Battle of the White polishes!

 I decided to see what white base was the best for under a neon. I used all the whites I had in my bin including OPI Tutu which is a sheer jelly and not really a white but more of a control in the experiment. After reading reviews I though China Glaze White on White would perform the best. Its rather popular for white due to price and its a nice white cream that tends to perform rather well. How they did will be shown in pictures and with descriptions below. The funky texture on my hands is because I took the photos inside the screen door. It didn't seem that obvious until I was editing pictures, sorry!

So first up the whites on the nails in all their glory. Sorry for the dry cuticles, these pictures were from when I tried using 100% acetone to clean up cuticles, and its DRYING. Using vasoline on the cuticles will help save your hands, but I didn't realize that at the time.

 On the pointer finger, I have OPI Tutu which is a sheer jelly and I mostly used this as my control in the experiment. This is essentially how it would look if I didn't use white under the polish. I only did one coat because I know its sheer.
Middle finger is OPI's My Boyfriend Scales Walls which is a slightly gray tinted white cream from the Spiderman Collection. This needed 2 coats to be solid. As you can see its more gray than the last 2 nails. Also, this needed the *longest* dry time of the bunch.
Ring Finger is Orly's Dayglow (won in a giveaway from Apple Laquer! Yay!). Dayglow is labeled as a 'stark white cream' but there is some shimmer type action going on in the bottle and it almost seems more like an opaque jelly on the nail based on how it wants to be applied. This was sort of streaky. I added a couple of drops of thinner, that didn't help much.I found out it just wants to be put down in a thick coat and then let it dry a little longer than you would for thinner coats.
Pinky is China Glaze's White on White. White cream, I have used this before pretty much a 1 coater, but I have had issues with chipping within a day/hours of application. I did add a second coat just to make sure it was a good solid white base.

 Adding the neon was an issue for me. Turned up Turquoise dries matte. And it start looking matte before it was actually dry. So you can see brush marks  from where I added more polish and the other layers weren't dry. So wait several minutes between coats even if it SEEMS dry.

And here they all are with a top coat. See that middle finger? Yeah OPI boyfriend smudged. It really really needed a long dry time for me. Longer than I anticipated that is for sure. The brush strokes actually started with the first layer and got worse after each layer.

My faves as a base for neons? Orly Dayglow and Chine Glaze White on White. They both made the neon POP! I would say for the least amount of layers and thus fastest mani, use China Glaze White on White. If you have a longer amount of time and get the white base solid before adding the neon the Orly performed really well and made the color pop. This was my first time using Orly Polish and I was pretty pleased with it. Again, I would recommend doing thick coats just to even out the white base, but it wore a lot better than the OPI and the China Glaze.

Third option for a neon mani would be OPI Tutu or no white base at all, just a clear base. It took an extra coat or so to get the same depth of color, and it wasn't quite as bright as the white bases, but if you don't really want another polish in your box you can feel free to skip it.

OPI Boyfriend seemed to darken the turquoise and it was not very exciting or neon once darkened. I did use an extra coat on the first two trying to get them to look as good as the last two (part of why I got lovely brush drag marks). PLUS the chipping! After waiting for.ev.er for everything to dry this one still was not dry. And I love OPI polish in general so I was rather bummed. I don't know if it was the base or how the base and the neon worked together.


Opi Boyfriend is best not layered under a neon. Its fine for nail art or with a glitter or something on top, but it made the neon more drab. Its also nice for a white nails that is less white out looking. But again this was experimenting with layering and in this experiment it was a big fat fail for me.

You can buy these brands and polishes at various retailers on the web as well as in stores (though some of these colors/collections might not all be available now). All opinions are my own, and with the exception of winning the Orly in a giveaway, I purchased all the polishes myself. Prices can rage for the polishes, but retail prices are $7-10. China Glaze is the least expensive and you can find online retailers that sell it for $3ish every day.

DaringDigits Disco Diamond

Daring Digits Diamond disco is a clear based glitter top coat. It has tiny little holographic sparkles as well as larger octagon and large diamond holographic glitters. Its AMAZING in the sun. Simply stunning.  Save this one for a day you will be out and about a lot. Its nice indoors and on cloudy days, but when the sun hits it Bam!

