Color Club Raspberry Rush

Raspberry Rush was part of Color Club's Wicked Sweet collection from summer 2011. It's a hot pink neon jelly and it smells strongly of raspberry candy. Somehow, Color Club also managed to get a bit of the tartness of real raspberries in the scent to balance the sweetness. In fact, they smell almost exactly like La Vie de Vosgiennes Framboises, which I ate tons of in high school!

There was still some VNL after two coats, but I like the jelly finish, so I didn't add a third. Oh, and that's not dirt under my nails, I had a pen sort of fall apart in my hand, and of course it was black ink!

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Color Club Cold Metal swatches and comparisons

Cold Metal is part of Color Club's 2011 Foiled collection, and is still easily available at most etailers. It was almost perfect with one coat, but I used two and no topcoat because it was shiny as heck on its own!

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I actually have more blue polishes than I do copper (someday I'll have to do another mani with both colors) so here are some comparison swatches. None of the finishes match, but one of the colors is almost a dead ringer. Still, because the finishes are so different, I feel quite comfy keeping all of these!

Pinkie to thumb, two coats each of China Glaze Frostbite, Cold Metal, China Glaze Blue Year's Eve, China Glaze Blue Sparrow Neon and Nubar Midnight Sparkle.

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Water Marble Wednesday: Purple & Turquoise

More learning curve--if your base color bubbles, re-do it! I just keep telling myself this is only my third water marble and I'll get better.

Right? I will get better?

This is one coat of Color Club Gingerbread Man as the base and Zoya Mimi and Charla for the marble.

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A shoutout to Nikki at Walgreens!

I just had to write a quick post to thank the cosmetics counter sales associate at my local Walgreens. Nikki actually knows what's going on in the cosmetics world, is quick, thoughtful and cheerful even before 9 a.m.! I always have a great time chatting with her and she's always ready to help me look for something or check a price before I commit to buying.

Not only did I get to talk to Nikki this morning while I was waiting for a prescription to be filled, I got lucky enough to find three Revlon polishes I wanted from last summer on clearance, along with a box of Sally Hansen spring nail polish strips, also on clearance! I got Mint Fizz, Watermelon Frizz and Mystical, plus the Sally Hansen strips, plus a bottle of Rimmel Black Satin, all for $15.24! I reeeally debated about the Revlon Fizz shades last summer, but I have a lot of royal blue polishes, so I didn't get them. I was so thrilled to see them on the clearance rack I practically bounced. :D

Not only did I get my pretty goodies for a nice low price, Nikki told me that in March, a $10 cosmetics purchase gets you entered into a store giveaway for a big fat tote full of cosmetic samples and coupons, so now I'm entered. Wheee!

China Glaze Gothic Lolita

Gothic Lolita is part of China Glaze's recently released Electropop collection, and it's a medium reddish lilac. In the bottle, the pretty blue flash shows up strong, but even though I reached bottle color in two coats, the blue didn't show up on my nails. After Tantalize Me, Gothic Lolita was a disappointment, and so it's off to a new home with someone whose favorite BPAL scent is Lolli.Goth. I think it will be happier there.

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China Glaze Tantalize Me

The talented and supportive Jacqui noticed this polish in Friday's haul post, so I told her I'd swatch it first. That worked out very well for me because NE Ohio lost the sun this weekend, so I'm holding off on the China Glaze Prismatic polishes!

Tantalize Me was part of the Fiji Fling collection from 2005, so it's not quite vintage, but not so rare as to be worth big bucks on Ebay. I love purples, and I love colors which look layered without the work of an extra coat of polish, so this reddish lilac with a strong blue flash had my heart from the first coat, and it only needed two coats for perfection.

Without further ado, here is the gorgeousness of Tantalize Me!

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I haven't done a haul post in a while

So here are my latest goodies!

The China Glaze Prismatic collection! L-R, Polarized, Optical Illusion, Ray-diant, Liquid Crystal, Prism and Full Spectrum.



Miscellaneous polishes from my wishlist, L-R, China Glaze Gothic Lolita, China Glaze Tantalize Me, China Glaze Instant Chemistry, Color Club Cold Metal and Color Club Raspberry Rush.

China Glaze Harvest Moon swatches & comparisons

Another pic-heavy post! Harvest Moon is the only polish I got from the Hunger Games collection, but I'm so glad I did. It's a gorgeous, bright, blazing copper foil, and I'm wearing it on my toes right now. It was perfect and opaque in two coats and removal was easy. Plus, I'm a complete sucker for BPAL's Harvest Moon perfumes--I have two of the six versions of this blend and adore them both.

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China Glaze Harvest Moon and In Awe of Amber look similar in the bottle:



But totally different on the nail. Two coats of each:

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From pinkie to thumb, two coats each of Zoya Colette, China Glaze Harvest Moon, Revlon Copper Penny, China Glaze Ginger and China Glaze in Awe of Amber.

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Clearly, I adore copper nail polish, but thankfully all of these are different enough to justify keeping them all. Colette is browner and has a softer shimmer, Copper Penny is paler and softer, Ginger has glitter and In Awe of Amber is much sheerer. Hmmm, now I'm thinking about doing jelly sandwiches with In Awe of Amber...

Caswell-Massey bath goodies on Haute Look right now!

It's not a huge selection, but what products they do have are half-price.

