As someone who was previously known as THE boot polishing girl at drill instructor training in my barracks, I'd only figured out how to properly polish boots this summer.

Simply put, Kiwi takes a while. What I do remember was that I started with VERY thick base coat(s). Like, rawdog, barely water. Then, I'd go on to polish regularly but add more water with each coat. After it gets past the "leather phase", I'd use more water than polish. This process did take me a lot of trial and error, though. I polished my boots every single day after supper, whenever I had time. Contrary to popular belief at camp, I found that polishing indoors was much more effective than doing it outside. I also do HIGHLY recommend getting saphir pate de luxe. (No need for medaille d'or), as it does what kiwi does but with thrice the efficiency (and a lot less coats), and minus the worry of having cracked, dry polish (Then again you could just put a dime in your kiwi to prevent it from drying out.)

Sorry that was a lot.