Wednesday, December 24, 2014

Untried Wednesday: Starrily Barbie's First Christmas and Essie Scarlett O'Hara

Merry Christmas Eve and last night of Hannukah!  I hope you all are having a great holiday, or just a great normal day.  I have a half day at work today then we're heading over to the in laws for the holiday, so here's hoping work doesn't drag on.


The red on my nails is Essie's Scarlett O'Hara, a glowing red shimmer.  It was completely opaque in two coats, but I added a third to deepen the color.  I feel that it is a good staple color to have in any collection, but there are similar shades out there.  So this specific one is not necessary.  My accent fingers are Starrily's Barbie's First Christmas with is a white crelly base full of different shaped glitters.  It has pink butterflies, purple stars, lime green large hexes, red circles, and pink, green, and red smaller hexes.  It was opaque in two coats.  The glitter was very dense, so I did not have any problem getting the larger pieces on my nail, but it did make the formula a little thick.  I just had to make sure I placed the large pieces instead of just swiping with them.

As I have mentioned in myBlack Friday Haul, the Starrily customer service and shipping was TERRIBLE, but I adored all of the polishes I had ordered.  So if you don't mind waiting or can avoid sales, Barbie's First Christmas was fantastic.  You can check out Starrily here.  There is only a select inventory right now, because apparently they are still shipping out their November orders.  From Black Friday.  Yeah.


As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)

Monday, December 22, 2014

Mani Monday: Oh, Christmas Tree

Happy Monday everyone!  I hope you are all going to have a lovely week and have some nice plans for the holidays, whether you do celebrate this week or not.  Today I have a festive manicure that was actually pretty easy to complete.


On my thumb and middle fingers I am wearing Revlon Perfumerie in Balsam Fir, a dark christmas tree green cream that was completely opaque in one coat.  It was smooth and very easy to work with.  The fun part of this polish is that it smells like Christmas trees.  I loved it, but as soon as I top coated it, the scent disappeared.  On my pointer and pinkie fingers I am wearing Zoya's Chita, a forest green Pixie Dust with silver shimmer running through it.  This was also a one coater, which is actually kind of rare when it comes to textures.  It was a touch thick, but nothing that you can't work with.  Now, this past week the nail polish community has been in a frenzy because Zoya may have implied that they were discontinuing the Pixie Dust line and had put them all on BOGO.  They had actually just said "Let's see what 2015 holds for the Pixie Dusts", or something to that extent.  I hope they're just changing something, but here's hoping that this fantastic color does not become HTF next year.  On my ring finger I am wearing two coats of ORLY's Mirrorball.  This polish is entirely just holographic glitter with larger holographic particles and it is from the 2014 Sparkle Holiday collection.  This one also created a bit of a frenzy with the nail polish junkies because everyone keep scooping them up and they became impossible to find at Sally's Beauty, which was apparently the only store carrying it.  I found my bottle at one of the beauty supply shops I frequent in Orange County.  Yeah, I drive an hour plus to go buy discounted nail polish, and what?



On top of Balsam Fir I drew two cords in OPIs My Boyfriend Scales Walls (apparently the only white polish I own) and using Mirrorball and China Glaze Ruby Pumps I drew ornaments hanging from the cords.  On top of Mirrorball I used Balsam Fir, Ruby Pumps and a yellow rhinestone to draw the Christmas tree.  There is no easy way for me to explain how I did it for you guys to understands, so this is the YouTube tutorial  I used by PheobeMoon, who I adore watching.


As the usual kind reminder. These products were purchased with my own money.  They were not sent to me for review purposes.  I am not cool enough to have people send me products for review. 

Saturday, December 20, 2014

Swatch Saturday: Spellbound Nails Black Leather Thigh Highs

Hey all! Happy Saturday! I hope you all are having a lovely weekend. Today I have for you a polish that is technically an untried, but I wanted to show it off as quickly as possible because there is only two more bottle left in the shop, and let's not be coy here. I totally of love how sparkly this is.



This is Spellbound Nails in Black Leather Thigh Highs.  It is a black jelly with green glitters and blue hexes that give off a holographic flash.  It is so full of glitter that the formula was a touch thick and difficult to work with, especially around my cuticles and the tips of my nails, but then too much glitter is not really a thing.  This polish does have a jelly base, so it did take me three coats to reach full opacity, but that is really par for the course when it comes to jelly polishes.  I love this polish and the style actually reminds me the Deborah Lippmann glitter polishes.

If you like this polish, make sure you head over to Spellbound Nails and check it out.  You can find Black Leather Thigh Highs on there.  Like I said before, there are only two bottles left!


As the usual kind reminder. While these products were not purchased with my own money, they were a gift.  They were not sent to me for review purposes.  I am not cool enough to have people send me products for review. 

