with flash, since there was no sun to be found today:
And here, again with flash and deliberately blurred so youo can get an idea of the beautiful depth and shimmer:
So my fairy-tale romance with Prince Ala Charm had a happy ending after all; I just have to remember the next time I want to wear it, to layer it over black or another darker color. It's practically pointless on its own. All pics are three coats layered over Wet'n'Wild black polish plus top coat.

So glad to be back to blogging again; I've really missed it, and all the beautiful blogs I read regularly.

Mystery Polish Number Three

The next of the unnamed, unidentified-brand dollar store polishes.

Metallic magenta shimmer, butter-smooth application, dried in a flash, opaque in one coat (!!)...what's not to like? Nothing!...if you're me, that is. I thought this one was really pretty.
Here it is with flash:
I would have loved to have gotten a picture of this one in the sun, to really show off its shine, sparkle, and glow, but it was a dreary, drizzly here, so flash it is:
And one more for good measure:
I'm really impressed with the quality of these polishes, especially for a brand that I still can't identify or find any information about.

I must apologize for the awful pictures; the batteries in my camera were dying. All pics are two coats (though, really, one would have been just fine with this polish) plus base and top coat.

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend! :)

CQ - Vintage Gray

This looks very gray in the pictures, but is actually more of a "greige" creme in real life. Greiges and taupes really don't usually appeal to me that much, but I like this one because it does lean more toward a mouse-y gray in some lights. The first pic is closest to being color-accurate of any I took, although indoors the polish definitely takes on a more taupe/putty shade.

Here it is outdoors with flash:
And in shade, no flash, looking very gray:
It went on smoothly, but there was a little bit of minor bubbling on a few nails, which you can see in the pictures on my index finger; it was another scorching day here and I think the heat may have had something to do with the bubbling problem. Pics are three coats plus base and top coat.

Even with my nails being as short as they've been lately, I still somehow manged to break one of them yesterday, in such a way that I couldn't fix the break without it still being obvious and making all the nails on one hand look uneven. So - I took a nail-clipper to all ten of them and -chop! Off with their heads! My poor nails...they're almost as short now as they were when I used to bite them years ago. Good thing they grow back - in time!

Pure Ice - Super Star

I've always liked Pure Ice polishes; they're good quality, have a nice color selection, and at $2.00 each at Walmart, they're certainly inexpensive. This one is no exception.

Super Star is red with tiny multi-colored glitter. On the nail, it's subtly fiery and very pretty, especially in sunlight:

Indoors or in the shade, the red looks a little darker and the glitter is a bit more subdued, but still noticeable:
Application had no problems, as I've come to expect from the Pure Ice brand, and it dried fairly quickly. It did look just slightly more dull than I liked after it dried completely, but that was remedied by a clear topcoat, which brought out all the shine and sparkle.

All pics are three coats of polish, plus base and top coat, and are pre-clean-up, unfortunately. When I see how beautifully some bloggers polish their nails, it makes me a little ashamed of my sloppy paint jobs, especially in pre-clean-up pics. I've been polishing my nails almost daily since I was fourteen, so it isn't lack of practice...maybe my hands shake a bit, or maybe I just don't have a talent for it. I dunno...I do my best. :) I've wondered sometimes if I'm actually good enough at it to blog, but then I remember that I'm doing this to share my love of the polish itself, not to show off my polishing skills, or lack thereof. So I continue to take pictures of my nails less than perfectly polished, and admire and enjoy the skill and precision of those who are more talented at it than I am. :)

Confetti - Masqeurade Ball

Another of my beloved vampies. :) This one is tiny red glitter sparkles in a black base. I had a hard time getting the red sparkles to show up in the pics, but they're definitely noticeable on the nail; I love that this polish is truly dark, yet doesn't really look black even in indoor light. The beautiful blackened red shimmer/sparkle is still evident.

Here it is with flash:
Pics are three coats plus base and top coat.

I happened upon a full rack of Confetti polishes at CVS a few weeks ago, and picked up this one and a few other colors that looked promising. This is one of the first ones I've actually worn, and I must say I'm pretty impressed with this brand so far, especially for the price of $1.99. It went on with no application problems and wore well, lasting three days with no chips, dents or tip-wear before I got bored with the color and changed it. The quality, at least judging from this color, seems at least comparable to Sinful Colors, another drugstore brand with a similar price point. The color selection was nice; even if there didn't seem to be anything drop-dead stunningly different, there was a good selection of colors and some very pretty ones at that.

One thing to be aware of with this brand, though (and if you've seen any reviews of the brand on other nail blogs you'll probably already know this, but I guess it may still bear repeating): Check the brush before you buy! Some of the bottles had really wonky brushes, too long for the bottle and bent over at the tip, that could probably make application quite tricky.

If you're careful about making sure the bottle you buy has a functional brush, it's a very nice polish at a very good price.

L.A. Colors - Lollipop

I have two batches of L.A. Colors polishes: one batch that I got at the Dollar Tree, which doesn't have a name label on the bottom of the bottle, and one batch not from the dollar tree, which do have labels. This is from the latter, labeled group.
Lollipop is a pretty, bright pink with a subtle bluish flash in some lights. It went on with no issues. It might have been a bit sheer on its own, but I layered it over a white polish because I just do not like sheer or even slightly sheer polishes on my nails. (On some people's nails sheer polishes are gorgeous; on mine - not so much. :/) So every time I have even the slightest suspicion that a polish is going to be sheer I use an opaque basecoat under it.

