Deborah Lippmann Let's Go Crazy

Okay, so, Deborah Lippmann's Let's Go Crazy is a Prince inspired royal purple (of course) jelly packed with multi colored glitter.  I don't know if I have anything else to say!

 

I used about three coats for this manicure.  This is the third time I have used this polish and taken pictures before I was satisfied with the outcome.  When spreading polish toward the cuticle it is best to try to get only the base on your brush or else you will have weird bare spots if you try to apply the first coat or second coats with lots of glitter gathered on your brush.

 

 

There is no problem finding glitter in this bottle.  And other than what I described above, it applies like a $16 bottle of polish should.

 

 

This is one of the Deborah Lippmann fall colors. It was a Nordstrom exclusive for a time and was hardly ever in stock, but I have seen it offered on Birchbox since, so I think it is easier to find now.

 

 

This is the same multi glitter combo found in Deborah Lippmann's Candy Shop and Happy Birthday, but in a purple jelly this time, I haven't seen anything else in stores or online that would be a dupe of this, so I would recommend going for this one.

Just Add Milk-Whimsical Nail Polish by Pam

Today I have Just Add Milk, one of the Eight Whimsical Nights holiday polishes by Pam of Whimsical Nail Polish.  Pam says this polish is chocolate chip cookies in a bottle and she is right!

 

The base is a milky light brown with darker brown glitter.  For these pictures I wore three coats.

 

 

Like always with Whimsical Nail Polishes, Just Add Milk gave a smooth application.  With milky glitters like these I like to control the brush and only have a tiny bit of glitter on my first coat.  I like to build up the base coat color.  I also love seeing all the layers of depth with the glitter in these semi translucent polishes.

 

 

I love this polish and I bet you don't have one like this in your stash!   You can order Whimsical Nail Polish through Pam's facebook page for $10 a bottle.

 

 

Candeo Colors Rock Steady & Essence Grey-To Be Here

Today I have Rock Steady from the Candeo Colors Winter collection.  Candeo Colors describes it as a, "mix of small garnet and navy hex with medium gold, navy and gunmetal hex in a grey tinted base."

I used two coats of Rock Steady over two coats of Essence Grey-To Be Here (swatches of it alone further down).

 

 

The grey tint is very light and I didn't want to build up the glitter too much, so I chose to layer it to get it to look like it does in the bottle.  These are the new printed bottles from Candeo Colors that you can purchase here.  I really love this color and it was very easy to apply.

 

Here is Grey-To Be Here on its own.  This is a beautiful grey with a slight shimmer. 

 

These Essence Colour & Go polishes are amazing.  You can find them at Ulta for $1.99, they have unique and deeply pigmented colors that dry really fast and you typically need only one or two coats.

 

Check out the Winter Candeo Colors, Rock Steady is perfect for fall into winter.

 

Crows Toes Bunny Slope

We got our first snow fall this week in Rhode Island, so I decided to blog about Crows Toes Bunny Slope!

 

Bunny Slope is a mix of white matte micro glitter and really shiny silver glitter that looks like snow.

 

 

I used two coats of Bunny Slope over two coats of Nicole by OPI Paparazzi Don't Preach.

 

 

This polish is beautiful and the formula was great.  Check out the Polished Crow blog.  Crows Toes can be purchased at Llarowe and Overall Beauty.

 

Pretty & Polished Pretty As A Peacock & Mannequin Hands

Today I have two new colors available at the Pretty & Polished etsy shop.  Mannequin Hands and Pretty As A Peacock.

 

Mannequin Hands is a neutral skin tone color (almost the same as mine) with light pink glitter.  Colors like this are amazing, they make your fingers look long and they're so chic.  This is a great way to wear glitter in an environment that has a focus on work appropriate nail color.

 

 

I have used three layers of Mannequin Hands for the photos. 

 

 

This polish makes me think of the Andrew McCarthy 1987 classic "Mannequin" which is always a wonderful thing to think about.  I should note that the formula on both polishes reviewed here were fantastic.

 

Pretty As A Peacock has green, teal, purple and blue glitter in an emerald green base.  This has beautiful colors, it really has to be seen in person!

