Ombre Manicure

I am not one for intricate nail art, however, I have been a bit more adventurous with minor nail art. I've delved into the accent nail, and now, I've tried an ombre manicure.

Ombre manicures consist of 5 different shades of the same color group, one on each finger. Honestly, even with my fairly large collection, it's difficult for me to pick out a set of similar colors. This time I just let myself go. I picked shades of black and gray. With the exception of one gilttery polish, I picked cremes.

On my thumb I used Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear White on. It's awful. I don't know why I have it. It's a thick and gloopy, but at the same time streaky white-out type of polish. On my pointer finger I used Zoya Dove. Middle finger is Nails, inc. The Thames. Ring finger is Orly Rock Solid and pinky finger is Orly Liquid Vinyl.

I've had this manicure on for three days now, which is normally my limit for nail-polish boredom, so it's probably going to come off soon. I actually received a lot of comments (many confused) on it, but I actually kinda like it.

Next I have to start looking for a good green polish for St. Paddy's Day even though I don't have a drop of Irish blood in me.

Free Zoya Polish!

So, did everyone take advantage of Zoya's 3 free polishes deal? I took this as an opportunity to not only get 3 free, but to get a few more.

A few weeks ago I took advantage of Zoya's free spoon deal and ordered 6 of them. Of those spoons, I added Crystal and Julieanne to my basket. In addition to those two, I grabbed Tiffany - a glittery peachy pink, Annie - an orange with golden shimmer, and Indigo - a deep, dark blue with blue shimmer and sparse holographic (!) glitter. I swatched them all out, and I have to say I am VERY happy with my purchases (and freebies!)

Zoya Tiffany

Zoya Tiffany closeup

Tiffany - this was a lovely peachy-pink with very dense pink and gold glitter. It is the glitteriest of the 5 that I got. Despite all of the glitter, it went on very easily and dried smoothly. This was 3 coats.

Zoya Annie

Zoya Annie closeup

This was a fantastic orange - and I do love orange - with lots of golden yellow shimmer. This left some subtle brushstrokes, but it wasn't too bad. The coverage on this one was excellent. This picture is 2 coats. I love this one.

Zoya Indigo

Zoya Indigo closeup

Indigo. This was a fantastic color. It was a very deep navy blue with a lighter blue shimmer. There is also a very sparse holographic glitter suspended in it as well. It gives it just the right amount of glitter to give it that little something extra. It was hard to photograph, but it looks awesome. At first I thought it was going to be streaky because the first coat didn't go on very well, but the second coat evened all of it out. This picture is 2 coats.

Zoya Julieanne

Zoya Julieanne closeup

Julieanne. Ok, this one wreaked havoc on my camera. When I took the picture without the flash, it was true to color, but make my skin look a jaundiced yellow. When I used a flash, my skin was the right color, but the polish looked blue, which it absolutely isn't. It's actually a deep purply-black base with dense dark purple and pink glitter suspended in it. It takes on almost a duochrome-like effect. Just to show the craziness with the flash, I have a little comparison.

 

The left side is no flash, but true to polish color, the right side is with a flash and true to skin color. Now, there was no direct sunlight today thanks to snow and cloudy skies, so that's whats making my skin so yellow. But the polish is on target!

Zoya Crystal

Zoya Crystal closeup

Crystal. A lovely medium icy blue with flecks of large gold glitter dispersed through it. Great color, application was less than great. It took three coats to make it look ok, but I was getting some bald spots and cuticle drag. I can get over it for a nice color, though.

When I put this on, I thought it resembled a color I had in my stash - Essence Choose Me. I fetched it out of the draw and made a little comparison

Zoya Crystal on top and Essence Choose Me on bottom

They are both blue polishes with gold glitter, however the essence is a bit more turquoise hued and jelly like. The gold flecks are smaller in Choose Me as well.

Zoya Crystal and Essence Choose Me

They're close, but there's a definite difference in the two. A big enough difference that I don't feel guilty owning both!

So, did anyone else pick up their 3 free Zoya polishes?

Wanna spoon?

Heh, I will never tire of that little pun.

A few weeks back, Zoya had a little special with their spoons. You could order 6 spoons for free, and shipping is always free on the spoons - so they sent you six spoons for free. I like the idea of the spoons - they send you an oval of color on a plastic "spoon" to see the color as it appears dried, rather than in the bottle. I do this with all of my polishes on a color wheel I buy at Sally's. Even better is that they give you a discount coupon for a later purchase.

I scoured the site and picked six colors that interested me:

Top Row: Astra, Crystal, Anaka.
Bottom Row: Julieanne, Nidhi, Lianne

 

 

The six colors I picked were Astra, Crystal, Anaka, Julieanne, Nidhi and Lianne. I was impressed with all of the colors I picked out.

Astra

Astra is a pinky red glitter. The glitter is pretty chunky. This would need a nice, thick base coat like Seche Vite to even think about smoothing it out. I'm still undecided on this one as I have a few glitters, yet I typically avoid glitters on my nails. Not that I don't like the way they look, it's that I dread removing them.

Crystal

Crystal is a bright blue with flecks of uneven-sized gold glitter pieces. This one isn't just glitter, so it dried a little smoother. This color is a definitely buy. This was my favorite of the bunch.

Anaka

Anaka is a shimmery fuchsia pink. I love this, but I have a few colors like it - still on the fence.

Julieanne

Julieanne is a deep dark purple-blue with purple and blue duochrome. I think this one is also a must-buy. I loved the color. It was very hard to capture all of the color-changing shimmer in this one.

Nidhi

Nidhi is an orangey-red shimmer. I'm leaning towards purchase on this one.

Lianne

Lastly, Lianne. This one was a shimmery (see a pattern here??) yellow-orange. I absolutely love the color, but when held up against my hands, it just didn't look right. So as much as I absolutely love this color, I think I will have to pass on it.

So, I'm at 2 definites and 2 maybes. They also have a new line coming out (which Vampy Varnish already reviewed) and I know that the green color - Gemma - will be on the must buy list. I'm going to wait until that line is released on the website and then scoop up the 3, maybe 4 that I want.

Did you take advantage of the Free Spoons? What colors did you pick?