Since I have my camera...

... And not my cell phone, why not a real pic instead of a cell phone blurry TwitPic this time?

UPS man just brought these...

Essie Spring

Color Club Spring (Rebel Debutante)

I'll swatch when I get a chance... They literally arrived 10 minutes ago.

(I can't be the only one who loves bottle pictures, right?)

Milani Holos (3D Holographic Collection)

I feel like this is the drugstore score of the century... I can't remember the last time I saw true holos from a drugstore brand... Sally Hansen Magicals? Nail Prisms had a couple holos too. But the last time I saw a Magical for sale in a store was 2003? That seems so recent, I wonder if they were old stock.

Sorry, I think my train of thought derailed. Back on topic... Milani holos. AWESOME. Love them. They rock. Pics.


3D. Gold holo. I didn't let these all dry enough before taking the pictures... It was cold and I was in a hurry! It's a lot more holo than this, but the funny thing is... It looks almost more holo under artificial light than it does in sunlight. Bizarre. Love it, though. Nice gold shade, not too warm for my skintone.

Cyberspace. Check out Dexter Douglas, nerd computer ace... Went surfing on the internet and was zapped to cyberspace! That's totally what this color blue reminds me of, and it is named cyberspace...

Digital. Kind of a mauvey-pink holo? It's pink and I still love it. I love the little jewel-like holo particles. So nice.

HD. Your standard silver holo, yet somehow... it's different. The particles are different. I'll get to that in a minute.


Hi-Res. Pretty purple holo! It's a light purple, but it's still purple. I wish there was a better dark purple holo out there... But yeah... super pretty...

Hi-Tech. Bright green holo. THIS IS NOT COLOR ACCURATE. My camera wouldn't pick up the crazy bright yellow-greenness of this polish. It is amazing. My absolute favorite of the bunch, and so far, my favorite green holo. I have never seen a holo with such a bright color. It's like... a super bright lemon-lime shade, not bright enough to be neon but the closest I've ever seen to a neon holo. It looks amazing at night because the yellow-green color stands out even more. The holo effect is really strong on this one too. If you get a chance to see this one in person, please do, my pictures don't to it justice.


The holographic effect in these is great. It's not like the China Glaze OMGs or the OPI Designer Series holos. It's a bit like the China Glaze Kaleidoscopes, but still different. It's closest to Ozotic holos- lots of larger flecks of hologram foil with a few tiny chunks. It looks likes pieces of holo glitter, but it's not glitter. It's perfectly smooth.

The other nice thing about these holographic polishes is that they're nice in low light/indoors/at night. A lot of holographic finishes turn into a frosty looking metallic when there's no light shining on them. These don't. These look sparkly and bright. Like a slightly prismatic foily glitter. I think that's why I like these so much compared to others.

The hologram effect isn't as strong as the OMGs or Kaleidoscopes, but it's still pretty strong. Stronger than the Color Club holos. It's that scattered type holo more like Kaleidoscope, not the linear smooth kind like OMG.

Like I said above, I didn't wait until these were fully dry to take my pictures, so it dulled the hologram effect a bit. They don't look like too much in the bottle, either. They really shine on the nails, though.

Formula was good. Not patchy with bald spots like I had anticipated. A little thin but densely packed with holo particles. Most only needed two coats, but I did three just because I'm like that. They dry super fast. Wear is good, too. I made it two days without chips... I didn't wear it longer than two days, though. The reason I mention the wear is that I don't get great wear from a lot of holographic polishes, but these seemed okay.

The only downside about these is the price. They're not expensive, but $4.39 seemed a little steep for drugstore. Not that they're not worth it... And they're not anywhere near as bad as Sally Hansen.... but when you can get China Glaze for $2.60 and OPI for $4.48-$5, it seems like a lot for drugstore polish. But, I'm not complaining, it could be worse. I just don't like the way all the drugstore brands are raising their prices to be almost level with salon brands.

Milani also had holographic shadows and lipgloss to coincide with the release of these. I got two of the shadows and one of the glosses. The shadows aren't actually holo- the packaging is confusing. It's covered in holo glittery things so it kinda looks like the holo is inside the package instead of just on it. It's also not really eyeshadow. It's basically glitter gel with some multicolored glitter. The bases are slightly tinted, but not tinted enough to wear them alone as color. They're not bad, but they're not as good as I hoped they were.

