Friday, February 27, 2015

Kbshimmer Belle Of The Mall Swatch and Review

Hi everyone! Oh man, I am so glad it's friday. Let the weekend begin!
Today's polish is one I've had for a bit, but hadn't tried. I put it on and wow I wish I had worn it earlier!





This is Kbshimmer Belle Of The Mall. The second indie polish I've reviewed here! I'm just getting my feet wet in the world of indie polishes. I got two Kbshimmer polishes in a gift exchange. I already love this brand and want more of their polishes ASAP. This one is from the 2014 Spring collection, and it's a warm red leaning neon pink jelly with holo glitter in all different sizes.
Here's my review..


Application
It was easy to work with. Because it has a jelly base you need around 3 coats to cover up the nail line. Even then it might be slightly visible, but it's not bad and I'm totally okay with it.


Look
It's pretty! It dries slightly matte so you'll need a topcoat if you want to make it shiny and smooth out the slight texture the glitter gives it. If you like pink you'll like this. The holo glitter is so sparkly. It's the perfect jelly sandwich in a bottle.


Price
$8.75

Overall

I love this, and definitely will be purchasing more Kbshimmer polishes in the future!

So what do you think? Do you like Kbshimmer polishes?

Update:
My mom saw me wearing this polish and had me paint her nails with it too!




Monday, February 23, 2015

From My Favorite Collection! Nicole By OPI That's What I Mint!

Hi everybody! Hows your weekend been? Mine was good, but not too eventful. Same old same old really.
Today’s polish is from one of my favorite collections of all time, the Nicole by OPI Gumdrops collection. For every nail polish lover there is usually a polish that started it all. Maybe it was one you saw at the drugstore that you were unable to resist, or maybe your mom gave you one of her collection. For me, it was this collection.
Lets rewind real quick to two years ago. I had never painted my nails in my life. In fact, I didn’t even really have nails. I’d bitten them for as long as I could remember.
And..then I saw an ad for this collection in a magazine.
Boom, two years later and I have almost 400 polishes and a blog. Convinced yet? Well..maybe a picture will help.



This one is called That’s What I Mint, its a teal blue texture.
Here's my review..

Application

Two perfect coats. It was very easy to work with.

Look

Its gorgeous. It has a gold and blue shimmer in it, which makes it very sparkly and adds dimension to it. I love it.

Price

Right now these are on sale at various places, I picked this one up at Ulta for $1.78. You guys know that love a good sale.

So..are you a fan of textures? Would you pick this one up? :)

Friday, February 20, 2015

Hard Candy Touch Of Teal

Hi everybody! How's everybody doing today? I've been okay, getting over a mild cold. I'm not a huge fan of this time of year for that reason. Maybe that's why I chose a bright polish to show you today.



Meet Hard Candy Touch Of Teal. I love this brand, especially their Itzy Glitzy and Crushed Chromes collections. They make some really complex and gorgeous polishes.
This one did not disappoint. Here's my review..

Application

I used 3 coats but they were easy and dried smooth.

Look

The finish is hard to describe. It's kind of a metallic shimmer made up of really fine teal micro glitter, but it's more complex than that. At some angles you can also see flashes of purple and dark blue. It's really beautiful and I love it.

Price

$3.99 at Walmart.

Overall

I love this. I wish the bottle was bigger but I'll forgive it. Hard Candy makes some amazing colors and this is one of them!

So what do you think? Are you a fan of the brand?

Monday, February 16, 2015

Sinful Colors Cinderella

Hi everyone! Hope you all had a good valentines day!


Today I have a polish that embodies the phrase "there is no beauty without pain". Sinful Colors Cinderella.

*Update* yesterday I wasn't able to get a good outside picture because it was sleeting, so here's ones I took today in addition to an indoor picture.







As you can see..she's all kinds of beautiful. A pretty light blue with peach pink shimmer. Gorgeous.
But unfortunately..it's also all kinds of frustrating.
Here's my review.


