Essie - Play Date

Play Date is a bright light, almost pastel purple.

Basecoat:  NailTek Foundation II (1 coat)

Color:  Essie Play Date (3 coats)

Topcoat:  Revlon Quick Dry Top Coat (1 coat)

Here's another one of those "I waited as long as I could to take pictures" posts.  This is on the fourth day of wear, and I'd been doing dishes the day before, so I have some pretty good chips and tip wear.

I loved this color a lot more than I expected to.  I am not sure it will go with my summer tan but I can see myself wearing this as a pedicure, absolutely.

Models Own - Purple Blue

Purple Blue is a sparkly duochrome. 

Basecoat:  NailTek Foundation II (1 coat)

Color:  Models Own Purple Blue (4 coats)

Topcoat:  Revlon Quick Dry Top Coat (1 coat)

This polish was a little bit thin and runny.  I had some bald-ish spots after three coats so I went for a fourth.  Other than that, though, application was pretty good and cleanup was surprsingly easy for this much sparkle.

Initially I was disappointed in the lack of duochrome.  Then I went into another room that had no lights on (to pet the cat) and whoa!  Transformed from "meh" to "LOVE" just like that!

Models Own - Aqua Violet

I caved and ordered the entire Beetle Juice collection when it was on sale. This was my first experience with Models Own. It took over a month to arrive - it was so long that I scoured other nail blogs to see how long theirs had taken to arrive.  I got the impression that bigger blogs got faster shipping, which frankly turns me off of ordering from Models Own again. 

Anyway, Aqua Violet is pretty much just what it says - an aqua/violet duochrome.  It was pretty sheer on my nail wheel swatch, so I layered it over Wet N Wild Black Creme.

Basecoat:  NailTek Foundation II (1 coat)

Color:  Wet N Wild Black Creme (1.5 coats)

Color:  Models Own Aqua Violet (2 coats)

Topcoat:  David (1 coat)

I took a ton of photos trying to capture the purple here, but I couldn't do it.  I'll try again later in the day or I might try at night to see if that helps.

Anyway, the application was pretty good - it was a little bit soupy but not too bad at all.  I do have a little bit of bubbling that's not visible in the photos (and hardly visible in real life), but I'm not sure I blame the polish - I know I applied with too much polish on my brush a couple of times.  This polish is a little bit brush-stroke-y but not enough to really bother me.

China Glaze - LOL

Here's an oldie but goodie.  I was just recovering from being basically in bed sick for an entire week, but my mom wanted to go do some shopping.  My darling husband graciously allowed it on the condition that he drive me to meet my mom and pick me up (what actually happened:  He drove me, halfway through he met us at the mall and carried all our bags, then drove me home).  Anyway, I still felt awful, and purple is my mom's favorite color, so I picked this out of my stash. 

LOL is a dark purple, linear holographic polish.

Basecoat:  NailTek Foundation II (1 coat)
Color:  China Glaze LOL (3 coats)
Topcoat:  Nubar Diamont (1 coat)

Love.

Orly - Oui

I really love these Orly polishes.  Oui is a purple with lots of gold shimmer.  Oui is a little bit bluer of a purple than some of the other light purples-with-gold-shimmer we've seen.

Basecoat:  Salon Sciences Fiberglass Network (1 coat)

Color:  Orly Oui (4 coats)

Topcoat:  David (1 coat)

The weather was awful when I wore this, so on the fourth day of wear I broke down and took photos under desk light. 

I did need to use four coats for this - it was a tiny bit sheerer than I was expecting.  However, application was awesome as usual for an Orly polish.  I do have a little bit of tip wear in the photos, but again - this was on the fourth full day of wear (and I'm almost certain I'd already peeled off the polish from all the other fingers, too - yes, I know it's terrible)

Orly - Fowl Play

Yep, slacking again.  Anyway, today I have on Orly "Fowl Play".  Fowl Play is very similar to OPI Merry Midnight, but Fowl Play is a little bit darker.  I own both, but the comparison's been done a million times - I'm not going to repeat it now even though it's been months since everyone was wearing it :)

Basecoat:  Salon Sciences Instant Artificials (1 coat)
Color:  Orly Fowl Play (4 coats)
Topcoat:  David (1 coat)

Look at those rainbow shimmery flakes!  Too bad they aren't as magical on the nail as they are in the bottle. Still, this is really pretty and I think I like the base color of Fowl Play a bit more than Merry Midnight - it seems a little less muddy.

