Not Too Polished : Hatter!

I've got another indie polish to show you ladies today!  Actually, it's another one from Not Too Polished called Hatter!

Hatter is from her Wonderland Collection (which is tooo cute, BTW!) and you can score this pretty polish for $6.00 for a full size bottle or $3.00 for a mini!

Check it out:

Hatter is a dark grey-ish green shimmery polish that appears to be a duo-chrome with purple undertones in the light!  It's packed with different colored glitters: silver, red, pink, blue, and green hexes, silver bar glitters, and gold micro glitter!  It actually reminds me of OPI Not Like the Movies with glitter!  I remember a lot of people went crazy over that when it came out because it was a duochrome and I kind of like this one better.  Honestly, it was the perfect consistency--by the way it applied, you wouldn't even know there was glitter in it because it went on so smooth!  No glitter fishing at all :) It went on opaque in two coats.

Have you guys checked out Not Too Polished yet?  Her May Flowers collection won't be out for much longer!

Whitney

Made by Hand May featuring Not Too Polished May Flowers Collection

Hey pretties!  I decided to go along with some of my other blogger friends and participate in "Made by Hand May" and feature only indie polishes for the whole month! 

So today, I've got TWO polishes to show you from an indie polish maker named Elizabeth from Not Too Polished.  She's got a limited edition collection out for this month ONLY called May Flowers and sent me two to show you guys!

First up: New Grass

New Grass is a pretty spring green with an appropriate name :)  It's a thinner formula, but not runny--very good, actually!  This one applied relatively easily!  This shows three coats, but two would've been okay if you let it dry it between coats.  I'm super impatient and tried to get each coat on one after the other and then....I dragged my hair through it, hah!  I liked this color a lot more than I thought I would.  Normally I'm not into greens but this one didn't stain and it looked okay with my skin tone!  I'd definitely wear this again!  Go to green!

The next one I have to show you is Peach Blossom:

Peach Blossom was a bit thinner than New Grass, but was not unmanageable.  It's a very, very pretty, girly neutral color that is perfect for spring (or any other time of the year!).  I even think that it'd look pretty to use as the "nude" for a french manicure, just to put a peachy spin on it!  It took 3 coats to make it opaque...it certain lighting, I could still see a bit of nail line, but I'm too lazy for 4 coats of polish, so I deal with it :)

Overall, I really liked both of these colors, and they're great for spring!  She's got four other gorgeous colors in this collection, available this month only, for $6.00 each. check them out here!  As a matter of fact, I just ordered 3 more lol.

Have you guys checked Elizabeth's shop out yet?

<3 Whitney

Featuring: Jessica Iridescent Eye + Glitter!

I know, I know.  I've been severely neglecting my blog.  I'm so very sorry!

I got caught up in filling Etsy orders and work has been insane.  BUT I'm back in full force now!

Today I'm going to be showing you all a Chanel Peridot dupe by Jessica called Iridescent Eye!

Jessica is a brand I hadn't heard of until recently and I was surprised to find is quite affordable.  You can pick up Iridescent Eye and many other Jessica polishes at Ninja Polish for $5.00 to $6.00!

Check her out:

As you can see, Iridescent Eye is a pretty green/gold/blue metallic-esque duochrome!  The formula on this polish was pretty descent, albeit just a tad bit streaky.  Streaky as in you can kind of see the brush-strokes, but this is typical of a chrome/metallic polish.  Two coats would be enough to make this polish opaque, but the pictures above show three!

Now I saw swatches of this and Peridot online a lot and I thought I loved it, but the green/gold just doesn't look awesome with my skin tone :-/  SO I decided to slap on some glitter over-top that I hadn't tried, but I didn't know what would go with a duochrome.  Well, why not add some 27 more colors to it? So I added OPI Rainbow Connection:

It's kind of all over the place, even with just one coat of RC, hah! But it grew on me after a while.  I decided I really like Rainbow Connection and am going to try and use it more!  However, I still am not totally in love with the look of Iridescent Eye on my skin tone, so keep a look-out for it on my blog sale page, which I hope to update this weekend.

Hope you all are well!

<3 Whitney

Glitter Gal Lizard Belly!

Holy Moly guys!  I have SO many entries in my giveaway!  Thanks so much for helping my celebrate my blog-oversary, I can't believe I'm still going strong after a year!  Your support has been awesome :)

Anywho, I'll be totaling the entries up for QUITE some time, hopefully by this weekend I can have a winner announced!  I'm adding some extras in with the prizes, so stay tuned! 

I'm sorry, by the way, for not posting for a few days up until the end.  I have been SUPER busy and this weekend we had FIVE guests come stay with us!  It was great!  I've got some good polishes to show you guys in the next few posts, too!