Friday, December 19, 2014

Hard to Find Friday: Dollish Polish Walker Bait

Happy Friday all!  It's only 5 more days until Christmas Eve and the last night of Hanukkah.  This year we're celebrating with Mr. LacquerVixen's family so I'm excited for a chill holiday.  When the holidays roll around with my family, there's always lots of people and food.  We open presents Christmas Eve, then we get gussied up and stay out super late with the very large extended family.  Christmas Day usually means lots of Mexican food and leftover cake, so I don't have any complaints.  My in laws, on the other hand, take a more subdued path.  We go check out the holiday lights, play board games, and watch movies.  They also open presents on Christmas Day, which means I am the first person awake, pestering everyone else to get up.  I am not particularly well known for my patience.  And this year I know there is at least one new pretty polish for me, so it's not like anyone can really blame me.  I've already started threatening to sick the dog on people if they don't wake up early enough.


Today for Hard to Find Friday, I have a polish that has been a huge lemming of mine.  This is Dollish Polish Walker Bait, which was originally released as a limited edition polish for the 2013 season premier of The Walking Dead.  I did not get a chance to grab it the first time it came out, but when she announced it was going to be coming back for a limited time in 2014, this polish became my NEED TO HAVE polish on my Secret Santa wish list.  My amazing polished partner in crime and one of my biggest supporters here, sunonwater11, actually ended up being my Secret Santa.  And she made sure to snag me this baby.  I could not be happier!

Walker Bait is one of those gross green colors, olive green if you had to specify, with a great holographic shift running through it.  It's somewhere between a scattered holo and a linear holo.  It was nearly opaque in one coat, but I added a second to cover the odd bald spot.  The formula was smooth and easy to work with.  Fun fact, my bottle actually has a hand written "56/2" on the label.  That's how limited edition it is.   ;-)  

If you are interested in checking out Dollish Polish, you can visit her storefront here.  It is one of my personal goals to eventually own all three of the zombie polishes she has made, so now I'm just missing Look at the Flowers Lizzie.  You can actually check out my swatch of Zombie Flesh here and a mani I had used it in here.  

As the usual kind reminder. While these products were not purchased with my own money, they were a gift.  They were not sent to me for review purposes.  I am not cool enough to have people send me products for review. 

Wednesday, December 17, 2014

Untried Wednesday: Stardust Retro Ruby

How's everyone's Wednesday going?  I hope you all are having a lovely week so far, and if not remember, it's hump day so the week is half way done.  :-)


For my untried polish today, I have Retro Ruby from Stardust Polish.  It is a bright true red jelly with red glitters.  It is similar to the cult classic China Glaze Ruby Pumps, but it is more bright.  I used two coats to reach opacity.  The formula is good and painted on evenly.  I'm not sure if this color is for me though.  Either it is not the best shade for me, or I am just not used to this kind of color.  What do you guys think?


As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)




Tuesday, December 16, 2014

Random Post: Black Friday Haul and Experience

Hey everyone!  I have a different kind of post for everyone today.  Like so many other polish junkies, I took advantage of the Black Friday/Small Business Saturday/Cyber Monday sales that so many polish brands offered.  All of my orders finally came in today, so I wanted to show them off and talk about my experience with them.  I made orders from ZoyaStarrilyRainbow HoneyShopKeeki.  Keep reading to see what I bought.


Zoya had various daily sales on their site, but the one I went with was their Cyber Monday deal.  It was a "Mystery Box and Bag" that was going to be a great deal for $15 and free shipping.  Yeah, I should have learned better from my last mystery experience.


Zoya's Mystery Box came with three mini polishes, a mini set of their Color Lock system, a Qtica Natural Nail Growth Simulator, Qtica Intense Lip Repair Balm, and two coupons for a future online order.  My issue with this bag are all the minis.  Okay, first off the mini Color Lock set.  I have received this as a free item at Ulta before for buying three full sized polishes, so I think that's kind of cheating.  Also, the three mini polishes were disappointing, more because I'm not a huge fan of minis.  I like my bottles full sized thank you very much.  As you will also see later in this post, I actually received a trio of minis and a full sized cuticle balm for free with an order.  My brain keeps thinking I spent $15 for a lip balm.


The polishes I received were Willa (black cream), Anja (plum cream), and Rekha (red cream).  Now they are all lovely, one coat polishes, so that makes me like them a little more.  The Intense Lip Balm is thick and helped a good amount with my super dry lips.  Really, it's not terrible, but I think I would have liked it better with a couple of full sized polishes instead of minis.  It seemed too much like free stuff.


The largest order I made was from Starrily.  All of the polishes were discounted and for every $50 you spent you received a free mini polish.  (Yeah we know what I think about minis, but I was planning on giving it as a gift.)  So I made a large order, with plans to give a few as Christmas presents and waited for a shipping email.  Nine days after my order nothing had happened, so I emailed them to check out.  There was no response.  Day twelve I sent them a message on facebook.  Nothing.  They did close the storefront and say that they had gotten overrun with orders and were trying to catch up.  At no point did they ever answer my inquiries.  I had even commented on an Instagram picture, and that was ignored.  Now, let me explain something.  I understand that small businesses can get swamped with orders and that it takes time.  My issues where that I made my order on Thanksgiving day and it took fifteen days for it to ship and that all of my attempts at communication were ignored.  If even one of my emails had been responded to, I would have been perfectly happy with the wait.  It is just terrible customer service to ignore your customers.  That is what drove me crazy.


I do LOVE all these polishes.  They are so gorgeous that I'm almost okay with the wait.  The glitters were super dense and the crellies were opaque in two coats.  If I do decide to make another order with them in the future, I know to avoid the crazy sales.


