Happy Hands: What's This

It ends up that a lot of the holiday polishes that I purchased from indies aren't exactly Christmas-y... nary a green and red combo is to be seen in my newly acquired stash. But they're all so pretty either way!

Happy Hands: What's This is one of her holiday collection, and it's a glitter polish made up of sky blue holo square glitter along with smaller silver and light blue glitter, and some white hex glitter. It's amazingly shiny.

I layered it over Color Club: Take me to your Chateau :)

This is actually just 1 coat of What's This -- although I did want a few more white glitters so I fished them out and stuck them on. Sparkly, pretty and wintry! Hard to take a picture of because of the shininess, trust me it's more gorgeous in person :D

You can find Happy Hands polish on her Facebook here and her Etsy here!

Woohoo! 1L done Glitter Spam! :)

Yay for my 1st year of law school being finished! Although by the time this posts, it'll have been over for 3 weeks and I'll be 2 weeks into summer school, it still calls for a celebratory glitter spam :) These are just some of my favorite glitter combinations within the past year or so. I'm leaving out the indie brand glitters because I'm making a separate post for that soon :D

And so here it goes!

my first try at layering glitters!
For the gold, I used CC Sultry
then Sinful: Call You Later
then NYX Girls: Turks and Caicos
then Nicole by OPI: Nicole... Spotted!
my base was NYX Girls Sea of Cortez

LA Splash Golden Seahorse + Brownie gold glitter thing (Japanese) + Milani FX Gold

American Apparel Hassid + OPI Divine Swine + LA Girl Glitter Addict Nostalgic

Butter London: The Black Knight + Butter London Tart with a Heart

Fingerpaints: Vintage Velvet + LA Girls Glitter Addict: Provocative

OPI Warm & Fozzie, Spoiled: Jewelry Heist (the bronzey glitters) & Essence: Edward (green glitter)

Piggy Polish: Among the Stars + Color Club: Very Merry Berry

OPI: Lucerne-tainly Look Marvelous + OPI: Crown Me Already! on ring finger

Nerd Lacquer: Warrior Ethos + NYX Girls Frizz Spots gradated

Hope y'all enjoyed seeing those as much as I enjoyed wearing them!

How to drive a manicure over the edge: Orly Rock Solid... with LA Girl Inspire... with Color Club Smash Hit

This is what happens you're lazy and easily bored like I am. Let this be a lesson to you all. 

Orly Rock Solid

Part of Orly's Mineral FX collection, it looked so promising in the bottle. Black with strong silver shimmer and a heck ton of holo glitter. HECK TON. Yet it was kind of flat (and somewhat gritty) on the nail. The black shimmer ate the glitter almost entirely. Three coats. 

Closeup of Rock Solid

LA Girl Glitter Addict Inspire over Orly Rock Solid 

But I really wanted a glitter manicure that day, yet was loath to take off Rock Solid. So I decided to try out one of the LA Girl Glitter Addicts on top of it. (Btw, that collection was the most disappointing LA Girl collections ever but we can discuss that another time.) There seem to be two types of pink glitter: magenta and this old-fashioned rosy pink that seems to be the go-to pink glitter. Inspire was the latter and, as is usual for this type of pink glitter, it doesn't look so hot. I figured the polish wasn't going to be opaque so I might as well have a bit of contrast going by putting it over a dark polish, right? (Wrong.) Turns out, Inspire was even more sparse than anticipated: the above is three coats and the Rock Solid is still very visible. 

Closeup of the mess

Color Club Smash Hit over LA Girl Glitter Addict Inspire and Orly Rock Solid 

Having NOT learned my lesson -- and now having the double disincentive of removing a dark polish AND glitter -- I decided that I might as well layer on a polish that was sent to me by Color Club: Smash Hit, a black crackle. And I actually liked it better with the crackle than without. Still and all, it was pretty damn fug. 

Closeup of the coup de grace...

