Manicure Monday: Green Green Ocean

Posted on March 24, 2014 by Stacie Wacie

It’s Manicure Monday again! This week I’m wearing Green Ocean from Sinful colors over various greens. At least, they were green before I started. This is one coat of Green Ocean over two coats of Julep’s Fiona, Revlon’s Posh, and Zoya’s Envy.

Green Ocean is a ton of iridescent shred and hex glitter floating in a green-tinted base. As you can see, depending on the color it’s layered over, the glitter looks different, as is the case with most iridescent glitter. Over the yellow-green Fiona, the blue color is the most obvious. Over Posh, it’s the darker blue-to-purple. Over the dark Envy, the shape of the glitters is more defined. Shredded glitter sometimes stands up and doesn’t lay flat on the nail; I used two coats of Seche Vite to smooth it down, but I still have some bumps and points from it. Despite that, this is still one of my favorite glitters. You can tell by looking at the bottle; I’ve had this bottle for years, and even though this is it’s first time on the blog, it’s a pretty well-loved polish.

A quick word to the other polishes I used: Julep’s Fiona is a yellow-green with good coverage; it dries to satiny finish. Revlon’s Posh dries with a beautiful shine, but remains still a bit translucent after two coats. Zoya’s Envy is so dark it may as well be black, but it looks great after two coats .The colors do appear a little different after applying the glitter coat, and I can’t tell if the green tint of Green Ocean is strong enough to change it, or if it just looks different because of the glitter. Either way, these nails are totally blinding in the sunlight, and they’re a ton of fun to wear.

I know the last day of spring was last week, but this is probably the best spring manicure I could have hoped for.

Manicure Monday: Barely There Glitter Gradient

Posted on January 20, 2014 by Stacie Wacie

This week we have another subtle, dainty, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it manicure. These soft shades didn’t pair together as well as I thought they would, but I still like the result.

Revlon launched a little duochrome nail line called Sweet Nothings sometime around 2006 or 2007, I forget exactly when. I snapped them up when Walgreens had them on final clearance for $2 each. I’ve had these babies for a long time now, and I’ve gotten so much mileage out of them because they’re so versatile. They’re easy to wear; they look amazing worn over light colors, dark colors, or alone. There were only a few shades in this line, and sadly, I’ve already run out of one. Using the last of a discontinued product is always a hard thing for me to do.

Right, so the polish. Here I’m wearing two coats of Rendez-Blue. It’s a sweet, milky blue with lots of pink shimmer. The blue would probably be more visible on a dark color; here I’m only wearing it over base coat. The pink shift is hard to capture on camera, but I think I did well enough.

The glitter I used for the gradient is Julep’s Camille. Camille is a clear base with iridescent glitter that shifts from orange to green. The colors in the glitter are the complete opposite of Rendez-Blue, but I kind of like the contrast. I was afraid the glitter would blend in and it would just look like a bunch of nothing on my nails. Given the subtle colors, it already kind of does, but the glitter helps it stand out.

Revlon’s Rendez-Blue, Julep’s Camille

So, quick announcement: it turns out that wacie.com is a nail blog after all. Yeah, that wasn’t really my intention, but I felt really inspired and motivated over the weekend and decided to start my own indie polish brand, Wacie Nail Company. Yeah, I’m excited, too! Since wacie.com is already mostly about nails, I decided just to use wacie.com for my nail shop and blog, and move my writerly pursuits somewhere else. If you’re interested in reading my bad fiction and fail stories, please hop on over to my new blog. Thanks for reading!

Manicure Monday: Last Mani of 2013 Green Gradient Celebration

Posted on December 30, 2013 by Stacie Wacie

Happy almost-New Year! I accidentally have sparkly nails for New Year’s Eve!

I used three polishes to get this look. LA Colors’s La Creme is the pale nude you see at the bottom of the gradient there. Man, was it impossible. It was very sheer; the first coat was horribly streaky, and the second coat didn’t even anything out. The lacquer itself was very thin and tended to pool in my cuticles. It was only until I started sponging on the gradient that the color began to even out. Because this foundation coat was so uneven, the gradient took more time and more polish to get right. Usually I can get away with two rounds of sponging; some of these nails took four. The glitter here, the real star of the manicure, is Sinful Colors’s Call You Later. I prefer those big in-your-face glitters to these fine ones, but as long as it sparkles, it’s good in my book.