Out of the all the orders I made, Rainbow Honey was my favorite.  They were only 20% off, so I only made a small order of two polishes I had been lemming after for a good long while.  I was pleasantly surprised to find an extra gift of three mini polishes and a full sized tube of their cuticle balm.  I made a $16 order and I received about $16 of extra free stuff.  Does it make sense as to why I was disappointed with my Zoya Mystery Bag?


Other than the fantastic customer service, I have discovered I love the polishes.  The glitter toppers are dense and spread evenly, the glitters and jellies are opaque in two coats, and the cream is opaque in one.  I need to order a bunch more of Rainbow Honey polishes now.  Take my money!


Now, my Shop Keeki order wasn't technically a Black Friday purchase, because it is a UK shop so they weren't having a sale, but I did make a random order on Thanksgiving and it still managed to get here a week before all my other US orders.  They have a lot of options and I'm super excited to start using these.  Keep an eye out for future manis with these guys!


As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I spent a LOT of money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)

Monday, December 15, 2014

Mani Monday: Do You Want to Build a Snowman?

I love the movie Frozen.  It speaks to me on multiple levels.  I love it because I'm an older sister and I have a little sister too.  The music is some of my favorite Disney songs, and Do You Want to Build a Snowman is a favorite.  Especially because it played into Mr. LacquerVixen's proposal.  ;-)  So as soon as I got my hands on Funky Fingers Olaf, this mani idea has been in my head.


For my base, I used two coats of Julie G Santorini from the 2014 Cruise Collection from this past summer.  It is a baby blue cream.  Unfortunately the pretty silver shimmer in the bottle doesn't translate to the nails at all.  The formula is thick and easy to work with, but it is a touch patchy.  I don't really have anything like this in my collection, but from my understanding, light blue creams like this tend to have finicky formula.  So two coats is not that bad.



I topped four of my nails with Funky Fingers Olaf.  It is a glitter topper with small white hexes, iridescent glitters, and white snowflakes.  The glitters spread out pretty well, but the snowflakes were a touch difficult.  I had to do a fair amount of fishing for them.  The ones I did get on my nails, laid completely flat on the nail and did not curve at all.  So they did stick out a little.  I almost like it better without the snowflakes.  I may just avoid the snowflakes for the future.

On my ring finger I drew a snowman with a dotting tool, OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls and Call Me Gwenever, along with ORLY Liquid Vinyl.  Those are all some of my go to's when it comes to nail art.


As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)

Saturday, December 13, 2014

Swatch Saturday: ORLY Bling featuring Picture Polish Kryptonite and China Glaze Ruby Pumps

Happy Saturday!  I hope you have all had a lovely week.  I had to admit to something.  Today's blog post isn't just a plain swatch.  We had to go to a holiday party Friday night and I wanted to have festive nails.  So I kept it simple and that's what I have for you all today.  So I cheated.  Just a little bit.


On my thumb, pointer, and pinkie I have two coats of ORLY's Bling from the 2014 Sparkle collection. It is also the same collection that the infamous Mirrorball is in, though right now, I kind of like Bling more.  It is a super dense gold holographic glitter.  The formula was smooth and easy to work with.  The selling factor of this polish for me is that it is super holographic in doors with normal lighting.  Normally holo really looks amazing in sunlight, but Bling still has that rainbow sparkle inside.  I love it!  If you can still find this at your local Sally's Beauty Supply or Ulta, GET IT.  On my middle finger I am wearing Picture Polish Kryptonite which I have recently swatched here.  My ring finger is two coats of China Glaze Ruby Pumps.  This one is a cult classic.  It is a red jelly with red glitters, and it just sparkles like no one's business.  The glitters almost seem to glow with this one.


As a side note, this polish was purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have people send me polishes just to review them. ;-)

Friday, December 12, 2014

Hard to Find Friday: Julie G Sleigh Ride and Sugar Plum Fairy

Hey everyone.  Forgive the lack of post on Wednesday.  We were a sick family here at LacquerVixen headquarters, but now we're back up and running.  So let's get started on today's Hard
to Find polish.


Today I have two polishes from Julie G's 2013 Gumdrop collection, their holiday textures.  On my thumb, middle, and pinkie I have two coats of Sugar Plum Fairy a dark purple texture with purple glitters.  On my index and ring finger I have two coats of Sleigh Ride, a bright blue teal.  I love these polishes already.  They are some of my favorite textures and the colors are so bright.  I had the bright idea of looking to see how how they would be glossy.  OH. MY.  GOODNESS.  They are so damn sparkly and amazing.  So sparkly that my camera could not quite focus on my nails.  I just cannot deal with it.  I want to go back and see how all my textures look glossy.  I'm just going to sit here in the corner and gush about how great they are.  Excuse me.

Looks like the only place to get these polishes and the other Gumdrops and directly through the Julie G website.

As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)

Monday, December 8, 2014

Mani Monday: Glitter Tips

Happy Monday!  Did everyone have a nice weekend?  I'm still on a giddy rush from my Christmas party with my nail girls from Saturday.  So many polishes got knocked off my wishlist, I just can't even deal.  I wanted to bring you all my mani from that awesome day, so here it is!