At this point, I had eleven layers of polish on my nails (bc, 3 Rock Solid, tc, 3 Inspire, tc, Smash Hit, tc). Well, this was just ridiculous. And kind of very unattractive. After I took this photo, I waited for the entire thing to dry and then peeled off the monstrosity off of all ten nails. (I know, I know. Gross. When you have that much polish on, once dry, it really just pops off with a little nudge.) Would it have been easier to just remove Rock Solid when I realized that I didn't like it? Probably. 

Chanel Graphite & Color Club Clean Break

Chanel Graphite

When did I start buying Chanel polishes, jeez. Expensive habit, that. Should've never started... and I come up against the same question that I have with almost about 80% of the Chanel polishes that I buy: I love the polish itself but do I think it's worth $25? (Especially since Revlon seems to be having some success with their dupes of recent Chanel colors for a fraction of the price.) I have a ton of silver and gunmetal polishes but Graphite is probably better described as pewter because of the gold microglitter that gives it a warmer appearance than most silvers. It applied well in two coats and had pretty good staying power (which I find is true of many Chanel polishes). I think this one (like Particulaire, Jade Rose and Paradoxal before it) may become a "conference" polish. It's not the most understated look but it's still elegant and can pass for professional. 

Color Club Clean Break over Chanel Graphite

A good white crackle is hard to find because most whites need multiple layers to appear anywhere near opaque. This one, which was sent to me for review by Color Club, is one of the better white crackles I've tried because it is a little more pigmented (but still crackles very well).   

Closeup of Clean Break Over Graphite

I still don't know whether I like crackle polishes or not. I think they can look very, very cool. But they can look very messy if not applied well. They also take better to larger nails, I think. It's difficult to apply one uniform layer of crackle on a small nail because usually, the brush isn't big enough to do the nail in a single sweep... and it isn't large enough that two sweeps won't overlap. So crackles are very hit or miss with me. I'm endlessly surprised that crackle caught on as a trend. It's been around for awhile but now, it's everywhere. Is it because it's a way to... double one's manicurial wardrobe at low cost? 

More Color Club Foiled (Fall 2011) swatches

The rest of the Color Club Foiled collection that CC sent me for review. 

 Color Club Lumin-Icecent

OK... that's a pretty bad name for a polish. But sure, why not. Light blue foil with slight greenish tinge. Really nice one. Two coats. 

Color Club Cold Metal

Ordinary but very nice dark blue foil. One coat does the trick. :) Gotta love those. Dried super fast. Best five minute mani ever. 

Color Club Hot Like Lava

Favorite polish from the collection but worst photos ever! I don't understand what went wrong with my ability to use a camera but all of these photos came out blurry and very, very orange. And my skin looks bizarre in the first one. So annoyed. But the polish was great. Another one coat polish, super fast dry time. This was taken on the third day of wear and is a very aptly named for a hot pink foil.

Some Color Club Foiled swatches (Fall 2011)

I am super behind on Color Club swatches. :( Between what I've bought and what they've sent (such as this collection), I really could wear nothing but Color Club for over a month. It would be a pretty good month. Anyhow, the Foiled collection brought China Glaze Khrome to mind and I couldn't help comparing the two when I applied and wore the polishes, though the two collections actually feel pretty distinct. (Khrome was more metallic, Foiled is more... foil. Brighter, more sparkly, with more of a textured feel.)

I have a weird relationship with foils: I like them but I don't love them and yet I probably wear them more often than most other finishes. Sunlight does fabulous things to them but they're dull as all heck indoors. So I never plan to wear a foil. I only wear foils when I don't have time to do my nails. Application is very forgiving, quite a few are one coat wonders, most dry very quickly and it looks pristine for the first 24-48 hours. Absolutely perfect in a pinch. 

Almost all of my Foiled photos are actually NOTDs because they arrived during an extremely busy week... So I was a little put out when some of the Color Club Foiled polishes were somewhat thin and didn't dry quickly. But it varied from polish to polish. 

