Ohio Wears Blue April 8, 2015

Wear Blue is a statewide awareness campaign that takes place on the second Wednesday of every April, Child Abuse Prevention Month. Ohioans are encouraged to wear blue that day - to work, to school, to a community event - to show support for preventing child abuse and neglect.

Since my outfit tomorrow will be a navy blue & white tweed jacket and navy pants, I thought I'd also post some blue nail polishes!

Tons more after the jump!

Happy Valentine's Day Part II: Free Shipping at Incoco and Barielle!

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Sales! Barielle and Cult Nails

Two great sales this week!

Barielle

Cult Nails

Barielle Jess' Champagne Toast review and swatches

Jess' Champagne Toast was originally part of the 2010 Holiday collection from Barielle, but is now available year-round on their website. Because all of the reviews I saw of this polish said the pretty pink glitter got drowned in the purple base, I debated about getting it, but succumbed to my love of purple. Instead of using three coats of this polish, I layered one thin coat over two coats of Orly Au Champagne, and I'm pleased with the result. The base color is a grey-purple, slightly frosty, but all the fuchsia glitter is on display.

Indoors with flash:



Indoors without flash:



A couple of hours after I typed this post, the following arrived in my Inbox:

Three Comparisons

So in my initial review of the True Collection from Zoya, I said that Skylar seemed like a silver-glitter version of Barielle's Falling Star. Ha! I was pretty well wrong in that--the shades are just barely in the same family in the bottle and completely different on the nail! I did some quick swatches, from left to right of Falling Star, Zoya Jo, Zoya Skylar and Orly Snocone.

Two coats of each polish, with flash:



And without flash:



Interesting how the other blues make Skylar look greenish-greyish-blue!

Another comparison that came to mind was Zoya Opal and Sinful Colors Green Ocean. When it first came out and when it was re-released, Green Ocean was all of $1.99, but I just looked on Ebay, and it's currently selling for $12.99, so Opal is definitely a better buy at $8.00. As for the comparison, this is three coats of each polish, Opal on the left and Green Ocean on the right--can you see a difference?





No? Neither can I, so if you've wanted Green Ocean, grab Opal as soon as it's available!

One last comparison, for my lovely friend clowder, Zoya Maisie and Nfu-Oh 52. As you can see, Maisie is a barely-there wash of color, and 52 is a full purple jelly base, so yes, there is reason to own both!



I hope the comparisons have helped or at least entertained you, and if you want to get Jo or any other Zoyas besides True or Fleck Effects polishes, Zoya has a coupon code for you:

In 2012 we want everyone to try Zoya and add some new color to their world.

So from now through 1/9/2012 11:59 PM ET we are going to let you try any* 2 bottles of Zoya Nail Polish for FREE on ZOYA.COM.
All you pay is the standard shipping charges.

As a bonus, you can purchase an additional $25 or more of Zoya or Qtica products and get FREE Shipping Too!..Bonus!

Use Code: ZOYA2012

Please see the complete official instructions and terms & conditions on our blog:
http://zoyanailpolish.blogspot.com/2012/01/let-zoya-color-your-world-in-2012.html

*Promotion Excludes True & Fleck Effect Collection Colors

Green Week Day One: Zoya Holly and some friends

I swatched Holly as soon as I got it, and then Hauly over at Haul of Fame mentioned that she was tempted to layer Barielle Buddha-ful over an emerald green, but she didn't think it would work. Um, yeah, she was completely correct! Pictures of that particular failicure are at the bottom of this post. After removing the non-beautiful Buddha-ful Holly from my nails, I started again with one coat of Orly Ridge-filler, two coats of Holly and one coat of Color Club Covered in Diamonds. Much better! I took pictures before putting on two coats of Nubar Diamont, because Covered in Diamonds has lumpy flakies in a clear base.

