Barry M - Bright Purple & Once Upon A Time

Good afternoon darlings! Today I'll be showing you two great polishes which were sent to me by the equally great Claudia at Nailing This!

Claudia sent me these pretty polishes in a spring swap and I love them!

Barry M - Bright Purple
I've often heard from other people about Barry M's wonderful formula but I was always super bummed with the formula of the ones I tried. Thankfully, I've finally learned what a good Barry M formula is like because this one is great!
It covers perfectly in two coats and doesn't require any foolin' around.
The color is super cute too.

Barry M - Once Upon A Time
This is a crazy sparkly bar glitter topcoat! It's packed with purple bar glitter and holo bar glitter and also some other small glitter. It's a really fun topper.

The glitter wasn't the easiest to spread around nicely but it was manageable.
I might be letting some of my other Barry M's go in an upcoming purge but these ones will stick around.

These two polishes work so well together! You sent me a great pair, Claude! Thank you :)

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Barry M - Boots Limited Edition

Hi guys! Tonight I'm going to show you a super adorable polish from Barry M.

This is Barry M - Boots Limited Edition. A cute purple-toned pink creme that covers well in just 2 coats!
I think this might be quite similar to Essie's Splash of Grenadine but I don't own it so I am not entirely sure.

Barry M is available only in the UK and this particular one is only at Boots which I believe is a drugstore!

What's on your nails tonight?

More about → Barry M - Boots Limited Edition

Color Club - Scent-suous Collection - swatches and review

Good afternoon! More glitter swatches for you today? Yes!

Today I'm going to be showing you the Scent-suous Collection from Color Club.
This collection is strange - there was no promotion or press releases. It just started showing up... At Sally Beauty.
Sally's does not carry Color Club as a rule but for some reason they got this collection for Christmas.
The polishes are all scented and they actually smell great (unlike the other scented collection from Color Club, Wicked Sweet, which smells totally overwhelming.)

I was worried this collection wasn't going to show up in Canada, but thankfully it did! I got there in time to snag the entire display - a set for me and a set for Kayla. (I wish they came in a set but they don't!)

I'm going to show you the foils first and then the glitters.

Gingerbread Man. 2 coats. This is another great foil from Color Club. As I'm sure you can guess, this smells like gingerbread. It smells really yummy. I'm sure this would work great for stamping.

Kiss Me Mistletoe. 2 coats. I'm going to assume this smells like mistletoe but I'm not sure what that smells like. It's sort of like an evergreen tree smell. I'm not a huge fan of this scent but it is not overwhelming.

These 2 foils are pretty similar to other Color Club polishes:

Gingerbread, Antiquated, Perfect Mol-ten, Kiss Me Mistletoe

Gingerbread is a true gold compared to the warm bronze-gold of Antiquated from the Foiled Collection.
Kiss Me Mistletoe and Perfect Molten, also from Foiled, are dupes.

Santa's Cinnamon. 2 coats. This is a red jelly packed with red glitter. It's a dupe for China Glaze Ruby Pumps, but maybe a bit more sparkly.
This one smells like cinnamon, duh, sorta like cinnamon hearts candy or Red Hots. I'm not really a fan of those candies but the smell is nice.

Now for big glitters!! I've first swatched them on a wheel in different ways just because I like multiple pictures of glitter.

One coat

One coat

Two coats

One coat over black

One coat over black, matte

After that pretty spam, here are the nail swatches.

Orna-Minted. This is one coat over Soulstice Monterey (swatch coming later this week!)
As you can guess, this one smells like mint. Not offensive and strong, just a nice light mint scent.
This isn't very original though, just three sizes of silver hex glitter in a clear base. It's very pretty though!

Sugar Plum Yum. This one is small green glitter and large purple glitter in a clear base that smells like sugarplum, I guess! Not that I have ever smelled a sugarplum before...
I have to say, this one is my least favorite scent. But I like the glitter!
I've shown it here over Kiss Me Mistletoe.

Very Merry Berry. This one is my favorite! I just love the colors. There is small blue and large fuchsia glitter in a clear base and it smells like berries. It's a fresh scent and I like it a lot.
This is shown over Barry M Boots Limited Edition.
I just love it!

That's all she wrote today! I hope you enjoyed these swatches and good luck finding them at your local Sally's.

More about → Color Club - Scent-suous Collection - swatches and review

splattered AND dripping?! + poll!

Hey everyone!
Remember the recent splatter mani I did during that week long challenge?
Well, before I took it off, I really wanted to put some black drips over it.
I'm not sure how it came to me, but it turned out really cool!

Drippy manis are really easy to do - just make some big dots and then connect them to the tip of your nail. And they don't need to be perfect at all, because drips aren't perfect!

The splatter colors are:
China Glaze - Strawberry Fields
Nicole by OPI - You're An Angel
China Glaze - Light As Air
Wet N Wild - Tickled Pink
Barry M - Limited Edition Pink

I did the drips with Wet N Wild - Black Creme.

Really simple yet really bold. I'm a fan!
 
Now before we go I'm going to post a quick poll. I've recently gotten a ton of polishes to swatch and I don't know where to start! So I want you guys to help! (And of course, I want to know what you want to see first. The option with the most votes by the time I get ready to swatch tomorrow will get done first! And then I'll refer to the poll for future posts as well.
I hope you guys like getting a say in what you see here!

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Nail Polish Blogger Challenge - Day 5

Hi guys! Just getting this post in before midnight, haha. I had a lazy day and only just did my mani for today.
But again, I made it super cute, so it was worth the wait!

