Wednesday, June 29, 2011

China Glaze He's Going In Circles - Kaleidoscope Collection

  

Holographic polishes are, probably, the most sought after in the nail polish community. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to know why. These polishes are so beautiful with their rainbows of colors that reflect from the holographic particles. Most of them, however, do not reveal their beauty until they are placed under flash lighting or sunny conditions. Which is why they're the ideal polish to wear in the summer. During the summer, you spend more time outdoors and under the sun, so you are better able to appreciate the holographic uniqueness. However, I'm one those indoor type people that detest the heat! I know I look crazy half the time, but in order to appreciate the holographicness, I use my camera's flashlight. O_o I don't want to bore you anymore today with my chitter chatter of how awesome holographics are, I'll just show you. ^_^


Let's start off with the boring pictures.... I did use four coats, but this formula was so thin that it was really only 2 thick coats. This also has one coat of Seche Vite, and it was taken in the shade. Blah.

Another shade picture, but no topcoat. Eh...

In the sun with topcoat... ooh!

 Far away picture in the sun with no topcoat. NICE!!

Closeup with no topcoat....OMFG!!! O_O !!!

  If you don't have a holographic polish, yet, run don't walk to your computer and place an order! You will not regret it! It's almost as if wearing the holographic backing of one of those stickers that you get for .50 at the entrance of your local grocery store. Who wouldn't to sport that on their nails? Yes, I know they are HTF, but there are many other ways that you can get these without paying an enormous price on eBay. You just have to do some research and some stalking.

 On a side note, I found out where to get some of those Santee polishes!! I'm so excited, they're literally only two minutes away from my house. My brother actually bought me three today! How nice is he?? I want to go back and get some cremes to try out the formula, since the three I have now are all glitters. I think I shall go tomorrow...

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Revlon Mini Nail Polishes: Waterfall, Sparkle, Garden


 I was swatching these this weekend at my mom's house, and she asked me, "Are these Revlon?" She was surprised that Revlon had bright colors like these available now. Back in the day this was one of the brands of nail polish she would buy, but she said that these colors weren't "in". Then again, ever since I can remember, her nails have always been done in some sort of burgundy or red hue.

 I suppose it's for that reason that I was never attracted to Revlon nail polish, because in my head it was one of the "mom" brands that never appealed to me. Now, I am loving Revlon. These bottles are utterly cute!! I just couldn't get over the cuteness of these little babies!


Here is Garden with one coat of Sparkle. I didn't like Sparkle too much though. The hexagonal glitter was really sparse and I had to fish out the few that you see below.

Garden by itself. This was two coats. This was my favorite of all three.

Waterfalll with one coat of Sparkle.

This is two coats of Waterfall. This color isn't a creme like Garden. It actually has a slight shimmer to it at certain angles.

 I have to admit that I am now open to Revlon nail polish, but these aren't their best polishes. However, at 7.99, you really can't expect much more from this set.

Monday, June 27, 2011

Hard Candy Mr. Wrong, Mr. Right and some CRACKLE!

 I am so excited today! I will be conducting my first swap ever this week on MUA! I have been a member of Makeup Alley for awhile now, but I never really visited the site too often. I  have been iffy about swapping, but I decided to go ahead and try out swapping to try and get some of my wishlist items fulfilled. It took some work, though, to find someone who was willing to swap for my Sally Hansen Hidden Treasure. Finally, I did find someone who had a China Glaze 2Nite and was willing to swap. The only caviat to this, however, is that she's from Canada. I don't necessarily look at this as a bad thing, but since this is my first time swapping, I would have felt more comfortable doing so within the US. Regardless, I am super excited and hope that all goes well! Well, enough about my excitement and on to some polish goodness!!

 Mr. Wrong is a polish that I had been lemming for awhile, and I almost bought it off eBay. I'm glad I didn't, though, because I actually came across this one last week and it was only 4.00. (That's the normal price for any Hard Candy nail polish in my area, but way cheaper than eBay.) When I first started applying it, I was amazed! I couldn't believe how sparkly it was. This polish is a lilac shimmery polish loaded with gold microglitter and I needed two coats for complete coverage.