Application was pretty good - not very runny at all.  It was opaquer than I was expecting it to be based on everyone else's posts, but I still ended up needing four coats.  It didn't try totally smooth, but one coat of David topcoat fixed it right up.

Revlon - Facets of Fuchsia

Facets of Fuchsia is a black jelly with fuchsia glitter - both regular sized glitter and larger hex glitter.
I layered this over Wet N Wild's Black Creme.

Basecoat:  Salon Sciences Instant Artificials (1 coat)

Color:  Wet N Wild Black Creme (1 coat)

Color:  Facets of Fuchsia (2 coats)

Topcoat:  David (1 coat)

Sorry for the crap photos - the weather was awful and foggy the day I took these, so I had to resort to my desk light.

Facets applied very nicely - of course I had the super opaque Black Creme underneath, so it was pretty forgiving.  I didn't have much issue with glitter placement - I only had to push one big hex off the edge of my nail.  It wasn't thick or gloppy, either.

Zoya - Neeka

Neeka  is a dusty purple with sparkle.  I've seen this described as a glitter, but to me it seems like tiny glass flecks instead.

Basecoat: Zoya Ridge Filler (1 coat)

Color:  Zoya Neeka (3 coats)

Topcoat:  David (1 coat)

Neeka applied nearly flawlessly.  It was a little bit thick but not enough to be goopy.  It didn't run into cuticles or anything.  I did notice that it didn't self-level quite as well as Zoyas normally do, and it didn't dry as shiny as usual - I definitely needed a topcoat.

Revlon - Royal Cloak

Revlon Royal Cloak is a medium dusty purple with tiny flakes.  Today has been super overcast, and it's 5:pm and already dark, so you don't get my usual photos.

Basecoat:  Salon Sciences Instant Artificials (1 coat)
Color:  Revlon Royal Cloak (3 coats)
Topcoat:  David (1 coat)

I have stayed away from Revlon polishes for a long time, because I historically have had awful results - it peels off entire sheets.  Which is fun, but not really the look I'm going for.  But, I like Royal Cloak enough that I'm willing to try it again.  Royal Cloak applies really well - it was thick but not goopy, and I didn't have any problems with it running into my cuticles or anything.  Cleanup was super easy, too.  I did find that some of the tiny flakes hung off the free edge of my nail, but it wasn't too big a problem to fix.

Wear will be interesting, because we're hanging our outdoor Christmas lights tomorrow.  This is the first year we've had a house to hang lights on, and usually we put up the tree Thanksgiving weekend.  However, my in-laws are coming to our house next Friday for dinner (we go to my mom's house Thursday) and we both know that my father-in-law will insist on helping my husband put up the lights, and he doesn't need to be doing that kind of stuff.  So, they go up tomorrow.

Pardon my short break.  I'm going to try something different this winter.  Last year I basically quit blogging when the baseball season ended - I work at home full time and in winter I pretty much only leave the house a couple of times a week.  So I stopped polishing as well, and it just didn't seem worth the effort to put up a post when I wasn't even bothering to polish every week, either.

This year, I'm going to put up some swatches, instead of full NOTDs.  I have already swatched a bunch of polishes I keep either putting off wearing for one reason or another, or that I just don't see myself wearing.  I'm going to spend time this weekend writing posts for them, and hopefully I'll have enough stockpiled that I won't need to worry about lack of posts later this winter.  These won't be the most awesome things ever - you're gonna see some indifferent cleanup, and some lack of topcoat altogether.  I'm going to tag those as swatches, too, which should help.  It might take me a few days to get it going, though, so bear with me.

Orly - Rococo A-go-go

Too late, I realized I'm wearing basically the same color as my last post, which I usually try not to do.  Oh well.  Rococo A-go-go (this is a stupid name and it's annoying to type) is a deep plummy purple with lots of duo chrome sparkle that shows gold.

