Hello Kitty by Sephora Banana Creme

 Hello Kitty! What can I say about her that you already don't know? She's cute, adorable and at times can be a bit pricey. I have been infatuated with Hello Kitty ever since I was in high school. However, back in those days Hello Kitty was not as popular as she is now. Nowadays, Hello Kitty can be found in sooo many stores that, it's almost, dare I say, tacky? I heard even Snooki from Jersey Shore is now sporting HK on the show! I don't know how to feel about that. =/

 Anywho, when I received the email from Sephora last year saying they were launching a pre-sale on Hello Kitty items, I immediately logged on and did a bit of damage to my wallet. Banana Creme is one of the items I picked up.

  It's a really beautiful pastel yellow and taking into consideration on how difficult yellows can be to apply, I think I would give this polish a B-. Yes, the bottle is cute and I would have bought it even if I had known the formula was less than perfect. It took three coats to get it nice and even, but it took some work to get it to apply evenly.

These are all indoor pics.

 I ended up buying all the Hello Kitty nail polishes except for two, but I was browsing the Sephora website a few days ago and it looks like they will be coming out with four other colors! I am really excited about that because it looks like all four will be glitters!

***Don't forget to enter my giveway!***

http://thelacquerroom.blogspot.com/2011/09/lacquer-rooms-first-ever-giveaway.html

Wet n' Wild How I Met Your Magenta

 One of the reasons why I have so much nail is because I tend to buy all the colors in a collection, regardless of whether I like them or not. I used to be like Pokemon: Gotta Catch them All! Now, I will admit that I still am somewhat like that, ok no that's a lie. I'm still like that. I know I shouldn't buy nail polishes just because I need to complete my collection, but it's so satisfying to see one of my collections completed. The reason why I jumped onto this rambling train is because this polish is a perfect example as to why I bought How I Met Your Magenta.

 Now granted, this polish was only .99 and I love the show, but I don't even like pinks all that much. In fact, I haven't done a full pink mani since, hmm... a long, long time ago. I don't even think I've done a pink post before. This is one of those polishes that I made a mental note to purge when the time comes. The idea behind this polish was really great, if you like pinks. A pink polish with gold micro glitter. It looks really awesome in the bottle and the nail.. after 4-5 coats. Yea, 4-5 coats people. This polish was so frigging sheer and would be best if layered on top of another pink.

This is four coats with a coat of Seche Vite in the sun. Visible nail lines should be way more visible in pictures than in real life, but this polish is the exception. The visible nail line is waaay visible in real life and hardly noticeable in pictures.

A closeup. The gold glitter makes this polish a bit less straight up bubblegum pink.

In the shade.

 *Sigh. I love how pinks look on other people, but I just couldn't get used to it. I wonder if this color is a "don't worry, it'll grow on you" color. I ended up taking it off the right after pictures.

Nars Night Flight

 Another first and only polish in my collection, Nars Night Flight. I bought this polish back when Nars.com had a 20% off, if I remember correctly, sale and they had free shipping. This polish is part of their limited edition Night Series. The series includes Night Porter (green), Night Breed (Black) and Night Rider (pink). They retail for 16.00 each, but with the sale I ended up paying a little over 14 for Night Flight. I didn't have the budget at the time to buy more than one, so I picked the one that looked most interesting to me. Night Flight is a shimmery blue based polish with micro blue and purple glitter. 

 The formula on this polish was really, and I mean really good. It went on smoothly, the brush was great quality and the packaging was ok. I say the packaging was ok because the cap is a little wide and it makes applying the polish a tad difficult, it's not a huge deal but I do wish I could take it off like with the Butter London and Chanel's. I think I've been spoiled.

This is two coats with a coat of Seche Vite. Also, excuse the cut on my index finger, I was trying to be a good co-worker by refilling the printer and I ended up getting a papercut!

Here's a closeup where the purple glitter in the polish is a little more noticeable.

Bottle pic. Doesn't it look beautiful?

