Year: 2012

Of Life and Lacquer > 2012

Deborah Lippmann Almost Paradise

Posted on by Cynthia

I finally got around to using another one of my Deborah Lippmann beauties. This is one of the 4 Deborah Lippmann polishes I got on major clearance on HSN, and I love them. Yes, they are expensive but I think the formula is pretty freaking dreamy. I think these would be a perfect splurge for a special occasion like a birthday, Christmas or Saturday night…hee! I don’t see myself splurging too often on DL polishes, but I think I will really be on the lookout for special and unique colors that catch my attention.

The first thing that comes to mind when I look at this polish is key lime pie. Hmmmm…who doesn’t like that?! Just the sound of it sounds decadent with a refreshing citrus punch. Have you ever had key lime cheesecake? Enough food talk; can you tell I’m hungry right now?

This is such a pretty color! I wasn’t sure it would suit my skin tone, but I actually really like it. Since cremes are my favorite polish finish anywhere, this was a no-brainer for me. The first coat was streaky, but I wasn’t expecting any less. The second coat evened it all out perfectly

It’s official: Insta-Dri polishes are awesome for stamping. Doesn’t Blue By! look amazing over Almost Paradise? I used plate MASH 43 for this design.
I think my stamping mojo is 100% back! Let me know what you think of this design.

Hope you’re having a great weekend, and thanks for stopping by!

Rant

Posted on by Cynthia

I don’t know how to really feel about this. On one hand, I am happy that people like my pictures and swatches enough to use them in their articles, but it is also frustrating to feel that they think so little of me that they don’t even bother to ask me if it’s okay to use them.  I googled “Wet N Wild Saved By The Bell” and this is what came up on THE FIRST PAGE. I looked at the second page and it was more of the same.

Picture Link 1

Picture Link 2

Picture Link 3

This video here used my swatches and bottle pics in their video. There is a credit mention, but I don’t recall anyone even shooting me an email to see if it was okay. The people over at Buzz 60 seem to be the ones responsible for this video, but it’s all over the place from AOL to The Detroit Free Press.

Video Link 1  Shown on Channel 9 News Front Page

Video Link 2  Shown on First Coast News Front Page

Video Link 3  Shown on AOL

Video Link 4  Shown on Detroit Free Press

You want to know what really annoys me? I am more than happy to let people use my photos. I am honored when people ask me if they can share them on their blog or article which is why this is so disappointing to me. Don’t get me wrong: any blogger who is just starting out and is slowly building readership loves the exposure and treasures every single new reader and commenter. For those of you who blog about cosmetics/nail polish, you know how time-consuming it is to swatch color after color, take a billion pictures hoping a few of them come out right, edit them and then have to write up a post. I do this because I love it. I love sharing all my polish finds and what I think about them, but this is still my work; I spend my time and energy on it.

I hope no one thinks I’m taking all this too seriously or that I’m blowing it out of proportion. It’s just frustrating. Why can’t people just ask? I know that sometimes images get shared around the internet and it becomes almost impossible to find out where the images initially came from so I know that MOST people aren’t doing this to be rude, but it doesn’t stop it from being just that: rude and inconsiderate.  For other bloggers who may have used my pictures without permission–even if you gave credit–I would recommend that you read the following article. There are a lot of things that I didn’t know when I first started blogging so please read this article that one of my favorite bloggers, Amanda, shared on her blog. Don’t let yourself get wrapped up in something like that. It’s unfortunate, but it could happen to anyone.

Anyhow, let me know what you think about this. Am I just being too sensitive?

Entity Pearl Brights Collection for Spring/Summer

Posted on by Cynthia

I don’t know about you, but it doesn’t really feel like a true summer here in California. I know it’s been incredibly hot in other areas of the country (and the world), but I feel like we have had an atypical summer for sure. Today was fairly hot and I was very uncomfortable in my dusty havens when I went looking for some new nail polishes.  I was definitely feeling the heat today! When I got home, I just wanted to play around with some summery colors and lo and behold, these beauties were waiting for me. I’ve always thought of Entity Beauty as a company that caters more to the professionals since I had never really seen their products at any of the nail supply places I frequent. The only time I came across their products was at one of my favorite nail salons.

