Watercolor Nails

So, totally inspired by Sarah of Chalkboard Nails, I decided to try my hand at watercolor nails. Hers looked amazing! I had enough similar colors, so last night I decided to give it a whirl.
I had just pulled out OPI's Skull & Glossbones, I had thought about trying a sponge with it - but when I read she used that as a base, I thought it was perfect.
In addition to that, for the dots of color, I used Color Club Raspberry Rush, Maybelline Express Finish Sunshine, Sinful Colors Fly Away, Envy, and Amethyst. I would like to try this again with other colors, it was fun! I think my pinkie and ring turned out a tiny bit muddy but overall I'm really happy with it.

So, what do you guys think? They're pretty easy, if you just follow Sarah's instructions - I'd like to see it if anyone else does these!

Top Picks For 2011, Part Three

I could pick SO many more than the ones I'm showing you, but this has been fun taking a stroll down photo-memory lane!

OPI Glacier Bay Blues. The second one to make it into my top picks not released this year, but acquired this year! How can I resist adding this one in - it's a stunner.

China Glaze Skyscraper. Again, from their fall collection - I really really loved that collection, so many great colors to choose from!

Color Club Alter Ego. Yum, I just love the complexity of this!

Orly Fowl Play. Boy, did this cause a stir among the lacquerheads of the world or what! For good reason - this is a purple flakie stunner and a dupe to the much beloved and discontinued OPI Merry Midnight.

Last for today and most certainly not least, China Glaze It's Alive from the Halloween collection. Gosh, they really do the best Halloween collections. I can't wait to see next year's!

Just two more days left of great polishes from 2011!

Top Picks For 2011, Part Two

On to part two! It's been a heck of a time narrowing these down - there were some great polishes released this year.

From Finger Paints fall, Cordur-Orange. YUM. This is an awesome polish.

Zoya Yara. Seriously, one of the best years for greens, especially in the fall. Yara is divine, and I really loved the Smoke & Mirrors collection.

You didn't think I would skip China Glaze, did you? This is Midtown Magic from the fall collection. Shown off in bright sunlight, to see how freaking amazing it is.

Color Club Ulterior Motive. Holy bats, is this hot or what? This was a great collection.

China Glaze Trendsetter. The ultimate uglyawesome polish. Seriously this is one of the most perfect greens ever, and then it's got the China Glaze glass fleck too? *swoon*

Moving right along! Part three goes up tomorrow.

Happy Christmas Eve!

I hope you guys are having a wonderful holiday, wherever you are! We are getting ready for our Christmas Eve celebrations, lots of baking and cooking going on today - my Daddy is going to finally teach me how to make his famous spaghetti, which we have on Christmas as a break to all the turkey we eat during the holidays. Mom's already made her pumpkin bread, I've made the snickerdoodles, hubby and my daughter are making sugar cookies too! Nomnomnom. Tony has also made his famous sausage balls - I swear I could turn INTO a sausage ball, I love those things. We'll be opening presents tonight, following my dad's Christmas traditions from his family. What are your holiday traditions?
Today I'm wearing a festive combo - I've got a beautiful pine green jelly from my friend Tuli in Israel, it's Jade Emerald. I love it so much! I used Color Club Art of Seduction as an accent nail - I just love that glitter set so much, and the red and green from it are so festive. Lots to do so I'll leave you with the photos - I used three coats of each polish and I've a full on sunlight shot for a little bling!

I got bubbles on my pinkie finger! Oopsie, I'm sure that was from rushing around. I could have put some flakies on the green jelly and made it even more festive. Have a wonderful evening!

Color Club New Bohemian

New Bohemian is another shade from the Back To Boho collection from Color Club's fall release. Actually, I think this might be my favorite collection of all the fall collections - I want all but two of these! I've always felt that Color Club is underrated. They make wonderful shades, and though there are a bunch of neutrals in this - they make some really nice neutrals.
So, New Bohemian. This has been compared to China Glaze For Audrey, but that is quite a bit more blue - this is much more strongly green than For Audrey. They're both awesome aqua shades, though. I think this might be a tad more dusty than my photos show, but this is surprisingly color accurate. I thought I would have a hard time capturing this, and although it looks different depending on what lighting I was in, I did manage to find some that were almost perfect!
Let's talk about formula - Color Club usually has some great formulas on their polishes, and this is no exception. I used two coats for complete opacity, and it has a high shine. I like their brushes and of course, the square bottle is perfect.

I just love shades like this - I'll probably always find these irresistible.

Color Club Red-ical Gypsy

You know what? I didn't have a single berry red in my collection until I got Color Club Red-ical Gypsy. I actually love berry shades - I don't really like reds, because I don't think they look very flattering on me, generally speaking, but berries seem to go well against my skin tone.
This is a nice one - it's a jelly creme, with great opacity. I used two coats, but it maintains the high gloss and squishy feel of a jelly. It's not unique, I'm sure - but Color Club does great with these kinds of staple shades, and this is no exception. The application was so nice, also.

Just such a pretty shade. This is of course from the fall Back to Boho collection.

China Glaze Near Dark

This polish will not appeal to everyone. But those of you that love the dark, sexy polishes like I do? You'll LOVE this. Near Dark is one of this year's Halloween polishes from China Glaze, and it's a deep, dark murky swampy green. It's got a tinge of yellow to it, which is perfect for a Halloween shade, right? I only needed two coats for the level of opacity you'll see in my pictures. Super shiny and easy to control, too.
Okay, so I really wanted to show you what the base color of this looks like. The first picture is only one coat, so ignore the streaky and uneven look.

