Blog Award + Ooglay Fauxnad

            Man, I can't sleep. So I'm here to clog up the blogosphere with a post of random and nail-related things. First order of business is a blog award, because I actually won one (homophone shout out) thanks to Lacquer Ware for Tips and Toes! I don't want to be all mushy, so I'm just going to say that I really appreciate this award, and that it means alot to me. I'm also really grateful to anyone who takes out time to read my nonsense, because there are like a bajillion blogs out there, so nobody has to pay attention to mine. So thanks, people! ^_^

Very pretty, no? 

     The rules for this award says that first, I have to tag ten other bloggers for the award. I wish the number was higher...even though I'm still new-ish to blogging, there are so many blogs that I've come to love and stalk. The ladies of the nail blogosphere truly amaze me with their creativity and great personalities! Here are my picks, in no particular order:

Pinkginger's A Thing of Beauty

Susie's Home and Hobbies

Skulda's Claws

ANOTHER Bottle of Polish?!

Nailstah

Little Music Boxes

Nail Junkie

Nails Beautiqued

Nikki's Nails

Imperfectly Painted

A Black Woman's Guide to Surviving Any Money Crisis

 (Not a nail blog, but I enjoy reading it)

Yeah, I picked eleven. Say something. u_u


The rest of the rules are as follows:


Make a post about the award including the picture and mention the person who gave it to you.

Put the award on your blog.

Let your nominated 10 know you've awarded them by leaving a comment. 


Second order of business is to post some fauxnading that I did over Scherer Calypso. I wanted to remove it, but my sister wanted to go to IHOP (and what a disaster that turned out to be), so I just stamped over it to kind of...refresh it. Again...what a disaster that turned out to be. lol!

I used the Bundle Monster plate BM20, and stamped on the pattern using Color Club Where's the Soiree? Then I put one coat of Finger Paints Floatin' on a Cloud, and sealed the whole thing with one thick coat of Out the Door Top Coat.

Natural light, no flash. 

Natural light, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

   I think I would like this a whole lot better if I had just left off the glitter. I don't know what it is with me and glitter, but I just cannot leave it alone. If there's any possible way for me to use glitter, I will use it. Even when I'm about to take off a polish, I'll think to myself, "Maybe I should try some glitter." And then I'll put on the glitter, look at it for a while, and then remove the whole thing. Smh, I need help! The good news is that this mani did make me laugh all day. Whenever I looked at it, I'd think of RuPaul shouting "Extravagaaahhnzaahhh!!" and then start cracking up. Only Jesus knows why such an image would come to my mind, because my nails have nothing to do with RuPaul whatsoever. Just one example of why I worry about my brain circuitry sometimes. 

Scherer Calypso

           Good morning to everyone! I hope the Monday blues aren't hitting folks too hard. I'm personally feeling a little down about my nails, because they refuse to cooperate with my dreams. Can you believe that I broke another nail over the weekend? This time, it was thanks to my little cousin who swears that he's a stuntman. He was showing me his flying kick, and of course, he kicked the pinky nail right off my left hand. I picked the fool thing up off the floor and glued it back on, because I really love that nail and I wasn't going to give up on it. I'm so mad. Not at him, but at my nail. Man, this sucks. *roars*
        Now that I've got that out of my system, I can talk about what I really meant to talk about: Scherer Calypso, from the Chameleon line. 

Calypso is a frosty duochrome. Its main color is a silvery-lavender, but it shows green and blue as well. 

Also, I replaced my patch! It's not perfect, but it's better, so I can stop complaining about it.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

Natural light, no flash. This is a really unflattering angle, but I wanted to show the color change. 

Natural light, no flash.

      Calypso is such a beautiful duochrome. The color change is obvious and fun to watch, although I'm not too keen on the frosty finish. 
      Although Calypso is beautiful, applying it sucked! There was lots of cuticle drag, the polish felt too thick and it wasn't easy to spread, brush strokes were visible, and the bubbles were horrific. All my fingers looked like this:

     I tried to ignore it and go about my day, but no ma'am. I had to take that mess off...it was just too ooglay. When I reapplied it, I was ridiculously slow and meticulous, and that helped some, although I still have bubbles and some visible brush strokes. I'm not surprised though, because Blue Sky gave me some application issues as well. Additionally, wear is horrible. I've been wearing this application for two days now, and I'm already getting cracking and chipping. 
    Overall, I'd say that I'm pretty much torn about Calypso. I love duochromes, and colorwise, this polish is a real winner. But putting it on was just too hellish for me to honestly say that I like Calypso. So I guess I'll call it a draw, and say that I feel meh about this one. I won't be getting anymore Chameleon polishes because I can't do it with the application. But I will say that I sincerely hope that CQ or Scherer reworks the formula on them, because these polishes are really quite lovely. It's a shame that something like formula would be what sinks them.

