Masked Ceremony with a dash of Champagne

Heya lovelies! How are you doing? I just did a fresh mani and decided I'll show it to ya right away. Do not forget about my giveaway now, 8 days left!

I finally put on Orly Masked Ceremony and decided to throw in China Glaze Champagne Bubbles as an accent nail, because to wear it alone seemed a bit too ... gold. :) 

Orly Masked Ceremony is a part of their Secret Society collection. It looks very promising in the bottle, with silver square and purple round glitter in gunmetal base ... but the glitter basically does not show on the nail. No matter how you try to work the handle and brush. The two silver squares you see on the pictures are the only ones I managed to get on my nails, plus another one on my right thumb. Purple glitter is even less visible. Pity. I do like a silvery-blackish polish so I do not mind much the final result, but still. It is the same story that happened with Androgynie, remember that one? On pictures I have three coats.

China Glaze Champagne Bubbles was a part of one of their holiday collection, Let is snow, from 2011, but I got it this year. Surprisingly, wearing it as an accent, I kind of want to wear it as a full mani now too, I like it more than I thought I will. On pictures I have three coats.

Which polish disappointed you the most, comparing how it looks in the bottle and how it then looked on your nails?

Thank you for reading and commenting!

Orly Secret Society mani with lace accent

Hey everybody! How are you doing? I am enjoying a beautiful sunny day here in Bratislava and I decided to post a quick post of a mani I did a couple of days ago. I am really loving these water decals and am putting them on every colour that seems appropriate. 

For this I combined two Orly shades, one is Risque Encounter from Secret Society mini set, the other is called Conduit. Conduit is more known on nail polish blogsphere under SpaRitual brand, but as they are sister companies, appearantly Orly put the shade in their mini line. Either way, it is a stunner. 

Risque Encounter is a bright red crelly that perhaps seems a bit too orange on my pictures, due to the jellyness of it. I think the shade is more accurate on my little finger, with the water decal over it. It is a lovely colour, a classy bright red, it applies great. Conduit is a bit sheer, but builds up nicely and IMHO would be worth six coats (needs three on my short nails though), because it is absolutely perfect, golden bronze sparkle. I put my matte TC on the accent finger and, quite honestly, regreted a bit that I didn't do a full mani with this combo. Coming soon!

It is a mani many girls would wear for Christmas or NY's, even I felt it is a bit too festive for end of January, and I never give a damn about these things. Still, I love wearing it. 

Have a lovely week!

Thank you for reading and commenting!

ArtDeco ~ 130

Hey people! It's been a while. May is the hardest with the exams, although June is going to be hard as well. Lots of work. Today I had one of the exams and I am so tired. Nevertheless, I am still polishing my nails and trying to take photos of my nails (my camera is slowly dying on me). This particular polish is an old gift I got for NY a couple of years ago. I actually doubt it is still available ... it is a part of ArtDeco Ceramic Nail Lacquer line. I am not a fan of ArtDeco nail polish solely because the price is way to steep in my opinion, for the rather poor choice of colours. Well, maybe the choice is not that bad ... just not after my taste. But this little fellow is a pretty one.

I can't remember really, but I think this was three coats. Good brush as well. I especially love the golden specks of irregular shapes in the purple base. 

Do you own any ArtDeco nail polish?

Thank you for reading and commenting!

NOTD: Catrice ~ Mint Me Up

Hello people! Today I'm going to show you my NOTD, because I love this colour so freakishly much I need to share it with someone else than my BF who's only comment was: you can sell this one. To elaborate: I am planning to thin my collection a bit and obviously he thought I do not need to stick to this particular shade. Then again, I know he hates these colours on me. But I shan't sell it because i LOVE it! 

I am a bit late with the new Catrice colours, I was in Hong Kong when they came out. And then I first saw them in Vienna and I've bought The Dark Knight, because I needed a vampy colour and I adore the name (Batman fan!). The brush on that one was a disgrace! A very old and used broomstick came to mind when applying the polish. Catrice, what have you done? You had perfect brush, what the hell happened? But still, seeing new colours on Parokeets blog, I realised I will buy some other shades as well, even if I swore I shan't be buying any more polish for myself. Mint Me Up was the first one I bough then and luckily the brush is wonderful, and the colour is simply fantastic. Yay! 

To see the golden shimmer more clearly.

This was three coats, two would probably be enough, but I wanted my macro shots to look nice. Good brush, a bit tricky formula though. Mint shade, what can you do. All in all I love it. It's like someone in Catrice factory would mix I Sea You! and Am I Blue Or Green? and added a bit of shimmer. Success!!

Which colours do you recommend from the new line?

Thank you for reading!

Zoya ~ Crystal a.k.a. Ice Queen nails!

