Essie Art of Spring polishes are available now at Transdesign.com and 8ty8beauty.com for around $4 each. Also available soon at Trade Secret and Ulta and I want to say the regular retail is about $9

Whoa Nelly, my application on this one was jacked up. What can I say, the formula was a bit difficult and I have had a migraine for 4 days. Anyhoo, this is a light pinky peach with a creamy base. The application was tricky as this is the kind of pastel, like a lot of Essies, that create a bit of a shadow. You know the ones; even though they're basically lighter than your skin, the streaks it leaves make it look like you applied it over a muddy grey base... Ugh. It's somewhat chalky as well. While I normally consider myself to at least somewhat careful when it comes to application, after three painstaking coats I still had streaks and uneven lines. Me no likey. Add to that the fact that this polish doesn't dry the same color it looks in the bottle. It ends up a shade darker and more orange. Whatever, I guess it's still pretty, but it's like false advertising. I did find out an easy way to get it to look bottle-color on the nails without frankening though, so read on!

Believe me, in person the nail on the right is exactly the same color as the bottle. What did I use? You may remember my review on Color Club Milky White Base Coat and how it will pink up not only your nail, but any polish you put over it. I learned this by accident a couple years ago when I just randomly reached for this base coat then applied China Glaze Blk-Bila-Bong over it and all of a sudden the polish seemed a bit lighter and a heck of a lot bluer than I remembered. Since then, not only have I used this base coat for my sheers and french manicures, I've been using it to cool down polishes that are a touch too warm for me. Instead of using it as a base coat, I simply added a coat of the Milky White Base Coat as a top coat after color. I know the fact that this shade dries different than bottle color has been ticking some people off and hopefully this cheap-as-heck base coat can solve that problem.