PinkDipsyBulle Franken Polish - Queen Conch, Golden Apple, Nebula and Lady of the Lake Swatches & Reviews

GUYS HEY!

I'm 23 weeks pregnant yesterday and I can no longer bend over without grunting. So, anyway...

I actually have some swatches for you today! That is your reward for still subscribing to my junk... you get to see some stuff sometimes. Quality blogging, right there!

*Hallelujah Chorus interlude*

It's no secret that I'm a total PinkDipsyBulle fangirl, and I could not have been more excited to review some polish at the request of The Shimmer Wizard herself (which I'm going to call her from now on... sorry). If you'll recall, my first favorite indie polish ever was Indian Ocean and it continues to reign as champion of my heart; it's also the only polish in my entire (kind of pathetic, comparatively) 300-ish bottle collection that I have a backup of. That being said, my fanatic raving is completely genuine and honest.

First up is Queen Conch, a cool-toned bubblegum pink with electric blue flash. Good formula on this guy; the brushstrokes are much less apparent in person than the OttLite picture would have you believe, so don't let that deter you. The blue flash is also more flash-tastic in real life, of course.

Shown below is three thin coats with topcoat.

Sunlight

Sunlight

OttLite

Sunlight

Next stop: Golden Apple, a soft mint green with bright golden flash that seriously glows on the nail. The way this dude looks in the bottle makes me want to eat it... it looks as though maybe it would taste like the best, like, magic taffy in the universe. Can we just pretend there's any amount of sense in that? Thanks. So, uh, yeah... I've always wanted a shade like this but none that I've found that were similar (mint base/golden flash) had enough oomph, you know? Another good formula, also less brushstroke-y in reality.

Shown below is three coats with topcoat.

Sunlight

Sunlight

OttLite

Sunlight

OttLite

Now we're at Nebula, one of three recently released multichrome toppers. This guy shifts between violet to blue to teal, and has gold to green shifting glitters. Pretty much bottled divinity, if you wanted to know how I really felt.
A bit on the thicker side but not in an unreasonable way, which made for an easier application as I only needed one steady coat to achieve righteousness. If this polish doesn't make your extremities tingle even a tiny bit then I don't even know if we can be friends anymore.

Shown below is one coat with topcoat over black.

Sunlight... kinda

OttLite

OttLite

Shade

Shade

OttLite

And lastly, we have Lady of the Lake, a grape-violet jelly base with bright blue shimmer. Reminds me of Rescue Beauty Lounge - Scrangie, except with a cooler, jelly-er base. A bit less opaque than the first two, I was still able to build to opacity in three coats. Lady of the Lake is a limited edition polish (read: she's only going to make a handful so I suggest jumping all over that noise if you want it). The blue shimmer in this is effing glorious -- it almost reads as a duochrome in some lights, and it has this sparkle that is just so yes.

Shown below is three coats with topcoat.

Sunlight

Sunlight

OttLite

Shade

Sunlight

Sunlight

So, right? And she has a whole shop full of polishes like these -- here! Each goes for $6 for 10 mL and they're 3-free. She's also releasing two other limited edition polishes along with Lady of the Lake and they're also gorgeous, and that's all you get to know.

On a side note: my pinky nail snapped in half the day after I was asked to swatch these, so I kept the nail in order to glue it back on for swatch purposes, but then I lost the damned nail. So I'm wearing a false nail for the photos which is why it looks kind of bizarre compared to the rest of my nails, in case you noticed that. Poor little freak-nail. 

Well maybe I'll see you around soon, you know? I'm still buying crap-tons of polish, just not swatching them so much these days. I've been workin' from home, with two endlessly energized children and the third in my belly, making not taking naps pretty much not an option if I get the opportunity. 

Oh, by the way, he's a boy. A little boy without a name yet and he's currently kicking me just to the right of my belly button. THERE IS A SMALL HUMAN BEING LIVING INSIDE OF MY BODY. It seriously doesn't get any less freaky the second time around. Pregnancy is SO WEIRRRRDD.

I used to seriously get gaggy thinking about just having organs. A HUMAN. Anyway. Hope you're all well. I miss you. XOXOX

Enchanted Polish - May 2014, June 2014 and July 2014 Swatches & Reviews

Heeeyoooo.

I was in my first online semi-argument with a delightful gal in a CVS couponing Facebook group in which she suggested I stick coupon tearpads up my hindquarters and find a male chicken to entertain myself with (note: paraphrased for the younger readers). The thread was sadly deleted, but it all started when another member of the group called a fellow out for selling coupon tearpads which he very unlikely procured legally. Some members were saying there's nothing that can be done about it and that our having a discussion about it was a waste of time. Long story short, my whole thing was that regardless of HOW wrong what he's doing is, it's still wrong. Then we had the whole "there are murders happening and you're worried about THIS?" comments. I just... I guess I'm lucky to have been raised with a conscience and a clear outline of the difference between right and wrong. I'm not saying that coupon fraud is on the same level as murder, but it's still a crime, you know? Shoplifting something for $2 isn't a major offense, but it's still punishable by law, dawgs. 

I mean seriously. Hrrgrgg. The worrrrsssst are comments that are like "you're stupid for spending time arguing about it blah blah blah". Like, what are you LITERALLY doing right now? I just can't even.

So anyway, Enchanted Polish Monthly Mysteries versions May, June and July; editions 2014: I'm slightly underwhelmed.

