OWWWP: Color Club Ultra-Astral

(Why is Lacey Chabert so orange in this pic, anyway?)

Super-quick Pink Wednesday post.  Two posts in one day, after disappearing for a week or two.  Yep, that's how I roll. 

I present to you Color Club Ultra-Astral, from the Starry Temptress collection.

This is part of a collection of neons with glitter in them, which as you might guess is right up my alley.  This dries fairly matte as with all neons, but applied pretty well.  Somewhat sheer - you do need three coats to avoid VNL.  The glitter effect overall is nice, although somewhat muted.  But have no fear - Color Club thoughtfully provides you with a glitter topcoat in this set that you can slap on top of these if the glitter payoff from the polish alone isn't enough for you, like it wasn't for me:

Oh baby.  That's what I'm talkin about :)  This is after applying the Starry Temptress Topcoat that's included in the set.  It eliminates the yucky matte effect, and adds even more sparkle to the somewhat dull glitter.  You still need topcoat to get the maximum effect out of these, but I do think they look better with the topcoat than without. 

Overall, I love this polish, I love hot pink, and I love how Color Club always finds a way to make their neon collections a little different :)

Til later :)

*EDIT: I just noticed this - two pinks with glitter in a row.  Yeesh.  I'll try to switch it up a bit next week  :S

*EDIT#2: Go Canucks Go :)  Nashville, you goin down.

Spams, Spams, Everywhere the Spams

This isn't really a full-on spam, just a little bitsy mini spam.  I just wanted to prove to you that even though I've been working a ton and not really allowed to wear anything interesting on my nails (and when I am, I'm not allowed to change it), I am still diligently photographing what I do have on, and obsessively changing it in my spare time every chance I get :p  Yup.  This is me.

I'll start with what I have on tonight - my Freehanded Cloud Mani That Didn't Turn Out As Nearly As Cute As I Pictured It In My Head:

It looks a lot less messy IRL :-/ I swear it acutally looks half-decent - here in macro it just looks smudgy and sloppy. I wanted to do a cloud design but my cloud Konad plate walked away on me :( So I freehanded them by just doing a bunch of dots close together, but I didn't think they looked like clouds (my bf said they just looked like smudgy white blobs) so I outlined them in WnW Black Creme using a toothpick. Like I said, it looks better IRL. The base is SpaRitual Sky's The Limit.

This is the Lippmann Ruby Red Slippers mani I had on for three days straight due to work.  I used two coats of China Glaze Lubu Heels as a base, then followed it with three coats of RRS.  One coat of Gelous, one thick coat of SV, and a coat of Barielle Mani Extender applied 24 hours later, and there you have it - it stayed on for three days on set :)  There was some tipwear, as you can see, but no chips whatsoever!  I couldn't capture on camera how sparkly this was.   I know I've worn and reviewed this before, but I just want to say again how pretty this looked under the bright studio lights... The glittery red was was very noticeable and just popped against the black.  I got compliments on it from girls and guys alike!  .

China Glaze Ahoy!  I had this on for exactly 20 minutes before I got bored of it and had to change :S  It's pretty - like Strawberry Field's darker cousin - but I just wasn't feeling it today for some reason.  Which I don't know why, because as I said, pretty.

My attempt to dupe SH Frock Star.  You know those nail stickers that they charge $9 a box for?  Yes, well, I refuse to pay that for something that similar-looking to polishes I already own.  And yes, I know, this isn't really a dupe, but it was close enough for me.  Glittery and loud.  I used CC Magic Attraction, Milani Gems and Wet N Wild Party Of Five Glitters.  There may also be some Zoya Gaia underneath all that as a base - I really don't remember after all that glitter :p  And yes, I do own the SH Girl Flower nail stickers, but those are a different story - you try duping those.

