Essence Nail Art Twins - Chuck and Blair

Good afternoon all - I hope you're having a better afternoon than I am, because it's snowing here! I've had enough snow. It makes me sad. Bring on the spring!
I'm counting down the days until I get to go on vacation and go to somewhere warm! (23 days!)

Until I get to go away and cheer myself up with some sun, I'll have to cheer myself up with polish. So here's another pretty swatch for you!

Essence Nail Art Twins - Chuck and Blair
Here's the second set of nail art twins I'm going to show you. I think this set might be my least favorite of the four sets I have. It's still great and love it, but the glitter just isn't as satisfying as the others! Haha. 

Chuck and Blair are a couple from the book/TV series, Gossip Girl. I don't watch/read the series but I know who they are because I have some friends who are fans of the series.

Essence - Chuck
Chuck is a cool royal blue creme that has a bit of a dusty feel to it. The formula is great and you can almost get away with one coat but you'll wanna do two for a perfect finish.

Now for the glitter!

Essence - Blair
Blair is a silver glitter topcoat in a clear base. The silver is more of a gunmetal type color, it's darker than usual. There's a bunch of different sizes of the glitter and there's also some small holo glitter mixed in there. 

On certain angles the glitter almost looks black, but if the light hits it, it starts shining.

This is a great set from Essence, as usual!

Essence Nail Art Twins - Romeo and Julia

Morning everyone! Today I'll be showing you the first of four sets of Essence Nail Art Twins that I have!
I absolutely adore Essence and their polishes, and the Nail Art Twins were such such a cute idea, I knew I had to get all the ones I could.

All of the Nail Art Twins are now discontinued, so I'm lucky to have them. Sadly, I don't have any of the older ones... So if any of my lovely readers have the older ones, I might be interested in swapping! Haha.

Essence Nail Art Twins - Romeo and Julia
As you might notice, all the Twins are named after fictitious couples. I was confused at first as to why this is "Julia" and not "Juliet" but some smart readers informed me that Julia is the way they say it in Germany! And Germany is where Essence comes from. So it makes sense now!

Essence - Romeo
Romeo is a medium gray creme with a great formula that covers well in 2 coats.
I've tried a lot of Essence polishes now and all of them have wonderful formulas! Another reason to love them.

Now we'll add the pretty glitter...

Essence - Julia
Julia is a crazy blingy, sparkly glitter topcoat. The base is clear and it is packed with small silver and holo glitter, as well as larger holographic square glitter that almost looks like little tiny mirrors!

Square glitter is the bomb.

Look how much it sparkles! I could stare into the bottle all day.

This combo is a definite winner in my books, and the best part is, I have three more winning Twin combos to show you in the next few days!

Before I go, I wanna show you some great nail mail that I got yesterday!

So much good stuff! All of this came from a lovely friend named Anissa, who was playing mailbox for me because we did some group orders from places that don't ship to Canada. (I got Across The Universe when it was on sale, and NOX Twilight polishes when they were on sale!)
Since she had stuff for me anyway, I had my 2 Color Club polishes from their contest sent to her.
And as if being my mailbox wasn't enough in itself, Anissa sent me a beautiful gift - my first Ciaté!
It's called Cupcake Queen which is so adorable because as you know, I love cupcakes.

She also sent me this adorable Hello Kitty 2-finger ring. Too cute! (Yes I'm still wearing my leopard french mani.)
Thank you Anissa, for everything!

Flormar Supershine Miracle Colors - U16

Good morning all! I did a bunch of swatching over the weekend so I have a lot of great polishes to show you in the next little while.

Today I'm gonna show you an amazing polish that I got from my friend Ruth in Spain. You may remember I posted before about a polish she sent me - Flormar U33, the beautiful blue/purple duochrome - and today I have another Flormar from the same collection! And dare I say it, this one is even better!

Flormar - U16
I saw just one photo of this on another blog, and I fell in love with it and I said, "damn, I wonder if Ruth can find me that..."
Lucky me, she did! Thank you so much, Ruth!
This polish ended up being like 100 times better than the one photo I saw, so I'm pumped about it.

When you're looking at it directly, this is what it looks like. And I thought this was going to be the only look of the polish because the other blog had not mentioned it being a duochrome.

And then I moved my hand.

Whoa. Full on hot pink sparkling duochrome.
I've always wished for a purple-to-pink duochrome and now I've found it!

This is three coats and it still isn't fully opaque in person so I think you'd want to layer this over a purple when wearing it. The shimmer makes it look opaque in most lights but if you're not catching the light right, you can totally see through it.

As I said, at first you think it's just a purple jelly with crazy blue shimmer and then suddenly, it's totally pink and amazing.

I'm pretty sure I gasped when I saw it. Because I'm really cool. And easily amused.

No matter what way you're looking at it, it's beautiful!

I could only capture the two extremes of the color shift but really there are a bunch of different shades between purple and pink that you see in the transition between colors. I tried taking a video on my iPhone to capture it but it didn't want to cooperate. So use your imagination and imagine just how awesome it is to watch this change colors!

That's all I've got for today! I have some more international swap goodies to show in the next couple of days including some Essence stuff, Barry M, and two adorable polishes from Depend.
Don't you hate it when you have so much cool stuff to show and no patience to wait to show it? Haha!

Have a lovely day!

neon leopard french!

The world must be coming to an end - I've been wearing a french manicure since Sunday.
And I love it!

No, I'm not going crazy. I just did a really great modified french mani!

