Lumene Night Party

 Lumene - Night Party, 2 coats

Remember OPI's notorious Shim-Merry Chic from last year's holiday collection? The bronzy brown shimmer that had flakies in it? Well meet Night Party, her twin sister (we don't know which is the evil one but both are pretty deranged). It may look cute in the bottle but opaque shimmer base and flakies don't mix, period. Each time someone scrolls down and gets to the last picture I think I can hear a distant "Oh that's not that bad, in fact it's quite uniq-- KILL IT!! KILL IT WITH FIRE!1!" :D Application was piss poor as the formula is very chunky and porridge-like. The only reason I got this lacquer for was its sheer ugliness.... and I got a discount. A very generous discount, Lumene has discontinued the Quick & Chic nail polish line and shops are getting rid of the uglies.

Etude House Sparkling Indigo & OPI Catch Me In Your Net

 Etude House - Sparkling Indigo, 2 coats

I just noticed that I mislabeled the pictures - they say Sparkling Blue when it's supposed to be Sparkling Indigo. I'm sorry, I blame it on my flue. :< I'll fix the pics once I'm done gathering enough energy to do so. In any case, Sparkling Indigo is a silver foil in blue jelly base and it's simply divine. Great application, wonderful wide brush.

 Etude House - Sparkling Indigo & OPI - Catch Me In Your Net, 2 + 1 coats

I made the mistake of thinking that Sparkling Indigo was wonderful enough on its own, but when I added a coat of Catch Me In Your Net over it it rose one step above divine. Wow, just... wow. The sparkle is out of this world!

Zoya Happi

Zoya Happi, 2 coats

Happi is a Barbie pink loaded with duochrome shimmer that changes from greenish yellow to soft orange. It's a wee bit brushstrokey and may even appear frosty to some. Application was okay but cleanup was harder than usual and I had to go over the mistakes several times with my trusty corrector pen.

Happy Holidays!

Season's greetings from us to you! We were supposed to travel to northern Finland to spend the holidays with my grandfather, but I came down with a cold and as my mum fears others will catch it from me (mainly my grandfather who is 86) our travel plans came to a halt. It's only the third time ever for me that I won't be spending Christmas there with my mum and dad... :< I'm not especially fond of Christmas or any other holiday but it feels very strange to be spending it at home.

Sinful Colors Color Scare & Precision Hazel & Gretel

 Sinful Colors - Color Scare, 2 coats

The gorgeous, glowing Color Scare has golden metallic particles in a burnt orange base. I'm really not into gold or bronze copper at all, but I have to admit that Color Scare looks great with my skintone, bringing out the warm tones (I usually look like a corpse with just about any polish on).

Sinful Colors - Color Scare & Precision - Hazel & Gretel, 2 + 2 coats

I'm not sure if Hazel & Gretel has a typo in the name ("Hanzel & Gretel") or if it points to the orange half of this silver and orange glitter polish. Anyway, these two make a great festive pairing that looks good under all lighting conditions.

Revlon StreetWear Envy

 Revlon StreetWear - Envy, 2 coats

Envy is the love child of olive green and chartreuse - too saturated and bright to be the former and too muted for the latter one. It has small golden flecks and orange and green shimmer in a green creamy base and two coat were enough to reach opacity. Unfortunately, this one didn't quite suit my skintone. :L BTW, the UK version of Toad is almost identical with Envy except I find Envy a bit prettier than the UK Toad as it has a bit more of that gorgeous golden shimmer.

Wet 'n' Wild Flirty Rose Crème & French manicure with nail art stickers

Wet 'n' Wild - Flirty Rose Crème, 3 coats

PSA - Avoid, I repeat AVOID Flirty Rose Crème like the plague! It's a watery, streaky mess and a pain to apply. It took three carefully applied coats to hide the streakiness and a lot of cleanup to make this wreck of a lacquer presentable.

Wet 'n' Wild - Flirty Rose Crème & H&M - Kitty Princess, 3 + 1 coats

The tips were painted with H&M Kitty Princess and a bunch of heart, flower and butterfly nail art stickers completed this vomit inducing pink sugary cuteness!

L'Oréal 413 Supernova

L'Oréal - 413 Supernova

Hello, and welcome to another disappointing episode of Bad Swatch Day. This old-ass L'Oréal comes from their long extinct LaquiResist line (good riddance!). It's a dark plum shimmer with some silver glitter thrown in and it took absolutely ages to dry. All my other LaquiResist polishes were/are also this way and most of them also have god awful splayed out brushes. Still, it's fun to have some remaining relics from the darker ages of nail polish no matter how bad they are, and Supernova isn't _that_ bad a lacquer, just a very mediocre one and layering some kick-ass polish over it could save the poor Supernova.

