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Dare To Wear Night At The Cinema

Posted on 19 October, 201319 October, 2013 by Cynthia

You know when you wake up with a son stuck in your head? This morning I woke up completely obsessing over Hotel Song by Regina Spektor. I went around singing it all morning while I swatched a bunch of polishes. Then I was trying to figure out what movie to watch on Netflix and I settled on Friends With Kids and something weird happened: Hotel Song was on the movie’s soundtrack! The movie was pretty good and now I’m still singing Hotel Song. That’s weird, right? Anyway, if you’re not familiar with this song, take a listen because Regina Spektor is freaking amazing.

The polish I have for you today is another beauty from Le Chat Dare To Wear which is quickly becoming a brand I’m super impressed with and that I will hunt down every chance I get. Let’s take a look at my swatches of Dare To Wear Night At The Cinema.

Dare To Wear Night At The Cinema is dark plum/raisin colored polish with copious amounts of pink/purple glitter that really pops against the darker base. The contrast gives this polish the look of almost glowing from within. I absolutely love this!!!! The formula was ok…it felt thin at first, but it was very easy to build up. I ended up applying 3 thin coats for my swatches because I wanted even glitter coverage.

I am seriously excited about getting my hands on more polishes from this brand because they are like little hidden gems. I know this brand can be a little difficult to find in retail locations as I have only seen them in random beauty supply stores, but they seem to be pretty easy to purchase online. Even better, they are way economical so you don’t have to feel guilty about buying ALL THE THINGS. If I remember correctly, I got this one on sale and it was under $3. What a steal, right? I hope you like this polish as much as I do, and I apologize if you now must get it. I know enabling is a specialty of mine so I’d like to say I’m sorry to your wallet in advance–well, not really because your nails will thank me. Thanks so much for stopping by today, and I hope that you’re enjoying your weekend.

Sation Let’s Mingle & Jingle

Posted on 18 October, 201318 October, 2013 by Cynthia

Ok, I’m super excited that it is Friday because that means that I have tomorrow off and I can be semi-lazy once I get my laundry, cleaning and errands done. Uhm, ok, that doesn’t sound like a lazy day, but that’s what happens when you only have one weekend day off. I sort of had a total womp, womp day today because I was super excited about getting out of work today and going to pick up a bottle of Tom Ford Black Sugar and the Essie Encrusted Treasures Collection. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get either so here I am totally disappointed. Polish disappointment is the worst. Fortunately, I had some awesome nail mail waiting for me at home so at least my Friday was salvaged. Polish to the rescue! The polish I have to share with you today is Sation Let’s Mingle & Jingle. Let’s take a look at it.

This is Sation Let’s Mingle & Jingle and yes, it is gorgeous. This polish was part of Sation’s 2012 Holiday Collection called Holiday Golightly and sadly it is discontinued, but I think there is still stock available at various etailers. The sapphire blue base is deceptively thin at the first coat, but it does build up nicely so you should get good coverage with two coats.

While I was writing up this post, I was catching up on last night’s episode of Scandal. HOLY CRAP. OMG I love this show. I have such a soft spot for Huck and I am totally in love with Noel…I mean, Jake! Scott Foley will always be Noel to me. Remember how amazing he was in Felicity? Speaking of old shows, do you guys remember a show called Relativity? It was with Kimberly Williams and she played an American student who went to Rome and met another American student there who then followed her back home? I loved that show and then it got cancelled. Le pooh. Anyway, I’m totally talking about random crap so I’ll stop now. Let me know what you think about this polish: do you like it or not? Do you think it’s too early to start talking about holiday polishes? Thanks so much for stopping by today, and I will talk to you soon.

OPI Top This! Set – Holiday 2013

Posted on 17 October, 2013 by Cynthia

Are you excited that Friday is almost here? I am! I can’t wait for my Saturday even if I don’t have Sunday off. I really want to stay up tonight to watch Grey’s and Scandal (omg I love Scandal!!), but I think I’ll go to bed early so I don’t have to be a complete sleepy lunatic tomorrow morning. Today I want to share with you a really cute set of top coats from OPI. The OPI Top This! Set comes with two top coats and one awesome glitter topper. Let’s take a look at what I did with the three products.

