CG - Glittering Garland

Glittering Garland by China Glaze was one of the polishes that was released with their holiday collection in 2011. My first impression when looking at it online is that it was just a densely packed hunter green glitter. My first impression is wrong. Yes, it is indeed glittery, but it is a pigmented base. I wasn't sold on this color when it first arrived in my mailbox. It looked dark in the bottle, indoors. I tend to shy away from dark colors because they make my already short nails look even shorter. I have to say though, my mind was changed when I finally got around to wearing it last night.

The brush is the usual CG brush. A little too narrow for my super wide nails, so it took some finagling to get it to look right. The formula is surprisingly smooth considering how much glitter is in this polish. It was smooth after one coat of top coat, which was a relief. It self leveled well. Once again, I used my striping tape for the accent finger. I love my striping tape. LOL

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Zoya - Reva

I have a whole bunch of Zoya polishes that I under utilized for a very long time, because I always had problems getting them to dry completely on my nails. For some reason, the top would always dry perfectly, but the polish would remain soft for days underneath, leaving me with dings and dents. It made me sad. Luckily Zoya seems to play well with Seche Vite top coat and I haven't had a problem with hardening since.

Yesterday was awareness day for heart health, and everyone was supposed to wear red in support of it. I don't own many pieces of red clothing, so I ended up putting red on my nails. I chose Reva. It is a strawberry red with gold shimmer in it. I absolutely adore this polish. It is so dimensional. Then I remembered the striping tape I had ordered a few weeks ago. There were two golds in the set of striping tape that I bought. One was a smooth gold, and one was a more patterned gold. I decided to use the patterned gold for the accent on my nails because I felt it matched the gold glitter in Reva better.

The formula was very smooth despite being in my collection for quite a while. I thought two coats was plenty, but looking at some of my photos, it is a bit sheer in some places still. That could be entirely my fault though. Next time I will probably go with three coats though.

Here are some photos for you. Forgive my sloppy work and ragged cuticles. I haven't been moisturizing enough recently and it has been a long time since I've been in for a pro shaping and the likes. With out further ado, the photos!

Disclaimer: This product was purchased by me with my own money, and I was not compensated in any way for this review.

Sally Hansen Salon Nail Care - Protein Nail Strengthener

A week ago, I had to cut my nails down past the tips. Very very short. My nails are very flimsy so they bend and peel at the tips because I do a lot of things with my hands. So, I picked up a bottle of this in hopes of getting some length to them again. they will probably stay on the shorter side, but I'm going to test my limits with this. It would be lovely to have long nails for my friend's wedding in May, where I will be maid of honor. The dress is picked out, my friend is making me some beautiful hand made jewelry to go with it, as well as lovely hair and shoe clips I bought off Etsy.  I'm planning on doing a few trial runs of the manicure I'll be giving myself once I have a swatch of the dress fabric/color to take to the nail supply place.

I have been using this product for about a week now. It says to use for 2, so I will write an in depth review them. In the mean time I apologize for lack of updates, but I have been avoiding painting my nails because I tend to wear a lot of glitter, and I want to avoid acetone while I try to heal my nails.

I know the lack of followers here is probably due to lack of posts, but I just want to put out there that I will be doing a giveaway if I ever make it to GFC 50 followers. Here's to hoping!

Pointless Cafe's Winter Giveaway!

The Pointless Cafe is having a polish giveaway!

http://pointlesscafe.blogspot.com/2012/01/pointless-cafes-winter-giveaway.html

I am a Julep Maven

Today I received in the mail my maven box from Julep. I got my very first box from them for only $5 with a promotion that they are/were having, and the box only took 2 days to get to my mail box all the way from Washington. Inside the box was 3 colored polishes, a top coat, and 2 sample packets. One packet was a glycolic hand scrub, and the other packet is a SPF30 hand cream. I wasn't a huge fan of the hand cream. It smells just like sun screen and has a greasy after feel. The polishes as shown from left to right in the photo are the top coat, Megan, Leah, and Hayden. Megan is a shimmery blue color. Leah is a grassy green with the very smallest hint of shimmer, and Hayden is a creamy peach color.

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I started with Hayden, it was the brightest in the bunch, and drew my eye first. The formula was a little on the thick side, but applied rather well. I did mess up and pressed too hard while applying my second coat, leaving some thin spots. That was entirely user error. If I had been more careful, 2 coats would have been fine. I did have a little problem with bubbles that not even a coat of Seche Vite could smooth out. I'm not sure if it was just the thick formula, or bubbles left over from transit. Hayden did not disappoint me when it was dried. It was just as bright and creamy as it appeared in the bottle. Here are the swatches. Please forgive my sloppy application. I always have problems with heavily pigmented creams.

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Next up is Leah. I absolutely adored this color from the second I saw it. It was such a grassy green, it immediately made me smile. It also looked creamy like Hayden but when I started to apply it, there just just the tiniest hint of shimmer hidden in this polish. It was very subtle, I could have easily missed it. This polish was also a little on the thicker side, but it wet on smoothly and easily. Here are swatches for your enjoyment. 2 coats with Seche on top.

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Lastly we have Megan. I knew Megan would be a color for me right from the start. It is a lovely shimmering blue. This formula was not as thick as the other two, but went on smoothly, and still only needed two coats. Sadly, it was prone to strokes from the brush. On this polish I also tried the quick dry top coat that came with it, but was not impressed. I was spoiled by the speed of my Sech and put that on instead. On to the swatches.

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Flash at another angle to show the shimmer.

All in all, I am pleased with this box. I unfortunately have to skip next month's box because of the way their billing cycle falls, but I will continue to use this service. I suggest you give it a try as well. The service is $19.99 a month. Also, if you sign up with the link I posted above, you will be helping me earn a free box. =) Thanks for looking!