A girl and her love of nail polish

Amy’s Nail Boutique Woodsie’s Wish

Oct. 5, 2012

Today I’ve got an indie nail polish for you called Woodsie’s Wish from Amy’s Nail Boutique.

I actually bought this to help satisfy my craving for Pretty & Polished’s Jawbreaker, which I still don’t own. But in the meantime, I’ve got Woodie’s Wish, which is definitely a fun little polish.

Amy's Nail Boutique Woodsie's Wish

Woodsie’s Wish features a white base with bunch of matte hex glitter. The description from Amy’s Nail Boutique lists the colors as turquoise, yellow, blue, pink, orange, hot pink and purple, but I see red in mine too.

In terms of formula, it was a little challenging to apply, in the same way that every other white polish I’ve ever tried is challenging: a little streaky and difficult to get full coverage.

These photos are of three coats. In retrospect I should have started with a few coats of plain old white polish and then just added Woodsie’s Wish from there to save it a little. Although honestly I can’t recall the last time I finished a bottle of nail polish that wasn’t base or top coat, so what am I worried about?

Application aside, this is a very pretty, cute, fun polish to wear. It reminds me of sprinkles on frosted cupcakes.

I’ve seen a lot of white base/multi-color matte polishes crop up on Etsy, so perhaps it’s not the most unique formulation in the world, but I love it. And it’s definitely different enough from Jawbreaker that it hasn’t wiped that lemming off my list.

These photos were taken in August during my vacation in Mystic, Conn. Loved wearing this one in the summer! It’s just taken a while to get them on the blog.

Polishes from Amy’s Nail Boutique are sold on Etsy, and as of press time, Woodsie’s Wish is in stock. There’s also a sale going on now: save 20 percent by using the coupon code “FALL20.”

Category:

Indies, Swatches

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A Not Polish Review: La Fresh Eco Beauty Acetone-Free Nail Polish Remover

Oct. 4, 2012
La Fresh Eco Beauty Acetone-Free Nail Polish Remover

photo: from Birchbox.com

My September Birchbox included one La Fresh Eco Beauty Acetone-Free Nail Polish Remover pad.

The concept is very cool. It’s an individually wrapped pad about 1.5″ by 2″ that has some sort of botanical, eco-friendly oil-ish stuff on it that smells like orange. Not just orange, “fresh tuscan orange.” Way better-smelling than acetone, no doubt.

The pros of these are that they don’t have harsh chemicals and that they seem very nourishing. After I was done removing my polish, my nails were shiny and moisturized.

But … these didn’t seem powerful enough to be cost-effective. The write-up on Birchbox says you can remove polish from all 10 nails but I did not find that to be the case. I could only remove 7.5 nails-worth with the pad, which means using two per removal (the manicure I was removing was my leopard print design from earlier this week so it did have metallic polish, but no glitter). These are priced at $9.99 for a box of 20 pads, which means $1 each time I want to remove polish if I need to use two. That’s fine if you’re only doing your nails occasionally, but too expensive IMHO if you’re doing your nails several times per week. Plus it took 15 minutes to get through those 7.5 nails.

If you’re not a total polish junkie, then I would recommend the La Fresh polish remover. But if you’re a nail blogger or someone who changes your manicure as often as you change channels, then you’re probably going to be disappointed with the speed of the removal. That said, I’m still thinking about getting them to use once per week to get some good moisture into my nails and cuticles.

Category:

Not Polish

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Sinful Colors Zincing Of You Leopard Print Nail Art

Oct. 3, 2012

Wow, I definitely needed a day off after the manic posting schedule that was the 30 Day Challenge. But I’m back in the saddle today with my first leopard print manicure.

Sinful Colors Zincing Of You Leopard Print Nail Art

I started with two coats of Sinful Colors Zincing Of You from the new Hot Flash Metallics fall collection. It’s a sparkly taupe with a foil finish. Really pretty!

I’ve seen a lot of tutorials for leopard print manicures, but I used this video tutorial from CutePolish.

Sinful Colors Zincing Of You Leopard Print Nail Art

For the spots, I used Cos Bar Bronze from the Shops At Target collection. It was a little sheer, though, so I had to double up the dots. The black is Orly Liquid Vinyl, applied with a small dotting tool. It’s topped off with one coat of Poshe fast-dry top coat.