Our theme for the meet up glitter and I decided to match to match a pink sweater with a large, silver sequined bow.  I painted two coats of This Gown Needs a Crown from OPI's 2013 Miss Universe collection.  It is a silver metallic polish that dries to a satin matte finish.  I did paint a coat of top coat because I was trying to do my mani quickly.  On my other fingers I painted three coats of Essie's Got Engaged from their 2014 Wedding collection.  It is a pretty baby pink with a heavy shimmer in the bottle that does not translate onto the nail at all. The first coat was patchy, and the second helped, but was not enough to make it opaque.  


I then used a make up sponge to pat Essie's Set in Stone on the tips of my nails and also painted a coat of it on my silver nail.  Sponging glitter is a quick and easy way of glamming up your nails and keeping them from getting too thick with the clear base.


As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)

Sunday, December 7, 2014

Random Post: November Empties

Hey all.  It's that time again!  It's time for us to go through my beauty trash, you know the fun stuff.  This month is a lot shorter than last month, I only have eight products this month, so at least we know I'm not just pouring them down the drain. ;-)


1. Dead Sea Elements Wet Cleansing & Make Up Remover Towelettes (60 pack):  I randomly bought this at Marshalls because I was out.  They were fantastic.  I only had to use one towelette when I took off my make up, and let me tell you, I wear a fair amount a make up.  I didn't even have any trouble taking off my mascara.  Would I repurchase?  If I can find them again, I totally will.

2. Bath and Body Works Pink Chiffon Triple Moisture Body Cream: This is a thick cream that I prefer to use when my skin is particularly dry.  It does a good job of that and doesn't leave me feeling sticky or leave a gross film behind.  Pink Chiffon is also my favorite Bath and Body Works scent, since they discontinued all the original classic scents including Mango Mandarin, but that's a different rant.  Would I repurchase?  Yeap!

3. Garnier 5 Sec Blur Skin Renew Instant Smoother: Now I have obvious pores on my nose and forehead, they're probably even considered big.  So a pore filler or blurrer have always been a part of my make up process.  The 5 Sec Blur does exactly that,  it will not fill your pores, but it does diminish the appearance of them.  It also is a large size and lasted me a long time.  Would I repurchase?  As soon as I can find it again.

4. Cinema Swatch Lacquers Deleted Scenes Polish Remover in Chocolate Orange: In case you have not heard, Deleted Scenes is a pretty popular indie polish remover because it has a bunch of extra nourishing stuff and smells really good.  It was good at removing my polish quickly and left my cuticles feeling moisturized and smelling good, but jeez I flew through the bottle.  I felt like I used it up a lot quicker than other ones.  Would I repurchase?  If I had an infinite polish budget, than sure, but I feel like my beloved pink Sally's Beauty remover was just as good and I get so much more product for less money.

5. Julep in Myrtle: I got this in a random Julep box at some point and was thrilled because the formula was smooth and it was opaque in nearly one coat.  Until I noticed that I had two dupes for it in my collection, specifically OPIs Big Apple Red and Essie's Size Matters.  Would I repurchase?  Nope.  Not when there are readily available dupes that are significantly cheaper and give more product.

6. Julep Matte Top Coat: This was a good matte top coat, it went on smoothly and there was no shrinkage.  Would I repurchase?  Just like Myrtle, not because there are cheaper and larger options.

7. Nourish Organic Moisturizing Cream Face Cleanser: I got this in an Ipsy bag randomly and over all I enjoyed it.  It foamed up well with my Clarisonic and left my face feeling clean, but the smell of it was very unappealing.  Though it probably was not bad enough for me to stop using it.  Would I  repurchase?  Possibly.  I have a fair amount of face cleansers in my stash to try out.  If I don't find something I love more than I will probably be picking it up.

8. Different Dimension Cuticle Oil in Jolly Rancher: Oh my goodness.  This stuff smells AMAZING.  It makes me want to chew on my fingers because it smells delicious.  I adore cuticle oil that comes in little pens like this one and this one may have been my favorite.  Would I repurchase?  As soon as I finish the stash I have now, I may only be buying this one from now on.


As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)

Saturday, December 6, 2014

Swatch Saturday: Picture Polish Krytonite

Yay!  It's December!  So like I've said before, ALL THE HOLIDAY COLORS!  I'm not a big fan of over the top holiday colors, I much prefer to use what I have to make a holiday themed manicure myself.  Picture Polish Kryptonite is one of those colors that looks gorgeous any time of the year, but during December it screams Christmas to me.  


It is a dark green jelly with a scattered holographic glitter.  I needed two coats to reach opacity and it is just so pretty!  When I first bought this polish, I bought it entirely because of the name.  Superman is probably my least favorite superhero and Kryptonite lets me pretend that I may be able to backhand Superman.  Yes, that is how my brain works some times.  Though, now I love this polish.  So hey, I may break my fingers if I slapped Superman, but at least my nails would be fabulous in the cast.

 Kryptonite is from Picture Polish's first Blogger Collaboration Collection from 2012.  The blogger  behind the polish is Cathy of More Nail Polish.  Picture Polish is an Australian indie brand and you can find their storefront here.  I personally prefer Llarowe for all my overseas indie needs.


