Kleancolor Military Green

After falling madly in love with Kleancolor's Holo Chrome, I decided to check out the rest of their offerings.

I find I really hate swatches on websites. When I saw China Glaze's holiday collection on their website, I was all "oh, ho ho ho-hum...." but once I saw that Scrangie's swatches I had to run out any buy it.
Unfortunately, Kleancolor's website suffers the same fault: bottle pics with photoshopped highlights. I will applaud them for having clear photos with a good amount of contrast and saturation - but we all know how things don't always look the same in the bottle.

Thankfully, that whole paragraph is completely negated by Kleancolor's flickr stream.

You should be able to click this and go there. If not, there's a link on their site.

Boo yeah! It must be lovely where Kleancolor is headquartered because they have outside, sunny photos of each colour. It almost makes it worthless for any of us in the midwest to bother swatching Kleancolor until summer.

But I'm going to anyway.

I saw Military green at my LBS but wasn't sure if I wanted to buy it. After being really underwhelmed by Galaxy Girl, I just don't feel like spending money on polish I haven't yet seen (thank God for Zoya's 3 for free deal, huh?). After viewing it on Kleancolor's flickr, though, I was pretty sure I wanted it and purchased it during my last beauty supply splurge. All 15 bucks of splurge...

3 coats + Orly Matte Top

I originally put this on last night and then scuffed it all up doing the dishes. In an instant of laze, I just slapped another coat on top today. For a very military look, I added the matte top coat I happened to have closest. Orly Matte Top isn't as matte as some of my other faves. I actually can't recall if I used this after I bought it. I'd really like to deathmatch my matte coats. My LBS has Kleancolor's Madly Matte, so I'll be sure to pick that up.  I hope that it will be more matte than Orly.

Even with more of a satin look rather than flat primer, I think I got a good army green base for some fun nail art.
And I know a thing or two about a military look...

Revlon Fire and Ice 2010!

Finally I get around to purchasing the whole collection AND posting about it!
I feel like I'm always a little late to the game. I finished buying the rest of the colours on Christmas at CVS (the only place that was open) and then this week it's absent from the other CVS by my house. Is it already gone?

Anyway, Revlon's Fire and Ice is a redux of a classic 1952 collection. Joining the classic namesake shade is 3 other shade; Demure, Temptress, and Siren. Fire and Ice's companion nail polish is called All Fired Up. I keep feeling like everything is so very familiar, so the whole collection could just be a rebranding.

As you can see from Revlon's site, linked above, the collection includes the retro logo on both the lipstick and the nail polish. Even better, Fire and Ice lipstick was released in a special, "limited edition" (excuse me, could you roll those eyes back to me?) throwback tube. It really was a faithful reproduction of the ones my aunt had sitting on her dresser - except in plastic. I can't complain too much though... Even the throwback tube was the same price as the usual, inline products.

Onward to the colours!


Demure:

Demure is a very soft, peachy, feminine shade. I haven't seen a single episode of Mad Men (I know, I know... I don't have cable.) but I'm a fan of the Barbie dolls and this seems to be a very Betty Draper colour.


Temptress

This actually may be Demure, not Temptress... Will change pic and caption as soon as I pull my bottle out.

Temptress is the pink cousin to Demure. This was the only polish I had any coverage problems on. It is a little sheerer. One of the big reasons I use nail wheels for polish swatches instead of my own nails is because of the constant staining from ink, dye, and paint under my nails. You can really see it here.


Siren

Siren is a very bold coloured coral. It really doesn't have enough pink in it to call it a coral. It is orange. Siren is orange and it is chic as hell! Notice the nail polish bottle says "NEW COLOUR". Will Siren be available year-round now?


Fire and Ice

Somehow I ended up without a nail polish bottle pic of All Fired Up. What a glam red cream! I really don't have anything else to say about that.

The entire Fire and Ice collection really is an accurate recall to the vintage glam of the 50's. I'm sure it was released right before the holidays in antici...pation of ladies wearing this to all their parties. But do the parties stop on January 1? NO WAY!
If you can find this at your local stores (Meijer and CVS had really nice displays for it, but I didn't see it at all at Walgreens), snap up the entire collection. It really is timeless and very flattering.

Kleancolor Holo Chrome

I first came across the Kleancolor brand at my local independent beauty store while on the search for makeup to go along with my 1940's living history persona. I found a daring red lipstick that went on smoothly, smelled beautiful, and wore almost all day!
So when I found their nail polish at another local store, I wasn't too hesitant about buying it.

