Zoya Spam Part 2

So I intended to post part two of my Zoya spam a long time ago, but it just didn’t happen. I have been super busy with study and other polish projects.

 

Love Thy Polish is my indie polish brand which I created in December 2011. For a long time I just sold my polishes in my home town and at the markets here but at towards the end of last year I decided to create an Etsy store and have a go at selling them online too! I love concocting different combinations!

 

Anyway, here are some more pretties for you!

Zoya Evvie:

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With some Bundle Monster stamping. Such a super pretty green-grey creme. Beautiful in two coats.

 

Natty:

The perfect deep teal with just a hint of grey. I love this colour!!

 

Some stamping jazzed it up just that little bit more!

 

Have an awesome evening

 

Em

China Glaze–Recycle

I’m still on the hunt for a perfect grey polish. I thought this was it but nope, it just doesn’t do it for me.

 

China Glaze Recycle:

Two coats. Formula was not too bad, but it’s just so boring. Am I too honest in my reviews, too brutal!? Sometimes I feel like I am! Some polishes are just so disappointing though, especially when you see lovely swatches on other people’s blogs. It doesn’t help that this is a terrible photo but honestly, it doesn’t make much of a difference because the colour just washed me out and did not suit my skintone.

 

Into the swaps pile you go!!!

Em

OPI–My Pointe Exactly with Pirouette My Whistle

I was  so looking forward to the OPI NYC Ballet Collection. As soon as I saw Scrangie’s swatches I knew I had to have ALL of them! I’ve been searching for the perfect french polishes for so long and I had a feeling these were it! I was actually a little scared that the collection wouldn’t live up to my expectations.

Well, I needn’t have worried. This collection is AMAZING!!!!

 

This is My Pointe Exactly:

A gorgeous light grey milk jelly. Can you say perfect?! I am so in love.

This was three coats. The awesome thing about the polishes in this collection is that you can build them up to the opacity you want. One coat adds a pretty shine and polished look to your nails, two coats adds more colour and three gives you the beautiful squishy jelly look above.

 

Of course, I had to try out Pirouette My Whistle, the lone glitter of the bunch:

Ahhhhhhhh! I love you, Pirouette My Whistle! So beautiful! Silver microglitter with tiny little silver hexes. I actually thought they were circles at first but upon closer inspection they are very subtle hexes.

 

Stay tuned for more of this collection because I can’t seem to stop wearing them

Em

essence–The Dawn is Broken

Meh. This polish is meh. So disappointing because the others in essence’s Vampire’s Love collection are stunning. This one was a bit like they suddenly thought “Oh crap, we need another colour! Oh, this one will do!”

 

This is essence The Dawn is Broken:

Two coats. Formula was okay, a little thick. Chips the next day. I just can’t get excited about this polish!

What do you think? Am I being too harsh?

 

Em

essence–Into the Dark

Oh, drool. Essence has come up with yet another amazing polish in their Vampire Love collection. I am so glad I picked up this collection when I was in Adelaide last because I have loved every one so far.

 

This is Into the Dark:

Two coats of perfection. It is a beautiful dark blue-grey (bley? Okay, so I’m taking the combining colours thing a bit too far now ). Amazing formula and opaque in two coats. This was an absolute dream to apply and I felt that the colour really complimented my skin tone. I think this is one for everyone and an especially good way for people who are afraid to venture outside of ‘classic’ polish colours to broaden their horizons.

 

I’m totally and completely loving essence at the moment Are you?
Em

Miki Rainclouds with OPI Turquoise Shatter

Hello everyone!!!

I'm back from my Christmas/New Years holiday in Adelaide. I had such a great time but I'm so glad to be home. I spent way too much money, of course, but it was worth it ;)

Anyway, here's a mani I did before Christmas.

This is an unnamed Miki polish which I have dubbed "Rainclouds":

Such a gorgeous colour. This would be perfect for Winter! I can't remember if this was one or two coats, but I think it was one. Fantastic formula, like the other Miki's I've tried. I keep getting more and more impressed with these polsihes!

I decided to try an OPI Shatter polish for the first time. I've used other crackles and shatters, but this was my first OPI.






This is their Turquoise Shatter.  I buggered it up a bit because I painted it on too thick on some nails. I wasn't really a fan of this colour combo because you couldn't see the grey very well through it. Definitely need a more obvious base colour.


Anyway, I hope you all had a great holiday season. Welcome to 2012!

Em

Chi Chi Disco Diva

Apologies, apologies… I have neglected my blog the past couple of days because I was in Adelaide doing my hot stone massage and cupping courses! They were AMAZING. The man who taught us was a wealth of knowledge and I picked up so many hints and tricks that I never ever considered! I have been knocked out the past couple of days with a super-cold. The hot stones brought it out of me but I’m healing a lot quicker than normal, which I completely think is due to the stones. I’m a total convert and I can’t wait to start practicing it!

 

Anyway, onto the polish! Talk about bling bling. This Chi Chi polish, Disco Diva, is amazing!

Check out the craziness happening on my nails:

Woo! This was two coats. Crappy formula, very thick and gluggy, but nothing a bit of thinner won’t fix! It took three coats of SV to smooth it out because it was a little gritty.

 

As most glitter polishes do, this wore well. I applied it Thursday evening and ended up taking it off on Sunday night because I had a few very, very large chips and I picked the rest off until there as hardly anything left. Ha!