As a side note, this polish was purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have people send me polishes just to review them. ;-)

Friday, December 5, 2014

Hard to Find Friday: Sephora by OPI Sugar Plum Fairies Gone Wild

Happy Friday everyone!  I for one am super excited for this weekend.  I'm meeting up with some of my polish gals on Saturday and we're doing a Secret Santa Swap, which is super exciting.  So I'll be coming back with a bunch of new babies for my collection!



Today for Hard to Find Friday I bring you Sugar Plum Fairies Gone Wild from the now discontinued Sephora by OPI line.  It is a purple glitter topper full of small glitters and scattered with holographic purple hexes.  It is fairly dense and application was smooth.  I used one coat on my nails and did three coats on my ring finger to make it fully opaque.  I don't see too many straight purple glitters, so I'm pretty happy to have it in my collection.

I did paint it over Essie's Sittin' Pretty.  I have previously reviewed it here, but I thought I'd throw in another swatch.  It was a two coater and easy to work with.  I have no idea why so many people were having issues with it.


As a side note, this polish was purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have people send me polishes just to review them. ;-)

Thursday, December 4, 2014

Random Post: Enchanted Polish October 2014

Good news everyone!  I managed to get my hands on Enchanted Polish October 2014.  If you remember my last Enchanted Polish review, I was pretty disappointed in August 2014.  If not, you can read it here.  Long story short, I was really annoyed that it was not holographic like the other ones that had been coming out this month.  Yeah, I'm THAT girl.  :-P



So Enchanted Polish October 2014 is a blackened olive green with gold shimmer and a scattered holo.  It looks identical to China Glaze's Cast a Spell, plus holo, which I love, but can't wear because the China Glaze formula hates me and will chip off my nails within twelve hours.  It is also a one coater just like the China Glaze.

I am really happy with this polish, though that may be because I've been looking for a good dupe of Cast a Spell for a while.  And holo makes everything better.  :-)

Don't forget!  My giveaway is still open until Saturday, so make sure you enter here.


As a side note, this polish was purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have people send me polishes just to review them. ;-)

Wednesday, December 3, 2014

Untried Wednesday: OPI I Don't Give a Rotterdamn and Funky Fingers Elsa

So I have a basket of untried polishes sitting on the floor by my desk.  Usually I am good about cycling through them, but I don't even know what happened lately.  I've picked up a couple of bottles here, a couple there and now I have a bunch.  Plus I have quite a few Black Friday orders coming in and two swaps this month.  So I need to get on the swatching of these babies!



This is OPI's I Don't Give a Rotterdamn from the Spring 2012 Holland Collection.  It is a elephant gray  with a heavy silver shimmer.  I have heard this described as dusty blue, but I don't see that at all.  It did have a bit of a sheer formula, so I used three thin coats for my picture and was perfectly happy with the opacity.  Strangely enough I don't really have many gray polishes so I'm glad to have it now.



I topped it with Funky Fingers Elsa, from their Frozen trio they came out with last year.  It is a glitter topped with small icy blue hexes and a few medium hexes.  I did just a single coat on the nails and it had a pretty good glitter pay off and dispersed pretty well.  I kind of wish that this polish had snowflake glitters like the other two in this collection, it would be fitting for the Snow Queen herself.


Don't forget!  My giveaway is still open until Saturday, so make sure you enter here.


As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)

Monday, December 1, 2014

Mani Monday: Snowflakes!

Happy December everyone!  I'm finally back after my impromptu vacation.  I had not planned on being gone for a week, but we went up to my parents for Thanksgiving and that is always chaos.  If I wasn't babysitting, cooking or running errands for my dad, then I was stuck in traffic.  I had also forgotten that my parent's internet is terrible and I can never get any of my electronics to work out there.  I rarely even have phone service.  If I had been smart I would have prewritten my posts before going up there, instead of just prepping them to be written.  Oh well, we're back and up and running now, so let's get on it.

On a side note, my giveaway is still going on so make sure you enter before it ends this Saturday.

My plan for December is to use as many of my holiday polishes and glitter bombs as possible.  So be prepared for lots of red, green, gold, blue, and silver this month, along with a lot of Deborah Lippmann polishes.




Today, I started off with two coats of Zoya's Dream.  It was a strong blue jelly with a scattering of holographic glitter.   The formula was a touch thick and my application was a little messy because I wanted to be sure that I got all the edges, but that is nothing that a good clean up brush can't handle.  Now this is one of my favorite polishes, I've used this at least on four different occasions, so I suspect that the formula is thick because of the usage and the air it has been exposed to.  Nothing that a bit of thinner can't fix.


On top of Dream, I placed some glittery, silver, snowflake shaped decals from VinylsaurusRex.  Each sheet of vinyls has eight large snowflakes (like the ones on my pointer and ring fingers), four medium ones, and four small ones.  I placed them randomly on my nails and just clipped off the extra parts that did not quite fit.  Over all I liked them.  They lay down flat easily and were easy to work with.


