Year: 2012

Of Life and Lacquer > 2012

Jindie Nails Seeing Stars

Posted on by Cynthia

I don’t know about you, but I am really liking the idea of purchasing more indie polishes. I like feeling that I am supporting a small business that is creating something unique–especially if it’s something that I love like nail polish. When I first saw Jen’s creations, I thought they were definitely pretty and unique, but I was going through my glitter hater phase so I didn’t jump right on them. For the last couple of months, I have seriously done a 180 and started coveting and drooling over every glitter I see. I revisited Jen’s shop and OMG I went crazy trying to decided what polishes to get.  After making my choices, my polishes arrived in less than a week, and I was so surprised to find them wrapped up like this:

    

While some people may not think much of this, I think that Jen’s careful attention to things like how her polishes are wrapped and presented, shows how much she cares about her products and her customers. I, for one, really liked seeing my polishes wrapped in pretty tissue paper and ribbon. It’s the little things that make me happy.

                            

These are some macro shots of the 4 polishes I received–yeah, just to tease you!

The first polish I have decided to share with you is Seeing Stars. This is a vibrant polish with tons of different shaped glitters ranging from stars, bars and hexagons. The glitter is holographic for the most part so I love how it looks in different types of lighting. The thing that I was most drawn to about this polish when I visited Jen’s shop is the amazing blue jelly base. Because I still consider myself a glitter novice, I was very excited to try such a vibrant blue jelly with all that glittery magic explosion. I considered using this polish on it’s own, but decided to use a base color for my first attempt. I immediately thought of using China Glaze Frostbite since it is such a bright blue, but I went with a purple instead: OPI Purple With A Purpose.

    

I hadn’t used Purple With A Purpose in a really long time so I had forgotten how much I love it. I don’t think I’ve been giving OPI much love lately, but I have to say that they definitely have my favorite brush of all the brands I have tried. Their brush works PERFECTLY with my nail shape so it is a breeze to do a manicure since clean up is minimal. I actually didn’t do any clean up.

    

This is one coat of Seeing Stars over Purple With A Purpose. As you can tell, the blue base is VERY pigmented since it pretty much covers up the purple. The polish was a little thicker than I am used to dealing with so I added a few drops of thinner like Jen recommended and it became very manageable. It was not hard to pick up glitter on my brush, but I did have to fish for the stars. I dotted and pushed the bar glitter around a little bit to get it where I wanted it which is pretty typical of similar glitter polishes. This polish dries very glossy and there was some roughness, especially from the stars. I have not picked up any thick top coats such as Gelous, but I am planning to because any glitter lover knows that it’s a necessity.

Overall, I would say that Seeing Stars lived up to my expectations. I think that I would only wear the stars if I’m doing something festive. Otherwise, I would wear this polish any time!  If you are a glitter fan, I highly recommend that you check out Jen’s etsy shop here. She is very active on Facebook as well so you can always reach her there. So let me know what you think of Seeing Stars. Is it something you would wear? Are you a glitter lover or a glitter hater? I’m glad I could start out this Monday with a little glitter love. Thanks for stopping by my dears!

 

Stamping Sunday: Pulsating Pink And Purple

Posted on by Cynthia

I feel like I have been in a total funk lately so when I remembered the Sunday Stamping theme, I had absolutely no idea what to do. I took out a bunch of pink and purple polishes and it came down to Sation Shock Me Twice Pink and Sation Power To The Purple. I thought about combining the two, but changed my mind. So I went with two coats of Shock Me Twice pink over a base of China Glaze White Out.

    

I really like Shock Me Twice Pink because it’s neon but still delicate. It has a really pretty shimmer that shows up unexpectedly at certain angles.

    

I then used stamp Mash 48 and Wet N Wild’s I Can’t Stand Up Straight for the design.

    

Since I still wanted some kind of purple accent, I used these purple rhinestones on my design. I always think rhinestones will look better than they end up looking once I glue them on my nails. I should just give up on rhinestones already!

