I have some new nail art! It's been ages, but I had a ton of down time today and I was in the mood to do some nail art! I browsed Pinterest (Pinterest.com/rakuzen) and found a cute sunflower ish nail art.
The cast of characters:
From left: China Glaze Agent Lavendar, Zoya Arizona, Zoya Wednesday, Zoya Shelby, Revlon Dreamer, OPI DS Illuminate, and a Sinful Colors yellow striper.
First step, two coats of each color. These colors show up on my blog a lot because they're basically the only spring/summery ones that I have. Most are dark and more suitable for fall.
Then using the brown color, paint a small circle in the corner. Using a yellow striper (it was yellow, although it did turn green on the middle finger), draw petals around the brown circle. Finish with top coat and voila!
Super simple design, but I love it! Has just enough sparkle for me. It was nice to get back into nail art too, I haven't had much time or energy lately with working and taking classes all summer.
I just got my Ipsy Glam Bag and I love it for the most part! I am a little bit nostalgic for my Birchbox because they would put random "stocking stuffer"-esque items in it, such as a nail file, candy or a hair tie whereas there's always only beauty items in the Glam Bag. (I realize that it is a beauty subscription, but it would be nice to throw something random in.)
This is the bag that came this month. It's so cute! A cute light pink color with a white zipper and white button tag that says Ipsy.
The card that came in it this month. February's box is love/Valentine-themed!
A box of J. Cat Beauty eyelashes and glue in EL05.
The back of the package with instructions. According to the website, this is $3.99, which isn't bad for fake eyelashes. I have a ton of them (because I'm an impulse shopper) but I've never actually worn them. I still like having them on hand with the fantasy that some day I will dress very fancy and use them.
This is an Eyetini Cordial Cream Shadow + Base in One stick from Tini Beauty in Violette. I usually use Urban Decay Primer Potion as a base when I wear eyeshadow (which hasn't been often lately because I am lazy), but even with that my eyeshadow still smears and rubs off. So far so good with this one! Plus I like this color because I usually wear purple eyeshadow. This is $18 and the one in the package was full-sized.
PopBeauty Plump Pout Mini in Fuschia Freesia. I love this bright pink color, I always go for bright pink or red lip products. Plus this is mostly flat, which is awesome because it makes it more portable. Happy with this! This is about half the size of the one that they sell on their website, which sells it for $16, so it'll probably run around $8.
This is a blue clay mask and activating gel that is supposed to be used weekly. I haven't used it yet because I'm cheap and want to savor it, but the reviews look good! The website sells it for $39 for six packets, so this one in the Glam Bag would be about $6.50.
Zoya nail polish in Dot. I love Zoya, but this color is such a light girly pink that I passed it on because I don't use pink nail polish that often. It's $8 for the full size on Zoya.com
Overall, this bag is worth $44.50, which is an insanely good deal, especially since I liked this month's Glam Bag.
Hope you like it! If you're interested in signing up, here's my affiliate link:
These are my nails from last week. I haven't had time to post! But final exam week always gives me time :) Plus, these past few days it has been so warm and spring-y out that I had to make spring time nails!
This was a popular design last year and I really love how cute and simple it is. I tried using spring colors but I only brought about twenty or so polishes with me when I moved to college, so I didn't have as many choices as I would have liked. In fact, I'll do a quick paragraph about that at the end!
I love these polishes (which is why I happened to have them with me). I tried to be as spring-y as possible! I used my Art Deco White nail polish striper to draw lines on each nail (3-4 per nail). On my pointer finger, I finally used one of my dried flowers from the wheel that I bought over the summer. I LOVE THIS NAIL DESIGN!
The polishes that I brought with me to college.
If you want to know what they are, I can post it. As you can see, lots of polishes haha. China Glaze, OPI, Essie, Butter London. Some of them I haven't used yet though (surprise, surprise). But still! I store them in a small cardboard box on my desk.
Hope you like it! I do have a couple more nail art posts to put up, some product reviews that have been waiting for me. Off to study!
In honor of my favorite holiday of ever, I did my nails! This is exciting because it has, unfortunately, been awhile since I've had time to do that. But here's a quick and simple design that I did.
I chose red and gold because they are lucky colors in China. The thumb, middle, and pinky finger are all Zoya Stella. My pointer finger is China Glaze Ruby Pumps because it was glittery and I wanted to see how it looked. It was too dark though, so the rest of the nails I did in Zoya Stella. The glittery gold is Butter London West End Wonderland. Such a perfect gold (both for this design and in general!)
