Zoya Sarah

I've actually owned my namesake from Zoya for a long time now, but I've only ever worn it on my toes before.  The theme was "My Favorite Red" this past week in my favorite Facebook group and I thought it was a good time to break Zoya Sarah out from pile.  I also had just received two new stamping plates on Monday, that I had purchased myself from Nailz Craze, so I was anxious to use them.  This was 3 coats of Sarah, stamped with plate NC03 and Konad Special Polish in white.

I will say that I probably have other red polishes that I like a little more than Zoya Sarah, but Sarah is definitely near the top of the list.  I like the darker, ruby tone of it and the subtle flaky sparkle it has.  I think the sparkle is a bit more noticeable in the bottle than on the nails, but it's still pretty darn gorgeous.  Like most Zoya polishes I've used, it had a great application.  I might have been able to get away with 2 coats, especially since I was stamping over it, but I went with 3 just to even everything out.

The Nailz Craze plate, by the way, worked great.  I've been wanting to buy a few of these plates for a while.  I finally ordered them and I was not disappointed.  The designs are a great size for all different nail lengths and quality of the plates is definitely high.  I had no issues with stamping at all with this design.  The design stamped clean and crisp each time.

I will say I had a tiny bit of staining when I took Zoya Sarah off.  More staining on my skin actually than on my nails, but I think I can actually blame that on not taking my time removing the polish.  I kind of rushed it and had too much remover on my cotton pads so I ended up with some excess remover running down my fingers leaving little trails of polish with it.  It wore off with washing quickly though, so no real complaints.  I'll just make to sure to be more careful the next time I wear this color!

Spun Sugar: Take 3!

It has been a while since the last time I tried out the spun sugar technique.  My last attempt was not one of my favorites...it was ok, but not as exciting as the first time I tried this technique.  I had been wearing OPI We'll Always Have Paris Suede for about two days and was staring at my nails trying to decide if I wanted to change it up and the idea try a spun sugar mani again finally hit me.

Before I get any further, here are a few shots of We'll Always Have Paris Suede by itself.  This was two coats, no top coat.

I love the OPI Suedes.  All of them.  As a whole, it is definitely one of my favorite collections of all time.  Without top coat they are prone to chip quicker, just like most matte finishes, but application is so smooth and they just look fantastic once dry.  I think I'm going to have to try out each one of them as a base for a spun sugar mani at some point.  Just like with the my first attempt using OPI Here Today...Aragon Tomorrow Suede as my base, I love the way the subtle sparkle squeaks through between the strands of creme polishes layered over it.

For the strands, I started out with applying random lines of the original/non-suede OPI We'll Always Have Paris.  That was followed by strands of Orly Artificial Sweetener and Orly You're Blushing.  I went back and added just a few more strands of We'll Always Have Paris at the end because I felt it needed just a few more dark lines.  Once that had set up for a bit, I tried to get the surface as smooth as possible by applying a coat of Seche Vite, one coat of Gelous and then one last coat of Seche Vite to finish it off.

I can't wait to do another one, definitely one of my favorite techniques!  Also, I finally caved and bought myself a new camera with the help of some gift cards I was hoarding since Christmas.  It's a Canon PowerShot SX50 HS and I love it.  I think you can tell the difference in clarity right here in this one post between all the swatch pics of We'll Always Have Paris Suede, which were taken with my 9 year old Sony, and the pictures of the spun sugar mani, which were all taken with the new Canon.