Wet N Wild Megalast Lipsticks

First, to preface, I'm sorry this has taken so long to come out. I've been working on it for WEEKS (months actually) but I'm just now posting it because I kept having to retake pictures and I lost my peach one. =/ So no pics for that one.

I wanted to hurry and get this out because these are great little numbers for only $1.99 so they'd make great stocking stuffers!!

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If you had asked me a year ago, I would have said I don't like lipstick. I own about three, and that's because I've purged the rest (to my mother - she loves lipstick and she's always happy to get free lipsticks, Hi Mom!!). Anyway recently I've made a love connection with lipstick. And Wet N Wild makeup.

Wet N Wild Megalast Lipsticks are a deal at $1.99 each! They have a great color selection, and at that price, I just kept picking up more as I kept seeing blog posts and makeup looks using these great little lippies!

Karen

Happy 12-12-12. The last repeating numbers day EVER. Does that make you a little sad? Even though this repeating number really means nothing, it's fun and I always look forward to it once I know it's coming up!

Anyway, on to the polish!

Shimmer Karen is a gorgeous mix of pinks, purples, and blue with hints of gold and green. This polish truly has everything and it meshes beautifully.

Shimmer Karen (1 coat) over Orly You're Blushing

Update

Hello lovelies.

I'm so sorry I've been MIA. Things have been really busy at work and we're trying to get our old home ready to sell and buy a new one (in different states) and it's been a little overwhelming.

Since I've moved to a colder climate, the dry air is wreaking havoc on my hands and for those of you who know a little more about me, I'm in the medical field so I'm washing my hands or using alcohol based foam every 15-20 minutes so my hands and nails are a HOT MESS. I've had nekkid nails for weeks. Eek!

These are all poor excuses for being a bad blogger, and I wanted to let ya'll know I'm still here and I <3 ll.="ll." p="p" ya="ya">
I've also developed some apprehension toward my blog due to some unkind comments on here and it started making me feel bad about myself. I know I don't have amazing nails like the big known bloggers, and lately I've been getting down on myself and my blog so I haven't been going near my computer lately.

In the meantime I'm going to work on editing some photos/posts I have squirreled away for such times and hopefully get back to business!

Hope all is well with each and every one of you!

Giveaway winner!

Happy belated Turkey day! I was on the road all of yesterday and am wide awake now at 2:30. There is something wrong with me.

Anyway.

Congratulations to Melissa E. or winning the giveaway! I've emailed and she has 48 hours to respond.

I've got some other goodies heading out ya'lls way so stay tuned!

L'Oreal Limited Edition Project Runway 2012 Electric Fantasie Polishes

Whew that was a serious title. And these are some serious polishes. In total, there are 8 adorning the limited edition Project Runway displays around local drugstores (someone else's local, I have no drugstores in town, boo!), two in each subtype. I've got all 8 to show you (I know, I have a sickness when it comes to buying nail polish). I tried to do some simple nail art with each combo.

This is a pic heavy post, so just be warned!

L'Oreal Project Runway Electric Fantasie 2012 Nail Polish

Nirvana...Matte?

Did you know Sinful Colors has some matte colors? I didn't realize it until recently when I came across a display and I was checking names to see if there was something new hiding in the midst of the polishes. I came across Sinful Colors Nirvana (Matte).

I LOVE matte polishes, rubber polishes, suede polishes, etc which I find ironic since I'm so in love with glitter.

Anyway.

I put this baby on right away and behold it's matte-ness!

Sinful Colors Nirvana (two coats)

Jennifer

I've got another fabulous Shimmer Polish for you! 

Shimmer Jennifer is a great true multicolor glitter with different sizes and shapes. This one truly has a little bit of everything and would look great over any color polish making it really versatile!

Shimmer Jennifer (1 coat) over Sinful Colors Morning Star

Tammy

Shimmer Tammy reminds me of Mardi Gras in a bottle with the heavy purple and gold. Two coats to reach opacity. Here I'm wearing it over a base coat of ... Elmer's glue and it worked great! It did eat three coats of top coat, but who's complaining? I'm not! Totally worth it and it sealed the glue basecoat so I didn't have any disintegration problems.

Shimmer Tammy (two coats plus topcoat)

You're Blushing

While working my way through neutral, work appropriate polishes while giving me a little fun with color, I picked out Orly You're Blushing.

Orly You're Blushing is a beautiful muted lilac rose creme that applied a little thick and chalky (like a pastel) but it evened out on the second coat. Opaque at two, but you may need a third if it pulls at the cuticles. Lovely color I like to think is work appropriate but at the same time feminine and a little fun.