It was really hard to try and capture all the gold glitter, but if you click on the pictures you will get a better look at it. This picture was taken in the shade with no topcoat.

This was taken in the sun with no topcoat. 

A closeup in the shade with a coat of Seche Vite. Even though, it looks somewhat gritty, it was actually really smooth after applying Seche Vite.

Closeup in the sun with Seche Vite.

Mr. Wrong was a lot easier to find and this is the second time I use it, but I had not seen it in it's pure glory. The first time I used this polish was as a base under my Tron Inspired Look. I don't recall ever seeing it in the sun, but then again the striping tape I used stole this lacquer's thunder! This is two coats with a coat of Seche Vite.

See what I mean?? At first, it seems as if it's your standard navy blue creme, but once you get this color under the sun... OMG! I had to file my nails really short because of a break I had in my pinky, but this polish makes me crave my claws again just to see more of this shimmery greatness!

Finally, the crackle that was promised in the title. This is one of the new metallics from China Glaze, Latticed Lilac. 

I have the first Crackle collection that China Glaze came out with, but because some of them take work to get them to crackle, I haven't used them. This one, though, is comparable to OPI Silver Shatter. It was incredibly easy to get this one to crackle. I loved this combo! I only wish that the cracks would be bigger to let some more of the awesome blue show through.

  That's it for today! I hope you guys enjoyed!!!

Friday, June 24, 2011

A Glitter Party on Snow

  A lot of nail polish bloggers that I follow on Twitter, seem to have untried boxes of all the new polishes that they plan on swatching. At first, I didn't see a need for it, since one of the things that I love to do after buying polishes is getting to put them away. That just gives me an excuse to spend more time in my polish "room". Well, this week I decided to start an untried box because my husband is getting on to me about buying new nail polishes. He keeps telling me that I should use the ones I already have everytime I buy more. Men. They don't understand. So, in order to keep him happy I am going to start using all the NEW polishes I buy, I'm definitely not going to fish out all the untried ones that are already stored.

 For today's manicure, I used two coats of Sinful Colors Snow Me White. So far, this is my favorite white nail polish yet, since I only had to apply two coats. Then, I applied one coat of Sinful Colors Queen of Beauty, which is the first picture, but then I felt like it needed more bling...


... so I added another glitter topcoat. I used one coat of Wet n' Wilds Kaleidoscope.

I liked it much better with this topcoat because Kaleidoscope has holographic glitter in it, and it looks so good in the sun.

Here's a closeup of all the glitter going on.

 Looking at the closeup makes me want Deborah Lippmann's Happy Birthday even more. I guess now I'll have an excuse to buy more polishes, since I used two out the eight I had in my untried box. I seriously want some of Cult Nails polishes too, but I have to find a way to convince my husband of letting me put an order on 70-80 dollars worth of nail polish. Like that will happen! I'll just have to resort to hiding money from him to feed my addiction. ^_^ Hope you enjoyed today's manicure!

Thursday, June 23, 2011

China Glaze GR8

 I was in a hurry yesterday, and I literally only had ten minutes to paint my nails. I knew I had to pick a fast drying polish, so I went to my China Glaze holographics. Since, I really didn't want to waste one of my harder to find holo's, I decided it was time to finally try out GR8. I originally bought this one because I found it dirt cheap on eBay, which rarely ever happens on eBay. It never appealed to me as a good holographic color because in the bottle, the holographicness of this polish isn't too noticeable. Boy, was I wrong! It was close to dusk at the time I was applying it, and even in low lighting the holographic effect was noticeable.

This picture was taken right after I applied it. My camera wasn't able to capture much of the holo particles, but if you click on the picture, you will be able to see it much better. This is three coats of GR8, but in the sun I noticed a few bald spots, so I added another coat today.

Here is a better view of the holographic effect, but it's still muted because the sun kept hiding.

This was taken under the same conditions as the picture above, however, the holographic particles are much more visible.

Now we're getting to holographic awesomeness! This was taken with full sun exposure.

