Happy Halloween!

I've always enjoyed Halloween polishes but it seems like this year's have fallen flat from the mainstream companies, but indies have made me very happy! I'm still trying to catch up and purchase all of the ones I've been eyeing but it's a slow process :(

My Halloween manicure this year isn't very inspired, this semester has been zooming by and trying to balance school and real life (along with my gaming tendencies hah) has given me less time for manicure originality.

The orange polish is KBShimmer: Orange Pop. It's multicolored glitter in a orange jelly base. I didn't use a base color underneath it but I probably should have, as it took about 5-6 coats to get to the opacity/glitter distribution that I wanted, but even then the polish wasn't "thick" on the nail. The ring finger is American Apparel Hassid with a gradient of Hit Polish: Citrus Salad.

Last year's Halloween manicure is one I already featured, but it's a goodie, so :)

Lynnderella Cauldron Droppings gradient over black, first glossy then mattified.

The year before I was feeling a bit "artistic" and did some nail art:

Did y'all go with a Halloween manicure? If so, was there black and orange included? :) Happy Halloween!

Inglot 913... now transformed into an ugly manicure.

Blue Cross Meteorites Shooting Star

I love bar glitter. Or rather, I love the LOOK of bar glitter in the bottle. I mean, look at how festive it is! (Also, I didn't know Blue Cross sold polishes at some point. Yay eBay.) But then I try to apply it and...

Shooting Star over Inglot 913

Talk about a hot mess, eh? I could have picked a better polish to put under Shooting Star. Three coats of unevenly dispersed gold bar glitter. Some people can really pull off this type of glitter. And they have some magical way of applying it beautifully. I am not one of those people. 

Summer neon gradient with black and white glitter

One of my long-time lemmings was Lynnderella's Connect the Dots, so I was overjoyed when I found out that one of the many black and white glitters that followed in its wake was available in Australia. I layered Peita's Polish Zebration over a gradient of Darling Teenage Dream (pink) and Endota Spa Ephraim Island (soon to be renamed Paradise Point - neon yellow/green):

Teenage Dream is the first neon I've tried which is properly neon without white creme underwear - it only takes 2-3 coats as well, which is very impressive. Ephraim Island/Paradise Point is an interesting polish - one coat over white is neon yellow (the most neon yellow I've ever seen by the way - in person it sears your retinas!), but 4 coats on the bare nail is definitely neon green.

I'm so glad a similar polish has successfully killed off my HTF lemming - HTF lemmings are the worst!

Blackcurrant Beauty - Essie Bahama Mama

Another traditional fall polish colour for you today - this time in a plum hue! Essie Bahama Mama caught my eye when I was in CVS the other day...and I happened to be clutching some unused Extra Bucks. It came home with me! I LOVE the gorgeous lush plum colour. It really doesn't ever seem to go black. BUT...

...it turns out I have a dupe for this. The very limited edition Ulta-exclusive Essie colour from years ago - Plumski. Plumski happens to be one of my favourite colours of all time (it was the first polish I blogged about here on PoP!) and I'm always very choosy about when I use it, so I'm very pleased to have a readily available dupe. If you've always wanted Plumski, Bahama Mama is your girl!

What is your favourite plum polish?

kittytokaren

Models Own Utopia

I wanted this for ages. It applies nicely (this was three coats, but it was mostly fine with two) and looks nice. It's kind of a berry yoghurt colour. I was kind of hoping it might be a bit less...pink? I had in mind a slightly more grey/white shade. Like a baby elephant colour.

Dunno whether to franken this or swap it.

On another note, I love slanting Autumn light for nail pics - better make the most of it before the Winter fug descends in earnest!

China Glaze: Elephant Walk + Hit Polish: Patina

A lot of times I have trouble picking out my next manicure --  a problem, I'm sure, is because I own too many. Either way, I eventually pick a polish or a polish combo and go with it.

This one is one that occurred to me while staring at polishes laid out on my dresser. I thought it'd go perfectly together and it did, and I loved it while I wore it!

China Glaze Elephant Walk is a smokey darker periwinkle, and paired perfect with Hit Polish Patina, which is a glitter top coat made up of varying sizes of copper glitter along with some light blue and smaller aqua glitters. In the bottle, I thought Elephant Walk would make the lighter blue glitters blend in but it dried darker than evident in the bottle.

Even my roommate, a non-glitter lover, liked this combination :)

Inglot 913

I am trying hard not to acquire any more nail polish. Ever since I moved this summer, I've been extremely aware of exactly how much I have. And how much of it is untried! So I'm on a mission to try as many as I can without buying more. (As a result, I don't read many blogs anymore; it's too tough to resist temptation. I'm weak.)