Orly You're Blushing

Morning Star

I've decided I really like Sinful Colors nail polish. Debacle aside, they've got decent polish for pretty cheap, especially when  you can get them on sale, which they often are at local drugstores!

Sinful Colors Morning Star is a light blue polish with baby blue shimmer. Beautiful color. Formula is slightly thin so this was four coats for opacity. It reminds me of Sinful Colors Cinderella which wasn't a huge win for me. While the idea and color is gorgeous, it falls flat in the pink shimmer department. Sinful Colors Morning Star, however, has beautiful shimmer you can see in medium to strong light, and it glows from within. It IS thin, however, so layering over a similar base color or lots of time to do a manicure is best. Aside from the shimmer, the color is a gorgeous true baby blue that looks great without the shimmer in shade and low lighting and I think it would be gorgeous as the accent to a light/neutral outfit or a wedding manicure!

Sinful Colors Morning Star (four coats plus top coat)

Eternal Optimist

I've been picking through my neutral polishes and wearing a lot of pink lately. This one reminds me a lot of Revlon Cheers. I think this one is a little more light pink and less dusty. I'll have to do a comparison of them, because Revlon's formula was soooo much better. This one was thick and goopy and hard to get even. Three coats here plus topcoat. Not a fan, Essie.

Essie Eternal Optimist (three coats plus top coat)

Revlon Just Bitten Kissable Balm Stains

I am in love.

Revlon Just Bitten Kissable Balm Stains are the new love of my life. These little babies are amazing!! I've posted about them a few times on here, Twitter, IG, etc so if you follow me then you know that I'm quickly becoming obsessed with these. They are fantastic! I keep buying more just because I feel the need to own one of every color. They have great pigmentation, apply easily in a chubby stick form (compact for traveling!), and stain so you're left with color afterwards. This is going to be a long post, so let's get started!

**I am going to apologize in advance that I have used two of these quite a bit already so sorry for that! I had taken pics before those but I kept adding more balms so I did group pictures and, well, we've got some nubs. I am so sorry you have to look at those!

Revlon Just Bitten Kissable Balm Stains
 (top) Romantique, Darling, Crush, Honey, Smitten, Rendezvous (bottom)

Julep Maven American Beauty Nov 2012

Hiya beautiful! I've got the beauties from my Julep Maven November 2012 American Beauty Box. Wow, that's a mouthful! For those of you who don't know about Julep Maven, there will be more information below!

Nov 2012 American Beauty:
Julep Brit (matte suede finish)
Julep Amber (matte suede finish)
Julep Body Frosting in Pink Grapefruit
3 Julep One-Step Polish Remover Pads

Julep Maven American Beauty Nov 2012 box

October Empties

It's been a long time since I've done one of these! I just didn't have anything to post! My July post went down the drain since we moved and my husband, being ever so helpful, threw away my bag with all my empties! Who does that? Just because it was a plastic grocery bag filled with empty containers doesn't mean it was trash! Then August and September went by and I didn't finish anything as I started using some different makeup with the change in climate and weather. After being inspired again by Vita and her monthly empties post, I went back and found all the products I'd been working on to finish!

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Favorite Mani!

Happy Halloween!!

Hiya beautiful! Today's challenge is a fun one, which is nice since it's the last day of the challenge! It's been super fun and I've really enjoyed seeing everyone's interpretations of the prompts this entire month!! Thanks so IsaBella and Theo who helped bring this all together!

I decided to do something new and fun that I've been wanting to try and just didn't have time to put together until now. Sugar Skulls! I've seen these around and there was an awesome one on Instagram recently but I can't find it to reference now. =/

Halloween Nail Art: Sugar Skulls

LensVillage Dueba Crystal.i In Violet Review

Hiya beautiful! I've got something a little out of the mainstream nails and makeup that I normally talk about.

Recently I was able to try some lenses from LensVillage.com, an online e-tailer for circle lenses. They offer up to 400+ designs and colors. The products they carry are all Korea Food Drug Administration (FDA) certified brand lenses. They carry GEO Medical, EOS, Dueba, and Vassen.

I've been interested in circle lenses for awhile so I picked up a violet pair of lenses. I used to wear colored contacts and I loved how they changed my look and opened up my eyes! My small eyes seem smaller with dark brown eyes, so with a lighter color eye, it really makes a huge difference! While it's harder to wear light contacts on dark eyes (I'll never have baby blues or crystal green), if I choose a darker color, they look more natural. I can generally pull off violet, dark blue, dark green, and gray colors and not have them look super crazy!

