day sixty one, barielle shades outgreygeous

usually i post pictures where i'm holding the bottle but i had issues today...i finished painting my nails and then lost the bottle for about 4 hours. way to go sara! but i found it in the end. this is a nice grey steel colour from the all lacquered up collection by barielle and has a bit of a shimmer that i couldn't really capture. also i am not pleased with this photo set because i got into a bit of a zen-zone when painting and ended up putting on like 6 coats unintentionally. so i had way too much polish on my nails and kind of drowned the colour in an unattractive way. so i'm kind of disappointed with my pictures because they aren't doing this grey justice. it looks darker here and less interesting but with a normal amount of coats (2-3) it looks like a lovely piece of shiney steel. not dull and dark like it seems on my photos.


the name does make me chuckle thouhg...it's quite cute. outgreygeous...nice little play on words

day sixty, misa burnished bronze

i am sad to write this,...this is the first time i'm not going to rave about misa! the polish is beautiful but not what i expected. a polish called burnished bronze makes me think of the colour bronze...not an orange/pink duochrome. there's nothing wrong with orange/pink duochromes but i was looking forward to an actual bronze hued polish! so...if we set aside my disappointment the polish is beautiful. orange with a pink duochrome flash and chock full of shimmer. very pretty...just...not what i wanted or expected.

day fifty nine, icing awkward

here's another great one from icing (the claire's nail polish brand). this is a great green...i do love me some green! it is a darker green than the barielle green that was a yellow-green...this is..less yellow? does that even make sense!? i have trouble describing colours i guess. i was never very good at anything beyond the primary/secondary colour wheel! this has a bit of a shimmer but not a totally noticeable in your face one. just adds a bit of depth...but of course i couldn't capture it. the sun and my camera were at war. i raised my camera...the sun went away and vice versa. there was no winning! either way it's a nice colour, definitely still going to catch attention since it's not a super dark green that could pass as any vamp but well loved in my book all the same!

day fifty eight, lippmann collection rehab

alright. first i have to say how ridiculously excited i am that there are more people following this blog...since i don't really consider myself to be a blogger or a nail blogger. i'm just a girl who loves nail polish a ridiculous amount. i don't even consider myself to be even remotely peer level to the nail bloggers i read daily and worship at the altar of (hello...you got to join up with RBL and create your own polish. i'm not even a blip on that radar:D). so hi people, this is all very exciting!

someone asked me if changing my polish everyday negatively impacts the quality of my nails. and that's a totally valid question and my answer is no. or...not yet? before i started this i changed my polish every 2-3 days anyway so doing it every day hasn't seemed to make much of a difference on my nails. i've never been very good with long nails (the length they are now is long for me and testing my patience...i have very short nail beds and i type using the tips of my fingers so i'm constantly hitting the nail and it is a bit painful!), years of playing piano and violin...i always had to have short nails. plus i inevitably manage to do something to my nails and make one peel in some way or another. so this is about as long as they get and then i make them quite short again. because i have short nails i guess my nail quality hasn't been impacted much? they seem the same to me. i can say however, that my nails are ridiculously ugly and yellow without polish! using polish has 'cured' my nailbiting (although if i take the polish off i start to nibble again...it's disgusting, i picked up the habit in my 20s! i NEVER did it as a child!!!) and made my nails stronger overall.

no one has asked me this but i'll tell you anyway...how i pick what to wear. i have a lot of different brands and i try to showcase them as fairly as possible so you all can have a different variety of colour and brand over the course of the blog or just a few days. and also...whatever suits my mood or personality or thoughts of the day! sometimes i just wanna wear red even if i did yesterday so i will just do so! i do worry sometimes that i show you way too much shimmer...but i LOVE shimmer in polishes and happen to have a shedload. so yes! onto the regular post!

i whined earlier in the blog about the application of lippmann collection polishes saying that no matter what i did i always seemed to pull at the polish around my cuticles and have uneven application with bald spots all around my cuticles. no more i say! i finally figured it out. really i'm just a moron! i am an incredibly impatient person so i never waited for the coats to dry in between and i used thinner coats at first and it really made a difference. i had to take my time applying rehab but it reminded me of why i have so many of these ridiculously expensive($15+) bottles of this brand. there is one picture in here where my nails haven't been cleaned (since i am still learning not to paint my whole finger and then just remove until it's only on my nail!) because i wanted to show how insanely glossy these polishes are without a topcoat. it's really not needed. i just like topcoats because they seal the polish and quick-dry ones make my life easier because i inevitably mess them up somehow.

rehab is a stunning navy glossy creme. i was worried that it would look black but thankfully the weather was in my favour and i only saw blue. it is a dark...vampy blue. definitely navy and not bright ceylon blue. but i am really pleased with it and it has definitely restored my love for lippmann!!

day fifty seven, diamond cosmetics hi ho silver

this is an exciting post for me beacuse there is a huge trend right now for silvery purple nails and this cheapie polish by diamond cosmetics hits the nail on the head and doesn't come with the $30 dior nail polish pricetag! it should be noted that there are lots of silvery purples...i own 2 different ones and i like this one best (we'll get to my other one eventually!!). it's just mellow and subtle. it's not in your face, it's elegant! this is called hi-ho silver. it definitely has a strong purple in it, some polishes seem like they are silver with a purple reflection..this definitely feels like a 50/50 mixture of purple and silver to me!

