Checkin' in

I've had a few people asking me where I've been so I thought I'd check in-

I'm still alive :) I just haven't really felt up to posting/email/twitter lately.

Normal posting will resume when I'm feeling better

China Glaze Poolside Collection Summer 2010

Okay, wow! Brightness! China Glaze has a tradition of doing neons each summer and I'd actually be a little worried if I didn't see a neon collection from them this year.... But... they did and here it is!

A quick note before I post the pictures: These pictures are not 100% true to life. Neons must really be seen in person to experience the full effect of the brightness and fluorescence of the shades. They do freaky things to cameras and the best photos I've been able to get of them are mere approximations. They are super bright, vivid and glowing in real life.

Flip Flop Fantasy. This is a super bright and almost... milky looking?... in-between coral orange pink shade. Out of all the shades, I'd say this is the most unique for sure. I can't think of another color that really matches this one. The closest I can think of is Jessica My Cabana Boy, to give you an idea of the shade.

Kiwi-Cool-Ada. Your standard medium neon green creme. Very glowy. Not totally unique, but still hot. There are just not enough neon greens in this world. I wish this was closer to Limonyte, but it's really closer to Color Club Limelight.

Pool Party. Super super bright glowing neon reddish-pink creme. This is a rich-toned neon, very colorful, very bright, very saturated. Much better in real life than in my picture.


Sun Worshiper. Light glowing neon orange creme. This reminds me a lot of that ubiquitous blue box of noodles with the unnervingly neon orange powder that's supposed to represent cheese... Unnaturally bright! This is almost like Color Club Explosive in color, very glowy bright-light fake-cheese orange with yellow tones.


Towel Boy Toy. This one is more of a bright than a neon even though it dries matte like neons do. It's a bright pretty sky blue with a very subtle shimmer to soften the overall look. Pool water!


Yellow Polka Dot Bikini. Woohoo, yellow! This is a lot like Celtic Sun but much more opaque and dense. Creamy base more than a jelly-like base. This was the sheerest of all the shades and I'm wearing four coats here, but the overall effect is definitely worth the trouble. It's not quite as bright as Essie Limelight but it is a lot brighter and yellow-er than Color Club Volt of Light.

The formula on these was okay. Not good or bad, kind of middle of the road. Not difficult to apply but not buttery-smooth-perfect, if that makes sense. Average. The only application issues I encountered were the watery consistency of Towel Boy Toy and the slight streakiness of Yellow Polka Dot Bikini. The colors are quite sheer on the first coat but are pretty much opaque in three. I'm wearing three coats of all but Yellow Polka Dot Bikini in these pictures and I'm satisfied with the coverage. A fourth coat would just be icing on the cake. And, like all neons, these dry to a matte finish. If you want them to be shiny, you will need to apply topcoat. If you like them matte, leave them as-is.

I love neons, so these were right up my alley. Even though the shades aren't totally unique, brand-new never-before-seen groundbreaking colors, they're still incredibly lovely. I think it's probably pretty hard to make an entirely unique neon so I don't fault them at all for that. I find that the formula, dry time and application of these is greatly improved from previous China Glaze neons and I'm rather fond of the intense glow these colors provide.

I don't have the exact date, but these are scheduled for a February release. Should be any day now!

(These were sent to me for review)

Savvy Red Caviar and CND Crimson Sparkle

Savvy Red Caviar with CND Crimson Sparkle. I am not totally in love with the new CND effects, but I really liked this combination.

Color Club Spring 2010 Rebel Debutante

The first of Color Club's spring offerings this year is called 'Rebel Debutante' and it's really different from what I'm used to from Color Club! Very unexpected. All cremes!



Best Dressed List. Looks like a nice fleshy light brown on me. Sort of a nude shade. Soft and flattering on my skin tone but I can see this shade working on a variety of tones.



Charity Ball. Oooh... yuck.



Gossip Column. Very nice rich medium teal. A little more on the blue side than the green side of teal, but not quite as blue as it looks in my picture.


High Society. Soft mousy grey with a little something more to it.... maybe a really subtle purple or reddish undertone? It gives the grey here a little extra richness and I can't quite place what it is.


Ms. Socialite. Medium red-toned purple creme. Love this one! Even though it's not really a bright shade, it still stands out.


Rebel Debutante. Ah, that's more like it. For a collection called 'Rebel Debutante', this seems to be the only rebellious color! It's a soft neon green. I know, that makes no sense, but picture it... A very soft, sort of light and almost pastel shade of green but with neon glow and intensity. I couldn't capture this color in pictures, it freaked out my camera.


She's Soooo Glam. A rich looking light pink. Very dense and opaque. I like the tone of this one, it looks half cute and half super 80's. I didn't quite capture the color in this picture, either. It looks better in real life.... richer... pinker. Different, another feature that I can't pinpoint.



