Hauls, Gifts & More Crackle Swatches

Small hauls, but quite a bit of polish when all taken together.  Some hauls I bought myself, some gift hauls from friends & family =)

 

First I have a couple from Walgreens that I got when I picked up my prescription:

 

 

I'd never heard of the brand on the left, 2012 Max Makeup Cherimoya - have any of you?  This green crackle is called Crucify, and the Revlon is Royal Cloak from a special display that I forget the name of.

 

Stopped at Sallys to use my 15% off coupon, picked up some top coat & supplies & also these 2 Finger Paints Crackles:

 

 

Named, un-creatively enough, Purple Crackle & Blue Crackle.

 

I stopped at Claire's mainly to check their clearance, but then I spotted their Crackles:

 

 

I realized after I lined them up that the stem on the white was longer than all the others, which is kind of weird.  They don't have actual names, so they're just pink, black, white & silver.

Then these are back from my birthday last month, from my friend Sam:

 

Top is the brand Love & Beauty, and they didn't have names so they're just blue, neon green & yellow glitter.  Bottom is Mood Struck Berry Pink to Neon Pink, Teal to Turquoise & Purple to Light Pink.

 

And a gift just a week or so ago from my aunt:

 

Top is Savina Money Tree, then Revlon Bright Sky, Mauve Twinkle, Golden Glimmer & Lavender Light.  Bottom row is L.A. Colors Bright Pink, then Cover Girl Pink Twinkle & Crystal Mist.

 

Here's the vid:

 

 

& then here are some close-up pics of the crackle combinations I show at the very end of the vid - the bad on top & the good (with a layer of topcoat between the 2 crackles) on the bottom:

 

I think that's everything ... for now =)  Thanks for reading.

 

~Colette

NOTD: Cover Girl Midnight Magic + Disco Dazzle

Up past my bedtime as usual LOL ... might as well make a quick post so I don't fall farther behind!  I started with Cover Girl Midnight Magic, a vampy deep blue, & I almost forgot to take pics of it plain so that's why you get my right hand:

 

 

Then I layered Cover Girl Disco Dazzle, a silver-holo hex glitter with smaller plain silver glitters, & it turned into this awesome stars/space/galaxy look:

 

I really liked this mani ... but I do not like what I have on my nails right now.  They turned out mostly how I intended, but ... they're so pink LOL.  White & pink marbled hearts ... good for Valentine's Day nails, not so good for my personal taste.  I think you'll see what I mean when I post them =)  Hopefully have them up tomorrow.

 

Until then, thanks for reading!

 

~Colette

January Hauls +1

The +1 is because one was just over the weekend, so it's a February haul, but I wanted to post it since I'm making such a massive haul post.  I'd have to look at my receipts to even figure out exactly when I bought all of this LOL, but the majority were in January.  So for the most part they're not in any particular order.

 

I found an almost-new display of the Milani Glitters at a CVS, but the red & silver were already gone!  I hunted probably about 5 more stores, only saw the display at one other, and it was even more picked over.  So I may pick those 2 up at Cherry Culture, but I did get:

 

 

Left to right:  Milani Silver Dazzle, Blue Flash, Purple Gleam, Gold.

 

Two coupons & two trips to Ulta yielded some pretty good clearance as well as the Katy Perry collection ... well, most of it - the black shatter was completely sold out & I haven't been back yet to see if they've restocked:

 

 

Top left to right:  Orly Wandering Vine, OPI Pink of Hearts 2010.  Bottom left to right:  OPI The One That Got Away, Teenage Dream, Last Friday Night & Not Like The Movies.

 

Sallys - just one trip I think:

 

 

Left to right:  Savvy Garland, Finger Paints Tough Art to Follow, Orly White Tips, Orly Elsbeth's Rose.

 

I came literally within 10 mins of missing the Zoya 3 free polishes promotion - I managed to get my order in on time, it did take weeks to arrive because they had so many, but here are the colors I quickly threw into my shopping cart to take advantage of that code:

 

 

Left to right:  Edyta, Crystal, Julieanne.  They need to have another sale now so I can pick up more colors that I passed on!  I love Zoya but I admit I only buy when they have a sale, because they're always so good & they seem to have them so often =)

 

I had an excellent trip to Big Lots - I've never heard of this brand before, but 3 bottles for $2 was a pretty good deal:

 

 

Left to right:  Color Mates Spring Fling, Fuchsia Flash, Cabernet.