Isn’t the packaging pretty? What lacquerista wouldn’t want to get this as a gift?

Since I was totally in love with OPI Taylor Blue, I decided to use it here as well. The top coat is just your traditional top coat–nothing much to report here. It’s not a fast-dry top coat, but it gives your mani a beautiful shine.

The matte top coat makes OPI Taylor Blue look amazeballs. Seriously–how cool does this look mattified?

And I’ve saved the best for last. OPI Snowflakes In The Air is such a delicate looking holographic top coat. It has various different sized silver holo glitters and I can see this making any mani look gorgeous.

I’m loving that these holiday sets are coming out so early because it gives us plenty of time to stock up. I’m definitely looking forward to playing with Snowflakes In The Air. What do you think? Is this something that you think would make a cute holiday gift? Thanks for stopping by today, and I will talk to you soon!

Top This! is available now at Professional Salons, including Beauty Brands, Beauty First, Chatters, Dillard’s, jcp Salons, Pure Beauty, Regis, Trade Secret, ULTA and ulta.com. Top This! retails for $27.00 ($32.85 CAN).

For more information, please call 800-341-9999 or visit www.opi.com. Follow OPI on Twitter @OPI_PRODUCTS and become a Facebook fan!

OPI Taylor Blue & Taylor’s Gift Foundation

Posted on 16 October, 201316 October, 2013 by Cynthia

Hello everyone. I hope you’re all doing well on this sunny Wednesday. Today I have a special polish to share with you: OPI Taylor Blue.

OPI Taylor Blue was created for The Taylor’s Gift Foundation, and all proceeds from this polish go towards financially assisting those touched by organ donation. I suggest that you head on over to the Taylor’s Gift website so you can learn more about what they do, and also learn more about Taylor’s story. This is directly from their mission statement:

Taylor’s Gift Foundation was founded in 2010 with a mission to Regift Life, Renew Health and Restore Families.

Increasing official organ donor registries is just the beginning of our purpose. Current areas of focus include:

providing Taylor’s Gift Legacy Gifts to financially assist those touched by organ donation
working to change the conversation of organ donation to be a positive one about life
sponsoring a rider on the Donate Life Float at the annual Rose Bowl Parade
awarding Taylor’s Gift Scholarships to graduating seniors who demonstrate an above and beyond “Outlive Yourself” spirit
providing emotional support from licensed therapists for those touched by organ donation
providing affordable lodging for pre-transplant and post-transplant patients and their families

This is a gorgeous color, isn’t it? The formula is nice and creamy and two coats were enough for full opacity.

OPI Taylor Blue will be available November 21, 2013. If you’re interested in purchasing a bottle of Taylor Blue, make sure that you check out their website for more details. Click here for more information. Did you know that only 40% of adults over the age of 18 are currently enrolled in state donor registries? This was rather surprising to me as I am a big supporter and believer in being an organ donor. I’m an organ donor–are you?

Venique Breast Cancer Awareness Set 2013

Posted on 15 October, 201314 October, 2013 by Cynthia

I hope you’re all having a nice Tuesday. As for me, I’m a little bummed about some work stuff, but there isn’t much I can do about it so I’ll just have to deal. Fortunately, I feel a little better today especially since my headache went away. I filed my nails down pretty short over the weekend since they weren’t all the same size after the break. Now I am sharing a bunch of older swatches I did when my nails were a little longer. I actually love my nails in this picture because they are the perfect length: not too long and not too short. I have a heck of a time with my pointer finger nail because that is the one that always breaks no matter what I do. Now that I am growing them again, I am going to use my bottle of Rejuvacote religiously and see if that makes a difference. I’ll be sure to let you guys know once I’ve had a chance to use it for a few weeks.

