China Glaze: We've Got The Beet

I'll be honest, for over the past year or so I haven't been into buying new polish. It's rare I find anything that stands out. I find most new polishes I see unoriginal, so I was really please to see this polish. For the first time in a long time I was excited. It's a shame that feeling didn't last long.

I'm honestly not sure how I feel about this polish. We've Got The Beet is a beautiful magenta shade from China's Glaze's 2016 Summer Lite Brites collection(*I KNOW* I'm reviewing something that's current!). It leans purple (but photographs more purple then it actually is irl) with mostly gold/copper-ish flecks. The formula is like wet lime plaster, and it takes 3 careful coats for total opacity, and the dry time is tedious. On the plus side like lime plaster it does seem to last eons on the nail. In the photos the manicure is 5 days old.

I'm glad I got the teeny tiny bottle for now. Pretty colour, tragic formula. Maybe I will get the full size bottle one day when it inevitably goes on sale somewhere.

It's Alive!

I've actually posted this before, but I'm nuts, so I'm gonna post it again. Actually it's too amazing not to share again. This is China Glaze's I'm Alive, from their 2011 Halloween collection! It's a murky green, filled with small glitter and micro glitter. It's one of my favourite Halloween polishes ever. What's one of yours? Sorry this post is super short, busy few days and I am beat. And a plain manicure is better than nothing :P

Mandatory Mani

I feel like this is a mandatory manicure for anyone that has pointy nails. Watermelons. You just have to do it at some point. So this is my time/I wanted to do it before it started to feel like autumn.

I started with my base of Running in Circles then with acrylic paint I added the pink and white. Finally I painstakingly added the black glitter which is Ninja Polish Sticks and Stones. That took the longest time, trying to pick out the small black glitter from the white glitter. Love how it looks even though he glitter was a pain.

Here's running in circles on it's own. I have actually swatched it before, but this is too pretty to not show again!

Happy (Belated) World Pride - Part 3: Success!

I know I've been away for a while, but I'll get into that later :P

These nails are what I wore to the Pride Parade almost 2 weeks ago. As you know I didn't like how my last set of pride nails turned out. I am happy to say that I loved these! The whole gradient was done using acrylic paint, and I topped it with China Glaze Fairy Dust! The one thing I don't like about these photos is the blue and purple gradient. My camera hates purple and likes making it blue. Rest assured that in real life the blue->purple gradient looked amazing.

The parade itself was interesting. Mainly because it was sooooooooo long. We were near the beginning of the parade and we were there for 4 hours in disgustingly hot weather before we decided to leave. Rumour has it the parade was 6 hours! But one of the "best" moments happened after the parade. We had decided to go and get something to eat, and I had ordered a water(easy right?) When I got my water there was gunk on the bottom of my glass. So I asked for a new one, but to my joy this one had gunk floating in it. My friend's boyfriend then said "It's fine. It looks like food" My response was, "But it's not MY food!" *facepalm*

Nail Polish Canada Nail Art Challenge. Week 1 - Snow: When all else fails, do a Doctor Who manicure

When I was invited to do Nail Polish Canada's nail art challenge I thought "Why not?"  Normally I don't do things like these because I loose interest quickly.  But since this is once a week for 3 weeks, I think I can do it.

This week's theme is 'Snow'.  Now I know what you are thinking.  And no they don't mean Snow, the Canadian reggae sensation.  They mean solid water that is 0° or less.  As we all know by now I hate snow, it's cold and it tastes funny.   I was less than inspired.  So I thought maybe I could connect something I liked to snow.  So I thought Doctor Who ---> Snowmen made from telepathic snow!  Perfect.   Although it is kind of funny because I actually am not of fan of the episode they were in(The Snowmen).  Thought it could have been better for a Christmas episode.  Hopefully this year will be more exciting with 11 regenerating.

To do this mani I started with a base of Butter London Big Smoke.  The rest was done using China Glaze Glittering Garland, Fairy Dust, and White Ice.  Along with a white Wet n Wild(Cant find a name), Essie Pretty Edgy and acrylic paint for the Snowman's teeth.

If you like this mani.  Head on over to Nail Polish Canada and vote for me here(Yup it's a challenge where you can win things.)  Just scroll down the drop down box till you reach varnishedvalkyrie.blogspot.ca.

Is there snow where you are?

China Glaze Bells Will Be Blinging: Snow is great in theory.

