Wet N Wild Megalast: Toxic Apple

Hi all! Late post today since I spent a good portion of my free time today working on my Halloween mani! I can't wait to show it to you later! It isn't perfect, but it did come out much better than I thought it would, especially since I threw it all together at the last minute, not really knowing what I was going to do when I sat down at my polish table. It was a lot of fun, but I made a gigantic mess, and my cuticles are not happy about all the sponging, painting, and cleaning up involved with this one. Having sensitive skin in the desert is not fun. But you're not here to listen to me whine! Let's see some polish!

Today I have another awesome new Wet N Wild Megalast Polish to share with you. Toxic Apple is a fab Deep Blurple polish with subtle pink and purple shimmer particles. I love Blurple polishes, and this one is a definite fave. Toxic Apple is actually a touch more on the blue side in most light, however it does flash the purple often. As a bonus, it's also a good one coater! (Sorry about the Lobster Hands - I didn't want to color correct since the polish is true to color in these shots)

Check out the nubbins! Growing nicely already...oh Qtica Natural Nail Growth Stimulator, How I love thee! But, more importantly, check out that color! Rawr!

Formula:
Toxic Apple has the standard Wet N Wild Formula, simply one of the best drugstore polishes around. Not too thick, not too thin, no glopping, gooping or thickening, and no bubbles, dragging or balding.

Application:
Opaque in a single coat, TA was lovely to apply save for one thing...the brush. This polish has the standard Megalast "Mani-curve" brush, which I usually don't mind. This time around I managed to snag the bottle with the wonky, uneven brush, which led to a very hard time getting anything near a clean line. Which meant more clean- up. Usually not too much of a drag, but this polish is HIGHLY pigmented, and even the smallest swipe of acetone left a blue streak along my skin and nails. Not worth skipping out on this beauty, but to avoid staining be sure to use a good base coat and try to steer clear of your cuticles, even with the edges of your clean up brush.

Overall the good certainly outweighs the bad on this one.  The brush issue seems to be a fluke, and I don't always think of dense pigmentation as a negative, it's just a minor annoyance with cleaning up and possible staining. I use either Qtica or OPI Nail Envy Matte as a base coat and I have had one polish actually stain my nails, and that was a Zoya. Since I always keep my nails polished, not a huge issue. Plus with a price tag of a whopping $1.99? Who can complain? ;)

What do you think of Toxic Apple and the new Megalast colors?

Be sure to check back later on for my "not-really-epic-yet-epic-for-me Halloween Mani", complete with Born Pretty Store Nail Art Brush Review!

Thanks for stopping by and Happy Polishing!
-Kimber

Wet N Wild Megalast Poison Ivy

Hello all! I have a couple of posts I want to get up today, since the photos were taken before my most recent length chop (I has a sad...I hate taking down my length, but I hate the weird curling more and it will not go away unless I file them down and start over. Boo!).

First up today is Wet N Wild Megalast in Poison Ivy. This years new releases from Wet n Wild have been fabulous. I love the Megalast line, but had been wishing that there were some darker, more vampy colors. Well, wish granted! I don't know if these are LE or specifically a Halloween release, (they were on a Halloween endcap) but they added a blackened emerald, a metallic cobalt, metallic gold, and a really awesome blurple.

The first of these new babies to catch my eye was Poison Ivy, an aboslutely stunning Blackened Emerald. In certain lighting, it has a bit of purple flash, kind of like Illamasqua Viridian, but not really.  It is a bit on the metallic side, but doesn't have a "true metallic" finish. Either way, this is one of the most gorgeous greens I have ever worn, and I was stopped several times by women wanting to know what polish I was wearing.

Photos all pre-chop. Please take a moment to feel my pain. :(

Oh what little length I had, how I miss you already!

Tell me this is not a breathtaking green! I am in love, and removing this gave me a sad. If you don't have this color, get thee to a Walgreens! It is well worth the $1.99 price tag.

Formula:
Very smooth and silky, no bubbling, dragging, balding, or gooping. Wet N Wild has always been my fave drugstore brand, and formulas like this are part of the reason why.

Application:
Poison Ivy flowed onto the nail smoothly. Consistency was perfect - not too thick, not too thin, and I had no issues with the polish thickening up during use. I'm wearing 2 coats for opacity, and it does need both. PI was a bit streaky on the first coat, but evened out perfectly with the second. I find this to be the norm with blackened hues.

I'm so glad I didn't pass on these, Wet N Wild has really made me happy polish fiend this Halloween. Between these and the Tombstone Fantasy Makers, I am a happy girl!

What do you think of Poison Ivy? Have you picked up any of the new Megalasts?

Thanks for stopping by and Happy Polishing!
-Kimber

31 Day Challenge (v.2!) Day 12: Stripes! (and a quick Salon Express review)

**Edit** More info coming later, but please note that there are some discount codes for my newest sponsors added to my sidebar. Please take advantage of the discounts**

Morning Ladies! Welcome to day 12 of the Challenge! Today's challenge is Striped Nails, and I gotta tell ya, I love the idea of this mani, but the stamping plate I chose to use is less than stellar and really frustrated me.