The lipgloss is Milani's answer to MAC Dazzleglass. I got a fuchsia purple one and I like it a lot. It's a little too sheer for me, but the shimmer effect is great and it's even kinda duochromey/iridescent! Smells nice too, like orange and cream.

These items (polish, shadow, gloss) were all on the permanent display! So that's good news. There were also a line of new neons just above the holos on the display but I didn't grab any. They're all in opaque colored bottles, which is weird. Maybe I'll go back for some. They didn't jump out at me when I saw them, but I won't know until I wear one...

Barielle Spring 2010 Wildflower Collection

A Bouquet For Ava. This is a really pretty bright aqua/turquoise/teal creme. It's a little more green than my picture shows- my camera keeps wanting to turn this into a bright sky blue, so this is the closest shot I have. It's not too off though. It reminds me of China Glaze Shower Together/Aqua Baby, to give you an idea of the tone.



Blossom. Soft pinky-peach creme. I think I've mentioned that I don't own many peach polishes, and after seeing how good this one looks on me, I don't know why I don't have more! I know, it's a pretty safe color, but this just looks so... so... cute? It's cute. It's like a kitten nose. Undeniably cute!
Daring Dahlia. This is an extremely red-toned purple (maybe even magenta) and it's half-neon. I say half-neon because it's not super neon bright like its neon cousin Essie Bermuda Shorts, but it is pretty bright and dries matte, so it's at least a little neon. It also has a really nice looking hot pink shimmer that's visible in the bottom of the bottle, but it doesn't seem to transfer to the nail. If anything, it's 'secret shimmer'.

June Bug. Soft slate-blue with electric blue shimmer and red-purple and silver glitter. I like this one in the bottle more than I like it on my nails. It's a cool idea for a polish! The dark colored glitter in a light contrasting base. On my nails it seems more like a flat speckled grey, maybe like a bird's egg or that floor paint with the speckles that people put in their garages. There's a tiny amount of silver glitter that makes it look like white specks or imperfections. The pretty bright blue shimmer doesn't seem to show on the nail. Could just be my skin tone, though.


Urza... um... I mean... Myrza's Meadow. Light mint/jade green with a sprinkling of hologram glitter. This is totally unique. Very fascinating. You would think that the holo glitter would be the focal point of the polish, but it's really not! Once it's on the nails it's a very subtle effect. The overall effect is a very soft mottled jade green with the occasional multi-colored glint coming off the buried glitter. Makes my hands look red but I'm still going to wear it cause it's cool!

Snap Dragon. Chrome green. Maybe not 100% chrome, more in between chrome and pearl. It's pearly and a little brush-strokey like a pearl, but it's very reflective and metallic like a chrome. I like that it's green, but it's a little too frosty for my tastes. I've never seen a frost flatter anyone's hands.


The formula on these was thick, which is par for the course for Barielle. Thick, but not necessarily hard to control. The thickness tends to add opacity, which usually allows for fewer coats. I did two coats of all except Myrza's Meadow where I did three. Drying time is a little on the slow side, but not too bad with a quick-dry topcoat.

The important detail about this collection which must be highlighted: 100% of the proceeds from A Bouquet For Ava, Myrza's Meadow and June Bug go to the Ovarian Cancer Research Fund. One hundred percent. That's AWESOME. You can order them here from the OCRF's website.

I'm proud of you, Barielle. Not only do these polishes help a worthy cause, but 100% of the proceeds!! That's rare. Usually it's a small percentage, or it's not even specified at all how much goes to a cause, but Barielle puts it right out there in plain letters. 100%.

This collection really says 'spring' to me. It reminds me of budding plants and flowers. I guess that was sort of the point... so... woo, spring! I am rather fond of Blossom, it's not even a 'me' color, but it looks so nice and pretty and dare I say.... girly? Despite the fact that it's girly, it's flattering and I like the way it looks on me.

I believe these are available now on Barielle's website (which has a permanent buy two get one free sale).

