The Bermuda Escape Mani

Good morning, Dear Reader!

I woke up today to a dreary, grey mix of rain and snow, and do you know what I decided I needed?  A Bermuda Escape.  Since I can't hop on a plane and take one, I decided I'd have a Bermuda Escape on my hands.

I used the China Glaze Bahama Blues less Calypso Blue (the darkest) for a gradation mani, starting with Bermuda Breakaway and ending with Bahamian Escape (hence Bermuda Escape).  The result is a mani that starts and ends with a creme, and has a sparkly, almost metallic center with a shimmer and a microglitter on either side of it.  Something very wicked in me gets tickled to death when I have a super sparkly middle finger, like I'm secretly flipping off everyone in the world I want to flip off - terribly immature of me, I know, but it's true!  What I like about the overall effect (other than my immature glee), is that the progression of finishes works as well as the progression of color - from thumb to pinky, it's creme, shimmer, glittery, then toning down with a more subtle microglitter, and then back to creme.  I was tempted to use the creme Calypso Blue and substitute two other creme blues to make this mani strictly a gradation of color, but I'm really pleased with the end result of using different finishes as well.

That's what I think of it.  Here are the pictures for you to decide what you think.  The colors are, from thumb to pinky, Bermuda Breakaway, Blue Paradise, Blue Island Iced Tea, Caribbean Blue, and Bahamian Escape.

This is a mani that boosted my mood when the weather outside is doing just the opposite.  I hope it perked you up a bit, too!

Here's something else to perk you up, also from China Glaze.  It's Mooooonpoooool!  Yes, Dear Reader, I have a brand new bottle of China Glaze's Moonpool to give to you.  I'll randomly select the winner on December fourth, and am taking entries until then.  Your name will show as you enter it (so you don't have to enter your full name), and your email address will only be used to notify you that you're the winner.  If you haven't yet tossed your name into the hat, please do!

That's all for now, Dear Reader.  Until next time, love and nail polish to you!

Blue Gradation: The Yoga Light Mani

Hello again, Dear Reader. Left home alone with the only sunlight for the last five days and probably the next day and a half, I decided to do one more round of pics for you.

Recently, a reader asked for a look at some different blues. There are just so, so many blues out there that I decided a gradation mani would be a good way to select a few for us to view. When selecting the blues for this mani, I decided to skip the entire "is it blue or is it black" family of blues and just use ones that truly look blue in normal lighting. I started with the lightest blue I could think of and worked backwards to get to darker ones. Here's the result, The Yoga Light Mani.



The colors used, from thumb to pinky, are OPI Yoga-ta Get This Blue (also the bottle in the picture), Color Club Jewel Tone Blue, China Glaze Blue Sparrow, OPI Just Groovy, and Color Club Blue Light (hence the name Yoga Light - the first and last words of the names). All are three coats over a base coat, topped with Seche Vite.

Yoga-ta Get This Blue is a darker blue with a slightly teal shimmer, Jewel Tone Blue is a true medium blue with a strong shimmer, Blue Sparrow is a slightly lighter blue with light blue glitter, Just Groovy is a light blue creme, and Blue Light is an even paler light blue creme. The glitter of Blue Sparrow may seem out of place here, and I could have used Rescue Beauty Lounge's Dead Calm in this manicure to avoid the glitter, but it was by design for two reasons. First, the practical: the glitter in Blue Sparrow is the same color as Just Groovy, so it leads into it well. The second reason is more frivolous, coming to me as I lined up the colors, which is that the notion of flipping someone off with my one sparkly nail tickles me, so I used the Blue Sparrow.

There you have it, Dear Reader - the Yoga Light Mani, and a look at a variety of blues to boot. My Partly Sunny is rapidly turning into the predicted Partly Cloudy, so this will be the last one of the day (unless football comes on or something!). Love and nail polish to you!

Gradation with a Twist: The Call Jacques Mani and Reader Questions

Good morning again, Dear Reader!

I have pictures of today's NOTD for you: The Call Jacques Mani. Since the idea of a gradation mani, using the same color light to dark from one nail to the next, was recently introduced to me I'm stuck on the idea. My twist on this one was to not just change tone, but to change color - the shift from index to middle finger is in color rather than tone, with all five colors being the greyed-out shades I love. Although I'm not a huge fan of the "holding a bottle" pic, I've included one because holding something seems a good way to display the mani and a bottle of polish is more appropriate for the picture than a Bic lighter. Here she is, Call Jacques:





The colors are, from thumb to pink. OPI You Don't Know Jacques, $OPI Metro Chic, $OPI On Stage, OPI Parlez-Vous OPI, and $SOPI Call your Mother - hence the name Call Jacque, which had a better ring to it than Jacques Your Mother.

The other topic for this afternoon is some reader questions we've had on some older posts that I was afriad would get buried and go unanswered. The first I can answer, but am sure that you have additional answers for, and the other two I'm just putting out there hoping for an answer from you, Dear Reader.

First, LuvLngNlz asked about cuticle care. All I did to tidy mine up a bit was use a cuticle clippers to take off any hangnails and then used Sally Hansen Instant Cuticle Remover (blue bottle). Otherwise, I just push them back. In winter I used Lush Lemony Flutter Cuticle Butter to keep them from becoming problematic, but don't bother with it when the weather's like it is now. If you have any tips that keep yours in good shape, please throw in your two cents.

Next up, Nail Juice asked about less expensive dupes to Chanel's Robertson Collection. It's true dupes we're looking for, not just kind of close. I've seen the kind of close variety, but have yet to see a true dupe of any of them. Suggestions? I can do comparison pictures if we have any stand-out contenders that I own.

Finally, Rosey from Autralia was interested in dupes for $OPI Meet for Drinks and $OPI I'm with Brad, preferably from OPI. I'm not able to think of any true dupes offhand, and again will be glad to do comparison pics of strong contenders.

That's all for today, Dear Reader. Love and nail polish to you!

The Greydation Mani and Something for Mom

Good morning, Dear Reader!

Very recently I was introduced to the idea of a gradation mani - gradation of color from one nail to the next. Since I love a good play on words as much as I love grey nail polish, I decided to make my first gradation mani The Greydation Mani.



The colors used are, from thumb to pinky, Essie Great Expectations, RBL Concrete Jungle, RBL Stormy, Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Gunmetal, and Color Club After Hours. Ideally, I would have had a color midway between Great Expecations and Concrete Jungle to make that color shift more gradual, but since I didn't, I used what I had. Not the best, not the worst, and I'm pleased with it as my first attempt.

The rest of this post is for my mom. Two months ago today my mom, Lucille, passed away. She always told me I should write, and I wish she knew about my little blog because I think it would make her happy. The fact that I write about nail polish, maybe not so much (I can just hear her say her annoyed, "Oh, Siobhan..."), but the fact that I'm writing at all would please her. I don't normally have the patience for a jelly polish, but for today's NOTD I did.



So if you haven't in a while, call your mother. Someday you might be glad you did.



That's all I have for you for now, Dear Reader. Love and nail polish to you!