A Bouquet for Euridice: Drugstore Haul!

I love the name of the Barielle nail polish "A Bouquet for Ava" so I'm using it as the inspiration for my drugstore haul from this weekend. Doesn't it look like a nice bouquet arranged on the platter like that?

The Rimmels are from CVS from a few weeks ago. I have never purchased anything from Rimmel, but the display looked enticing, and I love dark colors. The rest of the nail polish is from Rite Aid. I don't normally shop at Rite Aid, but I was quite enchanted by all the nail polish they had on offer!

First off, I saw two special displays of Borghese. I couldn't help but snatch up the spring colors....even the bubblegum pink. I also picked up a couple of intriguing darker Borgheses. I don't normally buy Sally Hansen, but I was so captivated by the neon metallics!! So, I grabbed a blue and a green. By the time I was through, I also picked out some Maybelline polish. I basically ended up with a lot of similar colors....the blues especially were beckoning.

Here is a parting shot taken outdoors to go with the shot indoors of my bouquet of  lovely colors. More posts to come!

Lacquer Link Love 4/3/2010

 The Dutch Nail Blog is hosting a Surprise Puppy Giveaway! Why Puppies? You can win a number of Catrice polishes from the new collection depending on how many puppies are born! Open to international followers.

Helen at Just Nice Things showcases an all-time classic nail varnish from OPI's Russian Collection.

How unique is NARS Purple Rain? The Swatchaholic calms the Purple Rain lemming with a comparison to a great dupe.

Sasha at Manicure Mommas does China Glaze Poolside Skittles.

Babbling Brooke took a walk through nature with SpaRitual. Check out her swatches of the newest collection: Believe.

Travels With Euridice shows us Barielle's A Bouquet for Ava, a beautiful blue!

Polishing the Nails has some new H&M polishes.

Yay! Giveaway Blog Post!!

Hi, be sure to check out the blog of my lucky giveaway winner. Skulda posted the gorgeous Spin Me Round that she won from my very first giveaway. It looks gorgeous on her, and the cookies don't look half bad, either!! Yum, check it all out at Skulda's Claws.

Color Club Pucci-Licious

Okay, I have a confession to make. I am a little dispirited. Maybe that's one of the reasons why I haven't posted as much in the last two weeks. You see, I am in love with the Color Club collection "POPtastic." A lot of the colors are NEONS. Wonderful, poptastic neons. But you see, the neons don't love me back. Or rather, they don't love my freaking camera! Wail!

I took loads of pictures of these awesome colors, but I don't want to post them because they are not true to life. Well, the orange "Wham! Pow!" and the yellow "Almost Famous" worked okay in pictures. But the pinks....the pinks! So sad. Sniff!

I think perhaps my favorite in this collection is "Pucci-Licious." I was delighted to see this lovely medium purple. When I tried it on, I noticed it was showing up rather BLUE in my camera indoors. My fingertips were PURPLE. Sigh. Well, I have to admit that this color has a lot of blue in it. Could this be a periwinkle blue? Not quite....blurple?

The application was really nice, so much better than the yellow. The surface was rather matte, with a dull shine, like candle wax, or a "wax matte," as I think of it.

I went out into the sun, and I saw that it did show up rather blue! But wait! My camera decided to portray the color as purple! Ta da! Lol. Okay, well the pictures are fairly decent.

That last picture is in the shade.

So. What's the verdict? I imagine everyone is clicking on the pictures and waiting to hear my final pronouncement on this color. Okay. It's....BLURPLE! Yes, I have decided it has enough blue in it to be called a blurple. It looks purple in the bottle but bluish purple on the nails. And I have to say: I LOVE it! I just adore this charming color. My first blurple. Sigh. Love! I heart Pucci-Licious.

Barielle "A Bouquet for Ava"

Suddenly, out of the blue....Blue! Literally! I love a wide variety of colors, and I never had had a favorite color except possibly purple. Too many gorgeous colors to choose from to have a favorite! If anything, I love color combinations, with my favorites being purple and green or purple and yellow.

So, I guess maybe a month or two ago I started lemming for some serious gorgeous medium blue color for the nails. Sure, cobalt, such as in Essie Mesmerize and my cobalt handbag, was an awesome addition to my wardrobe last summer. I think Essie Aruba really captures this ideal blueness, although it's a bit dark..

For 2010, turquoise is supposed to be THE color, and I'm all for that. But there is so much more to life than turquoise and cobalt. Enter Barielle's "A Bouquet for Ava." It's a dark turquoise. Perhaps a lagoon blue? Well, I've read about lagoon blue and am still not exactly sure what that is, so let's stop blabbing and get to the matter at hand. The polish!! GOR-geous!