 After trying out Night Flight, I'm not sure that I want the other three. I really thought the purple glitter would be more noticeable, but it's pretty much invisible unless you are in direct sunlight or really bright lighting. Maybe, I let myself down by expecting too much from this polish and maybe I'll give it another try some day. Who knows? When I first starting collecting polishes I could never fathom purging, but lately I've been making mental notes as to whether I would purge or keep a polish if I ever got around to doing that.

Clinique Crushed Velvet

 Crushed Velvet is an awesome shimmery, vampy polish that I received in a swap a few weeks back. I swatched this polish and immediately fell in love with it, but for some reason I never got around to wearing it. I used two coats and was pleasantly surprised at the formula of the polish, even the brush was great. I have actually never heard of Clinique polishes nor have I seen them out in the wild, but now that I have had my first experience, I hope I find more.

This is how it looks like in the day.

 This is a shade picture.

You can see the glittery, shimmery goodness in this pic. 

 I have several vampy colors in my collection, but they always seemed kind of grandma-ish to me and my husband confirmed that saying my hands looked like they were 38. On the other hand, no pun intended, I received tons of compliments on this polish. I was stopped several times by people wanting to know the name of this polish. It was both flattering and frustrating at the same time, because I had no idea how to explain to them that I received it in a swap and had no idea where they could get it. I ended up just telling them it was burgundy.

*** Don't forget to enter my giveaway!***

http://thelacquerroom.blogspot.com/2011/09/lacquer-rooms-first-ever-giveaway.html

 

My Stash and Storage

 I'm doing this post because Eileen from The Sneakerette asked to see how I store my stash. I would love to show you guys as well everything that it's in my stash, however I have over 700 polishes, since the last time I counted, and I have no idea how to get started. I decided to at least show you how and where I store my nail polishes and stuff.

 I have an l-shaped desk that I use for all my nail stuff and I also have a polish room, but at the moment it's "under construction", meaning I haven't yet set it up. One of the reasons for this is because I still haven't found a suitable nail polish storage solution. At the moment they are being kept in plastic shoe boxes and while it worked fine when I had 100-200 polishes, it has now become too much? I have 14 shoes boxes filled with polish plus all the drawers in my desk are full as well. I have heard a lot about Melmers and Helmers, but I don't think these are for me. I'm looking for something, well quite frankly I don't know but I need to find it soon as I refuse to buy another clear shoe box and my desk is starting to overflow.

The majority of my shoe boxes are pink but a few are turquoise and one is blue.

Part 1. This is how they are on my desk, all stacked on top of each other. It makes it difficult when I'm looking for a specific color. 

Part 2. The Color Club sets don't fit in any boxes so I have them going around the perimeter of my desk. 

Part 3. The plate to the right holds items I use often: remover, lotion, cleanser, oil, cuticle balm, a brush to apply the balm and pure acetone. 

 There you have it. That's my stash. Once I get better storage, I plan on doing something like Polish Insomniac is doing. Maybe, I'll do that even before I get a better storage, however, right now I'm super excited for Halloween. I have strayed from nail art, but all the fun months are coming up and they are the perfect excuse to bring out my nail art stuff!

***Don't forget to enter my giveaway!***

http://thelacquerroom.blogspot.com/2011/09/lacquer-rooms-first-ever-giveaway.html



The Lacquer Room's First Ever Giveaway Featuring Lynnderella Snow Angel!

 Ok guys so here it is, my blog's first giveaway. I had delayed on posting the giveaway because I was unsure as to how I wanted pick a winner and I didn't want to make it too complicated, so I scrapped the form! I am going to make this super duper easy for everyone, therefore I will not be asking you to tweet, blog, or fill out a form to be able to win these prizes. I will only have one winner. Before we get on to the requirements, let's have a look at what you can win!

The star of the show here is Lynnderella's Snow Angel.

Orly Bonder and a Wet n' Wild Fast Dry topcoat.

An e.l.f cuticle pen and a the holy grail brush that most nail polish lover's use for cleaning up around your cuticles, including myself, an e.l.f concealer brush.

Saly Hansen Xtreme Wear in Pumpkin Spice, Rimmel in Grey Matter and another Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear in Hot Magenta.

Finally, OPI's Black Shatter and Sinful Color in Green Ocean.

