I'm alive! Makeup stash pics.

Hi guys! I know it's been a while...but I wanted to let you know that I am still here, and still collecting tons of polish! I plan to get back to trying to post regularly now...work is winding down a bit and I've actually been able to grow my nails a little bit past sad little nubs. Don't get me wrong, they are still nubs, just not as pathetic :)

I have a dinner to go to tonight, and some major cleaning to do in the meantime, but I had someone message me to ask about my makeup stash on Facebook, so...here it is! This is probably the nicest it will look for a while, I foresee things getting tossed around a bit in the move I have coming up.
 

Drawer 1: foundation, powder, BB cream, concealer, and primers. A bit of a mess, isn't it? I have a lot of MAC with some random brands - Tarte, Benefit, Too Faced, Bare Escentuals, Missha, and more. I have a lot of problems finding the right color foundation that doesn't hate my skin.

Drawer 2: Blush (Benefit, Stila, and Maybelline), a MAC bronzer, and some random things - unopened perfume rollerballs, brushes, and an awesome mirror compact. I need to get more blush and bronzer, and work on my application skills, as I'm not very good at either. Oh, and I'm not a fan of the Maybelline blush, really, it's a bit strange.

Drawer 3: higher-end palettes. Mostly Urban Decay, with Stila, Lancome, and Too Faced. I loooooove my UD palettes especially, but the Lancome is a really nice neutral palette.

Drawer 4: drugstore palettes. Lots of Wet 'n' Wild, with L'Oreal, Revlon, and Rimmel. WnW has really stepped up their game from when I was in high school - their eye shadows are pretty damn good, though I think the Fergie line isn't as good.

Drawer 5: single powder shadows - MAC, Urban Decay, and L'Oreal. The L'Oreal I tend to hoard a bit, as you can see - they're supposedly very close to Armani Eyes to Kill (which I would love to own!), and I love the formula on them - so soft and pigmented. MAC runs expensive, but I'd love more...same goes for UD.

Drawer 6: mostly cream shadows - tons of Maybelline Color Tattoos, a couple MAC paint pots, NYX and UD pencils, and my shadow primers. I highly recommend the Color Tattoos, they beat any cream shadow I've ever used, they're cheap with a huge variety of colors, and they last all day - though I have to use primer underneath since I have oily lids. The summer collection has AMAZING duochrome shadows in it!

Drawer 7: Eyeliners (UD, Milani, MAC, NYX, and a few other random ones), as well as my Benefit BrowZings and Anastasia brow gel. I need more color variety...but as you can tell, I love my UD. The Milani pencil formula is great, too! A little lacking in gel or liquid liners, but I'm trying to learn with what I've got.

Drawer 8: mascara...black on the top, colored on the bottom. Benefit They're Real! and Buxom mascara are my favorites, the others just don't compare...there are some I've been wanting to try, though. The MAC Extended Play has a nice small applicator that I like for my lower lashes.
In the top right corner are my Milani hair mascaras that I occasionally use for a temporary streak of color. I'm sad that I'm missing the red one...not that you could see it if I used it now :)

Drawer 9: Lip glosses! Some glitters, some sheer color, and a few L'Oreal Shine Caresse gloss stains that I am loving - I'd like to get more!

Drawer 10: Other lip products - my Revlon lip butters and balm stains, some Maybelline and Milani lipsticks, Nyx lip creams, and MAC pencil and lipglass. There are a shocking amount of drugstore lip products that are really good! I just wish I were brave enough to wear bold lip colors out of the house. A lot of those lipsticks are crazy bright! I wear them around the house for now :)

Last but not least, the top of my makeup storage unit! Lots of perfumes and my meager brush collection. I think that's the first thing I want to work on...I love nice brushes.

See you guys later! Let me know if there are any particular nail polishes you'd like to see reviewed or compared here! I desperately need to update my stash spreadsheet :)

Fall in a bottle!

Hi all! As I'm sure you've noticed, I haven't posted in a few weeks...I've been busy with work and classes, and I've been constantly breaking my nails at work. They've been slow to grow back...I need to pay attention to what I eat! Anyway, I've been itching to paint them, so...

Since tomorrow is the first day of fall, I figured some fall colors would be appropriate. I chose Glitter Gal Furnace Glow Soft, from their Shade Shifters. The "soft" colors have a finer shimmer to them, where the "brilliant" are more glitter. Furnace Glow is a multichrome that shifts gold, pink, orange, and copper, with a metallic finish. As such, there are definitely brushstrokes with this one, but they're not too bad, and the color is so worth it. I used three coats with OPI Nail Envy as a base and Out the Door topcoat. Application was great, but...I think my top coat needs thinner or something. No matter what I do, I end up with bubbles everywhere.