I love looking at the snow fall while having a cup of something hot(BUT NOT TOO HOT), especially when its a heavy snowfall.  But the minute I have to go outside it becomes horrible, glorified, hard water, that will inevitably turn into dirty slush as it melts.  Also as most of us know due to science, it needs to be cold for there to be snow.  I hate that too, the cold.  The only thing good about winter is it looks pretty and Christmas.  I would say "Damn you Australia," but I also hate really hot weather.  As you can see I am a ray of sunshine.

Today I have another polish sent to me by Nail Polish Canada.  China Glaze Bells Will Be Blinging.  It is also part of their Christmas Collection this year as well as the Dash of Dazzle trio.  Now in theory I shouldn't love this polish.  It's a glitter storm that includes small piece of blue glitter, slightly larger pieces of silver glitter and the pièce de resistance, holographic bar glitter.  Now I'm not usually crazy about glitters, but I liked this.  It reminded me of a snowstorm, when all the snow is falling, and the wind is also blowing it about.  I was ok with the bar glitter because even though it was small they weren't skinny like in those "fuzzy" polishes.  So they never reminded me of hair, or creepy bugs.  Application was easy and even, I only needed one coat over OPI's Dating a Royal.  To me this is a great Christmas/Winter glitter!

Natural outdoor lighting

 Natural indoor lighting

 You can see the holo here

If you would like to polish the Dash of Dazzle Trio you can get it over at Nail Polish Canada for $15.00CND.  Or you can buy the polish on it's own for $6.95CND.  And for a limited time all orders(no matter what the price) will be shipped for free within Canada!

Who else hates snow but likes things that remind them of snow?

*Product Sent for honest review

China Glaze So Blue Without You: The Tea Incident. ALWAYS USE YOUR BRAIN!

So the other day I decided to have a nice, hot cup of tea.  Then I did something stupid.  AS SOON as I made it, without thinking, I took a huge sip.  Liquid that had less than a couple minutes earlier been boiling.  Immediately I spat it out all over myself, the dinner table and a chair and got a glass of cold water.  It was the worst.  And to make matters even better, two days later my tongue just started to seep blood.  It's been about 5 days now and it still feels weird but it doesn't hurt.  Lesson Learnt.  Always use your brain when doing anything.

Anyways you know what scolding drinks remind me of?  Christmas!  Today's polish China Glaze's So Blue Without You was sent to me by Nail Polish Canada.  It came with 2 other polishes in China Glaze's Dash of Dazzle gift set trio, and is also part of their 2013 Christmas collection.  So Blue Without You in an icy blue metallic foil.  It applied in 2 easy coats.  Word of warning.  I swatched this without base coat, and despite only wearing it for a few minutes I could see that it was beginning to stain.  So if that's not a thing you are fine with base coat is for sure something you will want to wear unless you want Smurf fingers.

I also decided to compare So Blue to Orly's Sweet Peacock.   They are close and look like they could be related.  Application was also pretty much the same for the two.  But is you can see Sweet Peacock is a deeper, dare I say peacock blue. 

If you would like to polish the Dash of Dazzle Trio you can get it over at Nail Polish Canada for $15.00CND.  Or you can buy the polish on it's own for $6.95CND.  And for a limited time all orders(no matter what the price) will be shipped for free within Canada!

Tell me you deep dark feeling of metallic blues.
*Product sent for honest review.

Revlon Enthrall AND a comparison post!: Cold feet

A lot of the times I consider my body to be in a state of permafrost.  Well mainly my extremities.  I'm always cold, and for the most part it doesn't bother me.  I can actually do this cool thing in the winter mostly where I'll put my hand against a clothed person and you can slowly feel my cold.  I like to pretend I'm a short Frost Giant :)  The only time is kind of get's annoying is my feet at night.  They take FOREVER to warm up.  I find when your feet are uncomfortable cold(or hot) it just makes your whole body feel gross.

So today I have something requested by Robyn.  Revlon Enthrall.  It is indeed a beautiful colour!  It's a dark olive green base with golden-olive shimmer.  It was a simple two coats.  My brush was a bit uneven, but I paid pretty much nothing for it at a warehouse sale so I'm ok with it.  Just have to take a bit more time.

When I was looking at it it reminded me an awful lot of China Glaze Cast a Spell, so I decided to compare the two(a first for me!)!  In the bottles you can immediately tell that their bases are different with Revlon being lighter.  You can also see that the Revlon is a lot less sparkly.  When you put them on the nail they look a bit more similar then when in the bottle.  The big difference is Revlon as a whole is more olive toned and the shimmer is all the same.  Where as Cast a Spell is a bit less olive and the shimmer varies from green to gold and has much smaller pieces as well as more.  Overall I think I like the China Glaze more.  For me it just has a bit more depth to it.  That being said they are both BEAUTIFUL colors and I wold not kick Enthrall out of the bed(Unless Enthrall was being a douche).  They are pretty much cousins.

