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OPI New Orleans Collection

Posted on 29 February, 201628 February, 2016 by Cynthia

So how about them Oscars, eh? There were parts that felt super awkward but overall I enjoyed the show. I have always enjoyed watching them so I always look forward to the glitz and glamour. This weekend seemed to just fly by, and I had about a million things to get done: guess how many of those chores I actually got done. Regardless, I at least got some swatching done and have plenty of content for the coming week. Today I have my swatches of the OPI New Orleans Collection to share with you. I know a lot of people have complained that this color palette is not representative of such a vibrant and rich city. Let me show you my swatches and then I will let you know what I think of the collection.

OPI Take A Right On Bourbon

OPI Suzi Nails New Orleans

OPI Spare Me A French Quarter

OPI Show Us Your Tips!

OPI She’s A Bad Muffuletta!

OPI Rich Girls and Po-Boys

OPI Let Me Bayou A Drink

OPI I’m Sooo Swamped!

OPI I Manicure For Beads

OPI Humidi-tea

OPI Got Myself Into A Jam-balaya

OPI Crawfishin’ For A Compliment

Let me just get one thing out of the way: WHY? WHY??? Why do we continue to get shades like Take A Right On Bourbon in every single collection? I can’t stand shimmery silver metallics and there seems to be at least one of them in every single OPI collection for the last…5 million years. Yes, I feel strongly about this. Anyway, moving on… I have to say that I love, love, love the shades in this collection. While they may not be faithfully representative of such a rich city, they are gorgeous colors on their own. The formula on all of these was rather spot on, and I can’t think of any shades that I found particularly hard to work with. Overall, this is a beautiful collection that any creme lover will approve of. There are some stand-outs like Show Us Your Tips!, but they are all great. Now I want to hear what you think! Have you picked up any of these shades? Let me know in the comments below. Thanks so much for stopping by today, and I will talk to you soon.

Love, Angeline Haughty Taughty

Posted on 15 February, 2016 by Cynthia

Hey there! If you’re lucky enough to have the day off for President’s Day, I hope you’re enjoying your long weekend. I’ve had a pretty nice weekend because I’ve been super lazy at home and haven’t done much. However, this means that today I have tons of errands to run and now I’m mad at myself for not getting everything done yesterday so I could just relax today. Before I forget…OMG…did you watch The Walking Dead last night? I am dying! I won’t reveal any spoilers because I don’t want anyone hating me for it, but you will not be disappointed! For today’s mani, I am sharing with you a beautiful polish that was given to me by Amanda for Christmas. All of my girls know what an indie newb I am, so they always send me the most gorgeous indies to suck into the dark side. I really, really want to feature more indies on my blog because I’ve always been so loyal to mainstream brands only because cremes are my #1 favorite finishes and mainstream brands do those so well. Anywho, today I’m going to show you Love, Angeline Haughty Taughty.

In the bottle, Love, Angeline Haughty Taughty does not look that interesting but boy did I change my mind one I slapped on this baby. I wish that my pictures could show the depth of this polish and that you could actually see all the different colors in the base. It’s just so complex and I love that it dried to a satiny finish. The formula was also A+.

Just for shiggles, I added a glossy top coat to see what it would look like. Although I like both, I think that I much prefer the original matte finish. Which one do you like best?

Well, I hope you are all doing great and that you’re enjoying your long weekend (if you got one!). It’s ridiculously warm here in Southern California, in the 80’s, so I’m trying not to be upset about it. I know some people would kill for this weather, but for someone who hates the heat, this is pure evil. Anywho, thanks so much for stopping by today, and I will talk to you soon.

Bear Pawlish Mulbearry Lane

Posted on 2 February, 20161 February, 2016 by Cynthia

I don’t think I will ever get tired of holographic polish. There are times when I think I might be sick of it because how many holo polishes does a girl really need? (The answers is ALL OF THEM, by the way.) Then I see one more shiny rainbowy pretty thing and I forget my momentary insanity. Today I have a gorgeous holo polish that was given to me by Frosso because she just loves me that much. I have to admit that this is my very first Bear Pawlish and now I know that it won’t be my last. Let me show you the gorgeous shade which is Bear Pawlish Mulbearry Lane.

