Orly Androgynie

Happy Sunday, everyone!  C and I just returned home from an awesome little vacation at the coast with my parents.  It was warm and sunny and we all had lots of fun.  If you follow on instagram, you might have seen a few of my favorite photos throughout the past four days, from 11am scotch whiskey (never again) to my excellent choice to sport holos all weekend.  It's GREAT to be home again, though, nothing beats your own bed.  Los gatos are happy we're home again, too (in fact, my little blogging pal Sal is in her rightful and usual spot on my lap as I type this).

Orly Androgynie made its way into my stash a few months ago during a buy one get one Ulta sale.  I had to have Rage and I decided it might be fun to branch out on my love of dark, shiny, opaque black cremes and work in some blacks with a little more interest.

Androgynie is a black jelly laden with gold and silver microglitters and medium sized blue, teal, gold, orange, and red-orange hexes.  Reports of this one not looking the same on the nail as it does in the bottle rang sort of true for me.  Because it's got the sheer-leaning jelly base, I used three coats, and these coats all but buried the colorful hexes.  The gold microglitter, however, is plenty pronounced and even flashes a little holo here and there.  It's kind of a gothically elegant polish.

Also, I totally miss the old bottle design... le sigh.

 You can kind of see a hex on the base of my index finger and one on my ring in an above picture, if you look hard enough.  It's not that they don't come out (though you do need to give the bottle a really good shake because everything settles to the bottom).  The remedy to the buried hex problem, per Polish Insomniac, is to use a creme base underneath, but then you lose the cool depth of the layers of microglitter.  I may give that a go and do an Androgynie 2.0 post.  In the meantime, I'm not unhappy with this at all.  The formula is great and it is fun to wear a flashier black polish. 

So here are a few more pictures of my vacay, lol.  C photobombed my selfie on the promenade of one of the towns we visited (that's my mom in the corner).

I love seeing animals just sitting around.  It always reminds me of my Sal.  These seagulls are sitting around like Sal. 

We made an impromtu stop at a charming little cheese factory, complete with petting zoo and photo op cutouts.  My husband is just so darned cute ♥♥ Here's a tip-- if you're in the Tillamook, OR area and want to go to the Tillamook cheese factory, go to Blue Heron instead.  It's a lot more fun and it's got everything the Tillamook factory has (including Tillamook cheese, curds, and ice cream parlour), but with more character and a LOT less corporate influence (and a delectable selection of Brie).

And that's it!  Thank you for reading and have a beautiful day. ♥♥♥

BadAss Polish Copper Waters (photo heavy)

*product sent for review

Hi friends!!  Today I get to show you all an as yet unreleased BadAss Polish.  It's an absolutely smokin' gorgeous glitter that is akin to Dusk and Chocolate Covered Cherry but totally its own twinkling, beautiful entity, too.  

This is Copper Waters. It's a clear base filled with tiny royal blue and copper glitters interspersed with tiny holographic glitters that flash bright violet, neon green, and teal.  Here is one coat of Copper Waters over Orly Rage.

I noticed the holo bits in this one are more pronounced in dimmer light, so I had a little fun with photoshop, lol.  Observe.

Isn't that cool?!  How awesome would it be if it glowed like this in real life?  Red?!  Seriously?  Where'd that come from?!  And the green!  That ridiculous blue!!  Okay, moving on.

Here's one coat of Copper Waters over Zoya Song.

This duo is mesmerizing in real life.  It's so hard to capture the depth of Copper Waters and the amazing things it does.

If you're wondering if Copper Waters is buildable, it is :) Here it is over my clear base coat, in three coats.

It's pretty close to the look over Rage; the holo bits are a little more pronounced on its own, though.  It's so fascinatingly multidimensional!  I love how those green sparks just sort of show up out of nowhere.  It is hard to get full tip coverage with this one and it's definitely more noticeable when there's no base color underneath.

I owe this last duo to Candice at Mommy Does Her Nails.  We were playing around with Copper Waters a week and a half or so ago and she remarked that it would look awesome over a berry creme.  She was right (it's so cool to have an artist who sees color in such remarkable ways in my corner ♥).  My base is more of a quinacridone, brighter and more fuschia, a little more spring/summery and equally stunning.  This is one coat of Copper Waters over Sinful Colors Folly.

Indie glitters tend to be topcoat hungry, and this beauty is no exception.  I used one coat of Out The Door for each manicure, mostly because I'm a little bit lazy, lol; two will smooth things out considerably.

As stated above, Copper Waters has not yet been released.  Like BadAss Polish on facebook to keep current on release dates and surprise flash giveaways.  It will be available for purchase at BadAss Polish's etsy shop.  Check out the other gorgeous glitters Amy's got for sale there in the meantime.

Thanks for reading and have a lovely day! ♥

*product sent for review

Orly Rage

Good morning!!  My lovely friend Essie's been tempting me with Orly Rage for months and I finally pulled the trigger on this gorgeous foil this last weekend.

Ever since rose gold jewelry arrived on the scene a few years ago, I've been a little obsessed (I had to show it with my favorite rose gold hoops, lol), and Rage is the perfect way to wear the gorgeous tone on nails.  This one's got an abundance of silver shimmer, giving it a little more of an elegant appearance than its chromelike counterparts.  I love it.  It's a little more neutral than the flashy gold and silver foils I'm also fond of wearing, making it a smidge more demure even as it commands attention.  I used two coats here.  The formula is exceptional and if you don't have this beauty in your collection, I highly recommend it.  It's lovely for glitter layering, too, as I'm learning, but more on that later. :)

Thanks for reading, and have a wonderful day! ♥♥

Orly Fowl Play

Happy first Sunday of autumn!!  To commemorate the changing weather and my newly acquired scratchy throat, I decided to finally wear my Orly Fowl Play.  Most of you have seen this one before.  It was one of the darlings of last fall's Birds of a Feather collection.  I've been saving it for shorter, cooler days since my Ulta haul this past May.  Two days into the new season is a long enough time to wait, lol.

You know the description.  Fowl Play's a dark plum purple jelly packed to the gills with tiny holographic shimmer, iridescent shimmer, and color shifting mylar flakes.  It's a very cool, unique polish that's left me feeling slightly underwhelmed.  Maybe I expected the shimmers and flakies to pop more. Maybe it's just not the right shade for my skin.  The formula kind of bugged me, too.  Fowl Play is not an easy one to control.  It's opaque in two coats, which is great for any jelly, but I kept dealing with runaway flakies and really thick spots near the middle of each nail.  Nevertheless, I'm sure this won't be the last time I wear it.  Stuff like this tends to grow on me.

Also... you may or may not have noticed that my photos are now gargantuan.  I'm test driving this different size for a bit.  I think I prefer the smaller photos, but maybe I'm just not used to the new size.  The detail in the polish is certainly better in extra large.  Got an opinion?

Thanks for reading. <3