Don't Mind Me.....Just Gonna Mosey on in Back Here

Oh hai there.
It's mee Chaosbutterfly, back from my exciting and completely unannounced tumble off the face of the Earth. While I'm sorry that I didn't give a proper explanation (or any explanation at all really) before my swan dive, I definitely needed the time away from blogging and nail polish to sort out my life. Life has changed so much in the past year...I got my first post-college job, moved to DC, was forced to leave my polish babies behind in NYC, found a place to live, started financially supporting myself, discovered that one of my roommates was handcrafted by Satan to destroy my spirit and that my apartment was cursed, lost 60 pounds (and counting), discovered how difficult it is to make friends as an adult, got really into makeup again, quit relaxing my hair, and am currently in the midst of my third house-hunt and move in the past year.

It has been absolutely exhausting in every way possible and I haven't had any time or energy or money to devote to nail polish. Actually, I still don't. And with a portion of my job being packing, shipping and logistics, my nails are going to be too shitty to photograph most days anyway. But I miss the therapy of painting them, I miss having beautiful nails that I could be proud of, and I miss the nail blogging community, so I figured I'd take another swing at this.

So I guess I'm back. Definitely sporadically at first, because I am moving and that's never a good time for nails. But hopefully, I can be back to a more regular posting schedule before too long.
I'm looking forward to reconnecting with my beautiful phalanges friends and getting myself up to speed on what has happened in the nail world over the past year!

And just so this isn't a word post, here are some nail polish swatches that I found in the vault today.
These are of Studio M Fast Play, which is a nice little opalescent glittery topcoat.

I don't remember much about this polish; I took these a million years ago, but I do know that I liked it.

Thanks for reading (if anyone still is lol), and have a great weekend!

Graduation Nails! (Zoya Phoebe + Jordana Funky Gold Town)

Hey guys!
Firstly, sorry about disappearing again. The past two weeks have been taking care of last minute things, prepping for graduation, and going to senior stuff, and it was way busier than I could have imagined. Don't worry though...school is over for real for real and I'm not employed (working on it though), so I will probably be a much better blogger for the forseeable future lol.


But anyway, Saturday and Sunday were my graduation dates (yes, I had two graduations lol), and of course, I had to wear something festive on my nails to celebrate. Since my school colors were buff and blue and time was short, this is what I ended up with:

I started with two coats of Zoya Phoebe, and then applied one layer of Jordana Funky Gold Town on top.

Then I applied a layer of BYS's Matte Topcoat to finish it off.  Super easy and quick. :D 

Sunlight, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

      Even though it wasn't what I originally wanted, I really liked how this came out. The glitter looked pretty against Phoebe's shade of blue, and I appreciated how easy Funky Gold Town was to put on. With chunky glitter, there tends to be placement issues, but in this case, I swiped on the polish and the glitter went exactly where it was supposed to, which was nice. However, I need to go to one of these meetings where they decide the names for polishes. Funky Gold Town? Clearly, everyone there was drunk.  

And unrelated, but I think I'm gonna go back to square nails. The pointed ones were fun, but I've been scratching the hell out of everyone (never myself though oddly enough), and soon, nobody will want to be my friend anymore. Plus, I think they look prettier on my hands. So back to squares I go. 

But that's all from me today! 

Thanks for reading, and have a happy hump day!! 

Wet n Wild Back Alley Deals

    Hey guys! So first off, I'm really excited because The Phalanges Files has broken 600 followers!! That's so crazy to me, and I'd like to thank all of you for hanging out with me and reading my senseless rambles. I was going to have a giveaway anyway, but maybe I'll make it a little bigger to celebrate lol. 

Finals are fully upon me, so today's post is a little blast from the past from the backlog.  This is Back Alley Deals, from Wet n Wild's Ice Ice Baby Collection. 

Back Alley Deals is made up of lots of small amethyst glitter, with larger bits of fuchsia hex glitter thrown in. 

Sorry for the bubbles, btw. 

Sunlight, no flash.

Ottlite, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

       Although I don't think I like the name very much, Back Alley Deals is beautiful! The purple glitter is so luxe-looking and blingtastic, and the little bits of fuchsia add some nice interest. I also liked how delicate and feminine my nails looked with Back Alley Deals on, since sometimes, glitter can make your nails look clunky and weird. My only critique of this polish would be that I wish the fuchsia glitter offered more contrast against the base and I wish the polish came in the standard .5 oz. size, but overalll, I'm really happy with Back Alley Deals. 

     Back Alley Deal's formula was okay. The coverage wasn't awesome (I needed four coats for the opacity in the pictures) but the polish went on smoothly and dried quickly. It also needed lots of topcoat to be smooth and shiny. In the future, I'll probably layer it to conserve polish and time. 

But that's all from me today!! 

I hope everyone is having an awesome weekend, and thanks for stopping by! 

Happy (Extra Belated) Earth Day! + Maui's Dolphins

Hey guys! Sooo almost one absolutely miserable week later, I finally have the last post for Earth Week for ya'll. 
This time, it's Maui's Dolphins:

I love their nubbly little fins and chubby bodies.