day fifty six, creative nail design cuppa joe

so before i begin today's post i'll answer something that was recently asked of me...which was how many bottles of nail polish i have...the real answer is i have no idea. i have at least 200 bottles and i've acquired way more since that was my last count. i tend to acquire polish in batches of 30-40 every few months instead of one or two at a time. these 56 have barely made a dent...especially since i just bought a whole batch in the early weeks of this month!

this is one of my new ones, creative nail design 'cuppa joe'. the old CND polishes are being phased out so they can be acquired pretty cheaply on the internet (i personally use transdesign.com). now this is a great polish and i totally messed up my manicure and these pictures don't do the colour justice. this is one of my first truly brown polishes. i admit the colour has never had any appeal...i could wrap my mind around almost every colour in the rainbow except brown. but colours like cuppa joe and the upcoming nubar chocolate truffle collection (6 brown polishes) that brown is finally growing on me.

cuppa joe is a lovely multi-tonal brown shimmer. i don't know that it really reminds me of coffee per se...but it's a beautiful colour. a nice warm brown that has a strong shimmer, mellow and inviting!

day fifty five, essie alligator purse

this is a new polish (well..new to me i just acquired it) from essie called 'alligator purse' and yes i bought it solely based on the name. it is this awesome...red/brown/orange (is that even possible?) creme and it is totally unique. it's not a red red...it is such an intriguing colour. i am so pleased with it!!

day fifty four, opi (suede) lincoln part after dark suede

so this is from the new opi suede collection. it's actually a collection of classic colours done in a 'suede' matte finish. i wasn't that impressed with the matte finish (plus it shortens the wear time) and these are SO GORGEOUS with topcoat that i just wore them that way. well...wore this one. it's the only suede i have at the moment. the original lincoln park after dark is a 'vampy' burgundy that mostly just looks black. the suede version however...is STUNNING. it is this light purple with silver all over and it looks textured even though it is flat. working with mattes is tricky because they dry very quickly. this is my first experience with mattes and it was a bit tough to get an even application because it dries soooo fast. but this colour with a topcoat is just so special and different. i love it and definitely want to acquire the whole suede collection. the most exciting matte i've seen!

day fifty three, china glaze wagon trail

here is an exceptionally gorgeous colour from china glaze called wagon trail. it's a blackened gold with microglitter and i LOVE IT! it is so beautiful and special and it never looks black under any light. it is this gorgeous black gold colour with gold microglitter and i just love it. i had trouble capturing it so this post is really image heavy. and i still don't know if i captured it well enough! it is from one of the 2008 collections...i believe it was called rodeo diva

day fifty two, opi merry midnight

okay so this is a pretty exciting post (at least for me!). i have now gotten my hands on the OPI flake polish from the 2009 holiday collection called 'merry midnight'. it is GORGEOUS!! it is a deep purpe base with all different coloured flakes inside (and they're big flakes so they're really obvious which makes the polish so interesting...it would be boring if they were tiny). i adore this polish, it was easy to apply and i tested removal and it is easy as pie. no annoying glitter removal here, so fret not!! it's just...amazing! i love it and it is definitely on my favourites list

day fifty one, illamasqua rampage

here's another great polish from illamasqua (i'm not sure they do any non great ones!), rampage. it's a dark green creme and it is super lush and shiney. i don't know what colour it reminds me of...besides dark green, maybe evergreen?? anyway, it's amazing and i love it! i can't get enough illamasqua (but at £12/bottle) i can only acquire them slowly!

day fifty, barry m cyan blue

oh man i can't believe we're at fifty days! it certainly doesn't feel like it! although i have been going through nail polish remover pretty quickly! here's another great one from british drugstore brand barry m. great application, huge variety of colours and only £2/bottle usually. this is a lovely bright blue..i guess like a toucan blue? it feels very summer/spring...easter and tropical flowers and birds. definitely a fun change from the grey overcast weather we've had lately. makes it really tough to get accurate polish pictures!!!

day forty nine, orly mirror mirror

so here we have orly 'mirror mirror' from one of their most recent collections (more of whihc i'll show in due course!). it's a lovely light grey creme. i suppose you can call it dove grey? that seems to be a popular shade even though i'll admit i don't understand what it means...unless because doves are white it is a whiter shade of grey?? who knows! it is called mirror mirror (part of a whole enchanted/fairytale theme) and it is a lovely polish. eventually someday i'll do comparison swatches of the various shades of grey (and red and purple and blue...etc!) to show some possible dupes or how shades vary! but that's for another time....i do like the orly rubber handle, makes for easy gripping!

this is only my 2nd or 3rd orly polish i've applied but i've had wonderful application with all of them...

day forty eight, nailtini champagne

so this is my favourite nailtini polish, champagne. it's a golden....frosty/metallic/shimmer? i don't even know if that's possible but i love this colour with my skintone. it's warm but not garish. the only issue i have with this polish is that it is (a) very delicate or (b) i am too rough to wear it. somehow i ALWAYS manage to ding it up almost instantly. but i still love it and wear it for interviews or whenever i want a subtle hint of colour in a non-distracting way. it has a faint shimmer that you can see when it catches the light...it's just a soft, beautiful colour and way more interesting than a dull watery pink! this is the mini-nailtini bottles, i find them much easier to work with than the full sized because the polish wand is a normal length, not extra long like on the full sized bottles.