Choose Me! Stamped

I couldn't think of what to do with Choose Me! but I knew I had to do something because it's so gorgeous. After flipping through BM plates and considering other options, I made my boyfriend choose. So this was his idea :)



















2 coats Essence Choose Me!
1 coat Poshe
Bundle Monster plate BM-208 with Konad White

I think this looks so neat, almost like stained glass.

Essence Choose Me!

Can I just say that I totally love cheap dupes? Especially this one. Choose Me! is a dupe of several polishes - OPI Catch Me In Your Net, Zoya Charla, and Orly Halley's Comet. I don't own the other three, but there are plenty of awesome comparisons on other blogs. Some say they are slightly different, but they're close enough to be called dupes to me! Best part? Check out how CHEAP Choose Me! is compared to the other three:

OPI CMIYN retails at $8.50 for 15mL. That's 57¢ per mL.
Orly Halley's Comet retails at $10.00 for 18mL. That's 56¢ per mL
Zoya Charla retails at $8.00 for 15mL. That's 53¢ per mL.
Essence Choose Me! retails at 99¢ for 5mL. That's only 20¢ per mL!!

I'll definitely choose Choose Me! lol
















Closeup



2 coats Essence Choose Me
1 coat Poshe

Ugh this is so pretty!! It's a foil-y super micro glitter/micro flakie filled polish with a teal jelly base and the glitter particles are these green/teal with a subtle gold shimmer. Truly gorgeous. I'd say unique, but we know there are at least 3 other polishes identical or near identical to this. But I still think it's amazing.

The formula was just plain awesome. Thin and easy to use but still opaque in 2 coats. And I TOTALLY loved this brush. For how lame my brush was on MAC Bad Fairy, there's no excuse for that when this 99¢ brush was flawless. Reminded me of the Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear brush, but when I held them next to each other, the Essence brush was just a LITTLE smaller. But the shape and density seemed nearly identical. And I love the Xtreme Wear brush.

MAC Bad Fairy

Remember when people were ALL OVER this polish? It came out fall of last year when the duochrome foils were HUGE. Bad Fairy was the only one of the MAC Venomous Villains polishes that wasn't a dupe for an Orly Cosmic FX polish. It was its own polish.



















2 coats MAC Bad Fairy
1 coat Poshe

I snatched 2 of these suckers up when I caught it just right online when they were back in stock at Nordstrom. I'm so glad I did! Not only is this one of my fav polishes, but its one of my sisters as well! I'm about 1/3 of the way through the bottle so I'm glad I have a backup!

This is a gorgeous dark pink/warm orange duochrome. At first glance it seems like a simple foil polish, but as soon as you move the duochrome is very prominent. I love duochromes because they're like an "indoor holo" to me. You know how you need good light for a holo to really look amazing? Duochromes look special and awesome in any light.

The formula was ok, but the brush was freakin' horrendous. The polish is kinda streaky, but these types of polishes can be finicky anyway. Definitely tolerable and not frustrating. You just can't do a ton of strokes of you get bald spots. So long as you use a light touch and don't go over it a ton of times you'll be fine. But the brush was just bad. I had to trim it because there were bristles going whichever direction they felt like, and it's not a very dense brush it it flares at the tip. Not in a good way. Again it's tolerable, but for $13 I expect WAY more higher quality packaging. I have 99 cent polishes with AMAZING brushes that make MACs look like a brush from a pack of 10 watercolor brushes from the dollar store complete with 10 bristles per brush. Point being, I really expected a better brush for $13.

A Bad Brush Killed Gray's Anatomy

I actually Konaded on my most recent mani, but I did it at night and never took photos. I have this bad habit of not top coating my Konads, and I went to the beach the next day. I think that explains why I have no photos of it. Lol.

Anyway, I had no idea what I wanted to do to my nails today. I knew I didn't want to wear a creme, which kinda sucked because I actually have a bunch of untried cremes that I've been dying to wear. Then I saw Wet 'n Wild Gray's Anatomy, which is apparently an alternative (but not total dupe) for OPI Not Like The Movies. I do not own NLTM, so I apologize for not being able to offer a comparison, but here and here are blogs with a comparison if you're curious.