Here it is in shade, showing a hint of its slightly bluey/lavender side:
In sunlight:
Pics are three coats, base coat, and top coat. I think it's a pretty, cheerful pink for summertime. (Which, by the way, I can't believe is going by so fast! Has this summer just flown by for anyone else? I noticed this afternoon that the leaves on the huge maple tree in front of the house are starting to get that slightly dusty, drooping look that they always have toward the end of the summer, as if the tree is getting a little tired of holding up the weight of its own foliage and is starting to look forward to the time when it can let its leaves drop, one by one...) I hope you'll all be able to enjoy this late-summer weekend to its fullest!

Color Club - Sexy Siren

My camera really doesn't seem to handle glitter well. Either that, or I just haven't figured out how to take really good pictures yet. That's entirely possible - it's a new camera (it was a birthday present from my very sweet boyfriend about a month ago) and I'm still not always sure if I'm using the right settings, etc...Anyway, these pictures didn't come out entirely accurate as to color. This polish is actually much less turquoise than it looks here. Weirdly enough, the bottle in the first photo is fairly color accurate. (Why will it show the right color in the bottle but not on my nails in the very same picture??)
Sexy Siren is part of the fall 2008 Color Club Glitter Vixen collection, all of which I coveted at the time, but never got around to actually buying. So when I spotted a lone bottle of Sexy Siren on a dusty shelf at the back of one of the local beauty supply stores, I pounced.
It's a very pretty medium blue glitter in a clear base. It went on very smoothly, and would have been opaque in three coats, but I used four, since I never quite know when to quit when there's glitter involved. My mind goes blank, except for the single thought: "MOAR GLITTER!" as I gleefully glop on coat after coat...Yes, I have issues. ;) It dried pretty rough to the touch, as so many glitter polishes do, but a top coat helped smooth it out.
I layered the polish over black for added opacity and to make the color of the glitter "pop" a little more. All pics are four coats plus base and top coat.

Here it is with flash: (There was no sun when I was taking these pics, more's the pity; it was another cloudy afternoon.)
I may just have to try to hunt up the rest of the Color Club glitter polishes at some point.

Simple Pleasures Nail Polish - Unnamed

This polish was one of a set that I found at Ross a few week ago. I bought it because I thought the colors were pretty (they are mostly pinks and corals, which I don't have that many of, and they're all cremes, in which my collection is also a bit lacking. I didn't use to care for cremes very much, but these days I find myself kind of drawn to them.) They were also a really good price - I think they were $4.99 for a set of six colors, plus a clear polish.
This is the first one of the set that I've tried and I must say I'm kind of torn about them. On the one hand, I really like the color and finish of this polish. It's a beautiful medium-pink creme, almost bubblegum or Barbie-like but a little more sophisticated (or so I like to think, anyway. Feel free to disillusion me.) It also works fairly well with my skintone, which usually does heinous and unappealing things when combined with the color pink...
That being said, though, there is one problem with this polish - the application, and that is entirely due to the brush. The brush is...well...pretty atrocious. Imagine going outside, selecting a nice-sized twig from a nearby tree, chewing on the end of the twig until it's all frayed and bristly and then trying to use it to polish your nails. That's kind of what using this brush was like. It's so coarse, stiff, and unruly that it made the polish streaky (which I don't think it would have been with a different brush), caused tons of cuticle drag, and took off whole strips of color when applying a second coat.

With careful handling and some patience, I managed to get a nice, smooth, even finish with this polish in three coats...and then, after all that effort, I went and put a big, noticeable ding in the polish on my second finger! Arrgh! I seem to be smooshing up every manicure I do lately...

Pics are three coats plus base and top coat.
If you're willing to work with the not-so-great brush, it's a really nice creme polish for not a lot of money. I'm looking forward to trying out the others in the set, and if I see another set from Simple Pleasures with different colors, I will be very tempted to get it.

I'm open to suggestions...

What do you think of the new background? I'm not sure if the pale text on the darker background is a bit hard on the eyes...

And, while I'm at it, if anyone has any other suggestions for things they'd like to see on this blog, or anything I could do differently to make this blog a more enjoyable experience for you as a reader, please do feel free to speak up! :) I'd love to hear from you.

And welcome to each of my new followers, and thank you! :) I'd blog about polish just for the sheer fun of it (and because I'm pretty much hopelessly obsessed and need an outlet for my babbling) , even if nobody read my blog, but knowing that you all liked my blog enough to want to follow it makes the whole blogging experience about a zillion times more fun...Everything's more fun when you get to share it with somebody... I'll do my best to keep this quiet little corner of the polish-blogging world enjoyable for you!

Mystery Polish Number Two

Here is the manicure I wore this weekend. It's the same "mystery" brand as the red polish I posted a while back and was found in the same dollar store.

This one is a very frosty medium pink shade. It went on with no issues and lasted almost three days before the first chip appeared.

The smudge on the thumb nail is entirely my fault, not the polish...I managed to bash my hand against the edge of my desk while the polish was drying.
Here it is in full sun:
I think it's a pretty color; I'm just not really into frosts these days. Something about that frosty finish just doesn't appeal to me... If you don't mind frosts, though, or if you actually like them, this is quite a nice one.

I still wish I knew what brand this polish actually is...