So how was your weekend? I hope you had fun. Thanks for stopping by despite my uninspired nails as of late. I hope this coming week finds me in a better frame of mind. I actually have another post coming soon and it is one spicy tamale full of glitter goodness. I hope you will enjoy it!

Bourjois Grenadine Tonic

Posted on by Cynthia

I have the most amazing nail polish connections in France. Yesterday I got a package from Sabrina and today I got another from Julie. Oh man…am I spoiled or what??? If you haven’t visited Julie’s blog, go visit Un Brin De Julie. Her blog is in French, but you can use google translate. She speaks English so you can always talk to her! She is so sweet and does the most beautiful nail art. Here is one of my favorite looks that she has done:

You can see her blog post here and see more pictures of this look. How freaking cute is this? I don’t know why I have always loved Navy/Sailor everything (Hello, sailor!) and this made me remember a dress my mom got for me when I was a little kid. I think I used to wear it ALL the freaking time, AND I would wear it with cowboy boots. Huh?! When I asked my mom why she combined the two, she said I was the one who insisted on wearing the boots. Oh well…tacky from birth. Anyway, here is a picture of me in the infamous dress. I think I was maybe 2 or 3 years old in this picture.

Yes, I was wearing shorts underneath! My mom knew that I liked to play with the boys and dresses and jumping off things don’t really go well together. I was such a boy growing up. I hated dolls unless it involved decapitating them, cutting their hair, burning them or making clothes for them. I envied my brother for having He-Man toys, Tonka Trucks and marbles. Since I’m a year and a half older than him, I would always find a way to butt in and take his stuff or force him to play with me. I was such a bossy kid.

The polishes I received today are two Bourjois beauties!

    

I had been drooling over the orange one, Grenadine Tonic, ever since I saw it on Ommorphia Beauty Bar. I am so lucky that Julie went out of her way to track it down for me. She also sent me this lovely lavender polish called Lavande Esquisse. (Exquisite Lavender) On to the swatches!

    

This is three coats of Grenadine Tonic. It is such a strange and lovely (in my opinion) jelly-like polish. It’s so glossy that I thought it was still wet the whole time I was wearing it. Obviously, if you don’t like VNL, this is not the polish for you.

    

Since I just picked up China Glaze Techno, I layered one coat over Grenadine Tonic. I know I’m tardy to the party on this glitter, but I just never wanted it until I found it for dirt cheap today and caved.

    

And lastly, I ended with one last coat of Grenadine Tonic for a strange jelly sandwich. Let me tell you something: this may not look impressive in my pictures, but when I went outside, it was completely magical. It was like my fingertips had the sun in them! I was actually blinding myself with the orange shine. People stared. People ran away in terror thinking I was a Drew Barrymore Firestarter-like creature. In short, I loved this.

And just to give you a better idea of my depravity, these are the polishes I have acquired in the last 2 days. Yes, 2 days. In the famous words of Patrick Henry: “Give me polish, or give me death!” I am 90% sure that’s what he said.

For fun, here is a little flash mob video that my friend shared:


I worked for Air France for a few years in my early 20’s and she said that she could totally picture us doing that. Haha. What a crazy time, but I loved that I was able to travel so much.

Wow, I’m tired. Crazy day today. As always, thanks for stopping by.

Sation Hot 4 Teacher + OPI Spotted

Posted on by Cynthia

Young teacher, the subject
Of schoolgirl fantasy
She wants him so badly
Knows what she wants to be
Inside her there’s longing
This girl’s an open page
Book marking – she’s so close now
This girl is half his age

I am a rabid The Police fan so I don’t need much encouragement to burst out into song whenever something reminds me of one of their songs. When I got Sation Hot 4 Teacher, I started singing “Don’t Stand So Close To Me” at the store. Seriously. I’m not lying. People already know I’m a little “whacky” at my usual nail places so they didn’t think anything was out of the ordinary.