Hello everyone! I just finished the biggest sandwich I saw in my life and am too full for work, so why not show you my NOTD. I've been wearing Brazilian polish until today and I absolutely love it, can't wait to show them all to you! But today Zoya Crystal looked too beautiful to pass. I wore almost every Zoya from my Zoya package I got few weeks ago and ... I don't know, if someone told me I have to buy only three brands of nail polish from now until the rest of my life, Zoya would be one of them. They make the best polish colour and formula.

Crystal is a gorgeous polish. I'm sure you all remember the hype this baby created. Ok, maybe not hype ... a buzz of love all around blogsphere. Everyone seemed to like it. Not me though. Crystal was one of those shades that didn't look at all intriguing to me from the swatches. I get that every now and then. It was like that with Paradoxal and now with Peridot and others. Since I love the Paradoxal dupe I have, and I love Crystal, maybe I should get one of peri-dupes too, hehe. But anyway. Crystal didn't make it on my WL right away, it took me months until I decided to give it a go. Luckily, Kris sent it to me in our last package and I honestly don't know what was I thinking, not liking this colour. I can't stop staring at my nails, seriously. It is insanely gorgeous. It has this really icy feeling to it. I think Ice Queen would wear this for certain if she was cool and payed attention to her nails as well! I get Winter Wonderland association looking at it. Clear blue sky, pure white blanket of snow, naked trees with snow on their branches and warm, woolly clothes as you walk in the silence of winter forest. Ah. 

Lucky for me, Crystal is also very photogenic polish. Lately I have been having so much trouble with trying to capture the right shade of varnish, I was starting to think either my camera broke or I forgot how to take good pictures of nails. Crystal is a part of Zoya Fire and Ice Collection for Winter 2010. I also have Valerie from that collection, just as stunning as Crysta. Although light blue foil with golden foil specks wins in my book. Three easy coats, the formula is amazing. No complaints. Thank you, Zoya!

Do you have Crystal? What colour gets all hyped but you don't care for it at all?

Thank you for reading!

Zoya ~ Kimber

Hi there! As seen in my previous post, I got my Zoya mode on. The response surprised me a bit, thanks for the lovely feedback! :) You asked for Tru, Lotus and Kimber, and they will be shown ASAP. As it happens, I wore Zoya Kimber right after Skylar (the first one I tried but didn't have time to make photos of it, believe it or not, probably the first time since I'm blogging). Kimber was chosen by my BF, to my great surprise. He usually prefers dark reds and vampy colours. 

Kimber is a warm pink base with golden shimmer, similar to China Glaze Ahoy!, also in the fact that in the artificial light it warms to pink red, that I adore. They also turn too pink in my lightbox. But yes, Kimber is a perfect nail polish for these winter days in October, to make them a bit brighter. I love Autumn, so I hope lady Winter will give us a few weeks more of it. I did natural light photos in extremely gloomy weather, sorry about that. The details are gone, but the base colour is accurate.

The formula on this baby is superb, very easy application. Three coats, I dislike VNL, as you know. Kimber is a part of Zoya Surf Collection for Summer 2012. I got 5 out of 6 in the Surf collection. Whoop! I love wearing Kimber, it's a cheerful colour, very rich too. If you're interested in comparison with Ahoy!, let me know in comments. :)

Do you like these kind of colours? Which ones were your pick in Surf collection?

Thank you for reading!

Comparison: China Glaze Fast Track vs. Catrice Clay-ton My Hero

How I thought these two were similar I still do not know. Scrangie said Fast Track reminds her of Essence Irreplaceable and in my head Essence and Catrice are close enough not to own them both. As you will see in the pictures, they are not really similar. Actually, they're not very close either. My skin had a rough time when I made this comparison. Luckily now it's much much better, thanks to my hand cremes and oils. It was dried up and I got a major cut on my pinky, like a paper cut, only a bit thicker and longer, it hurt like a papercut though. I was able to cut it out from the pictures, so I'll spare you the view. ;)

Clay-ton My Hero is a taupe with golden shimmer, while Fast Track is beige with golden glass flecks. I suck at describing colours, but I guess that's close enough. :) Naturally they don't look at all similar, I guess the concept of making could be, although I think China Glaze wanted the golden glass flecks to really pop out, whine Clay-ton My Hero is very work appropriate with shyer shimmer. 

Two coats of Catrice, three of China Glaze, both polishes have a wonderful formula and wonderful brushes.  I like them both, I was on the verge of giving Clayton away, but there is something awesome on it that I really like. So I kept it. Glad to know I don't have any dupes of it! :)

Do you have any of the two? Which one do you prefer?

Thank you for reading!