The violet ones I am wearing below are the Dueba Crystal.i Violet. 

I did order the 14.2mm diameter, which is on the smaller end of what you can order. You can go all the way up to 16.5mm diameter to really enlarge your eyes. I've also heard the bigger they are, the more irritation you'll have at the beginning because your eye isn't used to having something that size on it (even if you wear regular contact lenses). Being that I have small eyes and I'm new to these, I went with the smallest options so they wouldn't be quite so dramatic. I'm so glad I did! I don't know if I could go larger in diameter or else I'd never get them in! 

Dueba Crystal.i Violet

A Rhyming Dictionary Swatches!!

I simply adore Morgan's creations and I recently got some in the mail and wanted to show them to you! I have four to show you today!

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Halloween Character

Hiya gorgeous! We're getting closer to the end, and today's prompt is much more open. It's favorite character.

I tried to think who was my favorite Halloween character, and I really didn't have one. So I perused the world wide web for inspiration, and I happened upon an awesome mani. While it didn't turn out as good as Simply Rins' Frankensteins, I like it!

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Favorite Character, Frankenstein Nail Art

Precious Metal

I grabbed this while out of town a few months ago (or so? I'm losing track of time!) and I thought it'd be a nice background for some bats stamping, which turned out to be a huge FAIL.

Sinful Colors Precious Metal is a gorgeous deep metallic blue that starts out sparse but is opaque in three coats. Sinful Color is notorious for putting already sold colors in "new" displays and marketing them as a seemingly new release. I found this in the Metallic Display, but I couldn't tell you certainty if this is a new release or not. All I know is, it's new to me and I found it with the metallic collection! =)

Sinful Colors Precious Metal (three coats with topcoat)

Heavy Metallilac

I've had this one in my stash for awhile and I'm just now pulling this baby out. I could kick myself. It's a gorgeous, gorgeous color. Thank you to Theo for sending it during our swap!!

Catrice Heavy Metallilac is a GORGEOUS medium purple shimmer duochrome that flashes light purple and pink in the light. Self-leveling, great formula. Two coats for perfect opacity. I tried to take pictures in different lighting so you can get a good idea of just how breathtaking this polish looks!

Catrice Heavy Metallilac (two coats with topcoat)

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Mummy

Hiya beautiful! It's no surprise what I'm doing today - halloween nail art!

Today's prompt is Mummy, which I've been dying to try since I saw the post by Simply Rins. (Have you noticed my slight obsession with her nail art?) I know these are likely the most popular mummy design around, but I saw her post first, which is why I'm crediting her on this.

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Mummy

Milani Eyeliners

I love Milani products. Lip gloss and nail polish specifically, but I'm trying to branch out more into their other cosmetics. I've heard a lot of good things about their Liquif'Eye eyeliner pencils, so whilst browsing one day, I grabbed one and a liquid eyeliner. I grabbed the basics, and black and a brown, because really, can you have too many black or brown eyeliners? I think not.

Some quick hand swatches before the individual stuff!

Milani Liquif'Eye Brown (left), Milani Infinite Liquid Liner in Everlast (right)

Color Club Halo Hues

Finally, right?

I had to wait for a sunny day to swatch these babies, and boy did they not disappoint! It ended up taking me two days to do them all since the sun kept dodging me, but I wanted to get these to you quickly!

Color Club Halo Hues (with flash)

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Ghost

Hiya gorgeous! I'm back again with another installment of Halloween nail art!

Today's challenge is Ghosts!! I've decided since most of my nail art so far has been more cartoonish and silly, I'm going to go with my strengths!! Hopefully you can recognize who it is on my nails.

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Ghost

Wicked Star & Haunted Heart

Hello gorgeous! Today I've got two of the new Revlon Limited Edition Top Speed polishes for Fall/Halloween 2012. There are more in the displays, but these two caught my attention. To be fair, I had passed these several times until my enabling husband mentioned them, I picked them up, and saw the beautiful shimmer under the indoor lighting, and then promptly bought them!

Revlon Wicked Star & Revlon Haunted Heart

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Bats

Hiya beautiful! I'm back again with another installment of missed nail art challenge posts! I'm hoping to get some serious work done this weekend with my nails. I have lots done but I think they're going to be huge posts instead of doing each polish separately...

Anywho. The missed challenge was on BATS. I tried some stamping earlier this week (when I would have been ON TIME) but that was a huge fail. I'll see if I can link the image at the bottom. I tried again but this time freehand since my stamping skillz are less than adequate!