Kleancolor Holo Chrome in the bottle... Featuring blur-o-vision to show the HOLO!!!

After reading this post by Emerald Sparkled, I am in a holo mood. I want everything sparkly and glitter and I WANT IT NOW!

Kleancolor Holo Chrome isn't quite like OPI Designer Series or what I imagine those Turkish lovelies to be like. It is a purple jelly (if my understanding of "jelly" is correct) with holo glitter in it.

Once on the nail, it has a slight grittyness, but nothing that wasn't cured with one coat of Out The Door's Northern Lights. What can I say, I just needed more sparkle!

I find I also really like the current Kleancolor bottle. It has a really chic look. Unfortunately, I discovered as I was shaking the bottle up at the store, the cap stem is not glued on. If you're a shaker, hold the bottle by the bottle instead of the cap. Thank God it didn't shatter all over the tile floor it landed on!!

The polish is very fumey and when dry (this one) has a grapey scent.
The ingredients are listed as: Butyl Acetate, Ethyl Acetate, Nitrocellulose, Formaldehyde Resin, Acrylates Copolymer, Steralkonium Hectorite, N-Butyl Alcohol, and Ethyl Alcohol.
So - long list short - NOT 3-free.

Orly Galaxy Girl

Found it on clearance for $3.99 at Sally Beauty Supply.
Hated it.
Exchanged it for China Glaze For Audry.
Am not sure if I'll like that either though :(

China Glaze Party Hearty!

I picked this up at Sally Beauty Supply a few days before Thanksgiving, but I'm pretty hardcore on keeping Christmas in the Christmas Season - which, in my mind, will never overlap Thanksgiving.

I played with it and have worn it a few times since Thanksgiving, but forgot to post about it. There's not that long until Christmas, so I should get on it!

The set includes:
Phat Santa, a rich red
Holly Jolly, a deep holly green (I used this for the Zombie experiments too)
and Party Hearty, a festive glitter in green, red, gold, and silver.

Party Hearty looks really great layered or on its own.

Here is 4 coats of glitter, 2 of glitter, each of the colours with 2 coats of glitter and bare, and OPI Alpine Snow with 2 coats of glitter.
So far, I've had the best feedback with the white.
2 coats of glitter may seem excessive, but I REALLY like glitter. Christmas seems like the only time of the year where something this glittery is seen as festive rather than childish.

Hot Pop Collection

A week or so ago, I posted about Creative bringing Hot Pop Pink into the Shellac collection...
...with lackluster results.

So here's the rest of the collection. Now that I see the whole thing together, I'm falling a bit in love with it again but am still unimpressed. I hope the Shellac will be nice.

Nothing else to say about it, so here's the pics:

OPI Tuxedo Collection

A recent post on Body and Soul, a blog I follow, reminded me of the beauty that is was is the Tuxedo Collection by OPI.
She titled it "Old School!", to which I replied "oh come now, it's not THAT old..."

Then I found it in a 2005 advertisement in a nail magazine.
For the fashion world, that's ANCIENT!!!

Even so, it capitalised on one classic rule of fashion - black never goes out of style.
Which to me is kind of funny because this was one of the first times that black was IN style for nails. Previously, black nails had pretty much been reserved for goths, punks, and all the other rockin' counterculture kiddies.  We had to stock up during Halloween and put up with the sheer, spotty coverage of what Markwins gave us. (And I do have to say now, Markwins is putting out some quality stuff - just look at everyone's reviews of the Wet N' Wild holiday palettes.)

Not only did OPI give us deep opaque coverage in a lush black creme - they gave us 3 different finishes!

Midnight Blue Glitter, Black Satin, Black Onyx, Alpine Snow

This pic is junk. I'm sorry. I swear I went to photography school. Really.
Anyway, OPI offered in the Tuxedo Collection:
Midnight Blue Glitter, a charcoal gray glitter with deep blue specks (needs 3 coats, but I give it 4).
Black Satin, almost a precursor to the Suede Collection - it is black with silver/gray shimmer and a gloss finish. It really looks like when you put a gloss topcoat over the Suede polishes.
Black Onyx, a beautiful pure black creme that is opaque in 2 coats and hard wearing.
Alpine Snow, a standard white shade. It had always been our beauty school standard for french tips but on the whole nail I find it needs a minimum of 3 coats, sometime 4, for complete opacity.

