Comparison Before & After: Zoya blues sing the blues :)

Hello there!

This has been a hectic weekend and week, and it's not going to get any better tomorrow, so I decided rather to do a two-fer post today. Recently Katrina asked to see a comparison of my Zoya blue cremes, and I wanted to get that up as soon as possible. I'm also overdue for my Cheeky Challenge Twin Post with Dina of Secretary's Nail Art, so I thought I'd combine the two. :)

As it turns out, I only have three Zoya blues, and one of them has a green undertone to it, so I decided to round out my four fingers with a very light green that almost feels blue in some lights. So today I'm going to compare for you these 4 polishes:

Zoya Neely, Wednesday, Rocky, and Breezi

 From left to right:

Zoya Neely
Zoya Wednesday
Zoya Rocky
Zoya Breezi


Here is how they compare on the nail, in the same order:

Zoya Neely, Wednesday, Rocky, Breezi

Zoya Neelie is technically described as a light green. However, the only reason I know that is because the Zoya website tells me so--most of the time I have an on-going debate with myself when wearing this about whether or not this is a green-leaning blue, or a blue-leaning green. So I guess it sort of depends on what you want it to be and what you wear it with. :)

On my middle finger is the lovely Zoya Wednesday. This is a turquoise with a 'green undertone'. It's a soft turquoise, so if you like the color but don't want to go all the way out with a bold, bright turquoise, this is the color for you. I love it, and I'm not usually a turquoise fan.

On my ring finger, we have Zoya Rocky. This is a sky, robin's-egg blue that screams happy summer day. It's a keeper for wearing on its own, but I particularly love it as a base for nail art.

Finally, on my pinkie we have Zoya Breezi. This is a slightly muted cerulean type of blue; this is more of the type of blue I'm likely to have in my wardobe, so this is a complete winner for me.

More often than not, I struggle with the formula on Zoya cremes. But something interesting happened when I swatched these today. Because I'm trying everything I can to get my nails to de-nub, I used my Sally Hansen Hard As Wraps as my base polish...and the cremes went on smoothly. So if you also struggle with Zoya cremes, you might want to try changing up your base polish, and maybe try the Hard As Wraps. :)

Okay, so. The next thing I wanted to do here was a manicure with Cheeky summer plate 51, for my twin post with Dina. The image we agreed on was the one with different symbols on it for fast-forward, play, stop, etc., like you find on a DVD player, VCR, or in the case relevant to my mani, a cassette player (back in the day). For some reason, though, I just couldn't get inspired, and I think my final design reflects that. It's cute, but it's nothing super special.

I started by masking off slanted strips of nail, and stamping the image over them. Then, to create a music theme, I stamped cassette tapes, a boom box, and a guitar onto the bottoms of the nails (these images are from the same set, on Cheeky plate 30). I used Konad Black for the target image (I'm starting to really despise Konad Black because it's just too smeary, no matter what I do), and Barry M Silver Foil for the other images:

Zoya blues sing the blues

Seriously, I give up on Konad black. GGGGGGGGRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRrrrrrrr.

Hope you enjoyed the polish comparison and the spirit, if not the execution, of the nail art! And I hope your week is going well. Thanks for stopping by!

Hugs,
M.