Link (and yes, that's my personal referral link)

Water Marble Wednesday: Pink & Silver

I am by golly going to learn how to do this water marble technique correctly! So to make myself practice, I am doing one water marble each week and posting it on Wednesdays, no matter how bad it looks. Today's manicure used a base color of Orly Au Champagne and China Glaze Something Sweet and femme couture Chrome for the swirls.

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I think my lesson from this attempt is that foils don't work very well. I haven't tried a glitter polish yet, so maybe next time I'll do that!

Hits Mari Moon: Artsy and Unconventional

Fair warning--this post is extremely pic-heavy! I got these two beauties from the always-wonderful Llarowe, where they are $8 for 6 ml. They look almost identical in the bottle:



But side by side you can clearly see the difference. This is two coats of Artsy on my ring and pinky fingers and two coats of Unconventional on my middle and index fingers.

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Unconventional is a blood-red to dark purple duochrome with hints of purple shimmer. All swatches are two coats of Unconventional on my pinkie and ring fingers and one coat over black on my middle and index fingers.

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Artsy is a dark, dusky purple with a strong blue flash. All swatches are two coats of Unconventional on my pinkie and ring fingers and one coat over black on my middle and index fingers.

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I love them both, but Unconventional is my favorite. Artsy looks better over black, and Unconventional looks better on its own. They're certainly reasonable in price, and Llarowe's shipping costs and customer service are phenomenal. Highly recommended!

FingerPaints Grape Gumball

Grape Gumball was the only one of the FingerPaints Gumdrops & Lollipops collection that appealed to me. I can't believe that as much as I love purple, I don't have a dupe for this! It's a lovely, dusty, dusky periwinkle with periwinkle shimmer, and it reached bottle color in two easy coats.

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FingerPaints are only available at Sally Beauty, both online and in stores and this lovely little gem will cost you about $5-$6. It is LE, though, so if you want it, get it quickly!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Until I put Zoya Veruschka on for this manicure I'd forgotten how beautiful it is and how much I love it. It's a rich, dark green that never looks black, and the matte finish dries quickly and looks like velvet. Swatches are two coats of Veruschka over two coats of NailTek Foundation II.

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I was inspired by the lovely Kayla Shevonne's Leprechaun Hat nails, but I wanted the matte base to show, so I used Veruschka. The hat bands are Models Own Emerald Black and the buckles are L.A. Colors Art Deco striper in Gold.

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Zoya Summer Preview

New nail color - coming soon to a salon near you and Zoya.com!

Summer 2012 is going to be a super stylish season for nails with the latest offering of nail polish collections, Beach and Surf, from the new color of fashion, Zoya! This new splash of color, designed by the Zoya color experts, is kissed by sea and sand translating beautifully onto the nail in the famous, full-coverage Zoya formula.

Dive into the creamy shades of the Zoya Beach Collection or the shimmering sea foils of the Zoya Surf Collection. The choice is yours – this color palette is sure to be a splash!

Zoya BEACH Collection

•Reagan (ZP614) - deep cerise pink cream
•Lara (ZP615) - vivid cerise pink cream
•Shelby (ZP616) - soft pinky pink cream
•Arizona (ZP617) - soft coral orange cream
•Tracie (ZP618) - sea grass metallic
•Wednesday (ZP619) - soft aqua cream
Zoya SURF Collection

•Rory (ZP620) - lotus pink foil metallic
•Carly (ZP621) - thalia purple foil metallic
•Kimber (ZP622) - magenta pink foil metallic
•Myrta (ZP623) - coral orange foil metallic
•Meg (ZP624) - mermaid green foil metallic
•Zuza (ZP625) - aquamarine foil metallic
Zoya is the new color of fashion...

The Zoya BEACH and SURF collection was designed and inspired by resort runways and tropical get-a-ways.

Ultra long-wearing, glossy nail lacquers by Zoya are free of harmful industrial chemicals like toluene, camphor, formaldehyde, resin, dibutyl phthalate (DBP) that are known to cause cancer and birth defects.

Find Zoya BEACH and SURF as well as over 300 other ultra high-fashion Zoya shades at www.zoya.com. As always, each and every Zoya color is made for women so we name them after women.

BEACH and SURF by Zoya Nail Polish - 12 new colors:
Available April 1, 2012 (USA)
www.zoya.com

Sug. Retail $8.00 per 0.5 fl.oz. bottle (US).

Countdown to St. Patrick's Day: Green Manicure #6

There are a lot of words before the pretty pictures, but it won't hurt my feelings if you scroll down. :)

When I was in middle school, my grandfather retired, and he and my grandmother moved from Ohio to Arizona. They did a lot of traveling, but when they were home, Grandpa learned how to make stained glass, how to find pretty rocks, how to turn those rocks into jewelry-worthy stones, and how to make settings for the stones. One of my most prized possessions is a malachite ring my grandfather made for my grandmother, which came to me after Gramma died. I always knew that if I ever did a water marble, it would be in an effort to match this ring.

So I tried my first water marble, and while it's not perfect, it was fun, and messy, and I think I actually got pretty close to the stone in Gramma's ring. I'm not sure if the water should have been warm instead of at room temperature, because the polish set up pretty quickly, or if it was just inexperience. I'm also thinking that next time I'll use pastels for easier cleanup. *grin*

I used a base of Zoya Holly, then Orly Au Champagne, Color Club Kiss Me Mistletoe and Models Own Emerald Black for the marbling, followed by a coat of Nubar Diamont.

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Gramma and Grandpa, I love you both and think of you all the time.