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.

Orly - Just Peachy Swatch

Don't go getting used to this two-days-in-a-row crap. Der Boyfreuden is working late tonight, the kids are asleep and I only have like 20 more minutes of the finale of Top Chef Season 10 so I was all like, "Oh I know, I'll swatch this polish that I've had for-ehhh-ver".

I put up a DISO* post in a nail polish facebook group I'm part of, basically begging for Orly - Just Peachy. Remember that whole thing, like six months ago or whatever? A darling babe actually sold it to me, under the conditions that I would neither 1. resell it for any sort of profit and 2. not love it. Cool man, right?

Just Peachy is kind of a tricky polish in that it was never a part of any collection by Orly but rather manufactured without hitting the market and instead sent to discount retailers like TJ Maxx (or possibly only to TJ Maxx... I don't know that I've heard Just Peachy being spotted anywhere besides) which is d to the umb because it's freaking DANG. You've got this bright, warm pink base packed to heck with gold shimmer, right? And it's a texture polish too, which you and I both know that I am ALL about, girlfriend.

Shown below is two coats with topcoat under OttLite. I added topcoat because it brings out the color of the shimmer in photos.

Ughhh. I can't wait to use my regular watermark font again, side note. Pretty fabulous though, right? And I'm starting to really love the shape of my nails, now. Plus they're super good for scratchin'. Super happy I got my grabby-hands on this little friend without having to cut off my foot or whatever bizarre sacrifice I was willing to provide to the giver-of-the-polish.


*Desperately In Search Of, ya donk.

ORLY - Pink Crystal Swatch & Review

1. I found out from this blog post that ORLY sends polish colors that didn't quite make it to market to discount retailers like TJ Maxx and Marshalls (except, apparently, to the ones in all of flipping northeast Ohio) to be scooped up by fancy polish connoisseurs.

2. I couldn't find it around me (see above) but one popped up on Storenvy! Scoop!

3. I guess go ahead and google another one of these kinds of ORLY rejects called Just Peachy if you want to quietly sob while gently stroking your computer monitor. I love Pink Crystal, don't get me wrong, but I would seriously consider cutting off one of my toes for Just Peachy. A toe, guys. If you think an actual human toe is a fair trade for a bottle of nail polish, please get a hold of me immediately. We can hash out the deets lates.

ORLY - Pink Crystal is a super-sparkly cool-toned berry pink texture polish with gold shimmer. The shimmer was much more apparent in real life, of course. The formula was great and super easy to work with and the little texture chunks dispersed evenly.

Shown below is two coats in direct sunlight.

With topcoat (under OttLite, which for some reason brought the gold out more than sunlight):

Uh, yeah, right? And this for some reason didn't make the cut? What the heck, ORLY?  Even mind-blowinglier was that Just Peachy didn't make it. What doofus looked at those two polishes and was like "no, you know... I just don't think there's a market for these".

ORLY! I AM YOUR MARKET FOR THESE! HI, I'M BRANDY!

So you pretty things, keep your eyes peeled for awesome little treasures like this floating around at your local TJ Maxx and Marshalls. If you find Just Peachy, don't even tell me unless you plan on having one of my toes.

Fresh Paint - Gold Medalist Swatch & Review (and my 100th blog post!)

GUYS GUYS GUYS. I LIKE HARDLY EVER COMMIT TO ANYTHING!!! I can't believe this is my 100th post. I guess that's only like 3 months' worth of daily blogging. BUT STILL, DANG! I feel like my posts are less-sucking, and I'm somehow slowly managing to gain followers (thank you thank you thank you thank you!) and I've only broken one nail on my swatch hand recently so I'm not embarrassed by my swatches! Ye blog gods seem to be finally nodding in approval!

This is the kind of thing my feels are doing.

I wish I would have thought enough ahead to swatch a, like, significant polish. Like maybe one I had been lemming a while orrrr a favorite color even, or did some nail art for the occasion. Nope! Not one of those things. :/

I do have, however, another polish from Five Below called Gold Medalist. I guess Fresh Paint had kind of an Olympics-themed collection because there was a blue polish there called... uh... I forget what, but it had to do with the Olympics. Cool story, right?

Gold Medalist is a sheer yellow base with gold and pink shimmer that is difficult to photograph but is much more apparent in real life. In the store, this polish looked like a duochrome but it's not, really. It never isn't gold, it just has a strong pink sheen to it in certain lights.

Below shows three thin coats (except on ring finger which is one coat over Zoya - Raven) with Essie G2G topcoat.

I also layered one coat over OPI - Love.Angel.Music.Baby (only on my ring finger) to get rid of VNL without straying too far from the original color. Although it's subtle, the polishes play soooo well together.

Gold Medalist kind of reminds me of Orly - Space Cadet without the blue base. I think this would be a fun polish to franken with, especially for how inexpensive it is (3 for $5 at Five Below).