In the sunshine:



In shade:



Failicure:

Red Week Day Five: Color Club Santa's Cinnamon and Barielle Elle's Spell

Santa's Cinnamon is a red jelly with red glitter from the Scent-sual collection that was exclusive to Sally Beauty. I have other red-jelly-n-glitter polishes, of course, but this one smells like red hots candy! It covered very nicely in one coat, no bald spots, but the color wasn't quite deep enough, so I added a second. It dried almost matte and was slightly gritty, but before I added top coat, I added one coat of Barielle Elle's Spell, which is red glitter in a wine jelly. It deepened the whole look, shot the bling factor up to 11, smoothed out the grit and shined up the matte. It's going to be hard to take this off!

One coat of Elle's Spell over two coats of Santa's Cinnamon, inside with flash:



One coat of Elle's Spell over two coats of Santa's Cinnamon, inside without flash:



Two coats of Santa's Cinnamon, inside with flash:



Two coats of Santa's Cinnamon, inside without flash:



Even with Elle's Spell and a coat of Nubar Diamont over it, I still get the candy scent when my hands are near my face. Altogether, I think this is a gorgeous and holiday-appropriate mani!

I really wanted to see this as a matte, so I grabbed my bottle of China Glaze Matte Magic. CGMM does magic things to glittery, glitzy nail polishes, but I can't really recommend it, because my bottle dried up terribly and it took a huge amount of thinner to return it to usable. I'm stubborn, though, so when I got this revived, I used it. This is Friday's mani with a coat of CGMM:

Inside, with flash:



In the sun:

More copper, please!

While I loved the blue and copper color combo of Falling Star, I wanted some more copper. First I tried a coat of KleanColor Chunky Holo Copper, but that only gave me a few large sequins, so I added a coat of Del Sol Trick or Treat!

Artificial light, no flash:



Artificial light, with flash:



UV light, no sun:



I love this combo, and I love it even more when it darkens the base color of the polish outdoors. Of course, this time of year I'm not outdoors much, but when I am, I like looking at my nails!

Barielle Falling Star review and swatches

This is my second Barielle polish, and it's a bit more successful than the first. I love the color combination of blue and copper. Truthfully, I love copper with blue, green, black, brown, and white, so this was a natural for me. However, whether I got a bad bottle or they're all like this, this stuff was thick bordering on unmanageable. I persisted, and got it to look decent if not neat in two coats, but I won't be wearing it again until I add some thinner. Pre-cleanup pics, all in artificial light since the sun has deserted NE Ohio:

Without flash:



With flash:

Barielle Buddha-ful review and swatches

I have to say that my first Barielle polish was not a wild success. The flakies are very pretty--they go from gold to green to blue depending on how the light hits them. Unfortunately, the polish was very sheer, and removal was an absolute nightmare. I'm talking the foil method didn't get all the glitter off nightmare. I think I'll put the rest of the Barielles on hold and wear a few nice creams for a while...

Three coats, with flash:



Three coats, no flash:

Sorry for the lack of sunshine pictures, but that's been in short supply here in NE Ohio the last few days!

Quick haul post

My nails are currently bare, eek! On Saturday I did that thing where you catch your hand wrong and flip the nail backwards. Of course it was the ring finger nail on my left hand, which is my best nail, and of course the break was well under the smile line and into the nail bed, so I've been trying various things to keep it attached until it grows out enough that I won't bleed like a stuck pig when I clip it.

Wow, that was a long sentence! o.O Anyway, here are my weekend hauls:

From Discount Drug Mart, two different Sally Hansen Nail Strips, in Ghoulie Girl and Spun for You:



Discount Drug Mart is a NE Ohio chain of drugstores, and they always seem to carry Sally Hansen products at a dollar or more lower than CVS and Walgreens, so between their regular price of $7.99 plus the $1 off coupon from All for You, I got these for $6.99 each instead of $9.99 each.

Barielle haul, polishes in Falling Star, Jess' Champagne Toast, Buddha-ful and Elle's Spell:



Barielle was having a buy one, get one half off, plus they gave me a 50% off my order for signing up for e-mails, so I got all four polishes for $14.47. It's also worth noting that I ordered last Tuesday and the polishes arrived on Saturday!