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Of Life and Lacquer > Swatches

Dare To Wear Sweetheart

Posted on 19 March, 201320 March, 2013 by Cynthia

If you follow me on twitter, you may have heard about me getting bitten by a dog…on my swatching hand to boot! Now, before you imagine some gross puncture wound, blood and tears, it was actually just a minor bite and it was more annoying than actually painful. Since I’ve been really stressed lately, I decided to go to scope out some nail polishes after work. Well, normally I get off work at 1:30 but at about 1:25, I got a crazy complicated client so I ended up staying an extra half hour to deal with his issues–great, thirty extra minutes at a place I abhor. I should have just gone home, but noooooooooo…Cynthia needed some new polishes. I went to two of my usual nail places but I didn’t get much (most of the newest Orly collection and a new bottle of Seche). I then decided to stop by another place that I rarely go to because they don’t have the best selection, but I just felt like checking them out. When I walked in, the place was empty but then I saw this cute little dog walking towards me. Since I am absolutely nuts about dogs, I got all excited and bent down to pet him. Well, at first he seemed fine with it and then he snapped and bit my hand. The owner yelled at him and he walked away. She was apologetic, but I just brushed it off and got a few more polishes. So my lesson here is: I am not the Dog Whisperer so I need to not be so grabby with strange dogs.

One of the polishes that I got this past weekend, is Dare To Wear Sweetheart. I can’t explain why I’ve been gravitating towards pink polishes lately–maybe I’m just in a girlie mood.

Are four pictures of the same polish overkill? I’ve been wondering if one or two pictures are enough, but since I’m not really changing the lighting, I’m thinking that maybe 4 are too much since I’m only changing the angle. Let me know if you have an opinion or preference. Anyway, Dare To Wear Sweetheart is a super hot pink with holographic and silver glitter throughout. This polish dries a little matte and super gritty. I applied two thick coats of Seche to try to get a smooth surface, but this polish pretty much sucked it right up. The formula was pretty good, though. It was super opaque and it was kind of goopy in a good way where I was able to control it really well and didn’t have to do any clean up at the end. That’s my favorite.

I’ve mentioned my health a little bit from time to time, and I’ve been stressing about not having health insurance a lot lately. For the last week, I’ve been stressing out about everything…my health, my craptastic job, my even more crappy car that’s one step away from the junkyard and just EVERYTHING in general. This is one skip and a hop away from major anxiety attacks so I’m just trying to keep it together. One way that this stress has been physically manifesting itself is that I wake up almost every night throwing up. It’s really bad because it basically happens a couple of hours before I have to get up for work so I feel like I’m not even sleeping. I really don’t want to go back on meds and I really can’t afford to be paying for therapy and doctor’s appointments out of pocket so I feel like I’m just between a rock and a hard place. Maybe for now, polish has to be my therapy. Sounds like a plan to me!

So I hope that you don’t think I’m just sharing this for attention or because I want sympathy…I just feel like it helps to get this stuff out, and I know that some of you soooooooo understand what this feels like. I just hope this passes and I start feeling better about everything. Thanks for listening. <3

Discolsure: All products featured in this post were purchased by me. For more information, please see my disclosure policy tab here.

Nailtiques Moscow Review & Giveaway

Posted on 18 March, 201317 March, 2013 by Cynthia

Discolsure: All products featured in this post were purchased by me. For more information, please see my disclosure policy tab here.

This weekend, a friend and I decided to go polish shopping. As if she really needed to force my hand! Unfortunately, all of the places we were trying to go to closed early so we ended up finding only one place that was still open. I don’t go to this particular beauty supply very often, but they always remember me because of the sheer quantity I usually purchase. Nothing was really catching my eye, so the owner asked me if I had ever tried Nailtiques. To be honest, I have heard of the brand but never really tried any of the products. She brought out this red and told me I would love it so that is how I ended up with Nailtiques Moscow.

The formula on Nailtiques Moscow is pretty darn flawless. After the first coat, I could have left it alone, but this polish has a crelly-like formula so I had some VNL. I applied a second coat and that pretty much took care of the VNL problem. I also felt that this polish dried lightning fast so you don’t want to overwork it or else it can get goopy on your nails. My one complaint right now is not so much about the polish but the brush. I like how the brush fans out, but I feel like it’s too squared so I had to work really hard to apply the polish on the curve meeting my cuticles. I did get a bit of polish on my skin and holy moly it’s crazy pigmented. I had to go over those areas a few times with my brush and acetone to get it all off.