The ads all showed different ways to give yourself a tuxedo manicure like doing the tips black or even drawing a little bowtie on the nail. I actually find the suggestions to be clever and it would be really fun to go to a black tie event with that kind of whimsy (and that thought may be the reason I've only been invited to one black tie event).

Alpine Snow and Black Onyx are now part of OPI's standard line. I've seen Black Satin pop up from time to time at the nail supply shop but I don't know if it is old stock or if OPI releases small amounts. Midnight Blue Glitter, to my knowledge, has not been produced since 2005. It can be found on eBay usually without the HUGE markup of other discontinued shade.
With storage in an outside garage for a year, my bottles did not suffer a bit (they were inside in a closet the rest of the years). Some of my polishes show separation from having frozen then been subjected to heat so bad all my LPs warped, but the entire Tuxedo Collection applied just as the day I bought it.

Glitter and Gel Part 2!

I've talked a few times already, I think, about how much I love the OPI Designer Series. Somehow, I missed out on China Glaze OMG (found some at the supply shop today, though) so I'm diggin' the holo sparkle of DS.

After the success of the iPod glitterizing with Spitfire, I decided to take my Divine manicure into a more permanant arena...



I didn't get a "blur-o-vision" of this one, but the holo on this is pretty amazing too! Divine sparkles with blues and silvers. Very lovely and multi-dimensional.

I used the same method as before but did both the front and back this time. On the back, the brushstrokes didn't level out all the way. I'm not sure if I should be using more or less gel, a wider brush, or thinner product. Time will tell.

Til then, here's some rad pics of the project...

Matching nails. This is just too good of a shade. I may need more bottles!

I wish this captured the many colours of the sparkle better.

I see blue, and I see silver, and I see gold, and I see....

Glitters and Gels

Last week, I got my order from Premier Nail Source. I love them as a distributor so, so much. Their shipping is quick, orders are packed safely and personally, and they give you a FedEx tracking number as soon as it gets picked up - I didn't even have to ask for one!

One of the things I decided to invest in is a UV Gel system. I have had brief tutorials on using a few gels from Young Nails at trade shows, but have never used them myself so I went with an inexpensive kit that came with a lamp and sample sizes of products.

The Nouveau Nails UV Gel Starter Kit

I don't wear false nails, though, so I don't really have anyone to practice on right now. I wanted to get the hang of working with the brush and lamp, so an old habit and a new colour inspired me...



Pure Ice's Spitfire really drew my eye. Even under the crap light at the WalMart, I could see the intense sparkle (check out the blur-o-vision!!) and as soon as I saw the name, I knew I NEEDED IT!!!
(Trivia: I'm a HUGE aviation nerd and one of my favourite memories is driving down the Dan Ryan as a formation of Spitfires flew overhead on their way home from Oshkosh.)

This colour was more than just a nail laquer - it was a lifestyle and I had to properly capture it!

One of my old hobbies was to cover most everything with nail polish for a customized look. I would do my sunglasses, my electronic organizer, my Tamagochi, my cellphone (in SRO Silver! WOOT!)... If it was paintable, it got painted.
The only problem was that it chipped easily and glitters left a bumpy surface.

The solution? Gel overlay!

After covering the face of a hard plastic Belkin iPod case with Spitfire, I used 2 coats of Nouveau Nails UV Gel (each cured under the light), and was able to skip any topcoats.
The gel came out a little bumpy and would probably benefit from a buffing, but I think it's pretty great for a first attempt!

I can't wait to use the gel more - hopefully on NAILS soon!

China Glaze Zombie Zest

I don't know how behind the times it is to take a look at Halloween polishes, but I love Halloween and wear Halloween clothing and keep up my decorations year-round.
I found Zombie Zest, part of the Awakening Collection, at Cosmoprof for $1.99 on clearance. They had the whole boxed Awakening Collection for $7.99 but they also had the VooDoo box for $3.99 so I got just my favourite colour.

Wow! Looking to see if China Glaze still had a link to the collection, I discovered this polish was reviewed by some other bloggers as early as July this year. Now, my mantra is "Halloween is every day" but releasing a collection in July seems a bit early. Ah, that's the fashion world for you. I *AM* pretty behind...

When I first got the polish, I was wearing OPI Who the Shrek are You? and just put it on over. It looked siiick. It really looked like glistening, rotting flesh or the skin of a salamander. I got to thinking about using it as a layer glitter rather than on its own.

So I tested different greens!

The new colour balance makes everything look kinda blue.