My freshman year of college, I was hopelessly in brain love with my literature professor. His class was at 8:00 am. and I never missed a single session despite the fact that it was 3 times a week. I would sit in the back of the class and literally swoon when he would regale us with his stories or get into deep discussion about Mark Twain, Emily Dickinson, John Dunne, Baudelaire or TS Eliot. I found ways to take more of his classes which I did. One year, in his American Literature class, we had to write a paper on Kate Chopin’s The Awakening. At the same time, I was reading Jean Anouilh’s version of Antigone in my French Literature class so I incorporated both books and heroines into my paper. The reason why I still remember this is because he wrote such glowing comments on my paper that I felt I was walking on air for the rest of the week.  So while I really was “half his age,” I wasn’t some ingenue. I don’t even think he was extraordinarily handsome when I look back, but he was so intellectually stimulating that I was so into him. Sadly, not that it mattered because I wouldn’t have done anything anyway, he was happily married. So, Dr. B****, I really wanted to brain bone you. Oh yeah, really badly. (Yes, I’m a nerd. SHUT UP!) Now, if only he had been the one to compliment me in class all the time and act creepy when I went to his office hours for help instead of my Comparative Religion professor…no, the irony is not lost on me.

Talk about tangents…back to the nail polish. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I LOVE SATION. Hot 4 Teacher is another polish from the Class Of Sation Collection, and I am in love with its radioactively bright magenta goodness. Like most neons, this dries to a satin finish which I like but much prefer it with a coat of Seche Vite.

Here are some shots of Hot 4 Teacher with and without topcoat:

    

    

    

And now for the polish I was super excited to receive…OPI Spotted!

    

I received OPI Spotted courtesy of the lovely Sabrina from Polish In Paris. (Merci ma belle! Merci mille fois…tu n’imagines pas combien j’adore ce vernis!!!) I had already read online that it’s important to apply this very thinly or else you won’t get many spots. As you can tell, I applied it too thickly on my pinky so I didn’t get  much of the spotted effect. You really have to apply the thinnest coat possible if you want a lot of spots. And just to make you more jealous, she also sent me 3 other polishes that look amazing and that I can’t wait to try. Eat your heart out:

Ok, so I really didn’t mean to rub it in your face, I just feel like I won the polish sweepstakes. 😀

So what do you think of Hot 4 Teacher? What about my inappropriate obsession with my lit professor? What are your feelings on OPI Spotted? Is it something you would wear?

Thanks for stopping by and catching up with me. I hope you will be back. I swear I’m not psycho. Really, I’m not…….

Illamasqua Serenity

Posted on by Cynthia

Why does Illamasqua keep putting out such lovely polishes? Why do they want to push me to financial ruin? It’s ok, Illamasqua: I forgive you. It’s not your fault that I have no self control whatsoever. When I saw that they had added a few colors to their rubber finish polishes, this was the first one that made me run out to Sephora to see if it was in stock. It wasn’t yet, so I ordered it online along with 2 other colors from this line. For those of you who have NARS Koliary, how does this color compare? I didn’t get Koliary so this color kind of makes up for it in my mind.

(Before I forget, I would really appreciate some input about my pictures. I am using a new light box system that I set up today, and I don’t know if I need to change it up or what. I am used to taking direct sunlight pictures, but I need to move away from that because my schedule won’t allow it in the near future. So please let me know what you think.)

    

Serenity is such a beautiful shade of blue. Like its name states, it definitely has a serene quality to it. This polish is pretty freaking pigmented so you only need two coats but make sure that you don’t overwork the polish like I did. You can kind of see some brushstrokes, right? I wore a good ridge filling base coat because I find that this formula tends to show every single imperfection.

    

The two pictures show Serenity with a coat of Seche Vite. Ahhh….glossy and lovely.

    

And here is my feeble attempt at some type of nail art. I am such a fail at this stuff…I should just face the fact that all I can do is stamping!

What do you think of Illamasqua polishes? Are you a fan of the brand? Is there a color from their new Rubber Brights that you are interested in getting? Thanks for stopping by and have a great Wednesday.

