Lots of Konad

Good morning, Dear Reader!

Today I have a Konadicure I'm pretty pleased with, so I thought I'd show you that and a few other Konadicures. One of them doesn't have the nail polish name or plate numbers because I didn't edit the photo right away , but I know you'll let that slide.

The base color nail polish on this is the yellow Essie 2008 Neon (although it's not really neon) that has "Pants" in the name. I used Misa I will Survive on my tips, but I don't remember the plate number for the leopard print. I like this one a lot.

Then there's today's, which I did remember to label . It's two coats of Nubar Baby Blue as the base nail polish with Konad Blue Special Nail Polish as the all-over pattern from Konad plate M70 (which is quickly becoming a favorite), and Konad White Special Nail Polish as the tip pattern from Konad plate M56. It's still not perfect, though - I have no idea where I put the bottle of Nubar Baby Blue after I used it, so I didn't have it for the picture . Instead, I just used my magical bottle of Nu-Nails for the picture.

Last, I have one from a few days ago that I really like a lot. I was told it looked like Valentine's Day in April , but I think it looks like my nails have their hair back to do housework . It kept me entertained for a while! The base color nail polish is Color Club Lazer Pink (that's how CC Spelled it), and I used FingerPaints Shiny Red Apple nail polish for the hearts and Konad White Special Nail Polish for the bows , both from Konad Plate M59.

Have you noticed sometthing a little different in this post, Dear Reader? Yes, I found a site with smileys galore, and they're entertaining the heck out of me. For now, I'll be working them in wherever I can! I'm sure the novelty will eventually wear off and I'll quit it, but for now, please enjoy them with me!

Until next time, Dear Reader, love and nail polish to you!

Reminder: WowSoCool is giving you 20% off Konad supplies with coupon code "nailphile" for an indeterminate period of time. Get in on it while you can!

OPI Colorcopia 2009, Part II

Good afternoon, Dear Reader!

I'm back, as promised, with the rest of the OPI Colorcopia Collection 2009. Since I told you about the collection the brushes, and the application in Part I, I'll just get straight to the pictures. These are all two coats.

Berry Berry Broadway is a deep shimmery red, originally released in Fall 2000 with the OPI New York City Collection.

Copper Mountain Copper is a coppery red shimmer that was originally released in 1995's OPI Winter Resort Collection. I like this nail polish, but if I were to pick one color to rerelease from this collection, it would have been Black Magic Mountain.

Florentine Fuchsia could have used a third coat, but I left it at two to be consistent. This almost-red fuchsia creme was originally released in the Fall of 1991 with the OPI International Collection.

Kinky in Helsinki is a reddish purple shimmer with a fuchsia flash that was part of the OPI European Collection from Fall of 1992. This one would have also been better off with a third coat.

Here's a favorite: Purple-opolis, a purple shimmer from Spring 2004's OPI Greek Isles Collection.

My top choice from this collection is probably Sahara Sapphire, from the OPI Painted Desert Collection of Spring 1998, which is a super shimmery light blue.

That's all of it! Now you've seen the entire OPI Colorcopia Collection of 2009. Until next time, Dear Reader, love and nail polish to you!

OPI Breathe Life

Good morning, Dear Reader!

I've just finished swatching the rest of Colorcopia 2009 for you, but it'll take me a century to select and add text to the pictures, then look up and verify all the original color releases and dates, so I thought I'd keep it simple for now and show you OPI's lung cancer awareness nail polish, Breathe Life.

First off, I looked at the site for the Lung Cancer Foundation of America to get facts about this color, and they're not too available. There's a lot of advertising, and it tells me that OPI "made a generous cash donation" to the LCFA, but I cannot find any information telling me whether some percentage of sales of this nail polish go to cancer research, and that bugs me. I inferred that was the case, but since I can't find anything to verify that, I question my assumption.

For reference, here's the promo flyer for the nail polish.

It was the "Let's Cure It" that seemed to me to imply that OPI was working directly with a cancer research charity with at least some percentage of the proceeds of this nail polish. If you, Dear Reader, have details about precisely how this works, please email me or leave a comment and I'll modify this post to include the new information.

Anyhow, I had been a holdout on this color, which became available on April 1, for a couple of reasons. First, it's quite sheer, and on it's own wouldn't be too attractive against my pale skin. Second, I've smoked for 23 years, and although I've tried to quit a few times, it's the staying quit that eludes me, and so I prefer to not think about lung cancer too much. One of my aunts died from smoking-related emphysema and eventually lung cancer, so I'm 100% clear on what that looks like. Since I have proved to simply be incapable of staying quit for now, I have a hard time mulling over the gruesome details. But I finally cracked on this color, thinking the proceeds went to research, and used it over white to address the sheerness.

I'm taking a cue from The Polish Addict here and showing you my mani failure from last night rather than just keeping it to myself. She's inspiringly brave about showing less-than-perfect pictures! My idea for dealing with just how sheer Breathe Life is was to put it over a white, so after swatching last night, I put two coats over two coats or Orly White Out. Unfortunately, I messed up my ring finger, but I'll show you the pics anyhow. The failure, to me, is in that the white that I used was way too stark. I don't have a picture of Orly White Out alone, but trust me that it's well-named.

I decided to get a do-over on OPI Breathe Life this morning, and used it over a sheerer white nail polish. Right now, I have the ultimate torso-cancer-awareness mani, as the white nail polish I used this time is one of Jessica Cosmetics 2008 BCA colors (which clearly stated that 65% of sales went to cancer research), Hope, which is the whitest of them. Here's Hope alone, two coats.

It's a much softer foundation, and two coats of OPI Breathe Life are much better over it than over Orly White Out.

I'm really pleased with the pearly outcome of the do-over version. It's what I had in my head when I overdid the foundation last night - I guess my pathological fear of VNL got the best of me!

One quick note on the messed up ring finger from last night - it was because I was sloppy applying Nubar Diamont to wet polish. I've had a few emails about troubles with applying Diamont to wet polish, and as you've seen from pics, I generally have great results with it allowing literally zero wait time between polishing the tenth nail and applying Diamont to the first. The way I normally use it is to get a big drop and quickly and lightly spread it over the nail, sort of "floating" it over the colored nail polish. I was tired of doing my nails after all those swatches yesterday, and got lazy with the Diamont and made it drag the colored nail polish underneath while applying it, causing the wrinkle in it. I just didn't have enough on the brush, but didn't care enough to re-dip. I go through a lot of Diamont using this method, but it gives great results, and the big refill bottles are no more expensive per 0.5 oz refill that Seche Vite, so I'm sticking with it. Just thought I'd mention that here, since I have an example picture of the error, as well as the way to avoid such error.

That's what I have for you for now, Dear Reader. I'll have the rest of OPI Colorcopia 2009 for you in a little bit. Until then, love and nail polish to you!