This is what the polish looks like under regular indoor lighting. It’s a saturated berry polish with a fantastic formula, but just wait for the holo…

And this is what you can expect under LED/sunlight. I want it on my nails every day. I want to stare at it all day…even while I’m driving which is not a good idea. Have you ever distracted yourself with holo nails while you’re driving? There should be a PSA about that. For reals.

So, thank you Frosso for the awesome gift. In a way I hate it because my wallet will eventually suffer, but…it’s only money. Haha! What do you think of this pretty and what other shades from this brand do you recommend? I’m all ears! Thanks so much for stopping by today, and I will talk to you soon.

OPI Hello Kitty Collection

Posted on 1 February, 201631 January, 2016 by Cynthia

Hey there! Can you believe it’s February already? What the heck is going on because it feels like time is flying. Well, the one thing I like about February in California is that it actually sorta feels like Winter. I said sorta. Yesterday it was raining and it was windy as hell. While I was out running errands, I accidentally grabbed my car door all weird while I was trying to close it and I broke a nail…the same son of a dick nail that breaks all the time. I had some decent length in my new oval shape as you can see in the pictures below, but since I can’t stand having nails all different shapes and lengths, I just cut them all off down to nubs. I did quite a bit of swatching this weekend so you’ll be seeing this shape for the next couple of weeks until I am able to do some more swatching. One of the collections that I swatched this past weekend is the OPI Hello Kitty Collection. Now, I must admit that I don’t really care about Hello Kitty. I mean, it’s cute and all but it’s not like I am all into it. Because of the cuteness factor and because it’s nail polish, I was pretty excited to get my hands on this collection. Let me show you some swatches first, and then I’ll let you know what I think about this collection.

OPI Let’s Be Friends!

OPI Kitty White

OPI Small+Cute = <3

OPI Charmy & Sugar

OPI Look At My Bow!

OPI Super Cute In Pink

OPI Starry-eyed For Dear Daniel

OPI Spoken From The Heart

OPI 5 Apples Tall

OPI My Pal Joey

OPI My Twin Mimmy

OPI Never Have Too Mani Friends!

Was that pink enough for ya? Well, I can’t say that I was surprised at the amount of pink in this collection and I am definitely not complaining because I LOVE pink nail polish. If you like pink, then you will probably like this collection. If you like Hello Kitty, you will love this collection. If you don’t like either, then don’t even bother…unless you want a super gorgeous blue like My Pal Joey. I do want to tell you that My Pal Joey suffers from the blue pigment curse: it smells like skunk mixed with pot. The yellow and black polishes seem kind of out of place in this collection, don’t you think? My 3 absolute favorites in this collection are: My Pal Joey, Spoken From The Heart and Super Cute In Pink. Spoken From The Heart is like the most gorgeous coral pink ever and Super Cute In Pink was so incredibly flattering on me that I just loved it immediately. Since I’ve seen a few people complain about this, I did want to mention that the handles with the cute Hello Kitty images are just shrink wrap plastic so they tend to come off if you are too rough with the bottles…or if you accidentally get acetone on the plastic…yeah. So overall, I like this cute collection. It’s a must for Hello Kitty lovers, of course, but I can see a lot of these colors being favorites whether you’re into HK or not. This collection is out now and hopefully still on shelves near you. Have you picked up any of these polishes or will you be getting any? Let me know what you think. Thanks so much for stopping by today, and I will talk to you soon!

