Rainbow Honey - October 2014 Mystery Bag

Well hi!

I picked up Rainbow Honey's mystery bag this month because *mysteries* but also because I haven't gotten one in a while and I missed it. I went with the $10 mini version because *broke* and still made out like a dang bandit.

Included in this month's mini mystery bag:

Cafe Con Leche 5mL - Basically couldn't have been named anything more appropriate. Super creamy nude with gold and silver shimmer: the perfect polish for my skin tone for mannequin hands! Smooth, easy formula. 2 coats + topcoat under OttLite.

Zi 5mL - Purple jelly packed with blue, gold, magenta and silver micro glitter. It almost looks like a glass fleck, but like, a micro glass fleck, if that makes sense. A bit on the thin side color-wise, this guy built to opacity in 3 coats. The first picture is under OttLite, the second is under crappy kitchen light to show more accurate color/shimmer (both swatches are with topcoat).

All Your Base base coat 15mL - Full size! Yeah girl! I, uhhhh, very rarely wear base coat (scoff!) because of how often I change my polish, but this one apparently has pretty good reviews. I actually got the mini size of All Your Base a few months ago and HAVE used it, thank you.

L'orange Ganache nourishing lip balm .15oz - I can never have enough lip balm during the winter. This one smells like chocolate with maybe a hint of orange, but I mostly just get chocolate. And it tastes kind of sweet, which is nice, because nothing is more disappointing than a yummy smelling lip balm that tastes like nothing. :( I have it on right now, and it feels, you know, nice. My lips are happy.

Sweet November Eu de Parfum Rollerball 4mL & Shimmer Soap .5oz - I loooove sweet scents, so this couple is perfect for me. I'm glad RH includes an info card detailing the products or I would have described this scent as 'Um... sweet... there's like, vanilla and maybe, like, some caramel notes..?' Officially, Sweet November is "a warm sweet musk with notes of coconut and vanilla sugar". It makes me want to wrap up in a big, warm blanket and lay in front of a fire surrounded by Christmas lights.

Like, I HATE winter, mind, but I really love feeling cozy. This smell makes me feel very cozy.

So heck yeah, right? I'm never disappointed with these bags, especially for the price. I love how much of a variety of products are included, too. It's nice to see an October mystery thing that isn't specifically Halloween-related.

Sinful Colors - Splatter Spell, Cauldron Couture and Mystery Moonshine Swatches & Reviews

Firstly, these swatches suck large amounts of horse hineys (autocorrect wants to change "hineys" to "chimneys" which, if horse chimneys were a thing, these swatches would be sucking those as well). I wouldn't even pretend to be mad if somebody told me so, either. I agree with you, friend. Such suck.

But it's what I have, soooooooooooooooo...

Found these bishes at Walgreens a couple weeks ago on an un-built display, still in their boxes. I sneakily snuck one of each out, even though I'm pretty impartial to glitter toppers. I figure for Halloween maybe I can get into it a little bit.

Bleh.

The problem with drugstore glitter toppers, I've found, is that the ratio of glitter to base is pretty weak. I mean, obvs I'm not looking for a full-coverage glitter, but as thick as these polishes were, I would have liked to have gotten a better payoff, you KNOW? I had to do some fishing for an even layer of glitter. All swatches were taken under OttLite (even though it's a beautiful day out and likely one of the last of its kind this year :/  ).


First up is Splatter Spell which is a metallic orange shard/hex and various-sized black hex glitter mix in a clear base. Shrug. I kind of wish the orange was more saturated, I guess.

Shown below is two coats plus a few dabs over Sinful Colors - Enchanted.

Cauldron Couture is similar to Splatter Spell but it's, oh you know, metallic green and black instead. There also seemed to be a much higher glitter concentration in this one, making it my favorite of the three, and I still don't really even like it that much.

Shown below is two coats plus a few dabs over Sinful Colors - Innocent.

I thought Mystery Moonshine was going to be my favorite because of the lack of black hex glitter, but this one can just go straight to heck. It was a goopy nightmare with very little glitter payoff, plus the super-thick base was tinted pinkish (though I don't know if it was intentional or because of glitter bleeding).

Shown below is two resentful coats plus countless dabs over Sinful Colors - Cool Gray.

I'm only keeping these guys because I collect Sinful Colors and they look pretty in the bottle, but I very highly doubt I'll be actually using them anytime soon. Whatever, they were $2 a pop (because somebody didn't just wait until Walgreens was having their $.99 Sinful Sale...).

Whatever, I say. Hey, Halloween isn't until, like, a month from now. I have time to find successful Halloween polishes, right?

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

Revlon Street Wear - Monster Mash

Oh, hey, it's Tuesday.

May the Fourth, Cinco de Mayo and all of that! I played Lego The Hobit for most of the weekend and volunteered with my best friend at a food bank yesterday. We did, however, go to a pretty excellent Mexican restaurant after so I guess that kind of counts.

Oh, hey, the mailman's here and it's only 10:30am.

I don't remember from where or at what age I procured a certain Street Wear Monster Mash, but I had it, and now I don't because I sold it. Because I hadn't worn it for about a hundred years. But now I kind of regret it. I swatched it a while before putting it up for sale and was like 'oh, this is neat, but I won't wear it on the reg'.  And now I kind of miss it.