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Bats

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Spider

Hiya gorgeous! I know I've been slacking with my nail art prompts, but I promise to try to be better. I've just been so busy with going out of town and work has been picking up so I find less and less time to do my nails, much less edit and post. =/ I'm going to see if I can do some damage this weekend and get some mani's edited and posted!

Today's prompt is spiders. I'm really scared of spiders. Small ones are fine, but if they're a dime or bigger, I totally freak. My husband thinks I'm silly but I don't care. If you've seen the movie Arachnophobia then you KNOW what I'm talking about!

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Spiders (no top coat)

Drawn To You

Sometimes I struggle with finding polishes that are work appropriate that are still fun to wear when I'm craving color. Being someone that has (cough) a lot (cough) of nail polish in not-so-business-appropriate colors, I find that I push the envelope sometimes without even realizing it. While I'm not a pink person, I find that pinks are more work appropriate than say, purple or blue, so I've found myself wearing them more often.

Finger Paints Drawn To You is a beautiful dusty mauve with light purple shimmer. The color of the shimmer is only visible in stronger light, but it gives a subtle shimmer to the polish that is noticeable in any light. Very feminine while (I think) still being work appropriate. Two coats for complete opaqueness. Great formula, easy to work with.

Finger Paints Drawn To You (two coats)

Julep Maven October Box - American Beauty

This is late and likely not news to some of you, but here is my October Julep Maven box!

Barielle Sweepstakes

Barielle is hosting an awesome Facebook Sweepstakes!

Vanessa

I love a good glitter don't you? Especially now that I can use the glue base coat method! Peel off base coats are blowing my mind!

Shimmer Vanessa is a gorgeous glitter that when  you look at it, it seems mainly silver, black, and red. once you apply it, you see so much more - greens, blues, golds, etc. Below is three coats on the middle and pinky, and one coat over Deborah Lippmann Footloose on my index, and one coat over Petites Night on my ring finger.

Shimmer Vanessa

Green Tea

I've decided I really like the brushes on Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure bottles. I know a lot of people don't, but I like the paddle brush, it helps me with application. 

Sally Hansen Green Tea is a gorgeous light mint green that was fully opaque in 2 coats. Lovely color, light enough it doesn't give me the notorious "lobster hands" green polishes tend to do. Very flattering considering it's a green polish.

Sally Hansen Green Tea

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Corn Candy

Weee! Another day of Halloween Nail Art. What more could you ask for? Candy, you say? Well of course!!

The prompt for the long lost missed nail art challenge was Corn Candy, which is one of my favorite candies during the entire year! Now my sweet tooth is waning a bit, and I can only eat a few at a time! I decided to do a three color gradient french type look.

Halloween Nail Art: Corn Candy

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Tombstone

Hi everyone, I'm back with more spooky nail art! Well, sort of spooky anyway. I apologize for missing the last challenge but things have been so busy time got away from me. Even scheduling ahead I couldn't keep up!

Tuesday is my anniversary with the husband, so we're going out of town for the weekend so I'm trying to get caught up this morning before he wakes up! I guess we'll see how far I get!

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Tombstone

Twilight

The other day I felt like some color on my lids but nothing bright, just a nice subdued eye. To me, soft grays and purples fit that bill well. I do like grays and purples on me, they look nice against my brown eyes, but really, they're flattering on everyone.

Airriann

Shimmer Airrain is a gorgeous dense pink, gold, and red glitter in a clear base. No trouble with formula, perfect consistency to place polish where it needed to be without running or pulling. No dabbing required, it spread on its own beautifully. Below is three coats with topcoat.

Shimmer Airriann

Tracy

Shimmer Tracy is a gorgeous multicolor glitter that includes mainly gold with some red, blue, green, and orange mixed in. It even contains some holo glitter as well as short bar glitter. This one is really special!

Shimmer Tracy

Navy Baby

You've already seen this polish in all its glory yesterday in my not so original spider web stamping mani. I mentioned I had some issues with this polish. I'm going to take you through the circus in my head while I'm photographing nail swatches, and it'll give you a good idea about this polish color.

What a beautiful morning! I'll take some pictures outside in the natural light so I can get an accurate color...

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Spider Web (Week 43: Spider Web)

Hiya beautiful. I'm back with another installment of the Halloween Nail Art Challenge. Today's prompt is Spider Web!

I had originally wanted to freehand a cool design in a holo polish on a dark base, but that was a major fail. So I opted to try my hand at stamping. I had a seriously bad day when I did this, but more on that tomorrow! You'll see how crazy I am! =)

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Spider Webs

Decorous

Awhile back I ordered some Rescue Beauty Lounge polishes and I was so excited to try them out! This post got lost in the shuffle of moving. If you're wondering why, it's because when we moved my main computer became my desktop and my laptop somehow decided to not recognize its battery, so I had tons of pictures on my laptop that I forgot about!

