Christmas Glitter Vomit featuring China Glaze Party Hearty

Hi there everyone!! Christmas is just around the corner, so I figured that I would do a festive mani for you guys today! Sorry I've been in and out lately, for some reason I've been ultra critical of my pictures lately (I feel like they get worse as I go along) so I just haven't been posting much.

Anyways, for the base of this manicure, I used Essie Mint Candy Apple from the Essie 2009 Winter collection. This polish is actually the one that really got me started into collection nail polish again so although MCA is kind of a streaky mess, it holds a special place in my heart because it was one of my first polishes! MCA is a gorgeous light mint green cream, and since it is a bit sheer and streaky, I did three coats here.

Then, I layered on 2 coats of China Glaze Party Hearty from the 2010 Tis the Season collection. Ahh! I love this polish so much! It has small round green glitter, medium sized red hex glitter and micro gold glitter. This is probably the best Christmas polish ever. I wanted to add a little bit more sparkly goodness so I added a coat of Essie Golden Nuggets over Party Hearty. Golden Nuggets is the perfect gold microglitter top coat. I love how dense the glitter is in this, but not too dense to still let Party Hearty shine through!

Here is my Christmas Glitter Vomit manicure. Hope you enjoy!!

Thanks for stopping by! I hope all of those out there who celebrate the holidays are enjoying themselves and have completed all their shopping! I, of course, have a lot more shopping to do. Ugh! I always wait until the last minute, you think I would have learned my lesson by now.

Anyways, see you all again soon!

Butter London The Black Knight

Hi everyone! Thanks for all of your love on my last post, I hope to respond back to all of you soon! Today is going to be a quick post.

Lisa over at Shades of Magick sent me this absolutely stunning polish in a Secret Santa exchange. Thanks Lisa! I was having major camera issues today, unfortunately, so I wasn't able to capture the true beauty of Black Knight.

Butter London Black Knight is a black polish packed with blue, magenta and gold glitter. It was a bit sheer, but was thick and goopy so 2 coats was enough. I did two coats of top coat on this, as it was a "hungry glitter" and dried pretty gritty. I am totally in love with this color! It is from their limited edition holiday 2011 collection, so snatch it up now before it's gone.

So here's 4 terrible photos of one amazing polish, Butter London Black Knight.

Ugh, terrible, horrible photos today!

Thanks for stopping by! Hope everyone is having a fabulous weekend!

Hits Zeus and a Thank You to My Followers!

Hello my lovelies and Happy Tuesday to everyone! I completed my last final of the semester today so it is a lovely Tuesday indeed!

Over the weekend, I hit 100 followers and I just wanted to take a moment to thank all of my awesome blog readers. So, THANKS SO MUCH YOU GUYS!!! I never, ever thought I would hit 20 followers, let alone 100 and it really means the world to me! Whether you just come to look at the pictures, whether you read every word that I write, whether you are a blogger yourself or just a fan of nail polish in general, I want to thank each and every one of you! The reason I do this blog is for my insane love of nail polish, and I really enjoy sharing the love and chatting with all of you wonderful people. Just to know that you guys are riding along on this journey with me warms my heart. You guys seriously rock!!! I'll stop before I get too mushy, but I want to let you all know that I do have something special planned coming very soon to thank you guys. So stay tuned!

Anyways, today I have another awesome Hits holo for you all! Hits Zeus is almost too amazing for words. It is a KICK ASS (pardon my French) charcoal with a strong linear holo effect. Again, this polish had an absolutely outstanding formula. Last time I used my aqua base which is meant for holos, and this time I used my regular base coat (Barielle Hydrating Ridge Filler) and the application was still FLAWLESS. Had the same jelly-like consistency of Hits Atena. The polish is thick but super easy to apply, and I didn't have to do any clean up whatsoever for these pics. So good news - no special base coats required for these Hits holos! On to the pics - no words can describe how truly stunning this polish is!

I did three coats here, as it was a bit sheer. So here's 3 coats of Zeus, with my normal base and top coats. Enjoy!

Again, thanks for all the love and support everyone!!! I will see you all tomorrow for Pink Wednesday!

It's Just Another Manic Monday - Vintage Hard Candy Manic

Happy Monday everyone! Today I thought I'd swatch one of my vintage Hard Candy polishes for you guys. Considering it is manic Monday, I figured Manic would be the perfect color for today! Manic Monday (if you don't know - BUT YOU SHOULD) is the famous song that was released by the Bangles on January 27, 1986. While that date isn't especially significant, the next day, on January 28, 1986, the US space shuttle Challenger exploded during launch and killed all seven astronauts on board. It was the first time in NASA manned space flight history that a crew was killed during a mission, and was a very sad day for the United States. 6 days later, on February 3, I was born. How is this significant at all to this polish? It's not, just thought I'd throw out some random trivia for you guys!