Direct Sunlight


3 (thicker) coats Gray's Anatomy
1 coat Poshe

Now, I love duochromes. They're the cloudy day holo IMO. By far one of my favorite finishes. Sally Hansen Golden Cinnabar is one of my favs. This... not even close.

This is a silvery, purple-grey-green duochrome that has visible purple shimmer when in the sunlight. I think this color should have been released in the fall, not spring.

The forumla was WAY too thin. The photos are 3 thick coats, and there is still VNL (visible nail line). I just could not deal with doing another coat. The VNL isn't terribly noticeable in real life, and the duochrome does a pretty good job at camoflauging it. But in the sunlight, it is VERY noticeable, as is the sheerness of this polish.
The worst part was the brush. I do not have any other WnW Fast Dry polishes to compare to this one, but it made application a bigger pain. It flares at the end, is too round, the bristles are too thick so it left very obvious brush strokes, and the bristles are uneven. No thank you. Honestly, if the brush were better, I would have tolerated doing 6 coats if this polish needed it because it really is pretty and I love duochromes. I don't mind doing a ton of coats for a sheer polish, but not with this brush:


It doesn't look THAT bad, but oh it was.

Luckily I work tomorrow, so this mani only has about 9 hours left before it comes off. Which is also why I'm not bothering to redo this or to just do a different mani all together.

Crazy Week! China Glaze For Audrey with Sweet Nothings

Ahhh!! It's been 5 days since I've updated my blog! It has been an absolutely insane week for me. Wednesday was finals at school and I wore my leopard nails for that. Then I went into work for the evening, and no polish for work, so no update on the blog. Thursday was my boyfriend's graduation from the CT Fire Academy (Brag Moment: He now has his dream job as a fire medic for a city in north central CT). I wore For Audrey and wanted to update, but the graduation and after party stuff was an all day thing that prevented me from so much as touching a computer (totally worth it, though)! Friday I worked (no polish), and was going to post my For Audrey that night, but it was a friend's birthday that I went out for right after work and didn't get home until late. No blog update. Then yesterday, they were short on medics at work, so I offered to stay until 2100. My shift is 0800-1800. Well, I had a student (I love taking students), but I ended up not getting out of work until 0030!! So I spent 16.5 hours at work total. Obviously, that meant I went to sleep the second I got home, and no update again. (If you haven't read my other posts about it, I'm not allowed to wear polish to work).

So here I am Sunday morning, showing you my nails from Thursday of last week. Better late than never!! I'll hopefully put up another post with today's nails, or I may end up posting it tomorrow. We'll see how things go!







With Flash:


iPhone:


Close-Up:


2 coats China Glaze For Audrey
1 coat Poshe
1 coat Revlon Sweet Nothings in Rendez-Blue

I know these photos aren't the best. I wasn't able to upload them until now, and it was then I realized how difficult this was to capture. This is not the first time I've worn this combination, and I'm sure it won't be the last, so if I wear it again, I'll add better photos.

I don't have any photos of just For Audrey, but this is it with a gorgeous top coat. I'm not focused on talking about For Audrey as much as I am Rendez-Blue. Revlon Sweet Nothings collection was an LE collection that came out I BELIEVE in early 2007 or late 2006? What I'm basing that on it a review of Sweet Nothings on MUA. The earliest review I found was from 2007. I looked at reviews of Dark Pleasures (which seem as though they would've come out in the same collection or around the same time), and the earliest one was from December 2006.

Anyway, Rendez-Blue is a sheer, two-toned (blue and pink), shimmery polish that I think goes beautifully over other polishes as a top coat. It adds an interesting dimension to a creme polish. When topped on For Audrey, it gives FA an all over shimmer, not glitter, but with an opalescent, duochrome-y feel. I'm not one to wear a polish like this on it's own. I wish I had more info about these polishes, but I haven't found much. I'm not certain what Revlon's intention was with them. But I vote use them as a top coat.

