Maybelline Sage Staple

Happy Friday, everyone! I am really looking forward to a long weekend. Hopefully I will get a lot of reading and knitting time in. Maybe a bad movie or two. I would like to get some swatching done but it's seriously going to be 100 degrees here so I don't know if the sun will be too crazy to get decent pics. We will see.

Today I have a new polish from Maybelline's recent Vintage Leather line. I spotted the polish display at Target about a week ago. There were polishes missing but I did manage to grab 2 that looked interesting to me. This is Sage Staple, a medium sage green.

So the finish on this is pretty interesting. The polish is matte (obviously) but also contains little flake like glitter that are supposed to, I think, add a leather-like texture to the finish. It's kind of an interesting finish. I don't know how much like leather it looks like but it's definitely different. The flakies do not give it an actual texture that you can feel (it's still smooth) and just adds to the "leather effect."

The formula on this was kind of thick and I was having issues with patchiness on the first coat. The second coat helped a lot though and I only needed 2 coats for the look above. I did't try this was top coat as this actually chipped on me the day after. So yeah, I am on the fence about this one. I have the plum polish in this line as well which I will give a try. However, I don't love this look. I prefer a straight matte if I am going for matte.

Anyone else spot these yet? What do you think - yay or nay?

Have an awesome weekend, everyone!

Maybelline Denim Dash

Happy Wednesday! Today I am posting a really pretty polish that I got at the last CVS sale. This is Maybelline Denim Dash, a really beautiful deep blue with awesome shimmer. I am pretty sure The formula on this was super opaque and I could have gotten away with 1 coat though I did 2 here out of habit. I think this color is just beautiful and I love it. I find the brushes on the Maybelline polishes to be a bit on the stumpy side but I can deal with it for something as lovely as this.

This is one of the first Maybelline Color Show polishes I have tried and I really love it. I don't know if you can really see the shimmer but it is awesome in person. If you can still find this one somewhere, you should snap it up. Love this one.

I am playing around with the picture sizes on the blog if you can't tell. I wanted them to be bigger but not too big since I don't have the best camera and want to keep the image quality high. I kinda like this size though. What do you guys think?

Zoya Carter

Hello and happy Monday! Did you guys all have a good weekend? It's been so hot here lately as the last bits of summer go away. I cannot wait for fall though because it is my favorite season. Anyway, today I have another textured polish for you (act surprised). This one is from Zoya's Pixie Dust Fall 2013 line and is named Carter. Carter is a gorgeous polish with blackened base and purple and fuchsia glitter. Seriously, it's amazing.  If we only get one polish from this collection, I would go with this one.

Carter seems a bit watery on the first coat but becomes rich and opaque after a second coat. Below is 2 coats with no base or top coat.

This was kind of what I was hoping OPI Vesper was going to be but just wasn't. This beautiful purple is a must have for any texture or purple lover. I am even considering getting a back up... :)

Stashed (5): Ciate, Zoya, Maybelline, SpaRitual

Hello! Hope you have all being having a good weekend. It's still ridiculously hot where I am though I can tell that fall is coming with the cooler nights and shorter days. Fall is my favorite time of year so I welcome the change.

I have a pretty small haul this week. I have been trying to spend less on polish lately and I seem to be doing alright. Hopefully I can maintain it. :)

I received my Zoya order from when they had the CAMO promo code. These are all from the new fall lines. I am missing one polish in this picture that broke in transit. Zoya is sending another though and I should have it soon.

I did some shopping at the discount stores and drugstore this week as well. The Marshalls and TJ Maxx near me both had a bunch of the Ciate foil and caviar kits for $9.99. I decided to try the foil kit and chose one with a pretty coral polish. Also picked up two of the new Maybelline Leather Effect polishes. I tried one and I am not sure if it's for me. I love matte but these are a little odd and it chipped in a day. I'll have that on the blog soon. Also picked up one of the Sephora by OPI colors (can't remember which) also at TJ Maxx. A bunch of those are popping up now that they are discontinued at Sephora. It was $3.49. And then I picked up a pretty gold/chartreuse foil type polish by SpaRitual. 

That's it for my haul this week. Did you pick up any new polishes this week?

ulta3 Orchid

Hi, everyone! TGIF. I am SO glad that it's finally Friday. Work killed me this week and I am so glad for a break. I am really hoping to just chill out this weekend and maybe see the City of Bones movie. Today I have for you one of the awesome polishes that Mandee from The Bookish Manicurist sent me in our swap. This is ulta3 Orchid, a gorgeous almost dusty purple with a subtle gold shimmer. I really wish we had ulta3 polishes here because they are really inexpensive and great quality for the price. I asked Mandee for this one not knowing if she'd be able to find it. ulta3 doesn't seem to have a permanent collection and it's pretty hit or miss. But Mandee worked some magic and found this one for me and I really love it.