 

 

 

Three coats were used here as well.

 

 

I have a lot of nail polish, it's over 500 bottles now, and I have nothing close to either of these two.  I highly recommend adding both of these to your collection.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pretty & Polished Holiday Collection

Here are the rest of the Pretty & Polished holiday collection starting with the Happy Holodays Duo.

 

Here is three coats of Happy Holodays Ruby, a stunning jewel toned holographic polish.

 

 

As with all holographic polishes, the first coat was a little bit streaky, everything evens out beautifully in the second coat.  I love, love, love this polish and already wish I had purchased a full sized instead.  I didn't have any red holos in my collection and this is perfect.

 

 

Here is the other half of the duo, Happy Holodays Glitter Topper.  This is two coats over the Happy Holodays Ruby.

 

 

This is a super shiny red and green glitter topper.  This duo is out of control when you are out in the sun!  The glitter topper applies with ease and could be built up for a dense glitter look.

 

 

Up next is the very exciting Island of Misfit Toys!

 

 

This is indescribable besides calling it a multi shape and color glitter topcoat!  Everything is in there! The pink squares made me smile.  Again, the formula was fantastic on this topcoat.

 

 

I used two coats of Island of Misfit Toys over two coats of Julep Claire.  Whenever I think of the movie I see this shade of blue, and I think it may be one of the only hues of colors not included in the glitter mix, so it really makes it pop. 

 

 

Now, lets look at Xmas Wreath, described by Pretty & Polished as, "a dark green base packed with green shreds, red hexes, and holo golden glitter".  Below is three coats of

Xmas Wreath.

 

 

Here is two coats of Xmas Wreath over two coats of Revlon Wicked Star, another good application here.

 

 

 

And, finally, and my favorite of the Pretty & Polished holiday collection, Everybody Loves Penguin!  I love a white base, here we have a milky one with large and medium black hexes and small yellow hex glitter.

 

 

I used two coats of Everybody Loves Penguin over one coat of Milani White on the Spot.

 

 

 

This is a polish that can be applied in three to four layers on its own, and the base coat will give it an amazing look of depth, which is how I love to wear a polish like this.  I thought this layering would be best to showcase the glitter mix, though.

 

The holiday collection will all be available this week through etsy.  The Pretty & Polished blog can be seen here, and follow on facebook here.

 

Check out my reviews and swatches of the other two polishes in this collection here.  There you will see S'no Mans Land and Love Always, Candy Cain.  This collection is great, Pretty & Polished gives us some classic holiday colors and presents them in fun and fresh way (never did I think I'd love wearing a red and green glitter) and then takes some traditional ideas and items and deconstructs them into something so unique and perfect for the holidays. 

 

I will have a couple of new, non holiday colors soon, so check back!

 

Pretty & Polished S'no Mans Land & Love Always, Candy Cain

I have two of the Pretty & Polished holiday collection to show you today.  These are going to be available this week on etsy.

First up is one of my favorites S'no Mans Land.  This is packed with multi sized white hex and iridescent glitter in a shimmery pearl base. 

 

 

This is three coats of S'no Mans Land, but it easily can be worn with two on its own.

 

 

 

Next is Love Always, Candy Cain.  This is a red and white glitter topcoat.  This seems like a simple topcoat, but it has a complex glitter mix, there is shiny micro glitter, different sizes of hexes and hearts.

 

 

 

This is two coats over one coat of Milani Black Magic.

 

 

The formula is perfect on both of these, they apply smooth and easy with lots of glitter to disperse.  Follow Pretty & Polished on facebook.  I should have the rest of the holiday collection tonight or tomorrow, so check back!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pretty & Polished Election Day!

Just in time for Election Day (GO VOTE ON TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 6TH!) I have Pretty & Polished's Election Day polish!

 

Election Day is a fun glitter mix of red micro sparkle, small and bar matte white, silver star, matte red square, matte blue hex and I think some holographic bars.  I have two coats here over two coats of OPI Don't Pretzel My Buttons.

 

 

I was really wondering what I was going to wear on Tuesday, then this came into my life.  I love this mix of glitter, this is perfect for every patriotic holiday!  Remember, Veteran's Day is November 12th. 

