A Box, Indied: The Deadly and the Beautiful

I know I've been regaling you all with my misadventures of body aches and pains, but I seriously can't catch a break. I was out sick on Thursday this week with laryngitis. Go me! I have felt awful all week, but I'm still very protective of my caseload at work and made myself go in yesterday. Anyway, again, legit reason for lack of posts...

Before May is over I thought I'd show you my favorites from this May's A Box, Indied. I get the box because I don't want to miss out on exclusive shades, and anything I don't like I can usually just get back what I paid for it on my blog sale (go look! I also have a cheapie cheap board).

The first, and my favorite, will come as no surprise: HARE polish The Blooming Desert. I love me some HARE! The Blooming Desert is a hot pink jelly with orange and white glitters as well as golden flakies and shimmer. I used three coats for my swatch, starting thin and building up coverage. HARE polish does have a learning curve for application, so if you're new to glittered jellies & crellies check out this post. My accent nail is Sephora by OPI Hi-Def with some pearls.

HARE polish
The Blooming Desert

Contrary Polish Darling Wildflower was a surprise favorite for me, as I am not usually a purple person. Darling Wildflower is a purple jelly with microflakies and microshimmer. I see golds, pinks, and reds making this one of those beautifully complex shimmers. I did a first thin coat, a second thicker coat, and a third generous coat. In the photos you can see a little VNL but it was much less noticeable in person. I couldn't resist adding an owl from Hex Nail Jewelry.

Contrary Polish
Darling Wildflower

I just looked and there are still May boxes available, go grab yours if you like what you see! June's A Box, Indied goes on sale Monday May 26th. If you can swing the cost, it is a super fun treat every month. I am already dying over the HARE and Jindie previews for June!

Products:
A Box, Indied

Have you loved your cuticles today?

The Hunger Games: Catching Fire Nails feat. Hex & Covergirl

I really underestimated how much adjustment my new work schedule was going to need. I am literally waking up when I used to go to bed UGH. I apologize for my unplanned weekend off from posting anything. I lamely tried to get people to post on my facebook page but that appears to be a fail as well. Then I had a bad break and my nails are beyond nubby at this time.... I have some ideas for nail care this week though which I hope will help everyone with the dropping humidity!

So who hasn't seen Catching Fire yet? I went on Saturday with a friend and of course I needed some appropriate nails. They needed to be quick though because that is the story of my life... I wait until the night before to figure out what I want to do hehe. I have two new-to-me brands which I purchased and received at just the right time to inspire this quick look!




For these nails I used:
Undies--Sephora by OPI Hi-Def
Covergirl Rogue Red from the Capitol Collection, 3 thin coats
Gold Studs from Born Pretty Store
"Free Bird" Gold Charm Hex Nail Jewelry

Rogue Red is a foil-metallic polish made up of red, orange, and golden-yellow flakes. I had swatched the Covergirl Capitol Colors on a piece of paper and they are very very sheer. Plus the undies make the polish super bold and they literally look like an ember's glow!
 

Let's talk about the bird charm. I am in love with Hex Nail Jewelry and I am going to be ordering more for sure. I stuck on my Free Bird with a dab of nail glue a couple hours before I left the house, which is important so the glue is good and dry. I did make sure I was careful when wearing it and it stayed on well even through mitten changes (it went into single digits that night, brr!). When I went to remove the charm I found it popped off fairly easily and I was able to peel off the glue without damaging the polish. I was able to stick it back on the next day, but I wasn't paying attention and it popped off when I opened a cereal box... luckily it just fell into the box and I didn't lose my bird!

Oh, and Catching Fire was amazing and even better than the first!
You can purchase Covergirl Capitol Colors in most drug stores.
You can purchase Hex Nail Jewelry from their website. They are very affordable!
Cuticles should never be on fire, sooth them with some moisture today.

Jindie Nails For Fall 2013: Breakfast At Tiffany's Cousins & What Are You Smokin' Mirrors

Sorry ladies, little later than I wanted to post this... I just got a awesome new job which I interviewed for on Monday. I pretty much did not sleep since Sunday because of nerves and then I didn't sleep because I knew telling my current employer was going to suck. I think I'm caught up now though!
Anyway, today I have the other two polishes I purchased from Jindie Nails from the Fall Chic collection this year. I wanted to mention again that I purchased the new 9ml bottles and they are great! I didn't use them to photograph because they were hard to pose with.