 

Em

Tony Moly unnamed grey-blue-green

I’m currently mourning the loss of my nails. I cut them down, as I always do when they get to a certain length, and I went a little too far and now I hate them

Oh well, they grow fairly quickly but I just have to be careful about what colours I paint them. Boo.

This is one of the Tony Moly polishes I got from Morning Glory in Adelaide:

 

I can never work out what colour to call this kind of shade. It’s like a grey-blue-green. Either way, it’s gorgeous!

This is two coats and it went on like a dream. I’m most impressed as this only cost me $3.50. Tony Moly are an Asian brand and, as far as I know, the only place to get them (apart from online) in Adelaide is Morning Glory.

So what are you waiting for!? Get to it and collect some Tony Molys!!

 

Em

Spectrafranken–Janie’s Got a Gun

I’m on a mission to try all my Spectrafrankens so that I can share them with Cathy from More Nail Polish for her awesome Spectrafrankens blog post.

So far I’ve created nine Spectrafrankens, only one of which was a fail (and I’m still seeing if I can resurrect that!!!)

This is Janie’s Got a Gun, a beautiful gunmetal grey holo:

Two coats. Beautiful! This one isn’t quite as holo as Blue Lagoon or Hot Stuff, but still gorgeous!

The recipe is easy peasy! I use 5mL bottles so I filled a bottle to the top of the widest part with NYC Colors Charcoal and added 3 tiny straw spoonfuls of Spectraflair. Shake, shake, shake and you have a beauty!

 

Here’s another photo:

 

I’ve been having so much fun creating Spectrafrankens that I emailed Cathy today and ordered another 2g of Spectraflair. My name is Emma and I have a Spectraflair addiction …

 

Stay tuned tomorrow for, you guessed it, MORE Spectrafrankens!

Em

Three gorgeous Spectrafrankens

Hello friends,

I went to the dentist after work today so I’m sitting here feeling a bit sorry for myself, eating mashed potato and waiting for the feeling to return to my face. I got one wisdom tooth out and had a filling on the other side. My poor mouth   On the up side, that should be it for dental work for a long while

 

Anyway, I was feeling inspired tonight so I decided to create some Spectrafrankens! I am really, really pleased with how they turned out.

Have a looksee:

I have named them Bump in the Night (black), Blue Lagoon (gorgeous and what I think is very unique blue) and Janie’s Got a Gun (gunmetal grey). You like?  

 

Now here’s where you come in. I need you guys to help me decide which one to try first! What do you think? Will it be Bump in the Night, Blue Lagoon or Janie’s Got a Gun?

 

Em

k.k. Gunmetal Grey with Blue spotties

I tried the first of the k.k. polishes Mum got me from Melbourne!

I love the formula. Such a perfect consistency and this grey was a one coater!! I did two coats, of course, because it just felt wrong doing one

Look at the pretty silver shimmer through it:

 

Beware, though, your nose will hate you. These stink.

 

Pretty, pretty, pretty! Such a nice, dark yet shimmery colour!

 

And then I tried out my new nail dotting tool and did some dotties with the greeny blue KK polish! They didn’t stand out too well but I still liked them!

 

What do you think?

Em

eBay and mummy haul!

I love it when I get more than one package in one day! I felt thoroughly spoilt when I got home from work last Thursday and found my eBay package waiting and the goodies Mum had bought for me on her trip to Melbourne

 

 

50 little pots of glitter for frankening. Wheee

 

Very fine paintbrushes for nail art and a couple of dotting tools.

 

Two plastic palettes for mixing frankenpolishes.

 

Then I ripped into the package of goodies from Mum.

 

k.k. nail polishes. These don’t have names (annoying!) but they are all beautiful colours They are only $2 each!! I wish I lived in Melbourne where I could get these Look at the beautiful gunmetal grey on the left!!!

 

Sally Hansen Cuticle Massage Cream. This stuff smells amazing and is so moisturising. And look at the awesome price Mum got it for!!!

 

It’s kind of weird looking but I promise it smells good! Nice and apricotty.

Aaaand some delicious choccies. YUM! The Milk Duds were awesome and the fudge .. oh my! There was a little bundle of Haighs Dark Chocolate Squares which were amazing too. There were two mint choc biscuit bars but, er, I had them as a pre-massage snack What?! I needed some quick fuel  

 

I loooove getting goodies in the mail

Em

BYS Matte Grey with white Konad zebra stamping

I did not have any luck at all with my nails tonight! I painted them a beautiful Face Shop pastel blue colour and stamped them with Konad heart tips and then smudged the crappola out of my right hand. Sigh.

I just didn’t know what colour I wanted to paint them, and then I remembered I had this beauty:

BYS Matte Grey. This is two coats without a top coat. This is almost a one-coater, but not quite. Goes on beautifully and dries quickly (as most mattes do).

And then of course I had to practice Konad-ing!


Zebrahhhhh!

The smudginess is annoying me … hurry up and get here, Konad kit!! If they all looked as good as my ring finger I’d be happy, but my middle and little fingers are bugging me. This will come off tomorrow night. I’ve lost patience tonight!!!

edit: As much as the perfectionist in me isn't entirely happy with this mani, I've had some good feedback! One of the girls at work said she loved my nails and asked where I got them done.. When I told her that I did them, she said "oh, I don't like fake nails" and I said "they're not fake, they're real" and she just about fell over! It was awesome :D Gave me a buzz for the rest of the day!!

Em