P.S. As you can tell, I am finally trying out some watermarking. Today I got a few emails from people I had contacted about using my pics without giving me credit. They were all apologetic and said they would have credited me if they knew where the pics came from. Weak defense in my opinion, but maybe if I had watermarked, they would have credited. We shall see how it all pans out. As most of you know, there are a lot of shameless people out there who don’t care about stealing/using other people’s work.

Ninja Polish: Nail-Venturous Humblebee

Posted on by Cynthia

Today I have another installment of the reformed glitter hater chronicles. I’ve been on a serious glitter high for the last month or so despite all of my previous statements about hating glitter. I still have issues with it when it comes to removal, but otherwise I am mesmerized by the world of indie glitters. There are so many amazing glitters out there and I recently I did something I said I didn’t have the patience to do: buy some polishes on Etsy. Now, that statement came from all the complaints I would hear about having to stalk certain shops, but I had no problems whatsoever getting the glitters I wanted. That is probably going to change in the new future once people get a load of the polishes I have coming. I’ll have those later in the week so I’ll be able to post them soon.

I decided to use the second polish I recently purchased from Ninja Polish: Humblebee. It is such an amazing matte glitter in the same vein of Floam. I layered it over Wet N Wild Pin ‘Em Slater from their HTF collection, Saved By The Nail. I didn’t really need a base color because you can build up Humblebee to opacity, but you have to be sure to allow each coat to dry or else you risk dragging.

 

 

    

This is 3 coats of Pin ‘Em Slater. If you don’t want VNL, you must wear some white undies.

    

And here is the majestic Humblebee. Ahhh….so pretty!

Sorry for more food porn…don’t mean to make you hungry. I was so in the mood for these carne asada tacos so they hit the spot.

Today was not as hot but it was still pretty gross. I can’t wait for this weather to just calm the F down. How has your week been? Ready for hump day tomorrow?

Also, don’t forget to enter my two giveways:

Free Julep Maven Intro box ($40 value) details here

Polish package + Beauty Samples details here

Thanks so much for stopping by and indulging my glittery beating heart.

Sephora Day

Posted on by Cynthia

On the heels of asking all of you if I post too much, here I am with a second post today! haha! I just got so excited that I wanted to share these new polishes I picked up today. I think I tweeted earlier that I was going to go scope out all the drugstore deals so I went to Walgreens and Rite-Aid because I wanted to see if I could find those WNW Halloween polishes. Alas, I didn’t find them. Feeling sad and dejected, I went to one of my favorite places:

And I feel super deluxe lucky that my Sephora has a MUFE boutique!! I’m spoiled, I know.

So the reason why I am posting today again is because I picked up two gorgeous polishes that I had not even heard about. Being the Sephwhora that I am, I can’t believe these flew under my radar. Are you ready for awesomeness?

This beauty is the Sephora + Pantone Universe Jewel Lacquer in Parachute Purple. I don’t even have the words to describe it right now.

I only picked up two of the colors because I wanted to try them out first before buying a few of the other colors that looked interesting. These are the two colors I got:

I was also really excited about their latest 500 pt perk so I ended up getting two. If you think about it, I had to spend $1,000 dollars to get these since each dollar is worth 1 point. lol

I usually think that their perks are lame and worthless so when something good comes around, I make sure to stock up. These are full-size tubes of Benefit Porefessional!!!

So what do you think about Parachute Purple? I can’t want to try Reflecting Pond. Are you going to check these out at Sephora?

Summer Blue

Posted on by Cynthia

Lately I have been on a China Glaze kick. Since I have so many dusties in my area, I always like to go and look for older China Glaze polishes…especially the pre big-3 free polishes. I am convinced that one of these days I am going to find Channelesque if I just look hard enough.

    

Rain Storm was first released in the China Rain collection for Spring/Summer 2001. It was then also re-promoted as part of the Rainbow of Hope Collection in 2010. Let me just tell you that I absolutely adore this polish. I don’t even care that it was crazy sheer and I needed 4 coats to reach bottle color.