This is a new Revlon, called Blue Lagoon - a delicate baby blue creme with really noticeable glass-fleck shimmer.  It's part of their Summer collection, which also includes a peach and a yellow with the same glass-fleck shimmer.  I really liked this polish, for a Revlon - application was great, smooth and even in two coats, and the pretty glass-fleck shimmer is just as noticeable on the nail as it is in the bottle.  Very ethereal and icy-looking.

China Glaze Electric Pineapple.  Neither pineapple-coloured, nor electric-looking.  Maybe like a greenish, chartreuse pineapple?  Yeah, sure.  I swatched this on one finger when I reviewed the Island Escape collection, and I said it looked odd - as you can see, I was correct.  It changes from greenish to yellowish depending on whether I'm indoors or out, too.

Another glitterbomb mani.  Sometimes I'm just in the mood for glittah.  And I know I'm not alone *looks around at all of you*  This was H&M Lavender Sky, topped with one coat each of Paris Couture iridescent blue-green glitter (a dollar store glitter, similar to Inglot XL4), Fasino purple hex glitter (another dollar store polish that smells like absolute death) and WnW Party Of Five Glitters.

And this was the mani I did to match my blue-grey dress they put me in at work. This was Orly Pixie Dust, OPI DS Sapphire, some no-name Goldie holo and ChG Fairy Dust. It was a gorgeous match for the dress... and then they ended up putting long white opera gloves on me :p Go figure.  I did take my gloves off quite often, though (as would anyone - gloves are a pain), and every time I did I was like, "Oooh!" :)  Polishes always look so good under the bright, hot studio lights - especially glitters and holos! :)

Alright, that's all for right now! :)  Will be back later!

Oh, and PS:  Would you guys be interested in seeing more stash pics?  Maybe my China Glaze drawer, or my HE drawer?  LMK!

NOTD: Color Club Electro Candy collection with OPI Black Shatter

Just throwing this up here real quick before I go to bed, cuz it's super-late and I should be in bed.  Hehe.  Throwing this up.  Ew.  Anyway, I just wanted to show you all my NOTD that I'm going to have to take off in a second, since I'm working on set tomorrow, and I'm sad because I love it:

I striped three colours from the Color Club Electro Candy collection - Electro Candy (the pink), Volt Of Light (the yellow) and Pure Energy (the blue- which happens to be one of my very favorite blues!), and then put OPI Black Shatter over the whole deal.

I quite like how it turned out, and of course, things like this just wow the muggles - tons of people (three to be precise, which obv. = tons!) complimented me on this, and one person claimed they didn't want the OPI Black Shatter till then :)  Ah, the power of polish influence!  This wasn't actually my idea originally, though - I'm pretty sure I saw this posted on the nail board a while back, although I don't remember whose it was... so credit the nail board in general  :)

Okay, I have to get to bed.  Working on a movie tomorrow that's a retelling of a fairy tale, and they have me in a blue-ish grey gown.  I won't get into the hat they put me in, but let's just say it's hilarious  :-/  Anyway, I settled on Orly Pixie Dust topped with OPI DS Sapphire and ChG Fairy Dust as a mani.  It's quite pretty.  I'll try to get pictures of that up when I get home tomorrow - gonna be a long day, though.  I'm told I'm going to be there for about 15 hours  o___O  Oh well - more money for haulin'!  Speaking of which, I took the plunge with those Catherine Arley holos today, for those of you who know what those are.  We shall see how that goes  :S

Thank you and goodnight!  be back later...

New SpaRituals! Truth Collection: Reveal Yourself Swatches & Comps

Happy Groundhog Day!  Has that movie been on TV nonstop for the past three days in your area as well?

I'm a little down today, so I'm gonna keep the incessant chatter to a minimum.  I went out and hauled a bit the other day, and got some new pretties... even though there's still all that stuff I'm waiting on in the mail - urrgh.  Today's mail brought me Maybelline Blazes Of Blue though - yay!  Although is this a flaky?  It looks like a plain ol' glitter to me, but I've been told it's a flaky....

