L'Oreal L'Orange

I apologize for not having blog posts up recently.  Last week I had a migraine all week long, and this week I had to go to court a couple of times, so I was busier at work and have not had time until now to blog.

L'Oreal L'Orange was my manicure polish during the last week of July.  I really loved this orange nail polish.  In the pictures below it looks red, but it's spot-on orange in real life.  My iPhone's camera just refused to show the orange as anything other than red.  The color reminded me of orange Tic Tacs, but I think Tic Tacs are a darker shade of orange.

The formula is a thin cream.  Maybe it's a crelly.  I had visible nail line at two coats, and I still had it at three coats, but I was getting darker than the polish bottle color, and I didn't want to have more coats, so I stopped at three coats.  The polish had a good formula, and it dried quickly.  The cleanup was easy, too.  It was very shiny even without top coat.  The brush is wider than Revlon's traditional thin brush.

I don't see as many blog posts about L'Oreal's polishes; I think that may be because many bloggers won't use products from companies at all involved with animal testing or whose parent companies conduct testing on animals.

I love orange-colored nail polishes, so I noticed when the Pantone Tangerine Tango polishes came out in Sephora stores earlier this year.  I had also heard that Sinful Colors Citrine was a dupe for Tangerine Tango.  Rite Aid sold Citrine months ago, but we don't have Rite Aids in Florida, and my local drugstores didn't carry Citrine . . . until a month or so ago when I spotted Citrine at a Walgreens display of Sinful Colors.  After asking for permission, I tested Citrine on my nail polish wheel right next to L'Oreal L'Orange, and they were identical.  They are 100% dupes.  So, I didn't buy Citrine then.  A few weeks ago I finally bought the Pantone Tangerine Tango polish set, and while L'Orange is close to Tangerine Tango--just as close as Citrine--it's not a 100% dupe.  But, if you own one of the three, you don't need to own the other two . . . unless you're a nut about orange polishes like me, and even I don't own all three, just two that are not 100% dupes.  Tangerine Tango is sold as part of a four-polish set for about $17, L'Oreal polishes retail for about $7 or $8, and Sinful Colors is normally priced at $2 but often goes on sale for $1.

In the pictures below, I have on base coat, three coats of L'Orange, one coat of Seche Vite, and a coat of Revlon Quick Dry Top Coat.  I didn't get much shrinkage from the Seche Vite.  The pictures were taken on day two of wearing the manicure and on day three I took the bottle pictures.

Direct sunlight.  My camera could not focus on the color when it was in direct sunlight.
In direct sunlight, the polish started to "glow" with an effect similar to the glow that I love from Revlon Chili and Hits Hula.

Direct sunlight.  This is the "glow" from another angle.

Direct sunlight.  "Glow" from another angle.

Direct sunlight.  Polish at a slightly different angle to the angle that created the "glow" above.

Indirect sunlight.  Very shiny!
You can see some tip wear after a day of wear.

Indoors.

Indoors.

Indoors, on day three.

Indoors, on day three.
This may be the most color-accurate photo if you look at the shade of orange of the polish in the bottle.

Thank you for reading my blog!

L'Oreal Greyt Expectations

My husband's Aunt Carole sent me surprise nail mail earlier this year, and inside were three L'Oreal polishes.  One of them was Greyt Expectations.  I really like it, but I have to say that my husband just can't wrap his head around the fact that women wear this color on their nails and that it's trendy.  This coming from a man who was into the goth look briefly in college . . . including non-traditional nail polish.  I really like the color, though.

The formula and brush were good in terms of application.  It has a creme finish.  The polish took a while to fully dry and cure, though.  I do my nails on Sunday night, and this polish had a nasty accident on Monday morning.  A nail dug into another and dented the polish all the way through to the nail.  I had to redo that nail quickly before work.  Luckily that nail dried quickly, and I didn't have any other dents.

The color is very pretty.  I don't think you can see it in the pictures, but it has the tiniest black specks that really add to the beauty of the color in my opinion.  The color to me looked like it had some purple in it.  In some lights it was just regular greige or concrete, in other lights it reminded me of some kind of clay, and in lower lights I could see the purple undertones.  I started calling it grurple.  And, I have Chinese crested hairless dogs, and one of my dogs' skin is the same shade of grurple here and there.  That has to be a first in the nail polish world:  matching the color of your hairless dog's skin.