Uptown Girl. Soft dusty mauvey lavender. We've seen a lot of colors like this in the last two years and that's a-okay with me! I personally love this type of shade.


Who Are You Wearing? A light white or dove grey with a subtle touch of lavender. Sort of like a creme version of Urban Decay's White Widow. Kinda spooky looking. Interesting. I like it, this is my second favorite of the collection for sure.

The formula was good. Standard Color Club formula, no real issues. I like that they seem to be really consistent. Maybe it's cause they're all cremes, but they all applied identically. This is two coats of all.


Overall, I'm 50/50 on this collection. I like almost all the shades (except Charity Ball, first time I've ever said yuck about a Color Club shade! Sadness) but they don't seem totally unique. But, more so, they don't seem like the Color Club I know and love! There's not much variety or innovation like I've seen in past Color Club sets. They're kinda sleepy, not lively. That's not to say I don't like this collection, because I do like the colors and the formula, it just seems... different. It doesn't seem to have that trademark Color Club spark. Color Club's other two spring collections more than make up for the lack of variety and excitement here, at least.

Neons and glitters are coming :)

(These were sent to me for review.)

Orly Metal Chic Collection

I was so torn on these. At first I thought, man, I'm matte-d out, I do not want to even look at another matte! But then I was like... well... I might as well take a look, I like the names... So I went to Sally, put them in my basket, brought them to the checkout and went eeeehhhh.... These are kinda boring. And I put them back! But then my curiosity got the better of me and I eventually ordered them from 8ty8 because they were way cheaper, and man, WHY DIDN'T I JUST BUY THESE THE FIRST TIME?! THEY'RE AWESOME!! ARGH!

Anyway. Yeah. I really, really misjudged these. Take a look.

Glam Rock. This is kind of a copper metallic-flake matte. See?? Isn't it cool? It's a lot like the OPI Suedes, but this is all metallic. Metallic base, metallic shimmer. Very interesting speckled effect.



Iron Butterfly. In-a-gadda-da-vida honey, don't you know that I love you... in a gadda da vida baby.... don't you know that I'll always be true.... Oh won't you come with me and take my hand.... Oh won't you... what? You honestly expected me to actually review a polish with a name like this? *continues rocking out*


Solid Gold. Very nice gold, a little orangey, maybe a hint of greenish-brown to it. I think my skin tone makes it pull more brownish. Nice metal flake action going on here. I'm diggin' it.


And, of course, with topcoat because DAMN:




Glam Rock.


Iron Butterfly. *organ solo*


Solid Gold.


The formula on these was excellent. Easy to work with, thick but not impossible, good opacity. They do dry quickly but not immediately so you have a little time to work. Really nice *fully* matte effect, not wishy-washy half-matte rubbery look that I hate. These are velvety.


So, yeah. They're kinda awesome. I am kicking myself for writing them off because I ended up liking these a LOT. Especially with topcoat.

OPI Hong Kong Collection Spring 2010

My Bling Dynasty bottle broke in transit so I wasn't able to swatch it at the same time as the rest of the collection.... I'll upload it here as soon as I get a pic :)

Lots to cover here... on to the pics!


A Good Mandarin is Hard To Find. A bright summery looking orange creme. Very saturated, not a faded or pale orange by any means.



Chopsticking To My Story. This is more of a burnt orange creme. This seems like a fall-caramel-pumpkin pie color to me, definitely unexpected for spring! I rather like it. It's a little bit like Ginger Bells... I did a little comparison.

Index: Chopsticking To My Story
Middle: Ginger Bells
Ring: Out Of This World
Pinkie: OPI And Apple Pie

Dim Sum Plum. The sunlight kinda warps and washes out this color. It's really not what I'd call plum, maybe plum blossom instead? It's a purple-berry kinda magenta creme. Not totally unique but I like this version because it's cooler and goes better with my skin tone.



Hot And Spicy. Somehow I forgot to take an indoor picture of this! I'll add one when I add Bling Dynasty. Anyway, this is a light orange creme. Reminds me of shrimp. Very pretty. I love orange.



Jade Is The New Black. The star of the show. This is a very unique green. I don't have anything else in my collection quite like it. It's a very blue based dusty green. Not so dusty that it looks grey, but it is more 'faded' than 'fresh' looking. Love.


Lucky Lucky Lavender. The sun really does weird things to these violet-pinks! Anyway, this one is a pale pastel violet-pink. It says lavender, but it's more pink to me than lavender. Pink with a kiss of lavender. It's a little softer and not as stark looking as, say, Mod About You. Little bit like Essie Neo-Whimisical from the spring collection too.