Anyways, if you know me, you know that I have a slight obsession with vintage Hard Candy polishes. It all started back in middle school when I began seeing ads for the brand in YM and Teen magazines, and when the lovely little square bottles started popping up at Sephora and other department stores in my area. I was hooked. The brand was revolutionary for its time, as there were not many "fun" nail polish colors on the market. The story begins when the founder of Hard Candy, Dineh Mohajer, mixed up a sky blue polish one day to match her shoes. People flipped out, she created the brand Hard Candy, next thing you know Alicia Silverstone wore Sky polish on Letterman one night and the rest was history. The original Hard Candy line is long discontinued, and although the line has been revived and is being sold in Wal-Mart stores in the US, I still prefer the old stuff =)

Manic is from the original Hard Candy release back in 1996 and has been discontinued for many years. The formula was a bit thick and goopy, so I added a few drops of thinner and it was just right. Manic is a vibrant royal blue/purple shimmer and I am absolutely in love with it! Unfortunately, no matter what lighting source I used, I just couldn't capture the true awesomeness. Imagine these pictures with a hint of a purple flash and you will have the right idea of Manic.

Here's 2 coats of Hard Candy Manic, first outdoors then indoors with diffused flash. Enjoy!

Thanks for stopping by! I will see you all tomorrow =)

Swatch Request Sunday - OPI's of Collections Past

Happy Sunday everyone! I hope you are all enjoying your weekend so far. Today I have some more swatch requests from Twitter. I think I will be doing this every Sunday, so don't be shy and let me know if there is anything from my stash that you would like to see!!

First up is OPI Redipus-Oedipus, requested by the lovely Radha on Twitter. R-O is from the 2004 Greek Isles collection. Greek Isles was the first collection that I remember coming out when I worked at Trade Secret back in the day, so its very nostalgic because that is when I first started collecting OPIs. Anyways, Redipus-Oedipus is a really fun bright red shimmer. The consistency was almost like a jelly, it was a bit sheer but super shiny and had that lovely shimmer dispersed throughout. Since it was an old formula OPI, it was relatively thin and required 3 coats to opacity. I absolutely love this color, it would be so fun for a summer pedicure.

Here's 3 coats of OPI Redipus-Oedipus, first in outdoor light then the last pic is indoors. Enjoy!

Next up are two colors requested by the lovely Jamie on Twitter. First up is Let Them Eat Rice Cake, from the 2005 OPI Japanese Collection. Let Them Eat Rice Cake is one of my absolute favorite nude shades of all time. It is a light pinky-nude creme that seems to look amazing on all skin tones. Although it is an old non-3 free formula, it wasn't as smooth and thin as the others and was a bit thick and goopy. My bottle has a bit of a wonky brush, so that didn't help the application process either. It took 3 coats to reach opacity, and though it was a bit uneven on the nail, a nice thick coat of Seche Vite evened everything out beautifully.

The following pics are 3 coats of OPI Let Them Eat Rice Cake. First three pictures are outdoors, last three are indoors.

Last but not least is Baby It's Coal Outside from the 2008 Holiday in Toyland collection. This is probably one of my favorite OPI colors of all time, so I put this on last and decided to wear it as a full manicure because it's just so awesome! Baby It's Coal Outside has a black base with this amazing gunmetal brocade shimmer throughout. The brocade shimmer gives it almost a sueded look, I love it! This is a 3-free formula, and I had no problems with application. It was a bit sheer, so it took 3 coats to reach opacity.

Here's 3 coats of Baby It's Coal Outside, all the pictures are outdoors except for the last one. I can't stop staring at my hands with this on, it's gorgeous!

And here's a macro shot to show you the awesome shimmer!

That's all for today! I hope you guys enjoyed seeing these swatches. Again, I'll be doing this every weekend so please let me know if there is anything you are dying to see.

See you all tomorrow!

Kleancolor Metallic Green

Quick post today!

Here's Kleancolor Metallic Green. Are you sick of these yet? I know I'm not! Metallic Green is probably my favorite of all the metallics. It's a glowy, amazingly metallic lime green. Application is easy, dry time is a bit longer but that's pretty standard for these polishes. 

Here's two coats of Kleancolor Metallic Green with one coat of Seche Vite. Enjoy!

Don't own any Kleancolor Metallics yet? Stay tuned, you may get the chance to own a few =)

See you all tomorrow!