LA Colors’s La Creme, Revlon’s Posh, Sinful Colors’s Call You Later

Stay tuned for a New Year’s Eve post tonight or tomorrow. Spoilers: my New Year’s resolution is to blog about more than nail polish.

Manicure Monday: Hearts of Gold Over Blue

Posted on November 11, 2013 by Stacie Wacie

I waited until the coffee kicked in to start this entry. Best coffee is best best best coffee best.

Note the blue cuticle on the middle finger. I had a hell of a time getting my cuticles clean.

This week I faced two challenges: having a polish that stained my cuticles to hell, and trying to get large glitter out of a bottle. My blue polish, Orly’s Witch’s Blue, is a beautiful jewel color. It’s dark and mysterious and dramatic. I knew the holo gold hearts in Revlon’s Hearts of Gold would stand out nicely against it. What I didn’t count on, though, was the fine gold glitter overpowering the background color, or the haphazard way the hearts landed. I did manipulate them a little with a toothpick, but mostly wherever they are is where they landed. Also, I really had to work for these hearts. A little further down, you’ll see that the Revlon bottle is about a third of the way empty. Yeah. I wasted a good bit of it just trying to get the hearts out.

I went back and traced my cuticles after I took that first photo. It’s better now.

I love the colors in the hearts, though. Holo glitter is beautiful! I just keep looking at my nails and fanning them back and forth to watch the rainbow.

Rainbow!

Not the rainbow.

Orly’s Witch’s Blue, Revlon’s Hearts of Gold FX

They’re kinda messy, kinda sloppy, but I’m into it.

Manicure Monday: Undersea Epic Glitter Gradient

Posted on September 16, 2013 by Stacie Wacie

The first day of fall is this week, and so the viciously bright neons and the whimsical glitter mixes are being put into storage for next year, and the dark muted colors are coming back. Well, for some people that’s happening. It’s not happening here. I’ll wear my neon orange whenever I want. I am, though, going to be using a lot of blue colors throughout the season. A lot of my recently acquired colors are blues, and I’ll be trying lots of colors I’ve never used before, ones I’ve had for a few days and ones I’ve had for a few years. I have some great things planned for this season.

I did a similar manicure in July, and decided to try it again with different colors. I like it much better this time. The dark blue side of the Moon Candy is almost black, but over the white, it’s very blue. After putting the shredded glitter over the blue tips, I got this wonderful oceanic effect. It really makes me want to book it to the beach. I know this was meant to be a fall manicure, but as it invokes thoughts of swimming, of sunshine and water, it’s anything but appropriate for fall.

This was intentionally blurred to show the colors. Maybe.

Of course, I encountered a few problems with this week. Something I’ve consistently had trouble with is Revlon’s double-ended polishes. I’ve had the brushes start losing bristles, I’ve had the cap break completely off, and I’ve had the polishes completely dry out. The Moon Dust I used this week was one of those. I had to thin out the glitter side once before, when I noticed the agitator ball was suspended in the middle of the polish. When I opened it to use it this week, I had the same issue. The blue was thick, stringy, goopy. The glitter was impossible to remove from the bottle. I put some thinner in it and let it sit overnight, but maybe I used too much, because it was kind of watery. I also had a hard time getting the colors to blend, and once the watery glitter was added, it kind of smeared the gradient around. I’d be mad if I didn’t like it so much.

Sally Hansen’s Hard to Get, Revlon’s Moon Candy in Moon Dust.

I went back to Seche Vite this week because my Digital Nails topcoat is now this strange reddish orange color, and I was afraid it would affect the white polish. I was also afraid it wouldn’t smooth out the coarse glitter as well. Hard to Get is back, too. This bottle is like a workhorse. I use it for everything, and as a result, it’s almost time for a new bottle.

So yeah, fall manicures. Bring it on.

