China Glaze Four Leaf Clover

From the Up And Away collection 2010.

This was 1 coat, no topcoat.

This was one of the first few nail polishes that I bought for myself online, and I bought it on the recommendation of Scrangie. Being totally new to nail polishing, I had no idea what colours I'd like and what I wouldn't. As a result, I wasn't quite a fan of Four Leaf Clover from the start because I just couldn't really pull off the really bright rich green colour that it boasted. Make no mistake, if you are a fan of green, you should definitely get this polish. I like green enough but when it's such a full-green as this one, I just couldn't handle it. It made me feel like the wicked stepsister from Cinderella, for some reason. When I curved my nails to take photos to show my friends, they said it looked like the witch's claws. In addition, the finish is so glossy and smooth, plus the exact shade of green, my nails looked like the back of mahjong tiles.

However, throughout the months, I haven't yet been able to part with this. I'm not sure why. I've used it in several nail marbling experiments and other things that required the liberal use of polishes that I may not wear that much, which is why its levels are still dropping despite my only having worn it as a manicure just once. Maybe it's because, despite my not being able to pull off green, I recognise that it's a pretty epic green colour. I haven't yet seen any polish that matched its pureness and richness of green. It's bright but not neon, rich but not dark.

Can't say that I love it, but definitely a must-have for green fans. Are you a green fan?

Essie Ballet Slippers

This was 3 coats, no topcoat.

Essie Ballet Slippers is one of them age-old polishes that are so ancient, I don't even know how to find which collections they were from - if they were even from any of these recent invention called 'collections'. This is a sheer nude pink that are meant, I suppose, to resemble the shade of actual ballet slippers. I would call it sheer because it does take a few layers to build up. Even here at 3 coats, you may still be able to discern a bit of VNL if you're not careful but personally I'm too lazy to paint more than 3. It's acceptable for me!

I get the feeling that this has become the sort of quintessential sheer nude pink shade. Although it's not quite as interesting as OPI Who Needs A Prince?, I actually like this shade very much. If not for the troublesome Essie formula, I would like to wear this much more often! I have a soft spot for all these light-nude shades of pink, it's somehow so girly and feminine that I can't resist.

Speaking of Essie formulas though, I just can't seem to master it! I find that almost all my Essie polishes are rather streaky and slightly goopy. It's not too bad when I paint them in an air-conditioned room like in these swatches, but of course that'd be equivalent to shutting myself into a sealed chamber with no ventilation, inhaling nail polish fumes at very close proximity. When I attempted yesterday to paint them with the door of my bedroom open and my fan switched on, the polish dried so fast (bad thing) that it turned positively goopy before I even managed to finish the coat, which was disastrous. To add to this, it dried just enough to turn goopy, but it didn't dry completely so when I hit my finger against something, it still ruined it after all. I removed all ten fingers in frustration.

Anyone else having such problems with Essie?

OPI Breathe Life

Warning! Sentimental post ahead.



This was 5 coats.

Yes, 5 coats.

So maybe it's not meant to be worn as a polish by itself? But it's so lovely though. I'd definitely give it a go over Black one of these days, along with OPI Give Me The Moon. OPI Breathe Life is a lovely sheer icy-blue fine glitter in a blue-tinged beige base (which you can't really see much of). I'm not sure what collection it's from, or if it's from any collection at all. It is the polish released by OPI in aid of Lung Cancer Awareness, in collaboration with the Lung Cancer Foundation of America. I'm not sure if proceeds from the sales of these polishes go towards this cause, but let's hope that it does spread the awareness of this terrible disease. If I'm not wrong (not entirely sure about this), this polish is limited edition!

As someone who is training to become a pharmacist, I'm academically exposed to the hard facts of this disease. Having a close grandma who passed away just at the beginning of this year from lung cancer, I'm also emotionally aware of the outcome. As we all know, those suffering from lung cancer are mostly long-time smokers. My grandma herself smoked for, I think, 60 over years. I'm thankful that my grandma was diagnosed at a rather old age and therefore was able to live her last years without the very, very painful, emotionally draining and expensive therapeutical options for the disease.

I wouldn't want to come across as a bit too naggy or righteous on a nail polish blog (that sounded incongruous), but I'd really like to take this opportunity to get any smokers out there to just contemplate quitting. The amount of money spent on cigarettes, over the course of so many years, only to have to spend more money later on for treatment that could have been unnecessary. And of course, as we all know, second-hand smoke kills as much as first-hand does. I'm even more concerned for those close to me, like my family and friends, who do smoke. It's not so much because I think smoking is evil or reprehensible, but more because I don't want to lose people I love so unnecessarily.

All right, I shall stop nagging. Hahaha. Other than that, IT'S A GREAT POLISH. XD If only it was more opaque!

OPI Do You Think I'm Texy?

From the Texas collection 2011.