Basecoat:  Salon Sciences Instant Artificials (1 coat)

Color:  Orly Rococo A-go-go (3 coats)

Topcoat:  Sally Hansen Insta Dri (1 coat)

The third photo down is probably the most color accurate as far as what this polish looks like most of the time.

This was almost two coats - my brush was a little bit wonky, or I am sure this would have been just two coats.

Even though this is a super pigmented polish I didn't really have any problems with cleanup either.  So far I really love all the polishes I've tried from this collection.

China Glaze - Stella and Nfu Oh - 50

Today I have a shining example of the phrase "know when to stop".  Stella is a medium reddish-purple shimmer.  Nfu Oh 50 is a pale purple jelly base with blue/purple/teal flakes.  Somehow I thought they'd go together.

Basecoat:  Salon Sciences Fiberglass Network (1 coat)

Color:  China Glaze Stella (3 coats)

Topcoat:  David (1 coat)

Color: Nfu Oh 50 (2 coats)

Topcoat:  Sally Hansen Insta Dri (1 coat)

Stella on its own is pretty but I felt like it was a little boring.  I initially stopped with just Stella and then a few hours later I had the bright idea to add flakes.  I should have gone with a different one like Hidden Treasure or Nubar 2010 but noooo, I looked at 50's base color and thought "that'll be perfect!" Well, it's not.  This combination is awful together.

Stella did apply nicely, though - it was a little thin and runny, but it cleaned up nicely.  I can't speak to wear because I hated this and took it off as soon as I got home from my dentist appointment.

Color Club - Shabby Drab

Shabby Drab is kind of a dusty periwinkle/purple creme.  I got it in a box set at Ross so for all I know I don't even have the right color name.

Basecoat:  Salon Sciences Fiberglass Network (1 coat)

Color:  Color Club Shabby Drab (4 coats)

Topcoat:  David (1 coat)

The color in these photos are pretty accurate, for once.  When I look at my nails (and see my whole hands with them) it pulls very purple, which is kind of weird.

Anyway, this wasn't quite as awesome as Color Club cremes usually are - it took four coats to cover any streaking and bald spots, but the opacity otherwise was quite nice.

China Glaze - VIII

VIII is a deep, dusty purple.  It's very similar to "Crimson" from this year's Halloween collection, but it is a touch lighter.

Basecoat:  China Glaze Ridge Filler (1 coat)

Color:  China Glaze VIII (3 coats)

Topcoat:  Seche Vite (1 coat)

I've had this bottle for a while, so there's been some settling at the bottom (visible in the bottom photo).  It doesn't affect the color of the polish.  This was a little bit runny and wanted to pool in my cuticles, and once it gets there, good luck getting it out cleanly.  This polish is *just* light enough to not be one of those "looks black all the time indoors" polishes.

Clarins - 230

Awwwww yeah.  The red shimmer in Baptiste reminded me of 230, so I just had to pull it out and put it on top of Baptiste.

Click to embiggen - they're worth it, especially the first photo.  This is two coats (probably could have stopped at one but I couldn't resist) followed by a coat of Sally Hansen Insta-Dri topcoat.

My favorite color from 230 is the strong green flash - I thought I hadn't managed to capture it at all, since it's usually only visible at certain angles that aren't good for photos, but nope, there it is in the first photo, especially on my index finger.

This polish is probably going on hiatus for a long while - I've only worn it twice and I have a noticeable dent in my bottle's fullness, boo.

Illamasqua - Baptiste

Illamasqua Baptiste is a purple with shimmer that leans red.  It's the first Illamasqua I've tried, though I also own Rampage (dark green jelly).  These have both been sitting in my untrieds for a while.

Basecoat:  Fiberglass Network (1 coat)

Color:  Illamasqua Baptiste (3 coats)

Topcoat:  Seche Vite (1 coat)

How gorgeous is this?   Baptiste applied near-flawlessly.  The only thing I didn't like was the stupid huge square bottle cap - I would have liked it to come off and leave a functional top, like Chanels and Butter Londons do.

Anyway I tried hard not to get this in my cuticles - as you can see I did anyway.  It wasn't too bad to clean up, though obviously once it gets all in your cuticles good luck cleaning it up.

I really like the red shimmer in this polish, and I also love that even though it's a really dark purple it never looks black like other polishes (Hello NARS Midnight Express!).