OPI BRAZIL COLLECTION + ON-NAIL SWATCHES PT. 2

I kept to my word! You guys! I only bought five OVERALL polishes from the OPI Brazil collection. Contrary to what I said in my last post, I did end up exchanging 'Toucan Do It If You Try' for one of the polishes in this post so I came out with four total. I may have to grab one more 'Don't Bossa Nova Me Around' though because I can already tell it's going to be a staple of mine.

Let's move onto the new guys, though!

(From L to R: Kiss Me I'm Brazilian, Live.Love.Carnival)

Now I do apologize for the photos in this post. I tried my darndest to get the colors to be as true as possible but just could not get it!

First of the two is Kiss Me I'm Brazilian. You may think you've seen a true bubblegum pink but until you wear this polish on your nails ladies YOU HAVE NOT LIVED! It's coming off much warmer and less bright in-photo so just trust me on this (or google it if you'd like) you need this polish. I have so many pinks but this is not like any of the ones I own. Pink is an easy-to-wear shade just like red but unlike reds, no two pinks are the same. and this pink? The queen. You need it. So girly and SO fun! Two coats and you're golden.

Live.Love.Carnival is one of those pastel-but-still-bright polishes. In the photo it looks like a reddish orange but it's really a sort of bright pastel coral that leans more pink than orange. If you look back to my first OPI Brazil post, it's the pinker cousin to Toucan Do It If You Try. As with all of the formulas in this collection it was opaque in two coats!

I have nothing but rave reviews for the polishes that I tested out/own from this new collection from OPI and it's refreshing to have some new creme finishes in my collection to play with! These will be on my nails alllll Spring and Summer long. Of these two, which do you think you would rather have?

This was sort of a short post and I'm sorry for that! I'll be back with something new next week :)

OPI BRAZIL COLLECTION + ON-NAIL SWATCHES PT. 1

YAY!!! OPI!!!! COLLECTION!!! AN OPI COLLECTION!!! A NORMAL ONE!!!!!!!

Okay. Excitement over. OPI has finally come out with another "normal" collection that doesn't focus on a trendy texture polish. I have always been and will always be a creme polish gal and when I see a collection that's mainly that I can't help but buy as many as I can get my paws on.

Buying all of those polishes does not happen all at once, though.. I am a college student after all. I'm planning to have five overall and I split those into three and two. So here is the first three of the collection!

Wow. All of this excitement and I haven't even mentioned the name of the collection. This is the OPI Brazil collection for Spring/Summer 2014. Although it just snowed fifteen inches outside of my window, my nails are still going to be getting ready for the warmer days that are ahead.

Here are the first three polishes that I bought:

(From L to R: Don't Bossa Nova Me Around, I Just Can't Cope-acabana, Toucan Do It If You Try)

I try very hard when purchasing new polishes to stray as far away from 'typical' shades because you can find a solid red or pink and rock that for the rest of your life! A good yellow? Now THAT'S hard to find. Trust me. Yellow is a very difficult shade to pull off but I'll just say right now that this yellow is definitely a winner. The entire collection has a good chunk of warm coral-y colors and a couple taupes but these two were my favorite options of them all.

Don't Bossa Nova Me Around

Possibly one of my favorite polishes that I now own is this one. 'Don't Bossa Nova Me Around'. Think Barry M's 'Lychee' with more taupe. Think American Apparel's 'Mouse' with more sand. It's the perfect nude for us pale girls! It's a nice cool taupe-nude that is slightly pink edged and is just.. beautiful. What surprised me the most is that I would have been able to get away with just one coat of this but since it was the last polish that I applied because I plan on wearing it for a couple more days, I wanted to be certain and went with my usual two coats. But wow. OPACITY ALERT!

Toucan Do It If You Try

Toucan Do It If You Try was the one of the trio that I really thought I was going to swatch and post about but then go back to Ulta and exchange it for the other coralish shade, Live.Love.Carnival because I didn't think it was going to be AS orange as it actually is. However, that changed once I applied it! Although this one would definitely turn out better on naturally tanned skin, I do think it was a flattering orange-red color. I'm imagining a perfect ombre mani with this, Live.Love.Carnival, Where Did Suzi's Man-go (not pictured), Red Hot Rio (not pictured) and the next polish in this post, I Just Can't Cope-acabana. Two coats were good as gold!