Tada! Neon leopard french!
For some reason, the stains on my nails recently disappeared. They're just gone. I did nothing to make them go away, but they are gone.
(I think it is from all the times I have peeled off my polish in the last month. I must have taken off the stained layer.)

So, with my stain-free nails, I knew I had to do a french because I think I've ever only done it once before.

But of course, I couldn't do a normal french manicure. I had to make it more fun! And more me!
So I added leopard print. (Shocker.)

This design was loosely inspired by these nails from my friend Leslie at Polish Art Addiction.

I love this look so much it's ridiculous. I can't believe how much I am enjoying a french mani!
And because I love it so much, you're getting pic spam!

Here's the polishes I used to create this look:
- Zoya - Loretta (sheer nude to cover any nail imperfections or staining)
- Zoya - Carey (gray for the french tip)
- Color Club - Twiggie (green dots)
- Color Club - Pucci-licious (purple dots)
- Color Club - Peppermint Twist (pink dots)
- Essence - Let's Get Lost (blue dots)
- Wet N Wild - Black Creme (black detailing) 

I did the tip directly with the polish brush, and I did the leopard with a small dotting tool.
I finished it off with a thick coat of Seche Vite to even it all out!

I've been staring at my nails since I put this on. I'll have to change it tomorrow after I inevitably ruin it at my job, but 4 days is a pretty long time for me to wear something! (Especially something that doesn't involve glitter.)

Okay that's all my picture spam.
I really hope you guys enjoy this manicure as much as I do!

I'll have to come up with some more awesome french ideas to do while my nails are still all healthy looking!

Sephora by OPI Betsey Johnson Collection Mini Set

Hey guys! As promised, here are my swatches of the Sephora by OPI - Betsey Johnson Mini Nail Colour Set.

I ordered this sweet little set from Sephora and it retails for $24.50 in the US or $29 in Canada.
(Again, don't get me started on their stupid markup!)

The set consists of 6 mini polishes - 3 of them are available in full size as well but the other three are only available in this set.

At first I was going to buy two full size polishes but I really wanted the turquoise which is mini-exclusive, plus 2 colors would have been $24 and with the mini set, I get 6 for $29. Yeah they are smaller but hey, am I ever going to use a full bottle? Not likely.
Some of the colors in the set aren't very unique but they are all beautiful, except maybe the red because I don't ever find reds to be beautiful. Red is just... red.

Let's get started!

Sephora by OPI - XOX Betsey
This is hands down my new favorite nude. It's a great 2-coat sandy pink-toned nude that I think works great with my skin tone. I just love it. I love the name too, of course.
The formula was awesome, zero streaking, and I actually really love the brush on these minis.
This is one of the colors I was going to get in full size and that's probably the only thing I regret about getting the mini set. If I happen to find this in full size next month while I'm on vacation, I am not responsible if it comes home with me! That's what vacation is for, right? (Right!)

Sephora by OPI - Alley Cat
This is a bright magenta with very subtle gold shimmer. Very nice shade of pink, it's not the most unique of colors but I am pretty sure I don't have anything similar in my stash. (I could be wrong because I seem to always underestimate my collection of pinks.)
Again the formula is great and covers in 2 coats. I love this color!

Sephora by OPI - Too Too Turq
This is a beautiful shade of shimmering blue-turquoise, again with a great formula that covers in two coats. (Too too coats?)
This is the standout color of the collection for me and it is so lovely. You all know I am addicted to turquoise and teal so of course I love this! This is sadly one of the ones that is only available in the mini set.
It's named after her Too Too fragrance and I think that is too too cute. (I'll stop now.)

Sephora by OPI - Yellow My Name Is Betsey
Okay first of all, great name! Second, this color is not original and it's an exact dupe for Color Club Almost Famous and a handful of other yellows. That being said, this is the only shade of yellow I actually like on nails so props to you, Betsey, for choosing a great shade.
You may remember that I used this shade of yellow in my Betsey Inspired Nails. I know my Betsey!
This is the only color that took 3 coats to cover completely which is the norm for yellows. This is only available in the mini set.

Sephora by OPI - Son Of A Gun
Son Of A Gun is the most unique shade in this collection, I've never seen anything else like it! It's a shimmery gunmetal gray that is blue-toned, more blue than the photos show. If you look at the bottle in my hand, it's closer to that color. The shimmer stands out too much in the photos and takes over the blue.
This is a really cool color, I'm glad the set includes something so different. This one is only available in the mini set.

Sephora by OPI - Pushing Your Luck
This is a candy apple red polish that is, as far as red goes, pretty great. I normally hate red shades like this because they're always a jelly finish and you always see nail line. This one is just opaque enough that with one coat, you can wear it as a jelly, but with 2 coats, you can wear it like a creme.
I also found that this didn't stain my skin the way other red polishes do upon removal.
So for a red, I like this. When I need red, this will probably be my go-to polish because of the formula and the non-staining.

Alright, there you have it!
Overall I would definitely recommend purchasing this mini set if you want to get a taste of what this collection has to offer. The nude, turquoise and magenta are all totally fabulous, the yellow and red are great if you haven't already got those essential shades, and the gray is super unique and different.
And if you love Betsey, then it's all great and you need it just because it's Betsey.
(If you missed it yesterday, don't forget to check out my review of It's My Pink!)

There are 3 colors left in this collection that I don't own - a dark purple, a light blue, and a silver glitter. As I mentioned earlier, I am not responsible for anything that may come home with me from vacation!

XOX Rebecca
(See what I did there?)