A Vanilla Marriage

The Polish:
BC: T.I.P.S. - The Incredible Protection System
KleanColor - Vanilla Villa, two coats
Fancy Gloss - Marry Me
TC: Seche Vite

Oh my GOODNESS, I should have titled this "The Stinky Mani." Let's take it from the top, shall we?

To begin with, I tried out T.I.P.S., which I found at a thrift store for a quarter. Not sure what it's made of, but I'm pretty sure it's some kind of an oil. I've been hearing nothing but praise on the nail board about oiling nails before your mani, so I thought I might as well try this. The instructions I found online say to apply and rub it into the nail and cuticles, so that's what I did. But man... I'm not sure if it's just my bottle, but there is a strong smell of cigarettes coming from it. It could have belonged to a smoker before it found its way to the thrift store, or maybe it always smelled like that. Who knows. What's important to me is that my bottle stinks.

Next we have Vanilla Villa. KleanColors are notoriously smelly, but this one just so happens to be vanilla scented. So I wasn't really sure what to expect with this one. It didn't really seem to smell like anything, really. I mean, it just smelled like nail polish to me. I assumed the vanilla came after it dried.

Then Marry Me, a polish I have been excited about for a month now. She's sooo cute, right? Look at those gorgeous matte white and iridescent glitters. *swoon* But soon after I started to apply it, I started getting a whiff of some major chemicals going on. Maybe it's the KleanColors just now catching up to me, I thought. So I topcoated and did my right hand to double check.

NOPE. DEFINITELY THE FANCY GLOSS. It became apparent as soon as I opened the bottle again. I quickly covered it with Seche Vite to try and hide the smell. (And what does THAT say, huh? So bad that even Seche Vite smells better? Wow.) The odor lingered for hours afterward and wasn't completely gone until after sleeping on it.

And even aside from that, the glitters poked up past the top coat, creating an uneven texture that drove my hands crazy. Baah. But... isn't she CUTE!? I'm totally willing to overlook all of her shortcomings because of how gosh darn pretty those glitters are... (I just probably won't be wearing it often.)

Wear: Three days. So... turns out TIPS isn't a base coat. Yeah. My bad. Lesson learned.