First let me say that I am kind of amused by the unique bottle shape. These are the first nail polishes that I’ve tried that have this round bottle, and it just makes them stand out a bit. As far as I’m concerned, packaging is a big part of initial brand appeal so they score points on that end right off the bat. To get to the nitty-gritty of it all, these polishes had a pretty nice formula. I am in the habit of applying very thin coats which usually forces me to apply 2-3  coats of polish. I opted for 2 thicker coats for these swatches and that seemed to work pretty well. I was actually surprised that I didn’t have more problems with the yellow polish since they are notoriously hard to work with. I’ve been on a yellow kick lately so I really liked this color! While these colors are definitely summery, they aren’t necessarily neon. They dry shiny and smooth and with a lovely pearlized shimmer that is noticeable yet not over the top. I know you’re all thinking that you may already have similar colors to these, and I agree that most polish hoarders fans will have dupes no matter what. Either way, this collection is cute and worth checking out if you like bright colors with a pearly/shimmer finish.

So now that I’ve blabbed for a while, here are the swatches:

    

PEARL FUCHSIA

    

PEARL ORANGE

    

PEARL RED

    

PEARL TURQUOISE

    

PEARL VIOLET

    

PEARL GREEN

    

PEARL YELLOW

For more information on where to purchase Entity products, you can visit their website and locate a distributor and/or salon in your area. You can also visit their facebook page for all their latest news and announcements. If you’re interested in purchasing these polishes online, you can find them at  Trans Design.

So tell me: what do you think?

****These items were sent for review. This in no way influences my review and opinion of the product.****

Thank You!!!

Posted on by Cynthia

When I first started this blog, only about 2 people knew about it and they were my only readers because I was writing mostly personal stuff. I needed to get it out of me so that it could stop torturing me. I started writing about my issues here about 6 months after being released from a psychiatric hospital, and it turned into a cathartic exercise since I was still resisting any kind of therapy. Since then, I have met some of the most caring group of women I could ever hope to meet. Not only do they listen and offer advice, but they share their own experiences and make me feel like I’m not alone.

Once I started blogging about nail polish more regularly, I would get so excited every time I got a new follower or a new person who would comment on my posts. I slowly started to see my readership grow each month and this made me feel like people were actually interested in my opinions and thoughts about nail polish, make up and just random topics. I saw a nice jump in blog visit for the month on June so I told myself that I would LOVE to reach a few milestones for the month of July:

1) Reach 300 published blog posts

2) Reach 100 followers

3) Reach 10,000 views for the month

Well, I managed to reach all of those thanks to all of you who take time out of your day to check up on what craziness is going on in my head.  The most exciting part was that not only did I reach 10,000 blog views in July, but I actually got a little over 16,000! For a little blog such as mine, I feel like that was such a huge accomplishment. Nicole from Polish Me Please! had been encouraging me to use twitter and when I finally did, that’s when I started seeing an increase in traffic.  So thank you Nicole and thanks to all the lovely twitter ladies who always make me laugh!

I was so happy to have hosted 2 giveaways last month for 2 sets of the Wet N Wild Saved By The Nail, Saved By The Bell inspired nail polishes. I would have loved to give out more sets but they became pretty impossible to find as a lot of you noticed. If I randomly find more, I will be sure to add them to my next giveaway. I am planning to hold another giveaway in the near future as a thank you to all of you who have made me feel so welcome in this lovely nail blogging world. Once I figure out what the prize will be, I will let you all know.

I posted last night how I received my MASH plates and how excited I was to try them out today.  I am happy to report that these plates are awesome!! I used a few of the designs to see how well they stamped. I have to say that Wet N Wild I Can’t Stand Up Straight is my favorite silver to stamp with. Look how great the designs turned out!

My brother is taking me out to dinner tonight (for once!) so we’re headed out in a little while. I hope I can control myself and not stop at any place that sells nail polish on the way back home. Uggghhhhh! Wish me luck!