I took a bunch of pictures of it. It's from the 90s, it's green, and is glittery. It's, like, a full-coverage glitter. I'm pretty sure this was only three thin layers over nothing. Nothing but nailz. Also it's pretty much impossible to find, I guess. I saw one that was auctioned on British eBay for $62. I didn't sell it for close to that much because a.) evap and b.) I painted the bottle handle with other nail polish years ago and when I was cleaning it off with polish remover it started smudging the ink of the label off. Such lame. I also had Costume Party (which I didn't swatch before selling :/) and still have Black Widow and I kind of feel like maybe they were sold in a set together.

Oh, hey, also this polish is the only example of the use of bar glitter than doesn't make me puke in my mouth.

So anyway, here's six of those pictures I was telling you about:

Under OttLite

Under OttLite

Under OttLite

Natural light, shade

Natural light, shade

Direct sunlight

Sooooo, yeah. I probably would have worn this again, actually, now that I'm staring at these pictures. I mean, I'm glad Monster Mash has gone to somebody who will love him. I liked him all right in a sentimental way, but I didn't really treasure his full value. If you love a polish, let it go...

We just weren't that close, you know? But maybe we could have been. Maybe I should have just given him a chance.

Hey, so I've been writing this while listening a conversation going on and I'm not even going to reread it because I'm sure what I've written is absolutely brilliant. I'm, like, 101% confident.

Funky Fingers - Neon Glitters Swatches & Reviews

Hiiii.

Today, for you! I have the Funky Fingers Neon Glitters (collection?) from Five Below. There are three polishes in the set, named in embarrassing homage to television shows from the late 80s/early 90s (AKA the grodiest time period in history). The formula is, unshockingly, the same amongst the three: not too thick with a good glitter payoff. The swatches all show one coat of Funky Fingers over a pastel gradient with topcoat.

Saved by the Glitter - Three sizes of hex glitter in neon blue and neon pink with small white hex glitter in a clear base (over ORLY - Pretty-Ugly  & CoverGirl - Peek a Boo Pink).

Glitter Matters - Three sizes of hex glitter in neon pink and neon yellow with small white hex glitter in a clear base (over CoverGirl - Peek a Boo Pink & ORLY - Melodious Utopia).

Glitter Explains it All - Three sizes of hex glitter in neon yellow/green and neon blue with small white hex glitter in a clear base (over ORLY - Melodious Utopia & ORLY - Pretty-Ugly).

My favorite is Saved by the Glitter, but I really quite like all three. I liked the Salon Perfect Neon Collision Collection released last summer (which is the only other kind of neon glitter polish I own)  but I'm more into the size variations of the glitter in these, plus I like how the white glitter breaks things up a little bit. If you're looking for a good, cheap (3 for $5), Summery glitter topper, here you go. Yoooooou're welcome!

Funky Fingers - Berried Treasure, Fro Yo, Puffo Gelato and Mint Choco-Chip Swatches & Reviews

So yeaaaah, these polishes have been around for a while. They were on clearance at my local Five Below for 5/$5 so I was like what the hay-hay.

What the hay-hay indeed.

I tend to overlook Funky Fingers as a brand, mostly because my first experience with them made me go 'meh'. I've since gotten a few colors that are actually quite excellent, and for the normal price of 3/$5 it's hard to be too upset with them if they're not, like, a-maaa-zing, you know?

Three of the four polishes (Berried Treasure, Fro Yo and Mint Choco-Chip) consist of a milky crelly base with various sizes of black and sheer white hex glitter, while the other (Puffo Gelato) is a crelly base with only black hex glitter in various smaller sizes. The glitter with these dudes (with the exception of Puffo Gelato) was all kind of clumped at the bottom, and I struggled to get an even amount of it out, as you can see in my pictures. I would have liked them a lot more if their glitter was like PG.


First up is Berried Treasure, the sheerest of the bunch. The soft, little-puppy-nose pink is sweet and feminine but even after three coats you can still see bald patches on the nail.

Shown below is three coats with topcoat.

Fro Yo is a pastel purple. The formula was better with this one in terms of sheerness. The white glitters, consequentially, weren't very noticeable as a result.

Shown below is three coats with topcoat.

Puffo Gelato is my favorite, and not just because it's blue. This one is the most egg-speckly, least sheer and lacks the white glitter (which, honestly, they all could have done without since the glitter is also sheer). I muuuch prefer the smaller glitter in this type of polish; the distribution ends up being more even and more interesting to look at, in my humble opinion.

Shown below is three coats with topcoat.

Finally there's Mint Choco-Chip. It's, uh, mint green and like, just below Berried Treasure on the sheerness scale. I've said the word 'sheer' like, a hundred times I feel like. It's just such a better word than 'milky'... gag. Anyway, I don't know. It's a nice color and all of that. Things.

Shown below is three coats with topcoat

So there you go, guys. Swatches of an older set of polishes you can probably still find at your Five Below, possibly on clearance. I don't hate these but I'm not in love with them either. I like the idea of them, you know? I wish the glitter was more eager to hang out with me, on my nails. OKAY BUT FOR A DOLLAR. Okay, I know. For a dollar each, they're cool.