Twinsie Tuesday: Themes Revisited

For today's Twinsie Tuesday we're hitting the rewind button, revisiting any theme we particularly enjoyed. I tried to get Husband in on the action again, but I think he felt he'd already spent his artistic genius on The Bee. I was so tempted to do the floral nails theme again, but I do flowers all the time, so..."animal inspired" it is! Last August I had a blast trying to recreate the poisonous dart frog. This week I decided to go tropical fish. Specifically, this little dude.

source

The result was...interesting? I didn't recreate it very accurately, so my tropical fish kinda wandered into Van Gogh The Starry Night territory...

...not that I'd have the first clue where to start if I'd meant to do something remotely Van Gogh on purpose! I'll take it, though. And it's still animal inspired, even if it didn't wind up in quite the same place it started.

The base for these is China Glaze Splish Splash, which in addition to being brightly neon also has an amazing shimmer to it, which I tried to carry over to the acrylic paints, mixing in some silver and gold. Aaaand that's just about all I can think of to say about these because I'm still not quite sure what to make of them! They were a blast to do, though, and it was good to try something so different again. I really do enjoy getting outside my comfort zone once in a while!

Can't wait to see what themes everyone else decided to revisit this week!

Amanda at Amandalandish
Anna at Going to the Showing
Anne at Grape Fizz Nails
Chelsea at Nailed Blog
ChiChi at I'm Just Me...ChiChi
Cordia at Seriously Swatched
Elizabeth at Did My Nails
Katherine at Haul of Fame
Kelly at Tuxarina
Lakeisha at Refined & Polished
Maribeth at Obsessive Cosmetic Hoarders Unite
Marisa at Polish Obsession
Meredith at Polish and Charms
Nory at Fierce Makeup and Nails
Rachel at Top Coat It
Sarah at See Sarah Swatch
Traci at DrinkCitra

Color Club Beyond

I think I've mentioned a time or five that the Color Club Halo Hues are fabulous? Well, Beyond is no exception. Charcoal grey-black, it's easily the darkest of the Halo Hues and doesn't throw off quite the dazzling, holographic rainbow flare of the others in this collection, but that's such a relative comparison--we're still talking Halo Hues, and from my experience, that means we're still talking about a base level of awesomeness that other linear holo collections are hard-pressed to match.

This is three coats of Color Club Beyond, but two was totally sufficient. Again, this is simply my regular lightbox setup, since sunlight has been a rare commodity in Hongkers for the past couple of months, and this is pretty much indicative of how Beyond looks in regular room lighting. Not as intensely rainbow-hued as the others in this collection, but given its smoky, grey-black colour, that's not a huge surprise.

One of the things I've particularly appreciated about the Halo Hues is that unlike a lot of other linear holographic polishes, you don't need any special base coat to bring out their colourful flare, and top coat doesn't diminish the holo in any appreciable way. Actually, Sally Hansen Insta-Dri did just a little bit, when I experimented with a few, but the coverage on these is so great that even if you do get some fading when you top coat, you can just pop another swipe of the holo over it to get right back to peak fabulousness.

I may swatch Beyond again once the sun quits playing coy, just to see the difference in full sunlight, but I kinda like the more subtle rainbow this one gives off. Honestly it's still as strong as, or stronger than, any non-Halo Hue holo I've tried so far, but with the darker base colour, the shades it gives off are more like primary colours, and against the greyish-black, they look pretty dang swell.

Color Club New Bohemian

When I first picked up Color Club New Bohemian on my last shopping trip, I had a brief moment where I thought, "Don't I already have a lot of similar polishes?" but that nonsense was quickly squashed. Of course I have some similar polishes. Because I love them. And there is always room for more.

This is three coats of Color Club New Bohemian, from the autumn 2011 Back to Boho Collection (and thanks very much to my dyslexia, which twice had me just type that as "Back to Hobo"). With an even first coat, you could easily get away with two for daily wear, but since some of my first was a bit streaky--as first coats often are--I did a good three before I was ready to top coat and take pics. New Bohemian also dries to a semi-matte finish, but SV popped the creamy shine right up.

Similar to my favourite shades like China Glaze For Audrey and Skinfood Green Bean Milk, New Bohemian skews just a bit more green, with a slightly dusty, vintage feel. It's like antique jade and teal had a gorgeous baby, and I want to paint flowers all over its little face.

(Note to self: wear this again, and paint flowers all over its face.)

Am I ever going to have enough turquoises and minty teals? No. No, I am not.  And I'm okay with that.

White Flowers on Zoya Minka

Technically they're "mostly white with some cream mixed in to make them sort of vanilla," but that's a bit long for a post title... Anyway, after spending a day with Zoya Minka, I decided it was time to dress up this warm neutral with some floral nail art, taking this tutorial by Robin Moses as inspiration.

