Celebrating Earth Day: Zoya Suvi

Happy Earth Day! Today I thought I would share a polish from Zoya, since they are known for being more eco-conscious. I chose Suvi, a lacquer I got from the Green Friday sale back in November. Suvi was thick and a bit goopy, but very pretty. The base is actually charcoal with an intense amount of green shimmer which turns it into a blackened emerald green color. I like how soft the Zoya brush is. With a little thinner I think it would be a dream to apply. This is three thick coats with no topcoat.

As you can see, I chopped my nails down to nothing. They feel very very short, I'm not sure I like them. They looked alright when I was filing (they were bare) but once I put some color on them they looked ultra-short! I hope they grow back soon!

Speaking of Zoya, they have brought back their famous Nail Polish Exchange for a limited time! From today until the 30th of June, you can trade in your old/unwanted colors for brand new Zoyas of your choice, and Zoya will properly dispose of the polishes sent to them. Unfortunately I think this is available only for those in the continental US. Find out more here.

Not only is it Earth Day, but it is also the birthday of my sweet "wild" abyssinian Gil. He turns 6 years old today! I thought I would show you a candid we took of him a few months ago. He has a special towel for when he eats catnip because he can be very messy with it!

Are you going to exchange some old polishes for some new Zoyas? What's on your list?

Until next time~!

Zoya Midori + Dutch Nail Blog Giveaway

Firstly, I love this color. Wow. A perfect spring green with yellow shimmer. A bright green that doesn't look terrifying on my skin! The yellowish flash in it matched the daffodils wonderfully, so I used that as a backdrop.

My one complaint with Midori, however, is the formula. I can't remember using a gooier, gloppier formula. The brush didn't spread well, and didn't dry quickly (I believe this is because of the thickness), so I ended up banging my nails before they had fully dried. I tried to even it out with another coat, but it didn't self-level, so it just looks a bit blobby, my apologies for that. I am convinced that with thinning this polish would be perfect, but this one really drove me crazy.

In other news, Kirsten at The Dutch Nail Blog is having a surprise giveaway! In honor of her new puppies, she's put together a neat giveaway. Ever wish you could pick your own prize? The winner of this giveaway gets to select the Catrice polishes she's got her eye on, I believe for a total of 9. Open internationally. This ends on the 3oth of April, find out more here.

Until next time!

Orange Swatches

I remember in fourth grade all the girls in my class agreed that orange was the ugliest color because it didn't look good with anything. Except black, but if it wasn't Halloween, you just looked dumb. I never liked orange either, although I did get this set of two Old Navy mini polishes in a goody bag from someone's birthday party, one pink with gold flash and one orange with gold flash, that I thought were super cool. I justified that as being okay, though, because we had been talking about clothes, and nail polish wasn't clothes.

...Anyway.

Apparently that logic stuck with me because I love orange nail polish. I started buying polish again last year and ended up with a lot of orange near-dupes really quickly. They're not identical, I swear! See, let me show you...

(with flash) China Glaze Dreamsicle, OPI DS Treasure, Jordana Mango, NYC 112a, Zoya Penny

(no flash) China Glaze Dreamsicle, OPI DS Treasure, Jordana Mango, NYC 112a, Zoya Penny

Dreamsicle is a cute fun light tangerine but oh so chunky. :( It took me days to get it off my toes. ...It also flaked right off my fingers in big sheets. Actually, the parts on my toes that didn't have me scrubbing forever also chipped off really fast. I don't know what's up with this one, but China Glaze's Bad Kitty had the same effect. Must be a junk batch.

Treasure's my favorite out of the lot. ♥ As you can see here, it's actually a pink base with a LOT of orange and gold shimmer. I usually layer it until it's more or less opaque, so that it looks more orange than pink, but it wouldn't be bad sheer, either.

Mango is a softer sort of orange shimmer and... really doesn't look like a mango to me. It's yellowy, but the shimmer throws me off. Very pretty, though, but is kind of streaky. I thought it might be a match for the Old Navy mini I had (which, btw, is officially so old it doesn't dry), but it has more depth to it.

At the other end of the spectrum, I have no idea where this NYC came from. I asked my mom to mail me some things and this got included. I don't remember buying it and it must be from junior high. It's actually not a bad creme, though. Really streaky at first but evened out nicely after three coats.

Zoya Penny is very pretty and very opaque. I think this is two coats, although one is almost good enough to wear. It really does live up to its name. It looks exactly like a melted new penny.

(with flash) Zoya Paz, Jordana Hot & Spicy, Wet'N'Wild Inferno, Zoya Kaufda, Nfu.Oh 58

Breaking up the monotony with a family portrait. :)

Zoya Penny, NYC 112a, Jordana Mango, OPI DS Treasure, China Glaze Dreamsicle, Nfu.Oh 58, Zoya Kaufda, Wet'N'Wild Inferno, Jordana Hot & Spicy, Zoya Paz

(with flash) Zoya Paz, Jordana Hot & Spicy, Wet'N'Wild Inferno, Zoya Kaufda, Nfu.Oh 58

I think everyone is allowed to have a couple of polishes they buy just because of the name. Paz is one of mine. Except that I also like the color. So. Anyway. It's a really, really, really, really neon orange. Blinding. Takes two to three coats for full oh-my-god-my-eyes appeal.

I got Jordana Hot & Spicy to try and get a dupe for Treasure. It's close, as it is also an orange shimmer in a pink base, but this base is more berry and the shimmer isn't as intense. I think it looks redder when being worn. Still nice. Just not as magical.