Orchid has a super creamy and opaque formula. Below is just 1 coat with too coat. Yup, 1 coat for all this gorgeousness.

The gold shimmer doesn't come out as much on the nail but you can definitely still tell that it is shimmery. Love this one and cannot wait to try more ulta3. Thanks for sending this one, Mandee!

OPI Alcatraz Rocks

Yup, I am back with another textured polish today. I am not sick of them yet so you all must endure. :) Today's polish is Alcatraz Rocks from the new OPI San Francisco collection. I grew up near San Francisco so this collection is near and dear to my hear. I knew that Alcatraz Rocks was going to be one from the collection that I had to have. 

Alcatraz Rocks is a beautiful dark blue. But what makes it special, is the glitter, which ranges from pink, blue, silver and gold. There may be other colors in there as well. Formula was great and it took 2 coats to get what you see above. I really love how the new texture polishes are getting so much more complex. This is a great example of that. I don't have anything like this in my collection. I didn't put top coat on it but it would probably look great with top coat as well.

What do you guys think of this one? I have one other polish from this collection to show you. While I love the San Francisco theme, I don't know if I love all of the polishes. Right now I have two though I may pick up a couple more later on.  Thanks for stopping by today. Have an awesome day!

Topshop Eclipse

Happy Monday, all. Hope your weekend was great. I spent a lot of mine indoors hiding from the heat. :) So a few weeks ago, my awesome friend L sent me a package out of the blue. L isn't a blogger but knows I have this blog and she ordered me a couple of polishes from Nordstrom. The first polish she gave me is Topshop Eclipse. Eclipse is a gorgeous blue-green duochrome shimmer. The formula on this was nice and I used 2 coats on the photos below, no top coat.

lighting: sunlight

lighting: shade

As you can see, in the sun, this polish looks like a pretty teal shimmer. It's nice, but not spectacular. However, the duochrome really comes out in the shade and you can see how the edges pull really blue.

lighting: sunlight

lighting: shade

This shade reminds me of mermaid tales and the ocean. If you like these types of shades, you'll probably like Eclipse. You can see more of the pretty duochrome in the bottle shot below. Thanks, L, for the polish present. I love it and am glad to have it in my collection. Thanks for visiting, everyone!

Stashed (4): ulta3, Australis, OPI, CND

Hi, everyone. I have a really big haul to share with you this week. I did a swap with Mandee from The Bookish Manicurist recently and my package just came this week. Mandee lives in Australia and I was moaning about the fact that the new Ulta3 Glitterati collection was only available in Australia when Mandee generously offered to do a swap with me. She threw in some other brands as well and I am excited to try them all. :) I also made a beauty supply run last weekend and picked up a few polishes as well as the new CND Vinylux system. Full review to come but I've been wearing it for a whole week now and it looks great, but I am dying to change my polish and my nails are getting super long. I'll be glad to take it off tomorrow.

I am too tired right now to list the names of all of these polishes. You can see the Ulta3 names on the front of the bottle (which I love). If there's anything else you want to know the name of, just let me know in the comments below and I'll get back to you. Happy Sunday!

Dare To Wear Ready For My Closeup

Hello there. Happy Friday. Today I have for you a gorgeous, sparkly glitter bomb. I picked up Dare To Wear Ready For My Closeup a month or two after seeing it on a blog (sorry, can't remember which one). It looked so awesome that I immediately went on eBay and found myself a bottle. Of course it took my until now to finally wear it. But it's a super gorgeous glitter that I think everyone needs. This is definitely what I would call "blurple," a cross between a blue and purple. This polish is packed with blue, purple and holo glitter. I put it over a manicure that was getting a bit old so I don't know if it would get opaque on its own. The base looks somewhat jelly-ish.

Below is 1 coat over Salon Perfect Playful Plum. You can see how sparkly it is with just one coat. 2 coats will probably blind you. It wasn't super gritty and I think I only had to do one coat of top coat for most of these nails, though I did do a second coat on a couple of them.

I stared at my nails a lot when I wore this one. If you like glitter, get this polish! Thanks for stopping today. Have an awesome weekend!

Nicole by OPI My Cherry Amour

Yes, it's another textured nail polish. I really hope that I don't get sick of these anytime soon because I have a lot of them. :) Today I have a polish from Nicole by OPI's Gumdrops collection that came out this summer. My Cherry Amour is a raspberry pink jelly full of scattered holo glitter and regular glitter. The holo doesn't translate on the nail as much as the bottle but it's still a lovely color. No issues with formula and I did 2 coats below. I still love that textured polishes are such an easy mani for when I don't have much time.

look, holo

I think there's only one more polish from this collection that I want. It's a denim blue one that I can't remember the name of right now. I just bought the new OPI San Francisco blue texture polish and am hoping that alleviates my need for the NOPI blue, but we'll see.

Happy hump day!