My swatches are of the two crellies: Breakfast At Tiffany's Cousins and What Are You Smokin' Mirrors. One is a swatch and one is a skittlette I wore for a day inspired by the polish.

Jindie Nails - Breakfast At Tiffany's Cousins

2 coats BATC

1 coat KBShimmer Clearly On Top

Love this crelly! BATC is a teal crelly with blue, green, maroon, and more glitters in assorted shapes and finishes. BATC applied very easily, I did a first coat with mostly the crelly base and then a second thick coat with most of the glitters. I lastly did a little dabbing to fill in where I wanted. I really like the big hexes and the little glitters which give it a speckled look.

Jindie Nails - What Are You Smokin' Mirrors

Pinky: 3 thin coats Zoya Tomoko, 1 thin coat of KBShimmer Clearly On Top

Ring: 2 coats Sephora by OPI Frankly I Don't Give A-dam, studs from Born Pretty Store, 2 coats KBShimmer Clearly On Top

Middle, Index, & Thumb: 1 coat Sephora by OPI Frankly I Don't Give A-dam, 2 coats What Are You Smokin' Mirrors, 2 coats KBShimmer Clearly On Top

This was my favorite polish from Jindie's fall collection. WAYSM is a gray crelly with glitters in silver, gold, holographic, metallic, circles, shimmer, and more. This polish inspired the skittlette's colors, I just loved the gold and silver with the gray. Tomoko is a great accent and the pale gold studs make it very "Fall Chic"!
I used undies for WAYSM, then I did a thin coat with the jelly part followed by fishing and dabbing for the larger glitters. It wasn't too bad at all. I found that for this polish the glitters showed up nicer without another coat of jelly over the top.

What Fall Jindies are your favorite? You can purchase Jindie Nails here--looks like she still has many Fall and Halloween polishes still in stock!

Anyone noticing a difference in their cuticles with daily moisturizing?

You Polish Monthly Box for October

I have another box review today! I saw some You Polish swatches and decided to try out their monthly box. For $16.99 (that includes shipping!) you can choose two full-sized polishes from a monthly selection in a variety of colors and finishes. Of the six polishes available for October I chose the two I am going to show you today: After Midnight and Calaveritas. Keep reading to see some nail art, too!

You Polish October Monthly Box

After Midnight

Black Jelly with Orange, Purple, & Silver Micro Glitter

Two coats over China Glaze liquid Leather

I felt that the Purple leaned more Magenta and I saw green sparks along with the silver--all quite fine with me! What you see in the bottle is what you get on the nail! Formula was very good, thick but easy to apply.

 Calaveritas

Black, White, Gray, & Pink Glitters--and SKULL GLITTER!

Shown over OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls

This is the polish that made me check out You Polish. SKULLS. You Polish tells us that Calaveritas means "small skulls" or "skulls" and is inspired by sugar skull tattoo art. Love love LOVE. To apply I turned my bottle upside down while I was swatching my other polish as the large glitters are sinky. I applied a first coat and did a little dabbing, then I did some major fishing for the skulls. I would fish around and when I caught one on my brush I grabbed it with a toothpick and placed them on my nails, without looking too planned. Completely worth the effort and overall a good formula considering the large glitters which was a very pleasant surprise!

I felt like I didn't choose the best undies for the swatch and I planned on wearing this awesome glitter anyway, so here is my skittlette featuring Calaveritas. I don't even care how cliche this mani is, I freakin' love it!

Index--3 coats SquareHue Happy Creme, white studs from Born Pretty Store
Middle & Ring (& Thumb, not shown)--2 coats Sephora by OPI Break A Leg-Warmer!, You Polish Calaveritas
Pinky--3 thin coats Zoya Dahlia
All topcoated with 2 thick coats of KBShimmer Clearly On Top

Sorry for the zombie skin, I took this without flash so you could see the glitter goodness!

For more information and to purchase You Polish, you can visit their shop. I will for sure be checking out the November box, I hope there is another holo selection then to try!

