Seche FAIL

So remember how I obtained a bottle of Seche Recondition from Sally Beauty Supply as a gift with purchase and I said I would give this a shot and see what it could do for my nails?



Sorry if I just made you lose your lunch. I'll give fair warning next time.

I'll post something lovely a little later to make up for this.

NOTD...a week late.

Hey there! Last week threw me for a loop, but I am trying to get back into the swing of things. This is the manicure I wore all last week:



For this manicure I used Essie's Looking for Love as the base (which looks like a lilac in the bottle, but as blue a lilac as you can get before turning into an actual blue), Sally Hansen Insta-Dri in Brisk Blue for the french tip, and Orly's White Out for the polka dots!

I enjoyed wearing this manicure so much this past week. I have tons of colors to swatch coming up and will try to post once a day for the rest of this week. I am already backlogged terribly and don't want to fall any further behind! I can't start swatching tonight for the sun has gone down and I really want nice pictures of these swatches, but tonight I will paint my nails Mr. Wrong from Hard Candy. It's one of my newest bottles and I am very excited to acquire this lemming.

In unrelated news, my financial aid came through today and Igot my student teaching assignment! No high school (which is a major bummer because that is the grade level at which I wish to teach) but I got paired with some really good teachers.

That's it for now, I will be back tomorrow with some awesome bottle shots (at the very least) of the newest bottles I have purchased!

Night!

China Glaze Poolside Collection NOTD

Don't these colors just make you happy? China Glaze's Poolside Collection in Sun Worshiper and Towel Boy Toy. Though these are not marketed as neons, they are pretty darn near close. Like any addict, I wanted to swatch both right away but only had time for one polish change. So what does any ingenuity polish addict do?






Do a combination of both! I love polka dot manicures! And this one is super bright and fun for the "poolside" during the summertime. My biggest trouble was deciding whether to do blue on orange or orange on blue. I am very happy with the results. I used a dotting tool to make the polka dots. The biggest lesson I learned in doing this type of manicure is to pick a polish that is opaque in 1 coat so the dots show up. In this photo, which is very color accurate, the dots look more uniformly opaque than they really are. And then in this pic they are obviously not all uniformly opaque. Uniform dots or not, I still love, love, LOVE this manicure.



I picked these beauties up at Sally Beauty Supply. And right now there is a special, when you buy 2 China Glaze polishes you can get a Seche Perfect Nail Product for free! I have never tried anything from the Perfect Nail line of Seche, only Seche Vite and Seche Base.

(My gift with purchase from Sally Beauty Supply)

Seche Base I never felt did much for my nails as a base coat, but I tried Seche Recondition (to add flexibility to fragile nails) as my base for this manicure. I figure, at a $7-$8 savings after getting this free with my CG purchase, I can't go too wrong by at least testing it out. One manicure probably won't make much of a difference, but I'll keep using it (along with Seche Vite as a top coat) and I'll let you know how it works out.


Thank you for reading, and as always, if you have any questions or requests, please leave them in a comment below!

The NOTD that went one day too long...

This manicure morphed over the course of a week:

Day 1: Nailtek Foundation II Base Coat, 3 coats of Sally Hansen HD Nail Color in DVD, 1 coat of Seche Vite.

Day 3: Reverse French Manicure with Sally Hansen HD Nail Color in Laser (3 coats), 1 coatof Seche Vite.

Day 5: Refreshed the reverse french manicure (touched up tipwear) and added 1 coat of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Nail Color in Shooting Star, 1 coat of Seche Vite.

Day 5, later on that day: Added several layers of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Nail Color in In the Spotlight to tips of thumb and ring finger, 1 coat of Seche Vite.

Day 5, still later: Removed all polish with foil method. The weight of all that polish was too much for my fingertips, LOL.

I often employ techniques such as these to extend the life of a manicure. When I am busy during the semester and only have time for a polish change once a week, these are all things I havce done to extend the life of my manicure. I did go a little over thie top this time, but that is the beauty of nail polish: you can change it as often as you change your mind! (And for me, that could be a lot!)

Thanks for taking the time to read my little beauty musings. If you have any questions, comments or requests, please leave them below!

Bet You Can't Swatch Just One! And NOTD!

Ok, so I may have a slight tendency towards hoarding. It's not a big deal. I have it under control.