(These were sent to me for review)

NARS Purple Rain

NARS Purple Rain. I was complaining on Twitter the other day about how disappointed I was in NARS Purple Rain... but I completely take back everything I said. It is darker than I had anticipated based on all the ads and promo pics I saw for it, but that's okay now! Once I put it on my nails I knew how wrong I was. This is awesome. So awesome. I haven't been impressed by any NARS polish since they discontinued all the good colors, but this one redeems them in my eyes. This is a rich and complex deep red toned purple with tons of red and blue shimmer. It is very shimmery and very gorgeous. My picture pulls it more blue than it looks in real life... But you knew that, because you always read what I write under the pictures so you know about my camera and purple, right? Right?!?! (HA!) So yeah, it's definitely a red-toned purple in real life. Not *too* far off from my picture. It's how it looks in the bottle in these pictures.

The first thing that came to my mind was that it looks like Illamasqua Baptiste... which it kinda does a little but they're far off enough to warrant owning both.

Index and ring: Illamasqua Baptiste
Middle and pinkie: NARS Purple Rain

See? Not duplicates of each other. They're both dark purple and shimmery, though!

So.... yeah. I really love this. And I think I have... what... 3? 4? Polishes named Purple Rain now. Nubar, Lippmann, this NARS and I swear there's another one. Creative. At least it's not Ruby Slippers!

Formula was excellent on this as well. Extremely opaque and dense and very smooth.


Just for fun, here's a picture I took of the label. I really like the way this looks. It shows the color accurately, too.

Neat! Someone found one of the Essie gems!

I just got this email, pretty cool!

Mom of Twins Hits the Diamond Mine, Finds Hidden Gem in essie Nail Polish

Michele Larsen hit the diamond mine… literally. The Orlando mom is the official winner of the precious gemstone that was hidden in an essie nail polish as part of the Essie Loves Diamonds by Judith Ripka collection – a limited-edition collection of 3 nail colors infused with genuine diamond dust.

Larsen, who had not had a manicure in 15 months, was thrilled to be the winner. “I was getting a manicure and pedicure at the Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort & Spa – my first mani-pedi since having my twins – I finally got a couple of hours to pamper myself,” says an enthusiastic Larsen. “I was completely surprised and so excited when I saw that there was a diamond in my polish, I couldn't believe I actually won – I loved the color and was excited about the diamond dust that is infused in it!”

While at the spa, Larsen purchased the essie nail polish color to use for her manicure and pedicure. That polish was the only one in the exclusive limited-edition collection distributed worldwide that held the hidden diamond.

Now this polish has become a life-long gift for mom and daughter. What will Larsen do with her newfound diamond? “I will probably put the diamond in a setting for my little girl.”

“The joy and happiness that women feel from getting a mani-pedi is so wonderful and that is why we created these colors and this chance to win… we wanted to add something even more special for one woman,” says Essie Weingarten, founder and president of Essie Cosmetics, Ltd. “We are thrilled that such an amazing woman and mother found the diamond and we are so happy for her.”

OPI Alice In Wonderland Collection Spring 2010

Wow... I was so excited about the new Nubar glitters that I forgot to post these yesterday! Oops!

I know these aren't my best pictures, but I had to work with the lighting I had... Less than ideal, but I managed to get a couple clear shots at least.


Absolutely Alice. The color is accurate in the first picture, it's really not as light as it appears in the second picture, but the difference in lighting brings out the gold glitter that isn't as visible in the first picture. This is.... dare I say... the most gorgeous polish OPI has done since My Private Jet. OPI doesn't do glitters often, but when they do... they do them right! I can't even tell you how much I love this polish. I love it even more than China Glaze Dorothy Who? In case you can't tell by the pictures, this is a vibrant medium blue with a splash of shiny gold glitter. It is insanely sparkly.




Mad As A Hatter. Another perfect polish. This is a multicolored glitter. The base looks silver or blackish in these picture, but I don't find that to be the case when I look at my nails in real life. The silver does appear dominant, but what it really reminds me of is Rescue Beauty Lounge Frugalista with a little rainbow glitter tossed in. The purple and silver stand out to me the most, but there's also green and blue and gold and red, maybe a few other colors I can't pin down. The overall effect is a jewel-encrusted look. HOT.

Off With Her Red! An orangey-red creme. This has a soft quality to it- it's not super bright and crisp, it's a little bit dusty. Similar feel to OPI Bullish On OPI. Orangey, dusty. Not terribly exciting but not bad either.