The wear was good.  It lasted the entire week, although I did have to patch up my tips early on.  I did get shrinkage from Seche Vite and from Revlon Quick Dry Top Coat, but it wasn't too bad.  Cleanup and removal were easy.

Here are some pictures:

Morning Sunlight

Indoors Office Lighting

Afternoon Sunlight

Afternoon Sunlight

Thank you for reading my blog!

Nail Mail and Nail Haul

So, I had not been buying nail polish for over a week.  It doesn't seem like a long time, but my buying polish whenever I wanted was leading to larger online orders and more purchases at my local stores.  I didn't want to have to buy more storage. . . yet.  And, I told myself that I couldn't keep spending lots of money on nail polish and instead should be buying work clothes.  I have not bought work clothes since July 2011, and I need some.  But, I also told myself that I don't go and get mani/pedis at a salon, so I'm saving lots of money there, and why not just buy polish bottles instead of getting mani/pedis at a salon, right?  As long as I didn't spend more than $95 per month, I figured it was O.K.

After not buying polish for at least 10 days or so, and planning to continue on my no-buy path, I got surprise nail mail on Thursday.  Essie and Tom's footwear got together on Facebook a few weeks ago to give away 15,000 bottles of a limited edition Essie polish:  Barefoot in Blue.  It's a perfectly smooth cream in the most dreamy periwinkle color.  And, oh, how I had been wanting a periwinkle blue!  I swatched it on a nail wheel right away!

Then on Friday, I had *more* surprise nail mail!  My aunt-in-law sent me three new amazing L'Oreal polishes with a very sweet note.  She sent me Now You Sea Me (an aqua polish), Greyt Expectations (a greige polish), and L'Orange (an orange polish).  I was ecstatic!!!  I didn't even wait to take off all my work clothes before swatching all three colors on a nail wheel.

Here are pictures of my nail mail from Thursday and Friday:

 

 

The colors IRL were in between the colors in the two photos above.

#13 is L'Oreal L'Orange.  #16 is L'Oreal Now You Sea Me.  #17 is Essie Barefoot in Blue.  #18 is Revlon Colorstay Indigo Night.

I *love* orange, and I was afraid I might have a dupe of L'Oreal L'Orange in my Essie Orange It's Obvious, but L'Orange is lighter and brighter than the untried Essie, and it's darker than my untried Wet n Wild Megalast Club Havana.  Yay, no dupes!  

Some of my orange polishes.  No dupes for L'Orange!

#1 is WnW Megalast Club Havana.  #2 is Essie Orange It's Obvious (NOT A DUPE!  YAY!).  #3 is OPI Cajun Shrimp.

Then I was worried the NYSM polish would be a dupe of one of my blues, but it wasn't.  It was much darker than a very pale and sheer no-name blue shimmer polish from Icing (untried), and it was darker than my untried Wet n Wild Megalast I Need a Refresh-Mint.  

#18 Warpaint Galaxy.  #1 Icing no-name light blue shimmer.  #2 WnW Megalast I Need A Refresh-Mint.  #3 Icing no-name blue shimmer.  #4 Icing no-name darker blue shimmer.

#18 Warpaint Galaxy.  #1 Icing no-name light blue shimmer.  #2 WnW Megalast I Need A Refresh-Mint.  #3 Icing no-name blue shimmer.  #4 Icing no-name darker blue shimmer

I only have one other greige, the Wet n Wild Megalast Wet Cement (that my husband *hates,* so this polish has gone untried, too), and the L'Oreal is different from the WnW.  The L'Oreal leans a little to the dusty pink side and is lighter than Wet Cement.  I didn't get good pictures of my WnW Wet Cement and my L'Oreal Greyt Expectations swatches yet.