 All these products are brand new, never tested, opened or swatched and purchased by me with the exception of Snow Angel. Snow Angel was given to me by Lynnderella so that I could do a giveaway on my blog. Seriously guys, she is the sweetest person ever. Here is a link to her blog where she does her sales http://lynnderella-lynnderella.blogspot.com/. Her glitters are incredible so if you have the chance to buy some of her creations, definitely don't miss out!!

 If you have made it this far down on the post then I am assuming that you really are interested in entering this here giveaway, so without further adieu, here are the requirements:

•  Be a follower on my blog of course! Although, I hope if you do follow me it's because you like my blog and look forward to my future posts and not just because of this giveaway! No? Yes? Maybe? Well, whatever your reason may be for initially following my blog, I hope you'll stick around!
• Last but not least, comment on this post telling me why you would like to win. I know you're saying "What? Only two requirements??" Yup! Only two! There is no need for any extra hooplah to enter, unless of course, you WANT to let other people know about my blog. If that's the case, then I'd be very much grateful.

 So, if you only have to comment then how will you know you won?? Hmm.... iiiiinteresting question! I will do a post specifically for this reason. It will have the winner's name, that is your username since I will be using the name that appears on the comment, on the title of the post. Something like "Congratulations Blank!" I will use random.org to pick a winner. If this is your userid then simply email me letting me know you want to claim your prize at hklinda1976@gmail.com within 48 hours after the post has been posted, otherwise I will chose another comment with random.org. I will then get all necessary information to ship the item to you. The contest will end 10/07/2011 at 12:00am Central Time, so if you're comment reaches my email after this time then you will not be entered into the contest.

 ONE MORE THING! This is totally optional if you win, but I would like to do a followup with the winner. Something along the lines of doing a guest post on my blog. You don't have to agree to this if you win, only if you want to, but I think it would be neat to see the winner showcased with maybe a NOTD or even random cat/dog/kid or whatever kind of pictures the winner wants to have posted. It'd be even more awesome if we could get a NOTD with one of the prizes!! Ok, that's all I have for you guys! Good luck to all who enter the giveaway!

A Glitter and Flakie Sandwich

 I started the idea with a glitter flakie sandwich when I wore OPI's Don't Mess with OPI. This is a really beautiful almost hunter green. It only needed two coats and it was really easy to work with. Even though I had fun with this polish I thought that a little glitter would really make it pop, but it ended up just look like a Christmas Wreath! That would be cute except, we're about three months away. Don't get me wrong, I love, LOVE Christmas so much that.. umm.. I may or may not already be listening to Christmas songs when I feel down. O_o

This is a coat of Color Club Object of Envy over Don't Mess with OPI. It's a cute combo, but a little on the Christmas side.

Then I decided to add some Nubar 2010 to take the Christmas look and feel away, but then it seemed that the flakes overpowered the glitter.

Finally, I added another coat of Object of Envy and I was so happy with the final look. Just the right amount of flakes show through.

 That's my glitter and flakie sandwich! I actually tried this as well with red glitter and the flakes gave it a really awesome effect. It ended up looking AMAZING, so I will have to post that mani sometime next week.

P.S.

 Eileen if you're reading this, I'm working on taking pics of my stash so it might be a few more days before I can get it posted!

Spa Ritual Circle of Life

 As promised here is my mani after the nail fix. I intentionally chose a creme so that you will be able to see any flaws a lot clearer, whereas a glitter polish would totally hide any evidence of a fix. When I wore this mani, I actually told quite a few people about my break and no one seemed to notice anything different. Of course, without macro the bump towards the cuticle is barely noticeable and even if you're looking for it, you will have to tilt your nail at different angles to view it. I also want to add that the fix can last between 2-3 mani's. If you don't have the time to do a fresh fix, just don't press too hard when removing the polish. You actually want to do smooth and light strokes with the cotton ball, felt, etc., towards the free edge of the nail until you get most of the color off. Stop once you see the tissue. Any places where the polish didn't completely come off can easily be removed with a brush or cotton swab.

I've accumulated quite a few Spa Rituals with the Ave You deals that have been going on, but this is the first time I wear the brand and let me just say OMG. The formula is amazing! Super duper smooth and opaque with two coats! I mean it was just perfect. It wasn't runny or thick. I can't wait to try more of these. The picture below is the way the polish looked indoors. So beautiful!