Claire's Twinkle Twinkle & chevron funky French

Claire's - Twinkle Twinkle, 2 coats

Twinkle Twinkle = ♥. This little beauty has silver and blue glitter in very saturated blue jelly base. I wish I could have this in every colour imaginable! This is two coats of Twinkle Twinkle plus additional two coats of a fairly thin regular clear polish and then a coat of SH Insta-Dri top coat to finish things off. Glassy-glossy! Oh, and can you see how my free edges are curling inwards? We've experienced some seriously cold weather here for the last week or so, thus my nails are rapidly losing moisture.

Claire's - Twinkle Twinkle & chevron funky French, 2 coats

I used pieces of tape as makeshift chevron guides and went over the tips with Wet 'n' Wild Black Crème. Any jagged lines were then covered with a silver glitter art liner, and finally I slapped on a couple of heart shaped silver rhinestones. The colours remind me of the Estonian flag which is blue, black and white.

Eveline 413 & JDN 66

Eveline - 413, 2 coats

Eveline 413 is a weak holo lacquer that looks either mauve or brown, depending on lighting. I did this mani last night and was absolutely certain that it was a brown holo, but come daylight and I am looking at a completely different colour. Formula was good, 413 is an easy colour to apply and the brush is pretty nice.

Eveline - 413 & JDN - 66, 2 + 1 coats

JDN is a Chinese (I think) nail polish brand who have put out some wicked colours - one day, I'll show you this gorgeous purple glass flecked shimmer that's OPI DS Royal's little sister! 66 has a decent amount of small magenta coloured stars and normal sized glitter in a clear base. This combo was okay but the placement of the stars bugged me so much that I removed the whole thing after a couple of hours.

Ruby Kisses Cream White & black and white half-moon manicure

Ruby Kisses - Cream White, 3 coats

Cream White is an off-white jellyish creme, quite a classy colour IMO. Judging by the INCI my bottle must be at least half a decade old - non 3BF polishes are great, I get no bubbling with them, ever! But I also got a small dent on one nail while I slept which meant that it never fully dried. :/

Ruby Kisses - Cream White & Wet 'n' Wild - Black Crème, 3 + 1 coats

 I did a half-moon manicure with Wet 'n' Wild Black Crème, using hole reinforcers cut in half as guides. I only added rhinestones to one nail as an accent, but if I were to wear this mani for longer than two days (or to a festive event) I'd add them to all my nails. I have to say that this is a really sophisticated look which I'll be sure to duplicate someday. But now I really want a pair of black & white peep-toe pumps with crystal accents...!

DICI 013 & IsaDora Subway Green

DICI - Metallic green 013, 2 coats

Lobster hand alert! 013 is a very pale green consisting of super dense, super tiny metallic pigment particles. I got this super cheap off eBay last summer - I'd direct you to the seller's profile but they're no longer registered there. I could've gotten away with only one coat, but since I'd be applying a crackle polish over it I decided to do two to avoid bald spots for this base colour would be shrinking with it.

DICI - Metallic green 013 & IsaDora - Subway Green, 2 + 1 coats

This is a pretty spot on photo of what the colours really look like together - the base polish looks almost golden until you take a better look. Be prepared to work FAST and try to apply only one swipe of polish. My gripe with the IsaDora graffiti lacquers is that without a top coat they wear off super fast. I don't mean they chip off but little by little, the actual pigment is transferred to anything you touch, be it a tissue, your clothes or even the walls of your house. You could use your nails to draw on a piece of paper! I've worn this mani for less than 12 hours and already I've lost almost half of the graffiti lacquer from my index fingers and my right thumb. Also, I noticed that after I took a shower and applied my regular hand lotion the graffiti shrank even more, pulling the base polish with it and now my mani is a faded crumply mess. :< Next time I'll be sure to use my regular quick dry top coat.

China Glaze Tempest & Orly Lunar Eclipse

China Glaze - Tempest, 3 coats

Ah Tempest, you're one of my very favourite lacquers. ♥ The formula was watery but not especially runny and I had to do three thick coats to get full opacity. Tempest has a very shy duochrome side to her but it's there alright!

China Glaze - Tempest & Orly - Lunar Eclipse, 3 + 2 coats

I tried to stamp some snowflakes over Tempest but that was a big fat fail, so I grabbed Lunar Eclipse and hid the offending designs with two coats of this liquid loveliness.