Color Club Antiquated

Silvery champagne. The above shows two coats but I think it could've used three: it was pretty thin. It dried very quickly though. Good staying power. 

Color Club Perfect Molten

Darkened seafoam. Two coats was perfect. Oddly, it dried slower than Antiquated. Still, much faster than many polishes. One of my favorites from this collection. 

Color Club Foil Me Once

Cool pink. This one I cursed. Three coats, took longer to dry than the other two, and then started chipping immediately. I was not a happy camper. 

Color Club Artsy Crafty (Back to Boho, Fall 2011)

There's something really off about the name of this polish... like it should rhyme, but it really doesn't.

Color Club Artsy Crafty

One of the major hurdles I have to swatching again is that I have a huge backlog of nail polishes to go through (especially since some of them were sent by PR departments, such as this one). Sigh. But this was lovely: a wonderful dusty-ish teal creme. It was just a tad uneven with two coats so this is three. 

Speaking of being artsy crafty, I made boxers for my SO! :) There's a great story about how my SO underestimated his waist size (vanity sizing, not just for women!) but I don't know that he'd like me sharing his actual waist size here. 

Color Club Wink Wink Twinkle (Starry Temptress, Spring 2011)

I remember reading somewhere that they had a great experience with these polishes and that they were smooth and easy to apply... and it's entirely possible that they are just better at nail polish than I am but... umm... this wasn't cool. (I mean, neither are my cuticles here but my cuticles didn't make application hard nor made it dry extremely bumpy.)

Either way, not really pleased I bought the entire collection on faith. I should stop doing that.

Color Club Wink Wink Twinkle

As I already mentioned: bumpy, goopy, hard to apply. I'm okay with the dull, non-sparkly glitter. The color is pretty cool, a neon-ish red-leaning purple. But.... yeah, nothing special and I could've skipped it and had no regrets.

Closeup of Wink Wink Twinkle

Cute story about the SO and his trying to engage in the activities I enjoy:

We were in the mall and I had a Groupon to a beauty supply store that I wanted to spend. This store carried most of the Deb Lippmann collection and I was trying to decide between Don't Tell Mama and Wicked Game. Having nothing better to do at the moment, he started pointing to each of the polishes and proclaiming whether he thought they were good or not.

He went down the row and when he got the the fabulous Lippmann glitters, he was like, "Wow, I would put any of these on my toes. Even the pink one [Some Enchanted Evening]. I hate pink but I would wear that pink one on my toes."

And then he got to Bad Romance and was like, "I would wear this on my fingers! Can you get ALL of these?" (He pointed to all the glitters.)

"Uh, honey? I HAVE all of these."

Anyhoo, he's currently walkin' around with Across the Universe on his toes.

He has the most uncanny way of enjoying the MOST EXPENSIVE things. When Bath and Body Works still regularly had their non-holidays Temptations 3-in-1s, he routinely preferred the twice-as-expensive Philosophy 3-in-1s. He likes the LUSH solid shampoos ($10 each) but vastly prefers BIG or Curly Wurly ($22 each). Whenever I give him a few nail polishes to choose from, he picks the most expensive. (I mean, the boy likes his Chanel and Dior. But never Color Club or Milani! Or even OPI! WTF, dude.) And he doesn't know the prices of any of these things.

Lately, he's been using my Dermalogica Microfoliant because he had a ton of peeling skin from sunburn/windburn while going whale watching for four hours without any sunblock. While we were at the beauty supply spending my Groupon, he saw a Dermalogica display and asked, "Hey, is this the stuff I've been using? I like it. Maybe you should get more."

"Did you use it up ALREADY??" I've had it for years and was thinking that if he had used it all up unnecessarily, he was going to foot the bill for the next one.

"No, but maybe you should stock up." So, I went over to the display, picked up a Microfoliant box and showed him the price ($50). He just sort of stared in shock at the pricetag.

My response: "Maybe you'll be more careful about not spilling two teaspoons of it all over the counter next time."

