My Superbowl-Themed Nails

I don't like the Giants and I don't like the Patriots. But both teams have the same colours - red, blue and white - so I couldn't miss either way :). I don't even really like football, tbh - I like it more than baseball, which isn't saying much - but the game turned out to be way more exciting than I anticipated. I actually watched it. Now that's saying something :p

Sorry I haven't posted in forever. I'm aware of how lame this is. My computer still is having problems though and, well, YOU try blogging from your phone. It doesn't work very well. I'm using the Blogger app right now, because the BlogPress app - that I paid for :( - isn't letting me publish anything. It says "it seems like your network is not ready for posting.". Wtf. Why the hell not?

I hate this Blogger app. It sucks. I can't even post a picture in the middle of my post - it appears at the end. How shite is that?!? Truthfully I don't even know if this will publish. But you c here for nails, not bitching and moaning, so here it is.

The red nail is Zoya Sooki topped with OPI Crown Me Already. The blue is Essie Mesmerize topped with the same OPI, and the white nails are Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Whirlwind White topped with LA Girls Glitter Addict Animate and Jostle.

Hope you had a happy Superbowl weekend!

My Essie and Orly Collection

Hello all and happy weekend! As usual I have a whole backlog of stuff that I need to show you, but I'm way behind, so I'm just gonna start with this  :p

I was organizing my polishes into my new Melmer (yay for 50% off Michael's sales!) and I was deciding which three brands were going to get a drawer dedicated to them (My Helmers and Melmers are organized by brand, and most of my brands - except for OPI, China Glaze and Color Club - share drawers).  I decided that Orly, Essie and Zoya - three more of my favorite brands - were the lucky winners of a drawer of their own :)

So I decided that I'd show you my collections of two of these brands, Essie and Orly - I haven't got around to Zoyas yet. 

Here's my Essie drawer:

Okay, I'm going to list them all - you ready?
Back row, L-R: Blanc, Naughty or Nice, Jackie Oh My!, Ballet Slippers, Mademoiselle, Fiji, Cool-lots, the mini is Pop Art Pink.
Row 2: Knockout Pout, Pink Parka, Watermelon, Jag-U-Are, Really Red, After Sex (heh..), mini is Red Nouveau.
Row 3: Van D'Go, Haute As Hello, Tart Deco, The Cove Copper.
Row 4: Funky Limelight (my favorite neon polish of all time), Pretty Edgy, Sew Psyched, Turquoise and Caicos, Mint Candy Apple.
Row 5: Borrowed and Blue, Lapis of Luxury, Mesmerize, Aruba Blue, Midnight Cami.
Row 6: Nice Is Nice, Lilacism, Demure Vixen, Splash Of Grenadine.
Row 7: Wicked, Decadent Diva, Sole Mate, Sexy Divide, It's Genius!
Row 8: Playa Del Platinum, Main Squeeze, Steel-ing The Scene.

I just kind of took a pic of the whole drawer.  You might want to click on it to see better.  This was before I figured out that you probably can't see it too well in a photo like this  :-/  Fail.

Untrieds:

L-R: Limited Addiction, French Affair, Beach Bum Blu (why did I get this just cuz it was on sale? It looks frosty and horrible), Coat Azure, Dive Bar, Going Incognito, Merino Cool and Smokin Hot.  I know, I know, supposedly my untrieds are some of the best ones :-/

I love Essies.  For a fairly pricey mid-range polish, I do have a lot of them, and this is mainly for one reason: wear.  I've said this before and I'll say it again: Essies wear like iron on me (and a lot of other people).  The formula is usually pretty good, if inconsistant - it can be thin or thick or streaky at times, but no matter what the formula and application is like, an Essie polish can always be trusted to last the longest on my nails without chips out of all my brands of polish.  And I probably have about 50 brands in total :O  On average, an Essie will last for three days with no chips and the smallest amount of tipwear of any brand.  They can be trusted to look great no matter what I'm doing with my hands, and hence, they are one of my favorite brands :)  I just wish they'd continue to make awesome colours like Funky Limelight (they have a lot of awesome neons, actually) and Turquoise and Caicos - most of Essie's collections consist of neutral pinks and sheers >:p

Okay, and now my new Orly Drawer-ly:

L-R: Red Carpet, Ruby Passion, Orange Punch, Crush On You, Secret Admirer, Opal Hope, Passion Fruit, Swizzle Stick.

I suck so bad, I cut off Green With Envy :( I don't have another photo, sorry.  Trust me, it's there on the left. L-R: sliver of Green With Envy, Bailamos, Wandering Vine, Enchanted Forest, Royal Navy, La Playa, Star Of Bombay.

L-R: Charged Up, Fantasea, Happily Ever After, Glam.

L-R: Pixie Dust, Mirror Mirror, Love Each Other, Fifty-Four, Goth.