Just Another Day In Polishland

Posted on by Cynthia

Today was such a weird day. I couldn’t fall asleep last night so I read until about 2:00 am and ended up waking up at 6:00 am. Grrrrr! I got up and started doing some cleaning and wanted to do some laundry but I got in bed to read a little and fell asleep again around 8:00. I took a long nap until about 10:00 during which time I missed 10 calls on my cell phone. 10 calls?!?!?! What the hell? All the calls came from an “unknown” number and there were no voicemails so there wasn’t much I could do. A few minutes later, my phone rang again and it was my dad. I should have known it was him. He always calls me a million times and he never leaves a message. Him and my mom were convinced that something had happened to me because I forgot to call my dad for his birthday, and I never forget his birthday. I don’t know what happened this year, I just completely spaced out and feel terrible about it.

This incident also made me very sad because my parents are NEVER at ease about my well-being. They no longer trust me or my brothers to tell them the truth about anything because we kept the truth of my hospitalizations from them last year. My first hospitalization happened around mother’s day so I was unable to talk to my mom, and I asked my brothers to tell her that I had the flu and was just resting and that I would call her soon. Well, her spidey sense perked right up, and she knew something was going on. I called her after I came home and assured her everything was fine. Then a few weeks later, I was hospitalized for a longer period of time, and that’s when my brother pushed me to tell them I was having issues so they could come and stay with me while I got better. Because of that whole episode, my parents are now always thinking that I keep the truth from them. It’s suffocating, but I know they do it because they care about me. How do I let them know that it drives me bananas that they call me a million times or start calling my brothers and friends if one day they can’t get a hold of me right away? That’s kind of crazy, right?

I spent most of the day with L. because she was having a really bad day and she needed some company. She is a good friend and was always there for me when I was going through my stuff so I want to be a good friend and be there for her as well. We went to the mall just to walk around and because I needed to return an eyebrow pencil at Sephora. So my reasoning is that if I return an item, I have to purchase one to replace it…right??? Well, that’s how I ended up with a new Illamasqua polish. Later in the day I also went to Ulta and I cleaned out their Essence polish section. Oh, and I also got my MASH plates in the mail today!!!!!!!!!

This post has been way talkier than most of my recent posts, and now it’s going to go the other way. Get ready to get photo bombed!

    

This is Illamasqua Swinger which I picked up today at Sephora. I really didn’t think I was going to like this polish but when I tried it on, I loved it. L. wasn’t that impressed with it, and I know she thinks I’m crazy for buying polish this expensive. I also took every essence polish they had left at my Ulta which was just 6 bottles, and I also got Zoya Marina. It’s an ok color that was on sale, but I got it mostly for the name because that’s my mom’s name. Best of all, I only paid $8 for all 7 bottles of polish after the discounts and my coupon. I am a coupon savant when it comes to nail polish…no joke. I’m adding most of these polishes to my future giveaway stash. 🙂

    

    

    

    

    

    

I am so excited about these plates…I can’t wait to try them out tomorrow. I hope they all stamp well!!!

And lastly, here is my dinner. Ahhh…..so good.

This delicious and humongous grilled steak salad is from Café Rio. The first time I ever ate there was during a business trip to Utah, and I was hooked!!!!  Then, last year I heard that they were opening up a few location in So Cal!!!! Luckily (or unfortunately for my hips), they opened up a location  a few blocks from my place so the temptation is there. Ugh!

Today was definitely a weird day. I can’t wait for tomorrow. New month, new day…another opportunity for me to mess up my life royally. Ha!  I’ve got some fun news coming soon so make sure you stay tuned.

Précision Color FX Collection

Posted on by Cynthia

Last week I stumbled upon a full display of Précision polishes that were on sale. They had me at sale. I ended up picking up the Color FX collection from 2010 and I finally got around to swatching them today. I really liked these colors, but I do think that the formula is a little sheer. I used 3 coats for all of these swatches. I would say that 4 out of the 6 colors could have gotten away with 2 thickish coats but Honey Dew This and Wait A Melon For Me needed those three coats badly. I didn’t have any problems with the brush; it was flexible and easy to manipulate. I had practically no clean up! I’ve provided two pictures of each polish: one in direct sunlight and one in the shade.