I also bought this really cute mini set to give away which includes a base coat, top coat and a mini manicure kit. The color included is Moscow which I just reviewed above.

In order to enter this giveaway, use the rafflecopter widget below. The only requirement is to be a blog email subscriber but you can earn additional entries as outlined below if you wish.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

I’m really interested to hear if you have tried Nailtiques because I have heard some really good things about their products–especially their nail care line. After this positive experience, it is very likely that I will scoping out some additional items to add to my collection. Let me know what you think of this color–are you a red polish whore like me?

Thanks for stopping by today, and I will talk to you soon!

Discolsure: All products featured in this post were purchased by me. For more information, please see my disclosure policy tab here.

China Glaze Four Leaf Clover, St. Paddy’s Day and Guinness

Posted on 17 March, 2013 by Cynthia

Discolsure: Jindie Nails Underwater Disco was provided to me by the manufacturer or their PR firm. China Glaze Four Leaf Clover was purchased by me. For more information, please see my disclosure policy tab here.

Happy Saint Patrick’s Day to all my readers–Irish or not! I’ve always found Saint Patrick’s Day a really fun excuse to get just a little rowdy and maybe a little wasted. This year, I’m not going out whatsoever since it landed on a Sunday and I have to be up at the buttcrack of dawn for work tomorrow. Oh well–at least I can have cute nails, right? I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do, so I just started looking through all of my green polishes to see if any of them caught my eye. That is how I ended up choosing China Glaze Four Leaf Clover.

It’s been a long time since I’ve worn China Glaze Four Leaf Clover, and I’m asking myself what took me so long?!?!?! It’s such a gorgeous green with a teal hue to it. The teal in this color is not as obvious, but it’s definitely not a true green. Since this color had been sitting in my melmers undisturbed for the last year, it had separated so I had to shake it up quite a bit to get the color and consistency back to normal. The first coat of this polish is really streaky, but the second coat fixed it right up.

And here is the star of the show: Jindie Nails Underwater Disco. This was my very first Jindie Nails polish that I got in August of last year. This polish has really big blue hexes that I purposely did not apply here because I wanted my mani to be mostly green. After not using this polish for the last 7 months, it was super thick so I added some thinner and it came right back to life. Jen was the first ever indie nail polish creator to send me some samples to review, and I kind of blame her for starting me on this dark path of indie glitter obsession.

I hope that you have a great Sunday whether you are out getting your drunk on, or if you’re just staying home dreading the start of a new workweek like me. Take a moment to enjoy the warm weather (if you’re in So Cal, enjoy the 70 degree weather!) and maybe have a Guinness–or six–like me. That’s Alfie on my computer wallpaper. Being an Irish Wheaten Terrier and all, I figured he should be in on the shot as well. I miss my little bubs.

Thanks for stopping by today and don’t forget to check in tomorrow because I am launching a new little giveaway. 😉

Nails Inc. Leather Effect Shoreditch Lane

Posted on 15 March, 2013 by Cynthia

Hey kids, it’s Friday! Unfortunately, it’s not my Friday since I will have to go to work tomorrow. Wah, wah!!!! Today I was just feeling so lethargic and tired despite the fact that I went to bed really early last night. I think I was just so miserable thinking about having to go to work in the morning that I couldn’t even get some proper rest. Today, as I was nearing the end of my workday, I was sitting at my desk softly repeating over and over: “I hate my job. I hate my life. I hate my job. I hate my life.” That is both sad and funny to me. I hope that no one heard me because I am sure that they would think I’m completely insane. Anyway, things could always be worse, right? Now that I’ve had my work complaint for the day, now I’m going to show you a polish from the Nails Inc. Leather Effect line: Shoreditch Lane.

I don’t know about you, but I think this finish is pretty damn interesting. I think it’s pretty similar to the Liquid Sand finish but less gritty and more matte. It definitely has a bumpy texture, but it did not bother me at all. I really appreciated the formula because it was very easy to control and it was very opaque, but it is necessary to apply at least two coats to really let the texture develop as it dries completely. While a lot of special effect polishes come and go as annoying trends, I can actually see myself wearing this a lot. I love the deep color, and maybe next time I will top coat it with some seche and see how it looks glossy. Shoreditch Lane definitely gets two thumbs up from me. I was super close to getting one of their new “Feather Effect” nail polishes but as some of you may know, I have major issues with birds–basically I hate them all and they gross me out. The bottle even had a picture of a bird…uhm….no thanks! Just thinking about it now gives me the willies.