As you all know, October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month and we are pretty much overloaded with PINK everything. While I like that that people are are raising awareness, this has also become extremely commercial. Wherever there is a buck to be made, you know that people are going to find a way to exploit it. I’m not going to get preachy about this and there are a lot of great articles out there about this subject. When I picked up a few BCA sets recently, I was lured by the pink polishes (cause I like pink). I have a very personal story that I will be sharing in a post later this month. It’s difficult to write, and I’m working on it with someone else so I hope to get it out soon. Let’s take a look at the three polishes from the Venique Breast Cancer Awareness Set for 2013.

Venique Galoshing In The Rain is a very delicate pink hue. It’s very creamy and glossy, but the formula can be a little difficult. As with most very light and creamy shades, this polish tends to be streaky so I recommend 3 coats to even it out completely.

My favorite polish in this set is Venique Secured With Straps because as you all probably know, I love hot pink everything. I’m kind of a weirdo about hot pink because for the longest time I hated anything pink and now all of a sudden I love it. I didn’t really notice the bald spots on this mani so I apologize for the sloppiness. I definitely recommend allowing enough dry time in between coats to minimize this issue.

I’ve gotta say that I’m not really a fan of shard type glitters. I hate saying shard because I always think of this scene:

I know. Totally gross. Anyway, this is Venique Pink Stiletto over Galoshing In The Rain. I kind of like how this looks but still, I’m not a HUGE fan of this look.

So let me know: are you a pink fan? Thanks so much for stopping by today!

Morgan Taylor Lost In Paradise

Posted on 13 October, 201313 October, 2013 by Cynthia

I don’t know what’s up with me lately, but I’ve been feeling super gross. I’ve had a massive headache for the last 3 days and it doesn’t seem to want to go away. I went to bed around 8pm last night and woke up at 5 to get ready for work. That’s like 9 hours of sleep and I still felt like crapola! Work was super slow today so at least I didn’t have to deal with too many issues. I’m hoping that whatever is going on goes away soon. After work I drove to my favorite carniceria (butcher shop) and bought some of my beloved chorizo. This stuff is so freaking good, and I like to make some eggs and chorizo or sopes or refried beans with chorizo…ok, I’m hungry now. So before I start cooking myself some dinner, let me show you a mani I did a few weeks ago.

Morgan Taylor Lost In Paradise is yet another amazing creme. First of all, who doesn’t like a lovely blue/green Tiffany-esque polish? The formula on this baby is pretty great as it is very smooth and pigmented. The first coat was a tiny bit streaky, but the second coat evened it out nicely.

I then decided to top my mani with Nubar Black Polka Dot. I love the whole speckled look that this top coat gives any polish.

I hope that you’ve had a nice weekend and that you’re ready for the start of another work week. Yay for Mondays…NOT! Don’t forget to check in tomorrow because I’m launching a giveaway–fun times. Thanks so much for the visit, and I’ll talk to you soon.

OPI Mariah Carey Holiday Collection 2013

Posted on 12 October, 201312 October, 2013 by Cynthia

Get ready for a picture heavy post! I woke up super early this lovely Saturday morning so I ended up taking advantage of it by swatching the rest of this collection. I was up at 5:00 am, but not by choice. You see, I woke up to the loud noises of my brother throwing up in the bathroom. At this point I am not sure if he was sick or if he was drunk, but I am annoyed that he was vomiting in the bathroom sink. Who does that? If that’s all clogged up, I am going to be beyond pissed at him for being such an idiot. Ok, so after I wrote this, my brother wandered out of his room at 4:30 pm looking like death. He is saying that he got food poisoning. Uhm, yeah…if by food he means a lot of cheap beer. Maybe he does have food poisoning, and I shouldn’t be such a betch.

Anyway, back to the polish! Since I had so much extra time that I would have spent in dream lala land, I was able to finish up my swatches and start working on this post. I probably wouldn’t have gotten it done until sometime next week without today’s inconvenience so yay for not sleeping. Enough blabbering–let’s move on to the swatches for the OPI Mariah Carey Holiday Collection!

If you want a staple red, OPI All I Want For Christmas (Is OPI) will fit the bill. It’s a nice and pigmented red that can be a one-coater if you’re careful with your application. There’s nothing too exciting about this color but it is a nice and shiny creme.

