Warm and Fozzie

Love. Love is fozzie bear on my fingers. I have nothing but good things to say about this color. It went on easily, stayed on nicely and looked gorgeous doing so. Love.

Meep Meep Meh

This was a color I coveted from afar. I don't know if I got a bad bottle or what, but the formula on mine was not stellar. It was thick and goopy. However, I bought this from a new supplier (to me) so maybe they weren't storing this nicely.

Pros: she's a gorgeous color. When people ask you can say you are wearing "meep meep meep"

Cons: if it's not just mine, it's a hinky formula.

Zoya - Neeka

I took advantage of the zoya deal in early January. I yoinked up five colors. This is the first.

Pros: great moody dark color. One flipping coat.

Cons: I think I'm maybe too pale for it right now.

Kim-pletely in like.

I had seen the posts. The swatches. It looked so promising. I thought my search for the perfect baby pink had ended. Alas, this is close but not quite. I like but not love Nicole by OPI's Kim-Pletely in Love.

Pros: stays on forever. I've been wearing this since last Thursday and I haven't chipped at all. Cute sparkle in the pink.

Cons: the pink isn't quite right on my skin. Took five coats to achieve near opacity.

Urban Nights

Another creme from China Glaze's Metro Collection from fall 2011. This deep shade looks like a vampy plum indoors but turns straight up purple in the light. This was a fab palette cleanser after my excursion to bright blue! Great application, lovely color. Gold star, China Glaze.

Sky High Top (or ALMOST Honolulu Blue)

My Lions made the playoffs this year, and this blue shimmer from China Glaze was how I celebrated. Be aware: this color is so bold that you WILL get looks and comments from nail polish muggles. But it's fab and makes you feel good in the rather unfestive mid-January.

Return to Revlon

Revlon and I have a long and tortured history. I'd find colors they had that looked gorgeous in the bottle, and then I'd put them on my nail only to find that it was difficult to apply, or I'd end up with bubbles. As this didn't happen with more expensive brands, I assumed it was their fault. Now I realize I was putting on insanely thick coats and it was fully user error.

But then I saw Starry Pink, and I couldn't resist giving them another go. This ballerina pink has huge chunks of glitter that gives it a really cool edge and little pieces of glitter that make it look light and sparkly. This was my Christmas manicure and I felt like I was a punked out Nutcracker ballerina. For me, this was full of win. Until removal -- that's painful.

Velvet Two Ways

So for today, I have Orly's Velvet Rope done two ways. The first is the basic Velvet Rope. And this is a great color. It's a nice deep pure purple with little teeny silver microglitter running throughout.

Next is Velvet Rope, but with two coats of OPI's stunner Serving up Sparkle on top of it. Serving up sparkle has a great holo glitter with big hex pieces mixed in. It was somewhat difficult to apply the hex glitter evenly. You really have to shake the heck out of the bottle. Frequently. But it was super pretty.

This combo is actually how I rang in the new year and it definitely felt appropriately festive!

Midnight in Moscow

Here I have the lady that initially got me back into nail polish. I got this when OPI first released the Russian collection, though it sat mostly alone in my medicine cabinet for years before the polish psychosis set in.

Midnight in Moscow is a dark, dark vampy red (though when you're removing it, it comes off black) with red sparkle in it. When the light catches it, it's just about the most gorgeous thing you've ever seen. I've had this color for... five years? Six years? And I still get excited when I put it on.

Tiny Bottles 2.0

In keeping with my resolution to update more often, I updated the look o' this place. It feels a lot less "1996" in here now. Welcome to the new millennium, my nail blog... welcome, indeed.

Loft-y Ambitions

Loft-y Ambition came from the China Glaze Metro Fall 2011 collection. This color is a deep wine shimmer color -- kind of like a nice Malbec. And now I'm thirsty.

Meet Me at My Mom's House

Today I have for you OPI's Meet Me on the Star Ferry. This went on pretty easily, has a cool micro glitter in an already shimmery base. But... it's mauve. As was everything my mother ever wore growing up. I never saw her wear nail polish that wasn't mauve... in fact I think I still haven't! She, of course, loves this color. So if you want to find it, you'll have to go to her house.

Nite Owl

I somehow managed to only pick up one of the Orly "Birds of a Feather" collection, despite great intentions of getting the whole thing. But oh, if there was just one... I'm glad it was Nite Owl.