As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)

Monday, November 24, 2014

Mani Monday: Rica Hanukkah Collection

Happy Monday!  Today I have Rica's Hanukkah Collection to show off.  A month ago, I was telling a friend how difficult it was to find holiday polishes that were not Christmas ones, so I usually skip the holiday collections.  Then I saw something on Instagram saying that Rica was having a Hanukkah collection.  I never saw swatches, I had no idea what they would look like, but I knew that I had to have them.  If you follow me on Instagram, then last Monday you would have seen the screenshot of my order.  Yeah, that's how excited I was.  So I got this in the mail over the weekend and of course had to use it right away.


This collection has three polishes called Show Me the Gelt!, 8 Crazy Nights, and I Love You Latke.  On my thumb and ring fingers I am wearing Show Me the Gelt!  It is a gold glitter with holographic gold hexes and regular copper hexes.  It was opaque in two coats.  It did dry a little bumpy, but nothing that a coat of thick top coat wouldn't fix.  I really love the glitter and I'm glad to have it in my collection because I don't really have anything like it.  On my pointer and pinkie I am wearing 8 Crazy Nights which is a super holographic blue polish.  Now when I swatched this on my swatch stick, it took four coats to be opaque and it was still kind of patchy, so I was disappointed.  On the nail though, I am wearing three coats, and the third was unnecessary.  Two coats was perfect.  Finally on my middle finger I am wearing I Love You Latke.   It is a three coat warm cream color with a gold shimmer.  It is a very pretty color and a three coater is not strange for a polish of this color.  I really like it.


On top of the polishes, I did some quick nail art.  Once 8 Crazy Nights was entirely dry, I placed lightning bolt Nail Vinyls and painted over them in Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Go For the Gold.  Then on top of I Love You A Latke I placed a gold colored filgree plate.  Over all, I am happy with the end result and glad it was easy.


As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)

Saturday, November 22, 2014

Swatch Saturday: OPI You Don't Know Jacques and Zoya Maria Luisa

Yay it's Saturday!  Today is a short work day, then Thanksgiving is next week.  I am so excited to get some time off next week and do some Black Friday shopping!  I'm hoping that HK Girl, KB Shimmer, and Different Dimension have sales.  I heard last year Different Dimension was 50% off last year!  So far, KB Shimmer's isn't too impressive, it is just free shipping at $40 and a free polish if you spend $70.  Eh, hopefully something better comes too.  If you're hoping for some indies, make sure you follow the makers on IG because that's where they will post the sales first.  I know I've been stalking them like crazy.  The Mercurial Magpie does have a list that she updates, so make sure you keep and eye on it.


Today I have OPI You Don't Know Jacques.  It is a taupey brown cream that was nearly opaque in one coat, totally perfect at two.  You Don't Know Jacques is one of those OPI cult classics that everyone needs in their collection.  It is a good work color and lovely as a base for glitters.  


I topped You Don't Know Jacques with Zoya's Maria Luisa, a gold flake polish from the Fall 2013 collection.  The clear base is dense with the glitter.  The pay off you see in the picture is just with a single coat, no dabbing here!  I'm generally not a fan of flakes at all, but this one makes me happy.  I think it works really well with the base.

As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)

100 Post Giveaway!

It's finally here!  Yay!  In honor of my 100th blog post I have put together a little giveaway for everyone.  It will be open until December 6th, so make sure you enter.

I am giving away all three Magical Pixie Dusts from Zoya's Winter 2014 collection in Imogen, Nori, and Thea, two Julie G polishes from the Summer 2014 Cruise Collection, and two surprise polishes donated by the amazing Yvette from Bliss Polish.

The main way to enter is to subscribe to LacquerVixen.  For a second entry, make sure you comment down below and let me know what else you would like to see here on LacquerVixen, whether it is another themed day or a specific post you would like to see.  Good luck, and may the odds ever be in your favor!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Friday, November 21, 2014

Hard to Find Friday: Color Club The Uptown

Wow, November has already flown by, it's already the 21nd.  Thanksgiving is next week then the holiday crunch starts.  Family, presents, and food galore!  Also holiday nail art.  That will be coming up soon too, so that's something to be excited for. :-P

For today's Hard to Find Friday I have Color Club's The Uptown.  If you may not have already seen the panic, Color Club recently changed the formula for this.  They said that they no longer had access to the flakes in this polish so it was replaced with glitter.  This is the original formula.


The Uptown is a purple jelly base with flakes that shift from yellow, orange, and green.  Let's just be honest here, The Uptown is one of my top five mainstream polishes.  The others would be Zoya's Dream and Odette, OPI Affair in Red Square, and Essie Wicked.

On my pointer and middle fingers I painted two coats and on the rest of my finger I painted one coat on top of Julep's Josephine, which is a dark, dusty navy blue cream.  I'm glad that The Uptown was able to be opaque in two coats, but my favorite way to wear it is a single coat over a dark color.  I feel the flakes pop a lot more and you can tell the shift better.  In the purple jelly they almost disappear.  The flakes are plentiful and are evenly dispersed.  I say if you can find it for a not ridiculous price, do it immediately.


As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)

Wednesday, November 19, 2014

Untried Wednesday: Essie Trophy Wife and Peacock Portrait

Happy hump day all!  I had started writing this last night and was going to be very proud of myself that it was up on time, then I got distracted.  It happens.  But we're here now, and it's coming up!  So lets get started.