CND's Hot Pop Yellow, OPI Who the Shrek are You, Sally Hansen Lickety-Split Lime, Some Neon, China Glaze 4 Leaf Clover, China Glaze Holly Jolly, Finger Paints Expressionist Red, and Zombie Zest.

I thought it would be neat to throw in a few odd ones. Zombie Zest over Shrek looked really sick, so I wanted to see if a red base would mystically transport me to Silent Hill or something.

Hot Pop Yellow, Shrek, Lime, Random Neon Green

4 Leaf Clover, Holly Jolly, Expressionist Red, 4 coats of Zombie Zest

Each colour got 2 coats of Zombie Zest and I also did just some Zest to see what it is like on its own.

On the Yellow, it really reminds me of a salamander and on the red it came out very gold. It was quite surprising to see the variations on Zombie Zest when placed on different bases. I almost want to take this nail wheel into my Colour Theory class for extra credit.
And as soon as I typed that, it sounded like a good idea.

*packs up schoolbag for tomorrow*,

News?

Do I finally have relevant news? Goodness, I hope so!

I put nail stickers on my Japanese Rose Garden. I got them from XXI about a year ago...

They're.... okay. They were cute and I had fun with them but they chipped off quickly. At the salon, I have my hands in water all day so I really need longevity out of my stuff. I have a lot of polish that will last a week or so, but even the polish - not just the stickers - peeled off. Lame.

But that's okay!

It's time for a celebratory change anyway....

NEW SHELLAC COLOURS DUE OUT SPRING 2011!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


In addition to the current offerings, CND will be adding to the Shellac line:
Mother of Pearl
Beau
Clearly Pink
Gotcha
Hollywood
Decadence
Masquerade
Iced Coral
Cocoa
Rock Royalty
Black Pool

and....

HOT POP PINK!

Ooh, Hot Pop Pink was one of my most favourite colours. I still have the entire Hot Pop collection, as well as a display backer card I stole from the beauty supply store. Man, I even have a binder from beauty school that I did completely Hot Pop themed.
So yeah, I'm obviously.... stoked....?

Hm. This is not the Hot Pop Pink I remember. It's a bit washed out because I couldn't get the camera to white balance for anything but the flash, but that is pretty dead-on as far as the shade goes.
It's Barbie pink.
Not that I have a problem with Barbie pink, it's just that Hot Pop Pink was so loud and in your face and WOOO LOOK AT ME I'M PINK!!!!!
This took 3 coats for even a streaky coverage and is still sticky without top coat a half hour later.

This is not the Hot Pop Pink I remember.
Has anyone else had problems with their older polishes getting strange like that? Everyone seems to talk about needing to thin it out and having stringy application. This was quite unexpected.
I'll be swatching the rest of my Hot Pop collection to see if it's just a pink problem and will be hoping hoping HOPING that the polish, not my memory, is faulty and the Shellac will be nice.

OPI Japanese Rose Garden

Found this one in my polish box this evening when I was going through it for green polishes.
Pinks like this usually aren't my thing (exception, Mod About You). I go for hot pinks like China Glaze's Pool Party or glitters like OPI Glow It and Show It. I don't recall how this one came to me. I imagine it happened the same time as Let Them Eat Rice Cake and Miso Happy. I'm pretty sure I've never worn it.

With flash, tungsten lit (I swear I'm trying to get into CFLs)

Japanese Rose Garden is a lovely salmon pink with a silver frost. Very delicate and feminine. I really see this as a princess colour. I can't wait to do some rhinestone nail art or lace Konad stamps with it.
The consistency of this was really off. It took 3 rather thick coats to get full opacity. The formula was rather thin, but runny and streaky, leading to globby bits that got to thick in some areas. I used Rush Top Coat, but can see brushmarks. That's the way frosts go, I guess.

No flash.

I rather love this shade. It's very fun to try out things that don't fit with the Punk Rocker Who Loves Barbies version of myself. I can already see parts where this is peeling off my nails though, so soon it will be back to some kind of glitter.

China Glaze ON SALE

Premier Nail Source has China Glaze on sale for $2.50 a bottle!!

I don't know if you have to provide a beautician's license to shop there, so I apologise if one is needed. Even if they don't require it, a LOT of the products on there are intended for PROFESSIONALS ONLY so please stay safe and limit your purchases to traditional nail lacquers.

30's moon manicure

Felt like busting out my fave red, Finger Paints' "Expressionist Red". For Veterans Day, I thought I needed something to match the many paper poppies I'm sure I'll be picking up.