Meet Me On The Star Ferry. Shimmery warm red-purple with a little gold frost. Very complex finish- it's not straight shimmer and not straight frost. Has a few little flecks of foil mixed in. Reminds me slightly of Queen of West Web-erly from last spring. Not matches, though, just slightly similar.



Panda-monium Pink. A cool pastel baby pink creme. It has a little bit of lilac to it, it's not straight pink. It's also dense but not as stark as some other similar 'mod' type white-pinks. Looks springy to me, like the flowers that grow on my neighbor's tree in spring.



Pearl of Wisdom. Ooh! Surprise coolness. It's an iridescent/duochrome sheer shimmer shade, very cool looking. The main color is pink, but it also flashes green, purple and a little silver and gold. Looks nice alone, but it's AMAZING over black. The shimmer in this is really nice too. (This color might actually be a re-release, I'll have to see if I have the original)



Pearl of Wisdom over black. See how all the colors come out? You can see the green and pink and purple but you can also see the little flecks of shimmer scattered on the nail too.

Red My Fortune Cookie. BRIGHT red creme. I think this is the kind of red I like. I'm not really drawn to medium reds or dark reds in creme or shimmer, but I love reds like this. It's bright and happy and kinda retro looking. I want to say this is a little on the warm side because it has a slight orange undertone.


Suzi Says Feng Shui. Dusty blue! I know it looks really bright in my pictures, but it has a definite soft and faded look to it. Again, pretty unique, I can't think of another dusty blue quite like this. Love love loooooove


The formula on these was great. Consistent. A little on the thin side, but pretty standard for OPI. I had no trouble with any of them. I did two coats of all, except for Pearl of Wisdom which is three. Good opacity, no streaking, good wear. Great dry time, too. The one odd thing I noticed about these is that they smell WEIRD. They don't have a nail polish smell like I was expecting... It actually smells like Sharpie to me! Permanent marker. Very odd. The smell doesn't stick around long after it dries, but you can definitely smell it when it's wet. I wonder if they changed formula again? Hmm....


As for the theme of the collection (Hong Kong)... I don't have a clue! I don't know if these are typical Hong Kong colors or not. When I think of Hong Kong I think of red and gold, and this collection is surprisingly easy on the red! Not a bad thing, just surprising cause OPI always does lots of reds. One red and one gold in this collection. The other thing I think of when I think of Hong Kong is neon signs. Yellow, green, red, orange. I'm surprised there wasn't a yellow in this collection too! But, overall, not bad, I actually like all the colors. No duds. And this time they did a green and a blue! Big improvement over South Beach from last spring which didn't have too much color variety.

Another surprising aspect of this collection besides the amount of red is that they're almost all cremes. Only three shimmers. I like cremes so this is not a flaw to me, but it is surprising because it seems like they always do half-and-half with collections. Six cremes, six shimmers. But I'd rather have a red creme than a red shimmer and an orange creme instead of an orange shimmer... so I'm happy. There's green, there's blue, there's orange, there's a duochrome.... Pretty good for spring!


I don't know the exact release date of these, but I'll check and update when I have the date. Early-to-mid February is my guess.

(These were sent to me for review.)

New drugstore awesomeness

I'm a huge Wet n Wild nail polish fan. Always have been. I noticed some new displays of Wet n Wild polish while out grocery shopping the other day and picked up these gems!


Blackmail. This is from their new line, it comes in squatty little round bottles. This shade is a black base with multi-colored glitter. Along the same lines as Sephora by OPI Never Enough Shoes and Sally Hansen Midnight in NYC, but I like this better. Why? More glitter. The glitter in the other two is too subtle for me, this one sparkles more. There's gold and red and something that looks iridescent or multicolored but it's small so I can't tell.


Blue Moon. HOLY CRAP. SO HOT. It's a dark blue shimmer with a green sheen/slight flash to it. It reminds me of my favorite blue from Jessica (Midnight Moonlight!), except this is 99 cents. It's rich and beautiful and not so dark that it looks black. Right on, Wet n Wild!

Night Prowl. Black base with hot pink/magenta glitter. Love at first sight. This is a bit like Petites... something... Amethyst something... I can't remember the name. The color of the glitter is rich and bright, not faded and silvery and it really stands out against the dense black. No glitter gets lost in the black base! So awesome.

Formula on these is on par with the rest of Wet n Wild's polishes- perfect. Pretty opaque, all looked good at two coats but I did three cause I'm like that. Good dry time. Excellent price tag.

The new squatty-bottle Wet n Wild line had a dusty blackberry/purple/mauve color that looked cool but I didn't grab that one. The others were mostly pinks and berries, but there were a few interesting ones sprinkled in. The Wild Shine line had a handful of new colors too, one was a glitter that looked like China Glaze Snow Globe, one was a lavender duochromey color and one was a silver? Oh, and two pinks.

Love me some Wet n Wild...