L-R: Rage, Luxe, Glitz, Flagstone Rush.

I loved the Sweet collection.  L-R: Pixy Stix, Cotton Candy, Lemonade, Gumdrop, Snowcone, Lollipop.

L-R: Glitz & Glisten, Naughty Or Nice, Meet Me Under The Mistletoe, Winter Wonderland.

My favorite collection of last year :) L-R: Space Cadet, Lunar Eclipse, Hailey's Comet, Out Of This World, It's Not Rocket Science, Galaxy Girl.

And minis, L-R: Ruby, Last Dance, On The List, Limelite, Starry-Eyed, Sheer Nude, Velvet Rope.

And that's my Orly collection :)  Orlys are another favorite brand of mine, mainly due to the great collections they release.  Sometimes they're not too unique, but I thought they really outdid themselves last year - the Cosmix FX collection was unbelievably awesome, jacked-up price and all.  Rage and Luxe are two of the best metallic foils I own, and the Sweet collection was so much fun to wear - I loved every shade.  Also, I really like Orly's bottle, for a round bottle.  It feels heavy and sturdy, and I looove the rubber grip bottle top :)

Most of the time I organize by colour within brand, but sometimes I just can't bear to split collections up - hence the random organization.  I just think sometimes collections look nicer all together, and some polishes I remember primarily by what collection they were part of.  And the ones I don't, I organize by colour :)  Get it?  No?

Sid, as always, decided to interfere.

Okay, that's it - I have to go watch our President's Trophy-winning hockey team now :D  Be back later!

Some China Glazes, Essies, Nicoles and More ~or~ Ten Posts Crammed Into One Because I Don't Post Frequently Enough

*EDIT*: WHYYY the EFF is Blogger not posting my photos?!???  I just uploaded the photos three times - I promise they're there, if you click on them it will take you to the pic, but blogger is not showing them in the post for some reason.  It's making me want to pull my hair out,.  I've just spent fifteen minutes trying to fix this, but blogger just won't show them, and I have to go to bed now, so I'm hoping this will just fix itself :( :(  stuff like this makes me want to quit blogging :(

*EDIT #2*: Okay, I think I got it to work.... I just have to paste the photos in HTML form... which I don't know crap about, so if it's all wonky, blame blogger :p

*EDIT #3*: Okay, that didn't work AT ALL.  I so fail at HTML.

*EDIT #4*: Now blogger is going to delete this post altogether?? I had it published, now it's back in my drafts?  WTH?

*EDIT #5*: Yeah.... it is now Sunday evening.  Blogger seems to mysteriously be working again, although it decided to take random photos I was trying to publish earlier and make them tiny little pixels that you can click on to go to a full-size pic.  Which is what it was doing before with all my pics.  Sigh.  I could delete all these edits, but they're entertaining.  At least they will be for me to read later  :p


Good Saturday Evening, all!

Yes, I know this should really be broken up into seperate posts about each colour to maintain everyone's constantly waning interest, but I would actually have to post on a semi-regular basis to do that  :p  Alright, no excuses today - let's just delve right into it, shall we?  Let's!

Forgive my brutal cuticles in all of these, please, by the way.  Winter no likey me hands :(

First off, some crack - China Glaze Medallion topped with Lightning Bolt and Sally Hansen Hidden Treasure.  Not too sure about how this came out...

China Glaze Kaleidoscope Him Out.  Okay, "love" is not a strong enough word for how I feel about this polish.  It's my second favorite blue holo behind DS Glamour.  I lemmed this for soooo long, and finally caved and bought it on ebay - remember I told you I got a good deal on it because no one bid on it due to the fact the seller couldn't spell "kaleidoscope"?  It was listed as "China Glaze hom Out"  XD

Boring old Essie Ballet Slippers.  This is my go to Boring Office-Appropriate Neutral, and has been for some years now.  I can't stand wearing it sheer, though - this is four coats here.

SpaRitual Face Of Destiny.  From the Truth collection.  I don't like this on me at all.  Ugly gramma-ish apricot barf.  Making matters worse: ew, oily skin!  Sorry.  Darn that China Glaze Peppermint cuticle oil!

SpaRitual Eye Of The Beholder.  Again, pardon shiny cutes.  I only have one of the SR Truth collection left to swatch - when I finally get around to it, I'll post them all together.  This colour is okay, a chartreuse-y lime creme, but it doesn't seem horribly unique or exciting to me, although I can't think of a dupe I own...

China Glaze First Mate.  Another one I loved.  Applied great, I loved the shade on me, again I don't know about the uniqeness, but it's a blue so I don't care :)  I'll happily own every blue out there regardless of similarity :)  Okay, that's an exaggeration.  Either way, I loved this on me....