Color Club Enchanted Holiday mini set, Part II of II: Magic Elf & Snowflakes

The rest of the Color Club Enchanted Holiday mini set...

Color Club Snowflakes over Revlon Powder Puff

This was going to be sheer so I layered it over a soft white. Pretty iridescent glitter in a slightly cloudy base; leans towards looking pinker (as on the nail) than bluer (as in the bottle). Two coats.

Color Club Magic Elf

Saved the best for last. AWESOME grass green foil with strong gold shimmer. So bright! So sparkly! Two coats, could've used three (though the VNL wasn't as obvious IRL as it is in the photo).

Thanks to those who commented on my post about my grandfather. I hope to respond to everyone soon. The internet's really spotty in my mother's place in Taipei: the only place where I can access wifi is on floor in the middle of one of the bedrooms, as I am stealing someone else's signal. Why? Because my mother doesn't know her wifi password. She didn't know her wifi had a password. (Actually, she didn't know the name of her network either. My uncle set everything up for her so she has no idea how anything computer-related works.)

Color Club Enchanted Holiday mini set, Part I of II: Enchanted Holiday & Wishlist Red

I love Color Club mini sets: unlike most minis, these actually feel substantial. The bottle is nice and weighty for its size, the brush is pretty much normal, and they're a breeze to apply. Even though I feel no affinity to Christmas (which, I am aware, was a couple days ago), I was thrilled when this set unexpectedly showed up on my doorstep from the company.

Color Club Enchanted Holiday

Typical cool gold glitter in clear base. Two coats here, could have used three. Still, pretty nice for a glitter in a clear base: Color Club does these sorts of polishes so well.

Color Club Wishlist Red

This was unexpectedly beautiful. It's the same old red glitter in red jelly we've all seen a thousand and one times (usually named in reference to Dorothy's ruby slippers) but this applied extremely nicely. It was such a rich, pigmented red jelly: two coats and you can barely make out VNL.

Stay tuned for the other two polishes. :)

I did try to do some nail art with the cute stickers they included but I'm pretty incompetent so they turned out... not cute at all.

A Grey Comparison

It's comparison time again!  This time I thought I'd compare some of my grey polishes.  Here's the cast of characters:

I applied three coats of each in the same order as above, from thumb to pinkie.  I took this picture in the sun.

I took this picture in the shade.

And I took this picture with the flash.

I was hoping to find a dupe for Waking Up In Vegas, but I didn't.  What I actually found was that it's probably my least favorite of these polishes.  It just seems to not go as well with my skin tone, unfortunately.  Oh well, I still needed to have it for the name.  It seems like a lighter version of Recycle, but I prefer Recycle with my skin tone.

High Society and Vintage Gray are very similar in color, but Vintage Gray is lighter.  There's probably no reason to own both since they're quite similar, though if you like this type of color, then owning both might be a good thing for you since they aren't dupes.

Point Break and Recycle are the darkest greys in this comparison.  Point Break leans blue whereas Recycle seems to lean a bit green.

Color Club Tangerine Scream & Volt of Light... I am in denial that summer is over!

A couple of polishes from Color Club's awesome ElectroCandy collection from a couple of years ago. It's an amazing collection of neons that have contrasting color shimmer. I found mine at Ross for $8.

Color Club Tangerine Scream

Take that, autumn! I defy you with three coats of neon orange with ridiculously bright shimmer!

Yeah, okay, I'll go do my homework now. Boo. Maybe one more swatch?

Color Club Volt of Light

Neon yellow with teal shimmer. This one is one of my favorite colors ever... except that this is five coats, possibly six. And is that VNL I see?! Still, it went on so thinly and smoothly that it wasn't painful at all to do all those layers, just a tad time consuming. Didn't take forever to dry either, surprisingly with all those layers! I wish I had gotten a shot of this outside rather than just in the lightbox.

