It’s been weeks since I’ve posted a Mani Monday, and I have a lot to say about the polishes I’ve been wearing lately. Some good, some bad, some…no. Just no.
Let’s start with a springy mint green with a wintery name, OPI My Dogsled is a Hybrid. I snapped a picture of this one when Olivia Newton-John’s “Sam” was playing on XM.
This was a really great polish, and I got a ton of compliments on it. I swear, random cashiers everywhere I went said they loved my nails. It applied really nicely, and it lasted about as well as I can expect from my manicures. I wore it on my toes too for about three weeks. Highly recommend this one.
Next is another OPI, Koala Beary. This one looks pinker in real life. It’s coming across as more red in the photo than it really is. I liked this one as well. Applied nicely, stayed on fine. Not a lot to say about it. It’s another bright pink cream from OPI. I picked up all of these polishes from Ulta in the Clearance section. I’ve been having really good luck finding polishes on clearance at one particular Ulta (but not any others, go figure).
This is a definite winner, OPI Grand Canyon Sunset. It’s not a great photo. It was cloudy that day or something, and my lighting is bad. But I’m telling you, if you don’t have this color already, you need it. I mentioned this purchase to a couple polish fan friends, and they said, without fail, “Oh yeah, I have that color, and I love it.” Why didn’t anyone tell me?! It looks pinker in real life than it shows here, but it is a very warm pink. It applies like a dream. It’s very nearly a one-coater. I probably could have gotten away with one coat, but I went ahead and did two. It wore pretty well too. Win.
Sadly, they can’t all be winners. *sigh* Where to begin with this Hello Kitty polish fiasco? Well, I don’t know whether to blame this on the actual polish, or on the base coat. Likely, it’s the base coat. If you hate taking off glitter polish with nail polish remover like I do, you may have wondered about using a peel off base coat. I decided to give it a go, and I purchased OPI’s Glitter Off base coat to try with this OPI Hello Kitty Collection polish, Starry-Eyed for Dear Daniel. You see this mess? This is day two. TWO. I’m not even kidding, I painted my nails Sunday night, went to bed, and woke up Monday morning with a chip. What am I doing in my freakin’ sleep to chip my nail polish?! By day two, I couldn’t stand it. I took this photo, then promptly started peeling it off.
So, here’s the thing. If you create a base coat with the sole function of being able to peel off easily, it’s not gonna stay ON. I guess. I’m not a scientist. It seems like there should be some way to make it stay on for a little while? Say whilst one sleeps? And honestly, it didn’t peel off that easily when I peeled on purpose. I kind of had to hack away at it while I listened to a boring conference call worked diligently at my desk.
The actual color? Well, I got a lot of compliments on it. And no, they weren’t all from 12-year-old girls. It was very pink and very sparkly, and a nice change from three weeks of cream polishes.
The next time I did my nails, I tried another of these OPI Hello Kitty ones, Look at My Bow! It looks okay in this photo. The photo is blurry. Don’t let it fool you. This polish is a disaster. It applied really streaky. I did three coats, and I still had streaks. It was awful. And it’s just a pink cream, nothing special. If you want a color like this, go for Opi The Minnie Mouse Limited Edition Collection, If you Moust You Moust
So there you have it. Four weeks worth of manis in one big post. The Hello Kitty ones were both in the same week, and each lasted just a couple days, because, no. My nails are bare today. I needed a break from the disappointment. I’ll watch the Voice tonight and try something new and hopefully fabulous.