I Just Can't Cope-acabana

Wooo hooooo!! The nail world is loving on this guy. I Just Can't Cope-acabana has opened new doors for us funky polish color lovers with a wearable and non-streaky yellow. I previously have not owned a yellow polish since I was in the eighth grade and I bought a really really bad Taxi Cab Yellow by NYC. It didn't look good on me. But take that same vibrant yellow and give it an OPI twist and you've got an absolute winner. It was uneven after one coat but adding one more made it look perfect. I am in love!!

—
Adding this in a few days after the original post.. here are the next two colors that I purchased!

(From L to R: Kiss Me I'm Brazilian and Live.Love.Carnival

Kiss Me I'm Brazilian 

Live.Love.Carnival

To read about the last two colors, check out my post on them here.

I am very excited to get more polishes from this collection and even though I say five altogether.. I can definitely seeing myself hitting seven. It's a great collection full of cremes and even a funky duochrome! I highly recommend checking it out on Peachy Polish to see all of the shades in the collection and to get a liiiiittle more info from more of a professional on the topic. I'll be back as soon as I can be with my new additions to the family!

AMERICAN APPAREL 'MOUSE' + OPI 'CROWN ME ALREADY!'

Ah, glitter polishes. Everybody's love/hate. My particular polish that leans more toward hate than love is OPI's 'Crown Me Already!' from their Miss America collection. It's a rockin' silver mix of fine glitters, small glitters and medium hexagonal glitters. What stinks is that after two coats of it on your nails it becomes a solid sheet of glitter and is extremely prone to chipping within hours.

With this post comes a new understanding of the application of this polish, though. I have conquered it! When layered over American Apparel's 'Mouse' polish(two coats overall not including top/base coats), it becomes an uber-cool and demure sparkle that actually.. yep.. LASTS! I've had it on for four days and not a single chip thus far. and to be quite honest, I prefer it with the taupe base over solid silver anyway! It adds more depth.

After five days of wear it began wearing away on the tips and I started chipping it away but that's still a good enough life for me! I'm glad I was able to resurrect one of my polishes in a way because I almost never use Crown Me Already! since it was so prone to quick chipping! Yay!

ESSIE 'LAPIS OF LUXURY' W/ OPI 'LAST FRIDAY NIGHT'

Hi there! Long time no talk.. sorry! I've been moving into my apartment at school and the first day of classes was today so I'm officially in the school grind. Now I can make a schedule and keep posting regular for y'all. Today I've got a nail post starring Essie's 'Lapis of Luxury' and OPI's 'Last Friday Night'.

OPI's 'Last Friday Night' is from my beloved Katy Perry's collection a couple of years ago and is a blue-based jelly with iridescent mini and small circle glitters within it. 'Lapis of Luxury' is a darker periwinkle cream.

Above is two coats of Essie's LOL with one layer of OPI's Nail Envy as a base and no top coat.

and the photo above here is just with an added coat of OPI's LFN and again with no top coat.

I've never made this combo before but I don't know why not! It's really beautiful and I love iridescent glitter polishes because it makes your nails sparkle in the sun more than a regular gritty glitter polish.

This mani brings back my memories of that Katy Perry OPI collection and now I'm sad because that collection was just so, so perfect. So many staple polishes were introduced in it! Hope you guys enjoyed and I'll be back as soon as I can with some more content :)

OPI LIQUID SAND 'JINX'

Liquid sand has returned!~

After a fatal initial try with OPI's newest texturized nail polish, Liquid Sand, I was sworn away for good. or so I thought. The first one that I got was from the Mariah Carey collection and that was the first line of liquid sands that OPI had done. I guess they have learned since then because this polish is the exact opposite of that first one! This shade is called Jinx and is from the all-liquid-sand James Bond collection. It's a warm red jelly base with golden flecks in it. I'm a sucker for anything with golden glitter in it and I tried my absolute hardest to walk away from this polish but it was just too beautiful to pass up.

The above photo is two coats of the polish on top of one coat of OPI's Nail Envy with no top coat. I never expected a top coat would look nice with this polish...

This image courtesy of Scrangie!

...UNTIL I SAW THIS PHOTO COURTESY OF SCRANGIE.