Daring Digits Diamond Disco

This is 2 coats over a graphite gray/black color.

And just to show how this polish wears I took a couple of photos late in the day of day 3 of the mani. Keep in mind I don't baby my hands.I washed dishes, cleaned up a few spills and even did some serious packing for a friend on day 1 of the mani. The 3rd day was also, you guessed it cloudy. Still nice, but not nearly as holographic.

Daring Digits Diamond Disco on day 3 of wear

And above is compared to the first day in full sun.

My only complaint, is easily fixed by me with better application. If any of the big diamonds are near the edge they are pokey. I did clean up on the middle nail and the corner of a diamond stuck out a little. It was catching on everything and rather annoying. Obviously not THAT annoying since i wore the polish for 3 days, but next tiem I wll make sure there aren't any diamonds on the top edge as well as the normal hanging off the end of the nail.

Daring Digits retails for $7.75 for full size and $4.25 for minis. You can find her on etsy! All polish was bought by me and all opinions are my own. And yes I do want to wear this again.

Catching up!

Sorry I missed Monday's post! I have taken some photos and didn't get posts written. I also did my nails and never got good pics twice. So, today during preschool when I only have one kiddo at home I plan on getting at least tomorrow taken care of. My nails are actually rather LONG for me, like to the end of the fingertip. I have to show them off while I can.

Also a post on hangnails and care/treatment is coming. Winter is coming and if you get dry skin issues in the winter, you are more prone to hangnails.

And I am hoping to keep this schedule for posting, however my 33mo old has officially gotten a diagnosis of autism so I get to add 25-40 hours of therapy a week for him. Fun times! This is also a reason why I will never have long nails, playing with kids all day just doesn't make for nails past the fingertips. 

Pumpkin Patch Nails with Zoya Lianne

So this is a quick and dirty post with a not very nice photo. What can I say, it was nail art time with my 4 year old and you can't make mistakes with black.

Zoya Lianne is a tangerine orange with gold shimmer. I put it on and it needed pumpkins. My 4 year old hopped on that wagon as soon as she heard the idea. So the pumpkin match manicure was created. And, just in time for a trip to the pumpkin patch.

The art was all done with the brush from inside the bottle. Yeah seriously. The little hands had 1 coat of Lianne as the base, my hand has 2 coats. Black is Sinful Colors.

Also, I don't know if you can tell or not but I have a hangnail on the jack-o-lantern face on my middle finger. Grrr. It was dry skin and a bit of nail sticking out because of the dry skin and I messed with it. Darn it. I am working on intense moisturizing to heal that. There is another that isn't as obvious on the ring finger nail. That will teach me to use the 100% acetone remover my husband got because it sounded like it would work better.

Zoya retails for $8 and is 5 Free and cruelty free. You can find Zoya on their website and at a few retailers. I have yet to find it locally, but their website shows there is one salon that carries it locally. If you don't have an account with Zoya and sign up with my link I get Share The Love points which are probably awesome (haven't got any yet, lol!) https://www.artofbeauty.com/rd/01513464

China Glaze Joy

Joy is a nice plum purple metallic from Spring 2009 Romantique collection. I have a couple of polishes from this collection, but I think this one its my fave. Plus plummy purples are totally fall friendly, so I am wearing it.

Joy is an awesome one coater. Yes seriously. Aside from that blip on my pinky (from clean up oops) it would have been perfect. I wore this today and meant to take more pics in different light, but I did some serious packing and cleaning for a friend and its chipped beyond belief. So just the bright morning sun photo.


So you see where I hit the nail when I was cleaning up the pinky? That is the one nail that didn't chip. Ha! The others do look like I packed 10+ boxes of books and office stuff as well as washed dishes by hand. Yep. See things like this are why I have short nails. I use my hands.

I love this color. I want to wear it on my toes. Its a nice metallic type finish but not a foil and not streaky. The opacity in one coat means it should stamp great for anyone that is looking for stamping polishes.

