Bumble Bee Redux

I wanted to post a manicure I loved. I did this back in February before I removed the Polygel.

It makes me miss the Polygel for the simple reason that Polygel didn't stain and I could put sheer stuff on them without that usual yellow/orange tint that I never could remove.

Here is Sephora X Chaotic topped with OPI Color Paints Primarily Yellow:

OPI Color Paints, unlike their tint collection, are impactful sheer jellies that are essentially designed for layering.

Here's another shot.

This is two coats and thought I managed to slop it around, it really was pretty nice as far as a formula.


I love it, unabashedly so. In fact this yellow surprised me with it's ability to really set down some color!


Black and white glitter are favorites of mine, this combo is pretty simple, I have a couple, but I haven't compared. I don't know if glitter is much of a thing these days, so it's hard to say what's coming out.

Here's a shot alone before I added the OPI Primarily Yellow:

There isn't a definite size, I like the range and the bar glitter works for me, too. More heavy on the black glitter, but enough white to pop some contrast.


If you can find the Color Paints around, and you like to layer, grab them. They are good, very good!

Black and white glitter, you may have to poke around because there is so much flux with Sephora nail polish. I don't even see it on their site. I think the private label upscale boutique brand freights a lot of brand loyalty. It's one thing to buy a Chanel or a Dior and it's another to buy a Nails Inc, or Smith and Whatever it's called. Most probably use WnW or Color Club or Essence or Orly or Nubar. Companies with nail polish making infrastructure are not super common, nor is it a high profit/volume endeavor. It's not like they are making straws or plastic bags or glass bottles.

I get it and I don't mind paying premium for something I like, but I think it is hard to sustain something not tied to a bigger juggernaut.

I found my Sephora X at Ross and the OPI Color Paints at TJ Maxx. As a quick note: both won't be there, so it's off to eBay, etc.

I have noticed TJM to carry less polish and Ross seems to just have JBL and lesser known brands, with rare smatterings of the odd OPI or Sephora X.


Excuse the ramble. Hope it helped you find these if you are interested.


Thanks for reading my little nail polish journal!!

Winter Blue

Well, I realize I've had Orly Total Eclipse around for a while. It's a pale blue base chock full of tiny glitters and small glitters that are blue and iridescent.

I put it over Sephora by OPI I Don't Bite (blogged here).

Two coats and you can see the blue around my untidy edges.

It's a lovely royal blue with iridescent glitters, too. I like how the blurple contrasts with it a bit.

Here's another shot in the sunshine:

You can see the blue glitters popping out a little more here. I have to admit I love this combination.

I think with some searching you can still find these polishes.

I know that the Sephora by OPI is pretty hard to find and so is the Orly.

Total Eclipse won't come up on a search of Orly's site. Found at TJ Maxx, I am unsure when it came out. Orly has fallen off my radar, why I don't know. I like the size of their collections, but maybe I have so many dupes and their collections aren't inspiring me right now. Having said that, and poking around their site, I do like their small, edited collections!

Thanks for reading my little nail polish journal!

Glitter Sponge Learning Curve

I wanted to try sponging a glitter again and sharing the highs, lows, ups, downs, etc.

Sephora by OPI G-listen To Your Heart

Sponged on over black with a triangle cosmetic sponge found at Dollar Tree.

First off: what a delightful shade of purple! I love how fresh and bright.

So, what I learned this round:

• Protect your fingers - I use latex body paint that I use for stamping, it makes a huge difference. Cleanup was still a chore, but it sure went much better than the last time (A lot of that glitter on my fingers is from the swatches I did the previous glitter post)
• Let the sponge do it's job - the sponge needs to pick up that extra base so you can add the glitter without building a big soupy mess. Have a tissue handy to squeeze out the nail base between applications of glitter. If your sponge is too saturated, it won't be useful any longer.
• You don't need a base color - I put down black, but really I didn't need it. It doesn't show up, that's just the black reflection of the light not hitting that glitter.
• Let coats dry - I jumped the gun on this one. The sponging part went very well, but I tended to not do a lot of waiting and I think it would have helped.
• Thinner topcoat - this went a little overboard. I should have used a thinner coats so I would be able to really make it work. 

So I am getting closer to making it work better. I don't know that it was a viable manicure because it did get soupy and it did get a thick dose of topcoat. Neither of which are the best to help it dry down through the layers.

Sephora by OPI G-listen To Your Heart has gone the way of the Dodo. I would check eBay or Amazon. I found mine at Big Lots! for $1.99 and I am glad I grabbed it! In its heyday Sephora by OPI was about $12 a bottle. It was prohibitive while I could snap up Color Club in 7-packs and OPI for $4.50.
Then it was starting to discontinue, so it went down to $4-5 a bottle through Sephora and then it was just gone. OPI got out of the relabeling business with Sephora (who knows who they work with now, super secret spy stuff I guess!).  Sephora has their X brand, but it's truly not affordable for so little information one has about it, and they transition collections with the season (and these days with fast fashion, there are virtually dozens and dozens of seasons) so I don't really keep track of it.