 

This was my first time doing the moons. I didn't have a brush to take the moons out so I used a little bit of cotton wrapped around an orange stick. I think using a brush would be a lot better.
I can't wait to try this again.

More of my fave polishes!

When it comes to nail colours, I like to think I'm quirky or a little different. In some ways I may be, but I haven't really changed much at all for years. I've always gotten the same colours - green, pink glitter, blue, and black.

This week's new purchases were no different. When I moved from Chicago to Indianapolis, very little stuff could come with me, but I was sure that my best nail polishes did. Here's what I had (with my new ones now added)

1) Absolutely Alice from OPI's Alice in Wonderland collection.
This is by far one of the best glitters OPI ever made. Once I moved all my stuff from Chicago to Indy (a year after I moved my body here), I found a box of nail polish dating from 8th grade to my beauty school 8 years later. In it, I found 4 or 5 different blue glitters. Not a single one is as good as Absolutely Alice is. Not a single one could have such nice coverage in only 2 coats. This polish is perfect. Absolutely perfect.

2) DS Divine from OPI's Designer Series
The Designer Series is everything it has ever said it is. It has amazing coverage, intense holographic sparkle, and long wear. Divine is 100% pure Barbie. I'd pair it with Stila's or MAC's Barbie cosmetics collections (more on Stila's later). When I wear this, I have trouble not looking at my nails. Now that I'm going to take a job back in a salon, this will have to be vacation polish. Yes, it's that distracting for me.

3-7) See yesterday's post.

8) Russian Navy from OPI's Russian Collection 
I believe this is now in the normal stock. At least, we had it in line at Ulta last year. I remember when it came out everyone was ga ga for the fact that it was "off black". It really is deep. When the Russian Collection hit shelves, I was spending too much money on fine art supplies (though little of what I've ever made could be called "fine" art) so I got a knock off version. Too blue! The OPI version has this... something about it. It's blue, true, but it's not dark blue. It's something different.


9) "Summer French"
This was one of the new polishes I got this week too. I hate the way it looks on the wheel though. In actuality, it's a very sheer red shade. This is very like the polishes used in the 20's and 30's. I'm trying to get a more retro aesthetic to my fashion lately, so I figured I'd give this a go. The jury's still out on it. It seems to be a "private label" polish and I got it at the pro supply store but Orly's Beverly Hills Manicure is very much like it.

10) Miso Happy With This Colour from OPI's Japan collection
Sadly, I think this one is discontinued. I have always called it my "going to court" polish. On my skin tone, it is very natural but still finished. It can have a sheerer coverage, but I always do 2 coats - usually without base and top because it gets removed rather quickly... Not because it's a bad colour; because it's just not really "me".


11) Let Them Eat Rice Cake from OPI's Japan collection
I'm pretty sure this one is supposed to be a sheer coat. When done with only one, it doesn't get streaky like so many other sheers do. It's a little light for my tastes, but it was given to me at a beauty show so it went into the grandmother-approved collection. I've worn it several times to go do bridal trials or office job interviews. Sometimes, you have to play dress up.

12) Barefoot in Barcelona from Espana by OPI
Holy crap holy crap holy crap this is my FAVOURITE COLOUR!!!!!
I know I don't usually tend toward the neutrals, but this one is just so timeless and classic I don't think anyone can pass it up. In fact, the ENTIRE Spanish collection was perfection in a bottle. I call it my "rich lady" colour. My hands just look so refined and my nails look long and well formed when I wear this. It really goes well with any skin tone. I think everyone should own it. Even better - it comes in a no-chip gel polish form! Just be sure to see a professional to have it applied. OPI's UV gels are NOT for consumer use!


13) Can You Tapas This? from Espana by OPI
Lucky 13 - Can you Tapas This? NO YOU CAN'T!
If I had the money for the whole collection, I would have bought it. Can You Tapas This is a perfect deep burgundy with just a hint of brown to bring it neutral. It's another of my "rich lady" polishes. Very chic, very vintage! This is a wonderful colour for the 20's smokin vamp. I think this one has gone into the in-line collection as well.


Looks like I have a few more spots on the colour wheel. I can already think of a few that are missing. Lincoln Park After Dark, for one. Black Satin from OPI's Tuxedo Collection belongs on there too.
What do you think? What colours would you put on your wheel of favourites? As an inaugural blog contest, the first commenter to this post will receive a full-size OPI polish in my choice of colour. Perhaps one of my faves will become your new fave!