So whyyy did I have to ruin it with this childlike attempt at a gradient?  Seriously.  I love White Cap and everything, it's very gorgeous, but this looks like a smudgy mess.  Like a four-year-old did it.  I should have just left it alone or did a full top coat of White Cap.  I love WC, by the way, and plan on trying it over a lot more things.

My St. Patty's Day mani!  This was China Glaze Emerald Sparkle topped with one coat each of China Glaze Sour Apple and Sinful Green Ocean.  It's a hot green mess, but all I was going for was sparkly and green, so it sufficed :)  God was it horrible to get off, though.  I don't know what it is about the foil method and green polishes, but it all just goes directly underneath my nails when I try to remove it and makes me look like I have dirty green gunk under my nails for days.  Hawt.

Essie Borrowed and Blue, from their Spring 2011 Wedding collection.  Forgive the chips.  Very, very pale blue, paler than CC Take Me To Your Chateau, maybe a touch less pale than Hard Candy Sky?  I'll have to compare.  Application was a tad more annoying than usual, as it the norm with these super-pale cremes - a bit streaky.

Nicole Iceburg Lotus.  Very pretty foil-y teal shimmer with very noticeable pink flash that I could not capture no matter what I did! :(  Trust me when I say it's there, though!  It's totally visible on the nail.  Scrangie was right, though - this is everything I wanted OPI Austin-tacious Turquoise to be :)  Too bad it's in that... bottle...

Aaargh - Nicole, why do you have to be so frigging awesome lately?!  I can't take another one of your horrible, storage-disrupting, Helmer-drawer-fuglifying bottles!  But look what they're packing inside these horrible hideous bottles!  This is I'm A Pool For Love.  I don't get the name (pool?  It's a blackened glitter :p) but yes, it's gorgeous.  A blackened duochrome glitter that's deep blue and purple most of the time, but goes from purple to gold at extreme angles.  Nicole rocks blackened glitters.  Actually Nicole's been rocking everything lately.  I got a couple more the other day besides these two - Nicole's Nickel (another black glitter!  Not blackened, but acutally black, like the one they had at Christmas! Squee!) and Brilliant Idea (a lime green glitter), and there was a holo glitter and a blue with pink flash I was eyeballing as well... but I'll have to wait until Nicoles go on sale for $6 again at Shopper's Drug Mart, which is when I got these - $11 is just waaaay to much for me to justify spending on such an ugly bottle.

I just decided to go count my Nicoles, on a whim....I own FOURTY-SEVEN freakin Nicoles, people.  47!!!  47 of those heinous freaking things, in my house, in my possession...*shudder*... Yeah... Maybe I won't go buy those other ones when they go on sale  :p  ("But," the voice in my head protests, "you love every single one of those Nicole colours...")

Blah.  I'm still not even remotely caught up on posting pics.  Also, I just got the China Glaze Island Escape collection the other day - swatches of those coming up soon!  Plus, ten more random spam posts like this, probably  :p

See you soon!  I should probably go to bed   :p  For some reason I am really craving a pepperoni stick.  Wish I had some of those.

Oh, oh, PS:  I gave my niece (the BF's best friend's daughter - got that? so not really my niece but you get it)a bottle of ChG Black Mesh, and she posted a pic of her crack mani on Facebook saying how much she loves it :D  And all her friends posted comments saying, "Omg, I love it, where did you find it, I can't find it anywhere" etc. etc., since Black Shatter's been sold out around here since the day it came out.  And my niece is all, "Oh, my aunt got it for me, I'll have to ask her.."  HAHA! :D  Who's the best aunt in the world?!??  :D  I love being the nail polish fairy to a fourteen-year old! :D

Massively Hugely Enormously Massive Haul Post

Okay, so this started out as just a post of what I've hauled this past week, but then I thought, what the hell - I'm going to do a post of every single thing I've bought this year so far.  Wanna stop reading?  I don't blame you :p

I don't know if I should do most recent to oldest, or....?  I guess I'll do it from oldest to most recent.  Keep in mind, those of you thinking I'm some spendaholic freak, that this is for this entire year so far.  Some of these are swaps, as well.  Oh, I'm just going to stop making excuses for myself - you know you're all just as bad as I am ;p

Ready?  Grab some chips and turn the TV to something boring :)

Sephora by OPI Read My Palm and Just A Little Dangerous.  Two I'd been lemming for a while - I only had a mini of RMP.

From Forever 21, Love & Beauty scented polishes in Peppermint and Kiwi, and a regular polish in Lime.  These do smell, although not very good - the scent reminds me of those scented fat felt pens we had when we were kids.

Boring stuff - Barielle Camo and Mani Extender, found at Winner's for $5 each.  After I bought these, I walked into Eterna Skin Care on Robson and saw Camo for $18!  D:

But oooh, this is exciting - the Dare To Wear Disco Tech collection!  Hee.  I like glitter.  I just noticed that my older polishes from this brand are spelled "Dare 2 Wear".  Huh.