So the bottom line is that this polish is absolutely breathtaking both with and without a top coat. It looks like it's truly made for the liquid sand finish! As with my first bottle, I do have issues with it chipping but what's cool about it is that although a little piece might chip off the top of your nail, you can barely tell. It's almost as if the texture chips but the color stays a little bit.

In the sunlight is when Jinx truly stands out and to capture the beauty of it, I recorded some of the glitz and glitter for you all! Here it is:

The second bottom line is that I'm really just in adoration. This is a great polish and I'm glad that the formulation of the Liquid Sand texture is much better than my first one! This gives me hope to try more in the future.

Do you all have a favorite Liquid Sand polish that you think I should try next?

OPI NAIL ENVY

Hello my ladies! Today's post is about a new nail product I've been testing out for a little bit. That product is OPI's Nail Envy. Originally thought to only be available for $16 (!!!!) but later found for $7 on Amazon, this guy has a lot of talk about him. I have seen nail bloggers swear by this product. Below I will discuss how I feel about it!

I have been wanting this for so long because my pointer and middle fingernails chip and peel incessantly and I'm tired of my manis only lasting a few days! I figured this was my cure-all and was really excited to try it out! I'm a few manis in, however, and I'm not seeing much of a difference.

I wanted to post a photo of my nails' thicknesses before and after application but I simply couldn't manage getting a picture that clear of such a thin area. I'm about three manis in and although there is much less chipping and a bit less peeling, I haven't experienced what I feel like everybody else did. When I saw photos online, there were such vast differences in both the thickness of the ladies' nails and the shape of the nail itself. It seemed almost as if it strengthen the nail so much that it made the nail curve more around the nail, making it less flat and brittle.

EDIT: That being said, after months of testing both this product and other base coats I have concluded that this is definitely my favorite. I was expecting this product to change my nail curvature which it definitely does not do. What it does do, however, is extend the wear time of my manicures on my more brittle nails up to three or four days in some cases. My initial disappointment has been overshadowed by the constant strengthening that Nail Envy does over time. No more chipped pointer fingers!

If I were to rate this, I would give it an 8.5/10. Best base coat I have personally tried out!

OPI 'DATING A ROYAL'

Old polish, new post! 'Dating A Royal' is a medium-deep blue creme. After one coat it's very sheer and uneven, two coats clears everything up. It will always remind of the Dutchess of Cambridge.. or also known as our very own Princess Kate because of that blue engagement ring and dress that she wore in her and William's official portraits. So pretty. So royal!

This used to be a go-to color for me but has just seemed to find itself in the bottom of my collection for years. The main reason for that is most likely because after a few days, the blue seemed to turn purple.. sounds cooler than it actually is. I'm not sure if it's just something that happens to me but the middle sort of turns this purple/magenta color and although it's nothing major, it's annoying that the color doesn't stay true since the initial color is so beautiful!

Not sure if this is even available in stores any longer but as always, you can find it on various websites online as well as beauty supply retailers.

HOW I PAINT MY NAILS + OPI SUZI'S HUNGARY... AGAIN! W/ NARS ARABESQUE

A lot of people have been asking me to film a video on me painting my nails so I decided to do it this weekend! Nails were the first thing I dabbed into in the beauty world so I feel like a pro.. totally not but I still feel like it. I know I already posted about the Euro Centrale OPI collection, but I didn't have on-hand swatches of each color specifically! So here's Suzi's Hungary... Again! with NARS Arabesque on the accent nail. Video to follow with photos below!

Enjoy!

 

and here's a couple of photos of the nail look:

OPI 'Suzi's Hungary... Again!'

NARS 'Arabesque'

OPI MERMAID TEARS

'Mermaid Tears' is a color that came out as a part of the Pirates of the Caribbean collection. It's a seafoam teal creme that is good to go in only two coats. In direct sunlight it can appear as just a green, but there are definitely gray and blue tones within it, making it a color that reminds me of the ocean. It applied extremely easily and is a great spring color, without being a pastel!

I still sometimes see this in stores, but I wouldn't count on it. It's going on Amazon for about $18, so it's not too bad! I have heard that dupes for it are Zoya 'Bevin' and Sinful Colors 'Open Seas', although I have not tried them personally! So purchase with caution!

Totally matches my wall color!

direct sunlight

I never owned any other colors from this collection, did you? I'd love to see them!