Scrangie did a review on Inferno a while ago that was pretty dead on. It's a really vibrant reddish/gold orange. Very pretty! I'll wear it properly someday and show the color better then.

Zoya Kaufda is another one I should really look into wearing... It's beautiful. Deep orange to bronze, very opaque. I think Zoya gave it a 5/5 opacity.

This Nfu.Oh was kind of a mistake. The picture on the site is very misleading. In reality it looks like rotting leaves with flakies instead of dark red with rainbow as they would have you believe... Once you get over that, it's pretty cool! Brown-orange with warm tone flakies. It got used in the first mani on this blog! :)

More Giveaways and a Slytherin Manicure

If you aren't interested in the giveaways, skim down for a simple Slytherin manicure. Otherwise, read on.

My goodness, there are giveaways happening all over the blogosphere! Here are a few more to be on the look for:

Lyra at Nail Junkie is having her first giveaway! She's compiled a huge amount of really fantastic looking polishes for one lucky winner. Check it out here, but hurry because this ends on Saturday, March 20!

Laura at Sawan is giving away all FIVE of the new Claire's Mood polishes! Aquajogger is wearing the green (earthy/happy) right now and it is really quite amazing! Three people will get to try all five, so hurry and sign up! This ends on March 28, and can be found here.

Jacie of You've Got Nail is having another giveaway! This one is for a Nailtrixx kit (like Konad) and an adorable ulta3 lacquer. This ends on March 29th. Find out more here.

Mari and Lissi of Nail Addicts Anonymous are having their first giveaway! The winner will receive nail polish from Essie, Orly, OPI and China Glaze! This giveaway ends on April the 9th, check it out here!

AllYouDesire is having a giveaway for having reached 500 followers! As a gift to her readers, she's put together a package of some of her favorites things, from nail polish to perfume. This ends on April 10th, so check it out here!

Trincess at Emerald Sparkled is having a neat giveaway. Since she's reached 200 followers, she's put together a bunch of fun polishes for her giveaway/contest. Find it here! This ends on March 27th.

As part of the giveaway she suggested recreating one of her manicures, and my St. Patrick's day one was getting a bit chippy and too lurid for me, so I thought I'd give it a shot. I didn't want to be scared off greens forever, so I tried Zoya's Veruschka. I've never worn a matte manicure before (I know, where WAS I last fall??) and I've been wanting to try Konad plate m28, but I never had a good reason to do either, until now. Envy might have been a better choice, but I wanted to explore my untrieds. Here is the original. :)

I love it. The color work well for me, I think it's a very wearable green. Application was a bit thick and tricky, but fine and very opaque once I got used to it. The snake on m28 was a little harder to capture, and its little tongue wouldn't come up at all, but it's still recognizable as a snake, so I love it. It wasn't anything complicated like a lot of the other manicures on Emerald Sparkled, but I think it's still pretty snazzy. :)

What do you think? How do you feel about snakey manicures?

Until next time!

The Little-Known Zoya Kaitlyn

Happy Girl's Day! Today I thought I would show you a rather rare (but not discontinued!) polish. I have never seen a swatch or reference to Zoya Kaitlyn. She just isn't very popular in the nail blogging world, it seems. Kaitlyn is an older Zoya, with no listed collection. Zoya ranks her as a sheer, with a 2/5 in opacity. They also list her as a cool-toned pink, but I think she's pretty neutral. Now, with my history of picking poor polishes, I like to see several swatches before I make my decisions. But Kaitlyn is my first name, spelling and all, so I was drawn to this polish. Because I take my pictures when I get home at night, they are all done under artificial light. The last one was taken with added flash.

Zoya Kaitlyn is a milky pink sheer. This is shown with four or five coats, because it was streaky the first time I wore it. However, I have swatched it since then with minimal difficulties, so I blame application at least partially. I believe this is designed to be a base for a french manicure, but I've never mastered those, so I wore it as is. The sheer color made my nails look very long, almost as if I were wearing artificial ones.

Because of the amount of coats I used to build up the color, I did not want to risk stamping with konad. My nails did look rather bare, though, so I decorated with some cherry blossoms from Konad's 3D stickers. I don't know if these have a number or not, but this particular sheet has pink and blue sakura on it. I used a yellow-out basecoat (the same that Aquajogger has already blogged about) that is notorious for chipping, and that plus the four+ coats is why I had to change my polish after only a couple days.

I never wear sheers because I have some staining lurking beneath all those layers of lacquer, but I quite enjoy Kaitlyn. It was certainly different for me, but I felt so chic. I'm sure I'll wear this again later in spring or even summer.

Until next time! <3

Pre-New Year Mani

Hello! I'm Aquajogger, the other blogger here with my first post, another set of Chinese New Year nails. I actually did these the week before New Year, so they're not as fancy but they were fun to look at anyway.

This was actually my third try. I had found a bottle of Island Girl Yellow Out that I had never used, so I decided to give it a try as a base coat--not doing that again. An hour or so later, all my polish had come off in big nail-sized pieces. I tried again with a regular base coat, but I guess I didn't wash off all the residue properly (or two coats of Nubar Sugar made it too thick) because the same thing happened again. I finally got pictures of the finished product the next day on my third go at it.

1) Island Girl "Nail Stregthener"

2) OPI Conquistadorable Color (two coats)

3) Nubar Sugar (one coat)

4) Jordana Black (stamping)

5) Zoya Armor

Konad Plate: m8

Hope to post later with our haul from shopping on the 14th! :)