Inglot 913

OK. I kind of lied. I bought this while I was in Montreal this summer (for a conference and to visit a dear, dear friend). But it was on SALE. Sales don't count. Right? And I've never seen any Inglot on sale... like I said, I'm weak.

I didn't recall liking this that much when I wore it back in September but it feels refreshing to see it in a photo. Pale peachy with fine white shimmer. It's just a little short of pearly and has the tiniest hint of streakiness. 3 coats, decent application.

Traditional Fall - OPI Mrs O'Leary's BBQ

Almost every fall season in my memory, burgundy has popped up as an "on-trend" colour. Which to me makes it a classic, as opposed to trendy, but who am I to argue with the fashion magazine gods? OPI Mrs. O'Leary's BBQ is one of the most traditional incarnations of burgundy that I know of, and every fall it always seems just right...

Creamy, rich, and dark without being black - if you want to add a burgundy to your fall nail wardrobe, this is a really solid choice. Plus, it really does remind me of barbecue sauce!

What is a classic "fall" colour to you?

kittytokaren

Gloss 'n Sparkle Goblins Grave

Here's another Aussie indie post - I'll be dangling a lot of these tantalising beauties in front of your eyes, sorry! Gloss 'n Sparkle is an Aussie indie brand made by Angela, and her glitterbombs are gorgeous. Here's Goblins Grave, a mix of green and black glitters in a clear murky green base:

It's hard to tell how many types of glitter there are in this mix, since the jelly base changes the tone of the glitters in the lower layers, and it just turns into a complex myriad of greens. Some of the green glitters are also holographic. I suspect there's only 3 different glitters in it, but this is one of the most interesting glitterbombs I've had the privilege to try, and it doesn't even begin to veer into tacky territory. The nail line is a lot less visible in person than it is in these photos.

It dries pretty smooth, but I've used a layer of Essence Gel Look topcoat followed by Seche Vite on top anyway, which is my new glitter-smoothing combo. It's been working well for me so far!

I've been assured by Angela that she's been looking into ways of getting her polish shipped overseas, but at the moment, these are only available in Australia, on this page. Time to find an Aussie swap buddy! ;)

Cobalt Continued... Barry M Indigo

Earlier in the year I was trying to track down my ideal cobalt blue shade. I tried quite a few, and some were recommendations of kind and very knowledgeable readers! (See Orly Royal Navy, Revlon Royal, & Essie Mesmerize.) Orly Royal Navy was the winner, but admittedly it was a bit of a pain trying to avoid getting any of the shimmer on my nails. I also wished that it had a touch more purple to make it the perfect Yves Klein colour. Enter Barry M Indigo...



Ahhh...isn't that just a treat? I think it's pretty much perfect. Whenever I've worn it, I've gotten mad compliments too. It's bright, but there is something sophisticated about it. VERY happy to have this as a part of my collection, and I think its what I've been looking for. Barry M never lets me down!

Is there a colour you've been hunting for? Have you found the *perfect* one yet?

kittytokaren

Kat Von D Sparklehorse

Kat Von D Sparklehorse

What IS it with me and nail polishes that take an absurd number of coats? That cheerful, glittery, warm-yellow-gold was six coats and still not opaque. Maybe it was supposed to be sheer but I'm not a fan of having my nails look sparkly and jaundiced. Nevertheless, Sparklehorse was marvelously eye-catching... even though I had terrible cuticle drag, immediate shrinkage and a very long application time, followed by an even longer dry time. At least it didn't chip quickly or anything. :P

Loki's Lacquer Abby-Lanche and Wolf in Fashion

I'm still quite a newbie when it comes to indie polishes, but I've well and truly broken the seal now, and I can see how it can become addictive! Today I have swatches of two Loki's Lacquers, made by the lovely Aussie lady Tara. I posted a couple of her newer polishes on my blog last week - the two I have today are inspired by Monster High, a show which her adorable daughter is obsessed with. Coolest mum of the year or what? If you Google the character names, you can really see where the inspiration comes from.

Abby-Lanche - inspired by the character Abbey, an abominable snowgirl, this is a milky white base with subtle shimmer containing lots of matte glitter: big purple and pale pink squares (you have to fish a bit for these), big blue hexes, medium pale purple and blue hexes, and little red hexes. This is one of my absolute favourite polishes right now! Two-ish coats over white, using "dabbing" techniques.

Wolf in Fashion - this is inspired by the character Howleen Wolf. It's matte blue glitter in an orange base, with a blue shift where the light hits it. A very unique polish! This is swatched over Sally Hansen Sun Kissed (orange creme).

The formulas of these are great, and these are easy to apply. Abby-Lanche is probably my favourite indie polish so far - I go weak at the knees for milky bases, and the glitter combo is gorgeous! Unfortunately due to Australian shipping restrictions, Loki's Lacquer doesn't ship directly overseas, but if you're lucky enough to live in Australia or have an Aussie swap buddy, they're available here.