So anyway, part of my haul yesterday was a new SpaRitual collection, called simply "Truth" (not to be confused with the Zoya collection of the same name.)  I love SpaRitual polishes (made by the same company as Orly) - the formula is great and the wear is amazing, almost as good as Essie.  Their cremes are amazing and this collection is all cremes :) 

L-R: Circle of Life (oooh! pretty!), Face Of Destiny, Enlightened Soul, Eye Of the Beholder, Knowledge Is Power, and Reveal Yourself.  The minis are pretty good - 5 mL isn't a bad size, and for some reason my beauty supply stocks more mini SRs than it does full-size :-/  so I make do with them. 

This is an incomplete post for two reasons: one, I do not have pics of the rest of my haul, and two, I did not manage to swatch all of these SpaRituals :-/  I did get pics of Reveal Yourself; however, when I put it on I thought it looked so similar to a bunch of light pinks I already own that I had to do a comparison.  And then the sun went down :(  So this is all I have.

SpaRitual Reveal Yourself (indoors).  A light baby pink creme, cool-toned and leaning blue.

Outdoors.  It's pretty and I like it, but other than neons, opaque baby pinks like this are my favorite kind of pinks :)  Application was awesome - SpaRituals apply really well, and this was very opaque.  This is two coats here - one was a tad streaky, and two smoothed everything out.  It may look a bit brushstrokey, but the marks disappear once dry.  Drying time is better than average, I'd say - my SR hand was dry a few minutes before my comp hand.

It looks soooo similar to others I own (or so I thought).  The first one that came to mind was OPI's Mod About You, but I think I gave this away to my sister (what is wrong with me...?) so I didn't have that one on hand to swatch (I always end up giving away polishes that I can easily obtain... I'll have to swap for this one or pick it up next time I'm at the beauty supply... I actually meant to pick it up when I hauled yesterday, but forgot..)

So these are the ones I used for the comparison:

L-R: Maybelline Bubble Pink, Color Club Vintage Couture, China Glaze Something Sweet, SR Reveal Yourself and NYC 108A (I got this in the US a looooong time ago - I dunno if it's even still available.  I know that's lame.  Sorry.)

Pinky to thumb: (I know they're reversed in order from the pic above but just ignore that - I wasn't gonna retake the pic :p) NYC 108A, SR Reveal Yourself, ChG Something Sweet, CC Vintage Couture and Maybelline Bubble Pink.  The NYC isn't even close - too dark.  Something Sweet is paler and more muted, and Bubble Pink is more yellow-toned, and both these two and Vintage Couture are all warmer in tone than RY - RY is the coolest out of the lot.  Overall I'd have to say Vintage Couture is pretty close, although they're not exact dupes.  And the SpaRitual had the best application and wear out of all of them :)  I've had it on for more than 24 hours and there's no chips or visible tipwear at all.

Sorry I don't have Mod About You to compare...  I promise I will do swatches of the rest of these, though.  I really want to.  Even if you just get crappy-lit, not-the-most-accurate indoor photos (I need an Ott light... soon... badly).  I took nail wheel swatches.  Wanna see my nail wheel swatches?  Yeah, I thought not  :p

So I'll be back later with more of these.  Promise.

Another Spam Post

I told you I had a ton of backed-up NOTDs to post, so I'm getting it over with.  I hope you don't mind.  I'd just really like to get caught up to date with these so I can start just posting my NOTD almost every day...  yeah, good luck with that, Lex...

Anywho, these are sort of in order from oldest to most recent...

This is Hard Candy Frigid.  Droool, old Hard Candy.... please excuse the hideous tipwear.  This polish was pretty sheer, but buildable... I think I used four coats here though.

A konad I did with plate m57, Color Club Warhol and L'Oreal French Tip White.  Tacky, but I kind of loved it...

Barielle Elle's Spell over Essie Limited Addiciton.

Indoor shot.  Look at those flakies!