These pictures are all in natural light...I love how it almost looks like molten metal!

Here's some of just my thumb, to show the color shift a little better...

 

Pictures can't do this one justice. It's awesome, I love it!

You can pick these up from Harlow & Co, and probably Glitter Gal's website (though they ship from Australia).

Next up, I'm going to get back into the whole nail art thing, I think. Stay tuned - thanks for reading :)

What are your preferred fall colors? Tell me in comments!

Gobble Gobble, Bitches!

Good evening everyone! With the end of August comes classes, changing leaves, cooler temperatures...and college football. Now, I don't claim to be a football fan at all, but with all of the "welcome back" type things that are going on on campus as well, I couldn't help but throw together a school-colored mani. After all, I may not be a game fan, but I am a Hokie.

For this, I used a base of OPI Nail Envy original. I started with two coats of Essie Orange, It's Obvious! on my pinkie, ring, and middle finger. Orange, It's Obvious! is a red-leaning orange cream, very similar to the infamous color of the year, Tangerine Tango. Formula and dry time were good on this one, and it was perfectly opaque. On my pointer and thumb, I used two coats of Essie Recessionista, a maroon cream. Formula was good, maybe even better than the orange, and it dried quickly.

On top, I decided to try a non-fast-dry top coat today: Barielle Advanced Gel Top Coat. It's a bit watery, but easy to control, and super shiny. It looked great - then I added a coat of Out the Door on top, and it started bubbling like crazy! Maybe it was too much top coat, or the humidity in here or something...at least the bubbles aren't visible unless my hands are close to my face...

For the middle finger, I took a thin paint brush and freehanded a line with Recessionista, then filled in the right side of the line with it. I let it dry, then cleaned up a bit with a thin, flat paintbrush dipped in acetone. The extra topcoat allowed me to fix a minor imperfection on my right hand without disturbing the orange - fair trade-off for the bubbles. I'm also getting better at cleaning around the nail with a brush! Exciting...for me, anyway :)

Orange, It's Obvious! came out in the spring 2012 collection, Navigate Her, and Recessionista is in the new Stylenomics collection that was just released. Both should be easy to find at your local drugstore, or any etailer.

I plan to go to my first football game this year...if only to have an excuse to get my drink on with friends! Do you do special manicures for sporting events? What are your favorite polishes for your chosen team or school's colors?

Thanks for reading!

Surf Skittles!

Hi all! I have sad news - I broke most of my nails at work yesterday. They're in a pretty sad state...all short and some are peeling. I'll be taking time to give them lots of extra TLC this week.

It should come as no surprise to anyone that the Surf collection that Zoya released this summer is one of my favorite whole collections ever. Bright colors with a shimmery metallic finish? Sign me up! There isn't a single one I dislike, and not a single one has a bad formula - the lighter colors (Zuza, Rory, and Meg) need two thin coats, while Carly, Kimber, and Myrta really only need one. And with my super-short nails, I don't feel quite as "crazy nail polish lady" when I do a skittle mani!

Thumb to pinkie, I used Orly Ridge Filler, then two coats each of Carly, Zuza, Meg, Myrta, and Kimber, with a coat of Poshe on top. Dry time was pretty quick, thankfully, as I did this right before work.

You can see my poor abused cuticles and peeling pointer finger...and that my polish was already starting to chip when I got around to pictures, thanks to work. :( But it's still super pretty and got me compliments...

Thanks for reading!

The Show Must Go On!

Hi all! Today I have a very quickly done mani for you - I had to paint my nails before I played with hair dye, and you know me - I can't just leave it at clear coat. I went with OPI The Show Must Go On, from the Burlesque collection - one of my favorites that was, unfortunately, before my love affair with nail polish, so they've been tough to track down. I received this lovely in a swap! Shown is two coats - the first coat went on VERY streaky and patchy, but luckily, the second evened things out. TSMGO is a lovely duochrome glitter that's almost metallic - I get flashes of red and gold, depending on the light. I topped it off with a coat of Poshe.

On my middle fingers and thumb, I added a thin coat of Max Factor Fantasy Fire. The purple made those nails look slightly darker, but the multichrome goodness of FF was mostly lost in the flashiness of TSMGO. In super low lights, though, I could see the green shimmer - I just couldn't catch it on camera.

No cleanup here - I didn't expect the mani to last through my hair dye ordeal, but it did (and so did some of the unwanted hair color). Off I go to fix it - Thanks for reading!