Let me know what you think of this polish…do you like it or do you think it’s just a fad that will probably go the way of crackle? Oh, God…please let crackle/blasted/shatter polishes disappear from the face of the earth. Banish them to Atlantis, if you must. Thanks for stopping by today, and I will talk to you later.

Color Club Halo Hues Collection 2013

Posted on 14 March, 2013 by Cynthia

The other day when I went to my nail polish Mecca, the owner shopped with me. Yes, he actually put stuff in my basket. He pulled out all the stuff that wasn’t on display yet to try to tempt me. He actually did not have the Halo Hues out on display but he took them out from behind the counter like an evil polish Jezebel. I instantly wanted them all, but I showed a little self-restraint and only brought home two of the 6 colors because I already have a big collection of holos. The two that I ended up purchasing are two unique colors in my collection, so I was really excited about trying them out. Here are my two picks from the Color Club Halo Hues Collection for 2013.

I really loved the idea of a nude-type of holo. Is that an oxymoron? Well, this is a nude if it was on crack and meth. Cosmic Fate definitely did not disappoint. It’s a peachy-gold color that looks rather tame in low light but absolute goes nuts in direct light. The first two pictures were taken indoors in my light box and the last one was taken in direct sunlight.

Kismet is what I wished butter london Trustafarian had been. This is like the perfect pale seafoam green holo! I am glad that this has a definite green hue to it because I was afraid it would look like all the other silvery holos that are pretty much everywhere nowadays. So pretty!

Have you picked up any of the new Halo Hues for 2013? If you’re new to holos, I think these are definitely worth it. The formula is really great and you don’t need any of that aqua base nonsense. Let me know what you think of these shades and if you have spotted these in your area. Thanks for the visit, and I’ll talk to you soon!

Color Club Fiesta Collection For Spring 2013

Posted on 13 March, 2013 by Cynthia

Happy Wednesday everyone! I am always happy when Wednesday rolls around because it’s my day off during the week, and I get to sleep in. Why does sleeping in feel so delicious? I was planning on getting up somewhat early to get some stuff done, and of course I ended up waking up at 9:00. There go my plans of rising early, but it was worth it. I felt like angels woke me up this morning. For today’s post, I am busting out my 4 picks from the Color Club Fiesta Collection for Spring 2013. Here we go!

I always loved watching Speedy Gonzales cartoons when I was a kid and I kept thinking about them when I was swatching the Fiesta collection. I’m weird, right?

When I saw this barbie doll/bubblegum pink, I wanted to try it out immediately. Flamingo is such a bright and fun color and I absolutely loved how much tanner it made my hands look. The formula on this one was a little streaky in the beginning but it was fine after the second coat.

I’ve been loving all the great one coat reds that have been coming out and Mamba is no exception. If you’re looking for a gorgeous and creamy red that will look perfect after one coat, you should pick this baby up. The formula is extremely pigmented, smooth and just glossy. You won’t regret this purchase if you love red polishes.

Growing up in Orange County, CA–just 10 minutes from the beach–the first thing I thought of when I saw Endless Summer, is the surfing movie. I’m not a surfer or anything like that (stop laughing), but I really love that movie. Anyway, this is another gorgeous, bright blue. It is important to note that this polish dries to a satin finish, but I went ahead and applied a shiny top coat. I seem to have one of these colors from every brand now–it’s still one of my favorite hues to wear year-round.

I’ve got to be hones: Wild Cactus is the color I was most excited about–especially after seeing it on Frosso’s blog. This color is right on trend since the Pantone Color Of The Year is Emerald. This polish is super duper pigmented so I was very careful not to get any on my skin–especially since Frosso had warned me that it stained her skin. I am happy to report that I didn’t get ANY staining on my skin nor on my nails. YAY!

So there you have it, my fellow lacquerheads. Let me know what you think of these colors. Will you be getting any of these? I also picked up a couple of new Halo Hues so I’ll be swatching those soon. In case you’re interested, I’ve added some of these polishes to my blog sale so check it out! Thanks for stopping by today, and I’ll talk to you soon!