I can find China Glaze at my local Sally's Beauty Supply for about $7 unless on sale, as well as numerous online retailers for less than retail prices. I bought this polish myself and all opinions are my own.

Daring Digits First Love

Ahhhh indie polish. On my blog. This might be very, very bad. But hey, I ran into a sale and a bad day at the same time. So this happened.

First Love is large pink and white heart glitter with a purple to blue duochrome 'interference base.' I put that in quotes because that is what Daring Digits calls it in the description. It is essentially a white-ish looking base, but it has a color flash from the itty bitty duochrome sparkkles. I didn't see many good photos of this online so I tried to get some. Try is key because its a little hard to catch color flashes in a still photo. IMO the bottle shot better than the nails themselves. Darn you rain for changing my lighting on me.

 Natural light

 Bottle shot showing the interference base. See that shimmer.

Flash

This is 2 coats of First Love over OPI's My Pointe Exactly. Check out the previous post to see the undies alone. The base totally changed the look of the gray with that purple blue duochrome going on. I had to fish for the big glitters. Once I grabbed a few glitters on the brush I split them between the nails.

My only complaint is a minor one. And probably my own fault. When I was fishing for glitter, I ended up with gobs of polish on the nails. It took for.ev.er to dry that last coat. So if you tend to use your hands a lot, like short nailed me, you should totally paint this at a time where you won't need your hands. Like bedtime. But not too close to bed or you will get blanket creases. Or use a tooth pick to fish out the hearts instead of the brush, but that would require a toothpic.

P.S. I really liked the duochrome as a topper even without the big glitters. So don't feel pressured to add the glitters. Unless you are blogging about the polish and taking better photos than me, then add the glitters. I couldn't find any good photos of this color online when I was shopping, so I want there to be awesome photos out there.

This polish was bought by me and all opinions and photos are my own. Daring Digits can be found on etsy. Full size polishes are $7.75 and minis are $4.25. She has some fun geekdom inspired polishes, so go check her out.

OPI My Pointe Exactly

The worst part of mommy being sick is that the house gets trashed. My house is a nightmare. My kids haven't been sleeping well. As a result no one has been sleeping well. And its been cloudy and gloomy for days. Don't get me wrong, I love rain. We need rain. But I am feeling a little cabin fever. We went out today and picked a TON of pears. Well most of them were on the ground, after all the rain storms. But pears. Out. The. Wazoo. I look forward to the pear sauce, preserves, and cinnamon spiced pears this winter. The water bath canner will be getting a workout this week!

Now on to the polish. And I think my nails will always be short and that is ok.

Natural light.

My Pointe Exactly is a sheer jelly. This took 3 coats to be this opaque. There is some nail line visible, but I used very thin coats to encourage fast drying. It has been humid here lately. Thicker coats or a 4th layer would probably take care of it. Application was really great even in the super humidity of open windows and Midwest thunderstorms.

The color is sort of a brownish shade of gray or maybe more of a nude meets gray. Makes me think of gray pantyhose more than tights or thin fabric blouses where you can just see the hint of skin beneath it.And dang its so shiny. This is top coat free and it doesn't need a top coat. OPI is usually nice and shiny, but I just love the shiny finish on jelly polishes.

 Flash photo.

 I love the NYC Ballet collection, (what I own and I want Pirouette My Whistle which is the only one I am missing). The colors are all simple, sheer, and classy, but they can be a nice background for something bold. It would also probably make some nice jelly sandwich manicures, but I don't really care for those. I like my glitter more sparkly.

But, here is the bad news for me at least. I was sitting here in poor lighting typing this up, and looked down at my nails and didn't like the color. It seemed sort of dead/zombie. I don't know why. Maybe its the slightly brown tint to the gray, maybe its the jelly base keeping it semi sheer. So natural light = love. Dim indoor late night is blah and makes me think of frostbitten finger or dead hands.  I might be watching too many creepy shows thanks to Halloween.

This nail polish was purchased by me and all thoughts/reviews are my own. OPI retails for $8.50 and can be found at large retailers like JCPenny, Beauty Brands and from many salons. Find a reputable retailer near you at www.opi.com