Day 6: Violet - Layering with Orly Love Each Other

I have a feeling this is going to be the month of long post titles...ah well. Today, like yesterday, I had a really hard time choosing what manicure I wanted to do. I had originally planned on Wet 'n' Wild Back Alley Deals, but after yesterday, I didn't really want to take off another glitter after only wearing it for a day. I vacillated for a while before finally settled on a layering manicure with Orly Love Each Other, which I picked up at Ulta on clearance a little while back. I decided to layer it over black, but to add Nubar 2010 in there for some extra oomph. So, I used one coat of Wet 'n' Wild Black Creme, one coat of Nubar 2010, and four (I think) coats of Orly Love Each Other. The result:

natural light

natural light

 natural light

sunlight

sunlight

Sorry for being a bit picspammy, but I really wanted to show this off - it deserves it. Love Each Other is a purple/pink duochrome glass flecked shimmer in a ever-so-slightly milky base, though as you can see, the pink doesn't show up in this manicure. I'm curious to see if it would over other colors, so perhaps you'll be seeing quite a bit more of this lovely polish before the month is up. I still can't figure out why I'd never heard of it before, as it's a truly lovely polish. Perhaps a few more people will learn about it from this post - at least, I can only hope!

And here are the lovely ladies doing this challenge with me (I forgot to do this yesterday and didn't realize I forgot until this morning...fail):

Aly Loves Lacquer

Manicure Addict 

Dees Polish Endeavours

Bright Lights, Big Color

Life and Polish

31 Day Challenge: Day 1

Like many others in the nail blogosphere, I've decided to do the 31 day challenge. I'm not sure where it originated, but this is the challenge:

Why did I decide to do this in November, my busiest month yet? I honestly have no idea - perhaps I'm actually going 'round the bend. In any case, I will be joined this month by the wonderful Elizabeth of Life and Polish, so at least I'll have someone to keep me company as I journey down the path to insanity and aggravated chronic sleep loss.

Today, Day 1, is red day. Easy enough, right? I used OPI Red My Fortune Cookie (one of my favorite red cremes), then used two alternating layers of Nubar 2010 and BB Couture Sex on the Beach and topped it all off with good old Sally Hansen Insta-Dri. I took these pictures last night because I knew I wouldn't have time this morning, so they're not the best quality (dorm room lighting = far from excellent), but I hope you get the general idea.

 indoors, artificial light

 indoors, artificial light

indoors, artificial light

I'm quite fond of this combination. While red with flakies has been done many times before by myself and by others (speaking of which, why didn't I use Elle's Spell today? I just got it and haven't tried it yet...clearly my brain was not turned on last night), I still think it's pretty, especially because the layering of the jelly with the flakies gives it a certain depth, as well as a touch of glitter. All in all, I think it's a good start to my 31 days, and I'm not sure I'll want to immediately take it off later tonight. Now go peep Elizabeth's Day 1 post, and have a great day!

Edit: Unbeknownst to me until a few minutes ago, Manicure Addict, Polish Pauper, Bright Lights, Big Color, and CC Manicured are also doing the challenge in November, so go check them out as well!

Edit 2: And Dees Polish Endeavours! Who knew!

Sally Hansen Blue-Away + Nubar 2010

Hey there! I hope your weekends are all off to a good start. I wore Zoya Ali this week, but didn't get a chance to take a picture of it until it was far too chipped to post here. Sorry about that! Instead, I have a lovely layering combination for you to drool over today (at least, I've been drooling over it). I couldn't decide what polish I wanted to wear after I took Ali off, so I chose my usual method of grabbing a bunch of polish bottles and swatching them on paper until I picked one. This time, I ended up with Sally Hansen Blue-Away and Nubar 2010. I used two or three coats of Blue-Away (sorry...it was only last night, and I still can't remember) and two coats of 2010. I couldn't get my sunlight pictures to capture the fiery orange of 2010 in the sunlight, but the pictures I took in indirect natural turned out much better, so I included more of those.

natural, indirect light

 natural, indirect light

 natural, indirect light

sunlight

Gorgeous, don't you think? I do wish the sunlight pictures I took had turned out better, though - I'm not sure why I couldn't get the strong orange flash to show up in the pictures, because it was certainly there in person. I guess 2010 was just camera-shy. However, I'm glad the pictures taken in indirect light turned out so well. They show the orange-gold-green shift perfectly; in fact, I think they might be my best pictures of 2010 in general. Also, I have absolutely no clue what those tiny, dark specks on my nails are. I didn't notice them until well after I was done painting my nails, but they're definitely attached to my nails at this point. Finally, I feel like I should say that my nails are actually a bit longer than they look in these pictures, though they are still quite nubby. So. Yeah. Have a great rest of the weekend!