This is Essie's Trophy Wife.  It is a green leaning teal pearly polish that took two coats for opacity.  I love teal, it happens to be one of my wedding colors.  This polish does not disappoint.  If you are a fan of these kind of colors, go out and get it now.  I'm a little surprised it stayed in my untrieds basket for so long.  


I topped it with Finger Paints Peacock Portrait.  It is a glitter polish in a clear base with chunky holographic glitters and teal hexes.  I think it is a lovely topper for Trophy Wife and the formula is nice.  I did not have any issues getting the glitter on my nails and it spread out very well.  I'm going to have to check out some more Finger Paints glitters.  If they are like this one, I know I wouldn't be disappointed. 

As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)

Monday, November 17, 2014

Mani Monday: Red Nails for #meetupinthe714 and a Giveaway!!

Hey all, sorry this is coming up a little bit later in the day, but yesterday kicked my butt.  In case you did not hear, yesterday Yvette from @blisspolish held a meet up in Westminster and of course @lacqueredmizzy and I had to go to represent San Diego.  It was a blast, I spent too much money, met some cool new people, and came home exhausted.  I had such a headache when I got home that I just passed out.  Too much excitement for little ol' me.  If you're interested, make sure you search #meetupinthe714 on IG to see all of our pictures and everyone's red nails.  I'm still a little shellshocked that I got to meet @SealorePolish, @PolishTBH, and @sloteazzy.  Yeah, I'm still fangirling a little.  Just a tad.


So for the meet up Yvette asked us to rock our red manis and I always use events like this to try to do something different for me.  
On my thumb and pinkie I am wearing Zoya's Jacqueline from their Spring 2013 collection.  I call it a vanilla cream and while the first coat was a bit streaky, like most whiteish creams, the second coat leveled this out perfectly.  Honestly, this is one of those polishes that I have boughten entirely because of the name, but I love it now.
On my pointer finger I have Julep's Myrtle.  It is a pretty solid red cream that was opaque in two coats.  I have two other identical red polishes, so I've been trying to use this one up for a while.  Luckily this mani finally finished off my bottle, so I can move on.  If you like it, I say go for OPI Big Apple Red or Essie Size Matters off the top of my head.  They are big bottles and cheaper.  I am sure that every brand out there has a red cream just like this.  
On my middle finger I am wearing wearing two coats of ORLY's Bling.  It is a gold holographic micro glitter.   It is the gold version of this season's must have polish, ORLY's Mirrorball.  Okay I love this polish, if you can find it pick it up.  Even indoors the holo is obvious.  It is totally worth it.  
Finally on my ring finger I am wearing two coats of OPI Magazine Cover Mouse.  It is a red Liquid Sand with a bit of pink shimmer.   I have yet to meet a Liquid Sand I did not love, and this one does not disappoint.  


On top of Zoya's Jacqueline I painted on some leopard print with my dotting tools.  The centers are a large dot of Myrtle and I painted "C" shapes around them with my usual black Cult Nails Fetish.  I filled in some of the blank spots with ORLY's Bling because I can't stop using it.  On my pointer finger I glued on a bow.  I randomly bought these on eBay, if you're interested just search "3D nail art bow" and you'll find lots of options.  I do use gel resin to get that on my nails instead of regular nail glue.  I would especially suggest it for something big like this.  Finally on top of Bling I drew a little heart in Myrtle and a heart in Fetish on top of Magazine Cover Mouse.

Yeah, I loved this mani and I'm actually of disappointed that my bows popped off after two days.  I could have totally rocked it for another day.

So here's my super exciting news!  In honor of my 100th post I'm having a giveaway.   I have most of the things for it, I'm just waiting on one part.  Hopefully I'll open it on Wednesday, if not Friday at the latest.  So stay tuned!


As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)

Saturday, November 15, 2014

Swatch Saturday: A England Fated Prince

Yay it's Saturday! I am so excited to have to tomorrow off and do a little bit of polish shopping with some of my fellow San Diegans.  Don't forget to check back Monday for what my 100th post surprise! I think it'll be nice.  :-)


This is A England's Fated Prince.  Excuse the picture, but we are entirely cloudy in San Diego and I had to hunt around for a sunbeam. Fated Prince is a black holo we all already knew, I love me some dark gray/black holos and this was my first one.  A England's site lists it as a "a mysterious grey base hue with deep olive undertones, throwing off valiant prismatic flashes to herald the arrival of a certain destiny" and I think that is a pretty apt description.  It is not quite black, which I have said before may be because of the Spectralflare that is used to make it holographic, as it tends to gray out a color.  I used two coats for complete opacity.  It is a gorgeous color and it makes me want to go make a giant order of A England polishes on Llarowe.  No, I have to exercise self control and at least wait until after the holidays.  ;-)


I also did want to throw in a quick comparison of my three gray/black holos, Bliss Polish Jax 2.0 (1), A England Fated Prince (2), and Color Club Beyond (3).  The largest difference between all there is the level of holographic glitter.  Jax 2.0 is by far the most scattered of the three, and I feel that Fated Prince has a larger grade of glitter.  They are all beautiful colors though, and I do not feel bad owning all three.