I picked this up at Ocean State Job Lot a while ago. I believe I paid $1.99? I also grabbed a Dark Pleasures (Talk Dirty) that looks VERY similar to China Glaze Wagon Trail. But that polish is not my thing. I have it up for swap on MUA right now. Anyway, the last time I was at OSJL, I remember still seeing Sweet Nothings. Regardless, if you come across this polish, I definitely suggest it. I think it's absolutely gorgeous!!

Golden Cinnabar with OPI Silver Shatter

My first use of Silver Shatter!! As I've said before, I'm not a huge crackle fan. Black Shatter just didn't do it for me. And I'm convinced it makes my nails look fat. No, really, I swear. But did that stop me from speeding out to go pick up Silver Shatter (and 3 other polishes from the Pirates of the Caribbean collection)? Umm, nope. But I think that's a good thing because I actually like Silver Shatter. Maybe because it's spring, and black doesn't scream "spring" to me the way this silver does. It keeps the nail light and pretty. I'm hoping I like Black Shatter more in the fall. I just tend to follow seasons when I wear polish. In the fall/winter, I'm in the mood to wear darker colors. In the spring, I like pastels, and in the summer I like brights. Slight variations here and there, but you get the idea.

So obviously when I picked up Silver Shatter, I had polish on. So when I got home, I couldn't swatch it on my nails. In hindsight, I could've used a nail wheel, but eh. Oh well. However, my sister was at home with naked nails, so I took advantage of them. I painted 10 random colors on her nails, and Golden Cinnabar was one of them. This ended up being one of my favorite combinations!!







Closeup


2 coats Golden Cinnabar
1 coat Poshe
1 coat Silver Shatter

I know I said I loved this on my sisters nails, but I don't know how much I loved it on mine. Maybe because it didn't crackle super well on all nails, or because my nails are much longer than my sisters.

Sally Hansen Nail Prisms in Golden Cinnabar

I was initially planning on wearing a holo, but because I was doing my nails before bed, I didn't want to take the chance of it being overcast the next day (By the way, it was amazingly sunny today). So I was going through some of my older, "not salon brand" polishes, and I came across Golden Cinnabar. I bought this about a year ago from Dollar Tree and it came packaged with Sally Hansen Reddy to Mingle. So technically, this cost me 50 cents!! Yay for cheap polish!! And for the record, when it comes to polish, expensive does not equal good quality and cheap does not equal bad quality. You should never assume that because you're paying $8.50... or $14... or even $25, you're getting the best quality polish you can find. You can easily find polishes for $1 that are amazing all around, and you can also buy $25 polishes that are awful in every way. So keep that in mind when you're choosing a polish.

And for the record, despite that I've had this polish for about a year, this is my first time wearing it!! One of the things I love about duochromes is that means I get to take a ton of photos!! Woooooo!!















Closeup


2 coats Golden Cinnabar
1 coat Poshe

The Nail Prisms were probably some of the most awesome polishes put out by Sally Hansen. To some, they're probably some of the most awesome polishes put out by ANY nail polish brand. Nail Prisms have since been discontinued :( but you can still find them randomly at discount stores, dollar stores, or online. Some were more holo, some were more duochrome, but regardless they are all gorgeous in their own right.

Golden Cinnabar is a bronze-y/copper-y gold, coral-y rose duochome. The description I give it makes it sound pretty ugly. Haha. But I think it's super intriguing. I'm generally lucky in that I rarely come across a polish that really looks awful with my skintone. Either that or 1. I don't buy colors that clash with my skintone or 2. I just pretend all nail polish looks good on me. Regardless, I can see that this polish may not work with all skintones. I do think, however, that it is a polish that can be easily worn in all seasons.

The formula was great. It seems very thin, but it's totally opaque in 2 coats with no brush streaks. Absolutely no complaints with the formula and application. I'm satisfied :)

Also, I don't have it to compare, but it looks very similar to Nubar Stardust. Maybe a dupe or at least dupe-ish?