Let's start indoors as we do a lot of the time:

Come into the light! The afternoon sunlight, that is:

Outdoors still but in the shade:

This dark turquoise is a creme with very nice application. It reminds me of a slate blue, such as Barielle's "Slate of Affairs" from the fall 2009 Barielle collection, only with a dose of green to make a spring/summer color. Not enough green to be a teal, hence my tagging it a dark turquoise.

Barielle calls it "deep cool Caribbean blue." Who am I to challenge the creators of the color?? Caribbean blue it is! Whatever one calls it, I love this beautiful color. Well-done, Barielle! Well-done! 

Color Club Almost Famous

Continuing with Color Club's POPtastic Collection, I give you "Almost Famous," a bright, neon yellow creme. Now I began this series for the POPtastic collection with Wham! Pow!---a crossing guard vest orange....like, if you worked at an airport directing airplanes around and forgot your orange cone thingies, you could just use your hands as long as your nails were painted with this orange. Seriously. The yellow "Almost Famous" continues the the whole neon highlighter marker theme.

Now, I started a lovely afternoon of swatching nail polish with this particular color and I immediately regretted starting with a yellow. I have learned that yellows are notoriously difficult to apply because of the pigments...or something to that effect. This yellow went on rather streaky, but I thought it looked okay by the third coat. I found the rest of the colors went on really well, fortunately!

So, let's take a look. I start with a couple of shots indoors and then go out into the sunshine.

Now for direct sunlight, where the color is a tad washed out but still shows up bright in these pictures.

Outdoors, but in the shade, yep, it's definitely yellow!!

I have a neon yellow patent envelope-style clutch that I need to dig out and coordinate with these screamin' yellow nails!! Fun!! Sunshine and happiness. The only reason NOT to feel happy while wearing this polish is the streaky application, but if you want a punch of yellow, please do persevere and you'll be rewarded.

Color Club Wham! Pow!

I am loving pretty pale spring colors, but let's not forget the brights and neons!! Perfect for summer, intense brights and retina-scorching neons in all sorts of amazing colors, please!! Color Club's POPtastic, one of three collections they released for spring 2010, delivers these bright flourescent colors and then some.

I LOVE this collection! The colors literally POP right off your fingernails....but unfortunately, they tend to pop off my camera lens, which cannot accurate capture the intensity and color of neons.

I'll start with the accurately named "Wham! Pow!" because this highlighter orange does show up fairly accurately in my pictures. tt's basically an intense, super-bright bold orange neon. SUCH FUN!

In the sunlight:

You know it's neon when it glows this bright in the dark for a picture!! This is outdoors but in the shade.

Like many neons, this polish is rather sheer and shows visible nail line after 2 or 3 coats. I decided to experiment with a fairly opaque white polish on my index finger to compare. I was very pleased with the results....no nail line! But looking at my pictures, I realize that the color is altered to a lighter color. Phooey! I don't mind the different color, but capturing the true color but using an undercoat to cover the nail line would be the ideal. Suggestions and tips welcome, please!

Index finger with the white and ring finger with just Wham! Pow! (I tried black on the middle finger, and that did NOT work at ALL! So I am refraining from showing it).

I had some spillage of the white polish into the side of my nail, there, so it looks a bit messy, begging everyone's pardon!

The first pic of the white undercoated index finger is in shade, and the second one is in the sun. You can definitely see the difference. If you want a perfect WHAM! POW! neon orange, however, Wham! Pow! from Color Club certainly fills the bill.

Lacquer Link Love 3/19/2010

Babbling Brook has her head in the clouds and to be quite honest, with all the sunshine around us right now I can't blame her.  Check out her cute mani using OPI's Suzi Feng Shui... I promise it'll bring a smile to your face.

And after you too get your head out of the clouds... take a trip with Konadomania down by the sea!

Tuli has been having fun finger painting thanks to Nicole... LITERALLY, and wants to share with you this week her handpainted masterpieces.  Pun intended!.  :)

Naive Nails has lost her marbles and they've landed on her fingertips, lol.... check out the wonderful marbled mani they created while hanging out there.

Euridice brings you a really nice color comparison between OPI's Hot & Spicy and you guessed it, the Essence Hot & Spicy.  See how they both stacked up.

The NEONs are coming, the NEONS are coming... and they're poolside with Pretty in Polish.

Cucumpear has a a little spring fever and a cute nail art tutorial to share with you that even the novices can follow.

Helen's Nice Things has a question about OPI's Dulce de Leche that only we fellow nail junkies can answer... or maybe not, lol!

And for all you green lovers out there prepare to foam at the mouth as new member Mon coin Moua brings you a sea of green spam swatches.

Now for some very special giveaways...

Bright Lights Big Color's "favorite things" giveaway ends today so make sure you've entered for your chance to win.