See?  See?  I told you!  This is Hunter Green x2, Billie Purple Haze (awesome neon purple with subtle shimmer, and only a buck!) and some little butterfly decals I found - which are sitting on top of a Hello Kitty fauxnad plate :)

Aren't these adorable?  I got these so I could copy this mani that I saw on Chloe's Nails.  It's so simple, but so adorable - one of my favorite manis of all time :)

Anna Sui 101, 103 and 011.  011 has flakies!

Some old discontinued China Glazes.  L-R: Stone Age, Sunset Glow, Channelesque, FYI and Drama Queen.

More old discontinued China Glazes.  L-R: Subtle, Beatnik, another Channelesque ;p

Now, we move on to our OPI part of the presentation:

OPI Texas collection. L-R: Y'all Come Back Now Ya Hear?, Big Hair..Big Nails, Guy Meets Gal-veston, That's Hot! Pink, Do You Think I'm Tex-y?, Houston We Have A Purple, Austin-tacious Turquoise and You Don't Mess With OPI!  These names get worse with every collection :p

More (yes, more) random OPIs - Skinny Dip'N In Lake Michg'n, Tickle My France-y, Barefoot In Barcelona, Over the Taupe (I needed neutrals, lol), Just Groovy and Simply Smashing.

And dusty finds!  Awesome dusty finds!  L-R:  Mad As A Hatter, Sapphire In The Snow, Smitten With Mittens, Merry Midnight.  I already own all these, but backups, swaps, you know how it goes... :)

And that concludes our OPI portion of the evening, now how about some Daiso finds?

OMGHOLOsqueeeeeeeee!  <--- iz what I did when I found these in the store.  These are the "Rainbow" line of polishes, they are pretty holo, and they are fantastic!  The three in the middle look like they're the same, but they're actually three seperate colours.  But aren't these just the FUGliest bottles you've ever seen?  Daiso has some seriously ugly bottles, man.

Like check THIS out.  These are all very pretty - a chunky silver and holo hex glitter, iridescent hex glitter, a blue that looks really frosty and horrible here but it's actually very silvery and pretty, and the one on the end is called Aurora Lights and it's basically an exact dupe of CND Crimson Sparkle.  But those first two bottles are seriously some of the most ridiculous-looking things I've ever seen in my life...

SEE?!?  Like, seriously?  What the hell is that thing?  A nail polish bottle or the frickin Empire State Building?  I think the folks at the Winmax must've just done this for a laugh  :p

And look at this!

Aren't these cool?  Anyone know how to read Japanese?  :D  The pictures are SO awesome though.  I'm going to pick a couple of pages and try to scan them like Wan does with Nail Up! magazine over at I Love Nail Polish - a fellow Vancouver blogger, btw :)  And that concludes my Daiso finds!  Back to our regularly scheduled programming.

American Apparel polishes in (L-R): African Violet, Cameo Blue, Army Jacket and MacArthur Park.  Now I just need Passport Blue, Dynasty, Echo and a couple more  :p

Some randoms. L-R:  Nox Twilight Disco Darling and Citrus, unnamed LA Colors yellow gold, Claire's Poison Apple and Zoya Jade.

Wet N Wild Teal Of Fortune and Blue Wants To Be A Millionaire?  TOF looks like another Charla dupe, and BWTBAM looks similar to the Justin Beiber Nicole polish Me + Blue, although they're not dupes.

China Glaze mood polishes that - blast it all - have no labels!! :(  Anyone have any idea what these might be?  The one on the left is baby blue with a pinky-gold flash, and the one on the right is slightly darker with blue glitter.

CND Effects - all for a swap :)  Aren't they pretty?  I love these, they're so fun to play with.

And some Essies - Coat Azure, Beach Bum Blu (frosty and horrible - I dunno why I bought it :-/) and French Affair.

And last, I know no one cares, but some non-nail-polish stuff that I got for cheap:

I got my makeup done by a Smashbox artist at SDM, and since I had a gift card I bought two products - the Halo powder and Peony cream cheek colour duo, and the MU artist ended up throwing in all this stuff for free!  She threw in a full-size lipgloss, lip pencil and concealer for free, as well as a travel-size mascara and a billion other little samples.  I was blown away!  Usually they're just trying to get you to spend money and even when you do, make you feel like you're not spending enough, but she was extremely generous!  Thanks Smashbox!  Oh, and the In Bloom eyeshadow palette I bought at Sephora a few weeks back - happened to grab the last one :)

I started composing this post about a week and a half ago, so I've bought a couple of things since then.  I'll take some photos and get an updated haul post up as soon as I can :)  I've been working lots lately, which I really need.

Crappy Monday :)