Photo from Elsa at Like a Candyshop

As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)

Friday, November 14, 2014

Hard to Find Friday: Librarian's Shush

Happy Friday everyone!  I hope you all are happy a lovely day.  Here's a little LacquerVixen fun fact for you all.  This is my 100th post!  Crazy, I know.  I have a little surprise for you all, so make sure you come back on Monday to see.  ;-)


Today's Hard to Find Friday polish is Femme Fatale's Librarian's Shush.  It is a light gray crelly with white squares, black squares, hexes, and bars.  It is opaque in two coats, which is a little surprising for a crelly.  Usually they require at least three coats for full opacity, but it is nice to only need two.  I haven't seen too many gray crellies so I am glad to have swooped this guy up.  If you stumble upon it, I say go for it and get it.  It is totally worth it.  But then I am partial to the librarian name.  

As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)



Wednesday, November 12, 2014

Untried Wednesday: OCC Electric Sheep and Deborah Lippmann Boom Boom Pow!

Happy Wednesday all!  I hope that the week has been going well for you all.  I'm still managing to kick NaNoWriMo butt and blogging consistently, so go me.  Today I have two untried polishes to show you all, so I hope you enjoy them.  Also, what is up with my skin that I have lobster hands?  My skin is usually not this red.  I'm going to blame it on the dry air and fluctuating temperatures here in San Diego.  It is totally not fun.   


On my thumb, index, and pinkie fingers I have wearing Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics in Electric Sheep.  It is a dusty lilac cream with a bit of silver shimmer.  I love these kind of colors and the best part about this is that it is a one coater.  The formula is a little thick, but nothing that you can't work with.  Electric Sheep was released in OCC's Spring 2013 Sci-Fi Lullabies collection.  It was named after Phillip K. Dick's novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? which was the inspiration behind the 1982 film Blade Runner.  It is still available on Sephora's website, but not on OCC's site.

Now on my middle and ring fingers I am wearing Deborah Lippmann's Boom Boom Pow! from the Winter 2010 collection.  It is a mixture of gold hexes and actual 24 karat gold dust.  This works best as a topper, but I wanted to see if it would become opaque.  For my picture I used four coats and could still see a touch of nail line.  So this one you want to limit to topping polishes.  It is a beauty and totally glad I got my hands on it.  I bought this at Ulta on clearance and it is still available on the website.  It is also listed on the Deborah Lippmann website, but it is full price there.  If you happen to be in an Ulta, make sure you check out the clearance section.  I've found lots of other Deborah Lippmanns for at least 50% off, so don't ever discount it.


As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)

Monday, November 10, 2014

Mani Monday: Glitter, Polka Dots, and Mint

Happy Monday everyone!  Did you all have a nice weekend?  I'm super excited right now because tomorrow I'm going to go pick up my wedding dress.  Whaaaaaaaat??  But LacquerVixen, you're not getting married for ten months!  Well yeah, but it wasn't supposed to be ready until January/February and then I got an email two weeks after ordering it that my dress had come in.  Apparently they happened to have my size in the warehouse.  Yeah, so here's hoping it looks all nice and new.   Cross your fingers for me y'all!

Today's mani was originally inspired by those Caboodles Nail Valets that are super nifty.  They have compartments to fit your polishes so that they do not wiggle around in travel and different areas for extras, including brushes and dotting tools.  And they look like this:


Now I love me some black with white polka dot, so I have been wanting this one for so long.  So my nails started out looking like the box, then I started adding extras.  What do you all think?



On my thumb and pinkie I have OPIs My Dogsled is a Hybrid from their Nordic 2014 collection.  It is a mint cream that was nearly opaque in one coat, I added a second to cover up a few bald spots.  Seriously, this is a great polish and it is still available in stores.  If you don't own it already, go out and buy it now.  I topped my thumb with Sephora Formula X in Chaotic which has black and white hexes and black bar glitter.  Now this Formula X is from Sephora's first and short lived launch of their store brand polishes.  I found this at Big Lot's for less than two dollars, so it's not particularly easy to find, but there are plenty of other brands that came out with the same kind of thing.  China Glaze and Hard Candy are the first ones that come to mind.  On my pinkie, I just have a coat of ORLY's Shine on Crazy Diamond which is a sparse holographic topper.  The glitters are slightly larger than China Glaze's Fairy Dust.

On my pointer finger I have two coats of Nails Inc in Noho which was from their Leather Effect polishes.  It is slightly textured and is probably my favorite black, glitterless texture polish.  I also added a silver square shaped stud on the base of my nail.  In the past, I have always just used a dot of top coat to glue studs on, but they would only really last about twelve hours before they popped off.  So today I used brush on Gel Resin.  So far it has lasted through a shower, sleep, and cooking, so it works pretty well for me.  

My middle finger is just two coats of Essie's Hors d'ouevers.  It is a dense gold glitter polish with silver hexes.  Finally, on my ring finger I painted one coat of my much beloved Cult Nails Fetish then made my dots with OPIs My Boyfriend Scales Walls.  

I am pretty happy with the over all result and I hope you guys like it too.  :-)

As the usual kind reminder, these products were purchased with my own money.  I am not cool enough to have companies send me free stuff to review them. ;)