OPI EURO CENTRALE COLLECTION + SWATCHES

I was so beyond stoked for this collection because not only were all of the colors really great and wearable, but there were a ton of them! I only picked up four on this go around but I know that over the coming weeks I will definitely be picking up at least two or three more.

I got the colors 'You're Such A Budapest', 'Can't Find My Czechbook', 'My Vampire is Buff' and 'Suzi's Hungary... Again!'. All were opaque in just two coats and are pictured without a top coat.

From L to R: 'You're Such A Budapest', 'Can't Find My Czechbook', 'My Vampire is Buff' and 'Suzi's Hungary... Again!'

You're Such A Budapest is a pale blue-lilac creme, absolutely perfect for Spring. Essie's 'Splash of Grenadine' is pinker while OPI's 'Do You Lilac It?' is a bit dustier and darker.

Can't Find My Czechbook was a tricky one for me. I thought for sure it was going to be a dupe for my all-time favorite OPI polish 'What's with the Cattitude?' but it's actually quite different! It pulls a little greener and dustier and it definitely darker on the nail than in the bottle.

My Vampire is Buff is such a refreshing shade in my collection because it's a pale neutral that 1. isn't sheer like allllll natural/neutral polishes and 2. it's a bit yellowy! I would call it just a very pale yellow creme. This was the streakiest of the three but don't let that fool you, it is still great with two thin coats. I had no problems with it, just note that it's the streakiest of these four!

Suzi's Hungary... Again! is a slightly coraly pink and really.. that's the reason I bought it. I'm not a huge pink or red polish girl but coral anything will have me hooked. Much prettier in the sun than indoors and in shading.

directly in front of window with very overcast sky

indoor lighting 

in shading

Overall, very impressed with this quad of polishes. I can't wait to wear these this spring and I really can't wait to get more of this collection!!

Do any of y'all own some of these polishes? Which ones?

OPI PINK FRIDAY

Oh man. This is bringing back memories of the Nicki Minaj for OPI collection. That one was my favorite, even over the Katy Perry one! I own three colors from it including 'Pink Friday', obviously. It's hard to describe this color, but my best guess would be a muted bubblegum pink. It's not bright, it's quite understated and a bit foggy. That's why I love it so much! It used to remind me of OPI's 'Mod About You', but then realized it had way more pink in it than that color. In direct sunlight, it slightly resembles it though.

As with most of my colors, it's a creme. Took me three coats for the pictures, but if you wait longer than I did between coats (so.. longer than 20 seconds haha), then I'm certain you can do two and be 100% opaque.

direct sunlight

Have a great day everybody! :)

OPI WHAT'S WITH THE CATTITUDE?

I can barely even contain my excitement for this polish post... you know why? THIS color is my all-time favorite nail polish color. It was released with the Shrek collection in 2010 and since then has been the most coveted color in that collection. It's selling on Amazon for $50! Fifty dollars! I haven't even worn it in over a year because I didn't want to use up the little amount that I already had... check the picture below to see that but then I made a post on my tumblr about it and I think one amazing gal is going to send me hers! I COULD CRY! I am so in love with this polish and I'm not even sure why..

It could be because it's just the perfect creme polish. Ever. It has no shimmer, it's just a true creme. The blue is light but not pastel and definitely not chalky. Although it is a bit streaky in the first coat or two, top coat fixes everything. I had three coats in these pictures just to be safe! The polish job on this one isn't the best because the polish has gotten really thick and it was a hassle trying to get it out of the bottle since there's so little! I just know that every time I wear this nail polish, I get instantly happy and feel so good.

If you have this on hand, try it out again! You never know if you can fall in love with an older purchase. If you don't have it and want it, best of luck to you! I know that it's been on eBay for the past few months for around $30!

in direct sunlight

What's your favorite nail polish color?! Tell me in the comments below!

OPI DO YOU LILAC IT?

As I've previously mentioned, I feel like I own the entire line of OPI nail polishes so I'm just going to start posting all of them on here for you guys! I'll begin an 'opi' tag so it's easily searchable, too :)

First up is Do You Lilac It? which is a light purple creme that is opaque after two coats. A little streaky after one, but perfect with another on top. It's a little blue-toned but can go with any skin tone. It's just an absolutely perfect nail polish color! I do 'Lilac It'........ heh.

direct sunlight

Stay tuned for some more colors!