Today I bought three Revlon Colorstay nail polishes at CVS and a Revlon Top Speed nail polish.  For buying $15 of Revlon, I got $7 in Extra Care bucks.  I also bought a Spoiled brand nail polish at CVS for which I had a $.50 off CVS coupon. They were running a buy two get one free sale on Spoiled, but I didn't see two other Spoiled polishes I wanted. The Revlon Colorstays were $7.99 each, the Revlon Top Speed was $5.99, and the Spoiled was $1.99 = $29 before tax.  I had $1 off coupons for all three of the Revlon polishes and the $.50 coupon for the Spoiled, which brought it down to $25.50.  I bought $15 worth of the Revlons first (two Colorstays and a Top Speed), got the $7 Extra Care bucks, and used those to buy the fourth Revlon (a Colorstay).  In total I used $16 of Extra Care bucks, which brought down the nail polish cost to $9.50 cash out of my pocket.  That's not too bad!  Four beautiful polishes for $9.50 (before tax)!  Yay!!!

The first two colors I bought were Revlon Colorstay Indigo Night (I'm going to call it a dark periwinkle, but I am not good with color descriptions) and Coastal Surf (a sky blue).  I had wanted both colors since seeing them at another store a few weeks ago (when I made my last nail polish purchase before briefly going into no-buy status--what I bought then was a Revlon Colorstay polish at CVS that with coupons and discounts and Extra Care Buck rewards was actually a money-maker, so that was a no-brainer to "buy").  

My husband picked out Revlon Colorstay Bonsai (green with gold shimmer) for me.  The most beautiful polishes I own were picked out by my husband.  He's come a long way.  After years of only thinking in terms of pink and red and orange polish, in December he went out by himself and came back with the Sally Hansen nail strips in Teal with It, a bright, "electric" aqua blue.  I had mentioned once, in passing, how I was thinking of buying the strips.  And, that's how he is.  He surprised me with them the same day.  I wore them that night to the firm holiday party.  They matched my blue dress.  I got tons of compliments on that manicure, and it lasted about 11 days.  Since then my husband has picked out some gorgeous blue polishes and green polishes for me.  

The Revlon Top Speed I bought was Royal; I had been wanting it more and more each time I saw it on a new blog post. It's, as can be expected from the name, a royal blue.  The swatch on my nail wheel dried matte, but it doesn't seem particularly neon-like.

The last polish I bought today was Spoiled's Ants In My Pants, that I had wanted for a while, but I would do the old pick-it-up-and-put-it-back thing on every trip to CVS.  My husband picked Ants In My Pants today from the Spoiled display, and I took it as a sign from the nail polish gods and added it to my collection.  Yay!  Ants In My Pants is a re-release of the limited edition Wet n Wild release Behind Closed Doors, which is believed to be a dupe of the very expensive Deborah Lippmann Ruby Red Slippers.  AIMP has a black jelly base with red glitter in two different sizes.

Here are pictures of today's nail polish purchases:

Left to right:  Revlon Colorstay Indigo Night, Bonsai, and Coastal Surf.  Revlon Top Speed Royal.  Spoiled Ants In My Pants.

Not a great picture, but these are four of today's purchases swatched on a color wheel.  Left to right:  Revlon Colorstay Bonsai, Revlon Colorstay Coastal Surf,  Revlon Top Speed Royal, and Spoiled Ants In My Pants.

Another photo of four of today's purchases swatched on a color wheel.  You can't see Ants in My Pants too well on the right, but you get a different view of the Revlon polishes.

#18 is Revlon Colorstay in Indigo Night (not very color-accurate).  #13 is L'Oreal L'Orange.  #16 is L'Oreal Now You Sea Me.  #17 is Essie Barefoot in Blue.

I am going to paint my fingernails this afternoon.  I want to use a blue polish because a lot of the nail bloggers are wearing blue polish tomorrow for World Autism Awareness Day.  My husband said my new Revlon Colorstay Indigo Night was his favorite of all my new blue polishes, so that's what I will be wearing tomorrow.  I would have gone with a more wimpy choice of a lighter blue because I will be in the office tomorrow, but at least I don't have to go to court.  Usually I wear my blue polishes on my toes. I hope Indigo Night doesn't stain too badly!

My pictures aren't the best.  You can Google all of these colors and see AMAZING swatches by the more experienced and very talented nail polish bloggers.

Thank you for reading!