I haven't been in a Ross for over 4-5 months and I used to see the joblotted stuff there.

Now you know! ;D

Thank you for reading my little nail polish journal!

Every Month Is Breast Cancer Awareness Month

Awareness means monthly self exam and getting mammograms every year.

I think as we realize that our diets affect our bodies in ways we haven't completely parsed scientifically (though there is a ton of actual evidence, too), it doesn't hurt to address nutrition in a meaningful way in ones life. It's something I'm addressing beyond just thinking about it. Won't say it's easy, but every little bit helps.

Meanwhile here is a pretty combination that surprised me with its blatant cuteness

Color Club Yachty, Yachty, Yadda topped with Sephora Formula X Whimsical

CC YYY is a staple in my pink wardrobe, it's the perfect blend of an Easter pink and a bubble gum pink.

Sephora's X line has been through several iterations of bottle design and seems to also regularly discard lines and colors. I will be frank here, I dislike Sephora's site and search features. It's often like walking into a crowded party only to find the company would have been nice if the music wasn't so loud.

I found Whimsical at Big Lots! and for $1.80 I am pleasantly surprised. It's a combination of a scattered silver metallic glitter of two sizes mixed in with a strong dose of silver glass fleck as a base.

A pretty polish, but super hard to find. I'd suggest if you are after this effect, without trying to hunt down this one, try SinfulColors Out of This World and a silver hex glitter, there is one in every brand and price point. It's pretty easy to recreate since it's fairly generic.

In the meantime, this pretty little polish that combines topper and glitter, which is always nice!

Thanks for reading my little nail polish journal!

Red Glass Fleck Swatch Fest

That trove of 2014 photos yielded a ton of colors I was sure I'd swatched. Finding these photos has been fun.

Here are a pack of jelly based glass fleck reds to share.

Enjoy!




OPI Wing It!

From OPI's Summer Flutter collection of around 2010, it is a beautiful bright cherry red packed with red, amber and purple glass fleck. It shifts from pinkish red, to orange red, depending on the light.

I found mine originally when it came out through an online etailer. The good news is that it's still floating around online, though not on OPI's site itself.

The mix of colors is splendid.

It's a three coater, with vaguely visible nail line, but truly a beautiful creation by OPI.



China Glaze Cherry Pie

From China Glaze's 2009 Summer Days collection, this is a beautiful red on red glass fleck in jelly base.
More of a sheer polish, though I have three coats, it's bright and fresh like a perfect summer day.
Still available online, but at a fairly HTF price point.

I won't lie, I miss that China Glaze used to put together whole collections of one type of finish. This was part of one such collection.






Borghese Colosseo Crimson

Now pretty much defunct in the nail polish realm, Borghese three out some unique shades.
This is a fairly generic red jelly packed to the rafters with gold glass fleck.

Three coats and scant visible nail line.

The red is bright, and it covers the glass fleck very well. Quite affordable on eBay at this writing.






Sephora Go With The Flow-er

Bright red with a generous, but scattered array of glass fleck in purple, amber and red. Lovely and almost full coverage at three coats.

I like the substantial SOPI bottles, but they don't grab my attention for some reason when I am reaching for a polish.

I found mine at the Big Lots! near me, since Sephora by OPI was phased out a few years ago and replaced by Formula X. Unable to find it online, it might show up, though I would opt for Wing It! should you be wanting this kind of polish since they have a lot of the same backbone with the amber, purple, and red glass fleck.




Nicole By OPI Fuchsia Wife

Not dissimilar to OPI Wing It!, but much more sheer and really more of a topper than anything else. Although not to discount it's capabilities as a topper. It can rock on its own dime admirably. Personally I like it a lot. I toss it over red and purple as well as any think vampy.

Not impossible to find, either. I will say this whole collection did have a lot of cool stuff that really never surprises me from Nicole by OPI. People hate on the bottles, but they do a nice job of keeping their head above water in a competitive drug store environment. I've got a lot of NOPIs and I have very few that give me a problem.




Milani Just Peachy

Perhaps the most obscure of the bunch, but still online for the having.

Found at the Dollar Tree, this one is loaded with silvery color changing glass fleck in a warm red base. In no way to I consider this "peach" at all, but really just a bright red.

The jelly red is strong and just zings. I think it, here at three coats, can stand alone and work as a topper.

This is part of the discontinued Milani as they've changed their bottles and tightened up their look into a much more modern and visually arresting one than they had in the past. I will say I've seen people comment on the look of the bottles, but I've never been too bugged by the look of a bottle if the polish inside works for me.


All right, there you have it. A bunch of zingy reds. I had tried to do a comparison, but my camera settings make my hands look red and even with access to real Photoshop, there was just no fixing any of the comparisons.

In a nutshell I'd say if you are like glass fleck, grab Wing It! if you like cool toned and Cherry Pie if you are warm toned, or the Milani (eBay for a song, btw).