New Nail Polish

I have ALWAYS been a fan of nail polishes!
As a young girl, my mother subscribed to a faith that did not allow the wearing of cosmetics or nail polish (or slacks, or jewelery, or modern hair styles, or...). That faith worked for her, but as a fan of New Wave bands like Culture Club and Missing Persons it didn't work for me.

You mean Boy George is a boy?! All the better!

When my father married a cosmetologist in October of 87, every holiday spent with him was like an act of rebellion. I spent my days in the salons where she worked and played with the haircolor swatch rings, putting the samples up against my own hair (Level 5 Ash Brown, I discovered) and thinking of all the cool punk rock things I would do when I grew up. Punk would never die, after all... Not like disco!
His wife was also certified to do Tammy Taylor nails. Acrylic nails were the new hotness back then and not every salon offered manicuring services. Tammy Taylor was (and still IS in many ways) the best system available so as word got around that she used the best products, her reputation grew... And as her reputation grew, her collection of nail polish colours grew!

When I was younger, I could only paint my nails with my right hand. The boys I played "superhero" with would tease me and call that my "COOTIE HAND!" It was a bit of a duality - I only "had cooties" when I would do things outwardly girly. Otherwise, I was just one of the boys - except for that one hand.

Back then I would usually wear whatever my dad's wife had available. There were always beautiful reds but also shades like "Muted Wine", "Dusty Plum", and "Windswept Arbor". In other words, "mauve". There was also tanning beds in her salon (nothing I ever took part in) so she always kept around "California" colours like neons and pastels. I always gravitated toward neon pinks and various greens.
The mid-90's came and her design focus changed. She opened her own salon and put aside nails for styling people like Courtney Love and Beck. My tastes still leaned toward obnoxious nail colours though.  My mother and I finally came to an understanding on nail polish so I started buying from the Delia's catalogue and brands I could get at K-Mart like Street Gear and Jane.

As I grew up, I found the only thing that changed was my brands. I started wearing Orly, OPI, and Creative (now CND).  I would sometimes have to mix shades to get what I like but eventually my generation "grew up" and started making the decisions - like putting BLACK NAIL POLISH (3 shades, in fact) into OPI's fashion collection! For the first time, I didn't have to stock up at Halloween.
OPI continued the trend of previously avant-garde colours and the rest of the salon brands followed suit. Today, I can find most any shade I could ever dream of having....

And in fact, this week I found 5 shades I dreamed of having!

1) OPI Burlesque Collection; Sparkle-isicous (gold, red, pink, and blue sparkles)
2) OPI Burlesque Collection; Show It and Glow It (various pink and silver sparkles)
3) OPI Shrek Forever After Collection; Who the Shrek are You? (an intense chartreuse green)
4) OPI Coleccion Espana; Here Today, Aragon Tomorrow (dark, almost black, green)
5) China Glaze Rainbow of Hope; Ovarian Cancer/Four Leaf Clover (light blue-green)

Aren't they all just so interesting and beautiful?
I can't ever resist glitter nail polish. When I saw a preview this summer that OPI was doing a collection based off the movie Burlesque I was pretty excited. OPI polishes and strippers? Well that's gotta be a HOT collection. Then I found out that CHER was going to be in the movie and I just went over the moon. CHER?!??! I LOVE CHER!!!!! As always, these glitter polishes are a wonderful quality. They only needed 2 coats to get the coverage shown and dried as quickly as the other polishes.
Shrek and Aragon took me some convincing to buy. I have always loved green polish but I never get the coverage I expect. I loved every other colour in the Spanish Collection, but shied away from Aragon. I had a manicure at my favourite place in Indianapolis and decided on that colour and was not disappointed. It opened the door to not only add it in to my collection but to also try Shrek and the China Glaze Four Leaf Clover.
A "psychic" once told me that seafoam green is my "power colour". I'm not very sure what she meant, and she said that I would be stinkin' rich by now, but neither of those points detracts from the fact that Four Leaf Clover is one of the most lovely shades I've seen in a long time. And when you purchase any of the Rainbow of Hope colours, China Glaze will donate funds to cancer research organizations. Check out the shades - they are raising awareness for not only Breast Cancer (pink, of course) and Colon Cancer (brown, LOL) but also Male Breast Cancer (a lovely blue) and a very fall chic grey Brain Cancer.

I really love all these shades. I've gotten out of my usual practice of weekly polish changes. I'm hoping this new purchase reignites my passion for this simple accessory.