This is how it looks outside. It's a really bright blue outside. Lol my fingers look so fat here. I was squeezing to prevent it from slipping since I had just lotioned my hands.

 If it hadn't been for the Ave You deals going on, I don't think I would have as many Spa Rituals as I have bought. I love those deals, you're basically paying $25 for a $50 certificate plus they have a coupon "five" that gives you 15% off your entire order making the Spa Rituals $8.50. Unfortunately, the Ave You deals have expired from KGB, but I heard that they are now being offered through SaveMore http://svmr.co/BD-p. That's my referral link, but you don't have to use it, of course the website is http://www.savemore.com/DailyDeals/Dallas/3756/30_worth_of_beauty_products. You can get $15 for $30 or $24 for $50 or $35 for $75. At the time of this post there are only four hours left to purchase the deal. I would recommend that you buy the $24 one because with a $50 purchase you get $1 shipping and with the $15 you would have to pay for shipping. Also, for being a new user they will give you a $10 credit right away so the deal will be even cheaper if you're a new signer.

Tutorial: How to fix a broken nail

 I mentioned yesterday how I had a break on my pinky nail and I know a lot of you might just file down all your nails or maybe even just only file down that one broken nail. Well, I couldn't do either. The break in my nail started way below my free edge, so I had no option except to fix it. Unless, of course, I wanted to be in pain and at risk for infection with the exposed skin. I rarely do fixes to begin with because I rather file down all my nails whenever a break occurs to have all my nails at an even length. The first time I ever did a fix was actually using scotch tape because that was all I had and it worked fine up until I had to remove the sticky residue! The next time I tried to do a fix I just used tissue paper. That worked really great since it's thin enough that it will hardly be noticeable once your nails are polished.

 On to the tutorial, shall we? There are six things that I use for a repair: tissue paper, nail glue, orange stick, ridge filler, cuticle nippers and a nail file with approximately 400 grit. The grit is important because you don't want to use one that will damage your nail bed or remove all of the tissue paper that is already placed on your nail.

Here's a pic of my broken nail sans nail polish or base coat. The white stuff at the tip is actually a bit of nail glue that didn't entirely come off, since I didn't want to press too hard on the nail and cause further breakage.

Here are the items necessary. It's preferable if you use white tissue paper to avoid the color from showing through, but this is all I had on hand.

This is the tissue paper I used. Nothing special about it. I just used some scissors to cut a small squarish piece that would fit over the break and then some.

Now that you have all your materials ready, the first thing to do is to put some nail glue over the breakage and let it sit until tacky. If your nail is completely separated from your finger then you will just need to glue it together until a little firm and you will need to do the following step also on the underside to give your nail some strength.

After the glue becomes tacky, apply the tissue paper to the nail and smooth with orange stick until it is completely adhered to the nail.

This is how it should look once it is completely smoothed with the orange stick.

Once dry you can begin buffing out the bumpy parts with the nail file until it's smooth to the touch. This is where you will use the cuticle nippers. Occasionally, I will cut a piece of tissue too big and not know it until I already have the tissue glued in place. Well rather than start over, with the cuticle nippers you can just trim it down with exact precison, whether the overage is at the tip or sides.

Here I have smoothed it out to my liking. While buffing your nail you will be removing some portions of the tissue paper but don't worry you will be reinforcing the fix with the ridge filler.

I used two coats to help cover the green tissue, but if you're white tissue you should be ok with one layer of ridge filler.

 The total process took me a little under five minutes, but to me it's worth it if you need your nails for a special occasion or to avoid further breakage like me. Tomorrow I will be posting the mani I did after the fix so that you can see for yourself how unnoticeable it is.

Mani Fail

 No matter how badly we try to be perfect, there is no doubt about it that we are human and we will err regardless of our efforts. This mani is my proof that I'm human, not that anyone thought I was a robot or anything. O_O I was trying so hard to not have to do any cleanup on this particular day and I actually succeeded, well at least until my mom called to tell me that she was on her way to pick up my kids. That little phone call led to a catastrophe of dings and smudges while trying to get the kids ready for their grandparents. Needless to say, I was upset and was really in no mood to redo my whole mani, so I decided to just do some quick fixes and then throw some glitter over it all to camouflage the disaster. Yea... I imagined that going sooo much better in my head.