Zoya Whispers Collection – Transitional 2016

Posted on 12 January, 201612 January, 2016 by Cynthia

Hi there! Oh my! I have really slacked on my first post for 2016, and it kind of makes me sad. I keep telling myself that I’m going to try to be better about planning out my posts, but it just never seems to happen. In my defense, 2015 did not end on a high note only because I got sick. I ended up at urgent care right after Christmas with a vicious UTI but that ended up being the least of my worries. Due to a combination of being dumb, skipping my meds and eating/drinking like a fool, my sugar was at such an unacceptable level that the urgent care doctor threatened to admit me to the hospital. After additional blood work, I was allowed to go home but not before being “educated” about how to take care of myself. It’s not like it was news to me, but I think that it was a big wake up call. I have diabetes. Diabetes is no joke. Diabetes will kill me if I continue to ignore it. Soooo…I’ve been back on my meds AND I am making slow and manageable changes to my diet. I’m not going to go crazy all of a sudden and not eat any carbs because I know I’m just going to set myself up for failure. I’m making smarter choices about what I eat and when I eat; if I mess up, I’m not going to beat myself up about it and will just resolve to try harder next time. So you see, I have not started 2016 with a resolution to lose weight but to try harder and make better choices when it comes to food and my life all around. Despite not being in good health, I feel in good mental health which is half the battle. I am almost afraid to say that I am content because I don’t want life to jumpkick me in the face, but I feel good! It might just be the whole cheesecake I just ate (kidding!), but I’m really excited and looking forward to this year. Yeah, I know you’re thinking, “I’m here for the polish, not for your medical TMI!” Ok, ok…let’s move on to the polish. For my first swatch session of 2016, I sat down and swatched a dozen polishes and it took me forever because I was binging on Netflix at the same time. Today I have the Zoya Whispers Collection which are the transition shades for 2016. I know so many people were not excited about these because they’re not exactly vibrant, but what you call boring I will call…boring? Let me show you my swatches below and then I’ll give you the deets.

Zoya Eastyn

Zoya Lake

Zoya Ireland

Zoya April

Zoya Cala

Zoya Misty

Let’s talk about formula right off the bat. I almost felt like a polish newb because I had a hard time applying these in the beginning. Come to think of it, I think it was due to the fact that my apartment is colder than Siberia. I did notice that when the polish warmed up a bit, the application went a lot better. Still, these light shades can always tend to be streak-arrific. For all of my swatches I applied one thin coat and a second thicker coat to even out the color and finish. I followed up with a generous coat of my bff Seche Vite. I’m not gonna lie: these polishes are really pretty but kinda ho-hum. If you like soft and clean colors, you will really like these. Since I rarely meet a nail polish I don’t like, I do like these and do recommend at least 2 of these: Eastyn and Lake. Those are my top two favorite shades from this collection and now I’m wondering if you have any favorites. Let me know! Well, I really hope that your 2016 is starting off right and I want to thank you for stopping by today. I know I haven’t been very consistent with my blogging so I hope that I haven’t lost you! Talk to you soon.

OPI Starlight Collection Holiday 2015

Posted on 11 December, 201510 December, 2015 by Cynthia

Happy Friday everyone! I am so looking forward to the weekend because I am going to try to get all my Christmas shopping done (hopefully online), and I want to do a major cleaning session. It’s probably not the best time of the year to do this, but I’ve been wanting to paint my bedroom forever. I want to do a light blue or light green with white accents–it’s going to look awesome. Anyway, today I have the OPI Starlight Collection for Holiday 2015 to share with you. This is a pretty typical holiday collection so let me show you my swatches before I give you the rundown.

OPI Guys & Galaxies

OPI Two Wrongs Don’t Make a Meteorite

OPI Love Is In My Cards

OPI Infrared-y To Glow

OPI I’m In The Moon For Love

OPI Let Your Love Shine

OPI Give Me Space

OPI Cosmo With A Twist

OPI Center of the You-niverse

OPI No More Mr. Night Sky

OPI Press * For Silver

OPI I Drive A Supernova

OPI Is This Star Taken?

OPI Comet Closer

OPI By The Light Of The Moon

OPI Ce-less-tial Is More

OPI Super Star Status

Well, this is a huge collection! There are some really great shades here, but I can honestly tell you that I can live without all the metallic shades. Some of them are downright ugly, but then you see others like Give Me Space and Cosmo With A Twist and you just fall in love. Despite all the misses with the metallic shades, the cremes, shimmers and jelly glitters are just gorgeous and definitely worth picking up. What are some of your favorites? Let me know what you think. Thanks so much for stopping by today, and have a fantastic weekend!