 

The formula was great with this polish.  In my experience, stars are the hardest glitters to get out of the bottle and I actually found one of my brush before I knew they were in the glitter mix.

 

 

This Election Day polish went up for sale today here.  To keep track of updates and sale info follow Pretty & Polished on facebook. 

 

They're saying this election is going to come down to 100,000 votes, so make sure that regardless of who you are voting for, get out there and vote! 

 

In the next few days I will have reviews and swatches of the Pretty & Polished holiday collection and some other new colors, so follow me and check back!

 

 

 

Happy Hands The Swamp

Here is The Swamp from the Greetings From Florida collection by Happy Hands. 

Looking for an awesome orange jelly polish withe multi color/size/shape matte glitter?  I didn't know this was looking for until I saw this amazing polish!  These pictures are with three easy to apply coats. 

I need to try more polishes from Happy Hands, check out the etsy shop here.

October Birchbox

Here are the contents of my October Birchbox!  I got the Goop box, even though I think I opted out of it.  Goop is the Gwyneth Paltrow lifestyle company, and this month besides the regular Birchbox there was a Goop box option with cherry picked items.  The funny thing is that I didn't really know much about Goop previous to this box (I think I was familiar with the notion of Gwyneth blogging recipes) and even though I am a huge fan of its contents, I have no desire to learn anything else about Goop.  Not sure why, maybe it's the name.

Joanna Vargas Daily Serum is natural and has vitamins A, C and E to combat wrinkles and dark spots.  The Birchbox site says it is like a green juice for your skin, and it really is!  You get a boost and feel the difference right away.  Your skin gets tighter, but moisturized, and brighter in the first use.  It has a nice smell and the sample size is lasting a long time.

 

I love getting a full sized nail polish in my Birchbox!  Here is Essie Carry On, a deep burgundy.  This is very nice and will be great for fall/winter, I didn't swatch this yet (other than on my color wheel), and I do have other colors that are similar or dupes, but there is nothing wrong with a nice cream finish with a good formula.

 

Marie Veronique Organics Body Oil is packed with rose, neroli, avocado, and jojoba oil and is made without any parabens or chemicals.  It is also a pure oil and not mixed with water.  It sinks into skin right away and has a great smell.  Again, this is a sample that is a great size. 

 

 

My last item is a full sized Sprout Cocoa flavored, organic, fair trade lip balm.  It is made of beeswax, cocoa butter and coconut oil and that's it.  This is wonderful and it's just like Mom makes!  Really, my mom makes lip balm and lots of other things, you can see her handmade cards on her blog Score at Four and a Quarter. 

 

 

 

All the pictures used in this post were taken by my boyfriend, I do not have the patience to shoot all the different product pictures.  He watermarks all of my photos too. 

 

That's it until the November box, which won't be too far away since I waited 'til the last possibly second (and then some) to crank out the rest of these October posts!



OPI Black Spotted and So So Skullicious Halloween

I am in my third month of blogging!  I took on a Halloween challenge this month, that I unfortunately did not complete, Hurricane Sandy was not conducive to taking nail swatch pictures outside.  I did get to try some new methods and I am now posting the last of all my Halloween polishes.  I also finished my first month of beauty school!

Here is the Halloween manicure I wore today.  I used OPI Hi, Pumpkin!, A-Rose From The Dead and Candlelight from the So So Skullicious mini pack for the base colors with three coats each on alternating fingers.  I love how bright all these colors are.  I then used the Sephora France exclusive Black Spotted effect topcoat from the Amazing Spiderman collection.  Black Spotted took the place of the Green Shatter that we had here in the US, and what a better polish those French girls got!  This is an amazing polish.  I also used some of the sugar skull decals from the Skullicious set.

 

I love Halloween and all things spooky, and there were some amazing collections this season, but I am so tired of Halloween polish!  The amount I had to swatch and wear made it almost impossible to wear anything other than a Halloween manicure for 31 days!  Now I get to start posting the lacquer I have been sitting on!

 

Thanks for reading my blog and leaving comments!  Now, on to November!