Beyond Perfect Poetic Peony

Here's another work appropriate color! That's right, another pink... :) This time it's a pastel color by beyond perfect, which I must confess I have never heard of... I just found it in my drawer, so it must be one of my sister's... lol :)

As you can see, it looks like a fairly classic pink, and the square bottle looks oh-so-elegant! Here's what it looked like on:

This is three coats, but no top coat. Two coats would have probably been enough, but the application was very uneven, some of my nails came out perfect and others looked like a mess... The color also looks more like bubble gum and less refined on my nails, but it could have just been how my cuticles were looking that day... :) Also, even though I reserved a sufficient amount of "drying" time, I got horrible dents in my nails without even trying. Even though it applied relatively thinly, it felt way too thick for this polish to do any good.

NUMBER OF COATS: 3
FINISH: very light shimmer (but it's still there)
APPLICATION: 1.25 (there was a lot of drag and the polish wasn't consistent)
COLOR: pretty good
WEARABLE-NESS: good
HILTND: not consistent at all... some of my nails turned out gorgeous, and some of them had dents. However, none of my nails got sheet marks and tip wear is very slight...

Check back next time for a magenta-y color! Definitely NOT pink... :)

NEXT POLISH: L'oreal Steel Color Strong-Arm

Pinkie Swear Punch

Here I am, with yet another "work appropriate" polish. This time, it's a beautiful white glitter that I cannot stop wearing! According to the polish bottle, this is a "nail blush" but it looks like an ordinary glitter to me... :) Here's what it looks like in the bottle:

Because the bottle's so short, it made application a little difficult, but it was still ridiculously easy, even with my left hand. It looks even better on:

This is two coats, with no base or top coat. The glitter was a little "gritty" but it still stayed on and I couldn't be bothered to put on a top coat. This is one of my favorites because even though the glitter pops, it still looks normal enough to be worn without a lot of awkward stares... :) And now, for the official rating:

NUMBER OF COATS: 2

FINISH: glitter

APPLICATION: 2.75/3

COLOR: good!!!

WEARABLE-NESS: good!!!

HILTND: absolutely amazing, with no tip wear or dents!

Make sure to check back for a gorgeous pink... Yes, I'm obsessed... :)

NEXT POLISH: Beyond Perfect Poetic Peony

OPI Chapel of Love

Here I am again, with another classic OPI pink... This time, it's Chapel of Love, which has a much brighter tone than Aphrodite's Pink Nightie. This pink is also perfectly matched to my skin tone, so that the color really pops.

It even looks gorgeous in the bottle! As with most OPI's, this one had good application, but I still need three (or more) coats to get this lovely shade...

And now, for the ratings (please notice the extras)!

NUMBER OF COATS: 3

FINISH: shimmer (but very slight)

APPLICATION: 3/3

COLOR: good!

WEARABLE-NESS: good!!

HILTND: not so good... I got a lot of dents, even though I let it dry for an obscenely long time...

And make sure to check back next time for a white glitter... I just can't stop myself... :)

NEXT POLISH: Pinkie Swear Punch (yes, I know pinky is spelled incorrectly)

OPI Aphrodite's Pink Nightie

Yes, I have a classic OPI shade for you today! This is a beautiful pale pink, which is perfect for work. This color may be a little too pale for my skin tone, but I wore it anyways... :)

As you can see, this is definitely a pale pink, and there's a little hint of purple as well. This is also a pearl, which is a first for this blog!

This is three coats, but no topcoat. It applied perfectly and two coats may have been enough... And now, for my complicated rating system!

APPLICATION: 3
COLOR: pretty good!
WEARABLE-NESS: good!
HILTND: there was a little bit of tip wear, but nothing too major. And no chipping!

And finally...

NEXT POLISH: OPI Chapel of Love

NYC 118A

I'm back with yet another NYC polish. This one is a beautiful teal green, and it's definitely a prettier shade than the last green I tried. :)

Despite the beautiful bottle color, it was surprisingly sheer, but the final color is worth it.

It's shown here with one layer of base coat and three layers of polish. It dried relatively quickly but I'll check on how well it wears tomorrow evening.