Before we get started - the Bundle Monster Facebook nail art contest ends soon!
Click here to check out my entry and give me a vote if you like my design. You guys helped me win before and I know you can do it again! I totally appreciate it!

Now for the nails!
I've been waiting to do a splatter mani for a while now, but never took the time to do it until tonight.
I thought an all-pink splatter might be nice!

So here we go.

Pink overload! In a good way!

I'm so happy with how this turned out.

The base is, as you know if you've been following this challenge, Color Club Peppermint Twist.
I splattered using several different polishes:
China Glaze - Strawberry Fields
Nicole by OPI - You're An Angel
China Glaze - Light As Air
Wet N Wild - Tickled Pink
Barry M - Limited Edition Pink

To acheive the splattered look, I dipped a coffee stir stick into a drop of polish and quickly blew it over my nails. There are several tutorials for this on youtube - check it out!
It's super easy. No nail art skills required!

I'm so happy with the way this turned out and I'm not looking forward to changing this manicure tomorrow to keep up with the challenge! That's the problem with these challenges... Haha!

One of my lovely followers, Line, who I've been interacting with on my Facebook page suggested I do a pink manicure for breast cancer awareness this month.
I've been doing pink all week as you know - but today I decided to add a ribbon to really seal the deal!

I added the ribbon with China Glaze Urban-Night. I hope this breast cancer awareness mani hit the spot, Line!
Line has recently started her own blog too (it's contagious,) but it's in French so many of you may not understand. But you can all look at pictures! Check it out here.

And again, check out the other manis from the girls in the challenge this week!

Caroline from Good Lack Nail

Deniz from Emerald Sparkled 

Leslie from Polish Art Addiction 

Inge from Polish Sis
Ulmiel from Did someone say nail polish?
Sidrah from beauteous blog
Sarah from Lucky Lacquers
Maestra from parokeets

Gejba from  parokeets 

More about → Nail Polish Blogger Challenge - Day 5

more international swatch spam! my swap with shel :)

Hi guys! I have some lovely polishes from the UK to show you today.

I was considering making an order from Barry M, but then the lovely Shel from If It Shines It's Mines offered to swap! Of course it is nicer to swap than buy direct from the company, right? Because then 2 people get lovely polishes!

I gave Shel a list of all the Barry M's I thought were cute and asked her to surprise me with a Models Own. And she sure did good! Let's start with the one Models Own.

Models Own - Magenta Pearl. This is a really pretty deep magenta polish. In the bottle it looks as if it will be a metallic shimmery frost, the type that will cover in 1 coat and be really good for stamping.
But when you start applying it, it is very different! It is sort of like a shimmery jelly.

It's hard to tell in the photos but it does have that nice jelly look to it, with the added bonus of shimmer! Plus the color is really lovely.
I love this one a lot! You surprised me well, Shel :)

Now for my little army of Barry M's! I just love these little square bottles. If I ever go to the UK I'm sure I would come home with another army.

Barry M - Blue Moon. The formula on this one is really bad (4 coats!) but I love the color despite the application. I think if I use a different base coat I might get better results.
See how the polish is sort of sticking off at the tips? That kept getting worse with every layer I applied.

So I'm not sure what the issue is here.
The shimmer is very subtle and the color is lovely, it's too bad the formula isn't great.
I bet this would be a nice polish to wear underneath Lippmann's Glitter In The Air! (I'm hoping I'll be able to show you that combo sometime soon - let's hear it for delayed birthday presents!)

Barry M - Turquoise. As you can see, this is not turquoise at all but a true blue. Formula was better on this one but still a bit thin, 3 coats.

Very similar to OPI - What's With The Cattitude? but a bit brighter.

Barry M - Cyan Blue. Another pretty true blue! I love this particular shade of blue because it is really vibrant and stands out on your nails. This one was also 3 coats.

Similar to Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Brisk Blue (and therefore Blue Me Away! as well) but more of a jelly.

Barry M - Mint Green. The formula was very thin on this one as well, 4 coats. Despite being 4 coats, the jelly look is cute and I think this is my favorite mint green now!

Brighter than China Glaze Re-Fresh Mint and less blue than Essie - Turquoise and Caicos.

Barry M - Spring Green. Pretty grass green creme, 2 coats but could have used a third as I can see in the photo. I don't own any other green quite like this one! Very happy to have it.

Barry M - Fuchsia. More of a true deep pink than fuchsia as the name suggests. 2 coats! This one has a good formula, and I don't own anything quite this shade of pink!

Barry M - Blue Glitter. Hello, lovely. This is possibly the best glitter formula I have ever tried. This is just 2 coats for full, complete coverage.

Above is 1 coat. Much more dense than other glitters. And despite the density, it is still thin enough to apply very easily!

Dries to a matte finish and is very gritty, so you need topcoat with this one.

Ahh, glossy glitter.
I wore this one as a full mani!

But... I ended up having to run an errand right after applying this, and my nails lost the battle against the jeans I had to put on.
I ruined 2 nails by taking out large chunks of the glitter.
Instead of redoing my entire mani, I decided to add patches of other glitters!

I fixed the holes on my thumb and index finger, and then added fake patches on 2 other fingers to complete the look.
This design was silly, but the glitters worked nice together!

Bubbly Bombshell, Blue Glitter, Here Comes Trouble. Happy glitter family!

Thank you so much Shel for this awesome swap and I hope your package makes it to you soon! :)

More about → more international swatch spam! my swap with shel :)