 

All of the Revlon's except for the Perplex were 2-bottle packs for $2 - the trick is to avoid duplicates, since almost all of the 2-packs contain different duos.  I managed not to get any duplicates this round:

 

 

Left to right:  Revlon Beach, Ocean Breeze, Grape Icy, Gum Drop, Perplex (x2)

 

And an awful lot of pinks LOL ... all different but still an awful lot of pinks:

 

 

Left to right:  Peach Smoothie, Cotton Candy, Pink Pursuit, Power Walk Pink, Racy Raspberry, Bubble Gum, Orange Pop & Bewitching Bordeaux.

 

And finally, the oddball out February haul from Target clearance on Sunday - there seemed to be a lot of cosmetics on clearance, like they're making room for the spring stuff or something:

 

Left to right:  Cover Girl Midnight Magic & Disco Dazzle.  These 2 are on my nails, about to come off in favor of ... yet to be determined.

 

So, that's the hauls lately =)  Thanks for reading.

 

~Colette

Merry Christmas! (3 NOTDs)

Well, I'm off to brave the blizzard & make the trip to grandma's house shortly, and I'll take some pics of the ridiculous amounts of snow we got when I go out, but I thought I'd throw up some NOTDs & wish everyone a Merry Christmas before I leave =)

Here is my Christmas NOTD, using China Glaze Emerald Sparkle & Ruby Pumps. As usual, pics don't do justice to either one of these colors:


Here is Mom's Christmas NOTD, one of my Dollar Tree haul polishes, Maybelline Blackened Teal:


And, here's a blast from the past, my NOTD from LAST Christmas! I didn't take too many pics of my nails before I started the blog, but these were an exception. I believe this color is Cover Girl Boundless Color Goldstar, but I'm not 100% positive. I'm not sure what Konad plate this is, I'll try to come back later & edit in the info once I have time to dig it out (EDIT: image plate m59):


Stay safe & be happy everyone =) Thanks for reading.

~Colette

NOTD: Cover Girl Chocolate Mint

Yet another tricksy one that is not playing 100% nice with my camera, although I managed a couple good shots. The name pretty much says it all; Cover Girl Chocolate Mint:


Chocolate brown with mint green shimmery duo-chrome effect is what I'm going to describe it as. Sometimes I have a little debate with myself regarding at what point a secondary color goes from being just a shimmer or an opalescence to a true duo-chrome, especially when it's so hard to capture on film. Either way though, this color was pretty enough I only had a passing temptation to Konad it last night. However, after having it on all day, I must confess to being bored. I'm not even sure if a Konad would have helped, but I'll be changing this tomorrow unless something pops up.

I'm actually kind of sick of my current Konad selection. But I told myself I wouldn't place my order until I did my taxes, and I kind of felt like crap over the weekend so I didn't get around to them. And I'm trying to keep my word to myself because if I allow myself any wiggle room, it won't be long before I wiggle myself right out of my no-buy.

The only upside to the feeling crappy is that I haven't been up to anything but sitting & reading, and so I managed to finish a book in what is more normal time for me which was under 2 days. Usually I read 2-3 books per week, not the 1 per week I've been at lately. I guess I'll see once I'm feeling better if I can keep it up. Thanks for reading.

~Colette

The Lasts

The last Romantique & the Last Dollar Tree. I don't think 3 is enough bottles to constitute a haul, but this is what I picked up today:
I originally thought I only needed a couple of the Romantique collection. Then I started hearing how well they worked with Konad, and then I saw it for myself, and by that time various displays were semi-sold out & I had to start searching for the rest of them. Magical completes my set.

The last Dollar Tree was a little dissapointing ... but if I were only going to find 2 polishes, one being purple & the other gold is a good way to go. The purple is Sheer Orchid, and the gold is Moonglow. And I walked out satisfied that I had raided every Dollar Tree in the immediate area.

The immediate area.

My friend lives outside of what I consider my normal shopping radius. And she just told me there's a Dollar Tree on the way over there. So I have a detour to make the next time I go out to visit her.

I chipped one of my nails pretty badly while I was grocery shopping today, and I thought it was the perfect excuse for getting started with my "paint my nails more often" resolution, but when I got home ... well, I don't know what happened, but after putting everything away & fixing & eating dinner, now it's suddenly time for bed & I never got around to taking off the old stuff, let alone putting on anything new.

*sigh*

I probably won't have time for them tomorrow either, but maybe Thursday. I don't think I can make it all the way to the weekend. My bottle of Seche is a looming accusation that it won't take as long as I think it will, if I just get in gear & do it.

Thanks for reading.

~Colette

Pills & Polish

The pills I'm talking about are biotin capsules. I've read a lot of good things about it, and I have pretty bad peeling on about half of my nails, so I thought I'd give it a try. My grandma placed an order for me when she placed her own for other supplements & it was buy 2 get 3 free, so I now have almost a year's supply.