This was 3 coats with no topcoat.

Awww, don't my nails look like strawberry gummies you just want to sink your teeth in? I'm beginning to appreciate this jelly finish (no nonsense about the sorbets, now). This is my very first proper jelly-finish polish! Unfortunately I accidentally ordered another one which means I've to sell one off to raise funds to buy the OPI Houston, We Have A Purple. Heh.

OPI Do You Think I'm Texy? is a berry-hot pink polish that is saved from being a little too striking with its jelly finish. You would notice that the close-up seems to be a bit peach/orange. And I've no idea why it appears as such. As I've ranted earlier, this was one of the polishes that turned up a completely-off shade of red in the photographs, so I had to tweak the settings a little on Photoshop to make it a bit more closer to life. The colour is closer to original now than it was previously, though not completely accurate either. In life, there is more of a red tone to it but you can definitely tell that it isn't a full-red from any distance, I imagine.

Also - annoying name. XD I keep typing 'Sexy' instead of 'Texy' when talking to my friends, which may lead to some awkwardness depending on who you're talking to.

China Glaze Ruby Pumps

Disclaimer: I'm almost ashamed to look at these photographs because it reflects almost nothing of the awesomeness that is Ruby Pumps.





From the Wizard of Ooh Ahhs collection 2009, and also released under the Loves You Snow Much holiday collection 2009.

This was 2 coats.

Do you notice something? Do you notice there is no close-up circle in my first photograph? I decided not to put it in because WHY BOTHER ZOOMING IN ON SOMETHING THAT ISN'T ACCURATE?

Attempting to photograph this polish (along with almost every other pink/red-pink/hot pink polish out there is a problem I doubt even Einstein could solve. Come on, has there not been a camera invented to deal with the flashiness of hot pinks and reds? It's not just this polish either, it's also OPI Do You Think I'm Texy, OPI Diva of Geneva, China Glaze Ahoy! amongst many others. All these come out way too red than they really are, although in this case, though it's more or less the correct shade, the levels that my camera downplayed the glitter effect of Ruby Pumps is nothing short of a blasphemy.

Rants aside, Ruby Pumps is a deep, rich red polish that has a semi-jelly base and has the best glass flecks I've ever seen (sorry, OPI The One That Got Away, you just got served). As if the colour of the polish isn't already sexy enough, China Glaze added in some winning glass flecks that makes the polish look as if it has RED CHRISTMAS FAIRY LIGHTS INSIDE!

I'm not very much of a red-polish kinda person. I shun vampy, vixen colours because I just can't pull it off. This is probably the 2nd full-red polish I own, and the first one isn't even really mine, I stole it from my mom (for unknown reasons). But the polish in the bottle captivated my heart in the store. Believe me, I warred with myself for a loooong time (until the store was about to close, actually) because I had no idea if I was going to ever wear it in my life since I don't like to wear red polishes, but omg, it was a great buy. I'd recommend it to anyone. It is really a whole lot more captivating in real life.

And yes, I am going to wear it, in defiance of my usual avoidance of red.

China Glaze Senorita Bonita

I've always wanted Blue Iguana from the Island Escape collection, but for some reason when I entered the nail polish shop, the one that caught my eye was this one.





From the China Glaze Island Escape collection 2011. This was 2 coats.

All the swatches in the world could not have prepared me for the brightness of this beautiful red-toned purple. It adds a splash of really bright, almost glowing colour to your nails, without transcending the thin line into the realm of neon. I wouldn't really quite call it neon because it doesn't have that eye-popping brightness, but the shimmer really does make it seem like it's glowing from within! It's complete with a sparse pink glitter that's not very noticeable but gives it a bit of texture! This polish was made to be eye-catching.

I used to be all over the blues and blue-greens but lately I seem to be transiting into a pink/red/purple phase where my pink/purple catalogue nail wheel has been filling up at an exponential rate.

Of scotchtaping, take 1!

As my weekend manicure this week, I painted the OPI DS Sapphire. Today being Sunday and having to take it off eventually, I decided to play around with it. I attempted scotchtaping before but I finally got it to work!



Base: OPI DS Sapphire
Pattern: OPI Ink

It's a jumble of pattern because I was testing them out, but it came out pretty well! The lines were neatly defined, contrary to my previous attempts.

I tried it first with frosty tape like the 3M sort, but I found that for some reason, the frosty tape would sort of be corroded or weakened by the nail polish (when you paint the nail polish over the tape), so when you attempt to remove it, it tears off into shreds and leaves bits and pieces of itself on the nail. It was a mess! I tried it again with clear tape and found that it worked a lot better. The only downside to clear tape is that you can't really see the line you're pasting so you'd have to be quite careful. Frosty tape had better visualization! But I've heard from others that frosty tape was better for them, so I'm not really sure if it's just the quality of mine!