Polsh on Digital Paper is hosting a giveaway celebrating 125 followers... help her celebrate the ocassion by entering.

The Dutch Nail Blog is having a spring giveaway... be sure to check out her blog to see what you could win!

Did somebody say a 300 follower giveaway?!!! Yep, Konadomania is celebrating the big 3-0-0!

and Babbling Brooke is having a very special giveaway that you'll just have to click the link to find out about.

OPI Hot and Spicy

I haven't posted in a few days...I must confess something, actually. I've been a bit distracted by trying to decide on a possible handbag order! Yep. You can turn the handbag addict into a nail polish addict, but you can't take the handbag addict out of the nail polish addict! Er, or something to that effect.

It rained all weekend, but I still have much to post from my picture-taking last weekend when it was nice and sunny. The lovely rijaH of Polishing the Nails! voted for some OPI Hong Kong Collection, so I will start off with the intriguing "Hot and Spicy," a creamsicle red-orange color.

I first thought "creamsicle orange" when I saw this polish in the bottle, but it really is more of a creamsicle red-orange. The color is vibrant but still has a pale, muted quality to it. It is the color of Buffalo sauce, sort of. Well, even if muted it's definitely spicy! Let's start off indoors.

The latter picture shows that creamsicle muted quality, while the top picture shows it at its most vibrant. Moving outdoors into the sunlight, then! Onward!

And, in the shade:

I am fascinated with this interesting color! Just to demonstrate the pale red-orange quality, I tried on a vibrant straight orange "Get the Fever 09" from Essence. Below, indoors, you can see the difference between a true vivid orange and "Hot and Spicy."

My parting shot is the comparison between the Essence and Hot and Spicy in the direct sunlight. Sure, it's paler than straight orange, but there definitely is a spicy quality to Hot and Spicy. It definitely goes with the coral tones one is seeing this spring.

BB Couture Tortuga Island

I've decided it is high time I continued my exploration of the BB Couture Hands of Hope Collection, which paid part of the proceeds for aid to Haiti. This is the polish that captures that pretty, cool spring day after a few dreary days of rain and clouds....the sun is out, and the fresh green buds and leaves are showing. Ah, spring! New growth! 

I have been into the pale colors, recently. And I like it! Out of the six colors in this collection, Tortuga Island is the only shimmer (the others are cremes, such as Cap Haitien). I just love this fresh, pale green, and I am looking forward to wearing it soon! 

These are my first BB Couture, and I am very happy with these polishes. The formula is rather thin and slightly runny but otherwise easy enough to manage. So, let's get to swatching! 

In the sunlight, with slight VNL showing:

Taken in the shade:

Ooh, I just love this delicate green. Pale green is a color I am feeling for spring. I may have to go get a pretty pale green linen jacket or something. Or maybe I already have one? Yikes, time to dig out my spring clothes, especially before I do any shopping, ha ha!

I know tortuga means "turtle" in Spanish. I Googled "Tortuga Island" and found more than one possibility, but the one in Haiti is an island off Haiti's north coast. I think it has a lot of trees, so perhaps that is why it's the name for a green polish? At any rate, I love that these colors are named after places in Haiti, and while I am running late getting all of the colors posted, perhaps this post is a reminder not to forget what is going on there in Haiti. 

Color Club I Believe in Amour

I've written before about how I am not into pinks. Pinks and reds, both, I guess. They are the traditional colors for nail polish, and I guess I am much more interested in the less conventional, "fashion" nail colors. When I was playing with Color Club's "I Believe in Amour" I actually had to remind myself of this apathy toward pink! Yeah, I forgot for a moment that I am not supposed to like this polish, lol!

Well, I do like this polish a lot! It is a really pretty medium shade of cool pink, maybe with a trace of lilac tones. Although, I think I see lilac and lavender in everything! But anyway, I don't know what else to say except that it is a very pretty cool-toned pink.

So, let's continue with this series on the Color Club Pardon My French collection, one of three spring collections, by looking at some pics of this pretty pink taken indoors and outdoors in the sun.

By the way, please ignore the dryness of my fingers and cuticles! I hate that things show up in my pictures that I don't totally notice in real life, ugh!

Okey-dokey, now it's time to examine "I Believe in Amour" with the glitter that I think it's supposed to be paired with, "Hot Couture." Interestingly, the colors don't seem to go together at all! The glitter is a wram-toned pink; I would describe it as strawberry-peach daiquiri. Well, I tried it anyway.

Voila! LOVE! I really love this glitter on top of the pink!! I left my pinky fingernail plain to show the comparison.

I think the glitter works beautifully with the pink. If I were a teenager who loved pink, I'd be all over this combination! I don't know if I am likely to wear this...or not. Maybe...well, yeah, I just might!