Manicure Monday: Pink and Brown Flakie Gradient Thing

Posted on July 22, 2013 by Stacie Wacie

This wasn’t the manicure I had planned when I started. I wanted a water marble with this pink and a pastel yellow, Julep’s Blake. I used two coats of it, and got one hand marbled, and then completely ran out of the yellow. It was about half full from the last water marble I did, and the Julep bottles are so small that I’ll go through half a bottle without realizing it. I’m a little miffed I only got two manicures from that one bottle. So there I was, one hand finished, one not, no other pastel yellow polish to use instead. I tried a neon yellow, and it just turned everything orange. I gave up and started over. I dug around in my bag for hours, looking for something I hadn’t used yet. I saw the Moon Candy in there and said “Hey, why not?”.

I liked the brown and pink gradient on its own, and at first, I was hesitant to add the flakie glitter. It reminded me of this ridiculous ice cream my boyfriend ate when he lived here that was chocolate and cherry and even had these heart-shaped chocolates with cherry filling. It’s excellent break-up ice cream. Anyway, so I was thinking about that, and I almost used heart glitter instead of the flakies, but I’m glad I didn’t. I like the way it came out. Also, something completely new to me is using both kinds of gradients together. I’d either do a color gradient or a glitter gradient, but never both at the same time. I like the dimension I get from doing both.

Sinful Colors’ Soul Mate, Revlon Moon Candy in Universe

On an unrelated note, this manicure survived mowing the lawn right after being finished. I thought I’d chip at least one, for sure, but nothing happened. I have failed twice at mowing my own lawn, first because the mower ran out of gas and I didn’t realize it, and the second time because it started breathing smoke. At least my manicure is intact.

Even nice nails make dirty hands look good.

Manicure Monday: Iridescent Glitter Gradient

Posted on July 8, 2013 by Stacie Wacie

This manicure was a total surprise. I didn’t expect it to turn out this way, and I definitely didn’t expect to like it so much!

I don’t know if it’s been obvious, but I’ve been using a lot of warm colors in my manicures. It’s summer; I’m wearing a lot of warm neutral makeup shades to achieve a natural sun-kissed look, and wanted to get the same effect on my nails. I chose the glitter, Revlon’s Heavenly, because in the bottle, it’s warm and iridescent. When paired with the black, I got a completely different look, and I couldn’t be happier with it. The colors in the glitter are much more visible, as well as the different shapes and sizes. I almost feel as if I’ve judged this glitter polish unfairly.

Sinful Colors’ What’s Your Name, Revlon’s Heavenly

Here’s a picture of a cat my friend drew on my dusty record player. I should clean my stuff.

Manicure Monday: Nude and Gold Gradient

Posted on May 13, 2013 by Stacie Wacie

So my nail disaster this week was a rare event: I emptied a bottle.

Satin Sheets.

I’d had this bottle for a while, almost ten years probably. I got the whole collection of them when Walgreens had them on sale for two dollars a bottle, once upon a time. I’d been using them occasionally ever since, just wearing them over my naked nails to give them a hint of shimmer. When I got into nail art and multiple colors, I struggled to find a way to preserve that natural, minimal look while still getting some attention. I tried to work it into this gradient, and towards the end, I didn’t have enough polish left to finish it. I had my heart set on this gradient, so I took it off and started with another color. I kind of feel like a jerk. Not only did I run out of the polish, I wasted what I had left. Sorry, Satin Sheets. You still had a good run.

So I started over with a crème nude. I still wonder what it would have looked like with the sheer white, but I think I like what I ended up with. The first coat of Whipped was so sheer that I thought it was a jelly, but turned opaque with another couple of coats. Rare and Radiant has a lovely green color in the bottle, but appears mostly gold on the nails. It also appears I didn’t blend my pinky nail very well.

I was trying to get the green shimmer to show up. It did a little bit.

I like gradients. I like them a lot. I feel like it’s the best look I can get with minimal effort. I always manage to screw up taping, dotting is tedious and prone to mistakes, I don’t have the patience for freehanding anything. With gradients, I just dab a sponge on my nail, and that’s it. I still get to try surprising color combinations; I just don’t have to work as hard for them.

Bonder, Whipped, Rare and Radiant, Out the Door

Now I’m off to recount my polish bottles. I was somewhere around 250 the last time I checked, but I need to make sure that’s accurate, especially now since I’m down one.

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