China Glaze ~ Fast Track mattefied

Hello mah peeps! Whoa, I think this is the weirdest hello so far on this blog. :D I am full as a hobbit, and that's saying something! But I have a dance practise in the evening and I'm also happy as a hobbit for it. Sure, after that I'm working my butt off the entire night, but details details! No matter. It is a good day! :) 

Today we continue with China Glaze and the seriously spectacular collection that is The Hunger Games Capitol Colors. Fast Track wasn't really my first choice in this collection but I was very happy when I saw it in the package. The golden glass flecks looked ah-mazing! I thought it will be an excellent neutral work-college-appropriate colour and I was right. Plus, the golden twist is very nice and does bring a bit of bling to the whole look. The next day I mattefied it and I loved the result even more.

A friend of mine told me that Essence Matt top coat isn't available anymore. And I'm using mine surprisingly often! :/ Sucks, really, I love how strong the matte effect is with this one. Oh, on Fast Track it looks even more yummy because the golden flecks keep a bit of glow even when mattefied. I think it looks awesome. :) 

The original finish:

The golden glassflecks are quite strongly visible, they give a very nice twist to the nude base colour. I think it looks beautiful. Still, I prefer the matte version. :)

Do you have any suggestion on wallet-friendly substitute for Essence matt top coat? 

Thank you for reading & have a great week!

China Glaze - Trendsetter

Hey people! Why, my comeback isn't really working, eh? I had tons of work to do, not to mention I came home from Austria on Sunday, enjoying wonderful weekend with fellow Tolkien geeks. It was amazing, in short. ATM I'm waiting for my lunch to cook before I go back to the books, so I have a few minutes to spare. 

Trendsetter is a typical ugly-but-beautiful colour, I think. I adore this type of colours for their uniqueness and strangeness, yes. I resent all the feces related comparison the colour is getting, I think Scrangie and Short'n Chic describe it perfectly: a dingy dijon mustard base with a bunch of avocado mixed in & an incredibly elegant swampy green with really lovely golden shimmer.

 

I'm far from being a purist, but toilet humour is really not my thing and I can't imagine how you can wear something that reminds you of something gross. But that's just me, I guess. This colour reminds me a lot of swamp and its murky colours, I love it. Plus the shimmer is amazing. Most of people around me hate it though. My mother and BF were even more worried about my colour choice than usual. ;) A couple of friends said it was interesting ... but still ugly, hehehe.

The last picture is sooo old. It's taken when I wore Trendsetter for the first time and on blogsphere Trendsetter reminded some people on Classic Camel, so I took a shot that's by now probably irrelevant. Still. :) I can't pull off Classic Camel, it looks horrible on my skin tone, but Trendsetter I love. It was a part of China Glaze Metro Collection for Fall 2011 and it's the only colour I got, it's not a strong collection for my taste. Trendsetter is amazing gem in it though. 

Do you like "ugly" colours in general? Which one is your favourite?

*due to me thinking fugly means something completely different, I used the expression and now changed it :P Thanks, Chaosophia!

Thank you for reading!

Essence - Gold Old Buffy

Until this very moment I thought the name of the polish was Good Gold Buffy. Hah. Go figure. I continue with my Essence mani's, because, frankly, Essence doesn't get enough love on my blog. I was cleaning up my stash last night and I realised I have a lot of Essence that I really like, but I just never show them to you. Same goes for Gold Old Buffy. This colour is incredible. One of the best colours Essence ever made, in one of the strongest LE they ever did, Vampire's Love. You've seen it all before and I loved the swatches of this baby. Still, it took me months to wear it, so the swatches are late, but maybe they'll remind you you have this beauty in your stash and you haven't worn it since the LE came out.  ;)

Three coats for this beauty,  I can't remember why, really, perhaps I wanted to make the colour even richer. The formula was flawless, so was the brush. Amazing polish, really. It reminds me of China Glaze Wagon Trail, but being a better version of it. Since I had an enormous crush on Wagon Trail, that's saying something! 

Anyway. I hope you got at least this colour from Vampire's Love TE. It's gorgeous! Or do you prefer other shades from this collection?

Thank you for reading!

My Awesome Beauty Competition mani

Hei everyone! How are you doing on this very hot day? I'm doing my nails ATM and I remembered I wanted to mention Sophie's competition early enough for you to participate too (in case you haven't yet). Well, you still have today and tomorrow until 10 am. And that is enough time, btw! Here's the deal. In case any of you don't know Sophie: she owns My Awesome Beauty blog.  A beautiful blog with a beautiful author, her blog is versatile, fun and holds incredible photographs. I do recommend you visit it! Nail wise she does awesome designs with great colour combinations. I always wanted to recreate them, but you know how I am with time and my nail art ... until the competition started. You have to recreate one of the two patterns, but with your own ideas. I got hooked immediately and searched for inspiration. That's how I finally discovered that the designs are actually very user-friendly and that they don't take much time, so they're in my nail art book now! 