I keep thinking of chestnuts when I see OPI Visions Of Love–probably because I would call this a maroon color and chestnuts in French are marrons. Pretty logical, I guess but I’m just weird. I really like this polish because it has a squishy jelly quality to it. The formula was nice but it’s easy to have seer patches which you can kind of see in my swatches.

OPI Sleigh Ride For Two reminds me a lot of Essie Sable Collar–maybe with just a little more red in it. The shimmer in this one is much more apparent in real life so it’s sad that my pictures don’t show it very well. I applied 2 coats for my swatches above and a generous coat of Seche to make it extra shiny.

OPI calls this a spiced coffee hue, and I can totally see that. OPI Warm Me Up is one of those kind of ugly but kind of pretty colors. The base color is interesting and the shimmer isn’t super visible, but somehow it makes it look a little brushstroke-y. Is that weird? Anyway, this polish is super pigmented so you will only need two thin coats for full opacity.

OPI Cute Little Vixen is a nice magenta shimmer. Formula is nice. Not much else to say about it.

The color that is most typical when it comes to Christmas is this red shimmer. OPI In My Santa Suit is the perfect Santa red. 2 coats and voilà!

I absolutely love the look of OPI Underneath The Mistletoe because it has a jelly base and the red is dark and gorgeous with delicate scattered glitter. It just makes me sad that I wasn’t able to capture how pretty this is in my pictures. The first coat seems a little sheer, but it looks perfect at two coats.

Circle glitter lovers rejoice! OPI I Snow You Love Me is made up of large holographic circle glitter that magically doesn’t curl. No taco time here, thank you very much. Since the glitter is so large, you would get best results by picking the glitter from the clear base and applying them with a dotting tool or toothpick. Otherwise you will get TONS of clear base and not too many glitters. Here I applied OPI I Snow You Love Me over Underneath The Mistletoe.

I know V would go gaga over this as usual. OPI All The Sparkly And Gold is literally ALL THE SPARKLY AND GOLD. hahaha This is a very fine glitter that is super easy to control for painless application. It’s nearly opaque at one coat but it does need two coats for complete coverage.

OPI My Favorite Ornament is more of a champagne color fine glitter. It has the same formula as All The Sparkly And Gold which means that the base is super dense with glitter. The only complaint here would be that it gets EVERRYWHERE when you try to remove it.

And here we have the latest in cracked pepper chic. OPI Wonderous Star is such a strange, but kind of cool polish. I really like the black glitter in this polish but the base is kinda meh. Overall, I think they work really well together.

Last but not least, we have OPI Ski Slope Sweetie. I don’t know what to think about this polish. It’s like a weird iridescent polish that I thought would work for layering over other colors. However, I think it’s too thick for that so I prefer to wear it on its own. You will need two coats to get full coverage.

So what do I think about this collection overall? When I first saw the promo images, I thought it looked totally boring because it was RED OVERLOAD. Now that I have gotten a chance to swatch these, there really are only 3 true reds in this collection which is kind of normal considering this is a holiday collection. While not all of these polishes are very unique, there are some good staple colors and others that are just super different. I’m not like in love with this collection, but I can see its appeal for those who don’t have a million versions of these colors. If I had to pick favorites, they would have to be Visions Of Love, Underneath The Mistletoe and I Snow You Love Me. I have already reviewed the other part of this collection which has all the Liquid Sands so you can check it out here. Let me know what you think of this collection now that you have seen it in its entirety. Thanks so much for stopping by today, and I hope you’re having a nice weekend!

OPI Mariah Carey Holiday Collection 2013 – Liquid Sands

Posted on 10 October, 2013 by Cynthia

If you follow me on facebook, you probably saw my post yesterday about receiving the OPI Mariah Carey Holiday 2013 Collection. As soon as these babies arrived, I was trying to figure out the best way to tackle this massive 18 bottle collection. Yes, 18 bottles!!! Well, I decided to swatch the 6 Liquid Sands for this collection first which is what I have for you today. I was debating whether I should even swatch these since they will have to be the dreaded three-finger swatches. I guess I should stop being such a turd about it and just deal with it, but it annoys the bejeesus out of me. If I wait the 2-3 weeks for my nail to grow a bit, I will be super behind so I’m just going to put my big girl panties on (literally) and suck it up. I’m not going to talk about each polish individually because they all had the same formula except for the black one which I will discuss at the end. Let’s take a look at the new holiday Liquid Sand offerings.

