Traveling With Nail Polish: What to Bring? Picking Polish!

This is my second post in a mini series on Traveling with Nail Polish. Be sure to check out the first installment about packing polish for air travel, which included a video showing how I pack polish. :)

For any nail polish junkie like myself, it’s super hard to condense down what I love into a small bag for travel. As you saw in the video showing how I pack, sometimes I don’t condense it too much. LOL! In that particular case, I was going on a girls trip and I knew I would be painting other people’s nails. So I wanted to give them a variety of colors to choose from.

But when I travel just on my own where I know there won’t be an opportunity to paint other people’s nails (which I love to do!), I usually go about it this way…

Choosing Polish

  1. After choosing the clothing I will wear on the trip, I try to pick complimentary nail polish colors. When I’m at home, I generally don’t mind wearing mismatched polish and clothing, but when I’m away I want to look more put together, you know? So first I look at what I’ll be wearing. If there’s just a couple shades that would look nice with my clothing, I’ll pack those shades.
  2. After I pick out the matching shades (usually just two polishes), I’ll throw in a third that’s fun and funky. :) Sometimes I just want to wear a polish that’s fun and I don’t worry about matching my clothing. I usually pick polishes that just feel good and I know that when I’m away from home I’ll at least want the option to pick something daring.
  3. Then into my bag I throw in a basecoat (Orly Rubberized Bonder), topcoat (Seche Vite), small bottle of remover (2 oz. Zoya Remove+), cotton pads, and a nail file.

In total, that’s 5 bottles of polish. For some, that’s just too many. But for me, it’s the smallest amount I can pack without feeling completely deprived. :) In short…

The Packing List

Bottle 1: Complimentary polish color
Bottle 2: Complimentary polish color
Bottle 3: Fun color
Bottle 4: Basecoat
Bottle 5: Topcoat
Small nail polish remover
Cotton pads
Nail File

Or Keep it Simple

To keep it simple, you could also just take nail strips and a topcoat. That would be super easy to pack. :)

When you pack for a trip, what do you take?

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Rescue Beauty Lounge Chinoise

Morning, all! Today I have Rescue Beauty Lounge Chinoise on my nails. It’s such a beautiful red! Love love it!

I did need to do three coats, but I think if I had mixed up the polish (rolled the bottle in my hands) it might have been a better consistency and applied in just two coats. As it is now, I can just barely see my nail line. But it’s not too noticeable. After all, who will be looking at my hands with my nails only 10 inches away from their face except for me. :)

Application was great and it self leveled over time. I used the RBL Prep, Basecoat, and Topcoat as well. All were wonderful and a day later (I painted my nails yesterday afternoon), I have no chipping and no tip wear. I sort of want to wear this manicure for as long as possible to see how long it lasts.

Chinoise sort of reminds me of Pushing Your Luck from the Sephora by OPI Betsey Johnson collection. I might have to do a comparison swatch of different reds for you guys soon. :)

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Deborah Lippman Mermaid’s Dream

Picked up Deborah Lippman Mermaid’s Dream last week from Nail Polish Canada. I’ve worn it once on my nails, but I think it will become a pedicure polish instead. It’s a pretty chunky glitter and I can’t stand anything but immaculate smoothness on my nails (thank you, Seche Vite!). I even put two coats of my topcoat on. Still was kind of bumpy, though. But for toes, I think it wouldn’t bother me.

It sure is dreamy, right? Very mermaid-y. :)

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Traveling with Nail Polish: Packing Polish for Air Travel

Hi all! This is the first blog post in a short series I’m doing on traveling with nail polish. In this first post, I’m covering how I pack nail polish for air travel. I usually use this method when I’ll by flying on an airplane, and it works well for travel by ground as well.

Things to note:

  1. Some polishes travel better than others. In particular, I’ve noticed that my CND polishes don’t travel well. They tend to leak no matter how tightly I close the bottles. For that reason, I usually take Orly Rubberized Bonder insead of my usual CND Stickey Base Coat.
  2. For nail polish remover, I use a small travel size bottle (the 2 oz. bottles of Zoya Remove+ are great for this). I “double bag” the remover and then put it either inside the padded toiletry bag with the polishes (if it fits), or just inside my suitcase. As long as the top of the bottle is tightly closed, I don’t have any problem with leaking.