Essie Virgin Snow Collection Winter 2015

Posted on 7 December, 20156 December, 2015 by Cynthia

Can you believe that in less than 4 weeks, 2015 will be behind us? It’s such a weird feeling to realize how quickly this year has blow by. I was thinking today, that if you have followed my blog for a while now, I feel like I’m in such a different mindset now than I was a couple of years ago and I hope you have noticed it and that you also think it’s something positive. I think that the biggest change in my life is that I now have a job that I actually like. If you guys can remember how much I used to complain about the job I had 2 years ago, I’m sure you can agree that it’s night and day. Anyway, I am just grateful for the positive changes in my life. Even though I still have my struggles, I just feel fortunate to be where I am now. Moving on to more important things like, ahem, POLISH! I’ve been totally lazy about my blogging lately only because…well, I’ll say the holidays is my excuse. I’ve had these swatches done for a few weeks, but I just haven’t had the energy to even put this post together. As you may know, I have this weird obsessions with purchasing all Essie collections hoping that they are awesome. I won’t tell you know many times I end up being disappointed, but let’s just say it’s a lot. Despite this, I just keep coming back for more. Currently I’m waiting with bated breath to see what the 6th polish for their anniversary collection will be. Rumor on the streets is that it’s Starry Starry Night but I’m just going to wait and not spaz out just yet. I think I am forgetting why we are here today. Oh yeah! I have swatches of the Essie Virgin Snow Collection for Winter 2015! Let me show you my swatches before I give you the rundown.

Essie Peak Show

Essie Virgin Snow

Essie Shall We Chalet?

Essie Altitude Attitude

Essie Haute Tub

Essie Apres-Chic

Let me get this out of the way and just say that this collection gets a big fat MEH from me. Ok, so there is nothing really wrong with this collection, but it’s so boring. I was super deluxe looking forward to Haute Tub, but it ended up disappointing once on the nail–it’s like an Essie trademark: gorgeous in the bottle, fail on the nail. (Hey, I should coin that phrase!) Both of the reds have a great formula and the two lightest shades are kind of a PITA but they are so glacial and perfect–like Catherine Deneuve in a bottle. I won’t even bother to mention the silver because we all know how much I dislike the 5 million silvers that have come out this year. So all in all I can say it’s a very boring collection made up of nice polishes. Since I’m not in love with this collection, it’s going up on my blog sale. If you want a good price, you can buy this collection and the Luxeffects collection for a decent price. Anywho, check out my blog sale here if you’re interested. I’m interested to hear what you think of this collection so let me know in the comments below. Thanks so much for the visit, and I will talk to you soon.

Essie Luxeffects Collection 2015

Posted on 25 November, 201524 November, 2015 by Cynthia

Do you remember when Essie put out Shine of the Times and everyone lost their shit over it? I think that it might have been my first flaky polish back in 2011 when I was still a nuggle. That was the first time that I even heard of an Essie Luxeffects Collection, but they have steadily put out this collection every year since then. I don’t know about you, but when I saw the Luxeffects Collection for 2015, I thought I had suddenly entered a time vortex and had been transported back to 2012/2013 when bar glitter was all the rage. I hated it back then and I still hate it now, but you know me: MUST BUY EVERY COLLECTION, EVERY TIME. I wore each glitter over a shade from the Essie Winter Collection (swatches coming soon) and only applied 1 coat using a dabbing motion to distribute the glitter to my liking. Let me show you what they look like before I share my thoughts.

Essie Fashion Flares

Essie Frilling Me Softly

Essie Fringe Factor

Essie Tassel Shaker

I’m feeling a little weird saying this…I actually like some of these! I actually only like the first two: Fashion Flares and Frilling Me Softly because they are an interesting combination of bar and small dots which kind of reminds me of cracked pepper. Every time I see bar glitter I think of how irate I get when I see the sink covered in hairs after my brother shaves, so I guess I’m never going to love bar glitter. Overall, I don’t think these are worth the Essie price tag, but a couple of them are nice. I have put these babied up in my blog sale so check it out if you’re interested. What do you think about bar glitter? Yay or nay? I’m curious to hear what you think! Thanks so much for stopping by today, and I will talk to you soon.

OPI Designer Series Collection 2015

Posted on 23 November, 201522 November, 2015 by Cynthia

This might be the only time you will truly see me excited on a Monday, and it’s all due to the fact that we have a short week due to the Thanksgiving holiday. I am looking forward to a long weekend and to all the delicious foods that come with Thanksgiving dinner. I was pretty lazy this past weekend which gave me some much needed time to swatch. I got through 3 collections which I should have up this week–unless I get super deluxe lazy and don’t post them until the following week. Anywho, today I wanted to show you the two polishes from this year’s OPI Designer Series Collection. I know we all dream of the past when DS polishes were delicious holos, but those times are long gone. Despite this, OPI manages to put out some interesting DS polishes and this year is no exception. Let me show you the two new polishes that have been added to the Designer Series line.