OPI Just Spotted the Lizard

Sorry K2K, but I love this one! Then again, I love chromes, so chromes AND duochrome is a match made in heaven. I had so many compliments on this at work that it actually got kind of ridiculous (I'm still at that stage where I want to prove myself, be taken seriously, etc, and I started to seriously entertain the worry that I had forever marked myself as 'superficial nail girl'!). Fortunately, 'are they real?!' in the context of nails is on the right side of socially acceptable, so I'm not complaining.

This was three coats, but it dried quick and was dead easy to apply. Sigh...this one will be in heavy rotation.

Too Much Whimsy? Revlon Whimsical

Not sure why my fingers look like shriveled up raisins in this pic...oi. Anyways, this is Revlon Whimsical - a supposed dupe of Lippmann's Glitter in the Air - over Essie Absolutely Shore. Looks pretty ghastly.

I do like how the two base colours came together to create an ethereal seafoam green colour, and I do love some copper sparkle, but this just isn't doing it for me or looking anywhere close to nice with my skin tone. The large hex glitter chunks look kind of diseased to me, and the overall effect just isn't very elegant or pretty (in my eyes anyways). Oh well, plenty of other polishes in the drawer!

What was your latest polish disappointment? I can't be the only one!

kittytokaren

Spring pastel tape manicure with gold accents

This is a mani I did, inspired by the range of polishes Darling sent me. Darling are a new-ish Australian nail polish company, and their formulas are very impressive! They do that self-levelling thing that good polishes do, hiding fudgy application. As well as a range of gorgeous lacquers, Darling also carry mixtures of beads for caviar manicure (the Rock Candy range), and they've got some super exciting things in the works (super cute nail decals which I got to try out at the Beauty Bloggers Utopia conference, and something metallic for Christmas which I'm not going to leak too much about!

This is actually the NOTD I wore to the first day of BBU, which was a blast - chocolate for breakfast, learning exactly what Bioderma's "micellar water" is, hauling at IMATS, manicures in the media breakout room, going backstage at Legally Blonde The Musical with the founder of awesome sample subscription box Lust Have It! And of course, one of the greatest things in a beauty blogger's life has to be when other beauty bloggers gasp over your nails in real life! No complaints here :)

The polishes used are Darling's The First Corsage (lilac), Butter Wouldn't Melt (yellow), Hopelessly Devoted (pink) and likeomg (gold). And here's what the cremes looked like before the tape bonanza:

 

I think the gold really helps tie the skittles together!

OPI The Man With The Golden Gun

I've been drooling over this since the promo pics came out. Happily I can report that I'm still drooling. I mean...look at that bottle!! 18K gold flakes! And I am *such* a sucker for anything gold. It's as if OPI trespassed into my dreams. As soon as this delicious bottle arrived in the mail, I slapped it on over the mani I was rocking at the time - Essie Bahama Mama....

The formula on this is really easy to work with and smooth. This was two "coats". I say "coats" because its easier to get the flakes of gold off if you kind of dab at the nail as opposed to paint. It all levels out nicely. Unfortunately it does not dry as shiny as I'd like, so I did add another topcoat after all was said and done to bring back the intense shine. I think it also helped the golden flakes to pop more!

I think I'd like this *even better* over a darker colour - like OPI Lincoln Park After Dark or a really deep green. I also think I preferred the look with fewer gold flakes, but I did want to show it off to you guys so perhaps I went a little overboard. :P

So, this thing is expensive. But in my opinion, worth it. It's utterly fabulous. Will you be investing in a bottle?

kittytokaren

OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls

OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls

I miss my perfect nail polish swatching balcony. Sunlight for as long as there is sunlight. Private, so I don't have to feel sheepish in an apartment building. But alas, I moved and the balcony did not move with me. So now if I want to take a photo without running outside, I only have a couple of hours a day where I'll get good direct sunlight. As a result, some of my NOTDs are going to look more ragged... because they're being taken on the third or fourth... or in the case of this photo, fifth day. (Besides a bit of tipwear, it wore very well. I think I rode this NOTD out for over a week.) This very pale blue creme -- bordering on greyish -- was a bit thinner than I thought it'd be (four coats) but applied pretty easily. So, no big complaints from me!

Sorry for the absence! Orly Gogo and Illamasqua Harsh

OK...sorry that I've been MIA. Things have been insanely busy (I had a day off on Friday, where I did nothing, for the first time in three and a half weeks) and I've not had much time to a) do my nails and b) take pictures. On the plus side I LOVE my new job so working my socks off doesn't seem like much of a chore, but I am finding less time for, well, anything else.