I go see my grandparents every Friday after work for dinner, and on the way I stopped at a Dollar Tree nearby their house that just happened to have a Sally's right next door, and ... well ...

I struck Maybelline Express Finish gold at the Dollar Tree. Left to right: Purple Party, Sunlit Coral, Red Comet, Berry Fast, Turquoise Seas, Key Largo Lime. Bottom row is from Sally's, Savvy Golden Mauve, Raspberry & Sparkling Lavender, Finger Paints Spark My Interest, China Glaze Admire, and 2 Seche Vites. And there's my cat (again hanging out in just about the middle of everything), her name is Frisky (give me a break, I was 10 when I named her).

I'm sure you can understand how all that just kind of happened. I wanted to get my friend & my mom bottles of Seche Vite, which in Sally's January flyer is buy 2 Seche get a China Glaze free ... and then there were all these clearance polishes ... which I love clearance although I hate clearance stickers. I've got an awful lot of bottles with ugly orange stickers because they don't come off easily & I'm too lazy to peel & pick.

The Savvy Polish were actually the nicest surprises. Not much from a distance, but when I picked up the bottles I got a different appreciation. The Golden Mauve has a heavy gold shimmer:

The Raspberry also has a lot of gold shimmer:

And the Sparkling Lilac is actually almost duo-colored, pinkish lavender at some angles, bluer lavender at others, with a fine holographic glitter in there too:

So, a good way to kick off the weekend, all things considered. And then tomorrow I have a date! Well ... I'm getting together with my other single friend & some blackberry brandy & a Scrabble board & we decided since we're doing dinner we could call it a date lol. But it's more eventful than my weekends normally are.

Hope your weekend is going as well as mine! Thanks for reading.

~Colette

Sometimes less is more

With Konad sometimes it's easy to get carried away. Especially after last week's manicure gave me a false sense of confidence regarding my double-stamping skills. I love my base color, I haven't worn red in a really long time, and I like the black over top, but I am disgusted & disappointed with the final design. Even if I'd managed to get everything even (which is tricky if not impossible since my nails are varying lengths) it ended up reminding me more of upholstery than anything.

Nubar Unfaithful Red from the Liquid Metals collection, Konaded with black special polish & plate m4. I even did a pretty good job of painting neatly & cleaning up everything with an orange stick.

Usually I do my nails once a week, but I don't know that I can stand this for that long. Right now my intention is to sleep on it, see if somehow I miraculously love them in the morning & if not redo everything after I go to lunch with my parents. Like I said, I love the red & the black so I may stick with the same colors and a more moderate hand with the stamper.

Anyway, the moral of the above story, as the title says: Sometimes less is more. On the other hand - sometimes more is just more & great. And while my day ended on a somewhat sour note with a manicure that did not live up to the image I had in mind, the rest of my day was a lovely polish-buying happyfest.

Here's my cat making room for herself in between my purchases & haul from the library. She's old (17) so she does whatever & goes wherever she pleases.

I stopped several places, a couple Sallys to pick up more of the Romantique collection, where I also ran across a few clearance items that needed to come home with me, and a few cheapos at Target that were lonely. Best bang for the buck was at Dollar Tree, though. Another thing to thank my fellow bloggers for, I had never been in a Dollar Tree but so many people said they had oldie-goodie polishes I put it on my to-do list & this is what I turned up at my first stop (there are 2 other stores I know of to raid at a later date):

Top row is some nail art rhinestones, and some Cover Girl. Nailslicks: Chocolate Mint, Galactic Green, Sunrise, & Midnight Metal. & Mattalic (which I think have to be about 10+ years old because I remember purchasing a couple when they first came out) Pink Zinc & Silver Violet. Bottom Row is Sally Hansen Super Shine Naturistics Aura Pearl, New York Color Cozy Cottage, and Loreal: Brave (Bijou Crystals), B. Strong (Bijou Gems), Shocking (Crystals), Hopeful (Bijou Facets), B. Rebllious (Crystals), B. Adventurous (Crystals), Sweet (Facets), B. Impulsive (Crystals), & another B. Hopeful. Almost none of the 3-packs had the same set of colors, so I counted myself lucky to only end up with 1 duplicate. I have no idea when this line originally came out, how old they are, but you can see a couple of them are pretty separated.

So, with all the shopping I did not get around to doing anything with my existing stash except add to it. I think that's like a step past procrastination, not just putting off the task but making it a larger task at the same time! Oh well, the perils of being a nail polish addict I suppose. It's hard to go anywhere that has polish without looking, and finding at least 1 thing to pick up.

Thanks for Reading.

~Colette