The gold flakies in this flash to green at certain angles.  I loved this.  It's absolutely gorgeous.  Wish Barielle was more widely available here :(

Another konad - fauxnad actually - using the L'Oreal French Tip White and Illamasqua Jo'mina.  Jo'mina isn't as blue-toned as it looks here - it's acutally much warmer.

Claire's Venomous.  I couldn't really get a decent picture of it, but this one shows most of its tones.  I didn't really find it to be as close of a dupe for Orly Space Cadet as I'd read.... the base in this is much more green. 

This was something I'd lemmed for a long time, but I was kind of disappointed in when I finally tried it on: OPI Sand-erella.  This is sort of HTF, so I feel bad saying it disappointed me... but I dunno, it just looked frosty under most lights.  I didn't really get too much of the holo sparkle you see in the bottle in the 2nd pic.

This is Zoya Erika.  This polish is really pretty, but I don't know how crazy I am about this colour on me - what do you think?

Milani Hi-Def.  This is really pretty, and my favorite of this line after Cyberspace (the blue one) - it's sort of a pea green colour, and very holo.  I didn't use a topcoat here, as not to diminish the holo.  Sorry about the blurry 2nd pic, btw, but the way my thumb looks in the first pic is how this polish looks 99% of the time :)

Last, we have Claire's Bright Skies.

Blue.  Jelly.  Holo glitter.

Do I really have to tell you what I think of this polish?  I think you can figure it out :)

Blurry to show the glittah!

Alright, that's all for now, I guess... I had another picture of Bright Skies, but Blogger isn't letting me upload it, and I just sat here for 10 minutes trying... so now I'm all bad-tempered.  Also, I've been sick for the past two days and haven't eaten ANYTHING - literally, nothing.  And I like food.  A lot :(  So I'm going to go try and eat a meal.  Wish me luck!  If Blogger stops being poopy I'll edit that pic in later.

Oh yes, my NOTD is Revlon Perplex, and I am in LURVE.  Whyyyyyy can't we get this in Canada??  Pics of this to come :)

CRACK

Hello.  I know, one post every two weeks is ballz.  I fail for life :( 

Also, do you guys think I should change my blog design?  I just kind of went with the default back when I set this thing up, aside from my banner, and never really gave it another thought...  I'm so challenged when it comes to this stuff though, sadly.  Like, I would love to put a picture of my own up as my banner, but I have no idea how... maybe Blogger makes it easy for you?  I haven't actually checked :p  Wow, I sound like a complete idiot... why am I writing this here anyway....?

Oh, oh, oh - guess what I got???

Yay!  The OPI Katy Perry collection!  L-R: Black Shatter, Teenage Dream, Last Friday Night, Not Like the Movies, and The One That Got Away.  I was despairing at first, cuz these were all sold out on Transdesign, but then I found them at a local salon!  The first salon I went to had a full display, so I bought two Black Shatters, but then as I was shopping throughout the day I noticed more and more displays with empty slots.  By the end of the day, every KP display I passed had empty BS slots, and I noticed Teenage Dream was disappearing fast, too.  So I had a minor freak-out and then proceeded to motor my way around the huge mall I was in looking for TD, Not Like the Movies and Last Friday Night.  Not only did I find one, I found a salon that had a Buy 3 Get 1 Free deal - and they let me use it on the KPs! :) So I got The One That Got Away as well - wasn't really lemming it, but I figured why not.  I don't want the name to become annoyingly ironic.

Anyway, as you can guess, I'm obsessed with Black Shatter and have been putting it overtop of everything lately.  Here's a couple of my BS manis (heh) - I haven't photographed them all because we just plain haz no sun right now, not to mention it's freakin cold outside, but I did get pics of a few:

This is the first mani I did with BS - I wanted maximum impact, so I skittled neons.  Base, thumb to pinky: Color Club Psychedelic Scene, Misa A Sunny Smile Makes Me Go Wild, Color Club Limelight, Misa Lather Rinse Repeat, Color Club Bizerk Turq.