Do you think black & pink are overdone? Will you be checking out You Polish?
I know you've loved your cuticles today ;-)

Llarowe's A Box, Indied for October 2013: Swatches & Review

Llarowe is a renowned indie stockist in the nail polish world and the single biggest reason for my credit debt. She recently came out with "A Box, Indied" which is a monthly indie offering of five unique polishes exclusive to the box. I tried to limit pictures as there are five polishes but this post is still picture-heavy!

A Box, Indied

October 2013

Jindie Nails - Screaming Halloween

3 coats OPI Fiercely Fiona
2 coats Screaming Halloween plus a little extra fishing and dabbing
1 thick coat CND Air Dry

 

Let me begin by saying I love Jindie. Not only does she make incredibly unique polishes, she is also a complete sweetheart! Unfortunately for me, this color makes me look like a zombie. I love the concept though, just look at the bottle shot, yum!

Any of you gals blessed with any significant amount of melanin (I swear I have none haha) would probably be able to pull this off with no problems.

Black Cat Lacquer - Came Back Haunted

1 coat China Glaze Liquid Leather
2 coats Came Back Haunted
1 coat CND Air Dry

This was my first experience with Black Cat Lacquer, no complaints here! This is a sheer black jelly with multi-colored shreds and holographic micro shimmer. I swatch in the middle of the night and my lightbox kills holos (sadness, I am working on a solution) so the holo shimmer actually looks simply multi-colored in my photos but I promise it's there. 

Make sure you shake the bottle well and turn it upside down for a bit as the larger shards are sink-y. I think this looks like shredded Halloween candy wrappers from a frantic sampling of trick-or-treat spoils haha. It also looks like confetti and I could see this for New Year's manis, too!

Polish Me To Go - Luna Verde

3 coats Orly Day Glow (white) and 3 coats China Glaze Kiwi Cool-Ada (accent)
2 coats Luna Verde, no topcoat

Polish Me To Go is also new for me. Luna Verde (love the name!) is a sheer lime green with silvery flakie shimmer. I had a hard time figuring out how to wear this. It is incredibly sheer so I wanted to try it like a topcoat and sort of by itself. It looks nice as a topcoat but the glow is very subtle. On the other hand it doesn't look that exciting over white, but the glow was incredible! I had no idea what I was doing while trying to photograph this in the dark, but I'll show my picture anyway so you can see the difference over dark verses light colors.

In person the glow was pretty awesome and not blurry like my crappy photos look, I'm sorry I couldn't do it justice. Glow-in-the-dark polishes are fun, but I only see them glowing for the few minutes before I fall asleep so I feel like the novelty is wasted on me.

Lacquerlicious - No Tricks, Just Treats!

Undies are China Glaze Gaga For Green, Sephora by OPI Hi Def, China Glaze liquid Leather, China Glaze Grape Pop
1 coat No Tricks, Just Treats! plus some fishing and dabbing
1 coat CND Air Dry

Another new brand for me! This polish is a Halloween glitter bomb, I couldn't even begin to list the glitters involved in this chaos so just refer to the bottle shot...

Wow! Anyway, I initially tried this over a light purple and a light peachy orange. All I will say it it looked awful and I recommend black or bold colors like I'm showing you now. I prefer it over the black and dark purple, I feel like it just looks like a mess over lighter colors.

Ethereal Lacquer - Devoured

3 coats Devoured
1 coat Glisten & Glow HK Girl Top Coat (doesn't dull holos!)

Now this is what I'm talking about! Devoured is a very deep plum holographic polish. I know the holo market is pretty saturated right now but this is classy, sexy, vampy--the quintessential fall polish. I probably could have stopped at two coats, but I used three for photographic purposes. If you see anyone giving theirs up just throw your money at them and take it.


Surprisingly there are still October boxes and subscriptions available on Llarowe's website here. I think a lot of people passed because of the swatches, but there are some real gems in here. And really, can I NOT buy something that is exclusive and/or limited edition?! I do have the subscription and I hope to continue showing you the monthly offerings to either sign up yourself or track down just what you *need* from blogs and personal sales.

That was a lot for one post, thanks for sticking with me!
I hope you took some time while reading to moisturize those cuticles ;-)