OPI It’s Frosty Outside

OPI Silent Stars Go By

OPI Make Him Mine

OPI Baby Please Come Home

OPI Kiss Me At Midnight

OPI Emotions

That is a whole lot of sparkly Liquid Sands! I’ve been a huge fan of the Liquid Sand polishes, and I like the quality of these polishes but I am NOT a fan of the colors. I live for vibrant polishes so these left me underwhelmed purely because of the color selection. I would have loved to see a hunter green or a santa red but there are so many neutral type colors here that I just felt sad. I do love Kiss Me At Midnight (big surprise!) and Emotions is just a little strange. Actually, I ended up liking it and I am kind of obsessed with how this looks at one coat: you get a wash of black and lots of black flecks like cracked pepper. So what do you think? Are you a Liquid Sand lover? What about the color selection of these? Let me know what you think! Thanks for stopping by today, and I will talk to you soon.

Additional Info:

Mariah Carey Holiday nail lacquer shades each feature OPI’s exclusive ProWide™ Brush for the ultimate in application. Liquid Sand nail lacquers should always be worn without top coat. Mariah Carey Holiday is available now at Professional Salons, including Beauty Brands, Beauty First, Chatters, Dillard’s, jcp Salons, Pure Beauty, Regis, Trade Secret, ULTA and ulta.com for $9.00 ($10.95 CAN) suggested retail for each nail lacquer. For more information, please call 800-341-9999 or visit www.opi.com. Follow OPI on Twitter @OPI_PRODUCTS and become a Facebook fan!
ABOUT OPI
As the world leader in the professional nail care industry, OPI is committed to providing high-quality products and services to both salons and their customers, along with a focus on industry safety and innovation. Known for its exceptional formula, fashionable colors and iconic names, OPI’s heavily-pigmented lacquers are super rich, long-lasting and chip-resistant – offering an affordable luxury to consumers. OPI nail lacquer is available in over 200 shades. Each lacquer features OPI’s exclusive ProWide™ Brush for the ultimate in application. Currently, OPI is available in over 100 countries and retails a full line of professional items, including nail treatments, finishing products, lotions, manicure/pedicure products, files, tools, gels and acrylics.

Dare To Wear Ready For My Close-Up

Posted on 9 October, 20139 October, 2013 by Cynthia

Yay it’s raining today! I absolutely love this kind of weather, but hate driving in it. I guess it was my lucky day because I didn’t have to work today. I did however totally forget about the street sweeper this morning so I had to run out half asleep to move my car before I got a ticket. Last night, Lesley tweeted me about a polish we had both picked up when we went to PM (Polish Mecca), and I immediately wanted to go swatch it because she said it was amazing. It was 11:00 and I was already in bed, so I decided that I’d rather sleep than swatch a polish. Well, I woke up thinking about that polish (why must I be so obsessive?) so despite my gimpy broken nail, I decided to once again do a three finger swatch for today’s post. So what is this mystery polish, you ask? It is Dare To Wear Ready For My Close-Up.

I had to share that clip. Beejus she was good in that movie.

Dare To Wear Ready For My Close-Up is a gorgeous combination of a blurple jelly-esque base full of blue and magenta glitter as well as holographic goodness which unfortunately wasn’t captured in my pictures. Since it was raining, I didn’t have any sun out to take some decent sunlight pictures but trust me: this baby sparkles. The effect of this polish is breathtaking when you see it in natural light. The formula feels a little thin but it builds up nicely. You can get away with two coats, but I applied three because I had a few bald spots. I applied 2 coats of Seche because it sucks up top coat–not terribly, but it does.