OK, now I'll really go do my homework. It's my last quarter EVER with homework! After how many years of schooling? (13 K-12 + 4 college + 1 master's + 2 PhD = 20 years worth of homework... plus many summers worth of academic camps.)

Color Club Untamed Luxury, Part I: the glitters

Here are my first set of swatches done with a wrist brace on. And they took much longer and don't look half as good as they should. I just couldn't wait to try the new Color Club collex (provided by Color Club for my review).

So I'm not sure if my swatching was particularly bad or if these polishes were particularly difficult to make look good. One thing I kept thinking throughout was that these were seven missing Revlon Street Wear polishes; that if I had found these polishes in Street Wear bottles, I would be frantically searching for their names online. They're very old school Street Wear glitter type polishes to me: brilliant in the bottle, somewhat difficult on the nail, often gritty and streaky but ultimately kinda cool... sometimes. Anyone else get this vibe from these polishes?

Color Club Resort to Red

Basic red shimmer... almost frosty in appearance. A little brushstrokey but very easy to apply (especially while in a brace...). Two coats. Very meh to me.

Color Club Snakeskin

Apologies for the sunlight washing this one out a bit: it's more of a mossy metallic grey color than straight up grey. Something that's a little more obvious in shade but I didn't get a good shade pic of this. It's also dotted with tons of gold microshimmer, as you can kind of see in the larger photos of this (and in the closeup). Two coats, also very easy to apply.

Closeup of Snakeskin

Color Club Ms Hautie

One of the ones I think most resembles old school Street Wear. Holo glitter with a purported red flash in a metallic grey base. This took me two tries to apply properly. For my first try, I used thick coats and the third coat just destroyed the mani. For my second one, I used three very thin coats and it came out alright. This definitely needs topcoat because the holo glitter looks very gritty in this base.

Ms Hautie in bottle

See that pretty red flash there? COMPLETELY disappears on the nail. Boo!

Color Club De-Luxe-Cious

Another polish that I should have applied a second time because the first time didn't go so well. Everyone use thin coats with this one! Otherwise, it'll be translucent AND be brushed right off the nail by the third coat. This one is also very reminiscent of old Street Wear: sheer dusty blue shimmer base with opalescent and/or holo glitter. Oddly enough though, this isn't as bumpy as it looks: it actually has a pretty smooth, glossy surface when you see it in person. But it does appear bumpy. Its definitely an interesting, unique polish but it also looks a lot like someone's failed franken.

Color Club Red Velvet

Basic idea as seen before in China Glaze Lubu Heels and Eyeko Vampira (red glitter in a black jelly base) but it seems that Red Velvet is a little more dense that Vampira (though I don't know how it stands next to Lubu Heels). This one needs topcoat. It looks terrible without topcoat. Three coats.

Color Club Covered in Diamonds (over Red Velvet)

Come on. This is so a missing Street Wear type of glitter. It's like the bar glitters: great idea, looks kind of cool, ultimately kind of messy and uneven. These are irregular flakes (not flakies though) that are kind of thick and stick up all over the place and are hard to place evenly. Sometimes it looks like opalescent confetti gone wrong, and sometimes it looks like the coolest stained glass ever. I happen to like the effect from a distance but closeup, it just looks a mess. Two coats.

Closeup of Covered in Diamonds (over Red Velvet)

Color Club Untamed Luxury

Well, of course I was gonna love this one! Teal jelly suffused with blue (rather than perfectly matching) square glitter. I LOVE square glitter. Three coats. Very happy with this one.

Closeup of Untamed Luxury

Well, that's that for this half of the collection. I hope to get the rest swatched before the end of the week! (Grr, dumb wrist brace.)

Ahh! Last day of August! Now I get to count up how many nail polishes I get in September for exercising... Aug 26 (25m cardio), Aug 29th (35m cardio), Aug 30th (45m cardio), Aug 31st (60m cardio+very mild strength training). I don't have time to tally it now but I'll post about it the next time I have a swatch to post. :)