    

PINK WITH A WINK

    

HONEY DEW THIS

    

THE NEXT “IT” GIRL

    

WAIT A MELON FOR ME

    

SURFIN’ IN MALIBLUE

    

PUR-FECT FX

So what do you think of these colors? I actually think they are really pretty. I probably would have found them a little more original a few years ago when they came out because I wasn’t such a hardcore polish fiend back then. Nowadays, it seems like we get the same colors over and over again every season. Maybe that’s why when something somewhat different comes out, we all go bananas. B-A-N-A-N-A-S! I am definitely going to keep up with Précision collections going forward because I think their nail polishes are of good quality and are very affordable. They may not be easily found in your area in retail locations, but you can purchase them online at their website but you may also be able to find them for less at other polish etailers.

Thanks for visiting today and I’m sorry for being such an enabler; enabling means caring in my book.

Stamping Sunday: Red & Black

Posted on by Cynthia

A few weeks ago, Jessica from Once Upon A Polish blogged about a facebook group called Adventures In Stamping where everyone votes for a particular look or color scheme and then all the ladies post their manis every Sunday. Well, I thought it sounded really fun so I joined! I really didn’t know what to do so I started looking through my melmers and realized I hadn’t used Layla Flash Black.

    

    

Call me crazy, but I actually don’t really like Flash Black on me.  It just looks so weird on me, and I’m really disappointed…not to mention that Layla holos chip in 5 seconds on me.

    

    

I then stamped over Flash Black with Konad special polish in red and plate BM 322. I then used a dotting tool to add the black dots with China Glaze Liquid Leather. One word: barf. I hate how this turned out but not all manis are going to be winners, and you have to embrace the good with the bad. I have no idea why I thought that stamping over Flash Black would be a good idea. It just looks dingy and grey…not interesting at all. I’m annoyed that I spent so much time on this mani and ended up not even liking it; hey, at least now I know Flash Black isn’t what I thought it would be.

So I think my first Stamping Sunday Challenge is a big fat fail. Hopefully I will do better next week. Voting has already started and our three choices are:

  • Fun In The Sun
  • Olympics
  • Using silver, gold or bronze as a base, accent or stamping color

I voted for using silver, gold or bronze as a base, accent or stamping color. So far this choice is in the lead, and I hope it stays that way! Check out the look Jessica created here. I am in love with it!

Thanks for stopping by!

Essence You Belong To Me

Posted on by Cynthia

I don’t know about you, but when you buy as much polish as your average nail polish fanatic, you are constantly on the lookout for sales. Just look at the great success of Nouveau Cheap! I love that blog because it fills me in on all the affordable cosmetics and drugstore sales. I know a lot of people stocked up on Sinful Colors despite the PR nightmare that ensued when they were caught using bloggers’ photos without their permission. Taking it one step further, they manipulated the images onto their models and incorrectly described the process of achieving the look. I find it rather tasteless on their part, and hope that they do right by the affected bloggers.

On my cheap polish quest, I found myself at Ulta a couple of times this week…and by a couple I mean I visited 3 Ultas in my area trying to find good deals. I had noticed that Essence polishes were being put on clearance and that the images of their bottles were different on the website so I figured they were trying to get rid of old stock. Well, tickle me cheap…I was all over that. I ended up purchasing all the colors I could get my hands on and they ended up being around $.79 each. Score! Today I found a few Zoyas on clearance including one of the flaky topcoats, Chloe. Woot! Major score. One of the polishes I purchased today is You Belong To Me which I decided to wear as soon as I got home.

    

While it’s not very noticeable in the bottle nor in my pictures, You Belong To Me has the faintest shimmer which makes it look so beautiful. The formula was ok…not really problematic but I needed a third coat to smooth it out.

    

I really like how delicate my nails look with this stamp design. I used BM 314 and my favorite WNW Silver for stamping called I Can’t Stand Up Straight. Does anyone have any recommendations for a cheap silver that stamps really well? Upon closer inspection, I think this design looks arachnid-like and it’s kind of freaking me out.