I love holographic polishes and I think that this polish hasn't gotten it's share of the glory. Everyone is always raving about all the other colors from the OMG Collection, which I agree are awesome as well, but I don't think people have raved enough about this one.

The next two pictures were taken with full sun exposure, as well, but I added a topcoat. While the holographic effect is still visible, it's not as prominent as it is on its own.


 If you want to get a lasting manicure out of holographic polishes, a top coat is necessary to minimize chipping, since they tend to chip a lot easier than other lacquer formulas. However, if you opt for the top coat be prepared to lose some of the holographic greatness. I normally do not use a top coat, because I love the holographicness so much, that I feel the more holographic it is, the better. Then again, I am not too worried about my manicure lasting too long, since I change polishes frequently. That's it for today. Hope you enjoyed!

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Nina Ulta Pro Blu Blaze

 Since trying out Color Club's Otherwordly, I have been on the hunt for that exact same color, but without the glitter. I have bought a few polishes that I thought might be it. This is one of them. In the bottle it's a bright blue neon, but sadly it doesn't stay like that once dry. 

Here is a sun picture. I used two coats but there was a tiny bit of visible nail line, so I would reccommend three coats to ensure it's opaque. As you can see, the color in real life comes really close to the bottle color when it's in the sun.

This picture was taken in the shadows cast by my carport. It actually looks a bit brighter here.

Here is what it looks  like in real life with no sun.

Another picture of this lacquer's true color. There's part of my kids chalk drawings in the background, they were drawing robots.
 Although this is not the color that I was expecting to get, I have to say I was in love with this color while wearing it. I literally could not stop staring at it. I even used this color for my toes, and it looked so gorgeous! There was actually one time when I thought no one was around, in the breakroom at my workplace, so I just stopped to stare at my toes. I have no idea how long I was staring, but when I looked up there was a man looking at me like I was the craziest person in the world. I just laughed and proceeded to walk hurriedly away into the safety of my cubicle. That's it for today. I hope you enjoyed!

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

From the makers of Color Club: Cosmetic Arts Part 2

 On to round two of Cosmetic Arts polishes, and there are six more that I would like to show you. I forgot to mention on Part 1 of this post that I used a top coat with all of the polishes. I don't want anyone to be shocked when they see that these polishes aren't as glossy in real life.

This is Sprout Your Wings from the Spring Collection. I am showing this one in the sun, because I think that it's brightness is better showcased in the sun. It is such a vivid light green and it almost looks to a be a neon, but it doesn't dry matte like neons do. This was two coats.


This one is Enchanted Forest. The first picture reflects it to be close to Sky High, but it's actually more on the sea green side, which you can see on the second picture. This one took three coats to obtain full coverage.


The last one from the Spring Collection is In Bloom. This is a really pretty lilac shade. It's not so light that it looks white but it's also not as bright as an Easter lilac. It took three coats to get it opaque.


I only have two from the Fall Collection. The first one is called Snow Bunny. It's not just a plain gray color, this one actually has a hint of blue mixed in. The blue tendencies are most noticeable on the second picture. Most grays only take two coats, but this one was really sheer, so I had to use three.


La La Lilac isn't actually lilac, it seems to me that they mixed in some brown because depending on the lighting it can tend to look somewhat brown. Only two coats were needed for this one. I didn't expect to love this one as much as I did, by just looking at the bottle, but I really loved it. It's a very neutral color which would look even better on lighter skintones.


The last one that I have to show you is Limelight, but the website doesn't show a name for the collection. This one is a neon color. I haven't tried all of Color Clubs neons yet, but the one that I tried over the weekend was so sheer that even with three coats I could still see my nail line. I sincerely hope not all their neons are as sheer as that one. This one however, took three coats and it provided complete coverage.

Neons tend to be difficult to photograph and this one was no exception. This one was taken inside and it's color is more accurate than the top one. It's not a limegreen color, rather it's more of a teal neon.