Sinful Colors Zincing Of You Leopard Print Nail Art

This is pretty quick and easy as far as nail art goes, just dab and dot!

(For more animal prints, see my zebra stripe french tips manicure.)

Sinful Colors Zincing Of You Leopard Print Nail Art

Here’s a look at Sinful Colors Zincing Of You on its own.

Sinful Colors Zincing Of YouSinful Colors Zincing Of You

Are you falling in love with the fall metallics trend?

Category:

NOTD, Swatches

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Restock Radar: Week of Oct. 1

Oct. 1, 2012

Here’s a look at some of the indie nail polish restocks scheduled for this week. Check back every Monday to see what’s coming up.

Monday, October 1
1pmET
SERUM NO. 5 (On Etsy)
Notables: Launch of Pink Lantern (bright pink glow in the dark) and restock of Day Glow (lemon ice yellow glow in the dark)

time not specified
365 DAYS OF COLOR (On Big Cartel)
Notables: Launch of limited edition breast cancer awareness polish called Love My Tatas (shimmer pink top coat with gold flakes and pink square and hex glitter) $2 of the $9 price will go The Breast Cancer Research Foundation

time not specified
APHRODITE LACQUERS (On Etsy)
Notables: Launch of Printemps a Paris collection, a series of white and pastel-base glitter polishes

time not specified
HIT POLISH BY D&R APOTHECARY (On Etsy)
Notables: Launch of Winter Holiday 2012 Collection:

time not specified
LACQUISTRY NAIL POLISH (On Etsy)
Notables: Launch of five Halloween polishes

Thursday, October 4
8pmET
WINDESTINE (On Etsy)
Notables: Senescence (dusty evergreen with gold shimmer) and Snow Prince (white jelly with purple and gold glitter)

Friday October 5
time not specified
NAIL POTIONS (On Etsy)
Notables: Launch of Powerpuff Girls-inspired Saving Townsville (pink, blue and green hex glitter, small black bar glitter and silver holo micro glitter in a clear base) Plus, get a free 3.5ml bottle of Halloween polish with all orders $16 and up through October 15.

And Keep An Eye Out For …
As of Sept. 26, KISS YOUR ELBOW POLISH is donating all proceeds to charity.

OOPSIE DAISIES NAILS is donating $2 from each bottle of Pink Of Me to HisBreastCancer.org to help raise awareness of male breast cancer

There’s a Fall Sale at AMY’S NAIL BOUTIQUE. Use code FALL20 to get 20 percent off your order.

There’s a birthday sale at CHAOS & CROCODILES. Use coupon code PARTY to get 10 percent off your order through 6pmET on Monday Oct. 1.

If you know of any planned restocks coming in the future, please let me know at polishgroupie@gmail.com Thanks for stopping by!

Category:

Indies

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30 Day Challenge Day 30 – Tutorial: Bold Retro Wallpaper Nail Art

Sep. 30, 2012

It’s Day 30 of the 30 Day Challenge, and I’m proud to say that I made it all the way to the end without missing a day. Not bad for my first challenge!

Off the top, I’d like to thank Rachel from Polished Criminails for getting this iteration of the challenge going and for organizing the InLinkz codes that made it possible for us all to link to each other. And thanks also to all of the other bloggers that participated. I really enjoyed seeing what everyone else came up with.

So on to the manicure, which is inspired by a tutorial. It’s based on this video tutorial from IndigoNova1, recreated with a slightly different color scheme.

Black and White Retro Dot Nail Art with Color Club Tweet MeBlack and White Retro Dot Nail Art with Color Club Tweet Me
For the base I used Color Club Tweet Me from my September BirchBox, which is a chartreuse creme. I really didn’t like it in the bottle but I thought it would provide a great backdrop to this design, and I’m so glad I tried it out. I like it a lot better on the nail. And first glance I thought it was yellow, but now I see it as more of a green. As far as formula though, it goes on very streaky and patchy. I used three coats here, and had it not been for the fact that I was going to put nail art on top I would have needed a fourth.

Black and White Retro Dot Nail Art with Color Club Tweet Me

For the dots I used Orly Liquid Vinyl and Ulta Snow White, and then Kiss striper polishes in Black and White for the stripes.