I was feeling really lazy tonight so I didn’t feel like cooking dinner. Instead, I made my special tuna sandwich: tuna, mayo, mustard, lettuce, tomatoes, pickles, swiss cheese and slices of hard-boiled egg. Egg?!? Yes, egg. You have no idea how delicious it tastes. The creaminess and richness of the egg adds a whole new level of yumminess to this sandwich.

I don’t even know how many times I’ve talked about The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo on this blog, but I’m going to do it again because I have a major girl crush on Noomi Rapace. She is such a crazy badass in these movies. If you have Netflix, the full Swedish trilogy is online and it has like 2 extra hours of content that was edited out when they were released in the US. And yes, I’ve been watching the movies all over again. lol

I hope you’ve had a good and relaxing Saturday! Thanks for the visit and let me know what you think of my “spider nails.” hehehe

P.S. Do you have a preference for the picture size on my blog? I’ve made the images smaller for this post instead of using the full-sized images. What do you think?

Barielle – First Impressions

Posted on by Cynthia

Barielle is not a brand that I’ve ever had easy access to so it’s not a big surprise that I hadn’t used any of their products yet. When I stopped at TJ Maxx the other day to scope out their cosmetics section hoping to find some Deborah Lippmanns (is this just an urban legend??), I was pleasantly surprised to find a bunch of Barielle sets so I didn’t hesitate a second and bought one. Out of all the sets I saw, these dark vampy colors seemed the most interesting especially because I spotted a few cremes in the set and we all know how I feel about cremes.

 

REMEMBER ME

 

FRIDAY NITE PARTI

 

BLACK ROSE

 

MYSTERY WOMAN

 

HIDDEN HIDEAWAY

I really do like these colors especially Hidden Hideaway and Mystery Woman because of that beautiful lit-from-within shimmer. I think that Remember Me and Friday Nite Parti are way too similar to be together in a set, but both colors are nice. Remember Me was probably the only one I didn’t appreciate as far as the formula is concerned. It seemed really sheer despite how dark the color is. You can see in my pictures that it looks somewhat streaky and uneven which I did not notice until I uploaded the pictures.  In case you’re interested, I got this set for $9.99 so check out your TJ Maxx. They had tons of these and other sets. I know stock varies from store to store but I think these are worth a look.

And for my food chronicles, today I decided to make some chicken strips and Rice-a-Roni. I had seriously been craving potato salad, but I didn’t want to spend a lot of time to make such a small amount so I bought a little side container of it from Sprouts. I love Sprouts!

I’m getting really pumped for some interviews next week so I have to do some boring nail look…can’t go in there with some sparkly stamped up nails…or maybe I can! I am happy to report that I have seen some slight nail growth and that makes me really happy. I ordered the latest MASH plates today because I found a 20% off code online which made them around $11 and they ship for free! I hope that by the time they get here, my nails won’t be so crazy short anymore so I can really try out my new plates!

I hope you have a lovely weekend and thanks for the visit.

Self-Control? What’s That?

Posted on by Cynthia

I had mentioned to Nicole on twitter that I had scored a lot of polishes during my latest Ulta escapade. I failed to mention that I also stopped at Walgreens to pick up some polishes for a friend (my imaginary friend that refuses the polishes and I am forced to keep) and that I also went to TJ Maxx and I found an interesting Barielle set. I know what you’re thinking: Isn’t this the girl who is always talking about no-buys? Sadly, yes…that’s me. I am just going to shut my trap from now on about no-buys and just resign myself to the unfortunate fact that I have a serious polish hoarder problem. As far as problems go, this one is not so bad. However, if later this year you see some crazy California chick on Hoarders who can no longer walk around in her apartment because it’s full of polish, yes, that would be me.

I am actually very proud of myself because I got a bunch of polishes for very little money. Let me show you what I got at Ulta before I tell you how much I actually spent.

After my coupon and redeeming some points, I ended up paying around $12.50 for all the polishes above. Can you say fantabulous deal?

 

I broke down and got a few more bottles of Sinful Colors while the sale is still going on. I actually did grab a few of these for a friend so I don’t feel so bad about this one.

I’m really excited to share these Barielle polishes with you because it will be my first try with this brand.

 

So how was your Thursday? Happy it’s Friday?