Venique Goes Hollywood Collection

Posted on 12 March, 2013 by Cynthia

Happy Tuesday everyone. I am off tomorrow so I’m really looking forward to sleeping in which means that I’ll be getting out of bed at 6 am. WOOOOOT! hahaha Do you even know how horrible it is to have to get up at 3:30 am? No? You’re lucky! I have been such a turd about getting up my posts in a timely manner, and I am finally catching up. Today I have the Venique Goes Hollywood Collection to share with you. Before I even get into it, I have to admit one thing: I don’t like metallics. I just don’t know what is about metallic finish polishes, but I just can’t appreciate them. I tried to put all my metallic prejudice aside before I started swatching this collection so let’s take a look at the polishes…

The formula for all of these polishes is identical so I’ll talk about that at the end. I also want to mention that I am missing one polish from this collection which is the silver metallic called Reels Of Fun.

Venique Golden Age Of Beauty

Venique Diamond Kisses

Venique Down The Carpet

Venique Acting Is Living

Venique Oceans Of Pearls (over Acting Is Living)

I didn’t think that I would be saying this, but I actually kind of liked these polishes. I don’t find the colors too unique, but they are pretty nonetheless if you like metallic finish polishes. To tell you the truth, I was scared that these would be as difficult to work with as the Essie Mirror Metallics, but the formula was rather easy to work with. However, the brush strokes….OY VEY! I could not find any way to work with these polishes that left me with a brush stroke-free result. Overall, if you like metallics, you should look into these. I haven’t tried using these for stamping but I hope they work!

To learn more about Venique, you can visit them on their website and on their facebook page:

Website: http://veniquenails.com/

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/VeniqueNails

Thanks so much for stopping by today. Let me know what you think of this collection. Do you have a favorite polish finish?

Disclosure: The products featured in this post were provided to me by the manufacturer or their PR firm. For more information, please see my disclosure policy tab here.

Nubar My Sweet Escape Collection Spring 2013

Posted on 11 March, 201323 March, 2013 by Cynthia

Don’t I always start my Monday posts by commenting on how much I hate Mondays? Well, this will be no different. I had a hell of a time waking up this morning because of the damn time change. When my alarm went off at 3:30, I nearly wanted to cry. I also had the most random dream about a guy I haven’t thought about or talked for like 10+ years. You know those people that touch your life in a very significant manner and then things get a little ugly and you decide to walk away out of pure laziness? Yep, the story of my life. I feel like I tend to not want to deal with things when they are challenging out of fear of failure or being hurt. Anyway, it was really strange to have a dream about him but wherever he may be now, I hope he’s happy. Oh my God…I’m such a loser.Let’s move on from the sappiness and focus on the pretty polish, shall we? Today I FINALLY got my act together and I will be sharing my swatches and review of the Nubar My Sweet Escape Collection for Spring 2013. I’ve had these polishes for a few weeks, and I just couldn’t find the time to swatch them all. This Saturday I swatched probably 20+ polishes so I have a good stock of pictures for upcoming posts. Well, here they are! Are you ready for my “perfect little tan fingers?” (One of my readers wrote that in my comments and it made me giggle.)

Am I the only one who has been humming this song the whole time?

Let me just get this out of the way: Resort Yellow is probably the most awesome yellow that I have ever used. Not only is it a true yellow, but it is super opaque and it looked perfect at two coats. I’ve said before that I’ve been completely obsessed with yellow polishes lately and this one just made my cool like Donkey Kong list.

All I can think of when I look at On The Radar is: That is a one spicy meatball. I don’t know why this makes me think of marinara sauce. Is that weird? It’s a cherry tomato color with some orange in it to boot. It’s pretty but it’s not usually a color that makes me get all excited.

I like bright blue polishes. I like From Dusk Till Dawn. That is all. Actually, this one is a little sheer so I felt like I had some bald spots. I have a lot of blues like this one but I still like it.

The Pantone color of the year is emerald so I’m really digging this color right now. Into The Wild is that gorgeous shade of green/emerald that everyone will be rocking this year. I think it’s a little smoky and not as bright as true emerald–more of a gorgeous jade. I’m definitely on board!

I am a little torn about Forbidden Fruit. It’s such a strange looking color, but I kind of really like it. It reminds me a bit of pureed pale yams…or baby food! I actually do like how this color looks on my skintone but I don’t know if it’s a universally flattering color.