Rescue Beauty Lounge Decorous is a medium olive brown with subtle pink shimmer. And I mean subtle. I had such high hopes for this polish, but for me, it fell a little flat. I keep coming back to these pictures and I can't decide if I like it or not...

Rescue Beauty Lounge Decorous

The Mystic's Kiss & The Temptress' Kiss

I recently saw a (fairly) stocked L'Oreal Project Runway Limited Edition display and grabbed ALL the polishes (obviously!) but I also grabbed two lipsticks, a lipgloss, and an eyeshadow quad.

I wanted to show you the lipsticks today, and I'm working on swatches on everything else so in case something strikes your fancy,  you can go out and (hopefully) find it!

I picked up The Mystic's Kiss and The Temptress' Kiss.

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Blood

Hiya gorgeous! I'm back with the Halloween Nail Art Challenge. Today's theme is blood!

I had originally wanted to do a red splatter mani but I've seen it fairly recently to commemorate the Dexter season premier, so I wanted to do something a little different. I tried to do a sugar spun mani, but I couldn't get the stupid polish to thicken enough to really get the strips on the nail. So I just globbed it on the nail sporadically. =P

Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Blood

Cloud 9

You may recognize this polish from my Halloween Nail Art Pumpkins. I thought I'd show you the polish on its own today!

Sinful Colors Cloud 9 is a medium, yellow toned orange with light orange shimmer in strong light. Beautiful color, but below is 4 coats. I still had a visible nail line at some angles. This polish may work best as a top coat.

Sinful Colors Cloud 9

Moonlit Dance, Crystal Beading, Blue Frosting, Sparkling Rose

Have you seen this display out and about? I just saw it while out of town and since they were BOGO 50% off, I grabbed all of them. I intended to grab two, then four, then six, then my husband (who was dutifully holding nail polish and makeup in his hands) said, "You might as well get all of them." Haha, smart man. I knew I married him for a reason!

This Limited Edition collection is a set of eight glass fleck polishes that most are comparing to the Color Club Take Wing collection. While I do not have those Color Club polishes, I'd have to say they're fairly similar.

Let's have a look shall we?

Ruby Ring, Sparkling Rose, Moonlit Dance, Twist of Lime, Blue Frosting, Tender Teal, All Aglow, Crystal Beading

Ruby Ring, Sparkling Rose, Moonlit Dance, Twist of Lime, Blue Frosting, Tender Teal, All Aglow, Crystal Beading

Now before you get TOO excited, I only have four today. That's as far as I could get swatching before I lost my light but I can't wait any longer to show them to you!!

Sally Hansen Moonlit Dance is a gorgeous golden orange glass fleck polish. It's nearly opaque at two thick coats. Here the accent nail is L'oreal The Muse's Inspiration (2 coats) and one coat of Sally Hansen Moonlit Dance.

Sally Hansen Moonlit Dance

Sally Hansen Moonlit Dance

Sally Hansen Moonlit Dance

Sally Hansen Crystal Beading is a sheer white multichrome polish that flashes pink, blue, and purple. Three coats shown here, accent finger is Sally Hansen White On (2 coats) with two coats Sally Hansen Crystal Beading.

Sally Hansen Crystal Beading

Sally Hansen Crystal Beading

Sally Hansen Crystal Beading

Sally Hansen Blue Frosting is a sheer light blue that flashes blue, purple, and pink in the bottle, but on the nail I could only get a little purple around the edges. This one took four coats but there is still a visible nail line at most angles. Accent nail is Essie Bikini So Teeny (2 coats) with two coats Blue Frosting.

Sally Hansen Blue Frosting

Sally Hansen Blue Frosting

Sally Hansen Blue Frosting

Sally Hansen Sparkling Rose is a light pink glass fleck. Maybe a little duochrome? I could never get it on the nail but on the bottle I think I see a little orange at some angles. This is three coats, accent nail is Models Own Pastel Pink with one coat Sparkling Rose.

Sally Hansen Sparkling Rose

Sally Hansen Sparkling Rose

Sally Hansen Sparkling Rose

Dry time was quick, application was nice. Interesting color selection for Fall/Winter but whatever, I bought them all anyway! I'm really excited about All Aglow and Tender Teal, which I'll show you next time!

Sally Hansen Diamond Strength polishes are 0.45floz/13.3ml. I purchased my set at Walgreen's where they retail for $4.79 each.