May is this pumpkin orange jelly with some linear holo and that sparkle I always talk about that EP has, except in pink. It has a lot more dimension on the nail than my photos show; it almost looks like a glass fleck buuut not. This one had the best formula -- two easy coats and required zero cleanup. I like this one the best out of the three which kind of indicates my underwhelm-ed-ness since I'm pretty "meh" about orange in general.

Shown below is two coats without topcoat.

Sunlight

Sunlight

Shade

June is a plum-my purple/berry pink metallic duochrome with linear holo and that pink sparkle action. It reminds me of all those purple-toned multichromes except instead of going all the way to gold, this one stops at pink. The formula wasn't as smoothy-smooth as May but it was still pleasant.

Shown below is two coats without topcoat.

Sunlight

Sunlight

Shade

Shade

Shade

While this one is the most interesting in terms of what's going on in a nail polish, I'm not in love with it like I think a lot of people are. Some people, maybe. A few. I don't know if it's the shade of purple or what, but I was just kind of like, okay, neat. *shrug*


July 2014 is a metallic bright cherry red with linear holo and pink and blue sparkle which very barely shows up on the nail. Pretty basic and uninspired-feeling, which bums me right out since July is my birth month and I was hoping for something blam-tastic. I don't, like, LOVE rubies or anything, but I kind of wish this was a jelly instead of being metallic to emulate July's birthstone more. Deep cherry jelly with red shimmer and linear holo... that's a monthly I would campaign for, yo. I don't hate this polish, but I don't see myself reaching for it anytime soon. The formula on this guy was also pretty suck -- quite goopy compared to what I've become used to with EP formulas. Sigh for days.

Shown below is two coats without topcoat.

Sunlight

Sunlight

Shade

The shade picture definitely makes it look a lot more interesting than it actually is, just FYI. If it looked like that IRL I would be all about it.

Aaaanyway, that's that. Five more months of this mystery stuff and I kind of think I might be done with Enchanted Polish. Unless something in the next five months blows me right the heck away, I'd rather spend my dolla-dollas on polishes that I know I'll love.

Polishnv - Fire In The Sky, Tilt A-Whirl, Route 66 and Mermaid Tears Swatches & Reviews

Hi guys! HEY!! Do you see that little picture up there? The one that says "Press Sample"??!! THIS IS MY VERY FIRST PRESS SAMPLE AND I AM SO PUMPED. Alsooo I changed my watermark finally. Now people won't be left wondering what the F an "lbol" is. I kind of finally feel like a real blogger!!

Today I have four (very soon to be released) colors from Polishnv. Purchasing info can be found at the bottom... after all the pictures and reviews and stuff. So let's dig right in, shall we?

The formulas with Fire In The Sky and Mermaid Tears were similar; three thin coats for opacity. I also used three coats with Tilt A-Whirl but you could likely get away with two. Route 66 only required two coats for opacity. They all applied smoothly and were neither too thin or thick. All of the swatches are shown with topcoat, with the first two pictures of each polish being taken in the sun while the last one shows it in the shade. Did you get all that?


Up first is Fire In The Sky, a purple/pink/red to rusty orange metallic duochrome with linear holo. Not a color I would ordinarily have chosen to wear, I quite like what it looks like on. It is a bit of a chameleon, shifting to varying shades of red/orange at different angles and lighting. The righteousness of the duochrome, however, is also most apparent out of direct light.

Tilt A-Whirl is a summery bright light purple that has the most subtle linear holo of the bunch. I love this kind of purple -- I swatched it last so I could wear it around for a bit! It takes on a softer berry tone in the shade but really pops in the sun.

Route 66 looks, in the bottle, like a vampy burgundy red with subtle linear holo but applies lighter and takes on a raspberry quality in the sun. I thought this color was going to be a bit too dark for Summer but it's totes nots. I'm looking at the bottle indoors, right now, and it seriously looks brick red. What a little trickster.

Finally we have Mermaid Tears, my (unsurprising) favorite of the bunch. Heavenly shade of blue? Check. Aqua flash? Check. Having to do with crying? Check! I would punch a mermaid in her throat if I knew her eye juice was this pretty. To, you know, make her cry so I could collect her tears... not just because I had the knowledge... anyway, it's real pretty is what I'm saying. It's also got kind of a scattered linear holo, if that makes any kind of sense. The arch is loose, but it's there.

These little darlings will be available on the Polishnv Etsy Site (which can be found here!) soon and will be sold for $9 bucks a pop, full size style.

Adventures in Nail Stamping: My First Success!

I bought a Konad double-sided stamper and a brand-unknown stamping plate (it's octagonal and is labeled KD28... I googled it and found nothing, and when I googled "Russian Doll stamping plate" a round version of what I had by a company called Nail Craze came up. So I don't know) with the cutest little triplet of Russian Dolls, this winter sweater pattern and a pretty floral pattern (and a mouse? And a flower "sprig," if you will). I wanted to do a fall-themed mani, so this is what I came up with.

I used Hard Candy - Crush on Lava (which is this really neat sort of burgundy-rust to gold duochrome... sort of like Orly - Space Cadet without the blue base) and stamped with Essie - As Good As Gold, then lightly brushed on some Zoya - Maria-Luisa.

It doesn't shift to quite as green of a hue the pictures are showing you in real life. The macro is really the most accurate in terms of color. As Good As Gold was awesome to stamp with. I haven't done a lot of experimenting with stamping yet, so it was nice to actually have something work out pretty early on.

Well, all right. I'm going to go play some GTA5 while the kids are asleep.