Application
Prior to this I had never seen a polish that somehow manages to be both thick and thin at the same time. Now I have. Sinful Colors has made a lot of polishes with good formulas, and this is a giant flop compared to them. When you put it on it pools towards the side of your nails and leaves bald spots in the center. I had to use four coats to get a semi even coverage, and now it looks thick and you can STILL see some imperfections.


Look
If this wasn't so pretty I would've thrown it out. But it's gorgeous. It has that type of shimmer that I like to call "sugary" and I love that.


Price
$1.99


Overall
If it wasn't for the craptastic formula this would've been an instant favorite. If you're a master nail painter and think you can tame this polish, go for it. If not, maybe skip this one and hope a dupe comes along.

Friday, February 13, 2015

My Favorite Pink Polish For Valentines Day! Zoya Binx!

Hi everyone! So..tomorrow is the big day. I'm really looking forward to it. I have date plans. But whether you have big romantic plans, are hanging  with friends, or spending the day sitting at home in protest of consumerism, maybe you'll still like this polish.

Prior to this post I went through all of my pink polishes, trying to decide on my favorite. I have a lot of pink polishes, so it took a while. But I narrowed it down and finally chose this one! Zoya Binx.



Binx is from my favorite Zoya collection, if not one of my favorite nail polish collections of all time, the bubbly collection. I adore iridescent glitter jelly polishes. They're my favorite finish, and Zoya nailed it so awesomely. I only have three of them as of now, but someday I will have the whole collection(my budget didn't allow me to buy it when it came out, so I'm stalking Ulta for the ones on clearance now).
Anyway..back to the topic. Binx is a gorgeous raspberry pink jelly filled with golden shimmer and iridescent glitter.  Here's my review..

Application
I had no problems here. Because of the jelly like finish I used three coats for opacity.

Look
You can probably see why this is my favorite pink polish. She's a stunner.

Price
Right now the bubbly collection is on sale at Ulta for $.99 to $1.99.

Overall
Take a wild guess.

So, I want to see what colors you'll be rocking tomorrow? Link up in the comments!

Monday, February 9, 2015

Chocolate Swirl Nail Art

Hi everyone! Wow, it's valentines week already? Seems like New Years was just a few days ago.
Well, i'm pretty happy. I love valentines day. I'm not normally the "pink fluff" type of girl, but when valentines day is near my girly side comes out. I'll admit, I'm a shameless romantic at heart. But..I promise that I'll also have some things for those of you who are already sick of seeing hearts everywhere.
My first design of the week is one of those things, today I have something that I hope even the most anti valentine girls might like.

There's one thing that most everyone likes about the valentines day time of year, whether they're single or in a relationship or hate it all regardless..and that thing is chocolate. All the stores have everything out and the day after the 14th it all goes on sale..*sighs happily*.
Anyway, this nail art is my tribute to that wonderful treat.


At first I wanted to do a water marble for this design. But then I decided on something better. A dry water marble. It's faster than a regular water marble, less messy, and uses less materials. There's also no chance of the cup of water getting knocked over, or more accurately thrown across the room in frustration(If you don't understand why than you haven't tried the technique..). Plus I think it looks cooler for this particular design. What I did is this:

1. Paint your nails with a light shade of brown.

2. Paint another really thick coat of the lighter shade on top.

3. BEFORE that dries, place drops of the dark brown color on top of the thick coat of the light brown.

4. Quickly swirl the two colors together. I used a toothpick to do this, but nail art brushes will work fine. You can add drops of the light and dark as you go until you're satisfied with the look.

5. Let it dry and topcoat. :)

The colors I used in this are OPI Ice-bergers and Fries and 10 Professional Chocolate Kiss. The OPI worked well as the lighter base because if it's amazing formula. They also both dry thin on the nail, meaning that while the design will look thick and lumpy while you're doing it, it will dry flat.
This design also marks an exciting occasion for me. My very first video tutorial! The video will be up on my Instagram account, which you can view here. Feel free to give me your feedback on it. I've never done videos before and I'd love suggestions on how I can improve!

Well, until next time, happy painting!