Which do you like more?

China Glaze - Cast A Spell: Let's have a serious chat about ghosts, and Christmas.

First of all unlike aliens I can't say if I believe in ghosts or not.  They may be real, they may not be.  I don't know.  I do know one thing though, if ghosts do exist they are creepy.  Not in an "Eep that's a dead person" kind of way, they are creepy in a sketchy kind of way.  When I think of ghosts I think "Oh, so are you watching me do stuff...that's weird".  Think of how many people have died.  I sometimes wonder is my room is filled with non threatening sketch ghosts.  Are they lurking during special cuddles time?  I wonder at times if ghosts are invading my privacy.  This is something that troubles me.

Now the polish is from last years China Glaze Halloween collection.  I actually bough it last year in December.  I found it and I thought it would be perfect for my friend as part of her Christmas gift. Then the minute I brought it home I immediately changed my mind and decided it was mine.   It does not count as taking back a gift if they never got it.

Cast A Spell is a black base full of olive/gold shimmer.  It went on like a dream in almost one coat.  But I did need a second for a bit of patchiness.  It is soooooooooooooooooooooo pretty in real life.  Had the sun come out for a bit longer today I would have had to have taken photos outdoors.

If you can still find this, I suggest you all go out and buy it!  It's such a fantastic shade.  I'm so glad I decided to keep this :)

 Flash *A-AH*

Pumpkin Half Moons! - I hate pumpkins!

Soooooooooooooo I actually did these nails over two weeks ago and started this post maybe 10 days ago.  I ended up pushing the post back and finishing it now.

Let's start with some hard hitting truths.  I actually don't like pumpkin.  I've had one pumpkin soup that I've liked and that was it.   Actually had a pumpkin spice latte the other day.  I was in the mood for a fall drink, which generally means something apple.  But since the place I was at didn't have any apple goodness I decided to try the latte.  Wow.  The only way I can describe the flavour was a cross between horrid kids medicine, and vomit aftertaste.   No, it tasted like I had thrown up horrid kids medicine.  Ill stick to my apple cider next time.

UNLESS I don't have to ingest it.  I think that is why I ended up loving these nails.  They were super easy to do as I didn't have to be exact with them *HUZZAH*.  For my base I used China Glaze Glittering Garland, and for the pumpkins I just used acrylic paint.

Again I was super pleased with these.  What do you think?  Also does anyone have a pumpkin recipe that can convert this pumpkin hater?

With Flash, *A-AH*.

 Without Flash, *A-AH*.

LynBDesigns - Deadly Nightshade: VHS??????

This polish is from LynBDesigns The Nightmare Begins collection (It's inspired by The Nightmare Before Christmas for those of you who have yet to catch on).   If you don't know about her brand most of the polishes are fandom related.  I'm 97% sure she has the largest collection of Doctor Who polishes :)

Now back to this polish.  I'm going to be honest with you guys.  I do love this film, but I haven't seen it in YEARS.  I'm going to blame it on the fact that I own a copy of this film on VHS*.  I have a VHS player but it's annoying.  Woe is me.  But I really want to watch it again in the next few days.

Hail Yeezus and bless the interwebs.

So Deadly Nightshade is what Sally put into Doctor Finkelstein soup in order for him to fall asleep and her to escape(He made her, she a rag doll).  The polish is a purple pink, with super fine green shimmer.  In the bottle it reads more purple than pink but when you put it on your nails you for sure get purple pink.  It was also more sheer than what I expected looking at it in the bottle, but at the same time it surprised me by only needed 3 coats for opacity.  I also layered one coat over a dark purple(China Glaze Urban Nights).  When you layer it over a darker colour the green for sure takes center stage.

If you would like a bottle of this you can head over to LynBDesigns Etsy shop.  Polishes retail from between $8-$10USD.  And if you order now through Sunday, and use the code CHICAGO you can get 50% of your purchase of $16 or more.

Onto the photos!  I actually found the green to be the hardest to capture.  You can see it in the photos but it's a bit more green in real life.  And the last photo is over the purple.  Not only that but I used flash to show you exactly what the shade of green looks like.  Know that the flash makes all those streaks pop out. It does not look streaky in real life.