Awhile back (and I mean a loooong while back), when they first came out, I picked up one of the Salon Express Stamping kits. I was pretty stoked that there was finally a stamping kit that I could just run down to CVS and pick up, and for $10 for 5 plates and a stamper and scraper? Well, you can't beat that, right? So I picked up the kit, and it sat in my stamping drawer until last night when I decided that the striped image would be awesome for the mani I wanted to create. The plates are sturdy and seem fairly well etched, deep etching, clear images. I figure that would make for some really good stamping. Well, I was wrong. Despite the deep etching, I had a very hard time getting the image to pick up clearly. Since they are etched so deep, they hold a lot of polish, which meant that I had to scrape either very hard, or several times. Scraping hard just scratched up the plate, and multiple scrapes meant the polish would dry partially before I could pick up the image. I did manage to get the image to transfer okay, but.....and this is a big but for me...the full nail images are very narrow. Which meant that there was no way to get the image to cover my entire nail. That always drives me crazy. My nails aren't very wide, and even smaller images usually work for me. I have the first set of Mash plates, and those images are tiny, but still cover almost the entire the width of my nails. The Salon Express images left alot of uncovered space, which makes for some less than stellar looking stamping. All in all I wasn't that impressed with these and probably will not be using the full nail images again. I'll stick to my Konad, Bundle Monster and Mash plates for now, thanks!

Despite the less than stellar stamping, I do dig this mani. I wanted to do multicolor pastel stripes, so I grabbed my Wet N Wild Megalast polishes in Candy-licious, On A Trip, and I Need A Refresh-Mint to stamp with. I used Revlon Powder Puff, a matte white with lovely iridescent shimmer as my base (I love this color but the formula is nightmarish. Gloppy, goopy, and takes FOREVER to dry, even with SV!). I had seen Amy Grace do a rainbow mani kind of like this and loved it (oh how I wish I had her nails! Perfection!), so I was realy looking forward to doing this one.  Although I like the color combo and the idea, the base polish refusing to dry and the really irritating problematic stamping kit made for a less than stellar mani. But, in the spirit of showing you guys everything, here is my striped mani.

All in all I guess it didn't come out that bad. It's tolerable, but my eyes are just drawn to the naked spaces where (no matter how many times I re-did the stamping) the stamp just abruptly ends. I'll have to try this idea again with a different plate soon.  Strangely enough, the least of my manicure annoyances was the cat insisting on rubbing her tail against my freshly topcoated nails! Usually that drives me batty, but I was already swearing and threatening to take a blowtorch to those plates so the cat was the least of my worries!

Be sure to check out all the Varnished Vixens and their Striped Manis! I sure hope none of them had to battle with stamping plates! ;)


Kimber at Kimber's Lacquer Korner
-Kat at Hooked On Polish
-Diana at Nails By Diana
-Aly at Wonderland Beauty
-Meredith at Perfectly Polished
-Nicole at The Color Republic
-Kate at The Painted Pony Nails
-Cee at Absolutely Cee
-Sam at Polished Art
-Nail Narcotics
-Nicole at Nicole Gets Nailed
-Shelby at Shelby's Swatches
-Stephanie Louise at All Things Beautiful
-Mixed Mama
-Joanna @ Sweet Polish of Mine
-Patty Greenberg
-Liz and Lisa @ Lozlosa 
-Mari at Nailista
-Miss L at Beauty by Miss L 
-Gini at Sassy Paints 
-Chameleon Stampede 
-Pam at Nail-E-Glance
-Me, Myself, and Polish 
- Robin Sparkles  

Thanks for stopping by! I should have some swatches of Sally Hansen Lustre Shine in Firefly and Copperhead over the weekend for ya!

Happy Polishing!
-Kimber

31 Day Challenge (v.2)! Day 1: Red Nails

Good morning, ladies! Despite it being a Monday, I'm feeling happy and excited! It's Day 1 of the 31 Day Challenge, and I can't wait to check out everyone's red nails!

For my Red Nails, I decided to do a tape mani. I used Wet N Wild Megalast in I Red A Good Book, an awesome red Jelly, as my base color, then added chevrons using scotch tape and Pure Ice Silver Mercedes and Orly Liquid Vinyl.  This was the first time I've done actual tape Chevrons, and they came out much better than I expected.

I did have a hard time getting decent pics of this mani, though. Could have something to do with trying to take photos with my eyes half closed at 2 am!

I'm really happy with how this turned out! Not bad for my first Chevrons right? Although that little ding in my ring finger is driving me nuts! I have a bad habit of whacking the table as soon as I finish applying top coat. It never fails!

Be sure to check out all the fabulous Red Nails everyone is posting today! Just clicky the links below:

-Kimber at Kimber's Lacquer Korner
-Kat at Hooked On Polish
-Diana at Nails By Diana
-Aly at Wonderland Beauty
-Meredith at Perfectly Polished
-Nicole at The Color Republic
-Kate at The Painted Pony Nails
-Cee at Absolutely Cee
-Sam at Polished Art
-Nail Narcotics
-Nicole at Nicole Gets Nailed
-Shelby at Shelby's Swatches
-Stephanie Louise at All Things Beautiful
-Mixed Mama
-Joanna @ Sweet Polish of Mine
-Patty Greenberg
-Liz and Lisa @ Lozlosa 
-Mari at Nailista
-Greta at How Was Your Day?
-Miss L at Beauty by Miss L 

Our Next Challenge day will be Thursday. Orange Nails! Woohoo!


Thanks for stopping by and Happy Polishing! 
-Kimber