The red and gold design: Paint your nails with base coat (I used Essie's Ridge-Filling base coat), then two coats of your red. Use the gold polish and swipe it diagonally across your nail. It took me about three coats to get the gold to be opaque, but it dried really fast and it is SO glittery and eye catching, especially in the sun!
I had wanted to be able to do more Chinese New Year designs, but I ran short on time. No matter! Chinese New Year lasts for 15 days! So expect at least one more red/gold/Chinese New Year-esque nail design before I move on to Valentine's Day nails! If you're looking for a quick design, I posted a cut-out hearts design last year. I picked up a gorgeous pink Orly at CVS today, so I plan on putting that to good use! (And yes, I realize that I haven't posted any new nail polish purchases. Truth is, I haven't been able to buy nail polish lately because the nearest Rite Aid is kind of far and it's really cold here in Michigan. Oh well, it'll be a good chance to finally use the half of my collection that's been sitting untouched.)
Here's the first part of the new Zoya summer collection, the Zoya Beach Collection. The press release describes it as being "designed and inspired by resort runways and tropical getaways."
indoor shot of Reagan
middle and pointer finger painted with OPI Dim Sum Plum
Reagan. Described as a "deep cerise pink creme." But on the nail, this is a dark fuchsia colored creme. When I first applied it, I thought it looked familiar, so I compared it with my bottle of OPI's Dim Sum Plum from the Hong Kong collection, and they're an exact match! Can you tell the difference between the colors if you hadn't read the caption?
Lara. Zoya describes this as a "vivid cerise pink cream." It is a lighter fuchsia than Reagan, pretty much matches the bottle color exactly.
Shelby. Another pink! This is described as a "soft pinky pink cream." Very true. This is a very light pink, and it appears almost jelly-like on the nails.
Arizona. Described as a "soft coral orange cream." It is a little bit darker than my picture, but not "pumpkin" colored. A nice color, and it actually looked nice with my skintone because it has a yellow tone to it.
Tracie. A "sea grass metallic." It has a touch of frost shimmer to it, which gives it a pearl-like finish. A nice, soft, light green that I don't have any other of.
outside photo
inside photo
Wednesday. "Soft aqua cream." This one really changes colors for me when you go from inside to the outdoor light. Inside, it's a darker turquoise, but when you go outside, it is a nice light blue. Doesn't really look like the ocean, if that was the intent, but it is a nice, relaxed blue colors. I wore this one last and kept it on for longest, and it has received a lot of compliments.
Each polish has three coats, but Arizona was the only one that really needed it. Something about the polish made it runny and streaky, but if you take time between coats then it should be fine.
Overall, the collection is nice, but three pinks? And none of the colors really scream summer to me, usually I think of neon or very bright colors, but this collection of muted colors is very off-putting. Not that they're not nice colors, but they're not unique or summer-y.
I know it's been awhile since I last posted (read: a couple of months), but I haven't done any nail art for a few weeks. And I had a nail haul post planned a few weeks ago, using the Blogger for iPod app, but the app ate my post and all the pictures that I had taken for it, so I'll have to re-do that. I am also planning to do another Sensationail post, about different uses and possibilities for it, so I will definitely keep working on that. Meanwhile, the Zoya Surf collection should be up by the end of the week.
(PS, sorry about the watermark on the pictures! Flickr has a new editing program called Aviary to replace Picnik, and it is not nearly as nice or easy to use, so I'm still trying to get my watermarks straight and neat.)
Summer collections are finally here! Well, Zoya's is, at least, and I'm sure lots more will follow. But just look at this collection! Such bright, pretty colors.
Here is what the press release says:
Summer 2012 is going to be a super stylish season for nails with the latest offering of nail polish collections, Beach and Surf, from the new color of fashion, Zoya! This new splash of color, designed by the Zoya color experts, is kissed by sea and sand translating beautifully onto the nail in the famous, full-coverage Zoya formula.
Dive into the creamy shades of the Zoya Beach Collection or the shimmering sea foils of the Zoya Surf Collection.
The Beach collection consists of six polishes:
Reagan (ZP614) - deep cerise pink cream
Lara (ZP615) - vivid cerise pink cream
Shelby (ZP616) - soft pinky pink cream
Arizona (ZP617) - soft coral orange cream
Tracie (ZP618) - sea grass metallic
Wednesday (ZP619) - soft aqua cream
And the Surf collection also has six polishes:
Rory (ZP620) - lotus pink foil metallic
Carly (ZP621) - thalia purple foil metallic
Kimber (ZP622) - magenta pink foil metallic
Myrta (ZP623) - coral orange foil metallic
Meg (ZP624) - mermaid green foil metallic
Zuza (ZP625) - aquamarine foil metallic
The two collections were designed and inspired by resort runways and tropical get-aways. All Zoya polishes are free of toluene, camphor, formaldehyde, resin, and DBP. You can buy the collection at www.zoya.com, starting April 1st.
