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Category Archives: Nail Polish
An actual mani on my actual hand!
To prove to you that I am not some evil robot and a real live human being, here is my left hand wearing the Urban Outfitters Silver Holo polish. Excuse the crude addition of the crown to cover up a boo boo. This polish should have a warning label: “Do not operate a motor vehicle while wearing this polish as accidents may occur from driver distraction”. I took this pic indoors at a restaurant (pendant lighting, probably LED) with a lovely fajita steak quesadilla as a background. *burp*
And she was blinded by the light…
My hands are shy. Seriously, i don’t think I could ever use my real camera to photograph my manis-too many pixels! I am kinda digging the camera phone fuzziness that covers up the less than perfect paint job.
Cirque XX
Oh my word, this polish! This is my first Cirque polish-I’m blown away by it. Very dense, very holographic. I’ve never seen glitter like this! Just, wow is all I can can say.
Cirque XX
Taste the rainbow!
*swoons*
Hey there, 2013! How you doin’?
I hope you’re better than I am-I’ve got the flu. This is the last year I forgo a flu shot I’ll tell you that much. But over the Christmas holidays I went back home to visit my parents and discovered a box of old polishes I’d had when I was in high school. Check them out!
Heck yeah, that’s Rimmel Zeitgeist! I’ve been searching for one for ages on eBay or blog sale. Didn’t even remember buying it back in the day-it’s full too!
New L’Oreal metallic polishes
Found these today at Walgreens-they are sort of metallic/chrome looking. How sexy are these? The middle one has the worst name I’ve ever seen though…”Don’t Hate Me Cuz”? This makes my grammar girl blood boil.
My favorite nail care things
These are the top 4 things I can’t live without when doing my nails. They have made a huge difference in how my nails look and grow-no more peeling, flimsy nails!
Filing with a glass nail file is half of the equation; glass files are so much less damaging than regular nail files. The OPI one on the top left is my favorite for taking down a lot of length and the Nail Tek XL on the top right is wonderful for fine-tuning the edges. The second game-changer for me is Nail Tek’s Foundation II base coat. I’ve tried dozens of other treatments none work like this does. I wish they sold it in bigger bottles! It keeps my nails from peeling and being too bendy. Added benefit is the finish when it dries is matte and very smooth which makes it a perfect base coat. Lastly, the cheapest quick dry top coat out there-New York Color’s Grand Central Station nail polish. Not technically marketed as a top coat but someone on the MUA Nail Board figured out it worked great and a cult following was created. I used Seche Vite before making the switch and have never looked back. You don’t have to thin this stuff like with SV nor does it get stringy. If they discontinue this I will flip my shizz.
Dusty treasures!
When I first got into nail polish the big thing seemed to be finding old polishes at beauty supply stores or nail salons. No one seems too into that any more, maybe because all the good stuff has been found or dustying had become overshadowed by the rise of indie polishes. Here’s what I had found (and lost) and rediscovered yesterday lurking in a corner of a closet. I think I had considered putting them up for sale at some point to they were sequestered away from my regular stash. Then I forgot about them until a few months ago. I saw someone’s picture of their OPI Black Magic Mountain and said, “Don’t I have that?” The search was on! I unearthed them last night from under a box of Christmas decorations along with a bunch of other old stuff that I will get around to posting but these are the prettiest ones.  I have had a change of heart for the time being and will not be selling any of them.
OPI Black Magic Mountain, OPI Pike’s Peak-A-Boo Purple, OPI Jasper Jade, OPI Peru-B-Ruby
I’ve never opened any of these I don’t think. I really want to wear Jasper Jade for Christmas though! It looks very pine-tree colored. Since they are black label I doubt they smell anywhere near a pine tree though. Peee-ew!
OPI Revved Up & Red-y, OPI Russian to a Party, OPI Tucumcari Boys-n-Berry, OPI Glacier Bay Blues
OPI At Your Quebec and Call, OPI Dominant Jeans, OPI Play Til Midnight, OPI Have You Seen My Limo?
OPI Hey! Get in Lime!, OPI NYPD Beet
I left the dust on them and didn’t shake them for dramatic effect. Seriously though, don’t be afraid to poke your head in one of those  strip mall chop shops and ask if they sell polish. Most of them are very nice people; I only encountered one place that I wanted to call immigration on and report them for human trafficking.
No buy FAIL.
I admit it, I’m weak. When faced with shopping temptation I often cave. I especially am susceptible to sale goggles as you will see from the pictures below. 
Group shot; from L to R top row: back Maybelline Sequins for frankening, 3 Sephora by OPIs, 3 bottles of Revlon Popular (to be frankened). Bottom row: Salon Perfect Snow Flurry (I think?), the Milani holos, and 2 Barielles.
I would bet my right arm that this bottle of Salon Perfect’s holiday LE polish (Snow Flurry) is a 100% dupe for China Glaze Frosty from a past holiday collex. I never found Frosty locally but for $3.98 it works for me. Salon Perfect is made by American International Industries, Inc. which is the parent company of China Glaze. This LE holiday display (at WalMart) also contained a dupes of other past China Glaze holiday shades like Party Hearty and Mistletoe Kisses.
Marshall’s at lunch yesterday again yielded some pretty cool finds. These are my first Sephora by OPIs-L to R are: Never Enough Shoes, Fancy Schmancy and Don’t Be Eggnog-ious. I’m collecting copper glitters to use in frankens-they are hard to find loose! I Â only ever see copper glitter offered already in a polish.
Also from Marshall’s, Barielle Envy and Wrapped in Ribbons. I’ve never seen Envy but it has a cool duochrome thing going on. Looks really cool layered over black!
From Rite Aid today, these were 75% off and called out to me “Add stuff to me!!!”. Revlon Popular is a cool light pink base with tiny & medium sized silver hexes. I will be adding white, gunmetal and pink glitter to see how it shakes out. Get it, SHAKES out? Franken humor LOL.
I never had a big yen for these when they were full price because they are scattered holo particles and I am a linear holo kinda girl. But for $1.37 a pop I will make an exception.
How do you organize your nail polish?
I have a good amount of polishes now. I’m not sure exactly how many because I refuse to count them because counting them leads to other mathematical things like figuring out how much I’ve spent on them. So, No.No. No.NO. NO NO NO. Hell no. NO. NO!
With all these bottles of polish and no Ikea within 2 hours of here, I’ve had to improvise. My solution is clear shoe boxes from Sterilite and metal industrial shelving. Not very pretty but I’m the only one who has to see it. I do plan on getting 3 acrylic 90-bottle racks soon for my OPI/China Glaze/Essie collections but everything else is sorted by brand in the boxes. I’d like to some day do a spreadsheet but again, that arrives at a final number and I’m not having any of that. Here is a picture of some of the boxes:
A franken and my last purchase of 2012 (she says hopefully)
So I have to spend money on other people besides me this month of December. Boooooo. Just kidding, I am looking forward to shopping for The Young One, my folks and even my SO this year. To do so I have to declare a No-Buy for me though as I didn’t win that stinkin Powerball earlier this week. Today I went to this weird dollar store and came out with $1 nail polish that doesn’t suck. L.A.Colors do some really nice polishes! Not a fan of the bottle but I can overlook that for a buck a pop. I got these for frankening helpers-that pink looks like OPI’s I Lily Love You to me and the blue glitter is what I used as a base for the last pics of my franken. The green will become a jelly for a Hare-esque polish idea I’ve been mulling over since my Glitter Unique order came.
Shopping is cheaper than therapy 