And now, for my new and improved rating system:

APPLICATION: 3/3
COLOR: good!
WEARABLE-NESS: good!
HILTND: *Edit* There is no tip wear and the polish still looks fantastic!

And finally,

NEXT POLISH: OPI Aphrodite's Pink Nightie

Rating System

Just as a little FYI, I've decided to streamline my rating system for polishes. They will be judged based on application, color, wearable-ness, and how it looks the next day.

For application, it will be rated on a scale of 1 to 3, 3 being smooth, perfect application.

For color, it will be rated on how pretty the color is. This will just be a good, bad, or okay rating.

Wearable-ness is how easy it is to wear a color. This includes how it looks with my skin tone, and how it would look for work. This will also be on a good, bad, or okay rating.

And finally, how it looks the next day (HILTND) is exactly what it sounds like. After a night of sleep, and a day of wear, I will post whether there has been any tip wear, and if the polish became lumpy.

This rating system is in affect starting....................................... NOW!

Wet 'n' Wild Desert Plum

Here's another old polish, but this time it's a Wet 'n' Wild one. This is a very pretty mauve creme, but the pictures I got were NOT color accurate... Check them out anyways... :)

This is actually one of my favorite colors so far, most likely because of how it can easily be worn to work without looking too over the top...

This picture was taken with two coats of polish, but one would have been fine. My nails got smudged so I had to add another coat. Without a top coat, this polish does NOT wear very well... But the color is definitely worth it... :)

POLISH RATING: 4.75/5

NEXT POLISH: NYC 118A

Claire's Raspberry Sorbet

Here's another one of my sister's picks. This polish is from the ever popular store: Claire's. This would definitely not be my first choice of color, mainly because I tend to shy away from jellies. However, after three coats, I can safely say that jellies look much better on my nails than my usual cremes.

Here it is pictured with three coats of polish. Two would probably have been enough, but I kept smearing so I just added a layer. However, I'm really starting to like the resulting color. Another nice thing about jellies is that extra polish just peels off my fingers when I'm not very tidy about my application.

A semi weird thing about this color is that one coat (and in the bottle) looks pink, but three coats, and it's a definite red... hmmm...

However, reguardless of its perks, I definitely cannot fave this polish.

POLISH RATING: 2.5/5

-this was a pain to apply, and not really worth it...

NEXT POLISH: Wet 'n' Wild Desert Plum

Revlon Ultra Violet

Here's a bizarre polish; an ugly color with perfect application! This is another old polish, but instead of getting thicker, I think it's gotten thinner. It still became completely opaque in two coats.

The bottle's kind of a weird shape, and the brush is actually a little bigger and a little wider than a normal brush. This probably helped my application technique.

However, this color turned out extremely ugly. Maybe it's just my nails, or maybe it's the lighting, but this is UGLY! It applied perfectly though...

Another weird thing about this polish is the finish. From up close, it's a shimmer, without a doubt. But in real life (and from these pictures) it looks like a creme. Even weirder, in the bottle, it looks almost like a duochrome, but not enough for me to classify it as such...

POLISH RATING: 4.25/5

COLOR RATING: 1.25/5

NEXT POLISH: Claire's Raspberry Sorbet

HC Cosmic

Today's polish is a random one. It's a very sheer, nude glitter. HC, of course, stands for Hard Candy, which was discontinued a while ago. But not so long ago that I don't have half full bottles lying around... :)



Warning, this polish is MUCH shiner than it looks in the pictures here. These were taken with a coat of nail strengthener, a layer of basecoat, and two coats of polish. I apologize for my horrible cuticles, but I didn't have enough energy to do a full manicure...



As you can see, this polish is definitely a nude color. But, even though it looked sheer in the bottle, two coats was more than enough. This is a really good color when you want to go low key. It's a little bit browner than my actual skin tone, but that didn't show up very well in the pictures...

POLISH RATING: 4.75/5

NEXT POLISH: Revlon Ultra Violet

Remember, the first person to comment on either this post, or the post right before it ("TEN POLISHES!") will get to choose my next manicure color (which will be featured for a week!). Otherwise, I'll just have to let my sister pick... :)

TEN POLISHES!!!