BUT! I'm hoping that now that teaching has started and I'm more in the swing of things I can start posting more regularly. Fortunately the other ladies on POP have been so awesome that I'm sure you've barely noticed I was gone ;)

I think this was three of four coats of Gogo (streaky hell fest) plus glitter to make it look a bit more even. I did think this was quite pretty but I don't think I'll be reaching for Gogo again for a while.

My EL Love Affair continues - Estee Lauder Smashed

I hope you're not sick of Estee Lauder polishes just yet...I'm having a love affair! (See Tempestuous and Molten Lava too!) 

Today I'm showing you Smashed - a lovely plum with some amazing glitter/shimmer that isn't too out there. I feel like the polish is *just* dark enough to carry  off this level of sparkle and still look sophisticated. The formula on this one was just as excellent as the others. Bravo, Tom Pecheaux, bravo.

Have you fallen in love with a new brand lately? Let me know!
kittytokaren

China Glaze Electric Pineapple

China Glaze Electric Pineapple

I'm in utter denial that it's not summer anymore. Hence, a greenish neonish yellow. (It's just slightly greener in real life than in the photo.) Unfortunately, this polish was thin (I think we're looking at 4 or 5 coats up there), prone to cuticle drag, and then chipped in just a few days. Boo. Still, it was a nice little early fall pick-me-up.

OPI Germany - Two creams

I already showed you the two vampy shimmers I picked up from the OPI Germany collection, and here are the two creams that I ended up grabbing later. I know just about the last person to blog these, but better late than never! I tried, but I could not resist the siren song of a beautiful taupe and a deep murky green...I am weak.

OPI Nein! Nein! Nein! OK Fine! (Ugh what a name. Seriously, Suzi? Seriously.)


I do love a dark green. And this one is very pretty. Dark with a handful of grey in it, it might be more grey than green. Compared to Essie Power Clutch, it is darker and more green. It's a hair lighter than Essie Stylenomics, which doesn't contain as much grey as this and is a bit bluer. The formula is really lovely and two coats were all that was needed.

OPI Berlin There, Done That (Better name...by a bit.)


Oh taupe...by far the predominant colour in my collection. I can't seem to get rid of them. To be fair, I do wear taupe polishes a lot! This particular incarnation has more grey in it than something like Essie Mink Muffs or Chanel Particuliere, but more brown than Essie Chinchilly, and is a lot lighter than OPI's You Don't Know Jacques. The word that comes to mind when I see this polish is "elegant". So in my stash it stays.

kittytokaren

HARE Polish: Dog Day Dream

I know I say I have a lot of favorite indies, but HARE Polish is one of my earliest forays into indies and she's been a favorite since the first bottle.

Today's polish is Dog Day Dream, 2 perfect coats of a wonderful delish red jelly filled with orange, purple and magenta glitter. The real surprise is the microglitter in the polish. It adds depth and I was unaware of it until I applied it and it was a very pleasant surprise.

One thing about HARE Polish that is notable for me is the perfection of the formula. This mani was done with hardly any clean up. The polish applies itself like butter to the nail. I even got a compliment on it from a girl sitting behind me in class -- the polish had actually caught her eye while I was playing with my hair and she asked me during our break which polish it was. It's definitely eye-catching!

You can find HARE on her Facebook here, her Etsy shop here and also on Llarowe here. Enjoy!

SALE! 2 Mystery Grab-Boxes

...or, as I like to call them, Insta-Stash. Or maybe Stash-in-a-Box?

Either way, they are medium USPS Priority Mail flat rate boxes filled with at least 50 nail polishes each. The polishes are from a variety of brands, finishes, and shades. For instance, neither box has all the high-end polishes or all the glitters! The polishes cost me between $0.50 to $14, with a mean price of about $4.00 per polish. Almost all of them have only been used once or twice; a couple may have been used more or have undergone evaporation (since some of them were from old, old beauty supply places).

I'm selling each box for $75 (which already includes the $11.35 for shipping). Those who are interested, please fill out our blog's Contact Us form and select "flinty". First come, first served. :)

Some pics of the polishes that went into the boxes...

Some of the brands represented are:

Barry M
BB Couture
Bug Me Not
Cetuem
China Glaze
Claire's
Confetti
Cover Girl
Diamond
Duri
ELF
Elianto
Elizabeth Arden
Essie
Eyeko
Hot Topic
Huemorista
Integrate
KleanColor
L'Oreal
LA Colors
La Femme
LA Girl
Misa
Missha
Nicole
NYX
OCC
OPI
Orly
Oscar
Pa
Palladium
Pop Beauty
RBL
Rimmel
Risk
Sally Hansen
The Face Shop
Wet n Wild
Zoya

(The boxes were packed earlier this summer before I moved so I really have NO idea which boxes contain what polishes...)

I prefer to sell in lots like this because I just don't have the time to sell 100 polishes piecemeal anymore. :( Boo. I remember when I was a selling, swapping fiend. Those were the good old days.