Spark De Triomphe with White Shatter

June 23, 2011

This is from OPI's Serena Glam Slam collection.  It's one of the French sets. I couldn't wait to try this color on.  Spark De Triomphe is super pretty. It has fine glitter and larger round flecks. The pictures didn't catch the depth of this polish.  It could be a top coat or opaque on its own.  I used three coats.  I didn't want to cover it up so I used white shatter only on the tips.  Glad I did.  It didn't shatter well.  Could be the angle I applied it or the texture of the SDT.  I noticed with glitters, if you don't use a top coat before applying shatter, it won't shatter as much.  Can't stop looking at all the sparkles.  This is a great year round color.

Serena Grand Slam

Okay, totally excited!  I went to my local salon today to see if the last bottle of OPI My Private Jet was still there.  It wasn't.  That's okay.  I bought Serena Grand Slam Spark De Triomph with white shatter instead.  It's a super nice combo.  I didn't want to get another shatter but I really liked the gold glitter in SDT.  It reminds me of pyrite (fool's gold).  I asked if the Grand Slam England that I prepaid was in.  They said no, but when I went to the grocery store my phone rang.  It just arrived early this morning and was in the back.  I was so excited that I forgot to buy my produce at the grocery store. At least I remembered the milk.  Both sets are really nice.  I think I'm going to use Spark De Triumph at soon as my Mermaids Tears start showing wear.

OPI Mermaids Tears

I’m hoping this manicure will last longer than the last two.  This is OPI “Mermaids Tears”.  I really love this Jade color. The Konad stamp is smeared because my two year old kept shaking the table and grabbing everything.  But I think it still came out okay considering.  The smearing is only noticeable in the close up picture.  In person at a glance, no one will notice.  I don’t even notice it without my reading glasses.

A Case for my nail polish collection

June 18, 2011
 I went to Ross’s today to look for something to keep all my polishes in. I found this black case.  I didn’t realize I was actually going to fill it up.  Maybe I should hold back on getting new polishes.  Or maybe I could always get a second case J.   It reminds me of a treasure chest. 

OPI Planks a Lot

June 16, 2011
“Planks a lot” is the basecoat.  I did a Konad design with a teal California brand.  (Not that noticeable).  I’ve been wanting to try out “Funky Dunkey” from the OPI Shrek collection.  I found one left at the salon hiding behind other leftover collections.  I’m practicing free hand French tip.  I have the Konad French tip plate but with I usually have to do it twice over to get the tips opaque.  I don’t use the special polish since I like to do different color tips and don’t want to spend extra on a rainbow of colors.  Konad polishes also have expiration dates.

This manicure was on for three days. 

OPI Steady as She Rose

June 14, 2011
This is “steady as she rose”.  I’ve been overlooking this color since it came out.  All the swatches I had seen made the color look really washed out (even the pic I took makes the color look pale). I finally noticed it when I bought “skull and gloss bones”.  The color is so pretty.  I have a couple shirts that are this color.  In my opinion, it looks like a combo of “sparrow me the drama”, “planks a lot”, and “skull and gloss bones”.  A dusty, pinkish-lavender.

This is two-coats.   I wanted to do a feathered black French tip and a Konad white bow-but that didn’t turn out. I painted “teenage dream” and a silver stripe to cover it up.  I’ll try this again another time.  It only lasted two days.  The random black polish chipped superfast.

OPI Give Me the Moon (take two)

June 8, 2011
I went back to my favorite “give me the moon” with French tips in “skull and glossbones” from the pirates set. I also did Konad flowers and some jewels.  S&G is such a nice gray.  I ended up getting the regular size bottle.  I knew if I didn’t I would regret it when my mini ran out and the color was no longer available.  I also picked up “steady as she rose” but I’ll tell you about it next mani. 

I kept this on for six days because I loved it so much and I also was too busy to redo my nails.  So that worked out.

Milani 3D

June 7, 2011
Went to CVS pharmacy and scoped polishes while I waited for a prescription.  I guess I’m the last person to know about holographic polishes.  I bought four of the Milani 3D polishes.  The holo really isn’t that noticeable in the bottle.  If I hadn’t seen other swatches online-I wouldn’t have even bothered to get it.

The top pic is “HD’ (a silver) over the previous “stranger tides” and below is “Hi-Tech” (a green) over everything else.  I really liked the green.  It shows the holo best.

                     That night I still wanted to the try the blue Milani called “cyber space”.  I decided to do a gradient which gets nicely blended with this set.  And yes, with all these coats layered over each other it didn’t dry and I had to remove it. 

OPI Stranger Tides

June 6, 2011
This is “Stranger Tides” from again the OPI pirates collection.  It’s two coats and I didn’t do a good job painting. I was overtired from my day.  I took this pic the next morning before leaving the house.  It’s a khaki or olive green. I don’t know really how to describe it.  It’s the same color as my front door.  My camera didn’t pick up the colors pigment. 

OPI Give Me the Moon

June 4, 2011
This is OPI “give me the moon” from their Night Brights collection with NYC starry glitter and black shatter.  Give me the moon is my favorite from all the colors I currently have.  The NYC glitter adds a really nice touch.  I needed to retry my shatter because it had gotten really clumpy and not usable.  I picked up a lacquer thinner and now keep my shatter in the

fridge.  IT WORKED! My shatter is good as new.  I also give the bottle a good shake after painting each hand and when I’m done, I add the thinner before putting it away.  It’s really humid where I live so I need to take extra measures to keep my polish good.   *Note-when I bought “give me the moon”, I also saw “my private jet” but it wasn’t the original holo release.

This manicure lasted all of two days.  I ruined it by handling polish remover.  Oh well, I get to try more colors.

OPI Sparrow Me the Drama

May 30, 2011
     My latest addiction has been nail polish. It all just started when I went to buy OPI black shatter to see what all the fuss was about.  I went home with my shatter and the Katy Perry mini collection.  Totally loved it!   I started checking online for reviews, blogs, upcoming colors, all the collections I missed.  I’ve bought more polish in the last two months than I did in all my previous years.  Since I’ve been doing my nails so often now, I wanted to take pictures and share with everyone.  My cuticles are not the best though.

For the month of June I’m doing mostly light pastel colors.  I’ve been rocking dark colors all last month and am ready to lighten up.

May 30, 2011

This is OPI Pirates of the Caribbean “Sparrow Me the Drama” with Sally Hansen X-treme wear in “celeb city”.  I eagerly waited over a month for this collection to arrive in salons.  Since I live in Hawaii, everything arrives well after all the other states.  I tried ordering online, but shipping for six bottles was going to cost over $40 (cancel order!).  But my local salons have been getting a lot of business from me.  I’ve been trying to hit all OPI retailers looking for discontinued colors.  Anyway back to the subject, I bought the mini set and found the silver shatter at other location that charged $15. Later, I picked up the other colors.  The mini bottles are hard to paint with.  However, they are perfect for my four year olds tiny fingers.  I tried and love the entire pirates set.  The silver shatter covers too much of the base color for my liking, so I prefer to Konad with silver polish instead.

This manicure lasted 6 days with no chipping.  I couldn’t believe it.  It’s not like I wasn’t doing dishes or laundry.  I even went swimming.

I finally took it off so I could try a different color.