You know what? This polish IS kind of acceptable for this post! It's like I've symbolically given myself a gold medal for being first place in Actually Following Through! Yeah! Go Brandy!

Polish Addict Nail Color - Jellyfish I Swatch & Review

It's Jellyfish I, right? Like, Roman numeral-style? Not 1? (Personally I think the second version should have been called Jellyfish II but I suppose that is neither here nor there, as said in my nose-up tea-drinkingest-with-the-pinkie-out voice).

Jellyfish I is a white base with a deeee-lightful golden flash and tiny purple, light blue and gold glitters interspersed all up ins.

Shown below is three thin layers with Essie G2G topcoat.

It's kind of like warm sunshine on my nails, you know? I haven't looked at a jellyfish in a long time, but yeah, I'm sure they'd probably like having this polish named after them. They'd probably even wear it on their nails, if they had nails... on the ends of their tentacles... which would be horrible.

Truth time: real-life jellyfish kind of freak me out. I like the cartoon kind, though. And those moon jelly guys are pretty all right too.

Colors by Llarowe - Ocean Water & Cult Nails - Baker Simple Nail Art

Foreword: I was once on a search for a teal jelly polish. I am no longer on that search.

The walls in my room are the color of Ocean Water (or, possibly, a touch darker and more blue) and I love it. I plan on painting a room in my house that color, every time we move, because I love it so much. Hopefully we're not going to be moving so much because I really hate painting walls.

I have a pair of sunglasses that are kind of Ocean Water teal with yellow arms. I did this manicure with those colors the other day and it was too much -- the colors look great together, but not with this design. But I liked the design, so I found a pretty nude: Cult Nails - Baker, and it worked, and I like it, all right?

I love hole reinforcements too, FYI.

For this look, I stuck the reinforcements to the top halves of my nails, making sure to wrap them completely around the nail so I could polish all the way to the sides without there being that strange angled gap between colors. I applied three coats of Ocean Water and, after letting it mostly dry, removed the labels. I then carefully applied Baker to the area of nail that didn't have Ocean Water on it (I'd say three coats here too) and then once everything way pretty much dry I put on topcoat.

Just something a little different than your typical half-moon manicure. Like, a reverse half-moon? Upside-down half-moon?

St. Patrick's Day Nail Art

Hey! Hey, guys!

Once upon a time I used to celebrate St. Patrick's Day the only way Americans know how: green wearin' and copious amounts of alcohol starting at the crack of dawn, usually in the form of Killian's, Guinness and Baileys or any creative and shudder-inducing combination of the three. St. Patrick... Patron Saint of hangovers.

Now I'm all old and wrinkly and fun-resenting (but hangover free, bitches!) and I celebrate St. Patrick's Day by making corned beef and cabbage (the recipe is, like, a freaking book and kind of all over the place but i results in DELICIOUS WONDERS). Holidays seem to be the only thing inspiring nail art out of me these days. Meh. Too busy being a grumpy old person I guess.

I started with a base of Essie - Good As Gold and after that was completely dry I used page hole reinforcements to tape off  at the base of each nail. Then I applied two coats of Sinful Colors - Emerald Envy. For the accent nail, I just used my super fancy DIY detail brush and, starting at the cuticle, painted rainbow arches! I had this really great idea to use the reinforcement labels so that the arches would be super crisp and perfect buuuuut no. Nope. Too impatient for that noise.

The rainbow consists of:
Formula X for Sephora - Hyped
Color Club - Wild at Heart
Colors by Llarowe - Young Turks
Sinful Colors - Happy Ending 
Cult Nails - You're My Dandy Lion 
Essie - Meet Me at Sunset 
Colors by Llarowe - The Mighty Red Baron 
..and a coat of Essie G2G

Uh, yep! That's a potato.

Liquid Sky Lacquer - 24 Karat Rose Swatch & Review

My boyfriend and I just watched all the Harry Potter movies in a row (except for 2 and 3 which our five year old insisted on watching pretty much daily when we didn't have cable last year) and it makes me want to reread the books. I know I'm almost thirty and all, but what I wouldn't give to find out I had some sort of magical abilities. I would sooooo still totally go to Hogwarts, I don't even CARE.

I really loved swatches of 24 Karat Rose but I had read mixed reviews about the warm color being pretty but maybe too subtle. I had never owned a thermal polish before, mostly because I think a lot of the sweetness of a thermal comes from seeing the effect of both (or more) colors on longer nails. My nails aren't so long, if you didn't know. Luckily I found a mini for sale for super cheap on Storenvy, though after wearing it I wouldn't mind having a full size bottle.