While stopping off at my local pharmacy last night, I saw another Sally Hansen HD Nail Color that I had not seen on Tuesday.

Sally Hansen HD Hi-Definiton Nail Color in #16 Laser

I thought I would add this to my collection. I haven't been able to stop looking at my nails with the DVD on them. Since I couldn't bear to take it off, but NEEDED to swatch my newest color I came up with this:

Sally Hansen HD polish in DVD, tipped with Laser, topped with SecheVite.

I think I did OK for my first reverse french manicure with homemade janky nail guides. I'll give my DIY nail guides another shot. I have to find a better stencil to draw my guides before I cut them out. I need more of a moon or crescent shape to follow rather than the slight curve, which would be more appropriate for a regular french manicure.

It seems that I am on quite a Sally Hansen kick. While searching the SH section for the illusive Hidden Treasure polish, I had never realized that the Hard as Nails Xtreme Wear line was so affordable. At only $2.99 for an almost full sized product, I thought why the hell not. This is my first experience with the Xtreme line from SH and I can't wait to give it a go.

Shooting Star, In the Spotlight, Disco Ball, Going Green

I can't wait to test out the formula on these polishes. I am seldom disappointed with SH polishes and have found that their formula has only improved over the years. I did decide to get some "effects" polished over regular polishes. I had to throw one in there. I missed out on China Glaze's Four Leaf Clover. I hope this is a close dupe.


I'm happy to take swatch requests if there is one particular polish you would like to see first!


Thanks for reading!

First Beauty Related Blog Post!

(LOL, a font to choose for blogging is Webdings. Can anyone actually read Webdings? If you can, you're my hero!)

I finally have time to sit down and write a beauty related blog! That seems to be what always happens, I start a blog only to have it fall by the wayside because of life, jobs, school, etc. Anyway, this is not a complain post. This is a NAIL OF THE DAY POST!

As most other nail blogs have posted, the new Sally Hansen HD Hi-Definition Nail Color polishes are amazing. I have passed by these time and time again because of the eye-catching sparkly colors.

But each time I saw them I kept passing them up because of my first experience with Sally Hansen HD polish. I first bought SH HD when launched about 2 years ago. I picked up Hi-Def because it so closely resembled the polish that Elphaba from the musical Wicked wears in costume. (I will fill you in on my healthy obssesion with Wicked and the Wicked Witch of the West another time.) When I first applied this polish, I was not pleased. It took more than four coats for an even coverage. The polish was thick and difficult to work with. It ruined my manicure, even though the green nails would be the last thing people would be looking at on me. (Again, I will tell you about Wicked and myself another time.)

So with my past experience, I was weary. However, after reading other nail blogger's reviews and seeing their swatches, my willpower during my last trip to CVS was not strong enough. Being partial to the non-traditional nail polish colors, I had to pick up these beauties:

(Pictured from left to right: #13 Resolution, #14 Spectrum, #15 DVD)

These are so pretty, I didn't know which on to try first. I decided upon DVD because...I was wearing a purple shirt today, hee hee. I used Nail-Tek Foundation II as a base coat, 3 coats of polish (though are still some bald spots that can be seen in the pictures, 4 coats would have been best, but I did this manicure during my 30 minute lunch) and topped with Seche Vite. The polish applied fairly easily, a bit on the thicker side. A single coat of DVD could be used as a glitter top coat in layering. Maybe I will try that sometime. Drying time was pretty fast between coats. Lastly, the Sally Hansen website says that this polish acutally contains liquid cyrstal particles. That at least sounds cool.

Anyhow for your viewing pleasure and consideration, Sally Hansen HD Hi-Definition Nail Color in DVD:

Under florescent lighting

Florescent Lighting^

With Flash^

In bright sun

Yeah, I picked a great first polish to blog about. Purples are notoriously difficult to photograph in respects of color accuracy. All these pictures are acurate. The polish shines differently in different lights. The purple is cool toned, but photographs almost blue. When the polish is looked at on it's own, some might call it blue. But when set next to a true blue color, it is obviously purple. It even photographs as steely silver. So if you decide to buy this polish completely based upon my review, plan on getting a multi-dimensional purple. Another note: in some pictures, the polish appears to have a gritty or grainy finish. It does have a bit of grittiness to it, but under a thick top coat dries completely smooth. The grit is what adds to the dimension of the polish.

Thanks for reading! If you have any questions or comments, please leave them below. :-)