Thanks So Muchness! This is not really a great shot of this, but if you enlarge the picture you can see the interesting detail in the finish. This is your average medium red shimmer with the addition of some light pink shimmery broken flakes. Like someone took a handful of the Nfu Oh flakes and crushed them. Very cool, kinda similar to the 90210 red from Valentine's Day.... I forget which one had the flecks... Pretty & Privileged? This is a lot like that one.


I thought the formula on these was great. Everything was opaque in two coats and applied like a breeze. I have good luck with OPI's formula. I did two coats of everything in these pictures. You can see a tiny bit of nail through the glitter (toward the tips but not really on the nail plate) with two coats, but not enough that it inspired me to do a third. A third coat would probably make them even better, though.

The glitters *were* a huge pain to remove. I normally don't have a problem removing glitter- if anything, they just take a little longer. But for these, they took three times as long. I don't know what's different about these that makes them so much tougher to remove. And, since I've been asked a few times... I don't do anything special to remove glitter. I find that a cotton ball or two soaked with Zoya Remove+ is enough to remove them fairly quickly. Sometimes if I'm feeling lazy I'll use the tub with the bristles, but I find that that takes longer than just cotton balls most of the time. Well... I guess I do one special thing to remove glitter... Here's a confession. Sometimes I peel it off. Thankfully it has no adverse effect on my nails, but... yeah. LOL


I'm extremely happy that OPI took a risk and did some AMAZING glitters instead an entire collection of safe colors. I only wish that the two reds were glitters too!

Nubar Sparkles Collection preview :O

This just came via email... OMG... OMG!!! Glitter!!!! And they're supposed to be opaque in two coats according to the description in the email.

Release date is January 30th.


EDIT: Looks like my pictures are messed up a little- they're tiny! I'm going to see if I can get bigger ones.

Edit again: Here are the nice big pictures! Click to enlarge, these look amazing!

Rescue Beauty Lounge Spring 2010

Rescue Beauty Lounge's spring collection this year is a set of three 'surfer-girl' themed polishes. And the best part? They're not your average bland spring colors! Yay!


360. This is a very soft, hazy greyed-out blue. It seems brighter in my indoor picture than it seems in real life. This is what I would consider to be a slate blue. It looks like a creme but it actually has some extremely subtle fine silver shimmer. You can see the shimmer in the bottle and you can see it a teeny bit when the sun hits the polish, but otherwise it looks like a slate blue creme. Hidden shimmer!

Bangin'. Very bright bold and pigmented! I wasn't crazy about it in the bottle, but on my nails I love it! It's an extremely orangey red- or is that a slightly red orange? Maybe it's neither. Maybe it's coral. This looks like coral to me. And it is VERY BRIGHT. Pow! Awesome.

Diddy Mow. Pardon the dings and dents and tipwear- I've been wearing this since Sunday morning so it looks a little beaten up. Anyway. This is a grey-green. It's not entirely green... it's not entirely grey. This color was boggling my mind! Every time the lighting changed, the color seemed to change. When I put it on Sunday morning I thought it was just murky grey. In the afternoon it looked more mousy green. Very cool. This one also has that hidden shimmer, but it's even more hidden in this than it is in 360. The name is kinda goofy, but it's apparently a surf slang for a "harsh wipe-out". I'll still feel funny saying it. XD

When I put on Diddy Mow, the first thing that came to my mind was, "Grey and green? Is this like Essie Chinchilly?"

But it turns out it's really not. Observe:
Index and ring: Essie Chinchilly
Middle and pinkie: Rescue Beauty Lounge Diddy Mow

Not even close. Same general idea, though. Grey with green or green with grey.

I can't comment on the formula of these since these are only color samples and aren't in the Rescue Beauty Lounge formula... However... if the samples are any indication of the actual formula, it'll be up to the usual buttery Rescue standard. All of these were opaque in one coat and perfectly smooth. So.... I'm not worried!

While I like the colors in this collection, the thing I love the most is that Ji has once again marched to the beat of her own drum and created a set of colors that are different! They're not your typical spring colors and that makes me really happy. Ji Baek is the master of making unique-colored cremes and these didn't disappoint me. I am especially happy that there is no pink in this spring collection! It seems like she doesn't give in to the pressure to do what everyone else is doing and is free to create colors based on her own eye and inspiration. That impresses me.