I am starting an official tradition here on Les Deux Chiens; every ten polishes posted, I will host a contest. The first person to comment on this post will get to choose my next manicure color. If I'm feeling particularly generous, I will franken a polish and name it after him or her!

So go ahead, start commenting!

NYX Nails Sunset Blvd

Here's another new color: orange! This one is part of a group of NYX nails that my mom was given for her birthday. This one is particular was chosen by my sister.

It applied very smoothly and I only needed two coats. It's pictured here with a coat of nail strengthener, one layer of base coat, two layers of polish, and a topcoat.

Even though this is shown after having been worn for a day, I was still disappointed with the results. Some polishes I've used without a top coat and they've shown less tip wear than this one has. However, it's barely noticeable, so I still love it.

This polish is definitely an orange shimmer, but in the close up pictures the glitter is very noticeable. Hopefully I'll post the rest of the polishes this one came with very soon...

POLISH RATING: 4.25/5 (because orange doesn't look good with my skin tone)

NEXT POLISH: HC Cosmic

Sinful Colors Forget Now

Here I am, once again. This time I'm using a fairly new polish, so maybe somebody has heard of it... :) It's a magenta/fuschia polish with very small red glitter. It looks good in the bottle and on the nail!



Here's my sister's hand. I had to use three coats... Two would have been enough, except she went swimming before I could take a pic of it and it started chipping. So excuse the thickness and bizarre uneven-ness...



This polish applied very smoothly and did not clump at all. I would give it a similar consistency that I did to NYC 110A (the green). The only difference is the bottle... :)

POLISH RATING: 4.5/5

NEXT POLISH: NYX Sunset Blvd.

NYC 110A

I'm back! This time with a light, olive green. Even though this polish looks really ugly in the bottle, I fell in love with it on my nails.

It actually doesn't look as bad in this picture, but in real life the bottle looks ugly...

And here it is on my nails! Even though this polish is really sheer, I only needed two coats to get the perfect affect. From a distance, this looks almost like a foil, but it's actually a shimmer. Up close, the sparkles are really clear.

All in all, I would give this polish color a 3.5/5, but actual application gets 5/5 because of how easy it was to put on, even on my right hand!

That's it for this polish, but my sister got to pick the next one, and it's a good one!

NEXT POLISH: Sinful Colors Forget Now

Wet 'n' Wild Shiver

Here I am! And this time, I'm doin' something different... :) Today's polish is Shiver by Wet 'n' Wild, which is your basic drug store polish. This one is a blue-ish silver. It looks almost like a light blue foil on my hand.





I'm not quite sure about the age of this polish, but one thing for for sure, it's THICK! It took me two coats to try and get a perfect manicure, but not because of opacity, but because of how unevenly this polish applied. Even though I like this color, there are a lot of similar colors that apply much better than this one. It did, however, wear well, once given enough drying time. This picture here is after I'd worn it for a day with no top coat. All the bald spots were there when I originally painted my nails.



It is a nice color... Maybe I'll give it a few days to determine whether or not I really like it. But for now, that's it for this polish!



NEXT POLISH: NYC 110A

Sally Hansen Nail Prisms Lapis Amethyst

Here's the next polish, and it's not pink!!! This is a lovely blue prism, which I distinctly remember buying a looooong time ago. Nonetheless, it still held up and produced a beautiful blue-ish purple. But first, here's what I put on my nails:

I was originally just going to use my usual China Glaze strengthener, but one look at my stained nails convinced me to use Nail Life Gripper basecoat too. Here's how it looked on my nails:

Although it looks blue with the flash on my camera, if you turn your hand a little bit, it becomes purple. As pretty as it looks, this polish was almost not worth it because of the applying time. It required three-ish coats, and a lot of drying time in between. However, I didn't put a top coat on, and it still held up throughout my entire day. Application was very streaky, most likely because this polish was so sheer.

Check back for even more polish stories!

NEXT POLISH: Wet 'n' Wild Shiver