Oh, and CLICK HERE for the info on the cosmetic bag (links to the tutorial).

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Zoya Fleck Effects Maisie & Ibiza

Morning, all!

On my nails today I have two coats of a dark navy color from Zoya called Ibiza (it works well for stamping, too). Then I put a coat of Zoya Maisie over the top. It looks cool, but I don’t think I’ll leave this on too long. It’s a bit… flashy? LOL! Like glitter isn’t, right? Hmm… maybe I need to just let it grow on me. :)

Ibiza is really pretty on it’s own, too. I took this picture before adding Maisie on top…

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Essie French Manicure Colors + Color Discrepancy

Essie French Manicure Colors + Color Discrepancy

I’ve used the same colors for doing a French manicure for nearly five years: Essie’s Marshmallow for white (the perfect soft pearl color) and Essie’s Mademoiselle (a pale, sheer pink). The perfect colors, I think, for a natural looking French manicure. I don’t usually like the stark white manicures, so the pearly white of Marshmallow with Mademoiselle over the top is perfect for me. [See these colors used in a video showing my French manicure process HERE]

When I went to Ulta the other day I thought it would be smart to pick up a couple back up bottles. After I came home, I realized that I really only needed a new white bottle. I had plenty of the pink, but for some reason thought I didn’t. Anyhow, after I did my manicure last night I kept thinking that something looked different. I wasn’t able to place it until I looked at the new bottle of Mademoiselle next to the old one…

The new bottle is much more yellow than the original. Almost more nude. Well, crap. :(

I still like it on my nails, but the pinky-ness of the older bottle usually makes my nails look more healthy. Not so much with this new version. So, Essie, what’s up? Did your color checker take a day off when you approved this color coming off the line in production? So strange.

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Butter London Slapper + Butter London Basecoat and Topcoat

Butter London Slapper + Butter London Basecoat and Topcoat

This gorgeous teal blue is Butter London’s Slapper. I adore it so much! I’m really into blues and teals at the moment. :)

Butter London Nail Foundation Flawless Basecoat & Hardwear P. D. Quick Topcoat

I noticed when used Seche Vite Topcoat (my favorite!) with Butter London polishes I get a bit of shrinkage (the polish pulling away from the tips of my nails). Not the most attractive thing in the world. Definitely not as much shrinkage as when I use Seche Vita with Zoya polishes, but enough to make me want to try the Butter London base and topcoats.

I found a set at Ulta Beauty called Backstage Basics that came with the basecoat, topcoat, remover, and then a polish color of your choice. For my color, I chose Slapper. It really is a great way to try out Butter London since you save $30 when you buy the set!

As you can see from the photo above, the basecoat is a pale nude color. It goes on pretty sheer and dries to a semi-matte finish (I would call it a satin finish). It was actually very pretty by itself.

After I let the basecoast dry for about 3 minutes, I applied two coats of Slapper, waiting about 3 minutes between coats. Then I topped it off with the Hardwear topcoat. It dried fairly quickly and I was good to go after about 15 minutes as long as I was still careful not to dent it. It was dry to the touch, though.

Four days later, I had very minimal tipwear…

Granted, I had a few very easy days. I didn’t do any housework since I was out of town, but I did do a bit of packing and moving things around. Generally when I’m doing lots of dishes or putting my hands in water quite a bit (even just to take a shower), my polish doesn’t last as long. That being said, I thought my Butter London manicure lasted a long time. :)

The verdict? I love the Butter London basecoat and topcoat. It helps Butter London polishes last for a long time. The only thing I miss is the high shine of Seche Vite topcoat. But for the better wear and no shrinkage, I’ll happily use all Butter London when I want to use a Butter London polish color. :)

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Teal Stripes & White Dots

Teal Stripes & White Dots

Experimenting with more tape manicures. I also tried a Sally Hansen Nail Art Pen, which I really liked. I used the white pen for the dots and white stripes. Truth be told, I only did this on my left hand since I was just playing. I didn’t have time to attempt it on my right hand as well. Anyhow, it’s certainly fun! :)

Dark Navy Base Color: Essie Midnight Cami
Lighter Aqua: Color Club New Bohemian
Teal: Butter London Slapper
White Dots and Stripes: Sally Hansen Nail Art Pen

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