So many miles away from Robin's beautiful original, but I absolutely loved these! From arm's length, any little flaws or hiccups just melted away, and they looked like a sort of delicate wallpaper design, maybe something you'd see from Laura Ashley. Robin calls them wedding nails, and with the soft, shimmery base she used for hers, I can totally see it.

I really need to do a whole Robin Moses week soon. I have so many of her tutorials saved in my "Ooh, do this!" folder and bookmarked all over the place. She makes it all look so easy, and even when her designs are still totally beyond me, I feel like I pick up so much about nail art just from watching.

By the way, yes, I did this on my other hand too, and no, they weren't as good. But they were much better than I thought they'd be! Lefty still has a lot of catching up to do, but the practice is actually starting to pay off, and that really makes me feel good.

Twinsie Tuesday: Oldest Untried

This week's Twinsie Tuesday theme is our oldest untried polish, and for me that was OPI Extra-Va-Vaganza!. At least, I'm pretty sure it was. My collection only goes back a couple of years at most, and I definitely remember this being an early addition...

Extra-Va-Vaganza! is from the OPI Burlesque Collection, from late 2010. I didn't buy it until sometime in the spring of 2011. It came in a little Christmas-printed mesh bag along with Glow Up Already! and Sparkle-icious, both of which I've worn before, but this brassy-copper orange mix just hadn't quite grabbed me yet.

In all honesty, I probably wouldn't have bought this one on its own, but I spotted this threesome while my polish addiction was still all fancy and new and pretty much went, "ZOMG, sparkly!" I have to say, though, that I was really pleased with how much I liked this one. Much more even than these pictures show, the shimmering sparkle is just fantastic.

Three coats gave great, full coverage, and it wasn't until I had this one on and looking closely that I really noticed just how many colours are actually in there--in addition to the rusty orange, there's also silver, yellow, pink, green, and blue. And it's worth repeating that this is one of those polishes that looks much better in real life than in pictures. It may not have captivated me in the bottle, but there's a warm, dazzling glow to Extra-Va-Vaganza! that is definitely going to see this on my nails again come autumn.

Looking forward to seeing what blasts from the past the other Twinsies have in store for today!

Amanda at Amandalandish
Anna at Going to the Showing
Anne at Grape Fizz Nails
Chelsea at Nailed Blog
ChiChi at I'm Just Me...ChiChi
Cordia at Seriously Swatched
Elizabeth at Did My Nails
Katherine at Haul of Fame
Kelly at Tuxarina
Lakeisha at Refined & Polished
Maribeth at Obsessive Cosmetic Hoarders Unite
Marisa at Polish Obsession
Meredith at Polish and Charms
Nory at Fierce Makeup and Nails
Rachel at Top Coat It
Sarah at See Sarah Swatch
Traci at DrinkCitra

Guest Post at Peace, Love and Polish

Today I'm very excited to be a guest at Peace, Love and Polish!

Heather is truly one of my favourite bloggers, and I'm so happy to be able to help pitch in while she adjusts to life with her beautiful new baby boy. Congratulations, Heather, and all the best! ♥

Color Club Miss Bliss

What can I say about Color Club Miss Bliss that I haven't said about all of the Halo Hues polishes? Honestly, this entire line has been fabulous. The weather here has continued dreary for weeks on end, but that didn't stop me from wearing another one of these gorgeous holos because I remembered my lesson from Kismet--bright sunlight is always a plus, but these Halo Hues don't need it to look fantastic.

This is two coats of Miss Bliss, and sure enough, it shines like a boss, even indoors. And this isn't even direct light or camera flash--the linear holo just that freaking awesome. If memory serves, Miss Bliss is the third pink Color Club has released among the Halo Hues. Where Halo-Graphic is the darker of the first two pinks, Miss Bliss is even more so. And instead of being softly, dusty pink like Halo-Graphic, Miss Bliss is brightly pigmented with a vibrant, cool tone. So yes, I absolutely need them both.

One of the things I'm absolutely loving about this collection is that while the colours are still softer than the ones I usually wear, the combination of these colours with the incredible linear holographic flare is so appealing! Then again, I'd love this kind of holo-kablam with just about any colour out there, so pretty much, as long as Color Club keeps making these, I'm going to keep buying them because I'm officially hooked. Well played, Color Club!

For this last picture I folded back my high-tech light-diffusing pillowcase, and while you can see a little bit of a difference, I'm afraid the true extent of the rainbow fire was just too much for my camera to handle. Everything it couldn't fathom it turned a bright, periwinkle blue, and then it went to have a nice lie-down in a dark, quiet room. Fortunately it's feeling much better now because I still have a couple more of these Halo Hues left to try!