Breathtaking, isn’t it? I bought another polish from this brand that reminds me a bit of Chanel Taboo. Well, I wouldn’t call them dupes at all, but they have a similar feel and look. I can’t wait to try it out. I’ve purchased Dare To Wear polishes in the past, but I don’t think any of them were as interesting as this one. They are definitely on my radar now. GREAT! Another brand to obsess over. Let me know what you think about this polish. Have you tried this brand before?

Talk to you later!

Essie Shearling Darling Collection – Winter 2013

Posted on 7 October, 20137 October, 2013 by Cynthia

I had such a bummer day today. There are certain days when I can tolerate my job better than others, and today was one of those days when I was just incredibly sad about being at a job that slowly kills my soul every day. After work, I decided to go get my newest lemming: Tom Ford Black Sugar. When I stopped at Bloomingdales, they didn’t have the Fall collection yet so I went to Saks. They didn’t have it either. I was totally defeated and decided that it wasn’t meant to be. I guess I saved myself the $32 for now, but I can’t guarantee I won’t be back there next week. I am instead consoling myself with some Ben & Jerry’s Chunky Monkey.

Anyway, today I have the Essie Shearling Darling Collection for Winter 2013 to show you. Before I get into the swatches, I wanted to remind you that these are three finger swatches due to the breakage of my pointer finger nail.

Oh the humanity! That is a total nubbin, and I pretty much lost the entire free edge. I won’t really get into HOW i broke the nail but let’s just say that a very hard chicharron was involved. Ok, I know that sounds super dumb so let me elaborate: If you don’t know what a chicharron is, it’s basically a pork rind. It was a special chicharron with the meat attached, and I was trying to break off a piece. When it snapped off, it also snapped off my nail. Nice. My gluttony has once again punished me. So now that that I have shared that dumb story, let me show you my swatches of the Shearling Darling Collection.

Haven’t we seen tons of these darkened blues this Fall/Winter? It doesn’t matter to me because Essie Mind Your Mittens is absolutely gorgeous. I can’t get over how glossy this looks–and this is without top coat!!! The formula was nice and opaque so I only needed two coat for full opacity.

Where to start with this color? Essie Parka Perfect is a beautiful greyed dusty blue with hidden shimmer that only becomes apparent at certain angles. The formula was a little streaky so I used three very thin coats which worked out well for me.

I think that Essie Sable Collar is the absolute winner in this collection. It’s so beautiful!!!!! The microshimmer really comes out in sunlight and depending on the angle, you see some brown, grey and burgundy. Seriously gorgeous! The formula was nice and needed two coats.

While being the collection’s namesake, Essie Shearling Darling is nice but not exactly exciting. The reason why I really like this polish is because it is amazingly shiny and smooth and as we all know, I can’t resist a gorgeous creme. It almost has a squishy crelly quality to it. The formula is great and it just SCREAMS Fall.

Essie Toggle To The Top is a unique polish in my collection–I don’t think I have anything similar to this. At first I thought that this polish was pretty close to Essie Leading Lady, but there are some differences. I think Toggle To The Top has a darker jelly base but the glitter is pretty similar. The formula was kind of gritty which is to be expected. I got some dragging when I didn’t let each coat dry. I ended up applying 3 thin coats for even coverage.And lastly, here we have Essie Warm & Toasty Turtleneck which is the token lilac/purple in so many Essie collections. This one, however, is one that I can get on board with because it’s more of a gray purple which makes it look dusty and absolutely gorgeous. The formula was nice, and I needed two coats for my swatches above.

Overall, I am very happy with this collection. After a few disappointing collections, I am glad that Essie is bringing us interesting collections again. Best of all, I feel that the formula on their polishes isn’t so problematic anymore nor so hit and miss. This is a solid collection with beautiful colors that perfectly go with the cooling temperatures. One thing I did want to mention is that there seems to be some confusion about two polishes and that they might be mislabeled. Apparently the labels on Mind Your Mittens and Parka Perfect are switched on some polishes. I have no idea which is the correct labeling so I guess we will just have to wait and hear the official word from Essie.

Let me know what you think about this collection. Do you have any favorites? Thanks for stopping by today!