    Maui's Dolphins are a tiny group of dolphins endemic to the North Island of New Zealand. They're a sub-species of another Kiwi species of dolphin, Hector's Dolphin. Like most dolphins, these guys are a really social and clever species and can be observed playing and chatting with each other as they go about their business. They're also really cute, unless you're one of those people who are terrified of dolphins. But anyway, a combination of the Maui's Dolphin's tiny living space and reproductive cycle, which includes waiting like 9 years to have kids and then only having one baby every 2 - 4 years means that its numbers have traditionally always been on the low side, compared to most dolphin species, but they've been steady. But lately, their numbers have been declining at a crazy fast rate with there only being 55 of them left the last time anyone checked. 55! In the whole world. The reason is that fishermen will use nets to catch other fish and will end up catching the dolphins instead. Dolphins caught in a fishnet can't get to the surface to breath, so they drown to death, which is a terrible way to go for anyone, but even more sad for marine mammals like Maui's Dolphins. Of course, an easy way to stop these guys from going extinct is to make stricter rules about or outright ban the use of nets in the dolphins' habitats, but nobody wants to do it. Why are people so mean and selfish to the animals? ;___;

For their vaguely greyish-blackish coloring (which up-close is apparently quite beautiful), I decided to wear Sephora by OPI If You Got It, Haunt It, from their Halloween 2010 Collection. 

If You Got It, Haunt It is a bunch of tiny black and silver glitter in a black jelly base, with larger pieces of blue-green opalescent hex glitter mixed in. It's pretty interesting. 

Sunlight, no flash.

Ottlite, no flash.

Ottlite, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

      If You Got It, Haunt It is quite pretty...it looks a lot better in person lol. Sometimes, black-grey glitter comes out kind of dull or bleh-looking even with topcoat, but I find that's not the case with this. It's not super-sparkly or anything, like Milani Silver Dazzle, but it sparkles just enough to get a hint of the glassphalt look. The opal hex glitter is also a nice touch. It's kind of subtle and doesn't come across too well in the pics, but in real life, I can look down at my nails and get little glints of other colors amongst the black, which I love. 

    Formula-wise, I didn't have any trouble with If You Got It, Haunt It. It was opaque in three coats, went on easily, and dried quickly. Cleanup was also a snap because it was pretty easy to control, and I actually found that it wasn't as gunky as some other glitter polishes. So yep, I am a happy camper. 

And that is the end of Earth (Semi)Week! 

Sorry for missing so many days, but I will try to post some pretty things this week to make up for it lol. And I'll be posting a giveaway soon, so keep your eyes peeled for that!

Thanks for reading, and have an awesome night!

Earth Week 2012 + Polar Bears!

      Hi guys! So Earth Day is exactly one week away, on April 22, which means that it's time for Earth Week around here. Last year, I did a week of nail colors based on endangered species and people seemed to like it okay (plus it was fun to do) so I thought it would be good to have that as the theme again. I can't promise a post every single day, with the way my life is going nowadays, but I'll do my best lol. 


The first animal we're gonna look at is one that everyone is probably very familiar with, the polar bear!

      Polar bears are really great animals. They live in the Arctic Circle and spend most of their time strolling across sea ice and swimming in the ocean. They eat mostly seals, although they will eat other kinds of meat if they can't find what they normally like. They're also very smart and surprisingly gentle, unless they are hungry or someone is bothering them, which is when they can get angry and vicious. And since they are huge and powerful creatures, the last thing anything wants to deal with is an angry polar bear. Unfortunately, these guys have alot to be angry about. The ice that they depend on for pretty much everything is quickly becoming a thing of the past thanks to climate change, as as a result, polar bears are starving to death or are having trouble caring for their young properly. Of course, this means fewer polar bears in the future, so if we don't want to lose these guys forevah, we have to take better care of the Earth so it won't be so damn hot anymore. 

I don't think my nails came out quite as cute as I intended, but here they are:

   To do this, I started with two layers of Color Club Pretty in Platinum, and then applied a layer of Studio M Fast Play on top. When that dried, I used Color Club Where's the Soiree and a dotting tool to draw the bear faces. Then I put topcoat on, and that was it. 

 In retrospect, maybe I should have left the faces off? Or made the lines finer? Or put on ears? Something. 

Oh well though..what's done is done and that's my polar bear look. 

To wash the sight of my nails from your eyes (even though what has been seen cannot be unseen), here are some gratuitous shots of adorable polar bears doing adorable polar bear things:

I love this. 

And that's all from me today!! 

Thanks for reading, and have an awesome Sunday! 

China Glaze Electrify

   Hi guys! For today, I have the second (and last) polish that I got from China Glaze's Colors from the Capitol collection, Electrify.

Electrify is a bunch of small, bright gold and slightly larger red hex glitter in a clear base. There's alot of red, but more gold. 

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Ottlite, no flash.

Ottlite, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

        Electrify was named for District 5 (which is in charge of giving electricity to all of Panem) and happens to be my absolute favorite polish from the collection. At the most superficial level, I love this because it's ridiculously sparkly and fun, and ya'll know how I feel about GLITTAH. But I also like that you can see how the district fits in with the polish, and I can also see some other Hunger Games stuff in there too, like the girl on fire costume and even the cornucopia. My only sadness is that more of the collection didn't come out like this, but I guess my wallet is relieved about that. But bottom line, Electrify is magic. Get you some. 

    Formula-wise, Electrify was good. I used three coats for the pictures and was really happy with the coverage. However, Electrify does dry gritty and dull, so to get the most out of it, I needed two layers of topcoat: one thick layer of Gelous and another thick layer of Poshe on top. It was hellish to remove, but at least everything dried lightning quick and was absolutely gorgeouss. 

But that's all from me today!

Thanks for reading guys, and have an awesome Thursday!! ^_^