Royal Layering

You know those days when you can't think of a good title for your blog post? Yeah, it one of those days. It's a shame, too, because today's layering is (in my entirely unbiased opinion... *cough*) absolutely gorgeous. I grabbed Revlon Royal, Nubar 2010, and Savina Diamond Ice - and then this happened:

 indoors, artificial light

 indoors, artificial light

 indoors, artificial light

indoors, artificial light

Holy crapola...is that not the most gorgeous thing you've ever seen? Okay, maybe not, but it's still pretty effing awesome (aside from my dry fingers and chipped index fingernail, which I apologize for - college happens). As I've learned, Royal is an excellent base for any sort of layering, Nubar 2010 is awesome over anything, and glittery nails are nirvana. So, yeah. No big deal. In all seriousness, though, I think this is probably one of my best layering combinations. Writing this post, I kind of wish I'd put this back on instead of Orly Fowl Play - and I've been lusting over Fowl Play for a while, so that's saying something. What do you think?

Summer Layering

EDIT: I forgot to mention that Adamo 117 is one of the awesome polishes I got in Greece. Whoops!

For today's mani, I really wanted to use Adamo 117, a orange jelly packed with glass flecks that flash orange and gold. I plan on trying it on its own at some point, but I wanted to go to bed before midnight last night, so layering was necessary. I slapped on OPI A Good Man-darin is Hard to Find, which is my favorite orange creme, then added one coat of Adamo 117, one coat of Nubar 2010, one coat of 117, two more of 2010, and one final coat of 117. The results? HOT.

outdoors, sunlight

outdoors, sunlight

outdoors, shade

outdoors, shade

As I told my mom, this mani accurately reflects August weather here in Missouri, but I much prefer this gorgeous layering to the heat and humidity. Even as I'm typing this post, I keep stopping to stare at my nails. Pitiful, I know - but they're so pretty! I bet something similar would look great with pink, as well . . . I may have to try that, too. In the meantime, I'll just admire the juicy deliciousness I have on at the moment.

Don't forget to enter my Zoya Smoke & Mirrors giveaway - it ends Thursday!

Repost: China Glaze Turned Up Turquoise

China Glaze Turned Up Turquoise is not only my first China Glaze polish, but one of the earlier polishes I showed on my blog, as well as my first neon. Though it well deserves all of those "firsts," it definitely deserves a better blog post than I gave it the last time around. I'm not linking to the first one, but you can find it at your own peril - I really had no clue what I was doing back then. I used three coats.

outdoors, sunlight

outdoors, shade

Probably because it's a neon, I couldn't get my camera to accurately capture the color of Turned Up Turquoise - it's more of a greenish teal in real life. However, it truly is a gorgeous color, and I love the finish. I only have two neon shimmers for some reason, but I definitely need to get more. After wearing Turned Up Turquoise for a little while, I added a coat of Nubar 2010 and Essie Matte About You. Funnily enough, this actually made the color of Turned Up Turquoise show up a tiny bit more accurately in the photos.

 outdoors, cloudy

outdoors, cloudy

I would definitely do this combination again . . . I love cool colors with warm-colored glitter or flakie top coats. What do you think?

Flower Nail Art

Helloooo, everyone! I hope you're enjoying the last day of June - it seems like it's gone by so fast! Today I have some nail art that I did with my new Nubar nail art pens. I got the creme set, and so far I'm loving them. I really want to buy all the other sets too, but as I'm saving up both for a MacBook Pro (my mom's buying most of it, but I want to contribute) for college and a new iPhone, that probably won't happen anytime soon. Oh well, hopefully I'll get one of the on-campus jobs I applied for and have a little spending money come fall.

*steers back on topic* Ahem. So. This was actually quite easy to do, and looks quite nice if you just have, you know, normal eyes. If you have 0.3-mm macro focusing eyes like my camera does, though, it looks a bit smeary. Ew. I assure you this wasn't - and isn't - visible in real life.

indoors, artificial light

Ta-da! It's not the neatest job ever, but it'll do. I used Zoya Robyn for the base and Nubar pens in Plum, Mint, and Navy Blue for the flowers. I find it kind of funny that the green nail art pen is called "mint," because while we normally think of mint green as a pale, cool green, this green is closer to the actual color of mint leaves. I'm not sure why I'm amused by that - maybe because I'm typing this at 4:30 in the morning because I can't go to sleep - but I am. I'll have some more nature-y nail art for you tomorrow, so stay tuned!

Pink Wednesday: Jelly Sandwich

Today's Pink Wednesday post is my first (I think) jelly sandwich. I used Revlon Desire, one of the new Revlon jellies, Nubar 2010, and a base of Wet n Wild White Creme to satisfy my hate of VNL. I used quite a few coats, as my manicure went something like this: Wet n Wild White Creme, Revlon Desire, Nubar 2010, Revlon Desire, Nubar 2010, Revlon Desire, Nubar 2010, Revlon Desire. Yeah. And then I put Insta-Dri on top to make it all shiny.

 indoors, artificial light

indoors, artificial light

I really like this combination, though I don't think I'm quite as fond of the jelly-flakie sandwich as I am of matteified flakies...we shall see. I need to buy a new bottle of Revlon Royal (I used the last for frankens) so I can try one with that.