I actually like how my right hand turned out a lot better, for once.  The base polishes are all the same as above, except I swapped out Psychedelic Scene for Illamasqua Jo'mina on my index finger.  People were pretty amazed by this - I got lots of compliments from random people :)

The trick to Black Shatter is to apply one coat, as thickly and in as few strokes as you can.  The thinner you apply it, the smaller the cracks will be - I like the wider cracks that one thick coat gives you.  Try not to overlap your brushstrokes.  I don't think I quite have the hang of it yet...

Here it is overtop of Hard Candy Lava, with some SH Hidden Treasure added for extra lava-y-ness (yes, I really just said that).  I didn't really like the way this came out, though - it looks pretty here, but the HT tinted the base and make it look orange, and under the black it just looked Halloweeny to me in most lights.

And finally, what I have on today: Black Crack (I mean Shatter, whatever) overtop of Anna Sui 080.

Let me just talk for a second about Anna Sui 080:

She is absolutely gorgeous.  These are sad, crappy, really horrible indoor photos taken at night inside my house with dim energy-saving light bulbs, so they don't even begin to show how pretty this is.  It's larger holo and iridescent hex glitter with tiny pink glitter sprinkled throughout.  It's fantastic.  It's probably my favorite AS polish that I own.  It's one of my favorite glitter polishes, period (and we know what a glitter hoor I am!)  As soon as I put this on, I decided I needed a backup.  Pretty, pretty things like this always get discontinued   :(

Anyway, I almost didn't want to ruin it with Black Shatter (no one wants to be BS'd over, heh...heh... 'kay, I'll stop), but I did anyway and I like the way it came out:

It still sparkles beneath the cracks, and I really like the way my thumb turned out.

Did manage to get one, sort-of-lit picture.  But yeah, I like it.  I think I'm going to try it over either Color Club Magic Attraction or Blue Light next :)

I have a metric crapload of NOTDs to post, so I'll be doing that next.  I'm waiting on my Zoyas in the mail still (the Order Status still says Shipping, and there's no tracking number yet), and I ordered a bunch of Nubars from evilbay (most of which are duochromes! Squees!) - I can't wait for those! :D  I'm waiting to make a TD order until the China Glaze Crackle Glaze collection comes out (yes, more crack in multiple colours.  You can surmise what I think of those :p), which is making me extremely nervous - they better still have Anchors Away fully stocked by the time that happens!

Anyway, 'tsall for now!  Bye :)

I Can't Sleep.... Let's Look At Some Recent NOTD Pics!

 So I really suck at keeping promises.... yeah.... you're probably so sick of hearing me apologize too.  Whatever.  On with the blog.

First of all, let me tell you a story.... Lex isn't very good at staying awake lately.  Which is weird - I have had chronic insomnia since I was a little kid.  I'm used to staying awake whether I want to or not - usually way past the point that I want to.  But these days, I come home, blather on to my bf and dork about on the computer for awhile, make dinner, and then I can barely make it through a DVD episode of Lost before my eyes are starting to close on me....  It's really frustrating.  So tonight, Saturday night, I decided to chug a can of Red Bull in order to not fall asleep in front of my friends during the hockey game.  Hence, this post at 5 in the morning.  And this is after Falling Behind. It's actually 6 in the morning  :(  I love my Red Bull, and it's helped me through some tough times, but lately the stuff has such an adverse, hateful effect on me...  Anyway, the end....  Because of this, I can't sleep and you get this cracked-out-sounding post!  High fives!

In other news, I bought another Helmer, and am in the midst of reorganizing my stash.... trying to figure out what goes in what drawer and what deserves its own drawer and all that....  I thought it'd be more fun, and, I mean, it is kinda fun, but it is kinda just like cleaning.... I need to massively de-dupe, I'm realizing as well  :-/

In other other news, I found all the holiday China Glazes except for... well, like half of them.  My Sally's is ballz.  I still need Peace On Earth, Little Drummer Boy, Frosty, Mommy Kissing Santa and those two golds...  Problem is, no one place has all of them in stock  :(  At least I got my greedy mitts on Party Hearty.  We all know that's the important one :)

So anyway... who wants to look through some old NOTD pics?  yaaay!  Well, they're actually pretty recent...