The release date given for this is March/April 2010 but I do not have a specific date. I do know that when you sign up for the mailing list, you'll automatically be notified when the new collections are released (and sometimes get a chance to pre-order).

Ooh.... new stuff at Claire's!

Man, I can't get over how much I love the polish they have at Claire's! It is worth braving the horrible music that sounds like a parody of itself and the feeling like you're a few decades too old to shop there to get these. Claire's isn't so bad though. I like a lot of their jewelry- they have slap bracelets!

Anyway, I went into Claire's the other day to see what kind of new polish they had and wow! I saw these. Love at first sight. Had to have them. Go Claire's. Woo!


Chunky Blue. Blue glitter and silver hexagon glitter in a blue jelly base. Right off the bat I'm going to say that this isn't a Starry Starry Night duplicate. Kind of a similar feeling with all the glitter in the blue jelly base, but that's where the similarity stops. Anyway... this is super gorgeous. The blue is such a pretty deep color without looking black or navy (I have never really liked navy blue). The glitter is a blue-tinted silver so it's nice and shiny, and I think there's also just plain silver in there too but I can't tell because of the blue base. The larger glitter is sparse and comes out kinda randomly. This is two coats. This also comes in a few other colors, such as....


Chunky Green. Oh man. Just look at it! Look! Grassy green glitter!!! With a hand full of silver hexagons thrown in! Exclamation points!!!! This was three coats.

Here's Chunky Green over black. It doesn't need it. I thought it was going to be more sheer than it actually was so I preemptively did a base of black... bleh. I don't care for it over black.

Chunky Purple. I dunno if this really looks purple to me. Looks like a really dark pink. Maybe a drop of purple. Oh well, it's still pretty. It reminds me a lot of Claire's Rock, except I don't remember that one having any silver hex glitter. This was two coats.

I think there were a few more colors in the "Chunky" style but I didn't grab those. I might go back for them sometime. I did get the gold and silver holo versions (Goldmine and Hollywood) a long time ago, but I think I saw a kinda light bronzy one and another silvery one when I was there too. There was a neon pink one in the same style...

Glitz And Glam. Holy waffles. I love this so much. I can't even tell you how giddy this polish makes me when I look at it. It is NEON PINK with HOLO GLITTER!!! It kinda looks like there's a little bit of a blue flash to it too, but it's very subtle. There's also a sprinkle of very big hexagon glitter in there too and they come out very randomly, I actually had to intentionally fish a few out so that each nail would have one. The base color of this is similar to China Glaze Shocking Pink, it's a little lighter and waaaaaaaay brighter in real life.


I also picked up a new green-

Dream Catcher. I'm not really into the whole jade/mint green trend. I don't like the way it looks on me, it gives me big red lobster claw hands.

Me wearing jade/mint green polish:



Anyway... Dream Catcher is actually surprisingly nice. It has a little shimmer to it. It has a more yellowy-toned green look than most of the pale greens I own, which I think helps a bit when it comes to making my hands look red. This is a very pale shade and I find it very calming and dreamy looking. I have heard that it's similar to Chanel Jade, but I don't own it so I can't really say. Some people have also told me that they thought the formula was horrible... however... I found it to be quite lovely. This picture is two coats, no topcoat, no basecoat. I did not have any streaking or anything, it went on perfectly for me. If you are having a lot of trouble with polish streaking, you should try using more polish on the brush and using a lighter touch on the brush.

So... yeah. I love Claire's. The polish seems to be permanently on sale for buy one, get one 50% off, cause every time I go there that's how it is. Which is kinda dangerous cause it forces me to buy polish in pairs. I can't just get three, I have to get four. But if I see a fifth one I like I have to get six! They're tricky, man. They know how to get me.

New Nicole by OPI stuff for Winter 2009

Attempting to work through some more of my backlog... so much stuff I want to post!

Anyway, Nicole has a few new things for Winter. First, they're doing glitters- woot! Glitter! Two 'new' ones (I think the new ones were actually from Fall) and two re-promoted ones.

The re-promotes:


Imagine If.... from Spring 2009. Light silver scattered holo.

