Sally Hansen Delphinium

Good afternoon Ninjas!

Today I've got a really pretty pastel for you from Sally Hansen, Delphinium. I knew when I picked this up on clearance at Ulta that I already loved it. Unlike Essie's Nice is Nice which looks horrible on my skin tone, Delphinium is a grey based pastel purple. This was incredibly flattering on my hands and I almost didn't want to take it off. It was very complimentary to my skin so I'm thinking that I might want to look for nudes in the future that lean a little grey/purple for a good match. First off, here's a picture of what Delphinium flowers look like:

And here is what my lovely, two coat manicure looked like:

I can definitely see the inspiration the color mixers at Sally took from the pretty purple Delphinium flowers when making this polish. I'm a huge fan of the color purple but in the polish world, I wear more greens. If I could find more purples that went so well with my skin tone, I might wear more of them! And yes, that is my RIGHT hand! The polish just came out smoother on that hand so I decided to make my life easier (aka, not have to edit my photos besides cropping) and take a picture of my right hand instead of my left. Can you see how long my nails were getting? I took a good bit off of them a couple of days ago because they were stating to affect my ability to type.

Dolphin face!

Hello Ninjas,

Tonight I've got the past week's makeup challenge: Dolphins! I went with some sea themed colors (blues and a green) over the Sweet dreams colorpot from Performance Colors. Then, because that wasn't enough, I added a Dolphin tail in white eyeliner and the same blue shadow I used on my lids. This was a very fun look!

Essie Bobbing for Baubles and glitter!

Hello Ninjas!

Tonight I've got a quick combination that I produced after asking people on my dog forum what I should wear. Blue won out by majority but there were other bright color suggestions that I incorporated through glitter! The base color is Essie's Bobbing for Baubles from their Cocktail Bling collection for Winter 2011/12. This was a great dusky blue with a wonderfully opaque formula. If I wasn't worried about bubbling, I probably could have gotten away with one thick coat but I ended up with two thin ones. Then I added a generous coat of Spoiled Peacock which is a clear base containing purple/blue/green/silver/gold hex glitters. The end product looked very festive, like something I could have worn for New Year's Eve! I got a lot of compliments on this look and it wore very well.

Performance Colors: Colorpots

Hello Ninjas!

Today I've got an all cosmetics post for you. Sorry Lacquer-holics, I'll understand if you skip this post <3

I recently heard about the amazing staying power and great price of colorpots done by Etsy seller Performance Colors. Being in need of a few good sticky colors to base my normal loose mineral looks on, I ordered her 5 sample pack. For $5 I got 5 colorpot samples, two concealer samples, and she added and extra lip gloss sample too! She shipped super fast and the product packaging is super cute (I might be biased because I love lotuses though).

All of the goodies!

Ingredients and a sweet thank you note

The freebies

Colorpots!

Light concealer on the left, Fair concealer on the right

After taking pictures of all the pretties in their packages, I did a quick arm swatch. I did not have the ideal lighting for this so I apologize that two of the colors are super hard to see (Champagne and Flush) But at least this gives you an idea of how very sparkly and pretty they are!

L-R: Sweet Dreams, Champagne, Spanks, Babycakes, Flush

Blurred for shine: Sweet Dreams, Champagne, Spanks, Babycakes, Flush

What do you think? They're gorgeous, the extras were very sweet and her packaging is great. I'll be showing a look I did with these in a few days. I wore them super simply on Valentines day.

Zoya Shay

Good afternoon Ninjas!

Today I've got Zoya Shay from their Touch collection that released over the summer. This was the one I thought would be closest to my mannequin hands at the time. It is entirely possible that when I picked this color up, it would have matched my slightly tanned complexion perfectly. However, since I did not swatch it until the dead of winter when I'm getting zero sunlight, it's too dark for my hands. The color itself is really pretty and the pearly shimmer makes it a more unique nude color but it just isn't right for my winter-time skin tone. Two coats was all it took for this to be opaque though which was a pleasant surprise considering how light the color was. It self-leveled as I expect of all Zoya colors and was a nice neutral color to wear after the amazing sparkle and awe of Dragon.

AEngland Dragon

Hello wondrous Ninjas!

Tonight I have the highly sought after Dragon from AEngland's Legend collection. This is a gorgeous lush green that flashes with not only gold duochrome but a wonderful scattered holographic effect. When I first started collection AEngland polishes, I wanted nothing more that a green in the same style as Lady of the Lake and Tristam. Now that I have Dragon (And the soon to be worn St. George) I feel like my dream has come true! This is two easy and glossy coats of Dragon that lasted me 4 days with minimal tip wear and no chipping. I have never tried an AEngland polish that I didn't like. Adina is a genius <3

Illamasqua Kink and Essie As Gold as it Gets

Hello darling Ninjas,

Thank you for the kind words for Tango, he's on the mend but being a horrible brat when it comes to taking his meds! Hopefully that means he'll heal right up with no issues.

Today I've got na layering combo that wasn't what I had planned. I had initially meant to wear only Illamasqua Kink for a few days because I love green and I thought the vinyl manicure would get some interesting comments at work. I did three coats over Essie All in One Base with no top coat. I let it dry for almost three hours before I went to bed since I didn't know how long it would take to cure without topcoat. It seemed fine when I went through my nightly routine so I thought nothing of it. However, in the morning I had horrible sheet marks all over my lovely nails! I was sorely disappointed in the dry time of this polish. The application was a breeze, even my husband commented that I didn't "take long enough" to paint my nails. With all the press marks all over my nails, I had to find something easy to cover them up with before I went in to work  that I could use Seche QD over.

