How to Avoid Getting Nail Polish on the Sides of Your Fingers

Given that you learned to color inside the lines so early in life, you'd think you'd be good at it long before adulthood. But when applying nail polish, it's easy to find yourself once again going outside the lines. Like most things, the more often you paint your nails, the better you will be at keeping the polish where you want it. In the meantime, there are a few tricks that can make it a little easier to keep your fingers clean.

Hoard brushes. The more you like a particular nail polish color, the more likely it is to have a cheap brush. When you find a nail polish application brush you like, wash it out and keep it when the polish bottle is empty. That way you will have a nice brush to use when you find a great color with a not-so-great brush.

Lay your hand flat when painting your nails. It is hard to hold your hands perfectly still when they are not lying flat against a table or other solid surface. 
The odds of painting your nail instead of your finger are better if you aren't aiming for a moving target.

Avoid using too much polish at once. Each nail should be painted with three brush strokes -- one down the middle and one on each side. 

Wipe the brush on the sides of the bottle until you have only the amount of polish you need to do one stroke.

Apply a bit of pressure to the brush when applying polish. Quality nail polish brushes will fan out with a bit of pressure. This helps spread the polish out over the surface of the nail and keeps it from running or dripping onto your skin.




Keep the nail polish remover handy. Even professional manicurists sometimes color outside the lines. When mistakes happen, a paper towel or cotton ball soaked in nail polish remover makes a great eraser. If you accidentally take some polish off of your nail while cleaning your skin, wipe away all of the polish from that nail and paint it again.

While applying perfect polish still takes some practice, utilizing these tips will make the application process much easier. With the right techniques and a little time, you'll be painting like a pro.

References

1. Linda Rose: The Perfect Woman's Manicure   
2. Cosmopolitan: Paint Nails Professionally at Home 
3. Hints and Things: Ten Steps to Give Yourself an At Home Manicure 
4. "The Complete Nail Technician"; Marian Newman; 2005

Summer should be colourful: OPI

I am sure no one would disagree if I say summer should be flowery, colourful and happy. And so if any packaging that give me this feeling, I would be very tempted to buy them. Like this one, OPI Summer Flutter Minis.

I just can't resist it, the colours, the flowers, the box, oh so nice! All four colours are bright and easy to match, so get them and start showing off eye-catching summer finger and toe nails (that's what sandals are for, right?) colours!

OPI Hong Kong Collection SS 09/10

OPI is going to launch a Hong Kong Collection, it immediately catches my attention, I am happy that they are inspired by the Pearl of Orient, a name for Hong Kong as known to people in the world. This collection includes 12 shades:

- Bling Dynasty

- Red My Fortune Cookie

- Hot & Spicy

- Dim Sum Plum

- Jade is the New Black

- Suzi Says Feng Shui

- A Good Man-darin is Hard to Find

- Lucky Lucky Lavender

- Meet Me on the Star Ferry (I love this name, sounds romantic)

- Panda-monium Pink

- Pearl of Wisdom

- I'm Chop-Ssticking to My Story

Personally, I think it's more like a old Hong Kong, like in the 60s/70s, especially from the setting above with the boat, and also the hair style and chunky accesssories (below). As for colours, Mathilda's favourites are Red My Fortune Cookie and Suzi Says Fung Shui.

This collection is set to be in stores in February 2010.

(Photos credit: P'ssion)

Sidenote: Dell has launched OPI X Dell laptop, so nice! I like No Room for the Blues by OPI.

Disappointing OPI x SEPHORA

I was so happy that I could finally bought the OPI x Sephora Nail Polish when I went to the US in June. First it was cheaper (US$9) than normal OPI edition, and (I thought) the size is smaller because it does look smaller on the USA Sephora site. :P






I didn't use it until like 2 weeks ago. As much expectation as I have in it, it does really disappoint me...I normally start polishing the thumb first, and you know how the nail size is bigger than others, and the first touch the brush had with my nail, the first impression I got was "What? It's so thick" Anyway, I just keep applying on the nail, but it's so hard to make a nice, smooth surface compares to other nail polish I use (e.g. Missha, Revlon). I still did put them on all my finger nails and toes. However, I had to clean the index and middle finger afterwards because they were screwed up (uneven surface). And I didn't re-apply until like 2 days later...
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So 2 days later, I gave it a second chance. Again, I failed, I started to think whether it's my applying skills or what, but it couldn't be because I used to be good with other ones. So I concluded it's the nail polish's quality. So I cleaned (yet once again) the 2 fingers and just left them, really can't be bothered anymore. So for like a week I was with 3 fingers on orange-reddish nails and 2 with none (yea, looked so "nice") :(
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I told my friends about it, and they couldn't believe that the quality is that bad. But again, maybe I was just unlucky to have picked the not nice bottle, afterall, I only bought 1 bottle. But I swear that OPI version are all good ones.
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Has any of you have a different opinion about this product?