Release date: April 1st.
Retail value: $8
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My comments: How pretty are these? I like the Surf Collection a lot. Foil metallic? Definitely. One thing that I have to say is that I didn't realize until the True and Fleck Collection that all Zoya polishes were named after women. Now, I totally see that and am smacking myself for not noticing. But seriously, it just makes Zoya that much more friendly to me that they're not trying to make up clever names to match their colors.
Are you anticipating this collection? How does it look to you?
I have two nail pictures to show y'all this week! (:
The first one is not my nails, but my sister's. This is the first time that I've done nail art on someone else's hands. If I'd been doing it for myself, it probably would have only taken 15 minutes at most. But... it took closer to 45 minutes, I believe.
I got the design off of one posted on soompi, but I didn't write down the username. This design was done using Zoya Skylar and a black striper and a grey striper.
This is a swatch of China Glaze Dorothy Who. It's so pretty! I got my nails professionally done that time. I know, I could have spent the $10 on a bottle of OPI and done my own nails, but I wanted to see how they shape my nails, do my cuticles, etc. Sadly, I do not own this polish because I didn't get it either time China Glaze released it. It is now my dream to own it though.
I have the new, spring 2012 collection from Zoya for review today. It features 6 colors in the "True" collection, with 3 fleck polishes that can either be worn alone, or layered on top of the nail polishes.
TRUE
This is Lotus. This one was kind of hard for me to capture! It's a really nice cool purple with pink shimmer. This is three coats, although it was mostly opaque at two. Very nice application (although I did manage to get too impatient and accidentally made a mark on my ring finger). Looks good with my skintone, so I can envision wearing this often. (And I completely forgot to clean off my cuticles in the second picture, so I'm sorry!)
This is Tru. Flash in the second picture to show the shimmer. A nice, deep, red-toned purple with pink shimmer. It dries a shade darker than the bottle (not that you can really tell the bottle's color from my picture, with the way I'm clutching at it), which is kind of weird but it looks really nice!
Cho. Maybe I'm the only one, but when I first heard that name, I thought of Cho Chang from Harry Potter. Just me? Anyways, this is a creamy, yellow-toned shade with a subtle silver shimmer. It actually looks good with my skintone, and I might wear it more often (I don't usually do neutrals/tannish colors like this).
Farah. Dirty beige. It does not look good with my skintone as well, so I probably won't wear it very often. It is pretty though, darker than Cho, and stays close to the bottle color.
Skylar. Wow. This is so pretty! It dries a shade darker than the bottle, actually. I thought it would be a dupe for a Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure color, but no way. Skylar is a deep, unique blue with gold and silver shimmer. Awesome shimmer, too. It always turned out in my pictures. The first picture is more true to color.
Bevin. Would it be weird to say that this nail polish reminds me of a person? Not the name or anything, but when I saw Bevin, I instantly thought of my friend. Strange. It is a soft, turquoise-y green. It's extremely pretty! And it actually looked good on me, which I didn't expect from the bottle. I wore it for the longest, a week, and got tons of compliments on it.
Blurred to show the flakes. This is two coats of Lotus with one coat of Chloe on top. It's so pretty! The pink base is (obviously) unnoticeable when it's layered with Lotus.
Two coats of Tru with one coat of Chloe.
Two coats of Cho with one coat of Chloe. (It looks unbelievably beautiful!! In this picture, at least)
Two coats of Farah with one coat of Opal.
Three coats of Skylar withone coat of Maise.
From left: Zoya Maisie, Opal, and Chloe
From left: Zoya Cho, True, and Farah
From left: Zoya Bevin, Lotus, and Skylar
Dry time: Fast for the True Collection, but the Fleck collection takes awhile to dry. Not too long, but it is a bit longer than average dry time.
Color selection: I love the True collection, except I wish they'd done another color instead of two beiges. And the Fleck collection is amazing-- I'm a sucker for flakie top coats. But I do wish that Opal and Maisie weren't so close! Over another polish, they look exactly the same.
Wear time: I wore Bevin for a week, and at the end of the week, the only signs were some average tip wear.
Overall, this collection is very nice, and I'm glad that I got to review it! It was released on Jan. 13th, and you can buy it online at www.zoya.com