Zoya Adina

            Adina (from the Reverie Collection) is another Zoya that I tried out today. lol, yes...at the moment, I have quite a bit of time on my hands. smh.

Adina is another strong duochrome. She's mostly silvery-lavender, but also has a strong green shimmer and flashes pink.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Shaded sunlight, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash. Behold the pink.

     With Adina, I had a funny time. Immediately after putting it on, I did not like it. I'm not sure why...I just didn't get that...angels singing type feeling. Blasphemy, I know. But I wore Adina as a full mani, and she eventually grew on me. I think I was expecting something a little darker and greyer, and was just taken aback by how pale a lavender this is. But once I acclimated to that, everything was gravy. The color scheme is lovely and the lavender, green, and pink work together nicely. Also, the colors combined with the shimmer makes Adina kind of dreamy...almost ethereal even. Adina does mean gentle and delicate, so once again...dead on, Zoya! I'd love to try it under one of the floral Bundle Monster plates.

   The formula on Adina was great. Smooth and easy. I used my Seche Ridge Filler again, and after two coats of that, Adina was opaque in three coats. 

   

And completely unrelated to nail polish, look at what my little sister made in ceramic class! At the beginning of the semester, she  said that she would make me a piggy, but somehow, she ended up with this cute, yet strange creature:

I have noo idea what this mouthless, noseless creature is. She says it's a monkey. I think it looks like a cross between a panda, a lemur, and the abominable snowman. Either way, I love it! lmao, it's so cute and indescribable. 

Zoya Ki

           Another sunny day, and another day of Zoya swatching. Today, I did Ki, from the Suede Collection. My pictures don't really capture her beauty, but hey...I tried. 

Bottle Ki. She really does look like a gasoline rainbow.

More pictures and whatnot after the jump!

Borghese Stellare Notte

           Today, I'm wearing Borghese Stellare Notte. I was going to try to wear my polishes from the Rock Star Collection consecutively, but I'm just going to put them aside and swatch them come summer break. Which is soon! But anyway, I was looking through my spreadsheet and I noticed that I only had one more Borghese to try before I was done with that brand. So I slapped it on.

Stellare Notte is a shimmery charcoal black duochrome. The shimmer flashes from pink to teal. This picture shows more of the pink. And it was taken indoors..the ones I took in the sunlight came out plain black. But more on that later.

Sunlight, no flash.

Shaded natural light, no flash. This shows a little bit of the teal.

Natural light, no flash.

Indoors, flash. This shows more of the teal.

This is what made me pick up this foolish polish in the first place. 

    Why do I call this polish foolish? Because it is! 

    Stellare Notte looks great in the bottle, but on the nail, it's not even trying to do much of anything. Granted, my pictures of this aren't very good, nor do they adequately convey what this polish does, but even in real life, it's just not very impressive. And I'm not sure why. I like the base color, and the color change on the shimmer is noticeable. When I lift my hand up at the wrist, I get teal. And when I lay it back down, I get pink. But I don't know....I'm just not very impressed by this. And for eight dollars, that's a shame. Scherer Blue Sky, Brucci Black Emerald, and Savina Black Pearl ($2.99, $2.79, and $2.50, respectively) all blow Stellare Notte out of zee waterz. I'm kind of bummed too, because this is a great day to take pictures...the sun is shining and there's not a cloud in the sky. I feel like I wasted it on this polish. smh!

  On the upside, the formula for Stellare Notte was good. It applied smoothly and easily, and dried in good time. These pictures are all three thin coats with one layer of Poshe on top. 

Earth Week Day 7: Scherer Chameleon Blue Sky

           LOL, this has been the longest week in history, but it's finally drawing to a close. Today, I'm wearing Blue Sky from Scherer Cosmetics' Chameleon line. I thought this one would be fitting because with some environmental stewardship, we can have blue skies all the time, instead of brown or yellow or black.

Blue Sky is a strong, frosty/metallic (honestly, I can't really tell the difference sometimes) duochrome. Its base color is a mid-range blue, and it shows lots of violet, green, and silver.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

Indoors, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

       Blue Sky is fabulous. My pictures don't really capture how nice this one is. Most of the time, my nails are violet, with green and blue hovering at the corners. But with a tilt of my hand, the whole nail goes green, or the violet is reduced to a sliver, with the nail showing primarily blue. Or the violet ends up at the edges, and the nail is mostly green. As you can imagine, this makes it terribly entertaining to watch my fingers type. And I don't know what it is about this polish, but damn son...it makes my nails look good! They look all long and sexy! 