 This concludes my Cosmetic Arts collection. I try to go to Ross every week, to ensure that I won't miss out on any new Color Club collections, so if I happen to find anymore Cosmetic Arts nail polishes I will make a post of those as well. I wanted to do water marbling posts next week, but that might have to be postponed. Instead, I was thinking of swatching either some of my most interesting Sinful Colors, or a few of my Color Club collections. I'm unsure at the moment, however, for the rest of this week I'll be doing random nail polishe swatches that I have worn in the past few days. Hope you enjoyed!

Monday, June 20, 2011

From the makers of Color Club: Cosmetic Arts Part 1

 I had a post lined up to be published yesterday, but when I came home from the hospital, it hadn't been published. I went ahead and published it, and when I took a look at the post, I noticed half of my post was gone! I was really upset, so I decided to just scrap the post, even though it took me about fours to work on.

 My original post was meant to showcase a few of the polishes that I have bought from the Cosmetic Arts collections. However, I was only going to provide pictures of the the the nail polish bottles, and later do swatches of the actual nail polish. Since part of my post mysteriously disappeared, I thought it would be best to go ahead and do the nail polish swatches.

 The first time I came across the Cosmetic Arts display at a Ross, I was really close to not buying them, simply because they have no names written on the bottles, but the colors were too beautiful to not purchase and they were only priced at 1.99. As I mentioned in a previous post, I did pick up three nail polishes during my first encounter with the display. Then, two weeks ago I visited a Ross, and I found the display again, but that time I had more options, so I was able to pick up five more bottles. Three days later I decided to go once more, to see if there were any left. I was able to find two lonely bottles, just waiting to be snatched up. Luckily, those were colors that I had also liked during my previous visit, so I was quite content with my find.

 After checking out their website, I was somewhat able to tell which ones I have, but I'm not entirely sure if I am correct. I have emailed Forsythe Cosmetic Group, which are also the makers of Color Club, to see if maybe they have other pictures or perhaps even swatches that they might email me. If they ever get back to me, I will be sure to edit this post if I am not correct in my interpretation of the names. If you would like to take a look for yourself at their full collections you can click here, and it will take you to the Cosmetic Arts webpage directly.

This is All the Trimmings from the Holiday Collection. Despite how opaque the color looks in the bottle, it's actually on the sheer side. It has purple duochrome, micro glitter suspended in a bluish purple base and even though it was a sheer polish, it only took two coats to get it opaque.
 

The duochrome in this polish, however, isn't strong when applied to nails. It was really difficult to try and capture the duochromeness.

Nonetheless, this polish is an amazing purple and is one of my favorite from all the Cosmetic Arts lacquers that I own.

Another one from the Holiday Collection is You Sleigh Me. This one also only took two coats and it's a slate gray shimmery base with tons of gold micro glitter. I like this color, but I don't think that it looks too great on my skintone.


The last one that I believe to be in the Holiday Collections is New Year's Ball. This is a blue frost and it took only two coats to obtain complete coverage. I thought this was going to be an interesting polish, but the streaking on this polish was as bad as China Glaze's Avalanche.

If only there was a way to get rid of streaks from frost polishes...

I have already shown this polish in a previous post, but I thought I would show it this time when it was freshly applied, instead after a few days wear. This is called Sky High from the Spring Collection. Out of all the polishes, this has the best formula.


 I do want to mention, as well, that the formula in all these polishes is a bit watery and you have to be light on the application to prevent it from running to your cuticles. I don't want to make my posts too long, so I decided to break it up into two parts. Although, I'm not a fan of some of the polishes, I am going to keep them because there is something about the bottles that I just love. When the bottles clink together they make a more sublte clink than any other nail polish I own. I know it's a bit weird for me to be commenting on the noise they make when they clink, but I have a thing for noises... I might be the only person in the world, but I also love the sound of chalk on the chalkboard.. Lol. I promise I'm not crazy. My next post will have the other six polishes that I own from Cosmetic Arts. Hope you enjoy!

*** EDIT***
All the Trimmings looks to be Equinox Fox from the Fall Collection. After doing some research, I was able to find out that All the Trimmings is actually a whole different color, GREEN! That is according to some of the other blogs out there.