 

*VHS™

abbreviation for

(Electronics) video home system: a video cassette recording system using ½″ magnetic tape

 *Product sent for honest review

Incoco Temptress and other things that are going on finger nail wise.

So today I have the last set of nail polish appliqués that I was sent to review from Incoco.  I decided that this time I didn't want to do a whole manicure with this.  And for the record I don't think I've ever done this before.  I find it hard to do multiple different nails and have it all be cohesive.   But I think I pulled it off!

Anyways Temptress is a black nail appliqué with random purple lines.  Normally I would find the appliqués that fit my nails best.  But this time since I wasn't doing a full mani I used the 2 largest sizes and cut them down to fit my nails.  Once that was done application was easy.  I finished off with China Glaze Angel Wings on my ring finger and H&M Plum on my pinky and thumb along with some studs from the Born Pretty Store.

Overall I really like Incoco's nail polish appliqués.  They are thin, flexible and you can stretch them without distortion.  I also really like the fact that they are nail polish, they aver very natural looking(as far as polish goes...if that makes sense).  And I love the idea of having a bunch of these and using them for things like vacations or accent nails. 

If you would like to get your hands on some of these head on over to Incoco's website.  They retail for $8.99USD each.

*Product sent for honest review

These were going to be my Valentine's Day nails. Nails the boy will like (Somewhat mature content...don't worry no n0odz)

When it comes down to it I do my nails for me.  If people notice them that's great.  But in the end if they make me feel great that's perfect.

These nails were half for me and half for someone else.  The words on my nails(if you seek amy) are from a Britney Song by the same name.  It's also a double entendre(you see now why the nails aren't just for me?).

I actually wanted to do these around Valentines Day because I'm a class act.  And let be honest no one is really surprised I would do this?  Something fun and a bit cheeky :P

More about the actual nails now.  I started with a white base and the sponged on pink, blue and yellow.  Which when sponged over each other can create orange, purple and green.  Then I topped it off with China Glaze Fairy Dust.  I wrote the lyrics with a roller ball pen.  I know people have tried using sharpies(which I haven) and said they smear but I have yet to have this problem with roller ball pens.

Winner for our giveaway should be announced tomorrow!

I'm going to call this art.

So I have an appointment with those Mac Geniuses tonight and we'll see what going on with my laptop.  Until then I am relegated to taking iPhone photos, uploading them to tumblr, and then uploading them to photo bucket where I attempt to tag them.  Like some neanderthal.  Also the compute I'm using right now is so-so.  I gets the job done but as far as photo quality on this computer I can't actually tell if photos look good or not.

If they decided to keep my laptop hostage I will still try and post.  But unless it is a proper review for something that was sent to us I won't be taking photos with a real camera.

Well yesterday I really wanted to do some nail art but I had no clue what I wanted to do(as usual).  My brain immediately was drawn to these colours(I would name them but all the bottle are in another room and I don't have it in me to get them atm).  In the end I ended up blobbing them together.  My only problem was it bubbled a bit but it's not that noticeable so I'm not going to complain.

Easy nail art.  My favourite!

China Glaze - Running In Circles

If there's one thing I don't like it's the sun.  It's hot and gross unless it's behind a cloud.  But the one thing the sun is useful for is taking photos of shimmery things.  Anyways I'm convinced the sun has it out for me.  It knows I don't like it so as punishment it has recently been popping out randomly and just being more inconvenient then usual.   That being said the sun did manage to give me a few minutes of it's time a few days ago.

Running in circles is from China Glaze's recent Cirque Du Soleil collection.  George convinced me to buy it because it was on sale for $0.99.  Running In Circles is an emerald green, glass fleck polish that kind of has this gold glow from within look.  It went on in 2 easy coats.

I'm glad I bought it.  And there's something satisfying about getting it for such a low price.  I'll show you how a I Jazzed it up tomorrow!

Blue Valentine

I'm hardly the romantic type, so this is probably as mushy as things are gonna get from me.

Here's my V-Day mani - no goofy pink hearts here. I used Bundle Monster plates BM08-09 and this simple decal tutorial from Layniefingers.

Base: China Glaze Stone Cold
Glitters: Kozmic Colours HD Sparkle, Sally Hansen Diamond Strength Tender Teal (thumb only, under crackle)
Crackle: Maybelline Colour Show Shredded Purple Possibilities (thumb only)
Stamping: Sally Hansen Insta-Dry Silver Sweep
Decals: China Glaze Hanging in the Balance
Topped with Warpaint Beauty Mattify
Scrapbook punch from Dollarama, ooh yeah