In short: my inspiration was the Eye of Sauron, that's why it is in the background of the pictures. Beyu 209 with Essie flakies on top represent the lava of Mount Doom, the gold is for the One Ring and the orange Finger Paint seemed a better combination than the predictable red or yellow for the eye. So I mixed them in an orange colour. ;)  I played with the pictures a bit before I sent them, here you'll see them separated.

Really wonky position of my fingers, Finger Paints bottles are not nice for holding. 

I liked the result, I didn't get tired of this mani until it looked to tired so I basically had to remove it. It's a bit blingy, but I wanted that. And yes, it's another geek inspiration for me, but frankly when you walk into my room, Tolkien is pretty much the first thing you notice. That and nail polish. So they're bound to come together every once in a while. And btw, yes, that's an actual poster of the Eye, my BF thought I photoshoped it, I didn't. :P 

Enter the competition! You have enough time and the prizes are wonderful! Good luck to all of you and Sophie, thanks for the chance!

Thank you for reading!

Vipera Jumpy 154

Hello! How about another Jumpy for today? I still haven't got through all the gorgeous polish Sabbatha sent me, but I'm getting there. I wore quite a few in the past few weeks and my enthusiasm for Polish polish has not ceased. They make awesome nail polish, I can tell you that.

Vipera Jumpy seemed like a perfect little thing on my very short nails and in gloomy weather, you know, to cheer me up a bit. This was a few weeks ago, after my heavy exams and the stress took all my nails to hell, so I needed to shorten them completely. 

Jumpy 154 is very similar to Jumpy 155, but the base colour is brighter and more juicy. The glass flecks are similar too, and I *love* them. It is an awesome polish with an awesome formula. Three coats, two would be enough, but the third one creates more depth. 

Another gorgeous Jumpy! I love all that I have, actually.

Do you have any Jumpys? What do you prefer to wear on very short nails ... or on a gloomy day?

Thank you for reading!

Essence - Mojito Green (Soul Sista LE)

Heya people!  How are ya? It's really late here in Slovenia and I feel like crap, so I decided to spend my zombie time in front of the computer. Blogging kinda makes me feel productive, hehe. I've been reading until now but I started to feel dizzy. So warm tea and Blogger for me, thank you! 

I'd also like to show you one LE polish while it's still available. I buy my share of LE polishes that Essence is throwing at us on regular basis, but I'm very strict about it, I do not want to get all 'it's LE, that's why I HAVE to have it'. No, my dear ladies, I really don't, certainly not only because it's frakking limited edition. Limited editions in shapes that Essence does them annoy me more than not, all the hype is ridiculous. Still, they do make some awesome polish. Vampire's Love was an amazing collection, I bet you remember that one. I also thought Fruity was rather cute, but of course missed it entirely. Well, I wanted the green one, it was cute and had 'Kiwi' word in the name, which I find quite adorable. 

So ... where was I? Oh yes, yes. My point is, normally I'm really really late with showing you my LE purchases, also because I rarely wear them right away. For instance, I'm wearing True Love from already mentioned Vampire's Love now. For the first time. Yay me! It's a cool one too. :) But Mojito Green from Essence Soul Sista LE was a surprise for me. I actually got to a full counter, not even wanting to buy anything, but, as always, I checked it out, a habit a nail polish fanatic knows and has. Mojito Green caught my eye immediately because of the golden shimmer. It was gentle in the bottle so I walked around in Müller, trying to convince myself I don't need it, because the shimmer won't show on the nails anyway. I'm glad I bought it. While shimmer really isn't obvious, you can catch it with your naked eye, even off direct sunlight. On direct sunlight it gets quite beautiful. Plus the aqua green colour is simply awesome and no, I don't have it in my stash yet. FTW!

 Sadly my camera wasn't able to capture the tiny shimmer in the shade, it's so subtle. Like I said, I could see it, but it's a shy one and apparently it's too shy for my camera.

This is how horribly inaccurate the colour gets in lightbox. I'm only showing you this picture so you can see the shimmer more clearly.

Nothing else interested me in the Soul Sista LE. Well, the brushes were gone anyway. My second favourite from the varnish bunch was actually the pinkish one, because of the same shimmer it contains. But I decided to pass on it, I'm trying to clear my stash a bit right now, no point in buying a 'maybe' polish then. 

I'm not that crazy about the application. Actually, it really surprised me, since Essence normally has an excellent formula. This one was very, very thick and that's why the application wasn't really all that well. Not extremely bad - two careful coats were enough - but Essence can certainly do better. Still, this bright aqua green polish is very vibrant and a very happy colour, I loved wearing it and I'm glad I took it off the counter. :)

Did you get anything from Soul Sista edition? Any thoughts on constant LE done by Essence?

Thank you for reading!