Friday, February 6, 2015

Claire's Dime A Dozen Review and Swatch

Hi everyone! So I was at the mall, making my rounds to the stores that sell nail polish(Yep, no clothes shopping for me at the mall..just polish. haha). I went into claire’s and saw that they have a couple of cool special collections right now. The mood polishes, which are thermals, and some that say “Liquid metal”. These come in an opaque black bottle and the shiny cap supposedly tells you what color it is. I was particularly drawn to the silver in the collection. I don’t currently own a silver chrome (I bought OPI Push and Shove but she tragically perished in a brutal fall to the floor. Rest in peace.), so I bought it, and it is the polish that I have to share with you today.


Claire's Dime A Dozen Sunlight

Claire's Dime A Dozen Intense Sunlight

Claire's Dime A Dozen Shade



It's called Dime A Dozen(which I think is a great name for it), and as I stated before, it's a silver chrome. I do want to note that it's not a pure, white leaning silver, it goes more towards grey. I like that, because I think it makes it look more like actual metal.
Now for the review,


Application
I have mixed feelings about the way it applyed. At first I tried to apply it straight onto my nails with no base coat (I usually do this unless I think something is going to stain, because I think it better shows the polish since not everybody has the same base coat and some don't use one at all), and was really impressed with how opaque it was. It was technically completely opaque in one coat, but once it started drying I saw the problem.
I'd forgotten that chromes show every ridge and imperfection on nails, and I'm one of the unfortunate few who has a lot of ridges. I'm an ex-biter (*gasp*), and needless to say my nails are far from smooth.
So I took that off, and this time applied a coat of Essie Ridge Filler Base Coat before the chrome. There were less ridges shown, but this presented another problem. Streaks. Every time I went over a place twice with my brush it would streak a little bit, and the brush in the bottle, while it was easy to control, was skinny and stiff and made it difficult to cover the nail in less that four strokes. One good thing I found was that once it dried most of the streaks disappeared. So if you get this apply your first coat then let it dry before putting on another.


Look


I like the effect of this polish. If you can get it smooth it looks very metal like.


Price
Currently it costs about $6.50 at Claire's stores. I can't find the online price so that is not definite.


Overall
It's not my favorite thing in the world, but I don't hate it either. The effect is pretty cool once you put in the effort to get it smooth, or if you're one of the lucky ones with no ridges (I'm so jealous of you).

Before I sign off, I do want to add that putting 2 coats of Butter London Dodgy Barnett over it makes a really pretty metallic silver/grey holo. :)




Tah dah! I love that combination! I hope you enjoyed this post! Happy Painting!

Monday, February 2, 2015

Really Amazing Deal! Deborah Lippmann Cleopatra In New York

Hi everyone! So, remember the last Back To The Clearance post from two weeks ago? When I was excited about the deal I got on a Deborah Lippmann polish at TJMaxx?
Well..the record has been beaten.
By Ulta. I went there and discovered that they had Deborah Lippmanns on sale. They were all labeled between $6 and $10. The lower ones about matched the price at TJMaxx, and they had a lot more colors, so I went to buy some.
Guess how much they rang up for at the register. Go on, guess.
They all cost between $1.25 and $1.50. Not just the ones labeled $6 either..ALL OF THEM. Deborah Lippmanns..for less than $2 each.
My friend(who was with me at the time) and I about cleared out the clearance section. It was awesome. Seriously..go check Ulta. Anyway, today I'm going to show you the one I put on first.


Deborah Lippmann Cleopatra In New York Sunlight

Deborah Lippmann Cleopatra In New York Shade



This is Cleopatra in New York. Its a black jelly with gold glitter.


APPLICATION
I was expecting this to go on kind of clumpy or sheer like a lot of jelly glitters tend to do, but nope. It was opaque in two coats. I added a third on a couple of fingers because I was clumsy and smudged it before it was dry, but that was my fault not the polishes.


LOOK
I love the shade of gold the glitters are, more of an antique gold. They really go well with the black base and give it a luxury feel.


PRICE
As I said before, the price is the best part about this.


OVERALL
This is so worth tracking down an Ulta that sells Deborah Lippmann. When you find one that has some on clearance ignore the labels and just price check them.

Hopefully you'll be able to get in on this deal too!