This is after all was said and done and kids were on their way to their grandparent's house. Pretty? I think not!

My attempt at fixing it by applying more polish and touching up bald spots. Haha, I don't know how I ever thought all would end well.

Totally bumpy lumpy.

A closeup. Even though this was a total fail, this polish totally rocks! I should live under a rock from now on for making this polish look so bad.

Outside (and far away) it actually doesn't look that bad! *nervous laugh

 Perhaps, I should have also mentioned that I was already in a bad mood because I broke my pinky nail way below the free edge and had to do a repair to avoid anymore damage. Actually, I'm working on a post for you guys to show you how to a fix a broken nail. That will probably be coming tomorrow. Oh and update on the giveaway, I am almost ready to post it, but I'm a little confused with the Google Docs Form that I need to create so as soon as I get that figured out the giveaway will get started! Yay!

Butter London Wallis

 Hey guys, so yea I'm still in my fall mood and this is what I chose for my mani. When I first bought this, I was really hesitant to wear it because in the bottle the polish has a gritty look and I thought it would be a pain to take off. Was I ever surprised when I started applying it! It's actually a really smooth formula and not at all gritty.

  I was excited to wear this polish as much as I was hesitant. I don't know if I have mentioned this before, but I LOVE these green, gold, ugly yet pretty polishes. This polish itself has a lot of hype in nail world and let me tell you that this polish has earned that hype! The price tag on Butter London's lacquers is a little steep at $14 per bottle, but this polish is worth every penny. This is actually my first Butter London and I am really looking forward to the sale Ulta is having on September 20, which is next Tuesday. They will be offering this brand at an amazing sale of BOGO free!! So, if you're interested but think the price is a little high, I highly suggest you go to Ulta on the 20th. It'll be like paying only $7 per bottle.

Now that you know to score this polish for cheap, what do you say we move on to some swatches??

 I do want to take a moment and thank all those of you who have recently started following my blog and as well to those of you who have already been following since pretty much the beginning!! Thank you, thank you!! I am really amazed at how many followers I have and even though it's not many compared to other bloggers, to me it's as if I had a million! When I first started this blog, I really didn't think I would even get to 10 followers, let alone 32 as of today! WOW! I also want to add that I welcome any special requests or suggestions that you guys might be interesting in seeing on my blog. Whether it be haul pics, stash info, polish swatches, you name it and I will see if it can be done. Once again, thank you, thank you for supporting my blog by following!

Color Mates Decadence

 I was at a family party a few months ago and a couple of my cousins were going out for a liquor run, so I decided to tag along. We ended up going around the corner to a Minyard's and well being me, of course I had to stop by the beauty section first. Nothing really caught my eye, but there were a few dollar items that looked interesting. I grabbed a few nail art pens and the polish in this post. The only reason I even picked up this polish was because I didn't have any browns and it was only a dollar. When I got home, I ended up just storing the polish and never took it out again.

 Now that fall is approaching, slowly, I felt the need to wear a fall color. Looking through my stash I realized this polish had long been forgotten and decided to give it a try. The brand is not one I have heard of before and it is most definitely NOT 3-free. This polish has as much (if not more) chemicals as the brand Kleancolor. I actually was not even able to finish the mani in one go. I did one coat then went to my mom's house and finished when I got back. Once I was done and was ready to topcoat, I actually welcomed Seche Vite's fumes.

This is indoors and this is exactly how the color looks like in real life. It's a brown shimmer with silver microglitter.

Excuse the tip wear, this was taken the morning after. It looks a little lighter here because of the brighter lighting.

 Would I recommend this color? Well, that depends if you can stand the smell, I would say yes otherwise I'd say skip this. Besides the stinky-ness, I think this is a really beautiful color and perfect for fall. It was opaque in just two coats and Seche Vite actually covered up the smell.

What do you guys think, are stinky polishes worth it if it's a color you like?