    But every rose has its thorn, and Blue Sky is no exception to the rule. The application of this was tough, because of the awful cuticle drag. The only way to avoid it was to really load up the brush and to never try to go back and correct brushstrokes. It sucked. And I got some bubbles when it dried. However, the color is nicely pigmented. It would have been a two-coater, if I didn't have to apply another one to even out brushtrokes and dragged places. Also, dry time was great. I slapped on Poshe and ten minutes later, I was in bed. In the morning, my polish was pristine, except for the bubbles, so yay! 

   And even though the application was hellish, I'm still wearing this one again and I'm going to recommend it to people too. A duochrome of this strength for only $2.99 is nothing to trifled with. The Chameleon line are all duochromes and can be found exclusively in Rite Aids, although other polishes by this company can be found in Walmart too. 

  And the tip for today is simple, but may take some discipline: don't buy cosmetics from companies that test on animals. Admittedly, this doesn't really have anything to do with saving Earth as a whole. But animals are an important part of the world, and we have to look out for them. And covering them with potentially harmful chemicals is not looking out for them. I won't be buying any cosmetics that have been tested on animals, no matter how great the lemming. I also plan on going through my collection and purging any polishes that have been tested on animals, and I hope others will join me. If you find six or more, maybe you can do the Zoya Polish Swap thing. And if not, then maybe you can donate them to a women's shelter. Or return them to the store if you still have the receipt. I can understand why medication is tested on animals, because medication can save lives. But eyeshadow is just not that serious. 

This post on Nevertoomuchglitter features a great list of companies that are and are not cruelty-free. The list isn't exhaustive, but it's a great reference point. And FYI, CQ and Scherer Cosmetics (the makers of Blue Sky) are cruelty-free. I made sure to write in and ask. ^_^

And with that, Earth Week is officially OVAH!!  And I can finally wear some other colors...I'm embarrassed to say that I've been craving red. 

Earth Week Day 4: Brucci Black Emerald

           HAPPY EARTH DAY!! ^_______^   
           On this, the greatest of all April days, I'm unfortunately not wearing what I really wanted to wear, due to the fact that I'd only have to take it right off for tomorrow. Which would normally be fine, but I've been really anticipating this color, and I'd like to revel in it for a bit. But that's okay, I'll show it at the end of Earth Week. 
Anywho, I'm wearing Brucci Black Emerald, which isn't a very celebratory color, but it's pretty all the same. And there are lots of pictures today.....it's a celebration, you know. 

Black Emerald is a green to copper duochrome shimmer in a blackened green base. 

Bottle shot. Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash. 

Sunlight, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

Artificial light, flash.

Sunlight, no flash. Sorry for the jank index finger...during clean up, I was practically falling asleep.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash. 

Man, this color is complex and my pictures don't begin to cover it. Looking at my nails, I think of the floor of the rainforest. It's dark down there, and everything looks black, dark green and brown. But in some places, a shaft of sunlight will filter down and illuminate the undergrowth, making it bright green until the sun moves. This polish is so much like that. 
I feel like they should have named Black Emerald Envy instead. LOL, I know that every green polish in the world is named Envy, but honestly...what's one more? And the name would be perfect for this color. Black Emerald is actually the exact color that I visualize when I say envy...it's all dark n muddy...and somehow cancerous looking. Me gusta!


The formula was okay. A little streaky but opaque on the first two coats. By the third, it was smooth and even. Dry time was fine...I used Poshe and the Essie drying drops, and went to bed about 30 minutes later. There are no wrinkles or sheet marks today, so there you have it. When I bought this, I was looking at it funny, because I wasn't sure if I would like it, but I'm glad that I did. Brucci really outdid themselves on this one.


The tip for today is: Invest in a tote bag for your groceries!
Thanks to my semi-rant on Day 1, we all know the deal with plastic. They are Satan! And buying groceries is a great way to unleash Satan upon the Earth, doncha know. Think about it. If you buy a ton of groceries, and the clerk double bags them, you can end up with as many as 20 plastic bags going home with you. I know that most people save grocery bags to reuse them, but eventually, those bags do end up in a landfill or in the ocean somewhere. It's best for them to not even leave the store. Plus, there are some stores (CVS is one, and I think Whole Foods is another) that offer discounts and reward programs for using canvas bags instead of plastic ones.
And if you regularly buy large amounts of groceries, then just get a few tote bags and one of those folding metal carts to carry them in. Problem solved!


Have a great Earth Day!! (And don't forget to hug a tree!)