Black and White Retro Dot Nail Art With Color Club Tweet Me

As recommended in the notes of the video tutorial, I used the blunt end of a wooden skewer as a dotting tool to create the largest dots. For the smaller ones, I used the head of a pin. This was pretty simple to create and pays off big with a strong visual element. It would look good in a lot of different color combinations.

Black and White Retro Dot Nail Art With Color Club Tweet Me

And here’s a look at Color Club Tweet Me on it’s own:

Color Club Tweet Me

Thanks very much for reading. I hope you enjoyed some of the manicures I came up with for the 30 Day Challenge. Next up for me is the Nail-aween Challenge from datyorkLOVES (not too late to join, if you’re interested) and the Polish Us Pink Breast Cancer Awareness campaign organized by The Subtle Shimmer and several other bloggers (another not-too-taxing one that you can still join).

30-Day Challenge, 30 Days of Untrieds

Please visit some of the other bloggers that participated in the 30 Day Challenge this month.
I know we all needed a lot of encouragement to get through, so thanks for providing it! Click here to see them:



Category:

30-Day Challenge, NOTD

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30 Day Challenge Day 29 – Supernatural: Vampire Nail Art

Sep. 29, 2012

Coming in under the wire here on Day 29 of the 30 Day Challenge because it took me all day to figure out exactly how I wanted to portray the theme of vampires for my inspired by the supernatural manicure.

Vampire Nail Art

I’m a big fan of most things vampire these days: Buffy The Vampire Slayer, True Blood, Twilight, Being Human, Anne Rice novels, etc., etc..

I finally found this manicure based on the Buffy The Vampire Slayer TV series, so I used that as the basis and then tweaked it a bit to be more generally vampire themed rather than specifically Buffy.

The thumb represents fire. The index finger represents dripping blood, ever-present in most vampire lore. The middle finger is a cross necklace. The ring finger is a stake through a heart and the pinkie is a vampire bite. So representing both sides with this one: the vampires and the weapons that can take them down.

Vampire Nail Art

Here are the polishes I used:
thumb: two coats of Color Club Catwalk Queen, Sinful Colors Lets Meet, Kiko 359, China Glaze Riveting, Ulta Steppin Out

Vampire Nail Art Fire

index: two coats of Ulta Snow White, Ulta Steppin Out

middle: three coats Orly Royal Velvet (untried for 30 Days of Untried), Kiss Silver striper polish

Vampire Nail Art Dripping Blood, Cross/Crucifix

ring: two coats of Orly Liquid Vinyl, Essie Very Cranberry, Kiss Silver striper polish

pinkie: two coats of Ulta Snow White, Orly Liquid Vinyl, Ulta Steppin Out

Vampire Nail Art Stake Through The Heart, Vampire Bite

30-Day Challenge, 30 Days of Untrieds

Please visit some of the other bloggers that are participating in the 30 Day Challenge this month. I know we will need a lot of encouragement to get through! Click here to see them:



Category:

30-Day Challenge, NOTD

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30 Day Challenge Day 28: Storm Warning Flag

Sep. 28, 2012

For Day 28 of the 30 Challenge Challenge, we were tasked with doing a manicure inspired by a flag. I wanted to do something a little different, so I went with maritime weather warning flags.

Storm Warning Flag Nail Art

I based my design on the storm warning signals. The storm warning flag consists of a black square in the middle of a red square. Flying two storm warning flags indicates a hurricane.

Storm Warning Flag Nail Art

I painted my pinkie to mimic the storm warning flag and my ring finger like hurricane flags. The other fingers don’t represent actual flags, just other designs that picked up the color scheme.

Storm Warning Flag Nail Art

As for the colors, the red is Ulta Steppin Out — untried for 30 Days of Untrieds — which is a nice red but very thick. The black is Orly Liquid Vinyl and the white is Ulta Snow White. The white stripe on my thumb is with a white Kiss striper polish.

Storm Warning Flag Nail Art

Originally I was going to work in small craft warning and gale warning flags (on red triangle flag and two red triangle flags, respectively) but I didn’t like the way they came out so I replaced them with what you see here. I was trying to use striping tape to block of triangles, but the Ulta Steppin Out really was too thick to work for that. Maybe I’ll try this manicure again sometime with a different red.

30-Day Challenge, 30 Days of Untrieds

Please visit some of the other bloggers that are participating in the 30 Day Challenge this month.
I know we will need a lot of encouragement to get through! Click here to see them:



Category:

30-Day Challenge, NOTD

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