This photo is what it looks like in normal lighting.

This is in bright sunshine, you can really see the green here.

And because I can't ever resist a little layering, I decided to play up this sexy polish with a layer of Color Club Covered In Diamonds, which was recently gifted to me from Amanda of Nail Polish Enthusiast! Thanks girlie, I love it.

So, what's your stance on those deep dark sexy polishes? I've still got Crimson to show you from this collection, that will be tomorrow night's feature!

Focus On Black: Color Club With Abandon

You may remember that I compared this lovely fall polish to China Glaze's Midtown Magic. It is a tad different, and so therefore in my mind I can justify owning both. Now I'm going to feature it full on its own!
With Abandon is a black based jelly (blah blah blah) that has gold and brownish-red micro flakies that almost spark pink in the sunlight. Awesome! The third shot is in direct sunlight, and check out that macro!

This just screams fall to me - of course, it came out in a fall collection, so I guess that's what Color Club was going for eh? Haha.

Color Club Alter Ego

I filed my nails down a bit! They were getting a tad overwhelming for me. The photos of Alter Ego were taken right afterwards, so at this point I was like ahhhh.
Well, this is another stunner from Color Club. I guess this could almost be considered a foil? Metallic shimmer in both darker and lighter purple, shot with gold and something else that I can't quite put my finger on. Instant favorite, this. Someone mentioned to me on twitter that this is what they wanted Opulent Cloud to be, and I can see that! This is just a tad thin, so I used three coats, but it dried so quickly it was no trouble.

A bottle shot and a macro both here, to hopefully give you an idea of everything that is going on in terms of color with this polish. I want one of these in EVERY SHADE IMAGINABLE, Color Club. Please?

Focus On Duochrome: Color Club Wild And Willing

Oh, Color Club, you slayed me with the Wild At Heart collection. From fall of 2009, this is still one of my favorite fall collections ever.
Wild And Willing is ... amazeballs. Seriously, if you don't have this and you love duo/multichromes, you need this. Get it. Stat. It's a shimmer and it flashes gold, pink, orange and sometimes green. Seriously, it screams fall and you will be mesmerized by what you see on your fingers. I think I took almost a hundred photos of this and captured the gold and orange really well, you can see a bit of the pink flash in there as well - but that green just hid from the camera. Again, like a broken record, click to enlarge these.
This is a bit thin - I used three coats here and you can see a bit of VNL in my photos, but it was a lot less visible off camera.

AIIIEEEE look at the bottle in the middle photo! Isn't that cool? Mmm, this is too lovely.

Pink Wednesday: Color Club Ulterior Motive

Ahhh, I know this color is more fuchsia than pink, but you know - it's close enough. And it's SO amazing, it deserves to be showcased anyway!
I believe I've mentioned before that for a pink to really capture my attention, it should be screaming hot. I would say that Color Club Ulterior Motive qualifies! As I mentioned, it's fuchsia - so, between pink and purple. This is a shimmer - a jelly that's absolutely packed with lighter pink and royal blue metallic shimmer. I used three coats to get to this level of opacity. Oh my goodness, this one is awesome. I think it would look hot on toes, too!

Look at that macro! Guh. So, so pretty. More evidence of how fantastic Color Club nail polishes are! Are you wearing pink today?

Comparison: China Glaze Midtown Magic and Color Club With Abandon

I found a near dupe for Midtown Magic, so I thought I'd show you guys a quick comparison. These two are not dead on dupes, but they're sisters, very close. Color Club With Abandon came out with the fall 2009 collection Wild At Heart.
Now, I have to apologize here - I was trying an experiment with a new quick dry top coat, so the fingernails that With Abandon are on have weird wrinkling. You can still see the similarities and differences, thankfully.
My index and pinkie are With Abandon, and my middle and ring are Midtown Magic. Two coats for each polish - they have similar formulas as well.
The main difference is the base - With Abandon is a black jelly base, and Midtown Magic is a deep reddish purple (wine) base. Also I don't think I can spy any red shimmer in With Abandon. It's mostly copper and gold.

In this shot the color difference in the base is obvious, I think. Both of these are beauties! Hope you found this helpful.

Color Club Total Mystery

Total Mystery is from the Color Club spring Alter Ego collection - the Keep It Undercover half! I picked four shades from this half of the collection. I have not picked up any of the other half of the collection, but if you're looking for good neutral shades with excellent formulas, Color Club always wows me. They make some of the best neutral creme formulas I've used.
Anyway! Total Mystery is stunning. It's a bright, royal blue base with blue, pink and purple shimmer. Naturally this doesn't want to photograph right, you probably already figured that out just from the description! It's more vivid and purple-toned in real life, and the pink sparkles show up a bit more, although I was able to marginally capture those in the macro shot.
I used two coats for this, the formula was fabulous.

Now, when I had Focus On Blue week, I had swatched Orly's Lunar Eclipse. Loodie mentioned that she thought it looked quite a bit like Total Mystery - so I have a side by side bottle shot for her! The base blue is very similar. I don't think Total Mystery is a true duochrome, though - but Lunar Eclipse is a multichrome, as you can see from the bottle, it flashes blue, purple and pink - sometimes all at once! They are both startlingly beautiful shades.

I'm a huge fan of Color Club and I've started picking up the shades I feel like are essential for my collection. They're highly underrated outside of the blogging world, rarely when I'm wearing one and people ask me what brand it is do they know what I'm talking about! Do you have any Color Club favorites?