This is OPI DS Charcoal. Oh, now I wish I could have gotten better pictures of this polish. It’s so freaking pretty in real life. It flashes from green, to pink, to purple, to charcoal, to my polish loving heart. I think that what makes this polish stand out is that it dries to a satin finish so it just looks different from similar polishes. Of course I immediately thought of OPI Peace & Love & OPI, but they are not the same. They are similar, but they are NOT the same. It was incredibly difficult to capture the true essence of this polish, so you will have to trust me when I tell you that it’s kind of amazing.

OPI DS Imperial did not wow me in the bottle. In fact, I thought it was kind of boring when I first saw it. But I take it all back because this shade looks pretty phenomenal on the nail. It also has that satin finish that I love and it is super pigmented.

Overall, call me pleased. I think that both of these polishes are beautiful, but Charcoal is my fave. I just find it unique which is not something I get to say very often. These polishes are out now so pick em up while the are available. Let me know what you think of these. Will you be picking one (or both) up? Thanks so much for stopping by today, and I will talk to you soon!

P.S. I put up tons of stuff up on my blog sale. Polish is taking over my entire apartment–they need a new home. Check out the new stuff here.

China Glaze Cheers! Collection Holiday 2015

Posted on 16 November, 201515 November, 2015 by Cynthia

Hey there! Nice to see you here on this lovely Monday morning! I had a pretty busy weekend so I feel like I barely even got some time to rest. My nephew had his birthday party which was a lot of fun. He turned 2 last week, and it’s like he’s a mini-adult now. I love hearing him talk–even if he still can’t pronounce a lot of sounds. He’s such a cutie pie! On Sunday, I spent most of the day doing laundry, running errands and just cleaning my place. I hate it when things are all messy and out of place so I got lot of stuff done. I guess I should feel rested since it’s barely the start of the work week, but I feel exhausted! You know what I am excited about? The Thanksgiving holiday!!! After Thanksgiving, it’s a hop, skip and a jump over to Christmas and then the new year. Can you believe 2015 is almost over? And with all the holidays, we can expect all the holiday collections to land in stores near you. Today I have for you the China Glaze Cheers! Collection which is the holiday offering for 2015. I was really looking forward to trying out all the glitters because they all looked so pretty. Check out my swatches below before I tell you what I thought about the collection overall.

China Glaze Mix and Mingle

China Glaze Wine Down for What?

China Glaze Son of a Nutcracker

China Glaze Peppermint To Be

China Glaze Better Not Pout

China Glaze Don’t Get Elfed Up

China Glaze I Soiree I Didn’t Do It

China Glaze Ugly Sweater Party

China Glaze Brand Sparkin’ New Year

China Glaze Coal Hands, Warm Heart

China Glaze Bring on the Bubbly

China Glaze Break The Ice

I want to mention a few things. To start with, I’m sorry about my wonky nail in my swatches for Mix and Mingle. I had a nail file mishap and didn’t notice how jagged and frayed my nail edge looked until I uploaded the pictures. I also wanted to mention that I used all of the glitters on their own. For all my swatches I used 2 coats of polish–some thicker than others. While the glitters would be infinitely more manageable if you used them over a similarly colored base, I just felt like swatching them on their own. As you know, glitters can be difficult to work with and it’s usually best to use the dabbing method when using glitterbombs. I did use more of a dabbing method when I worked with the glitters and that seemed to work fine and they glitters weren’t too much of a pain. While most of the polishes here are lovely, I am not SUPER excited about them with the exception of Mix and Mingle, Don’t Get Elfed Up and I Soiree I Didn’t Do It. These three are definitely my absolute favorites. Don’t get me wrong–some of these are nice staples, but I probably have something similar in my stash. Don’t I always have something similar in my stash? So what do you think about this collection? I know it has been out for a couple of weeks already, so maybe you’ve already picked up some of these shades. Let me know what you think and if you have any favorites. Thanks so much for stopping by today, and I will talk to you soon!