You're A Star, also from Spring 2009. A very sparkly white/light silver/iridescent pearl particle shimmer.

And the 'new' ones:

Let's Get Star-ted (over BB Couture Mendocino Midnight). I love these types of polishes that have the fun shaped glitter. It has pretty pastel opal glitter and holographic purple stars in an ever so slightly purple-tinted sheer base. The trick to applying these is to lay down as much of the base glitter as you want- this is one coat, two coats adds a little more sparkle. Then, with a toothpick or cuticle stick or whatever you have handy, fish out the stars and place them on the nails as you please. Usually I can just dip the toothpick in and two or three stars will stick to it, you may have to tilt your bottle and pick them out if you've already used a lot of the stars.

I swear I took a picture of this over a yellow creme but I can't find it at all... But it looks even better over bright yellow creme.


Sprinkle of Twinkle (over BB Couture Mendocino Midnight). A clear base with large hexagon-shaped hologram glitter and small round silver glitter. I wanted to try this glitter over a few different finishes, so here it is over a glitter/shimmer. Pretty nice. The glitter stands out a lot on such a dark background. Look at all that holo in the bottle!


Sprinkle of Twinkle over Diamond Cosmetics Metallic Venom. Here it is over a frost. Definitely takes the eye away from all the frostiness.

Sprinkle of Twinkle over Diamond Cosmetics Froggy. Here is is over a creme, and a neon creme at that. I like the way this one turned out the most! And somehow, the glitter makes it easier for my camera to pick up the neon base color. Crazy!

This is one coat in all three pictures. It's very similar to Winter Glitterland, but it lacks the golden champagne tint. This is just straight silver, no tint at all to the base or the glitter.


Nicole also released a few new colors in the Nic's Sticks polish pens, which I've been curious to try again after my first experience:

Dash Into The Dark. A very dark vampy purple, along the same vein as Lincoln Park After Dark. This is two-ish coats (more on that in a second). The color starts out as a deep eggplant colored translucent gloss (almost a jelly) on the first coat and each additional coat deepens the color to this vampy near-black shade.


Do You Deliver? Kind of a cranberry-rust shade. Man, I made a huge mess with this one. I kept pressing the button over and over going "Why isn't the polish coming out??" but I didn't realize that the polish actually was coming out... Yeah... Bad idea... don't do that! Hahaha!


Close The Deal Teal. My favorite out of all of them. This color is gorgeous! It's a medium blue-teal shimmer. Pretty simple but so pretty. I'll be keeping this one in my purse for sure.


Express-ion Of Love. This one surprised me. It's a pretty hot pink jelly. Not super super bright, but really fresh looking. Reminds me of candy. This was the easiest of all the shades to apply.

Snow Time To Wait. Pure white. This one was the most difficult to apply and I used topcoat on this shade because it really needed it. You can see the bald spot on my nail from where I accidentally wiped off the polish. This one is really good for french tips, if you're into that sort of thing. Because the brush is so big, it was really easy to just do one swipe across the tips and get them pretty crisp.

There is also a new silver one, but I seem to have misplaced it. I looked all over for it... I have no idea what happened to it...

These are a little tricky to apply. I don't think I quite have the hang of it yet. The polish in these pens is very different than regular polish in a bottle. This polish has a very thin, slippery texture, almost as if it's water-based (I don't know really, I didn't actually look at the ingredients). My suggestion when applying these is to get as thick of a coat onto the nail as you can manage for the first coat. I did coats that were really thin and I think that's why I needed to do a second coat. For the second coat, get a ton of polish onto the brush (by pressing the button) and very very very gently and lightly dab it onto the nail if you can. Applying a second coat too roughly seems to wipe off the first coat, as you can see in some of my pictures. I need to practice more with these.

I did notice that these have a very low amount of polish smell. I can't smell it while I'm applying it and really only smell it if I hold my wet nails by my face. Stealthy.

Another thing worth pointing out about these... The brush. It's CRAZY. It is huge and uneven and squirrely looking... However... it applies polish *perfectly*. I don't know how it can possibly do it, but it does. The polish goes exactly where you put it and it makes a nice crisp line. It boggles my mind. It does not seem possible. Must be some kind of voodoo...

So... that's all I think...

(Post contains some products that were sent to me for review)