Thank you for reading my little nail polish museum!

Sephora By OPI I Don't Bite

Sephora used to have a great line with their own name but clearly "made by" OPI. Now they have Formula X, which I hear is pretty nice, too, and I have one or two that haven't been blogged as of yet.
It's mystery as to who makes Sephora's Formula X these days, but someone posted a dupe that was in the Essie stable, although that is nothing to totally rest your case on.

In the meantime, I'm enjoying the job-lotted leavings of old Sephora by OPI. From their Super Sale at the end, to Big Lots, Ross, and TJ Maxx findings.

Back to my Big Lots! find of Sephora I Don't Bite.

Three coats, no top coat.

Icy shimmering glass fleck. It's beautiful foil finish is peppered with bright shimmer sparkles that keep it from being a  flat metallic.

I adore this one and am glad I found it!

Big Lots! doesn't have many Sephora by OPI polishes any more, but these are online on Amazon and eBay and other oddball places. I know that I personally like the heft of the bottle - quite well anealed - and the shape.

Thanks for reading my little nail polish journal!

OPI Had It's Hand In This

So, you can tell I've been hitting the green drawer. I sort my stash by color, which means a good daytime color corrected lamp and some swatching.

Here is OPI Jade is the New Black compared to Sephora by OPI's I Come In Peas.

I thought they were dupes...

Seriously, I had them next to each other as interchangeable.


Moving right along...

Left to right:
OPI JITNB
SOPI ICIP
OPI JITNB
SOPI ICIP

As you can see, or at least I hope you can see on your monitor, JITNB is much cooler, ICIP has a strong enough yellow undertone.

There you go. Dupes no more.

Thanks for reading my little nail polish journal!

Those Blues, You Know....THOSE Blues!

I have so many of those purple-y blues that it's almost embarrassing that I've not blogged them much before!

Here are two I adore.

E.L.F. no name

I got this little dude on a blog sale. It's three coats here. There is a lovely frost quality that adds to it's beauty.

Normally I'd blanch at a frost, and I won't say that this one doesn't show a few brushstrokes, but this is where the story ends. It's gorgeous. Gorgeous I tell you!

I'm so bias, I love this color, so I'm almost worthless at being very critical at all.

Sephora X Formula A Little Sexy

A little more blue than purple, but periwinkle for sure. It's three coats and a soft pearly frost as well. 

Frost, that white sheen that reminds they eye of chilled winter mornings. This is like a clear sky on a winter day. 

Found this one at TJ Maxx, and I don't see it on the Sephora site. Normally these run $12.50.

Wax on I may, but dang, those blues!

Thanks for reading my little nail polish journal!

Glitter Give and Take

Here are a pair of glitters that need an outing.

I've done something a little different: compared over white then over black. Hope you like!

Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Glam Fest

This is a bit of a fake out, to be honest. Lots of small silver glitter and enough random multi-color glitter to make it all looks very glittery in the bottle, but on the nail I had to wrestle to get it on enough to make it look decent. This is four coats.

Plus the base in this one seems to possess that "base melting" capability.

Over black it feels more successful:

I still used four coats to achieve some coverage of the colorful glitter, though. Bummer.

I picked this up randomly at a Walgreens and it was on sale, because it's about $4.49 per bottle for this normally. Eep.

Sephora by OPI Spark-Tacular Top Coat

One coat over white!

Oh the win!

Dense enough to just spread things around with ease. Nice!

Here I put two coats over black. The silver is big enough to show some flash, and tie multi-color is a pretty party array of orange, yellow, fuchsia, blue and silver. Feels like a Fiesta.

Sephora by OPI wasn't on my list until they were discontinued and on sale at Sephora and on sale at Big Lots. Love the bottles, the colors and am glad I grabbed some! I may have purchased this when Sephora had bottles for about $4.50 or I got this when I found hundreds at Big Lots for $1.80.
Can't recall, but I think the former versus the latter.

On the whole, the Sephora won the day. 

Thanks for reading my little nail polish journal!

Putting My Polish Where My Mouth Is...Hopefully Instead of My Foot

So I recently said that many polishes could be duped with layering.

I approximated RBL Aqua Lily using a pair of polishes I love.

Now I realize that it's not as green, but I love the bluer shade of turquoise that ended up here.

What have we got here?
OPI Fly - three coats, nice formula(!)
Sephora's Pantone Universe line Cradle Pink - two coats, easy formula!

Fly is so nice. Easy to use and remarkably little cleanup was necessary!
Cradle Pink is a translucent topper, full of glass fleck that shift around pink and lavender.

I figured I might as well aim for a very popular polish.

Cradle Pink was a polish my sister purchased for me for Christmas. It's got several cousins, but it's really a vibrant pink atop this pretty blue.

I have ample shades similar to the base in the real Aqua Lily, but I wanted to wear Fly and I really wasn't 100% sure if I'd enjoy something more green.

Thanks for reading my little nail polish journal!