Syrup & Succulents

Those of us entrenched in the nail world tend to know where we fall when it comes to nail art: Lovers, Haters, and Lack of Skill to Execute. I am decidedly in the last category; I love nail art, even the delightfully tacky over-the-top Japanese falsies encrusted with pearls and bows (although the functionality of said falsies means that I'll have to hold off until I can afford to hire a full-time maid).

I'm not much for attempting nail art myself, since any artistic talent I may have does not translate at all to nail polish. I bought a dotting tool set once upon a time and used it once. Luckily these "syrup nails" are easy to do, even for a nail art dummy like me.

 "Syrup nails" are basically a type of gradient manicure that uses a sheer jelly. In my humble opinion it works best with a polish that is very sheer--I feel it gives a smoother looking gradient this way. I did mine with ORLY Beverly Hills Plum, which is a beautiful translucent coral. This is 7 coats of Beverly Hills Plum at its darkest, plus 2 coats of Seche Vite and 1 coat of NYC Grand Central Station. One of my favorite things about wearing this manicure is that all the layers of lacquer gave them the super-glossy gel nails look, which I love. A commented that it looked like I had dipped my nails in blood, which the macabre in me also loved.

Unrelated to my nails, I bought four tiny little potted succulents, and I plan on doing the Blogger-y thing and re-pot them into tiny handmade pots. That's for next week :)

My Milkshake

It's time for another palette cleanser! I happened to see a swatch of Wet 'n Wild Megalast 2% Milk and liked it immediately--plus I don't have many pale-colored jellies in my collection, so it was a good fit. It was certainly nice by itself, but I couldn't leave it well enough alone so I sandwiched a coat of OPI Lights of Emerald City inbetween two layers each of 2% Milk. Have I mentioned I'm a sucker for food-themed names? I don't even like 2% milk (I'm much more partial to whole milk, or hemp milk if I can get it), but it's still a fun and cute name for polish.

2% Milk has a good formula for such a light color, and it flowed on the nail easily without being watery or streaky. It's a very nice, clean color that isn't as stark as a plain white; I'd call it an off-white or ivory.

Lights of Emerald City is a unique bird--I haven't seen another polish quite like it, even though the glitter combination of small iridescent squares and large matte white squares is a pretty simple mix. It is glitter-packed, so you don't have to fish for the big pieces of glitter (although giving the brush a swirl in the bottle helps get more of the larger white glitters on the brush).

Overall I really like this combination and I can definitely see myself wearing it again when I'm in the mood for something simple and refreshing.

HARE Cast in Bronze

In the aftermath of Sandy messing up the ENTIRE METRO SYSTEM (eff you Sandy, please go get a yeast infection), I decided I needed some cheering, and nothing does the job like my first-ever indie! HARE is one of the first indie polish makers to catch the nail community's attention, and she remains one of my favorites. I have a lemming for Bisbee that began practically the day of my indoctrination into polish hoarding, but I opted to pick up one of her new creations this time, the very amazing Cast in Bronze from her Fall 2012 Finder's Keepers collection.

Gorgeous. This was two coats of Cast in Bronze by itself, a beautiful lilac jelly packed with tons of shimmer and bronze colored hex and square glitters. If you look hard in real life you could probably see visible nail line, but to me the sheer, squishy jelly-ness of this is part of the charm so I opted to wear it alone.

Formula-wise, I had no problems at all. The base is thicker than most polishes to better suspend the glittery goodness, which is normal and expected and can be fixed by a few drops of thinner, but even without thinning I didn't have much trouble getting this on my nails. There was a brief moment after applying the first coat during which I feared the sheerness might also result in streakiness, since the distribution of color seemed a bit uneven, but the second coat erased all those doubts (and frankly it was probably my own fault anyway because I was using Revlon's 2-in-1 TC/BC, which is a terrible basecoat--so slippery, doesn't help with even polish distribution at all).

All in all, I had a great experience with HARE and can't wait to get more!

FRANKEN: Crystal Ink Sweetsleep

This post features one of my own creations, named "Sweetsleep" after the sweet poison in G.R.R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire world.

"A pinch will bring sound and dreamless sleep, while three pinches brings death."

The above picture is 2 coats of Sweetsleep over POP Foggy.

POP Foggy by itself

3 coats of Sweetsleep by itself--a sheer lilac-tinted jelly with pink glassfleck and pink and blue glitter.