But for today, here is Glitter Gal's Lizard Belly!

Inside lighting

Bam!  I was excited when I found out Ninja Polish carried Glitter Gal, 'cause I've been seeing these awesome holographic polishes on other blogs and I WANTED them!  I got my hands on three: Lizard Belly and 10 to Midnight and Silver Turbulence.  I've only tried this one, because it looked awesome in photos! 

This polish went on great for a holo!  Sometimes they are streaky but this one wasn't really and went on fine in two coats!  Lizard Belly is a dark green/teal/charcoal holo (depending on the way you're looking at it), and it looks awesome outside as well as in the sun.  I wish my pictures had turned out a little better, but my camera just refused to capture the holo! 

Have you guys tried Glitter Gal?  I'm psyched to try their other holos, especially now since it's still sunny when I get home from work and I've got time to take some sweet photos :)

<3 Whitney

Pure Ice Crackle Duo!

Gooood morning my pretties!  I hope you all had a good Easter holiday weekend!  I know I did, I got to go home and see my family, it was great :)

I've got a cool polish duo for you today that I was sent to review!  It's a polish + crackle duo from Pure Ice called Pure Ice Lightning Crackle Duo!

First up is the base polish, a lovely, but unnamed, green duochrome/metallic! 

I was really surprised with the formula of Pure Ice, which I hadn't tried before.  Sometimes the cheaper drug store brand polishes have crap formulas, but this one was actually good!  It went on opaque in two coats (but I used three for pictures), and was actually very pretty.   I love the dark green and it's got an ever-so-slight duochrome to it and sometimes looks quite teal.  Overall, very pretty!

On top I layered the lightning crackle:

This polish cracked quite easily, but I wish that it cracked...larger cracks so you could see the green a little more!  I think the silver kind of overpowers the pretty green! Maybe thinner coats could correct this problem, though, it'd been a while since I used a crackle polish!

However, I really do like the look of silver crackle.  I never received the OPI Silver Shatter that I won in someone's giveaway (bummer!), so I was kind of psyched to try this.  I think it'd look great over other colors as well!

Have you guys tried any of the Pure Ice polish duos?  I haven't seen them in stores, but then again, I haven't been in Walmart for a while--and to my knowledge, that's the only place they sell Pure Ice!  Correct me if I'm wrong, though, ladies :)

Hope you enjoyed!

<3 Whitney

Zoya Ivankaaaa!

Top of the morning to you!  :) Happy St. Patrick's Day lovelies!  I've got a GREAT green to show you today!

A few days ago I told you guys I picked up Zoya Ivanka when I got Charla, and even though Charla wins in my book hands down, Ivanka is still a very pretty color that I'm glad I purchased!

It's another one of those polishes I was a little late on picking up, so if you're like me, I'd add this to your wishlist next time Zoya has a sale :)

Artificial Light

Initially by the picture, I thought this polish was going to be similar to Zoya Apple (hehee that links to the 31 day challenge I realize I never finished...), but it's much more vibrant than Apple when I compare them.  Not to mention that Ivanka has the obvious green/teal/gold duochrome that Apple just doesn't have.  The only thing similar is their shimmer!  Ivanka is very much a "jeweled" shade of green that has a certain vibrancy to it that really appeals to me.  The formula is a little less opaque than Charla, which only needs 2 coats, and needs at least 2 coats for full coverage, but I preferred 3, at least on most nails. 

Do you guys own Charla and Ivanka?  Or any others from the Sparkle Collection?  I have Gilda, the pink one from that collection, that I got off a blogsale a while back, but still have never tried!  Whoops!  Maybe with the success of Charla and Ivanka I'll put it closer to the top of my list of polishes to try :)

<3 Whitney

31 Day Challenge, Day 4! Zoya Apple!

Don't think I've forgotten about this challenge, ladies!  I'm still here.  It's hard for me to update during the week with my crazy job, but I HAVE been painting my nails!  I've got a few days worth of posts done today, so horray!

I am really liking this challenge though, because along with the 31-day challenge, I am also doing my own "never tried" challenge and using polishes I've never used before to complete it!

Along with my never tried challenge, I've finally tried the last of the Zoya Sunshine Collection: Apple!  I am not too keen on green nails, but I'm glad I tried this because I liked it a lot!

I initially tried to have an accent nail of a CG Happy Go Lucky with Kermit the Frog painted on it, but after trying to paint him FOUR times (twice on each hand), I gave up.  I ended up with mixing my own lighter green polish (That I had hopefully named Kermit) and using that as a base with some flower stickers I had:

Happy Go Lucky accent nail...sans Kermit :(

Accent nail of my own mixed polish (Kermit) with some stick on flowers!