    

And because I couldn’t help myself, I added a coat of China Glaze Blue Hawaiian. I am IN LOVE with this combination. I’ve seriously been wearing this for 2 days now and I anticipate leaving this on for at least another day! *gasp*

Even though it’s still early in the day here, it’s supposed to be a little cooler. I am so looking forward to it!!! OMG…I think I just heard the UPS guy’s truck. Gotta go!

Guess Who’s Having Another Giveaway?!

Posted on by Cynthia

EDIT 8/25: I am noticing that I am getting a lot of entries from new people who are not showing up as followers in my stats. In order for you to be eligible, you MUST be a blog follower. If you follow my blog via email, you have to confirm your subscription. If you don’t confirm it in your email, you will not show up as a follower so you will NOT be eligible for the prize.

Am I a giveaway freak, or what? I’ve been seriously building up a crazy giveaway stash, and I figured I might as well do one now. The exciting part of this giveaway is that I am opening it up to the top 4 countries in my readership stats which means that this giveaway will be open to US, Canada, France and UK residents!

To enter, you can go to my facebook page and click on the Giveaway tab  or you can click here a Rafflecopter giveaway and enter that way. The giveaway is live NOW and will run until the end of the month.

So what will you get if you win??

essence Nude It!, essence Where Is The Party?, Sinful Colors Lavender, Zoya Nimue & WNW Nerd Alert: Screech

You will also get a bunch of random samples as well as a surprise or two…depends on how many entries I get. 😉

I wanted to ask all of you a few questions about my blog because lately I have been having a lot of trouble keeping up with comments and especially keeping up with all the blogs I follow. As some of you may know, I’ve been interviewing lately so that cuts down on my free time as well as what colors I can wear unless I want to change my nails more than usual. The absolute best part of having a blog, in my opinion, is interacting with all of you so I hate feeling like I’m dropping the ball by not answering questions/emails that I get. I also miss being able to visit all the blogs on my reader regularly. Normally, I post once a day but that has become a bit harder so I’m thinking of changing things up a little bit which is where your opinions come in. I have a few polls down bellow and it would mean a lot to me if you would take a minute or two to answer my questions.

Also, don’t forget to enter my Julep giveaway for a FREE Julep Maven Intro box. Click here to enter the giveaway or you can click here to read about how you can enter for the free box and also sign up for a box for only $0.01!!!

All of these questions are only about my blog. If you’re on twitter, you know it’s way easier for me to be on there and interact with everyone. I am very committed to this blog so I want to make sure that my posts are enjoyable to write and also enjoyable to read. Thank you so much for your continued support!

Stamping Sunday: Can’t Wait For Fall

Posted on by Cynthia

I am a fall person. I can’t help it. I was born during the Autumnal Equinox, and I always found something poetic about it because I’ve always felt like I was an old soul with a darker disposition. Maybe that’s one of the reasons why I hate summer so much!

This Sunday, our theme is “Can’t Wait For Fall” and it couldn’t be more appropriate for me. Today I’m teasing you with Pumpkin Delight, a color from the Jessica Spicy Dream collection that is not available just yet. It should be available this month so keep an eye out for it if you love dark, spicy and rich fall colors. If you would like to see swatches of the whole collection, you can click here.

I started out with 2 coats of Pumpkin Delight:

    

Then I used stamp BM 309 for this design. I’ve got to admit that I hate birds. They freak me out so this was a big step for me to actually have birds on my nails even if they are supposed to be cute owls.

    

   

So what do you think of this look? I wasn’t feeling super inspired today. This was actually my second mani for Stamping Sunday; the first one was a complete fail that I didn’t even photograph before taking it off. Don’t you hate it when things don’t work out at all the way you pictured them in your mind?

I hope this weekend has been nice and relaxing for you. The heat has not eased up here in So Cal so I’m beyond grouchy at this point. All I have to say is that next week better be cooler or else…