This is a great work-appropriate shade of beige with a lovely silver microshimmer running through it. I've decided that microshimmers are my favorite finish of polish. This and Smooth Sailing were my favorite polishes last year, and they have a very similar finish to them. Two pictures for your viewing pleasure below.

Happy New Year!!

The last couple of months have been filled with changes, drama, and no time for nail blogging. I hope anyone who reads this has had a happy holiday season and one of my resolutions is to get better about updating this bad devil.

I have several swatches ready to go that have been ready for months and today I give you the first. It's from the OPI Swiss collection: Ski Teal We Drop. This lovely is a nice teal that leans more blue than green on me. It's a great creme and applied nicely, if I recall correctly. My dog seemed to like it as much as I did as she chewed on the cap as soon as I put it down. Bad stylish dog!

Midtown Magic

I love this. I know it's everyone's standout from the Metro Collection, but I need to add in my love. Midtown Magic is a dark beauty. I've seen it described as a dark burgundy, but it looks like a deep chocolate brown with copper flecks to me. Whatever it is, it's gorgeous and I totally love it.

Meet Me Under the Mistletoe

Meet Me Under the Mistletoe is a gorgeous green sparkle bomb from a previous year of Orly's holiday collection. It has a blue-green base with lots of emerald/kelly green sparkles. This awesome combo results in the entire thing looking like a nice pine tree color. It catches the light beautifully, and I got lots of compliments while I was wearing it.

Lucerne-tainly Look Marvelous

I had an occasion to dress up in September, and I went and got my nails did. Because I was rockin' a bright blue dress with sparkly gunmetal shoes, I went with a sparkly gunmetal polish. I heart the matchy, matchy.

Lucerne-tainly look Marvelous is from OPI's Switzerland collection from fall of 2010. Its a shimmery gunmetal grey -- maybe a foil? It's close if it's not a true foil. It is SUCH a great color for us pale, cool-toned girls. Pictures below.

Zoya Jem

When I saw the previews for the Zoya Mirrors collection, I knew I needed to have Jem. Then I found a blogger who was having a mystery grab bag blog sale (10 for 27!) and this gem came in it (hah, Jem/Gem!)

Jem is a lovely purpley-red color with a lot of shimmery goodness. It pulls redder on me than most people (which is odd, because I tend to pull things bluer). Pictures 'neath:

CG in the City

So that hiatus happened. I apologize for the delay in posting. It's been the crazy busy season at work and September and October zipped by before I had a chance to catch my breath.

Today, I have for you CG in the City. It's been posted everywhere at this point, but here's my two cents. I didn't expect to love this given a lot of the negative buzz in the blogosphere. It's a multi-color glitter in a clear base. It took me three coats to build it up to a mostly opaque finish. Once I had done that, though, I adored how it looked!

I'm a sucker for all things silver, and this just looked like a silver glitter bomb on my finger. I have two pictures below for you. What do you think?

Hey Sailor, or Why Women Tear Each Other Down

Hello readers! Today I have for you China Glaze's Hey Sailor from this past spring's Anchors Away collection.

This color applied like a dream and required no post-polish touch ups. I love when that happens. It's a true tomato red, like a 40s pin-up girl. In fact, when I wore it, I had a vintage looking dress on and got some good compliments on the retro appeal of the whole look.

But beware...
There was one lady at my office who has achieved relatively high levels of success and has a reputation for woman-on-woman office crime, who saw fit to make a comment about the bright red color. In front of a huge group of our colleagues, she looked at the color and said "that's a very interesting shade of red." And I said "thanks, it's called Hey Sailor!" She replied, "It wasn't a compliment. It's a very specific red. It's red." I was really embarrassed and said "yeah, it's just 40s style." She repeated her take on it two or three additional times to the whole group. Meanwhile, I was too shell-shocked to continue in the conversation.

I really hate women who can't handle being around other women. And this, to me, was just plain tear-her-down-so-I-can-look-better. But, it does bring up a potential issue with this color. It's a bright red, and in the past those had a reputation. Despite the rather pedestrian reputation reds and pinks have for nail polish fanatics, the bold reds (and some hot pinks) still seem to scream "trollop" to some outsiders. And if you work with one of these outsiders, they may publicly humiliate you.

How would you handle a situation like this? Would you have defended your nails stronger, or would you have backed down (like I unfortunately did)? Tell ya what, I'm reticent to even wear a bright red or pink anymore! Boo to girl-on-girl crimes!