I ended up liking this mani okay and wore it for a few days.  The people at work were confused by my accent nail, but I don't care!  And sorry for my picture quality...I did this at night time and ended up having to take indoor pictures--lame salsa!

Anywho--this is 3 coats of Apple and three coats of HGL/Kermit.  I tend to do three coats of everything regardless if it's necessary, haha.  I love the Sunshine Collection, they're great!  Zoya polishes only tend to work well (and by that I mean last more than a day) with certain base coats and now that I've found some, I like them a lot.  I'm glad I bought the whole collection!

Wellllllll I hope you guys are enjoying my challenge posts--I'm enjoying doing them!  I've got a surprise for you all later in the week, so stay tuned!

<3 Whitney

I'm finally trying OPI Pirate's Collection.... :)

Sooo a while back in June I won a giveaway from a video blogger...I was supposed to win a silver shatter and the Pirates of the Caribbean mini collection.  SO I avoided buying silver shatter even though I desperately wanted it and only swapped for Mermaid's Tears since it didn't come in the mini collection. 

Howeverrrr after 3 weeks (late June) and no prize in the mail, I e-mailed her making sure she had my address correct (and also 'cause my neighbors at the time were kind of shady...), she said she'd just sent it out the day before.  Welllll on the first of August I moved and still hadn't received my package.  Bummer!

I don't want to sound too snobby about it because I don't know if I was jipped and she never sent it or whether it just got lost in the mail...AND it would've been a PRIZE that I didn't buy, but I'm still kind of bummed 'cause now I can't find silver shatter and I still want it. 

Anywho, I was avoiding trying Mermaid's Tears because I wanted to use it with Silver Shatter, but I picked it randomly on my list of untrieds, soooo here it is!

Indoor lighting

The first three pictures are (obviously) taken outdoors, but it was getting kind of dark so the color looks a bit more teal.  I took one inside to show you guys the dusty green hue it looks like inside.

I used three coats of this polish and it went on nice and smooth.  The formula was nice and great like a normal OPI polish, but I didn't like the color too much with my skin tone.  It grew on my after about a day, but I don't think it's one I'll just randomly use again unless I'm trying to match something I'm wearing, haha.

Overall, I'd still love to try a few others from this collection I never bought such as Planks A Lot and Sparrow Me the Drama, but I'm not going to rush out for them now, hah.  I was a little under enthused about the whole collection...I thought it'd be a bit more...piratey.  But oh well!  A few good colors came out of it and silver shatter :)

You guys done hearing about this collection yet?  Sorry I'm behind the times :)


<3 Whitney

Another Holo! CG He's Going in Circles + Giveaway Update!

Wowsers!! 200 Followers!! Yahoo! I'm so excited :) Thank you all!

I know that I said I'd add more prizes to my 100-follower giveaway if I reached 200 followers before it ends tomorrow, BUT I think what I'd like to do instead is just have another giveaway after this one so more than one person can win something!  I'm still in the process of putting prizes together so be sure to enter my 100 Follower Giveaway if you haven't since it ends tomorrow (6/25) at midnight EST, and then either Sunday or early next week I'll give you all details for my 200 Follower Giveaway!  Yay!

Alllll righty then, let's get on to some pictures!  I swapped the lovely Lori from the Polish-aholics Anonymous Facebook group and one of the polishes I ended up with was He's Going in Circles from the China Glaze Kaleidoscope collection!  I *love* holographic polishes and unfortunately my polish obsession started after most of those collections were released, so I've only managed to swap for a few of them!

He's Going in Circles is a sea-foam green holo polish and I apologize in advance for the mass amount of pictures.  Holos are hard to photograph!

Blurred slightly for holo effect

More blur

My camera can't even handle this shiz

I really like it!  It looked nice with my green/teal and yellow outfit I wore yesterday but not so much with what I've got on today.  But that's okay because I wrote down all the polishes I have that I haven't worn yet and it's an absurd amount...so I'll probably take it off here today and re do them later!

This is three coats of HGIC but I still have a bit of a bare spot on one of my RH nails (which may have been due to my lack of patience and applying additional coats before the first one dried).  Since it's so glittery and shiny, it's kind of hard to notice, though!  It goes on pretty smooth and dries quickly, so I really enjoyed using it.  I wrapped the tips and applied Seche Vite top coat (which I also wrapped) and it's seemed to stay on with no chipping for almost two days now! 

Anywho, I hope you all are having a great week!  I'll be closing the giveaway up tomorrow night and by Sunday I'll be announcing a winner!

<3 Whitney