My sloppy execution of the candy corn mani.  Did this sometime during the week of Halloween....  I used....

An old Sally Hansen Halloween exclusive from a few years back, Orange Pumpkin.  Yes, the point of me taking the pic like that was so I didn't have to type that, but let's move on....  Maybe it was just last year's release, I'm not really sure.  Anyway, I used the yellow and white SH Insta-Dris for the rest (Lightning, and... I don't remember...) Also, I freehanded the lines, because I couldn't find any tip guides.  Or tape.  Don't hate.

Another Halloween mani.  This is Sephora By OPI If You've Got It, Haunt It, with Color Club Tangerine Scream on the ring finger.  IYGIHI was one of the Halloween-exclusive $OPIs, along with Kitty Loves Black and that glow-in-the-dark white, and my fave of the three by far.  It's a black glitter in a base of grey microglitter, and there's some blue and pink in there too.  Gorgeous and unique in my stash.  I can't find Nicole Pitch-Black Glimmer anywhere, and this fulfilled that lemming nicely.

This is a Kiko Cosmetics #270 overtop of $OPI Kitty Loves Black, which was a black with pearly blue microshimmer.  Kiko 270 I've shown on top of $OPI Read My Palm before, but it shows up much better on top of a darker colour like this.  The paillette glitter reflects different colours at different angles - purple, blue, teal and green.  These photos are blurred but you can see some of the colours of the glitter...

It is really quite stunning IRL... very Across The Universe-ish.  I love this polish.  I got it in a swap from Italy - I wonder if there's anything similar on this side of the pond...

This was my anniversary mani, for my 3-year with the BF...

Cheesy, yes, but that's what I was going for :)

I used (what else) OPI Happy Anniversary! and layered various heart polishes overtop.  I actually kind of went crazy with the heart polishes.  I pulled out every one I own and started slopping them on, flinging hearts this way and that....  There's a couple of Nicole ones (Love Your Life, Have A Heart, Honey-dew You Love Me, Spring Romance) a Claire's one (Love Struck), some random no-name dollar store ones...  Yeah.  It doesn't look the greatest, I'm aware - the repeated application of the thick heart polishes turned the finish of Happy Anniversary all gungey and gross-looking.... but it served its purpose.  Boyfriend liked it :)

And last, but not least....  I have a random no-name dollar store polish for you!! (don't you hate those? :p)  I've been combing Asian dollar stores recently.  Being in Vancouver, I walk past a ton of them all the time, and decided to start exploring some.  Well, look how glad I am that I did!

I found this gorgeous grey holo polish in one such store.  It was $2, has no name and comes in a fugly-ass twisty bottle.  But look how prettyyyyyy! *_*

I love me some holo.  And this has got good holo :)  I also picked up kind of a rusty-reddish looking one that also looks kind of holo, so hopefully that one'll turn out to be as nice as this one!  I scored a bunch of stuff at that store and stores like this recently, and I'm going to have an upcoming post dedicated to my dollar store finds. Most of them are random Hong Kong and Korean brand polishes, they're cheap, and they're all kinds of awesome :)  I'll also include where I found them all, in case anyone's in Vancouver.  (And in case you're interested, I found this particular one at that Daiso-type dollar store in Tinseltown by Stadium Station  :)  Or what used to be Tinseltown.  I don't know if it's still called Tinseltown.  But you guys know where I mean, right?  I'm sure it'd probably be at Daiso, too, since this place seemed to have pretty much the same stock as them...)

Well, I have run out of pics for you right now.  But do not fret - I shall return with more stuff I promised I'd do.  Seriously.  I will.

(No, I'm still not tired yet.  FML  :p)