Could My New Obsession be my new obsession? It’s so pretty. I just can’t get enough when it comes to blue and turquoise polishes. How many of these do I really need??? I don’t know, but I seem to collect them. Heck, who am I kidding? I collect every color. hahaha

I think that Sour Apple is just kind of strange. It makes me think of Jolly Ranchers. Omg…I use to eat Jolly Ranchers like my life depended on it when I was a kid. Hello, diabetes! The formula on this one was a little thin compared to Resort Yellow. I don’t know if I really like this color

Jaded is my second favorite polish in this collection. It’s beautiful, bright yet smokey. I can see myself wearing this year-round. The formula was pretty good and I only needed two coats.

Since I have some similar colors and bought a few dupes of colors I knew I wouldn’t want to part with, I will be putting up a lot of these polishes up on my blog sale so make sure that you check it out if you’d like to get your hands on any of these colors. Click here for my blog sale page. Also, don’t forget to enter my giveaway for a set of minis from the OPI Oz The Great And Powerful Collection. Click here to enter.

I hope you liked the colors in this collection. I know Nubar isn’t as accessible as other brands, but they are definitely worth tracking down or buying them online. Let me know what you think. Do you have any favorites? Thanks so much for stopping by today, and I will talk to you soon.

Sation Delete Your Junk Male

Posted on 9 March, 20138 March, 2013 by Cynthia

Today’s post is dedicated to my friend, Nancy, whom I have known since I was 8 or 9 years old. The name of this polish fits perfectly with the advice that I had given her a couple of weeks ago. I hope it makes her smile. Sation Delete Your Junk Male is the only polish from the Miss Antoinette Spring 2013 Collection that I found at my nail place the last time I was on a Sation hunt. I definitely need to go on another hunt because I need the rest of the colors in this collection! So let’s look at my new pretty:

Sation calls this polish an electric cerise red which I feel is fairly accurate. If you love jellies, you will love this polish. It has that glossy and squishy quality to it, but it is also super sheer. I had to apply 4 coats here and I could still see some VNL. I was also a little sad to see that the super pretty pink micro-glitter/shimmer was really hard to see once it was on my nails. You can definitely get a flash of it when you’re out in the sun and it’s glorious but fleeting. Can’t win them all!

I don’t know why I’ve been so bummed out lately. I think that my hate for my job is finally starting to wear me down so today I headed over to Sephora for some polish retail therapy. Since they finally had the speckled Illamasquas, I want to go check them out in person. Once I got there, I went absolutely insane and grabbed a bunch of stuff including 2 Dior polishes: Rosy Bow and Gris Trianon along with all the speckled Illamasquas. While I was standing in line to check out, I looked down at my basket, and I thought to myself: “What the hell are you doing? You’re not rich, bitch!” So I put most of the stuff back. I did however come out with more than I should have but here are my new prized posessions:

These are Superstition, Speckle and Venous. Aren’t they pretty? I’m obsessed with Illamasqua polishes so I can’t wait to try these out–especially Speckle!

There is a lot of stuff that I wanted to write about but frankly, I’m so tired right now. I will leave it for a later post. Thanks for stopping by today, and I hope you have a good weekend. Talk to you soon!

Illamasqua MILF

Posted on 8 March, 20137 March, 2013 by Cynthia

And in my series of inappropriate polish name posts, today I have Illamasqua MILF. You all know that I love my Illamasquas and this one did not disappoint. However, I think that I got a super old bottle that had been at Sephora for eons because the bottle design is a little different AND the polish kind of smelled like poison. Despite all that, I didn’t hesitate to slather it on like nobody’s business.

Isn’t this the creamiest and most lovely mint green polish? The formula was very opaque but also kind of runny which I found very strange for Illamasqua. I actually flooded my cuticle pretty badly on the first nail I painted so I had to be very careful not to get too close with the brush. When I saw this gorgeous green, I immediately thought of blinging it up.

This is Sation Ego-friendly. *pause for ooohs and ahhhhs* I’ve worn this over dark colors, but it looks absolutely breath taking over a lighter color. I’ve been messing with polishes all afternoon, and this is the only combination I’ve actually liked. It’s like St. Patrick’s Day threw up all over my nails.

So I’m keeping this post short and sweet. I hope you liked it, and that you have a great Friday. Thanks for the visit today, and I will talk to you soon!