I ended up choosing As Gold as it Gets from Essie's LuxEffects collection since I thought that the gold flecks would look good with the deep forest green of Kink. I slapped on the new layer as I was dog sitting and it was good to go in under an hour (I was super cautious with it, it was probably fine sooner). This manicure turned out great but I'm still sad I didn't get to show off the cool vinyl finish of Kink. I know that the "matte" top coat I have from Kleancolor dries to a very vinyl finish, so maybe I'll try using that when I wear Vice.

RBL Scrangie

Hello Ninjas.

Yesterday was a really scary day for me. My larger dog accidentally bit the face of my newly rescued Chihuahua and he had to be rushed to an emergency vet last night at nearly midnight. That was probably one of the scariest nights of my life and I want nothing to do with that sort of violence again. If you have any spare vibes or prayers or whatever, please send them to little Tango as he heals.

Today I've got Scrangie by Rescue Beauty Lounge which is, of course, named after the famous beauty blogger Scrangie herself. This is a gorgeous grape purple base with green/blue shimmer that is wonderful in all lighting. I'm just going to let the swatches do the talking, the formula on this was great and it played well with my non-RBL topcoat <3

Cult Nails Iconic

Hello lovely Ninjas!

Today I've got a manicure done with Cult Nails Iconic. According to their website, Iconic "is a deep berry creme with gorgeous red flakes and hidden gold shimmer throughout. Iconic is destined to become an instant classic. " So it's safe to say Iconic has a complex formula to go along with the complex finish of the polish. When I got my bottle, I was wowed by how wonderful it looked just sitting there but the beauty was not entirely translated to the nail. I had a lot of problems with the formula on this one. It was fast drying which is good but since it dried to fast and was relatively thick to begin with, it was sort of goopy when I applied it. Due to the goopiness, I ended up with much thicker coats than I would like to avoid dragging with such a sticky polish

On top of that, the polish did not play well with others. What I mean by that is that it did not end up with a high shine finish I was expecting after a generous coat of Seche Vite. I think because of it's goopy consistency, Iconic was craving more polish to help it self level, sort of like a hungry glitter polish. You'll see in my pictures that there isn't the usual perfect mirror shine on the nails. There were even small indentations each place where a flakie was close to the surface like it sunk back into the nail. Very strange and very disappointing for the price of this polish. There was also tipwear on Iconic (Probably because it didn't like Seche) in less thank 24hours of wear. Nothing like I was expecting at $10 a bottle. I will probably refrain form buying any more Cult Nails colors and spend my money on a brand I trust implicitly like AEngland.

Weekend Link Love!

Hello again darling Ninjas!

A group of awesome ladies are sharing links as a means to spread the word about their blogs. Since I'm a fairly small blog myself, I decided to join int he sharing. Each weekend I'll be doing one post with link to other neat blogs from all over the world!

Ellie reviewed and swatched the Groundhog Day set, of Moon Rabbit Cosmetics (new indie cosmetics brand) at personellietea

Lacquer Ninja gives readers a look at one of AEngland's new polish colors, Princess Tears. Is it a holo or a duo-chrome? At Lacquer Ninja.

Dimiti created a makeup look inspired by the 80's and...rainbows! What do you think?

Cé reviewed some goodies from Little Mouse Ears at Caprichos Esenciales.

Claire checked out Lavanila's Vanilla Passion Fruit perfume at Claire's Beauty.

Luna wants to know what your favorite cream shadow is!
toxid-lotus.net

Bekka revisits Rockabetty Beauty with an updated review and swatches galore at glostix!

My Little Pony Inspired FotD

Hello Ninjas!

Here's the face I did for this week's makeup challenge at Toxid Lotus. This week was My Little Pony and I was stumped. I don't have a proper range of colors to make a nice rainbow eye and I also wanted something I could wear out and about without too many odd looks. The look I ended up with was inspired by the MLP logo:

There you have it! A Pink and White FotD. I got a lot of compliments on this look even though I wasn't happy with how it turned out. Glad someone liked it!

AEngland Princess Tears

Hello Ninjas!

Today I've got another one of Adina's amazing creations from the Legend: Princess Tears. This polish is not only a pale lilac holographic but a duochrome that shifts from purple/silver and occasionally, in the right light, green! I couldn't capture the multi-chrome effect on film but I got a lovely shot of the gorgeous holo patterns. This one has a stronger holographic effect than Bridal Veil but it's still not a true linear polish. Despite being hard to get pictures of, I have a lot of them in an attempt to show you the beauty that is Princess Tears!

AEngland Bridal Veil

Hello lovely Ninjas!

Today I have Bridal Veil from AEngland's new Legend collection for you. Bridal veil is a black scattered holographic polish with a pretty brown shimmer that is visible in some lights. Application on this was easy but I messed up in the cuticle area, please don't blame the polish! This is two super shiny coats in the sunlight with a Seche QD topper.

Revlon Whimsical

Good evening Ninjas!

Tonight I've got a follow-up to my Kristen manicure. This is two-ish coats of Revlon Whimsical over Kristen. Kristen made a great base for Whimsical and really brought out the pretty blue in the jelly base. Whimsical is a dupe for Deborah Lippmann's Glitter in the Air with a much nicer price tag! I will let the photos speak for themselves but I am totally in love with his combination. I got lots of nice compliments on this too.

Zoya Kristen

Hello Ninjas!

Tonight I've got Zoya Kristen from their Winter 2011/12 Feel collection. Kristen is a gorgeous light blue cream that works wonderfully with the grey bulky sweater I've been a fan of wearing this winter. The formula on this was a little thinner than I have come to expect from Zoya creams but the color pay off was amazing. It only took two coats for an opaque pastel cream!