When cold, 24 Karat Rose is a bright rose pink with gorgeous golden shimmer that, when warm, completely loses the pink. The base when warm has, like, a touch of a pale golden hue to it; enough that the nail doesn't just look bare with gold shimmer. It's, um, awesome. Note to self: Google synonyms for 'awesome'.

Shown below is two coats of 24 Karat Rose, with a coat of Essie G2G on top. First set of pictures is when my fingers were cold (which, by the way, I did nothing to achieve. Ms. Icehands over here).

Warm:

And cold with just the tips dipped in hot water:

The formula is lovely to work with. I really have no complaints with this polish. I know some people might be kind of 'meh' about the amount of VNL present with the polish warm, but I quite liked the effect-- in fact, it camouflaged the staining on my nails nicely. A great gateway thermal polish, because I needed another type of polish to lust after.

Finger Paints - Hammered Terra Cotta Swatch & Review

I have one of the new textured additions to the Finger Paints core line today called Hammered Terra Cotta. True to its name, HTC is a textured metallic copper (think brand new penny) with small gold hex glitter. Application was a breeze, free of texture bump-clumps and opaque in 2 coats.

The first two pictures shows two coats only. The color is brighter and more metallic looking in real life.

(I forgot to take a third picture without topcoat. Oopsie.)

The next set of pictures shows two coats with a coat of Essie G2G on top. I KNOW I STILL NEED TO GET GELLOUS.

Top coat deepens the color and gives it more of that terra cotta shade. I really like this polish overall-- it's one of those colors that when it's on I find myself looking at throughout the day, all finger-wiggly and stuff. I love the addition of the gold glitter. My only qualm is that I wish the bottle had any indication that this was a texture polish. I know there are a couple others, but there are a few colors that I'm not sure whether they're just glitters or what. As much time as I spend with nail polish, you'd think I'd be able to tell these things.

Zoya - Jules Swatch & Review

Jules was one of like 18 polishes I got from the first Pinterest board sale I ever bought from. That was so awesome.

Anyway, Jules here is this greige base with loads of gold and silver shimmer. Zoya does these kinds of polishes so well. A little watery but it built well enough in three thin coats. Essie G2G on le top.

Jules is one of those neutrals that had a nice added oomph, like skin-tone polishes that have, say, pink shimmer. Definitely one of my faves.

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.

Striping Tape & Gradients: NOTDs

In the midst of the moving madness, I still find the time to paint my nails. I guess you can probably see my haste, hahaha. Not the best cleanups in the world... Not that it matters. My nails have been chipping like maniacs what with packing and all. No breaks yet! Knock on wood.

First up is a little striping tape action. I don't love striping tape when left on the nail because no matter how careful I am to make sure to cover up the ends with top coat, they always start to peel within like, an hour. But using striping tape to make line designs with layered polish is definitely my currently favorite technique.

Orly - Glitz & Essie - Sunday Funday, sunlight

I've been using the Essie quick dry top coat and I must say, it's a nice change from my insanely gloopy almost-empty bottle of Seche Vite. It's not as, hmm, sturdy (?) feeling as SV, but it still leaves my nails super-shiny and it does dry rather fast.

Barielle - Berry Blue under Hard Candy - Bity Blue & Essie Naughty Nautical, sunlight

I mean, I really love that design, too. It was a Julep NOTD a while ago and she used gold and army green which is really quite lovely too. This got messy, however. Besides my wonky pinky paint-shape, my cuticles were, indeed, blue. Berry Blue is a gooorgeous deep blue, but it bleeds like no other during cleanup. 

SOPI - Is It Payday Yet?, Salon Perfect - Robin's Egg Blue & OPI - Parlez-vous OPI?
Zoya - Maria Luisa (awesomeeee) on my ring finger, sunlight

I joined a new facebook group called Nail Polish Challenge the other day and one of the prompts was pastel gradient. As you can tell, I suck hard at gradient. I understand the technique, but I'm not patient enough to let the first coat dry all the way before sponging on a second layer and it gets all sponge-marky. I like the color combo, though. I'll try this again around Easter, I think. Maybe I won't be so bad at it by then!

I bought Charla and Maria Luisa from Zoya.com a couple days ago. As a new registered user, I got one polish for free which was pretty great. Plus shipping was free too (I think because of a promotion that was running...?) Also, I've discovered pinterest nail polish sales/swaps! Oh nooooo! That just took this obsession to a whole new level!

I also recently did my first swap with the most lovely lady in Canada. She writes a darling fashion blog that you should check out here: bluecollarredlipstick.com. She was super patient with my complete cluelessness about swapping. Plus, she swapped me some really spectacular and HTF polishes!! I can't wait for that package to come. Friendliness really seems to be a trend in the nail polish community. It feels like everybody's rooting for each other and trying to help locate lemmings and things like that. That's not very common on the internet, I've noticed.

Well, have a good weekend, everybody ever!